Magic and Loss g-3

by Nancy A. Collins

  As Canterbury continued to argue into his headset, I returned to the main hall and sat down on a large marble bench. As I did so, a trio of monitors arranged in a semicircle flickered on and the fourth movement of Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique swelled from hidden speakers. As I watched, a series of woodcuts and engravings of Witchfinders skinning werewolves, cutting off the extra digits of Kymerans, and burning nymphs and satyrs alive flashed across the flat screens.

  “And so the war between the human and nonhuman populations of Europe and Eurasia raged for the better part of a century,” intoned a deep, authoritative, and decidedly British voice, “until the sacred groves were dyed red and the skies grew black with the ashes from the autos-da-fé. Then, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of the eleventh year of the twelfth century C.E., there came a sign from on high. . . .”

  Suddenly images of the three holiest sites in Judeo-Christian-Islamic culture appeared, one to each screen: the Tomb of the Holy Sepulcher; the Wailing Wall; and the Kaaba. Without warning, there came a thunderclap so loud it made me jump in my seat as fiery words written in Latin, Hebrew, and Arabic miraculously appeared on the walls of all three shrines at the very same moment.

  “And so it was commanded by the God of the Christians, YHWH of the Hebrews, and Allah of the Muslims,” the narrator intoned solemnly, “in words of fire, which still burn today, for all to see: ‘Suffer the witches to live, and those who come unto them, for they, too, are precious in My sight. Judge them not, lest ye be judged accordingly; and with what measure ye mete, shall I return measure to you a hundredfold.’”

  The photographs of modern-day Jerusalem and Mecca dissolved, to be replaced by Leonardo DaVinci’s most famous painting: The Divine Truce. As I looked at Lord Bexe, surrounded by his former enemies, I was struck by how much Hexe resembled his ancestor. The only real difference between the two was the color of their hair—and the look of haunted sadness in the Witch King’s golden eyes. But perhaps that was merely artistic license on Leonardo’s part, since he re-created the famous meeting three hundred and eighty-seven years after the fact.

  “Following what is now called the Divine Intervention, the Holy Roman Emperor Henry V, Pope Paschal II, Sultan Mehmed I, Patriarch John IX of Byzantium, Rabbi Ibn Megas, and Lord Bexe gathered in Constantinople, and with the signing of the Treaty of 1111, the Sufferance finally came to an end.”

  “I see you’ve found our new multimedia exhibit. We recently updated it in order to make it more immersive.” The Curator had, once again, ghosted up behind me without my being aware of it. I had to hand it to the old girl—she had some mad ninja skills.

  “Is that Sir Ian McKellen doing the narration?” I asked.

  “Yes, it is,” she said proudly. “Royal Shakespeare Company actors work best as the Voice of God, in my experience. The previous narration was by Sir Ralph Richardson, but we decided to record a new version when we upgraded from analog to digital sound.”

  As I turned away, a flash of bright yellow caught my attention. It was a length of police tape wrapped about a display case. “Is that the exhibit you mentioned earlier—?”

  “Yes, it is,” she sighed sadly. “We lost an entire collection of authentic Witchfinder devices: finger-cutters, witch-hammers, spell-gags—that sort of thing. The finger-cutter was particularly valuable, as it is rumored to be the same one Lord Bexe used to take his own magic upon surrendering the throne of Arum.”

  I grimaced in disgust. “Why on earth would anyone want to steal stuff like that?”

  “There is a brisk business in antique witchbreaking devices, not unlike the underground trade in Nazi memorabilia,” she replied. “Although it was part of the Treaty of 1111 that all such devices be destroyed, a few have managed to survive the centuries in private collections.”

  The Curator fell silent as the brace of horse-legged ipotanes came clattering into the hall, lugging the welding equipment and heavy crates as if they were made of balsa wood. The head drover, Fabio, set his burden down with a loud thud that resounded throughout the gallery.

  “Here is your delivery, Master Canterbury,” the ipotane announced sarcastically. “Please sign at the bottom, to verify that the items have been delivered in satisfactory condition. And I will be filing a complaint with my shop steward regarding your use of a racial slur.”

  “You go ahead and do that,” the centaur grunted as he scribbled his initials on the paperwork.

  Once Fabio and his team were out of the way, Canterbury and I opened the crates and set about connecting leg bones to hip bones, wing bones to shoulder bones, tailbone to butt bone. When I finished the final weld connecting the head bone to the neck bone, I stood back and gazed upon the fully assembled clockwork dragon.

  It stood ten feet high and fifteen feet long, about a third of the size of an actual adult battle-dragon, or so I have been told, and was all gleaming gears and escapements. The body itself was eight feet long, with the remainder being its tail, which tapered down to a barbed point, like the cracker on a bullwhip. It had a long, wide snout, flaring nostrils, and antlerlike horns that grew from its forehead like antenna. Its powerful legs resembled those of a Komodo dragon, and the wings attached to its shoulder joints were tightly folded while grounded. Once activated, the clockwork mechanism inside it was designed to move the head and tail in a realistic fashion and trigger a bellows attached to a resonator in its chest, which simulated the creature’s infamous war cry.

  “You did amazing work, Canterbury,” the Curator said with an appreciative nod. “She’s a real beauty.”

  I raised an eyebrow in surprise. “You mean this thing is supposed to be female?”

  “All battle-dragons were female; the males didn’t have wings,” the Curator replied. “The one Lord Bexe flew against General Vlad was called Skysplitter. She was the last dragon to die in the Disarmament. Immediately after Lord Bexe put her down, he severed his sixth fingers and went into exile.”

  “It seems like such a waste,” I sighed.

  “Indeed it does,” the Curator agreed. “But Lord Bexe truly had no choice. I have studied this single moment in history my entire adult life, from every possible angle, and have found no other means of resolution. General Vlad’s decision to attack human settlements following the signing of the Truce—knowing that mankind dare not retaliate for fear of divine punishment—forced the Witch King to take extreme action. There were already rumors circulating amongst the human powers that the Divine Intervention had been nothing more than Kymeran trickery. The Treaty of 1111 was in danger of being destroyed, and the Sufferance rekindled. Lord Bexe had no choice but to side with the human race against his own brother.” The Curator shook her head, as if clearing it of visions only she could see. “Well, that’s enough waltzing through history,” she said with a wan smile. “It’s time we put the finishing touches on our friend here and make her presentable so she can meet her public.”

  She briskly clapped her hands, like a school teacher summoning silence from her class, and a wooden trunk appeared before her. Reaching into the voluminous folds of her sleeves she retrieved a large ring of keys of various sizes and shapes, quickly flicking through them until she came to the one she sought. She opened the trunk, revealing what looked like folded cloth-of-gold. She gestured with her right hand, like an orchestra conductor calling four-four time, and the empty skin rose upward like a gilded ghost.

  The fingers of the Curator’s right hand moved like those of a puppeteer manipulating a marionette, guiding the shed so that it once more assumed the shape of the proud beast that had once worn it. The empty skin hovered above the clockwork dragon for a moment, then gently lowered itself so that it draped the automaton from the nape of its neck to an inch short of the barbed tail. Once the shed was in place, the Curator began tapping her fingertips together, as if she was playing a pair of invisible castanets, while at the same time miming a seamstress fitting a garment on a dressmaker’s dummy, until the gleaming skin was securely
bonded to the clockwork dragon.

  “Look at you,” Canterbury smiled, addressing his handiwork as if it were a beloved pet. “Aren’t you gorgeous?” He then turned and nodded to me. “Okay, kid—time to do your stuff!”

  Before I became Canterbury’s apprentice, my talent for animating the sculptures I created was entirely unconscious, and invariably a response to “fight-or-flight” scenarios. But under his tutelage, I had since learned how to make deliberate contact with the spark that resides in my creations and activate it through the force of my will. All artists put a little of themselves into their work—but in my case it’s literally true.

  I took a deep breath and focused my attention on the clockwork dragon, rerunning how I had put it together, piece by piece, in my mind. As I slowed my heart rate and steadied my breathing, I felt the edges of my consciousness travel outward, like the ripples on a pond. Suddenly the clockwork dragon reared back onto its hind legs, its forelegs clawing at the air, and spread gold foil wings that shimmered like the sun. It opened its mighty jaws and a deep, reverberating growl, like that of a bull alligator, rumbled forth from its chest. For the briefest of moments it felt as if the thing was genuinely alive, and I was its master, holding it on the end of an invisible leash.

  “Turn the head toward me a tad,” Canterbury instructed. “Now lift the wings a little higher—spread them out farther—no! Too much! Pull it back a bit! Yes, that’s it! Perfect! You can let go now, Tate.”

  I sighed and retracted my concentration, leaving the automaton posed to my master’s specifications. As my will slipped free of the clockwork dragon, I felt the spark I had awakened within it retreat, as if the golden reptile had fallen into hibernation.

  “Most impressive,” the Curator said, regarding me like a potential exhibit. “I have never seen the inanimate made animate without the ritual of the Unspoken Word. Are you certain you’re fully human?”

  “Believe me, there is nothing magical about my parents,” I assured her. “So how are we supposed to suspend this thing from the ceiling? I don’t see any hooks or mounts up there. . . .”

  Before I could finish my sentence, the golden dragon floated upward like a Macy’s parade balloon, positioning itself opposite its ebon foe.

  “The remainder of your commission is waiting for you in the administrative office on the ground floor, Master Canterbury,” the Curator said, returning her hands to her voluminous sleeves. “And don’t forget the gift shop on your way out.”

  Chapter 6

  Every year since 1778, there has been a parade and street fair on the first day of April to commemorate both the founding of Golgotham and the end of the Revolutionary War. Much like St. Patrick’s Day and the Feast of San Gennaro, the Jubilee is a public celebration that attracts far more than the ethnic group that originally founded it. Just like you don’t have to be Irish to dance a jig and swig green beer or Italian to knock back the vino and stuff your face with zeppole, you don’t need six fingers or hooves to caper about Golgotham like a wine-soaked maenad.

  The biggest crowd-pleaser of the Jubilee celebration is the Procession, where all of Golgotham’s major supernatural races, or ethnic groups, or whatever you want to call them, proudly strut their stuff. It’s also the official kickoff ceremony for the rest of the festival, which goes on all day and well into the night. Getting a curbside view of the Procession is very important if you actually want to see the parade itself, and not the back of someone’s head. So if you want to get a good spot you have to show up before the crowds do—say, around half-past the crack of dawn.

  It was five thirty in the morning when my best friend, Vanessa, and her new hubby, Adrian, showed up on our doorstep, outfitted with matching backpacks and dragging a cooler-on-wheels.

  “Thank God!” Vanessa groaned in relief upon seeing the pot of coffee waiting for her in the kitchen.

  “Be careful with that stuff,” I warned her. “It’s a special grind from the Devil’s Brew. One cup is guaranteed to wire you for sound.”

  “Wow, you’re not kidding.” Adrian grimaced. “I’ve barely taken a sip and my eyelids feel like they’re flapping behind my eyeballs. Where’s Hexe?”

  “He left about an hour ago to nail down a good spot,” I explained. “Golgothamites take their Jubilee very seriously, so it pays to stake a claim as early as possible.”

  “Have you heard anything from your parents yet?” asked Vanessa.

  “Not a peep,” I replied. “Normally my dad would have tried an end run around my mother by now, but he’s not going to risk crossing her when she’s this mad. I don’t need their money if the strings attached to it make me a puppet.”

  “Your cat just insulted me and flew upstairs,” Adrian said, looking nonplussed.

  “Don’t mind Scratch,” I laughed. “He’s under strict orders not to eat friends and family.”

  Upon finishing our coffee, we grabbed up some collapsible camp chairs and headed out for the Procession, chatting among ourselves. Despite the early hour, there was already a steady stream of people, many of them outfitted with stepladders, headed in the direction of Perdition, the widest and straightest street in Golgotham. Perdition stretched all the way from the Gate of Skulls, located on Broadway, to the wharves of the East River, and during the Jubilee, festive banners and bunting were hung from every window, doorway, and lamppost, and temporary archways of red, white, and blue had been erected along the Procession route.

  As we arrived at the corner of Golden Hill and Perdition, I spotted Hexe standing on the curb, talking to his childhood friend Kidron. It was one of the few times I’d seen the centaur out-of-harness, and he was dressed to the nines in a blue silk caparison decorated with small diamond-shaped mirrors, with a matching doublet and a leather helmet crested by an ostrich feather dyed to match his clothes. I couldn’t hear what they were discussing, but judging by the scowl on Hexe’s face, it was something unpleasant.

  “Jubilation, Tate, to you and your friends,” Kidron said as we approached. “And I am glad to see you back on your feet, Miss Sullivan. I trust your ankle is no longer bothering you?”

  “Thank you,” Vanessa smiled. “And it’s Mrs. Klein, now. But, yes, my sprain is fully healed, thanks to Hexe.”

  “That is good to hear. My people take such wounds very seriously,” Kidron replied. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must return to my herd.” With that he clopped across the street to join a group of centaurs, all of them tricked out in equally fancy dress.

  “So why the frowny face?” I asked as Hexe kissed me hello.

  “The Maladanti are putting the bite on the livery drivers,” he replied sotto voce. “They used to get ten percent. Now they’re demanding thirty, and are threatening to kneecap anyone who balks.” Upon seeing the look on my face, Hexe smiled and smoothed the hair away from my brow. “There will be other days on the calendar to worry about Boss Marz. I just want to enjoy the Jubilee with you before I end up being stuck judging who gets the blue ribbon for Best Potion for the rest of my life. Today is the Jubilee,” he said, raising his voice so that the others could hear, “a time to celebrate our freedom and the unity of our peoples!”

  “Damn straight!” Vanessa agreed as she set up her camp chair.

  “You certainly have some interesting neighbors here in Golgotham,” Adrian said, eyeing a clan of leprechauns as they clambered up a homemade reviewing stand constructed from a pair of ladders and a two-by-four.

  “These are just the ones who come out during the day,” Hexe said with a wink. “Wait until the sun goes down and the trolls, ghouls, and goblins take to the streets!”

  Adrian laughed uneasily and then checked the app on his phone that told him what time the sun would set.

  Within an hour of our arrival there were thousands of parade watchers, both looky-loos and native, thronging the length of Perdition Street. As the sun rose, the early morning chill quickly gave way to clear blue skies and pleasant spring temperatures. Children—human and otherwise—ran back and fo
rth across the broad street in mindless, kinetic tribes, shouting and playing tag. A trio of centaur foals frisked about under the watchful eye of their dams, while a couple of young satyr kids amused themselves by butting heads. A vermilion-haired Kymeran street vendor carried a long pole covered in giant hand-twisted pretzels, hawking his wares to the hungry in the crowd, closely followed by a faun with a refrigerated pushcart selling ice-cold bottles of butterscotch root beer.

  Suddenly, a red rubber ball bounced into the middle of the frolicking foals. A second later a five-year-old human child came running up to reclaim it, only to stare in amazement at the little centauride turning the toy over in her hands. Her upper portion resembled a four-year-old girl, her blond hair fixed in twin pigtails, and dressed in a My Little Pony T-shirt, while from the waist down she was a knobby-kneed palomino foal. Upon espying the little boy, she smiled and shyly held the ball out to him. He returned her smile and reached out to take it, all the while unable to take his eyes off her.

  Hexe reached out and took my hand in his and gave it a squeeze. I grinned and kissed him on the cheek. “Maybe things aren’t so hopeless, after all?” I said, resting my head on his shoulder.

  “The problem isn’t with the kids,” he said as a woman hurried from the crowd and grabbed the young boy by the arm.

  “Jaxon! What did I tell you about staying where I can keep an eye on you?”

  “But I was just getting my ball back—!” the kid protested feebly.

  A palomino centauress stepped out into the street, putting herself between the foal and the boy. “That’s enough horseplay for now, Wynona!” she said sternly.