Lady Raven and The Eternal Mirror - eBook

Chapter 1: The Holy Fool

There once was a man named Skipperary, 

And snails he sold in Tipperary. 

A snail a day, he figured, then, 

Would make him a businessman. 

But no one wanted his slimy snails, 

So his net he cast for blowing whales. 

But no matter how he pushed and strove, 

Not a single whale would be drove’. 

And so the man put up his dreams, 

For sale in Tipperary’s streams.

Magi read the poem again, then again, but he could make neither heads nor tails of it. What was he supposed to learn from this? That the author had no point at all? How could no point be a point?

For the briefest moment, a moonbeam pierced the dark clouds that seemed to continuously obscure the sky these days, and Magi looked up with a yawn. He still wasn’t used to this nocturnal schedule. Ever since Lady Raven had appeared in the house, saving him from the FBI, he had taken to hiding in abandoned houses during the day and going out at night. He had plenty of money now, and fast food was open at all hours, so he had no worries about going hungry. The only danger in his current strategy was the potential for other boarders of the creeping, crawling variety to seek refuge in the same abandoned house in which he had taken up refuge. There was no way the FBI could track him in this warren of crumbling kindling that was the suburbs of Detroit. Well-deserved indeed was the Detroit Fire Department’s reputation as the best in the world, for nearly every night a conflagration burst out somewhere in the decrepit city. Every time he thought about fire, a cold shiver ran down his back. The trauma of Professor Quincey’s house burning down around his ears had never quite left him. He was extremely careful not to use any flammable materials, especially to avoid providing light during the long night. Thankfully, summer nights in Detroit were warm, so he had no need to resort to drastic measures to keep warm, though the memory of the extreme cold he had so recently endured often led him to wrap blankets about him in the coolest parts of the evening. Magi thought that ‘The Summersnow’ was a rather anticlimactic name for the terrible gravity of that event, but some blonde news anchor he could never remember the name of had coined the term, and now everybody was using it. 

Magi had followed the news very carefully, especially in the construction of a police scanner of his own design out of RadioShack’s stores. He didn’t know what he would ever do if RadioShack went out of business. After the helicopter flying over the old safehouse had gone down, radio traffic positively growled with anger and suspicion. It seemed like every cop in the state had been called to scour the area for whoever or whatever had caused it. Many people were linking the tragedy to extreme weather caused by the Summersnow, but Magi knew the truth—or at least, as much of the truth as he could comprehend. 

Lady Raven. 

What had she done? He had seen her with his own eyes, yet he still could not believe that she had somehow enchanted fifteen men and smashed a helicopter, let alone raise that pillar of ice and snow. Yet, there did not seem to be any other explanation. The police, both on a federal and local level, were buzzing about like a shaken hive, ready to hunt down and destroy any foe, whether real or perceived. It had been one thing for the civilian population to suffer calamity, but when their own ranks were so assaulted? They were out for blood. It had been three weeks, and the initial fervour had not died down in the slightest. In fact, it seemed that more unexplained deaths were happening downtown, and the badges and guns were very upset. These new deaths seemed to be especially targeted towards law enforcement, since a disproportionate number of the rank and file among them had recently gone missing or turned up dead without any explicable wounds. The FBI was calling for an emergency injunction to install a universal camera network throughout the city to eliminate so-called ‘Black Zones’ named after holes in the private camera networks owned and operated by private individuals, which could be subpoenaed (is that the right word?) by the feds via warrant. The argument went that all these black zones made it prohibitively difficult for the police to do their job of tracking the movements of criminals, and a universal camera network, with all the normal safeguards expected by the American people, would allow no room for criminals to slip around law enforcement. Magi had laughed out loud at the unfortunate naming convention and was unsurprised when the proposal went nowhere. Besides, it seemed that the city was going through its own upheavals. 

The mayor seemed to be in trouble. Immediately following the catastrophe of the Summersnow, the news had been split between recovery efforts and a seemingly endless font of garbage spewing out of the mayor’s legal defences. Information was running like rivulets about misconduct in office, misappropriation of city funds, kickbacks, and a thousand and one even more sordid deeds. Magi refused to believe that the news flowing in this way was a coincidence. It was as though someone powerful wanted the people to turn their focus away from the Summersnow to the, admittedly outrageous, activities of the sitting mayor. 

Magi knew that Dakarius had had dirt on everybody rich and powerful in the city, and Magi was becoming increasingly convinced that the kingpin had been taken by the FBI. His current hypothesis was that Dakarius was attempting to buy a mitigated sentence by selling confidential information. Dakarius was just the sort to take everyone down with him. “No honour among kidnappers and thieves…” Magi mused as he stretched his stiff neck. It was not yet late enough to venture forth from his hiding place. He usually waited for midnight’s cold approach before taking the chance, for ever does the night shelter the hounded and hunted, until some day when men should devise themselves tools by which they might as easily see in the dark as in the light, and make these tools ubiquitous to the power-mad men in petty positions of tyranny. But that day had not yet dawned. Night still cloaked the wanderer in anonymity. 

As it was not yet time, Magi allowed his eyes to unfocus as he mused on the text he had just been reading. The book he had found in Isaac’s backpack was amazing. ‘The Holy Fool’ it was called, and Magi couldn’t decide which part of the book was holy and which foolish, but he simply could not put it down. He loved to run his fingers down its leather cover. The feel of its soft surface was glorious and good, and every time he untwisted the leather thong that held it shut, he felt an almost-glow, or warmth, in the room, like he was surrounded by candles in a quiet cloister. He loved that book, but it was driving him crazy!

For one thing, there was absolutely no structure, or at least none that he could devise. At one moment, there would be a nonsensical verse, at another there would be a meandering, often humorous story with no apparent context or conclusion, at another, it would be quoting Bible verses—though Magi was not much familiar with that particular historical text. It was as though the person who had written it was completely insane. Yet, Magi continually found himself chuckling under his breath at the antics of the author, like the time the book claimed that the Fool had spent a year dragging himself on his buttocks instead of walking like a normal person, or the tale of the time the Fool started jumping up and down on the tables at a Wendys, knocking food everywhere and throwing ketchup packets at an elderly women’s prayer group who met there every Thursday, terrifying the ladies as he shouted bible verses at them. 

Magi could not help grinning at the mental image of a crazy old preacher hurling condiments at old ladies. The Holy Fool was insane, and he loved it. Flipping the book open to a little past the middle, Magi began to read. This was one of his favourite passages. He had read it several times already, but it felt special to him. 

“That day was the Feast of St. Modestos. Therefore, it was correct to go into the small strip of forest on the leeward side of the steel plant that used to operate on Mt. Elliot and gather unto him all the small woodland creatures who depend so upon the nurture of that spot. Now, as harmless as the Fool was, no creature was ever afraid of him, so they came to him one and all, from the smallest mouse to the deer who lived in that place. Even the nighttime creatures awoke, though much grumbling accompanied their arrival. None would resist the Fool. 

When he had met them and named them one and all, he took up his staff, which was one of only two possessions he owned in the world. These two were a ragged black cassock given to him by a woman from a local parish who had seen the sufferings of the Fool and his extreme want and had forced him, through her great kindness, to take the robe she had purchased for him since he was naked. The second was a staff. Ever the trees of the wild wood gave freely of their bounty to him, and the staff supported the Fool as he journeyed through their regions. Few did the wood ever give any such present, for the trees of that place were angry and hurt, since men had enslaved them instead of reigning over them. But the Fool loved and cared for all living things, and ate only what the small creatures brought him, or what the trees gently carried to his lips, though he drank freely of the living water. But the Fool carried with him the staff and his black cassock. 

The Fool saw the suffering of this strip of wood and knew how the steel factory poured its waste into its stream, reeking of chemicals and soot. He knew the poison the animals were wont to drink every day, and the illness of the trees as they lapped at this poison with their roots. He knew, for he, too, had tasted of the pollution, for many a night did he spend in that sliver of woods that stubbornly clung to life in the midst of suburban sprawl. What he did not know at that time was the reason for the wood’s existence. The factory left it alone so that they might more easily dispose of the waste their practice produced; otherwise, they would have levelled it.

Therefore, the Holy Fool did gather unto him all the woodland creatures, and even some children of the trees, and he led or carried them in boisterous procession to the offices of the factory. Without leave, the Fool entered these offices, and the animals followed with him. Hundreds of mice poured through the door, running under desks and up people’s legs. Rabbits attacked the paperwork like leafy greens, sometimes leaping straight into people’s arms to get what they were holding, or just thumping their little war drums. Squirrels chewed through electrical cables, hardly noticing the shocks in their frantic excitement. But the pride of the parade were the skunks. No one long kept their positions after they entered the fray. Deer frolicked, birds sang, and, for once, the wood had a voice. By the time Animal Control arrived, there was only the Fool, sitting amidst a massive pile of paperwork like it was a nest.”

Magi could not help but imagine Numa taking part in the woodland procession, picturing the owl taking wing and beating at the oppressors of that little strip of forgotten forest, more litter than leaves, yet worthy of protection. Sometimes, lost to the story, Magi found himself acting as little boys do, making explosion noises with his mouth, and swinging his arms as though he, too, were taking part in the attack, and since no one was there to see him, he had no reason to be ashamed, much to the alternating delight and consternation of Numa as he flitted about, catching mice in the night and returning to Magi’s nest only to be startled by Magi’s strange actions. 

A giggle escaped from unconscious lips there in the dark, as Magi imagined the chaos of the scene. There was something about the Fool that Magi found both irresistible and repulsive at the same time. Having nothing better to do, he began to scoot around the room on his backside, trying to get a feel for what it must have been like for the Fool. He was sore far more quickly than he would have predicted, due to the extraordinary number of pointy things on the floor of this abandoned building and had to give it up. 

Shaking his head, Magi stood. It was no use sitting about forever. He needed to take some kind of action, to put his buttocks in the past and his nose to the north. He needed to get out of the state before a cop picked him up. He was starting to get sick of this hiding in the dark all the time. The intensity of the searching patrols had not died down in the slightest, even though most people were more concerned about recovering from the Summersnow. The police, it seemed, wanted him, and wanted him badly. From the reports he had gleaned, Casualties and injury numbers had stabilised, but contrary to Magi’s expectations, the insurance companies were not scrambling to repair and replace the damage done to people’s livelihoods; instead, the police—and a lot more FBI agents—had descended on Farmington Hills and the surrounding area en masse. They were treating it like some sort of military testing ground, or like a hazardous waste dump. Once a person or a body was taken out, nobody was allowed back in. The overall police presence in Michigan had probably tripled in the past three weeks. Not even when Celeste had been kidnapped had the American response been anywhere near this energetic or disciplined.

Magi paused at this thought, musing aloud, “Why is that? Why didn’t anybody care when we kidnapped her and kept her in a dungeon? Why was Isaac the only one who ever cared? She never did nothin’ to nobody. She was just sitting at home an’ we snatched her up like a snake snatches a mouse.” Magi’s shoulders slumped. The kidnapping was a much more painful memory than he had expected. For reasons he couldn’t quite explain, the memory hurt and wouldn’t go away. Therefore, he did something quite reasonable—he tried to rationalise it away. “But come on, I mean, she’s safe now. Nothing even happened to her! I didn’t even have anything to do with it. I was just sittin’ in the back of the car. It was all that Lady Raven, SHE is responsible. That song! Remember that song?!” 

This pathetic attempt to obfuscate his guilt only made him more miserable. He needed to be thinking about his own skin right now. He needed to make a plan to get out of the state, to get past all the watching eyes and roadblocks that had been set up lately. These were real, tangible concerns that money alone would not buy his way out of. He tried a different tack, The only reason you’re even thinking about that girl was because of Raven anyway. She planted the thought in your mind. This is not a natural progression of ideas. She got all excited about Celeste when we were talking, that’s it. That’s the only reason you are thinking about it.

This idea made him feel a little better, so he went to his usual place, pulled out a to-go pack of applesauce for a snack, and sat down. Unfortunately, he was no longer able to focus on anything else. The solitude of his position, weeks alone in the equivalent of a cave, and nothing but Numa and The Holy Fool for company had forced him into a state whereby he might be capable of anything. On the one hand, he was cabin-crazy; he wanted out of his current predicament for no other reason than the persistent call of freedom. On the other hand, he had been confronted with a morality he had never tasted before, and that new moral had got its teeth into him, demanding that he take some sort of action to atone for his sins. Unbidden, a passage from the book floated in perfect clarity through his confused mind.

“Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the Prince of the Power of the Air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:

Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.”

Magi had no more notion of the origin of that passage than of any of the other confusing and obscure passages in the rest of the book, but the poetry of this writing, the context, and most of all the characters made goosebumps run all down his arms. Who had the power to defy the Prince of the Power of the Air? Suddenly, Celeste was all he could see. Tears welled up in his eyes, and Magi remembered the vision: A dark lord, black and huge, rising up over the walls of a castle, throwing aside all resistance, and collecting his prize: a woman, a defenceless girl, whom he dragged sobbing and alone to a tower made of bone. It was him! He had defied the prince of darkness. He was once a child of Wrath, but he had refused that road. He would make this right. 

Before he knew it, he was standing, his fists clenched in fury and resolve. It was a lie to believe that he was not a party to Celeste’s kidnapping and imprisonment. He knew better, but he was also better now. Staggering to the window, a gaping hole in the side of the abandoned house, Magi stared into the soft face of the moon, letting her light bathe him; she was like a mother stroking her newborn babe. Closing his eyes, he basked in that glow and made up his mind. He could not complete his estrangement from the Dakarius, that lord of wrath, until he completed a penance. He would go to Mexico. He would leave this place forever, and it would all be to beg Celeste’s forgiveness. 

It didn’t make sense. It was a plan that would put him in unnecessary danger. He had no idea how the girl would react. For all he knew, her jealous father would execute him on the spot. The Mexicans might turn him over to the FBI, and the entire journey might be for nothing, but none of those purely rational concerns mattered to him now. This plan of his was foolishness indeed—but Magi knew it was what the Fool would do, and that made him smile.

Chapter 2: Road Trip

Jeff Pakulski cranked on a bolt so stubborn it made Melissa Haut look like a pushover. Sweat poured down from his scalp into his eyes, burning them and making it hard to see, but he couldn’t give up… until… it… gave! He had been wearing gloves a few minutes ago, but somehow, as often happened, he was currently bare-knuckling the socket wrench. Unfortunately, when the bolt gave, so did his knuckles—directly into the frame of the Flying Swiss. The consequent yelp of agony sounded something like an old school train whistle mixed with a kicked puppy.

Unfortunately, the all-too-natural habit that men have of shaking the pain out of a particular point through rapid gesticulations of the pained appendage rapidly resulted in another hard smack into a different part of the vehicle. This bump was followed by a low-pitched howling and some rather undignified kicking of the feet that stuck out from underneath the vehicle; in short, he looked like a mermaid that had been sat on by an elephant seal.

“I should have let Martin crush you!” Jeff yelled at the recalcitrant vehicle. Then, immediately feeling remorse, he added, “I didn’t mean that. Maybe I should just send you off to the farm instead, huh? That’s what my dad told me he did with Spark. I wonder how that old puppy is doing? Dog’s gotta be like thirty-eight by now…” 

Jeff had maintained a fairly steady stream of conversation with the van every night and on weekends since the Summersnow, as Melissa had dubbed it. Martin Glough, his producer, had summarily ordered the execution of Van #2 when he had seen the state Jeff had sheepishly brought it back in, but Jeff couldn’t stand the idea of the old girl getting totalled. They had been on too many adventures together. Yes, the mirrors and all the lights were smashed off, yes, you could see straight through the vehicle from nearly any angle, and yes, half a telephone pole was still sticking through the van like a marshmallow on a stick, but she still ran good! “Well, mostly…” Jeff reminded himself with a bemused chuckle, even as he sucked on a dirty knuckle. 

There had been leaks in pretty much everything a van had to leak, and the gauges were painting red all over the dashboard, but Jeff couldn’t let the Flying Swiss go. He had begged Martin to be allowed to take it home and try to fix it up like he used to fix up the lawn mowers he had used all throughout his teenage years to pay for college. Martin was half bemused, half furious over the incident, but Jeff won his prize. The Swiss had even made it back to Jeff’s garage on its own steam!

With an energy bordering on frenzy, Jeff had thrown himself into the vehicle’s repair. He had plans for this thing. As a meteorologist, the Summersnow had changed him. He now knew there were anomalies out there that threw all the science in the schools out the window. He wanted to know everything! He wanted the Flying Swiss to be a storm chaser. It already had four-wheel drive, and he was well aware of the vehicle’s staunch capabilities in adverse conditions. All it needed was a few repairs—and maybe an upgrade or two if he was being honest…

“That wire is disconnected.”

The voice came from above and outside the thin cavern in which Jeff was wedged. It startled him so badly that he dropped the spanner he had just been lifting directly on his nose. A red welt appeared almost as quickly as his yell.

“Who’s there?!”

Launching himself in scraping, bouncing arcs on his rubbery backside, Jeff popped out from under the van like a cork from a champagne bottle. A young man with dark skin and a short afro with a matching crop of stubble on his chin was sitting on his haunches with a strange look in his eye. There was something unexpected about this figure, and it all started in those uncountable eyes. Jeff recognised him immediately.  

“You! I know you! I picked you up outta the Summersnow!”

Magi nodded, a grin crossing his face. “You wouldn’t take me home, you jerk,” he replied with a wink.

Dramatically, Jeff placed his bruised right hand over his chest and replied with severity, “Some of us had more important things to do than playing taxis, like, oh, I don’t know, saving the elderly from doom.”

Magi bent his back, miming a cane, and contorted his voice to sound like an old man, “The young have absolutely no respect these days! No respect for the elderly!” Then he began kicking Jeff and repeating, “No respect! No respect!”

Spluttering at this entirely unexpected display of physicality and familiarity, Jeff scrambled to his feet and loomed over his youthful antagonist. “You keep that up an’ I’ll throw you back where I found you! In Antarctica! We’ll just let the narwhals play pincushions with you!”

Magi threw up his hands, a mad little ray of mirth refusing to leave his sparkling eyes. “The only thing that lives in Antarctica is penguins and orcas. And surly meteorologists!” he added with a snicker.

Spluttering, Jeff could think of no rebuttals to this extremely clever needling. Therefore, he turned to the van and threw out his hand as if asking for support, “Do you hear this sass, Swissy? Can you believe some people’s cheek?! Come over here and run over this buffoon, will ya?”

“At least my cheeks aren’t covered in motor oil,” Magi retorted with that same, strange grin.

Throwing an eyebrow into the air like a graduation cap, Jeff turned on his tormentor, indicating with his entire expression that he both wanted to know what Magi was about to say next and that he could not believe the other was still talking. “If you think I am going to stand here and take this from you…”

“Oh, you’ll take it alright. In fact, you’ll take me.”

Jeff’s mouth worked, but not a sound came out. It was exceedingly rare that anyone could elicit such a reaction out of him, and this experience alone was enough to make him half ready to agree to anything just to see how this would all play out. Or at least he thought he was ready until he heard what the crazy man said next.

“You’re going to take me to Mexico. And I’m going to tell you what caused the Summersnow.”

Jeff froze. Not a single part of him had been prepared for that. Mexico? The storm? he thought, these two phrases repeating themselves until he could not formulate any kind of reply. The worst part was, this crazy-looking kid was simply standing there, staring up at him with his thumbs through the straps of his backpack, and a confidence on his face that Jeff could not understand. This guy obviously believed every word he had just said. 

Then, before he could ask his first question, Magi sweetened the deal, “And I’ll pay both our ways; it won’t cost you a thing.”

More because he couldn’t think of anything more reasonable than out of any practical concerns, Jeff swept his hand apologetically towards the Flying Swiss and stammered, “M-my ride’s broken, man… I’ve got to do…”

The other man cut him off, “And I’ll pay for that new alternator you need, and the wiring harness. We’ll have your van completely ready to go in about three hours. We leave today.”

Jeff gaped at him. “What about a new rearview mirror?!”

“I’ll buy one.”

“And the spare tire? That one is shot!”

“I’ll get you a Firestone to match.”

Jeff scowled, “And a pair of fuzzy dice for the new mirror!”

Magi grinned wider, “Only if they come in pink.”

Jeff threw up his hands. “Oh, what the heck. I guess I’m going to Mexico! Dude, I don’t even know your name!”

The odd man with the mismatched eyes stuck out his hand, “I’m Magi, and I’m a fool.”

Jeff cocked an eyebrow at this last addition, but he took Magi’s offered palm. “Three hours? You are a fool if you think we can get this thing fixed up by then.”

The only thing Magi replied was this:

“O ye of little faith.”

The two men got to business, Magi surprising Jeff with his seemingly uncanny ability to diagnose any mechanical or electrical issue with nothing but the touch of his hand, and Jeff impressed Magi with the sheer confidence he had imbued into the vehicle he called the Flying Swiss. The van practically hummed with energy. Magi didn’t know much about this particular make and model, considering it was a foreign type, so he didn’t quite understand all the upgrades and tweaks Jeff had worked into the repair, but he did recognise quality work when he saw it. As they worked, Magi listened to Jeff as he talked to the vehicle, and he almost felt like he could see the man’s words winding themselves into the steel helix of the van’s DNA. It was awesome to watch, and he was proud to have been a part of it. 

Hidden away in the broken down underbelly of his city, Magi had had nothing but time to formulate strategies to evade the authorities, escape to Mexico, and meet Celeste. Unfortunately, the border was very far away, and with a federal law enforcement agency after him, not even crossing state lines would provide any reprieve. In fact, the FBI had been created for just such an occasion as this, with a wanted fugitive on the lam trying to escape to Mexico and who could easily baffle state bounded authorities, and now the full weight and power of that organisation was after him. 

He had to get to Mexico, but that meant either a car, a bus, or a plane. After 911, airport security was too hot, and busses took forever and were easily monitored, therefore car was the best bet. However, that meant a driver. But not just any driver, Magi needed someone totally fearless, and most importantly, someone who could talk his way out of any situation as he had seen the meteorologist do with the FBI. Magi had thought for a moment about looking up Will Harris, but had dismissed the thought with a sigh. It was too much to ask of the old man, besides, at the speeds that old sailor now drove, it would be six months before they crossed the border! No, he could not do better than the crazy weatherman from the Summersnow. Besides, Magi happened to know that the other was immensely curious about the storm, and how could he not be? Despite the best efforts of the news, half of Michigan had their own opinions and conspiracy theories about the event, and this line of thinking was not helped by the secrecy the authorities seemed to be wrapping the investigation in, and Magi remembered how Jeff had specifically mused about the nature of the storm as he was experiencing it. Magi had heard the curiosity in Jeff’s tone and talk, but the man was more than some primal goop in which the basest and most illogical of conspiracy theories could gestate. No, there was something else… something behind the subtext. Jeff had seen something in that storm. Magi had seen a glint in his eye. There was some secret knowledge there, and Magi knew that all he had to do was pluck on that chord like Jack on the giant’s harp.

Everything was coming together, almost like an invisible hand was guiding his movements. Jeff had taken almost no convincing, and not only that, the man appeared to be building the perfect undercover escort vehicle. News crews were allowed everywhere, even active war zones! Magi was often amazed at the audacity of the satellite news crews crouched in the rubble of Kabul, their uplink dishes pointed skyward as they filed live reports on the War on Terror, seemingly indifferent to everything around them. Of course, there were still some aesthetic issues in the van, but with a bit of white vinyl, they had those fixed up so that only an expert examination would notice them, and best of all, the van still sported the ostentatious radio dish installed on all news vehicles!

While neither man had accurately estimated the time required for the project, they nevertheless pulled out of Jeff’s driveway long before lunchtime, MapQuest directions printed and ready to hand. That was when Magi gave Jeff his next shock. Rolling down the window, he stuck his head out just as they were pulling away and called, “Numa! Let’s go, buddy!”

Jeff crushed himself against his side of the van as four feet of feathers and talons burst in through the open window. “What are you do-hey! What is that?!”

Numa turned a disdainful metallic eye on the astonished meteorologist, zooming the camera lens in and out on him as if to take in the entire man—so that he could be more summarily dismissed.

“It’s ok, Numa,” Magi said soothingly, “This man’s just a little excitable. You’re ok.”

“He’s ok?! I’m not ok! Why is there a-a-a cyborg-flippin’-owl in my van?! What are you?! Some kind of secret government agent? I knew there was a real Illuminati. Are you guys messing with animal DNA or something?! You got weather satellites? You can make it rain anywhere you want, can’t you. We are so cooked, aren’t we?”

Magi rolled his eyes. “Will you just get on the road? We need to cover some ground here.”

“You, mister, need to start fulfilling your end of the bargain! I got a semi-truck load of questions, and I want answers!”

“I told you,” Magi replied, “once we cross state lines, I’ll tell you what I know. But I warn you, you might not believe me.”

Jeff stared from the owl to the enigmatic man and back again several times before pursing his lips into a tight frown and throwing the vehicle into reverse. Grumbling under his breath, he pulled away from all security and normalcy, a world where not even 911 could completely rock, but which was now driven like snowflakes on the wind before the breath of change. 

To pass the time, Magi pulled an antique-looking leather journal out of his backpack and began to read. Uneasily glancing at the two silent partners of unknown fate, Jeff drove in silence for a while, his mind chewing on all this change that had come so suddenly into his life, but silence was never his strong suit, and, after some ten or twenty minutes had gone by, he gave the owl a sort of wary glance before saying, “Where did you get all that hardware, buddy? That’s some science-fiction stuff.”

The owl slowly revolved his head all the way around before studying him with both its organic and augmented eyes. It did not, of course, reply. 

Jeff and the bird stared at each other, as though sizing one another up. A sort of begrudging admiration slowly dawned on Jeff’s face. “Good Lord, but that’s cool. I mean, is that a retractable knife you got for a hand-thingy? I wish I had retractable claws!”

Numa lifted his head and looked away, as if sniffing in disdain, but Jeff noticed he extracted and retracted his talons several times. They were so fast it was like a blur. Jeff whistled. 

“I bet you could catch birds straight out of the sky with those things! You could slice ‘em, dice ‘em, and flay ‘em, all at the same time! Say, you got any superpowers? You look like you could shoot sonic rays out of your beak. Or maybe like do master strategy, like beat twenty chess masters at the same time… Or maybe! You can shoot ice out of your wings! Did you cause that storm, Numa?” Jeff had never heard of a name like that before, but he was quick with names, and that was what Magi had called him. Jeff couldn’t quite wrap his mind around this pair of misfits and cyborgs, and he needed a way of coping with that lack of certainty. Thus, when Numa only looked at him, Jeff stuck a hand underneath one of his wings and peeked underneath it. “Where do you keep all that snow?!”

Numa gave a mortified hoot and exploded from Magi’s side to flutter to the back of the van. Magi snapped the book shut angrily and shouted, “Stop it! He doesn’t do anything! He’s just a bird! You’re ok, Numa.”

Jeff threw up his hands in mock surrender, “Sorry! Sorry. No offence meant! I genuinely think Numa is awesome; I just wanted to know if he had any superpowers!” He threw a thumbs-up at the bird with an added nod and a wink.

Numa looked back and forth between Magi and Jeff, cocked his head as if he was thinking, then, just as he had done before, he lifted both his wings, tucked his head into his chest, and played the phrase he had been taught with the speakers built into its body, “Hi, I’m Arthor. I’m looking for Magi. Hi, I’m Arthor. I’m looking for Magi. Hi, I’m Arthor. I’m looking for Magi.”

Jeff whooped and pumped his fist into the air, turning in his seat to get a better look at Numa, causing the van to sway back and forth in its lane. “Now that’s what I’m talking about!”

“NUMA!” Magi shouted.

But Jeff was too excited to leave well enough alone. “I knew you had a superpower! Dang, dude, that made those dumb… parrots sound like two-year-olds! Talk about perfect inflection. I never heard any bird sound like that! Heck, I rarely hear people talk that good! You are seriously next-level, Numa. Ok, try this one: can you say, ‘Are we there yet?’”

Numa studied Jeff for a moment, as if truly listening to what he was saying, but just as Jeff was going to move on to something else, Numa repeated the phrase, perfectly mimicking his teacher’s tone. 

“Are we there yet?”

“Are you kidding me?!” Jeff shouted, jumping up and down in his seat like an excited child, “Say it again! Say it again!”

Numa graciously obliged him, seeming to hop a bit in the back as though some of the driver’s enthusiasm had infected him as well, “Are we there yet?”

Jeff whooped and cheered. “That’s it, buddy! Now make sure whenever you’re in a car, you say it as many times as you possibly can; that will drive everybody in the car crazy!” Jeff dissolved into hoots of laughter as Magi folded his arms and glared at him. 

“Well, excuse me,” Jeff sniffed when he saw Magi’s glower. “You are certainly not much of a talker on this little road trip of ours, and I gotta talk to somebody. Ooh, look at that! That’s a gorgeous Altocumulus Lenticularis! You don’t see those around here very often. See the lens shape of the three sort of disc shapes? Many UFO sightings can be explained by that particular formation, though I’ve always wondered if the UFOs are just pumping out cloud cover to hide out while they examine us, but maybe they only come in threes?” Jeff detoured into this baffling distraction as easily as if he was back on TV, and Magi found that he was both confused and mildly intrigued. He could be distracted by some natural cloud formations, if he wasn’t so interested in his book. 

Seeing that he was getting nowhere with his human companion, Jeff turned half his body towards the back of the van and directed the rest of his talk towards the agreeable owl. “Say! Numa, old buddy, why don’t you fly up into that formation and tell us if you see any flying saucers up there, will you?”

Jeff continued to speak. In fact, he did not stop speaking for the entire duration of the exodus from Michigan to Ohio. He talked so much that Magi had to drown him out. A pair of headphones connected to a portable CD player—RadioShack brand—successfully drowned out the prattling of his chatty neighbour. Magi was not uninterested in Jeff’s conversation; in fact, the more highly technical it became, the more interested he was, but right now, he simply knew the book was hiding a secret.

He still did not understand it. Such bizarre stories, such preposterous ideals, and worst of all, such foolishness! Magi could not understand what the point of it all was. He had tried a hundred times to imagine why someone like Isaac, a true soldier type if ever there was one, would be carrying around something like this. It seemed so out of character. Magi had not even been able to tell why he himself was reading it, let alone Isaac. It was just a dumb book full of random stories! But he kept coming back, every time more eager than the last, and now, finally able to examine it unimpaired by darkness and the need for secrecy, he could not shake the notion that there was something more going on. 

Again and again, he ran his fingers down the leather, feeling the magic that only a book wrapped in the mysteries of animal sacrifice could ever have. An animal had died to make this book possible, and now a sort of holiness from the blood of that creature who had given its life for this book was bound up in it. As he felt the book with his hands, he explored every subtle detail. As he did so, he gradually became aware of an anomaly between the front and back covers. The front was significantly more supple; it would even roll up if he wanted it to, but the back was hard and stiff. At first, he paid little attention to this disparity. The contents and the simple feel of the thing transfixed him more than such unimportant details, but as he spent more time with it, he noticed this discrepancy more and more, until it began to bother him. Turning over the work, he held it upside down and ran his fingers along the inside of the spine, where the cover met the binding. 

There was something there… Closing his eyes, he felt again and again. There was some kind of seam… With his fingernail, he felt the crack. Yes, there was some kind of binding point there, but it was glued shut. Disappointed, he let his finger fall. It’s obviously just the backerboard for the book. No secrets, just a hardcover, he thought. Closing his eyes, he rested his head against the headrest and stared blankly out the window at the infinite changelessness of the modern world. A pale imitation of nature passed by in a blur, neutered by the axes of a million men. There was nothing in that emptiness. Nothing at all…

Suddenly angry, and not entirely sure why, Magi sat upright in his chair and grabbed the book with both hands. He would know what was behind that seam. He would know why the back was hard while the front was soft. Furiously, he dug into Isaac’s backpack and took out the knife that he knew was in there. He did not even hear Jeff’s curious questions as he carefully slid the blade between the seam and the leather. He knew it was a desecration, but he could not stop himself. Every part of his logical mind expected to be disappointed with the discovery of a simple piece of backerboard and the cost of damage to his new favourite book, but he had to know, even though he did not know why. He had not felt this way with ‘Resonance, the Magic of Wavelengths and the Radio Signal’ by Nikola Tesla, but that had been another case.

The seam pulled apart, and Magi bent the book in half to peer into the crevice he had so carefully created. Something glinted within. With a pounding heart, Magi dug into the darkness with careful, shaking fingers. Then, with a bitten-off oath, he retracted his hand. A line of red appeared on his pointer finger. At first, he stuck the painful part in his mouth, like some sort of childish or animalistic reaction, but then he slowly pulled his finger out of his mouth and stared at it. Blood bubbled out of the wound. 

“… Band-Aids were first invented in 1920 by Johnson and Johnson, but nobody wanted ‘em until they got the Boy Scouts involved. Amazing how those little bandana bros could sell!”

Magi realised that Jeff was talking to him. Scooting the headphones off his ears with his shoulder, he turned and asked, “Yeah, a Band-Aid would be great right now, thanks.”

Jeff shook his head as if surprised, “Oh, I don’t have any Band-Aids here. I was just talking about where they came from.”

“Well, what good is that?!” Magi shouted, then shook his head and smiled. Then he giggled softly, then he broke into a full-fledged laugh and said, “What a bunch of rocks we are!”

“I think you mean rookies!” Jeff quipped. “I got some duct tape in the glove box? Or some random wires if that helps?”

Magi shook his head as he dug the duct tape out. It wasn’t the most elegant solution, but it kept all the pomegranate juice from leaking out of his body. Then, as he stared at his silver finger, he had an idea. Wrapping the rest of his fingers in duct tape, he made himself a sort of gauntlet, and, much more gingerly than before, pried open the crevice and fished out the hidden item within. 

It revealed itself slowly, and much to Magi’s surprise, turned out to be one of the most random items he could have ever imagined being encased in a book. It was a rectangular mirror, and as wedged as it was, it emerged very slowly. It was extremely tight within its leather sleeve. In fact, Magi had a hard time imagining how it had even been inserted within the book in the first place. As an inch appeared, he felt the leather come apart as the mirror’s sharp edges sliced it. Instantly, Magi stopped and examined the book with chagrin. The Holy Fool could no longer close with the amount of mirror sticking out of its bindings, but Magi could not move the shining glass without damaging it further. He felt helpless. All actions from this point were wrong. No matter what he did, the past would be irrecoverable. 

“Pull it out, dude! Why are you stopping?” Jeff asked.

“No! I can’t. It’s super sharp; it’s destroying the book as I pull on it.”

Jeff paused for a moment before saying, “Can’t put it back?”

“No…” Magi replied with a sigh.

“Guess you’re stuck then. Should have never started in the first place. That thing is in there tight.”

Magi turned the precious tome over and over in his hands. His soul felt as if it had sunk into a state of perpetual chagrin. Then, unbidden, these words came to his lips, “The brave have set their faces to the sun.”

Then, before even the quicksilver man beside him could reply, Magi took hold of the mirror with a firm grip and pulled. The leather parted cleanly on both top and bottom, leaving a flap that, sickly, reminded him of a flap of detached skin, but the mirror shone in the full light of day. 

It was nothing special. Just an eight-by-six-inch rectangle of glass, but it reflected the sun madly whenever he was not careful. If he allowed it even the slightest bit of direct light, it would blind everyone in the van. Thankfully, Jeff was an excellent driver even under the most hazardous circumstances and managed to keep them on the road with nothing but a few well-placed remarks directed at the owner and wielder of such an inconsiderate bit of technology. Disappointed by the relative banality of the object for whose sake he had so mutilated his precious book, Magi turned the mirror over to examine the back side but found nothing special about it. It was very clean, and that was obvious by how much light it reflected, but nothing about this piece of glass indicated any reason why its owner had taken so much trouble to conceal it. Once more, Magi felt that he was being forced to believe that all things could be explained by their face value, that Occum was a sort of god, cutting apart dreams with a razor as sharp and as keen as Death’s scythe. The mirror couldn’t be anything other than an alternate backerboard, and a poor substitute at that. The creator of the book must not have had the appropriate materials had simply used whatever was on hand. It was the simplest solution; therefore, it had to be true. 

Jeff broke into his thoughts, “That is so random. I mean, who puts a mirror in a book? Is it supposed to be some sort of metaphor? Like, ‘Here is a journal. A journal is all about looking within. So, I will hide a mirror within the mirror that is the journal!’ It’s so goofy. I love it!”

Magi blinked. That made perfect sense. At least, it made the kind of sense the Fool was known for. 

Suddenly Jeff made a mocking faux-yawn and said, “Alright, dude, I let you mess around with that book for a lot longer than we discussed. We’ve already passed Cincinnati, so I think it’s high time you started giving me the details on the Summersnow. That was the deal and you know it, so let’s hear it, or we can turn around and call it a fun little road trip outing that ended with some bro time, a trashed journal, and the coolest bird on the planet, isn’t that right, Numa?”

A voice replied in an almost perfect replication of Clint Eastwood, “Do ya feel lucky, punk?”

Magi’s eyebrows rose as he considered his companion. Slowly, he asked, “Numa, what’s a road trip?”

Instantly, Numa raised his wings and said, “Follow the yellow brick road!” The words came out not as those of Judy Garland or Munchkins, but like a man who was contorting his voice to sound remarkably similar to the actress of the Wizard of Oz. Magi’s eyebrows lowered in thought. Rubbing his chin, he slowly held out the mirror in his bandaged hand towards the owl and said, “And who is this?”

Perfectly on the heels of this question, Jeff added, “I think you mean, who is the handsome devil in that little square of glass?”

Numa cocked his head as he looked into the mirror. For a long time, the owl only stared. Magi felt the tension building, but Numa appeared lost in self-examination.

It was Jeff who broke the tension, “Man, I wish I reflected on stuff like that owl does. I’d be a regular Socrates if I stopped to think more instead of talking so much!”

Magi grinned despite himself. He wanted to focus on the moment, but he couldn’t help but flash Jeff a side-eye and quip, “Now, on that I think we can agree.” He tried to refocus the mirror after that, but his arm was getting tired, and they hit a series of bumps which all conspired to make him forget his purpose and turn away. Besides, Jeff was becoming insistent that he start talking.

“You promised! I want to know every detail, don’t leave anything out.” Pointing at his chin, Jeff emphasised, “I’m a meteorologist. Storms are my whole life! I’m dying to know.”

Magi sighed and put on his best ‘stern professor’ face before saying, “I warned you, you will probably be disappointed…!”