Firetale

by Dante Graves

  Chapter 8: The Magician & the Star

  “She won`t let on what that will be.”

  Temple of the Dog, “All Night Thing”

  After the murder of Mr. Berry, Greg felt lousy. He felt as if he had squashed a cockroach, and its chitinous carapace had stuck to his thumb, and he couldn’t shake it off. He was in Berry’s clothes, and it felt like dirt covered him from head to toe, enveloped him, compressed him like a clutch, making movements awkward. Typically after a murder, Greg felt relieved, released from a burden, like he had done a good job. But this time the darkness within him had not dissipated; it circled in his chest near his heart, stabbed him with its sharp, crooked teeth, and laughed. Greg knew the only escape from this feeling was Martha. She could damp down the darkness, could help him. He craved only one thing—to get back to the circus and hug her. Next to her he would feel better.

  When Greg got to the circus lot it was still early morning, but Blanche and Black had already started dismantling the main tent.

  Using a block-and-tackle, the ogres lowered the bale ring, a metal ring of large diameter that was attached to the fabric of the tent. Once on the ground, the fabric was disconnected from the ring by several melonheads, and then rolled and packed in oiled bags. Greg was always amazed at how much strength and agility these little people with huge heads possessed. Their heads were so heavy that when they walked, they had to swing from side to side. They worked in the arena as dwarfs or clowns or entertained the audience in front of the circus as curious freaks, and after performances their assistance in dismantling the tents was indispensable.

  Once the melonheads were finished, the ogres embarked on the most difficult part of the work, taking out the pillars. Huge wooden columns were embedded a few feet into the ground for greater stability, and secured at the base with grommets. In a normal circus, it would have taken three or four people to pull a pole out of the ground, but Black and Blanche handled each column by themselves. The ogres went to each pole, hugged it, and yanked it out of the ground. The two brothers could dismantle the main tent in less than an hour, rather than the three hours it took other circuses.

  Lazarus was watching their work and talking about something with the archivist Pietro, possibly in what town the circus would make its next show. Greg tried to pass unnoticed, but Lazarus saw him, gestured for him to wait, and approached him. Greg knew what Bernardius wanted to talk about. Certainly the manager had noticed the magician’s absence the night before.

  “Good morning, Greg. Your help here would be very useful.” Bernardius gestured toward the tent, which the two brothers were dismantling.

  “Okay, Mr. Bernardius. Just let me to fix myself up,” Greg said. He liked the old man, but today the magician was angry and upset, and he turned and headed toward his trailer.

  “Greg, I have not finished,” Lazarus called after him. “You look strange.”

  “I didn’t sleep all night.”

  “I think these clothes aren’t yours, Greg.” Bernardius’s voice was tense and upset.

  “Mr. Bernardius, let me get changed and help the guys. The longer we talk …”

  “Greg,” Lazarus said, interrupting the magician. Bernardius stared into Greg’s eyes from the top downward. At such moments, the old man seemed to the magician a truly otherworldly creature, ancient, observing life from a height where he could see everything, including small human joys and big fat sins.

  “Greg, when I was young and lived in my father’s house, black workers told their children bedtime stories. Sometimes I tried to eavesdrop unnoticed as they told these tales.” Lazarus’s voice had softened, and Greg thought he saw a smile under the rugged ringmaster’s long beard.

  “I really liked the fairy tale about Tro the Antelope and Kozo the Tree. Once they were inseparable friends. And this is how they had become friends. Tro often had to flee from her pursuers, hunters who preyed on animals. She was very noticeable because of her height and long horns. Once, the antelope stopped to rest under a tree and began to tell the tree—Kozo—about her troubles.

  “ ‘Sister,” said Kozo. ‘I know how to save you. Once you feel in danger, hide quickly under my branches. They are wide and long, and hang down to the ground, and will securely hide you.’ Tro thanked the tree warmly. Afterwards, she often escaped from her enemies under the protection of her friend. Under his branches she felt completely safe, since neither man nor beast could see her here. One morning, the antelope suddenly began to eat Kozo’s leaves. ‘What are you doing, miserable creature?’ asked Kozo. ‘I gave you refuge, and this is how you repay me!’ ”

  “Tro said nothing in reply and continued to eat the green branches. And so it was every day. She ate every day and ate off all the branches she could reach. Tro understood that with only the smaller leaves on Kozo’s branches, her shelter was becoming less secure. But the antelope liked the leaves so much that she could not help herself. A few days passed, and a hunter came by and immediately noticed the antelope. She slept soundly under the tree, but the leaves no longer covered her. The hunter took aim and killed the antelope. So Tro paid with her life for her ingratitude and carelessness.”

  “I got the story, Mr. Bernardius,” said Greg.

  “Greg, the circus was created to protect those like you, me, and Martha. Those you see every day. For things to remain exactly as they are, there are rules, my friend. Rules that you tend to break. Greg, I know about your absence. For now, everything goes smoothly, but if you continue, you will jeopardize all of us.”

  “I won’t, Mr. Bernardius. No problems because of me. I swear.” In Lazarus’s eyes anxiety was replaced with hope. “You know me, I can solve all the problems,” added Greg before trudging off. Lazarus took a deep breath and didn’t try to catch the magician. The tentmaster looked longingly after Greg and then returned to work.

  Greg’s trailer was a few dozen feet away, but he was so tired and devastated that he felt as if the walk took him an hour. When he went inside, Martha was cooking something. He looked at her, and his heart trembled. She wore a light floral midi-dress. His first gift to her. When she joined the circus, her entire wardrobe consisted of things given to her by the dancers she worked with. The girls showed compassion for the cute stranger with amnesia and collected some clothes for her. Greg did not like these ultra-short skirts with sequins, which looked as if they were for adolescents rather than adults, nor did he like the gaudy-colored cardigans. After Lazarus and Greg took in Martha, the magician bought a dress for her in the next town they visited, but for a long time he dared not dare give it to her, for fear of being misunderstood.

  Martha saw Greg, and her carefree manner vanished. “You got lost again last night. What clothes are you wearing? Are you okay?”

  “Don’t worry, I’m fine. You know, my fire will not let me down.” Greg was trying to be lighthearted, but Martha was not amused.

  “I know you’re reckless, Greg.” She tried to maintain a strict look, but couldn’t.

  “You know, I’m very tired,” said Greg and he sat down on a sofa. Martha sat down next to him and hugged him. Greg felt the darkness dissipating in his chest, as the fatigue of a sleepless night retreated. His thoughts became clear and devoid of anguish and pain. A moment later, he fell asleep.

  Martha lived on the outskirts of a town populated with losers who barely made ends meet. The place was quiet but dirty, and, once there, Lazarus and Greg immediately knew in which shack they needed to look for the girl. Her house was cleaner than the others. The other houses’ lawns looked trampled, while hers was green and neat with some flowers randomly growing on it. To Greg the entire area looked like a black-and-white photograph in the center of which, where Martha lived, an artist had drawn a bright, colorful house.

  Martha lived with a neighbor, a woman, also a dancer from the bar, who sheltered her when no one else would let a stranger without ID on their doorstep. The neighbor was delighted with Martha, and excitedly told the two men about how her life had changed since her fri
endship with her. She had quit using drugs, stopped dating with wrong guys, and began to save some money, which she hoped would allow her to move to another city, the farther away the better, where she would not have to make a living dancing half-naked around a pole.

  To Greg’s surprise, Martha confided in Lazarus at once. And when the circus manager offered her a job, she accepted without hesitation. The moment she said yes, Greg’s heart almost broke in his chest, but he did not dare show his emotions. Martha’s neighbor begged Lazarus to take her as well, if not as an employee, then at least as far as their next destination, but Lazarus gently refused her. Greg knew why. The circus was not a place for ordinary people. He wondered if Martha had ever suspected that she was a demionis.

  In the circus, the girl immediately became a universal favorite. Demionis felt no great love for each other, but Martha was accepted as if everybody had been waiting a long time for her to show up. After she joined the circus, everything mysteriously improved. Even the old wyvern stopped spitting fire when he was in a bad mood, and Blanche and Black had fewer quarrels with melonheads. The only one who shunned the girl was Greg. He did not realize it until the day she first spoke to him.

  Lazarus had sent the regular advance team—Zinnober, Greg, and Martha—to some town, where they had to perform the usual tasks: tell the locals about the circus, paste up posters, hand out flyers. Greg attracted attention by performing free tricks on the street, which invariably drew many kids. No one could refuse to take a flyer from Zinnober, seeing him as the perfect man. Martha’s flyers were snapped up immediately, as soon as someone drew close to her. Usually, the three separated to reach more people, and did not meet while in a town. When the business was done, they met at the car and returned to the circus. But this time, while showing tricks to some students on their way home after school, Greg noticed Martha. While he was wondering how they came to be in the same part of town, the girl approached him.

  “Hey, Greg!” said Martha.

  “Hi.”

  “I noticed that you’ve been kind of avoiding me.”

  “Me? Why? You’re trying to fly away from me, like a butterfly from the flames,” Greg said, blowing a fiery cobweb out of his wrist Spider-Man style. The trick fascinated the children.

  “Well, I’m not. I’m no more afraid of your fire than these children are. But you’re afraid of me.”

  Greg realized she was right. He was afraid that he was too bad, too evil for her. It seemed that even Blanche and Black, whose eerie past he had learned about from the archivist, had more right to associate with her than he did. Greg tried to convince himself that these thoughts were pure nonsense, because he had never been ashamed of what he was doing. But the fear of being too wicked rose again, and he felt like a helpless pimpled boy too frightened to approach the queen of the ball.

  Martha looked into his eyes for the first time since they met, and smiled. “Don’t be afraid of me, Greg.” Her smile defeated his fear. He realized that his interest in her was mutual. And since then they had been together.

  Returning to the city, they had fun joking about this and that, and only Zinnober silently watched the dull landscape outside the Galaxie Skyliner.

  Martha soon tired of just being part of the advance team. She was fascinated by the circus and begged Lazarus to give her the opportunity to perform. She considered flexibility to be her forte and decided to become an aerialist. So Martha became the first artist of the “Lazarus Bernardius’ Circus” who did not use the abilities or the appearance of a demionis for performances. Her trapeze acts under the dome, alone and without a safety wire, always thrilled crowds, and people watched the show with excitement and bated breath. Martha had always been confident in her skills, but Greg convinced her to improve her act. Ever since the magician had discovered his ability to manipulate fire, he ceased to be afraid of anything. But meeting Martha, he felt fear again—the fear of losing her. It was a new feeling for him. He was not used to being afraid for someone. Greg used fire to protect people, but never because of any affection for them.

  The trick was called “Escape from the Fire Serpent.” Martha was a princess kidnapped by a dragon. The fire monster picked up the girl from the center of the arena and took her to the very dome of the circus, where it left her on a tiny platform on which it was only possible to stand or sit. A few meters from the platform began a maze of trapezes and ropes strung at different heights above the arena. Martha covered the distance between the platform and the first trapeze, swung on it, and jumped to the rope. And then, as if she were a character who had jumped from a computer game, she mastered all the obstacles and made it to the tapes of the dense fabric, which she unwound as she descended to the ground. During the “escape,” the fiery serpent, sent flying by Greg, circled around the girl. The monster rose from the arena and then tried to snatch the girl from the trapezes, then it circled around in impotent rage, making figure eights.

  In fact, Greg had invented the “Fire Serpent” to protect Martha. Like the trick with the dove, the snake made of flames was harmless to humans, and if Martha fell from a trapeze, the fire monster would have easily caught her in the air and delivered her to the ground unharmed. Greg knew that Martha suspected his real intentions, although she never said so, and he was grateful for it.

  Soon it became apparent to everyone in the circus that Greg and Martha were together. Both were happy, but Greg sometimes was tortured by doubts. Murders. He could not abandon them, though the desire to kill was not so strong when Martha was around. He felt that Martha not only gave him relief but also tied him to the circus. He had never thought of the circus as his home, only as a convenient refuge from which, if necessary, he could easily escape. But Martha’s appearance changed everything. They were attracted to each other like darkness and light. He had always considered the statement “opposites attract” absolute nonsense, but with Martha, he felt complete. Now escape from the circus meant tearing himself in half. And he did not dare take Martha with him. She loved the circus, and everybody in the circus loved her. Greg did not want to take from Martha everything she loved, dooming her to a life with a killer, wandering aimlessly.

  Martha was sympathetic to Greg’s disappearances. He was amazed at her complete trust in him, but for her it was natural.

  “I do not know what you’re doing when you leave. But when you come back, you’re full of darkness. I know that you can’t live without it, and I’ll protect you from the darkness, which brings only pain, but one day I’ll find a way to save you,” she told him once.

  When Greg woke up, Martha was lying next to him, nestled against his shoulder, embracing him. Her breath was warm and serene. He tried to get up without waking her. Greg was surprised at how awkward he was as he tried not to disturb her sleep. He had slipped from Martha’s embrace and put his feet on the floor when the girl’s warm hand went up his back and ruffled his hair.

  “You’re not sleeping?” he said.

  “Of course not.” Martha turned on the bed, and her summer dress rode up, revealing her thighs. Greg did not deny himself the pleasure looking at them.

  “Well, if you’re awake …” he drawled with a smile.

  “I’m thinking the same,” she said, pulling him to her and kissing him.

  Lost At Sea

  Record made on 12/16/1923

  Archivist: Luca

  Today was truly a strange evening. Our circus stopped in a quiet California town, as small as the hairs on a gnat's bollock. The people who came to the show were the usual denizens of such places—penniless, dimwitted, and unpretentious. Only one man stood out in the crowd. He was dressed in a suit that would have cost a local family a month’s earnings, and he avoided the other spectators, who looked at him with a mixture of envy and contempt. The man's face seemed strangely familiar, but I thought little of it, figuring that he just looked a bit like a much older Rudolph Valentino.

  The performance went well. As usual, I watched it from behind the scenes, serving my archivist
duty, which tells me to enter on paper everything that deviates from the plan of the performance. As almost always, everything went off without a hitch. I was about to return to my records, when I heard voices from the arena. I moved from backstage and saw Mr. Bernardius talking to that Valentino gentleman.

  The stranger waved his arms so desperately that he knocked off his own bowler hat. I could not make out the words, but his tone changed from pleading to threatening. Our tentmaster’s voice was sympathetic, but not warm. Unable to end the conversation, he had to call one of the ogres. To my surprise, the man was not afraid of the giant and even seemed delighted. He started to explain something to Bernardius with fervency. But Lazarus was adamant. I, however, was interested in the stranger’s reaction to the ogre, so I ventured out from behind the scenes.

  I asked Bernardius what was happening, and he reluctantly told me that the man, whom the ogre had practically dragged out, had claimed to be linked to a demionis named Hevfra, who once had worked with us. I remembered her, a wonderful creature. Hevfra's face popped into my mind, along with the face of the man she had chosen over the circus many years ago. The memory stunned me. I immediately understood why the unusual visitor seemed familiar to me. It was the young man with whom Hevfra had left the circus. Rather, he was a young man more than twenty years ago. I asked Bernardius why he had kicked out the man. I had no doubt that, like me, our ringmaster could not forget the history of Hevfra and her lover. Mr. Bernardius just looked at me sadly and said what he always tells us: our circus is not a place for mortals. Of course, he was right, and I had often found sad evidence of the ringmaster’s wisdom in the circus archives.

  But I’m an archivist, and I couldn’t miss a chance to learn what happened to our former demionis after she left the circus. I came out of the big tent. The ogre was not around, and Hevfra’s former lover was walking slowly away from the circus. I caught up with him and offered to let him tell his story in my tent. He did not recognize me, but he was as eager to accept my invitation as a madman would be at the prospect of release from an asylum.

  In the tent, he hesitated for a long while. His breath came out in pants, and tears welled in his eyes. I offered him a drink. He accepted. His hands shook as he took the glass. It was brighter in my tent than on the street, and I could see his face. His trembling hands, it seemed, were not the result of a sudden disturbance. Red veins on his nose and swollen eyelids revealed him as a longtime lover of drink. Finally, having quieted his alcoholic shiver, he was able to speak clearly.

  I will tell his story in my own words, without distorting basic facts or adding anything of my own. In the hope of saving my successor from a long search in the archival books, first I'll talk about Hevfra.

  Hevfra was a mermaid. You must understand that neither she nor any other mermaid was anything like that hideous jackstraw exhibited in New York in 1842 by Dr. Griffin. Hevfra was beautiful. She was like a mermaid from a canvas of Howard Pyle—long dark hair, white skin and body, elegance that would have been the envy of every woman. When we found her, she had strayed from her flock. Mermaids are nomadic creatures, and her chances of finding her sisters were poor. All the flocks are extremely reluctant to accept outsiders, so she seemed doomed to remain alone. But a solitary mermaid has no chance to survive at sea, so we took Hevfra into our circus.

  Despite its ridiculousness, Mr. Griffin’s scam had served us well. One result was that nobody believed in the reality of mermaids, so anyone looking at our Hevfra assumed she was just a lovely young woman whose legs were hidden by fake scales. Her beauty attracted viewers, especially, of course, men. Often they received a slap from their wives or girlfriends when they spent too much time in front of Hevfra’s aquarium trying to see how her lower part was connected to the upper. For most she was just an exotic beauty in a bright suit. Until David. Once David saw Hevfra, he began wandering through the boondocks after our circus, just so he could gaze upon her again.

  Oh, no, David was not a prince from a fairy tale. At the time, his trade was not clear to me or Mr. Bernardius. But David always was in pocket, and in each new town, he appeared with a gift for Hevfra. Mr. Bernardius became indignant at the young man’s behavior, but the mermaid liked him. David was very good-looking. While husbands stared at Hevfra, their wives gazed hard at David. He was clearly the favorite of women, but he never took his eyes off the mermaid. A handsome young man, showering you with gifts! What woman could have resisted? One day, the show barely finished, the mermaid asked Mr. Bernardius to let David in. After much wrangling and disputation, the ringmaster conceded. To my surprise, the young man wasn’t terrified of a close acquaintance with the girl, and after a night together, David's interest in the mermaid only grew. He continued to come to the circus, like a dog to its owner, for almost three months. Eventually, Hevfra told us she wanted to live with David and leave the circus. Of course, Bernardius was against it, but Hevfra asked and asked, and whenever the ogres didn’t let David enter the circus, she was not herself. Eventually, Mr. Bernardius conceded again, showing, in my opinion, too much softness. But he always believed that sane demionis have the right, like humans, to control their lives, and their participation in the circus must be voluntary, as long as they were not harmful to people. Hevfra was sane and harmless and therefore free to choose her own future.

  On the day of her departure, when Blanche and Black loaded Hevfra’s aquarium into a truck hired by David, Mr. Bernardius explained to the lad in detail how mermaids are different from humans and told him how to take care of Hevfra. He showed him the technical features of the aquarium, which was eight feet by thirteen feet by seven feet high. David wrote down everything in a special notebook, looking like a diligent student struggling to catch every word from the teacher. And then they left, and for twenty-one years nobody in the circus heard any news of Hevfra or her lover.

  Until today. David has appeared at the show, aged and sad, to tell his part of the story.

  David was a player. Not the classiest, but better than most. He won more than he lost. But, unlike other gamblers, David was not going to play to the end of his days. He had ambition, and he had a plan. Cards were a way for him to raise money to invest in a business. Initially, Hevfra and David’s life was like a fairy tale. They lived in a small house on the beach and enjoyed life as only the young can. Thus it went, until one day David lost. He lost big. He had money, but making good on the big loss would mean saying goodbye to their dream of having their own business. The young man decided it would be cheaper to escape from the town. Escape was not cheap. Transporting the huge aquarium in secret and paying truckers and others for their silence drained David’s purse. To compensate, he played twice as much and sometimes did not come home for days. Left alone, the mermaid spent her days in anguish, dreaming that one day everything would be fine and David would spend more time with her than at the card table. During the times her beloved stayed home, she reached out to him, but deep down, David blamed her for his financial problems and began to think of her as a burden.

  David’s run from his creditors lasted almost three years. During this time, he saved enough money to repay his debts and invest in a business. He started a fishing business not far from the town where he first had come to our circus, and his life became routine and secure. David bought a big house with a pool, and Hevfra, for the first time in many years, had the opportunity to swim not only in the aquarium but also outdoors. The mermaid was as happy as a child and believed such a gift was a sign that their relationship would bloom with renewed vigor. But it was not to be. David was no longer a drifter with questionable pursuits. He was a respected gentleman with a good income, still young and attractive. Of course, no one knew that David lived with a mermaid. Local beauties in search of a successful man considered him an eligible bachelor. David again began spending a lot of time away from home, not at the card table but in the beds of young mistresses.

  Poor Hevfra knew nothing about David’s affairs. She never reproached her loved one, though she
sensed that his love for her was waning. As more years passed, David became more distant from the mermaid, sometimes showing his irritation when she asked where he had been. He scolded her, saying that only a wife dares to ask a man such questions. Finally came the hour when Hevfra asked him to let her go. Sometimes David imagined their farewell, thinking he would feel relief, but he felt only guilt and shame. The mermaid convinced him that parting would be better for both of them, and the next night David went to the pier owned by his company, took a seiner, sailed away to sea, and released Hevfra from the aquarium. The mermaid smiled at him from the quiet waves, on which the moonlight played, and disappeared under the water. That was fourteen years ago.

  David got over his guilt and chose a wife from the host of mistresses. She gave him two children, a boy and a girl, and they lived the life of the provincial wealthy. His existence was only occasionally marred by dreams. In them, he sailed across the sea in a tiny boat, surrounded by darkness, warm and inviting. It seemed he could touch it, and then it would embrace him. From the darkness, he heard the voice of Hevfra. When David dreamed such dreams, he did not want to wake up.

  In the eleventh year of David’s marriage, he dreamed again about the sea and the darkness. Only this time the darkness was bitterly cold, and David tried to wake up but could not. The next day, a messenger from the pier came to his door with news of something strange and frightening, and David realized what had happened.

  Examining the daily catch on the wharf, fishermen had found the body of a woman with a scaly tail instead of legs lying under hundreds of pounds of fish. This strange creature had become entangled in a net and, once on firm ground, she suffocated under the weight of the fish. When David arrived, he immediately recognized Hevfra. Only the presence of other people kept David from bursting into tears at the sight of the mermaid. She had not changed, and not even death could mar her beauty. David paid the fishermen for their silence and threatened to strangle anyone who revealed the discovery. He wrapped Hevfra’s body with burlap, tied a metal box full of old machinery parts to her tail, right above the fin, and loaded it onto a boat. Then, for the second time, he went to sea to release the mermaid, this time forever.

  That day changed David. Estranged from his wife and children, he stopped going to the marina and tried to avoid the sea. Worst of all, David was drinking and seemed desperately suicidal.

  "I'm sorry," he told me in my tent. "Why was she at my marina? She was looking for me. She was looking for me." I did not dissuade the poor fellow. I know that mermaids are too well versed in water to accidentally sail to the wrong place. David had learned about our circus performance from his son, who had seen the poster. Turns out this man has been looking for us all these years. Knowing that anywhere else he would be called a fool or a drunkard, he wanted to come to us and pour out his heart. I felt sorry for the man. I can’t blame him, because I know more than he does about people, and about demionis. I hate alcoholics, degraded creatures that allow one painful idea to poison their minds, but I decided to help David. Important note: I did it not because I had lost fortitude with age but because I did not want David’s drunken chatter to bring strangers to the circus.

  Fortunately his mind was in such a state that deep hypnosis could create a miracle. When David left our circus and returned home, he remembered no more about Hevfra, did not remember what had happened in our circus, and did not remember his craving for alcohol. If he’s lucky, he will even forget the dreams of the sea and the cold, inviting darkness.