The Weapon Bearer's Son

by Steven F. Warnock

  “No to both questions,” Mack sighed. “I might wanna punch you, but I don’t want to kill you, Uncle. Do you have a name you want to be called?”

  “The name I’m currently going by is John Williams, but the name your grandparents gave me is Ebenezer Hazael Llewellyn.”

  “No wonder you changed your name,” KC said before slapping a hand over her mouth and blushing.

  “What is up with my family and crazy names?” Mack sighed to himself.

  “That was not kind of me,” KC apologized.

  Uncle chuckled as he waved off the apology. “My sister certainly got the better end of the naming deal, but my name was chosen for its meaning. ‘Ebenezer’ means ‘stone of help’, which was supposed to influence my personality into being helpful, which I like to think I am, and ‘Hazael’ means ‘God sees’, which is a reflection of my Gift of Foresight. I’m not exactly prophetic, but I am able to determine what is necessary to fulfill a future need. Right now, that need is coffee.”

  “I get it. Go make a pot of coffee, Uncle Ebenezer,” Mack chuckled.

  “I prefer ‘Ben’.”

  “I am not calling you ‘Uncle Ben’,” Mack declared. “I am not opening either one of us to that particular comic book comparison.”

  KC WAS WAITING WHEN Athena came out of the master bath. Fresh from the shower, Athena only had a towel wrapped around her body to preserve her modesty, which she nearly dropped upon seeing KC seated on the end of the bed.

  “Sorry,” KC apologized as she stood up. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  Athena grinned. “It’s a nice surprise. I don’t suppose you’ve decided to cheat on Mack with me, eh?”

  KC snickered. “No. Not that I’m not tempted.” She patted some clothes laid out on the big bed. “Seems Uncle Ebenezer keeps a supply of men’s and women’s clothing in a variety of sizes in the back bedroom.”

  “That’s weird,” Athena snorted as she approached the bed. Then, she stopped and frowned. “Ebenezer?”

  “That’s Uncle’s real name.”

  “Ebenezer? Like, as in ‘Scrooge’?”

  “Yeah. His middle name is Hazael.”

  “Hazel?”

  “No, ‘Ha-zay-ell’. It’s Biblical.” KC blinked. “So’s ‘Ebenezer’ for what it’s worth.”

  Athena looked through the items KC had laid out for her. “Are you here to help me dress?”

  “No. I’m here to catch you up before you go out there,” KC explained.

  “Oh. So, it won’t bother you seeing me naked?” Athena teased.

  “I live in a little over 300 square feet with a werewolf, so casual nudity doesn’t bother me. Will me seeing you naked bother you?”

  Athena answered by dropping her towel to the floor with a smirk.

  KC cocked her head to one side. “Wax or shave?”

  “Wax. You?”

  “Same, but I do it myself.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re on the move a lot, so I’d rather not bother using some random esthetician in whatever random city we happen to be in at the moment.”

  “Cool. Does Mack help?”

  “Of course,” KC grinned.

  Athena held up an unopened pack of panties. “Seriously?”

  KC nodded. “There’s a stack of big plastic bins labeled ‘underwear’ and whether they’re for men or women. I even found bras in one bin. I guessed your size.”

  “Good grief, these are nice!” Athena exclaimed.

  “I know, and not just a random selection from Victoria’s Secret either. Some of these brands you’ve gotta order online.”

  “You’ve already raided his stash for yourself, haven’t you?”

  “Do I look stupid?”

  “Dresses?”

  “I thought you might like a change from jeans.”

  “You just wanna see me in a pretty dress,” Athena teased as she picked out a blue dress with a floral print.

  “Blue is my favorite color.”

  “Does this mean we just became best friends?”

  “I’ve already got one of those.”

  “You are allowed to have more than one, you know.”

  “I know,” KC grinned. “Okay, I’ve caught you up on one major development.”

  “My client’s real name. I thought his name was ‘John Williams’.”

  “His current cover identity. Okay, the second thing is that he told us that he killed the person who actually killed Mack’s parents.”

  Athena’s mouth gaped open. “Oh my god!”

  “That’s also the extent of the details we have. Apparently, Ebenezer doesn’t want to repeat himself, so we’ve been waiting for you. He and Mack have been cooking supper while I raided the clothing store.”

  “What’s in the front bedroom, I wonder,” Athena mused.

  “It’s set up like an office, but the closet’s got a safe in it. Oh! I forgot: Uncle makes his money by designing prosthetics and other medical devices.”

  “Lucrative. How do I look?”

  KC considered the other woman. “Perfect.”

  “Aw, you’re just being nice. I wish I had a little makeup to put on.”

  “You don’t need it, but you can borrow mine later.”

  Athena spontaneously threw her arms around KC. “Thank you for keeping me safe.”

  “We kinda blew up your house.”

  “I have really good homeowner’s insurance. Besides, I am dying to know what’s going on. This adventure is turning out to be as good as one of Mack’s novels.” Athena released KC and stepped back. “Mack doesn’t base his books on you guys’ adventures, does he?”

  KC laughed. “Oh, god, no! Our lives are super boring in comparison.”

  Athena rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Yeah, right. Pull the other one.”

  KC glanced toward the door. “I’m getting hungry. You wanna hear just how crazy prepared Uncle Ebenezer is?”

  “Beyond a well-stocked wardrobe?”

  “He keeps fresh blood stocked in the fridge. The blood supply I brought with me is starting to run low, and he’s got enough to last me another couple of weeks.”

  “It’s like he knows what we’ll need, which could explain why the master bath has my favorite brands of shampoo and soap.”

  “Apparently, that’s how his Nephilim Gift of Foresight works.”

  “Okay, we can stand here dithering, or we can go learn more about Mack’s family.”

  Chapter Nine

  Chesapeake, Virginia

  Monday, May 6, 2019

  “WELL, AREN’T YOU JUST pretty as a picture!” Uncle Ebenezer exclaimed when Athena walked into the kitchen.

  “Thank you. KC has great taste, don’t you think?”

  “Of course, she married my nephew, didn’t she?”

  “Are you feeling better?” Mack asked.

  Athena nodded. “Much better, thank you. KC caught me up.”

  “And I kept my hands to myself,” she assured her husband with a wink.

  “I was never worried,” Mack winked back. “Let’s eat before it gets cold.”

  Mack had prepared taco burgers using guacamole, salsa, lettuce, shredded cheddar, sour cream, and tortilla chips as the condiments. For sides he’d prepared a dish of green beans mixed with bacon and shallots fried in the bacon grease and crispy oven fried homemade tater tots.

  “Uncle Ebenezer is quite the handy sous chef,” Mack praised.

  “I am a bachelor, and I do have to cook for myself.”

  “You look different, sir,” Athena observed.

  “Oh, that’s because my nephew here has thoroughly searched and disarmed me. You may have noticed that a certain amount of paranoia runs in our family,” Uncle chuckled. “I’m at ease because Mack and KC are at ease. Do you feel at ease, Athena?”

  “I’m still upset that your attempt to protect me got my neighbors killed.”

  Mack held up a hand to silence his uncle. “Athena, I think we’re all falling into a trap of blaming ou
rselves and each other for actions which were beyond our control. Those Frateco Cutters made the choice to attack your neighbor’s house before confirming it was the correct target. We made the choice to defend ourselves with lethal force. Personally, I take comfort in knowing that we killed the people who killed your neighbors.”

  “You killed all of them?” Uncle Ebenezer asked with a piercing look.

  “I’m pretty sure the three at the back door were taken out by the Claymore. The back wall of Athena’s house is more glass than wood, and they were well within the effective blast radius. The three that came in the front door, their door kicker definitely was wasted by the mine. The other two were wounded. When we came out the garage, I shot the dwergar in the face, and emptied the rest of the clip into the bouncy elf. I chucked a frag grenade at the other two.”

  KC cleared her throat. “Um, babe, your count is off.”

  “How so?” Mack was genuinely curious. He never doubted KC when it came to tracking numbers.

  “On the news this weekend, they reported five people killed in the neighbor’s house: two men, the parents, and their three adopted daughters. Then, they reported seven bodies found around Athena’s house, Athena herself presumed missing. They don’t know about the two of us, so that leaves one hitter unaccounted for.”

  Mack nodded. “Probably the green haired chick. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts she was wearing body armor. Not much good against mines and grenades, but most likely quite suitable for pistol caliber rounds.”

  Uncle Ebenezer rubbed his chin. “Sounds like a fratoy of soldiers with a Cutter leader. You said she was an elf? With green hair?”

  “Yeah. It was cut kinda short, sort of butch looking,” Mack confirmed.

  “I know her. She’s an Aes Sidhe named Althea Baylor, but she goes by the street name of ‘Alpha’.”

  “And just how do you know that?”

  “The Llewellyns and the Baylors have been locked in a secret feud since the beginning of recorded time,” Uncle Ebenezer sighed. He put his half-eaten burger down on his plate and leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest. “I supposed I need to start from the very beginning of the beginning. What do you know about Nephilim?”

  “They were the offspring of the sons of God who mated with human women before the Great Flood,” Athena piped up. “I may be a Cupid, but I was raised by an observant Jewish father.”

  “Yes, you are correct, of course, Athena,” Uncle Ebenezer praised. “I would add that the ‘sons of God’ as you called them were a company of two hundred angels known as ‘Watchers’ or ‘Grigori’.”

  “That’s who we’re descended from, then?” Mack asked.

  Uncle Ebenezer shook his head. “Not... exactly. I mean, our family has interbred with the Nephilim of Earth off and on across the generations, but our origin is, um, slightly different.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, we’re of the Tuatha De...”

  “You’re Irish?” KC exclaimed. “I mean, ‘Llewellyn’ is Welsh...”

  Uncle Ebenezer laughed merrily. “Irish, Scottish, Welsh, they’re all just branches of the same Celtic ancestors who thought the islands of England and Ireland were a swell place to live. However, our ancestors pre-date them. The Grigori of Earth were not the only angels to fall in love with mortal women. God is God across the multiverse. He strategically set companies of Watchers in some of the Realms of Faerie with varying results. The best outcome, in my opinion, being the Tuatha De, and the worst, the Fomori.”

  “So, you’re saying that the ‘Tribe of the Goddess Danu’ were Faerie Nephilim?” KC gaped.

  “Not exactly. ‘Tuatha De’ is ‘Tribe or Folk of God’. The ‘Danann’ was added later to distinguish between the Children of Israel and the proto-Irish,” Uncle Ebenezer explained. “I suppose to primitive humans and even to slightly more advanced Sidhe, the mating of an angel with an Aes Sidhe or even an Ard Sidhe was a physical, living god.”

  “Hold on. Let’s back up a second. You mentioned the Fomorians. They’re Faerie Nephilim, too?” KC was looking excited.

  “Your Irish mythology nerd is showing,” Mack teased.

  “Shush, you! Uncle Ebenezer, please continue.”

  Uncle Ebenezer was looking entirely amused. “After a fashion, yes. You see, the way I understand it, there were three different companies of the Grigori chorus: High, Middle, and Low. The Middle company are the Grigori of Earth, who we know all Fell. The High and Low companies were placed in the Faerie realms above and below Earth, the ones that buffer our world from the Golden worlds of the Celestial realms and the Brimstone worlds of the Infernal realms.”

  “The Realms of the Wild Fae,” KC interrupted.

  Uncle Ebenezer nodded. “Yes, Avalon and Annwn, the High and Low Wild Realms. In Avalon, only half of the Watchers Fell to the temptation of mortal women. They and their offspring, the Tuatha De, were driven out of Avalon to Earth by the remaining High Company. Likewise, in Annwn, half of the Low Company Fell, but before they did, they slew their brethren who remained faithful, and in doing so, became demons like Lucifer’s army. The Low Company fathered the Fomori. Then, they drove the Fomori out of Annwn to Earth because the High Company was coming to slay the Low Company.”

  “Wow,” Athena gasped. “This is some story.”

  Mack was frowning in thought. “So, our ancestors were driven out of Avalon into exile here on Earth where we, what? Fell in with the Atlanteans and the Seelie Sidhe?”

  “Yes, exactly,” Uncle Ebenezer confirmed, “and the Fomorians fell into cahoots with the Lemurians and the Unseelie Sidhe.”

  “Are Fomorians as ugly as they are in the legends?” KC asked with a glint of intellectual excitement in her eyes.

  “No, not even a little,” Uncle Ebenezer laughed. “Like all Sidhe and all Nephilim, they are exceedingly attractive, if I do say so myself.”

  “Why?” Mack blurted. “I mean, why do you say so yourself?”

  “Because the Fomori and the Tuatha De intermarried from time to time,” Uncle Ebenezer replied.

  KC was practically bouncing in her seat. “I know this! There were actually Fomori who became kings of the Tuatha De Danann, and one of the greatest Tuatha kings, Lugh, was half Fomor on his mother’s side...”

  A look of shock had spread across KC’s face as she made the connections.

  “Babe?” Mack prompted.

  “’Llewellyn’ is from the Welsh spelling of the Irish name ‘Lugh’. Uncle Ebenezer, are you the descendants of Lugh?”

  The elder Llewellyn nodded. “Yes. Likewise, we are also descendants of Balor, who is also ultimately the ancestor of the Cutter you tangled with, Althea Baylor, and she is highly motivated to kill me because I killed her twin brother, who was the Cutter who murdered my sister, your mother.”

  Mack sat back in stunned shock. “So, why haven’t they ever released Danny Andrews if you had proof that it was this Frateco Cutter who shot Mom & Dad?”

  “Because the Frateco framed Danny Andrews beyond any hope of proving his innocence. When Bartholomew Baylor (Beta they called him) shot your parents he was shapeshifted into a perfect re-creation of poor Danny. They’d isolated Danny beforehand, and Beta had passed himself off as Danny for several days, establishing the fact that he’d gotten a gun and was intending to use it to rob someone to get his next score.”

  “What about the Program?” Athena asked. “Don’t they get involved when paranormals get killed by mundanes?”

  Uncle Ebenezer shook his head sadly. “They couldn’t get involved because the Frateco had so perfectly framed Danny that it appeared as if everything involved mundanes, and the only way to break the frame would be to expose the Great Open Secret.”

  “Violating the Roman Accords and making the Program subject to harsh sanctions,” Athena surmised. “Maybe even the United States as a whole.”

  “Exactly,” Uncle Ebenezer nodded. “On the other hand, a friend of mine in the Program who’d figured out the truth, blatan
tly told me that Beta was the actual killer, where I could find him, and provided me with suitable ammunition to get the job done. The Accords do recognize legitimate vendettas as a means of securing justice which has been legally denied by mundane jurisprudence.”

  Mack looked troubled.

  “I hope you’re not worrying about Danny Andrews, Nephew. He was never an innocent bystander. In fact, he’d gotten away with another, similar murder, which is why he made such a perfect fall guy for the Frateco, so even though he has been punished for a crime he did not commit, the punishment is still well deserved,” Ebenezer said. Then, he sighed. “Besides, I may have traded a few favors over the years and gotten Danny therapy and better treatment. You haven’t kept up with him in recent years, have you?”

  “No, sir, I’ve been too busy,” Mack admitted.

  “Have you heard of a prison ministry called ‘Kairos’?”

  Mack shook his head.

  “Well, they are a wonderful organization that I support, and Danny got involved with them. He’s a success story for Kairos. He got saved, took seminary courses, and is now an ordained minister. He’s actually the chaplain at the prison where he’d been incarcerated. In his testimony, he credits being sent to prison for Al and Marian’s murder with turning his life around.”

  “That’s...” Mack couldn’t say anything more as unshed tears clouded his vision.

  “I suppose we should turn to the subject of why Bartholomew ‘Beta’ Baylor killed your parents, and to explain that, what do you know about Balor of the Evil Eye?”

  Uncle Ebenezer looked straight at KC who blushed and grinned at the same time.

  “Okay, the story as I know it goes there was this Fomor chieftain, a tyrant, called Balor who was the son of Buarainech, husband of Cethlenn, and father of Ethniu that ruled his people from a tower on Tory Island. The story my dad told me was that Balor had a bunch of nicknames, ‘the smiter’, ‘the mighty smiter’, ‘the piercing eye’, and ‘the evil eye’ because of one of his eyes was deformed, over-sized, but possessed of an incredibly deadly power. Balor kept the eye covered because when he uncovered it and opened it, it basically killed everything he looked at.”