story window. Five bullets punched holes in the soft chest, and it hurtled downward with a flutter of wings and robe. He watched it fall as he swung the barrel of the gun on the second Cherub. Its wings flapped hysterically-its golden head clicked from side to side looking for escape, but Felon severed its left wing with a burst of lead. Screaming musically, it landed hard in the center of the dance floor.
The assassin spun to where the other Cherub had dropped. The white robed creature had staggered to its feet, and was limping quickly toward the rear of the hall. Felon miscued his fire and line of sight-bullets removed the back of its head, and the front of the sleeping man’s. He spun again. A pair of men had frozen at the door like terrified rabbits. Everyone else was gone. A motion of his gun barrel broke them from their paralysis and sent them running.
Felon pulled out the second magazine, and jammed a third into the body of the M-16 as he approached the Cherub on the dance floor. A pool of blood had formed around it-dark red like human blood but with the peculiar property of evaporating slowly at room temperature. Keeping his weapon trained on the dying Angel, Felon drew a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it. He looked down on the Cherub, thrilled by the risk he was taking.
Its chubby buttocks jiggled against its attempt to rise; its fat belly was slick with blood. The stump of its wing pumped a hot red jet.
“You’re dying today,” Felon said, watching the Angel as adrenaline thrilled along his nerves. These creatures had Powers. Still, he had the trigger pulled three-quarters back, and he could quickly terminate any spell the Angel tried to utter. Besides, this was part of the contract-earned him a big bonus. At the sound of his voice, the Cherub ceased struggling. With enormous effort, it flipped itself over, and then lay still-its fat chest smeared with crimson rising tortuously. The short arms and legs were splayed at all angles.
“Why?” it asked in a voice of bells and chimes.
“Cleerfindel?” Felon hissed a cloud of gray smoke. He remembered the image his client had shown him.
“I am.” Its dazzling blue eyes met Felon’s dark orbs. Fear crossed its features. “I cannot see you…”
“A Demon hired me to kill you. You caused the woman he loved to love another-a human. He killed them both and has hated you ever since.” Felon took another drag from his cigarette and threw it away. He lowered the mouth of the gun to Cleerfindel’s head.
“I do not remember…who? I do not control love… that is the heart.” Cleerfindel tried to raise himself on an elbow. Felon pushed him back with the gun. “The Demon lies!”
“ You lie. Azokal is his name. He wanted you to know that as you died.”
“Azokal…” Cleerfindel’s voice was fading. “Ah, Azokal.”
Felon felt the killing power rising up in him again.
“How human… I cannot see you?” Blood trickled from the corner of its mouth.
“Azokal spits on you.” Felon raised the gun, the sentence fulfilling his contract.
“Human, no.” A ragged gasp shook the Cherub-its eyes went wide with terror. “ Yahweh!”
Felon fired at the Cherub’s body until the gun smoked and burned in his hands. He left Cleerfindel in a dissolving pile of gore and checked the greasy smear that was all that remained of the other Angel. Felon walked out of the building and traveled three blocks before taking a public stairway down to Level Two where he caught a cab on the Skyway.
8 – The Entertainers
Mr. Jay lit a candle so they could prepare. It was early. Dawn watched him from her snug tangle of blankets. He hummed cheerfully to himself before turning to her.
“Get up sleepy!” he said, his teeth sparkling in the candlelight. “If you’re waiting for the sun to rise I might as well go without you.” He laughed. “It doesn’t come up in the City of Light.” His face became quizzical as he hovered close. “Which has to make you wonder why they call it that.” Mr. Jay kissed her forehead where she lay by the cubbyhole.
He walked to the table humming and started making breakfast. Dawn rubbed sleep from her eyes and crawled to her feet. Her belly grumbled.
“Maybe they mean the food!” she said, suddenly ravenous. “I’ve never felt so thin and airy and light.”
“That’s because,” Mr. Jay said over his shoulder, “you didn’t eat your supper, or much of it.”
“I’m sick of fish.” She pulled her socks on, and looked in a pack for her shoes. Since the Change, animal flesh did not stay dead, so people ate various exotic mixtures and pastes of plankton and fish.
“Imagine how the fish feel!” Mr. Jay laughed and scooped some sort of mucky substance into a bowl. “Oatmeal this morning.” He pointed to the pack beside her. “Sugar, please.”
Dawn dug into the pack and grabbed a plastic container. She carried it over to Mr. Jay while she kicked and wedged and shoved her foot into her right shoe.
“They go on easier if you untie them.” Mr. Jay took the sugar and sprinkled some on her oatmeal before handing it to her. “It’s cold but I soaked it overnight. You’ll have to use your imagination to enjoy it.”
But Dawn was too hungry to care about a thing like that, and soon dug into the porridge, enjoying the sugary sweetness on top. As she ate, Mr. Jay crossed the room, found his top hat and put it on.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” She asked looking at his hat. It was worn and patched, and had a frayed edge along the back that Mr. Jay hid by wetting his fingers and twirling the fringe around the wire frame.
“What?” Mr. Jay glanced over, pulling his coat on. It was a ragged shambles of a thing, but matched the hat just fine. “Oh, food.” He shook his head and pulled the coat tails out behind him. “I’m not much of a breakfast eater, dear. You know that! Wakey wakey!”
Dawn giggled as Mr. Jay waggled his head, and mimicked what he had told her were fine and gentlemanly ways, with his shoulders and legs stiff, and his elbows bent. He walked across the room and twirled, then twisted the end of his moustache.
“You look the fine figure of a man, Mr. Jay!” Dawn said with a giggle.
“It’s only fitting…” he said. “That I wear this to conjure up notions of the things that were. It’s all in the subconscious.” He slipped his gloves on and bowed with great flourish. “They may not even know it, but it’s there. Teaching them to see it is the hard part. And, as entertainers my dear, we’re obligated to employ all the trappings of our profession to accomplish that. A few loose threads will never overpower the imagination.”
“Conjurer” was what he sometimes called himself, but Dawn had seen people in books dressed like him who were called “Magicians.”
“I answer to either,” he once said with a laugh, “but I don’t pull rabbits out of hats.”
For now, they were “Entertainers.” Dawn had heard it referred to as busking, but what they did was go to street corners where Mr. Jay would do magic and entertain. People would gather around to watch and give them money. Mr. Jay often said it was a hard way to make a buck but that it beat working for a living.
Mr. Jay turned to her from where he was putting some food in a smaller pack. “I could do with some coffee though. When you are through, little princess. So chop chop! You still have to get into your costume!” He held up the fake beard.
As a forever child and being a rare and wonderful thing, as Mr. Jay called her, Dawn was forever in peril of capture. It wasn’t that people hated forever children, but the government still caught any they found and kept them in orphanages for their own protection. Dawn heard rumors of it from other forever children at the Nurserywood. Some said they had escaped from the government, and if they spoke about it at all, it was in hushed tones, with fear on their faces.
So to go out in public, Dawn had to go disguised as a midget. She held the collection basket for Mr. Jay and took great pride in her part of the ruse, because she had learned to disguise her voice and otherwise carry off the charade without discovery.
“Avoid real midgets.” Mr. Jay had warned her. “Most people are afraid to look at a little person for more than a glance, but a midget or a dwarf, he’ll see you eye to eye and know.”
Her costume was a multicolored patchwork of bright materials that covered her body completely. Mr. Jay called it “motley.” It came with its own broad padded shoulders and potbelly sewn into place. The boots she wore rose to her knees and curled up at the toe. Each toe was graced with a small bell-just as her cap bore on each of its five points. To complete the illusion, Mr. Jay would painstakingly affix the dark brown beard to her cheeks and chin.
