Firetale (29 page)

He
would take her to the hospital, thought
little Zinnober. The doctor would ask for his papers, but he would
come up with a story. They would believe him. Beautiful people are
always easier to believe. When he got out, he would say something
plausible to Astaroth, explain his disobedience. The main thing was
that Martha would live. Adrenalin and dreams gave him strength. He
would save her.

Once in the car, however, he realized he
did not know which way the nearest hospital was. Overcoming a sense
of panic, he decided to just drive and hope for the best. He put
the girl on the back seat and kissed her on the forehead, feeling
her feeble breath. For some reason, Zaches took the coming of dawn
for a good sign.

When Greg came to life
after
his
resurrection, the car was miles away from the forest.

Zaches stopped
along the side of
the highway and sobbed. His had lost his race with death. the
girl’s last breath had left her body hours before. The dwarf wept
bitterly, plagued by grievance and anger. He was mad at the Judge,
Greg, himself, and the damned dawn, which had given him false hope.
And now, as if nothing had happened, it had turned into a beautiful
sunny day.

“
I’ll be the moon when the sun
goes down.”

Otis Redding
, “That’s How Strong My Love
Is”

When Zaches, in tears, stopped
his car many miles away
from the woods, Greg came to life. The body of the
fire mage was full of unprecedented lightness, as if he’d just
woken up from a sound and pleasant sleep. He felt no pain, although
Greg was sure that the woodwose had given him a drubbing. He
thought of the wound in his back and tried to feel it, but he felt
strange. His muscles obeyed reluctantly, as if Greg were only a
passenger in his own body. It seemed to him that his body, which
used to be his own, was now a shell, separating him from the world.
He wondered if this was a continuation of the nightmare he’d had
when Martha was trying to save him from death. Or was the vision of
Martha a hallucination?

“
It was not a nightmare, Greg,”
said a female voice, interrupting the magician’s thoughts. He tried
to determine from where the sound came, but the echo in his head
got in the way.

“
Show yourself!” Greg
demanded.

“
Alas, I can’t,” came again the
melodious voice, calm, ancient, and wise. “Greg, calm down, let me
go, and I’ll show you.”

“
Let you go?” The world before
Greg’s eyes trembled and became dead, like a TV picture. The mage
tensed, trying to regain control of his body, but some power gently
and confidently stood in his way. Greg was not going to tolerate
this, and his fingertips flashed with sparks. Flashed and went out.
The same power that was crushing Greg in his own body damped them.
Easily, without resistance, like a man extinguishing a
candle.

“
Let me go, Greg.” The ancient
voice was strangely familiar. Greg had heard it in a vision long
ago. “Martha?”

“
I am no longer Martha, Greg,”
the voice said softly. “I never was. But I did not remember. Now I
am free. Relatively.”

“
What are you talking about?”
Greg asked. “Where’s Martha?”

“
I was Martha. I held her body
but did not remember who I really am. Let me go and I’ll show you.”
The same mysterious force gently but firmly pressed on Greg’s mind,
and he became a prisoner in his own body.

“
I am in you, Greg. I entered
you, to chase away death. But the way back is closed for me now,
because … because now I know who I am, and Martha”—the voice
sighed—“Martha’s body disappeared. For a time, I’ll have to share
your body with you, Greg. I do not like it as much as you, but I
need a human shell. For a while. Until I find another. I will not
hurt you.”

During his life, Greg had rarely been
afraid of anything or anyone. Ever since he had learned to use his
abilities, his self-confidence bordered on arrogance. He had even
met death with no fear—disappointment, perhaps, but not fear. Now
the magician was frightened. Martha had disappeared, perhaps was
dead. And he was a prisoner in his own body, because it had been
taken by … by whom?

“
You’re not a prisoner, Greg,”
the voice said with some emotion. “Martha has disappeared, you’re
right. But part of her is still with me.”

“
I don’t understand. Tell me
everything.”

“
Everything is good in its
season. We need to return to the circus and find Pietro. He will
help you understand everything. I will tell you everything I
remember.”

“
Why should I believe
you?”

“
For the same reason you always
believed. I love you, Greg. So I’ve come for you. That’s why I
freed myself.”

Greg was stunned.
Surprise, disgust,
and hope mingled on his face.

Greg longed
to talk to her, but the only
words he could squeeze out were, “We need to find a
car.”

When the magician sat in the
car, his first impulse was not to go
to the circus, but to find
Martha.

“
Why are we going to the circus?”
he asked. “Why not find Martha first? You also need her
body.”

“
I do not feel it,” the voice
said wistfully. “I’m sorry.”

Greg did not respond,
he just started the
car and drove out of the woods and onto the highway.

“
How do I find the way
back?”

“
I’ll show you. I remember, and I
know everything Martha knew.”

The road was silent.
The voice seemed to
be giving Greg time to get used to the thought of losing Martha, at
least the way the magician had known her. The unexpected neighbor
inside Greg’s head did not, however, merely talk. It directed the
fire mage’s hands at turns in the road. Initially, it took Greg by
surprise, and he instinctively wrenched the steering wheel, trying
to regain control over his body and the car, but he soon got used
to it and allowed his “neighbor” to take control. This allowed the
mage to clear his head. He found that although his new neighbor
might, if necessary, take away his control over his own body by
force, in his mind there was always a corner that the voice could
not reach. In this corner the outside world seemed very far away, a
memory so distant that it could not be distinguished from illusion.
But it was possible to think there without fear that his thoughts
would be an open book.

Greg
wondered about the voice saying that
part of Martha was still with it. The voice was strange, not human,
but Greg felt no lies in it. He still hoped he would be able to
find Martha. That hope rose in him and he nearly steered the car
off the road. Only his new neighbor’s intervention saved the car
from disaster.

At the circus encampment, Blanche and
Black, who hadn’t slept a wink since Martha’s disappearance, were
the first to noticed a rapidly approaching car. They called Mr.
Bernardius, and went to meet the guests. They were very surprised
when they saw Greg in the car that had disappeared along with
Martha. He was alone. The magician braked within thirty meters of
the perimeter of the circus lot, got out of the car, and almost ran
to meet the ogres. Greg had never imagined he could be so happy to
see their sullen, warty faces. The ogres did not experience a
similar joy from the meeting. Greg had to stop running, so as not
to bump into Blanche’s big hand extended in a warning
gesture.

“
Hey, Black, I am glad to see
you.”

“
I’m Blanche,” growled the
ogre.

“
Well, that’s exactly what I
said!” Greg tried to make a joke, but the faces of the brothers
just grew more sullen.

“
Are you alone?”

“
Yes. No. Technically I’m alone.
But not alone. It’s hard to explain.”

The ogres
’ faces became puzzled. Seeing how
hard they were thinking, Greg tried to explain.

“
Guys, I need to see Pietro. He
will explain everything.”

“
Let them in,” called Lazarus,
quickly approaching. “What’s happened, Greg? Have you seen
Martha?”

“
She’s with me. In some sense,”
Greg’s explanation bewildered Mr. Bernardius. “Lord, let me talk to
Pietro already!”

Greg, Mr. Bernardius,
Pietro, and Ino
gathered in the big top. They all waited for the magician to begin
his story, but Greg just opened and closed his mouth, not saying a
word, as if the story he wanted to tell was so fantastic and
confused that he did not know where to begin.

“
Martha found me at Ino’s
shelter. But it was too late.” Greg spoke slowly and carefully, as
if the fate of the entire world depended on it.

“
Go on,” Mr. Bernardius said
gently.

“
I was dead,” Greg said, and
before anyone could interrupt him, he added, “But she saved me. I
do not know how. She has somehow entered my mind and”—he
shrugged—“restarted me? But when I woke up, she was not there.”
Greg did not look up from the floor the whole time he told his
story, and his arms and shoulders were tense.

“
Do you know where she is?” asked
Lazarus.

“
I know that her body, her
physical being …” Greg took a breath as if he were about to jump
into deep waters. “Her body is dead.”

Questions rained down on Greg.
All the words that they had kept inside gushed
over Greg. He did not even try
to answer their questions, listen to their assumptions, or accept
their condolences. He was exhausted by his new neighborhood and his
gloomy thoughts.

“
Shut up!” Greg snapped. The
others were stunned by his anger and the sharpness of his
cry.

“
Part of Martha is in me. Or what
was in Martha. Heck, I don’t know. She said that she wants Pietro
to tell you.”

“
Why Pietro?” wondered
Ino.

For a moment, Greg turned
away from the
conversation; he looked like he was listening to something in the
distance, not paying attention to what was happening around him.
Then he turned back to the others. “She says only he can understand
and translate what she would say.” Greg seemed like a student
uncertain about a hint from his teacher. “So, Pietro, son of a
bitch, listen carefully.”

Something in
Greg
’s face
subtly changed. It was relaxed, and his facial muscles seemed to
have forgotten how to portray emotions. His eyes closed, and Greg
looked like a deep sleeper or a corpse. When his eyes opened, there
was no Greg anymore. From the mouth of the one who a moment ago had
been the fire mage poured words in a strange language, ancient,
like the sands of Babylon, incomprehensible to everyone except
Pietro. It was a woman’s voice, deep, calming, and holding out
hope, the voice of mother and defender. It spoke in a powerful
monotone flow that made the listeners congeal and dissolve into it.
Pietro’s face bore an expression of wonder as the voice spoke of
things unprecedented, even for a highly experienced archivist who
had studied ancient grimoires and served Lucifer. If Lazarus or Ino
could have torn their eyes away from Greg’s transfigured face and
looked at the chubby archivist, they would have noticed how his
usually good-natured face, for the first time ever, expressed awe.
The words were meant for Pietro, but Lazarus and Ino were captured
by the rhythm of the ancient language and were desperately trying
to understand what that part of Martha, now inside Greg, was
saying. The ancient language made them forget about time. The world
had become a deceptive fantasy, and at the center of it, and the
source of truth, was the voice.

After
the final echo of the ancient words
slipped away, and Greg’s face had lost the look of a man who had
just visited someplace beyond the familiar world, Pietro needed
time to regain his composure.

“
What did she say?” asked
Lazarus. The tentmaster and the witch were shocked, and the meaning
of what had happened was still not clear to them. Greg and Pietro
looked at each other, as if to make sure that they had heard the
same thing and correctly understood the meaning of what was
said.

“
I do not know where to start,”
the archivist murmured. “I need to check my records. I have heard
about it, but never seen it.”

“
Martha isn’t a demionis,” Greg
said grimly. “She is a goddess.”

By the time Lazarus and Ino realized that
what Greg had said was not a vulgar expression of admiration,
Blanche and Black’s angry voices resounded outside, and then
another voice, filled with rage and madness, rose up. Greg
recognized the voice, although he had been sure he would never hear
it again.

Record made on 06/05/1934

Archivist: Aldred

My old heart sank when we
entered Arapahoe. It was a mining town, half extinct, grubby and
somewhat black and gray,
as if coal dust had seeped into every nook and
cranny when the miners returned from the pit. We rode the short
main street slowly, as the locals gazed upon us with incredulous
and bleak looks. I’m old, so old that I sometimes think death
forgot about me and might never remember. But there, in that town,
I thought I had died and my soul had gone to Hell under the
supervision of a mournful ghost, ancient and
indifferent.