The cage was filled with snake. There was no head to it, and no tail‌—‌nothing but a wave of tarnished darkness rolling from one end of the cage to the other, leaving no room for anything but its own thunderous breathing. Only the unicorn saw, coiled in a corner, a baleful boa; brooding, perhaps, over its own Judgment on the Midnight Carnival. But it was tiny and dim as the ghost of a worm in the Serpent’s shadow.

A wondering gawk stuck up his hand and demanded of Rukh, “If this big snake do be coiled around the world, as you say, how come you to be having a piece of it in your wagon? And if it can shatter the sea just by stretching of itself, what’s to keep it from crawling off wearing your whole show like a necklace?” There were murmurs of agreement, and some of the murmurers began to back warily away.

“I’m glad you asked me that, friend,” Rukh said with a scowl. “It just so happens that the Midgard Serpent exists in like another space from ours, another dimension. Normally, therefore, he’s invisible, but dragged into our world‌—‌as Thor hooked him once‌—‌he shows clear as lightning, which also visits us from somewhere else, where it might look quite different. And naturally he might turn nasty if he knew that a bit of his tummy slack was on view daily and Sundays in Mommy Fortuna’s Midnight Carnival. But he don’t know. He’s got other things to think about than what becomes of his belly button, and we take our chances‌—‌as do you all‌—‌on his continued tranquility.” He rolled and stretched the last word like dough, and his hearers laughed carefully.

“Spells of seeming,” the unicorn said. “She cannot make things.”

“Nor truly change them,” added the magician. “Her shabby skill lies in disguise. And even that knack would be beyond her, if it weren’t for the eagerness of those gulls, those marks, to believe whatever comes easiest. She can’t turn cream into butter, but she can give a lion the semblance of a manticore to eyes that want to see a manticore there‌—‌eyes that would take a real manticore for a lion, a dragon for a lizard, and the Midgard Serpent for an earthquake. And a unicorn for a white mare.”

The unicorn halted in her slow, desperate round of the cage, realizing for the first time that the magician understood her speech. He smiled, and she saw that his face was frighteningly young for a grown man‌—‌untraveled by time, unvisited by grief or wisdom. “I know you,” he said.

The bars whispered wickedly between them. Rukh was leading the crowd to the inner cages now. The unicorn asked the tall man, “Who are you?”

“I am called Schmendrick the Magician,” he answered. “You won’t have heard of me.”

The unicorn came very near to explaining that it was hardly for her to have heard of one wizard or another, but something sad and valiant in his voice kept her from it. The magician said, “I entertain the sightseers as they gather for the show. Miniature magic, sleight of hand‌—‌flowers to flags and flags to fish, all accompanied by persuasive patter and a suggestion that I could work more ominous wonders if I chose. It’s not much of a job, but I’ve had worse, and I’ll have better one day. This is not the end.”