by Rowan Casey
There was the strangest sensation of tingling cold, I was surrounded by damp fog for a second, and felt a great weight press on me, a full-body thumbscrew, one that lifted as quickly as it had come.
I stood in a freezing cold room, finger-locked with the oldest woman I have ever laid eyes on.
11
"Hail, Gareth, table knight that was, table knight that shall be again," she said in the same, cracked voice I'd heard before.
"Hey, Seton, get back here!" I heard Black shout, as if from a great distance.
"Give me five minutes," I shouted back—more to buy myself some time than from any great confidence that I would even be able to get back to him, given that I had not the slightest idea where I was.
The old lady still held tight to my finger. Her face was as tanned, wrinkled and as burnished as the halter that I was here looking for. There were only two teeth in her mouth that I could see and her hair was little more than thin wisps across a bald, scabrous, scalp. But her eyes were the bluest, brightest, I'd ever seen. They looked up at me, scanning my face intently. I saw the disappointment before she even spoke.
"Och—not him. From him, but not him."
She let me go and went to sit on a stool by a wide fireplace where she had a small black iron cauldron bubbling over flame. The flame seemed to come directly up out of the stone; there were no sticks, no coal, no sign of any fuel at all. And yet it burned. It was the only source of heat in an otherwise freezing room. She bent over it, warming her hands and singing to herself.
"Someday my prince will come."
I took the snub as a chance to look around the room. It was circular, old stone, each block tight up against the next without even room to scrape a fingernail between them. Some of this stone was green with moss and slime—and there was no discernible doorway—I checked, twice, through a full circle turn. I also examined the floor and roof but the stones there looked just as obdurate and tightly bound to one another.
The chamber was sparsely furnished. There was a cot bed in a recessed area to the left of the fire, and to the right of the fire there was a set of wooden shelves, holding knick-knacks; porcelain dolls, some jewelry and, strangely, a man's gold watch. The only other item of note in the room was the long wooden quarter-staff leaning against the wall. It had been recently oiled and cleaned, but when I lifted it I saw tooth marks had gouged splinters out of it at one end—a result of my cousin's last, vain attempt to defend himself against the hound.
I kept the staff in my hand as I walked over to look through the only window. It was open to the elements outside and a stiff, freezing, breeze blew in my face as I peered out.
We were in a high place, at the topmost point of an ancient tower, what appeared to be a tall spire of black weathered stone that fell away below me. I leaned over, getting my head and shoulders outside to look down a wall that fell into abyssal depths filled with swirling fog. Sometimes the fog shifted enough for me to see the full length of the tower, stretching away to a position on a rocky peak impossibly far below—a decaying edifice, seemingly empty of life. There were no lights at the many windows I could see, no movement, and no sound save a gull-like screeching from high above that made me look out over the landscape.
Far to my left, hugging the horizon, a blue-black mountain range marched across the skyline, tall and snow tipped with jagged peaks like spearheads piercing the sky. On a closer look I saw that the tall pointed tops of the mountains were not rock, but were in fact towers, some of them fallen into ruin—towers that may well have been much like the one I was in now. A long row of them, one on each peak marched off far into the distance, having been built in a time immeasurably long past. Winged things that might not be birds fluttered above the peaks, their screeching cries carrying across the still night air. There was no vegetation on the peaks, at least none that I could see, just black rock. I saw what looked to be a forest, climbing high up the sides of the nearest peak, but the trees were all black and skeletal. Any leaves they may once have had were long since gone to dust. The sight of them made me wonder just how long it had been since this place saw any daylight.
There was a blanket of stars overhead, but they did not twinkle, and nor were they massed in any great profusion, but were dotted in sad little forlorn clumps around the firmament. There were no recognizable constellations.
The main source of any light came from the huge gibbous moon, a sickly glow that lent everything a pale yellow aspect. There was no knowing smile on this satellite, no jolly man in the moon. Yes, the surface was riddled with craters, but it was also cracked and split, with long scarred ridges running over the plains. One scar in particular ran across the face of the moon from pole to pole and must have come close to tearing it asunder in some long, distant past. Things scudded intermittently under the moon's surface, things that must be impossibly huge to be seen at this distance, leaving trails—worm trails—across the surface like a crazed roadmap. I was just glad they were up there and I was down here.
"Seton, if you don't get back here, I swear I'll have your pal shot."
Black again, and still coming from a great distance.
"I'm still here," I shouted back. "I'm not going anywhere. Give me a second. I'm right where you wanted me to be."
I turned back to the chamber. The crone was still bent over the fire. I realized something else, something I should have remembered before now. This must be Face's sister, that is, if Face could be believed on anything. She leaned over and, with her fingers, scraped a line of green slime from the wall before dropping it into the pot. At least I knew now how she sustained herself, although as a diet it seemed to leave a lot to be desired.
"How do I get back?" I asked her.
She didn't turn away from the pot.
"Back, forward, it's all the same way. There is only the way."
"Please?" I said. "I have a friend in trouble."
"Hubble, bubble, toil and trouble," she sang, and cackled loudly.
"I'm looking for your sister."
"Sister, maiden, mother, whore, crone. So it goes with everything but love."
Either she was completely mad, or I was. Neither was an attractive option at that point. She took to stirring the pot and the air filled with the smell of something like boiling cabbage. She sang as she stirred.
"Once a knight, always a knight, once a night is never enough."
"Seton!" Black shouted again. I turned toward the sound; it was coming from somewhere over near the cot bed. I moved closer toward it, and saw the air there shimmer, a thin fog rising as if from nowhere and everywhere. I remembered Drake's words. "It's there if you need it." I remembered what Black had said about the magic being in me, in my genes and in my blood. There was only one way to test that.
I thought of the library, of Black—I thought of George, bleeding and battered in the cell, I thought of beer and burgers and pizza and all the things that weren't here, in this dank tower.
I took a step forward. The cold, tingling sensation lasted less than a second, the heavy weight even less than that, and I finished my step in Black's library to see him staring at me in astonishment.
He saw the staff in my hand, and was about to shout when I stopped him by poking him hard in the belly with one end. All the breath went out of him in a whoosh and he went white, then red in the face, gasping for air. It looked like he still might try to shout, so I smacked him hard on the top of the skull and he went down in a heap. He was still breathing when I checked on him but there was blood at his nose and ears—when he woke up he'd have a headache for a very long time.
I picked up Face from the table and put her away in my pocket. I looked at the decaying hand. It had started to smell now, and looked green, slightly greasy; there was no way that was riding in my jacket pocket.
But leaving it behind wasn't really an option either. I'd traveled through and I might need to again, as I had a feeling there was a lot I could learn.
I tugged at the metal. There was some give in it
but it was too strongly embedded on the hand, despite the fact that bits of flesh sloughed off in my fingers during the attempt. A quick search of the library produced a letter opener on a side table and, with a bit of effort and no little disgust, I finally managed to tug the metal out of the soft, moldering flesh.
"Sorry, cousin," I whispered as I lifted it away. I wiped the mirror and my hands, clean on Black's suit jacket. I figured he could afford the bill. The surface of the mirror went foggy on me again and an old cracked voice sang a song I remembered from childhood.
"Where, tell me where has my Heilan' laddie gone?"
I didn't have time for a chat. I put her away in my other trouser pocket before having a look around. I wasn't sure yet that having her and Face in the same place was a good or a bad idea and decided to play it safe for the time being.
So far I'd been moving quietly, and hadn't drawn any attention to myself. The library door was shut. Black must have felt confident enough to ask the guard to step outside. Maybe he wanted whatever magic was to be found for himself. It certainly fit what I'd seen of the man so far.
Whatever the reason, it worked in my favor so far. But I still had to find a way out—for both George and myself.
I've never been one for over-thinking a situation. If a guard was waiting for trouble, I'd give him plenty. I smacked the staff hard against the display case that held the illuminated manuscript to make sure I'd made enough noise. The glass broke and scattered on the floor.
It brought the guard running. He pulled open the door and raised his weapon but I was ready for that. I stepped in from the left-hand side and smacked him full in the head with the staff. He was down and out before he knew what hit him. And unlike his boss, he wouldn't be getting up. His dead eyes looked up into mine as I stepped over him.
The old book lay there among the glass and broken wood in the busted display case. I don't know what made me lift it up and stuff it in the inside pocket of my jacket, but it fit snugly, and it might come in handy later as a bargaining chip, given what I knew of its value.
I checked the dead man's pockets. He had a wallet and car keys, both of which I held onto. And now that I had his machine pistol and the quarter-staff, the rest was easy.
There were no other guards in the hallway. I took the long way around the wolf's head mosaic as I made my way to the doorway that led down to the dungeon. I remembered Black saying that he'd leave a man at the dungeon door, so I was careful in making my descent, but I didn't have to be. The guard sat on a chair opposite the cell, leaning back against the wall, reading a newspaper. His pistol was on the floor beside him, but he had the good sense not to make a move for it when he saw me.
"Your choice here is simple," I said, and showed him the pistol I'd taken from his pal upstairs. "Bugger off or die."
He chose wisely and buggered off after opening the door for me.
George looked up and smiled.
"No fish supper?"
I handed him a pistol and left the other one on the cell floor. The staff has always been more my style. I can't do too much collateral damage that way.
"Let's just get out of here in one piece and I'll make you as many as you can eat. I might even give Big Bertha a call and see if she can fit you in."
"That was never a problem," George said.
As I was turning away, he put a hand on my shoulder.
"Thanks for coming back for me, lad. There's many that wouldn't have bothered."
"Aye, well, I still owe you a drink," I said. "I couldn't have that on my conscience."
We went back upstairs, slowly, waiting for any sound. But if there were any other guards in the house, they had chosen wisely too, and kept out of our way. We skirted the big mosaic and headed for the door.
Black was still out cold in the library. George looked at the dead man in the doorway, then back over at Black before giving out a soft whistle.
"You don't mess around once your temper's up, do you lad?"
I didn't tell him there had been no temper at all involved. It had all been done with flat calm. It had needed doing, and I did it, without thinking. That might come back to worry me later, but for now all I wanted to do was get moving.
George lifted the pistol, pointing it at the fat man. He seemed intent on pulling the trigger until I moved the barrel aside with the staff.
"No. Leave him. He's down."
"But not out. He'll come after us."
"Fuck him. He's lost his dog of war, he's lost us, and he's going to have a head like a Glasgow drunk on a Sunday morning for weeks to come."
"Okay, it's your call. I owe you that much. But if we're leaving him alive, we'll need to lie low for ourselves a bit until we see the lay of the land. I know just the place."
The dead guard's keys proved to be for a gleaming black new-model pickup that was parked in a double garage to the side of the property. We relieved him of that as well as his life, and five minutes later we were off and away down the canyon road, with George already on the man's car phone making arrangements. I opened the passenger side window and listened intently. I checked the mirrors again, all the way through the canyon. Although it was as dark as sin back there, there was no howling, and no great hound on our tail.
"Where are we going?" I asked when we hit Sunset Boulevard and he headed away from rather than toward the downtown area.
"The beach," he said. "I've got a wee place there that's nice and quiet. And if you're a good lad I'll even get you an ice-cream."
12
George's 'wee place' turned out to be a shore property on Malibu Beach. We arrived just as the sun was coming up and to say I was surprised when he slowed and pulled up in the driveway is an understatement to end all understatements. Either the Twa Dugs was much more profitable than I had ever imagined, or George had a lot more going on than he ever told me. Either way, his gleaming house of glass, steel and hardwood didn't look the slightest bit out of place among the film star and media baron properties that lined the strip between road and sea.
We parked in a garage under the main house where the stolen pickup would be out of sight. George went first, up a flight of internal stairs into a room whose sea-facing frontage was all glass, with tall sliding doors leading onto a high balcony with an unimpeded view that seemed to look out on forever. I only turned away when I realized I was in danger in getting lost in it.
The only things that looked out of place among the leather sofas, glass tables and vast TV set was my quarter-staff. I added to that the old book, and the two pieces of burnished metal that I took from my pockets.
George handed me a cold beer as I looked at the book and mirrors, wondering what I was supposed to do with them.
"Breakfast?"
I took to the beer eagerly, my stomach rumbling at the same time as the first chug went down. George laughed, then winced, obviously still having pain in his jaw where he'd been socked.
"We'll be okay here for a while. I'll get us some food, make some more calls, then we just keep our heads down until we see what's what with Mr. Black."
I hadn't slept for what felt like days, my stomach wanted to eat a horse, and I was full of questions about what exactly had gone down in the mansion in the valley. A period of reflection was probably going to suit me just fine.
George tapped at the table in front of me, making the two metal mirrors rattle in sympathy.
"I'll get us something to help the beer go down, then you owe me the whole story."
"I guess I do at that," I replied, and I meant it. After the night I'd put him through, he'd earned it.
While I tried to get everything straight in my mind, George went through to the galley kitchen. He also switched on the big TV that dominated one of the inside walls of the main living area. I half-expected to see our mug shots: wanted for armed burglary, maybe even murder, but there was no mention of the canyon mansion, or of Black. There was a lot of sports and politics on the news that, as usual, washed over me without sticking—and a small item ab
out a rabid coyote causing havoc in traffic on Sunset Boulevard. The idea of a giant spectral hound on the rampage in the city of angels was just too much for the local media to believe. Hell, I wasn't sure I totally believed it, and I'd been there.
A wash of fog across my cousin's mirror caught my eye. Now that I had both of them side by side, I saw they were almost identical. The main difference seemed to be the warping and slight bending where my kinsman had forced his into the shape of his palm, or maybe where I'd bent it in the attempt to get it out of there. The carvings around the edgings seemed to be the same crude symbols, and the metal itself looked like it might have been forged—or cut—from the same source. The only other difference was that Face stayed quiet and dead, while the fog swirled and danced in the other, faster the nearer I got to it. I heard the old one singing in the far distance—'Some enchanted evening'—but, thankfully, she didn’t seem in the mood for a chat right then. I wasn't sure I was ready for her yet. I might never be ready.
I heard George on the phone in the kitchen. He was checking up on the wounded men, and ensuring that repair work was scheduled for the bar, and that they'd be open as usual. He wasn't going to let a little matter like a giant slavering hound get in the way of profit.
I tried Face again.
"Come on, I know you're there. We need to talk."
I did, but she didn't it seemed, and she stayed dead.
"Lover's tiff?" George said, arriving at my shoulder with a plate of ham, eggs and hash browns that had my stomach growling again even before he handed it to me.
"More like a mother-son argument," I replied and, just like that, I talked. I told him a story I'd never spoken of before, except in discussions with Face herself, a tale of a hippie father who thought he was a Braveheart and immune to all the things like booze, ciggies and flu that finally got him. I spoke of a mother who died before I even really knew her, and finally of Face—my father's idea of shared parenthood, a family heirloom with origins long lost to history and a constant voice that had seen me through many troubled times.