Roger Zelazny - Jack Of Shadows

"Of course."

"Why?"

"To be aware of what transpires along it."

"That is all?" Jack snorted. "If that object is truly above Twilight, then it will be subject to magic as well as to its own laws. A strong enough spell will affect it. One day, I will knock it down."

"Why?" asked Morningstar.

"To show that my magic is superior to their science-for one day it will be."

"It would seem unhealthy for either to gain supremacy."

"Not if you are on the side that obtains it."

"Yet you would use their methods to enhance your own effectiveness."

"I will employ anything that serves my ends."

"I am curious as to what the result will be, ultimately."

Jack moved to the eastern edge of the pinnacle, swung himself over it, found a foothold, and looked upward.

"Well, I cannot wait here with you for the sun to rise. I must go chase it down. Good-bye, Morningstar."

"Good morning, Jack."

Like a peddler, sack upon his shoulder, he trudged toward the light. He moved through the smashed city of Deadfoot, not even glancing at the vine-webbed shrines of the useless gods, its most noted tourist attraction. Their altars never bore offerings worth stealing. Wrapping a scarf tightly about his head, he hurried up the famous Avenue of the Singing Statues. Each of these, noted individualists in life, commenced his own song at the sound of a footstep. Finally, after running (for it was a long thoroughfare), he emerged with temporary deafness, shortness of breath and a headache.

Lowering his fist, he halted in the middle of a curse, at a loss for words. He could think of no calamity to call down upon the deserted ruin which had not already been visited upon it.

When I rule, things will be different, he decided. Cities will not be planned so chaotically that they come to this.

Rule?

The thought had come unbidden into his head.

Well, why not? he asked himself. If I can obtain the power I seek, why not use it for everything that is desirable? After I have obtained my vengeance, I will have to come to terms with all those who are against me now. It might as well be as a conqueror. I am the only one who needs no fixed place of power. I shall be able to defeat the others on their own grounds once I hold the Key That Was Lost, Kolwynia. This thought must have been with me all along. I will reward Rosalie for having suggested the means.-And I must add to my list. After I have had my revenge upon the Lord of Bats, Benoni, Smage, Quazer and Blite, I will deal with the Baron and see that the Colonel Who Never Died has cause to change his name.

It amused him that, among others, he bore within his sack those very manuscripts which had aroused the Bat Lord's anger. For a time, he had actually considered the notion of offering to barter them for his freedom. The only reason he had not was the realization that the other would either accept and fail to release him, or- what would be worse-would keep the bargain. The necessity of returning stolen goods would be the greatest loss of face he had ever suffered. And this could only be expunged by doing what he was now doing: pursuing the power that would grant him satisfaction. Without the manuscripts, of course, this would be more difficult, and...

His head swam. He had been right, he decided, when he had spoken with Morningstar. Consciousness, like the noise of the double-hundred statues of Deadfoot, was a thing of discord and contradiction, giving rise to headaches.

Far to his right, the daysiders' satellite came into view once more. The world brightened as

he moved forward. Smudges in distant fields, he saw the first beginnings of green ahead. The clouds burned more brightly in the east. The first bird song he had heard in ages reached his ears, and when he sought out the singer on its bough, he saw bright plumage.

A good omen, he decided later, to be met with song.

He stamped out his fire and covered it over, along with the bones and the feathers, before he continued toward day.

HE HAD FELT the beginnings of its slow approach at some point near to the middle of the semester. How, he was not certain. In this place, he seemed limited to the same sensory channels as his fellows. Still, groping, turning, hiding, correcting its passage, coming on again, it sought him. He knew that. As to its nature, he had no inkling. Recently, though, at times such as this, he felt that it was drawing near.

He had walked the eight blocks from the campus to The Dugout, passing high buildings with windows like slots in punch cards, moving along thoroughfares where, despite the passage of years, the exhaust from the traffic still came noxious to his nostrils. Turning, he had made his way up streets where beer cans rolled on the sidewalks and garbage spilled from the spaces between buildings. Passive-faced people, by windows, on stairs, in doorways, watched him as he walked. A passenger liner shattered the air high above him; from farther yet, the ever-unmoving sun sought to nail him, shadowless, to the hot pavement. Children at play about an opened fire hydrant had paused at their games to watch him as he went by. Then there had come the false promise of a breeze, the gurgling of the water, the hoarse complaint of a bird beneath some eaves. He had tossed his cigarette into the gutter and seen it swept on past him. All this light and I have no shadow, he thought. Strange how nobody's ever noticed. Where, precisely, did I leave it?

In places where lights were dim there was a change. It seemed to him that a certain quality either came into or departed the world. It was in .the nature of an underlying sense of interconnectedness, which was not present in day's full glare. With it came small feelings and some impressions. It was as if, despite his deafness to them, the shadows still attempted to address him. It was in this way that he knew, upon entering the dark bar, that that which had been seeking him was now drawing near.

The heat of perpetual day dropped away as he moved to the rear of The Dugout. Touched here and there with auburn highlights, he saw her dark hair in the rosy glow of candle-light through glass. Threading his way among tables, he felt relaxed for the first time since he had left his class.

He slid into the booth across from her and smiled.

"Hi, Clare."

She stared, her dark eyes widening.

"John! You always do that," she said. "Suddenly you're just-there."

He continued to smile, studying her slightly heavy features, pinch marks where her glasses had been, a small puffiness beneath her eyes, some stray strands of hair reaching for her brow.

"Like a salesman," he said. "Here comes the waiter."

"Beer."

"Beer."

They both sighed, leaned back, and stared at one another.

Finally, she laughed.

"What a year!" she announced. "Am I glad this semester's over!"

He nodded.

"Largest graduating class yet."

"And the overdue books we'll never see..."

"Talk to someone in the front office," he said. "Give them a list of names-"

"The graduates will ignore billings."

"Someday they'll want transcripts. When they ask, hit them with notices that they won't be sent until they pay their fines."

She leaned forward.

"That's a good idea!"

"Of course. They'll cough up if it means a job to them."

"You missed your calling when you went into anthropology. You should have been an administrator."

"I was where I wanted to be."

"Why do you speak in the past tense?" she asked.

"I don't know."

"What's happened?"

"Nothing, really."

But the feeling was there. It was near.

"Your contract," she said. "Was there some sort of trouble?"

"No," he said. "No trouble."

The drinks arrived. He raised his and sipped it. Beneath the table, his leg brushed against hers as he crossed them. She did not move away; but then, she never did. From me or anyone else, thought Jack. A good lay, but too eager to get married. She's been impatient with me all semester. Any day now...