The Wizards of Central Park West_Ultimate Urban Fantasy Read online

  In the hall they found Jake Walker, Lawrence Berman’s partner, who Eddie called “Uncle Jake.”

  He came over and hugged Eleanor, repeating her name over and over as she cried into his shoulder, and Eddie felt even more afraid and alone.

  “Is Daddy dead?” Eddie was barely able to get the words out, scared that to utter them would make it true.

  Jake turned to him and gave a tight smile. “No, Eddie, he’s not dead. He got shot, but he’ll be fine. They just brought him out of surgery ‘bout an hour ago.”

  “How’d it happen, Jake?” Eleanor demanded. “If I found out he was takin’ stupid chances again, I’ll—I’ll—” And she burst into fresh tears.

  “Sh, no, this wasn’t his fault. Guy was on PCP. Came into a coffee shop and just started shootin’. Larry took him out, probably saved a whole lotta lives. Your husband’s a hero, Ellie.”

  Eddie snuck past them and looked into the room. There was his daddy, sitting up in bed with his eyes closed and tubes going into his arm and up his nose. He was a strange color, and Eddie thought Jake was wrong, that his father indeed was dead.

  He moved to the bed and grasped the big, rough hand. It twitched, and Eddie gazed up to see his father’s big brown eyes look down at him through half-closed lids.

  “Daddy?” Eddie said, and the tears fell.

  “How’s my little man?” his father whispered.

  “You got shot,” Eddie said as relief swelled in his chest.

  “I sho’ did.” He lay back in the bed and shut his eyes.

  “Why do you do it, Daddy?” The question burst from Eddie before he could stop it.

  “What’d you say, Eddie?” Lawrence Berman said, his eyes returning to his son.

  “Why do you do it? I mean, if people are gonna shoot you. Why don’t you do somethin’ else?”

  In response, Lawrence Berman pulled Eddie close in those big arms that could hold the world.

  “Protect and Serve, son,” he said. “It’s the police motto, and I believe it. I take a risk out there, but I make a difference. I got shot, but I stopped that guy so other people didn’t.”

  “I don’t want you to die, Daddy.” Eddie snuggled closer to his father’s side.

  “Sometimes you gotta take a big risk to do the most good, son. Remember that.”

  He always did.

  “A big risk to do the most good,” Eddie muttered. His eyes met Marlowe’s. “I’ll do it. I’ll join your…whatever it is.”

  Marlowe nodded. “If that is your decision, then you shall be bound by it.” He held his staff aloft, and the light on top of it grew brighter. The walking stick in Eddie’s hand began to tremble.

  “Hold tight, Eddie,” Marlowe said as a beam of white light flew from his staff to Eddie’s hand.

  Eddie could feel the cane grow warm and start to change. It grew longer and thicker and changed from black to a clear, pale wood. It kept growing until Eddie was holding a staff as tall as Marlowe’s, only more gnarled at the top.

  “How did that—” Eddie said.

  “You now see its true form, Eddie,” Marlowe said. “The cane was a shape chosen by the previous owner.”

  “Riftstone,” Eddie said. “The guy named after this arch?”

  A sad smile traced Marlowe’s face. “Nay, this arch was named for him.”

  “Get out of town,” Eddie said. “They built it a hundred and fifty years ago.”

  “He was an old friend, and you shall learn that many of the arches in the park are named for our kind,” Marlowe said. He stepped back and pointed at the staff in Eddie’s hand. “You must choose a new form.”

  “What?” Eddie was annoyed at how stupid he sounded.

  “It was a walking stick; you may choose that. But it should be a configuration that you can carry easily and readily.”

  Eddie looked up and down the length of the stick. “You mean I can make this look like anything?”

  “Correct. It must be a shape you can keep close at hand.”

  Eddie smiled like a kid in a candy store. “Can I make it a lot smaller?”

  “As tiny as a toothpick, if you wish it, or as large as a house, though I would suggest something easier to transport, yet uncommon enough so it cannot be easily misplaced.”

  “So if I choose a pen or a pencil, it’d be easy to lose.”

  “You are connected to it,” Marlowe assured. “However, you do not want a form that makes you hesitate when you need it. Now, choose quickly, there is much to do.”

  Eddie nodded. “A credit card,” he said, and held out the staff to Marlowe. “Make it the size of a credit card.”

  Marlowe pursed his lips and nodded thoughtfully. “An unusual request, but not without merit. Very well, close your eyes.”

  Eddie shut his eyes tightly, the staff in his hand.

  “Envision how you want it to look and the size it should be. Make the image as clear in your mind as you can.”

  Eddie closed his eyes and saw a plastic card in his imagination. The staff in his hand grew warm, and Eddie opened his eyes to see a small card in his hand. It was dark with a wood grain design. In one corner, his name was embossed in gold letters with the words “Member Since” next to it and 06/17 underneath.

  “Holy—” Eddie looked at the card a second and third time before he slipped it into his wallet.

  “Good! Now we must go!” Marlowe said, and Eddie noticed that he was no longer holding a staff but a fancy walking stick. The glow was gone, and the tunnel appeared as if nothing unusual happened.

  Marlowe walked out the far end with Eddie fast on his heels.

  “Where are we going?” Eddie asked. For an old guy, Marlowe was spry, and Eddie had to trot to keep up.

  “To your initiation, of course,” Marlowe reported.

  “Wait a second!” Eddie grabbed Marlowe by the arm. “I have to go back to the station, meet my partner, go home to my wife—”

  “Ah, yes, you are married.” Marlowe stopped short. His free hand went to his beard to gently stroke it.

  “I have responsibilities.”

  “Not this night. Quickly, make the necessary calls as we walk.” Marlowe turned and walked on.

  Eddie exhaled angrily, grabbed his cell phone, and spoke the name “Luis” into the box.

  “Vasquez,” Luis said as he picked up on the first ring.

  “Luis, I’m, uh, following up on a lead—”

  “Where are you? I can be there in ten minutes.”

  Eddie thought fast. “It might not pan out, and I don’t want both of us to waste our time.”

  “I’m your partner. Wasting time together is what we do. What if you need backup?”

  Eddie exhaled forcefully. “Luis, I don’t want to pull

  rank—”

  “But it sounds like you are about to,” Luis snapped back.

  “I need to do this on my own this time,” Eddie implored. The last thing he needed was his partner upset. “Please, work with me?”

  There was a long silence as the big man considered.

  “If that’s what you need, Eddie, I understand.” Luis’s voice was subdued.

  “Thanks, Luis, I owe you.” Eddie hit the “End" button then spoke the word “Home.”

  They continued walking rapidly, and Eddie noticed they approached the Central Park Lake and the memorial to singer John Lennon known as Strawberry Fields. Marlowe did not slow down but headed determinedly toward a standing group of lush and verdant trees.

  “Hello?” came Cerise’s voice.

  “Hey, honey.” Eddie tried to sound upbeat. “I may have a break on my case.”

  “That’s good, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, but I’ve got to do some legwork tonight.” He felt ashamed that he could lie to her so easily.

  “When will you be home, Eddie?”

  He could tell she wasn’t happy. “What’s wrong?”

  “Momma’s been asking for you.” Cerise sighed.

  Eddie stopped cold. “Is she all ri
ght?”

  “As well as can be expected.”

  He stood there, trapped by indecision. He’d done his best to be a good son, and now there was only so much time left to be with her. On the other hand, he was pursuing his father’s lesson of the importance of serving others. If the whole thing only took a week, he’d have time for her then. But what if—

  “Eddie?” Marlowe waited at the entrance to a grove.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know how long this will take. I’ll call you later.” Eddie shoved his phone back into his pocket. He felt a wave of anger and frustration wash over him. What had he agreed to?

  Marlowe's eyebrows were raised as if to say, “Can’t keep up with an old man?”

  “I’m here, I’m here,” Eddie wheezed, struggling to catch his breath.

  Marlowe glanced about at a throng of people who enjoyed the warm weather. He leaned toward Eddie and said, “You will need your staff.”

  Eddie reached for his wallet, but Marlowe stayed his hand.

  “Not here,” Marlowe said. “Once we enter the grove, casually take it out.”

  He then turned and moved into the shadow of the trees. Eddie followed, reached into his wallet, and extracted the black card. As he watched, Marlowe’s cane changed, grew, and became the tall, wooden implement.

  Eddie suddenly realized he had no idea how to change the card. Just as he considered this problem, it grew warm. It began to shift, change, and grow, until Eddie held the full-sized wooden staff.

  Eddie watched with such utter fascination that he smacked headlong into a tree, which in the tree’s defense, stood unaware of his wandering attention.

  Eddie lost his footing, fell to the ground, and cracked his head against a large rock. Lights flashed behind his eyes. He felt himself pulled into an upright position, as Marlowe’s staff waved before his face. There was a pleasant, pink glow, and his mind cleared.

  “Can you please be a little more careful, Eddie?” Marlowe chided.

  Eddie rubbed the back of his head. The spot no longer hurt, and he found he didn’t have a lump.

  “Sorry,” Eddie apologized. “I’m not used to— All this seems easy to you.”

  An understanding smile appeared on Marlowe’s face. “I suppose it does. It has been a very long time since I was a novice. Come, we are almost there.”

  Marlowe turned and began to walk again. Eddie used his staff as a hiking stick and followed, on the lookout for any more ill-placed forestry.

  Twelve

  Although the sun was still above the horizon as they entered the grove, once among the trees, it was dark as night.

  In fact, Eddie noticed that the grove appeared much larger than he’d expected. They kept walking, though he was sure they should have come out next to the Central Park lake minutes earlier.

  Eddie examined the trees and noted that they appeared different within the grove than outside of it. He caught up with Marlowe.

  Gone was the old man’s suit and tie, replaced with a long, flowing white robe with a black velvet over-tunic. Gone was the stylish hat, and in its place was now a full-cut hood that gathered loosely around his neck and head.

  “Your clothes,” Eddie hissed as he sidestepped another tree.

  “Oh that’s nothing.” Marlowe’s eyes were on the path ahead. “Look at yours.”

  Eddie looked down. Gone were his own suit and tie, and only a simple red robe covered him. He raised the garment’s hem to find he wore a pair of sandals.

  “Hey!” Eddie moved in front of the old man. “Those shoes cost me fifty bucks!”

  “They are undamaged—merely transformed,” Marlowe explained, easily stepping around Eddie. “When one is to be initiated, this is how they are clad. Your rank and your belongings are of no consequence here. We approach the sacred clearing.”

  True to his word, they walked into an open field. Eddie looked up, shocked to find that the sun was gone and a night sky opened up above them. A huge, three-quarters moon loomed overhead.

  “Hey, look at that.” Eddie gazed up at the nocturnal firmament. “I’ve never seen the stars so clear.”

  Marlowe took a token glance upward and nodded. “I imagine not. The lights of the city keep you from being able to see the sky clearly.”

  “Wait a minute.” Eddie was still fascinated by the view. “We’re just a few hundred feet away from those city lights.”

  Marlowe turned to him. “Eddie, at this moment, we are as far from man-made things as one can be.”

  “We’re in Central Park. We just walked into a grove.”

  “That is where we started, Eddie,” Marlowe told him. “Listen.”

  Marlowe stood stone still as Eddie did just that.

  “I don’t hear anything except the wind.”

  “Exactly,” Marlowe agreed. “No traffic, no horse-drawn carriages, none of the hustle and bustle of the city. And do you discern the moon? When we started, the sun had yet to set.”

  “Now it’s night.” Eddie looked at his wrist, which was pointless because his watch had vanished with the rest of his attire.

  “You are thinking as an ordinary man, so this is strange to you. But to the wise, all becomes clear. We have traveled to a place where it is almost midnight.”

  “Wait a minute. We entered the woods. How—when—did we travel?”

  Marlowe turned and gestured with his free arm. “What do you breathe, Eddie?”

  Eddie blinked, puzzled by the question. “Air.”

  “Good,” Marlowe approved. “Now, is the air you breathe just New York air, or is it all one air everywhere you go?”

  “You’re playing with me, right?” Eddie’s frowned.

  “I am very serious,” Marlowe replied.

  Eddie shrugged. “I’ve never thought about it, but okay. I guess it’s all one air for the whole planet.”

  “Excellent,” Marlowe chuckled. ”You are a quick student. Now, the water you drink, is it individual water or one water?”

  “There’s a lot of different water supplies,” Eddie countered.

  “But everyone on the planet drinks the same water?” Marlowe stated with a twinkle in his eye.

  Eddie nodded. “I guess so.”

  “Very well, Eddie!” Marlowe strode up a small hill as large shadows loomed in the darkness.

  “So if everyone breathes the same air and drinks the same water,” Marlowe announced as he approached the top, “is it not possible that we all walk through the same woods?”

  “Now that’s a stretch,” Eddie pointed out as he followed. “Where are you going with this?”

  Marlowe stopped with a huge spectral shape behind him. “It’s a new way of thinking, Eddie. If we walk through the same woods, all you need do is come out of that one forest in a different location than where you went in.”

  Eddie was close enough to see that the large shadow ahead was a stone—a huge standing boulder that towered above his head.

  Marlowe sped up his pace and reached a flat rock which rose up two feet from the ground. He leapt on it and planted his staff into a small hole in its center. The top of his staff burst forth with a glittering white light, and Eddie had a clear view of the entire hill. He could plainly see that they’d entered a stone circle.

  “Hey,” Eddie said. “Is this Stonehenge? Are we in England?”

  Marlowe returned to Eddie, silhouetted by the light from the center of the rock.

  “No, Eddie, Stonehenge is too public for us. This is a stone circle in a place far from prying eyes. Only we, the wise, know how to find it.”

  “We?” Eddie inquired. “There’s no one else here.”

  “I have bid them come.” Marlowe gestured toward the glowing staff. White and silver energy sparkled around the top like a small cloud buffeted by a tornado. “You are to be initiated.”

  “So, what does that entail, exactly?”

  “All will become clear,” Marlowe intoned.

  “You keep saying that, and nothing is more clear than it was before—�
�� Eddie turned then gasped!

  From the shadows between the large standing stones, small globes of light hovered above the ground. As Eddie watched, robed and hooded figures drew closer, each carrying a wooden staff. On the top of each one, balls of light glowed in different hues of the rainbow.

  The figures were an odd collection of shapes and sizes, some round and short, others so tall they passed seven feet. Their robes were different colors and styles, but all were decorated with stars and moons. Some of the symbols were merely cloth, but many sparkled as if tiny lights were sewn into the fabric.

  The faces were all very different: Caucasian, African, Spanish, Asian, and Native American, even facial structures that suggested ancestry of Eskimo or the Pacific Islands.

  Upon closer examination, Eddie could also see that there were subtle differences in the clothing along the racial divide. A very black man wore robes that suggested African colors and style, and one Native American man wore a robe that appeared to be made from the hide of an animal.

  Most of their faces were old and wizened, except for the rare youthful one. Eddie couldn’t remember a time when he’d seen so many people past the age of sixty in one place. Sixty? Hell, most were at least eighty!

  One shining, purple silk robe caught his attention, and he saw Frisha give him a nod. He looked over the crowd again and noticed a man with a blue light that floated above his stick. He was dark-skinned and had a gray beard that curled on his face like a pelt, and wore long, African-style blue robes.

  Eddie pointed to the man and said to Marlowe, “I know him.”

  “Of course you do. He’s been in Central Park for years.”

  Eddie stopped for a moment and stared at the man. “Trey, right?”

  “Trefoil is his full name,” Marlowe said.

  “Another guy named after an arch?”

  “Once again, the arch was named for him,” Marlowe corrected.

  “Whatever. He spoke to me the day of the murder,” Eddie said, and felt as if yesterday was ten years ago. “Is he part of this?”

  “A much larger part than you can imagine.”

  The others drew closer. They all walked at the same pace, so they formed a circle which grew smaller. It was as if they’d rehearsed the speed and tempo of their strides. They progressed until the circle of bodies was close enough for another person to pass between, but only just.