A Circle of Firelight

A CIRCLE OF FIRELIGHT

Curtis Edmonds

Scary Hippopotamus Books

Trenton, New Jersey

http://www.scaryhippopotamus.com

Copyright © 2020, 2021 by Curtis Edmonds.

All Rights Reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-7340464-6-5

Cover art for electronic edition adapted from original artwork by Daniel Oravec:

https://magic-virtual-world.com/

All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

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ALSO BY THIS AUTHOR

A Circle of Moonlight

Rain on Your Wedding Day

Wreathed

Lies I Have Told

If My Name Was Amanda

And I, according to my copy, have done set it in imprint, to the intent that noble men may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to honour, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to shame and rebuke; humbly beseeching all noble lords and ladies, with all other estates of what estate or degree they been of, that shall see and read in this said book and work, that they take the good and honest acts in their remembrance, and to follow the same. Wherein they shall find many joyous and pleasant histories, and noble and renowned acts of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry.

— William Caxton, Preface to Le Morte d'Arthur, by Sir Thomas Malory (1485)

DEDICATED TO

KATIE AND STEPHANIE

WITH HOPES AND PRAYERS

FOR SUNSHINY DAYS

AND SWEET DREAMS

A Thousand Midnights

Ashlyn | August 19 | The Land of Summervale

The river in my dream is deep, with a swift current. The water is silt-brown and scored with deep ripples. It moves at the speed of a thoroughbred racehorse in full gallop, running through a narrow gorge cut into the gray bedrock. Plumes of white foam lap against the far bank.

The near bank is carefully tended, with short grass and well-trimmed rosebushes. A dirt road, smooth and even, runs parallel to the river, shaded by a line of tall sycamores. But the far side is a wild, strange place, a landscape of tropical flowers and thick, green vines hanging from live oak trees, at once inviting and forbidding.

There is only one way across, and that is the bridge that looms ahead in the distance. It is both familiar and ominous, a wide antique arch spanning the rushing river. In the half-light of dusk, the pale-yellow limestone glows softly. It does not take long for me to close the distance. The two steel lampposts that flank the bridge on this side cast a cold pool of light. I take a tentative step onto the cracked paving stones. I feel for the hilt of my sword.

I have walked the dirt road toward the bridge for a thousand midnights and have never once crossed to the other side. As always, a guardian waits at the center of the bridge, tall, ragged and silent. As always, he is wearing a long black leather duster, with dark tattered robes underneath. All I can see of his face is his green eyes, flashing in the near-darkness. He leans on a rough-hewn staff of wood, a foot taller than his gaunt frame. He waits for me to make the first move, with a patience tinged with malevolence.

I am Ashlyn Revere, I say, and I wish to cross.

The guardian does not answer, as always, and when I draw my sword from my scabbard and point it in his general direction, he does nothing. Night after night of slow patient experience has taught me that I cannot taunt him or distract him. I know I must defeat the guardian in order to cross, but I have never learned how; it’s a puzzle I can’t solve. It does not matter what incantation or weapon I use. He can move that long black staff swifter than my eyes can follow; he can use it to parry any edged weapon or block any missile weapon, and if I get too close to him, he can use the staff to beat me senseless. Magic is even more worthless—he can dodge or withstand any spells I can bring to bear.

I could walk away, but I never do. Something keeps driving me forward, across the bridge, and not knowing what that might be is, in its own way, as frustrating as my failure to defeat the guardian itself. I can choose how to fight, but not why, for reasons I can’t even begin to understand.

I dip the point of my sword toward him, in an ironic half-salute. He nods his head slightly, in his only outward show of emotion. I feint twice to the right and then try a slashing move at his knees. He blocks the slash with the staff, hard enough that my sword arm tingles with the impact. I try the same move again, and he blocks it the same way.

This time, I try the same feint, but instead of slashing at his knees, I go for his neck with a vicious backhanded slice. The guardian raises his staff to block my blow, shattering the sword at the hilt. In one smooth motion, he lowers his arm, bringing the end of the shaft crashing down on my shoulder. I fall to one knee, and just barely stop myself from pitching face-first onto the limestone pavement.

The guardian goes back to his post, leaning once again on his staff, waiting on me to make the next move. A hot wave of emotion flares through me, sharper than the pain in my shoulder. I make my way to my feet. I taste frustration, sharper than acid, in the back of my throat. Most people, I think, have recurring dreams about fun things. I am not that lucky.

I throw the shattered hilt of the sword at the guardian, as hard as I can. He blocks it, almost negligently. He takes two careful steps toward me and then lashes out with the staff, slamming it into my injured shoulder.

I manage to keep my footing and stagger away from the blow, to the low wall on the side of the bridge. My hands find purchase on the top of the wall, where I steady myself for a moment. I hear, rather than feel, the impact on the back of my head, and then pitch forward into the dark river.

I open my eyes, expecting to wake up in my room, turn over, and go back to sleep. But all I can see is the silt-brown flow of the water, and all I feel is the current carrying me into the depths of the river. I cannot tell in which direction the surface lies. Some nameless obstacle careens against me, sending me spinning farther in the murk. I am drowning, and I don’t know what to do.

In my panic, I see a flash of white and make a grab for it, hoping that it is a rope or a branch I can use to climb out of the rushing water. It is instead a hand that grasps my wrist, but instead of welcoming flesh it is brittle bone. I struggle to get away, but the bony hand will not let go. It pulls me farther down, into the absolute blackness of the river bottom.

I Am Ashlyn Revere

Ashlyn | August 20 | Montgomery, New Jersey

I open my eyes, just a crack, and see thin strips of light on the ceiling. Morning sun rolling in through the blinds, the tentative first wave of August sunshine. I lift my head from the pillow a tiny fraction, to read my bedside clock. Seven-forty-six, and I reach a practiced hand for the snooze button. I press it, and feel a shock of excitement, like a current of psychic voltage rush from my finger to my brain and back again, completing a circuit.

This is it. This is the big day. The one you’ve been waiting for.

I sit up straight and swing my feet over the edge of the bed. I take a deep breath to burn off the last few scraps of sleepiness. In a few short minutes, I will be on my way to Manhattan for the job interview that I hope will change my life.

I am lost for a moment in indecision and anxiety over what to wear. I have had about twelve job interviews over the last two months, since I graduated from college in June. I usually wear my charcoal J. Crew tweed dress to interviews, but the fabric is too heavy for August. My beige pantsuit has a stain on the jacket from a lunch interview at an Italian place in Morristown. The light gray suit, I decide, is the best alternative, with a white silk blouse to make it look cooler and more relaxed. I study myself in the mirror and see split ends and un-plucked eyebrows and a button on my jacket hanging by a thread. I don’t have the time to fix any of it, so it will have to do. I make my way downstairs.

My sister Penny is downstairs ahead of me, tucking into a bowl of cornflakes piled high with bananas. Looking swanky, she notes, with that special bite of angst and sarcasm you can only master when you’re in high school. She is reading on her Kindle—no telling what, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she were re-reading Pride and Prejudice for the nineteenth time.

Leave your sister alone, Mom says. Ashlyn, I have French toast cooking for you on the waffle iron.

On the what? I ask.

I saw it on the Pinterest, and thought I’d try it. You need lots of protein before your interview.

I have a horrible vision of dripping maple syrup all over my light gray suit, but when your mother makes you a special breakfast, you eat it. That sounds good, Mom, I say. Thanks.

My mother spends her life running off inexhaustible reserves of nervous energy. The word relax is not in her vocabulary. She is typically fidgety and restless, over-involved in every school event, every soccer game, every class project. As a strategy—if not as a survival method—I have schooled myself to under-react around her, not to show her the side of my personality that matches hers, not to let her jittery approach to life overwrite mine. I am nervous now—about the interview, about whether I’ll be late, about whether I’ll make enough to cover both rent and student loan payments—but I can’t share my anxieties without her amplifying them.

So, tell me again about the interview, she says. I know you’re meeting with someone in publishing, but I don’t know what you’d be doing, exactly.

It’s an editorial assistant job, I say. It’s mostly reading the manuscripts people submit, at least at first. But there’s lots of room to move up in the organization.

You’re going to be a book editor soon, I just know it, she says. Just like Jackie O.

I have never heard of Jackie O, whoever he may be, but I wouldn’t tell her that for the world. The green light goes off on the waffle iron, and she takes two slices of bread off it and slides them onto a plate. It’s not bad, if you like your French toast crisp. My younger brothers clomp down the stairs, and Mom doles out more cornflakes. Dad follows close behind them and makes his way to the Keurig to fill up his travel mug for his drive to work.

How soon will you know if you got the job? Mom asks.

Not right away, I say. They’re interviewing people all week. It’s a competitive process.

The last two words come out a little tense. I have been living at my parents’ house since I graduated from the University of North Carolina in May. After three months spent churning out resumes and obsessing over the details of my LinkedIn profile, I am no closer to achieving gainful employment. This is the first interview in weeks where I think I have a legitimate shot at getting an actual job, and I don’t intend to waste it.

Do you want any more French toast, dear? Mom asks. There’s a couple of slices left.

No, thank you.

Can I have them? Penny asks. Penny has the appetite of a Burmese python.

Do you know how to get there? Mom asks. You don’t want to miss the interview because you’re running late.

It’s in Lower Manhattan, so I’m driving to Jersey City and taking the PATH train from Journal Square. I should make it there in plenty of time.

Wait a second, Penny says, around a chunk of French toast. You’re going to New York?

What if I am? I reply.

Does that mean you’re moving out of my room? You and all those old books, I mean.

"I am not living in your room. I am living in my room."

Girls, my father says, not looking up from the coffee maker. This has the subtext of this is the thousandth time you have had this argument, and everyone else is tired of hearing it, so kindly shut up.

And I don’t know where I would live, I say. If I get the job, I’d be working in Manhattan. I’d love to live there, but it’s so expensive.

This is a polite understatement. There is no way I can afford to live in Manhattan on an editorial assistant’s salary. Even Brooklyn is too expensive. I can maybe just manage Hoboken if I can find a roommate. But whatever the sacrifice is, I’m ready for it. Anything that gets me out of this house is worthwhile. I dearly love my parents and my siblings. But I worked my tail off through four years of undergrad to earn my independence, and it is tremendously frustrating that I am still far away from achieving it.

Where in New York? Penny asks.

Over by Madison Square Park.

Penny takes a bite of waffled French toast. It’s a perfect day to explore the city, and you get to go while I have to stay here. It’s so unfair.

I have heard those three words from Penny my whole entire life. It is unfair that I am four years older than her. It is unfair that she didn’t get to take over my room when I went away to college. It is unfair that I am healthy, and she is sick.

Penny was born with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that causes the buildup of thick, ropy mucus in her lungs. It impacts her breathing, and requires her to eat a great deal, even by hungry-teenager standards. She is on a detailed medication regimen that’s more complicated than integral calculus. Every time she leaves the house, she runs the risk of developing a bronchial infection—which can put her in the hospital for a week. That, in turn, limits her options as far as work and going to college. And unless she can get a lung transplant, she is going to die before she’s forty.

I know this, and she knows this, and we have both internalized it, but she cannot stop herself from bringing up the essential unfairness of things. I learned long ago not to respond to her when she acts this way, but I never stop feeling bad about it.

Penelope Dawn Revere, Mom intervenes. Do not talk with food in your mouth.

Sorry, Mother. Penny takes another bite of French toast and gives me a calculating look.

It’s okay, sweetheart. Ashlyn, do you need to leave right this minute? I can fix that button on your coat before you go. You want to be sure to make a good first impression.

I know she means well. I know that. But if I let her do this one thing, she’s going to notice more, and it’s going to make me that much more nervous and I’m already nervous enough. I really do need to go, but thanks. If I leave now, I should be there in plenty of time, I tell her. She wishes me good luck and gives me a hug. Penny doesn’t say another word to me; she just goes into the bathroom for what I presume is a good sulk.

㊋

Dad walks out the door with me and gives me a quick hug on the driveway.

So this is the big interview, he says. Do you know who you’re talking with today?

Probably not anyone you’ve ever heard of, I say.

Come on, he says. Give me some credit.

Behind the cool accountant façade that Dad displays to the world beats the heart of a paladin, and his preferred reading material reflects that. His high-fantasy paperback collection isn’t just organized, it’s cross-referenced in triplicate. Of course he knows who the top editors in the genre are. I let loose a sigh. His name is Gary Baxter, I say.

Gary Baxter? He runs Berserker Books. They published Hal McAllen’s series, the one about the invasion of Utopia.

That’s him, I say. Berserker got bought out by one of the big conglomerates.

Dad’s eyes wrinkle a bit. Your mother, for some reason, is under the impression that you are going to be editing literary fiction, not pulp genre trash.

You love pulp genre trash, I say. After I devoured all the Harry Potter books, he set me loose on his classic high-fantasy paperback collection. This was much to the despair of my mother, and eventually, the University of North Carolina English department as well. I mean, it’s not that big of a stretch to compare and contrast Virginia Woolf with Ursula Le Guin.

Don’t get all judgmental on me, I say.

I am not being judgmental. Not one bit. Your mother, however, is more than a bit judgmental about people who mislead her about things like this. As you should already know.

If I get the job, I’ll explain it to her. If I don’t, then there’s nothing to worry about. Except being unemployed for the foreseeable future, that is.

You’ll do fine, he says.

I’m so nervous, I confess. My father is as restful as my mother is worried; he has to bear my anxieties as well as hers. What if I’m not who they’re looking for? What if I say the wrong thing? What if come across the wrong way?

Relax, Dad says. You are going to go in there and be very impressive. And if this publisher won’t hire you, there are other opportunities.

What other opportunities? I have sent out endless résumés into the screaming void. This is the only shot I have right now. If I don’t get this job, I’m going to be stuck here forever, living in the same room, dreaming the same old dreams.

That wouldn’t be so bad, you know. Some of us have been stuck here for a long time ourselves.

"This isn’t about you. It’s about me. And I have to do this. I have to get it right, and I’m nervous, and I’m babbling, and I know I’m babbling, and how am I going to talk to a total stranger if I can’t talk to you?"

He doesn’t respond. He takes a deep breath, and then another, and waits for me to do the same.

You know what I’m going to say, don’t you? he asks.

That I should try to control my emotions.

"I am not telling you not to feel your emotions, sweetheart. But you don’t have to display them when they come to the surface. It’s okay to feel nervous, but you shouldn’t act nervous. Okay?"

Okay, I reply, sounding more confident than I feel.

You got this, he says.

Dad is getting gray now, with a network of wrinkles around his eyes from a lifetime of staring at balance sheets. He has a fine analytical mind, I know. If he says I am going to do fine, I have to believe him.

I got this, I repeat.

You’ll get the job. Don’t worry. Remember who you are. You are Ashlyn Revere.

I am Ashlyn Revere, I say.

Dad gives me another hug. I love you. Good luck. Knock ‘em dead.

I love you, too.

He gets into his car, gives a little wave, and drives out carefully, and then he is gone, on his way to remunerative employment. I want to do that, too, so much that something catches in my throat. But the only way to make that happen is to ace this interview, and to do that I have to control my emotions. I am not doing that so well at the moment.

Hear the Sirens

Ashlyn | August 20 | Hillsborough, New Jersey

I am in my hand-me-down Honda and trying to make the left turn onto the highway, but the guy in front of me is texting someone and doesn’t know that the light has changed. I honk at him in a friendly way, but when we get to the next light, he picks up his phone again. I decide that turning right is the better part of valor. That puts me on Amwell Road, which I can take all the way to New Brunswick where it crosses Interstate 287. I’ll catch the Turnpike from there and cross the bridge to Jersey City.

I think about switching on the radio, but I don’t want the distraction. I want to focus on this interview. Mr. Baxter is going to ask me about my background and experience, and I don’t have a lot of either. I don’t know where I want to be in five years, and I never remember what my worst trait is, other than being a nervous wreck about job interviews.

It does not take me long to drive out of town and through the fields and woodlands of Central Jersey. The summer sunshine promises to be blazing. Traffic is light at this hour of the morning. The strip malls replace the woodland as I get closer to New Brunswick.

Once I move out, I think, this is the way I’ll come back to visit. Whenever that is, wherever I go—I will come back. I’ll spend summer Sundays in New Jersey, sitting on the back porch, watching Dad vulcanize innocent hot dogs and hamburgers, while my brothers wrestle in the tall grass, and Penny complains about Mom and Mom complains about Penny. I love my family, and I want my independence. Why can’t I have both?

I slow down for a red light and hear a loud coughing sound from the rear of the car. I tense up and my foot hits the brakes hard, harder than I’d intended to, and I lurch against the seat belt. I look up, and my car has stopped fifty feet short of the intersection. The driver behind me blasts his horn, loud enough to make me jump half out of my seat. I look in the rearview mirror and see Penny emerging from the