A Befitting End
A Tale Retold
Kitty limped along, feeling the squeaks and protests of her aged joints as she hastened to continue on, hastened away from what might be occurring behind her. Two of her fellow comrades – for that was how she forced herself to think of them; if she made it any more personal she was liable to collapse then and there – were trying to do the impossible, or at least the suicidal, trapped in the pyramid of glass with a great horned demon not two hundred meters behind her. And here she was, Kitty, running away! Her faltering footsteps came to an abrupt and ungraceful stop, and her knees nearly buckled. An expression of utmost determination claimed her expressible features. Slowly, breathing heavily and with all the energy of an elderly crab, she turned and began hobbling off in the exact opposite direction that Nathaniel had ordered her to go. Hmph. Thought Kitty, streaks of sweat sliding down her grim face. I swear if his last act is ordering me around . . .
It was then that the explosion ensued, rough, terrible and earth shattering. It blew the air from Kitty's lungs, and had she been able to form coherent thought, she would have known that the Amulet of Samarkand was taking the full brunt of the force, barely sparing her life. She crumpled to the ground, eyes fluttering closed as her consciousness gave away to the halo of expanding wind and the shattered sting of flying glass.
Bartimaeus could feel the energy surrounding him, feel it almost engulfing his very essence, feel it tugging unceasingly at the master he was sure he was going to be entombed within – and he didn't like it one bit. This whole business reeked of the shenanigans that got people – and the godforsaken djinn that had woefully decided to help them – eaten alive in many surprisingly creative and horrific ways. The great horned thing that had once been Mr. Makepeace (Although Bartimaeus thought this was rather an improvement over the original model) loomed over them, mouth gaping wide, its cavernous halls filled to the brim with teeth reminiscent of razor sharp dagger points.
Well, Nat old buddy, it was nice knowing ya.
Nathaniel, in his turn, could barely speak. The gash that I had tried so subtly to ignore back by the grove of trees was dripping a dark red liquid, which was now staining the ground below us and my master's clothes in a very unsightly way. (Honestly, these humans were so messy, insisting on leaking everywhere . . .well alright I had lost a bit of my essence in the whole frog fiasco, but at least it was colorless. None of this garish maroon. Anyway – on to more pressing matters, such as Nathaniel's rapidly deteriorating health).
"The staff's . . . almost at breaking point." He managed to grit out.
Well I knew that. If you're going to waste your last breaths, you might as well use them by stating something other than the obvious.
Nouda was almost enveloping us by this point, his great spikes and curved spines closing in from every direction. I sighed deeply from within my essence, so loud that it managed to echo in Nathaniel's, poor human ears. It appeared there would be no more great and daring escapes from Bartimaeus.
"Wait . . ." coughed Nathaniel. "To – to vanquish this demon, it requires only a hand to hold the staff . . . after that, it will not matter anymore . . ."
I told you not to keep mentioning the obvious, Nat. This whole dying business is really making you lose your touch.
The beast bore down upon us, the malicious grin of the victorious upon its brutish face.
"I meant," said Nathaniel with a hint of impatience. "That you don't need to – "
Yes, yes I know what you meant! You idiot boy magician! Thinking you can sacrifice yourself at the very end, hmm? Think you can leave the world in such a mess when you're gone, and have nothing left to worry about? Think you can leave your dearly beloved, Kitty behind to weep –
"What are you – "
Oh, alright that last bit was an exaggeration, but your plan remains. You think old Bartimaeus wants only to run away, tail between his legs, you reaping all the heroic glory? (Actually, that's exactly what I did want. Things like these always came to sticky ends. But this was too much. It bore too much resemblance to the instance of Ptolemy's sacrifice. And what would I be forced to do back in the other place, my lackluster conscience nagging away? I'd have to induct too more guises of the silly humans into my future wardrobe. Looking like this boy for all eternity – ugh, some things can actually be worse than death, and I told him so.)
"No! I won't let you do it. If you've forgotten, I'm the magician here! I can dismiss you right now – "
I smiled wryly, Nathaniel's mouth protesting the movement. With a force that I hadn't possessed earlier I exerted my will to separate from Nathaniel's. A pool of energy, one that I think I must have been aware of, but completely unable to use before this point, bubbled and frothed within me. Ptolemy, I murmured, a sardonic grin stretching my face, which was now separating itself from the boy. You sly old bugger. You knew this day would come eventually.
With the aid of the new energy, I fulfilled a solid form, one of a brave magician, and wrested the staff from my old master's hands.
"I am now dismissing you." I said matter of factly.
Nathaniel's mouth opened, his eyes wide, but before he even managed to utter a word (it most likely would have been something very obvious anyway) I hoisted him up above my head and hurled him as far as I could. I was none too gentle about it either – he owed me big.
An explosion, hmm? Well I am a djinn of air and fire.
And then, I turned to face him. Nouda, the great spirit who had leveled so many cities. Was it ironic that I was choosing to vanquish a demon and spare a magician in my final moments of life? As the beast reared down and the staff let out an exultant scream of power, its shaft splintering into a thousand icy shards, I had to think so.
Nathaniel careened through the air at a ridiculous velocity, flying past trees and fairground equipment. His landing was no more graceful than his take off or the actual flight. Irony must have been heavy in the air that day, because his exact landing was atop an unfortunate and unconscious Kitty Jones. Symbolically it replayed the favor of three years previous when Kitty had done the same thing to Nathaniel during the golem incident. The world around them was being rent by a storm of noise, but both remained unable to see or hear it. Oddly, a spiraling energy was amassing around the two comrades, seeping into their every pore and orifice. The fatal wound in Nathaniel's side sewed itself up, skin reattaching to form a healed, if rather scarred side. The energy contained within the magician flowed now to Kitty Jones. As if in some parody of time flowing backwards, the wrinkles on her face dissolved, giving way to soft teenager aged skin. Her weakness evaporated from deep within her, and her sinews, bones and organs sped back up to meet the demands that an eighteen year old may put them to. Her body regained its youth, while her mind retained the wisdom she had found after crossing Ptolemy's Gate. The two lay there, as the final vestiges of Ptolemy's gift subsided, leaving nothing but the trace of faint laughter in its wake.
Bartimaeus had no idea where he was. His essence felt strange somehow, but he couldn't quite place the feeling. A mist of sorts seemed to surround him. It was like the other place, but different – like earth, but different. Wow he thought. The explosion must have severely affected my vocabulary. But it was true. This place was different, at least more so than anywhere else he had ever been in his five thousand year long existence. He strolled, quite at his ease, around the misty landscape. Pictures half appeared, pictures he had no recollection of, and shimmered in the air but for a moment, before dissolving or undulating into different images. Ugh! I used the word different again! Something has to be done about that.
But before he could rack his head for a brilliant and extremely long list of synonyms, a familiar laughter echoed up around him. It had been so long since he'd heard that sound . . . over two thousand years, in fact . . . and then, just as Bartimaeus was convincing himself that he was completely deranged (feasible, after being blown to smithereens) a boy made his way into the djinn's line of sight. It was like staring in a mirror, sort of.
"Hello Bartimaeus." Said the boy, his grin seeming to stretch on forever. He was exactly as the djinn remembered him, before the incident. Tanned skin, thin limbs, the same old loincloth covering the key areas. Yep, that was Ptolemy all right.
"Hello old friend." Bartimaeus felt a deep emotion well up inside him, and attempted to quench it, but to no avail.
"It appears my gift has finally been passed on, then." Said the boy, glancing at the djinn fondly. "I always knew you had it in you, even if you doubted yourself."
"Well – " began Bartimaeus, hoping to go for modesty. "I did save that Neanderthal magician's life. But I had to! There was no choice in the matter! You try sharing his thoughts! Kitty this, Kitty that! It was worth it just to escape his simple mind!"
Ptolemy shook his head, still smiling. "Oh Bartimaeus. This is so like you, trying to hide the best part of yourself. Oh well. I guess you won't care to learn how things panned out, then." The boy said it with a dramatic sigh, and the djinn immediately knew he was being baited. He also knew he was going to fall for it.
"What, how would I find out anyway? From – where are we anyway? Some sort of limbo?"
"No." Ptolemy shook his head. "This is the other other place, as I like to call it. What, you didn't think that all things just ceased to be after death did you?"
Bartimaeus chewed his lip. "Well, no. Maybe. Okay, yeah I did. So? Can you blame me?"
"Oh just shush up and watch you cantankerous old djinn."
Bartimaeus shushed and watched. The mist parted, and almost as if he were viewing it through a flawless crystal ball, a scene appeared before him. The very sight of it made him chuckle. Maybe this other other place wouldn't be so bad.
Nathaniel could feel his head pounding fit to burst. His body ached in every spot imaginable, and something was digging hard into his unwounded side.
"Urgh." Groaned someone, someone that was not him. He looked round blearily, and spotted none other than Kitty Jones laying beneath him. But she was different than the last time he'd set eyes on her. Her skin was no longer wrinkled or worn, her hair no longer grey. Instead it was its usual dark brown, bordering on black. Her skin was smooth and looked as young as any eighteen year olds, and was probably smoother than most. He couldn't keep the grin from his face, even if he had no idea where he was or what he was doing there.
"Ah, I think you're crushing my spleen." Kitty groaned. Then she seemed to come to herself, and actually took in who was causing her spleen such pains. "Nathaniel!"
His grin grew. "That's my name, don't wear it out." He had been dying to try that one out. Somewhere up about the clouds, a loud guffaw of laughter sounded, accompanied by the ringing sound a perfectly executed face-palm would make.
"You're alive!" without further ado, she flung herself around his neck, and kissed his cheek. Nathaniel's face burned.
"Yep." He managed to garble. Since when did he start saying yep?
"Oh this is so wonderful!" Kitty jumped to her feet, pulling the still grinning magician along with her. It was then that she seemed to notice her own vigor, and looked at him questioningly.
"You're back to normal Kitty!" he exclaimed. "Here, look for yourself." He bent down and snatched a shard of glass from the ground, and handed it to her. Kitty gazed into it with awe, one hand coming up to touch her face.
"I – how?" she managed faintly. And here, finally Nathaniel's grin faded, his memory flooding back to him, his eyes dulling. There was a cry from up above that sounded suspiciously like "About time!" but no one was paying enough attention to hear it.
"Bartimaeus." He said quietly, remembering the writhing giant that had been seconds from snuffing the life out of him and the djinn – until the djinn had done something completely impossible, not to mention out of character. "He – he dismissed me." Said the boy weakly. "A djinn dismissed a magician. Right before the staff exploded, he left my body – I don't know how. He seemed to gain this inner strength. Then he took the staff and flung me as far as he could." He looked sheepishly at Kitty. "You seemed to be my landing spot, sorry."
But Kitty wasn't listening. Her gaze was focused on the ruins of the glass pyramid beyond. The crushed and mangled globe of iron that resembled a giant, deadly ball of yarn. The wisdom she had gained from her trip through Ptolemy's gate kicked into gear, and suddenly an answer lit up her eyes. "It was his gift." She said faintly. "His last gift. It must have lived on in Bartimaeus. It would have been just like Ptolemy to give Bartimaeus something like that – that would only work if in such a dire situation, magician and djinn working together, as equals."
Nathaniel looked at her. "You mean Ptolemy gave Bartimaeus energy, and he could only access it if he were working with a magician?"
"Yes." Kitty's eyes were alight. "It was his plan all along. He knew, whether it took a hundred years, or two thousand, that Bartimaeus would end up saving a magician. Ptolemy trusted Bartimaeus explicitly, you see. He always knew he would do the right thing, one of these days."
Nathaniel could only shake his head in wonder. "That's incredible. He deserves a place of honor." He said stoutly. He lapsed into thought, only to exclaim seconds later, "I know! We'll build him a monument! It'll have to be out of something valuable as well . . .definitely not iron or silver, though that would be rather ironic . . ."
Kitty watched Nathaniel think, but her mind was elsewhere. It would take a lot to rebuild their country, and there were still enemies jumping at them from every corner, just waiting for a chance to strike. But something had happened this day that made Kitty hopeful for the future, for a world where magicians and other entities would live together without a bond of hatred. Maybe this was just a small step toward that goal, but it was a step nonetheless, and it had started the ball rolling in Kitty's mind.
"I'll build it with my bare hands if I have to!" continued Nathaniel, his eyes bright with anticipation. "C'mon Kitty, we have to tell people about this. You know Bartimaeus would want his fame spread as far as possible. Great slayer of demons and men, serpent of whatever and all that." He grabbed her arm and they set off across the desolate city, shouting the news the entire way. Kitty looked to the sky, thinking she had heard laughter from somewhere far above and the ringing shout of "Serpent of silver plumes, you dolt!" She spotted nothing, but the part of her that had ventured through Ptolemy's gate and still lived on, her mind, knew otherwise. Smiling to the sun as Nathaniel led her ever onward, his hand warm about hers, she whispered three small words, knowing they would reach the right ears.
"Thank you Bartimaeus."
And so, Ptolemy's last gift was handed down, and whether he liked it or not, Bartimaeus had helped to do it.