Mirrorworld Read Free

hold of the cricket bat he kept stashed behind the bar for such situations; he had little enough inclination to serve new customers at this time, and few enough morals to be okay with the idea of giving whoever was descending a quick rap about the skull and dropping them in the street outside.
    As the descending figure came into view, however, the barman hesitated. Tall, tall enough that by all rights it should need to stoop to dodge the low ceiling, and yet somehow did not, it was wreathed in the folds of a black cloak and robe, the raised hood casting its face into blackness, and held a sleek staff that matched its height in length, and looked more weapon than walking aid. The barman fought the urge to shrink bank and hide as the figure strode towards him purposefully.
    “Double vodka, please,” the apparition said, in a voice like a distant avalanche. “I’ll be over there.” It pointed towards the man with the whiskey. The barman almost asked the figure if he was sure that was a good idea, but then swallowed his tongue, unsure that he wanted to know what such a menacing figure might consider a good idea to be. Instead, he practically ran off towards his optics as the black figure slid along the bar to stand beside the whiskey drinker.
     
    “Hello Marcus,” it said.
    The man with the whiskey didn’t look up from his apparently highly interesting perusal of the label on his most recent bottle.
    “Oi,” the figure said, poking him on the shoulder. This time the man looked up.
    “Hello,” he said after a moment. “Fancy meeting you at the bottom of this glass.”
    The dark figure appeared to hesitate. “Do you know me, Marcus?” it asked after a moment.
    The man addressed as Marcus regarded his new conversational partner. “Let me see. Dramatic dress sense. Very tall. Very pale. Skull for a face. Rings a faint bell. Maybe I know you, maybe I don’t. Can’t be sure at this point. What brings you here, friend? Me, I came for the drink, but stayed for the sterling conversation.” He punctuated his words with a hiccough that prompted the momentary focus to fade from his eyes, and resumed his distant observation of his bottle.
    The dark figure frowned, or rather a set of shadows passed over its pearly white face in such a manner that might be taken for a frown in a face capable of expression. “Few can truly say they have known me, Marcus,” it said after a moment, “but I certainly know you . Look, you’re in my book.” A bony hand retrieved from somewhere within the depths of the figure’s cloak a small address book, and delicately flicked through it to a certain page, holding it up in the bar’s dim light. “Marcus Lathir Chiallion,” the figure intoned. “Twenty-nine years, three days, twelve hours and fourteen minutes living out of twenty-nine years, three days, twelve hours and eighteen minutes total. Six feet tall, raggedy brown hair, sense of perpetual loss. Oh yes, that’s definitely you. You see me well, as I see you. That is interesting, but only for a little while. Thank you,” it added grievously, to the barman, who had finally worked up the courage to approach with the figure’s drink, “put it on his tab.”
    There was silence as the dark figure idly chased the ice cubes around his glass, while the man named Marcus, piqued by the figure’s words, studied him intensely. “You know, I’m not actually drunk,” he confided after a few moments. “I’m just practising how to pretend to be.”
    “Pretending by drinking heavily isn’t really pretending”, the dark figure replied absently.
    “No, listen,” Marcus said, waving his hands about. “The sixth sheik’s sixth sheep is asleep. Wait, was that right?”
    “That is a remarkable impression,” the dark figure intoned soberly. “I could almost believe you have no idea what you’re talking about.”
    “Listen,” Marcus said again, then decided to give up. “You’re the Grim Reaper, aren’t you?”
    “Yes,” said