Roger Zelazny - Jack Of Shadows

"Your consent."

Jack smiled. He lit a cigarette, his hands ? trembling slightly.

"What if I were to withhold my consent?" he asked.

"Then I would become a wanderer. I would follow you at a distance, unable to comfort you and caution you, unable-"

"Great," said Jack. "I withhold my consent. Get out of here."

"Are you joking? That's a hell of a way to treat a soul. Here I am, waiting to comfort and caution you, and you kick me out. What will people say? There goes Jack's soul,' they'll say, 'poor thing. Consorting with elementals and lower astrals and-' "

"Clear out," Jack said. "I can do without you. I know all about you sneaky bastards. You make people change. Well, I don't want to change. I'm happy the way I am. You're a mistake. Go back to the Dung Pits. Go wherever you want. Do whatever you want. Just go away. Leave me alone."

"You really mean it."

"That's right. I'll even get you a pretty new crystal, if you would prefer curling up inside one of those."

"It is too late for that."

"Well, that is the best I can offer."

"If you do not wish to be united with me, please do not throw me out like a vagabond. Let me stay here with you. Perhaps I can comfort and caution and counsel this way, and then you might see my value and change your mind."

"Get out!"

"What if I refuse to go? What if I simply force my attentions upon you?"

"Then," said Jack, "I would expose you to the most destructive powers of the Key, sections I've never essayed before."

"You would destroy your own soul?"

"You're damned right! Go away!"

It turned then toward the wall and vanished.

"So much for souls," said Jack. "Now we'll find you a chamber and some servants, and we'll see a feast prepared."

"No," she said. "I wanted to see you. Very well, I've seen you. I wanted to bring you a thing, and I've delivered it. That is all."

She began to rise.

"Wait," said Jack. "Where will you go?"

"My time as the Wise Woman of the Eastern Marches having passed, I am returning to the Sign of the Burning Pestle on the coach road by the sea. Mayhap I will find some young tavern wench to nurse me when I grow feeble. I'll teach her of the Art in return for this. "

"Stay awhile, at least," he said. "Rest, eat..."

"No. I do not like this place."

"If you are determined to go, allow me to send you by an easier means than walking."

"No. Thank you."

"May I give you money? "

"I would be robbed of it."

"I will send an escort."

"I wish to travel alone. "

"Very well, Rosalie."

He watched her depart and then moved to the hearth, where he kindled a small fire.

Jack worked on his Assessment, becoming an increasingly prominent figure in it, and he consolidated his rule of the night. During this time, he saw countless statues of himself raised in the land. He heard his name on the lips of ballad singers and poets-not in the old rhymes and songs of his roguery, but in tellings of his wisdom and his might. On four occasions did he allow the Lord of Bats, Smage, Quazer, the Baron and Blite to return partway from Glyve, before he sent them back again, each time in a different fashion. He had decided to exhaust their allotted lives and so be rid of them forever.

Evene danced and laughted at the feast Jack gave in honor of her father's return. Wrists still a-tingle, he raised in toast a wine from the cellar that had once been his.

"To the Lord and Lady of Shadow Guard," he said. "May their happiness and their reign endure as long as there is night to cover us! "

Then the Colonel Who Had Never Been Slain By Another quaffed it, and there was merriment.

High on Panicus, a part of Panicus, Morningstar regarded the east.

A soul wandered the night, cursing.

A fat dragon wheezed as he bore a sheep toward his distant den.

A beast in a twilit swamp dreamed of blood.

THEN CAME THE time of the true breaking of the Compact.

It grew cold, and he consulted the Book. He found the names of those whose turn had come. He waited and watched, but nothing occurred.

Finally, he summoned those dark Lords before him.

"Friends," he said, "it is yor turn for Shield duty. Why have you not done it?"

"Sir," said the Lord Eldridge, "we agreed refuse it."

"Why?"

"You broke it yourself," he said. "If cannot have the world the way that it was, would like it to remain the way that it is. That is to say, on the pathway to destruction. Slay us if you wish, but we will not lift a hand. If you are such a mighty magician, repair the Shield yourself. Slay us, and watch the dying."

"You heard his request," Jack said to a servant. "See that they are slain."

"But sir-"

"Do as I say."

"Yes."

"I will attend to the Shield myself."

So they were taken and slain.

And Jack went forth.

On the top of a nearby mountain, he considered the problem. He felt the cold; he opened his being; he found the flaws in the Shield.

Then he began sketching the diagrams. With the point of his blade, he scratched them on a rock. They smoldered as he did so and then began to glow. He recited words from the Key.

"Uh-hello."

He whirled, raising the blade.

"It's just me."

He lowered it, and gusts of icy wind went by.

"What do you want, soul?"

"I was curious as to what you were doing. I sometimes follow you around, you know."

"I know. I don't like it."

He returned his attention to the diagram.

"Will you tell me?"

"All right," he said, "if it will keep you from whining around-"

"I'm a lost soul. We do whine."

"Then do it all you want. I don't care."

"But the thing you are doing ..."

"I am about to repair the Shield. I think I have the spells worked out."

"I do not believe that you can."

"What do you mean?"

"I do not think it can be done by a single individual."

"Well, let's find out."

"May I help?"

"No!"

He returned to the pattern, elaborated upon it with his sword blade and continued his incantations. The winds went by and the fires flowed.

"Now I have to go," he said. "Stay out of my way, soul."

"All right. I just want to be united with you."

"Maybe sometime when life gets boring-but not now."

"You mean that there is hope?"

"Perhaps. Not at the present time, however."

Then Jack stood upright and regarded what he had done.

"Didn't work, did it?"

"Shut up."

"You failed."

"Shut up."

"Do you want to be united with me?"

"No!"

"Maybe I could have helped you."

"Try it in hell."

"Just asking."

"Leave me alone."

"What will you do now?"

"Go away!"

He raised his hands and buried the power. It failed.

"I can't do it," he said.

"I knew that. Do you know what to do now?"

"I'm thinking."

"I know what to do."

"What?"

"Go check with your friend Morningstar. He knows lots of things. I believe he could advise you."

Jack lowered his head and stared at the smoldering pattern. The wind was chill.

"Perhaps you are right," he said.

"I feel certain that I am."

Jack swirled his cloak about him.

"I go now to walk in shadows," he said.

And Jack walked among shadows until he came to the place. Then he climbed.

When he reached the summit, he moved toward Morningstar and said, "I am here."

"I know."

"You also know what I desire?"

"Yes."

"Can it be accomplished?"

"It is not impossible."

"What must I do?"

"It will not be easy."

"I did not feel it would be. Tell me."

Morningstar shifted his great bulk slightly.

And then he told him.

"I don't know that I can do it," Jack said.

"Someone must."