A Thousand at a Bound

The warrior stood in the middle of a small country road in Nantucket. The road broke free of the houses to bathe in the sunlight of a field stretching outward to the horizon. He watched a butterfly float serenely from one flower to another. In the very early hours of the morn the birds often sang, but this day they sang in a way he had never before heard. It was an organized blend of the chirps and calls of the various birds and the winds that blew lightly through the leaves, and to the warrior’s ear it sounded as if an orchestra was playing a symphony, though it ended almost before it began.

A woman on a bicycle came around the bend of the road and the music abruptly halted.
Her simple appearance had added the extraneous element. The exquisite and fortuitous balance of nature that had produced this miracle collapsed from the excess weight.
He scowled.
‘Do you frown at me, sir?’ she asked.
‘I didn’t mean to,’ he said, ‘there was music in the field.’
She looked over at the field.
‘Haven’t I seen you before?’ he asked.
‘You’re mad like the weather,’ she said and pedaled off.
He watched her go down the lane to disappear from view behind the houses.

The warrior went back toward the town center. The warrior doubted that he’d remember the birds singing years from now when all else would be forgotten. Not a wisp remains. Does a bird’s song suggest the possibility that a door has come ajar to a realm where sadness does not reign? A high magician learned in the practical occult might know of such a threshold. He felt for no apparent reason that there was a chance he might find a source who would reveal guarded secrets for a price.

He had been walking with his head down in thought. A speck of orange caught his eye. A poster in large black letters on a peach background announced:

COME HEAR THIS MAN SPEAK!

FROM DEEP WITHIN THE UNIVERSE. CRYING? PENNILESS? AN ASTROLOGER UNEQUALED IN ESOTERIC AND PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS. MERCY AND THE ALL COMPASSIONATE. FEARFUL OF MORTALITY? LEARN THE SECRETS OF LIFE AFTER DEATH. HEAR THE HARMONIOUS BALANCE OF LIFE REVEALED. SOON THE DRAGON WILL CONSUME EVERYTHING. WORLD FAMOUS HE HAS TRAVELED THE WORLD IN SEARCH OF MASTERS. ANCIENT DEITIES IN ALL THEIR GLORY. THE MAJESTY OF G-D. ATLANTIS. BEINGS FROM OTHER LEVELS. THE THRILL IS HERE. RELEASE YOURSELF FROM BONDAGE. KARMA, REINCARNATION AND LIFE EXPLAINED. UNREHEARSED. STARTLING. MAGNIFICENT. NOTHING FAKE. THE MARRIAGE OF THE KING AND QUEEN. METAMORPHOSIS AND EVOLUTION REFUTED. PAST LIVES. WANDER IN MYSTERIOUS REALMS WITH A GUIDE. ALL ABOUT YOU. NOTHING HIDDEN. LIGHT OF HEAVEN. CYCLE OF AGES. HOLY VESSELS UNCORKED. FAITH, PRAYER AND HOLINESS.

TODAY! AT THE PIER. DON’T BE LATE! 4PM. SWAIN WILL REVEAL EVERYTHING TO ALL.

“There isn’t much time. I must hurry.” The warrior sped toward the waterfront. He hoped he might find a magician.

Swain had just begun his speech when the warrior arrived. A throng of others of all stripes looked upward to the rostrum.

“Beings!” Jack Swain, astrologer and clairvoyant, shouted from the marble balcony. Other men, much greater than he, had once spoken at this venue. Masons had placed the rostrum at the top of a long winding stair, especially elevated in the air, so that the speaker’s voice would reverberate and audiences would hear no matter how far away they stood. Swain had practically flown up the granite stair. His heart pulsed with fire and joy.

“Hear my prognostications! I have parted the veil of heaven.” He pounded the desk. He unrolled a long paper wound tighter than a ball of rubber bands. He pushed back his unruly hair from his forehead and smoothed his beard.

“Fairies rise merrily from the garden anointing flowers. In the glade the stags hunt unmarried women who unaware of their peril go wandering. The poppy, the daisy, the tulip, the rose, all are flowers. Is not the aroma like heaven?” He paused.

“In what do you believe? Then come with me and I will lead you. The search for meaning goes ever on. Behind every nostrum lies hidden a particle of truth. The great bowman loosed you at your birth aiming for the bull’s eye. Every moment of unawareness the winds of fate blew you further from your destiny. You can fight your way back though the tide is oceanic.”

“Beware the witch and her evil designs. Cast not the evil eye on your family. Fear what you might awake. Goblins and fiends detest that you have a soul. They would snatch it while you sleep.”

“You have ten fingers because you have ten layers of soul. All is in everything. The Tree of Life has ten branches. The ten spheres of the Kabbalah came from Sinai, and the playing cards from the brothels of Europe. Seek the mystical marriage of the Red and the White.”

A pretty figure, clothed in red, ran up the stairs. She stood behind Swain.

The crowd, now swollen in size, strained to see. Swain, flustered, interrupted his speech.

“Dare you mention the sacred couple?” she charged. “You are a liar!”
Swain grew red with choler. “Are you the Red?” His eyes dropped to her bosom. “I am the White.”
“You are a poseur.”
He blushed. This woman belittled his manhood in public. He snarled. “You are the devil woman.” He felt charmed by her presence.
“You mock me, sir. She who is Red does not know lust as you would deem it. Say one more word and you will regret it.”
He paused.
The crowd grew restless as the moments passed. Swain sensed he was losing his audience. “Why do you torment me?”
His reference to the Red and White had deeply offended her.
“Be gone, devil woman, spawn of offal!” he demanded.
She dodged his blows. He could not lay a hand on her. Fires of self-doubt sparked into howling flames. Shame coupled with doubt bears midgets as spawn. Swain began to shrink. His fear grew and this only caused him to shrink the more.
She took his sheaf of papers when he had grown so small he could not reach them. She picked him up and he stood on her palm, a smaller man.
He yearned to complete his speech, but his voice had grown unaccountably weaker.
The crowd watched in horror.

She placed him in her purse and put him inside a jar.
“He is not expired,” she explained to the people who thronged around her.
He sat stupefied at the bottom of the jar. He began to question the very fabric of his soul.
“Do I worship at the nave of a false god?” He couldn’t determine the truth. He was utterly disorientated. He laid his head against the glass and listened for a hint. At best, his was an indifferent god of a reckless century.

She walked home halting now and again to check on Swain’s condition. She thought he was sleeping, though only known to him he had assumed a yogic position signifying death, the better from which to communicate with the recently deceased. He had concluded he had been sentenced to a period of indeterminate length in purgatory and deserved or not, he thought it best to continue his research into life after death.

Janice, known to a select few as the Red, arrived home with her parcel. She placed his papers on a pile of mail and put the jar on the edge of her work table. Her alchemical projects awaited her, and she threw herself at their solution with her usual zeal. She sought precipitate from her distillations that would illuminate the path toward the creation of the golden egg. Her greatest fear was untimely death. The alchemical texts clearly stated that she who had attained the golden egg would elude the ineluctable. The great men of the Torah will one day feast on the Leviathan in the presence of the Shechina. Janice believed to sit in the Shechina’s presence was the guarantee of immortality.

Over the next several weeks she remained fixed on her work for the greater part of each day, taking time out only for her sustenance, and once in a while she remembered to feed Swain some crumbs. Luckily, Swain remained mostly still and did not require much intake. It is devilishly difficult to starve an advanced astrologer and clairvoyant.

It had finally occurred to him after long and tortured reasoning that he had somehow gotten smaller. He had searched in vain for a means to enlarge himself. He had never stopped trying.

One day an unexpected knocking at the front door fractured the peace of Janice’s meditation.
Little known to her, some of Swain’s more devoted clients had been searching high and low as he had gone missing. Rumors led them to Janice’s door.
She yawned. Her meditation had been very deep. She regretted the break from her efforts to locate the lost key. She had hit a wall in her alchemical experiments and sought a solution that was only broadly hinted at in the texts. “Give me a minute.”
“Why does she delay?” The minutes mounted. They smote the door.

“Why have you come here?” she asked the dozen or more people standing at her vestibule.
“We know whom you have locked away!”
“Whatever do you silly men mean?”

“You know who,” they asserted, though a little cowed.
“You accuse me of kidnapping?” As if any crime could attach itself to her.
The small mob stepped back to reconsider. Out of the huddle one of them spoke. “Rumor reached us that you eloped with Swain and keep him in a jar.”
Janice relented just a smidgen. “I will release him in a week.” Then she unceremoniously shut the door in their faces.
They began to murmur darkly. The door did not open and not a sound could be heard. In outrage they left.

Janice had her reasons for delay. She retrieved him from the jar and fed him sweetmeats, pastries, and other tidbits to nourish him back to health.
Contrite, he asked her to forgive him for whatever he had done.
Janice could not forget her distaste for this astrologer. “Please, go.” She gave him back his papers and pointed to the door.
Swain hung his head and departed, a little wiser, for greener fields.

The warrior had heard the rumor that a noted clairvoyant had been shrunk by the very pretty woman who rose in the air like a phoenix would from the ashes of its demise. “Had this man shrunk or was this a reference to his penis?” He had left the public speech after the woman had interrupted Swain and so hadn’t witnessed the aftermath.

A month had passed. He considered his options. He wanted to find a magician who could lead him to a threshold out of this world. Could that be Swain? He chose to go to the quarter of town known for its strangeness.

He turned down Feather Street. Nooks and crannies, shop windows and doors at strange angles addled his sensibility. His eyes swept over the goods. Birds with matted hair sat on swings in cages behind heavily glazed windows. They peered fearlessly back. Never had he felt so intently the eyes of a predator. He looked closely at an old man’s face leaning against the door frame of one the shops. He did look something like a bird himself.
“Are you a feather merchant?’”
“I once bought and sold feathers.” He examined the warrior from head to toe. “That was long before you dropped from the womb.”
“Where can a person buy so many feathers?”
“In Shanghai we bought boatloads of feathers. That was over 80 years ago.”
The warrior realized this man was at least 100 years old though he appeared more youthful than that. The warrior had a strong interest in longevity as his father had died of a toxic disease in the prime of life.
“Do you still work?” the warrior asked.
“I deal in hard to find merchandise of various provenance, that sort of thing.” He leaned forward, his head almost touching the warrior’s.
Feeling crowded at the man’s nearness, he stepped back.
“I have a present for you.” Swain pressed a feather from his breast onto the warrior’s sleeve.
The warrior shook it away. Nothing is freely given. He pushed against the man’s arm and was surprised at his strength. “Who are you?”
“I am Swain. Your disguise is easily read. Really, this is a gift. It will take you where you want.” He quickly stepped forward pressing his body against the warrior.
The warrior shifted his weight and threw him stumbling to the side. Swain cried, “You fool, you tripped me!”
The warrior suspected the old man of cruel intent. Was this what a magician was like? “I don’t like traps.”
Swain pulled himself up from the ground, and snarled, ‘Ah, the hell with you.’
As he turned to go back into his shop the warrior saw a beak where Swain’s nose had been. Swain slammed shut the shop’s door and lowered the shade.
The warrior turned away. He noted the store’s name: Jackdaw Bros., Purveyors of Rare and Hard to Find Fowl.

The warrior had pursued physical immortality for years, and then after many defeats against the encroachments of aging, a dark figure he once dreamt of and forgotten had transformed into a recurring nightmare. He admitted defeat. He had to murder that figure in order to proceed, but he didn’t know how to reach him. He still followed the occult, but so far had met no one who could lead him across the threshold, if it existed, into immortality.

He saw a billboard for a play, The Witch Unmasked, One Performance Only, 7pm, Today.
The title entranced him. He decided to go. It was only half an hour before curtain.

He mounted up the stairs to the theatre.

An usher greeted him. “Standing room only.”
“That will do.”
The usher pointed to the only door open at the far end of the hall. The warrior went there and peeked inside. The seats were filled to capacity. Fine heads in curls and some smoothly bald sat in hushed conversation. Then the lights dimmed and all became quiet and expectant. Attention was riveted on the figure that appeared in front of the curtains.
She was of noble form with beautiful blonde hair. She said, “I am naked.”
However, she wasn’t. She wore a flowing red skirt and matching blouse, probably of silk. Then she curtsied spreading her dress wide.
The warrior admired her poise. “What kind of play is this? Tragedy?
Comedy?”

Three men, grim in aspect, bounded through the crack of the curtain and caught hold of her, roughly pinning her arms. Quickly they tied her to a stake.
The curtain opened. They marched to the table, sat in hard wooden chairs, and called out to the audience. “You are all witness to the justice about to be performed!”
“So, this is to be a trial. What is the charge?”
The woman began to plead her innocence in a flood of emotion. “Why have you done this to me? I have never done anything! Release me.”
“Never,” intoned the middle judge, the harshest. “You are a witch!”
“I am no such thing,” she sobbed.
The warrior thought he recognized that judge. Swain?
They donned their judge’s robes and lit a torch.
“This is the Flame of Rule,” said the judge holding the torch. Its flickering light commanded all eyes.
“Bring out the Book of Charges,” he commanded. A servant ran out from the sides and handed over the iron book. The middle judge, Swain, opened it and pages flew out littering the tabletop. “Stop this witchery,” he thundered. Frowning, he collected the pages and restored their order.
The warrior watched in fascination.
The harshest one lifted a page for closer inspection. “You have lived for centuries and by every account you are deathless. Years ago we first heard of you. Relentlessly we have hunted your scent pursuing you across continents and oceans, forest and glade, mountain and vale, under star and moon, until at last we discovered you on this stage at this very hour. Here and now you were set to work your dire magic, to lead these people astray and to ultimately draw out their life thread with which to clothe yourself in splendid garments, even a diadem for your hair as if you were queen of the dead.” He paused and looked at her crossly. “How do you plead?”
“I am innocent.”
“Then how can you explain your library and alchemical laboratory? Thousands of volumes on magic, witchery, manufacture of the egg, lives of the great sorcerers, recipes for potions, and most damning of all, the poison brew kept in the crystal goblet. Who is to drink it? For what diabolical purpose?”
“How did you violate my private chambers?”

A judge held up a large key. “We have informants.”
“Have you anything to say?” he sneered.
She hung her head at the futility.
“There can be no other explanation for your longevity, woman. For this reason you are bound in the Demon Court and by its authority we condemn you with the penalty of Abstraction Unto Ash.”
The audience gasped.
The woman called out to the unseen gods..

“Silence! ‘For the honor of the court!”
Tears coursed down her lovely cheeks. The warrior felt sorrow overwhelming him. “Immortal? I should speak privately with her.”

He found a stair leading to a floor directly above. None of the ushers had seen him leave. Everyone had surrendered wholly to her sexuality and to her possible death at the hands of the judges. Titillation? Of course. Symbolically? The nearness of death enforces intimacy. An entire life can be misspent fearing intimacy. What better place to come to an understanding of shame than in a theatre.

Not a person alive who does not fear coming to terms with the immortal.

He heard applause. “The woman’s dressing room is upstairs,” he thought. The stairs narrowed as he mounted. At a bend he came upon a hall that branched off going over the stage. A single bulb half illuminated the space. He chose this path and disappeared into the darkness.

He came upon a row of impressively carved doors on both sides of the hallway. The warrior paused. He chose the middle door.
“You erred,” said Swain sitting in a swing hung from the ceiling.
The warrior thought it an odd coincidence. He backed away toward the door.
“Wait a minute.”
The warrior replied, “Is it playtime? Heaven forbid that I would interrupt your nap.”
“That would be rude. You saw the play downstairs? She got her comeuppance.” Feathers of many colors lay strewn on the floor.
“Do you mean the witch?”
“You have a keen eye. You strut about as if you were already a zen master.”
The warrior saw the heavily gilt renderings of birds in various scenes hanging on the walls of the room. “Did you paint them?”
Jack swung lazily. “Would you care to see one brought to life?”
The warrior eyed the birds.
“No matter! Watch!” A great black bird lunged toward the warrior’s throat.
He had kept one hand on the doorknob. He slipped out of the room and
slammed the door shut. The scrape of claws and body crashed against the other side of the door.
Swain spoke, “You left without your compliments.”
“Pardon me. I forgot my manners.”

There were other doors. “Would Swain be behind every one?” He chose one at random.
“Enter Gently, Guest.” A card had been tacked on the door.
The warrior hesitated. He went to another door.
A slat opened and Swain hurled insults, “Fool! Dimwit! Hopeless Idiot!”
The warrior pulled the slat shut.

A door at the far end of the hall offered promise. He moved toward it, and pulled it open expecting Swain to be grinning like a ninny back at him. He was curiously absent, and so the warrior gladly entered and shot up the stairs.

He proceeded warily down the hall and came to a set of twin doors. He heard murmuring within the room behind the doors. It was the laughter he heard that caused him to choose the door on the right. He entered a theatre different from the one below. An impossibly high ceiling became lost in the darkness overhead. On the proscenium a tall thin dragon appeared. He doffed his black hat and his pate gleamed in the spotlight.

“Dragons! Tonight we will witness a dream of one man. Does it have meaning? What does it portend? You may decide, but by no means ask the gentleman who has just entered our hall.”
All the eyes diverted to the warrior.

“Your seat,” an usher led him to the balcony.
The barker continued, “It is the warrior’s dream. We have access to his private domain.”

The lights went down. The warrior closely watched the play unfolding.

The Warrior lay on a beach bound tightly in a net. He lay beneath a sky domed by starlight. He speaks, “My eyes blaze in memory of a wild descent. I thought I had won a path to God, but the way dropped off collapsing into an endless void. I did not doubt my individual perfection or the small chance that God would extend to me his grace. I was deceived. I swear that out of the sky a hand caught hold of me, perhaps it hooked the etheric debris swirling above my head. Then it threw me miles over the sea, for I was athwart a stout ship that cut through the waves and here I am bound by my own thoughts. These cords cut savagely into my flesh.”
He called aloud to the fires of immortal birth, “Ease my pain!”
A feathered serpent grew out of his skull and then sat on his chest. A ray of light shot out of the serpent’s mouth and burned the net’s fibers. Immediately he sprang to his feet.
Then the serpent dug in the sand to gather the crown of jewels that had lain buried beneath him and swallowed it. Then it dove into the sea vanishing from sight.
He started after it but heard a cry for surcease from an area behind him. He turned toward this cry. He carried a sword that blazed like a crystal of fire. He came upon the crest of a rocky incline. In a clearing he saw a circle of men enwrapped in devout concentration on a man twisted in pain before them. They held their prey in the crux between life and death by the finest thread. They toyed with him. One of them glanced behind and saw the warrior approaching. He motioned to his brothers.
“Another comes who follows the fleet hound faster than death!”
The brothers lifted their ears and eyes and saw him coming nearer. They hurriedly burned their prey to ash with the fire from their eyes. Its essence fluttered away in a soft wind. Then they turned to face him.

There were seven brothers and all had one face. They were death incarnate and in their eyes the lamp of God was a rumor, a rude joke of a coarsened beast. In their lust they swept upon him. Their greatest enjoyment was snatching the life away from any man who held it too dearly.
His sword glowed with living flame and he struck at the seven mercilessly. They attacked him from every side. The warrior formed circlets of fire that hung in the air to trap the seven. Then he cut each of them in twain. He hastily buried them in a shallow grave.
Then he hurried toward the sea to cleanse himself from the filth. “I must find a sacred passage.”
After washing he hid in the sea grass and watched the ocean. Two ships appeared over the horizon. Their masts were so tall they touched the heavens. He shouted, “The gates of mercy! The gates of mercy!” Then he saw a goddess appear in the gate.
“Does she wait for me? I do not know the way to her.” He kept his eyes fixed, but eventually the image faded and he fell over in sleep.
The goddess came to shore and lightly embraced him kissing him on the lips. “I am only a dream image.” Then she returned to the sea.
He bolted upright, but she was gone. “Which is the way to her?” Tears covered his cheeks.
The last tear spoke to him. “I am the water of life.”

The audience erupted in a fierce display of appreciation. The actors came out for further applause. “Is there really a goddess?” He shuddered at the all too real image of the seven brothers with the same hopeless faces.
The actress, Janice in costume, was sending kisses to the audience as they heaped roses at her feet. The warrior did not recognize her. He got up from his seat and turned away to the passage leading out of the theatre.

At a dark corner the warrior set himself to watch. Eventually the hubbub of the audience emerging from the theatre died down as they wandered down the stairs to the street. Soon after the overhead lights extinguished. Still the warrior stood waiting.
He heard a sound. Then he saw a procession of men walking alongside a cage pulled on wheels. The warrior trembled. There in the cage was a woman of tremendous beauty in red who softly glowed in the night. He whispered softly, “A goddess.”
The procession rounded a corner and disappeared from view. The warrior set out to follow. It moved slowly. He hung back. Yet they saw him. Three men peeled off from the procession.
“We have come for you.”
Menace stung him. It reminded him of his recurring dream. Could he find release from its binds?
Suddenly they rushed. At the last moment the warrior swept the legs out of the man on the right breaking his knees. The other two jumped back. They had not expected the warrior to resist. They pulled off their hoods. A ring of fire wrapped around their heads. A demonic gleam danced in their eyes. It stung his eyes to look at them directly.
“Are you human?”
They attacked from both sides. The warrior ran to attack the one on the left. He dodged a blow to his head while catching the punch in the crook of his arm. He threw himself to the ground wrenching his assailant’s arm out of its joint. As he scrambled free his other assailant hit him in the lower back. The warrior stumbled. The pain was intense, yet he managed to dodge the next series of blows. This attacker had blinding speed. The warrior could only retreat barely missing the brunt of the blows at this head. The warrior tripped over a cigarette stand. Down both tumbled grappling each other around the neck. With all his strength the warrior strove to choke his enemy to death. A stench arose that was horrid. It bit at the warrior’s mouth. Still he tightened his grip. He was merciless. His assailant failed. The warrior could hardly stand. He felt dizzy. He swung his arms as if he swam.

He cautiously walked to where he had last seen the entourage accompanying the caged goddess. The hallway was empty yet the warrior sensed a troubling presence. He halted.

Swain cocked his arm and let fly a bird straight for the warrior’s head. The warrior turned violently to dodge and hit his head hard against a door jam. He fell to the floor.

To his minions, feathered and eager, “Take him.”
Two men unnaturally birdlike emerged from the shadows. They bound his arms behind his back and blindfolded him.
They left the building and ran. At last they came to a forest where they halted.
Swain peered into a field, the very one where the warrior had heard the orchestra of birds. “Here we will make camp and prepare for the morrow’s battle.”

The men huddled on the ground and slept while Swain stared at the warrior. “I want to help you. That’s why I have taken you here probably against your will. Here we will meet a common foe. He denies all men immortality with unyielding might. With your strength and zeal we stand a chance, though few have ever defeated him, and then only in tales.”

The warrior couldn’t make sense of this. Swain his friend? He collapsed into a dreamless sleep. He awoke at the first glow of morning. The others had already prepared for war. He joined them.
“Who would assault them?” He held a sword. They stood absolutely still.

Suddenly Swain shouted, “There!”

Out of the thin blue air a company of soldiers materialized. The warrior watched.

“The Black Hand, that squashes him who follows the hound,” a man next to him whispered.
The soldiers bowed before their captain, a dark demonical being. Without warning the fell captain signaled for his men to attack. They broke upon Swain’s company.
The fire in the warrior’s being then erupted and lit his countenance with a ferocious gleam. Swain’s company counterattacked, but all died. The fell captain remained, a smile on his lips.
He retreated on his horse a few paces, and then he proudly turned. “You!” He pointed straight at the warrior. The roar of the captain’s voice caused the stillness in his body to quiver. Even Swain stood paralyzed in fear.
The warrior’s body flew into the air against his will. It was as if he had none. A susurrus would have carried him away. He slavishly followed the captain as they descended into the nether realms of the dead. They journeyed through a tortuous series of winding caves, over churning rivers, and then onto a dusty plain. They came nigh to a vast fort of endless dimensions.

The captain held up his hand and the doors opened. The proud steed and his strange quarry entered his realm. “You are my guest here!” He held him aloft though there was no wind. Not a breath of air.
The warrior grinned.
“You will be crucified!”
The warrior recognized the dark figure of his dreams. He was powerless to hurt him.
The captain dismounted, pulled him down, and then bound him to his sword. “Your search for immortality is nothing. You will rot like all before you.’”

He threw him like an arrow. He hurtled at tremendous speed back toward a growing source of light to the field of song, though no birds sang.

He fell to the ground and almost gave up the ghost.
A bird alighted on a branch and peered at him. The warrior heard it flap its wings and he looked up. He decided to make one more effort. He loosed himself from the sword and then plunged into the enveloping darkness of the evening. He thought he would go back to the beginning, to try again.

He came upon a lingerie shop. “What are women?” he wondered as he idly looked at the skimpily dressed mannequins. “At low tide the retreating ocean leaves behind seaweed. One could liken lingerie to seaweed.” The idea was far fetched, but it led to a pleasant dream. “Mermaids are a wonderful thought, and perhaps they are real.” He pictured a mermaid, her bosoms bare, stranded on a beach. “What would happen to a man who kissed her nipples?”

He smelled fished frying across the street. It stirred his appetite, and feeling for money in his pocket, crossed the street.

The waitress handed him a menu.

“Any fish?” he asked.

“Clear broth or with noodles?”

“From the ocean or a pond?”

“From the docks at 4am each morning.”

“In that case, I’ll have a fish that has swum recently in the ocean.”

She nodded and waddled off like a duck to the kitchen. She came back straight away with a bowl of soup and a wooden spoon.

The warrior noticed the bowl was deep and the waves frothy. “Is this sea water?”

She shrugged. “Too salty?”

He took a sip. “Not at all. My compliments.”

She turned. The restaurant didn’t have specialty chefs.

The warrior suspected there wasn’t a fish in his soup. Why didn’t she acknowledge his complement to the establishment? He took his wooden spoon and poked down in search of the fish. He wetted his fingers. He frowned.

The fish had watched the warrior’s antics from the corner of the bowl. He stuck his head out of the soup and asked, “Why the sour puss?”

The warrior eyed the fish. “I regret to inform you. I cannot fathom your meaning.”

“If you were sufficiently awake you would understand me perfectly,” spoke the fish.

“I’ve spoken with philosophers, salesmen, religious figures, occultists, the deranged, the learned, pretenders to the faith, channellers, the narrow, the wide, the opaque, sophists, performance artists, jazzers, the negro and the Caucasian, simpletons, cartoon characters, the ill-informed, the half formed, and many others, I’ve never been found asleep at the wheel.”

“I find you verbose and overtaxing. Desist from excessive chatter. Those are my directions.”

The warrior considered putting his fork in the fish’s breast. “Who are you? Do I know you?”

“Man and fish instinctively know the other.”

The warrior listed the fish he had known. “Swordfish, spearfish, catfish, dogfish, herring, whitefish, sardines, lox, gefilte fish, tuna, shark, dolphin, bass, minnow, carp, trout. I don’t know if you number among them.”

The fish shook his head and dove into the bowl.

The warrior waited for the fish to return while mindlessly swallowing whole itsy bitsy mermaid shapes crackers. They were meant for the soup. He didn’t dare put them in.

Swain came in the door. “Ahoy, mate,” he cried, “I haven’t seen you in ages.”

They fell into conversation about dreams.

“I have grown weary of the occult,” complained Swain. “My customers are stale, weather beaten, misbegotten dwarfs.”

The warrior noticed a beautiful blonde who had just come in from the street. He got up from his chair and sat down across from her, propelled by something he couldn’t understand.

“And who are you?” she asked. “You have the most extraordinary eyes.”

The warrior looked down in embarrassment. He realized she had been the actress that night. “I loved your role as that deathless woman. You must come with me.”

“Perhaps,” she said, blushing.

“We can go by a less travelled route,” he whispered. “Entourage!” Slowly a purple mist gathered over her coffee cup. “In a moment, my horses will appear.”

She waited with slight amusement, not knowing who he was.

At last two white stallions materialized. She studied them with practiced eye. Her hopes lit anew. Was he the White?

“They are small but powerful. Let us mount them and be off.”

She agreed, intrigued.

They rode them east then south along the coast above the vision of mortal eyes.

“Where are we going?”

“I remembered noticing you, first in that field, and then in my dreams, a shining speck of beauty.”

She gave him her hand, and he led her to a ship tied by a single thread to the dock. The stallions ran loose over the sea.

“We will follow them on this ship.” He undid the thread tethering the ship, and it sped to the island castle of the warrior.

“Who are you?”

He bared his soul. “I am a manifestation of the god of flame, the white fire. I will share with you my home.” He stood against the railing of the ship.

In the center of the isle there was a field with steps leading up to the clouds. He lifted her in his arms and ran up the steps, a thousand at a bound.