David awakes to darkness. There is a smell of warm, damp straw. His head feels cut, like a knife has been driven through its centre. His eyes hurt, there is a pressure through his head. His senses strain, searching out the cause. Bello's breathing is the only sound, a contented rasp of breath from the other bed. David reaches for his sword and peels back the blankets. Drawing the blade quietly he lays his feet on the cold floorboards, stepping to the window. Looking through the cracks of the wooden shutter he sees the graveyard lit by moonlight. Frost settles from the air.

A scream causes him to jump. THe stab of pain in his head increasing. He opens the door, feeling his way quickly down the stairs. No-one else is awake or stirring. The scent of magic stings him. His grip tightens on his sword and he heads outside, barely noticing that he is still barefoot. Listening for the scream, he looks about. The night is clear, filled with silver reflecting from ice. A dangerous night.

The scream comes again. David spins, running to the church. TUrning the corner to its entrance he sees the thing. A sliding mass of scales, a grating movement like steel rubbing against steel. It is digging in the graveyard, the scream comes again from below the ground. David has fought djinn and banshees across the Middle East and Europe so he is no stranger to the sight of this creature, its tail balancing the thrust of its misshapen claws into the tough soil.

Garden

Wrapped up against the cold I sit under the tiled roof that extends from the house, looking into the garden. My attention is focused on the broken wall of water that streams down, uncaught by a gutter. The rain falls in drops beyond it. There is a sense of peace, listening to the trickle and spatter, watching the darkness fall. A servant comes out with a steaming kettle to re-fill my teapot. I ignore her. I am aware of her presence but it is of no consequence to me. I am trying to focus only on the water.

Water in a stream will wear at a rock for hundreds of years, slowly removing its surface at a speed I cannot measure or observer, but the change is happening. Too often I have been the water, crashing against the rock, wearing myself out, when all I had to do was accept patience and carry on my way. Despite insight, meditation, intellectual reasoning, I cannot change that part of me. So I sit and drink tea, watching the rain and trying to leave both reason and instinct behind, to bind myself in the experience.

The old man tells me it might turn to snow in the night. I do not think it will, but I am minded to wait, and watch. The girl is heading back inside when I turn and ask her to fetch the brazier. If I am to stay here much longer I will need more than an extra layer of clothing and hot tea.

If it does snow I do not wish to miss my opportunity. Still grasping for that chance to split the stone in two and move on.

Rain and magic

Manchester, slick with rain. Light falls like glass. It glows, bringing every grainy surface of Deansgate into sharpened focus, the air wiped clear, bringing it to solidity as every surface reflects all others. The streets are busy, dark huddled figures moving quickly inbetween each other, focused inwards. Behind the reflection of a Starbucks window Aldervale watches for the mathematician while nursing a cool, flavourless latte which films his mouth and he is only grateful he did not bother with their tea. He wipes his forehead, bitter with memory.

Aldervale has plenty of time for contemplation when he is on watch but finds he has nothing left to think about. Sometimes, when partnered with someone, he is amazed at the thoughts that spill from their mouths, the joins and connections that seem to come so easily to them, the passages of reading and learning that seem to mesh together. Instead he finds he has nothing to add. He is blank in the presence of others, unable to communicate, afraid to, really, because he does not know how. He is a perfect watcher, he knows this. He fumbles with the grimy package in his jacket pocket, seeking reassurance that it is still there, wrapped in sticky newspaper.

Across the road the mathematician emerges from the travel agency, bitter at the weather and shaking his tiny umbrella into the air. Aldervale does not bother finishing the coffee. He stands and leaves, pulling up his hood over his thinning hair. His hand casually unwraps the package, pulling out the coin within while holding onto the plastic that offers a last layer of protection. Crossing the road, ducking behind the deep red glow of traffic lights, he falls into step behind the mathematician looking for a way past the couple that are a walking barrier between them. His chance comes as they reach the next crossroads. He steps forwards and around, as though he were any other commuter in a hurry to get home, while taking advantage of the crush to get close, to slip the coin into the mathematician's pocket.

The mathematician's umbrella knocks him. THe mathematician turns to apologise. Aldervale shrugs his head with what he hopes is a smile and turns away, looking for the light to change. He steps into the road, growling with traffic and the growing winter dark, muttering the activation mantra. He feels the little veil of maya slip, the hidden world behind suddenly slips through. Rain falls from his hood into his eyes, washing it away.

Portraits

Felix the portraiture is aware that he is being followed but he does not dare to stop, or even to glance around and look. He keeps his gaze downwards, focussing on the grey stone in front of him, not looking up at the faces of the dark, thick-coated crowd around him. The mist is growing thicker, the dim light of the streets barely bolstered by the lamp-lighters casting their little balls into the air, carrying the little touch of magic to the cheap crystals threaded on wire across the street.

In his mind two tasks fight for attention, each thought jumping from one to the next refusing him any progression with either problem. The first is where to go, where can he get to on foot from here where he can be safe. This is not a part of the city that he knows well, returning from the commission with the old woman; his only paying customer and even she has paid less this week, promising the full amount later. He cannot afford to take a cab. He regrets blowing what little he had over the past couple of nights of drink, blue and gambling. The other skein of thought is working through the pitiful list of his past and present clients to determine what the purpose of his being followed might be. His headache beats out a tattoo of frustration and pain.

He moves to step around a figure stood still in front of him but the figure moves to intercept. he nearly screams but looks up into the grey eyes of a pretty, slight woman, close-cropped red hair and a sense of deep magics. A small, tarnished badge is fixed to her coat. Police, he realises, and he wonders if he can tell her about the his tail.

"Felix Ovgorod?" She says.

He nods, sagging with a wearied fear.

A carriage pulls up, the thick, rubber-masked driver turning to the woman for instruction. She opens the door and pushes Felix in, then follows him. The carriage rolls off with a whine.

"What is this? Am I in trouble?"

"Probably. But that's not my business with you. I need you to identify a body for me."

"A body? What makes you think I would know someone? Who do you suppose him to be?"

With a shock he wonders if a friend of his has been murdered.

"We found this card in his pocket. We've been looking for you for a while. You haven't been home for a couple of days."

He shows him one of his own business cards. A crude printing, cheap, edge-worn card.

"I. I've been on commission." Not completely a lie.

Within a few minutes they are walking down the dark, sullen corridor of the police precinct, heading downwards into the cool of the morgues. Doors are opened for them by uniformed officers keen to show respect to the woman whose name he has been too afraid to ask. They look at Felix, take in the dirty jacket, grease and paint worn into its fabric, into his skin, the grimy smear of beard over his face, and they offer an almost imperceptible sneer.

In the green painted room where they stop the woman points to the table at the centre where there is a sheet laid over a body. Felix has seen the dead before and thinks he knows what to expect. But when the sheet is moved down from the body's head he sees something he does not expect. The face has been torn away leaving only red muscle and the white of tendons and fat. Felix feels himself want to be sick, his stomach heaving, trying to release whatever pitiful morsels remain from a breakfast finished too long ago. He turns away.

"Do you recognise him?" The woman asks.

"Recognise him?" Felix says, spitting and coughing. "How am I supposed to recognise him?"

"I understood you are a portraiture. You should know him even in this condition, if you are of any little skill at all."

The dig at his ability annoys him. He knows she is right but he has no desire to look at the faceless body again. The one glance will be enough to sear the image into his mind. He calls it back up, lets himself reconstruct it.

"I'm sorry." He says. "You are right. But I do not know him. I don't know how he came upon one of my cards."

The woman looks disappointed but motions the medic to lower the sheet again.

"Does the name Elias Smith mean anything to you?"

Felix nods.

"Yes, he was my client. I finished a commission for him a few weeks ago. He still owes me money."

"I am reliably informed that this is his body. That is why I was hoping you might be able to identify him."

Felx shakes his head.

"No. No, that's not him. Really. You've got the wrong man."

The woman turns and beckons him to leave. She had seemed so certain that the body was that of Elias. Felix was sure that it was not. Someone wanted the police to think that Elias was dead when maybe he was not. That's why he was being followed. Those people must have known that Felix could have be used as proof that Elias was not dead. Likely he really was in danger. His thoughts suddenly come together as he tries to think of something to say that can convince this woman that he cannot be let go, that she must look after him.

Black Hill

The scent of rice cooking. Zhao touches his hand to mouth, the taste of food so tantalising. Soft rain soaking into wool. Zhao lowers his hand back to the sword at his side. His poetry will not be of much use to him now.

The black hill broods over the village, the dark heather and grasses the same colour as the soil, growing from the neat mounds of graves a thousand years old. The keening wind cuts into damp clothes. He shivers, pulls the padded jackets tighter with a tug on the rope belt and continues the climb, following the faint etching of the path.

Looking back the mist has grown. He can still make out the houses, the smoke from the fires, the courtyards and farm houses but they fade in and out of his vision. He unslings a small gourd and takes a sip of sweetened tea.

Walking on he hears a chanting. He is frightened at first but remembers the words of the town mayor. The Daoist priest may be able to help him. Or he may be the cause. Either way Zhao is committed.

The duel part 2

This post is a follow on to Vaslov's post: The Duel.

The muffled sound of iron ships slowly twisting in the dock punctuate the silence.

"The challenge has been issued." The ragged man says. "It must be met."

Daniel does not know whether to support Marcus or run away from him. He cannot express his regret.

"Marcus, we cannot pull out now. The price is too high."

Marcus is shaking, he cannot stop it, his mind is locked with his fear. He knows that if he is to earn Sarah's love, to gain any kind of position at all, he must prove himself here. Yet this is nothing like the fights he is used to. The blur of steel, the whistles of the gangs of Parliament roaming together in the night, the roar of the Members fighting. If he is to be of quality then it is here, in this wretched place, with the stench of rotten fish and blood, that he will show it, or die.

He tightens his fist.

"Then let us get on with it." He finally says.

The ragged man reaches back down to the sack and continues to unknot its cord. Marcus breaths deeply and turns to receive the briefcase from Daniel, who snaps the lid open exposing the dark reds of the velvet inside. On it rests the head. The flesh is grey, and the man was old when he died. Daniel's great-grandfather, a fierce man, a long-time supporter of the Parliament and a proud weapon of his family for generations since his death.

Marcus reaches out with his left hand and whispers the incantation. The eyes of the head snap open, exposing crystal globes that emit a faint light, barely visible. The head rises of its own volition, turning about as if stretching a hidden neck. It moves to Marcus's shoulder and hovers there, waiting.

The ragged man, a wizard of centuries long experience judging by his appearance, is stood facing them, a head of his own chosen from the bag and positioned near his hand, ready to respond to its instruction. The head is even more hideous than Daniel's great grandfather. The flesh is torn and loose, held together with crude, thick stitches and metal staples. One of the eyes is sealed shut and the other contains a dark green orb. It is a well seasoned weapon. Daniel has tutored him, warned him to be cautious. Their practise duels, with the heads of dogs and birds, have taught him the basics, but he feels nothing could really prepare him for this.

Daniel watches the ragged man. It is not the first time he has seen a master like this but his own station has meant he has been secure from walking into such a challenge. He feels guilty at dragging Marcus into this, as if his friendship inevitably meant this moment had to happen. That Marcus would need to see himself as Daniel's equal at all cost.

When Daniel sees the ragged man nods he raises his whistle to his lips. Before blowing into it he whispers a charm of luck for Marcus then gives the short, sharp blows that signal the start of the duel. Within minutes the dockside will be swarming with witnesses, but the fight will have already begun.

The two heads glide towards each other with respective flicks of the controllers' hands. They seem to shimmer in the dark air, ghost shadows falling on fog. There are a few shouts in the distance as the heads begin to swing around, nudging carefully at each other but not yet engaged.

Suddenly the ragged man's arm lifts up, his palm outstretched. The head under his control darts forwards, crashing into Marcus's head with a snap of his jaw and the swipe of a razor buried in his ear. Marcus cries out in pain as the hit is lodges within him via the link between his mind and that of the weapon. The pain is harder and sharper than he imagined it would be. The practise fights were barely more than light blows while the impact from that strike is buried deep in his nerves, a fire of neuronal activity. He recovers with a defensive strike that does little damage. Better prepared now he makes a move to parry another swipe and follows it up with a bite against the back of the neck. It does little damage but Marcus sees the ragged man wince in his own sympathy and Marcus feels heartened by it.

Suddenly the ragged man's head swings low and speeds too quickly for Marcus to react. It punches hard, driving Marcus's head away with a wooden crack, almost to the edge of where Marcus's control ends. Then it drives quickly forwards, directly at Marcus, aiming to attack him directly and claim a trophy that is the ragged man's desire. Marcus reaches out with his hand defensively, trying to block the rotting skull but it bites down onto his hand and severs a finger. Screaming, Marucs reacts instinctively, pulling his own skull back faster than he had thought possible with a drawing back of his arm. The ragged man does not notice in time, too focused on driving in for another attack, hoping to tear at his whole arm this time to claim it for his own. Only trphies claimed within the battle can be kept.

Marcus attacks the skull from behind, the old features of the grandfather are contorted with a sincere rage as it tears into the back of the ragged man's floating head, ripping into the stiches and pulling apart the metal hinge and staples that hold the skull's jaw on. The grandfather spits away the loose jaw and it falls to the ground, closely followed by the rest of the head.

Marcus falls to his knees, clutching his bleeding hand. He summons his head back towards him and seeks out the old, ragged man. The ragged man has fallen, unconscious and inert. Marcus has won.

the horde

the dark mass of dust on the horizon signifies the coming storm, the men riding across the desert with purpose. their scouts had already been spotted and the town prepared. those who could have already fled, taking their families and their valuables with them on the road to the south, hoping that the bandits they might meet will not take everything. as the sun rises through the mid-morning the slow, deep sound of the horses starts to be heard, barely audible, felt more through the soles of the feet than by the ears. instead of panic a grim determination overtakes those stood at the walls, their armour old and poorly fitting but still strong, their swords are sharpened and ready. as they look out they can see the figures through the dust. a thousand devils approach, wearing helmets wrapped in furs and strung with worn bones of enemies. the sounds of their heathen prayers layer the wind.

photomancy

I look through the album looking at the photos in my collection. It has been painstakingly built up over years, the images pressed lightly against th gum of the page, protected by a thin film of plastic, and carefully catalogued into the correct sections. Some of them are whole while others are missing corners, or have holes cut into them to remove key elements; a particular pattern of wood or stone, a person's head, the paw of a cat. Many of the photos I have taken and developed with my own hands but others I've sought out and purchased, occasionaly at great expense, in order to extend my collection.

They have to be real photos, developed from the original negative, or polaroids work well. Maybe even better, with little inhibition caused by the repetition of the original event. Digital does not really work at all. Some think that this is because of the resolution of the camera and some still try to use the latest cameras in an effort to experiment and free themselves from the purity, and difficulties, of film. I do not believe this can be done. The capture of a digital image is too transitory, the mechanism for absorbing the image is diluted by all the other images that have passed through it. Maybe the first photo a digital camera takes has power but after that there is nothing left. No essence, no magic.

rain

The wind drives the rain in sheets against David's body. He winces as the cold stings his face. His legs feels tired with as his trousers quickly soak through to his skin. The path is muddy and slightly treacherous. He pauses frequently to assess the best way forwards. Calculated jumps take him over larger pools of mud and water. Occasionally he detours around them, through heather that catches at his feet. Ahead clouds skim the folding slopes and hide the horizon. His world becomes only what is immediately around him. His grandmother will be furious with him for being out here, especially in this weather, but his fear has faded. His pace quickens.
The path is now lighter, made of sand and rock as it quickly ascends and leaves the mud behind. The damp does not bother him so much. The exertion brings him to relish the feel of the rain. He reaches the peak and the land flattens off. Ahead, he knows, is a plateau that stretches for miles. The level ground is filled with the warp and weft of streams, bracken and heather. Startled, a moor hen suddenly cries out ahead of him and flees deeper into the stunted bushes. He keeps on. He is not far now.
The clouds lift slightly and his view suddenly extends over the whole of the valley. On the peak of a small lip of land the blackened stones stand out against the sky. He runs up to the first of the three and kneels beside it. He pays no attention to the damp cold seeping into his trousers. His hands run over the rough surface of the stone looking for the faint cups and spirals that remain after centuries of weathering. He feels the vibrations pass through his fingers and leans closer to listen. On the edge of his hearing he finds it, the ringing beats of the rain against the rock. A thin membrane between worlds is being shaken by the sound and sings out with an alien song. Beneath the hard surface of the stone another world is bubbling up against ours.