by John Levitt
The sound of small rocks falling from the outcropping above finally alerted her, but not in time. Maybe she was slowed a fraction by her weariness. In any case, she had only made half a turn when the big cat landed on her shoulders, crashing down from the rock above like an avenging angel. Or demon. She screamed, as did almost everyone in the crowd, and then the strong jaws and sharp teeth were clamping down on her neck. I could smell the rank cat odor and the fetid breath. I could feel the sharp teeth tearing through soft flesh. The spurting of blood from torn arteries came as a shock, but by that time I couldn’t breathe; the jaws had clamped down on the throat in the typical predator’s killing bite. Color seemed to leach out of my field of vision and a deathlike lassitude overcame me as the blood was diverted away from the brain and onto the ground. Just before losing consciousness I could swear I heard the heavy cat chuckle deep in its throat.
I came to with a huge shock of dislocation, the way you sometimes wake from a disturbing nightmare late at night. I was standing in the field clutching the hand of the person next to me in a death grip, who was returning the favor. We let go simultaneously, both embarrassed. Eli peered over at me, looking shook up himself. Moira had fallen from her chair and was lying on the ground. For a moment I thought she was dead, but she sat up shakily and Christoph stood up and offered her his hand. You could see that she didn’t want to take it, but in the end decided that acting gracious was the way to play it. She looked pale and washed out, as if she’d been up for three nights without sleep. Christoph, on the other hand, looked positively vital, glowing with health and energy. I guessed that the transfer of power from loser to winner occurred the moment her double had died.
Christoph left Moira standing there and strolled over to the edge of the crowd. He immediately became involved in a discussion about something, presumably tactics, with a young black guy who was wearing a watch cap. He looked vaguely familiar but I couldn’t place him.
“You know that guy?” I asked Eli, pointing over in his direction.
“I know him,” he replied.
“And?”
“No one you’d want to know. A dark path practitioner. Very influential in some circles.”
I laughed. “Really. I mean, no one does that stuff anymore, do they?”
Eli favored me with a tolerant smile. “Don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it.”
“Whatever,” I said, dismissing it. “I think I’ll have a word with Christoph before we leave.”
I walked over to join them just as the black guy he’d been talking to slipped away into the crowd. Christoph saw me coming and broke out into a smile. But this wasn’t the friendly smile he had offered at Pascal’s party. It was a mocking, self-satisfied smirk.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he said. “Never thought I’d see you here. Come to try your luck in the game of life?”
“Not my kind of thing,” I said. “Is that what it’s called?”
His expression grew smirkier, if that’s a word. “Well, it’s what I call it. The losers call it getting their asses kicked.” He was bubbling over with jollity and good cheer. If I hadn’t seen the contest I would have assumed he was high. Maybe he was, in a way.
“You really ought to try it sometime,” he continued. “I’ve heard you’re quite a talent in your own right. It would be interesting to see what you’re made of.”
“I mostly try to stay out of fights,” I told him.
“Smart man. But that’s not always possible, is it?”
Again, was he just being obnoxious, or was he baiting me with double entendre remarks and hidden meanings? Somebody on the other side of the crowd beckoned him over.
“Sorry,” he said. “My adoring public calls. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around, though. You be careful, now, you hear?” He bounced away, throwing me a glance over his shoulder as he left. Was that his attempt at a friendly good-bye or some cryptic warning? I decided it didn’t matter. Either way, he was an asshole.
I located Louie sitting off by the bushes beside a large gray tabby, so there was at least one other Ifrit here. They sat side by side, watching. Not for the first time I wondered what Ifrits thought about all things practitioner. Back at the edge of the crowd, Eli disengaged from Sascha and came over to collect me.
“I think we’ve seen enough,” he said. “We’d best be going.”
That was fine with me. I needed time to digest what I had just seen, and even more time to recover. It’s not every day that your throat gets crushed by a powerful carnivore. I jerked my head to let Louie know we were leaving and fell into step beside Eli. We walked in silence back to the van. Driving back to his house, I had so many questions I barely knew where to start. But as soon as I opened my mouth, Eli put his hand up like a traffic cop. He’s a great one for gestures.
“Tomorrow,” he said. “I’ve got a lot of thinking to do. Just drop me off and I’ll call you tomorrow when I’ve gone over things in my head.”
I shrugged. Five minutes later, I was dropping him off outside his flat, neither one of us having said a word. Fifteen minutes after that, I was pulling into my driveway at home. Louie looked over at me and yawned.
“Yeah,” I said. “Another boring day. A piece of cake. Just a walk in the park.”
Eight
I met Eli for coffee the next day over at Muddy’s, a coffee shop on Valencia and Twenty-third that’s within walking distance of my flat. It was a beautiful day for once, sunny and hovering close to sixty degrees, glorious after the December rains. I left Lou outside by the café door and he settled down after looking reproachfully at me. He knew perfectly well there was good stuff to eat inside.
Once inside I decided to avoid the macho black coffee and indulge in a latte instead. The café was filled with the usual mix of Mission denizens: yuppies with laptops, working guys on a coffee break, young hipsters, faux bohemians. By the time Eli arrived, I was on my second cup. He got a latte of his own and sat down at my table.
“I’m pretty sure I saw Christoph with one of those jewels last night,” I said as he took his first sip.
He rolled the coffee around in his mouth, not answering, a singularly obnoxious habit. He gave the impression that he was deeply considering the flavor of the roasted beans, when I was pretty sure he couldn’t tell one type of coffee from another. Finally he swallowed and cleared his throat.
“When?”
“In the middle of the duel. Lou pointed it out. Christoph was covering up something in his lap and it was glowing.” Another sip of coffee gave him time to consider.
“You know, I might be a bit out of my depth here,” he said.
I took a sip of coffee myself. “Amazing. I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say that before.”
“I say it all the time. Just not out loud.”
“So, you have no idea what this Challenges thing was all about?”
“No, it’s more that I don’t understand the point of it. It’s clearly about gaining power, but why? As far as I know, you can’t make the transfer permanent. Unless somehow one of those jewels…”
“What about Christoph?” I asked, changing the subject. “Have you found out anything more about him?”
He gave me a sour smile. “I did some research earlier this morning. Guess who just bought a new house?”
“Uhh, could it be…Christoph?”
“And guess where said house is located?”
I waited patiently.
“Try Sea Cliff.”
Sea Cliff. Real estate isn’t one of my areas of expertise, but houses there run in the low millions. The shabby ones.
“I didn’t know he had that kind of money.”
“He didn’t. Apparently he now does.”
“Those gems, you think?”
Eli shrugged. “It wouldn’t take a whole lot of them to make you rich. Maybe it’s not about power. Maybe it’s about money.”
“Or maybe both. Any ideas yet on where they come from?”
“No.”
&nbs
p; “So now what?”
He took a large gulp of cooled off latte. “Well, I think we’ll take a ride down to Half Moon Bay. I know a man there who just might be able to help. He runs a small café, nothing fancy, just coffee and sandwiches. On weekends he plays jazz with some of the locals, just for fun, mostly.”
“Anyone I know?”
“You might. He used to be an enforcer.”
“Wait a minute,” I said. “You don’t mean Geoffrey, do you? The guy who retired? Used to be Victor’s idol?”
“That’s him.”
“He was always studying and practicing, trying to be some sort of superwizard, right? When I was a teenager we used to call him Gandalf.”
Eli nodded. “You always did have a lot of the brat in you.”
“Well, as I remember it, the guy was a little off. He was supposed to be this all-powerful individual, and then one day he goes off the deep end and just withdraws from everything. Stops being a practitioner, anyway. He started playing piano or something, right? After a while he just sort of faded away.”
“So there was something wrong with him because he preferred playing the piano to working with Victor?” Eli asked mildly. “I realize the piano’s not anything serious, like the guitar, but…”
“That’s not what I mean, and you know it. He was totally gung ho on the whole enforcer thing, so when he quit suddenly it was peculiar, that’s all. Like if Victor suddenly decided to throw it all in and become a potter or a surfer or something.”
“Stranger things have happened.”
I snorted. “Stranger than Victor on a surfboard? I don’t think so.”
Eli took another sip of coffee and did the rolling around in his mouth routine again.
“Anyway,” he continued, “Geoffrey didn’t exactly quit for no reason.” He paused again. “Have you ever heard of the Transcendents?”
“You have got to be kidding.”
“Humor me.”
“Well,” I said, “aren’t they supposedly practitioners who have reached a form of ultimate enlightenment, like a yogi reaching Samahdi. Then they renounce everything magical and go around with a begging bowl, or—”
“Or open a café perhaps.”
“You can’t be serious.”
Eli sighed theatrically. “So young, yet so open-minded.”
“Oh, come on. I mean, really.”
“Let me put it this way. If the most powerful and knowledgeable person you know reaches the pinnacle of accomplishment, then turns around and walks away from it all, what would you think? That they were mentally unbalanced, or that maybe they knew something you didn’t?”
“I see your point. But I might still vote for unbalanced.”
“Yes, you would. But let me run a theory by you. It’s not just mine; a lot of people over the years have come up with similar ideas. Throughout history, extremely powerful men and women have always existed, the elite of practitioners. And a small number, at the height of their powers, have simply given it all up and retired to the simple life. As far as I can ascertain, for the rest of their lives, none of them ever again so much as cast a spell to keep bread fresh.”
“By inability or by choice?”
“No one knows for sure. None of them spoke about it much and when they did it was like listening to Zen koans.”
“But I’m sure you have an opinion.”
“How well you know me.” Eli geared up into professor mode. “Okay, here’s the idea: What happens to these people is analogous to the Yogi you mentioned, but with a crucial difference. The practice of magic is basically the manipulation of reality by the use of talent. How that is best accomplished has long been a matter of conjecture. Some use complex rituals, some learn arcane focusing disciplines, some employ objects of power—the list of various methods is almost infinite. And they all work, though some more effectively than others. There is no one way, as long as the path you choose is one that can access power. The reason that black magicians can be so powerful is not anything supernatural, it’s that the symbols and practices they use are fraught with emotional significance, and they use that emotion to focus their power.”
“Graveyard dirt has more resonance than dryer lint.”
“Precisely. And whether we create our own source of power or simply tap into some vast underlying reserve is another matter for conjecture. But one thing is clear—the more powerful the practitioner, the less the need for reliance on power objects, complex spells, or theoretical magical systems. You actually do something similar yourself, which is quite impressive considering your lack of training and dedication.”
Eli is the master of the left-handed compliment.
“Current theory,” he continued, “holds that whenever a practitioner reaches a critical level of knowledge and power, all those devices we usually rely on become mere props, irrelevant and even distracting. The ability to directly affect reality then takes no more effort than does a fish swimming through water. Magic becomes no different than eating or sleeping or singing.”
“But apparently no one ever actually gets to that place,” I pointed out. “I’m pretty sure I would have heard about them if they had.”
Eli smiled. “Well, there is a catch,” he admitted.
“Isn’t there always.”
“Oh, yes. By the time you reach the level where you are able to directly manipulate reality, by definition you’ve also reached a stage where you’re no longer concerned with such things. Once you understand that the square peg goes into the square hole and the round peg goes into the round hole, there’s not much point in actually doing it.”
“There is if it results in world peace.”
“It doesn’t seem to work that way. Direct action isn’t an option. Read Autobiography of a Yogi by Yogananda if you want to understand why.”
“So you open a café instead and drink coffee all day?”
“That’s one possibility.”
I was still skeptical. “You know, I was a teenager when Geoffrey was around and don’t remember him that well, but he never struck me as an uncommonly spiritual type.”
“Oh, he wasn’t. But that’s not necessary. Are you up on your French Symbolist poets?”
I peered at him suspiciously. With Eli, it was sometimes hard to tell when he was putting me on. He saw the expression on my face and hurried on.
“Baudelaire and his circle. They believed that the way to salvation was equally accessible through both the highest path and the lowest. Since in his day—and in ours, for that matter—sainthood is quite difficult to achieve, it makes more sense to seek enlightenment through following the path of sin and degradation. It’s the great circle—when you get all the way down it’s identical to all the way up. Each path leads to the same destination.”
“I see,” I said. “So if you diligently practice black magic, complete with human sacrifice and demon summoning, eventually you achieve enough spiritual enlightenment to, say, open a café next to Mother Teresa.”
“Cynically stated, but theoretically, yes.”
“I don’t buy it.”
Eli shrugged. “Well, it’s only a theory.”
We sat there for a while drinking coffee in silence. Finally I asked, “So, do you think that Geoffrey could tell us anything useful?”
Eli scratched at his beard. “Oh there’s no doubt of that. The study of magical objects was a speciality of his. If anyone could tell us what those stones are, it’s him. I also expect he could tell us about everything else going on, if only he would. But he’s become odd over the years, even for a Transcendent. It’s difficult to get him interested in current problems and even more difficult to get him to answer any questions. Even when he does, he tends to be cryptic.”
“On purpose?”
“I don’t think so, but it’s hard to tell.”
“So why do you think he’ll be interested enough to help us?”
Eli smiled. “I think we have a hook. You remember I told you that the Challenges started up again
about thirty years ago? Who do you think was behind that revival?”
* * * *
We took Eli’s car down to half moon bay. Since he’s too large to fit comfortably in a compact he had bought himself a silver Volvo 900 S. “Safest car money can buy,” he would say, extolling its virtues at length to anyone who would listen and to a lot who wouldn’t. On the way down I tried to get him to tell me more about Geoffrey, but all he would say was wait and see.
So we chatted about inconsequential things, because as tight as Eli and I have become, he stays mostly closed off about his private life. He doesn’t clam up; he diverts questions he doesn’t want to answer until you find yourself discussing the role salt plays in modern culture without knowing how you’ve got there. I knew he had been married a long time ago, before he took me under his wing. His wife had died young, but I didn’t know any details and he never talked about her. I’d met a few women he’d dated, none of them practitioners, but they seemed to always drift away before I could get to know them. Someday, I hoped, he’d finally start to open up, but that day looked far, far away.
The day was pleasant enough to roll down the windows, so Lou spent the ride with his head stuck outside, nose quivering. It’s hard to remember sometimes that he isn’t really a dog. We wound along Highway 1 with seaside vistas suitable for postcards on the right and occasional fish-oriented towns popping up every few miles. We passed by Mavericks, the big wave-surfing mecca for northern California, and pulled into Half Moon Bay a short time later.
Half Moon is maybe fifteen thousand people or so, pretty much divided equally between locals who live off the tourist trade and locals who just live there. Every fall they hold the event which has put them on the map: The Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival. I’d heard the festival mentioned all my life, but I didn’t really have much of an idea what it was all about, except that it obviously had something to do with pumpkins.
