《Desert Green, Wizards and Nasty Cowboys》


 Chapter One: A Rude Awakening, and, A Vistor In The Night.

    ¡°Twas a grim kind of a night when he first came a-knocking on my door. The stars weren¡¯t out, the moon weren¡¯t bright, and the rain was already pouring quite a hammering down on my little shed. I was up in the wops with no one around. I couldn¡¯t¡¯ve seen if someone had come along, as I had no windows then. And with the cabin having no windows, one of them old oil lanterns, hanging from the ceiling by a frayed rope, was all I had to see by. It was blue, the lantern, and rusted on the bottom, I can still remember it, just swinging there.


    I was lying on my bed, a very thin mattress laid crosswise the floor. The mattress was slightly damp, as was the air. It was damp, it was wet, and it was very cold. The walls of my little cabin had been sheets of corrugated iron, and as I lay on my scrappy bedding, I ran my hand along the bumps, which made a sort of knocking sound. It¡¯s odd to say now, but that metal, and running my hand across it, was a comfort of mine; especially on long, cold nights, or the wee hours of the morning. I just liked it, I don¡¯t know why.


    I think I must have been very tired, for it was late at night, but I couldn¡¯t sleep. I had snuffed the light ages back, so I just lay in the dark, with my hand dragging along the wall, listening to the rain drumming against the roof, and my own hand knocking the thin metal wall. And I felt the cold wind leaking in and whipping me, and I heard thunder in the distance in large cracks and booms.


    Then, there came a scuffle and a commotion outside. Then there came a rapping at my door, which was just by my feet, it being a small room and all. I had this old door back then, a weathered, wooden door with the paint peeling off. It was shutted and bolted from the inside, but whoever was beating against it, had a strong enough hand. The old door shock, swinging in a bit with the knocking. It was dark and I was skittish, especially in those years when I was up on my lonesome in the bush, so I sat right up, and scrambled to the top of my bed. I am not afraid to say, I was afraid. I cowered at the top of my bed, imagining all the horrible ways I was going to die, with the storm beating down and around me. And I watched the door. Somewhere in the distance, thunder ripped. The old wood moaned and the weight of the incessant knocking bent her further in. With the door bent curved wise I could see the night all flecked with rain just behind it. I pressed my left hand against the wall to steady myself, although I was sitting down, and in a huddle no less. I busied my right hand with fumbling in the dark, I rifled my pockets and on finding nothing I began to blindly sweep and pat along the (small and dirty) floor until I found an old and torn paper parcel, which I took up.


    I shook it, and emptied its meagre contents out over my palm: spent matches, and short ends from good matches that over-jostling had since broke. The knocking at the door stopped, and whoever it was outside, began moving around the cabin itself. And he started banging against the metal walls, which a¡¯course were, at that very moment, thinner than ever. I jumped when he hit right behind me, and I scuffled my way into the middle of the room, right below the oil lamp, which began to slowly swing. It was still dark and I still had the matches in my hand, so the longest one, I took, and struck it against my knee.


    The match came to life with a fizz and a sparklingly bright light atop it. The whole cramped cabin was shot up with warm light and harsh shadows. I held the burning match between my thumb and forefinger. I raised it to each of the corners of my little cabin, (and it was small, no much bigger than a broom closet, or outhouse) looking all around. No one was in there with me, and what a relief that was, though as I thought, no one else inside, I couldn¡¯t help but also mutter to myself,


    ¡°Not yet, anyway.¡± As if in response, the feller outside gave the furthest wall a swift kick which had the cabin rattling. From its leaks and holes, the roof shook with enough water that I felt assailed by a sheet of indoor rain. I cupped my hand over my match to stop it from snuffing, setting the room in a low red light, which I must say gave the gear I had strewn all over the floor much more of a sinister feel to it. Once the sudden water spell cleared up (as much as it ever did for all the leaks in that ramshackle hut) I thought to put my light somewhere where it could better weather such abysmal weather.


    I cupped my fire into that snuffed lantern, and it caught to the wick. I grabbed the old, blue thing and realised that there was nothing now, between myself, and opening the door. With the lantern, even in that horrid weather, I could go out, without fear of my light doing the same. My hands shook a little as I took the lantern down and off its oily string. I clutched the cord that looped on the lantern¡¯s top, and I clutched it hard as I went to step for the door, but some courage in me still needed mustering. With the rain pounding with my heart, and the long footsteps of that man, pacing outside, I thought that maybe I didn¡¯t have too much time on me hands. I took a deep breath and stepped across the cabin. Before I knew it I was pulling chains back and undoing those flimsy latches before the door, and I was standing out in the rain. And for my lantern¡­ I couldn¡¯t see a Gosh darn thing.


    The light from it was there a¡¯course, but nothing came of it. The world outside was bleary and dark, and my little light seemed so far away behind so many sheets of icy rain. And as for the rain, it soaked me through with every breath. Not that I was breathing much. I choked as I stepped into the storm and from there I was gulping for air, but letting more water in for it. I coughed and spluttered for the deep and abiding coldness of it all, and the wild drench of the rain. It was a kick-up of a thing, I¡¯m telling you, and I staggered out there with my useless light in the impassible dark.


    Great black clouds churned above me, and the night was like pitch as well. Then there was a clap of thunder someplace near. And the man come rounding the corner. And I froze where I stood. He was tall, and large, and coming out from behind the shack, spilling forward like so many black sheets and all at once. I ran for the door. It was a mad dash from sod to shack, but I made it, gapping it as the door nearly shut on me, it was swinging in the wind and all. And I found my little shack were no brighter than outside, darker even, and it grew no brighter with my being there. I must¡¯ve, I realised, dropped my lantern out there, out of fear, and left it lying in the muck as I ran. I kicked myself for it but no matter. I fumbled with the locks and bars but the door had gotten very wet while swinging loose in the rain, and I could nary see a thing. Locking the door proved impossible so I held it shut and threw my whole weight against it, bracing myself and the door in case the bugger tried knocking it in. The old thing buckled outwards a bit with my weight on it, but it did not break.


    I breathed quietly in the dark. I stood like stone. Still. And perhaps I had the face of death about me. I cannot say I remember what I thought when I felt someone pushing on the other side of the thin wood. Or as I felt the doorknob twist in my hand, too cold and slippery for me to slow. But I forced myself forward pushing back the rising force on the other side, that I could not see but I knew to be harmful.


    I can tell you this, as I fell suddenly forward, the door whisked away and out of sight, my hands flying, flailing, as I lurched towards the grass and the mud; I screamed. Yes, I fell flat onto the ground, and screamed with fear. I screamed as I came toward the dirt and as I met it, and I screamed a while longer as I lay in the wet grass and mud, black water streaming down and around me on all sides. The great shape bent down as it stepped over me and into my cabin, it was carrying my lantern, by which I could see that it was a man, with a great green coat and pointed hat. His feet thumped as he padded through my door, he circled my home like he was some sort of shuffling snuffling carnival curiosity. I was still out on my hands and on my knees, trying to force myself against the rain and onto my feet. And from behind me I heard the man from my own doorstep speaking down to me, like I was some vagrant come a-knocking,


    ¡°You know,¡± he said, and I can¡¯t tell you how his voice was, except that it were warm but still had this deep melancholy to it. Though then, that night, it was the horn of war for all the sudden and booming fear it inspired within me ¡°you should not have tried to brace it. It did not do anything. Far be it from me to remind you, but should you not know your own door opens both ways?¡±


    From where I was, on all fours and on the ground, I was still filled with a certain indignation,


    ¡°What?¡± I half spluttered. He snorted, and raised his voice when he repeated the question,


    ¡°To satisfy my curiosity, why did you try bracing yourself against a two-way door?¡± I looked at him, through the mud, and the rain, the terrible rain, and I saw that he had cast aside his pointed hat, and was leaning in the door frame, with his arms folded. And he stood there, and he addressed me. Myself being bellow him, some many paces away, scrambling and scrabbling in dirt and the rain; he came off as a rather cocky sort of a fellow. Then again with him standing between me and shelter, I felt compelled to answer,


    ¡°I don¡¯t know - I was terrified.¡±


    ¡°Terrified of what?¡± he talked fast, didn¡¯t string thoughts together so well.


    ¡°You, a¡¯course. What kind of fellow are you to be harassing me anyway? First you scare me off my wits and then you get all verbal like and attack me for it.¡± Fear in me gave way to confusion by the feller¡¯s odd manners which broke away beneath a rising tide of anger that took me up from my muddy knees to my feet, where I stood, facing my invader.


    He raised his huge hands in alarm, though he certainly didn¡¯t fear for his life. He would be happier if I calmed down I knew, but I wouldn¡¯t be calm, not when this feller had the gall to think to -


    ¡°Sorry, I did not mean to offend, but you can sympathise, I hope, when I say I just wanted out of that storm.¡± Then he smiled, and punched me on the shoulder, as a friend. That hot anger inside me deflated like a sad balloon, and I was left a wet and raggedy thing. Defeated, and with no protestations left to offer, I caved,


    ¡°No, you''re right, the rain is vile. Go on then.¡± He grinned, and stood there, and grinned, and stood there ¡°Oh and if you please,¡± I gestured at him and the ground, ¡°could you move from the doorway, I¡¯d very much like to come in too.¡± The man laughed,


    ¡°Ha!¡± and then shuffled out of the way. I came in, holding one arm to my side with the other. I was bent and beaten down, mud was on my knees and I was trailing water behind me. And I was glad to be out of the storm.


    It came to be that after some fumbling about with very little light, I was sitting pretty in one corner of the little shack, and the stranger in the other, with the lantern hanging suspended like between us. The room was right small and our feet were almost touching. I was silent, the man was humming some old tune I couldn¡¯t really place. And I must say, I was staring at him. He, on the other hand, seemed to have lost his gaze somewhere in the corners of my roofing, and was trying to find it. I was in a rugged brown cardigan and messy overalls, he was, he was wearing something altogether different.


    It is difficult to describe the man then occupying my space, I have told you he was large. He was indeed, large. Superficially, which is the only way I can think to tell you of him, he had a grand green coat that sat on him well and was a sturdy sort of a thing. And he wore a waistcoat over that, brown and unbuttoned with a large gap left between its two halves. And then an old tatty yellow thing, which he wore beneath the overcoat, and a cardigan just under that. It all came toppoling down from his head in a sort of flipped cup, the bud of a flower, just at the tip of it opened, but not yet blossomed; though, I did get the impression, if a strong gust of wind were to come up from beneath him, or if he were to fall some distance, his coats might splay out and ¡°bloom¡± just yet. Like some worn parachute. He also had a tall and pointed green hat, which he was not wearing, as he had cast it aside somewhere in the muddle.


    His beard was not particularly interesting or of note, it was no bigger than mine, but he fiddled with it as he sat. As he sat in a small pile of clothes and other such things that I had kept strewn about the cabin floor. It was not a comfortable thing, the seat he had made for himself, and he shifted in it at a near constant. Eventually, he stuck his hand in the mess, rummaging for some sort of a cause to his pain, the pea to his princess of you will. He came up with a rather strange metal object which was totally alien to me. He cast it aside, but on settling back down, he did not look the slightest bit more comfortable for its loss. The pile remained, well, a pile of not at all soft particulars. He realised this, I realised this, and he looked at me with a grimace on his face.Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    He looked at me with that grimace before coming to his feet all of a sudden and knocking the roof, setting many parts of it a leaking again.


    ¡°Oh, sorry,¡± he said. Now, I was still reeling from the oddness of the situation, so it wasn¡¯t that I was very forgiving, rather, too aback to care.


    ¡°Uhh, she¡¯ll be right.¡± I murmured, still staring at him as he padded about the cabin on his great feet.


    ¡°Would you?¡± he said, suddenly turning to face me again, though I could¡¯ve sworn he¡¯d been headed for the door, ¡°would you be alright if I made myself something, more, comfortable?¡± I just gestured vaguely,


    ¡°Go ahead¡±


    ¡°Thank you kindly, now if I can just find it¡± and as he spoke he dug through his coats, to find some pocket or bag, and you can probably guess what I did; I sat on my springy mattress, and watched him intently.


    With some flourishing, he drew a long twig from betwixt his rags and pointed it at me. Thunder cracked just over head. I looked at the stick with what must have been some alarm and the twit grinned and laughed. He had a sallow sort of a smile. Anyway, he turned from me and took up this odd stick (slender and shaved it was, so more of a wand, really) and he fiddled with it for a bit, stooping over the thing, poking and prodding away, as if it were to do something. He drew the tip of it back so it bent curved. Then on his releasing it, it came up straight again with a thwack and a shiver.


    ¡°A rather elastic sort of a thing you''ve got there.¡± I said, but he didn¡¯t hear me. At some point he must¡¯ve been satisfied and he twirled the stick again through his fingers. And he turned to face the pile he been sitting in. And he raised the long stick (which was about the length his forearm, so pretty long) high above his head, or as high as he could raise it with the cabin¡¯s low ceiling. The light from the idly swinging lantern caught the paleness of the wand. And I swear the rain started hammering harder as the wand was raised, and I swear the stranger knew it, and I swear he wanted it that way. The fire in the lamp flickered and there were a few seconds of darkness in the shed, a few moments of black bleakness between me and the stranger. I never saw his hand move except for in that darkness, so he must¡¯ve brought his wand down hard and fast.


    The pile weren¡¯t a pile anymore, it was a plump armchair, ripe, red and overstuffed. And the stranger¡¯s arm weren¡¯t raised neither, as it had been before the latern almost snuffed. His wand was lowered, if still pointing at the chair that had been my trekking equipment. I blinked. He looked at me and smiled. He had a sallow sort of a smile. But I was wise to it now, for all the storming outside and the madness inside I wasn¡¯t about to let some party tricks throw me off, now was I? so I raised him, or I called his bluff, one of the two. I stared at him, and the chair, though I tried not to look too incredulous (miracle or no that was my stuff he¡¯d transmogrified) and I said,


    ¡°Could¡¯ya use that to fix me roof?¡± his eyes widened, evidently he was wanting more of a reaction out of me, but I wasn¡¯t going to give him one, not yet anyhow,


    ¡°What?¡± he didn¡¯t stammer it out, but he were now looking from me to the chair, and then to his wand, and all back again.


    ¡°I mean to say, awful lotta leaks in the roof, bad stuff on a night like this¡± another crack of thunder obliged my point ¡°and you¡¯ve got a magical whose¡¯awhat¡¯sit. Seems like you could fix a few things.¡±


    ¡°A magickal whose¡¯awhat¡¯sit, did you say?¡±


    ¡°You know, a thingy. Or can you not fix the leaks?¡± at this point the wizard (and he was a wizard full and proper, I would come to know) had some idea of my game and I think he thought he might play to it. He glanced at the roof, flashed one of them salesman¡¯s smiles with far too much teeth. And then he was all business.


    ¡°Yes I will fix your roof, and I will do you one better, I will upgrade your whole living space. I¡¯m getting a bit tired of corrugated iron, are you not?¡±


    ¡°Well¡± I said, worried I¡¯d gone out a wee bits too deep ¡°I don¡¯t know about that¡± but he had pulled off into a current, a riptide, and there were no catching him now. Especially as he cracked his knuckles and drew that stick, that stick he had that was long as man''s forearm, and more flexible still.


    The leaks were fixed first and the roof was made tile, though you couldn¡¯t see it from the inside, once he hid it with wood panels and all. My (somewhat precious to myself) walls, were flattened to wood and then shot back with the expansion of the room. Yes, he grew the room out as well, till it were the size of a proper study or lounge. It had room for a stuffy bookcase, furnishings and all. I was asked to sit down during the cabin¡¯s growth, so I wouldn¡¯t stumble for the floor shooting off in all directions away from the wizard, as it expanded itself. It was as this refurbishing was done that I found myself sitting in a plush armchair beside the man. He came down into his seat and spilt his coats, allowing the contents to go filing themselves into drawers what had just sprung up from the ground. Then he sild back, letting himself sink into the soft cushions of the chair. He sighed, letting the final room construct itself. There was no oil lantern anymore, though the chandelier had crystals in a shade quite near blue. And for the first time ever my shack had a window in. I could see that it was raining outside, and it was raining hard.


    I did thank him, but he didn¡¯t say anything, maybe there was a murmur, but I didn¡¯t catch it. There was a fireplace in the lounge, and the fire was burning a long time before we spoke again. I was quite comfortable there, and I think he was quite comfortable, and we both knew the other was comfortable, so there was really no need for talking, we could just sit there enjoying our comforts. But as I said, the fire had to burn a long time, but we did get to talking again that night, the stranger and I, the wizard and I.


    A question struck upon me as the logs in the fireplace were just slowing in their glow. And I called out, from the deepest recesses of my chair to the wizard. He was picking at some old lyre all the while, playing a ditty to the streams of rain, and I must¡¯ve interrupted him. Good thing was he was good about it, or atleast was too tired to mind, I said,


    ¡°So what kind of feller are you anyhow?¡±


    ¡°I am a wizard.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, well I gathered that much, but what kind?¡± we didn¡¯t look at each other as we spoke, we both sat in our chairs and addressed the empty room at large. Myself I was looking out the window as we talked, him, he was eying the wallpaper I reckon.


    ¡°I was not aware there was more than one kind. Is there?¡±


    ¡°Well, I don¡¯t know, you''re the wizard.¡± and he must¡¯ve found some quiet humour in the conversation for he dropped his lyre and softly laughed,


    ¡°And you,¡± he said, ¡°you must be some sort of god. For you have had no reaction to my magick, I must say you cared more for my knocking at your door than my transforming of it. Or have you met a wizard before? I know only one other, but perhaps you, my host, are more worldly than I?¡± I thought on that. As I sat on magic, and realised that I sat on magic, and was surrounded by magic, it did come to my notice, now that he¡¯d mentioned it, I hadn¡¯t revelled much in it. I couldn¡¯t figure what to do so I just kept talking.


    ¡°No I¡¯m no pretender to God. And you¡¯re the first wizard I¡¯ve ever met, or any sort of magical person for that matter. To be perfectly honest I hadn¡¯t believed in magic till now, and I apologise for my boredom at the extraordinary, and at the extraordinary gifts you possess. But I¡¯ve been off my wits for a while now, I wouldn¡¯t be up here if I still had them about me. So think not that it reflects on you, personally, more that it shows my own lack of sense.¡± he laughed and laughed harder then,


    ¡°Yes, well, I suppose.¡± is all he said, and I think I started laughing too.


    The fire was stocked and footstools were dragged along the floor to the both of us. He put his feet up and lay back. And I did the same. And we were quiet for a bit. It was nice, really, especially with the rain hammering on the roof and all. It was better still that the hammering rain was more distant now for the low roof having been raised. Anyway, it came that he leaned forward and looked at me for the first time in a while. With a sudden pipe trailing in his hand (one I never saw him take out or light) he asked me, ¡°Do you partake?¡± he pointed the end of it at me, and I blinked, then a¡¯course realised what he was asking,


    ¡°Smoke? No, I don¡¯t.¡± hearing that he smiled and lay the pipe beside himself, on an armrest,


    ¡°Yes, well, I do not smoke either.¡± I would¡¯ve asked him, but I thought it was whatever, so I didn¡¯t bother, and didn¡¯t mind myself with all that. Although, I did start glancing at him, more often than the window, and I noticed that the pipe that had been lay to rest, seemed to be smoking itself.


    I hadn¡¯t asked any questions but he answered them either way. From his cut layers he managed a brown knit bag, and he said as he did, ¡°I do not smoke, see. No, the pipe is not for me, it¡¯s for this fellow here.¡± I watched as he unbuckled the bag at its top, and rummaged it, making all sorts of sounds as he did. Presently he was raising with both hands a skull, as a priest takes up a baby after baptism. It wasn¡¯t a human skull, the thing he¡¯d taken from the bag, it was more like a horse, with horns. It did have human-like qualities, I just couldn¡¯t truly place them. ¡°Come over here.¡± he said and motioned for me. I didn¡¯t want to, but I pushed myself from the chair with a groaning all the same. I¡¯d been sitting down so long it took me a moment to get my bearings but once I had, I wandered over to the wizard¡¯s side. He had laid the skull in his lap, facing forwards so that it was looking up at him. ¡°Open its mouth would you?¡± he asked as much as he commanded, and I don¡¯t know why I did it, I suppose I had nothing better to do, but I bent down and pulled its jaw open, showing off all its nasty teeth. He took his pipe and placed it in the mouth, closing it again so the pipe was stuck between the skull''s teeth, and still smoking.


    ¡°Hold it up.¡± He said, and passed the skull to me. It was heavier than I would¡¯ve thought, but I held it by my chest with my two hands and held it so it was facing the wizard. The pipe hung loose in the corner of its mouth. The wizard looked at the skull, the skull looked at him. Somebody coughed, it was not the wizard and it was not me. I jumped, setting the pipe askew as I dropped the skull, and there were two voices to attack me. The wizard, ¡°oh no, do not do that¡±, and,


    ¡°Pick me up you fool!¡± at last, I gaped, and I hope the wizard got his satisfaction there. But I wouldn¡¯t know, I was too busy searching for words to address the skull and being generally flustered. I had no time to check the wizards face for a smirk, though I am sure it was there. And the skull went off again, ¡°Oh look at that you¡¯ve chipped my horn! You bloody fool!¡± I found myself on my hands and knees scrambling to help out this petulant skull, why? Again I still don¡¯t know, but it was very assertive, the skull.


    I scooped a chip of horn from the dull pink carpet and cupped it in my palm. ¡°Keep it,¡± came the harsh voice of the skull from behind me ¡°It¡¯s yours, you¡¯ve earned it.¡± As I was crawling around on the floor, at this object¡¯s beck and call, the wizard was being no help at all. I glanced up to find him chuckling to himself and looking nicely comfortable in his stuffy old chair, reclined back in it and all. ¡°And would you fetch my-¡± but I was step ahead of the skull this time,


    ¡°Pipe?¡± I finished its sentence,


    ¡°Please.¡± and it sort of opened the corner of its mouth so that I might fit the pipe in, which was a surprise, as the skull¡¯s mouth did not move when it spoke, I had supposed that it couldn¡¯t move.


    The pipe being returned seemed to mellow the skull out a bit, ¡°Thank you,¡± it said holding the pipe between its teeth, ¡°Now, would you please pick me up.¡± The wizard looked down at the both of us from his chair,


    ¡°Smoking.¡± he said, ¡°That will kill you, you know.¡± The skull didn¡¯t laugh. I picked it back up and stood facing the wizard, I felt terribly odd,


    ¡°Sorry, for all that.¡± I said.


    ¡°That¡¯s alright.¡± said the skull, and the wizard didn¡¯t say anything at all. Having taken a long pull of its pipe, smoke began to trail from the skull''s eyes. The wizard looked at it, and I noticed a furrowing in his brow. It was when the skull began to attempt blowing smoke rings from its pipe, its nostrils, and its eyes, and all of them at once, that the wizard clapped his hands and said,


    ¡°Right, to business then.¡± the skull paused in its puffs,


    ¡°Yes,¡± it murmured, ¡°to business.¡±


    The wizard pointed a fat finger at the skull,


    ¡°First order being. Who are you?¡± I didn¡¯t know skulls could cough until then, or become incensed,


    ¡°Who am I?!¡± it went off ¡°You don¡¯t even have the decency to introduce yourself first? Who am I? Who sir, are you? Who are you to be going around necromancing my dead body, dragging me away from a rather pleasant stint in oblivion, only to ask me who I am?¡± the wizard drew back a bit into his coats, and raised his hands to the skull, in much the same manner as he had done to me when I¡¯d gone off at him out in the storm.


    ¡°Sorry, compatriot, and sorry to disturb you. I, I am a wizard. Practioner of magicks and collector of stories. I thought, from previous experience-¡± The skull had a harsh voice, harsher still when on the attack, and I can only say it was shrill as it interrupted the wizard,


    ¡°You thought from previous experience, did you? So all skulls are the same are we?¡± the wizard looked far more harangued by this object, a thing he himself had conjured up, than he ever did with me out in the storm,


    ¡°No, no of course not. I wasn¡¯t saying that. It is simply that I find, and maybe this is just my bias from the ghouls and spectres I have talked to, but sometimes I find that the dead miss some earthly comforts, like pipe smoke¡± and he gestured to the pipe he had given it ¡°and then, sometimes, if you give that to them, they start talking. But if you do not want to talk that is fine by me.¡±


    ¡°Oh, so it''s a trade is it?¡± the skull lowered its voice, and seemed to be pleased at just the idea, ¡°you give me a pipe to smoke, and I tell you who I am, or rather, I imagine you¡¯ll be wanting, who I was.¡±


    ¡°Well¡± the wizard relaxed a bit, surfacing from the recesses of his cloaks and the chair, ¡°I would not think of it as a transaction, more, a friendly offer -¡± and the skull cut him off again


    ¡°I prefer to think of things transactionally, just a fact of my biology. But I accept your, friendly offer, although, is it not more of a payment and a product received?¡± and the skull laughed and the wizard did too, even I might or mightn¡¯t of laughed nervously at that, although I have no idea what about.


    ¡°You, my friend¡± and the skull was suddenly addressing me, ¡°I see you have a chair that needs sitting in, there¡¯s no need to be holding me much more, so go sit in your chair. You can leave me low on the floor between the two of you, so that I might smoke my pipe in peace. Do this, and get comfortable, then I will begin my tale.¡± I did exactly that. And the skull started talking, and it talked a long time.

 Chapter Two: Old Bones, and, An Odd Tale Of How They Came To Be

    The skull began, ¡°It was hot and dusty, I can still remember it. This is partly the story of how I died, but it doesn¡¯t begin with me. For me it was hot and dusty, for him it might of been, and I imagine it was. Regardless, the old outlaw, Frogbones, rode the long desert road. This was before mountains and ferns and grassy bush and such green and watered things. When there was still sand and lots of it. In fact I think the whole world might have been desert. Atleast it was vast, and it was called infinite. And there were many men like Frogbones, although I must say, no matter where he was in all that sandy expansiveness¡­ Frogbones was most often alone.


    He had a small and round head. His skin was an ugly brown, warted, wrinkled and tight. He was a broad, but not a tall man, squat really, and well muscled- ¡±


    Shame is I interrupted the skull here, though not without reason,


    ¡°Sorry.¡± I said, ¡°What was he wearing?¡± It didn¡¯t, it couldn¡¯t move, but I felt the skull glaring at me all the same.


    ¡°A big black coat,¡± the skull said ¡°leather, that hung off him and way down to bellow his ankles when he was on horseback. A wide-brimmed, black, hat, and spurred shoes. And would you not interrupt me any further?¡± I would¡¯ve said yes, if I didn¡¯t get a feeling that that would be taken as an interruption too. The skull continued, ¡°He rode a six-legged horse, which was fast, but then again, for all its six legs, the horse was always tripping over itself running. It clattered beneath him as they followed the road.


    They were in a bestial country, with many great monsters. These ugly things stalked and defined the landscape. Hideous spiders of a kind or another. Them being enormously tall as well, they stood well above the dunes and horizon, moving very slowly for all their height and weight. They were bone white, with tree trunk legs.


    One such animal, a ways away, strode forward, tall as a mountain, upheaving plumes of dust as it went. And another, bent down and hissed at it. The first levied a kick, but then the other lunged and bit hard into the beast¡¯s leg. The collapse of the giant was a distant boom. Though visually, it was only background noise. These spiders where like clouds, seen but seldom noticed. And Frogbones kept on with his journeying.


    He came over a dune, and then another, and then another. The sand was soft and rolling in this part of the desert, and the sun was a painful sore in the crystal blue sky. Heat the world and the land. The path that Frogbones followed was cracked and dry, like a long dead worm, stretched sorely over the grainy sand. The beating feet of the horse split the brittle earth and the sound was wilted on the gritsome air. Frogbones came up and over another dune, with his horse¡¯s feet sinking, almost stuck in the soft sand. But with much lifting of knees and dragging of hooves, they still managed a summit of the hill. There, up on top, Frogbones saw that the path went cascading down to meet some sandy flats, where it split into two roads along them. And in the fork of the road, there was some creature huddled over. And so Frogbones called


    ¡°Whoa!¡± and halted his horse. Together they sat on the top of the dune with Frogbones¡¯ coats all hanging down. And together they looked at the thing on the roads. And I¡¯ll tell you now. That thing was me.


    I saw him, this old silhouette at the very top of the last dune before the flats. He saw me, a wretched, wasted shape, pale and naked, rubbing in the dirt. He lingered a shadow, and I, I scrambled, a much more physical thing. Then with only a small movement, barely a half shift, he was off and trundling down the dune, kicking up dust behind his horse¡¯s six legs. I stood stooping to meet him, and I scratched myself along my shoulders which were aching and sore. He kept coming down in a supported fall. He surfed, skated the sand, and then he was on the flats, and then pulling on cords breaking the horse and stopping, with an upheave of sand, dust and yellow dirt that went off as a cloud. He stopped right before me. And he saw that I was a very pale and fat creature, with knocked limbs and skin that sagged right off me, hanging from the bone. That was the worst of me, I tell you, my skin. It clung in lumps and fell in bunches, and it was a most disgusting textured paint to coat all my folds. Gods I was hideous.¡± and then the skull laughed. Long and hard.


    ¡°Anyhow. He came down to me, and saw me in all these ways, and looked me up and down, and shook the sand out of his coat.


    ¡°You have me stopped¡± he said. I grinned, I smiled and,


    ¡°Yes¡± I said, ¡°and do you know what I am?¡± Frogbones leaned forward and almost off his horse, raising himself from his seat and coming toward me so that his saddle was far behind where he actually sat.


    ¡°Why. You¡¯re a crossroads demon.¡± he said it and he was right, I was to terrorise desert wanderers in those days, a monster bound to the darkest of paths, and he knew me for what I was. I, however, did not know him, not past his name, which all demons can see written upon your face, and my fool mouth went on,


    ¡°That¡¯s right, and your name is Frogbones. It¡¯s Frogbones, outlaw. Do you know mine?¡± he was silent. ¡°Fine ¡° I said raising a claw to him ¡°If you¡¯ll be like that, you should know I intend to kill you now. What do you say to that?¡± In response he swung something, with a motion, from his leg, up his hip and into his hand going clockwise around the wrist. And then, bringing it down, and suddenly there was a gun on me, in the desert, on the road.


    ¡°A gun?¡± I laughed, ¡°No man¡¯s bullet hurts me¡±. He didn¡¯t say anything, just kept it on me. This old iron revolver it was. Disquieting, it was. ¡°Wait, what¡¯s in it?¡± I asked, not really wanting an answer.


    ¡°No man¡¯s bullet.¡±


    ¡°Wha-¡± then he shot me. There was a loud bang, a crack really, like cannon fire. And my chest hurt like hell. I collapsed, a pile of loose bones in a looser sack. But instead of stepping over me the outlaw bent down, and I had time enough to murmur, ¡°What was that? holy water?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± he said, ¡°witch¡¯s lead. Fact is that was my last round, and damn you I had to spend it. So you¡¯ll be coming to help me procure more.¡±


    ¡°I can¡¯t¡± and I gestured to the great hole in my chest ¡°I¡¯ll be dead soon.¡± He hit me. It hurt.


    ¡°You die on my say so. Demon.¡± He never raised his voice, but I could feel the anger in that. And then he picked me up and slung me over his horse. Ten he was on it too. And there was nothing I could do about it. He sat near the shoulder of his horse, his saddle seemed lonely behind him, with only the very edge of it used. So I splayed along the back and hindquarters. And then we rode. Rode the desert and rode the road.


    On the long horse, on its long ride, I had plenty of time to look and to wallow. Plenty of time to look at him, his back ahead of me, and plenty of time to look at the sand. As if I hadn¡¯t seen enough of both. With my head aching and lolled I did catch a delirious glance at those great spider-beasts on the horizon. They moved so funnily to me, they walked skulkingly but at the same time were so huge that I had to laugh at them.


    ¡°Ha!¡± I coughed and spluttered for my wheezing, and the outlaw turned to look at me. The face of Frogbones was one hundred wrinkles of forgotten frowns. With the great scowl he levied at me, it was one hundred and one.


    ¡°What is¡± he said, and I saw that his brown tongue was thick and grossly warted, ¡°What is in the desert that makes dying devils laugh?¡± I looked at him, my eyes weren¡¯t working properly so his face shifted and warped before me, but it never lost its terrible anger. I could do nothing but laugh again and wheeze between stolen breaths, with some gesturing again at the great hole through my chest,


    ¡°Sorry Frogbones, I¡¯m not really in the mood for riddles.¡± he took his hand from the reigns of his six-legged horse to hit me, again quite painfully, on the arms and head. Then he said,


    ¡°Do not call me by my name, foulest beast. And it wasn¡¯t a riddle, I asked you a question, what had you laughing so?¡±


    ¡°Oh,¡± I said wincing from my sore wound and bruises, ¡°those spiders, they move in such an odd way. But they¡¯re so large. I had to laugh.¡± He turned away from me, but later he would turn his head and follow the beasts as they loped the horizon, and I think he had a laugh too.


    We came, eventually, to a desert market, or festival. We saw it first as we crested another summit of another dune. He slowed and stopped his horse and looked down on the market. It was made like a ring, cascading outwards from a pit it had been built around. It was a pit leading nowhere, shaped as a craggy mouth. Sand ran down it in streams that fell in showers, down the hole like waterfalls, breaking on jutting and broken stones that lined the pit like teeth. Many people moved around the market around the pit, in a mill of hither and dither and chatter and stamping feet. Frogbones pushed his horse and we came trotting and at times tumbling down the slope.


    The marketplace was strange. A bizarre bazaar of trinket vendors, cloth beaters and water salesmen among stranger stalls yet. I found myself staring at a collection of great insects, big enough to be men, that seemed to be peddling some sort of ochre wax. Then there was a row of brutal horses, led there in a winding caravan by the imperious representatives of empire from the east. Who were, on business, telling any village fool who lived anyplace near of the boons they would take if their anyplace near, became anyplace, in the empire. There were the pilgrims of Unmar, in their white sack robes and rose-petaled faces. There were the knights of the grand fold, all dressed in plates and assessing the worth of commission from a local flag-maker. There were men in rags with fat chains and ropes leading some ugly beast of the terrain to the pit, so that it might be thrown in. And at the very edge of the market place there had been parked a blue caravan cabin, led by three strong mules who were then resting in the sun. The caravan had a painted sign decorating its side that read ¡®fortunes, directions and secrets from the other side.¡¯ and then in smaller text ¡®services of a wizard.¡¯ With a sudden jolting speed, that is where we made for.


    The self-titled wizard leaning against the caravan was very tall and very thin. Pale too, you could say there was plenty sugar and cream, but not a thimbleful of coffee in the cup.¡± Now again, as I felt the skull were about to gloss over some much-needed details I felt my hand forced to speak up. I grunted. The skull stopped. ¡°Yes?¡±


    ¡°I am truly sorry, uh, skull. But what was he wearing? Skin and such is all very well and good, but I¡¯ve got to know, what does a desert wizard wear? It just helps me imagine things.¡± The skull had warned me once before, now it just gave me a withering look, without moving or looking at me once a¡¯course. Then it went on ¡°He wore flowing blue robes and a great blue hat, a turban that is to say.¡± Now it was the green wizard¡¯s turn to look up, his breath caught in his nose, and he said quietly,


    ¡°my brother¡±. I heard him but the skull did not, and as it hadn¡¯t heard the wizards muttering, it had been going on and on all the time. And it had been going like,


    ¡°And much like our other wizard friend here, he had a tall and thin wand. I did not know it for what it was at the time. I thought it was a stick, especially since all he had it out for was to draw menial pictures in the sand.


    ¡°Wizard!¡± Frogbones called, dramatically rearing his horse to halt, and having me tumble, scrambling just to stay where I¡¯d been slung over the horse¡¯s back. The stick-thin and tree-tall man jumped upright from where he had been sitting. All the sand, which he had been dusted with, fell off him at once, and his robes were clean. He had an odd manner of speech, the blue wizard, harsh and windy like a well run dry. He looked at Frogbones and asked,


    ¡°Friend or patron?¡±


    ¡°Both¡± said my captor with his low booming voice,


    ¡°Then,¡± said the wizard, ¡°then you are well to come.¡± and he threw open his caravan doors, and with a hop, had vanished inside. Beyond the blue caravan¡¯s threshold there was a maze of beads and silk drapery. As the wizard went through his hand lagged behind him, beckoning us to follow, before it too was swallowed by the silk with the rest of him. He disappeared leaving only the foremost curtains to ripple in the light breeze.


    ¡°Right,¡± said Frogbones, ¡°get off the horse.¡± I looked at him with bleary eyes, down at my chest, and back at him.


    ¡°But.¡± I protested, though I knew it was useless, ¡°You shot me..¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± he said ¡°and now I am commanding you to walk.¡± I felt the pain in my chest tighten and force my legs straightwards. I didn¡¯t want it, but I was soon on the ground, beside the horse. As I stood wobbling Frogbones grabbed my hand and led me, like a child, up the steps of the caravan and through its many silken doors. We left the six-legged horse behind us. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    Inside the cabin caravan, everything smelt deeply of burning incense. There was a tray of little delicates laid out for the wizard¡¯s patrons, but with the man¡¯s liberal use of overwhelming smells;  even the deviled eggs tasted of lavender and rosemary. The wizard was sitting down on one end of a grand table, adjusting his turban and,


    ¡°What have you brought into my caravan, Frogbones?¡± he asked, staring at me. I was down on the dirty floor, beside Frogbones, who was on a short wooden stool, opposite to the wizard, who was above both of us on a raised chair he had settled into. Up and down the wizard scampered his fingers along the large divining table that divided the room, separating us from him.


    ¡°A crossroads demon.¡± murmured Frogbones, ¡°and a question, for you.¡± A kettle skated silently across the air to fill two porcelain cups,


    ¡°Tea?¡± offered the wizard, and Frogbones gladly took it up. I was not given any. ¡°Now,¡± said the wizard, ¡°a question for me?¡± as he sipped his tea ¡°What could you possibly want,¡± as on his head his turban adjusted itself ¡°from myself?¡± In the dimly lit room, Frogbones¡¯ eyes were wide. As he waited for an answer the wizard took to moving stones across his table, to various places on a map of gold lines drawn all along its surface. He had been dotting the points of a constellation with small diamonds when, at last, from somewhere deep inside himself, Frogbones spoke.


    ¡°I must know when the next witch is to be burned.¡±


    With a sharp noise, one of the rocks the wizard had, this one in the shape of a tortoise, cracked along its side. The wizard frowned at it and brushed it off the table¡¯s edge, to show that it had been sitting on a glyph of the sun.


    ¡°You want to find a witch burning?¡± Frogbones nodded,


    ¡°With a real witch too. One who¡¯s sold her soul good and proper.¡± The blue wizard blinked and pulled his short, chin beard.


    ¡°If you don¡¯t mind my asking, why?¡±


    ¡°Because,¡± said Frogbones, ¡°I need more witch¡¯s lead, my last casing I spent on this creature here sitting at my side.¡± and then, unprompted, he gave me a hard kick to the ribs. It hurt. I collapsed to my side, coughing blood. They went on above me,


    ¡°I see,¡± said the wizard, ¡°yes I see it now,¡± he held his hand above three red crystals, each dotted in a row. A light came up blinking in the core of one of them. ¡°But why did you feel the need to bring this plague to my house?¡± and again he referred to me,


    ¡°I don¡¯t kno-¡± said Frogbones,


    ¡°I do,¡± the wizard interrupted him ¡°It is all written here, in the stars. You can¡¯t have this demon pay for you.¡±


    ¡°Oh¡± and Frogbones seemed a touch smaller in his chair,


    ¡°That¡¯s alright though, for I¡¯m sure you, Frogbones, know as well as I do that the beast will come useful yet.¡± I felt some apprehension at that.


    The wizard went on, ¡°Well, you want a witch? Which witch?¡± Frogbones grunted and pushed back on his stool, almost crushing my hand,


    ¡°Any that¡¯s real. And close. I need them to be close, both in time and distance.¡±


    ¡°Well,¡± said the wizard ¡°well, well.¡± He allowed one hand to wander freely above the table, as if feeling for some invisible aspect of the stones he had scattered before himself. With his other, free, hand, he produced from the folding sheets of his robes, that same long and thin wand. More stones and diamonds snapped, popped and shattered as he passed his hand over and over the table which crackled with the sound of it. Snapped, crackled and popped with the sound of his continuing divinations. After some time at this, and more tea poured for Frogbones the oracle blue wizard withdrew his hand.


    I thought he would¡¯ve sat in silence a moment, but with a sudden movement he had a crystal ball by him where he hadn¡¯t before. He may have brought it to him with his wand, if he did, I did not see him do it. Then he touched the empty glass, and the ball on the table was at once swirling with legions of coloured smokes and vapours. Within the tight chamber each onseting storm of bright gas was attacking each other so that there was a clouded, layered fog within the ball, always twisting in on itself to show off newer, flashier parts to its coloured density. Then great plumes of the same stuff began to rise from the crystal ball¡¯s base, to spill out along the ceiling and into the air. All but the wizard, that is to say, Frogbones and myself, coughed for the already oppressive atmosphere having been choked by this denser and acrid smoke. After the slow breaking of the table stones, this all happened quite fast. And then from the vapour the wizard took his fortune.


    I think I saw the silhouettes of figures in the orb that the wizard must have read as he said,


    ¡°The girl Emmeline Wood has cursed her lover. He bleats like a goat in the nighttime keeping his whole household up. Fool that she is, the witch loved a discrete man, who knows her for what she is and has been doing much about it. Her lover has been preparing a long time. Fooler yet, she keeps very indiscrete company, she talks to women who talk back but not until long after she¡¯s gone. And they only keep secrets from each other, never from the village. Miss Wood has been stung, and has had the unfortunate realisation that she can sting back. But a witch is a bee with her curses, not a wasp. And as the bee''s stinger is torn from its body, the villagers know her and call her for what she is. ¡®Witch!¡¯ the townspeople cry and they are quite right. Emmeline Wood is innocent on no fronts, and now all she can have is the innocence of the damned. And she is indeed damned, for even now, the hunter, called Witchfinder called mad, and also called dogged and relentless, chases her on the scent of unlit pyre. He rides a horse, wears a great black hat, and carries with him a smoking torch with which he means to set a blaze A blaze that will change the wind so that it carries with it the pungent stink of burning Wood. If you run now, Frogbones, you can come after him and watch it. The burning shall happen soon, in the town of Wizerdry. If it is not on your map, and I see no reason why it should be, the ramshackle huts are built by the base of the Great Red Mound, which you can see even now, to the east. I can tell you this, Emmeline Wood would be most grateful for your help, outlaw, and if saved will give you what you seek.¡± the smoke had lessened as he spoke, and I knew that there was a light in the wizard¡¯s crystal ball for I could see it fade. ¡°On that front.¡± the blue wizard carried on ¡°I can tell you little more.¡±


    From where I was on the ground I had a terrible feeling that I knew Emmeline Wood already. For, I then realised amongst creeping dread. The girl had sold her soul to me. This might not sound like such a bad thing, but I assure you, as I was assured then, that it is. For like fate, his plaything, the devil is malicious and blind. His cruelty extends to even his servants, who go around signing mortals, and are just as likely to be hurt by any given contract as the mortals are. So it is always wise, even for a demon, to run like hell away from any hellish dealings made, and hope like hell that whatever hell they make never catches up to you. With that in mind you can imagine my horror, when, just as Frogbones started to look like we might be leaving, him going out the wizard¡¯s door and me dragging after; the blue nonce pipped up. And pipped up with a look as if he had just drawn and read all thoughts of Emmeline Wood from my mind. He said, ¡°Sorry Frogbones, there is one more thing I can tell you. That creature with you there, it is Wood¡¯s master.¡± I screamed. I beat the floor. I cursed the ground. And I thought, woe.


    ¡°Come on, get up.¡± I had my face pressed into the floor, but I knew from his booming that it was Frogbones standing over me. There was a clacking from away that soon crossed the room to be nearer, and I heard the wizard asking,


    ¡°What is it doing?¡±


    ¡°Dunno.¡± his voice was like a bell¡¯s toll, ¡°ask it.¡± I was kicked in the side and made to roll over. My eyes were very bleary, and not just from tears, I was at the point in dying where my vision was beginning to fail me, but I had enough to see the two figures leaning over me, and to distinguish one from the other. The wizard had almost bent double to pour over the wretched figure on the ground. I could taste his hot breath on my lips and could see the whites of his eyes as they rolled up and down my skeletal self. I feel that he was caught often by the great gaping hole in my chest; as was I. Frogbones was still standing up and had barely moved his head to look. ¡°So,¡± he said with a great disinterest in anything, least of all what he was saying, ¡°how much do I owe you?¡± A distracted wizard shot him a look, before returning immediately to his study of myself.


    ¡°You know my price.¡± he said as he pulled one of my arms as if testing to see how far it would go. Frogbones grunted,


    ¡°Enough of this.¡± and he pushed the wizard off me,


    ¡°Oi!¡± was all the sound the man had time to make before Frogbones was marching out of the caravan. And I was on his shoulder. Somehow. I had no idea how I got there. I felt dizzy. Either way the outlaw and I were making for his parked horse, and I had a pretty good idea of where we would be going after that.


    The road to the east was not long. In fact it stopped altogether only a few paces out from the market. Most of the rest of the journey was over unkempt desert, with great dunes that shifted like waves, and long stretches of arid flats. Every so often we¡¯d stumble across an old or broken road, but we spent most of our time wading what I¡¯ll call the swamps'' dry cousin. There¡¯s not much to see in the desert, and I won''t regale you with endless description of sand, suffice it to say it was sometimes red, sometimes grainy, and mostly both. I did see, as we left, a great beast pull itself from the pit in the market¡¯s middle, it looked like it was really about to wreck shop. And then my senses failed me a moment and all was black. When I next woke we were out on a dusty path, most of it had been swallowed by the sand, what little was left was a cracked white stone, hardly a road at all.  Any semblance of civilisation was far behind us or far ahead. And the desert was silent. And the desert was still.


    Frogbones turned to look at me, he had grown a new wart on his face, it was turtle-shaped. There was a fuzz in my mind and everything seemed so distant and far away, but I could still make out his speech,


    ¡°This used to be a¡­ village once¡± his face and voice kept coming in and out of focus. ¡°Sandstorm¡± I heard him say, and we were suddenly far further along the path than we had been. ¡°none survived¡­¡± his eyes looked watery, he might have been crying, ¡°I didn¡¯t think it would¡­ end¡± and the rest was lost on me. I fell into another dreamless sleep, that I wouldn¡¯t call sleeping, and it was blacker this time than any other had been.


    The black left first and then it was grey. Slowly, slowly the grey sparsend and I began to make out figures and silhouettes. Objects and people filled my vision. At some point I started to see in a faded colour, although hardly and only by half. It was like I was almost in the world again.


    We were at the Great Red Mound. It was huge. A massive clay monolith tearing from the desert sand. A true landmark. And around it¡¯s base was a scattered village of tin and half-built houses, tiny by comparison. We must, I realised, have reached Wizerdry. And perhaps not a moment too soon, as at the base of the same slope we were on, a black cloaked man, with a wide-brimmed hat, led a black horse past the little buildings and towards a structure, a pyre, built in a barren field just past the sparse village. The man in black carried a smoking torch. Frogbones reared the horse but for the first time I was able to anticipate him as we tumbled down to Wizerdry.


    Sand was kicked up all around us, I coughed and spluttered and couldn¡¯t see anything but Frogbones¡¯ back in front of me. It suddenly occurred to me what I was about to do, and that I did not want to do it. I did not want to help Frogbones. I did not want to risk death by going near Emmeline Wood. But I was going to die anyway. And I felt Frogbones¡¯ will, and it was stronger than my own. I fell into despair. For I knew, that if all my mind failed me, if I only remembered one spell, one hex, one demonic law, it would be the one that saved Emeline Wood. As the sand spray cleared we leapt onto the flats of Wizerdry, the horse''s eight hooves pounded the yellow dirt as it galloped, plants were bowled over, people, houses, missed only nearly. I could only think one thing, over and over again it played in my mind a constant loop. I would save Emeline Wood, I would do so willingly, to spare the witch would be my last act on this earth. Good God, It was ordained. And suddenly the little tin houses stopped and we were only a few feet away from the witch hunter, and a young girl tied to a stake. The witch hunter was bent over the pyre and the young girl was screaming.


    The man¡¯s voice was as black as his billowing cloak, long, drawn, and terrible.


    ¡°And on these three counts,¡± he was saying, ¡°I pronounce you guilty.¡± A small crowd had gathered to watch the burning, there was long silence from all of them, except for Wood who kept on in her begging for something, anything, to save her.


    ¡°Please, no this isn¡¯t right, I¡¯m sorry, please.¡± she went on and on and on. But Frogbones wanted to wait until the fire was lit, to be sure that witch would be grateful enough that he would get what he wanted from her. Then the witch hunter spoke, or more shouted above Emeline¡¯s pleading, he raised the torch above his head and hurled it into the stacked wood,


    ¡°And may God have mercy on your soul!¡±


    Frogbones fell off the side of his horse and picked me up, I was too limp to stand. He raised me to the fire, as it grew it burned my eyes, even though we were still a few good paces from it.


    ¡°Time to shine, little one.¡± he murmured in the back of my ear. I looked at the fire, at the screaming, agonised witch. I looked deep into the flame, into the heart and eyes of it. And said the one thing I could still say. My tongue was swollen and lazy but I spoke anyway, to the fire and to all the world, in my last breath of demonic act.


    ¡°That is my ward you lick, flames. My servant. Her soul, her life and her death belong to me, and no other! You will not touch her!¡± And before all of us the fire shrunk and died. There was not so much as a hiss, the roar just stopped. The smoke stopped billowing from the torch and torches of the villagers, and I have heard that no fire could be lit in the place of Wizerdry since. Then again from behind me I heard the last thing I would hear alive, the old voice of Frogbones saying,


    ¡°Thank you. Feel free to die.¡± and I did.¡±


    That is how the skull finished its tale. We sat in silence for a moment and then the wizard came out from his chair and bent over to pick the skull up.


    ¡°Well,¡± he said, addressing it on eye level, ¡°it is getting very late. Would you like to go to sleep? Or do you want to keep smoking?¡± The skull grunted,


    ¡°Keep my pipe lit.¡± The wizard crossed the room to the fireplace where the fire had long since died. He laid the skull on top of the mantle and at this point I was beginning to fall to me own sort of dreamless sleep, but I thought I saw leaves fall from the air and into the pipe¡¯s cup, and perhaps a magical fire lit beneath them as well. Then the wizard were marching back to his own chair with long bags under his eyes and the whole room he had made for us felt warm and cosy. I¡¯m not afraid to say that after such a long night I welcomed sleep like an old friend.


    When I woke up in the afternoon of the next day, the wizard was gone and my home had returned to the way it was before he had arrived. A cramped little shack brimming with junk. My head was pressed against a corrugated metal wall, and the rest of me was splayed out along a single, dirty mattress that took up half the floor space It was quite the same. Except, the tall green hat, the one the wizard had discarded so quickly on coming in, was still there. The tip of it stuck out, pinned beneath a pile of my clothes that needed washing. That, and the skull was in the corner of the room, though it took me a while to notice it as it was doing no talking. All was much quieter, and the quieter was nice, really. And it was very calming, I felt very calm. It was good to be back. And out of the storm.