by Peter David
I’d more or less written off the money anyway, so I shrugged and said, “Sure.” Then I leaned back, interlacing my fingers and propping one elbow up on the back of the chair. I have to admit, he seemed rather pleased that I was going to listen to him. Gods knew the last time he’d had anyone he could really talk to. I fell much into the same category. In the past two years I had kept social contact to a minimum. Acquired no friends because I didn’t want them. Even kept the wenches at a distance, although there had been times when they’d expressed interest in me. Once upon a time I would never have thought I could spend two solid years wrapped in chastity (unless one was actually referring to a girl named “Chastity”), but my experiences with the ring had … I don’t know … temporarily burned me out on the opposite sex. That, and the burn I still felt in the back of my head every time I thought of Sharee’s eyes upon me, and the way she’d looked at me with such venom. There might indeed come a time when I changed my mind, but for the time being, I’d been spending all my nights alone and not disliking it at all.
“I,” said the stranger with a touch more self-importance than I thought appropriate to someone who was trying to weasel out of a bar tab, “am a Visionary.”
“Indeed.”
He cocked his head slightly. “Don’t you know what that is?”
“Should I?”
“Well,” he said, looking as if he was warming to his topic, “you’ve heard of prophecies, haven’t you?”
“Yesssss,” I said cautiously.
“How people are always saying, ‘It is written that so and so will happen.’ Well,” and he leaned back and thumped himself on the chest, looking rather pleased with himself. He still didn’t smell drunk, but he was acting it. He was also speaking louder than he’d been before. “I am the one who actually writes it.”
“You mean you’re like a farweaver?”
“No, not a weaver. Weavers operate via threads of the natural world. We Visionaries draw our magic from a different plane. Nor do I require tapestries. Words are my threads, pages my tapestries,” and he moved his hands through the air as if he was scribbling. “And here’s the amazing thing. I never actually know what I’m going to foresee … until I write it down. It just … just oozes out of me, like … like …”
“Pus?”
He actually laughed at that, which was odd considering I’d been trying to insult him. “Some would characterize it in that way, yes.”
I shook my head and started to get up. He looked surprised and grabbed me by the forearm with unexpected strength. “You would walk away from me?”
“I would if you let go of my arm.”
“But—”
“I’m supposed to be impressed by what you’re telling me?” I demanded. “I know of your type, of your prophecies. You make everything so vague and incomprehensible, so caught up in your cleverness to obscure your meaning, that everything you predict is useless until after it happens! Either that or it’s worded so broadly that people spend years arguing over precisely what you were talking about in the first place.”
“Ah, but here’s the difference between me and other Visionaries: I’m not very good at it.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “And this is supposed to mollify me how, then? How can you possibly hope to be of service to me if you’re now telling me that you are inadequate at the job to which you aspire?”
“Well, because I’m too literal minded, is why. I share your impatience with those who would be unclear or obscure in their meaning. As a result, I would make my predictions and simply upset people. A woman wants to hear, ‘Love will change your life.’ She doesn’t want to hear, ‘You’re going to fall hopelessly in love with a man who will brutalize you for three years before dumping you for a girl half your age.’ A man wants to hear, ‘You will distinguish yourself in battle.’ He doesn’t want to hear, ‘Men will marvel at how quickly you flee the foe, and you will be the subject of derision and scorn for the rest of your life as a result.’ You see the problem?”
I hated to admit it, but the fellow made a degree of sense to me. I have, as you know, some interest in the ways of destiny and fate. The notion that people simply could not deal with the truth of what awaited them certainly made as much sense as anything when trying to determine why prognostications were usually so oblique in their phrasings. I scratched my beard a moment in thought, then said slowly, “And you’re saying that you can predict precisely what will happen to me.’ “
“Oh, absolutely. But,” and he raised a warning finger, “I must ask you not to hold me responsible for what you learn. I have to say, I’m very, very tired of people venting their frustration upon me just because their life isn’t turning out the way they expect it to.”
“Well, fortunately enough, I am so used to things not turning out the way I expect them, that I doubt you could tell me anything that would be of tremendous bother to me. I’ve spent my life expecting the worst, and occasionally being lulled into a false sense of security until such time as the worst occurs. So I assure you I won’t be as faint of heart as some of your earlier clients.”
“That’s excellent!” he said, sounding genuinely chipper about it. “Just get me some parchment and writing implements, and I will be more than happy to accommodate you and settle accounts between us.”
For someone who was fundamentally a bum, he certainly seemed rather obsessed with keeping accounts settled. In short order I had obtained a parchment and quill, and placed them before the Visionary. I watched with curiosity as he closed his eyes, leaning back a bit. His eyelids seemed to flutter a bit. His breathing slowed, and I could see that his hands were shaking ever so slightly. I had to admit, if he was some sort of fraud, he was certainly putting on a good show.
He had picked up the quill, dipped it into ink, and slowly he brought the point down, down, until it barely just tapped the parchment. And then the quill pen began to move quickly, so quickly that it almost seemed as if it had flown right out of his hand. Rather than someone who was writing furiously, he came across more like a horseman who was barely keeping control of his mount.
Faster and faster the quill point flew across the parchment, and each line it left behind was perfectly written. Three lines, four and five, and I frowned and craned my neck, trying to make out what it said. I was very proud of my ability to read, you understand. Many men my age, and quite a few who were older, were illiterate. But my mother, despite the calling to which she had fallen, had been well-educated … mostly by her mother, since her father had had very little patience with her from the beginning. And my mother had made a point of teaching me how to read as well, something that seemed an utter waste of time to Stroker, the oaf who owned the tavern in which I’d grown up. “He’ll always be a nothing. Why are you making him a literate nothing?” he had demanded. Stroker always knew just what to say.
But now I was staring at the parchment and I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. “What language is that?” I demanded finally.
“Runic,” said the stranger, without even glancing up at me. He wrote another two lines and then, his hand trembling from the exertion, he slowly and delicately placed the pen down. He raised up the parchment, scanning the runes.
“Don’t you know what you wrote?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No … no, I don’t. Not until I …” Then he stopped and blinked like an owl in the daytime, and then blinked again, and then muttered, “My word,” which didn’t help me in the least, and “Oh, my word,” which I liked even less than “My word.”
“What sort of game is this?” I demanded. “Because I really don’t have time—”
“Is your name Apropos?”
The question caught me off guard. The wenches, as you may have surmised from before, knew me simply as “Mr. Poe.” It was the name I’d gone by since I’d arrived there, and I’d never felt inclined to give my full moniker to anyone. I reasoned that the fewer individuals who bandied my name around, the better and safer it would be for me. So when the Visionary i
nquired of me, I felt a sudden chill upon me. To a degree, this had almost been a simple, foolish game. The notion that this person could truly see what would happen to me … that my future and fate were that locked in … was contrary to everything I believed about myself. The moment when this little “game” of mine turned serious was similar to jousting with someone wherein you’re using a wooden practice sword, and you suddenly discover that the other fellow is armed with a broadsword.
“Yes. Yes, it is,” I admitted slowly. I tried to discern which symbols in the writing were the equivalent of Apropos, but quickly gave up. “How did you know?”
“I didn’t. Not until I read this.” He scanned the symbols, shaking his head. With each shake I felt more and more depressed, and I wasn’t sure why. “Oh dear,” he said, and then, “Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh—”
“Stop that!” I slammed my palm down on the table, causing him to jump. “You’re making me nervous!”
“And you have every right to be,” he said, staring fixedly at what he’d written. Either he was a remarkable actor, or he genuinely was seeing it for the first time, having written it while in some sort of trance. “Considering what’s going to be happening …”
“What? What’s going to be happening?”
The wind had been building up in intensity outside, and suddenly it blasted open the door. I jumped, startled, thinking for a moment that someone had burst in to interrupt us, or even threaten us. But there was no one there. The flames in the fireplace leaped upward as a result of the sudden air fanning them. For an instant the wind blew the parchment out of the stranger’s hands, but he snatched it from the air and slapped it back down to the table. I, meantime, hobbled over to the door, threw a shoulder against it, and forced it shut. The wind still bucked and whinnied outside like a frustrated phantom horse, but I secured the door and then went back to my seat. My impatience was swelling. The haunted mood of the moment, being exacerbated as it was by the creepiness of the weather, wasn’t helping any.
“All right … out with it,” I said firmly, not wanting any more games.
He looked at me cautiously and said, “You know … it’s not too late to go for something oblique.”
“What?” I was having trouble processing through my brain precisely what he was saying.
Sounding very hopeful, like a recalcitrant child trying to get out of chores, he said, “I could fashion some sort of verse so that it’s typically obscure. Speak in broad terms about what will happen—”
“No.”
“I could do it in rhymed couplets? A limerick, perhaps. Or a nice—”
“No!”
“—haiku,” he finished weakly.
“Bless you,” I replied, unfamiliar at that time with the poetry form about which I would later learn during my sojourn across the continent of Chinpan. “Now, if you would be so kind,” I continued, each word bitten off, “tell me what those damned runes say.”
“Yes, well …” He cleared his throat (somewhat unnecessarily, I suspected). He hunched forward, studying the runes. “It says …” He paused a moment, looked at me hopefully, and said, “Last chance for vague rhymes so it will be like all the other—”
“Do you see this staff?” I asked him, holding up my walking staff slightly, although that was more for emphasis than out of any real concern that he wasn’t seeing it. “I will either bash your head in, or shove it up your buttocks, or both, unless you tell me specifically what’s going on.”
“All right, all right. A quick question, though … do you have provisions?”
“What?” I had no idea what he was talking about.
“Handy. Provisions handy, for going on a trip.”
“What … sort of pointless jest is this?” I asked him, but my voice reflected my uncertainty. He did not appear to be joking in the slightest. And indeed, my hesitancy seemed to anger him.
“If you wish to be unprepared when your fate befalls you, then by all means continue to sit there and stare at me, slack-jawed and confused like an imbecilic jackanapes,” he said tartly. “If, on the other hand, you wish to have some measure of preparedness, then you will hie yourself to your larder and prepare, as expeditiously as possible, whatever you can carry for a lengthy journey during which time game will likely be scarce.” When I didn’t move, his face clouded so that his eyes seemed to gleam against it. “Well?”
That got me up and out of my chair. It is most amazing how cynicism and skepticism can quickly be set aside when even the intimation of a threat to one’s life and limb is being suggested. Without another word I raided the larder, took everything that I could find and comfortably carry. Two skins of water, several legs of mutton, some hardtack, dried meats and vegetables. I wrestled with my priorities, for my lame leg did not lend itself to carrying heavy burdens for too extended a time. On the other hand, I didn’t want to be caught short of supplies.
And part of my mind was scolding me. He’s having you off! This is some sort of game, and you are once again the butt of the joke! Have done with this nonsense, write off the ale he consumed as a cost of doing business and knowing for next time, and throw this oaf out into the cold!
Yet I kept preparing rations. They always say it is better to be safe than sorry, and when it came to my safety, nothing took precedence. Not even the simple joy I would derive from booting the man out of my place.
Finally I had everything I could reasonably carry together and shoved into a carrying sack. It wasn’t light, but it was bearable. Hauling it, and myself, back into the main room, I found the Visionary still seated there, looking just as perturbed as he had been earlier. I slid the sack off my shoulder, allowing it to thud to the floor, and then I mustered my annoyance and said, “All right, Visionary, I’ve done as you instructed. And so help me, if this is a twisted jest on your part …”
“I jest about many things, Apropos,” the Visionary said darkly, “but when it comes to my talent, nothing can sway me from the sacredness of my task. Is that,” and he indicated the sack on the floor, “supplies?”
I blew air through my lips in annoyance. “No. It’s my collection of eighth-century erotica.”
“Really?” He seemed intrigued, raising an eyebrow.
“No, of course not!” I fairly exploded. “Yes, it’s supplies. Now, let’s get on with this!”
“Very well.” He took a deep breath, and then looked at the text. “First … your old acquaintance, Denyys, will return quite shortly. After that, you—”
“Wait. Stop.”
He looked at me quizzically. “According to this,” and he tapped the parchment with a finger, “this may not be the best time to tell me to stop.”
“All right, but according to this,” and I imitatively tapped my finger on my head, “I don’t have any recollection of an acquaintance named … what was it? Deh-NEE-us?”
“Well, you do.”
“Well, I don’t!” The fire of my suspicions as to the absurdity and duplicity involved were being greatly stoked. “I think I have some familiarity with my own life, Visionary, which this piece of paper of yours most obviously does not! I do not, and never have, known anyone named Denyys! So either you are a liar and poltroon, or else you’re just incompetent!”
“How dare you!” he thundered, and it could have been my imagination, but it seemed as if the wind howled all the louder in accompanying protest. “My phrasing of my predictions aside, there is no Visionary greater than I! None!”
“Then I’m afraid that doesn’t speak well of your brethren.” To say I was unimpressed at that point would have been to understate it.
For a moment he seemed so flustered that I thought he wasn’t going to be able to get another word out, which at that point would have suited me just fine. But then he took in several deep breaths and, though he had been half-risen to his feet, he now set himself back down again and steadied himself. “It is imperative that you listen to what I have to say, because your future may depend upon it.”
“My future?�
�� I scoffed. “Well, if I am to believe you, what I would do and not do on behalf of my future is utterly beside the point. It’s all written down there, isn’t it?”
“Some of it is, yes,” he said flatly. “But how you react to, and anticipate, certain occurrences and happenings will very much dictate how you meet your fate. For instance, if I tell you that you will embark upon a long journey, I’m not telling you how many hands you will have attached to your body when you embark, am I. Whether you have two, or one, or none, very much depends upon how prepared you are to face your future. Now shall I continue?”
‘Twas a waste of time, of that I was becoming more and more convinced, but I told myself that there was no harm in listening to the fool, even though in doing so I risked making myself as grand a fool as he. “Very well, then”—I sighed—“pray continue.”
“Remember, I was the one who offered to give it to you in oblique fashion, just to avoid this sort of—”
“Will you get on with it!”
He looked back to the parchment, seemingly oddly pleased that I had lost my temper. It was as if he considered such impatience to be an indication that I was genuinely paying attention rather than dismissing him out of hand. This time I resolved not to interrupt him until he had finished all the nonsense.
“Your old friend, Denyys, will return,” he said, and then fired me a quick glance, obviously to see if I was going to interrupt him yet again. When I simply sat there with a bland expression, he nodded once to himself in apparent satisfaction and continued, “Denyys will be pursued by armed men who desire to kill her. She will seek refuge with you. You will reluctantly provide her with said refuge. Armed men will then attack and destroy your tavern, but you will escape through previously unknown catacombs …”
I broke my promise to myself, although I had not intended to. “What? Destroy this place? Catacombs? What catacombs? Aye, there’s a wine cellar beneath our feet right enough, but they are no catacombs! And what armed men? What do they want with her? What—”
As if I hadn’t spoken, he warned, “You will become a mere shadow of your former self while escaping to the Tragic Waste on the Road to Ruin …” He frowned and took a closer look at the parchment. “I … think that’s what it says. Although sometimes runic R’s can look like W’s …”