William Stiteler
Pilgrim watched from his wagon as the thing killed the farmer. It was bigger than most he saw—larger than a cat so he could see it clearly a hundred yards away across the rolling field, and too big and clumsy to clamber its way up to the struggling man's face. The farmer might have been able to fight it off, but he tried to run instead, leaving his plow horse behind, and the thing easily dragged him down from behind.
Pilgrim sighed and clicked his tongue at his team while he listened to the distant screams of the farmer. Nothing to be done for him now, but Pilgrim had nothing to fear himself, not with the partner he had seated next to him on the covered wagon's seat. They had quite a few miles to go before they reached their destination, so there was no time to tarry anyway.
* * *
The village, when they reached it, seemed to be slumbering in the heat of the afternoon. His traveling companion had returned to the back of the wagon as well, and Pilgrim felt oppressed by the solitude. He gave the reins a shake, but it was a half-hearted motion. The horses knew their job, and they didn't really need direction from him. Animals that needed to be cajoled or guided overmuch weren't used these days—that had probably been what had doomed the farmer.
The ruts in the dry dirt grew deeper as the road joined with another just outside the village, and the wagon rumbled past the first of the houses that actually had inhabitants, and weren't simply falling down from neglect. A man, leaning on his hoe out in front of one of those houses, silently watched them pass by, the first sign of life Pilgrim had seen in several hours.
Another sign of life came a few minutes later when a figure shambled into view around the side of a house—a man with a small black creature clamped on him. He staggered along, his arms moving jerkily as the thing made it to his neck. A crowd appeared behind him a moment later, moving faster and with more purpose, half a dozen men with clubs and farm tools.
Pilgrim reined in his team as the mob reached the struggling man and began to hack at the squirming thing with their weapons, the only sound the thud of the tools. The sound was muted when the impact was on the writhing mass of black, only slightly sharper on the man himself.
The man was driven to his knees, then flat, and the horses shifted a bit, but the whole thing was quiet enough that they were not much bothered. Pilgrim glanced back into the wagon at his partner and shook his head, then flicked the reins to get the horses moving again as the crowd finished its business.
* * *
The team found its way to the village green and eased to a stop in a clear spot between a stand stacked with vegetables and a small enclosure of sheep. Pilgrim nodded to his neighbours as he swung down and unhitched the horses. There were a few people wandering the green, making silent transactions, and the sight of the wagon, with its walls painted in arcane symbols, drew more from farther off. Some of them gave Pilgrim a curious look he'd grown familiar with, taking in his sallow skin and lank, greasy hair. Years ago he'd walked straighter and taken more pride in his appearance, like a performer should. But he didn't need to look the part to draw people in, not anymore.
The slow trickle of market-goers grew as Jackalynn opened the little door at the back of the wagon and stepped out. Her eyes shone bright, and her raven hair fell in waves as she walked around the wagon. She was at least as much of a draw to passers-by as the mysterious wagon itself. It was why he'd partnered with her years ago, even when he'd been somewhat pleasant to look at himself.
Jackalynn helped him fold down one side of the wagon and set up its hinged legs to form a small stage as more people gathered to look on silently. He laboriously mounted the stage and rummaged behind the curtain for his props as Jackalynn hopped up to sit on the boards then spun with a flash of petticoats before rising gracefully next to him. She stood, an adoring look on her face, as Pilgrim held two metal rings up to the crowd. He struck the rings together several times, hard enough for the clinking to be heard over the bleating of the nearby sheep, then linked them with a flourish. He swung them about, showing them to be firmly linked, then abruptly pulled them apart to a smattering of applause.
More applause followed as he produced a pigeon from his sleeve. Then he actually drew some laughter from the onlookers as he knelt in front of Jackalynn and she placed a boot on his knee while he drew a seemingly endless multi-coloured streamer from beneath her skirts.
A few more tricks, and he'd gathered several dozen appreciative gawkers. He could have passed a hat and made a nice sum simply from the legerdemain, but of course it was only meant to draw in the people for the next act. As Pilgrim tucked the last of his props behind the curtain, Jackalynn stepped forward and made a slight curtsy.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she said. ‘We've shown you wonders today. Now prepare yourself for a greater miracle still.’
The effect of her voice was electric. The whole crowd seemed to move back several steps in unison.
‘Ladies!’ Jackalynn called. ‘Gentlemen! Draw near, have no fear.’ She gestured as she spoke, beckoning to the onlookers. ‘I assure you that I speak with confidence, secure in my own safety, and so can you.’ Pilgrim saw one man at the back of the crowd turn and run—someone always did when she spoke. Everyone else simply stared, even the sheep. Pilgrim stepped back as Jackalynn began to pace across the stage, still declaiming in a loud, clear voice.
‘It has been five years now since the veil opened to that other world and the first of the Rastegarizat appeared, summoned by an incantation.’ She paused in her pacing and turned to the crowd. ‘Was that first invocation performed with some horrible purpose, or was it an accident? We can't know, ladies and gentlemen, but we know about all the tragedies that have happened since that day, once the Rastegarizat had a taste for our world and our flesh, and they began to stand ready with their ever-shifting summoning incantations. They may be unable to come here unless they are summoned, but we've learned, oh we've learned, that they can each decide the particular incantation that will perform that summoning, can change it as often as they like. Until some unfortunate man or woman utters it all unknowing—‘ she clapped loudly ‘—and suffers for the mistake.’ The crowd, mesmerized by her speech, flinched as one at the clap.
Pilgrim didn't react—it had been his idea, something he'd worked into Jackalynn's patter back when he'd first found her. Originally, of course, he'd brought her in to provide a distraction, and though she hardly needed to make a sudden noise to draw attention, it had helped with some of his tricks. There was no need for her to work to draw attention now, of course—the crowd could hardly have had any more to give her.
Jackalynn began to pace again, the tap of her bootheels on the stage clear in the utter silence of the village green. ‘How many were killed or worse when one of those creatures created a spell from the words “How do you do?” or “I will have a glass of wine”?’ she asked. ‘Now we live in a silent world, communicating in grunts, or simple phrases that we hope none of the Rastegarizat have thought of.’ Her voice rang like a bell, but even if it had been a rasping squawk the crowd would have hung on every word. More people were drifting in now, attracted by the sound, or waiting to see something horrible happen, readying themselves to fall upon whatever appeared at Jackalynn's inadvertent summoning. Or flee, depending on how formidable it was. A few dogs had even showed up at the edge of the group, sitting heads titled to one side, and listening.
‘But here I've been talking for some time now, without a flicker of fear,’ Jackalynn said. ‘And I've been doing so in town after town, never summoning a thing. How is this possible?’
She paused, long enough to make much of the crowd lean forward, then held up her arm with a flourish, displaying a gaudy bracelet. ‘This makes it possible,’ she said. ‘Proof against the Rastegarizat, a charm that deafens them to the invocations of its owner.’ She gestured to Pilgrim, who gamely held up his arm to display the bracelet he also wore. ‘Friends,’ Jackalynn said. ‘We are proof of the charms we sell—we stake our lives on them every day as we travel from town to town, chattering like magpies, conversing of things great and small, recalling old memories.’
She stepped closer to Pilgrim, grinning to the crowd, and he felt himself tense. ‘Of course, we've had to teach ourselves once again to speak quietly, when we discuss certain things,’ she said to the crowd. She draped an arm over his shoulder and tipped her head toward his. ‘Remember that village where I convinced you to let me try selling some of the amulets and potions, Pilgrim?’ she whispered. ‘I rehearsed that speech for weeks, telling you why you should let me talk to your crowd.’ Her breath was hot on Pilgrim’s ear. ‘Aren't you glad I convinced you?’
He felt his leg shaking, and fought to still it as he turned and moved his lips near her ear. The whispering, like everything in their act, had been another one of his ideas. Originally, it had been a bit of comedy, amusing the crowd with a touch of mock intimacy that had sometimes been real. And of course, while Jackalynn's act was still limited to ideas he'd come up with, he never knew what memory she'd drag up on any given day.
It was one of the things he most regretted teaching her.
Jackalynn laughed and pushed him away. ‘It is a good life, ladies and gentlemen,’ she said to the crowd, ‘and one you can have as well.’
She turned and gestured to the wagon. ‘We have enough for everyone, and we'll sell them at modest prices, for how could we grow rich on something that will keep you all safe? We charge just enough to allow us to keep body and soul together while we craft more charms, for they are sadly expensive to create. Just enough to allow us to keep traveling from town to town for the good of our fellow people. So come, come and buy. Buy, so you can talk to your loved ones. Buy, so you can curse your enemies. Buy an extra, in case you lose one. Buy for your family members who are sadly absent. Buy one for each of your children, so you can again teach them to talk. Buy one for all the children you intend to have yet, and I beg you, ladies and gentlemen, estimate high, for once you find yourselves again able to talk I assure you your families will multiply, and who knows how long it will be before we return? We have many villages to visit, my partner and I.’
The crowd surged forward, already rifling pockets for coins, and Pilgrim moved to the curtain to haul out the first box of bracelets. He cuffed a tear from his eye while his face was turned away from the crowd.
When had it happened, exactly? Jackalynn had been someone who'd tagged along after one show and from then on looked to him for every decision, the most enraptured member of his audience, there at the edge of the stage. But now his whole life was bent toward the time when Jackalynn would speak to the crowds, when he could let himself be swept away like everyone else. She'd begun to get so good at her spiel, though, that the speeches were getting shorter and shorter.
The price they charged really was fairly modest, although the mob that pressed up to the wagon would have paid whatever they could afford, scarcely seemed to notice how much money they thrust at the two of them.
The men and women who left with their new bracelets didn't quite seem to trust in the new artefacts, another thing Pilgrim had seen before. They were quiet as they moved off, for the most part. Soon, they'd begin talking, hesitantly at first, then with greater confidence. That was why Pilgrim was already stowing and securing their gear as Jackalynn handled a few final transactions.
Soon, most of the crowd was gone, and the remaining merchants were packing up their tables and stalls. A man in a ragged outfit approached as Pilgrim and Jackalynn folded the stage back against the wagon side.
‘Would... would you... like to join... me for... a drink?’ he asked Jackalynn, his voice sounding a bit rusty with disuse. Pilgrim wasn't even quite sure what he'd said at the end, as it had trailed off to a mumble.
Jackalynn smiled warmly. ‘We'll be along to all the taverns in the town soon enough,’ she said. ‘To enjoy some conversation and perhaps sell a few more bracelets to the unlucky ones who weren't here. But for now, I suggest you find your sweetheart and show her what a charming devil you can be, with the power of speech.’ She winked at the man, who promptly turned red. ‘We find that folks don't linger in the taverns anyway, once they rediscover talking, if you take my meaning.’
Pilgrim moved to hitch up the team, trying not to rush, as the man walked off. Once, a Rastegarizat had appeared at the summoning of one of their customers while they were still around, and they'd only made it out of that village because it had been a particularly nasty one, and caused a great deal of chaos.
* * *
He didn't begin to breathe easier until they were a mile away, with dusk falling to cover their progress. And of course, it was then, as they rolled slowly along, that Jackalynn rose from her seat and, without so much as patting his arm, headed back into the wagon.
A few moments later the little Rastegarizat emerged and settled into the seat next to him. It liked to take the air, especially after the sun had gone down. Pilgrim glanced back to see Jackalynn's empty shell of a body slumped in the back of the wagon, her mouth hanging open. He wished it wouldn't leave her like that, but he didn't dare try to argue with it. He had an idea that it didn't really like clamping itself to the back of her head, flattening itself under her hair, and it removed itself as soon as possible, to stretch its... limbs.
As far as he knew, the Rastegarizat that Jackalynn had accidentally summoned a few months ago was the only one cunning enough to actually take over its target rather than simply kill it and any other humans it could, or head off into the hills. He'd spent a fair amount of time looking at the flexible, questing proboscis on this one, with its three jagged protrusions that matched the wounds on the back of Jackalynn’s neck, and he hadn't seen the same arrangement on any other Rastegarizat. But then he'd never taken a close look at any others, and he'd hardly know if there were others doing what this one did. It was eerie, how much this one could bring what was left of Jackalynn back to life like she’d been years ago when they'd first started going from town to town selling trinkets.
He shook his head. There was no point in mulling over such things, and a bargain was a bargain. And it was a good one; he still told himself that he believed that. True, one could argue that he was betraying his race by convincing otherwise cautious people to begin speaking again, thereby bringing across more Rastegarizat, but what sort of lives was he interrupting? A silent slog. Clustered together in half-empty, isolated villages in the hope that if one did summon something, or if something came out of the hills, neighbors might gather to kill it before it was too late. In return for this minor betrayal, he got to be with the old Jackalynn again, for an hour or two, sometimes several times a week.
* * *
That evening, a strange noise startled Pilgrim from a doze, where he sat staring at the fire. He stood, head cocked, and heard it again, a metallic clink from behind the wagon. He made his way toward the sound, hand on the knife at his belt, and it came again. It took a few seconds for him to understand what he was seeing, once he rounded the wagon, and only in part because of the dim moonlight.
Jackalynn was standing in the road, her back to him, working with his trick rings. The clink came again as she tapped the rings together, showing an imaginary audience that they were unbroken, then sliding them together. It was difficult to tell in the poor light whether she was hiding the break in the rings properly, but the motions looked smooth to Pilgrim, and he wondered...
In the early days of their partnership, the little creature would make Jackalynn practice her patter in the evenings, looking to him for a nod or shake of the head to indicate how she was doing. But she'd been so good at it to begin with that watching her practice was a treat he'd not had for a long time now. Lately she'd simply eat dinner with him, then abandon Jackalynn's body until the next day. As far as he knew, the Rastegarizat could only make Jackalynn do things she'd known how to do before, and she'd never done any sleight of hand.
Jackalynn's form spun gracefully and dropped into a deep curtsy. The moonlight gleamed off her teeth as she straightened up and looked at him. ‘There are so many memories, here, Pilgrim,’ she said. ‘It takes me time to sort through them all. I used to spend hours at this, practicing tricks. But then, they weren't so hard to pick up after watching you every day. You were my whole world, you and your tricks.’
Her head tipped to one side. ‘You never knew how much time I spent working on this, did you?’ She stepped towards him and leaned close. ‘You would have been very cross, if you'd known, wouldn't you?’
She laughed, and took a single step back before vaulting gracefully into the back of the wagon. Pilgrim stood in the darkness for a time, lost in thought, then he made his way back to the fire. Things had changed, it seemed.
* * *
Three nights later found them camped near a deep, still lake. Pilgrim lay awake on his bedroll for hours, until finally, in the depths of the night, he threw back the blankets and rose to a crouch. Jackalynn had been practicing magic tricks every night, showing recollection of more and more of the repertoire, getting closer and closer to the point where she'd no longer need him to draw in the crowds with a hint of magic that made their bracelets plausible. But now her limp form lay neatly arranged next to him, as always. The Rastegarizat was off in the darkness somewhere—it didn't trust him enough to sleep nearby.
With a stifled grunt he picked her up. He staggered slightly as her form lolled bonelessly in his arms, then he started slowly off toward the lake, moving as quietly as he could. He arrived at an overhang above a pool, lowered the body, then knelt for a time, breathing heavily, before rising to find a large rock and dragging it close. He pulled a length of rope from his pocket. It took a few minutes, in the dim moonlight, to tie it securely around the rock, then around Jackalynn's ankles.
He sat for the better part of an hour in the darkness, staring into the water and holding Jackalynn's cold hand, before he finally tipped the rock off the overhang and into the lake. Jackalynn followed it with a splash, and he rose to return to the campsite.
It didn't affect him as much as he thought it would—in a way she'd been dead for months after all. But rather than go to sleep he sat, leaning against the wagon wheel and waiting for the Rastegarizat.
It didn't come that night, nor even after dawn broke. He'd expected it to attack him once it found Jackalynn gone, and he was prepared to kill it or die. But he sat next to the wagon for the better part of the day, until thirst drove him to stand up. and There was no sign of the Rastegarizat.
He moved on the next day—his water barrel was nearly empty and he couldn't bear the thought of drinking from the lake. He could make a living of sorts with legerdemain alone, and it seemed he'd have to, if the Rastegarizat had decided to leave him alone.
What would the Rastegarizat do without a shell? Kill people until someone managed to kill it in turn, he supposed, like the rest of them did.
He arrived in a village, and had nearly finished setting up his stage when the thud of a drum caught his attention. He glanced over to see a tall, rangy man with long wild hair standing in front of a wagon of his own. He gave one last thump on his drum, then produced a cloth mask festooned with metal beads, which he fastened over his nose and mouth, leaving only his eyes visible.
The stranger looked around for a moment, taking in the small crowd that had gathered. ‘Ladies!’ he said. ‘Gentlemen! Draw near, have no fear.’ His voice was muffled slightly by the cloth, but still loud. ‘I assure you that I speak with confidence, secure in my own safety, and so can you.’
Pilgrim staggered away from his stage and moved closer, staring.
‘It is this mask that lets me do so,’ the man said. ‘A mystical construction that alters what I say and makes it inaudible to the Rastegarizat, even as humans hear it clear as day.’
Pilgrim pushed through the jittery, gathering crowd.
‘And how did I discover this, ladies and gentlemen?’ the man asked, pacing back and forth. ‘Hard to believe as it may seem, not long ago I was a traveling peddler selling masks enchanted to cut down on dust, among other near-useless trinkets, like bracelets. And I fear we overcharged for these things, my partner and I. But when I discovered the small changes to the masks that would make them so useful, so very vital to us all, I had a revelation, and it came to me that I had to sell them cheaply to anyone I could. It caused a bit of a falling out with my former partner, I'm afraid, because he had always thought he was the one who really knew how to do what we did, that I was merely an assistant.’
He paused in his pacing and shook his head. ‘I think he thought of me almost as a parasite, sad to say, but the important thing is that now I'm doing good and spreading the word.’ With that he turned and winked at Pilgrim. His mouth was hidden, but Pilgrim had the feeling he was grinning beneath the gray mask. ‘No!’ Pilgrim shouted, his voice unfamiliar even to himself.
He heard the quiet pop of a Rastegarizat arriving with that common invocation, but barely noticed as he stared at the man in the mask. He was only distantly aware of the frantic movement from the crowd all around him as he felt something clamp tight on the back of his neck. Just before everything went black, he heard the man, not needing to raise his voice over the silent crowd.
‘A pity he did not have one of these masks. Pray, don't make the same mistake, any of you.’[GdM]