"It's income, Magda." I wave my clipboard at the surrounding opulence. "The state deserves its share under the law."
"Bull-squat, Oleo." Gunza chortles and strokes his braided red mustache. "Let the state get its own genie."
"Yes, fine idea." I walk around the room, taking notes on the clipboard. "We could get one the way you did. Force an old lady at gunpoint to use up her three wishes on nothing and hand over the lamp."
Gunza's grin darkens. "Hey now, Oleo. That was a straight-up gift, and no one can prove otherwise."
"Almost no one." I shoot a look at Magda, and she turns away.
Gunza shrugs. "If a door closes, open a window. The department passed me over for a promotion--which you got--but Mrs. Sandusky thought I deserved an even greater reward. She wished for me to have it."
The walls are made of alternating gold and platinum ingots, which I note on my clipboard. "Well, I wish you'd paid your taxes." I write more on the clipboard. "If I were you, I'd wish you don't have a coronary when you see the grand total you owe the state."
"I don't owe one cent!" Gunza releases Magda and storms over to grab my clipboard.
I snatch it right back. "You lazy prick. How hard could it be to pay your taxes? You already wished for unlimited wishes, didn't you?"
Gunza smirks. "That was my first wish."
"Why not wish for her to pay your taxes?" I point my pen at Magda.
"Because I don't choose to." Gunza's features twist into a scowl. "Because I am the master."
I shake my head in disgust. "You're just like all the rest. All the other scum you used to help me bust."
Gunza gazes into my eyes for a long moment, nodding slowly. "Run," he says finally.
I know where this is going. I knew from the moment I walked into the place.
"I wish..." says Gunza.
I swing the clipboard at his head, but he knocks it away with one thick forearm.
Before I can take another swing, he finishes his sentence. "I wish that a hunting party of madmen and monsters will hunt down Oliver Singel, then torture and mutilate him for as long as I wish...and not kill him, no matter how much he begs for it."
Magda's eyes meet mine. They well with regret and resignation.
I reach out to her. "Magda, please! Don't do it! I'm here to help you!"
Gunza giggles and smacks me on the back. "He's a liar! He's just here for his precious revenooo!"
"I'm sorry." Magda weaves her arms in the air, and a cloud of twinkling glitter swirls above her. "I have no choice but to obey my master."
"Wrong!" Even as the misshapen forms materialize before me, I keep trying. "I can help you! Tell me what you want!"
Magda hesitates, and the figures flicker. Gunza stomps over and smacks her across the face.
"Do your job!" he says. "Obey me!" He strikes her again.
Magda closes her eyes. Her nimble fingers finish their dance in the air, and the hulking forms solidify.
"Run, rabbit!" Gunza howls with laughter. "Don't let 'em catch you!"
With one last look at Magda, I turn and sprint off into the depths of the mansion.
*****
The hunters are silent. No shrieking laughter, no ululating howls, no clattering weapons and footsteps. I can barely hear them back there at all--just whispers and the rustling of wings and rags.
The quiet makes it all the worse as I run.
Heart hammering in my chest, I race to the end of the corridor and burst through the oak double doors there. Beyond the doors, I find myself in a vast arboretum, teeming with tropical trees and flowers.
Without stopping, I draw my cell phone and send a text message to my partner. At least I had the sense to post him elsewhere in case I needed backup.
Now, if only Gunza didn't think to wish for Magda to block outgoing phone signals.
As I pocket the phone, I hear brush shuddering behind me. Ducking off the gold-bricked path, I bolt through the thick foliage, crossing the room away from my original trajectory.
Suddenly, a feverish ghoul explodes from the shrubbery ahead of me, swinging a machete. I fall back, barely escaping the blade...and nearly end up skewered on the point of a bayonet brandished by a leering soldier.
Twisting out of the way, I leap off into the cover as both of them slash and stab at me. I rush straight through the deep green jungle, panting for breath in the steamy air--and surge out of the vegetation in front of another set of double doors.
Plunging through the doors, I find myself in a maze. Through its frosted glass walls, I glimpse shadowy figures moving around me...but I have to go onward. I hear noise from the other side of the doors, so I can't go back to the arboretum.
I move as quickly and quietly as I can, though it doesn't matter. The enemy can see me as well as I see them through the frosted glass.
I zip around a corner, then another and another, always choosing right at the branches. Turning again, I spot a blurred figure on the other side of the translucent wall...and he spots me. He changes direction and follows me down the passage, keeping pace in a humpbacked trot, separated from me only by a few inches of glass.
Luckily, the next time I reach a branch, he hits a dead end. He howls, caught in a corner, as I dart down another passage, hoping for an exit.
I find one--a gleaming golden door inlaid with multicolored gems--but just as I charge forward, it crashes open, revealing a towering maniac.
He stands seven feet tall, at least, and his
double-jointed limbs are like sticks. He's naked except for a leather loincloth, and his skin is reddish-brown like an almond.
His eyes and mouth gape wide as he scrambles toward me, drooling and whooping.
Suddenly, before I can do anything, he slows in
mid-step. His movements stretch out as if he were the star of a slow-motion movie, and his whoops extend to one
drawn-out tone.
I jump when I hear the normal-speed voice of Magda behind me. "That was one of my masters, two hundred and fifty years ago. Shall I tell you how he beat me?"
Looking around, I see another predator creeping from the maze in slow-mo. This one, muscular, blond and
bushy-bearded, wears the horned helmet of a Viking.
"Were these your masters through the ages?" I say.
She nods. "As you die, you will know what I've been through."
Stepping toward the tall one, I gingerly touch his reddish-brown knuckles. "How can you be doing this? Disobeying Rudy?"
"I'm obeying him," says Magda. "I'm slowing things down, but you will still be hunted and tortured."
"Why talk to me at all then?"
Magda cocks her head and frowns. "What did you mean when you said you could help me?"
"I meant what I said," I tell her. "All you have to do is tell me what you want. Just ask for it."
She narrows her eyes. "I know what this is about now. You want me for yourself, don't you?"
"No." I shake my head. "I want to save you."
"You're not the first to say that." Magda snorts and folds her arms over her blue satin bodice. "Somehow, saving me always ends with hurting me."
"Not this time." I spread my arms wide. "I swear, I'm here to help you."
"You want my help collecting Rudy's taxes," says Magda. "For all the riches I've given him."
"Actually," I say, "you're the only reason I'm here."
Magda stares, her expression split between confusion and disbelief.
"This time, I'm not as concerned about tax evasion," I say, "as I am about slavery and abuse."
She looks like she's thinking hard...and then her stare becomes an angry glare. "Liar. You're a liar, just like all men."
"I'm telling you, I came here only to save you."
"Liar!" She lifts her hands overhead to weave and conjure, and I see the tall man start to move faster. "You better run, liar!"
Without another word, I dash around the tall man, heave open the door, and race into the hallway. I can tell she's run out
of patience, at least for now. I can tell she doesn't believe me.
Even though I told her the absolute truth.
I don't care about the mystic taxes. This time, I came only for her.
*****
As I run down the hall, I open every door...but I'm not looking for a way out. I'm looking for something else.
A lamp. Her lamp.
Now that I'm on the inside of Gunza's mansion, I'm determined to find it. I'm going to end this perverted jerk's most heinous crime: genie abuse. The bastard's a djinnophile.
Here's how it works. The genie must obey her master. The genie has magical powers that can heal any wound, repair any damage. Even to herself.
What better scenario can there be for a twisted sicko who likes to hurt women? He can brutalize her any way he likes, then wish away the damage, removing any sign of the crime, expunging any guilt...and leaving a clean slate for the next round of abuse.
That's what makes it especially evil. The genie becomes an accomplice to her own abuse. She literally has no choice.
And it goes on and on and on like that, again and again and again. Forever, if he wishes eternal life for himself.
So it's no wonder Magda doesn't trust me...but she should. There's much more to me than meets the eye.
For one thing, I'm state police now, not Department of Mystic Revenue. I work for the Paranormal Victims Unit.
For another thing, I'm someone altogether different than any of that or anything Gunza could ever guess.
But Magda could figure it out. At least I hope she does before it's too late.
*****
I'm hustling through the gymnasium when they catch me. Two of the ghoulish thugs burst in through the far door from outside the mansion, and another drops down from the ceiling on a rope.
The one from the rope has dark skin and a tribal headdress of tattered fur and feathers. One of the other two has silver hair and wears a tuxedo, and the last one bulges with muscles and pads under a football player's uniform. More echoes of Magda's former masters.
As they surround me, I look for the best escape route. My eyes keep flicking to the open door to the outside, where my partner waits. If my text message got through to him, he could come charging through that door at any second, guns blazing.
Just as I have that thought, he pops up in front of me out of thin air. He's standing, and at first I think he's still alive...but then he literally falls to pieces--arms and legs and head and torso tumbling to the floor.
I hear Gunza laughing, and I turn to see him floating in midair on a scarlet magic carpet. As he claps, Magda slumps beside him, utterly joyless.
Like I said, she becomes an accomplice. She literally has no choice.
At least she takes no pleasure in it. That's what makes her worth saving.
She has yet to hand over her soul.
"Bravo!" says Gunza. "Bravissimo! You should've seen the look on your face, Oleo!"
I keep my eyes fixed on him, partly so I won't have to look at my partner's body parts oozing blood at my feet.
Gunza elbows Magda hard in the side. "You're getting all this on tape or a crystal ball or whatever, right? So I can watch it again and again?"
Magda nods. "Yes, Master."
I hate seeing her like that. A woman with so much power, a woman who literally could do anything...reduced to groveling and harming the very people who could set her free.
Unless I can get through to her. "I can help you, Magda."
Her eyes flick toward me.
"Tell me what you want," I say. "Ask me for it."
I hold her gaze for a moment before she looks away. She's still not ready.
That's the root of the problem here. A genie, acting always to serve others, knows nothing of selfishness...but she must ask for something for herself to become free.
The key stands in front of her, but it's useless if she won't pick it up and turn it in the lock.
*****
I wait for Gunza to become bored with my screams, but it takes a very long time.
He hovers above on his magic carpet as the echoes of Magda's demented masters torture me. They do it right there in the gymnasium, on a weight bench, using trays of knives and needles and power tools wished up by Gunza.
As the ghouls work me over, I wonder if they are improvising...or if every terrible step is drawn from Magda's memory. The pain is indescribable, unbearable, catastrophic. Each application of blade or pliers or drill bit plunges me into uncharted depths of agony.
Did they do the same to her? Did they twist and pull and crush and cut, sometimes all at once? Did they laugh as they tuned her screams by grinding harder, digging deeper, winding tighter?
Did they cut off bits of her? Did they taunt her as they excavated organs? Did they push her to the brink of death again and again...holding her alive with wishes as they ruined her in every possible way?
And then, did they wish her back to wholeness, repairing every damage...only to start all over again?
The way they do with me?
If so, my sympathy for her increases a trillionfold. More even than that.
Because this is hell. Sheer hell, as the devil himself might design it.
And I wonder, between strokes of the knife and blows of the hammer, how it is that Magda has not gone irretrievably mad.
*****
Finally, after what seems to me like a dozen years, Gunza does grow bored. Tired is more like it. His eyes start drifting shut, and instead of wishing himself wide awake, he floats off to bed.
Lying on his belly on the magic carpet, he winks and waggles his fingers at me. "Back soon, dear." His braided red mustache jumps as he chuckles. "Don't miss me too much."
At this point, I'm in excruciating agony on the bench. This is the sixth time I've been horrifically mutilated and left at the brink of death.
My limbs have all been disconnected and reattached in the wrong places. The ghouls wear my organs on leather thongs around their necks. Only wishes are keeping me alive.
Gunza gives Magda a shove off the carpet, and she thuds to the floor. "I wish you would put Oliver back together, good as new, and get him rested up for our next session." After he says it, he rolls over on his back, crosses his hands behind his head, and floats out the door, yawning and snickering.
When he's gone, Magda struggles to her feet. She weaves mystic sigils overhead, and the torture squad of monstrous masters past disappears in a shower of golden glitter.
Standing over me, she gazes down at the damage...then looks away. Turning her back, she weaves more patterns in the air with her agile, flickering fingers.
I feel a familiar tingling. Gold dust twinkles around me, and I hear a fluttering trill like the song of a tiny tropical bird.
Reality stops and shifts like a jump-cut in a movie. There is an instant of nonexistence, disconnection from senses and self-awareness...and then I am whole once more.
My body is intact. My wounds are closed, my organs and limbs back in the right places. For the seventh time today, she has put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
Except for the memories, it is as if none of it ever happened. This is how it must be for her, every time Gunza tears her apart and wishes her restored once more.
I wonder how many times a day she must do it. How many times she has done it since he took control of her.
How many times since her birth or creation.
She turns to face me again, fingers still weaving. The weight bench becomes a bed, the gymnasium a bedroom draped in white satin, aglow in moonlight.
Small figures materialize around me--winged children, robed in white. Some are toddlers, some older, some younger. Some are infants.
They push pillows behind my head and tuck blankets around me. They dab my forehead with a cool compress and wrap warm towels around my arms.
They raise a glass of water to my lips, and I drink. They feed me bread and hot broth from a silver tray. They sing softly as they work--dozens of them, all watchi
ng me solemnly, eyes glowing like little silver moons in their dark and pale faces.
"Who are they?" As I ask the question, an infant hands me a little cake.
Magda watches from the foot of the bed. "My angels," she says. "My babies."
Gazing around me in wonder, I begin to understand. "Your children? All of them?"
Magda nods. "They are my only comforts in this world."
I accept another spoonful of soup from a dark-haired little boy. "You made them."
"With my masters, as any woman would." Magda bows her head. "And unmade them, as my masters wished."
"My God." I shiver as I feel their moonlight eyes upon me--the eyes of dozens of dead children, recreated from the dust of graves and residue of tears.
Every last one of them, dead. Murdered by magic at whatever age they most displeased their mother's masters. Their fathers.
Gone now, as if they had never been. As if they had never been forced into or out of existence. Living on only in her memory.
Resurrected only to comfort her in moments of greatest pain and despair.
Tears roll down her face, and she wipes them away. "I'm sorry," she says. "Sorry for everything."
If only I could break her free from this unending cycle of woe. If only I could cut the magic ties that bind her to her heartless monster of a master.
If only there was some way to move her to ask for what she needs. What I can provide.
Maybe there is.
I glimpse it for a split-second. A look of sharper sorrow on her face. A sudden sinking. Fear and panic and rage and longing all at once, like fruit on a tree.
She touches her belly, and I know. She pulls her hand away instantly, but it's too late.
I finally know.
I know how to save her.
*****
"Very good!" Gunza claps from his royal box in the crowded stands of the coliseum. "Not perfect, but that comes with practice! You've just committed your first murder, Oleo!"
The bloody knife slips from my fingers and lands in the sand at my feet. My arms are soaked in blood up to the elbows. My white t-shirt and pants have gone crimson from sleeve to cuff.
I know what I've just done. I know that I had no control over it, that I was at the mercy of a compelling wish.
But it doesn't really matter. I still remember every detail. I remember killing the innocent woman wished up from somewhere in the world outside...killing her as the crowd around me cheered and stomped and showered me with roses.
6 Fantasy Stories Page 8