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WRATH * XIV * WRATH

The Magician

Once there was a man who went 2,508 years before finally understanding what the
point of life was. He never knew who or what he really was. No one from his family
had ever told him about how his soul had been sold into service to Death, by his
mother, in exchange for her husband and first born son returning safely from war. Now
he'd always been a strange man, a strange man indeed, and possessing of many talents
and powers, but he had never understood how it was that he came to have them while
other people did not. He never knew from what source those powers flowed. He'd
never known for what reason he was allowed to read people's thoughts, or control their
minds, or conjure up illusions for their eyes, or send dreams to them at night.

Certainly, he was not the most powerful or the most spectacular of Death's
Champions. He couldn't suck life up like soda through a straw. He couldn't shape
himself into cats or blankets and sheets. He couldn't put force and motion into cars or
fashion golems out of old castles. Beside that, many times he had even rebelled against
his master, stubborn and insubordinate, without ever really knowing it. In the end
though, when all was said and done, he was the best.

Once, he had unwittingly described himself, saying he was the subtlest and craftiest
of Death's Champions -- so inconspicuously insinuating as to often go completely
unnoticed. And he had hit the nail right on the head with that one. The one time he was
called upon to act in compliance with direct orders by The Big Man himself, he had
talked a man who would've lived forever into believing there was something noble and
courageous and chaste about one's own mortality. It was the greatest trick he ever
performed: convincing a man that Death was not his enemy. Abracadabra!

He had not known for sure, not for positive, until after the Animator though. Not
until the last of the other three had gone down. Only then, when Death had finally come
directly to him -- only because he was the last choice -- and he had been commanded
to bring in Greggory's soul, had he known for sure. Up till then there had still been
room for doubt.

There was a little grief in his heart for Greggory. That man had been his single
greatest friend of all time, so how could he not grieve? But he did what he had to do.
There was no way to go on fighting against the purpose of Death; all he could possibly
get out of that was more sickness and pain; more headaches, more grief. He had
shown Greggory one small mercy: he had vowed that he would not take the man's life
by force, nor would he cause anyone to raise a hand in violence against him. But after
all, he had simply done what he had to do. He'd followed orders.

And as a reward for his service, Death made him his Universal Champion. Death
took the powers of the Succubus, Shapeshifter and Animator and put them into him, so
in the end he was so powerful as to be considered godlike.

But most people just thought he was crazy. Most people didn't even bother with
his second book, a story about a man who fought against Death.

He lived in a home that was an island, anchored 450 miles off shore from Hawaii.

He had all the conveniences, comforts and luxuries that wealth could afford.

But all he ever did was think.