Fantasy & Science Fiction Mar-Apr 2013 (28 page)

He explained that coming to Red Star, well, that was Pink's idea.

Midas stirred the bucket. "So I guessed right. A Chinese boy with a Chinese dragon." For a moment Midas was far off in his thinking. When he continued, he smiled friendly-like at Jimi. "An Immortal like that, no length of chain nor bullet can end it. Maybe it got injured in all the fuss. But dead? Not like to happen. Where'd you bed this thing down?"

Jimi's tattoo prickled. "A cave. I doubt I could find it."

"We'll find it together." Midas pressed the last cold Bud into Jimi's limp hand. "I'll fix what you brought on us. You'll help."

The dragon mark burned. Jimi gulped the beer down. The cold drink eased the pain. He had a certainty that helping the augur-man was the thing to do.

 
WITHIN MIDAS'S WORK SHED played out a scene from some preacher's nightmare, or maybe a Hollywood movie, the kind that makes girls hide their eyes. Jimi swayed in place, wishing the walls would hold still. The augur-man jumped around throwing burning stuff into a chalk circle while shouting strange words. In the circle's security, he took the salamanders, threading them ass-to-mouth on heated metal sticks. The lizards tried to crawl off the red-hot dowels, their tiny feet and tails lashing the air in desperation. In their pain they burned in fierce reds and blues and yellows, hotter than any natural fire. Midas used his magic to collect the colorful essence, all the while singing. When their fires weakened, he gutted the pitiful creatures and collected the glowing coals of their innards too. Such cruelty made Jimi sick.

His head throbbed. He was pretty sure that came from the green drink Midas poured him,
a remedy for what ails you
, Midas had said. The augur-man made certain Jimi drank all the mixture down, even though Jimi complained it tasted of sulfur and oil and cat piss. It scoured his throat, which was still sore.

A small window cut in the far wall was minus a glass pane. Jimi edged that way. Maybe he could catch his breath. It seemed unlikely Midas would notice, not as het up as he was. After what felt like years Jimi arrived at the opening and put his face to the missing rectangle. He jumped at the touch of Pink's hand on his cheek. "What're you doing here?" he hissed at her.

"What're
you
doing?" Pink whispered back. "I waited till nightfall and you never came home so I went looking. What craziness is going on in there?"

Her color jar rested sidewise in the dirt, its contents a swirl of orange and yellow. Jimi twitched with effort to tell how Midas planned to kill the Chinese beast from Port Arthur. "It's an unnatural being," Jimi said. "Only something equally unnatural can stop it." For a moment he felt very wise.

"Where's my play-prettie?"

Jimi found he couldn't say. Pink's eyes were round as an owl's. "You've been doped. Can you get out the door?"

That wasn't possible as he could barely stand. Before Pink left, Jimi said, "The monster has to be destroyed."

"Creature's got a right to live. Killing's no business of ours."

He tried to warn her away, but Pink had grabbed her jar and was gone and he could not think further.

Midas had spent the rest of the night in some kind of trance, a hoodoo the like of which Jimi had never seen. Now he pulled Jimi through the woods with his fingers pressed against the back of Jimi's neck, reading the tattoo like it was a message. Jimi hoped that after their talking, Pink would have the sense to stay away. Or better still, take the car and get out.

While they traveled, Midas mumbled. Psyching himself up, Jimi figured, like for a football game. The augur-man's face grew red as he yelled about Harold, Pink's daddy. How the fool came demanding his wife, believing he was owed because of a gold ring on her finger. Anyone could die sudden-like from a brain hemorrhage. Later Midas paid for a stone up to Dripping Springs Cemetery.

Jimi threw himself down. When Midas went to lift him, Jimi wrapped his arms around a tree trunk and held fast. He said, "You murdered Pink's daddy. You magicked him dead. You're a stone-cold killer."

"That's not exactly the way of it," Midas said. "Harold came fixing to murder me. It was pure self-defense." He paced the oak tree to examine the situation.

"You do for Pink's mama, too?"

Midas slammed his boot heel on Jimi's entwined hands. Jimi screamed, then grit his teeth against his skin ripping, flesh mashing into the dirt. His bones ground together, the little ones just snapping. He cried out and swore, knowing it would be even worse when Midas stopped. Crushed, his misshapen fingers could not hold.

Midas hauled him up. "You think I'd harm my own precious wife?"

Everything Jimi heard came through a fog, and Midas would not stop talking. "She had no business leaving me. Leaving Red Star." Jimi couldn't rightly remember who Evie was, or why he'd cared once. His arms throbbed with the pain of his mauled hands. His shaking made it hard to walk, while Midas kept on at him. "No wood sprite is free to just up and leave like she did, not for love nor any reason. She's blooded to them oaks. I locked her, body and soul, into her grove. She hid the girl. But I knew she'd come. You're the one that don't belong. You and the dragon."

Jimi's hands hurt so much he couldn't think. He cursed himself for being a damn fool, for taking Pink's amulet off, for ever coming to Red Star. If Midas didn't kill him, the dragon would for sure.

A tangle of shrubs lay crushed beside a new-made river. Among the few hawthorns and cottonwoods left upright curled a patchwork creature. It wasn't yet as big as the ones Jimi thought of as adults. It still lacked claws to slash. But it was fearsome enough at three, maybe four times his size. A wiry neck with a goat's head sprang from the curled snake's body. Antlers, bad-ass as any seven-point buck's, sprouted from its bony carapace. Saucer eyes watched them with interest. A leaden cold emanated from the beast. Jimi could taste a metal tang, like blood, in the air.

Midas whispered, "Thought you put it in a cave."

"We did," said Jimi. "Dropped it down a limestone hole." He added unnecessarily, "It grew."

Midas thrust Jimi in front. The augur-man's power twisted into Jimi, doubling Jimi over as his hair began to singe. Steam hissed from his skin. Terror churned his gut. When Jimi opened his mouth, he coughed out smoke.

Prodding him forward, Midas said, "That's right, son. You're my locum to cast a mighty flame and destroy that thing. You'll die, but you had your chance to leave."

Pink slipped from an oak. Red leaves circled her head like a rusted crown. In her hands she carried a net woven of willow twigs. Embedded within the green mesh were clumps of brown feathers, bones picked clean, and specks of glitter. She said, "I've come for my Jimi."

"Step aside, girl," said Midas. "Keep your hocus-pocus for fairs and wonder-shows." Sparks exploded from his fingertips. She threw the net over Midas, trapping him and the glowing jots. The sparks fizzled to ash as they battered against the web.

Midas created a fireball in his hands. It burned like the sun. The ball grew, levitating between his palms. "You can't stop me, no more'n your ma could. Smart girl like you knows that. Let me do my work."

"I'm not my ma," said Pink.

Pain ate at Jimi from a terrible burning inside. His lips cracked as he coughed up smoke and bubbles of red spit. He looked to Pink and tried to gasp, "I'm sorry."

She laid his broken hands on the dragon's skin. A gluey substance engulfed them, attaching him to its shining scales. The dragon regarded Jimi with eyes that gleamed with unshed rain.

Molten gold glowed inside Pink's jam jar. She twisted the lid open. She said, "Trust me," then poured the fluid over Jimi. The liquid flowed like a living thing. It crawled into his ears and up his nose. He cried out as it seeped into intimate crevices and holes.

Taking advantage, Midas bowled the fireball at Jimi, who screamed as it set him aflame. His skin melted, seared, burned to blackened char. He blazed blue, then yellow, then white-hot. Fire wound pathways through his hands into the cold body of the dragon, heating it, transforming it into a creature of ether and mist.

Jimi stopped screaming and opened his eyes. He lay in the center of a circle of hot ash, buck naked, and hairless as the day he was born. He wasn't dead. The dragon—Panlong, he realized its name was—uncurled itself some distance away. Drizzle rose from the dragon's glowing iridescent skin. It hovered a few feet above the ground.

Diminished, Midas slumped within the twiggy net. Pink whispered a word and the shoots rooted. Pain etched Midas's face as he pushed against fast-growing oaks, cottonwoods, and maples.

Wood snared his flesh. Willow bark curled over his legs. Midas thrust out his arms as leaves sprang from his fingertips and his hands turned into woody excrescences.

Jimi gasped, "That's what he did to your mama, Evie. I heard him talk of it."

Pink said, "She told me through wind and leaf how he caught her. The red oaks knew. Midas broke her for revenge without a thought for me."

The augur-man rasped, "You plan to kill me, girl?"

"That'd be a sin as great as your own. But you've turned wily as a water moccasin. There's no trusting you." Pink made a gesture and bark grew over his chin, his lips, his eyes. In minutes no human sign remained of Midas Welbe. Where he stood, an ancient black willow leaned over a mountain stream.

"Can you free your ma?" asked Jimi as he got to his feet. He trembled as he touched the leaves on Pink's head with his scarred hand. Tiny bones and little toys dangled down. It was beyond his understanding.

Pink slumped against Midas's willow trunk. "There's nothing here Mama wants, not even me. Green life changes a person." She wiped tears from her face with the back of her hand.

With a groan, Jimi sat beside her. She laid her head against him to cry. Jimi held her close, wondering at the freshly healed scars on his bronzed hands. It felt like his wits and other parts were scattered far and wide. He kept his arms around Pink—choosing to ignore the aches, the spatters of rain, the gathering purple clouds, the wind buffeting the trees. Mostly he chose to ignore the Chinese dragon, Panlong, dancing close to their fragile selves. He knew the dragon wouldn't hurt them now. Maybe it never would have.

Panlong spun, tighter and tighter, pulling stones and leaves and dirt into its whirlwind orbit. Above, thunderheads split with a resounding crack. The unbridled dragon knocked nearby trees all cattywampus. Except for the black willow. It stood uncompromised, leaning over the foaming river. In a sudden quiet the dragon was gone.

Cold rain sheeted down, drenching Jimi and Pink.

Jimi said, "Once, I had a rig job. I worked my shift. Off-shift I got drunk, got laid. I never looked for anything like this," he waved at the mashed landscape, "whatever this is. I could sure use a shot of bourbon."

Above him, in the pearly layers of cloud cover, Jimi sensed Panlong stretching, growing, shifting in the wind. They were tethered sure now with an umbilicus made of water and fire.

Pink said, "Sometimes things just happen, one long string of bumps on the road. Doesn't mean the road's not worth traveling. We all gotta get to who we are somehow." She examined the contours of Jimi's face. "You staying or going? I'd like it if you stayed. Couldn't blame you if you left."

With considerable effort, Jimi struggled to his feet, then gave Pink a hand up. "Let's get home. My name's not Jimi Bone. I'm Eddie, Eddie Chun. The dragon's name is Panlong."

There were things they should talk about. About her pa, about the dragon, about what to do next. But today had enough trouble of its own, and besides, it was raining.

Last year saw the publication of the first collection of Steven Utley's Silurian time-travel tales,
The 400-Million-Year Itch.
Hot on its heels (at least by using a geologic time scale), a new volume entitled
Invisible Kingdoms
has just come out in Australia. Mr. Utley says his long-overdue fame and riches will be arriving soon. We hope he's not referring to geologic time.

Concerning this new tale, don't let the title fool you: it's not about vampires.

MONSIEUR IS LOOKING VERY well today. Of course. Monsieur looks very well every day. Actually, no one has addressed me as Monsieur for a long, long time, but every morning for many years a faithful valet—a succession of faithful valets—sent me forth with the benediction, "Monsieur is looking very well today." And one becomes so used to things.

Monsieur goes to work. Monsieur, one-time adventurer, former this, ex-that, erstwhile something else, now works the evening shift at what is euphemistically called a Retirement Home. It is in fact a warehouse for old people who are waiting to die. While they wait, they must be attended—fed, cleaned, dressed, undressed, put to bed. Monsieur does all of these things and more. He talks with his charges rather than to them, and they like him for it. Some of the women are obviously delighted by his youthful good looks as well and may be said to flirt shamelessly with him. He doesn't mind at all. Monsieur is an accomplished flirt—it's the least of what he is—and, even now, though he has scrupulously avoided both romantic entanglements and purely sexual encounters since before most of these people were born, he still enjoys being able to turn heads. It's all the vanity he permits himself. He is strongly drawn to these oldsters and, if truth be told, needs them as much as they need him, certainly more than they know.

They are discards, of no personal (as opposed to monetary and possibly statistical) value to anyone except me. They tell me that they can tell me a thing or two, and I listen, truly attentive, because some of them can indeed tell me a thing or two. My own experience may be extensive, but it isn't encyclopedic.

My current favorite is an old gentleman whom I call Casanova. The nickname pleases him immensely, as he claims to have cut quite a swathe through American womanhood in his time. I've no reason to doubt him. He dips his head toward me, speaks confidentially from behind his gnarled hand. His experiences with women seem to have informed his expectations of the afterlife. Heaven, he believes, will be more of the same pursuit to bliss. "But Hell," he says, "Hell is where all the men women wish they'd never met have to spend eternity with all the women men wish they'd never laid eyes on."