by J-F. Dubeau
“God . . . dammit . . . Abe . . . I make a living with . . . these lungs,” he croaked.
“I’m so sorry, Ezekiel. Are you okay?” the large boy asked.
“I’ll be fine. Ribs heal fast, right?”
Venus and Daniel approached carefully. The situation felt volatile. There was good reason to attract as little attention as possible, but at the same time, what they’d witnessed couldn’t be ignored.
She put a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “Abe? That man tried to kill your father.”
“Him? Nah!” Abraham said with confidence, going so far as to throw his arm around the small man’s shoulders. The stranger winced. “This is Ezekiel! He works with the circus. He’s one of Dad’s oldest friends. I’ve known him for years.”
The enthusiasm and confidence drained from his voice the more he talked, to the point where he seemed to doubt himself completely by the time he reached his last word.
“Right?” he finished.
“Actually . . . ,” Ezekiel said. “She’s right.”
Daniel stepped forward, ready to intervene should Abraham decide to murder Ezekiel for what he had almost done. Venus waved him back, fearing that his interference would make matters worse.
“Why would you do that?” the farm boy said.
“It’s what he wants. Dying in Saint-Ferdinand . . . Harry deserves better than that.”
“But he’s not dead yet!” Venus said.
“Exactly,” Ezekiel said. “He’s going to get better. He’ll go home to Saint-Ferdinand. He’ll die there. I can’t allow that.”
Daniel put a hand gently on Venus’s back, trying to nudge her down the corridor while giving a solid pat on Abraham’s shoulder to encourage him to do the same, but the Peterson boy wouldn’t have it.
“What is he doing here?” Abraham asked Venus.
“He’s . . . my ride,” she explained, signaling for him to follow.
Again, the Peterson boy didn’t budge.
“Your ride? Inspector Crowley’s the asshole who beat up my dad! I’m not following orders from this son of a bitch.”
“I’m just trying to help, man,” Daniel said. “If you don’t want your friend here to get cuffed and sent to jail, we have to get out of here.”
There was a tense moment. Abraham wasn’t an idiot, nor was he usually controlled by his emotions, but if there was any similarity between him and Daniel, it was how close they were with their fathers. Venus could tell it was a struggle for her friend to keep his belligerent urges under control. He’d already managed to suppress them once, and it was to his credit that he’d succeeded in doing it again.
“All right. I’m sorry.” He shook his head. “You’re right. It’s just—”
Daniel gave the farm boy a light punch on the shoulder. “It’s cool, man. I get it. I know it doesn’t help or change anything, but my dad’s been acting crazy these days. I don’t know why he’d do that to your old man.”
“I hate to break up this touching moment,” Ezekiel said, and wheezed, still clutching his ribs, “but can we move along?”
Venus nodded. “We can go to my uncle’s office. It’s in another building, but we’ll have some privacy there. And I need to pick something up.”
“Shit,” said Daniel. “I gotta go.”
Venus turned to see that he had his phone out and was staring at the screen. His face was pale and his shoulders were slumped. There was a slight tremble in his lower lip as he kept his mouth agape.
“Dan?” she asked, worried that yet another crisis had emerged. “You okay, Dan?”
“No,” he said. “I’ll . . . I’ll catch up with you in Saint-Ferdinand.”
“Dan! You can’t just leave.”
“I’m sorry. I have to.” He started to walk then jog away in the other direction. “Find me when you get back to town!”
“Daniel!” she yelled after him, tempted to try to catch up. “You’re my ride home!”
RANDY
BOOKS.
In the short time he’d been jailed, Randall McKenzie had built a temple of them. Most of the tomes he’d read twice, some even three times. After all, there wasn’t much else to do in prison. In fact, aside from his brother, Paul, Randy had received no further visitors besides Jackie, who brought him his meals.
They’d chat for a bit, mostly discussing some of the minor happenings around the village. On the second day, she showed him a rash on her upper arm, which he diagnosed as an allergic reaction. The doctor recommended a topical cream, and after a few days she didn’t mention it again. Banal, boring stuff. But no matter how mundane, it was still better than attempting conversation with Sam Finnegan.
The madman had only been capable of holding a coherent dialogue on a few rare occasions. Usually when other people dropped by, such as Venus or Paul. Otherwise, the Saint-Ferdinand Killer kept to himself. Either quietly weeping or occasionally humming loudly. It was best not to disturb him, as it usually brought on his more musical moods.
There was no television and no Internet access. Randy had requested some notes and documents from his office, but Crowley had categorically denied him. So in the end, all he had left were the books.
These had been picked by Stephen Crowley. They tended to be a hodgepodge of bad cop mysteries, the occasional horror novel, and books on religion. Occasionally, an odd selection would make its way into the piles that were brought to him. One was an ancient book on gothic architecture. Another, a huge atlas of the United Kingdom, with details about every castle, abbey, and pile of stone on the island. These were not the inspector’s books. These had belonged to his wife. Randy could tell because they were all annotated with scribbles in an elegant penmanship far beyond Crowley’s ability.
Despite his boredom, it was not a welcome sound to hear the cellblock door open so late in the evening. Randy had run out of imagined scenarios in which someone came to announce that the threat in his brother’s shed was neutralized. The only news he could think to receive was of more deaths. And the only way he could see Crowley releasing him was if the inspector had found a way to force the medical examiner to help him. In either case, it would be symptomatic that the village was tilting ever more toward its doom.
“Randall?”
The woman’s voice preceded her. He heard her footsteps coming down the short flight of steps toward the cells, their hesitance all but confirming his worries.
“Erica,” he croaked.
The psychologist finally turned the corner. She’d lost a significant amount of her radiance since coming to Saint-Ferdinand. The darkness of the town had taken its toll, stripping away her vitality and denying her sleep for days. She hadn’t been born here and wasn’t used to having secrets and mysteries as her bedfellows.
Right behind his old student was Venus’s best friend, Penelope LaForest. The daughter of the woman Randy was accused of murdering in the most gruesome fashion imaginable. As one could imagine, the young lady had no joy in her face.
“How are you doing, Randy?” Erica asked.
“I’m as fine as can be expected. She shouldn’t be here, Erica.”
The medical examiner wondered if his niece’s friend had received his message. If so, shouldn’t she be in Sherbrooke, retrieving his notes? Or maybe Penny had brought them to him?
“Actually, I’m the one who asked to speak with you, Dr. McKenzie,” Penny said.
“I know it’s unorthodox,” Erica added, “but Penelope wanted to confront you, as it were, to help her process—”
“I lied,” the girl interrupted, stepping forward to stand a few inches from the bars. “Randy didn’t kill my mother.”
She was speaking to Erica but staring down the medical examiner. Sitting at the back of his cell, obscured by columns of books and magazines, Randall McKenzie frowned.
“I’m sorry, Dr. Hazelwood,” Penny continued. “I didn’t want to trick you, but you were my only way in here. And I have to talk to Dr. McKenzie. Preferably alone?”
Erica
was stunned. Penny was a smart kid, but she’d never shown much in the way of guile. She simply didn’t have the malicious bent for it, but clearly the talent was there. Dr. Hazelwood tightened her lips.
“No. I can’t in good conscience leave you here.”
“But he didn’t kill my mother. I’ll be fine.”
“You’ve been anything but fine since the moment I told you about your mother, Penelope.” Erica was adamant. “If you knew Randy was innocent, why didn’t you say anything? He’d be free by now. We could tell Inspector Crowley, and he could be out of that cell before lunch!”
Randy could almost make himself believe that she cared for him as more than a friend, but he knew better. “Wouldn’t have helped,” he told her. “Stephen wants me where he can find me. He wants me contained.”
“And he wants you away from Cicero’s Circus,” said Penny.
The medical examiner stood up from his cot. Careful not to knock over any books, he made his way to the cell door, both in order to lower his voice and to better see his visitors.
“What do you know of Cicero’s Circus?”
“I know the owner needs to speak with you,” Penny said. “And I know how to get you there.”
The offer was intriguing. Randy could see that Erica, however, disapproved of the discussion.
“If you need to speak to someone, Randy, I can bring you a phone. Or better yet, get you released!”
“You don’t understand,” the medical examiner explained, shaking his head. “Crowley’s been controlling everything that comes in or leaves here. I don’t know what you’re planning, Penelope, but I doubt there’s a way to get me to see Cicero. I have a pen and paper. I could write down a few questions for him . . .”
He trailed off as Penny lifted her hands, showing him an object she’d held at her side this whole time. Audrey’s bear. Still stained with soil from her grave and still wearing that red felt hat. The nails he had inserted into Audrey’s feet were anchors, so that her soul couldn’t be ripped away or dissipate. The nails in her eyes allowed her to see clearly into the world of the living. The bear, though, that was supposed to keep her from wandering. Forcing her spirit to remain near her grave so they could find it later and, ostensibly, bring it back.
Wherever the bear was, Audrey’s spirit wasn’t far.
“You buried this with her, didn’t you?” Penny said.
Erica was shocked, but Randy paid her no mind.
“I had to.”
“I know,” the girl said in a voice of true understanding. “She told me.”
“What are you two talking about?” Erica said, unable to follow the discussion.
“Erica . . . you should go,” Randy said. “The longer you stay, the more in danger you are.”
“Randall, you know I can’t, from an ethical standpoint, leave this girl with you or him!”
The psychologist nodded toward the neighboring cell. There, Sam Finnegan had quietly approached the bars. He leaned his forehead against the metal rods, listening to their conversation.
Neither Randy nor Penny had seen him creep up, and while the medical examiner was surprised, Penny was even less comfortable. She might have been confident about Randy’s innocence in her mother’s death, but five years prior, when she’d lost her father, it was to the Saint-Ferdinand Killer.
Even so, the young woman managed to stay composed. Letting out a strained sigh to suppress both anger and tears, she continued.
“Dr. McKenzie,” Penny said, “for all I know, I’m having a psychotic breakdown. I feel better with her around.”
“You’re perfectly sane, sweetheart,” Finnegan said warmly. “I should know.”
“You! Do not get to call me ‘sweetheart’!”
“All right. I’m taking you out of here.” Erica reached to take the girl by the arm. The teenager shrugged her off, focusing once more on Randy. He could see in her eyes, and from the way she shoved the stuffed bear between the bars and into his hands, that she wasn’t beseeching him as a doctor. It was the necromancer she needed.
“She told me she had a way to help!” she said. “That there was a way to kill that . . . thing. She told me I could bring your soul to Cicero.”
Randy took the bear out of Penelope’s hands. With delicate care, he held it in front of him. It felt cold to the touch. He could see, in a way no one else had so far, that the toy wasn’t completely “here.” Part of it remained in Audrey’s grave. In a fundamental way, Theodore Francis Bear, Audrey’s favorite toy, was still very much with her.
In a voice so soft as to be inaudible, the amateur necromancer began to recite a chant. Something he’d taught himself along with the ritual that bound Audrey to the toy. The song had the rhythm of a nursery rhyme, but the words meant nothing to modern ears.
“Randy . . . ,” Finnegan warned from his cell. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
The medical examiner continued his chant. With every word, the cellblock grew a little colder. As if the bear was bait, he reeled in the spirit hooked to the stuffed toy. With every degree the temperature fell, his breath became easier to see and the ghost of Audrey Bergeron drew closer.
Erica stared in disbelief as she saw her old friend and tutor work his clumsy magic. From the corner of his eye, Randy saw her rising discomfort and fear. But it was too late to wish she had listened to him and left.
“No, Sam,” he said after finishing his ritual. “None of us know what we’re doing.”
VENUS
VENUS WATCHED DANIEL walk then jog down the corridor. For a moment she regretted having confided so many of her problems to him. So much about the god that she had trapped. She didn’t know the inspector’s son that well. Who was it that could call him and make him leave with so little of an explanation? Was he going back to his father to report everything he knew? Had there been another death in Saint-Ferdinand? What if the god had gotten loose? But surely he would have said something if that were the case.
They walked down the corridor, making their way back to the first floor and toward her uncle’s office. Ezekiel, still clutching his ribs, kept giving her knowing looks that made her uneasy.
“You must be Venus McKenzie.”
Venus turned a curious eye toward Abraham, silently asking if he’d been talking about her. A slight shake of his head was all the answer she needed.
“Have we met?” she said to the circus worker.
“I’ve met your parents and I knew your grandparents. Particularly your grandfather Neil?”
Again, her grandfather’s name had come up. The elusive and very much deceased Neil McKenzie. Spoken about with disdain by Venus’s mother, with fear and respect by her father, and with hunger by the god in her shed. Neil had been a looming shadow over the family: seldom mentioned, except on the rare occasions when Paul would argue with her uncle Randy.
“You know, you’re not the first stranger to mention my grandfather recently.”
Ezekiel gave her a thin smile and then nodded toward the exit. The trio walked outside into the warm night. They passed a woman helping a limping child into the hospital. Across the parking lot, they could see the flashing lights of an ambulance on its way to deliver a new patient.
“There should be a statue of your grandfather on Main Street.” Ezekiel took out a pack of cigarettes. A particularly foul-smelling American brand that Venus recognized from the occasional tourists who went through town. “He was a great man, after a fashion.”
“I never knew him. I’m told that’s not a great loss.”
“Well, if I have to be truthful, he probably wouldn’t have had much use for you. Never had much use for anyone. He was a very focused man.”
“Focused on what?” Abraham asked, wrinkling his nose as Ezekiel lit up his cigarette and took a long pull from it.
“Hunting lions,” he said, then exhaled.
“What ‘lions’?” Venus asked.
“Maybe things like the god in your backyard,” guessed Abraham.
E
zekiel paused mid-drag, his eyes bulging out in surprise. He followed it up with a weak attempt at keeping his cool and composure, but ultimately failed. “A god . . . in your backyard?”
“Maybe,” said Venus. “Back up, though. What was my grandfather into, exactly?”
As Ezekiel took another drag, Venus’s mind raced. Was Neil McKenzie the one who had introduced the powerful being to Saint-Ferdinand? If that was the case, it would explain why he was spoken about in such low whispers, but it would also mean that her parents knew about the god. That they knew about everything happening beneath the surface of the quaint little village, had moved her close to it, and had chosen not to warn her.
“Your grandfather, Cicero, me, your dad”—Ezekiel nodded at Abraham—“we were all part of the Craftsmen. Hell, half of Saint-Ferdinand was part of that particular enterprise at some point. I was trying to be coy, calling it a lion, but we were looking for ways to kill a god. And now you say it’s in your backyard? Are you serious?”
“Yeah, but you can’t kill it. We tried. My friend stabbed the thing in the gut. It did nothing! It barely slowed down.”
Realizing that her voice had been getting louder as the conversation went on, Venus looked around. A few people in the parking lot had turned to look in their direction. Employees on their smoke breaks picked that time to return to work. Venus looked back at them defiantly, but Abraham lowered his voice.
“Venus has the god trapped in her backyard shed,” Abraham cut in. “Go on. Tell him. I gotta go back inside in case they have news about my dad.”
Venus reached for his arm. “You come and get me if you need anything, okay, Abe?”
The farm boy gave her a brief, crushing hug. Once he was gone, Venus sat on a concrete post. She and Ezekiel eyed each other for a moment. A soft, paranoid voice whispered in the back of her head. Ezekiel already knew about the god, but what if he wanted to take it from her? What if more people got hurt because of her?
Granted, there was no obvious reason to trust Ezekiel. Yet Abraham seemed to have faith in him. He’d been forthcoming with information and seemed to know about the history of Saint-Ferdinand. This weird, short cigarette-smoking stranger was exactly what she’d been hoping to find for the past week. Someone who could help them. An expert. So why did Venus feel like she shouldn’t give him any more information unless he gave her some in return?