by Carl Purcell
“Don't. We have to get out of here, now!” Griffith pleaded.
“Fuck that.” Roland pushed him away. “I'm going to sort this out once and for all.”
“Roland, she has this under control. Will you just listen to me?”
“She's doing bugger all. And since you couldn't protect yourself from a dead moth, I'll have to take care of this.”
“Damn it. Fine! Stay here, but I'm not going to watch you get yourself killed.” Griffith turned and ran for the door. Roland wasn't sorry to see him go. Now nobody would stop him from having fun.
“Wait there.” Pentdragon didn't turn to look at Roland but when he spoke, Roland's feet became locked in place. He struggled against whatever magic held him but from the waist down, he was paralysed. “I'll deal with you next.” Pentdragon continued approaching the gorilla, chin held high.
Caia rose up, stomped on the ground and snarled. Pentdragon kept walking. She stopped and stood motionless for a moment. The sudden change gave Pentdragon pause. Caia grunted and flung her whole body backwards, against the wall. The room shook. Loose nails and broken wood fell from the roof. Pentdragon's eyes went wide. Caia smiled as much as her Gorilla mouth would let her. She leapt aside; now she was standing in the corner. She swung her arm out across her body and into the wall. This time a piece of the wall fell out. The whole roof tipped and rocked, groaning under its own weight.
“I'm going to kill you for this. All of you.” Pentdragon huffed and turned towards the door, running from the impending collapse. Caia Charged forward, more falling woodwork fell and bounced off her back. She scooped up Roland under one arm and dived shoulder first through a wall. That final, splintering blow brought the whole building down on itself in a cloud of dust.
The crowd, Pentdragon and his cottage were nowhere to be seen.
Chapter 13
A couple of cars had been abandoned outside Pentdragon's fake mansion. The rest were gone and a few panicked men and women could still be seen fleeing up the road on foot. Once Caia had transformed back into a human shape and given Roland and Griffith their bags, she looked over one of the cars and said with a nod:
“I can do it.”
“Do what?” Griffith asked.
“Hot wire the car.”
“Hot wire the ... That's ... you ...” Griffith stuttered. Then with a sigh, he threw his hands in the air. “Fine! Go ahead. I don't even care. I tried to be friendly and I've tried to keep us doing things right but I'm clearly wasting my time. I don't care any more. I just want to get to Salem.”
“Oh shut the fuck up,” Roland scoffed. “You know you sound like an idiot? Nobody wants to hear your preaching.”
“Roland, you're drunk. Be quiet,” Caia scolded from inside the car. Griffith ignored Roland's rant and placed his hands on the man's back. He closed his eyes and focused.
“What are you doing now?” Roland asked, trying to turn his head a hundred and eighty degrees.
“Saving your life. Let me focus.” Griffith's answer was quick; he'd already begun to cast his spell.
“Get off me!” Roland pulled away. “Keep your voodoo to yourself. It's useless anyway.”
“Roland, please. Lloyd used his—”
“No! I don't want to hear it. I don't want any part in this shit any more. I think we've established that staying with you, Griffith, is the worst thing I could do to keep safe from anybody. Now I think I'd like to try making it on my own.”
“You don't mean that, Roland. You're only saying that because you've been drinking.”
“You're right. I am drunk and you know what? I'm going to keep drinking. But that doesn't make it any less true.” He pulled the bottle of scotch from his bag and took a swig. “And kid, if you are going to keep preaching your good word, then I need something to dull the pain.”
“If you ever listened to me I wouldn't need to—” Griffith began.
“I'm not here to be your charity project!”
“Then why are you here? Why did you come?”
“To let you know when you're being an idiot – which is all the time, by the way. But since you never take my advice, I don't know why I bother.”
“No, that's why I asked you to come with me. Why did you agree to come? What do you want?”
“You were paying.”
“I know that's not true. There were better jobs you could find, ones that didn't take you away from Armidale. You didn't even ask how much I was paying. So if the money didn't matter why did you come?”
“Shut up, kid.”
“You only agreed after I told you that magic could control people's minds.”
“Shut up.”
“No wait. It wasn't control minds, it was change them. You asked me if magic could erase memories.”
“Griffith, you shut your mouth.”
“That's it, isn't it? You wanted someone to—”
“Go fuck yourself, Griffith. How's that for a reason?” Roland took another long drink. It burned all the way down his throat. It was good. “Maybe I don't have a reason. Maybe I'm not going any further. Hell, I'm going home.”
“Please, Roland. Calm down and—”
“I said I'm going home!” Roland started walking away. He'd only gone a few steps before he nearly staggered into a car. He kicked the tires and slammed his fist on the bonnet. The car's alarm went off, blaring and whooping into the night.
“And where's that?” Griffith asked. There was a long pause.
“I'm going. I've got a top-rate room at the Highland and I plan on using it.” Roland started up the road again.
“We have to move forward, Roland. There's no time—”
“Good. You fuck off and move forward.” Roland turned around and started back at Griffith.
“This isn't you, Roland. You're not like this.”
“This is exactly what I'm like! When you get down to it, this is what everyone's like. Nobody gives a shit and the sooner you accept that, the happier you'll be.”
“Happy like you?” Another pause, this time interrupted when Caia started the engine.
“Fuck it, I'm going to bed. You do what you want.”
“Look, Roland, now that we have a car we can get to Salem in less than a day.”
“Giving up, are you? Big surprise. What happened to the plan?” Roland took another long drink, coughing up as much as he managed to swallow. “What happened to helping everybody you can? Taking the long way and proving your worth? Huh? Is the real world too hard for you? Poor little Griffith. Go on, give up.”
“Things are different.”
“Yeah I bet.” Roland turned around to leave. He turned too far and twisted his legs, throwing him off balance and nearly plummeting to the ground. He managed to step out of it at the last moment and stay upright. Roland looked around to find the direction he wanted to go. He faced up the road again and kept walking.
“Roland!” Griffith called after him.
Roland didn't turn around. “When you fuck up again, you'll know where to find me!”
“Good-bye, Roland.” Griffith sighed.
“Just tell me one thing.” Roland turned and took a few steps back towards Griffith. “Who was that guy in there, tonight? I've seen him before, haven't I?”
Griffith hesitated. “I don't know.”
“Liar!” Roland spat back at him. “You look down on me but I have to wonder what you did to piss him off so much. Maybe you aren't the angel you want us to think you are.”
“I don't have to prove myself to you, Roland.”
“But everybody has to prove themselves to you?”
“I never wanted anything but friendship from anybody.”
“And how's that working out for you?”
“Are you coming?”
“No.”
“Good-bye, Roland. Somewhere inside you is a good person. I'm just sorry he doesn't get out more.”
“Whatever.” Roland turned, took another drink and staggered onwards.
Griffith got in the
car. Caia didn't say a word. She put the car into gear and started driving. Roland stepped out of their way as the car passed them. He watched them go, unable to contain his disgust at both of them, their whole stupid sorcerer world and their half-baked mission. Before they were too far gone, Roland gave them the finger and sipped his scotch. He stood like that until he was certain they couldn't see him any more. Then he kept on walking.
Roland walked at a slow pace, holding his bottle tight and burning away any thought of regret with scotch. This was how life was meant to be, anyway. Everybody is born alone and dies alone. People always try to ease the pain by convincing themselves that they should be with people. People were optional and, in his experience, they only ever complicated things. There was no cure for loneliness. It was the default state of mankind. He didn't need people to complicate his life. He could do that fine on his own.
He had everything he needed right there with him.
Roland kept walking along the dirt road until he got back to the highway. He marked the milestone with a drink and kept walking. His foot came down on a rock. It rolled underneath him, throwing him off balance. He fell face forwards. The scotch bottle slipped from his hands, out onto the road.
And shattered.
Roland lay still on his stomach, staring at the broken glass scattered over the asphalt. He watched it, unmoving as the minutes ticked by. Then he remembered he was lying in the middle of a road. He pushed up onto his hands and knees and crawled over to the side of the road and let himself fall into the long, wild grass. The sky was dark; a full moon was shining dimly through thick clouds. He closed his eyes. He could always go back to the Highland in the morning. For now he just wanted to sleep.
Chapter 14
The hum of the engine was soothing. Caia slid her jaw from side to side. It felt stiff and slightly unaligned. Changing shape had let her put her nose back where it belonged and tidied up the bruises she would otherwise have left over from the first encounter with Pentdragon. But sometimes the transformation left her a little lopsided or unaligned. She took a quick glance in the rear view mirror. It wasn't too bad – nothing anybody else would notice. She put her focus back on the road, lit up in front of them by their headlights but otherwise pitch black in the distance.
“Do you think he'll be all right?” Griffith asked. His unruly hair was flapping over his face in the wind. It was cold but Caia liked it cold.
“Roland is strong. He'll manage himself.”
“I don't think he will. I don't think he ever manages himself. He just does what he wants and doesn't think it through.”
“Some people do foolish things. Things like standing in front of loaded guns.”
“That's different.”
“Is it?”
Griffith stayed silent.
“Do you want to go back for him?”
“No.” He said. Caia didn't believe him but she didn't interrupt him. “This is what he wants. I can't save him now. He made it clear he doesn't want to keep going with us and he doesn't want our help.”
“Help with what?”
“Anything.” Griffith sighed. “When I first met him he really helped me out. If Roland hadn't been there I probably would have been killed. I thought I owed him for that and wondered what I could do to make it up to him. Then I saw what his life was like and I asked him to come with me. I guess I thought if I had time, I could heal him. He's wounded, Caia. Not physically but spiritually. Or mentally, emotionally or something. He's the kind of person who gets cut and lets it bleed because he's too proud to ask for a bandage. He'd rather bleed to death than ask somebody for help or even admit to somebody that he's hurt. The saddest part is, I think most of his wounds are self-inflicted.”
“Some people are fated to suffer. You can't help somebody who won't accept it.”
“I know. That's why he stayed behind and that's why there's no point going back. Maybe I should never have tried.”
“Whatever happened is what was fated to happen. The same goes for what happens now. The universe is out of our hands and there's no point regretting or questioning our decisions.”
They passed a sign that lit up in their headlights. The sign told them they were approaching Inverell. Not long after the sign, the highway turned a corner and the Inverell street lights appeared in the distance.
“The man with the white hair. Is it true you don't know who he was?” Caia asked.
“No.” He didn't look like he wanted to talk about it. That wasn't good enough for Caia.
“If he's going to be coming after us – if he's working with Pentdragon and he wants us dead – then I need to know who he is and what he's capable of.”
“All right. You're right, you should know. Damn it, I should have told Roland, too.”
“Focus, Griffith. This is important here and now.”
“Right. Sorry. His name is Lloyd Crane and he was my brother; not my real brother, but my brother the way Juan was yours.”
“I understand.”
“Master Edan, our master, wasn't a great sorcerer but he was a great teacher. He wasn't any more powerful than anybody else but he just knew how to teach us and make sure we reached our full potential. I always wanted to know how to use magic to help people. Ever since I was young I wanted to be a doctor but I just couldn't handle the schooling. But our master taught me so much, even how to turn time backwards for myself. I've looked practically the same for years, now.”
“How long?”
“I'm biologically three or four years younger than I should be. It's not a perfect spell and I won't live forever but I'm younger and healthier than I ever would be without it. In fact, without it, I'd be dead. It was one of the first spells our master taught us. He said we could spend as long learning from him as we wanted and with that spell. Time was on our side.”
“What about Lloyd?”
“He came later. At first he was just like me. He hardly knew anything about magic and he'd discovered it all by accident when he met a sorcerer. Our master taught a lot of people like us – people who would almost never get taught by other sorcerers because we were too old. Most sorcerers want apprentices when they're still children.”
“I know that,” Caia interrupted. “Get to the point, Griffith.”
“Of course you do. Sorry. I'm so used to telling this sort of stuff to Roland.”
Griffith kept going, talking in a kind of trance. He wasn't telling the story to Caia, he was just remembering it and speaking it out loud. Remembering how things used to be was bitter sweet. They were good times and he missed them. He could spend hours reminiscing, riding waves of joy and sorrow that came with thinking about the past.
“I was happy when Lloyd joined us because I had somebody to practise with. Lloyd was happy, too. Who wouldn't be happy when they get to learn to be a sorcerer? For two guys with otherwise boring lives and no promise of an exciting or fulfilling future, our master was the best thing that had ever happened to us. We shared a room in our master's house like students in a dorm room. We had it divided right down the middle. It had this strange mirror feel when you looked at it.” Griffith closed his eyes and he could see, in his mind, the bedroom he shared with Lloyd as if it was right there in front of him. He couldn't help but smile. Then smiling gave way to tears welling in his eyes.
“The beds were opposite each other, and the desks and bookshelves were opposite each other. But while I had books on medicine and some novels on my bookshelf, his was stacked almost to breaking point with big books by Alastair Crowley, Gerald Gardner and Anton LaVey.”
“Who?”
“They were occult writers who generally got everything about magic absolutely wrong. Lloyd had them before he met our master and he still occasionally read them.”
Griffith paused to collect his thoughts. “When you were apprenticed, Caia, were you ever asked to do things?”
“What sort of things?”
“Anything you wouldn't normally think of as being part of learning magic. Err
ands or jobs.”
“We called them hits. We all did them.”
“Hits?”
Caia grunted her confirmation.
“We met another apprentice who called them quests. But our master just called them jobs. Because I was the senior apprentice, I was given jobs first. That was when things started to change. Lloyd hated that he wasn't given jobs when I was. It's not like they were important jobs or hard jobs. They didn't even require much magic. Sometimes all I had to do was pick up a package from one sorcerer and then give it to another. The worst jobs involved helping a particular sorcerer with research – I was always having new spells being tested on me or given magic objects to try out. Sometimes it went wrong. My eyebrows never grew back properly.
“But I did all those things because I was told to. I did as the master told me and I figured they'd either get more important with time or I'd start to see the real reason for it.”
“Did you?”
“I guess it was to keep us humble. Maybe he wanted me to meet other sorcerers, too. One of them, his name was Geoffrey, became a good friend of mine. Our master was happy to keep our world secret but he believed it was still important to be a community. Or maybe he knew some of those sorcerers were crazy and dangerous and I'd have to heal myself afterwards. The truth is, I never asked.
“There were maybe a dozen sorcerers living near us. We had all just naturally congregated in the one neighbourhood. Eventually he started giving jobs to Lloyd, too. By then Lloyd resented waiting so long that he wasn't even happy to be trusted. I was so excited for Lloyd when he was on his first job. He didn't get back until late that night but I was waiting for him. From our bedroom I heard him come in and I listened to him make his way through the house. He went from the front door to the kitchen and spent a while there. Then he went to the bathroom and finally I heard him coming up the hall to the bedroom. In every room I heard something slam or crash and his footsteps up the hall were angry footsteps.
