The Amulet
They sat together at a table in the wagon in the dim light, the gypsy and the youth. The amulet swung gently in the paw of the chihuahua Sylvia, who looked over it at her client with dark, unspeakably wise eyes. "This amulet was brought from the heart of the Carpathian mountains," she proclaimed sagely. "It exists both before and outside of time, and within it resides indescribable power, the ability to realize simultaneously the depth of your fears and the summit of your dreams!-Do you wish to possess the secrets of the ages, entrusted to but a few? " The amulet twisted by its chain in the gypsy's diminutive paw as the trace of a foreboding smile passed briefly over her features.
With trembling hands, the adolescent human, Glenn, grasped the chain of the amulet with fear and reverence. "I know that there are things beyond understanding, and infinite worlds existing alongside our own!," spoke Glenn, his voice barely a whisper.
"Then you are halfway there!,' assured Sylvia with a flick of her paw. "So put the amulet on already!-Do you want to be furry or not?-What, do you think I've got all night for you?" She regarded the youth skeptically, wondering if her judgement in his faith, desire, and maturity may have been incorrect. Sylvia drummed her small clawed digits on the table surface before them impatiently.
Glenn nervously eased the chain of the amulet over his neck, the heavy pendant coming to rest on his chest. He felt a curious warmth emanating from the amulet, which seemed to settle further on his chest as if attaching itself.
"Look at the Cat's Eye stone in the center of the amulet!," directed Sylvia. "Does it speak to you?"
The boy regarded the stone, then jumped slightly as if startled. "Something moved in there!." he declared.
"Uh huh," acknowledged Sylvia, wishing that she could boot events into fast forward. Novices could be such a drag...
"Oww!," cried Glenn. "A pain just shot through my face!"
"And so it begins," droned Sylvia.
The youth grabbed at his face as soft, audible snaps were heard as the skull beneath the skin began to reconfigure itself. "It hurts, gypsy, it hurts!," he screamed.
"Birth is painful, child," counseled Sylvia patiently. "Pain passes, but beauty endures!"
Agonized screams emanated from the youth, who clenched his head and fell to the floor, where he continued to writhe and contort. As Glenn thrashed and kicked, the cries which tore from his throat altered as well, becoming more throaty and guttural. Objects began to fall from the walls as the boy's flailing limbs impacted with them.
"Watch the furnishings!," advised Sylvia sternly. "If you break it, you buy it!"
The boy's seizures reached a crescendo and then mercifully abated as his breathing stabilized and slowed. Sylvia looked down upon the prone figure, allowing him to rest for a few minutes. After a time, she hoisted her saxophone and played a few bluesy licks on it. "I serenade the new creation," she declared. "Arise, and behold yourself!," she ordered, handing the boy a small mirror and gently removing the amulet from his neck as she did so.
Slowly, as if awakening from a dream, Glenn reached to grasp the mirror, gasping slightly as he observed that his hand was clawed and covered with gray fur. Hurriedly, he held the mirror to his face to behold the visage of a wolf, his eyes bright with life and vitality.
"And to think," remarked Glenn with wonder, "I hesitated!"
"Out of the slime itself, spotless the lotus grows!," commented Sylvia.
"Say what?," asked Glenn.
"That's from a Japanese folk song," explained Sylvia. "The philosophy will come later.- -What are you waiting for?- Take that new body for a spin!- -Work the kinks out!"
The young wolf needed no further encouragement. He bounded from the door of the gypsy's wagon, and was carried by swift, muscular legs into the welcoming night, howling with delight as he went.
"In wilderness is the preservation of the world," mused Sylvia as she envied her young charge the life that he had begun that evening...