Taco Del and the Fabled Tree of Destiny

by Bohnhoff, Maya Kaathryn

  I take Doug to the railing to show him the damage. He quivers and I apologize. I forget how nervous fire makes him.

  He’s restless tonight and his boughs wave fitfully in the barest breeze. He leans west toward the Presidio. Of course, this is ‘cause the wind blows that way. My thoughts lean that way, too, ‘cause I worry about Firescape. This is stupid, of course, ‘cause Firescape is good at taking care of herself. Better than I am, I'm pretty sure.

  I put my face to Doug’s needles to smell what is now Firescape’s scent, but the fragrance is carried away from me.

  I close my eyes and beg to understand the runes I cast the night before. Nothing comes to me...except I can still see that dumb bird beak. After that, all I get is a rehash of stuff — the mural under the overhang, the one on the sidewalk. Same artist, I think — some Noe Valley smeagol with artistic flair. I see the sad, homeless clown that Scrawl hates and a firestarter in a red happy-coat.

  Cheap fireworks from the Gee Gah and ethanol. And nobody sees nothing. Gotta have connections to get ethanol, or you gotta rob a stash. Or you gotta have a secret stash of your own.

  There haven't been any stash robberies since God knows. The ethanol might’ve come from Potrero-Taraval, which also doesn’t make sense ‘cause our smeagols been telling us there’s no running machinery in Potrero — no cars, no buses, no lawn mowers, nada. And if you don’t have machinery what the hell do you need with ethanol?

  Of course, maybe they just use it to blow things up. Which still leaves me with where the flammables came from. I just can’t picture somebody sneaking all the way from the Borderlands with a big old can of ethanol. Of course, the wall-crawlers and mural painters came in by boat. Two boats, Firescape said, one of which they left behind. Maybe they left behind more than a boat.

  A thought comes to me which I throw away, not liking the smell. What if this too-close-to-home stuff isn’t Potreran do? What if somebody here is helping out? Somebody who could cadge fireworks from the Gee Gah and ethanol from a stash without getting the hairy eyeball.

  I think for a split second about the old Chinese guy that I was convinced for five seconds once upon a time had tried to assassinate my liege lord. The whole idea seems pretty silly to me now. I mean, why would some old Chinese guy want to do in Hismajesty? Unless, of course, he was in the employ of Lord E Lordy.

  Okay, that’s a maybe.

  Another thought comes — a question. Why now? Hermajesty is at the Summer Palace by now, shivering in front of a giant fireplace, moping ‘cause the beds are so hard. First I think maybe the firestarter doesn’t know this. Then I think maybe the fire doesn’t have anything to do with Hermajesty.

  Then I think maybe somebody just doesn’t like clowns.

  oOo

  In the morning nothing is clearer. I’d stop thinking about it except that Doug is so upset. His little boughs quiver like a cat’s whiskers. I move him to where the wreckage of the clown’s digs are not visible, but he is still twigged.

  The air smells like soggy ashes. I ask if this is the problem. I inhale his perfume and close my eyes, but all I know is that I don’t see the Royal Party or Firescape. All I see is the burning boatshed.

  Satisfied that Doug is merely feeling the effects of a wood-burner so close at hand, I go about my day’s business, packing a little here and there. Like Her M, I don’t really want to leave the Palace. But it’s damn lonely here, with the place so empty. The fire’s brought more knighties down to patrol the Wharf. Some of them are from the Knob and the Richmond and other areas, wearing a rainbow of colors. But most are Red Knighties and this makes me miss Firescape.

  I’d even speak to Scrawl this morning, but she’s mad at me ‘cause of the clown and shakes her bony finger at me and gives me the Look-O-Doom.

  “Bad times for you, Taco Face,” she says, “Bad times.”

  I tell myself I’m not worried, but I cast runes anyway. First, I make certain the rotten old peach pit and tacks are where I left them on the shelf next to my can. They are. I study the rune-fall, looking for patterns. The damn bird beak is still there, so’s the piece of driftwood. Being lighter than the other stuff, they fall one way, the glass and metal and pebbles bounce away into a raggedy line along the edge of the table, like a sort of phalanx. I notice I missed a few tacks. They’re strewn amongst the pebbles and stuff; I don’t feel like picking them out, so I leave them there.

  A little piece of paper lies between the beak and the wood. I pick it up and see that it’s the torn corner of the page from a book. There are page numbers on both sides: five and six. That makes eleven...or fifty-six, depending. Eleven or fifty-six what? Or is that even important?

  Books. The torn corner is from a book. I decide this means I must consult the Wiz. But not now. It’s dark, late, and my head hurts. I sleep.

  Sometime in the night, there is a big brouhaha. Pounding in the halls, noise in the streets. Eyes open, I see light dancing and weaving across the ceiling and walls of my room. I check all my windows and realize there is another fire somewhere on the Wharf. I dress and go out. In the street, knighties galore are headed for the piers and I hear the Firebrigade’s air horns.

  The fire’s a monster — down near the Old Ferry Building, maybe it is the Old Ferry Building. That would be terrible; there are a lot of fisher families in that old place.

  When I reach the Wharf road, I see it’s not the Ferry Building burning, but the two derelict hulks beached next door. Fireknighties are already pumping water onto them out of the Bay. While I watch, another troop comes along and starts spraying the Ferry Building. All I can do is stand there and mutter incantations to Tam Kung, who specializes in extinguishing fires, praying for a cold, thick fog — a helado at the very least — with no breeze.

  Despite that my prayers are answered with a fog so thick it is almost wu pesado, the hulks burn for hours. Once the flames leap to the roof of the Ferry Building, making the crowds shriek and the Fireknighties scramble to pour on more water. They get it under control when the keel of the biggest boat collapses and the whole thing slides into the Bay. The water burns now, too — oily sheets of flame, little bonfires of floating junk. But the Ferry Building is safe.

  When there’s nothing left onshore but embers, the coal collectors swarm in. Poor pickins — most of the coals are in the Bay. I stay till the end; till all the coal-gatherers have gone, till Cinderblock and her troops have gone over the area.

  “Arson?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “Hard to tell. Not much left. But...” — she looks out at the smoldering water — “...sure was a hell of a lot of fuel on those old barges — oil, gasoline. Big loss for those fishers.”

  About which the fisher families are understandably pissed. I remind them that whoever did this could more easily have set fire to their old warehouses and then none of them would be here to bitch about it. I leave them grumbling and drag myself home, thanking God for the wu helado without which things might have been much different.

  Back at the Palace that awful feeling comes over me again, so strong this time, I almost shake. Something is wrong. I try to reason with myself. It’s just the quiet. I’m not used to the Palace being so quiet, not any time of the day or night. There’s always somebody playing music or gaming or fighting or snooping the kitchens. There’s always something going on.

  Now there’s nothing. No guardian knighties on patrol, no Squire and Squire’s many ladies. Nada.

  But something is wrong, says this little voice in my head. I don’t realize how wrong until I’m in my room again with the lights on. I feel kicked in the head. The walls bleed glossy red with graffiti — one word over and over: GOTCHA. Just that: GOTCHA. Sure as hell did.

  Doug is gone, pot and all.

  Sixth: Pot And All

  (I Begin To Take This Personally)

  Now I understand all the quivering. Now, when it’s too late. Some merlin I am, I think. Some stupid, Taco-faced merlin I am.

  I send out knighties, but they’re a
bout wilted after the fire and I know it won’t do any good. I been away hours, fire-watching — like my prayers could do something about the physics of firecrackers and oily goo. Worst of it is, I understand that bird beak now. And the wood chip.

  Huh. Some light bulb I got. Now it comes on. They were never after Hermajesty. They were after Doug. They emptied the Palace, got us to split our knighties between the Wharf and the Presidio, snuck up on our big bare ass and got away clean...with Doug.

  I send one of Firescape’s girls to the Presidio with the news, then, just to keep from going shining, I cast runes. This time, the crap just looks like crap. My eyes don’t go wonky no matter what I do. And there are no Whispers. Zip. And to add insult to injury, the damned garbage is back in the can. I start to pick out the pit and the tacks and chuck them again, then think, why bother?

  Instead, I just put the stuff back in the can. That’s when I find another slip of paper, which is neatly folded and sticking to the underside of the peach pit. It’s kind of a lavender rice paper, fine quality.

  I open it.

  There is a strange symbol I don’t know in one corner of the little page and a series of Chinese characters, which I do know, in the middle of it.

  He sends the vultures, they say. He sure does.

  For one miserable moment, I take this as Lord E’s way of saying "Up yours," then realize he’s already done that with the GOTCHAs. Suddenly, the message don’t figure. I mean, Lord E barely speaks Chinglish, let alone Chinese proper. And a neatly folded note has never been in his repertoire. But if it’s not from Lord E, then who? And why? Was somebody trying to warn me about the tree-napping?

  With my cosmic sense of timing, that’d make about perfect sense. I get the warning after the crime.

  Disgusted, I pocket the little hunk of driftwood and the note and head for the Wiz. Can’t wait no more. Shoulda gone when I first saw that torn book page. Too late now, but at least I can go to The Fish and study maps.

  “Show me the quickest way from here to Lord E Lordy’s palace in Potrero-Taraval.”

  “Specify,” says Fish, “which Palace. There are three.” And Fish pops up a map with three bright spots on it.

  One of Lord E’s places is in a Conservatory, another one is in the old Trans-bay Terminal — spitting distance; no way he’ll be there. The last one is buried in the Sunset south of the Farm. Far and away from the Border; that’s where I put my money.

  “SF State,” I say.

  All the spots wink out but one, and Fish draws me a ziggy-zaggy red line all the way from the Wiz to the old University. The line is etched into my pea-brain. I genuflect respectfully, then I am on my way to the Farm — my last stopping-off point before I venture into Potrero-Taraval.

  The Farm is beautiful this time of year. The leafy trees are all different colors — yellows, oranges, the purply-red of the little maples. Only the giant conifers are green still. Usually when I walk through them, smelling their sweet pine musk, they remind me of Doug, and I’m happy. Now they remind me of Doug and I want to cry.

  I’m not a brave person. It’s all I can do not to cry when I finally see Bags and Kaymart gathering cones under the Giants. They’re surprised to see me. I realize it’s been weeks since I came out to see them.

  Guilt is one of the quickest emotions I know — quicker than anger, even.

  “Great harvest, Taco!” Bags thanks me. “Number one jade. Biggest squashes we’ve ever had. Thanks a lot.”

  Most times I’d be glad to take the praise for my merlinish ministrations. Now...who cares?

  “Most welcome,” I say, anyway. “You seen any skulking action down here? Last night, maybe?”

  Kaymart frowns, cuddling a monster pine cone. “It’s funny you should ask. I thought the dogs were up to something last night. They sure were raising Cain. Woke me up, oh, about moon-set, I guess.”

  Bags scratches in his grizzly beard. “I didn’t hear nothin'.”

  “You,” says Kaymart, “sleep like the proverbial log.” She turns back to me. “What’s wrong, Del? Somehow I seriously doubt you’ve just come home for dinner.”

  Kaymart talks like the Videoschool Teachers in the Wiz’s AV Shrine. This is because she is (or was, I guess) a Professor of Anthropology before the Getting Out. She didn't leave, she told me, 'cause she saw the Getting Out as surrender and wasn't inclined to do so. Then she met Bags, who was living under the back porch of her walk-up in Cow Hollow, and that was that.

  Sometimes it’s hard to understand Kaymart. She got all these quaint aphorisms. Right now, I’m having trouble understanding what my problems have to do with her dogs growing sugar. And they grow beets here, anyway, not cane.

  Right about now I realize how wore out I am.

  “It’s Doug,” I say. “The Potreros snatched him last night. I think they may be headed for the Palace at SFU.”

  Bags and Kaymart are blown about sidewise by this news. They helped me raise Doug practically from a fir cone — they’re like his grandparents — and they take it hard. I feel terrible. Doug is gone and it’s my fault. Bags wants to go with me into Potrero-Taraval. Kaymart wants me to stay with them and rest until nightfall.

  “You’re dead tired, Taco. You probably haven’t eaten since God-knows-when. It’ll be dark in about three hours. Stay and rest.”

  I start to protest, but she gives me a Mom Look. “You’re not going to do Doug any good in the condition you’re in. Just look at that; you’re hands are shaking.”

  She’s right, and I submit. It’s hard to argue with Kaymart when she’s in Mom mode.

  For dinner, we eat squashes stuffed with spinach, acorns, and goat cheese and talk about my plans to rescue Doug. I talk Bags out of going with me; he’s pretty old and so much like my own padre, I sure wouldn’t want anything to happen to him.

  One thing leads to another and next thing I know we’re reminiscing about Doug’s seed-hood and way back past that to when I first found my way to the Farm.

  oOo

  It was Hoot that brought me there, really — Hoot with all his questions about the Whisperers. He is, like, fascinated by the idea that there’re these voices in my head that I can’t tune in.

  Maybe I got a bad filling, he says. He’s read comics where guys with bad fillings hear voices in their heads. Me, I got no fillings. Hoot is disappointed, but the questions don’t stop.

  “So, d’you think it might be a directional thing, anyway, like a radio transmitter? I know all about radio transmitters. That’s what I do — fix radios and things like that when they go fizz. Now with radio signals, you gotta get the antennae oriented so they can pick up the signal clear. Ever thought of that? Are your Whispers clearer some places than others?”

  I had not thought of that and did not want to think of that. I was spending most of my time cogitating on a Calling — which, I figure, has nothing to do with radio signals or Whispers or antennae.

  “I don’t have antennae,” I say, but Hoot will not leave it alone, even though he has now determined I am not something he can take a screw-driver to.

  “Look, Hoot,” I say, finally, “I don’t think this is that type of reception problem. I think it’s more of a spiritual nature, comprendé?”

  He looks at me like I’m speaking in tongues. “You think angels are trying to talk to you?”

  “Not angels maybe. I don’t know. I just don’t think it’s a mechanical thing.”

  “Okay. You prayed about it then?”

  “On occasion.”

  “Yeah, but did you ever just say, ‘Hey, God, could you tune in these Whisperers a little better so I can understand what the hell they’re chewin' on?’ Did you say that?”

  “I don’t talk to God that way,” I answer.

  Before I know it, we are on a quest. We are taking a walking tour of Embarcadero and local environs to see if there are places where the Whispers are clearer than others. I make a point of stopping at every dios house we pass to go in and offer prayers for the clarity of Whisp
ers.

  I am thinking the day is destined to be uneventful by the time we have walked all the way around Embar and have wound up tracing the Slot up toward Potrero-Taraval. I am tired and tending toward grumpiness and am getting ready to grumble about all and sundry when I hear a Whisper that is a real word, Dolores.

  I stop in my tracks and turn all around.

  “What?” asks Hoot.

  “Dolores.”

  In answer to my non-answer, he turns and points across the Border between Potrero and Embar. There’s a trench that runs the whole length of the parklands on southside, just below the Farm — used to be a street. Maps show it was dug up to put in electronics for the masstransit, but it never got done, ‘cause right about then everybody was outward bound. On the Embarcadero side there’s a brick wall with gates, where there are Checkpoints with knighties on constant patrol. On the Potrero side is terra incognito, which means the ‘big unknown.’

  “There?” asks Hoot, still pointing. “There’s a Mission over there named Dolores.”

  Since this is inside enemy territory, I do not think that can be what the Whisperers are talking about.

  “No,” I say, “that can’t be it.”

  The Whisper in my ear is suddenly more of a little shout: Dolores! Damned insistent all of a sudden, these Whisperers.

  “We can’t get there from here,” I say, half to Hoot and half to the Whisperers.

  Dolores, insist the Whisperers, and Hoot grins at me, like he can tell what’s going on in my head.

  “I can get us across, no problem.”

  And he does, at a place where the abandoned masstransit dig lets us disappear on one side of the border and pop up again on the other. Trick is, we have to wait for dark to get across, so in the meantime, Hoot suggests we visit the Farm.

  My only real association with the Farm up till now has been dietary. Like anybody else in Embarcadero, I eat stuff that’s been grown there. Most greens eaten here — except for the ones from rooftop gardens — come from the Farm, or from the plot of land set aside at the Presidio. The Farm is almost a mythical place to me, but I never actually been there.