by Mark Jeffrey
But even here, he was thwarted.
He longed for sleep. His eyes kept closing and he would have to snap himself awake, even while walking.
His arm tingled. He looked down and saw stars shooting along his wrist.
But he had not summoned his power!
And now he learned another terrible thing about himself — not only could he exhaust his power, but after doing so, it was not in his control. Then another possibility occurred to him: perhaps it was the continuing integration of his memories, the other personalities fusing inside of him that were not familiar with starfire that had truncated his abilities and control — and was now working against him subconsciously.
He was helpless as his hand started to glow.
He strained to contain it but his hands grew brighter, lighting the forest around him — and certainly frightening away any game in the vicinity.
No! His mind shouted at it, but to no avail. His arms and hands were alive with shining silver fire. Stars whirled within it. He had no choice: he gave in, gave utterance to power that would not be denied.
He aimed it at the ground; he did not want to send a flare into the night. The ball of fire left him, detonated on a half-exposed boulder, shattering it with a clap of fire and thunder.
Then he went dark again. He panted and dropped to his knees.
The power was eating him, draining him. Because he couldn’t control it. He felt a new wave of exhaustion wash over him. This can’t go on, he thought. What if there came a time where the power was always on, such that he couldn’t shut it off? Would he blaze like a human candle, with himself as the wick?
Maybe he shouldn’t have asked Carlos Gustav to wake it up after all. Maybe Romani had been right in her caution.
But he pushed the thought away. He had more immediate problems. He needed rest. He switched to looking for shelter instead of game.
THE CREAKING dawn brought it’s own problems. A thick cloud cover had moved in during the night. It was so dense that it took Max awhile to realize that the sun was even up. And when he did, he sighed with relief: those wasp things probably would stay in their nests without sunlight to wake them up.
Then: thunder. A low boom, just a growl. But a promise of more to come.
Great, Max thought. Just great. He shambled like an animated corpse.
The first plops of rain onto the leaves above began.
But then he had his first bit of luck: he spotted what looked like a cave set into a high hill on his right. He forced his burning muscles towards it, sweating and gasping.
He peered into the cave. He couldn’t make out much. A throaty growl turned his stomach to Jell-O. He quickly backed away.
A small black bear charged him.
He stood his ground; he knew that if he ran, the bear would regard him as prey and easy rip him to bits. But if he stayed where he was, the bear would not know what to make of him, possibly even leave him alone.
But he was too close to the cave. The bear could not permit something that near to its lair. It didn’t slow down.
It was his leaking and terrible power that came to his rescue. At once, his arms were slick with white fire and stars whizzing around them. Then he smelled burnt flesh and smoke; he had blown a hole right through the bear, felling him instantly.
He strained to keep his power lit as he entered the cave. It was spacious, and there was no mate or cubs within. There was a large bubble of rock near the center of the floor. He knelt to it, wrapped his arms around it. Attempting a modicum of control, he focus on driving the white fire into the rock — not as a weapon, not as he had used the power to date. But rather as something that flowed, like electricity. He tried to make is swirl inside the rock.
Soon, the rock was glowing red. By degrees it heated and became molten. It vented heat that made the nearby air shimmer. Max hadn’t realized how horribly cold he was until that heat slapped against his cheeks.
With one last strain of effort, he used the power to prop himself up and supply the extra strength he needed to drag the bear carcass into the cave. Then he let it fall away. Exhaustion hit him again. But he did not want to sleep just yet: he was far too hungry. He used the machete to cut the bear and dig out a healthy chunk of meat. He put it on the end of his makeshift spear and cooked the meat on the molten rock.
When he had at last eaten his fill, he used a portion of the bear’s hide as bed on the floor and fell into a very deep sleep.
HE WOKE several times, despite his deep rest. The thunder and wind were tumultuous outside the cave: it was just too noisy. Every once in a while, there would be a loud report and a tree would fall, making him sit bolt upright in alarm. A few times he got up to drink rainwater as it collected on leaves.
After he had slept for a very long time — he didn’t know whether it was night or day or exactly how many hours he had slept — he rose and ate some more. His power kept rising of it’s own volition when he was awake — but he had somewhere to vent it here: the rock. By the third time, however, he accidentally split the rock: this didn’t much matter, the separate glowing red pieces still vented heat in great gouts.
He slept yet again.
When he rose at last, the forest was thrashing like a wild beast.
He could hardly believe his eyes. The skies were filled with tornadoes.
He repeated that to himself again, numb with shock: the skies were filled with tornadoes.
The horrors of the Bondsman’s world, no doubt.
How —?
Wind gushed across the forest floor with the same force as a runaway river. Trees cracked and split, collapsing into sawdust.
Long twisters hung from the soaked clouds like black serpents. There were two funnels that had touched down nearby, drilling into the dirt like a pile driver, gnawing the wilderness to ribbons. From his cave, Max could see one of them, not more than forty yards away, spinning like a pinwheel of madness.
And the sound —! The sound it made was unearthly. A tornado close up howled like a banshee. But it was also filled with lightning. Crackling bangs of sharp blue lit the dark cloud underbelly of the twisters in shouts of power.
It approached the cave. Max shrank back.
Dirt was shoveled in heaps through the cave doorway. Had he been asleep, Max would have been momentarily buried.
For a moment, Max feared that the cave would not protect him, that he might be sucked out by the vacuum of the funnel. He hadn’t thought this through, he might end up in the sky before he even knew what was happening …
By the tornado suddenly misted and was gone. Dirt rained from the sky as the twister spontaneously disintegrated.
He breathed a sigh of relief. But a giant crack of lightning struck a nearby tree, splitting it in two and setting it on fire, reminding him that the danger was not over. The spontaneous bonfire lit the night. There was now a real danger of a forest fire, especially with all this wind. Max realized he would have to leave the cave soon.
Everything was wrong with Bondman’s world. Nature itself was wild and sick, spinning out of control.
The clouds split later in the afternoon and Max resumed his hike.
HE HAD been journeying for three days since the cave. He longed for a bath, but the Sky Chambers buzzing the forest above would not allow it; he was terrified of being caught naked whilst one of those eldritch craft sailed the skies.
He was Max Quick: Public Enemy number one. He could not afford to make any mistakes.
He ran along the edge of the woods at a light jog. He needed to make up for lost time from the storms.
Abruptly, in early evening when fireflies filled the fields, he came upon a clearing lit by shafts of silver moonlight. It was an almost mystical place, filled with rich grasses and rolling hilly terrain, but also short craggy trees with voluminous verdant foliage capping their tops as if they were mushrooms of leaf. Upshots of pointed rock, laced with mica that shone in the moonlight, lay here and there. A small black tarn of still water reflected the ivory
light and throbbing jeweled stars just off his left shoulder. The sharp tangy scent of berries and flowers filled his lungs with new life.
There was a small country graveyard here, Max noticed, circled by an iron fence. Odd, this. In the middle of the woods, far from anywhere, a graveyard.
He read the names on the headstones and his stomach dropped out from underneath him.
The first one said, MADAME EUROPA ROMANI. He tasted copper in his mouth. Romani? Here? How —?
And the second one confirmed the ice in his soul. DOCTOR CARLOS GUSTAV.
But how could they be here? In the middle of the woods? Why would that be —?
MICHELLE LEVEUX.
She was here as well?
GASPAR FALIERO (ALSO KNOWN AS GASPAR THE GREAT.)
He was standing in the graveyard of long lost friends. His eyes watered. He did not know how this could possibly have come to pass, but the names hit him like blows. It was undeniable. It was them.
SAMBHAVA.
With a start, he saw an apparition standing nearby.
He almost didn’t recognize her. She was much younger. She was lined in silver.
But it was her. Lined in pearly moonlight was the spirit of Europa Romani.
Max assumed she would be harsh with him, stern. But she smiled. She was deliriously happy for some reason.
“Max,” she said, her arms open and filled with forgiveness.
I’m sorry, Max mouthed. She had given her life for him. She had done everything for him.
“Madame,” Max breathed. He could not even say the words. He was talking to a ghost. He must be delirious. He was too exhausted … he must hallucinating …
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Europa said. “It was my honor to save you. It gave the final meaning to my life that I craved.”
You craved —?
“Yes,” she nodded. “Does that seem so impossible to you? I suppose it might, to the living. And I had lived long and long and long again. I desired an end. But an end with purpose! And end with bravery, with fire. And the opportunity to fight Millicent Madworth was exactly the right thing. So again: I thank you, Max Quick. You gave my life the capstone, the very end I desired.”
Max swallowed. “But how are you here? Why are you all —“ He could not say the words buried here.
Yes, Europa nodded. “Our remains are here because I prophesied that we should be. I knew that one day you would come here, in dire need. I knew that you would need to see us again. So I instructed Marvin Sparkle that, should we die in the fight against the Machine, he was to carry our bodies here and bury us. He should erect gravestones that were clearly marked. So that you could see them in moonlight. As I knew it would be a night of the full moon that you would arrive.”
Max breathed. You knew I was coming?
“Yes,” Europa breathed. “Of course I did. How could I not, is the question you should be asking yourself?” She smiled. Wow, she was heartbreakingly beautiful in youth. Max was almost embarrassed.
Then Max realized something else: Marvin Sparkle had buried them here. And he knew they were here because of Romani’s prophecy. Would he now guess that this very spot was where Max was headed? He looked around nervously.
“I have several things to tell you, and then there are several more I wish to tell but I cannot,” Europa said, ignoring him.
“Yes?” Max managed to whisper.
“I must speak carefully,” Europa explained. “When the Archons made their offer to you, when they asked you to join them, they provided this opportunity for me.” Before Max had travelled to 1912, he had attempted to use a Whispering Stone. The Archons had appeared to Max and asked him to join their cause — an offer Max emphatically refused.
“Thus the Archons opened this door for me, though they did not mean to. Just by speaking to you, they created the equal and opposite opportunity for me to be likewise converse. And I have been patient. I have waited for the perfect moment to speak with you. And that moment is now.”
Now, Max breathed. Now. “Why now?”
“Because you need me. Because there are things I can tell you about the Bondsman.”
Max nodded, breathed. Yes. He needed information.
She shook her head, anticipating his first question. “No. I cannot tell you who the Bondsman is. That is something which I can not reveal. But there are other questions I can answer. So. Ask. I ask you to ask.”
Cannot reveal. Why?
She shook her head. “If I were to tell you who the Bondsman was, I would thence create an equal an opposite opportunity for your enemies to harm you. The value of the information is great. Therefore the danger would also be great. I would put you in severe harm.”
Okay, he breathed. That’s fine. I get that. But what can we do? What’s the next best question to ask?
Then it came to him. “My power. What is it? Can you explain it to me and how I can control it.”
She nodded and smiled like he had asked the right question. “Yes. That I can answer for you.” She inhaled deeply. “The matter of your power is easy. It is the power of the universe, of the One. It’s in everyone. Everyone has it. Everyone can use it, if they know how.
“But like most things, there are some who are better at it, who have a talent for it, than others. The Niburians call such a one an Imaginal. You, Max, you are bred for it. You are made for it. You can tap into it more easily than others. The Archons knew what they were making when they made you: the most powerful Imaginal ever born. Yes, it is true that you are the result of their match-making manipulations through the eons. But you are free of their control. They did not anticipate that.”
“So it is true,” Max said, dejected. “The Archons made me.”
Romani shook her head. “They gave you a gift, unwittingly. You, Max, are a gift! Sometimes evil plans result in good. No one can predict the way things will go. It goes both ways, of course. Sometimes good is planned and evil results. You did what you thought was best with the Machine, you meant well, but evil resulted.”
Max winced. At once, Romani saw her error. “Ah! I am sorry. Causing you pain was not my intent, my apologies. If you think I am still angry about that, you are wrong. The fact that you have seen the Bondsman’s world that resulted is punishment enough. I don’t want to cause you pain. It is not my purpose to haunt you.”
“You were right about that,” Max said mournfully. “I should have listened to you.”
Romani shrugged, to Max’s surprise. “Maybe you shouldn’t have. Maybe you would not have learned what you needed to learn any other way. I have learned, since I last saw you, that wisdom is packaged in many ways and there are many paths thereto.”
Max nodded slowly. The breeze made his skin feel electric. It passed through the silvery moonlit Romani as if she were part of another reality altogether.
“Your power is a manifestation of your will. Thought is what shapes matter — matter cannot exist without it. Words are the tools for shaping thought. In the beginning was the Word — that is true! The Word comes before matter, the Word is what makes it real. But humans — and Niburians — are complicated. Your will is all over the place, and conflicted. The more you can control what you truly believe, what you think, the stronger your power will be. When you believe a thing top to bottom, with your whole heart, with no reservations, then it shall be. But if you are divided, distracted … well then, so shall your manifestation of power be. That is what you are experiencing right now.”
Max nodded. “I see,” he said, not completely seeing. “So … where is everyone else? Gustav? Sambhava?”
“We’re here,” Carlos Gustav and Sambhava said together. Their shining forms appeared.
“And I am here as well,” Gaspar Faliero said, fading into manifestation. “Although you did not ask for me.” He smiled somewhat as if this were very hilarious.
“And … and Michelle?” Max asked quietly.
Romani’s eyes dropped. “Her shade is not among us.”
Max
nodded. “So. All of the rest of us. In one place again.”
“So it would seem,” Faliero said with a smile. A smile? Faliero never smiled! “And I have apologies to make to you, Master Quick. For how I treated you. I hope you will not hold … our disagreements between us.”
Max blinked, surprised.
“In death, or in True Life, I should say, I have gained new perspectives. What you think of as life is a pale shadow compared what awaits you beyond the veil.”
Max could only nod. “Of course, Faliero. We got past this before we went after the Machine.”
Faliero humbly bowed. “Nevertheless.”
“We are here to aid you.” Madame Europa Romani continued. “We have only love in our hearts for you.”
Madame Europa Romani, Max breathed her name. The same harsh beauty, the same dark lush skin and hair. But younger, more beautiful even. The same power that was her.
He had never met someone more powerful, save Mr. E.
“My power,” Max said. “It’s killing me.” It gnawed at his heart even now. He felt it. It was chewing on him like a wild animal gnawing his leg.
Romani nodded gravely. “You are conflicted. Horribly so. So many versions of you, all clamoring in your mind. You have been gifted with expression. Yet you do not know how to give utterance to that expression.”
“But it is vital that you do so,” Gustav chimed in. “For you are right. The power of an Imaginal is a two-edged blade: you have easier access to it than most, but you must wield it. The power must go somewhere. If you do not wield it, it will flip back and consume you.”
Max nodded. He felt that. He felt like a thing gnawed on.
But how? How could he correct his mind?
“That I cannot tell you,” Gustav said with a wan smile. “You will have to find your own path there. There is no formula, no exercise I can give you.”
Great, Max muttered. Just great.
