The Last Magician

Amanda and Dylan

Amanda looked at the ruins of the store.

Would they ever discover what had caused the devastation? It was becoming less likely the more they extended their search and found nothing except more vacant buildings and dead earth.

She glanced into the darkness of the store, unable to make out anything of significance. She listened for signs of Jack and Kurt moving inside but only the time-halting sound of silence flowed from the void.

She turned away, knowing that it wouldn't help to just stand staring into the darkness. The sky had dimmed a little, not growing dark like she knew it should, just growing dim as though the power of the sun was dwindling away.

It could be true. How did she know otherwise? This wasn't the world she remembered. It wasn't what any of them remembered from what Jack and Kurt had said. Something bad had taken over the world and left them behind.

And other things.

Amanda shivered as she recalled her encounter with the slug-creature. What could have created something like that, something so alien? Worse still, what else had it, whatever it was, created elsewhere?

She chastised herself. Staring pointlessly after the boys, asking herself rhetorical questions, it wasn't helping to ease her worries.

"You shouldn't worry you know."

Amanda started. She had become so tangled in her doubts that she had forgotten about Dylan.

He was sitting on a slab of rock, poking a stick into the dirt. He could have been an ordinary kid sitting on an ordinary street in and ordinary world. Amanda knew that there was something miraculous about the child; he had survived for however long or short a time on his own and had adapted better than any of them.

There was something else though. Something she couldn't get a handle on, but it was there. Dylan had taken to her instantly, although he still had brief moments of uncertainty around Jack and Kurt. As they walked the road from the house, she had noticed that he seemed unimpressed and unaffected by their surroundings. She wondered if it was simply his youth. He was in his early teens at most, a boy who until recently had conjured up worlds of mystery and horror in his mind. That was what children did. To him, this could be nothing more than a big adventure.

Yet she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something more.

"I'm not worried, Dyl," she said, forcing a smile. With a short laugh she added, "Just anxious."

"What's anxious?" Dylan asked.

"It just means feeling a bit unsure about things."

"The Magician says you shouldn't worry."

Amanda considered Dylan as he continued to poke the ground and push stones with his stick.

"Who is the Magician, Dyl?" she asked, sitting down beside him. "Do you know what he looks like?"

Dylan turned his attention to her. "Well, sort of."

Amanda waited for him to say more. She wanted him to tell her about the mysterious entity they had come to call the Magician. In the back of her mind, a single fragment of sense questioned why she was allowing herself to be drawn into a child's fantasy. One look at the land around her gave her all the rational reasoning she needed.

"He just talks to me every now and again," Dylan continued. "Normally to tell me where I should go, or what I should watch out for. Well, he used to."

"He doesn't talk to you anymore?"

"Well, he does," Dylan said. "Just...I don't know. He used to tell me where to hide and when someone was coming that I should keep away from. He told me about the Big Gun Man. Now he just tells me that everything is moving and soon we will see him. He says not to worry. That's all. "

Amanda looked around. What was there not to worry about?

She smiled momentarily. This all just continued to seem more and more unbelievable. From waking in the house, to the arrival of Jack, discovering Kurt, slugs, a Gunman, a Magician. At what point could she say she didn't believe it anymore? There had once been a clear line where the mundane and the fantastic were kept apart. She couldn't see the line anymore.

Her eyes drifted back to where Dylan sat only to find he was no longer there. The stick he had been playing with stood alone, a third of its length buried in the dirt.

Dylan stood a short distance away, his back to her.

"Dyl?" Amanda said quietly. "Dyl? What's wrong?"

The child remained still, his eyes looking off across the scorched ground, staring into the desolation of the village.

Amanda moved towards him, a dreadful feeling of unease settling heavily upon her shoulders. Something wasn't right. She knew it.

"Dylan?" she tried, coming up behind him. "Are you ok?"

She extended her hand, trying to steady her trembling.

Dylan's hand shot out so quick that Amanda let out a choked scream. His fingers curled tight around her wrist, dragging her off balance and pulling her to the ground.

She threw down her free hand but still fell awkwardly. She dropped her shoulder as she hit the floor and rolled onto her back. Her arm remained tightly clasped in Dylan's grip, held over her head as she rested in the dirt.

Dylan turned his head downwards, his vacant gaze meeting Amanda's dizzied eyes and halting her breath.

"You are all in danger," an unfamiliar voice said through Dylan's mouth. "The wolves are prowling."

Dylan's eyes suddenly snapped back in his head and he collapsed to the ground beside Amanda.

Before she could react, an unworldly howl tore through the silence of the street.

These wolves were not just prowling.

They were hunting.