Tuesday, March 31, 1998
Tommy turned off the TV, frowning as he crossed the motel room to look out the window at the highway. He thought, Is this how it all ends?
The national news had been sending out confusing reports over the last few days. Peeled bodies were turning up all over the state of Texas, and the pattern of deaths had spread, accelerating at a frightening rate. Predictions were made on when the problem would spread to other states, and rumors about what caused the deaths were plentiful.
Tommy put stock in nothing he heard, but nothing in his experience was capable of the gruesome violence that was becoming more common. Tommy wanted to believe that the human religious cults had gotten carried away, but the bodies being peeled so completely seemed extreme even for the devoted witch hunters.
He thought of Matilda and Kevin, alone at home while Tommy stayed with Jenny in a motel room in Duncan Arizona, waiting for one of Jenny’s acquaintances to arrive.
He wanted to cast a spell to complete healing her, but she refused his help. She wanted to suffer for the time being, and she did during their road trip from Texas to Arizona.
It was an act of atonement for tricking Roland into believing that she was dying. She was hurt bad, but the effect of the spell had healed a lot of the internal damage, pulling her back from the brink of death.
But while she suffered, so did Tommy. He didn’t want to, but he owed Jenny so much by then.
Roland had been good to his word, and fifteen million dollars had been transferred to Tommy’s offshore accounts. Matilda would be set for the rest of her life, and Tommy could heal her, thanks to the bardic magic Jenny had passed on to him. With Matilda taken care of, the rest of the family could begin to think about making investments for themselves, for once.
Tommy would be able to work on his own retirement fund with small, single person con jobs, and his aunt and uncle could team up to work their own favorite car flipping routines.
Tommy thought of Henry working in Canada by himself while Diana continued the hunt for Jasmine in Goodnight. Jasmine was doing a great job of avoiding all her favorite haunts. Either that, or she’d come up with new disguises that Diana didn’t recognize.
It didn’t really matter. Jasmine was probably shacking up with another of her call-girl friends. She didn’t want to be found, and she’d had enough of family life after she was dismissed by both Jenny and Marcus.
Jenny woke up to hear his thought, and he grimaced, turning around to apologize.
He’d barely opened his mouth when she said, “It’s all right. When you find Jasmine, you can tell her that I’ve decided to walk away from the whole family. So you’re all even again.”
“Jenny—”
“Roland gave you more than enough money to care for Matilda.”
“Jenny—”
She cut him off again. “I did my job in such a way that the client had no complaints. I still got shot.” Jenny propped herself up on one arm and moved her pillow up on the headboard. “I’m going to Canada to live with my family.” She talked while she scooted up, her voice sounding strained.
“If you want to see me again, then you need to decide which is more important. If you want to keep scamming people for money, then don’t bother looking for permission to visit. There’s always the risk that your schemes could lead to me getting shot again, even if I’m not involved.”
Tommy glared at her, but the sentiment didn’t match the helpless anguish in his eyes. “How can you blame this on me? They didn’t open fire on me, Jenny. They were aiming for you, and the rest of the bodies were just bonus witches and warlocks.”
“It wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t drawn me into your scam in the first place.”
“Jenny, please, you can’t—”
“I can decide what I want, and then if you want to battle against me, we’ll see who has the stronger will.” Tommy tried to reach for her, and she grabbed his wrist, pushing him away. “No, please, just go. I can wait for Ellen on my own. Pay the manager for another night, and I’ll be out of here tomorrow.”
Tommy opened his mouth to plead with her. “I can cover your ticket—”
“My family will cover it. Good-bye, Tommy.” Jenny looked away from him, ignoring the savage hole she’d just opened in her own heart by wounding him.
He picked up his bags and left the motel.
She closed her eyes as he shut the door, taking a long breath before she lied to herself. This is for the best.
***
Ellen McCullough looked just as frumpy and frazzled as she always did when she entered the motel room. The halfling’s curly mane of auburn hair flowed over her back and shoulders in a shower of kinky stray hairs, and she pushed the front back with a plain navy blue bandana.
A refugee from the McCullough clan, Ellen was the progeny of a halfling and a magi slave. As such she was a powerful telepath and an elemental mage. She had also apparently established a connection with God, and among the other halfling refugees, she was becoming an unofficial spiritual advisor. Her cynical relatives still teased her about joining a cult, but when they needed to speak to someone about personal problems without feeling judged, Ellen’s cell phone was often their first choice.
Jenny chose to call Ellen precisely because she knew the halfling wouldn’t judge her over taking part in a scam. Lowering her magic defenses to let Ellen read her mind, Jenny waited to see how Ellen would react.
Laughing tiredly, the short halfling woman tilted her head to pull her long black bag strap up over her head, and then she rested her bag at the foot of Jenny’s bed.
“You got away from Amber and Vicky, but you still fell in with another bad crowd.” Shaking her head, Ellen walked around the bed. “I’m warning you, Jenny. If you shack up with a daemon, I’m not helping you deal with your abusive boyfriend.”
“Yes you will.” Jenny laughed, then winced at the pain it caused. “You’re too much of a sucker for melodrama.”
“True.” Ellen sighed. “I suppose it’s one of the side-effects of working as a clerk in a comic book shop.” Sitting down on the bed, she lay on her side and smirked at Jenny. “Obviously you don’t need my help to heal you. So, what d’ya want?”
Jenny laughed at the false rudeness in Ellen’s voice. “I still want you to heal me. Hearing you cast the spell might allow me to fine tune my healing abilities.”
Ellen’s face filled with a look of admiration. “That’s not a bad idea. But come to think of it, I already took imprints from Felix and Simone. So I can also show you how they summon elements too.”
Jenny nodded, trying not to let herself get distracted by a tempting tangent. “Okay, that’s good too, but I also need to know how to become attuned to a deity.”
Ellen sat up, her eyebrows bunching in a look of irritation. “How am I supposed to do that? Should I consult my magic book and pick out a spell to bless you?”
“I don’t know. You master other spells so fast that I thought maybe you could help me out. I just…I need to figure out who to pray to. I need someone…someone interested in music, and maybe healing.”
“Apollo,” Ellen replied, barely thinking for a second before she spoke. “He’s a Greek god of music, and of healing. Oh, and of prophecy, so you’d want to be prepared for that possibility.”
“Okay, but how would I connect to him?”
“Wiggle your ass in the air?” Ellen laughed at Jenny’s annoyed expression. “Hey, I’m sorry, but I only know how I found my deity, and that took a long time of talking to thin air before I found a connection.”
“Wouldn’t you suggest that I try God first?”
“No. This isn’t a matter of who you’ll worship. It’s who your soul resonates with. I suggested Apollo, but if he doesn’t accept you, you’ll have to keep looking.”
“But how?” Jenny tried to contain her frustration, but it spilled out of her in an angry gasp. “Do I just say, ‘Apollo help me,’ or do I have to make up some kind of ritual?”
Ellen was about to make another objection, but her pale face went slack. “You call out to your deity the same way that you cast spells. Since your magic centers around music, you should try singing to him.”
Jenny nodded, sitting up in the bed. “Okay, that could work, but I want your help. For one thing, I need you to make sure no one walks in to break this spell. If this backfires, I could end up roasting part of the continent.”
Ellen rubbed her forehead and closed her eyes as she debated with herself, Go home and snuggle with my partner, or potentially blow up the state? She remarked, “And to think, I left my family because I thought they were dangerous.”
Before Jenny could say anything else, Ellen started to hum a melody, and Jenny almost groaned over the halfling’s selection. She put aside her annoyance, clearing her mind before she started to hum along with Ellen.
She sang, “My god has a name. Apollo please, can you look down on me? I need your power, can you listen to me? Will you come on down? I need a connection.”
Jenny looked up at the ceiling “Apollo, hear my plea. Apollo, help me see. Apollo, listen to me. Need a god in front of us. In a guise that won’t raise a fuss. Like MacGyver without the mullet, in an armor all in chrome.”
Ellen quit humming, intending to ask what the hell kind of spell Jenny thought she was making. Then a white light exploded in the corner of the room near the front door.
From inside the light, a hazy figure formed. The light faded, and the male who floated in front of the door indeed looked like MacGyver, Richard Dean Anderson. However, he had no irises at first. His eyes and his hair were also made of pure white light. Slowly, the light faded, revealing grey speckled hair and silver eyes.
Apollo smiled at Jenny and Ellen, and then he started to babble.
Jenny closed her mouth and thought, Are you getting any of this?
“Not a word,” Ellen muttered, a warm smiled plastered on her face while she waited for the man to stop talking. When he did, she glanced at Jenny. “I’m going to try something crazy, since I don’t think he knows English.”
“Go ahead.”
Getting off of the bed, Ellen approached Apollo and knelt in front of him, hoping that she was showing the proper level of respect.
She shifted over to daemonic, hissing her words in a soft whisper. “Forgive my choice of language, but I know nothing of your language to understand you.”
Ellen felt his hand on the back of her head, and she tried to relax. She expected a thump from a telepathic transfer, or a throb. But all she felt was soothing warmth.
Apollo’s spoke in her mind, seemingly even in her body. Use your own English words, child. Daemonic should not come from a tongue so mild.
Ellen thought, I am not the one who summoned you, nor am I your disciple. My friend seeks your guidance, if you would find her worthy to be your disciple.
He lifted his hand from her head, and when she looked up, she found his face filled with profound disappointment.
She thought, Have I done something to offend you?
“No, you would never offend me. There are dark events in your life I foresee, and I cannot prevent them from coming to be. Your loyalty is a bit of a problem, you see. I cannot show you visions when you serve your deity.” Apollo touched down, his bare feet scuffing on the cool tile floor. “It pleases me that you have brought me this waif to serve as a disciple in my faith. I owe you a favor for keeping her safe.”
“I don’t need anything,” Ellen said.
“Later. You will need me later.” Apollo walked to the bed, leaning his head over to the right while he examined Jenny. “You are in poor shape now, it’s true. The humans have not been kind to you.”
Jenny smiled, unable to help herself from saying the first thing that came to mind. “The daemon I met wasn’t much better.”
Apollo smiled, shaking his head. “No, certainly not. Would you like me to heal the scars you’ve got?”
“No. They’re just scars, and I don’t care about that. I don’t know those people who attacked me, but I can’t face them on my own. I’m not strong enough.”
Apollo laughed, a quiet harrumph as he took Jenny’s hand. “You summoned a demigod from a deep sleep, and yet you think you are weak. If you search yourself, search deep, then you could find the strength you seek.”
Ellen frowned, asking, “You aren’t a god?”
“I’m a deity, yes, and a demigod too. But there are powers above me and you, layers of order that transcend our point of view.”
Apollo continued to watch Jenny while he talked. “I left the humans when they began to shun me. I left before they killed demigods in their religious frenzy. So few people have offered their faith correctly, so I stopped working on this plane of existence directly.”
He squeezed Jenny’s hand again, and warmth flooded up her arm, filling her body. “You have real power in your voice, a power so strong it gave me no choice. Perhaps it should serve as some clue, since I had to return, just to speak with you.”
Jenny dropped her head. She had no idea what to say. A dozen responses came to mind, and she cast each of them aside because they sounded like she was bragging.
She settled for, “Well, thank you for coming to see me. Is there anything else I need to do to become your disciple?”
Apollo laughed again, and he let go of her hand to cup her cheek. “You’re already a disciple who celebrates faith the right way, by listening to music most every day. Your humility has convinced me to offer you more. You can become my emissary, and make a world tour.”
Jenny asked, “Will I have to talk in rhymes all the time like you?”
Apollo laughed. “No, but you can sing, and you can dance. You can collect magic if people give you the chance. Sometimes you collect too much magic for the spell you cast. You hold some of the charge, but how long does it last?”
“Right. It bleeds away if I don’t use it. You want me to collect energy from people at concerts, and then direct the excess energy to you?”
“Yes, that is part of the role I’ll bestow. But please keep in mind, you can say no. If you do, without complaint I will go. Being my emissary will grant you more power, and you won’t have to work for me every hour. But it will mean accepting assignments from time to time. When I need you, I’ll send you a sign. Your roles may be risky, but you can’t plead or whine. Are you sure you want access to a power like mine?”
“No, I’m not sure,” Jenny said. “But I need to grow up and choose a direction in life, instead of wandering randomly. These days, I feel lost.”
Apollo brushed his thumb over her cheek. His touch didn’t evoke excitement or revulsion, because it didn’t bring the familiar sense of friction that came between corporeal bodies. His thumb registered as a sense of pressure and heat, but there was no resistance of his skin on hers.
The heat was pleasant, like taking a hot terrycloth robe from a dryer and pushing the side of her face into it. She could almost imagine that his thumb was sinking below her skin to touch muscle and bone.
“A human poem through my mind has just crossed, and it says, ‘Not all those who wander are lost.” Apollo paused, watching to see if she understood. She didn’t. “It is all right to keep wandering, my child. Go where you want and let your wanderlust go wild. As an emissary, it’s best for you to move, to observe the world and keep me in the groove.”
“But what should I do to fix things?”
“Nothing.”
Jenny pouted, and she would have shook her head if she didn’t worry that doing so would cause the demigod to lower his hand from her face. “I don’t understand. Don’t you want to change the world?”
“The world changes itself without you. It will always change no matter what you do. Leave the world alone, and give the people their due. Worry less about them, or me, and think more about you. So, what do you want to do?”
“I want to be a witch.”
“You already are a witch,” Apollo said.
Jenny shrugged. “Okay, but I want to be better, and I don’t know a thing about training.”
“You have to keep singing to keep training, you silly changeling. There is potential for magic in every song you sing. Let the music in your heart guide you through, and as a witch, help only the people who ask for help from you.”
Apollo extended a stern finger with his other hand, his smile dropping. “Never sing a spell intended to reverse fate, and never cast a spell guided by hate.”
“What should I tell people about you?”
“You may say that you serve me, but you won’t have to make converts for me. Any religion can turn ugly, don’t you agree?”
“But if you don’t want me converting people to your faith, why do you need an emissary?”
“I don’t, and you aren’t necessary.” Apollo laughed at her baffled expression and dropped his hand, stepping back from the bed. “But you summoned me, so you need a deity. I accept your request, and you’ve passed every test. But from now on, you could just pray to me in song. I don’t mean to say that you’re wrong, but the journey to get here was tiring and long.”
Jenny blushed once she realized how vain her spell had been. “Oh…right. I’m—”
“I know you are, and it’s fine.” Apollo raised his hand, and his smile melted at the same time. “I accept your apology, so please accept mine.”
Jenny knew something bad was coming, and she tried to steel herself for it. But the beam of sunlight that shot out of Apollo’s hand was direct from the source, a magic heat from the heart of a star.
The beam struck the middle of her chest, and she couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t move or think. All she could sense was a white hot fire that consumed everything inside her, and yet what was left behind was not ash.
The pain of the transfiguration was intense, and if Jenny’s lungs and vocal cords hadn’t been blazing, she would have screamed.
The beam flickered out, and Jenny dropped her head, panting while her fingers moved to touch the scar on her chest. She could see it, because the whole front of her gown was gone. A ring of black scorch marks surrounded the hole, but there was little ash from the fabric. The heat of the spell atomized most of the cotton fibers when the beam struck.
When she raised her head again, Apollo was gone.
Her attention sank to the scar again, a circle with a single white dot in the center. Apollo’s symbol, burned into her flesh to mark her as his most devoted follower.
In a hotel room across the state, Tommy was rubbing a similar scar on his chest. Jenny felt guilt over that, and over the scar that marked Kevin too.
She thought, I’m sorry.
Tommy sent, You already tore my heart out. What’s one more chest wound?
He shifted to Lana, and she intentionally ignored Jenny.
Jenny felt even worse adding insult to the injury of breaking up with Tommy. But it wasn’t something she could have predicted, and even if she didn’t want to hurt Tommy, he had brought it on himself by scamming her.
The thought was a lie, and she knew it. She wouldn’t call herself on it, and Lana wouldn’t either.
Ellen drew Jenny out of her thoughts by asking, “Now what?”
Jenny looked up at the halfling, searching herself for an answer before she said, “I guess I’ll have to make a music video.”
The End?
—
Song Playlist and Credits (In order of use)
Am I a mage? (Who’ll Stop the Rain? CCR)
Blue Bayou (Roy Orbison version, final verse)
Con Artist (Rocket Man, Elton John)
Con Those Humans! (Stray Cat Strut, Stray Cats)
Draggin the Line’ (Tommy James & The Shondells, first verse)
Never (Brick, Ben Folds Five)
Will you Keep Me? (Paradise by the Dashboard Light, Meatloaf)
Lament of the Bill Collectors’ Whores
(Where There’s a Whip There’s a Way music by Maury Laws)
Broken Souls (Tainted Love, Soft Cell)
Christine’s Blessing (Sympathy For The Devil, Rolling Stones)
True Love (Good Lovin’, The Young Rascals)
Docs Squawkin’! (Jive Talkin’, The Bee Gees)
She’s Always a Woman (Billy Joel, final verse)
Only Strangers (Patience, Guns ‘n Roses)
The Ballroom Blitz (The Sweet)
Doctor Doctor (Robert Palmer)
Musicaled to Death (My Baby Shot Me Down, Nancy Sinatra)
God in Front of Us (One of Us, Joan Osbourne)
... I write dark fiction in a variety of genres. My blog contains my rants and rambles, and some short fiction that can only be found here.
I can be pretty fucking offensive, so viewer discretion is advised.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Zoe Whitten, Zoe Whitten, Jan Oda, shutsumon, Nancy Brauer and others. Nancy Brauer said: RT @Zoe_E_W: Changeling Epilogue: http://tinyurl.com/ya28pns #WebLit Seeking Apollo's divine guidance, Jenny summons…MacGyver? [...]
And Tommy is now in the dog house, and probably going to be there for a while at least. And talk about bringing on the pain, calling Apollo was quite a move. And at least she has some protection from somethings now, and should be able to hold more power with her songs too.
Now you just need to find some music for the next book.
True on all counts, and there’s already another book. I’m not sure if people will care for it, since it’s Apollo narrating it, not Shiva. So there’s a radical shift in narration to a rhyming book. I’m not sure how this will work out, or if it will be too annoying for readers. Still I had to try it. That book will bring back Tommy, Kevin, and Laura, though Lana doesn’t make an appearance. Roland will also be back, and the story will introduce some of the demigods too.
It is a very short book, so there’s only a few songs for the entire book. But of those songs, one is a musical fight between bards, and another is a musical cleansing spell. There’s also another musical gunfight, this time set to Iggy Pop’s Lust for Life. So if folks can tolerate Apollo’s rhyming ways, it should be an interesting book. ^_^
Thank you so much for checking out Changeling, and for your regular comments. You’ve brightened many a dreary day with your visits. ^_^
I am sure Apolo isn’t going to be that bad, and the bad news is I am running out of stuff to read… I have ate most of the stories already. *burp* I just read a lot and can’t help it. Good stuff and most have lots of funny spots.
Well you’re running out of stuff on the blog, yes. But if you head over to my web site, you’ll find a few more stories to keep you occupied:
http://www.zoewhitten.com/content/stories.html
I also have some e-books in this section:
http://www.zoewhitten.com/content/books.html
And if you don’t mind paying 0.99 cent for these e-books, there’s also another set of three books, The Campaign Trilogy, which tells another story about Jobe McKenzie and Wendy Stoffel.
Even if you just choose to go with the free stuff, there’s still lots of stuff to keep you busy.
I’m delighted that you’re reading so much of my work and enjoying it. I hope if you venture to the site archives and like what you see, you will consider referring other readers to my site. Honestly, I need all the help I can get.
Thanks again for reading. I will keep working hard to get you some new stories here on the blog soon. ^_^