Those eyes, so intense. I almost lost myself in her pained stare.
“Maybe I can help you . . .” She whispered, and flew up towards the firebird. But before I could ask what she was planning to do, Zax came back. He had a nasty grin on his face.
“You just don’t get it, do you, Greg Meridian,” Zax said, as he flipped through my wallet. “Ah, here’s your magical dick license. Nice. Thought you could bust me, huh?”
He tossed my wallet at my shackled feet. I glared up at him.
“You messed with the wrong guy, dick. You have no idea how powerful I am.” He knelt down in front of me and took my chin in his oily hands. I spat in his face. He snarled and wiped the spittle away, but let out a dark smirk in return.
“You think you’re a hero, don’t you? Like you can save these poor creatures from the big bad Zax. Well, I got news for you pal, magic is only good for one thing . . .”
He reached behind him and grabbed a bubbling vial, filled to the brim with liquid pain. I knew that spell he concocted. It was Enervate. I was screwed.
“. . . power.” It was like watching the warden come to deliver you to the electric chair. I didn’t see it, but I felt something land in my hand. It was soft and warm, like a picnic blanket left baking in the sun all day. I squeezed it hard as Zax forced my mouth open.
And that was that.
I’m dying of Enervate and the only thing that’s keeping me going is this feather.
Mr. Xang rested his chin on his folded hands as he was listening to my tale. I hoped it made the impression I was after. Having these guys as allies would sure help, even if they were criminals.
“How did you know to come to us?” he asked.
I watched an elf woman in a green cheongsam enter the room. She had a tray of tea that she placed on Mr. Xang’s desk. She poured him a cup of tea, then left without a single syllable uttered. I watched him sip his tea before I replied.
“I didn’t. I had a hunch. You see, I know a little bit about most magical creatures. I have to in my line of work. What I know about phoenixes is that they are life spirits, and they come from many places, including China. In China, they are revered as symbols of the empress. And this firebird, she looked special. I noticed she wore a necklace with a royal crest on it. Nothing I’ve seen in the Western world as far as crests go. So I let my hunch find you. My guess is you’ve been looking for it for a while.”
Mr. Xang put the tea cup down and grinned. It was the first sign of genuine emotion I saw on that hard face, “You are good, Mr. Meridian. I respect a human with good eyes.”
“Thank you.” I was hoping with a comment like that, maybe we were becoming friends. Or at the very least, Mr. Xang wasn’t going to kill me.
“I will let you work with us,” He said, and I wanted to roll my eyes at him. Yeah, let me work with you, now that I’ve done most of the work for you. Typical mob bosses. “Mai Ling, you will go with Mr. Meridian to this Mr. Zax.”
That’s when she stepped out of the shadows, moving like a leopard on the prowl. She had her hair in an elegant bun, her midnight black locks pinned to her head with a snazzy dragon hair dressing. Her cheongsam was crimson and flowing, with fiery phoenix feathers decked in gold along the sleeves and neckline.
“She is the ambassador of the Empress,” Mr. Xang said, putting my curiosity to rest. “She is the guardian of the Fenghuang.”
She bowed a greeting to me. I would have bowed back, but my body was still very weak. The feather only did so much.
“Lead me to her,” Mai Ling said, and I felt the skin shudder down my back. Her voice rang of raw power. It washed over me in waves, and gave me a little more of my lost strength back.
We were shuffled into a beautiful Morris Cowley Bull-nose, a boiler that was made just this year. The driver opened the doors for us, letting the lady slide in first. Now this was high class.
When we got there, I warned her about his powers. She flicked her long lashes at me, making my pulse race, “Follow behind me. I don’t want anything else to happen to you.”
I chuckled. What a doll! But I’m no wussy man. And she was an ambassador! I was responsible for what could happen to her.
“Don’t worry about me, Miss Ling,” I said, trying not to wince even though I was in terrible pain, “I can’t let anything happen to you. If I survive this mess, I’d be walking into another with your death on my head.”
She smiled at me in a way that made my head swim. Dames. One of my greatest weaknesses. I bet she thought I was being cute.
I pulled out my old bean-shooter and waved the dame behind me. I don’t know what I was thinking. How was I going to get back in with all those bolts and magical seals he had on the door?
But that’s when the broad behind me showed her stuff. She walked right up to the door, and placed her hand on the rusty steel frame. She slid it up and down, touching as much of the surface as she could. When she found what she was looking for she said, “Dust out!”
So I did as she told me. I backed off a few paces until I felt I was a safe distance away. I knew elves have magic of their own, but I didn’t know a thing about what it could do. Everywhere Mai Ling touched was glinting a hot white color. She stepped away herself, and joined me on the other side of the street.
“Ready?” She said with a grin. That’s when I noticed she had two pointed canines.
BOOM! The door blew right off its hinges, and all Mai had to do was snap her fingers.
Of course, this brought the weasel out of hiding. The fella was yelling and screaming, waving his arms around. He looked like a puppet.
Mai Ling took one look at Zax, and that’s when she got sore. That pointed smile changed into full-on snarling jaws of sharp teeth. She changed from a pretty little china doll, into . . . well . . . a dragon.
I had never seen one in person. Seen plenty of pictures and explanations of them, though, so I knew they could fly, spit fire, and wield some of the most powerful magics going. But I didn’t know they could shape change into dazzling babes.
She sure scared the bejesus out of old Zax. He trembled at her appearance, and I don’t blame him. She wasn’t even sore with me and I was intimidated by her sheer raw power. Her scales glistened with it. Her eyes burned like shooting stars.
She opened her massive mouth and a flaming explosion spat back at Zax. I took my fedora off and covered my face with it, but it didn’t stop the smell of charred flesh from burning my nostrils. Something to remember: always have dragons on your side.
When I moved my hat to put it back on my head, she was a beautiful gal again, smoothing out the wrinkles in her china doll dress. She adjusted the hair pin and turned to look at me, her eyes sparkling but soft.
“That . . . will be our little secret,” she said. Like a stunned bunny, I nodded and let her saunter into the building. She started to dispel all the magic keeping the animals locked up. Many of the creatures thanked her as they escaped. When we got to the beaded curtain, she snarled and dispelled that too. The beads melted into raindrops of color at her feet, and I made sure to carefully step over the goo puddles, so not to get any on my new loafers.
But when we got the bird, it was too late. The fairy was weeping, trying to scoop up the ash in her little hands.
There goes my chance at lifting this spell.
I sighed and leaned against a clean wall feeling beaten. The feather was keeping me going, but its power was waning. I’d be dead in a few hours.
“I’m sorry, kid,” I said to the fairy grandmother. I know it’s silly to call an old lady kid, but I wasn’t thinking straight.
Mai Ling began collecting the dust reverently. She put it into a sack she pulled off the floor. The fairy started to hassle her, but Mai gave her a kind look. It was enough to show the fairy she was here to help.
“Greg . . . you brought a dragon here?” the fairy said. Things were looking kind of blurry right now, but I managed a nod.
“Yeah . . . she . . .”
I fell to my
knees, and I heard a crack as I did so. Someone called my name but I couldn’t tell whose voice it was. I swear, before I passed out, I saw flames explode in the sack Mai was holding.
Ashes to ashes . . .
I woke on a rickety old bed, with a spring poking at my spine. But other than being uncomfortable, I was fine. Better than fine, in fact, I felt sharp. Even my lungs were feeling strong, like before I started smoking.
I sat up and Mai Ling greeted me with a smile and gently coaxed me back down. “You need your rest,” she said, smiling, but I didn’t get a peek at those fangs this time.
“What happened?” I asked, looking around. The fairy was on the end of my foot, smiling so wide it filled her whole face. I was also pleasantly surprised to find the phoenix perched on the night table beside me. And boy did she look swanky. All her beautiful feathers had come back, with rippling fire under the wings. And somehow, she looked younger. Like a thousand years younger.
She smiled at me and bowed, opening her wings.
“She is thanking you, Mr. Meridian,” Mai said, still smirking at me, “You risked your life to save her, so she gave me some of her tears to heal you.”
I chuckled and nodded my thanks to the bird. This time when I met her lava gaze, I saw only joy inside that stare. And it made my day.
“Doll, you can call me Greg,” I said to Mai. “You’ve earned it.”
The beautiful grin on her face only grew wider as she looked down at me. She even brushed my shaggy blue streak away from my eyes, “OK Greg, I think you also owe me a night on the town. I would like to go to the Green Papaya.”
Was she asking me out? Not that I was complaining. Then again, she was a dragon, and used to getting her way. And was I going to turn down a dragon? You got to be kidding me.
“I’d be honored, babe,” I said, knowing full well my grin was splattered like red paint across my face, “But I need to take Miss Fairy home first.”
She nodded, “I have to bring the Fenghuang back to Mr. Xang. He will take care of her until we can return to China.”
That was one dame I’d never forget. And sometimes, I still miss her. But it’s not like I have the dough to get my sorry self to China anytime soon. And besides, she may have had a good time with me, but she was way out of my league.
But still, I’ll never forget her, or that case. And when I really miss her, I pull out the phoenix feather and feel its heat.
THE AGE AHEAD
What lies ahead? We can only speculate. Science and technology have opened up new vistas of wonder, but the simple tenets of faith in the unknowable and belief that there are always mysteries behind every answer may be enough to allow the magical and fantastical to continue on . . . into the future.
Mars Bound
K. J. Gould
No one knew what would happen to an elf who left earth.
Sheela was about to find out.
Remembering the argument with her father was not the most auspicious way to start her 40-million-mile journey, but it was what Sheela thought of as the countdown approached zero.
“It will end badly,” he had intoned.
“Is that a prophecy or a curse?” Sheela had snapped back, stung by his refusal to share her joy at being chosen for the mission.
“Neither,” he’d replied, “but it always ends badly when elves involve themselves in the affairs of men.”
Sheela shrugged off the memory. Really, what else had she expected him to say? His faction had been against elves revealing their presence to humans in the first place, years before Sheela had been born. She’d thought he had come to terms with it, watching her grow up with human friends and human interests. If his old separatist attitudes still lurked beneath the surface, there was nothing she could do about it. Besides, she’d made up with him before she’d left.
“Please understand, Father,” she’d pleaded. “I must go.”
He had hesitated only a moment before nodding. How could he not understand? The human space program, especially Mars, was all she’d talked about as a child. Of course, he’d teased her about it, making a great show of checking her ears to see if the tips were pointed. “Are you sure you’re an elf?” he’d ask, while she giggled at his silliness.
She’d tried to lighten his mood by promising to come straight home when she got back, and tell him all about her Martian adventure . . . yes, every single detail, no matter how small. “It’ll probably take weeks,” she’d added with a mischievous grin.
He’d laughed, then, gathered her into a hug, and tickled the tips of her ears. “Just checking,” he’d murmured, before he turned away—but not fast enough that she’d missed the fear haunting his liquid-silver eyes.
Left unsaid was the reason for his fear: Elves were creatures of magic, and the source of that magic was earth. No elf had ever left earth, nor wanted to. Some of the older Loremasters thought that she would die, and she suspected that her father was among that number. Sheela threw in her lot with those who thought that she would merely become mortal, like humans. She had always thought the older elves were too dependent on magic anyway. They didn’t know how to live without it, and therefore didn’t believe it was possible. But she did—growing up with human friends had taught her that she didn’t need magic to do most of the things she’d wanted to do.
Even so, during the training, she’d been surprised to discover how often she called on magic without thinking. She was just as bad as the older elves when it came to small things. Need a tool on the other side of the room? Reach for it, and the magic would place it in your hand. Have to catch something when both hands were busy? Tell the magic to do it. She’d learned to control those impulses in the year since she’d been accepted for the training. Mostly.
The rumble of the engines turned into a roar. Earth clutched at her, no more willing to let her go than her father had been. The g-forces pressing her into the couch masked the draining away of the magic . . . at first. By the time the shuttle reached the Christa McAuliffe, waiting in orbit, there was a curiously debilitating void in her senses where magic used to be. She cast about for an analogy . . . maybe like an old sailor, staggering about on land as his muscles betrayed him by making the constant, unconscious adjustments so necessary on the rolling deck of a ship. No, she rejected the comparison, not quite. Magic was more than an impersonal force of nature, like the sea. It had a presence. Less than a consciousness, but . . . an awareness that responded to the wielder.
Loremasters disagreed about that, too. Some of them thought that magic itself was aware, others thought that the “presence” was just the remnant of elves who had dissolved into the magic. To Sheela, it didn’t matter anyway. Magic was what it was.
By the time the crew had gone through their preflight checks, Sheela had almost gotten used to the absence of magic. She couldn’t get over how bland everybody looked, though. She’d never really been conscious of the fact that she saw people with magic as well as with her eyes. It was just another of the elements that made up how a person looked, like the color of their hair or their height. Now she realized that the magic gathered around elves and some humans had always made them seem more there to her, more solid, more real. Her best friend in the crew, Cameron Saunders, in particular, had been among those ‘solid’ humans. It was disturbing to see him looking like everybody else.
The entire crew gathered in the Hab One wardroom for the send-off ’cast. When they finished here, the attitude thrusters would fire to orient them for Mars, then the big fusion engines would shove them out of Earth’s orbit, accelerating halfway to Mars, then decelerating the rest of the way. At least then they’d have gravity, even if it was only one-third of earth-normal, and her stomach would settle down. She hoped.
Sheela wormed her way through the crowd to Cam. It wasn’t easy. Cam was the poster boy for tall, dark, and handsome and most of the female crew members vied for his attention. But she used her elbows, and the purchase offered by her Velcro booties, to good effect, and made it in time to tal
k to him before the ’cast started. Keeping an eye on Mission Commander Levitt, she leaned toward him and asked, “Do you feel different?”
“Well, of course,” he answered. “We’re weightless.”
“No, I mean . . .” she hesitated. She’d tried to talk with Cam about magic during the training. He’d insisted he couldn’t see it, couldn’t feel it, and didn’t want to talk about it, so she’d dropped it. But she wondered if its absence had affected him. “There’s no magic here,” she said finally. “I was wondering if you’d noticed any difference.”
“Hmm. Well, I do feel a bit odd, but that’s just the weightlessness.” He looked at her and added, “But, you know, you look a little strange. And . . .” He paused for a thoughtful moment, “it’s interesting that . . .” Levitt gave the “quiet” sign, and Cam stopped, then whispered, “later,” out of the side of his mouth.
Levitt made his little speech about this colony effort being a new chapter in human—and elven, he added belatedly, nodding at Sheela—history, threw in some “next frontier” stuff, and finished up with thanks for all the nations who had contributed funds and personnel. Pretty boilerplate, in Sheela’s estimation. Well, there probably weren’t many people watching anyway, so what did it matter? This was the Christa’s third trip to Mars. The public’s attention was all wrapped up in the colony ship being built in orbit.
She waved with the others when Mission Commander Levitt said goodbye, then headed for her bunk, along with the rest of the non-flight crew, to get strapped in for maneuvers. She and Cam were both assigned to Hab Two quarters, so they had a chance to talk on the way.
“What’s interesting?” Sheela asked, without preamble, as they floated into the Hab One core.
“Huh? Oh, well . . . hard to explain.” He handed her through the hatch to the tube that connected the cores of the two habs. Cam pulled himself through the hatch, and they shoved off together to float down the tube before he continued. “Have to back up a bit, I guess. I was remembering what you’d said about why you couldn’t do magic tricks, and . . . well, you know I’m handy with machines.”
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