Make Believe

By: Bryan Watson

“For as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." - Canticle of Eli, Book of Proverbs, Chapter 23, Verse 7

A dozen and a half young faces stare at me, waiting. Some of them are nervous, some angry, and one or two of them have the good sense to look ashamed. But on the whole, most of them simply look bored. One face, however, glares back at me with hatred, loathing, and contempt. I know his type—there's one in every one of these classes, it seems—and the sooner I disabuse him of the notion of his own importance in the grand scheme of things, the better. But as usual, I let him make the first move; just because they're criminals doesn't mean that I have to be a hard-ass.

"You all know why you're here," I say as I pace slowly in front of them, making eye contact with each student. "You've broken the law and removed your restraining collars. You've used your magical talents without registering yourselves with the Bureau of Magic Registration.. These laws have a purpose, not the least of which is preventing some overambitious group of youngsters from unleashing a second Curse upon the city. However, since none of you have any previous criminal convictions, and since in the last several months you've all shown at least some willingness to work with the system instead of against it, you've been sent to me. My name is Artax, but for the next year you will simply be addressing me as Teacher." I allow my pacing to lead me a little farther up towards the front of the room. That way when I stop, turn, and fix my eyes on the one student sitting in the middle of the back row—not coincidentally the one with the burning hatred in his eyes, they all feel my gaze.

"But know this," I say after a pause, "You have escaped nothing. Most of you will be wishing you'd opted to finish out your sentences before I'm through with you. I am a harsh teacher, I do not tolerate foolishness, and I will not hesitate to make an example of any one of you should you step out of line. But before you contact your case workers and ask to go back to your detention facilities, know this: this is your one chance, your only chance, at ever using your magical talents again. You walk out of here, and you walk into a life of mediocrity. You will be choosing a life where you will be no greater than anybody else, and in fact you will be less than a great many. Are there any questions."Silence. There's always silence at first. "Very good," I say. "Then let us begin."

• • •

At least that's how it usually goes. This time … this time I should have known better. It was different. I … I should have known.

• • •

Saturdays are always busy in the morning. People are in a good mood: they've just been paid, they didn't have to get up to some shrill electronic device, and most of them get to look forward to the same thing the next day. Of course, those of us who make our income by catering to the public whims don't get to indulge in such luxuries. The word "weekend" is something of a cuss word to those people who work in retail and foodservice, and if the rest of the world gave us much thought, then perhaps they'd treat us a bit differently. But then I really can't complain. While my shop is open to the public, the merchandise I sell is of such a specialized nature that most people actually do treat me as if I know what I'm talking about. Which I do. Those who ignore me or the instructions that come with each and every bit of merchandise I sell do so at their own risk. And if you wonder how it is that I can work in a field where people are overworked, underpaid, and generally overlooked by the very people who depend on their services while still maintaining at least some shred of my sanity, I'll just direct you to look at the sign over the register that says BECAUSE I'M A WIZARD, THAT'S HOW.

Despite the fact that practitioners of magic have been operating in the open for longer than history has been written, despite the fact that every single person in this city is touched one way or another by some powerful bit of magic daily, people still view wizards and sorcerers as great men and women of mystery. Despite the fact that by high school even a student without any magical abilities will have been taught the laws and limitations of magic, people still think that magic can do anything. To be sure, we can do more than most, but we still have our limitations. One of mine is dealing with clueless people.

I close early on Saturdays as my afternoons and evenings are tied up in something of a community service project that I started some years ago when I first came to the city. I'm usually happy to deal with people, well, I'm willing to at least, but one day each year sees a new beginning to that project. On those days, I always seem to have someone who doesn't know what the words "closing early" mean.

"Okay, I've got, like, two major problems," the young woman said to me. "First, like my mother is totally allergic to my cat, and she can't visit. I love her, but I don't want to get rid of Areli."

"Areli being your cat, not your mother, I presume," I said.

Her face went blank for a moment, then the connection was made. "Oh. Yeah, totally." "Well a simple histamine blocker from your local pharmacy is probably your best bet, but if you're set on using a magical remedy, you could try this little number." I handed her a small phial made of blue glass. "It's essentially a magical histamine blocker, but there's also a mild mental suppressant that helps the taker relax and lets the medicine work more quickly. It's a bit more costly than its pharmacological cousin, but some people prefer it."

"Great," she said taking the phial from me. "This is perfect." She began to make her way to the register.

"I believe you said that there were two problems," I said.

She paused and seemed to be trying to remember if she had in fact said as much. It was something a lot like waiting for an elevator, watching the numbers light up one by one as the lift car slowly approaches your floor. "Oh, right! Okay, so, like my boyfriend and I have been having some major trust issues for a while now. I won't bore you with the details—" I said a small prayer of thanks to as many gods as I could think of on the spot. "—but I was told that there were potions that could give mundane humans low levels of telepathy." For just a second I started to wonder what her game was. "Oh, sweet, are these unicorns made out of real silver?" She held one up before me, her eyes wide like a child who's just discovered that they have a gift waiting for them.

"Some of them are," I said, "others are just silver plated. Many Kitchlanders use them in ceremonial wedding spells. Now the potions you'd be looking for are over here." I handed her another phial, making certain to grab one of the green ones. When she made to take it from me, I pulled it away a little.

"Two things first, Ms … ?"

She looked blankly at me for another half second. "Oh, Caitlin," she said.

We weren't winning any academic scholarships in school, were we? Out loud I said, "Right, then, Ms Caitlin, as I said, there are two things you must know before I can let you purchase these two potions. The first is that this potion," I held up the green phial, " is a somewhat modified version of Shimmer, that's a mild psi enhancer. This is not like a potion that will mimic some aspect of the Curse, help you sleep, or cure a case of the sniffles. This is dangerous magic here. It allows you to see into places where most people wouldn't wish to go. This will temporarily open a door that most people would just as soon leave closed if they were aware that it was there. The second, and the most important is that these potions must never be mixed. I know that one is for you and one for your mother, but each of these phials contains multiple doses and should somebody using one get it into their head to use the other the consequences would be very serious indeed." For once she showed some wisdom, swallowed, then nodded. I let her have the second phial. "Now, if there isn't anything else we do close early on Saturdays. Unless you'd still like one of these unicorns?"

• • •

"What I can't believe is that you talked her into one of the imported models," Levinson said. "I didn't 'talk her into' anything," I said. "I merely mentioned that those particular models were made in the very land where they came into use in the first place. She convinced herself to buy it."

"Whatever you say, Artax."

"And while we're on the subject of what was going on inside my shop, just what were you doing out there? Somebody could have noticed you."

He snorted, though I'm not really sure how he did it.. "Oh, please," he said. "You think I can't smell a teep a mile away? I managed to stay out of Sharabi's way the entire time that she was here, didn't I?"

I sat down. "That's true," I said, "though she was mostly confined to one room during her tenure here."

"But she's still a teep," he said. "Even if her telepathy's pretty pathetic, she'd have had a hard time missing me. If nothing else she or one of the other women who brought her in could have noticed you talking to your plants."

I looked up at the succulent asphodelaceae plants that grew in their pots all around my shop and its various rooms. They're bland, unassuming plants, and most people don't notice that they're in nearly every room.. "They could at that," I said. "But since they all think I'm mad anyway, I think it could just add to the mystery that is me."

"So how come those ladies never come around anymore? I'd figure Danni at least would feel some affection for all the help you gave her."

"I don't think that Mister Sommers likes me very much," I said, starting to dig through my desk drawers for the things I'd need for the upcoming classes.

"You're probably right," Levinson said. "But then I know his type; he's not really a fighter, not at heart. He'd rather find another way of resolving conflicts."

"It's one of his more admirable traits." I began looking over the two lists of names, scrying a bit into each one's life. Scrying is a useful talent. If a person learns how, they can look at a person, a formula, a building—anything really —and see into its future, its past, its potential. That said, scrying is a lot like wiggling your ears: it's easy if you know how to do it. It's also not perfect.

Strike that. It may well be perfect; perhaps it's just that people aren't. I've been scrying for as long as I can remember; nobody taught me, I've just always known how, much like how some people naturally know how to carry a tune, or how to play an instrument without having taken any lessons. It gives me what some might call an unfair advantage in life, but when people grow up how I grew up, they'll tell you that they grab hold of every advantage that they can get. This is mine, and I use it. Though, unfortunately, not all of the time.

Levinson wasn't done, though. "My point, Artax," he said, "is that nobody but you feels at home here."

"This is a place of business," I said. "It is not a condominium."

"You know damn well that I'm not talking about that," he said. "Even your best, most frequent and reliable customers usher themselves out of here as soon as they have what they came in for. Nobody lingers. Nobody chats. Do you even have any friends?" I turned once again to face the plant, though it really was pointless to do so. A being of pure thought could "see" me just as well if I were facing one direction as any other. "Of course I have friends," I said.

"Really?" he said. If he'd had a body he'd have been leaning against the wall with his arms folded across his chest. "Name one."

I turned back to my work. "I really don't see the point in this," I said.

"And I don't see how you think I'd be fooled by you stalling for time," he said.

"I am not stalling; I have work to do."

"Changing the subject, then," Levinson said. "The end result is that you don't have an answer for my question."

"Ms Drauling," I said not even bothering to look up from my work.

Levinson sounded thoughtful. "I might buy that," he said after a bit of a pause, "if you two didn't seem to want to make it your personal mission to destroy the dating scene of the greater metro area."

"For my part, it's actually a complicated form of evangelism," I told him. "Shouldn't you be contemplating the nature of the universe, or something?"

"That's what we have the elf for. Why are you so anxious to be rid of me?"

Because I don't care for the reminders of the past. Out loud I said, "I told you already, I have work to do to prepare for the new class."

He sighed, although again, I'm not really sure how. "Which despite your insistence that only the players change, is a brand new group of people. Each one is different and yet you continue to insist on treating each one of them the same. You're the only one who remains the same. Maybe that's a problem."

"I don't see how that could be," I said.

"When you do, then maybe we can actually talk about this."

I looked up to say something to that, though to be honest, I wasn't sure exactly what I could say—but there was a subtle emptiness in the room that told me that Levinson was already gone.

• • •

Each student's file has been reviewed and verified as accurate by the student in question. I have the case workers do this because it forms a personal connection between the person in question and their file. I could scry into their lives without this, but with the connection made, scrying is easier and more effective. Levinson doesn't believe me, but there really are patterns to every class that I get. One that presents itself every single time is one student who seems to be angry at everything. I was three-quarters of the way through the files before I found the one for this class.

How do I describe to you what scrying is like? Let's say you're looking at two people playing a game of catch. It would seem like a simple enough game to most people, but there are more variables at play than you might realize. Most of the time, one person throws the ball, and the other person catches it. Simple. But then the ball goes high. Or wide. Or it falls short. The ball may hit the other player in the forehead, or he may have to dive to catch it. The person trying to catch the ball may suddenly sneeze, or the person throwing may drop it. The possibility for any one of those things to happen, and dozens more like them, comes up each and every time one person goes to do something as simple as throwing a ball to somebody else. And by scrying, you could see each and every one of them.

Now imagine that you can see all of those things happening at one time. Some, the more likely outcomes, are more solid, more clear than others less likely to occur. Now imagine that by really trying you can focus on one aspect, one outcome, and not only see how probable it is, but how it's likely to play out.

That, in a nutshell, is scrying. And the big secret that gods and magic users alike don't want people to know is that nearly anybody can do it.

The trouble maker for this class was one Jon Tunstall. I looked deeper into his life and almost wished that I hadn't. I saw him speaking with passion and anger, rallying people— the others from his class—I realized, into some kind of action. And somehow, I knew that he was speaking about me. I saw him stalking the city streets, deliberately seeking me out. I saw him in a room of terrified people, power pouring out of upraised hands as the ceiling crumbled down around them. I saw him standing over my own body as it lay unmoving on the ground. I saw him dressed in the black combat fatigues of a battle mage. This one had power and a chip on his shoulder. And now he was my responsibility. Wonderful. I could have sworn that I heard a soft chuckle from the small altar to Klepnos that I maintained in the next room.

Levinson is wrong; I do have one very good friend, but he shows his affection by constantly trying to get me killed. Maybe I do need to get out more often.

The one final thing that you must understand about scrying is this: the future is moldable and malleable. Some things are destined to happen, yes, but most "destinies" are fouled up by free will. What I saw wasn't bound to happen, just the most likely outcome of a particular path. And I kept telling myself that every time I looked down another line and saw the same thing.

• • •

"The point I'm trying to make is this: we're more evolved than other humans, it's as simple as that. So why do you keep telling us that we should serve them?"

I regarded the student who had asked the question. He was good looking, tall, and better spoken than most of his classmates. Better spoken than most people his age, really. But still he was young and he had a lot to learn. "Because, Master Gibbons, magic comes from life itself. It serves life, and so we must serve life as well."

"Magic comes from mana," he said. "And maybe there's mana in a lot of things, but it's humans who know how to access it."

"Humans, elves, even some animals can manipulate magic," I said. "And people who have no inner pools of mana can still access magic through rituals. No, mana powers magic, much in the same way that electricity powers a skimmer; without some spark of sentience to guide it, it is useless, and possibly dangerous.

"And as to your statement of the magician being more evolved than other humans, well, I've some telepathic friends who would disagree with you. Sentient species have been using magic since time immemorial, in terms of percentages, our numbers aren't that much greater now than they were two millennia ago, nor has the nature of magic itself changed much. Our approach to it has changed, and yes, we have learned to harness it in new ways, but the simple mechanics of the process are essentially the same now as they were when this city was nothing more than a castle in a strategically important valley. What you need to remember is …"

I was interrupted by one of the city's civil defense alarms. The tones and duration of the klaxons told us that the threat was an attack by a magical person or persons. That wasn't good. The police had mages on its force and they were good enough for most cases, I had worked with some of them before, but if whoever this was was powerful enough to warrant a city-wide alert, then they might well be out of their league. It could be a sidhe lord, a demi-god, or even one of the gods themselves. It might even be somebody like one of these young people strung out on Spellfire, which could be worse than any of those other options. While Lothanasi involvement would be a foregone conclusion if the threat were a sidhe lord, or some disgruntled ex-deity, a creature like that will usually have some sense of self preservation. That means that they might be convinced to stop without the use of force. But a mortal mage causing trouble would be entirely a police matter.

The mages who worked for the city's police department and the Lothanasi were good enough at their jobs, though I'd never admit that to the Lightbringers outright, but if the threat is big enough, they both have a tendency to cast first and ask questions later. Though I wasn't technically a member of the either organization, my name still commands some respect in their circles. If I could get to the site of the disturbance quickly enough, I might be able to keep people, on both sides, from getting killed.

"Our class will have to be cut short for today," I told the students. "Please remain here until either I return or official sources report that the crisis has passed. At that time you will be taken back to your facility." I nodded to their case workers and the pair of guards that had come with them as I headed for the door. Before I could reach it, a shadow fell across my path.

"Teacher, let us come with you," a voice said. "We might be able to help."

I wondered if he saw me stiffen. I wondered if he noticed that I hesitated before I turned to face him. "Master Tunstall, is it?"

He was standing there, his left foot forward, most of his weight on his right foot; a fighter's stance, even if he didn't have his hands up for it. "Yes, Teacher," he said. "I think we could, some of us, anyway, be able to help you." He kept watching me, tensing each time I moved, though it was hard to notice; he was a bundle of barely contained nervous energy. I did my best not to provoke him.

"Master Tunstall, I'm not going out to investigate a cloud of funny colored smoke, or a malfunctioning charm. Whatever is out there is dangerous and well out of your league. None of you, none of you, are prepared for whatever that is out there doing gods know what."

"You're not even sure what it is," he said.

"Damn right," I said. "And Revonos take me if I'm going to lead a bunch of children into some unknown magical danger."

His eyes narrowed. "We're not children," he said. "Maybe we're not adults, but we're sure as hell not kids. We're something in between, but I think we're old enough to make some decisions ourselves."

"And look where it's gotten you," I said. He towered over me, but then I'd never been that tall, even when I had been a young man. My earlier sense of caution forgotten, I looked him square in the eyes and he actually wilted a little. I made sure that my voice could be heard by the entire class. "In a few months, some of you may be ready for some very limited and very controlled field work, but not today. As of today, none of you have proven to me that you're ready to be trusted with anything. When we meet for our next class, we can discuss precisely how it is that you can earn my trust, but until then, you are to remain here until I get back."

"And what if you don't?" His voice was lowered so that only I could hear. I matched his tone.

"Master Tunstall, if I don't come back then whatever is out there is more dangerous than any of us can imagine, and you won't have long to worry about the fact." That wasn't strictly true, of course, but perhaps a healthy dose of fear and uncertainty would get him to finally sit down. Eventually, and rather reluctantly, he did.

I waited until I'd closed and locked the door to let out the breath I'd been holding.

• • •

"The kid has a point."

I put on one of the sets of black fatigues that hung in my closet. I keep hoping, each time I'm forced to put them on, that the enchantment on them will have worn off and they won't fit anymore. But fit they always do, and eventually I know that I've run out of excuses. "Perhaps," I said, "but I'm not going to be responsible for anyone's death if I have anything to say on the matter."

If Levinson had a body, he'd be leaning it in the doorway. "You say that, but you can't always control who gets affected by your actions." I jerked my head up sharply to look at the plant in this room. I don't know if he felt my gaze, or just decided to amend his statement on his own. "I'm not talking about me or my people here," he said. "I'm just speaking in general: we don't always know where our actions will lead us, we just need to make the best decisions that we can with the information we have available to us. You tell them to stay here, but what if whoever it is out there decides on a whim that you're too powerful to leave alone and drops a curse on the place? Even you couldn't be expected to see that coming and yet you'd blame yourself all the same."

"If you're trying to make me feel better about myself, you're not doing a very efficient job," I said.

"I'm not trying to make you feel better," he said, "I'm trying to make you realize that not every person in this world, this city, or, hells, even in that classroom over there is your personal responsibility. Yes, maybe you influence some of them in ways that even you can't understand, but their lives are still their own. They make choices and they have to live with them, it's what being human is all about."

"Well I have to live with some of my choices," I said. "Choices that I had no right to make. Choices that cost an incalculable price, not only from the people who got in the way, but from people who had no idea what they would be walking into years later. And I do not want any more blood on my hands. What there is will never wash off."

"The sad part is that you really believe that," Levinson said. "But really, I think that you're afraid that if you do try to wash that blood off, you just might succeed."

And then he was gone.

A moment later, so was I.

• • •

The police had set up a headquarters in a small gourmet food store on Metamor's uppermost level. They were going over some blueprints when I came in.

"Artax." The cautious greeting came from an attractive young woman.

"Detective Kitaen. So good to see you again."

She arched an eyebrow and looked over my shoulder and out the window. "Yes, Artax, lovely."

"Oh, posh," I said. "If you're going to besmirch our reunion with unpleasant news about your job, I may just stop coming around entirely."

She smiled one of her humorless smiles. "I'm sure." Her gaze trailed over to an area just above my left shoulder. "I'm also sure you were told that this area was off limits to civilians."

I followed her gaze to the man at my left hand side. "Now that you mention it, I believe that this gentleman did say something to that effect, yes."

"And that's when you …"

"Certainly not!" I said. "I'm no bully."

The smile, cold and humorless as it was, left her face entirely. "Then why?"

"Because the baboon tried to force me away. I taught him the very valuable lesson that one should be careful about grabbing strangers in this city. You might want to give him the rest of the night off, by the way. I think it would be for the best."

"Do you think you might set him down first?" she asked.

"I might," I said, "if I were convinced that he wouldn't try anything stupid."

Now some of the humor of the situation did break through into her eyes, but it disappeared quickly. "Yes, your reputation would suffer horribly if you were beaten by a man dressed like that."

"Now, Detective, don't be insensitive; this is a standard MCPD uniform. I've just provided a few … embellishments. For aesthetics' sake."

"Artax, MCPD uniforms are dark blue, not pink."

"As I said: aesthetics. The frills and lace, of course, were my own personal touches." She had it controlled now, but there was a part of her that would find this funny if she weren't in the middle of it. "And the ears?"

The rabbit ears that had sprouted from the man's head were the same shade of pink as his new uniform. "Purely decorative," I said. "His own ears should be just fine, and this sort of spell breaks at dawn.. Usually."

I broke the levitation spell that had been holding the man off of the floor and Kitaen sent the man home for the night.

"Now what are you doing here, Artax," she asked me.

"I should think that would be obvious," I said. "I'm here to help."

"That's very—gallant of you, Artax, but quite frankly we can handle this ourselves."

A fireball chose that time to fly just overhead of the building we were in, rattling the windows and setting off skimmer security alarms as it went. A few seconds later the glow intensified as the sphere hit something not far from us. More sirens began wailing in the night air. I turned back to the detective and arched an eyebrow.

• • •

"This is the building where he finally stopped," Kitaen said. "He's been up there ever since." One man. All of this commotion was being caused by one man: a registered mage named Michael Parker, they told me. They also told me that Parker barely existed in the system at all; a couple of traffic tickets, but nothing serious, certainly not anything to indicate megalomania. They were still trying to suss out an explanation when I heard it: a sound like someone clearing their throat.

As they continued talking I flicked my eyes over the shelves and found what I was looking for. "You'll excuse me for a moment," I said. "The headache I thought I'd beaten this morning has come back. I'm just going to find something for it." I made my way over to the pharmaceutical aisle and found a number of small seedling plants.

"This is not very discreet," I said.

"Can't be helped," said Levinson, "I found you here and figured if you could find a way to communicate quietly, you would. They're out."

"Excuse me?"

"Your students. They got out."

"This had better be a new and revolutionary definition of the word 'out' that I've yet to become familiar with," I said.

"I'm afraid it's the old standard one," he told me.

"How did they get out?" I asked, feeling strangely calm.

"Don't know. The doors were already open when I got there. The guards and a couple of the case workers were out cold, and so was one of the kids—" My hopes rose for a moment; maybe it was Tunstall. "—I think I heard someone call him Gibbons." So much for hope. "Another one, somebody called him Tunstall, was trying to rally the rest of the kids."

"Rally them? How? For what?"

"Can't be anything good. He was saying that you're not as young as you used to be, slowing down." And it was true. Some people think that wizards grow more powerful as they age. This is not entirely accurate: while a magician can become better at what he does over time, his main advantage is that as he gets older, he's able to access greater pools of mana from within himself. Thus, a wizard who's relatively weak in their teenage years can become very competent by middle age, and quite formidable late in their life. I've been alive for … well, longer than most people with round ears, and I was no weakling as a young man. These days even two or three big spells in quick succession won't wind me, but like I said, Tunstall was right; I'm getting older and I'm slowing down. And a lucky shot can take down a wizard who's in his prime regardless of his power level or inner mana reserves. "What else did he say?"

"That together they could be strong enough that they wouldn't have to be afraid. I'm sorry, I didn't stick around much after that, I just came to find you, keeping just enough of my consciousness at your shop to feel a lot of the kids leaving."

And so there it was: I had two dangerous enemies out there tonight. "Could you find them?"

Uncertainty crept into his voice. "A lot of upper level homes have these plants," he said, "but not so much in the middle level and they're damn near unheard of on the Street. If the kids aren't up here, I'm not going to be any good."

"Right, never mind then. Here's what I want you to do—"

"Artax, are you talking to the shelf?"

I turned to face Detective Kitaen and smiled. "Of course not. I've been talking to myself." "Yourself?"

"My dear detective, if I want to have a conversation with an intellectual peer, then I am very limited in my options. Often I find that I myself am the only one who can offer any decent discussion on most subjects."

"I thought I heard another voice," she said, looking at the area behind me..

"That's because I often have to carry both sides of the conversation," I said, trying my best to recall Levinson's speech patterns.

"Uh-huh. Did you get something for your headache?"

I had forgotten my excuse to leave the planning table in the first place. The analgesics were about a meter farther down the aisle from where I'd been standing when she'd spotted me. If she'd heard more than she was letting on, then . .. . I really didn't want to think about it. "No," I said to her question.. "A thought hit me as I was walking over here and I got caught up."

She came over to stand near me and turned to face the same direction I was facing. "These are Nocturna's Lillies, aren't they? They're rare."

"Quite right," I said. "On both counts. They only grow in one place in the entire world."

Kitaen swallowed. "The Rift. How are they even gathered?"

"Oh, the Rift is quite safe so long as you don't venture in too deep," I said. "These plants abound along the edge."

"You couldn't pay me enough to go near that place," Kitaen said. "And now that we've harvested some of these, why do they have to keep going back there? Can't we just make a few cuttings and start growing them in other places in the world?"

"I'm afraid not. Their lives must begin in that magically saturated land. They'll grow here just fine after harvest, but any that are sown here don't possess the more esoteric qualities that make them valuable to potions masters and pharmacists. I sell them from my shop, you know."

"Yeah, Morgan mentioned that you seemed pretty obsessed with them. Which is saying something, coming from a vampire." One corner of her mouth had quirked up, but the smile was just window dressing. After a long pause she spoke again. "You were right. We're out of our league here, Artax."

I made my way to the end of the aisle and looked at the bright spot on the city's skyline. "Perhaps," I said, "but Parker out there isn't out of mine."

• • •

If, at any time, you plan on deliberately confronting your own mortality more than say once a decade, it's a very good idea to know what your limits are. Half a lifetime ago, I had thought I'd come up against my own limits. I was frustrated and ready to quit the assignment I'd been given when I had an epiphany. It was something small, just something somebody told me in passing that sparked a random thought which created the breakthrough that I'd been looking for. I never saw that person again. Just as well, really; I don't think I could have faced them afterwards.

Kitaen could say whatever she wanted to about what she wasn't willing to do, but I knew her type: even if the threat is too big to contemplate, they fight on. They keep doing what's expected of them, paying the price without counting the cost to themselves. Some people call that noble, other people call it stupid. I was fairly certain that both were correct from time to time.

Nevertheless, I found myself on an upper level rooftop facing something down that had once been a man. I wasn't sure what it was now, but it responded to me when I said "Hello, Master Parker."

• • •

"Artax," it said. "So good to see you again. Or shall I call you Teacher?"

It was still shaped more or less like a human, but larger and misshapen, like some god had gone mad and given it extra muscles at random. Its skin was darker than that of the man in the picture, but unnaturally so, like I was looking at him through a tinted window. His hair stood on end and writhed, reminding me of the tales of the ancient Gorgons, and when he turned to face me I literally saw fire in his eyes. And there was something else: a sense of power, pulsing, moving. I felt stronger just from being near it, as if my spells would be amplified if I used them here, like swimming with a river's current.

"I haven't been your teacher for quite some time, now, Parker, and I certainly never taught you anything like this."

"No, you didn't. More's the pity. If you had, people like you wouldn't be running shops for mundanes, you'd be ruling them."

"Must I remind you of the words of the Starchild, Michael?"

"Which ones? The ones about how all people with any amount of power should be a bunch of simpering pussies, or the ones where those same people should use their power to serve those born beneath them?"

I ventured a few steps closer. "We are born above no one, Michael."

"Oh, but we are. Despite what our illustrious Majestrix may say, all men are not created equal. Evolution has given us a leg up on the mundies."

"And yet there's still far more of them on this planet than all the magicians, psis, elves, and lutins put together," I said. "If you scare the mundane humans, really, truly scare them, then we're all dead."

"They've tried it before," he said, taking a few steps back to keep the distance between us. Belatedly, I noticed that the distance he was keeping was the optimal distance for dueling. Magical duels are best left observed from a great distance, or if you can arrange it, on a purely theoretical level. They're bad enough when the other guy is sane and in full control of his abilities. Parker wasn't even in the same city as his sanity.

"And now they have everything they'd need to wipe us off the face of the earth," I said.

"Guns, bombs, and the common man has enough knowledge of ritual magic to make the field of battle between himself and the average wizard very level."

The fire in his eyes didn't diminish, it just became more focused. He looked out over the edge of the building. "All the more reason why we should strike now," he said. I followed his gaze. The city is really quite impressive, beautiful really, and if you can get a chance to look at it from high enough up, it even looks peaceful. But like the storm clouds that had begun brewing in the skies, there was power and the potential for great destruction. I could see Saint Theresa's off in the distance, its proud spires dwarfed by the rest of the city, but still managing to make their presence known. I could see the building the Lothanasi used as their central headquarters, and if I craned my neck, I could just make out a portion of Westfall Academy. It took me only a second to realize that I hadn't just spotted the three buildings at random: three institutions of great power built so close together, though most people are still unaware of Westfall's true nature or of the mystical confluence that St. Theresa's was built upon in an effort to contain.

I turned back to talk to Parker, to try and bring him down, when the bottom of my stomach fell out. From the small trees the wealthy kept on their balconies I could see flocks of birds suddenly erupting, all heading south of us as the sound of dogs barking began to fill the evening. I felt suddenly nervous, tense, and it didn't take me long to realize why: just like the dogs and the birds, I was having a biological reaction to a sudden drop in air pressure. My eyes met Parker's, which were half-closed in concentration.

"It took you long enough," he said. He sounded almost calm.

I had thought I had been buying people time, that by talking to Parker I was delaying his attack. But up in the sky, the clouds above St. Theresa's, Westfall, and Lothanasi HQ had begun swirling. The air was still and the clouds had taken on a sickly shade of green. And finally I realized that the constant pulse of power that I'd been feeling since I came up to this roof had been Parker drawing power into himself to cast this massive spell.

I heard a shout from the skyway and looked down to see Tunstall running toward my building with Kitaen in close pursuit. The detective had a decent amount of magical talent herself, but it tended to be along the lines of Illusionism, not terribly useful in a duel. If she came up here, she was as good as dead; I couldn't protect her from Parker and Tunstall at the same time. This had to be settled here and now.

Fortunately magic has its own set of laws that have to be obeyed. Not rules that men make, mind you, but laws, like physics, that are problematic for a practitioner to get around. Parker was drawing upon massive amounts of energy, more than his inner reserves of mana could ever account for. Any wizard can do this, in fact you don't have to be a wizard to do it, because the energy is everywhere, in all life.. It's what makes it possible for mundanes to perform ritual magic. Parker was essentially allowing himself to become the magical equivalent of an extension chord. It was all fine in theory until that power was released.. If Parker had his way, the energy would be released into the storm to create three tornadoes to destroy what he perceived as three enemy strongholds. But that's where the analogy to the extension chord breaks down. If you unplug a chord, the power simply stops moving through it. In magic, however, that power still needs to go somewhere, and lacking a will to drive it, it tends to go back along the path that it's been moving on most recently If I could manage to "unplug" Parker, that energy would come back here. And if I was very lucky, I could contain enough of it to keep this building from turning into a crater.

"I won't let you do it, Michael," I said. "There's no honor in this, and those people have done nothing to you."

"But they will, don't you understand that, Artax? They will. Unless we stop them now. Stay out of it, it doesn't concern you."

I heard the stairwell doors below us as Tunstall and Kitaen slammed through them. I had to do this now. "It's too late for that, Parker; you've already sown the wind."

"And I suppose that you're the whirlwind?" he said.

Electricity arced between my fingers. "Just remember that you're the one who said that."

He turned and charged me just as I heard the door to the rooftop burst open.

• • •

I don't think I'm necessarily hell-bound, but whatever heavens are out there are probably not vying with each other to get my soul when my life is done. So I was rather surprised to see the face of an angel, a beautiful woman surrounded by a nimbus of light, when I opened my eyes. It was raining in this particular heaven, but it was a soft, cooling rain, so I figured I could deal with it. Then the angel shone a penlight directly into my eyes.

"Get that damn thing out of my face," I said, knocking it away.

"Yup, he's lucid," Detective Kitaen said.

"Will he be all right?" asked another voice. Tunstall's voice, I noted, and laced with genuine concern.

"Well, he hit his head, so … yeah, probably."

"Oh, look who's a laugh riot," I said.. "Now help me up before I turn you both into lutins." They both pulled me to my feet. What was left of Parker was smoldering on one corner of the roof. "Now, what in the hells are you doing here?" I asked Tunstall.

"Hey, go easy on the kid," Kitaen said. "He saved your life up here."

He shrugged, and turned his face away in embarrassment. "I did what anybody would have done," he said.

Kitaen stifled a laugh. "What a lot of people would have liked to be able to do, but few can," she said. She turned to me. "He channeled and redirected the energy that you couldn't from that little stunt you pulled. If he hadn't been here, this building would be about three or four storeys shorter — and that was after he saved a bunch of lives a few blocks from here."

I arched an eyebrow. "Really?" I asked.

She nodded. "You remember that fireball that flew past us earlier? It hit a movie theatre over at Hanning Plaza. Your boy here was walking past, looking for you. He managed to use his power to keep the walls and ceiling up long enough for everybody to get out." The cooling effect of the rain was now being negated by the heat coming from Tunstall's face. I was half expecting it to turn to steam when it hit. I smiled for a moment, then the memory of my vision of the young man came back to me, and I cursed myself. I'd been so intent on seeing my own prejudices that I hadn't considered any other interpretations of my visions. "What about the rest of the students?"

"The ones who stayed at your shop are being taken back to their center now," Kitaen said. "The rest are with my force, in the store. Don't worry, Artax, they're all accounted for."

"I wonder if I might impose on one of your men to take Master Tunstall and me back to my shop? I'd like to have a word with him there before he goes back to his facility."

She nodded. "I'll get someone to take you," she said.

• • •

Somebody was already waiting for us when I opened the door to my shop. "I don't know who you are or how you got in here, I said, but you picked the wrong store to try and rob."

The figure stepped into the light. "Rob?" he said. "I just came to give you a tip on tomorrow's market."

I let out the breath that I'd been holding; I really wasn't up to facing any more trouble that evening. I turned to introduce Tunstall to the deposed trickster god and saw that he'd already given my visitor a bow from the waist. Well now things were starting to make sense.

"Lord Klepnos," he said, "good to see you again, sir."

"And you, young Tunstall. Things working out for you here, then?"

Tunstall cast a sidelong glance at me. "He wasn't quite as open to my help as you implied he would be," Tunstall said, "but things seem to have worked out."

"Now, now," Klepnos said, "I never said he'd be willing to accept your help, just that he'd need it."

"Very important to listen to this one very carefully," I said.

There was wry humor on Tunstall's face. "I'm learning that," he said.

"Have you made a decision on my offer?" I asked him.

"I'll have to sleep on it," he said, "but it seems like a good idea."

I nodded. "Go get your things, the officer will take you back." He was gone a few minutes later. Klepnos was fishing through his pockets, pulling out things like bicycle horns and rubber haddocks before finally producing a tray with two glasses. Mine was a tall, cold glass of sarsaparilla, while his was three striated colors and seemed to have very tiny fish swimming about in it. For a while, we drank in silence.

"You offered to make him your apprentice, didn't you?"

I looked over at my friend. The half-smirk that always seemed to be on his face was gone, but the twinkle in his eyes was still there.. "Isn't that why you sent him to me?" I said.

He leaned back in his chair. "I sent him to you to help you with tonight," he said. "Now if you do decide to keep him on, well, I see a very beneficial relationship down that path. For both of you."

"You could have told me that he was working for you."

"But he's not. He's just somebody I met in my volunteer work in the juvenile correction system."

I barked out a laugh. "You? A volunteer? I can't believe it; you're actually starting to run out of jokes to tell."

"It's no joke, Artax," he said. "I've been doing it for about two years now."

The mirth drained from me. "You're telling the truth," I said. "Why?"

He shrugged. "Why should I lie?"

"You know damn well what I'm talking about. Why the volunteer work?"

Now even the twinkle faded from his eyes. "I'm scared, Artax. We all are. All of the gods."

He was, I could see the truth in his eyes. "Scared? Of what?"

He chuckled, but it was the laugh of a terminally ill patient who's accepted their fate. "The future," he said. "We're not sure what's coming."

"None of us are," I said, "not even those of us who can see the future know what's coming. My own experience this night is a testimony to the fact."

"And when was the last time you really looked?" he asked. "Looked beyond your current situation about how to get the customer exactly what they need so they'll leave faster, or how to use one of your student's own histories against him? There's a time, just a few years from now, when all prophecy fails. All of it, Artax. The gods look, and we see nothing."

I didn't know what to say. After a minute or so I asked, "So what should I do?"

"Just what you've been doing," he said, standing up. "I sent you to this city for a reason, and your time is coming. This play doesn't center around you, but you're plenty close to a lot of the people that it does."

He set down his drink and stared at it thoughtfully for a moment. When he looked back at me, his voice was gentle — the voice you would use at the bedside of a dying man — and that frightened me more than anything he had said before. "When I found you, you were a broken man. You rediscovered your purpose in life and got yourself back on track better than most people would … but now you're going to be tested again. That breaking point of long ago will either be the solid foundation on which you stand, or it will break you again — and this time you won't recover. Which one happens is up to you."

He rose then, downing the rest of his drink in one long pull. In a moment he was his old self again, his eyes and smile twinkling, as if all the grave words of the last few minutes had been forgotten. "Now, then! There's a young lady down south who's doing some interesting work, and I have to go and see if she has any promise." He sketched a quick bow. "I'll see myself out."

"I gotta say, I like him," Levinson said after the door closed.

I slumped sullen in my chair. "You would, you're both cut from the same cloth." "You should have known me when I was human," he said. "I wasn't the carefree soul that you see before you now … well, not see, per se, but you get the idea."

I just stared for a while, hoping he'd go away and let me brood. He didn't. "Hey, you okay?"

"No," I said. When he didn't leave I went on. "Not five years ago I sat in this very room and told someone that my killing days were behind me, and tonight I made a liar of myself." His voice grew softer. "You did what you had to," he said. "If what your friend Klepnos tells me is true, then you saved a lot of lives in doing it."

"And the price is another life? I'm sorry, but that's just not acceptable. There had to have been another way."

"Maybe there was, maybe not. Either way, you didn't have the time to look for it. You did what you had to. It's what happens when we operate on limited data, which just in case you've forgotten, is all anybody but Eli gets. You think I would have volunteered to lead that mission had I known about this?"

"I'm sorry," I said.

"And we're not angry," he said, his voice soft. "Well, Nightwind was for a decade or so, but for an elf that's like being pissed off for a week. The fact is we've all grown to accept and even embrace this, even Nightwind. He's had something like three epiphanies now that he doesn't have a body to distract him." I just sat in silence for a while.

"I'll be around if you need me," he said at last, and then he was gone.

Maybe he was right. Maybe I did simply have to move on. Maybe I needed to go through life realizing that even though I knew a lot more than most people, I didn't know everything. That in the end I was just as blind as everyone else. And that I didn't have to do it alone.

I didn't get up from my chair for a long time.

== The End ==

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