Changer (Athanor) (7 page)

Hair completed, he shades his eyes light brown, almost a coyote yellow.  The lines he etches in around them permit either menace or strength to be telegraphed with the faintest motion.

Finished, he surveys himself from head to toe, decides that he has precisely what he desires—a human male of strength and subtle power, who, despite these qualities, could vanish into a New Mexican crowd with minimal effort.  After memorizing the form, as a final safeguard he designs alterations to the features and fingerprints.  This way, if pursued, he can make subtle shifts that will protect his legal identity.

He showers and dons his now-ill-fitting clothing, then phones a number he has committed to memory.

“Pendragon Productions,” a female voice says.

“I want to speak to Arthur or Eddie,” the Changer says, his voice deep and just slightly gravelly.

“May I say who is calling?”

“Yes.”

There is silence on the other end of the line as the receptionist tries to decide how to deal with this, then the line goes mute as she transfers the call.

“Pendragon Productions, Arthur speaking,” says a baritone male voice.

“Arthur, this is the Changer.”

“Changer?  I didn’t expect to hear from you.”

“I know that, but I’m going to call my dues.  Last I checked, I had about thirty years credit to draw on.”

“At least,” Arthur agrees.  “Fly on over.  I’m at the same place as I was for the last Lustrum Review.”

“Can’t.  I’m traveling with my daughter, and she doesn’t shift.”

“Hm.”  There are many unasked questions in that grunt, but Arthur is, if nothing else, politic.  “Since you’ve phoned, I’m assuming that you’re somewhere I can send a car.”

“That’s right.”  The Changer gives the address.  “And make certain that it’s someone who won’t ask questions.  I’m not in a mood to make idle banter.”

“I’ll send Vera.”

“Good.”

“It will be about a half hour or forty-five minutes before someone can reach you.”

“Fine.”

“Then I’ll be seeing you.”

“Looking forward to the meeting with pleasure,” Arthur replies.

“Right.”

The Changer hangs up the phone and quickly resumes the John Anderson form. The latest shift has made him ravenous, and the she-pup is going to be hungry when she wakes up.  He also needs another box.  Somehow, he doesn’t care to transport a box that smells quite so strongly of frightened coyote.

3

Se non è vero, è molto ben trovato.
(If it isn’t true, it is a happy invention.)

—Italian proverb

N
ew Mexico calls itself the Land of Enchantment, and that is reason enough for a man who insists on calling himself Arthur Pendragon to set up residence there.  He would have preferred the more eccentric, art-oriented cities of Santa Fe or Taos, but those cities lack major airports, a serious inconvenience for one who, in his position as king, must often travel.

Although part of his reason for residing in New Mexico is that it permits him to relive a persona he made famous in England, he actually likes New Mexico better than England.  The British Isles’ foggy softness had been enjoyable at first, but the brilliant sunlight and wide-open spaces of New Mexico’s high-altitude grasslands remind him of the first land he remembers (as far as he knows, the land that gave him birth) and of several in which he had lived thereafter.  No, modern New Mexico might not be ancient Sumer or Egypt, but there is a pleasant sense of homecoming nonetheless.

Realities of the modern world being what they are, he will need to relocate within the next fifty or so years, but for now he has found a home.  Perhaps next he will return to the Middle East, have altered the reddish gold hair and piercing blue eyes of this incarnation, shave the curly beard, relinquish the cultured British accent, and resume the burly-chested, dark-maned figure that had been his as Gilgamesh the Wrestler, the first king, one whose epic is the oldest recorded in human history.

For a moment, he wistfully wishes that he were one of those like the Changer who are not bound by human form.  He would like to remain in one place, lazy decades stretching into centuries.  However, he suspects that such might make him hidebound and dull.  The need continually to outwit the humans who have spread over the world has kept him fresh and alive.

The Changer, though, no one would ever accuse that one of stagnating.  Although he isn’t like the satyrs, jackalopes, and yetis—the ones for whom modern science is a danger they do not dare confront—the Changer is in many ways wilder than those denizens of the untamed, isolated lands.

Wolf, coyote, raven, great cat: the Changer lives as a wild creature, rears his wild children, and reluctantly slouches into the meetings held every five years.  Sometimes, he doesn’t even bother to assume a human shape.  Last Lustrum Review, he had perched on the doorway, dark-winged battle-bird, croaking an occasional “Nevermore” to those points on which he disagreed.  Review finished, he vanished into the wilds once more.

He does live as a human from time to time, but those occasions rarely last more than a few decades.  Then he returns to areas far from humans and dwells as a wild thing for decades.

Now the Changer is coming to Arthur for assistance—even the King would not use the word “help” where the Changer is concerned.  He wonders what has stirred the old dog and looks forward to the challenge of assisting him.

Arthur rises from his polished-oak desk (this bought at an auction in New York City from himself the last time he needed to change personas) and crosses to the door of the office adjacent to his own.  His knock is acknowledged by a male voice.

“Come in.”

Arthur opens the door and enters an office as large and well-appointed as his own, even as it should be.  Eddie has been at his side since the dawn of history, from a time when he was known as Enkidu the Wildman, a creature said to have been sent by angry gods to punish an arrogant king for abusing his power.

Of course, the gods had been disappointed.  Enkidu and Gilgamesh had each found in the other the equal each was lacking on the created earth.  Rather than becoming enemies, they had become the closest of friends, and, when departure from ancient Sumer had seemed prudent, the excuse of Enkidu’s death had been what Gilgamesh had used to send himself into voluntary exile.

Unlike what legend said, he had not searched for the secret of eternal life, for both had already learned that aging passed them by.  Enkidu had learned this sooner than Gilgamesh, thus his residence among the beasts, for they did not grow hostile when he did not journey into old age with them.  

Gilgamesh had learned of this difference himself, as he had learned that he healed much more quickly and thoroughly than those around him.  With Enkidu, he had gone out into the world, and together they had left their mark on numerous cultures.

Arthur had the gift of inspired leadership.  As Akhenaton he had tried to reform the theocracy in Egypt, as Arthur he had tried to found a society based on law, not might, in England.  Many times, in many places, he had sought to change human cultures.  His influence rarely lasted beyond his own reign.

For the last several centuries, he had turned his energy to a greater challenge, that of protecting the athanor from encroaching human civilization and its damning records.  In this crusade, as in the others, Enkidu—now known as Eddie—had been at his side.

“Eddie,” Arthur says, and his friend raises his head from the computer terminal at which he has been working.  Dark, curly hair, and a perpetual five-o’clock shadow recall his original self, traits Eddie has maintained whenever possible.  His build recalls a stone wall: thick and blocky, hard with muscle and square of jaw.

“Yes?” Eddie says.  “You sound troubled.”

“The Changer is coming here.”

“The Changer?  What does he want?”

“I don’t know.  He says he wants to call in his dues.”

Eddie rubs his hand along his bristled jawline.  “That’s reasonable.  Every year he brings his contribution to the treasury—sometimes more than is called for.  We owe him service for that if for nothing more.”

“I agree,” Arthur says, “and there has always been his strong support of our rulership.  Can you free yourself to attend the meeting?  I’ve sent Vera to collect him.”

Snapping off his computer, Eddie nods.  “I would not miss it for the world.  The Changer come for
our
aid.  Old Proteus, sea-born, perhaps the oldest of us all.”

“There is no proof of that,” Arthur replies, slightly miffed.  He has always enjoyed his seniority.

“No proof,” Eddie says mildly.  “True, but no lack of proof, either.  He slips in and out of myths and cultures, refusing to be pinned down to any one origin just as he refuses to be pinned to any one shape.”

“Or name,” Arthur agrees.  “The Changer.  Most of us have names we use, a handful we return to as we return to certain callings.  The Changer gives us no name to hold on to and remains an enigma.”

Eddie stretches.  “I could use a sandwich before confronting the ancient.  How long do we have?”

“Easily half an hour,” Arthur says, glancing at his watch.  “Vera had to drive out nearly to Tijeras Pass to get him.”

“Why didn’t he just fly?”

“He said something about having his daughter with him.”

“Daughter?”  Eddie’s bushy brows rise to his hairline.  “How often has he claimed get?”

Arthur frowns thoughtfully.  “That is a fascinating question, Eddie.  I’d need to consult my records, but I could swear that this is the first time.  She must be very special, this Daughter of the Changer.  Could she share our gift?”

Eddie spreads his hands in a universal gesture of ignorance.  “I don’t know.  Most of our children do not.”

“Those of us who have children,” Arthur says sadly.

Like so many of his kind, he is sterile.  Even his celebrated daughters by lovely Nefertiti had not been his own.  She had not been precisely unfaithful; rather she had been more than faithful, trying to give him heirs to carry on his dream.  It had not made a difference in the end, and young Tutankhamen had been a weak reed who had forsaken the Aten.

He shakes himself, aware of Eddie’s dark eyes gazing at him with kindness.  Eddie has been burdened with a different sorrow.  He has engendered children and it has been his lot to watch each die, of age, of illness, of accident.

Long ago, each had given up asking the question of whether their immortality was worth the price.  Death is not a stranger to the athanor, only quiet, easy Death.  When an athanor dies, it is in pain and suffering, body struggling to maintain a haven for life.  Still, despite the phenomenal healing powers that are their heritage, athanor can die, they can suicide.  That neither Eddie nor Arthur has pursued that option is proof enough that life still holds fascination.

“Let’s get that sandwich,” Eddie says, taking his arm.

“I’ll be a moment,” Arthur answers.  “I want to check the records and learn what I can about the Changer’s children.”

His research confirms their earlier guesses.  The Changer’s biographical file lists no recorded children.  Offspring from his numerous matings with various birds and beasts (of late mostly ravens and coyotes) must exist, but the Changer has never brought any to the Lustrum Review, never asked that any be recorded and recognized.  This daughter, then, is a first.

Interesting.

He tells Eddie as they eat the sandwiches and potato chips down in the warm, tiled kitchen.

“I’d better make a few extra sandwiches,” the king concludes.  “They should be here any moment.”

As if in response, they hear the wrought-iron front gate opening and two cars coming up the gravel driveway.  The door to the kitchen swings open a few moments later and Vera enters.

Dark-haired, brown-skinned, with high, rounded cheekbones and almost oriental eyes, she appears to be a classic Navajo woman in her mid-thirties.  Even her speech is touched with an Athabascan accent: the even tones sometimes sounding flat, internal “r’s” softened, the final “g” in a syllable often dropped completely.  The only jarring element in this portrait is her large, grey eyes.