wizard-of-the-pigeons

beam of the citynight seeped in. He had slept in safety.
And awakened to terror. His cardboard had been wrenched clear of his
window to lie atop the clotting puddle of blanket on the gritty floor.
The cracked window was not transparent. Rising street dust and grime had
given it a milky wash. Stalactites of pigeon droppings graced it a la Jack Frost.
The recent pattering of rain against it had smeared it more, making it impossible
to see out. But the ghostly black-gray that passes for night in the city seeped in,
making shadows that oozed from the edges of his possessions and slunk from
beneath the brick and board shelves.
A smear of harsher light in the lower left corner of the window was flung
from the vulturing streetlamps of South Jackson. The light striated across the
cracked window, destroying even his memories of the blessed empty darkness of
true night. Sweet night of star-specked skies and tree-breathed air had been
replaced by a crouching grayness that emanated from the city. It came as much
from the gutters and dumpsters as from headlights and streetlamps. It was more
than the fogging breath of huddled winos and the gray puffing of exhaust. It was
not inanimate.
Wizard kept his breathing steady, but from the skin in he trembled. His heart
longed to gallop, his lungs screamed for more oxygen, faster. He smothered
them, choking on fear, and tried to think.
It was gray. And now that he so desperately needed to recall everything he
had ever known about it, he could remember nothing. Nothing. Except… Mir. A
name? he wondered, and chased the wonder away. No time for it. All he could
do right now was to defend. But at least it thought he was sleeping. He reined his
power back, risking no contact. It wanted him. He didn’t move. If he trembled, if
he flinched, if his power just brushed it, it would suck at him. It would drag him
from his bed to the window. It believed he still slept; he felt its tenuous probings.
It sought to find his dreams and slip in the unguarded back door of his mind. Not
again. Like the shock of a bright flashlight in the eyes, an unbidden memory
came to him. Once it had forced him to come to it. It had never forgotten its
triumph over him. But Wizard had. He could not keep the memory, let the force
of the recollection assault him. He couldn’t let it weaken him. If he harked to
that memory, it would sense his awareness. Without a reason to hover and sneak
and wait, it would leap in and fasten itself to him. Right now, it hunted his
dreams.
It pressed against the cracked window pane. He saw the glass bend with its