Friday, March 12, 2010

Double, Double

The hard part had turned out to be the fresh mugwart, because there wasn’t any in Las Vegas. Fresh anything was always hard in the desert, unless it was sage. But there weren’t too many magical potions that called for tumbleweeds, so fresh things always required, at the very least, tracking down a supplier with a greenhouse. It got expensive.

Lilith had found a supplier, a graduate student who looked like a leftover from the counter-culture Sixties, but believed in Wicca and grew all sorts of interesting things in a back corner of the university greenhouse. She’d come up with any number of herbs and rare cuttings as Lilith read them off her ingredient list, and without batting an eye or asking questions. But, when asked for mugwart, she shook her head.

“It won’t grow in the desert,” she explained. “Not under controlled conditions, not under any conditions. Mugwart grows alongside creekbeds. It needs mud and damp. And the light’s wrong here– you know that kind of green, leafy light you get in places where there’s lots of foliage? When the sun shines through the leaves and everything feels damp...” she stared off at a private vision, and Lilith nodded briskly.

“I get it. Where can I get some, though? There must be someone on the West Coast. There are creeks in California.”

Her expert looked doubtful. “I don’t know if they’re right. You know, the light is really different in different parts of the country. East Coast light is heavier, more muggy, you know? West Coast is lighter, brighter. Some plants don’t make the transition. Like nightshade, it needs–”

Lilith never learned what nightshade needed. It wasn’t called for in her recipe, so she didn’t stay to listen. She returned to her online searching, and eventually turned up a grower in L.A. who promised her as much mugwart as she desired. She flew there and back again one afternoon, the precious plant well-swaddled with damp rags in her lap, crossing her fingers that it was right and would do the trick. At least she hadn’t had to pick it at midnight under a full moon, she thought gratefully.

After that, the recipe was not hard. The spoken spell was a challenge, since it was in Basque, a language reputedly unlearnable by non-natives. She thought she might have hit a roadblock there, till she stumbled on a small collection of Basque Shakespeare and Jane Austen readings on cassette for the blind. By painstakingly comparing those original texts with her spell, she managed to create a phonetic translation. She never did figure exactly out what she was saying, but she hoped that wouldn’t matter. She refused to waste time wondering what a bunch of sheepherders in the upper Pyranees were doing making up spells like the one she wanted.

What she was trying to get, or create, was a champion to fight Zem for her. She needed something big. Something powerful. And something, if possible, as ancient as he was.

Or at least, some reasonable facsimile.

The incantation was to be said three times while she boiled the potion, which she did in a mutter, banishing thoughts of Macbeth’s three witches from her mind. She peered long and hard into her iron pot when she finished reciting, wondering if she’d done it right and if all the ingredients were sufficiently dissolved. With this spell as with many others, timing was of the essence.

She decided that if she couldn’t actually see any recognizable bits of mugwart or lemon peel floating around in the dark muck, it was probably ready. Besides, she should be able to count on the Winter Solstice to energize the spell and make up for some shortcomings, shouldn’t she?

She grabbed the pot with her heaviest oven mitts and headed for her car.

The potion had to be used hot. She supposed that really, she ought to have mixed it up on site, a yard or two from her subject. But that was obviously impossible. The modern world, not to mention the hospitality industry, was certainly not ready for a Gypsy witch stirring a caldron on a clear Tuesday in December.

She sped down the freeway, passing every car till she hit the last exit. Then she careened around three left turns, nearly overturning the pot in her passenger seat, and screeched into valet parking at the Nile.

She grabbed her mitts and the caldron and hurried out, managing to toss a ten to the pimply-faced youth who took her keys.

“Won’t be here long. Just don’t bother me,” she said sweetly.

He was young enough to be dazzled by her smile, or else new enough at his job to be impressed by the ten. In either case, he just stood there watching after her and didn’t say a word.

The incantation had to be repeated backwards while she poured the potion over each of the statue’s four feet. She’d made a special trip here yesterday to reconfirm that there were, in fact, four complete paws, that the wall of the hotel didn’t swallow the back two. She’d had some bad moments when she’d thought of that.

The inflections were even harder, speaking backward, and Lilith struggled to get through them smoothly. She finished the first paw, screwed up the second irretrievably, went back and started over, and noticed as she repeated her steps that the whole parking staff was gathering in a little knot to stare at her.

Just get through the spell, she told herself, and you won’t have to worry about them.

She only hoped her accent was good enough to make the incantation work. Whatever spirits or earthly forces actually listened to these things would have to pay pretty close attention to get every nuance. She stumbled as she came around to the fourth and final leg, and poured the very last of her now-cooling potion on its toes. And when she was finished, she straightened and looked up, studied the legs and the belly of the thing, which were the only parts she could see, and suddenly, without warning, she knew.

She knew before she saw the movement, before she even felt the ground shudder underneath her as the thing shifted its weight. She knew without doubt.

The actual performance was wildly impressive, of course. Boy, if Cheryl could just see me now! Lilith thought. But no one could see her. The valet parkers had scattered, she noticed. And even the car noise from the Strip seemed to have abated. No one was around to scream or point or wonder.

Somehow, in this most populous and busy place on earth, Lilith found herself, now, utterly alone. Alone, except for the gigantic form she’d brought to life, the statue she’d awakened, the monolithic being she’d succeeded in energizing magically.

When the ground stopped shaking, Lilith looked up at the thing she’d wrought and felt impressed, and awe-struck, and proud, and excited. But mostly, she felt very, very small.

The Sphinx looked down at her. “Shall we go?” it invited.

NEXT POST: ROUNDUP (Monday 3/15)

Monday, March 8, 2010

Fly Me to the... Moon?

Magnolia looked up at Errol and just registered his look of extreme shock and confusion before a blast of wind hit the back of her head. Her vision swirled, the world spun, and stretched and warped itself like a cheesy, twenty-year-old special effect in a B movie, and she fell on all fours the sidewalk.

Surely, she thought, this isn’t absolutely necessary.

“Zem!” she gurgled, “What are you–”

"Come," she heard Zem's voice intone.

She pressed her palms down and tried to glower at the empty air. Around her, three steps away, her untouched posse shifted uncertainly a step or two back. They were beginning to get used to the little eccentricities that following the mayor of Las Vegas these days entailed. Miraculous comings and goings, disembodied voices, occasional and intermittent farm animals had become parts of their employment expectations. But a private tornado was new.

“Errol–” she faltered.

There was a chuckle, a sound vibrating through the air and threatening to shatter it. Amused, yes, but so strong, so powerful, the world itself shied away in self-preservation. “Oh yes,” she heard, “him too.”

And then there was a thrust, or a grab and a pull, and Magnolia felt she was forced out of her body. She entered a realm of darkness, with speeding streaks of color ripping by. There was a feel of things tearing and crashing together, making and unmaking themselves on a huge scale. Scary. Unpredictable.

My body, she cried out in her own brain. I was just getting used to it!

Again, sounds of disembodied merriment.

“We’ll need these, too,” she heard, or felt, or somehow perceived. And just as the last veil fell and she was cut off from the real, ordinary world altogether, she knew her posse was rounded up, collected, and pulled through to where she was. They followed along like the tail of a kite, bouncing off the darkness, as Zem tugged her and Errol and them all along.

Holy shit, she tried to say. She thought she might have heard another chuckle from Zem, but in this state of things, who knew?

They went.

NEXT POST: DOUBLE, DOUBLE (Friday 3/12)

Friday, March 5, 2010

Hero Delivery

When Rachel woke up, there was a handsome prince staring down at her.

“Oh god,” she moaned.

“I think she’s awake,” the prince called out. His dark hair needed to be cut. It fell all over his perfectly guileless eyes. His chin was stubbly in a way that was not nearly artistic enough to have been deliberate, but sexier than any male model. The jaw line beneath the stubble was strong but not Dudley Dooright cartoonish, matching his brows, which were furrowed as he gazed down.

She lay perfectly still in the mud and slush. She moaned again.

“Of course she’s awake,” Testy Lesbiana’s voice approached. “She only fainted. Silly girl. Get up, Rachel, the ground’s cold and you’re all dirty.”

“Oh, thank you for pointing that out,” Rachel muttered. She thrashed around and managed to connect her two feet to the ground and her two hands to various other hands reaching out to help her. Everybody involved hauled, the ground retreated, and she stood up.

“Steady, Simba,” Testy cautioned, holding her arm firmly. "Now — Seth, Rachel. Rachel, Seth. I’m sure he’d be happy to hold you up all by himself, so I'm letting go, babydoll. And she did so, leaving Rachel to stumble again, into the strong and waiting arms of the made-to-order hero.

“Um, thanks,” she muttered.

“No problem,” he assured her. He helped her stand up straight one more time and smiled at her. His eyes crinkled at the corners.

She wanted to stare at that smile, look him in the eye and ask all sorts of things — Who are you? Where did you come from? Have we met? Why not? — but nothing came out from her lips. She looked back at Testy, instead.

“So who’s Seth?” she asked, and then flinched at the baldness of it.

“Your handsome prince,” her friend told her, just as baldly. “I’ve got to go talk to the dragon. This is what I warned you about, baby,” she said. “My friend over there...” she indicated a particularly dark patch of the lightless woods, where Rachel avoided looking, “well, I told you he wouldn’t fit in at any coffeehouse. Hell, he wouldn’t fit in any coffeehouse.” She made an attempt at laughter, but it fell flat in the gummy air. “I know, I know,” Testy added more gently. “It’s all just too much for your little showgirl mind, isn’t it? Wish I could help you with that, honey. But the truth is... well, this.” She spread her hands out to indicate the slushy park, its wet, drippy trees, the mysterious if sexy stranger who’d appeared without warning, and the shape that lurked among the trees only a dozen feet away. “I’m sorry, but here it is. This is the world, as I know it.” She shrugged.

Rachel looked down, then up again at Testy. She was afraid if she lost sight of her friend, she might find that Testy had transformed into a monster, too, or else disappeared completely and left her with this... Seth. Or... something even weirder.

“Don’t think so much, doll,” Testy soothed. “It’s better if you just go with it. Figure things out later. When you’re not in shock,” she added, and smiled and reached up to pat Rachel’s shoulder with her pudgy hand.

“I’ll stay here. You can ask me anything you want,” a voice behind her shoulder offered. She glanced back at Seth, who was watching her, and trying to look encouraging, she guessed.

“Thanks, but–”

“That’s perfect,” Testy interrupted. “Sorry doll,” she added, “but like I said, I have to confab with the lizard. Hang out here with the hero, okay? He’ll take good care of you. Hell — that’s his job!” She gave a hoot of laughter, stepped back to look Rachel, and then Seth, over for a long moment, shook her head, and smiled. “You kids have fun,” she said. And then she stumped off through the bushes, taking no time for the path.

“Have you known the wise woman long?” Seth asked.

NEXT POST: THE ONLY WAY TO FLY (Monday 3/8)

Monday, March 1, 2010

Here Be Dragons (Finally)

The park was amazingly dark, cold, and slippery.

Who could have imagined a place in Manhattan could ever be so black and inhospitable. Rachel's feet slid with every step, and she could no longer tell what was frozen ground and what was slushy mud. She wished she had a cigarette, but more for the light and warmth than the smoke.

"Testy," she whispered. Why was she whispering?

There was no sound. Her drag queen guide had gone ahead, ostensibly to make sure they were going the right way so Rachel didn't have to kill herself on this path for no reason.

There needed to be one hell of a good reason at the end of this, Rachel had decided. She slogged on.

The path led uphill, twisting and turning through trees and underbrush which Testy swore had been there since the island was bargained away from those unsuspecting Wappingers, who had clearly never heard of charging full retail.

Mixed in with the trees every now and again was an old fashioned lamppost, which sort of weakened Testy's claim, but none of them worked and Rachel could only see them if she happened to catch one silhouetted against the deep gray sky, bony as a scarecrow's skeleton looming above her. She shivered.

"Come on, Testy. Where the hell are we going?" she muttered.

The ground got steeper and she scrambled up it. The river, surely just over this rise and down a long way, could be heard louder here. Or maybe that was a lot of snow, coming in an avalanche to bury her once and for all. She couldn't decide if she'd mind that or not.

Up. Up more. Slipping and sliding, and clambering to the hilltop to find Testy standing with her fists on her hips in the dead dark.

"Testy!"

"Sh! I think he's coming. There!" Testy slung an arm out.

"What? Who's coming? Who is this friend of yours, anyway?"

"Shush, doll. No time to tell you. You'll have to figure it out for yourself now. I promise, it'll all be okay." Testy was suddenly standing right next to her, staring up at her with wide eyes. "Promise. Really."

"Okay. I guess."

"Look up."

And Testy pointed straight at the sky.

Rachel followed her finger, feeling foolish and waiting for her friend to start laughing. Probably this was all a joke, just Testy teasing her, giving her shit for following her up here like a crazed stalker.

"Higher."

Rachel looked higher. Waiting for the laughter. She'd better play along, or they'd be out here all night.

"Do you see him?"

See him? Rachel saw nothing. She reached out to grab Testy's hand, just in case her friend was thinking of sneaking away in the dark to really spook her, and kept on staring straight up.

And something brushed past the branches up there.

"No joke," Testy told her.

Rachel took a breath. No joke.

There was something large and dark up there, cruising by. It was remarkably quiet. It flapped, turned, and then broke through the trees and came down lower, snapping some branches and a small tree. It was huge, and it was heavy, and it was graceful in a black, stealthy manner. There was nothing funny about it whatsoever. It was not a joke, not in any way.

Rachel’s vision got fuzzy, and she started to see stars. The stars shifted and whirled and zoomed in at her and out again. The dark thing broke a few more branches, and she clearly felt Testy pulling on her hand to make her step back and give it more room.

It occurred to her how blank her mind was. This might all have been rehearsed, a big new production number for Extravaganza! 3 about a monster, and a maiden... there should be a boy, somewhere. A male lead — a hero. He wouldn’t save her, the monster always won in the end in Vegas, but she needed someone tall and handsome to dance with, before she got eaten or sacrificed or whatever. There would be a nice adagio number.

And then, as those thoughts ran together and whirled through her brain, the big black shape landed heavily, finally, ten feet in front of her and the stars in her vision brightened, rushed together, and exploded silently.

Rachel passed out.

NEXT POST: AUDITIONING HEROES (Friday 3/5)