Chapter 17
Finding one human in a city of millions was a difficult task even for the wind.
It gusted through the narrow canyon streets of the south, pinballing through alleyways and bouncing across the brick and concrete, until it landed at the Clark home. The trickster was meant to marry the cruel one’s sister. At least, that was what the father had decided.
The trickster always did what the father asked, so perhaps he was with the cruel one’s sister, wooing her with his sleek poet’s voice. It was hard for beings to resist the allure of a Bard bent on love.
The wind had seen the trickster lie with his penny scented lucky one, limbs tangled, mouths seeking, heart pleading, his every move filled with ferocious intensity. When the trickster was with his lucky one, nothing else existed—not even the wind whistling loudly at their joining.
Well. Perhaps the wind should’ve found the lucky one. The trickster could never stay away from her for long.
Besides, the Clark mansion was writhing with cinnamon and anise scented flames. The fire roared like a giant hell beast, spewing heat and black smoke. The wind swept over the grass. The blades curled in the heat, turning black.
The singed grass was the only sign of fire outside the home’s thick illusion.
The wind slipped under the front door and coughed on smoke and anise.
The blue fire burned hotter than a volcano’s belly.
It devoured the furnishings and the wood beams. The bookshelves, the parchment, and the vellum records were already ash.
The wind moaned, jumping from one grasping flame to the next.
Fire was a demanding being. It always grabbed for the wind, a lurching, greedy thing that wanted the wind to feed it and push it higher.
The wind snapped at it, trying to snuff it out rather than make it grow.
The fire shrank back. The wind blew a threat and trailed across the charred floor. It found a small, dancing blue flame. A polite, restrained flame. The wind asked it a question.
Who?
The fire crackled and snapped. It popped and hissed. It swayed in a mesmerizing dance that reminded the wind of a deep red sunset flickering over hypnotic ocean waves.
Fires always had interesting things to say. Why wouldn’t they? Humans had been telling stories around fires for eons. Campfires on the eve of battle. Hearth fires in every home. Candlelight before every seduction. Torches before every mob. What was fire except a conduit of stories?
—Smith! Take note! You cannot wear a crown without—
—He burned my mother’s picture. He burned my—
—Warn the Bard. Now.—
—Mari, did it work?—
—Now the Wards. Does this fire burn marble?—
The wind shrieked, and its blast snuffed the small flame. It raced through the fire, batting aside the grasping fingers. The blue fire was hungry—it bit at the wind, trying to consume it. A window shattered, and the wind burst free, riding the wave of heat.
The boy. He would hate it if his home were eaten by this fire creature. It would gobble up the dog-eared paperbacks he kept stacked on his nightstand. It would swallow whole the crinkle-papered library books he thumbed through on rainy afternoons.
Why did he read library books? The wind had always wondered, and the boy had answered, “Because if I buy a book, it’s only me that holds it.
But library books have had a hundred people hold them, and that makes us connected.
That makes us almost friends. Just think, the person sitting next to me on the subway could’ve held the same library book as me, almost like we were holding hands. Doesn’t that make you feel less alone?”
The wind flicked his ear. It never felt alone. It was the wind.
But if the boy’s books burned, then he might feel alone.
The cruel one’s sister had mourned that the picture of her mother had been burned.
Would the boy mourn the pictures of the man burning?
There was a picture on his bedroom dresser.
The boy was small, round-faced, and laughing.
He was perched on the man’s shoulders and pointing toward the sky.
They were in the north. The boy was pointing at the wind flitting merrily through a maple’s orange-flame leaves.
The next week, the boy had shattered his mirror.
He hadn’t laughed like he had in the picture ever again.
The wind rushed north, racing toward the lush, sweet smelling park in the center of the city.
It was night. Still and city-quiet. There were no rushing taxis to somersault over.
There were no bicycle wheels to catapult from.
Even the steam that gushed out of street vents gurgled out in slow fits and starts. The wind moaned and sped faster.
It was too late. By the time it blew under the front door, the anise and cinnamon fire had eaten all the boy’s books.
More. It had swallowed everything. Even the marble columns were melting like wax candles.
The stone dripped and pooled in melted wax mounds.
The roof had caved. The furniture was charred and twisted.
There was nothing left.
Even though this fire was hungrier than the last, the wind still drifted to the boy’s bedroom.
It swirled through the flames. They bit and burned and grabbed.
The wind shrieked and kicked them back. Then it stopped in the corner of the room.
There was an ash pile. A charred-wood, burned-dresser ash pile.
The photograph of the boy and the man and the wind was gone.
That had been the only picture ever taken of the wind. You couldn’t see it in the photograph. You only knew it was there by the reflection of joy in the boy’s face.
That was the way with beings though. Some of them spent their entire existence trying to make others see them so they could feel real.
Not the wind though. Not the wind.
It swept from the boy’s home.
The Ward’s illusion contained the fire, so it could only rage inside, imprisoned and invisible in the illusion’s walls. In the morning, when the fire had eaten all it could and then died a glutton’s death, the illusion would still stand, but everything else would be gone.
The wind sighed. The Bards would be next. It had heard the cracklings of the fire. But the wind would arrive too late.
And it did. The Bard mansion was a furnace, empty except for its hateful flame. The trickster wasn’t in his home. Where was he?
Where?
Where?
Where?
The boy wanted the trickster. The wind would find him. Where was he? Where?
It trailed down the sidewalk, humming, moaning, thinking.
After a while, it started to hum a little song to itself. I’ve lost the trickster. Where could he be? I’ve lost the trickster. How silly of me. Where is the trickster? Where did he go? Nobody knows, oh, nobody knows.
It whistled in surprise when a man hurried past, kicking up dirt and sending the wind into a whirl. The buzz of illusion stung it and threw the wind against the sidewalk. It bounced, shook itself off, and chased after the man.
Ha!
Aha!
The wind blew the man’s pant leg and climbed his T-shirt to ruffle the wavy ends of his black hair. The man sent a hand through his hair, pushing it back from his eyes.
Yes!
Not the trickster, but almost as good.
The wind laughed at its luck. This was a man with a secret. It could hear it in the rapid beat of his pulse. Instead of thump-thump, thump-thump, it whispered, se-cret, se-cret. At the wind’s cheerful chuff, the man looked behind him, searching the empty street with his sharp, alert gaze.
The wind sniffed. The twisted, cruel scent was gone. So was the scent of cranberries and allspice. The solange-eyed one only smelled of the air before a powerful thunderstorm and the soap he’d shaved with. The wind brushed over his jaw, rubbing his smooth skin.
Not twisted.
Not cruel.
Was this the solange-eyed one? Or was the man who’d killed the innocent one him? Both? Neither?
The wind didn’t know. He could be both. The wind had never understood Smiths. The armored cabinets of their minds were a mystery it could never comprehend.
The man looked over his shoulder and then crossed the dark street, splashing through a strip of light and then plunging back into darkness.
The wind kept close, creeping slowly behind him.
When the man looked back again, narrowing his eyes, the wind hid in the dirt around a sidewalk tree, knocking red begonia heads together.
A rat who’d been happily nibbling on a pizza crust scuttled across the concrete and dove under a parked car.
The solange-eyed man stared at the car, holding his hand out. The pins-and-needles sting of illusion crackled around the wind. It rattled the begonias.
The man cocked his head, listening to the sound of the wind through the flowers, and then his mouth lifted in a half-smile.
He dropped his hand and continued down the night-dark street.
He walked with a light, rolling gait—the one he used when weaving between swords and maces in a gauntlet.
Except the solange-eyed man didn’t sway and tilt anymore; he held himself tall and sure, like a strong oak that had grown perfectly straight under a blessed noonday sun.
So the crown wasn’t too heavy? It didn’t make him bend or bow?
The wind hummed, skipping after him, bouncing on trash can lids and sliding down iron railings. Every now and then, it would ruffle a roosting pigeon’s feathers and laugh when it cooed in surprised irritation.
At the startled coos, the solange-eyed man would flash a lightning-quick smile.
Was it him?
Who?
The wind called.
The man looked over his shoulder. “Does she know me?” he asked, his voice a deep thunder that rolled through the wind. “You said she did. Is there any of her left? Is there?”
The wind held still. It kept quiet. This was the girl’s secret. It wouldn’t tell the solange-eyed one, even if he asked politely. The girl hadn’t told the wind to keep this secret, but it would.