The sun was setting over London.
Sharon sat on the edge of a rusted iron staircase curling up the outside of the gasometer, and watched it. The sun was watery orange-yellow, sinking towards a horizon obscured by rolling grey cloud. A pair of angry blackbirds were shrieking at a cat that was stalking through the bushes on their territory. Somehow the best part of the afternoon had vanished, spent offering Rhys tissues from a box of Man-Sized Economy Deluxe, while he intoned between allergic symptoms and wrapped up various potions and powders in fragments of rag, labelling them with a felt tip pen and a piece of masking tape.
The names used by the druid seemed a little disappointing. But if nothing else they helped the inexperienced user. A small pack of powder was marked “Sleep”; another, “Hysteria”. At one point Gretel, intrigued by the smells, had wandered into their improvised shelter, made of buddleia branches and plastic sheeting, only for Rhys to shoo her out with a cry of “We can’t let Hysteria near a troll!” Thereafter the mere possibility had provoked a great, watery fit of coughing.
Now, Sharon knotted her fingers together between her knees and whispered under her breath:
“I am beautiful, I am wonderful, I have a secret…”
The first time she’d walked through a wall by mistake, it hadn’t been psychological counselling she’d required, since the fact of her turning invisible and being able to pass through solid surfaces was undeniable. What troubled her was more a question mark over whether any of these truths could be healthy. What effect, for example, did invisibility have on blood pressure?
Shamanism, it turned out, didn’t come with a manual.
She’d read a lot of self-help books. Not as a conscious decision; it was just that titles such as It’s Okay, It’s Not You and Working Through Your Problems Without Working Yourself Up had seemed at that time to chime with her very essence. And in one of them, on page one, there it had been–the mantra to be uttered whenever doubts assailed and confidence fled:
“I am beautiful, I am wonderful, I have a secret, the secret is…”
“Oi oi, scrawny!”
The voice of Sammy the Elbow.
“You got your battle paint ready?” demanded the goblin. “ ’S okay!” he cackled, seeing the look on her face. “Only stupid-git kinds of shaman do the battle-paint shit.”
“Sammy,” Sharon’s voice had the rising edge of someone testing a difficult hypothesis, “I’ve always wondered… do you enjoy watching people suffer?”
The goblin thought about it, then clapped his hands with glee. “Love it!” he exclaimed. “Arseholes everywhere, may as well stick…”
“Never mind.”
He hesitated, waiting for Sharon to move. Her face was turned towards the sunset, as if waiting for the last of the light.
“Uh… squelchy brains?”
She didn’t answer.
“It’s your tribe,” he said. “You’re their shaman. You’re the one has gotta lead ’em.”
“I know,” she murmured. “I think I always knew. But that’s… I think it’s gonna be okay.”
For once in his life, Sammy said nothing.
Sharon smiled, turning away from the setting sun.
“Right,” she said. “Let’s go fix this, shall we?”