Trader

by Charles de Lint

  When I’m done cleaning up the workshop, I take the guitar back into the farmhouse with me and lay it down on the table, eager to give the instrument its first proper workout. I light a candle and the finish seems to turn into honeyed gold, holding the light and drawing it deep into the wood’s grain. There’s a magic in completing an instrument, a high that can’t be matched by artificial mood enhancers such as drugs or alcohol. This is the time I always understand that touch of mysticism that Janossy brought to his craft, a moment of satori that’s both humbling and enlightening, akin to bringing a child into the world.

  For an instrument is a child, innocent, yet wise beyond its years, its wisdom inherent and pure, unlike the rough experience that we accumulate and piece together during the time we spend in the world, colored as it is by the limitation of our attention spans and the general confusion through which we process what we learn.

  Like a child, an instrument requires our input to fulfill its potential. How well or badly we satisfy our responsibilities is what makes the difference.

  This guitar isn’t entirely my work, but that isn’t relevant to what grips me at the moment. Self, possession isn’t the point. It’s not that I made this, or helped in its making, but the wonder that it exists at all. The transformation of natural elements, the raw wood and tempered metal, into a perfect instrument is an alchemy as potent as lead into gold and as rare to attain. But I believe we’ve come close, Janossy and I, with this posthumous collaboration. I only wish Janossy were here to share the moment with me. He’d fill the room with his exuberant delight.

  Finally I turn from my contemplation of the instrument to get a glass of water from the tap, but as I cross the kitchen, the outside world intrudes once more. A buzz starts up where the sixth sense keeping track of Devlin seems to sit and I realize that my few days here have only been a hiatus from the strangeness that’s become my life—or at least a calming oddity in amongst all the less pleasant aspects.

  I start to follow the connection to see what Devlin’s up to when the buzz flares in the back of my head. The jolt it gives me is like putting my finger in a socket and all the calm I’ve managed to store up in the past few days is washed away. I lean over the sink to keep my balance and another fierce jab of pain throbs in the back of my head. This time the pain is so bad I have to press my face against my hands, thumbs pushed tight against my temples as though to keep them in place.

  It’s a long time before I can straighten up. My face is wet with a fevered sweat, shirt sticking to my chest and back. The immediacy of the pain has faded into a dull ache that settles in behind my eyes and I realize something’s changed in my connection to Devlin, but I can’t tell what.

  He’s up on the ridge behind the farm, running back and forth across a small clearing with something—I flash on confusing, stuttered images of wings, a sharp beak, talons—battering at him, keeping him in motion. He’s so panicked there isn’t a coherent thought left in his mind.

  I push slowly away from the sink and step outside—a little unsteady on my feet, but that goes away by the time I’m off the porch. There’s a full moon tonight, the farmyard almost as brightly lit as day. That’ll make it easier to reach Devlin. I stop long enough to pick up the hickory-handled axe from beside the woodpile and start for the ridge.

  Devlin’s panic is ebbing, but his thoughts are no more coherent. The sense I get is that he’s tiring, as though whatever’s sent him into this frenzy is wearing him down.

  I want to hurry, but I force myself to go slow. The moonlight might be bright out in the open, but once I’m under the trees visibility drops considerably and the footing can be treacherous. Breaking my own neck isn’t going to help Devlin.

  Why this sudden impulse to help him? Self-preservation, for one thing. That’s my body he’s wearing, broken nose and all. I don’t want something worse to happen to it. But there’s another reason, too. The same reason I couldn’t let him starve: he’s another human being. It’s that basic. I might’ve wanted to thump him at one point, but I’ve managed to get past that. And while he’s not particularly likable, I can’t quite think of him as evil either. He’s just not the sort of person I want to spend any time with. Neither’s a good enough reason to stand back and not lend a hand if he’s in trouble.

  If?

  There’s no question he’s in trouble. Serious trouble.

  It’s gone so quiet in the back of my head that I wonder for a moment if the connection’s been broken. I stop for a moment, concentrating. The sound of my passage has made the forest go still. The first thing I hear is my own pulse, drumming in my ears. Wind, up in the higher boughs. A mosquito, whining by my ear.

  It occurs to me that I should have reached the top of the ridge by now. The old game trail I’m following up cuts a pretty straight path from the farm and I’ve walked it hundreds of times. But it feels different tonight. Longer, and twistier. And the incline is much steeper. The birch and cedar around me seem older—though that’s hard to tell for sure in the vague light. What I do know is that, in the forest I remember, the granite backbone of the hill never pushed out of the dirt and tree roots as dramatically as it does here.

  Finally I get a sense of Devlin again, but it’s only a vague presence now, as though he’s worn right out and barely conscious. I don’t know what he’s gotten himself mixed up in this time, but it can’t be good.

  I begin climbing once more, following the trail as it winds in between massive granite outcrops and thick stands of old cedar. It’s another ten minutes before I finally push through young birch and raspberry bushes into the clearing at the top of the ridge. The moonlight’s bright here and I can see more easily now.

  I don’t know where I am, but it’s not on the ridge behind Janossy’s farm—at least not any ridge around it that I remember. But I do recognize the ancient pine standing alone at the very edge of the drop, growing out of the wide fissure that has pushed apart the massive granite slab that makes up most of the ridge. It’s the same one as on the ridge behind Janossy’s that I thought was my destination. And then I spot Devlin, lying on the open stone to the right of the tree, limbs twitching, eyes rolling so that I can see their whites reflected in the moonlight.

  The sight of him puts a sudden tension in my chest and makes me grip the axe more tightly. I make a quick study of the other parts of the ridge, listen carefully to the forest around me, but I can’t spy what’s left him in this state, don’t hear anything except the harsh sound of my own breathing. Even the mosquitoes haven’t followed me up here. Finally, with a last nervous look around myself, I start toward him.

  Careful, a disembodied voice says. Don’t get him going again.

  I stop dead in my tracks and slowly look around again. Then it slowly registers. Nobody spoke aloud. I heard the voice inside my head.

  I’m up in the tree, the voice adds.

  “What...?” I begin.

  Christ, Trader. Will you keep it down?

  I know who the voice belongs to now. It’s Devlin talking to me in my head. But if he’s in the tree like he said, then who’s in the body lying there on the rock?

  I know, Devlin goes on. Big shock. I sure as hell wasn’t expecting it either.

  I sidle along the left side of the ridge, making my way toward the pine as quietly as I can so as not to startle whoever it is that’s lying on the rock. I still can’t see anyone in the branches of the pine, but then I make the mistake of looking over the side of the ridge and I freeze. The drop I remember was maybe twenty, thirty feet. This one’s over a hundred. I’m not normally bothered by heights, but there’s something about the way it looks in the moonlight, or perhaps simply the unexpectedness of it, that wakes a sudden vertigo in me.

  I look quickly away. Bending down in a half-crouch, I scrabble the rest of the way to the pine. The boughs still appear empty, except for a large bird perched about fifteen feet up on one of the first branches. I can’t quite make out what it is. A crow, maybe. Or a raven.

  “Wher
e the hell are you, Devlin?” I whisper.

  Right above you. Before I can say anything, he adds, That’s right. I’m in the bird.

  “Give me a break, would you?”

  Give you a break? If it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be in this mess.

  “What are you talking about?”

  Being here, wherever the hell “here” is. You hogging that farm to yourself leaving me to try and make do in the bush. And now this.

  I’m past arguing about how we got here and whose fault it was. As for why I don’t want him hanging around me, if he hasn’t been able to figure it out by now, nothing’s going to explain it to him. The thing I don’t get is what he means about being in the bird. And how did he suddenly learn to project his voice inside of people’s heads like this?

  “Are you going to bother explaining any of this to me?” I ask him. “Because if not, I’m going right back down to the farm and — ”

  Oh, no, you don't. Not till you give me my body back.

  This voice inside my head is really creeping me out, but I’m determined not to show it. I’m through with letting Devlin intimidate me. I want my body back, but there’s something not right here.

  “You’re the one with the monopoly on switching bodies,” I say.

  I look up into the tree at the bird again, then over to where Devlin is lying. He’s not moving now, but I can see the rapid rise and fall of his chest.

  I think of what I’ve just said, but then I shake my head. No. There’s no way.

  I hear a sigh in my head. Okay, the voice says. Here's how it went down: Thought I'd do a little exploring—I mean, you were such good company frigging around in that workshop, weren't you? So I spent the day hiking around in that out-of-shape body of yours and when I got tired, I thought I'd take a nap. Fell asleep and the next thing I know, some bird's taken over your body and I'm stuck in the bird's.

  I shake my head. No. I won’t accept this.

  Look up, the voice tells me.

  I don’t want to, but I can’t not do it. I look up.

  I'm going to lift my left wing.

  The bird does it—unfolds its left wing to full length, then tucks it back along its side.

  Now I'm going to hop down to the next branch.

  It does that as well.

  Need any more convincing? the voice asks.

  “How could you do this?” I ask.

  You think it was on purpose?

  “Did you go to sleep wishing you were somebody else again?”

  Man, I'm always wishing after what I haven't got. So what? Everybody does it.

  “But everybody can’t make it happen.”

  I didn't make it happen. Do I look like some clown in a wizard's hat? It just happened.

  I shake my head. “You were the catalyst.”

  So what? What's done is done. We can worry about who's to blame later, okay? Right now I want my body back and you should be looking after your own before that bird gets some strength back and tries to take another leap off the edge of the cliff.

  “What?”

  Hey, what do you think I've been doing up here for the past hour? Saving your ass, buddy. I just about wore myself out beating that stupid bird back from the edge. I didn't have to do it. I could've just let it do a high dive and then where'd you be?

  Safe in this body, I think. I’m shocked at the thought. Have I gotten so comfortable in this skin that I can have such disregard for my old body?

  Man, you don't think things are going to stay this way, do you? I'll tell you right now, when we shift back to normal, you'd better hope your body's still habitable, because otherwise you'll be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.

  I know he’s right. The idea of reinhabiting my body after its been used by both Devlin and some bird is even less appealing than if it had just been Devlin using it, but I probably won’t get a choice. If the balance does shift back again, I’ll want a place to go.

  “So what do you suggest I do?”

  Go tie that sucker down before he gets perky again.

  “Tie him down with what?”

  How should I know? Use your belt. Or give him a whack on the side of the head with that axe.

  Now there’s a sensible solution. Give my original body a concussion.

  “People just don’t realize how caring you are, do they?” I tell Devlin.

  What's that supposed to mean?

  “Nothing.”

  I look at where my body’s lying. The eyes are open now, watching me, but I get no sense that the bird inhabiting the body has any understanding of the situation. Truth is, I don’t have much either. Remembering what happened when Devlin attacked me in Fitzhenry Park, I worry about what’ll happen if I grab hold of that body. Will we switch, me to my own body, the bird into Devlin’s? Or will we end up in yet some other place, leaving Devlin stranded here in the bird’s body?

  What're you waiting for? Devlin asks.

  “I have to think this through,” I tell him. “We have no idea what’ll happen if I grab him. It could just make things worse.”

  Bullshit. You just want to hang on to my bod'.

  “Use your head.”

  My head? Christ. Look at this head. It's probably got a brain the size of a pea in it.

  Which would make it right about the size you need, I think.

  “I meant you should think things through first for a change,” I say.

  You're stalling.

  “I’m not. I just think we have to be careful how we—”

  Screw this. I don't have to wait for you to make up your mind—not when I can make it up for you.

  The bird suddenly launches itself from the tree, coming straight for me. I drop to the ground and it skims by over my head. By the time it comes circling back, I’m ready for it. I’ve got the axe lifted so that I can take a whack at him with the handle.

  “Don’t be so stupid!” I shout at him.

  He doesn’t listen, veering away only when I take a swing at him. He circles a second time, screaming audibly now, a raw, ragged cawing sound that sends a shiver up my spine. And then, like a kind of dissonant harmony cutting across the noise he’s making, the bird in my body answers with its own loud, inarticulate cry. The pain wakes in the back of my head again, drops me to my knees.

  Devlin banks away from me and I turn to look at the bird, hardly able to focus because of the screaming pain in my head. It’s got my body standing up, head bent back, still howling. I drop the axe and stumble to my feet.

  “Easy now,” I say. It’s all I can do to voice the words. My brain feels like it’s on fire, but I have to do this, have to try to keep my voice gentle but still audible over the horrible sound the bird’s making, have to try to calm it down. “No one’s going to hurt you.”

  I start to take off my shirt, thinking maybe I can get it over its head, blind it, calm it, the way people throw a cover over a budgie cage. The bird looks at me, but then Devlin comes winging down from the sky. I don’t know what he’s hoping to do—scare it back from the edge, maybe startle it, take its attention away from me so that I can tackle it? It doesn’t matter. All he accomplishes is to panic it more.

  The back of my head feels as if it’s exploding. My knees buckle under me and I drop to the ground again. I see the bird in my body, moving toward the edge of the cliff. Devlin comes down at it once more, but the bird isn’t putting up with his trying to make it back off anymore. Or maybe it’s just getting more used to my body. Right at the edge of the cliff, one of its flailing arms catches Devlin a stunning blow; then it launches itself off the side of the cliff.

  I have this frozen image that locks in my head: I’m on my knees, buckled over in agony, one hand supporting my body, the other reaching out toward the two of them. Devlin’s dropping off the cliff, dazed, unable to use his wings. The bird hasn’t got any wings, but it’s flailing its arms as though trying to fly. Then the two of them are gone.

  Pain flares white hot between my temples. The whiteness starts to
spin, like the funnel of a tornado, and I feel as though I’m falling into it, falling through a spinning white corridor with a flare of light at the end that’s even brighter still, grabbing handfuls of air as I fall, until my limbs go weak and I can’t fight it anymore.

  I just let myself go.

  6 TANYA

  It was like attending a funeral, Tanya thought.

  Boxing up Zeffy’s belongings had been hard enough, but actually driving with Geordie out to the warehouse where she’d rented some cheap storage space made her feel as though a part of her had died. But she couldn’t afford to keep the apartment, and the landlord’s charity would only go so far.

  It had been almost three months since Zeffy had disappeared and Tanya had borrowed enough money from friends, begged enough with the landlord. It couldn’t go on. Life had to go on. That’s what everybody said—like they did when someone died. Life had to go on.

  Where are you, Zeffy?

  The question ran through her head, as it had a thousand times since that day in June. She and Geordie stacked the boxes filled with Zeffy’s clothes, books and knickknacks, as well as a lot of Tanya’s own stuff that she didn’t have room for in the tiny bachelor apartment she’d rented in Upper Foxville. As though working on a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, they fit pieces of furniture in wherever there was room. The sofa standing on its end. End tables, bookcases, chairs. Zeffy’s futon and her bed frame, broken down into its component parts. All too soon the space was full, the back of the pickup truck Geordie’d borrowed from a friend was empty, and their job was done.

  The only thing of Zeffy’s that Tanya hadn’t put in storage was the guitar Zeffy had borrowed from Max Trader, the one she’d left behind at the restaurant the afternoon she and Nia disappeared. It wasn’t that Tanya wanted easy access to it in case Trader showed up to reclaim the instrument so much as to have something in her new apartment to remind her of her missing friend. The guitar, for all that it was a borrowed one, summed Zeffy up for Tanya, the perfect metaphor for what had been most important in Zeffy’s life. It stood in its case now, in a corner of her one-room apartment under a poster advertising Zeffy’s opening slot for the Glory Mad Dog gig. The gig she never got to play because...because she’d gotten swallowed up in some weirdness that neither of them would have become involved in if it hadn’t been for Tanya’s dating Johnny Devlin in the first place.