15
Predictably the press conference was crowded with rude reporters, and I about sneezed myself silly from all the flash-powder charges going off here, there, and everywhere. Sadly a far too-large number of them were expended to illuminate me; since I’d sort of been at the heart of the crisis, Shaper asked me privately ahead of time to pose for anyone and everyone who wanted a shot, and there were so many that it ended up taking almost all afternoon. One of the photographers had a bad tin of powder; it’d gotten damp and went off with such a thunderous roar that I thought the whole Castle was coming down. But in the end it was all just noise and smoke, much like the Press itself. They came, they made a terrible hubbub, then they left.
And sure enough, my next monthly check was signed by Leslie M. Shaw, Secretary of the Treasury, instead of Shaper’s non-magical business agent Henry Jenkins as it’d always been before. Even the paper it was printed on was the same color. The bank accepted it for deposit just like the old ones, and as predicted life went on. Bob and Eric pulled their wagon, Midnight prognosticated, Frederick’s education progressed and Mother crafted her lovingly-made amulets and charms.
Yet at the same time, and in a much more subtle way, everything was different. Even though I didn’t need guarding anymore-- the State Department had made it abundantly clear by now that any attempt to harm or kidnap American magic-related personnel would henceforth be considered an act of war by the United States, and what higher level of protection was humanly possible?-- there were always at least two or three cadets from the Academies wanting to visit and get to know me. Cadets weren’t routinely allowed to wander about the countryside, I already knew enough about their lives to understand. This was a not-so-subtle form of pressure to encourage my interests in things military. Teddy also sent me a signed copy of his own “The Naval War of 1812” to spark my interests, and I have to say that I found it interesting reading. Indeed, soon a veritable flood of military-related books came washing in. So many of them, in fact, In fact, that they piled up faster than I could digest them, even if I’d been able to tolerate such a one-dimensional literary diet. Yes, I liked military books. But I also enjoyed some Jules Verne and H.G. Wells and Mark Twain now and again as well!
At least no overt pressure was applied, as I kept hearing was increasingly the case in Europe. In the letter that came with his book, the President had assured me that I’d earned the nation’s eternal gratitude for the Baltimore thing alone, and that I should feel no obligation to study war magic merely because it appeared to be written in the stars that I should do so. “You’re your own person,” Teddy explained. “So you should follow your own heart and only your own heart. The drive towards service to one’s fellow man must come from within, not without. Otherwise one is a slave to their fellows.” But of course he also told me about how proud he was to have stood at the head of the Rough Riders, the importance of what so many of them had died for, and how wonderful and important the new navy he was building would soon be. On the one hand I wanted to roll my eyes and sigh; he could be so much like the Baron sometimes! Yet, on the other, I had to agree about how important the navy was. After all, I’d read “The Influence of Sea Power on History” just like he he had.
I’d sort of felt obliged to. After all, I’d been sent no less than eight copies, one of them from of all people the Kaiser. Though I never did decide if it was because he hadn’t yet quite given up on recruiting me, or by way of apology.
Guardian’s life changed too, though in her case it had little or nothing to do with the nationalization of the Guilds. Her specialty was fighting city-sized fires, and I’d put her at least temporarily out of business by killing the salamander in Baltimore. While her Towers of Truth were indicating eventual trouble on the West Coast, the results were vague and uncertain enough that nothing was liable to happen out there for at least another year and probably longer. So she was at loose ends as well. “It feels so strange,” she said to me one evening just as the mosquitos were coming out. We were walking back towards the castle from the Conemaugh River, where I’d enjoyed a pleasant summer afternoon’s soak while my escort lazed on the bank studying old scrolls. “For the first time since I don’t know when, I don’t have anything urgent to do.”
I smiled up at her. “You ought to enjoy it while you can. I mean… It wasn’t easy, earning your certification. How many thousand spells did you have to memorize, anyway?”
“Urgh!” she answered, looking slightly ill. “Please, don’t bring that up, even though it was was only hundreds. The scars are still too tender.” Then she sighed. “Especially since I just spent the entire afternoon memorizing more.”
My smile faded. It’d been a truly beautiful day, the skies had been full of singing birds… And what a glorious sunset! Had Guardian even been aware of any of it? If this was the cost of becoming a sorcerer, maybe I’d be better off taking a familiar oath after all? If one was ever offered to me, that was… Then I frowned. “You’re not that much older than me, you know.”
She nodded. “I’m twenty-three. Still just a baby by Guild standards. In fact… in a century or two there won’t be enough difference between us left to matter.”
“I guess not,” I agreed. Though the idea was sort of strange, what with her being an adult and me not. “But anyway…” I smiled again. “Tell me that you don’t want to go to the World’s Fair as bad as I do.”
She smiled back, prettily. “Of course I do,” she admitted. “I’ve never been to one.” Then she looked down at her bag of scrolls. “But…”
“Yeah,” I replied, as disappointed as she was. Then I frowned. “I… I think I could go. If I really wanted to, that is. I mean… I can afford it.”
Guardian nodded. Though she was well-compensated, volunteering to be permanently transformed into an animal paid well enough to make a millionaire blink. And Guardian had been kind enough to help me set up my accounts. I had no financial secrets from her. Nor any other kind, really.
I sighed and thought about how sick I was getting of reading military books. Probably spells were even worse. “We should go,” I decided. “I mean… You’re not a slave to your fellows. Teddy said that, in a letter. That no one should feel so duty-bound that they become slaves to their fellows. You’re a person too, and have a right to live a little.” I smiled again. “Besides, we can claim it’s educational. I was supposed to go overseas, you know. Before I got all burned up. And… I mean… Doesn’t the Fair sort of bring overseas here?”
“Hrrm,” Guardian replied. Then we walked on for a time in the gathering darkness, admiring the first fireflies of the evening. “You know,” she said eventually. “You’re right. Some of the other mages take holidays. Just because I’m a disaster specialist doesn’t mean I shouldn’t as well. It isn’t like we foresee anything headed our way at the moment.”
“Exactly! And anything we don’t foresee is as likely to happen in St. Louis as anywhere else,” I answered, feeling my heart flip-flop in a happy way that it hadn’t since I was maybe fourteen and might never again once I was all grown up, for all I knew. Then I was bounding ahead with all I had, not feeling a care in the world. “I’ll go ask Shaper! Right now!”
It ended up being much easier than I’d imagined. Shaper wasn’t only willing to hear out my request, but seemed pleased as could be to help matters along. “Of course you can go to the Fair,” he exclaimed even before I was finished breathlessly hemming and hawing after showing up at his office door without an appointment. “And Guardian as well. She works much too hard, and just between you and I think fighting the Baltimore fire took a lot more out of her than she lets on. A disaster mage specializes in huge, earth-shaking spells that drain their caster enormously; that’s why she comes to people like me for her small, everyday enchantments. We keep her as fit and strong as we can; when times are good she may go a decade or more without casting anything but detection and foretelling spells.” He smiled. “Similarly, when they do cast they go all-out. So Guardian is still terribly weakened, and no one would be more pleased than I if she were to recharge herself a little.” I was even more surprised when Shaper pulled a dog-eared little booklet out of his top-center drawer and smiled wistfully. “Here you go, son,” he said, holding it out so I could grab it with my mouth. "It looks like you’ll be needing this more than I will.
“1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition,” the cover read. “Your Faithful Guide to the World’s Fair and Olympian Games”.
I was so excited that I had to ask one of the groomers to help me get the “Faithful Guide” situated properly on my reading stand, though I tried three times on my own first. Normally I could make the thing work without any help, except with the biggest and smallest of books. And to be fair, this was a pretty small and delicate one; the covers were made of heavy paper instead of the stiff cardboardy stuff most publishers used. But it was well worth the trouble-- I sat and read it over and over again until I could hardly keep my eyes open, then dreamed about it all night long. Fourteen hundred displays! Battle re-enactments! An air-conditioned building! Seventy-five miles of walkways! Food from all over the world! And above all…
…the great Ferris Wheel was back! I’d ride it a dozen times, I promised myself, even if I had to pay for eight or ten tickets on every ride.
“Meet me in St. Louie, Louie!” I sang myself to sleep. “Meet me at the Fair!”
Arranging such a trip for someone like me is in a lot of ways a lot tougher than it seems. I can’t ride in a standard railcar, for example, so the Guild keeps a special one especially for we extra-large familiars. On the one hand, there was plenty of room in it for things like extra cases of blueberries and a separate compartment fitted with beds and such for my human companions and caretakers to ride along if necessary. On the other, buying a ticket at the the little window in the station is a lot simpler and easier to coordinate than persuading not merely one but a whole series of railroads to switch and move a private car from train to train across multiple states. It took Pieter, the Guild’s travel specialist in Johnstown, over a week and a huge telegraph to bill to set it all up. He had a much easier time finding us lodging, however; once word got around in St. Louis that we were coming the brand-new Jefferson Hotel offered us a suite for free, for as long as we cared to stay. “Better take it,” Pieter advised in his thick Dutch accent; he’d only been in the country a few years. “Rooms aren’t so easy to come by there this year. Besides, it’s one of the best places anywhere-- they’re doing everything they can to gain a national reputation. And I hear they have a great view of both the Fair and the Mississippi.” He smiled. “I only wish I could come along!”
Sure enough, when we finally arrived in St. Louis and were shown to our complimentary suite the first thing the bellboy did was to sweep aside the draperies with a grand gesture and let Guardian and I “Ooh!” and “Aww!” for a moment at the grand vista laid out before us. Forest Park was several blocks away, yes. But it was also green and beautiful and vast, yet despite its sheer size was jam-packed with beautifully sculpted buildings and frescoes and vendor’s booths and people, people, people! “Welcome to the Fair,” he greeted us with what I was beginning to appreciate as a very genuine smile; St. Louis was proud as punch of their Fair, and it showed. “Is there anything else I can do for you?” Guardian fumbled for change to tip him-- she had to take charge of that sort of thing for us both, of course. But he smiled and waved her off. 'I know what you two did in Baltimore." He turned to me and made a stiff little bow. “Especially you, sir. All of us on staff here do. So we got together and held a vote. Not one of us will be accepting gratuities during your stay.” He smiled again and gestured out the window at the Fair. “It’s not like we’re hurting this year anyway, you see.” Then he was gone.
“Well!” Guardian declared into the silence a few seconds later. “That’s something you don’t see every day-- a bellboy turning down a tip, I mean.” She smiled and seemed to visibly relax; certainly her shoulders lowered a bit. “Maybe this trip was a good idea after all.”
I smiled back. Guardian had spent the entire trip from Pennsylvania studying scrolls and mumbling practice-spells under her breath, seemingly oblivious to the beauty of the countryside and the freshness of the air around her. Only during the short few moments we’d spent actually crossing the wide, brown Mississippi had she looked up from her eternal studies and smiled. But now, it seemed she was finally entering into the spirit of the thing. “Let’s unpack,” I declared. “And have an early lunch.”
“Right,” she agreed. “And afterwards I’ll give you a good brushing for when we meet the Mayor at two.”
It was perhaps too much to expect to expect the mayor to come to the hotel to meet us; our appointment was at the brand-new City Hall. Mr. Wells chose to greet us out front at the top of a big staircase. This suited me just fine since there were dozens of reporters and photographers standing around and I was coming to absolutely detest flash powder. We rode over in a dray-wagon— about the only kind that could handle my weight— though it wouldn’t have been too awful of a walk. We’d learned in Baltimore that it was wise to give the newspapers a couple days to spread the word that I was in town and didn’t bite before I wandered about too openly. The mayor was unmistakable in his top hat and tails; immediately after bowing over Guardian’s hand and tousling my ears he launched into a long speech about how he hoped we’d enjoy ‘the New St. Louis”— you could definitely hear that capital N— and the extra-clear water and mostly-paved streets his administration had provided. By then I was beginning to get used to being around politicians and the mayor seemed if anything to maybe be a cut above average for one of his breed— certainly the Fair was a big success so far. Despite the speechifying, however, it wasn’t Mayor Wells who held my attention. Rather it was a rather elderly Indian in casual, almost dilapidated western dress who stood just behind him. Could it be… I mean, I knew he was supposed to be in town, but…
Mercifully the speech wasn’t excruciatingly long— after all, I supposed, he was probably spending half his waking hours greeting VIP’s, so by this late in the Fair he had it down to an art. Then he smiled and posed with us one final time, dozens of shutters clicked, and he lowered his voice to a more private level. “I’m so pleased to meet you both!” he declared, his smile wide and sincere. “After all, not many folks can claim to have saved an entire city.”
“Well, most of one at least,” Guardian observed. “I got far too late a start.”
“Hah!” Mayor Wells replied. “Believe me, so far as the average man is concerned you did a pretty wonderful job.” Then he turned to me. “And you, son! You killed a salamander!"
“Just a baby one,” I observed, blushing under my fur.
He snorted in derision. “In the bible, David killed only one giant.” Then he smiled again. “Son, as you might’ve guessed St. Louis has welcomed an awful lot of important and well-known people to this fair. I can’t even begin to name them all.” Then he gestured at the old Indian, who was waiting patiently in the background. “Of them all, so far you’re the only one that Geronimo has asked to meet. So, we decided to accommodate him.” His smile widened as he stepped aside. “Christopher Speiss, Chief Geronimo of the Apache. Geronimo, Christopher Speiss.”
The elderly man’s eyes twinkled, then he moved forward and extended his hand. “I greet a great warrior,” he said in his native tongue; my ears tingled to let me know that Shaper’s communication spell was working. He’d cast it so that I could speak directly with foreigners and learn more about them. “There are ancient legends of your kind among my people; I listened to them over and over as a boy.” He bowed his head slightly. “I’m pleased to have lived long enough to witness them become real once more.”
“He says he’s powerful glad to meet someone as strong and famous as you,” Geronimo’s translator declared. Then he thrust his hands in his pockets and stuck his chest out. “He says he wishes you’d been around to help him kill Mexicans, back in the day. And he killed enough of them, by god! Somewhere between dozens and hundreds— even he’s not sure!”
I blinked and looked Geronimo in the eye. He smiled slightly. “I too defended my people,” he explained. “Or I did so as best I was able, until there was nothing left to struggle for. We perished, yes. And with us our whole world. But we hold our heads high.”
“He says he’s not sorry, either,” the translator explained. “He hates Mexicans like you wouldn’t believe, you see. They killed his whole family.”
“In my old age,” Geronimo continued, “I have learned many things. One of them is that there is both good and evil in all peoples, and that it is sad that we must work so hard at killing each other. While some tribes are indeed are more despicable and treacherous than others, for the most part ordinary people are good everywhere.” He lowered his head. “There is blood on my hands that I’d take back if I could, oh Great Bear. My advice to you is to kill without hesitation when you must— there will indeed be times when this is the least bad of all alternatives. But try not to do so in anger, for it clouds one’s judgment and makes even the innocent appear to be enemies when in fact they are not. This was my greatest error, and today is my greatest regret.”
“He says that he’s sorry he fought against us for so long, and that all the suffering he caused was a bad thing.” The translator shook his head. “It’s a mite late for that now, don’tcha think?”
“I lived the freest of all men yet must die a prisoner,” Geronimo continued. “Though your tribe are for the most part kind jailers— I’m glad, for example, that they’ve allowed me to come to the Fair and see all the strange and wonderful things gathered here.” He smiled. “I hope you shall see and enjoy too, Great Bear. Appreciate the good times while you can. For I know better than most know what difficulties and hardships must lie ahead for you.” He bowed his head slightly. “Our holy men have spoken of your kind,” he repeated. “It is an honor to have met you”
“He says that he’s glad he was allowed to come to the Fair,” the translator explained. “And especially pleased to meet you. He hopes you have a good time. He smiled. “So do I, of course.”
I magic-smiled back, then licked my lips in the special way that activated my end of the translator spell so that Geronimo would hear me speaking in in his own native tongue. “I’m but a boy,” I explained, lowering my eyes. “And you’re a warrior of great legend. It’s not my place to stand in judgment of you, but instead to respect your abilities and love for your people. Thank you for your wise words; I promise you that I shall never forget them for all the days of my life.”
The translator’s eyes widened slightly, then he shrugged and turned to Geronimo. “The boy says that he’s pleased to have met you,” he said in what I presumed to be Apache— the magic made it difficult for me to keep track. “You seem to have really made an impression.”
Geronimo’s eyes widened too, then he threw his head back and laughed a single syllable. “Ha!” he declared with a big grin. Suddenly he seemed fifty years younger, full of vigor and… more than a little frightening. It was easy to picture him as he must once have been, sitting in a saddle in traditional beaded regalia, Winchester at the ready. “May the ghosts of your ancestors ride with you, Great Bear! I am old and shall soon depart this world; may we share many council-fires on the other side!” Then, still grinning, he turned and walked stolidly away.
16
Of course we couldn’t walk the whole seventy-five miles of Fairgrounds pathway that first day, though I have to say that on my part it wasn’t for lack of trying. It was terribly hot and humid, for one thing, and while I had my cooling spells Guardian sweated like the devil under her robes and needed to sit and rest sometimes. But we did manage to get aboard the Ferris Wheel that first day right at sunset. Its operator cleared out an entire car for us, and instead of accepting a fare had a photographer take my picture in five different poses with him. I even let him sit on my back, I wanted to ride so bad! But it was all worth it. The steam motor chugged, the whistle blew, and we soared and flew like birds. For the first time, I really appreciated what it must be like to have wings. Yes, I liked being a bear. But maybe the feathered familiars had something special going for themselves as well?
Not long after that the Edison lamps and gaslights were turned on, and you could tell right away who was from the country and who from the city. The rural types kept looking around themselves in awe, then up at the mysterious glowing orbs that were illuminating acres at a time. Guardian and I walked the park in a near-trance ourselves, overwhelmed at it all. Should we see the New Jersey State pavilion first? Look in on the Deep Sea Diver display, and find out how they’d made telephones work underwater, of all places? Admire the wireless telegraphy tower, which could send messages almost as well as magic? Or go watch mock ironclads refight naval battles with real guns firing tens of thousands of real bullets during every show?
We couldn’t see it all in a week or maybe not even a month, much less a single afternoon and evening! So after that first mind-boggling day we made a list. Guardian, naturally enough, was most interested in the recreations of famous disasters. There was a presentation claiming to replicate the Galveston Flood, for example— she’d been there as an apprentice but, not yet being certified to actually cast spells, had been stuck sorting essential magical materials in a back room for hours at a time and hadn’t experienced much of the actual event. She also wanted to see the firefighting exhibit, where a flaming six-story building was extinguished by wholly mundane means; obviously this was of professional interest as well. For my own part, while I wanted to take in some of the showiest stuff as much as the next teen-aged boy, I was most interested in what everyone was calling the “Living Exhibits”. There was the Esquimau Village, for example. While they had a mock-battle every day between the Esquimau and and wild dogs, I really sort of wanted to just talk with the Exhibits and learn about them. Even more, after meeting Geronimo I was sort of itching to meet more Indians; Chief Joseph was there as part of a Wild West show, and a bunch of other famous fighters as well. I was half-Indian myself after all, though I almost never thought about it and certainly didn’t tell others. So I guess it was natural that I’d be curious.
And then there were the Filipinos! Over a thousand of them, living on no less than forty-seven acres. They lived off dog-meat, I’d been assured, eating so much of it that the neighborhood just outside their quarters was now called “Dogtown” in memory of the thousands of departed canines that used to dwell there. They were Americans now too, of course, so I was eager to get to know at least a few of them as well.
Sadly, things didn’t go quite as easily after that first magical day. When one lived at Devard Castle, a place where familiars and their special needs were part of everyday life, it was easy to forget how many problems someone like me could cause in more mundane settings. It wasn’t anyone’s fault; Teddy had if anything been shortselling the truth when he’d said in recent letter that Americans were for the most part happy with their Guild and pleased with their nation’s high standing in the world of magic. While people avoided sorcerers as a rule, in these modern times it was more due to their legendarily sharp tongues than out of superstitious fear. Almost no one who was really sick, for example, failed to see a Healer if they could possibly get to one, and people were particularly understanding towards the needs of we familiars.
Yet all this was very difficult to explain to, say, a horse engaged in pulling a heavy wagon. Near noon on the second day an entire team ran wild after catching a whiff of me, and it was pure chance that no one got hurt. That’d never happened in Baltimore, but now it was clear that we’d mostly just been lucky. Even worse, a little later that same day a panic broke out as I passed near the Ozark Hunting exhibit. Someone apparently not only hadn’t read the newspapers announcing my presence but also failed to note my oversized orange collar and got the idea that I was an escaped exhibit. Before long hundreds of Fairgoers were running in panicked circles as a crowd of police officers surrounded me for my own protection. So after that I had to arrange for at least one policeman to escort me everywhere I went. Even that, however, wasn’t the end of the troubles. One day after I got caught in the rain and my fur was therefore especially pungent, my scent apparently caused a huge ruckus in the walk-through birdcage even though it was over a hundred yards away. Some especially rare and delicate specimens died trying to batter their way free, and, well… They very respectfully and politely asked me to stay well away from the animal exhibits after that and what could I do but agree? Even though that closed off maybe half the Fair?
Still, Americans were indeed fond of their Guild and therefore special efforts were made. I was certainly grateful for them! I got to spend a couple hours with the Esqimau after closing time, for example. They offered me wonderful smoked salmon— the finest eating anywhere, so far as I’m concerned!— and told me their stories of life and death and creation much longer into the night than anyone had planned. They were a happy people for the most part, I decided, though these specific individuals were quite eager to go home. They’d been well paid to come to the Fair, by their standards at least, and as nearly as I could tell had been treated fairly. Some had even taken the opportunity to send their children to school for the first time ever. Still, the Fair only had a few weeks left to run and they were eager to return to the world they understood and felt part of. The same was true of the Zuni and Hopi Indians who were pretending to be stone-age cliff-dwellers— near as I could tell I was about the only person at the fair who understood the difference. They too met with me after hours and put on a special dance, though as honored as I was I’d really rather have just sat around and talked and learned more about them. I also got to meet most of the Indians at the Wild West Show, though they weren’t nearly such a happy lot. I heard from the cowboys who performed with them that they drank too much and fought with each other and beat their wives, but I don’t know if it was true or not. All I can say for sure is that they didn’t make nearly as much money as the cowboys, didn’t smile very often, and weren’t especially pleased to have to work late. Maybe it might’ve been better if they’d known I was half Indian, but then again maybe not. Worst of all, Chief Joseph died before I could get around to meeting him. I especially regretted that, as Sister Magdelene had told me many times that as a half-Indian I should be very proud of him.
The Filipinos were very much as I’d expected— happy, active people who seemed thrilled to death to be able to come so far and see so much. Like the Esquimau, some of them had their kids in school and all the ones I met felt well-paid and decently-treated. “We fought you Americans like the devil,” one of them told me. Then he gestured at the big Edison lamps and shook his head. “Such great cities! Such towering strength. If only we’d understood!”
I frowned a little at that, thinking about the Wild West Show Indians. “You bear no resentment?”
He sighed, and for the first time his seemingly-eternal smile slipped. “Yes, of course I do, deep down inside. You Americans killed my father and brother, and one of my nieces prostitutes herself to your sailors.” He outright frowned, and his big knife chopped down extra-hard into the dog-carcass he was butchering. He gestured all around him. “In a way this is all a great farce. We don’t eat dogs every day-- just on ceremonial occasions. Most of the rest of what we do here is every bit as phony. I’m so sick of dogmeat by now that you wouldn’t believe it. Yet, the tourists insist that we eat dogs for them, so it’s dog, dog, dog day after day.” He sighed, them looked me directly in the eyes. “Your people had no more right to come to my land and call it your own than the Spanish did before you. Yet, we couldn’t hold our own against them either. And…” He gestured at the Edisons again. “I’m being well paid— much more than I earned fishing back home. You have all the money as well as the guns; it’s like a miracle, the way people live in this land! I’ve seen much that I never otherwise would’ve if you’d never come. My boy is learning how to read; he wants to be a doctor someday instead of a fisherman, and for the first time such a thing is actually possible. So at least you Americans are better than the Spaniards— that much at least is a mercy. In fact…” He smiled again, and this time it was genuine. “Most of you are very kind, here in your own land. Polite and respectful, even, as a general rule. Perhaps even kinder than we ourselves are to visitors.”
I nodded. “But you’d rather we’d have stayed home?”
He frowned, this time thoughtfully. “There is much good along with the bad in your coming,” he eventually admitted. “And yet… Who loves being forced to obey strangers at bayonet point? Or having one’s way of life laid to waste by waves of money and machines so that we can only survive by selling our women? Yes, it could be far, far worse. But overall… “ He lowered his eyes. “Magic-man, I’ve come to respect and even to like your people, despite everything. And yet, even all this wonder—“ he waved his hand about him— “and the money and learning that come with it aren’t worth the bayonet. In fact, I cant imagine what possibly might be.”
I spent a lot of time after that thinking about bayonets. I liked to think I already knew more about them than most kids my age, just from reading so many books about military history and hanging around with friends from West Point and Annapolis. The Filipino native I’d met had certainly been right; my country had expended far greater treasure ‘pacifying’ the Islands than it’d ever cost to wrest them from Spain in the first place, and many people I admired an awful lot thought the whole thing was a pretty bad idea. We’d broken away from England ourselves, after all, to be free and our own people. What right did we have to tell others they couldn’t be free as well? And yet… Teddy was a big supporter of holding the Philippines regardless, and he made good points as well. We didn’t exactly live in an ideal world; if we’d simply walked away and granted the Filipinos independence then the Japanese or even the Germans-- who’d maintained a fleet in Manilla Bay almost from the day we’d invaded, hoping to snap up something or another for the Kaiser in the event of a complete Spanish collapse-- would surely have taken our place, and been even more free with the bayonet than we were. The Fillipinos simply weren’t strong enough to control their own territory. Meanwhile, in naval terms Manilla Bay was by virtue of its location a first-class strategic treasure for whatever nation held it. Therefore it was inevitable, the world being the kind of place it was, that some Great Power would do exactly that, the wishes (and hopes and needs) of the natives be damned. As powerful as our nation was becoming, it wasn’t even close to powerful enough to change the way the world fundamentally worked. Colonialism in the Philippines was therefore unavoidable, or so those of Teddy’s school of thought claimed. Therefore it was far better that we be the overlords than someone else.
And yet… How could I blame Juan-- the Living Exhibit I’d spent so much time chatting with-- for resenting what America had done to his family, and even his way of life? I didn’t have any brothers or sisters, but what if my father had been killed in battle by an American soldier instead of in a railroading accident? The very idea of it made me growl and snarl to myself. And, for the first time, I maybe began to understand a little about why the Indians in the Wild West show were so resentful and drank so much. “Why,” I asked Guardian during the wagon-ride back to the Jefferson, “is the world such an awful place?”
She sighed. “I try not to listen in on your private conversations, Chris. It’s almost impossible for a Familiar to have any degree of privacy, so we sorcerers go out of our way to to respect whatever you might have left. Yet I’m human as well, and was sitting not ten feet away. So… Is this about your little talk with the Exhibit tonight?”
I nodded. “We did bad things to his people. For a bad cause. Or at least not a good-enough one, I think.”
She sighed. “Yes, we did bad things. But… We sort of had to. You’ve read more books about navies than I have. So, I don’t think I have to explain in detail about coaling stations and stuff. And the Germans, and tthe Japanese, and the British, and…”
“No, you don’t,” I agreed. Then I growled again. “But… The world isn’t supposed to be this way! This isn’t how people should live together!”
She sat silent for a long time. Then she shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “Christopher…”
“Yes?”
“I… Uh… You’re aware, I believe, that magic itself works on basic, fundamental rules. Rules that, so far as we can tell, are intertwined in the essential nature of the universe itself.”
“No one’s ever really out and out told me so,” I answered. “But, well… I can see how everything’s sort of symbolic. Like the way Bob and Eric pulling their cart makes magical power. And how apex predators like me are only good for war magic.”
She nodded. “Magic reflects the basic nature of the universe.” She looked down. “Think about it for a moment, Christopher. You don’t know a ton of magic, but you’re not totally ignorant either. Don’t some of the rules of magic seem a bit… unfair to you?”
I blinked. “You mean, like how familiars have to be owned?”
She nodded. “That’s a good example, yes. Ultimately, your friends are free to think and act tor themselves only because we sorcerers refuse to make you abject slaves. Even greater slaves than the negroes ever were, because at least they were able to think their own thoughts. If I were to make certain passes over you and speak certain words, you’d never think anything again without my explicit permission. In purely magical terms, you’d in some ways be more useful to me than in any other state.” She frowned. “Is it a fair world, Christopher, which permits that sort of thing? Which even makes it useful and tempting?”
My jaw dropped. In a way I’d known since the Baron had dropped rather broad hints about my coming to love Germany as much as he did. But… But… “How could you… I mean, that’s so wrong!”
She nodded. “Yet, it’s one of the firmest rules of magic. Which in turn reflects the basic nature of the universe.” She sighed. “I’d die before doing such a thing to anyone, and trebly before I’d allow anyone to do it to you, Chris. And yet, I meant what I said. Think about it, long and hard. And only then decide what is right and wrong about our policy in the Philippines.”
Yes, my inner voice agreed. Think about it hard, now and always. For she is right, young Christopher. The universe is hard and unfair, and left to its own devices ever would be. Only for brief, shining moments, through one form of heroism or another, can the blackness be forced to recede. Yet though the blackness is vast and the triumphs of heroes immeasurably tiny, their brightness is such that the darkness weeps in hopeless despair at the comparison.
Never bet on the darkness, Christopher. For while in some senses it seems ever the victor, its triumphs are empty and have no meaning. While yours and those of your people shall someday overturn the building-blocks of reality itself.
17
The older I got the less my Voice spoke to me. That was because I was growing up, I’d long since decided in the rational part of my mind, and didn’t need to imagine some sort of godlike being to tell me what I already knew and reassure me that everything was going to be all right so often anymore. But the rest of me not only listened raptly to and believed in every word of every last pronouncement but grew mildly worried or even agitated when too many months went by in silence. Thus, during our last days at the Fair-- even as my intellect mocked me as a superstitious imbecile-- my heart examined this latest pronouncement in minute detail for hidden meaning. Yes, courage was a Good Thing, everyone knew that. And yes, there were many kinds-- it wasn’t just about charging enemy soldiers or rescuing women from onrushing trains. The bravest thing I’d ever seen or probably ever would see was my fellow familair Carmen’s acceptance of a wretched existence as a carrion bird when she could’ve grown up to be a rich and carefree and beautiful young woman with all the world at her feet, simply because she felt it her duty to humanity as a whole. Oh yes, that very definitely took courage, and of a sort that dwarfed something relatively minor like tucking a salamander into my armpit and jumping into the Inner Harbor into insignificance. And, I supposed, it could also be called a “bright spot” contrasting against the vast “darkness”. But… Would her actions help “someday overturn the building blocks of reality itself”?
Even my fundamentally irrational heart rather suspected that this was just too much H.G. Wells and Jules Verne talking. Maybe I should focus more on my military books after all?
At any rate, the Fair was a lot less fun after that, somehow. Every time I saw a Living Exhibit-- and you couldn’t go ten minutes without running into one somewhere or another-- I wondered not only how much of his or her culture as presented was faked, but how much of their smile as well? How did it feel, for example, to have once ridden with the Nez Perce or crawled through the jungles with the Moros, and now playact mockeries of your own dying culture for the benefit of the victors? Where was the rightness or justice in it all? And yet… Teddy was also correct. If we hadn’t, someone else just would’ve done the same in our place-- heaven knew there were enough French and British and even Belgian African Living Exhibits wandering about to attest to that!
Magic mirrored reality-- Guardian was telling the truth about that. And magic was also manifestly inhumane and unfair. While I hadn’t gotten around to reading anything directly about them yet, I kept coming across dark, unsettling references in my reading to to ideas like Ubermen and Social Darwinism and the destiny of races. Even the secondhand mentions made it seem like pretty unpleasant stuff, yet also hard to refute. Part of me wanted to dismiss such things out of hand; nature might be red in tooth and claw, but we humans were special and therefore above all that.
Or were we? They said we were descended from apes, after all…
Maybe this was the hard, unfair darkness that my voice seemed to hate so?
I couldn’t know for sure, of course, especially since I was more than half-convinced my Voice was something I should long since have grown out of. I mean, yes, I was supposed to be a bit on the bright side for a seventeen-year-old, and even I had to admit that was probably true. But… These problems were all so big, so vast, so hard to grasp and struggle with! It didn’t help at all that, as near as I could tell, they were the most pressing and vital questions of all!
“It was a good idea after all for us to come to the Fair,” Guardian declared as we sat together in the Japanese Pavillon on our last afternoon there, she sipping and I slurping the most wonderful, delicious tea I’d ever consumed. It was precious stuff, far too valuable to be served in one-gallon buckets to the likes of me. And yet, because it took that much to satisfy my thirst, the ever-polite Japanese staff brewed it up uncomplainingly in an exquisitely-shaped ceramic bowl-- or bucket, more like!-- decorated in a cranes-in-flight motif. We’d come by almost daily ever since discovering the place, and not once had I been charged despite many offers to pay in full. The tea was a little extra-flavorful, this being our last day. Perhaps it was tinged with a little sadness? “Forgive me if this embarrasses you, Chris. But somehow, you seem to have grown up a lot in just these few short weeks. You were right-- exposure to other cultures has been good for you.”
I smiled and slurped up some more tea. “Fake cultures, really,” I replied. “If I’ve learned anything, it was from the ‘fake’ part.”
“Don’t go getting all cynical on me, Chris,” she replied, her smile fading. “It… Wouldn’t suit you.”
I frowned and lapped up some more tea. It’d cooled to almost the perfect temperature. “I’ll try,” I answered. “But… Yes, I’ve learned a lot here.” Then I looked off into the distance, where at that very moment somewhere not very far away intoxicated, angry, resentful Indians were riding madly about, waving fake tomahawks covered in fake blood in a fake attack on wide-eyed crowds of the near-illiterate. “It was good to meet Geronimo in particular. I’ll never forget that.”
“Yes,” Guardian agreed, looking at me carefully. “For you especially, that was probably very important.”
“One of the great moments of my life.” Then I sighed and met her eyes. “And the Ferris Wheel was wonderful too, and so were a lot of the exhibits. Everyone did their best to make me feel welcome, and I’m properly grateful. Even the bellboys! But… I… I don’t know. But… Why couldn’t it have been more real?”
“Because most people aren’t ready for reality,” she replied, meeting my gaze head on. “Much less are they willing to pay for it.”
I sighed. “Does everything always have to depend on money? Or power?”
She sighed. “I wonder about that fairly often myself. Though, I’ll note in passing, money and power are pretty much the same thing.”
I blinked. “I… Your’e right! I never…”
Her grin widened, then she reached across the table and tousled my ears. “It’s good that you’re growing up,” she said. “And I’m very pleased with how you’re shaping up. But… Don’t worry too awfully much about this kind of thing, okay? It’s a phase, or so everyone tells me. Something that every thinking person goes through when they’re our age. They say that no one ever really makes sense of it all, but we’ll learn to accept what we can and can’t do about it and figure out how to live with the rest as it is. I think I’m finally making a little progress that way myself, in fact.”
I blinked. “I… But you’re lots older than I am!”
She laughed again. “Not from the point of view of Mother, say. Or Shaper.” Then her face grew serious again. “It’s our last day here, Chris, and so far you’ve been very good about keeping your word and learning from the Fair instead of treating it like a big candy-filled carnival.” She smiled. “We have just about enough time left before we have to catch our train for one last hurrah. It should be an especially good one, I think. What shall it be?”
I didn’t hesitate a second. “The Ferris Wheel again!”
“Yay!” she agreed. “I was hoping you’d say that!” Then she got up and practically danced in place in anticipation.
“Hooray!” I agreed, as my heart ker-flumped again, as it had so often before all through my boyhood and now, I knew, would never do so in quite the same way ever again. But this one last time…
…Utterly carefree, I laughed and ran like the wind.
It wasn’t as hard as I feared it might be to leave the Fair and ride the long, long way back to Johnstown. This time for some reason we were routed through Kentucky, which was well out of our way. But at least we got to see different mountains, mostly, and crossed the Ohio as well as the Mississippi. Perhaps best of all Guardian didn’t spend all her time memorizing spells. Instead she smiled and laughed and played cards with me. Apparently the Fair had been good for her, too.
When we finally got back to Johnstown practically everyone turned out to greet us at the gates. It wasn’t so much that family was being greeted back home, though that was a big part of it. Devard, however, was more than just a home. It was a working research facility and even to some extent a factory. There were always spells in progress that couldn’t be be interrupted and charms occupying that dangerous, unstable place halfway through the blessing process. If you weren’t a workaholic then wizarding was no profession for you, in other words, so big welcome-home turnouts weren’t at all the norm no matter how much we cared for one another. The real reason everyone turned out for us was that they were dying to hear about the Fair.
“Did you ride the Ferris wheel?” Midnight demanded even before our coach came to a complete stop. He was scampering along so close alongside us that I was afraid he’d get caught under the wheel and be killed. “Did you?”
“How high was it?” Kim demanded. Though Canadian, he was currently on-loan to a Devard mage for a special research project and was having the time of his life with his old friends. “Ten stories? Twelve?”
“High enough that it’s just like flying!” Tim declared from his perch on the carriage’s roof. He was the only other Familiar who’d been able to get away from his spellcasting duties long enough to make it to St. Louis. “Isn’t it, Chris?”
I blinked and smiled. “You’d know that better than I would, now wouldn’t you?”
He laughed and flapped his tiny wings. “Well, it’s not quite as good. But almost!”
“Two hundred and sixty-four feet,” Eric replied primly from his place in the harness.
“We rode it in Chicago,” Bob agreed. He smiled. “I hope you enjoyed it!”
“Wow!” Midnight exclaimed, prancing in a little circle. “That’s huge! Too bad I missed it. I don’t think it’ll ever be set up anywhere else ever again.”
“Maybe not,” Shaper declared, looking sad. “Tell me…” His eyes glittered. “Did you by chance…”
Guardian smiled and handed him a package that we’d both gone to considerable trouble to obtain for him. “For you, sir,” she said.
He blushed and tore at the paper. Inside, I already knew, was a framed picture of the entire cast of the Wild West Show, complete with autographs. I hadn’t known Shaper was interested in the West, but Guardian did. “He was raised on a ranch in Arizona,” she’d explained. “Near Tombstone. He didn’t actually see the shootout at the OK Corral, but had at least met everyone involved. He practically grew up with the Indians-- that’s why he was able to recognize your tribal spell back when you first came here.”
. “Oh!” the chief wizard said, his jaw dropping. “I… I mean…” For an instant he grinned like a little boy. “Thank you both so much!” Then his expression faded and he was all business again. “I… Uh…”
“The world didn’t stop while we were gone?” Guardian suggested.
“Though it would’ve been rather nice if it had,” Shaper agreed. Then he sighed. “I very nearly had to call you back early.” He looked at me and sighed. “In fact, I probably should’ve. But… Anyway, I fear we have pressing business. Would you care to come to my office at say, eight this evening? Would that give you long enough to settle in?”
I looked at Guardian, who shrugged. “Certainly.”
“Good,” Shaper replied. He looked at his photograph and smiled again, then sighed and deliberately put it behind his back so that it wouldn’t distract him further. “Mother will be there too, and some other people.” He looked down. “From the government, I fear.”
I felt my own smile fade. “The government?”
He nodded. “Yes. I fear that the gears in Washington are finally beginning to turn and decisions are being made.” His eyes swept from mine to Guardian’s and back again. “I’m glad you two were able to have a pleasant time. It may be a good long while before you get another chance.”
Eight o’clock, as it turned out, actually wasn’t long enough to allow for a complete unpacking. Partly this was because of course I couldn’t help much, but the main reason was that every time I turned around I had to explain something to someone. Take Margaret, for example. She was a local girl maybe twenty years old who worked as a general helper-outer at Devard. “Oooh!” she declared as she removed my Japanese tea bucket from its soft paper cocoon. “What’s this?” Then I’d had to explain what the national pavilions were and how nice the Japanese one had been and about their special tea and how they’d given me the bucket as a going-away gift… It was like that for everything, from the souvenir brushes I’d bought for Bob and Eric to a picture of Geronimo and I talking that a nice reporter-lady had sent to our hotel room to… Pretty much everything, I suppose. My stuff was still half-packed when it was time for Margaret to go home-- it’s a good thing that bears aren’t expected to dress formally for official meetings or else I might’ve been in serious trouble.
Even as things were, I found myself growing more and more troubled as I approached Shaper’s office. Not one but three guest-wagons were parked in Devard’s carriage-house, and Bob and Eric were sharing quarters with more visiting horses than I’d ever seen before. Even more significantly, one of the carriages was prominently marked “US Army” and was painted Union blue. So I frowned to myself as I loped the last little way towards the Administrative Building.
“Hello, Chris,” Guardian greeted me as I turned the last corner. Then she held the door open for me. It was newly enlarged, I was pleased to see. Now it was an easy fit even for the horses. “They’ve reinforced the floors too, I’m told.”
I smiled; ever since the big Guild trial Devard had worked harder than ever at accommodating we Familiars. Sure enough the joists barely creaked as, at the stroke of eight, Guardian and I entered Shaper’s office.
“Welcome!” he greeted us with a big smile. The World’s Fair photograph was already hanging behind his desk, I couldn’t help but notice with a smile. “Thank you for coming by so soon after your long and tiring journey.” He gestured around the room, which was mostly crowded with male strangers. Predictably, several were wearing uniforms. Mother sat alone in one corner, however, with Midnight lying silent on her lap as she stroked his ears. She smiled and nodded at us as we entered, but said nothing.
“It wasn’t so bad,” I replied for us both. A nice thickly-blanketed spot on the floor had clearly been reserved for me; though it was a bit awkward due to the crowding I sort of lumbered my way over to it and laid down. The seated men tried not to stare, but most of them failed. Though they were doing their best to be courteous, clearly they were’t used to socializing with adolescent Kodiaks. Meanwhile, Guardian took the last open chair. “The mountains were nice. And it doesn’t take much nearly so much out of you to ride in a private car as it does in a regular coach.”
“Perhaps,” Shaper agreed, still smiling. Then the expression faded. “I fear that we’ve got a bit of a problem, son.” He nodded at one of the older and more dignified looking men. "Chris, Guardian… Please meet Benjamin Cowell, a member of the President’s private staff.
I smiled and nodded. “Mr. Cowell.”
“My pleasure,” he replied, half-extending his hand towards me and then dropping it awkwardly. “I… We’re here because we have not one but two pressing issues that must be dealt with immediately.”
“Problems of what nature?” Guardian asked in an extra-sweet tone of voice that I was coming to understand meant she was suspicious.
Mr. Cowell frowned, then sighed. “It’s… One of them is a very delicate matter, really.” His eyes sought out Shaper’s.
“An international problem,” a new voice declared. It was one of the men in uniform; he wore a colonel’s eagles on his shoulders.
“Yes,” Mr, Cowell agreed, sounding more certain of himself. Then he sighed and bowed his head. “As you know, in recent times the diplomatic situation has grown… Somewhat fragile.”
I nodded; most of the thunder and lighting had been focused on me personally. Europe’s Guilds had tried to steal me, and President Roosevelt had refused to cooperate.
“There’s an international effort underway to attempt to defuse tensions in the wake of the Conference. The Guild breakup took everyone by surprise, you see. People are starting to worry that the world may be headed towards an outright shooting war, with pretty much everyone taking sides.”
“That’d be awful,” Shaper agreed. “Maybe even as deadly and disruptive as the Napoleonic Wars. So, everyone’s trying to back off a little and try to get along.” He frowned. “On the surface, at least.”
I nodded, a bit mystified. “So… What does that have to with Guardian and I?”
“Well,” Shaper began. Then he frowned and began again. “It’s hardly a secret, Chris. A lot of people are hoping that you’ll pursue a military career.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “And I’m considering it. But I haven’t decided yet.”
“Of course,” the wizard agreed, bowing. “And no one here shall ever rush your decision. I can make that statement with utter, complete confidence because the fact is that we still don’t understand who or what you are, in the magical sense at least. So, even if you made your choice tomorrow we still wouldn’t know what direction to take with your career of training. Frankly, we still aren’t even sure yet if you ought to be made a Familiar or trained as a sorcerer in your own right. So, there’s no hurry.”
I nodded, but said nothing.
“On the other hand,” he continued, looking at Guardian, “it’s clear that we’re definitely going to develop a Department of Military and Defensive Magic here at Devard.” His eyes fell. “World events give us no choice. If one major nation militarizes magic, then everyone must.” His eyes met Mother’s for an instant, then returned to Guardian. “It’s equally clear that this new Department must branch out from our existing Disaster Prevention section.” His face fell. “This will be a complete perversion of everything a Disaster Mage is supposed to stand for. I fully and completely appreciate this. Yet it clearly must be so,”
“Except,” Guardian said bitterly. “We’ll create disasters instead of easing them.”
Shaper frowned. “In the event of war everyone will have to participate; therefore in the ethical sense all of our hands will be equally dirty.” He nodded at Mother. “Should active fighting break out we’ll need military charms by the thousand. And specialists in my own field will probably be called upon to specially modify volunteer soldiers and sailors and heaven knows what else.” He frowned, then shook his head. “There’s no sense in going over all the rights and wrongs of it again. What must be, must be. So, in the short run at least…” He looked down at the ground. “Guardian, your Guild is going to ask you to begin to work up the outline of a Military Department.” He nodded at the military officer who’d spoken up earlier. “Colonel James will act as your intermediary with the army. He’s probably more familiar with the benefits and limitations of magic than you think; not only has he studied extensively in Europe, but he’s currently in charge of the limited military cooperation program we’ve had in place for many years now. In fact, he spent a year as a sort of non-official sorcerer’s apprentice immediately after leaving West Point.” Shaper smiled again, feeling a bit more confident. “While the navy will eventually involve themselves as well, pretty much everyone agrees that that the army’s magical needs will be so much greater and more complex that they should lay the initial groundwork. Eventually he’ll be moving into Devard full time. But, for the moment…” He turned back to me.
“Yes?” I asked.
“As I said, the international situation is cooling down a little, at least on the surface. One of the things the old International Guild used to do was monitor the potential development of Pits worldwide, in the hope that the tragedies that spawn them can be avoided. The Guild may be no more, but this is clearly something that still needs to be done, and must be coordinated on a world-wide level.”
“Three weeks ago a treaty regarding the matter was signed at Paris,” Mr. Cowell interrupted. “The French were particularly eager, for some reason, to negotiate the matter. And sure enough, with the ink not even dry, they’re demanding an international expedition to investigate an imminent Emergence.”
“A new Pit’s about to form?” I asked.
“The French certainly seem to think so,” he replied, looking me in the eye.
“Where?” I asked.
Mr. Cowell smiled, but the expression was cold and dead. “German territory, naturally. Their Southwest African colonies. They want to use the new Treaty of Paris to send in a team of international observers.”
“Oh my heavens!” Guardian exclaimed. “That won’t… I mean…”
“The Germans have been forced to accept,” Mother declared, for the first time looking up from Midnight’s ears. “We’ve independently confirmed the French findings, you see, and so have the British. While it’s not at all certain, there are definitely signs of a Pit’s imminent emergence. So, national rivalries or no, it’s the duty of the magical community everywhere to do whatever it can to prevent the tragedy.” She sighed and looked down again.
"But… Guardian demanded. “I mean… What does that have to do with Chris and I, and forming a military department?”
“A Pit can develop from many causes,” Shaper answered. “One of them is a massive fire. While we have no specific indications, we can use this as an excuse to send a fire-specialist as one of our representatives. Though this isn’t the real reason we want you to go along, of course.”
“Then… Why?” Guardian asked.
“The real reason,” Mr. Cowell replied, “is because you’re used to working with Chris here. And protecting him.” He smiled again, this time less coldly, and turned to me. “You’re one of a handful of people anywhere who’ve penetrated a major Pit and emerged alive, young man. The French are as aware of this as anyone, and have officially requested your presence as part of the expedition.”
I felt my lips begin to form a snarl. “But that’s not the real reason, of course. Nothing’s ever that simple, not once international relations get wrapped up in it.”
“Right,” Mr. Cowell agreed. “Or at least the State Department doesn’t think so.”
“They want to humiliate the Germans any way they can,” Shaper explained, frowning. “In this case by rubbing their noses in the fact that they weren’t able to recruit you.”
“And,” Mr. Cowell added, “We think they’re hoping that something will go wrong to damage relations between the United States and Germany even further.” He frowned and sighed. “Sometimes I’m more grateful than anyone will ever know that there’s an entire ocean between us and Europe. They can be like squabbling children.”
“Healer’s going to be there,” Shaper continued. “Despite the fact that there’s always plenty of work for him closer to home. That’s a message to us, we think.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. Then I sighed aloud before replying. “I do sort of owe him, don’t I?”
“Yes,” Shaper agreed. “You do. And, by extension, the French as a whole.”
“The Germans have contacted us privately,” Mr. Cowell added. “They’ve said they understand the games the French are playing as well as we do, and don’t want to make things worse than they already are. Besides, they’re as much against Pits as anyone. You’ve been guaranteed safe passage-- full diplomatic immunity.”
My frown deepened. What was in German Southwest Africa anyway? Nothing that I’d ever heard of. Besides, it was sort of expecting a lot of me to trust the Germans after their kidnaping attempt, even if they did claim that the Baron had been acting alone. “I don’t know…”
“It’s a wonderful idea!” Midnight declared suddenly. “I’m all in favor if it.”
Yes, my inner voice agreed. What must be, must be. It’s already too late to prevent an enormous tragedy, but the lesson you-- and others-- shall learn will be with you always and the greater good thus served.
I blinked, then watched as Midnight, displaying his feline flexibility in full measure, languidly rolled over on Mother’s lap to have his belly rubbed. Meanwhile, the government men stirred and looked at each other uncomfortably. Apparently they’d thought he was just a cat, and were a bit nervous. What was going to speak next? Shaper’s desk? The Edison lamps? The floor beneath their feet?
“Well, Chris?” Shaper asked. “Are you up for another trip so soon? Or do you want a day or two to think about it?”
“I’ll be coming as well,” Colonel James declared. “As a military observer. So that my work with Guardian can begin immediately.” He bowed slightly. “And to see what there is to be learned in other areas as well.”
I sat and thought about it for a long moment. There was never any doubt that I’d go, of course-- only a complete fool would ignore both Midnight’s and my inner Voice’s pronouncements. But… Why did I think of the Fair when I thought about German Southwest Africa? They hadn’t had a pavilion; in fact, I was quite certain I’d never even heard of German Southwest Africa before entering this room. And yet… Why did I keep picturing Geronimo and the Filipinos and all the other Living Exhibits?
“Of course I’ll go,” I eventually managed to say, “I mean…” I nodded at Midnight. “It couldn’t possibly be clearer that I should.”
Shaper smiled, while Mr. Cowell looked vastly relieved. Apparently the French had applied considerable pressure. “When will you be ready?” the wizard asked.
I looked at Guardian, who shrugged. “I’m only half-unpacked,” I finally said. “The same’s probably true for Guardian. So… No time like the present!”
18
We didn’t leave the next day after all; even as Guardian and I frantically repacked and various sorcerers freshened up my language and expression and especially my cooling-off spells to prepare me for the hot climate, the French Guild sent Shaper a magical message inviting us to participate in a mass-apport from Cherbourg. Apports were inherently wasteful spells and thus normally only used in an emergency, but this time so many mages would be going so far in the same direction at the same time that the French felt the effort worthwhile in terms of valuable time saved Shaper agreed, so he ordered up a quantity of “power-charms” meant to “pay” for our fair share of the effort. Mother’s department couldn’t produce these in less than two day’s time, so for forty-eight hours there we sat.
I couldn’t complain, really, since it gave me a chance to spend an entire afternoon wandering around the forest and eating wild berries, as well as renewing old friendships. It was my ‘classmates’ idea; by tradition every year’s “crop” of new Familiars remained close and sort of extra-special looked out for each other. This was even truer for my class than most, primarily because we felt bonded by the kidnapping attempt and everything that went with it. At any rate my classmates invited me to go hiking with them and since I was all caught up on everything else there wasn’t any reason I shouldn’t go. Timmy rode on my back just like he always did, and Midnight capered about more like a dog than a cat, striking out here and there on his own and from time to time giving tiny forest creatures the fright of their lives. Cynthia, my goose-friend, tagged along in her own way by circling above our little group, then landing and waddling about whenever we called a halt. “Honk!” she declared at one break-- the longer she was a goose the less self-conscious she grew about interspersing her speech with wing-flappings and hisses and honks. She was adapting well, according to Shaper, especially for someone who’d ultimately decided they’d prefer to remain human after all but was then prevented from returning to her natural form by an unforeseen disaster. She’d even found a legal way to limit the percentage of her income her wastrel father was permitted to squander. This in particular warmed my heart; I’d never me the man, but had already heard enough that I didn’t think I’d ever want to. “I think we’ve found an extra-pretty spot. Lets just sit and rest here for a while.”
“Sure,” I agreed. Cynthia was absolutely right; Guardian and I often picnicked together on this particular little knoll. Besides, geese didn’t habitually fly around all day except during migration times, and she was probably getting a bit wing-sore. I lumbered my way into a nice sunny spot-- it was getting a bit cool in the shade by that late in the year-- and Timmy flitted up to a nice little perch over my head.
“I’m glad your trip was delayed,” Midnight declared, curling up between my paws. “It’s been… I mean…”
“It’s not the same around here without you,” Timmy declared.
“Yes,” Cynthia agreed. She lifted her left wing, preened at it for an instant with her beak, then was looking me in the eye again almost before I realized she’d done it. “We miss you terribly.”
I sort of blushed under my fur. “I get to travel so much because I’m not Sworn, I guess.”
The others nodded. Kimball and the rest were all back at the Castle, sitting bored as could be in a spell-node scrawled across a casting-room floor or learning a few basic passes and incantations that might someday help their masters along while they executed extra-complex spells. Perhaps someday we might explore the magical realms with our masters as well. But none of us were skilled enough for that yet, so in the meantime we were stuck with all the boring jobs.
“I’ve been dreaming about you,” Timmy admitted at last.
“Me too,” Gwen agreed.
“All of us,” Midnight rolled on his back and looked up at me with his strange but friendly jade green eyes. Pretty much all Familiars who needed them accepted sensory enhancement spells to make up for deficient hearing or, more commonly, sight. But Midnight had turned them down. “I’ve always been a cat deep down inside,” he’d explained to Shaper. “So for the first time I’m seeing things the way I’m really supposed to. It’s wonderful! Why would I want to mess that up?”
“Freddy and Kim, too,” Timmy added. He magic-frowned. “Not all the dreams are nice.”
“Most of them aren’t,” Cynthia agreed. She peered intently at me, tilting her head first one way and then another as if I were a particularly fascinating bit of food.
I nodded, but said nothing. Among mundane humans, dreams are usually nothing but meaningless phantasms. This, however, wasn’t at all the case among the magical. Especially not when there was a pattern.
“It’s hard to explain what they’re about,” Timmy continued. “There’s a whole bunch of different ones, and they don’t seem to make any sense.”
“But you’re flying in a lot of them,” Cynthia continued, taking over the story. “One in particular, in fact, that we all seem to have sometimes. Everyone agrees on that.”
My eyebrows rose. “Flying? That’s not so bad. Like, in a zeppelin?”
“No.” It was Midnight’s turn again. He rolled back over onto his belly; clearly this subject was far too serious for such a kittenish posture. “Flying, like by magic. And…” He looked down, clearly unable to continue.
“You’re covered in blood,” Gwen said, her voice as soft as a goose’s could be made. “Gallons of it, like you’ve just climbed out a river of the stuff. It’s pouring off of you, there’s so much of it.”
“You’re clearly angry at something,” Timmy explained. “Roaring in rage, teeth bared, claws spread wide. Madder than of us have ever seen you before.”
“In a killing rage,” Midnight added. “Literally. Though you don’t feel wrong or evil to us. But still… The image is absolutely terrifying. Even to your friends.”
I thought that over for a long, long minute. “And you think this is some kind of prophecy?”
“No,” Midnight answered, shaking his head. “If anyone knows anything about prophecy, it’s me. This… Feels different, somehow. It’s a possibility, is all. Or at least that’s what I think. It’s much more nebulous than when something seems right or wrong. I don’t ever feel any hesitancy at all when that happens, even when it turns out later I was wrong.”
“I see,” I said at length. Then I looked at Tim. “Have you told anyone yet?”
“We went to Eric and Bob at first, for advice,” he replied. “In private. Then to Mother, at their suggestion. No one else.”
I nodded again. 'And what did Mother say?"
“That terrible times are coming, and this is but another sign.” He sighed and looked down. “She said to tell you, so that you could prepare for them as best you can. As she already is, in her own way.”
“She said we should all prepare,” Cynthia added. “According to her, there’s never been another class of Familiars like us, not even close. And that’s a Sign in and of itself.” She magic-blushed. “Every last one of us has proven extra-powerful, in our own way. Some of us. like you, extraordinarily so. They don’t usually tell us things like that, she said, because it breeds bad feelings. But we truly need to know. So we can believe in ourselves.”
I sat and thought about that for a very long time. Somehow, there wasn’t anything to say.
“One more thing,” Midnight said, rising to his feet.
“What?” I asked.
“I… Uh…” He looked at Timmy.
“Geez,” he said. “I don’t want…”
Then, predictably, Cynthia was the one who took the bull by the horns. “Remember Gwen? She Changed with us, then vanished. None of us have seen her since.”
I nodded. “Of course I remember her. How could I not?” The truth was that I was still writing letters to her, which Shaper promised me were being delivered and read with appreciation even though none ever came back.
“She’s with you, in the dreams,” she whispered, looking down. “We can’t see her, though somehow we know it’s her. It feels like her, you see.”
I blinked-- to the best of my knowledge, I was the only one who knew she’d become a carrion-bird. She’d been too proud to tell us because we’d pity her. But I’d figured it out anyway. “Then… What does she look like?”
“A shapeless black blob, blocked from our vision” my snow-white goose friend replied, looking me dead in the eyes. “A nexus of pure horror, and at least as powerful in her way as you are in yours. Maybe even more so.”
A nexus of pure horror, I found myself thinking the next morning as I composed what would be my last letter to Gwen for at least weeks and maybe months to come. It’d already been tough enough to write her, knowing what she must be going through. And now…
A nexus of pure horror. Better to talk about anything rather than that!
“…is getting better at math all the time,” I dictated to Guardian, who was kind enough to act as a scribe whenever I wrote my missing friend. After all, who else understood the true pathos of it all? “He might’ve started slow, but I think Frederick has a real gift for numbers. He’s already passed me up, for sure! I wonder how the sorcerers knew? They sort of had to, I guess, seeing as how they Bonded him to Reckoner. Sure, rabbits are famous for multiplying. But that’s completely different, right?”
“Heh!” Guardian chuckled as she wrote. I missed being able to write for myself sometimes-- my penmanship had been particularly good, and I’d been sort of proud of it. But there were compensations, like finding out for sure if my jokes were funny ahead of time.
"Kim’s as busy as he can be. He’s been on loan to us for a terribly long time, and has been working like you wouldn’t believe lately. He’s not allowed to say anything, but sometimes a Royal Navy officer comes by and talks to both he and Impetus for hours at a time in a warded room. I probably shouldn’t even be thinking about it, but I’m guessing it has something to do with the big guns on ships. I mean… Orangs jump and swing through the trees, right? So maybe they have a special affinity with projectiles. Though I’d never have followed that line of thought if the naval officer weren’t involved. Who knows? Maybe I’m completely wrong and he’s working on easier-to-climb ropes or easier-to-scrape paint instead.
“Gwen has it easier most ways, though I think it’s tough on her being the only girl left among all us boys in her class. She’d surely be pleased if you came back to us, that I can say for sure. All of us would! She’s also still the only Familiar in the world working with child-related magic, and I think it makes her very happy to be around the little ones so much. Especially, of course, since she can’t have kids of her own. Midnight is still Midnight, of course-- he hasn’t changed a bit, and Timmy hasn’t changed either. Bright and cheery all the time!”
“Hey, guys!” a deep bass voice called from just outside my window. It was Bob. "“We’re on our way to be hitched to the carriage. You’ve got maybe half an hour, then the loading begins. Thought you’d like to know!”
“Right!” I grunted back. In the same way that Cynthia was more of a goose every day, so I was becoming a bear. Fortunately I wasn’t particularly grumpy. Or at least not yet. With luck, I never would be. “Thanks!” Then I turned back to Guardian. “I guess that’s all, really. Besides that we’re leaving and she won’t be hearing from me for a long time, and not to worry.”
She nodded and wrote it all down, followed by “Yours Truly, Chris” at the bottom. I didn’t have to tell her that part. Then she smiled and folded it up with a bit of candle wax, and I put my usual claw-mark in the seal before it hardened. “I’ll give this to Shaper right away,” she promised. Then she smiled. “You’re a really good kid, to still be writing her.”
I nodded, then looked away. So far no one but Mother knew about my classmate’s dreams about Gwen and I soaring through the sky, and I didn’t want to burden Guardian with such ugliness when she had so much of her own to carry. “I… I’ve told you before that I think I know what sort of magic she’s being used for.”
She nodded. “And I still can’t say anything about the matter.”
I looked out the window. “They weren’t able to close the Johnstown Pit until after she became a Familiar.”
Guardian smiled. “That’s true. But is there a connection? Maybe. Or maybe not. You and I don’t have enough facts to know either way”
I thought about threatening to ask Midnight, but the truth was that I was already pretty certain I was right. Why waste his talent, when for all I knew it might be a limited one? “We’re the only Guild that’s ever successfully closed an active Pit.”
“That’s also true,” Guardian replied. “Maybe because currently there are no other active Pits annoying enough to be worth the effort? Don’t think it was an easy job, Chris. It took more man-years of research and casting than the mundanes will ever guess. Had it not erupted in such an embarrassing place, we probably wouldn’t even have tried.”
“Or maybe it’s because no one else has access to Gwen, so they still can’t close theirs,” I replied, sighing. Then I looked her in the eye. “Isn’t it interesting,” I pointed out, “that both she and I came along just about the time the American Guild decided to embrace military magic for the first time?”
Guardian frowned, then shifted awkwardly in her seat. “That,” she said eventually, “is an ugly thought. I mean… Employing ordinary magic as a weapon is bad enough. But to use something like…” Her lips curled. “It’s disgusting!”
I nodded and lowered my head. “I know,” I answered. “I’ve been inside a Pit myself, so I have no illusions. But still… Our Guild didn’t want to see magic used in war at all. Yet, we’ve been forced against our will to prepare for the possibility. The likelihood, even. What if someone… I mean…”
She shook her head. “We’d never stand for it! No self-respecting mage would-- not even that Baron Attache character was that low.” She looked at me again. “I… You’re really and truly worried about the possibility, aren’t you?”
I sighed and looked out the window again. The sun was out, the birds were singing… But I felt a certain darkness edging in on my soul. No, I wasn’t Midnight and therefore given to premonitions on a regular basis. Yet there was no doubt I was every bit as magical a being as he was. And my sense of foreboding was suddenly running very, very deep. I should listen to it, I decided. “Something very bad is happening where we’re going, Guardian.”
She peered at me intently. “Are you sure?”
I nodded. “As certain as can be. Now I know how Midnight feels-- it’s not… a normal worry. Something very bad is waiting for us there. But as bad as it’s going to be, it’s only part of a long chain of bad things. Things are just going to keep getting worse and worse for a long time to come. Maybe even for years.”
She nodded, paling a little. Then she frowned. “That decided me. Thank you.”
My eyebrows rose. “Decided you on what?”
“Shaper offered me some special little toys to bring along to Africa,” she explained. “Things that are difficult to keep safe and secure on a long trip, and which I’ve barely been trained how to use because we’ve just begun to make them. Every single day, I’ll have to perform long, complicated incantations to keep them fresh.” She sighed. “At first I didn’t think they were worth the effort I am a fire-mage, after all, and therefore not exacty helpless. But with you suddenly going so dark on me, maybe it’s a good idea after all.”