by John Oakes
Remus made another sound in the back of his throat, asked, “Did this woman give you anything?”
“No. Just told me about the circle and fixed up my cut. A circle of healing is around you.” Winton looked at Remus, as astonished but confused. “You really think it has to do with being a dwarf?”
Remus’ pupils shifted side-to-side in his thick skull. He grunted and placed a bandaged hand over his mouth, turning away from Winton. He mumbled to himself, motioning his hands and fingers about, as if mimicking the playing of an oddly-shaped piano.
“My papers,” he mumbled. “They’re lost. But it can work. I can do it. I have to.”
Remus unhooked a chain from the wall, the one holding Winton’s right wrist, and pulled it from the big eyelet set in the post. Winton breathed a sigh of relief.
It had worked. He’d gotten Remus to rethink Winton’s positioning.
Remus used both hands to unscrew the eyelet from the post, then knelt a few feet from Winton within the semi-circle of candles. He placed the knife beside a couple candles on an old crate, and screwed the eyelet between two floor boards, cranking it tight and secure.
So that was the plan? To hold him fast on the floor for the sacrifice?
Winton scrambled in his mind for any last-ditch way to free himself. He had a length of chain running from his right hand. If only he could whip it at Remus somehow… But Winton couldn’t see a way that would hurt Remus gravely or free himself.
Remus next removed the eyelet from Winton’s left foot chain. Winton bared his teeth and panted at the pain in his left shoulder holding all his weight, making him twist and arch wildly to cross his ankles to change the angle of the pressure. Finally, Remus let the slack out of the chain keeping him suspended by the wrist. Winton crashed to the floor, and his knees buckled beneath his weight. He rolled to his back, massaging his sore left shoulder.
Just inside the eyelets, Remus poured a ring of salt, ostensibly to surround Winton and his ring of healing.
Winton realized both his hands were free, if weighted by ten feet of chain each. Had he been a man of six feet, he could have whipped one of those chains around Remus’ neck and dragged him onto his ass. Then again, if Winton were larger, would Remus allow him to stand there with his chained hands free? He eyed the crate with the knife on it. It was about six feet from the wall.
“Get up. Turn around,” Remus said. “No sudden moves.”
Winton took his time getting up. “You don’t have to tie me down and kill me.” Winton had to try and bargain. Anyone in his place would. It would also reassure Remus he was in total control. “I’m sure you can draw out healing powers in me another way. I’ll be more useful alive.”
“Not how it works. I don’t need a useful dwarf, I need your power.” He unhooked the last chain from the wall and threaded it through an eyelet on the floor, but didn’t secure it. Winton could still move the foot it bound. Remus pulled the chains holding Winton’s arms. He fell backward onto his ass and was dragged to the center of the eyelets, leaving the crate with the knife just out of reach to his left. If he could turn onto his left side, he might be able to reach the crate with his right foot. But he needed his right hand to have plenty of slack in the chain.
Winton began murmuring spooky-sounding gibberish and jostling his left hand.
“Hey, what’s that? What’re you doing?”
Winton kept at it, and Remus stopped dragging him. He clamped both hands on the left wrist. “Hey, what’s—”
Winton began to chant louder mixing in some gibberish French. “Pas loin de l’etranger est la claire de la lune.” He let a shiver run through his whole body and his legs danced on the dusty old wood floor. He continued to jiggle his left hand to keep Remus’ focus there.
“What’s happening? Winton, can you talk to me? What should I do?”
Winton felt a cold sensation spread through him, like the shadow of an old friend passing by his heart, giving it a wicked smile. The rage being so ready and present filled Winton with maniacal glee. But it wasn’t time to let it run. Not yet.
Winton quieted everything inside himself to a deafening silence. He heard nothing, saw nothing. A different part of him took over with a laser focus. Not his joy, not rage: the performer. The illusionist. The man who must make his body work with perfection, make his fingers do the impossible.
After the hush, “Go,” the inward command sounded, same as if he was about to step on stage.
Winton rolled over his left arm, which Remus had pulled tight, reached out with his stubby leg and kicked a toe into the crate, just hard enough to rock it back. The crate hesitated on its corner edge for a cruelly long moment as Winton prayed it wouldn’t tip all the way back. Finally it rocked back toward him.
As the knife slid off the top toward them, Remus lunged. “No.”
But now it was a game of speed and dexterity. Winton’s hands were as lithe and capable as anyone’s and he had the initiative. He’d found his surprise.
Winton snatched the knife out of the air, blade facing him. He felt the world slow around him, moving in flashes. He felt Remus reaching for the knife, bearing down his considerable weight and strength advantage toward Winton’s right arm.
But Winton moved with more grace, gripping the handle tight and slashing backward over his head. Steel slammed into flesh and bone, turning the blade in Winton’s hand but not knocking it free.
Remus gasped, rolling involuntarily onto his burned side, while Winton sat up and pulled his left arm away from the eyelet. Remus lay on the other end of the chain, pinning it to the floor, and Winton had to clench the knife in his teeth, working his fingers to unbuckle his right wrist to free his knife hand, then his feet.
Remus rolled onto his knees with his hands covering his face, still pinning the chain to the floor. A thin red line now stretched across his forehead, leaking out thick crimson blood that trickled down his face and into his good eye. Before Winton could remove the last buckle, Remus snatched the chain with one hand, barely looking, and jerked Winton off balance. Winton fell, but pulled his feet around and planted them on the eyelet, stopping Remus from pulling any further.
“You little shit!” Remus said through his gritted teeth and frothing, ruined mouth.
Winton plucked the knife out of his teeth. “That’s right. I ain’t no lamb,” Winton growled back. “I’m the lion.” Winton smiled. “No. I’m the goddamn tiger that ate the lion. And you’re gonna get the teeth.”
Remus moved an inch forward toward him, but Winton extended his legs, taking that inch of slack and not giving it back. Remus smiled cruelly in response, took the chain and knotted it, letting it fall to the floor, like moving a chess piece into check.
Winton stood to his feet with only four feet of leeway between him and the big knot behind the eyelet. Remus looked eager to pounce, but gave it a second thought. The blood running into his eye was perhaps a hint that Winton was willing to trade pieces on this game board. Remus circled. Winton kept opposite of him. Remus looked about for his best option and locked on his pistol resting on a patch of old straw ten feet away.
Winton swallowed in cold fear, then shot out, “Oh, tsk, tsk. That’s not art. Kill me with that and it doesn’t count.”
“Maybe I just wanna see you dead.”
“If I don’t die the right way, you die for certain. Besides,” Winton pouted, “big strong man like you can’t take on a chained-up midget with a knife? What kind of man are you?”
Remus’ top lip curled up on the unburned side and he glared into Winton’s eyes.
Winton put his knife hand near his left wrist and pulled at the strap in the complicated buckle. Remus came forward to stop him, and Winton raised the knife, backing him off.
“You go for that buckle, and I’ll crack your skull in half.” Remus picked up the short shovel and raised it. The rusted old thing had a clean shiny dent where Remus’ bullet had impacted it. Winton rubbed the back of his hand over the spot where the shovel had banged in
to his head. He shook off the pain and focused his attention on Remus.
Surprise, Winton shouted in his head. Where was the surprise? Where was Remus not expecting him? Remus probably thought he could walk Winton to the end of his leash and catch him with the shovel.
Sure enough, Remus stepped over the eyelet, just out of Winton’s reach, and raised the shovel like a judge with his gavel, delivering final judgement.
Instead of seeing an image of his loved ones, or feeling abject fear in the face of certain death, Winton felt a hot sensation, like the rush of a lover’s breath on his neck. The wrath inside took over in that instant, propelling him forward, not back. Forward with the certainty the sprinting predator feels as it closes on its prey.
Winton waited until Remus was committed to his hacking blow, then sprang forward, pulling on the chain with this left hand and flinging himself to the floor. As the shovel bounced harmlessly off Winton’s feet, he hooked his arm around Remus’ ankle.
Instinctually kicking back and away, Remus only helped the vicious slash of the knife bite deeper into his leg. Remus howled up at the moon like a dog and backed up, but his leg went out from under him, and he fell in agony, reaching for his severed Achilles.
Winton took that moment to undo the final leather cuff.
He got to his feet and faced Remus a free man, blade in hand, heart full of malice.
Remus whimpered and cried through gritted teeth. Unable to get to his feet, he reached in vain for his nearest pistol.
Winton stepped toward him.
Remus picked up his shovel and held it with both hands, wriggling toward his guns with an elbow and one good foot scraping at the ground. Winton did the math, realized he had to act and dove with his arm up to protect his head.
The veteran policeman still held unexpected strength and batted Winton away with the flat of the blade. Before he’d stopped spinning on the floor, he felt hot blood flood behind his ear where an edge had bit him. Dizzy and nauseous, he got to one knee, and felt behind his head. His fingers came away crimson.
He stood as if lifted by flame. The light of the candles seemed to grow orange and angry. His world zeroed in on Remus’ soft flesh and his desire to savagely tear at it.
Remus pushed his one useful foot on the floor and positioned himself again for a defense, this time right in the middle of the salt circle, feet toward Winton, knees bent. Remus glanced back for a gun that was nearly within reach.
Don’t blink.
Winton barreled forward. Seeing the shovel coming for him, he dove to lessen the impact and threaded his arm between Remus legs, planting the dagger in his crotch with all his inertia behind it. The shovel blasted Winton but fell away in a clatter onto the dirty floor. Remus curled into a ball like a pill bug, then arched his back with an ear-splitting shriek.
Winton pounced again, driving the knife down into his abdomen, using it as a handle to pull himself up onto Remus like an alpine adventurer using a snow pick. Remus’ hands slapped at him and grabbed for the knife, but Winton deftly drove the knife in again. He pulled upward through the furious blows and sunk the knife into Remus’ chest.
Remus’ one good eye met Winton’s for a brief second, then Winton ripped the knife free, drawing out a flume of blood. Remus’ hands waved in small circles and his thick, grotesque head fell back, as Winton stabbed him again and again.
Winton felt life leave Remus’ body and rolled off him. He lay with Remus spreadeagled in the circle of salt and listened to the pounding of his heart and the wheezing of his breath.
“Done,” Winton said between breaths. “It’s done.”
THIRTY-ONE
When Elgin arrived, Winton and Julius were licking their wounds again, leaning on the hood of Julius’ car.
“I knew something was wrong when the reports came in,” Elgin said. “Wasn’t sure who he’d come for first. You or me.”
“Us, turns out.” Julius touched a wet paper napkin to his split lip. “Homeboy stuck by his convictions to the end. I’ll give him that.”
“He in there?”
“Yeah.” Winton said, almost sounding disappointed. “Time for the old weenie roast trick?”
“Well, this old barn, if it went up, no one would mind,” Elgin said. “But I think it’s best if Captain Remus remains a fugitive at large.”
“Gators?” Julius asked.
“As per proud Louisiana tradition,” Winton said.
Elgin got the body wrapped in a tarp without asking for any help. Julius stepped into the barn to help him carry it.
Winton stepped inside as well. “Sergeant,” Winton said. “Hold on.”
Elgin looked up, bent at the waist, ready to pick Remus up.
“Those Aussies cut my brother’s arm off.” Winton could hear the heat in his own voice, could see it register on Elgin’s face. Even Julius’. “They cut it off in pieces. To get him to talk.”
“They what?” Elgin stood straight.
“They needed info on Remus. Lucas told them how Remus killed Maroulis. I honestly don’t know if they kept cutting for information or just for fun.”
“I… I…”
Winton brought Remus’ large caliber pistol out. It glinted in the still burning candlelight. “You’re part of the reason Lucas ended up on that boat.”
“Wait. Hold on.” Elgin held his hands out. “We were just helping Remus. We thought we had to.”
“Well, you didn’t.”
Winton paused, wondering if Elgin would reach for a weapon.
Elgin’s wide shoulders drooped and a sour look overcame him. “You call me out here, get me next to Remus’s dead body, and shoot me with his gun.” Elgin hung his head, seeing a perfectly laid trap. “Goddamit.”
“Looks that way,” Winton said, stepping closer.
“I’ve got a daughter to go home to,” Elgin pleaded with his hands up.
“You’re right,” Winton said. “You do.” He stepped forward again and lowered the gun. “You might be a son of a bitch, but you’re all that she needs.” Winton gestured with the gun. “We don’t all have to be on the fucking cheerleading squad, man. Happy is happy.”
Elgin let out a shuddering breath.
“But you are mixed up with what happened to my brother.”
“All right.” Elgin’s jaw muscles flared, and he blinked red-rimmed eyes.
“I reckon we can both keep that in mind if the day ever comes I need a favor.”
“I reckon so.”
“And you owe me a phone, asshole,” Julius grumbled.
“Oh, come on,” Winton said, breaking the tension. “Be real. You know it’s a great excuse to get the newest model.”
They hauled Remus to Elgin’s trunk, and Winton and Julius took everything else that seemed out of place in a random barn fire, including Remus’ guns, the chains, the knife and bullet-dented shovel, and tucked them in a sack to be dealt with later.
Elgin closed his trunk, holding a can and walked to the barn. Winton could smell it, knew it was paint thinner without having to read the label.
He exchanged a short nod with Elgin. “Well.”
“Your balls still hurt?” Elgin asked.
Winton gave himself a light jostle. “Yeah…”
“Mine too,” Elgin said, “if it makes you feel any better.” He continued into the barn with his accelerant, and Winton and Julius got in the sedan.
“I thought you were gonna pop him, right there,” Julius exclaimed after closing his door. “Jesus Christ, man. You’re scary as fuck when you wanna be.”
“I could have, but I didn’t. It’s better this way.”
Julius held his head in his hands. “I am beat to hell.”
“I’ve seen HGTV shows,” Winton said. “It helps to be pretty, but it’s not a firm requirement.”
Julius laughed weakly and groaned as he turned the key. “Where to, Ms. Daisy?”
“I don’t care. I don’t want to go anywhere.” Winton put a hand to his own aching head. “Fuck me. Ever
ything hurts.”
“Think that bullet woulda hit you?”
“If not, it would have permanently parted my hair.”
“If you ever need a nickname,” Julius said, “we can call you Clang.”
“Thanks. Already got enough nicknames for a lifetime.”
“Good thing my dad has a bad back.” Julius brought out a bottle of prescription pain pills and took one. “I probably need a full body scan at the hospital, but until then, these’ll do.” He offered the bottle to Winton.
“You know what? I’m good.”
“You don’t look good.”
Orange light spilled from the barn doors and cast a silhouette on Elgin as he stalked to his car.
“I try to steer clear of the strong pills at all cost,” Winton said.
“I hear you. It’s an epidemic. What to do then?”
Winton massaged his aching wrists. “I want three glasses of bourbon,” he said with sudden clarity. “And a stack of buttery pancakes as tall as me.”
“Sounds all right. I know a place.” Julius tested his jaw and his newly repaired lower teeth. “Might could actually chew something soft.” He chuckled and pulled forward onto the road and away from the growing flames in the distance. “Why pancakes?”
“I’ve been on a gluten-free diet my fancy Houston doctor put me on. Supposed to reduce inflammation in my back and joints. All in preparation for the big fix.”
“Gluten free, huh?” Julius asked. “It work?”
“I guess so. It’s not my back and joints that hurt right now.”
“So maybe you should keep your diet, then.”
Winton looked at Julius. “Oh, so now it’s house-flipping, helicopter repair and nutrition expertise, too?”
“I’m a real Renaissance man.”
“Yeah you are. Just drive us to pancakes and bourbon.”
As Julius drove on, Winton watched the barn burn in the sideview mirror, orange flames reaching higher and higher.
“That story you told Remus about the little woman in the yellow dress.” Julius looked over. “That really happen?”
Winton never took his eyes off the blaze in the mirror. “That’s the thing, Julius.” A little smile pulled at the edge of his mouth. “A magician never reveals his secrets.”