Firetale (32 page)

Give me some of your
power.

Greg stepped out of the fiery
wall with his clothes on fire. The sight
sent the surviving Judges reeling
back. Greg felt no pain, did not feel fear, felt only his inner
fire, stronger than ever before. Usually the flame was just a tool,
but now he himself was the fire element.

“
It is not over, fire boy!”
exclaimed the Judge. Caius held his harpoon against Lazarus’s head,
and two more Judges had wrung the ringmaster’s hands behind his
back. “Just try any of your tricks, and I will shoot an arrow
through his head,” said Caius, and he poked Bernardius’s temple
with a tip of an arrow.

“
Let me ask you, Judge,” Lazarus
said quietly, so that only Caius could hear him. “You were able to
identify almost all the mongrels in my circus. Do you know my
secret?”

“
I only know that you talk too
much, old man,” muttered Caius.

“
I am immortal,” said Mr.
Bernardius. “I cannot be killed.”

Greg
couldn’t hear what Lazarus said to
the Judge, but he saw the anger in Caius’s eyes replaced by panic
and fear.

Greg hoped. Hoped that the power
of
the new
Martha, or what used to be Martha, would unite with his. He had not
tried this. They had not tried. And if this didn’t work out
…

Greg gathered his inner fire to
the last bit, the last spark. But
he did not direct it at the Judge.
Instead, without letting the fire go, he gave it to Martha. She
took it and boosted it, heightened it with her divine powers, and
only then did Greg and Martha release the fire.

The flame knew no barriers, no mercy.
Greg’s body became the epicenter of the fiery wave, swift and
unnaturally dense and hot. It was alive and full of vengeance. The
wave scattered hundreds of feet from Greg, destroying everything in
its path, glass and iron, rubber and steel, flesh and bone. The
wave swept Lazarus, Caius, and the other Judges. The flash was so
bright that it was visible for several miles, to people in houses
on the outskirts of the nearby town, and to the ogre brothers and
the bikers who accompanied them. The flash was so bright that when
Ino saw it, she insisted that they turn back.

When they returned, the night was as dark
as when they had left. The flame had disappeared as rapidly as it
had come crashing down, burning everything to the ground, leaving
no spark behind. In the middle of a huge scorched circle, Greg lay
naked. His skin was as clean as a baby’s. His chest was heaving, as
if he slept. Around the magician, where the fire had raged, the
earth was as smooth as a mirror, with no truck’s wheels or
motorcycle’s tracks, no signs of armed men, no remains of the
circus encampment. Not far from him, an incomprehensible figure
crouched on the ground and sighed. Burnt almost to a skeleton,
Lazarus Bernardius, the ringmaster, was difficult to
recognize.

“
Split up on a dark sad night,
both agreeing it was best.”

Bob Dylan
, “Tangled Up in Blue”

“
What’s next?” Pietro’s excited
voice echoed in the empty section of an abandoned factory. After
the fight with the Judges, the circus had only a couple of trucks,
the Galaxie Skyliner, and Ino’s pickup to transport all the
mongrels as well as Pietro’s archives. No hotel, not even the most
disreputable and avaricious, would agree to provide rooms for such
a disheveled group of circus monsters. So they had to choose
alternatives, mostly abandoned buildings, preferably big ones. The
lack of amenities wasn’t a deal breaker. If they came across
something like a neglected factory with a strong roof to shelter
them from the rain and walls to protect them from the wind, it was
considered good luck. If such a building could be found in less
than a day’s journey, it would count as a miracle. The Lazarus
Bernardius Circus was like a homeless tramp that had been running
around for just a few days, but some of its residents were already
exhausted.

“
They’ll come after us,” the
archivist said.

“
They haven’t yet,” Greg said.
“And the longer they can’t find our trail, the less they are likely
to find us.” Greg did not look up from the fire in a barrel over
which tried, in vain, to warm his trembling hands. The weather was
warm, but the magician felt frozen. His body, torn by two
coexisting minds, suffered new failures every day. They were mostly
minor, such as shaking hands, dizziness and headaches, nausea and
fatigue. But every morning, Greg woke up feeling weaker than the
day before, and he was horrified by what might happen
next.

“
Eight judges disappeared
overnight,” Ino said, her tone of voice cold. “It is unlikely their
bosses will not notice. As for the townsfolk, that flash was so
bright, the dead could have seen it from their graves.”

“
I asked to take care of this,”
said Mr. Bernardius. The ringmaster looked like a mummy, wrapped in
bandages that had turned pink from the blood that soaked them. Only
his eyes, thoughtful and sad, could be seen under the rags. Lazarus
still needed the support of one of the ogres to move, but every
day, he claimed, more muscle grew. Here and there, new skin already
showed through the bandages. Mr. Bernardius applied his own
dressings, occasionally requesting assistance from Blanche and
Black, but apart from them, no one was admitted to the process,
especially Ino, who felt an impulse to help him.

“
There won’t be any hype,” Greg
said. “We have no Judges on our tail. It’s time to separate me …
us.” Greg could not hide the impatience in his voice. “It’s time to
find a new body for Martha.”

Greg still called the one who
had been Martha
by that name, but her real name was Demeter. Demeter,
Damate, Ceres, Prthivi, Earth Mother. She’d had dozens of names
over the centuries, different names in different cultures. Names
that over time people began to forget. The less they remembered
her, the less they believed, the more her power waned. And so came
the moment when the goddess had to live among mortals. As she
continued to lose divinity over time, she needed an avatar—a
physical shell—to exist among people.

For centuries she walked the
Earth, indistinguishable from
a human, and then something happened. Something
that Demeter could not remember until now. She did not remember how
she became trapped in the body of Martha, or where she was before.
She did not remember hundreds of years of her life. Only when she
had awakened inside Greg did she realize who she was and who she
had been inside Martha. Now she needed a new avatar, a new physical
shell. Greg grew weaker every day, and no one knew what would
happen to her if he died.

“
I have already said that it will
not be easy,” Pietro said. He was exhausted. “Finding the right
avatar is very difficult. Demeter can take any body. But it’s like
with clothes, you know? You can put on any clothes, but you won’t
feel comfortable in just anything. It could be too loose or too
tight. But you can get rid of clothes that don’t fit. But with an
avatar, no.”

“
I don’t chase fashion,” growled
Greg.

“
There’s a problem,” Pietro said.
“You’re not a wearer, Greg, you’re a jacket.”

“
There must be a way!”

“
I didn’t say there wasn’t. I
just said that it is not easy to find the appropriate avatar. Not
every shell is suitable to instill the goddess into. Albeit, she is
not as strong …” said Pietro and then added sheepishly, “as
before.”

Lazarus
’s voice came from under his
bandages. “It’s time to tell us, Pietro.”

“
Well,” sighed the archivist. “As
I said, not all bodies are suitable for a goddess. Each may have
its limitations. It is possible that in the wrong body, she would
not be able to use all her strength. Or she could lose a portion of
her memory. Or behave differently. I do not know what the
consequences might be.”

“
Isn’t it written in your books?”
Ino asked with a raised eyebrow.

“
No, it is not written,” admitted
Pietro with irritation. Close proximity with the witch had unnerved
the archivist. What unnerved him even more was that she was always
looking for any reason to doubt his and his brothers’ knowledge.
“In any case, as far as an avatar suitable for Demeter, it depends
on many factors. For example, the susceptibility of the physical
shell.”

“
What does that mean?” Greg
asked.

“
It means it is impossible to
enter some people. They are just not suitable for it. But others
are like a ready-made vessel, waiting to be filled.”

“
I don’t think Demeter wants to
take an appropriate body from just anyone. She does not want to
suppress his mind,” Greg muttered.

“
That’s clear. I’ve already
thought about where to find an avatar in case Demeter wants to show
the kind of humanity that’s uncharacteristic of gods,” the
archivist said.

“
Sounds like you know where to
find people who voluntarily give up their minds,” said
Lazarus.

“
Actually, yes, I do know.”
Pietro looked at Ino. “In the nuthouse.”

There was a puzzled
silence.

“
Where?” Greg asked, disbelief in
his voice.

Pietro looked
embarrassed.
“In hospitals for the mentally ill. As you know, some
people in such places complain that they hear voices in their
heads, as if someone is talking to them. Not all of them are crazy.
Some really talk to … different creatures. For example, to the
spirits of the dead lusting for their bodies. But these spirits or
ghosts are too weak, so they are only manifested in the form of
voices.”

“
It’s like a demonic possession,”
Lazarus said thoughtfully.

“
Overall, it amounts to the same
thing. Demon, spirit, goddess—they can all dwell in a man. But not
completely. The human personality is always trying to oust its new
neighbor. Only very powerful gods and demons can completely
suppress the former consciousness. Ghosts and spirits just make it
go crazy but are too stupid to realize it. Demons, as we all know,
possess people just to have fun. And gods need an avatar—a physical
shell—to exist on Earth.”

“
So we need to find any mental
hospital?” Greg asked. “And we’ll have a lot of
options?”

“
Oh, no. We need a hospital with
the most severe patients. You see, not all doctors believe voices
in the head is a serious disease. Almost every twentieth person on
the planet sometimes hears voices, but not all of them are clapped
in psychiatric hospitals. Only the most seriously ill patients. If
the cause of the disease is a ghost or demon, then there is nothing
the doctors can do to help, and over the years the patient’s
consciousness, exhausted by constant struggles for independence,
becomes decrepit. Sooner or later the person loses it and degrades
to a vegetable state.” Pietro looked around. “We can borrow the
body of one of these patients for Martha.”

“
And what about the ghost that
lives in it?” Ino asked, clearly wanting to find shortcomings in
the archivist’s plan.

“
Oh, it’s not a problem!” said
the tubby man. “As an archivist, I know how to banish ghosts and
demons. But I think that Demeter herself can handle the displacing
of the former oppressor.”

“
And what will happen to the
person?” Greg asked.

“
Nothing. If you choose an avatar
of a worst-case patient, he or she won’t feel anything—not the
exorcism, not Demeter. His mind, so to speak, has died. It would be
like moving into a house that didn’t belong to anyone,” explained
the archivist.

“
Where do we find the right
person?” Ino asked doubtfully.

“
It’s not far,” the archivist
said. He brightened, feeling everyone’s attention riveted to him.
“On my map there is one hospital a few hours away from our
temporary, as I hope, home.”

“
Will we really find … what we
need there?” Greg said, a faint hope in his voice.

“
This hospital has been famous
for many years for its, shall we say, unusual patients. I think
finding a suitable body there will be easy.”

“
Then it’s decided,” croaked
Bernardius. “Pietro, tomorrow you will hit the road with Greg and
Ino. I’ll stay here to look after the rest.”

“
Why do we need her?” the
archivist said.

“
You need someone to take you
there. You do not know how to drive, and Greg …” Lazarus paused,
and everyone looked at the magician, whose body was trembling,
especially his hands. Assessing the state of the fire mage, Pietro
said no more.

“
Go tomorrow at dawn. Ino, I hope
you don’t mind if you go in your car. It is less noticeable on the
road.” Lazarus’s voice was dry, and in the dim light, and because
of the bandages, Ino could not see Bernardius looking at
her.

“
Of course,” agreed the witch
with a sigh.

Greg was afraid to fall asleep.
Since shar
ing
his body with Martha, strange dreams had been hammering him. He
dreamed of Martha, about how they made love, and then she would
dissolve into his arms and he would be left alone, clutching
emptiness. He dreamed about the murders, but he did not see his
victims’ faces, but instead looked at himself with their eyes,
seeing only anger and darkness. And then the fire would corrode his
face from the inside and span the entire world. The most terrible
dreams were memories of his own death, with the creepy cave with
faces on the walls. That would have become his universe, if she had
not saved him.