Child of Fortune (78 page)

"And indeed you certainly should, my little Gypsy Joker!" I declared. We laughed together, and with that we parted, for certainement there is no better loverly farewell than that.

I watched Kim descending the hillside toward the Gypsy Joker encampment, toward his true wanderjahr, toward the Yellow Brick Road upon which I had first set foot a Child of Fortune's lifetime ago, until he had entirely disappeared from my sight into the carnival where his borning spirit belonged.

Then I began descending the other side of the mountain toward the town below and my future life in the worlds of men beyond. There was a spring in my step and no regret in my heart.

For it was in that moment that I chose to name myself Wendi Shasta Leonardo, in homage to my friend and mentor and to my own new version of the heroine of the ancient mythos, but in homage as well to this very future self who now half a lifetime later looks back on her Golden Summer as a Child of Fortune, and in the spirit thereof, transcribes these, the last words of her tale.

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