by Booth, John
“You will survive? I mean, as a species?”
Droplets of fire dripped from the flames like tears.
“We are the oldest life form of the multiverse. The first to be created in the fire of a million big bangs. Hopping from the heart of one star to another we have spread far and wide, though there are fewer of us than the stars in a single galaxy. We will endure and grow strong again, Wizard Morrissey. Do not fear for us.”
Then they were gone. I sat in that imaginary chair for a long time. Despite being directly responsible for the deaths of a large number of people, I still did not think of myself as a killer. Now I had destroyed millions of the most beautiful creatures in the universe. How was I ever going to look in the mirror again?
Thinking back over the parting words of the Braton, I felt cold anger rising in me. They had been tricked by the Brethren, the Elves. The Elves had promised not to attack me while secretly encouraging others to do their dirty work. There would have to be a reckoning over this. They had made me into an instrument of evil and that I would not forgive.
18. Conversations
There was no one in the Inspector’s office. The silver box was not on the top of his desk and I was not going to look in his drawers. Hopping to the entrance I walked into the police station I had become far too intimate with.
“Welcome, the famous Mister Morrissey,” the Desk Sergeant said with a bit of a twinkle in his eye. “What brings you to our doors this fine afternoon?”
Afternoon? A quick look at my watch confirmed the time. It was nearly five. I had spent most of the day in Hop Space.
“I’m looking for Inspector Thomas. He asked me to come in and see him.”
“A man might wonder about the Inspector finding that boy like that.” He winked at me. “More your style than his, when you stop to think about it.”
During my stay in the cells in this building I discovered that all police officers are gossips, and that was just when talking to a prisoner. It wasn’t the slightest bit surprising that some of them had put pieces of the puzzle together. Inspector Thomas and Sergeant Jones went from hating me to taking my part after they returned from Salice, and that would have helped stoke the fires of the rumor mill.
“I really don’t know what you’re talking about, Sergeant. But if Inspector Thomas is unavailable I’ll leave.” I must have sounded stressed because the Sergeant became all business.
“Don’t get your dander up, I’m sure he’s in the building somewhere. I’ll try his office.”
That didn’t work, but a call to his mobile phone did. The sergeant took me to an interview room and returned a minute later with two cups of coffee.
“He’ll be here in a minute.”
True to his prediction, Inspector Thomas came into the room a few minutes later and shook my hand. We sat on either side of the interview desk as there was nowhere else to sit. I noticed that he pressed the off button on the interview recorder twice, just to make sure.
“Jake, are your problems going to affect things here, in Wales?”
It was an earnest question and it deserved an honest answer.
“I don’t know. I agreed to be a representative at a conference for the Valhallans. You remember them?”
He nodded. “I gathered they weren’t your friends.”
“They enslave ordinary people because they can. But I needed the power they could give me to sort my little problem with Bronwyn, so I agreed to their terms.”
The Inspector nodded. He’s been in the Cathedral of Light when Bronwyn had tried to blow it up and knew how close I’d come to failure.
“Some people aren’t happy about my decision because it puts them at risk from the Valhallans.”
“Exactly how many are upset at you?”
I sighed and remembered Fluffy words in the Temple. “Could be over a hundred thousand of them.”
The Inspector’s eyebrows shot up. “People?”
I coughed before answering. “Worlds, confederation of worlds, empires, and so on.”
“Jesus Christ.” The Inspector’s face paled.
“It will end as soon as the conference starts. The attacks have all been directly on me, except for this poor kid. I still don’t understand what that’s all about.”
The Inspector was still having trouble coping with the news. “Will they blow up our planet just to kill you?”
“I doubt it. It would be unlikely to work and if it failed to kill me I would come after them.” I thought about all the dead Bratons and my blood ran cold. “They risk a lot by attacking me and I expect word is getting out by now that I’m difficult to kill.”
The Inspector sank into his chair and exhaled. “Another Bronwyn would be bad enough. If I can help, let me know.”
I looked at my watch again. It was getting late and I’d done nothing, well nothing I wanted to remember. “You were going to show me that silver box.”
The Inspector patted his jacket and looked annoyed. “I must have left it in my desk. If you come back to my office, you can look it over.”
“Not now, next time.”
When I reached the door I turned to face him. “Thanks for the offer of help. It means a lot to me.”
“Not hopping out?”
“Too many people saw me walk in. Even as it is, people are beginning to talk.”
He nodded. “If you keep doing unusual things, people will work it out eventually. Are you ready for that, Jake? Is Jenny?”
It was a good point. I’d stayed below the radar since childhood by not using my magic for anything much except to find the odd person. Now people were beginning to notice as I used my powers more frequently. Would Jenny be prepared to move permanently to Salice? She might have no choice in the matter. I shrugged my shoulders at the Inspector and walked out of the room because I had no answer to his question.
A reporter started to follow me as I left the police station. I stopped at the first corner and waited for him to catch up.
“You need the toilet urgently. You have less than a minute.”
The man looked around desperately and then started running for the mall. I hoped he made it in time. I stepped into a doorway and hopped.
[You look as though you have been through hell. I was expecting you here hours ago.]
I flopped into a chair and a stool flew across the room so I could put my feet on it. It was getting difficult to resist or control such casual magic as my reserves were overflowing.
“Fluffy, the Elves lied to us. They set the Braton on me.”
My dragon laughed and flames enveloped the room. Nothing was damaged because my magic flowed out without my conscious volition and protected everything it touched.
[The Elves are master deceivers. My species has had many encounters where we believed we could trust them and it turned out otherwise.]
“They said they would not attack me.” I may have sounded a little aggrieved.
[‘I have come to reassure you that we will not be one of those that attack you,’ Farolan told us. The ‘we’ referred to the Elves.]
“That isn’t a lie?”
[Not to them. If we inferred that meant they would not encourage others to attack us, then in their minds we are the fools. It is the way they think.]
“Their words are a game?” It was finally beginning to make some kind of sense.
[Everything they say is like that. They will invent a deception, even where none is needed.]
I sat and thought back over what Farolan said. It helps to have an excellent memory and I have one. When I got my ideas in order I tested them out on my friend.
“All planets orbit their suns. All that stuff about hopping their worlds could be a lie. He didn’t say their worlds would be safe or that the Valhallans couldn’t find them. All he said was that they would have moved.”
Fluffy nodded. [The Dragons do not believe that the Elves possess such power.] He pushed me with his nose. [The Dragons believe the purpose of his visit was to part you from your knife. You
had just obtained it and the Elves may fear its power.]
I felt for the knife in my pocket and took it out. While very pretty and oddly attractive, I could detect nothing magical about it at all.
“I don’t think it has any power.”
[Give it to me to keep for you.]
“No!” I stood and took up a defensive posture, ready to fight my dragon to keep the knife.
[And you think it has no power?]
I forced myself to relax and returned to the chair. Fluffy was right. The knife had power over me. Power I couldn’t see with magic sight, but there nonetheless. I wondered if it could do anything else, apart from enchant me. At least Frodo’s ring made him invisible. I resisted the urge to stroke it and call it ‘my precious’. Fluffy might not get the joke and think I had lost my mind.
“Should I get rid of it?” I was sure I could if I really wanted to.
[Not if that is what the Elves want.]
“But what if it’s a double bluff?”
Fluffy shook his head. [You always over think things. Tell me about the Braton.]
Fluffy’s face lost the concentration he used when communicating with his people.
[There is already mourning across the multiverse. The Braton have let it be known that they attempted to defy the will of the creators and it has cost them half their number. There is no mention of you, but they have implicated the Elves in the catastrophe. The Elves will find it much more difficult to influence others in the future. The Braton are loved.]
“You have never mentioned them before.”
Fluffy smiled, a look that could frighten giant alligators from their swamps.
[I did not know of them until you told me. It is the nature of our knowledge.]
I rubbed my eyes. This was a day I needed to both remember and forget. If I couldn’t get some distance from the near genocide I had committed it would tear me apart, but I also needed to remember so I never did it again.
[You are distraught, Jake. You must put this behind you. It was not your fault.]
“It’s not every day you nearly wipe out a species.”
He nudged me with his nose. [Let it go, Jake. They attacked you.]
“It might have been better if they had succeeded.”
[And yet the Braton do not place the blame at your door. Instead, they thanked you for your compassion and your mercy.]
I kicked the stool across the cave.
“That only makes it worse.”
Fluffy stood. [It is time we returned to Salice.]
That confused me. “Why?”
[You need to see Esmeralda. She is the only sentient being in multiverse that can make you see sense.]
Esmeralda was still shouting at me. At least she was no longer throwing things, but that could be simply because she had run out of ammunition. I stopped listening to her ages ago, but her body language, her outrage and above all her spirit were beginning to make me smile.
“You can just take that smile off your face, Lord Wizard, or I shall get a sword and cut it off.”
The word sword impinged on my consciousness and brought me back to reality. Esmeralda was dangerously good with a sword.
“I thought you wanted me to smile?”
“Don’t try thinking either. You know where that gets you. I could tell you that if you had gone with the Valhallans then none of the Braton would be dead, but I am not the kind of wife who says I told you so.”
She wasn’t? Who knew?
“And that smirk is not the slightest bit better than the smile. Those slugs attacked you and you didn’t kill them all. They should be grateful.”
That stung. “They are,” I whispered.
“Then accept their thanks and get on with your life. I will not have you moping around the Palace feeling sorry for yourself when you need your wits about you. If somebody attacks you, you kill them first and apologize later.”
“It’s not that easy…”
“Then make it that easy. My daughter will grow up with two parents not one. How will I ever teach her how stupid men can be without you as an example?”
I raised my hands in surrender. The truth is that I was feeling much better and the weight of the Bratons’ deaths no longer pressed down on my shoulders.
Esmeralda dropped the poker I hadn’t seen her pick up and came running up to me, hugging me as if she would never let go.
“You are such a silly boy, but I love you for being who you are.”
“I’m sorry. There were just so many of them and they were so beautiful.”
She pushed me away far enough to look me in the eye. “Then honor them by staying alive for them, Jake, to make their sacrifice worthwhile.”
I knew that made no sense, but I started crying and she comforted me until I got control of myself. Then she pushed me away again.
“Now tell me exactly how many times you did it with Jenny. I want to know the positions you used because I’m sure she’s found your usual position as uncomfortable as I do.”
“You’ll kill me. I’m not up to it.”
A broad smile spread across her face. I’m not saying there was evil in it because she might kill me if I did.
“Wives are allowed to exhaust their husbands like that. It’s in the contract.”
It didn’t quite kill me, but I may need to put it in bandages and buy it a splint.
19. Small Gifts
The girl at the checkout was giving me strange looks as I piled the packets of bacon, butter, boxes of eggs, packs of sausages, cans of baked bean, packets of mushrooms, packets of tomatoes and many loafs of bread into the trolley. I hoped I’d got the maths right as I’d raided my savings sock and this was all the money I had.
“Do you have a card?” she asked brightly. “Are you having a group breakfast somewhere?”
I counted my money and was relieved to find I had enough.
“Here you are. Visiting relatives.”
She gave me a sympathetic look. “I hate it when they come without warning. I hope you have someone to help you cook it all.”
I thought of the waiting servants back in the Palace and grinned. “One or two. We’ll be fine.”
Waving goodbye to the checkout girl I pushed the packed trolley towards the car park. There was a brick wall just outside the door and I hopped the trolley to Salice as soon as I was out of sight.
“Get it off the trolley. You’re having an English Breakfast this morning.”
Willing hands emptied the trolley, though there were baffled looks as the servants’ encountered vacuum packed bacon and plastic wrapped bread for the first time.
“You need to cut the bacon out of it,” I explained to the girl with the pack in her hand. “I’ll be back to show you how in a minute.” I hopped the trolley back to Wales and collected my pound deposit from its lock.
The people of Salice are naturally quick on the uptake and it took only a couple of minutes to unwrap everything, explain about cans, how to heat beans, and get everything frying nicely. I hopped to Esmeralda’s bedroom to find her getting dressed. She smiled at me, looking happier than I’d seen her in months.
“My Lord Wizard has returned for his seventh?”
My hands moved instinctively to protect my groin. It had been a turbulent and exhausting night.
“Only for breakfast. I have brought you exotic food from Wales.”
She looked puzzled, so I explained. “With food so scarce here I felt guilty about having breakfast with you, so I raided my savings and bought enough for us and a few others. The servants are preparing it right now.”
Esmeralda looked embarrassed. Something she doesn’t do very often.
“Then we shall dine on your beneficence. I’m so glad you are staying for a while.”
“You might not be so happy if more of my enemies turn up.”
Esmeralda dismissed that idea with a wave of her hand. The truth was that I was still feeling fragile over the Braton. When I was with Esmeralda I could push those thoughts down. S
he was a hard lady when it came to protecting her kingdom and the people in it and I was part of that protection. When she called me Lord Wizard she was reminding me of the importance of my role here and it felt good.
“Then let us go to the dining room and sample your strange exotic food.”
The King and Queen along with a sampling of noblemen and women had already gathered in the dining room. Word must have spread quickly because they rarely gathered at the same time. Most of the food they already knew, hens, pigs and mushrooms were common to Salice and Earth as were the grains. Despite this, there were big differences. I had brought smoked bacon, which they’d never encountered, and our Welsh sausages were new to them. Baked beans and tomato sauce, not to mention tomatoes, were completely unknown.
The thing that most delighted them most was sliced bread. Bread in Salice was hard and grit from the grinding wheels gave it a dangerous edge as you could lose a tooth if you didn’t check for hard bits first. The chef had fried some of the bread (according to my instructions), toasted some and left a third untouched. The untouched bread was going down a storm as it was so soft.
“I see you all live like kings in Wales,” Queen Janti said. “You must bring back the recipe for this bread so we might make it here.”
“You realize you are making me break my wow to lose weight, Jake,” the King said and winked at me.
“Did the Valhallans go home?” their absence having struck me.
“Immediately after you hopped out of the meeting,” the Queen said as she took another slice of bread. “They were angry. I doubt they are used to being refused.”
A flicker of a smile crossed Esmeralda’s face. “It shall give me great pleasure to refuse them often in the years to come.”
“My Lord Wizard,” said a familiar voice. I turned to find Urda and Anna behind my chair. Anna was looking at the food avariciously and I remembered she was familiar with an English Breakfast as she’d spent time in Wales. “We must talk.”
“Let Anna get some breakfast while we talk.” I got up and motioned Anna to use my chair. She grinned and rushed to get a plate.