The Magician

At the western edge of the Sahara, the walls of a sprawling city rose out of the sands. In their silent judgement, they lorded over the waste while dry winds carried dust to break against them. Decades of desert gales had rendered the orange stucco smooth, yet still it clung to the high brick walls. They towered over the slums I had been passing through, bringing weariness to a road surrounded by even wearier people.

The sky’s weight crashed down on this place, permanently dying it a forgettable shade of brown. I could not say where the streets ended, nor where the buildings began. Several times, I had looked at a wayward alleyway only to notice a pile move as if it were a person. Had I arrived in the sunlight the land might have been friendlier, but in the dark of the night, I was welcomed only with the cold hostility of a new and strange city.

I paced forwards to the two statues standing at the gate, their faces brought down by years of solemn duty. Stone countenances remained frozen as I approached, the only visible movement was a slow shifting below their eyelids, stopping me a few steps from their gate. Shining buildings, their peaks still graced by twilight, beckoned to me through the bars, scraping at the clouds above.

“Water,” I croaked out. My sore lips let loose a few flakes of bloody skin. The left guard moved slowly, reaching towards his waist and tossing me a metal container that landed heavy at my feet. I drank.

“Thank you.”

The face of the guard shifted in a slow and trained manner, as if heavy hooks pulled down the edges of his mouth and speaking was a bothersome endeavor that had to be tolerated, “Where did you come from? Your clothes are strange, and your skin is wrong.”

I had no good answer. I did not know if he would recognize the name of my home. “I came from the West,” I gestured to the road behind me “I came here to teach. I have heard there is need here.”

The guard raised an eyebrow, a human display of emotion flashing across his cold face. “There are people here, but your hands are empty. Our city has stood here for over a thousand years. What could a stranger teach us that we do not know?”

I turned my head towards the cracking streets behind me. I could hear movement in the alleys, an animal crying for its mother. A hunched figure shivered in the night. Eyes had begun to peek out of the windows. A familiar voice whispered in my ear.

I turned back. The guard’s face hung from his cheekbones and brow. It made him seem as if he was a part of the wall behind him, a golem that awoke only for its duty. His movements were trained and routine, his body was mechanical and unfeeling. Short chapters of his story were told on his arms, ragged tears and straight scars. His shoulders were burdened low under the heavens, but his head was tilted a degree higher than his compatriot. Perhaps he had children. The black pupils under his brow flickered, eyes darting across my face.

I spoke the words the voice had whispered.

The guard’s brow darted upwards an inch, his frown straightened into a slight bow, and his eyes shifted into a smile. His head moved up, eyes shifting down, and his shoulders relaxed. His mouth began to move again.

“Ah, I understand. Welcome.”

The few witnesses who were peeking from the house would say strange things about me after I had disappeared into the walls. Words that are forgotten in the homes, crushed under the weight of a city, and lost in the trample below. Rumors would blow away in the warm winds of Fall and would be planted again in the chill of winter. Dust would settle in windows, and they would brush it away when new guests came to share a meal, sweeping out what every other day they paid no attention to. So too, would the guard forget the things I said to him, remembering only on the odd summer eve when the sun had set over the slums and his water canteen was full. Even then, there would only be a whisper.

The guard stretched out a hand as I pulled a coin from my cloak. The gates opened, and he became a part of the towering walls again.