Skunk Man Swamp

by P. D. Workman

  “I am not concerned with the prize money.” Corvin paused to let the words sink in. “I am concerned with your welfare.”

  “Oh, I see. That’s very generous of you.”

  “It’s true, Regina.” He sounded hurt that she wouldn’t believe him, but Reg could feel his emotions. He wasn’t bothered by her sarcasm.

  “Something could happen to you. I don’t trust Damon to be able to take care of you. He’s young and untrained. He’s not familiar with the dangers of the swamp. And if he is… then he would know to leave well enough alone. Don’t try to solve the secrets of the Everglades.”

  The more he warned her off, the more interested Reg was in going. She wanted to prove herself and what she could do. She wanted to find out what he was talking about. She wanted to hit the road and start the adventure. And, as with most of the people who told her she couldn’t do something, she wanted to prove him wrong.

  “And he doesn’t know about you,” Corvin added.

  Reg stared at him. He was smug, pleased with himself.

  “What do you mean he doesn’t know about me? He knows all about me.”

  “Does he?”

  Reg started to protest. She had known Damon almost as long as she had known Corvin. Corvin had the advantage of having been inside Reg’s head and of holding her powers for a short time. But other than that, he didn’t have any more insight into Reg’s life than Damon.

  Then she knew what he was talking about. Their walk on the beach. When Reg… hadn’t been herself. She swallowed.

  “That hasn’t happened again. I think it was just… a weird one-time thing. I was tired.”

  He laughed. “You were tired. I don’t think that’s what happens when people get tired.”

  “Well, maybe for me it does,” Reg maintained stubbornly.

  Corvin said nothing.

  “Or it was the ocean,” Reg said. “I won’t be anywhere near the ocean.”

  “I wouldn’t say you won’t be near the ocean. You can’t escape the ocean in Florida.”

  “But it isn’t in the ocean,” Reg argued impatiently. “Nothing is going to happen.”

  “You don’t think that there should be someone there to keep an eye on things? Someone who can intervene if… you encounter something that the two of you and your expert guide can’t handle?”

  “Like I said… talk to Damon. He’s the one you’ll have to convince.”

  Corvin gave a nod. He took his phone out of his pocket and glanced down at it. “My battery is getting low, and I suspect this is going to be more than a two-minute conversation. Mind if I come in to charge it?”

  “No, you are not coming in to charge your phone. Nice try. Go see if Sarah will let you in,” Reg nodded to the big house at the front of the property, “or charge it in your car. Or better yet—go home!”

  Corvin growled in dissatisfaction at her response and turned away from her. “See you tomorrow, Regina.”

  Chapter Six

  Corvin had clearly been able to talk Damon into allowing him to come along on the quest, because they were both there in the morning to pick Reg up. Damon’s movements were jerky and his expression stormy. Reg looked over at Corvin, then back at him.

  “What are the travel arrangements, then?”

  “Separate vehicles,” Corvin said. “We decided it would not work well for us to travel in one vehicle. So you can choose which warlock you would like to travel with…”

  Reg knew very well that he wanted her to ride with him. And of course, it was a temptation. But for that reason alone, she knew that she couldn’t ride with him. She needed to be with Damon, where she was safe. She could manage Corvin in small quantities, but she didn’t know how long they would be in a car together and didn’t want to be exhausted from resisting his wiles for hours on end.

  “I’ll go with Damon,” she said breezily. “You both know the way, I assume?”

  Damon nodded. Corvin didn’t. He didn’t say a word, but turned on his heel and stalked back out to his car. Damon smiled at Reg and extended his hand. “Can I help you with your luggage?”

  “I can carry my own.”

  He shrugged. “All right. Your choice.”

  Reg hadn’t packed a lot. It was only going to be a couple of days, and then they would be on their way back. If she could find the wizard as quickly as she had in the crystal ball, it would be no problem at all. Just a matter of the distances they needed to cover. She grabbed her duffel and she and Damon walked out to the front sidewalk. Corvin was in his white compact and Damon in his big truck. Reg was surprised he would use such a gas guzzler for the trip to the Everglades. It wasn’t like they were off-roading. When they had gone to the mountains, they hadn’t been sure what kind of conditions they would encounter, and the truck had made sense. But when they were just going to a park? One well-equipped to handle tourists? It seemed like a bit of overkill. But maybe it was just a statement toward Corvin. Male posturing. My truck is bigger than yours.

  She threw her duffel into the second row of seating inside the cab, feeling a little pang that she didn’t have a couple of cats and a pixie to liven up the trip this time. It had been a wild ride. Probably best that she didn’t try to recreate it.

  “Last call,” Damon warned, buckling himself in, “Bathroom break? Turned off the stove?”

  She looked at him. “Why would I have the stove on?”

  Damon chuckled. “Some people use them to prepare food.”

  But he knew that Reg didn’t really do any of her own cooking. Sometimes Sarah cooked for her. Sometimes she had takeout or went to the Crystal Bowl to eat. Or sometimes she warmed something up in the microwave. But she didn’t think she had used the stove since she had moved there.

  Damon pulled the truck out into the street and Corvin followed. They traveled close together for the first little while, but Corvin put on a burst of speed and whipped by them when they reached the highway. Damon’s foot pressed down on the gas in response. Reg watched his speedometer creep up.

  “You really want to get pulled over for speeding? I’m sure Corvin would love that.”

  Damon looked at her, then slowly backed off the gas, letting their speed reduce gradually. “Aren’t you worried about him getting pulled over by the police?”

  “He’s got that whole charm thing going for him. He’d probably get a woman cop and completely bamboozle her. He has influence over men too, though I don’t know how much. Probably enough to get off of a speeding ticket.”

  Damon let out a sigh of frustration. “You’re probably right. And that’s probably why he did it, too. So that I would get a ticket and he could just laugh at me about it.”

  Reg shrugged. She wouldn’t put it past Corvin.

  She watched out her window, letting her thoughts drift. She didn’t want to think about Corvin. She didn’t want to get tense about his going with them and she didn’t want to get inside his head. She would just maintain the separation between them, and she would be able to be calm and relaxed. She needed to be open to inspiration when she got to the park, and she wouldn’t be if she spent her time being irritated about Corvin.

  Damon turned on the radio and flipped through his saved stations looking for something to listen to. “You don’t mind, do you?”

  “No, not at all. It’s your truck.”

  “If there’s something that drives you crazy to listen to, let me know. My tastes are pretty eclectic. If you don’t like something, I’ll switch over to something else.”

  He kept scanning through the stations to see what they were playing. It all sounded pretty homogenous to Reg. Mostly rock. Eighties. A few classic rock songs thrown in. Maybe a bit of heavier metal, but still pretty run-of-the-mill.

  People said eclectic when they were trying to show off. Use big words and make you think that their tastes were varied and discerning.

  She waited for him to settle on a station. Rock. Eighties. Who would have thought?

  Damon looked at her sideways one more time to
make sure she was okay with it. Reg shrugged. “Yes, this is fine.”

  “Good. Nice to have something on in the background. We can talk too, if you want. I’m not trying to drown out conversation.”

  “I think I’m just going to close my eyes for a few minutes. I’m not usually up yet at this time of day.”

  He didn’t argue and point out that it was already past nine. Not like it was before dawn. But anything in the morning was too early for Reg. She was happiest when her day started at about lunchtime. After all, she was often up into the early morning with seances or other psychic readings. Damon had a job with more conventional hours, so of course he was ready to start before she was.

  But Reg didn’t close her eyes. She continued to watch out the window, wondering how she would get through two or three more days with both Damon and Corvin so close together. The part where they were driving in separate vehicles was just fine. She could stand that. But when the two warlocks got onto a boat together and had to sit within a couple of feet of each other? That was going to be ugly. One of them might just end up in the river.

  Chapter Seven

  Reg hadn’t actually expected to fall asleep. That had just been an excuse for not carrying on a conversation with Damon. But someone was shaking her by the arm and the truck was no longer moving. Reg blinked and yawned and looked around.

  “Are we there already?”

  “We’re here,” Damon agreed cheerfully. “This here,” he leaned and pointed toward a shack with a touristy sign outside proclaiming various types of tours—gator tours, history tours, mystery tours, singles tours, and the like. “This is where we’re meeting our guide.”

  Reg blinked and rubbed her eyes. That little shack? It was worse than Corvin had suggested.

  “This is where you’re getting a tour guide? You think they know what they’re doing?”

  Damon took off his dark glasses and looked at it. “I know it doesn’t look like much, but Corvin knew a guy…”

  Reg rubbed her forehead, which was starting to ache. She hated being woken up from a nap. She always felt groggy and headachy if someone else woke her up. She got out of the truck, and Damon did too. The shack didn’t look any better close up.

  “This is Corvin’s guy?”

  Damon nodded. He looked at her. “You don’t think it’s some kind of joke, do you? Setting us up with someone who doesn’t know anything?”

  “Who knows. Where is Corvin?”

  “I don’t see him.” Damon looked around. “Maybe he did get pulled over.”

  “Let’s go in. We might as well get started, whether he’s here or not. No point in waiting around for him. Maybe he went to check in at the hotel first.” She looked around but didn’t see any close by. “Where is the hotel?”

  “Hotel?” Damon shook his head. “There’s no hotel.”

  “That we’re staying in tonight. When we’ve done as much looking as we can today.”

  “No. There’s no hotel. We’re camping out.” Damon indicated the bed of the truck. Reg turned her head and looked at the plasticky tarp spread out to cover the bulky items underneath. She lifted the edge and found herself looking at a rolled-up tent and other pieces of equipment.

  Camping. No hotel.

  “Didn’t you bring a sleeping bag?” Damon asked.

  Reg looked at her duffel in the back seat of the cab. He’d seen her stow her things away. He knew that the only thing she had was that bag. She supposed there were sleeping bags that could be collapsed down to tiny packages, but she didn’t have one of those in her duffel bag. Just a few toiletries and changes of clothing.

  “No. You never said to bring a sleeping bag.”

  “I guess… I just assumed you understood that part. It’s a park. If you want to be spending a few days here, you need to be ready to camp.”

  Reg felt dismay at the thought. They were going to sleep on the soggy, cold ground? “I thought we’d sleep in a hotel and go into the Everglades during the day.”

  “That would limit how far we could search during the day. By at least half. There’s a lot of ground to cover; we can’t be going back to a hotel every day.”

  That was great. Just great.

  Reg silently led the way to the tour shack. An early start. Sleeping on the cold, wet ground instead of sleeping in a dry, warm space. Two warlocks fighting over her. Unless Corvin had already gotten himself lost. If he were lost, maybe she would have one less thing to worry about.

  She pushed in through the light, flimsy door of the shack. It was dim inside. And hotter than outside. No AC running. Reg waited for her eyes to adjust to the dark.

  There was a spindly-looking table with a couple of wooden folding chairs pushed up to it. A cloaked warlock sat in one of the chairs. Reg looked around for the tour guide. Was he supposed to be there waiting for them? Was their tour scheduled for a particular time? She didn’t want to miss a minute of their first day of searching. If she was going to have to sleep on the ground, she wanted to spend as little time in the park as possible.

  The cloaked warlock stirred and looked around as if he had just noticed the arrival of other tourists. Reg saw that it was Corvin.

  “Oh. You’re here already.”

  Corvin made a show of pushing back his cloak to look at a watch. “I thought you’d be here an hour ago. Did you run into an accident?”

  Reg reached automatically for Damon, wanting to make sure that he wasn’t going to react in anger and start a brawl. At least give them a day of searching before they came to blows.

  “Don’t worry about him—” she started to warn.

  “I don’t care what he has to say, Reg,” Damon said in a flat voice. “He can try to aggravate me as much as he likes. I’m not here to compare… life experiences. He can come on the search with us, or he can go back home. If he gets in my way too much, he’ll be on his way home.”

  Corvin rolled his eyes, and he mentally nudged Reg. Can you believe this guy?

  Reg didn’t like talking about Damon in a way that he couldn’t hear. If Corvin were going to mock Damon, he was going to have to do it verbally so that Damon could hear him. Reg wasn’t going to participate in mocking him behind his back. She pushed Corvin away as much as she could.

  “So, is someone meeting us here?”

  Damon looked around for their guide.

  “He’s already outside,” Corvin advised. “He wanted to get started on preparations. I told him that I would wait here and watch for you.” Corvin looked at his wrist again. “He should be ready by now, I would think.”

  Reg turned back toward the door. She wanted to get out of the dead, stifling air and back outside, where at least there was a mild wind blowing.

  She led the way out. She looked around but couldn’t identify which boat held their guide. Several boats appeared to be ready to go, most with someone on board, either talking or tinkering with something.

  Corvin pointed to one of the boats. Reg couldn’t see the face of the guide who was aboard. He appeared to be a little on the short side, but solidly built. He wore khakis, mirrored sunglasses, and an outback hat with a broad brim to keep the sun out of his face. Most of the tour guides in the boats at the dock were dressed in a very similar fashion. Some were more formal, some with brighter-colored or flowery shirts, but all very similar.

  Damon strode forward confidently as if he knew the guide well, instead of it being someone that Corvin had suggested.

  “You must be Mr. Tybalt,” he greeted heartily.

  The man turned his head to look at Damon more closely. “Just Tybalt,” he said in a gravelly voice with an accent that Reg couldn’t quite place. “You Damon, then?”

  “Yes. I’m Damon, and this is—”

  “All aboard, then. We’re wasting daylight. It was my understanding that you wanted to spend as much time as possible searching for this… person.”

  Damon nodded briskly. “Right.” He agreed. “Let me just grab my gear, and we’ll be on our way.”

&nb
sp; He hurried back toward his truck. Corvin went to his car, popping the trunk with the key fob on the way. As Damon got his camping gear out of the truck bed, Reg went over and grabbed her duffel from the cab. She wasn’t going to let Damon forget it. She was still going to have to figure out what to do about a sleeping bag, but she wasn’t going to have any of the rest of her stuff left behind.

  She took it to the boat and tossed it in. The tour guide looked up at her as if she had done something she wasn’t supposed to.

  “What? That’s my stuff. We need it.”

  “Needs to go in the hold.” He gestured to a hatch behind him.

  “Oh, sure. No trouble.”

  It wasn’t as if he had opened the hatch for her and she had expected him to act as a porter. Reg climbed from the dock onto the flat little boat and relocated her bag. The boat rocked and tipped as she moved around.

  “You don’t have any gear, do you?” she asked Tybalt. “Damon didn’t exactly tell me that we were camping. I didn’t bring a sleeping bag.”

  He looked her over slowly. His face was broad and round. His skin was pale. Almost a green or gray cast to it. He scratched the back of his neck as he considered her question.

  “I don’t usually supply guests with supplies.”

  “No. That makes sense. It’s just that… I’m going to need somewhere. Is there somewhere near here I can go and buy one? Or somewhere close to where we’ll be touring? I’m sorry to be such a pain. Like I say…” She watched Damon struggling to scoop everything up and bring it to the boat. “Damon didn’t tell me we were camping. I thought there would be a hotel.”

  Tybalt shook his head. “There are no hotels in the park.”

  “Okay. I know that now. But before we got started, I just assumed. I figured if it is this big, then there must be hotels. You get lots of tourists through here, don’t you? Wouldn’t it be better if there was a hotel?”

  He spat over the side of the boat. A glob of spittle hit the side of the boat next to him and slowly started to slide down the surface. “I don’t like hotels.”