Creature Street

Twilit Scars

“So what’s your deal?”

I didn’t really understand the question, so I tried to smile. But that kind of hurt my face, so instead I looked at the ground. The thing about long periods of solitude is the profound sense of sluggishness that overcomes you at the point of first contact with another. I’d become used to this sensation. It’s like being a stranger in your own body, which at that particular time, for me, was little more than a battered shell of confused daydreams and malnourished hallucinations.

“How old are you? Where you from? You know, shit like that.”

I looked up and saw the man called Clover staring down at me. His face was a mix of curiosity and slight impatience, but disarming nonetheless. The room was dim, but the dull light of torches shimmered on the walls and floor surrounding us, giving off the distinct impression of water. I heard myself speak.

“I was born in upstate New York, late April of 1851. I do not know the exact date because my birth records were destroyed in the fire that killed my family.”

“And how old are you now?” Clover asked.

“What year is it?” I replied.

“Funny you should ask because that’s a whole story in itself. But one for another time.” He offered me a hand. “First things first, we need to get you some food, some clothes and—Damn—a shower.”

He helped me to my feet and wrapped an arm around me for support. Then we trudged into a pathway of absolute darkness. Once again, the suffocating absence of light began to eat its way into my consciousness, only this time, I felt something different. Exhaustion. We had gone perhaps fifty paces when my eyelids grew heavy and I began to slip, mentally. I thought my legs would shut down, too, when I heard Clover say something about the “indigo light stream.” As if on cue, a sliver of blue produced itself in the colorless air, and whether I saw it with my eyes opened or shut, I could not say. It enveloped us, and the jerking rhythm of our clumsy footsteps ceased. Yet we did not stop moving. Clover sighed, and I remember nothing of our journey after that.

When I came to, I was struck by a blinding, continuous band of white that entirely traversed my line of vision. Vague forms danced beyond the sclerotic mist. Blinking rapidly to let my eyes adjust, I thought of how these recent experiences had taken me to both ends of the color spectrum. The idea emitted a vague sense of closure, despite the obvious fact that I had no idea where I was nor what bizarre forces I was dealing with.

Low humming vibrations evolved into voices, and voices changed to coherent speech. I noticed that I was being addressed.

“Denny.” It was unmistakably a woman’s voice. Scratchy with age, yet soothing in its articulate surety. “How are you feeling?” She asked.

“Very relaxed, in a strange way,” I said, noticing the contours of a round face as they narrowed into focus. “I’m starving.”

Slight laughter, no more than a murmur, was the response. “We can fix that.”

The woman standing before me was outfitted in folded layers of white, like an elegant toga, but with small red jewels in strategic locations. She stood a few feet from where I lay immobile, on a soft bed of down. Her hair was golden, but graying; her face, the image of fading beauty below amber eyes.

“I am Magdalena and we are honored to have you here in this place of refuge. You’ve already met my friend Clover.” She took a step to the side and Clover appeared, dressed in the same charcoal suit, with green cuff links and a smile that said Hello again.

Magdalena pulled up a stool and sat down, ladylike and fluid in her mannerisms. Only then did I notice that she held a crystal chalice gently between the index and middle fingers of her right hand. She sipped from it and smiled.

“I want to tell you some things now, Denny, but only if you think you can handle it. You’ve been through a lot, it seems. But I have many answers for you. Unfortunately, time is short, as always, and much of what I have to say may be difficult for you to accept. Would you like me to proceed?” She had a way of speaking as though she was thinking aloud, and the listener was just fortunate to be able to hear her thoughts. But there was also what seemed a deliberate tutorial manner behind it all.

“Yes,” I said, without much hesitation. She smiled, emotionlessly.

“Our existence is a complex machine, Denny. Like all machines, there are a number of important parts that compose the whole. Some of these parts have obvious, useful functions, while others appear to be mere window dressing, lace on a sleeve, if you will. In some places, the parts are only vestigial remnants of a service no longer needed. Still others are wondrous, tempting and, of course, immensely dangerous.” She paused and stole a glance at Clover, who nodded his head with approval.

“It is through our natural senses and intuitions that we can detect and appreciate the manifold pieces of this great machine. But of all the various components that make up our existence, it is a certainty that we will never come to fully understand them all. Some of us, however, have special gifts that allow a clearer glimpse beyond.” She stopped and took a drink from her chalice, as if for emphasis, then continued. “As you’ve probably guessed, you have such a gift. And today, I will teach you how to use it.”

Trumpets of Providence

After countless hours, I still lay in utter darkness. I tried crawling in every direction and came face to face with jagged rock each time. There was nowhere to go, nowhere to move. My body ached from long periods of inertia. In between daydreaming and moving from my side onto my back, I explored with my hands. I met only dry, cold stone.

My mind moved like electricity at first, calculating and recalculating the moments of the fire and the forces that brought me to that desolate void, and then always, on to the incomparable story of Lorelei. Uncle Lee had gone on to say that, after that night by the lake, Lorelei moved in with his family, though they weren’t crazy about the idea. She seemed closed off for days after her mystical interaction with the demon, and by most accounts, she was just a sad, orphaned child, eager to live a stable existence.

After several months, during which time she rarely spoke, Uncle Lee woke one morning to find that she was gone. All that was left was a scratch of parchment and one of the tattered ribbons she had worn in her hair the first time she arrived in town. In the note she had written three words: “Thank you, Lee.” And that was the last anyone had seen of her. Recollection of Lee’s story brought me to sadness and wonder, and for at least a little while, I was distracted from my own dire needs.

When I had exhausted my mental search for clues, hunger set in. I nervously ground my teeth together, rubbing my stomach and envisioning warm food. The silence was the worst of it. I spoke to myself to break up the quiet spells, but even the sound of my own voice was murky, and its faint, fluctuating echoes frightened me. Complete loneliness and isolation is a torment of the fiercest degree, and as the stale contents of my waterskin gradually diminished, despair became my companion.

Like every other level of my senses, my eyes became accustomed to the oppressive blackness, and the absence of light became a void worthy of imaginative exploration. Though nothing actually appeared in my material vision, my eyes swam through colorful streams, and I became convinced that there was a network of passageways and corridors leading to light and water and possible escape. After some time, I was unable to discern whether my eyes were open or closed, and the feelings of hopelessness gave way to mild dementia.

Looking back now, I recall how my fear of death was overtaken by the will to survive, the empty desire to cling to any dim prospect of salvation. A desperate man’s search for providence, maybe by the grace of his creator, takes precedence over all other wants. Hunger, thirst, fear, sadness, physical pain; they are all secondary distractions. When my waterskin was emptied, I gave in to my clouded delusions, and after the last droplet of water touched my parched tongue, I resolved to follow the imagined passageways of light.

The cusp between life and death is a mystery, for most agree that no coherent man has crossed that precipice and returned to tell the story, without it being laced with fabrication. Those who speak of a great light or memories of their childhoods are likely trauma victims seeking attention. Who of us, then, can truly say what happens on the bridge to the afterworld? Or, I should ask, who is to be believed?

At the time, reason was no ally of mine, and I remember my hallucinations as only swirls of light and short transmissions of the waking world that had, until that point, been the only one I’d ever known. But in hindsight, my journey began the moment I surrendered all concern for my livelihood and decided to follow the tenuous route plotted by these ethereal visions.

I found that the paths of light were easy to follow, and the outcroppings of rock that had been my unyielding captors, seemed to open into shallow grooves, just wide enough to pass through. I trudged through the ghostly caverns, keeping my limited focus to the soft but radiant visual callings of the color spectrum. That slow, subconscious adventure touches little memory in my earthly affectations, but when I reached the other side, my life was changed forever.

I followed the serpentine beams into an opening and stopped to collect myself. All my senses came back in an instant, and I was nearly crippled by this sudden reconciliation. Injured, starving and beyond the brink of exhaustion, I collapsed in the dim chamber and the visions ceased. Torchlight that was no apparition or dream split the haze of the expanse, and my atrophied eyes burned into activation. I pulled my legs to my chest and sat panting, waiting.

“Well, you are no fluke, young buck,” said an excited voice, the first real sound I had heard in probably weeks. “I had my doubts about you, but now, mm hmm, it looks like there might be some celebrating on the horizon.”

What I saw then could not be adequately described by a young man from my era, and it is only with the knowledge and experience I have gained since then that I can describe it now. The speaker was a tall, slender man wearing a finely tailored suit, emerald cufflinks sparkling from his wrists above strong, well-kempt hands. His head was clean-shaven, gleaming in the dim light, and his dark brown skin was smooth and unblemished, the way I imagined angels to look. His eyes were a shade of green that complemented his cufflinks, and his face was sharp featured, handsome. He wore a smile that, given my despair at the time, can only be described as divine.

“My name is Troy Cloverdale, but you can call me Clover.” He approached me and offered a hand. I shook it without thinking. I was still too stunned, and relieved, to speak, so I just sat in a heap and stared at him. He pulled a cigarette from a shiny metallic case and lit it with a the flick of match.

“Well, young buck, you’re probably wondering where the fuck you are, how the fuck you got here and who the fuck I am. And the answers will come in due time, trust that. But for now, there are some things I gotta tell you, just so you won’t freak your shit later on.” This was all gibberish to me, but he spoke with fluid ease and confidence. His posture and movements exuded strength and sincerity, and I liked him immediately.

“I wasn’t sure you were gonna make it here, so count me among the surprised, but just so you know, those lights you followed to get here, they weren’t really there. I mean, they were for you, but not for anyone else. Some folks can use them, and we call them travelers. You’re a traveler, dude. Just like me. It will take some time, but close your eyes and picture them again, you’ll see them, and you’ll need to use them again, too. Cause there ain’t shit down here for either of us. You following me?” He looked at me with mild amusement.

“I think I understand,” I said. “But I don’t…understand.”

“Okay, young buck, things have been rough on you, so we’ll take it slow for now. But listen up, you’ve probably heard here and there in your life that you have some gifts, some special powers or something. That’s all true. That’s why you’re here. To be real with you, I don’t have a clue where you’re from or what it was like there, but judging by your gear, you come from like the 18th century or some time way back. Anyway, you’re here now, and though things will be crazy for you at first, I think you’ll come to realize that where we are going, and what we gotta do is pure bliss, dude. And guess what? I’ll be your escort.”

“Mr. Clover, what about my home — ” Before I could finished he threw a bottle to me. The contents were orange and, though sinister looking, made me salivate. I struggled to figure out how to open the container, but when I finally drank, the taste was euphoric. Sweet and cold and full of vigor. I spilled a third of it on my neck and chest with my ravenous intake. The bottle was empty in four swallows.

“It’s called Gatorade. But please, try not to be so wasteful.” He smiled and helped me to my feet. I wasn’t expecting to move again, but the drink gave me immediate energy, and I found I could stand without assistance. I had a million questions to ask, but I chose to wait while Clover continued his speech.

“Here’s the deal. I gotta take you somewhere to lay low for while, and catch you up to speed on what just happened to you and why. But trust me, it’s gonna be weird, no, damn strange. The place we’re going will be nothing like your world. It’s a world of the future and things have changed considerably since your day. Just don’t panic, and remember to do whatever I say. Follow me and try not to talk to anyone. Also, don’t shit your pants if you see an airplane,” he paused and looked at me with anticipation.

“A what?” I said.

“A flying machine. I’ve seen a dude have a seizure when he saw one for the first time. But that’s another story. So do you think you have enough strength to do this? It’ll take about ten minutes.” He produced a wide-brimmed hat that matched his charcoal suit and placed it on his head, then buttoned up his coat.

“I’ll do my best, Mr. Clover,” I replied.

“Just Clover. Now let’s go. Oh yeah, what’s your name?”

“Denny.”

“Damn. We gonna have to change that shit.”

Beyond the Pale

Uncle Lee took a long draw from his pipe then looked back towards the window. The old man held his breath then unleashed a torrent of thick pipe smoke. He spoke suddenly, life coming into his voice like a rising ember, and it was quite some time before he paused again.

---

Lorelei wandered into town in the summer of 1814, a child of no more than 12. Where she came from or how she got here was anyone’s guess. But she didn’t seem tired or unhappy. At least, no more unhappy than any other kid her age. She just waltzed in wearing a raggedy dress, stitched together with burlap, and no shoes on her feet.She came to rest by the fountain in town square, the fountain you’ve stopped by so many times before, and she sat on a post, looking around with a gaze that belied her youth. It seemed as though Lorelei had seen small towns like this before, and in all likelihood, she had.Her hair was black, the color of a moonless sky, and smooth, unaffected by the journey that had turned the rest of her appearance to that of a wandering peasant girl. A blue ribbon, partially ripped, adorned her head, and it flowed in the afternoon breeze. Her face was no more or less striking than any young girl her age, save her eyes, dark eyes that stared like unblinking coals from her pale face, an animal’s eyes.

Still a young man myself, I had been working across the street, helping my father rebuild a stable wall, when I saw her looking in our direction. I got the attention of my father, the town’s champion lawman, and together we walked into the street to speak to her.

“Are you lost?” my father asked, brawny arms crossed over his chest, badge deliberately protruding.

“I think I saw you in a dream once,” she said.

“Do you know me?” he inquired.

“I can see that you are some kind of sheriff, but I don’t think we’ve met.” She spoke to him as an equal, something many a hood and highwayman were scarce to attempt.

“Young lady, are your mother and father around?”

“I don’t know my parents. I just want some water, if you would be so kind,” she said. Her eyes looked up at us, and I could see years of stories in them. She frightened me, this precocious child, with her fearless looks and quick tongue, and I wanted to turn away and avoid seeing the pain in her face.

“Are you here by yourself?” My father was as incredulous as I, but his sense of obligation was unwavering.

“Just water, that’s all.” She looked away, disinterested in anything more we could offer.

I ran to grab water without looking for approval. Upon my return minutes later, I could see that nothing had changed. She sat, unspeaking, digging her feet in the dirt and occasionally looking around. My father’s questioning had ceased, and he rubbed his chin in thought, perturbed by the child’s mystery and likely cooking up a “stately” solution for this wayward orphan. I handed her the water and asked her name.

“Lorelei,” she said. “Thanks.” With that, she ambled off, ignoring my father’s shouts and demands to return. We shared a glance after a moment passed, and he raised his brows. When we looked back up, she was gone. My father and I said nothing more about it and wrote her off as the daughter of a migrant worker, perhaps a miner, as many indeed traversed our roads in those days.

A week later, Lorelei reappeared, in the same place, around the same time. The day was again beautiful and sunny, and we were once again at work in the center of town, where my father spent most of his time engaged in city business. I went into the street to meet her.

She looked sad, with her head down, scratching her throat. “Hello Lorelei,” I greeted her.

“The season is changing,” she said. “It’s going to get cold soon. And then what will I do?” She looked up at me and our eyes met for an instant. In that brief glance, I saw something flash in the darks of her pupils, an electric blue streak and then a shimmer of gold. Its majesty forced me to look away. “You know, you have a great spirit, one of silence. It’s like you have so much to say, but you just haven’t figured out how to say it yet,” she said in almost a whisper.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Right now, it’s still. Everything is still. And that is a good thing. It won’t be like this forever.” She continued to scratch her throat. I tried to say something just then, but couldn’t find the words. We both just stood in the afternoon sunlight for a few awkward minutes, glancing around. I felt lightheaded and, for a moment, thought I might be in another place. It’s difficult enough to explain being in one place at one time, but the creeping suspicion of being in between two places at once. After all these years, I still can’t understand that feeling, unmistakable though it is. “I’ll see you around Lee,” she said and then trotted away.

The next time I saw her was when I first experienced the power of the alm. It was dusk, and the summer was waning. Cool winds from the north quickened the steps of everyone in town. I had been running around all day, making pickups and drop-offs according to my father’s demand. I decided to close out the afternoon reading a book by a lake outside of town. It was a place of profound solace, and the sunsets over the elms and poplars in the west never failed to tweak my lonely young man’s heart.

I had with me a sack containing all the fruits of the day’s errands, some of the items quite important for reasons I did not know. It also held more than a small sum of money from my father’s purse.

In the fading sunlight, I fell asleep. How long I was out, I do not know, but I was wakened by the vicious cracking of wood to my scalp. Sprawling in the grass, I opened my eyes to see a man wrapped in a surcoat, with a tri-corn hat tilted over his dark face, revealing only a grizzled beard. He held a crooked staff, and stood unmoving, a few feet before me. His coat whipped in the breeze, and he held his offhand in the air, as though ready to strike with it.

“What do you want?” I shrieked, rolling to the side and angling myself to make a run for it. He hit me again with his staff, this time in the neck below my chin, and I saw a flash of purple sparks flare into the night air. I spit some blood.

“It’s reckoned simple, simple boy. Hand over the gunny and be on with ye. Away from me lake, and the cursed ground that’s not for simple boys.” He stretched out a pale sinewy hand and flickered long fingers, grimy nails begging for my sack. I faltered, running my hands frantically in the grass around wear I lay. The bag was nowhere in sight. “Here be trouble, goodly simp. This here’s wizard’s silage, not for ye trespassing simple boys.”

“I don’t have it. I’ve lost it,” I said. He dropped to a crouch and exploded into a blinding pounce, swinging the staff across his body. I had barely time to move, but had I not, the chair in front of you would likely be empty now. The blow caught me on the chest and arm, paralyzing me with white-hot pain, again sending sparks into the air, chasing each other like demon flies, fizzling into nothingness.

“Ye’ve one more chance to hand over me gunny rightful, or beyond the pale ye go. Yer brood here before ye is watchful. These here eyes have seen more’n worms, simp. There be darker serpents within the wizard’s gash, waiting for freshness, skin and blood of wee boys and girls. Yer brood here doing one last favor as ye please. Me next hew will cleave yer thick simple skull, boy.” He bobbed up and down slowly, poised to provide what I can only guess as the end of the line for me. Then something unexpected happened.

Fine white streams of light curled down from the limbs of an overhanging tree. The old man saw them and pulled his staff to him in guarded anticipation. He steepled his hands in the center of the staff and looked upwards. I caught a glance of his bearded visage and nearly screamed when I saw that he had no face above his vacant, lipless hole of a mouth. A voice from behind me spoke up.

“Leave him be, spawnling of black. Find your way back through your hole, away from our peaceful ways.” It was the voice of a girl.

“What trespass, what folly. Ye’ve stumbled upon death, simple child.” His voice betrayed fear.

Lorelei appeared behind me, filthy and tattered as always. Her eyes gleamed in the darkness, and the curve of a smile awakened on her small face. “I will not warn you again. Take your maggots’ bones away from us. There are those who are not afraid of your kind, you know.” She glowed, her voice a thin wave of innocence and hope, as she scratched her throat.

“Languoring sleepwalker, ye. Yer brood here deals in deaths deeper than holy rot.” He spat the words and leapt at her, his body contorting into a fluid shadow, his staff blazing violet. It all happened very fast, but what I remember is the old man’s form going limp in mid-air. Lorelei laughed, a full laugh that rang across the sky. Clutching her throat, her mouth opened into light. From it a burst of pure flame lit the air, it’s curls forming spiraling hands, dancing to the notes of her laughter. They grasped and smothered the dark, suspended figure, wrangling the life out of it as they stopped and then reanimated. Hacking screams and the slosh of mucous came forth from the writhing creature, as he diminished into a minute flicker that shot into the sky. The whole struggle lasted less than ten seconds. Then all was quiet.

Lorelei fell to her knees and began to recite something to herself, softly. It sounded like a prayer, but I couldn’t make out the words. I was hurting and exhausted, shocked and confused. Lorelei ceased her prayer and collapsed in a heap, looking more like a 12-year-old than I had previously seen. I tried to stand up and noticed something odd. Lying on my lap was my father’s sack.

I went to Lorelei’s crippled form and took her hand. “Come with me. We have an extra bed. You need to rest.” With that, she rose and we walked home together in silence.

Through the Vacuum

The night I heard the story of Lorelei was long, as long as any I remember. Lying in bed, I kept thinking of the possible implications of Lorelei’s story on my own questions. Her mystery haunted me with its similarities to my life and its profound foreboding. It tortured me for hours as I stared at the ceiling, sleepless, imagining that my brother was asleep in the room next to mine, down the hall from my mother and father. All of us at peace for the night. Only the truth was that I was not at peace at all, and they were gone, eternally.

Uncle Lee proved an artful storyteller, full of details and rich description. His intelligence was impressive, and deceiving for an old codger in a one-horse town. He took my mind and my imagination for the length of the tale, and I didn’t speak for a while after the story. I just sat, foggy-eyed and thinking, gazing through the tobacco smoke that wafted from his pipe.

After an amount of time for which I cannot account, Uncle Lee stood and asked me if I would like to return the next day for another conversation. He said there was something else he wanted to say about the alm, but he did not elaborate. I returned home in a chilling October drizzle, tipped with the frosts of a fast approaching winter. It would be a long time before I had that second conversation with Uncle Lee, or at least, a long time in this world.

As I lay, cold sweat moistening my back and chest, the night around me grew quiet, and all I could hear was my unsteady breathing. Then I felt it, discomforting but familiar. The thrumming vibration, distinct from any other sensation. I pulled up the covers and saw the faint glow. My feet were whirring, ankles blurred and tickling. Suddenly, a piercing wail held sway over everything. The sound exploded into my quarters, seeming to shake the dust from the wall corners. A siren. My unfeeling call to duty.

I leapt from the bed without a second thought, throwing on my clothes and racing down the hall, stopping a half second to grab my gear. By the time I reached the street, two other firemen were haphazardly throwing on their hardhats and strapping up their suit suspenders. I saw another man in the tower, winding the siren and furiously pulling the bell toll. We hitched the horses and tore off into the night, following the smoke that rose in the air over the crosshatched rooftops and chimneys of the northern hamlet that was my home.

Townhall. The large auditorium that, by day, housed municipal authority and historical records, and at night, more than its share of drunks, gamblers and corrupt policymakers. The building was ablaze and dozens of villagers gathered in the street, pointing, crying, shrieking. We hooked up the rig to the townhall’s ample well and began to pump water on the unsympathetic blaze.

It was clear to me that this fire would not be quenched, so I began giving instructions to any who would listen that we needed to do our best to fireproof the surrounding buildings. Most looked at me with horror and confusion, but several men sprung into action, moving carts and pulling curtains from windows. We aimed the water at these buildings, intending only to keep the blaze from spreading. It was a difficult decision for these simple men and women to accept, but the townhall was a lost cause.

Then a women, her face ash-covered and tear-streaked, came crying and pulling on my shirtsleeves. “Help!” she wailed. “Mayor Freeman is still inside, with Mr. Gruniger. The card games were on tonight. Help them please!” She was shaking. Others turned their glances to me, and more cried out. They turned their collective hopes over to me. They believed I could save the men trapped inside. Me and only me.

I took a deep breath and buttoned up my coat, pulling my leather necking over my chin. Grabbing two waterskins, I sprinted into the inferno, not stopping to fear my oldest foe. In the foyer, my nostril hairs were singed with the first breath I took in. Smoke curled around everything, and the books and furniture of the large room raged with heat and hatred. Everything teetered and fell. Gusts of flame shot across the room in flowing, rapid bursts. I ducked and rolled, jumped and parried, moving through the front room like a crazy man, beset by an invisible attacker whose punches disappeared into crackling explosion. I recall being struck by the notion that my entrance into this fiery maelstrom was a one-way ticket.

I kicked down a crumbling door and jumped aside as another fireball hurled over my head. I could feel my perspiration boiling and my ears pounded with pressure and pain. After moving through a dark hall, walls melting, I made it into the main rotunda for the last moments of the town’s great gathering place. It was disturbing. Smoky blackness, flames green with the tarnish from the consumed rows of wooden benches. A cross fizzled in the center of the wall. No one could have survived that room for more than a minute, so I figured that any survivors must have headed for higher ground. Then I noticed steps in the back, behind the podium.

My feet began to sing, erupting with intensity, and I answered their call with a frantic dash to the other side of the room. I heard the ceiling collapse behind me, but I wasted no effort looking back. My speed was blinding even to me, and before I understood where I was, I had made it to the top of the stone stairwell, feeling the rising swarm of hot air pushing on the door at the peak.

The next minute was, as I see it now, understandably hazy, and most of my actions were completely adrenaline fueled and frenzied. I opened the door and was instantly engulfed by a flame, which I put out with a waterskin in just enough time to save my face from burning destruction. The building was beginning to fall down around me, and the sounds of splintering wood and tumbling rubble were mind numbing. It was then that I began to fear this fire, fearing it like the blaze of my stolen innocence. It was the one power that always conquered my spirit, no matter how strong I forced myself to be.

I heard a desperate cry and saw the mayor and another man standing in the corner, trying to hold their heads through the remaining portion of a searing window pane. Had I heard it a second later, I may have taken a knee, given in to the conquering heat. But I knew my task, my reason for being in this madness. Without thought, I flew across the room, not bothering to avoid the flaming obstacles in my path. I dove at the men, wrapping my arms around them both and pushing us out the window. Flames followed us into the night, and we catapulted into darkness, chips of wood and glass stinging our faces as we fell.

My intentions, to the best of my memory, had been to roll over in the descent and land on my back, buttressing their fall. But jumping out of buildings from thirty feet in the air, I have learned, is a dirty business, and ill-thought plans have a way of failing under such circumstances.

As we tumbled out, the coolness of the wind offered a brief instant of relief from the heat. Then my body stopped obeying me. My hands slipped and I lost hold of both men, seeing only their flailing arms and terrified faces gaze up at me, as I stopped in mid air, and they continued to drop. I was pulled backwards, back into the arms of the fire. I heard the bodies of the two men land, with a thump. Then heat and a crimson flare surrounded me.

Though back in the building, I still felt airborne. And I gave up fighting the force that carried me. I was spun in a circle and rotated, over and over, as the crash and burn of the building screamed all around. And the black flame returned. It crept slowly into the room, taking the same places, inch by inch, of the original fire. I was beginning to choke on its fetid stench, ripe with death and scorched bones, when my vision went black.

I felt an earthy floor beneath me. It was soft and wet. The air was clean and I turned onto my back and breathed. There was no fire. There was no light.

I didn’t move from that prone position, staring into limitless nothing, for what may have been hours. I tried to rest, but sleep never took me. I began to think about what once was, and I convinced myself that this was my grim destiny, one of dark loneliness. Only the presence of my waterskin, still tucked under my arm, gave me hopeful reminder of the chaos from which I had recently escaped. So I lay and waited. Sipping occasionally, I meditated and reached back for answers. The hours turned into days, and I began to hallucinate. Through this slow torment, my mind kept going back to the same place, again and again. I could only think of her name and her story. I could only think about Lorelei.

Alms for the Poor

“There are many realities,” the old man said. “There is this one. The one you wake up to each morning, where birds sing and people brew coffee. The water is blue and reflects sunshine onto the land around it, revealing a crystallized beauty like that of an artist’s masterwork. We smile at this and feel contentment and peace in our guts. We hear the laughter of children and the purring of kittens. Everything is safe and worth keeping safe.”

He took a swig from his flask and continued. “Most people are fortunate. It is a great fortune, after all, to live and breathe clean air, to feel ease in our hearts. This is the world where you and I, and my little flagon of sweet jesus juice, sit now. But there is more, as you know, or else you wouldn’t be sitting here. There are secrets, Denny, many secrets.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “You speak as if it is all a lie. Our lives, a lie.”

He laughed and shook his head. His manner wasn’t offensive, just an expression of the comfort of age, experience. He got out of his chair and walked to the window, taking a deep breath in the sunlight, folding his arms across his chest.

After years of traveling, city to city, scant possessions to my name, aside from tragic memories and unconsecrated desires, I returned to the town of my birth. The gravesite of my family. I was 23 and working at the firehouse when I met Uncle Lee, as he was known to everyone, the oldest living man in town. For what may have been ages, he served as the centerpiece of the town gentry, the old guard. Though most of the locals sought his counsel at one time or another, few knew much about him, save for his all-embracing knowledge of obscure tricks and treatments for provincial maladies and his general peacemaking advice.

An outsider in my own hometown, I took to spending late nights by myself in the town square, staring at the placid fountain that was our greatest monument. One evening, time lost in my absent pondering, I looked up from the water and saw him standing next to me, gazing at the water as though he, too, was seeing what I saw, my demons, my confusion. Neither of us said a word, and after several minutes, he paced off down a sidestreet, tapping the cobblestone street with his walking stick.

A month went by, and I continued my lonely vigil, waiting for nothing, waiting for everything. He returned, and again there were no words, only a mutual solemnity and respect for the night’s peaceful grace. He left, not even acknowledging my presence. After many days and a dozen fires extinguished, I’d tallied at six the number of times Uncle Lee appeared. On the seventh, a misty night in early autumn, he spoke to me.

I had been in town nearly a year, and was contemplating another retreat to the familiarity of the road, when I noticed him standing beside me, leaning on his walking stick, smiling. The moon crept through the fog and brightened the street.

“I wasn’t convinced until tonight, but you have the alm,” he said, looking back to the bubbling fountain.

“I’m sorry I don’t understand,” I said. He turned back to me.

“The alm is a gift, or a curse, depending on your perspective. It’s very rare. In fact I’ve only seen it in someone once. Rare indeed.” He shifted his weight and adjusted his coat. “You see, son, people live at the behest and mercy of the elements, and not the other way around. But you, whether you realize it or not, hold some sway over the natural world, or at least, there is a connection there. Subtle, but true.”

I again voiced my confusion. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Hmm, how can I explain,” he said. “I have seen you sit here, countless nights, quiet as sod, looking into the fountain, delving into what nightmares I can only guess about. On every single occasion, there have been amazing changes in the sky and the air around you. You wouldn’t have noticed, as wrapped in thoughtful oblivion as you were, but the very wind changes directions around you. The clouds move, the sky clears up, and at the times when you looked most troubled, the thunder rolls in and the rains begin to fall. Ask yourself, have you ever awakened from a reverie and noticed that you were sitting here by yourself soaked to the bone from a summer storm?” As a matter of fact, I had, and the realization was frightening.

“That alone was enough to sway me and break my skepticism,” he continued. “But it’s not the extent of it. When I spoke to the constable and began to hear the street gossip about what you’ve done as a fireman, I knew that you had it. In all my years living in this town, I have never seen someone so successful at battling the natural pestilence of fire. You, my friend, are singularly responsible for putting out more than twenty fires. And yet, when I look at you now, I can tell you have no idea the significance of those feats, nor the awe with which your neighbors view your.”

His words, bold and articulate, made a backwards kind of sense. I’d been a ghost in this town, ever since my return, maybe ever since the inferno that usurped my childhood. I was, to say the least, captivated. “Now that I think about it, I guess there is a strangeness to my life here, like there’s an invisible wall that prevents me from living like everyone else.”

“It’s the alm,” he said. “You have the alm.”

“I still don’t know what that means. Can you tell me more?”

He smiled again, flashing the teeth of a pageant queen. “I’m Uncle Lee. Come see me this week and we’ll have a drink and a talk.”

“I’m Denny,” I said, but he was already walking away, tapping his cane at the stony gutter as he went.

A few days later, I found myself in Uncle Lee’s study, books piled high around us, the room dense with rustic charm and the smell of pipe smoke, cherry flavored. Our earlier conversation had roused in me desires, curiosity and renewed fervor for answers to what had been until then, by the simplest explanations, a lifetime of mystery.

Uncle Lee stole another gulp from his flask and turned from the window to face me. “I don’t pretend to know all the answers, Denny, but what I can tell you starts with a girl named Lorelei.”

“Lorelei?” I asked.

“Remember when I told you I’d seen one other person with the alm? Well, that’s as good a place as any to spin a yarn.” He returned to his rocking chair and sat, his elderly bones creaking with the endeavor. I stared back at him with anticipation.

Dawn of the Black Flame

I was once like you, a man, sensing, feeling and fearing. My heart was full of guilt at the everyday indignities of which men are capable, but I was idealistic and convinced that life had a purpose greater than the sum of foraging, sleeping and respecting my elders.

My neighborhood as a child was small and easygoing. People smiled and winked at each other on the street, neighbors and friends, kin and comrades. Most problems were settled in town hall meetings, the old guard, all of them mustachioed and oiled with drink, would drown out quarrels with simple propositions, mules for grains. After the women and children retired for the evening, those nights would end, more often than not, with outrageous card games and empty boasts of female conquests.

I worked as a fireman, a vocation stemmed from the broken heart I’d suffered as a little boy, orphaned and abandoned when my family burned to death in the town’s legendary three-day fire, a black eye on our collective history. I’d been sleeping that night, across the room from my brother, rest him, and could only remember running through red, blinding light and fierce heat. I can still feel the sweat coating my body, even today, soaking my lips and softening my face. I ran through the anguished screams of my parents, turning and twisting away from debris and dirt and dust and smoke. I’d landed in a patch of garbage, unsure of how I made it out, but coughing and streaked with char. My lungs hurt for weeks after, as I sat speechless in the town square, watching an unremarkable fountain bubble, wishing I could have had that water at my disposal when it mattered most.

My accident left me with many scars, emotional and physical, but two marks took precedence above all else. The first was a deep-seated respect, or more aptly fear, for fire. Every thought in my mind managed to whittle itself into a reflection on fire, the sizes and shapes of flames and the awesome power to burn and blot out life with heat. I became somewhat of a pyromaniac in my adolescence, refusing to back down from what I saw as my arch nemesis, the taker of innocence. This bizarre obsession with fire fueled my professional decisions, with the added catechisms of altruism and the desire to prevent tragedy from befalling other families lending extra motivation.

The second factor, and by far the most important in the story of how I came to be what I am, was the set of matching burns I received around my ankles. On the night of the blaze, I wore pant length pajamas, and though I know not how, I managed to throw on my slippers before my mysterious, frenzied extrication from the house. Aside from face and hands, my ankles were the only exposed portion of my body that night, and as the floor beneath my feet smoldered and seethed into unstoppable intensity, my slippers melted away and the balls of my ankles were ringed with congruent puffy scars. Though the pain was excruciating, the freak blisters left me with unimaginable gifts.

As the skin around my ankles healed, the muscles tightened and my feet became preternaturally strong. Before long, my running and jumping prowess was unrivaled among the other miserable orphans and hinterland street kids I knew. I used it to my advantage in making first impressions over the years, as I my life involved constant displacement from town to town and orphanage to orphanage. I was wise enough to keep this ability under wraps from authority figures, however, as my greatest worry was bringing too much attention to myself, a lesson learned easily in a childhood where abuse often disguised itself as care.

Being fleet was handy, and a source of pride, but my scars hid the secret of another, more formidable quality. Many years passed before I discovered it, and many more before I learned what it was. But one late afternoon while I was sweeping the carpentry shop where I apprenticed, my feet began to pulsate and shake. They made no sound, and they didn’t hurt, but there was a clear sensation, a rhythm beneath my soles. I pulled up my pant leg and saw that the feeling was no imagination, the scars glowed, and I felt a pull towards the shopfront.

I ran outside and stood in the street, feeling the cool night air. The wind hissed, but nothing else moved. My surroundings suspended and time stopped. It was still early evening and the street should have been bustling with activity by then, but all my eyes and ears received were silence and suffocating blackness. The smell of mold became strong, and the stores and building facades looked slippery, viscous. Trees were withered, paved walkways dilapidated and cracked. The town seemed just an echo of a rotted civilization. My own clothes felt tattered, and weakness overwhelmed my senses. I stood alone, afraid and exhausted, with only the pulsing of my injured ankles reminding me of my own presence.

Then I heard breathing from behind me. Hoarse, gruff breathing, like that of a rabid beast. The sound permeated everything, and the street grew darker, and hotter. I turned and saw an immense shadow, growing and blanketing me in the empty roadway. My instinct was to run, but my legs offered no response to any mental urging. I was confined to one position, and I felt my mind rise above my body until suddenly I could look down from above and see myself in the street, frozen in a shocked cower. What bore down on my figure was a dark mass, flanked with reaching, foggy tendrils. A single blue light pierced its silhouette from the center and stared at my crumpled form like a spotlight. The heat was staggering. Powerless, I tried to scream, but again, nothing. I watched in stark horror as a dark inferno overtook the body that was, only minutes before, my own, and then deep, reverberant laughter reigned over my thoughts, branding a black flame on my vision. Then everything was nothing.

I regained consciousness a few hours later, though it seemed like days, and found myself lying on the shop floor next to pile of filth and refuse that I had swept into a heap. I learned the next day that, while I slept on the floor, a lightning storm had savaged the town, destroying many homes and businesses and taking with it several dozen lives. The townspeople remarked in whispers about the oddity of the carpentry store being the only building on its street block that was utterly untouched by the storm’s calamitous reach. I felt ashamed.

A small black film began to grow on my scars that day, and it has since never left, despite rigorous washings. It wasn’t much longer before I found out why.

The Faerie Demon’s Hunger

Blinking, blinking, back again to conscious, I stared at the huge cut on my palm. Dried blood, sore as hell. Rubber marks lined my forearms. I’d suffered severe burns on my chest. Along with the pain, somewhere beneath the surface, a well of pride simmered, waiting for an explosive debut.

I craned my aching neck to observe my prone, slightly bent body. Limp and dirty, I lay in a parking lot next to a shattered bottle of Olde English and a severed, violet-tinted foot. Its blood pooled inches from my head, sticky and coagulated, yet still exerting a healthy shimmer. One of the clawed toes, had a ring on it, jewel encrusted, tacky. I pulled it off and slipped it into my cloak, then swallowed dryness and began to pick myself up.

I’d traveled countless thousands of miles, through shiny corridors lined with innocent souls, piling upon one another, walking to the next destination, unaware of what lurked among them. I’d seen both sides, the hearty, naïve peaceniks with their round faces and ample baby fat, as well as the disciplined killers who always thirsted, who moved like secrets between adulterers, spiderlike and sinuous.

Outnumbered by the hundreds, the predatory class dealt in shadow and stealth, using patience and cunning to run up stores of fresh meat. Their feeding had been a force of nature for eons, routine and powerful, much like rain or wind on this planet, in this time. Hiding even from each other at times, they preyed and preyed beyond conventional bounds of tolerance, thieves casing a mark, until finally, they would unveil themselves, consuming masses of wholesome upright innocents.

Integral to their Fortean ways was the ability to transfer between and among multiple planes, slipping into dimensions like light through a door crease. The scenery changed, but the tubes of time flowed always in one direction and their hunger was always directed at the same target, the spirit of ignorance. A fresh, vibrant spirit, a childlike temptation and life giver to a demon bent on human entropy.

Walking away from the spot where I’d awakened, I noticed that the area was (not surprisingly) silent and vacant, streaks of ash tattooing empty concrete. Another fight resulting in collateral damage. But I’d won yet again, creeping a step closer to the completion of my one and only mission. This time I had gleaned something from the dead discoloring lieutenant. I had gained ground. As the creature’s soul digested, a smile crossed my lips. I was confident. A reckoning between serpent and cattle was nearing, and my own hunger was reaching impossible bounds.

Leaving the ground and looking down on the frayed city block, I found it difficult to control my delight.