“Em...Calm with light winds,” said the raven on the left and then he cawed.
“Better than last week,” cawed the raven in the middle. “There was a hurricane on the twenty-fifth day at precisely one-fifty-four p.m.”
“Caw! Caw!”
I raised a brow. Birds that spoke were enough to believe, birds that had Irish accents were worse, but a hurricane? This place was nowhere near a body of water bigger than the hole at the bottom of the waterfall.
“Tomorrow,” cawed the raven on the right after dropping his coin into the pile below, “we predict severe thunderstorms with the likelihood of tornadoes.” The raven cawed and squawked and ruffled his big, black feathers.
“I hate crows,” Tsaeb said bluntly.
“Caw! Caw! Caw! Eejit little wanker!”
Tsaeb stood with his arms crossed over his midsection; he wore an annoyed and bored expression.
I, on the other hand, had begun scratching my crotch vigorously about twenty minutes back when we passed the halfway mark. It was beginning to worry me.
“It rains in Big Creek?” I asked confusedly.
“When it rains, it pours! Caw!”
“They talk ‘bout everything like it’s the wuther,” Morris revealed, “but what they mean is tomorrow sumthin’ will have the residents in an uproar and a few might even turn violent.”
“Ah...,” I said with the backward tilt of my head.
Glad I won’t be here for that.
“What happened last week on the twenty-fifth day at precisely one-fifty-four p.m.?” Morris put his hand up to shield his words and whispered to me, “A newspaper covered in feathers ‘stead of ink.” He winked.
“Caw!” the raven in the middle began, “Mary Mallon was boiling babies again. Cooked them up in fries and bangers, she did!”
“Erm,” the raven on the left paused, “the mothers beat Miss Mary with her own pots and pans and wooden spoons.”
“Caw!” said the raven on the right. “Strung her up on level three and hung her by the neck with, erm...” it looked to the raven in the middle, “What was it?”
“A rope?” it mocked, “Caw!”
The raven on the right squawked and ruffled its wings angrily. Two feathers, black and shiny, floated into the pile of coins and bird shit. A third was caught by the wind and carried off somewhere in the bushes behind the sign that read ‘Big cReeK’.
“They said today was calm,” interrupted Tsaeb, “so let’s go and find the damned imp and get the hell out of here.”
For once, I actually agreed with the demon.
“Cheers!” the ravens said as we walked away and down the last leg of the path.
My fear of having to go over the bridge again on our way back helped keep my mind off the itching in my pants.
“If you must eat it raw, please use a napkin.”
--
OLD RONAN WAS PARTIALLY demented and the rest of him, intellectual. He was a man of gray on white hair, combed back perfectly behind his ears. Everything about Old Ronan was clean and sophisticated except for his two wooden legs that tapped and sometimes scraped the floor when he walked. And despite what the brown-haired man in the tavern said about him, Ronan was not a crazy drunk from what I could tell.
He had beady black eyes like the rat that sat atop his makeshift desk made of crates and books, happily chewing on a cracker. Pushed up to the top of Ronan’s nose was a pair of glasses, lenses thin as though he only needed them for reading. He wore a monk-like robe complete with roped belt and big, hanging sleeves.
“It’s not often I get visitors anymore,” Ronan said. He walked toward the rounded ship window, struck a match and set fire to the lantern sitting in front of it. Daylight had been making its way over the mountain for an hour, but it was still dark and dank in this room, deep in the bowels of the larger ship. He had only this one window and the outside light was partially obscured by the shadow at the mountain’s base. The little flame danced inside the soot-stained glass globe. The room was just right for one man that seemed to like it dark and cozy. It appeared clean, but smelled like rotted wood and cool, mildewed air. Magazines were piled against a wall in a sloppy stack ready to topple and scatter if disturbed. Rolling Stone. National Geographic. Forbes. Glamour en Español. Vanity Fair. Cigar Aficionado. High Times. Subscription leaflets lay strewn around the pile and poked through stacks of crumpled, water-damaged pages.
Magazines from the Outside, here? I pondered.
There were many things in Creation that didn’t belong, as if two realities have been converging.
Tsaeb and I sat in the chairs we had been offered upon arriving. Morris appeared fidgety, often looking over his shoulder.
“The Garret brothers stop in and visit sometimes,” Ronan went on, “And every now and then I see my eldest sister, but it’s been some years since I was visited by anyone new.”
Ronan could’ve been forty-five or sixty-eight, or any age in-between. The deep wrinkles etched in his face seemed more caused by a short lifetime of hardships, or twenty years of smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. There was something about growing old gracefully, and Ronan just did not have it.
He offered me, Morris and then Tsaeb, a bowl of what appeared to be stew, but only I accepted. It had been so long since I ate and this food actually smelled like food, though it looked like nothing more than seasoned water with a few vegetables tossed in for good measure.
“Now what brings...” Ronan hesitated, looking at each of us, searching for the most suitable words, “...what brings such an odd trio to a place like Big Creek. Or rather, I should say, to visit the likes of me?
“No wait, let me guess,” Ronan went on, putting up his hand, “Morris—he and I go way back—happened to get stuck escorting the two of you here, right?” He pointed his long, slender finger. “Now the demon is with the man who—what did you say your name was?”
“Norman.”
“Ah yes,” Ronan continued, “he’s with Norman here because Norman has something which he needs, something of great value and importance that he himself cannot obtain or accomplish on his own.”
Ronan’s hand went up again to silence Tsaeb.
“Demons are demons because they cannot be trusted, because they lie, cheat, steal, break, foil and spoil better than anyone. A demon is a demon that has always been a demon and will be a demon for the rest of its days. There’s no turning back for those who possess a cloven hoof, forked tongue or a horn in the head, and you, Norman,” he pointed right at me, “would do better to believe that you needed one around like another hole in your ass.”
The silence and stares lasted long enough for Ronan to catch his breath, though it never appeared his breath needed catching.
“But you’ll have to forgive me; I am quite the hypocrite, as Morris McAlister here knows that I have a demon of my own.” He paused, smiled a huge close-lipped smile and gazed upon Tsaeb. “The only difference between mine and yours is that mine can be controlled. Mine, though evil as they come, cannot harm me; not even in my sleep, and I’m a very deep sleeper. But she is still a demon. I will never trust her. I will never like her, but I will always own her and she will always despise me for it.
“But back to the matter—”
“You know,” Tsaeb finally stepped in, “demon slaves, even imps, are like having a wild animal for a pet.” He knew there was no reason to finish the sentence.
Ronan was unaffected.
“But the real question here is,” Ronan’s attention was fully on me again, “What brings Morris to bring Norman that brought the demon to Big Creek to see Ronan? I am no man of wealth, fame, or even good looks. I barely have a bucket to piss in or a separate bucket to cook in. I’m not the keeper of some fantastical mystery, or a son that grew up to be a Chosen One. I’m not heir to any throne—unless maybe you’re here to lay siege to my shitter—and I am never in the market to buy new things unless holes start wearing in my socks—boy, I do hate wearing boots without socks, and that’
s why my feet never smell and are softer than a baby’s butt after a powder.”
“Uhhh...,” my wooden spoon had frozen near my lips a few sentences back, “...what did you say again about not having a separate pot to piss in?”
Ronan’s brows knotted curiously. He put a finger to his lips.
“Oh!” Ronan laughed. “No, no, it’s perfectly alright to eat the stew. I have more pots! See?” He bent over and yanked another pot from a dusty shelf near where he stood. The rat with the cracker paused, bared its teeth and then went back to its meal.
I was no longer hungry, extra pot or not and I didn’t care to question why he wore socks at all, seeing as how he had no feet.
Morris had been looking over his shoulder during most of the one-sided conversation. Now he had backed his way further from the door and stood closer to the rounded window where the flame flickered inside the globe. It wasn’t like him to be so quiet.
“Ahem.” Ronan gave me a cautious, curious look. “Phthirius pubis? Granuloma inguinale? Lymphopathia venereum?”
“What?”
Tsaeb looked downward toward my lap and chuckled.
“He’s asking if you have the Clap.”
The scratching had been barely anything more than an absent, recurring discomfort. I had not noticed how often ‘recurring’ truly was or how obvious it was to everyone but me. I squeezed my legs together and pulled my hand away out of slight embarrassment. Constantly I shifted in the chair.
Tsaeb leaned back in his seat next to me. Big devil-grin. Arms crossed. His feet barely touched the floor.
Morris found a spot in a shadowed corner to stand.
“Norman here,” Tsaeb began, “got a blow job from a succubus back in the city.”
“Aye,” Morris added with a strangely wild look in his eye, “and if it weren’t for Morris, they’d both be dead as a fly in a spider web.”
Ronan placed a thumb under his chin and gazed down at me. “Hmmm,” he said before pulling up a wooden stool. The stool legs scraped across the floorboards and then Ronan sat heavily, his own wooden legs straight out in front of him. “Show me your tongue.” He cupped his hand under my chin and gave my cheeks a squeeze.
My mouth reluctantly opened. I felt my cheeks force over the tops of his fingers like a squishy stress ball.
“Nothing wrong there,” said Ronan, letting go.
“Why don’t you unbutton your pants and let me see.”
I waited for a laugh or one of those grinning glances the joker gives to someone that is not the butt of the joke, but it never came.
“I’d really rather not.”
“Drop your pants, Norman,” laughed Tsaeb.
“Shut up you little shit.”
“Oh, come on. Let him see. He’s probably a doctor.”
“I said shut up....”
“No need to be embarrassed,” said Ronan, patting my knee, which made me even more uncomfortable.
“No, I’ll be fine. I-It’s just an itch; probably got it passing the swamp on our way here.” I drew my knees tighter and let my legs fall to the side. The thought of Ronan sitting directly in front of me with my legs spread was unsettling. “The mosquitoes out there were ruthless.”
Morris was even laughing by now.
“Morris has known Old Ronan fer many, many years,” said Morris from the shadow, “and Morris would trust him to look at his wee-wee a’fore anyone else.”
I stood, almost knocking the chair over on my way.
“Ha! Ha! Ha! This is rich!” Tsaeb laughed.
“Oh, don’t let the good-for-nothing demon get to you,” said Ronan.
Ronan moved carefully toward a shelf, carrying the low stool along with him. He was a short man and needed the extra height to reach the top of the shelf where a leather pouch with a pull-string dangled from a nail. I was long past beginning to worry. It took everything in me to keep from scratching, and I failed miserably at that. I thought about Charla the succubus and dreaded the inevitable news that I had contracted some special demon disease that would require nothing less than castration.
The leather pouch dropped in my hand.
“I suspect you got crotch rot,” said Ronan, wobbling on his wooden legs back with his stool. He maneuvered himself back down, carefully putting his fake legs out in front of him. He grunted and made a face. “Mix the salve with water and rub that stuff all over. It’ll clear up in a few days.”
I held the pouch in the palm of my hand.
“Crotch rot from a succubus’ mouth?”
“I guess she gave you something after all.” Tsaeb laughed with a snort.
Morris stepped slightly out of the shadow. “Disease carriers, they are. Vile bitches, Morris tells you!”
I was about to smack Tsaeb right out of his chair, until he began explaining further and with less mockery.
“The succubi and the incubi are real,” Tsaeb said, “as real as that crotch rot, but they don’t only represent sexual desire, they also represent sexual disease.”
“Just a’magine if you let her do more than bob on your knob,” said Morris.
“Oh yes,” Ronan added, “It would grow legs of its own and walk right off your body!”
Laughter filled the small room. None of it was coming from me.
I could feel bile churning in my stomach, the horribly sweet chemical-like invasion of my sinuses that would turn into vomit any second. Sweat beaded on my forehead and I felt pasty, even my hands and fingers were a sickly grey-white. I gripped the leather pouch of powdered salve tight in my fist and slowly took my seat again. Deep, calm breaths. Peaceful thoughts.
“We,” Tsaeb began, “well, Norman came here because he needs your imp to help get him inside the fortress.” He found absolutely nothing wrong with always wanting to get things rolling, even when one party was seconds from losing his stew and worried he was a scratch away from losing his penis.
“Ah yes!” Ronan remembered. “Why you all came here—wait, you want to borrow my imp?” He looked surprised and leery.
Morris drew himself back into the shadow and I had a hunch then why Morris had been acting so strangely.
“That true, Morris?” Ronan said with a curiously raised brow. “You mean to tell me you, of all people, volunteered to bring them?”
Morris nodded nervously and even in the shadow, the regretful look on his bearded face was obvious.
Ronan shook his head.
The itch was overwhelming. Finally, I shut my eyes and scratched as vigorously as I could, not caring anymore if they saw me do it. I could care less about their conversation, or about the ‘Task’, and why I was in Big Creek and what I had to do in Fiedel City. All I cared about was relief and if I had to go ahead, drop my pants to my ankles and scratch myself until I bled, then I would do it.
“You can use my shaving room to put on the salve, if you want,” Ronan offered. He opened his hand, palm up, toward the hallway. “Mine is first door on the left.”
“Thanks.”
I left with an uncomfortable stride.
The salve was a godsend. Surely, it contained the scariest and most inhumane ingredients I could imagine, but I wasn’t going to ask and hoped like hell that Ronan would refrain from telling me. I stood in the shaving room accompanied by a cracked ceramic bowl on a wine barrel, a straight razor and a woven basket that held a set of vintage shaving supplies.
After my unsuccessful search for a towel, I wiped the rest of the salve onto my pants. I stood there, gladly taking in the room’s isolation. I could faintly hear the voices of Tsaeb, Morris and Ronan just one room away, something about “if he succeeds” and “safe passage” and “Sophia kills things” and “the End of the Beginning”. I thought about what Tsaeb had told me back in the Field of Yesterday; that once I met with the queen she would tell me everything I needed to know. Soon I would know. As long as I could get into the fortress, most of my questions would finally be answered. I was already so sick of it all that despite my encounter with Charla, I was
ready to jump in bed with the queen and give her a bastard child. I just wanted to go home, back to the polluted city I grew up in, back to my ex-wife—no more decisions, no more consequences. And if she would not have me, back to Lou’s Coffee in my favorite seat near the south window where I could torture myself watching a woman I would never have. Back to work at the office where the smell of Bengay and Cool Water cologne was thick in the hallway near Hugh Bastardi’s office. And back to the street corner where I saw the Devil the first time and tell him to shove it, like I should’ve done.
I pressed my hands against the rotted wall in front of me. Closing my eyes, I lowered my head and sighed. I thought about curling up in the corner and falling fast asleep. Maybe I would wake up and find that this was all just a bad dream, but I knew better than that too.
What did I do to deserve this?
I had never killed anyone, or even physically harmed another human being for that matter. I was not the adulterous one in my marriage, no, Amanda cheated on me with the guy that worked at the auto body shop. I wasn’t a bad guy in general. I always tossed my extra change in the Salvation Army red kettle, and passed a buck to a homeless man on a street corner. I thought I had lived a decent life, one not necessarily for God, but not against Him, either.
Maybe that’s precisely why I was being punished.
I grew up under the religious thumb of my mother, but never followed her example. In fact, because religion was forced down my throat as a child, I was sick of it by the time I was old enough to make my own decisions. I never went to church when I got older, except once at my friend’s wedding, then at my own wedding, and at my father’s funeral. I never read the Bible, though I knew it better than anyone I knew, thanks to my mother. I never prayed, except when I really, really wanted something. I always hid when the Jehovah’s Witnesses knocked on the door and I made up an excuse when they caught me.
I was being punished, I was sure of it, and the Jehovah’s Witnesses were probably behind it all.
A shadow moved across the floor. I lifted my head as I heard something outside the door and the shadow moved again in the pool of light underneath it.
Dirty Eden Page 9