Grandmaster

by Molly Cochran

  She raised her arms, and a wall of flame rose up in the pit, encircling the terrified men. "Kill him or die in the flames of my anger!"

  As the men watched, still unable to comprehend the powerful magic they had just witnessed, the luminous vision of Varja the goddess disappeared. In its place was blackness and emptiness—a closed metal door. She had never been. Yet the flames were real.

  The men shouted, running wildly to put out the fire, but it surrounded them. One of them approached Justin, pulling a long-bladed knife out of his waist wrap. He spoke a bastard version of Hindi. "You have done this to us!” he shrieked.

  Another followed him, also unsheathing his knife. "Kill him," he said. "The goddess will put out the fire when he is dead."

  "She cares nothing for you," Justin said. "You are merely a horde of murdering beasts, and death by fire is too good for you."

  "Kill him!"

  "You will not kill me as easily as you killed the helpless women on the steppes. You." He pointed at the leader. "Fight me."

  The man's dirty face broke into a grin. "I'll fight you. And I'll kill you, too.”

  "Try," Justin said.

  The leader jabbed, long and quick. Just before the knife touched Justin, he kicked the blade out of the man's hand, caught it, and in the same motion slit open the man's throat.

  "For the women you butchered," he said.

  He took the second man by the arm, broke it behind the man's back, and threw him into the flames.

  A third bludgeoned him from behind. Justin felt the club a moment before it struck, and flattened himself on the floor to escape the blow. It was a mistake. In his prone position, the men were on him in a swarm. A dirty heel ground into his hand, tearing off the burned skin. Beneath it, Justin's raw flesh lay exposed and bleeding.

  As he tried to get up, another of the black-painted men kicked him. A third doubled his fists together and slammed Justin on the side of the head. Two strong arms grabbed him from behind and lifted him to his feet. As Justin opened his eyes, he saw the tallest of the mob, a giant more than seven feet in height, come at him with a knife glistening in his sweat-shiny hand.

  He lunged for Justin's heart. Justin wriggled free, but not in time to miss the sharp point of the blade. It struck deep in his side, ripping open his flesh in a spurt of blood. Justin moaned. He slumped in the first man's arms as the tall man stood back, watching.

  Justin lay still. His breathing ebbed and finally stopped. The old voices called to him again in the darkening recesses of his consciousness. Come back, Justin. Come back, hide with your fears and weakness...

  The tall man, gasping for breath in the airless pit, raised his arms and shouted above the din of the men: "Varja! Our goddess and protectress, we have done your bidding. The one you call your enemy is dead. Stop your fire of wrath. Permit your servants to live."

  There was no answer. The black metal door remained closed.

  The man holding Justin threw his limp body to the dirt floor. "Cut him to pieces," he hissed. "Let nothing of him remain. Then will the goddess be satisfied."

  Come back to us, the voices called, where it is safe and warm and forgetting. This life is too hard. Come back now, and when you die, there will be no more pain, no more suffering. Allow yourself to find some comfort, some peace, some rest...

  But then another voice spoke, jarring and uncomfortable. It was Tagore's voice, as clear as if the old man were himself present. Whereas Varja manifested her power in resplendent light, Tagore's voice came from a pure void. But Varja's light was centered around the bottomless darkness of her third eye. The darkness of Tagore's presence was focused around a pinpoint of shimmering light. Justin's mind followed the light in the darkness, willing himself nearer Tagore.

  "I hear you, teacher," he whispered.

  Who are you?

  "I am no one. I am nothing."

  Do you fear death?

  "No, master. I welcome it."

  But you fear life.

  "I... I cannot live. Varja's magic is too strong."

  Then you believe in magic?

  "I believe in all things now, my teacher. All is possible."

  What is karma?

  "A circle, master."

  Past and present...

  "The same."

  Yin and yang, good and evil, light and darkness...

  "The same."

  Life and death?

  The light was very close now.

  "The same, my teacher."

  Justin was bathed in light. But it was not Varja's blinding, fearful light of destruction. It was, instead, the light of the sun reflected on a rippling lake, and the cloudless sky of summer, and the sparkle in the eyes of an infant. And into this light came Tagore, again living and whole, his arms outstretched to Justin.

  Come to me now, Patanjali, and embrace life. For now are you truly the Wearer of the Blue Hat, the bearer of light in the darkness. If you do not fear death, then you cannot fear life. Go forth and do what you must. For life.

  Justin walked into Tagore's arms. The old man's spirit suffused him with a calm power, pure and perfect. For a moment, Justin felt as if he were not made of flesh at all, but solid energy. He opened his eyes.

  His own blood was everywhere. The tall man was withdrawing his dagger from Justin's chest.

  "He's still alive!" one of the men cried.

  "Surely this is no mortal."

  "Try again. You have missed his heart."

  The tall man lunged.

  If you do not fear death, then you cannot fear life.

  Uncoiling, Justin sprang upward, knocking the knife out of the man's hand. He saw his own blood spatter on the faces of his astonished attackers and sizzle on the hot stone floor. With a slap, he sent the tall man sprawling to the ground. He kicked out instinctively behind him. One of the men fell, doubled over. Justin made his way through the mob like a spirit, unfeeling, mindless of the airless heat, smashing whatever was in his way.

  One of the men ran toward him, crouching. Justin leaped, spinning, to land on the man's back. From there, he catapulted himself onto the stone wall, now dry from the tongues of flame that licked up its sides, and clung to it. The stone was blisteringly hot, and there was no air to breathe except the sooty black film that rose from the licking flames, but Justin felt nothing anymore. He had chosen life, with its pain and suffering and defeat. He was not afraid.

  Those who were still conscious watched with amazement as the dying man inched his way upward over the rough, hot stone. He was surrounded by flames, and the trail of his blood flowed beneath him, drying from the heat before it reached the floor.

  "He, too, is a god," someone whispered.

  He was answered by a deafening roar as the flames burst in an explosion of fire. The screams of the burning, suffocating men filled the pit with a horrible din as they scratched at the stone walls. The body of the monk had been consumed by flames, and the smell of burning flesh was acrid and nauseating. Justin felt his own legs burning, but he continued to climb, one hand, one foot after the other.

  He reached the top. Swinging his legs to the ledge at the base of the iron door, he pulled himself erect, and with his blistered, skinless hands, opened the door.

  The rush of incoming air gave new life to the fire below. The bodies of the men were completely engulfed in fire. Only their dying moans could be heard now, and the sight was a vision of the disembodied spirits of a Christian hell.

  For a moment, he wondered if his own afterlife would resemble the scene in the fire pit. It was no less than he deserved. It was the way of the Black Hats, consuming, complete. Varja and her kind could never see the magic of water that melts rock, or of running sap in spring, or of the sweet sky at morning. The magic of the Blue Hat was small compared with hers. Would his soul, with its broken karma, be made to burn also?

  He walked back into the corridor. Although the flames were already licking at the opening, it felt cool to him. He walked toward the dim, flickering light in the room at
the end of the hallway. As he approached, he could hear the faint tinkling of a bell. It seemed to call to him, beckoning him with its shrill, mocking beauty.

  He was tired, so tired. The effort in the fire pit had exhausted him. His wounds hurt. His head slumped with weakness. Inside the room, he knew, Varja would be waiting for him, and he had nothing left to fight her with. Varja's weapon was the ancient magic of the Black Hats. Justin had no weapon but the peace Tagore had finally placed in his heart.

  The effort of a lifetime, he thought sadly, had been for nothing. But he was not afraid.

  This is where it will end.

  The thought did not anger him. There was no more hatred in his heart. Tagore and the others had died, just as he himself would soon die. Zharkov, too, would be ashes in a blink of Brahma's eye and, in time, even Varja herself would fade into oblivion.

  Justin remembered a prayer he had recited as a boy at Rashimpur:

  All winds, all seas,

  all the heavens and earth will grow

  and die and pass away to nothing.

  I give myself up to the eternal sands.

  He walked into the high, vaulted room. The sound of the bell solidified into a pinpoint of black in the center of the room. Around the darkness grew the cold, unearthly light Justin had seen before. Out of the light grew the magnificent image of Varja the goddess, triumphant in her victory. And beside her stood Zharkov, the Prince of Death, his hooded eyes gleaming with malicious strength, his body clothed in silver.

  Justin was not surprised. The two belonged together.

  "Where is your magic, Wearer of the Blue Hat?" Varja teased.

  "I have no magic," Justin answered.

  The goddess smiled. "You are dying. You cannot even heal yourself."

  "If it is my destiny to die, then I will die."

  Varja laughed. "Very well. My prince will help your destiny."

  She looked at Zharkov, and the Prince of Death raised his right hand high. In it, out of the darkness, appeared a gleaming silver sword.

  "Now," Varja commanded. "The world is yours. The Wearer of the Blue Hat can fight you no more."

  Zharkov brought the blade singing downward. Justin did not resist. The sword struck him on his right wrist, severing his hand. Justin looked at the bloody stump of his arm. The pain was excruciating, but he did not cry out. If he was not afraid to die, he would not be afraid to live the moments before his death.

  The goddess's eyes were furious. "His hand?" she shrieked. "Why did you not strike his head, his chest...?"

  "I tried," Zharkov said, bewildered. "The blade moved itself."

  "But his hand ..." She stared at the severed appendage, her body trembling with loathing. Then, as the hand on the floor began to glow, she whispered frantic incantations, backing away until she was pressed against the wall. The words spewed out of her mouth in a torrent.

  No power came from her. The light that had surrounded her and Zharkov dimmed and vanished.

  But the hand, invisible beneath its golden light, began to hiss.

  "Patanjali," Varja sobbed. "Hail to thee ... Hail to thee, Wearer of the Blue Hat..."

  The hand had been replaced by a coiled golden snake.

  "Spare me," she whispered.

  "As you spared Tagore?" Justin asked. "As you spared Duma and the monks of Rashimpur? As your prince spared everyone who had ever shown me kindness?"

  "Then take him," Varja pleaded. "He is your enemy. The man you call Zharkov was born in the same hour of the same day of the same year as you. As you live, he shall live as your opposite. Take him now to end the suffering of your own life. I beg you...."

  But Justin no longer heard her. Another voice was speaking to him now, the same voice he had heard a lifetime before, when a strange man had cornered a child in an alley in Paris. It was Tagore's voice, asking the same question it had then.

  Is it your will?

  Justin looked at the coiled snake, understanding nothing and everything. There was magic, but it was not his. It belonged to the Wearer of the Blue Hat.

  "It is my will," he said.

  The snake uncoiled. Darting swiftly as a lightning bolt, it wrapped itself once around Varja's neck and struck in the black center of her third eye.

  Varja shuddered. A drop of bright blood appeared in the middle of her forehead. She closed her eyes and seemed to shrink before him. The smooth skin of her face began to wrinkle and crack. Knotted veins stood out on the backs of her hands. Her black hair turned white and fell out in matted clumps. Her cheeks hollowed; her red-painted lips opened, and she spat out the brown stubs of her teeth. Then she sank slowly, her brittle bones unable to support her, as her flesh dried on her skull and the skull itself rolled onto the folds of the sumptuous gown that lay rumpled on the floor, covered by the ashes of a hundred thousand years.

  And resting on her garment was a small snake the color of pure gold.

  When there was nothing left of her, the snake uncoiled itself and slithered up Justin's body to his wrist, where it wound itself tightly around the bleeding stump. It glowed for a moment, then was gone. In its place was Justin's restored hand.

  Horrified, Zharkov turned panic-filled eyes toward Justin. He brought the sword up high overhead and slashed downward with all his strength. Justin reached up and shattered the blade. Silver shards sprayed around the chamber, tinkling like a thousand bells.

  Zharkov ran frantically from one end of the room to the other. The fire had reached the main floor of the palace, and the doorway of the vaulted chamber was filled with flames licking at the inner walls. There was no escape except through the wall of flame.

  Screaming, Zharkov rushed headlong into the fire.

  Justin followed him, feeling the flames burning him, but indifferent to the pain. Zharkov was straining at the door to the white Sacred Chamber, but it had been sealed closed by the fire. When he saw Justin, he did not run. Instead, with a look of bitter resignation, he squared his shoulders and brought himself to full height to face him.

  His lips were dry and cracked. Sweat poured over his face in a sheet. But the hooded reptilian eyes were cold; he was again in control of himself. He swallowed to compose his voice.

  He is in great pain, Justin thought. But his dignity is greater.

  "Will you die now?" Zharkov asked.

  Justin nodded slowly. "I will die when you do. We are the same, you and I. We always were."

  Zharkov granted him a curt bow. It was a gesture one might use at the end of a game of chess, a civilized acknowledgment of his opponent's superiority.

  Their eyes met for one last time. Then, without hesitation, Zharkov walked to the open metal doorway leading to the flesh-stinking pit and stepped through it.

  Justin saw a rush of flame and sparks, as Zharkov's body struck the stone floor, but he heard nothing. The Prince of Death had resigned honorably.

  Justin pulled at the door to the Sacred Chamber. It slid open effortlessly. So there is still time to see Rashimpur again, he thought. Thank you, spirits of the dead. I will be with you soon.

  Outside, staggering numbly through the snow, Justin looked back to see Varja's palace engulfed in flames. It was finished now; his work was complete. He turned toward Rashimpur. It was a long journey, but he would make it. He would will himself to live that long.

  The lake at the base of Amne Xachim was frozen solid. He was glad. He could not have swum it now, even with Tagore's help. His body was burned beyond healing. He had lost too much blood, and the wounds in his side and chest were beginning to fester.

  He began the steep climb up the mountain on all fours. By the time he reached the first plateau, he was crawling, but he continued. He was too close to Rashimpur; he could not die now. He would not permit even death to touch him until he found his home.

  His vision was blurry, and he shivered with the cold. So easy... so easy to die.... He forced himself to cling to the rocks and scrub grass that jutted out of the snow. The cold on his belly numbed the pain of his wound
s. All the pain was ebbing at last. He knew he would see Rashimpur only for a moment before he died, but a moment would be enough.

  When he saw the second lake and, beyond it, the stone face of the ruined monastery, he staggered to his feet. Stumbling blindly along the rocky cliff, he fell, pulled himself up again, fell once more, then lurched forward on the strength of his arms alone, to go home.

  He crawled to the massive stone doors and, shaking violently with the last of his strength, pulled himself upright.

  "Tagore, I have come home," he whispered. With an effort greater than any he had ever made, he opened the door.

  His face drained of color. The trembling in his limbs stilled to numb shock. For in the center of the Great Hall, among the charred ruins and the dusty skeletons of the dead, stood the Tree of the Thousand Wisdoms, whole and in full leaf, as it had stood since the beginning of time.

  He did not realize for several minutes that tears were streaming down his face. It was as Tagore had said: Nothing can destroy the Tree. It was life itself, and no army on earth could kill it.

  Haltingly, he walked forward and knelt beside the tree. The bark was hard and dark with winter. Justin remembered learning of the change of seasons from the tree, and the beauty of color, and the patience to grow, as the tree had, without notice or admiration. The tree was, is, will be, and so life would endure forever.

  Tagore knew. He had always known. But Justin had never been able to understand until now, at the moment of his death, that some magic cannot die. Somewhere birds were singing the songs of the universe. Somewhere in winter's cold, a seed was waiting to be born, its magic coiled deep inside it, ready to burst forth when its time came. The world was full of magic, and it was vastly more powerful than any wizard's.

  "I understand, Tagore," Justin said, weeping. "I have not been cast out. I belong, too."

  A leaf fell from the tree. Justin caught it, clutching it in his shaking hands. A warmth spread through him, soothing him, calming his fears. When he opened his hand, he saw that the leaf was withered. The blisters on his fingers were gone. The wounds on his body were healed.