He looked back over his shoulder at orange and yellow flames shooting out the upper-story windows of the Washington Shoe Manufacturing Company building. The whole thing would be gutted. All his fault. On his next stride, the cold iron lamppost leaped out of the darkness before his fire-blinded eyes.
Cold iron smacked his left temple and thumped his ribs. He fell into a windy darkness full of the whirring of wings.
“FOR GOD’S SAKE, will you please quit crying!”
Wizard yelped like a kicked dog as the book bounced off his shoulder and skidded across the Indian prayer rug on the floor. He raised astounded eyes to Cassie. silenced by the sheer shock of her outburst. As she retrieved her book, he rubbed at his stiff face and wet eyes and took a deeper breath. His head felt less foggy, but he was still more than half-stoned. He knew there was nothing more unpleasant to be around than a drunk on a crying jag, but he was too confused to be ashamed- Cassie sagged back into her overstuffed chair and regarded him as if he were a wet dog in a freshly made bed.
They were in the library, a pleasantly dark room with bookshelves growing up to an unseen ceiling and fat furniture crouching on thick rugs. Floor lamps cast their puddles of yellow light near the chairs. It was a cozy room, if you ignored the cobwebs and the rustling of mice in the comers- Cassie did. So did Rasputin, who sat flat in a corner, swaying softly in his eternal dance as he teased Ninja with a string. They were ignoring Wizard, too. Or had been.
Euripides had left hours ago, right after he helped Rasputin drag Wizard up the endless stairs. After they had dumped him in the middle of the floor, he had looked at Wizard sadly shaking his head. “I don’t think it was entirely his fault ”
Euripides had begun cautiously, but the looks Cassie and Rasputin gave him silenced the defense. Euripides had tossed a shrug at Cassie and left. Wizard wished he had stayed No one had spoken a word to him since then, though he vividly recalled Rasputin shaking him violently just before they dragged him in. “Acting like you the last wizard in the world, and the only one going to get hurt by your crap. You dumb shit fuck-head!”
“I know, I know!” Wizard had wailed, and that was when he had begun to cry. He hadn’t wanted to, had been ashamed of it, but he was too drunk, stoned, and disoriented to do anything else. That was when Rasputin had slammed him up against the wall, not hard enough to really hurt him, but forcefully enough to let him know that he could just as easily have put Wizard through the wall. Only Euripides’s hand on the black wizard’s arm had stopped me demonstration. Euripides was the only one who had shown any sympathy at all for Wizard’s plight. Fresh tears stung his eyes at the thought, but Cassie’s glare dried them
She set her cup of tea down on the lamp stand by her chair and rose to cross the room to him. She towered over him, a sturdy woman in her thirties dressed in jeans and a faded cotton shirt. “Get up!” she ordered him sternly.
He sniffed and dragged himself to his feet. “You are a mess,” she observed without rancor. He bowed his head. The robe was torn from (he jagged window glass and bloody where he had cut his elbow on (he second window glass. Pigeon droppings streaked the fold of cloak where he had carried them, and he stank of smoke. When he rubbed his face again and looked at his hands, he saw stains of damp soot. “What happened to you?” she demanded, and he knew she was not asking about the fire.
“I don’t know,” he replied hoarsely.
“Ah doooon’t knoooow!” Rasputin drawled out in a mocking croon. He rose to waltz lazily around them both. When he reached the door, he said, “Hate to say, ‘I told you so,’ Cassie.
This one’s on you, like stink on shit.“ His dark eyes snagged for a moment on Wizard’s doleful face. ”Hey, Wizard. No hard feelings, huh? If you live, come see me. You’ll be welcome.“
He curtsied gravely and spun out the door.
“Thanks for bringing him to me!” Cassie called after him. Wizard wondered if she was sincere. She dragged a bandana handkerchief from her hip pocket and handed it to him. He wiped his eyes and nose dutifully. “What am I going to do with you?” she wondered aloud.
“I don’t—” he began.
“That was rhetorical!” she snapped, stopping him cold. “I’ve had enough of your crying and saying ‘I don’t know.’ Say or do anything you please, but not that.” She meant it. He took a ragged breath.
“I thought crying was good, especially for us inhibited males.”
A little of his frustration and anger leaked into his voice.
For a second Cassie looked pleased. “Well, at least you still have your wits. I was beginning to think your mind was gone.
Sure, crying is good. It’s a great tension relieving response to impossible situations. But when you substitute it for action, it’s no more appropriate than beating your head against a wall.
As Rasputin tried to demonstrate. What are you crying about, anyway?“
“I don’t—” Her look stopped him. “Everything. I feel like I just fell down the rabbit hole again, Cassie. It’s not that I don’t like you or the others. But, Cassie, I had it all straight in my head, finally. I was going to move in with Lynda and get a job or welfare or something, and forget all this stuff.” A frown divided her brows, but she was nodding for him to continue. “All this stuff… all this pretending about magic and Truth and Knowing and pigeons. I was going to be like everyone else. And then my place catches fire and bums up everything I own. And when I come to, Rasputin is hauling me up those damned impossible stairs of yours, and I am back to this… place.” Words failed to describe for him the gears of his two worlds grinding together.
Cassie looked pained. “A job or welfare. Shit, Wizard. Look at yourself. You can’t change your residence and put on new clothes and be what you aren’t. You’d still be a wizard, and you’d still have responsibilities to your magic.”
“My magic’s gone, anyway.” Wizard crushed his eyes shut as he made this final admission. He dangled once again in the abyss of that loss.
“Hold it!” Cassie’s voice snapped him back from it. She looked incredibly tired. “What a tangle,” she murmured, mostly to herself. She managed a tired smile for him. “Let’s take this one thing at a time. Go clean up. Maybe it will sober you up a little, too. Go on. You’ll feel better.
She picked up her book again. He blundered about the place, discovering a closet and an office with dusty files and a typewriter and then a short corridor with a door ajar at the end of it. The bathroom was small, little more than a sink, toilet, and shower stall. He untied the silver tassels of the cloak slowly.
He draped it and the soiled robe over the sink and turned on the shower to the hottest water he thought he could stand. He shut the glass door behind him and stood in the stinging rain, letting it batter his face. His brain slowly cleared. He began to soap himself, finding numerous small abrasions he had been unaware of. They stung. The hot water loosened the newly clotted blood on his elbow and it bled again, slightly. With cautious fingers he explored the tender lump on one temple.
He stayed under the shower until the water turned suddenly cold. Then he shut it off and stood dripping in the stall. It seemed so safe in here. Getting out of the shower and drying off meant facing up to whatever came next. But after a few moments he began to shiver. Best face it. He blotted himself dry and then glanced about for something to put on. There was only the robe and cloak. He slipped the robe over his head, expecting the smell of smoke and pigeons. But there was only the soft blue robe spangled with stars and moons. But for the small rips from the glass, the events of the past few hours might have been dreams. That was not reassuring. He pulled on his socks, slung the cloak over his arm, and emerged in search of Cassie.