Chapter 1a

Master snaps and snarls. Festival tonight, and Titania gives him a place in the procession — a rare honour. He growls, and we polish the trophies until the old bone gleams like silver. 

Chapter 1

- David -

I still say it was a light that woke me — a green flash, bright as spring. Yet I saw nothing but black when I opened my eyes. There was sound, though — the hushed swirl of snow against the front window. I opened the curtains to see the first snow of the season, carrying the streetlight from the front of the house to the back, through a million frosted mirrors.

Gazing out, rapt as a child, I saw it. The falling snow shimmered, the flakes spinning, shifting, between silver and white, and then coalescing into the form of a white bull cantering toward the narrow concrete alleyway between my house and the next. Then, before the frisson of shock had finished travelling up my spine, a gust of wind blew it out of existence. I had almost convinced myself this was some lingering fragment of a dream when I noticed tracks in the thin patina of snow. I got up, threw on my running shoes and bathrobe, and walked down the creaky stairs to the outside. As the door clicked shut behind me, two figures in evening wear came walking up either side of the street.

As I watched them, the wind gusted, cutting through the thin flannel of my pyjamas. The robe was more a futile gesture than anything resembling warmth, but even as I contemplated going back inside, another chilling gust brought the man’s voice to me.

"Babe, lad, where are you? C’mon now," he said.

It occurred to me that any two odd events must be related — surely there had to be some quantum rule about that somewhere — so I asked, "Are you looking for your dog?" It seemed safer not to mention an ethereal bull.

"Actually, no," replied the young woman. She had pale skin, long black curly hair, and wore an elegant velvet evening dress with a fur-trimmed stole. I couldn’t help noticing that the outfit was capped off by a pair of bright-yellow, shit-stained rubber boots. "We're looking for our bull."

I glanced down at the tracks that headed down my alleyway, already drifting over in the accumulating snow. "Ha, I think he might be in my backyard," I said, gesturing at the faint hoof marks.

"Oh, wonderful! We were terribly worried," said her companion, a young Asian man dressed in a tuxedo — with ruffles, no less. He somehow made the ensemble look wry and stylish, an exceptional accomplishment, given he was also sporting rubber boots. Or perhaps they’re what made the ensemble work.

"Follow me," I said and led them down the alleyway, pointing out faint divots in the snow.

Now, my house is a narrow, semi-detached, three-storey Victorian in Toronto. It’s not some fancy heritage home, but one of those sturdy old brick buildings in a constant state of renovation and historic enough that the glyphs against magic in the cornerstone were weathered and faded. The only access to my backyard was through that alleyway. The yard itself was quite small, a flagstone patio surrounded by a few clusters of bushes and the remnants of annuals, all enclosed by a border of high fences that gave it the impression of a small, slightly rundown courtyard. A bit shabby, but it was all mine, a comforting thought given my past economic challenges.

The wind was calmer here, due to the many trees and the other three story Victorians on my block. The lack of wind made me realize just how much the temperature had fallen since I’d got to bed, and a shiver passed through me. A table and two simple chairs, along with a low bench, were getting slowly buried by the still-falling snow. The tracks ended at the fence separating my yard from my neighbour’s. It was a good seven feet tall, and I couldn’t imagine a bull jumping that high. It just didn’t seem possible? Sure, I’d been a city boy for a long time, and I had tried to forget everything I’d ever known about the farm, but that still seemed implausible.

"He’s not here," she said. It was an accusation if I’d ever heard one, and I’ve heard a few over the years, especially from the women in my life.

"I’m sure I saw him," I said, the surreality of the situation making me doubt the evidence in the snow. Then we heard a faint lowing, followed by gravelly muttering from the direction of the fence.

We all turned — the fence seemed to cast a faint green light, like sunlight filtered through branches just gone green in early spring, but it didn’t seem quite real, more as though there had been a brilliant flash and we, somehow, were left with the afterimage on our retinas. It reminded me of the light that had woken me. Amid that green, an image hovered in my mind; a white bull on a distant field. I shifted to look at my companions, but they were looking only at each other. It wasn’t until they felt the weight of my stare that they turned to me. None of us spoke, none of us wanted to say the word. Really, it was an absurd thing, the idea of it. But for a moment, it seemed like magic.

That sense of light passed without any commentary. No one wanted to be involved in pointless questioning by some Inquisitor looking for a case. So when I looked around, I was relieved to see that all the blinds facing our backyard were closed.

Then the noise came again, and the young man seized upon that excuse for action, and broke the awkward silence, saying, "That sounds like him." He jumped, grasped the top of the fence, and, in a surprisingly fluid motion — especially considering the tuxedo and rubber boots — vaulted over it. His voice came floating back, and we could hear snow crunching under his steps. "Ellen, go the other way. Make sure he doesn’t get away."

Ellen ran back out the way we had come, and I followed her, somewhat bewildered. I had seen the bull walk down the alley-way which dead-ended in my backyard; hell, there were even tracks in the back, ending at the fence. What was going on? I immediately dismissed my earlier supposition. Magic, well, it was absurd. It was simply the disorientation of being woken from a deep sleep that was making me ridiculous. Only the credulous and, of course, the fundamentalists like my brother, believed in magic anymore.

I heard the man’s voice again. "Here, boy." And then I heard that lowing and odd muttering again.

When I got to the front of the house, the bull was just coming out of the neighbour’s alleyway, accompanied by the man.

It was huge, its coat blending with the snow, so that when the storm swirled, it faded into the wind like a primal, otherworldly spirit — though I could sense the bulk of it from several feet away. The beast seemed torn between heeding its owners and bolting. It made another sound, reminiscent of an old man complaining to himself. I didn’t think farm animals should make noises like that, and wondered if it might be sick. From the concern evident on the couple’s faces, they were thinking the same thing. I crept closer to get a better look at the bull. There was something compelling about him.

"Anything I can do?" I asked in a whisper. The bull started slightly and looked at me. I swear it opened its mouth as if about to respond, but at that moment Ellen interjected, soft and stern.

"No. Don’t move; keep quiet." She stepped closer to the animal, murmuring quiet nonsensical reassurances, and slowly stretched out her hand. Now that I was close, I saw it was wearing a halter as white as its hide. As she reached out to grasp it, I heard one word carry through the wind, emphatic, confused — a curse, a plea?

"Poseidon?"

We exchanged looks, as the bull shuddered once and seemed to settle into itself, less a wraith of the snow, now just a bull — if one that was out of place in the city.

In the uncomfortable silence, the bull looked at each of us in a most un-bull-like way. A flurry of snow enveloped us. Finally, the beast pawed the ground.

"Well, um, we should, uh, get back to the Royal Winter Fair. Thanks for all your help in finding Babe here," said the young man, petting the giant bull on the neck.

"No problem," I said, then the question occurred to me, "Is that his name? Babe? Isn’t he a bit large for that?"

The young man laughed. “He’s named after Paul Bunyan’s bull. He had a blue tint to his fur when he was born, and it really struck me, so gave him that name. Over Ellen’s objections, I might add."

"It’s grown on me," muttered Ellen.

"Well, thanks for a fascinating evening Babe," I said, giving a little bow to the bull. Then, looking at the man and Ellen, "It’s always nice to have an adventure that ends well."

Ellen laughed, a bit nervously, I thought. "Yes, well, that’s true. Good night."

"Good night," I said.

Despite the humour of my little adventure, I had a troubled sleep that night. The evening’s chill had gotten into my bones, and the look the bull had given me disturbed my dreams. The whole thing should have been nothing more than a charming cocktail party anecdote. Instead, I dreamt of the bull proffering muttered warnings in some dead language, while pawing at the leaf litter in my backyard to reveal the night sky beneath my feet.

I stood there, frozen by vertigo — staring across a hole in the world — at the great bull; acutely aware that nothing more than a thin layer of half rotten foliage supported my weight. Then, a series of pings and vibrations reverberated through my precarious footing, causing it to crumble. The bull sadly shook its head even as it dissolved into a gust of snow while I tumbled into the cosmos.

I groped, with some half-understood instinct, towards the noise that had cast me adrift, my hand landing on my phone. I sat up, still in my bedroom, gasping from the sense of falling. Blearily, I glared at the offending screen, wondering what had set the damn thing off. Wiping the sleep from my eyes, I pulled myself upright and began scrolling through the messages. "Holy shit," I said to the empty room.

It is encouraging to read an article on Voudoun that focuses on the congregation’s communion with God. Too often the media fixates on the sensational aspects of this religion, pandering to the history of fear and hatred of the syncretic religions and the people who practice them.

It was one of, what… over three thousand comments in my stream for an article that I’d just done for the Globe about my local Roman Catholic parish? They had an activist priest who was trying to reinvigorate attendance in an increasingly diverse population; so they’d opened their doors to a small Voudou congregation, allowing them to use the church hall for their ceremonies. The local priest had argued that Voudou practitioners considered themselves Catholic, so it was simply outreach to a… neglected branch of the church.

Of course, not everyone approved of this outreach, as evinced by other comments,

Andrews is a reckless idiot. Not all belief systems are created equal — Voudoun is magic, not religion, and should be treated as the lawless abomination it is.

This was amazing!

I’d actually pitched an entire series on alternative religions to the Globe, and they’d, rather hesitantly, agreed to the first story. As I continued to scroll my feed, a text pinged to the top. It was my editor, and the message was typically to the point: "Get Going." I had my series.

"Yes!" I shouted to my empty room.