by Kevin Hearne
I gaped at Hal. “I can’t believe you just said that to me.”
“What?” Hal protested, shrugging his shoulders and looking aggrieved.
“I called to ask Gunnar for help with the Bacchants yesterday and he shut me down. No well-wishing, no pleas to be careful, nothing. So now we’re dealing with the aftermath of what happens when I try to go it alone, and you tell me to be careful about Irish politics?”
“Well, I know precisely where Gunnar’s coming from. It’s not our job to keep the magical peace.”
“Neither is it mine.”
“Well, then, why did you get involved?” Hal asked.
I thought about explaining that I needed a safe place to live and work so I could restore the land around Tony Cabin, but it seemed too arcane and he might not understand why I was so eager to tackle a project that would take years to finish. I shrugged instead and said, “Irish politics.”
“There you go. Bloody dangerous. Our job is to keep you out of jail when you get in trouble, not help you get into trouble in the first place. Come on.” He rose from his chair and gestured inside. “I’ll help you get everything stowed.”
Oberon said as we walked inside.
You don’t offer werewolves treats if you want to keep all your appendages. They think it’s undignified and degrading to be offered a treat.
I beg your pardon?
No. You just made all of that up.
Clearly. I stopped in the kitchen to grab a handful of treats for Oberon out of the slightly scorched pantry cabinet. After you finish these, I want you to stand sentinel on the front porch and let me know if anyone drives up, please.
I collected Moralltach from the garage, a couple of other practice swords, and a roll of oilskin (the real stuff, not the synthetic fabric they call oilskin these days, because I’m a natural fiber kind of guy). Since I didn’t have a bat cave, I’d have to hide everything by using magic. I got out some scissors and started cutting lengths of oilskin, then told Hal to wrap the swords in them so that every inch was covered.
“Do you have some duct tape or something to keep it all together?”
I stopped slicing through oilskin and looked up at my lawyer. “Hal? I’m a Druid. Like, for reals.”
Hal flushed and muttered an apology. “Right. You can bind it yourself, can’t you?”
“Yes, I can. Are you ready with that one?”
“Right. Yes.”
“Hold the edges down, then,” I said, and waited for Hal to do it. “Dún,” I said in Irish. The fibers from the edges threaded themselves into the weave of the full canvas, creating a sort of Möbius strip where the fabric had no beginning or end, save where I could see it. To Hal’s eye it looked as if the edge had just disappeared and smoothed out, an unbroken piece of fabric.
Hal shook his head. “Too bad you don’t celebrate Christmas. Your presents would look awesome.”
We repeated the process three more times, and then I gathered all the swords and moved out to the backyard. Hal followed, his nostrils flaring at all the herbs I had growing back there. “You’re not growing anything that looks remotely like marijuana, are you?”
I snorted. “Only an idiot would think so.”
“Cops can be idiots sometimes.”
“There’s nothing precious here. They can confiscate it all if they feel they have to protect the public from my herb garden.”
“Right. So where are we hiding them?” Hal was looking down at likely spots for burial, and that was the wrong direction.
“See my neighbor’s palo verde tree overhanging my yard? We’re going to hide them up there.”
“Oooo-kay. How?” The trunk was on the other side of a very tall wooden fence, and the fence wasn’t the sort I could climb easily to access the branches high above.
“You use your giant hairy werewolf muscles to throw me up into the branches and then toss me the swords. I’ll bind them to the tree branches first so they won’t move, then camouflage them.”
“Those branches look pretty spindly. Sure they’ll bear your weight?”
“Absolutely. This tree loves me. Its roots go underneath the fence, and we talk sometimes about particulates and nitrogen and the horror of borer beetles.”
Hal looked at me uncertainly.
“Plus, I can temporarily strengthen the wood.”
“Ah, okay, then. I’ll just put my jacket over here …”
It was finished in less than five minutes, and Hal didn’t even break a sweat chucking me up into the canopy. He usually dressed to conceal his muscular frame, because in courtrooms muscles are associated with defendants rather than lawyers. Still, he was an imposing physical presence, a “manly man” with a cleft chin and a broad smile. He wore a pair of spectacles as an affectation, for he wasn’t visually impaired. He thought they made him look more gentle and intelligent to juries. “That’s a pretty good spell,” Hal said, squinting up at the branches where I had camouflaged the swords. “I know they’re there, but I can’t see them.”
“They’ll stay camouflaged as long as I have access to a bit of power. The bindings will stay until I release them.”
“Excellent. So what do we do with the rest of your instruments of death?”
“How much time do you think we have?”
Hal shrugged. “Maybe two hours, maybe two minutes.”
Thanks, Oberon; come on into the backyard.
“More like two seconds,” I told Hal. “They’re out front right now.”
“Guess we’ll have to wing it.”
“Sure.” I shrugged. “It’ll probably be fun.”
“Put a shirt on, will you? They’re looking for someone who killed a lot of people last night, and it looks like you might have done it.”
“Oh, yeah.” I looked down at my torso, still messed up from the Morrigan. I’d be able to heal it pretty quickly if people would leave me in peace, but that was in short supply today.
“And don’t answer a single question without me right there to harass them every step of the way.”
“Got it.”
As we returned inside, Hal to answer the door and I to put on a shirt, I gave Oberon his instructions. You’d better just hang out in back while we deal with this, I told him. Pretend you’re ultra-docile and stupid. If anyone addresses you, wag your tail weakly but don’t move.
Well, you can shy away from his touch, but definitely don’t bark or growl or bite anybody.
Struck by inspiration as I rifled through my shirt drawer, I picked out an old anime shirt with lots of pointy noses, large eyes, and giant swords on it. Put it on, and instant nerd!
Lots of men with suits were in my living room when I emerged from my bedroom. None of them had ever seen me before or knew what I was like, so I could play a part and get away with it.
“Dude! What the hell? Who are you guys?” I said, automatically lowering my IQ to everyone assemble
d.
“Atticus, these are the police,” Hal said.
“Atticus O’Sullivan?” a tall sandy-haired man in a green shirt and silk tie stepped forward with his ID out. “I’m Detective Kyle Geffert with the Tempe Police. We have a warrant to search your house for any swords you may have, as well as any blunt weapons such as baseball bats.”
His name rang a bell, but I couldn’t remember where I’d heard it before. “Oh, cool,” I said. “I hope you find my sword, because I’ve been looking for it.”
“You lost your sword?”
“I guess so, dude.” I shrugged. “I don’t know where it is.”
“So you admit that you own a sword?”
“Well, yeah, if I could find it. I’m training to become a ninja.” The detective blinked and looked over at Hal to see if I was pulling his leg. Hal was completely stone-faced, even nodding slightly in agreement with my story.
“How long have you been missing your sword?”
“Well, I think I lost it last night.”
“Interesting. I see you have both your ears,” Geffert observed.
I flicked my eyes uncertainly between him and Hal. “Um, thanks? And … so do you?”
“We’ve had reports of a man who’s missing his right ear riding around Tempe with a sword.”
“Really? Whoa. Guess that dude shoulda been more careful with his sword, eh?” I chuckled a few times at my own lame joke but looked down meekly when no one laughed. “Sorry. Nobody ever thinks I’m funny.” Suited men were looking underneath furniture and behind picture frames to see if any swords were concealed there. One of them reported that he’d found a large assortment of edged and blunt weapons in my garage.
“Any swords?” Geffert asked.
“Not yet, just knives.”
“Keep me posted.” He turned back to me and asked, “Mr. O’Sullivan, would you mind telling me where you were last night?”
“You don’t have to answer that,” Hal interjected.
“Nah, it’s okay,” I told Hal, and then I said to Geffert, “I was chillaxin’ with my girl and my pooch. We were hittin’ baseballs in the park, and I took my sword off so I could swing away, you know? But damn if some douche didn’t come by and jack it when I wasn’t looking. I was goin’ apeshit, dude, and I’m still pissed. If I ever catch who did it, he’ll have to deal with my kung fu.”
“I thought you said you lost your sword. Now you say someone stole it?”
“I might be remembering it wrong. I do that sometimes. I lose time when I’m in a ninja trance, and I don’t recall doing things.”
The detective’s mouth opened a bit, and he stared at me as if I were a talking slime mold. I looked down and shuffled my feet a bit. “Or maybe it was all those drugs I did when I was younger. Sometimes I black out.”
Geffert nodded slowly and looked at Hal. Then his eyes abruptly narrowed and he asked, “Mr. O’Sullivan, what do you do for a living?”
“Ninja training.”
“That’s your source of income?”
“Oh. No, I own a bookstore.” This guy had to know who I was already. Since Hal and I were suing the Tempe Police Department for shooting me last month—an unpleasant episode that was entirely Aenghus Óg’s fault—there was no way they got a warrant to come in here without very carefully reviewing everything they had on me.
“Would you say your bookstore is a successful enterprise?”
I ignored him and let my eyes lose focus at a point over his right shoulder.
“Mr. O’Sullivan?”
“Huh? What, dude? I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.”
Geffert spoke slowly to make sure I understood. “Do you make a lot of money at your bookstore?”
“Oh. You’re talking about Benjamins. Yeah, dude, I have plenty.”
“Enough to pay for very expensive lawyers?”
“Well, duh,” I said, pointing at Hal, “he’s standing here, isn’t he?”
“Why does a bookstore owner need lawyers like Magnusson and Hauk?”
“Because Tempe cops keep shooting me for no reason and searching my house for shit I don’t have, and then they act all surprised when I actually have both my ears.”
That made the detective clench his jaw for a moment, but to his credit, he didn’t respond. He served up another question instead. “You mentioned playing baseball with your pooch. Would this be an Irish wolfhound?”
“Yes, but it’s not my old one. He’s still lost or run away or whatever. This is a new one. Just got him a couple weeks ago—he’s all registered and got his shots and everything.” I had done precisely that to sell the fiction that my old dog was really a new dog. Again, thanks to Aenghus Óg, Oberon was wanted for a crime that should have been laid at Aenghus’s door. Luckily, it’s far easier to get a new ID for a dog than it is for a person. Bureaucrats at Animal Control don’t suspect people of getting fake IDs for their pets. They take your form and your check and give you a shiny set of tags for the collar, and that’s it.
“Where is he?” Geffert asked.
“In the backyard.”
“May I see him?”
“Sure, whatever, dude.” I waved at the back door, and Geffert walked through it to see this new dog of mine.
The Man is coming. Remember, you’re a meek little guy, turbo-tame.
I peered out the kitchen window to see Geffert approaching Oberon, and my hound was as good as his word. His tail twitched hopefully on the ground, he ducked his head, and then he turned over on his back, presenting his belly and neck with his front paws hanging limply near his chest. This couldn’t possibly be the man-eating animal the police were looking for in connection with a park ranger’s death.
Wow, what a performance! Where did you learn to do that? Oberon usually squirmed around during his belly rubs, and he sometimes closed his mouth gently over my arm. He never stayed that still and passive, believing as he did that belly rubs should be an interactive experience.
Geffert didn’t rub Oberon’s belly at all. He just squatted down to check the tags on his collar to confirm that they were recent. He stood back up and looked speculatively around the yard.
Like what? I don’t know if I can top your Oscar-winning performance.
Hal stepped up next to me with an update on the search. “They’re being much more polite this time, putting everything back once they move it. He hasn’t mentioned removing you anywhere for questioning yet, so I don’t think he will unless they find a sword.”
I heard a clatter coming from the living room and went to investigate. A female detective had managed to spill my DVD collection all over the floor. It seemed like an excellent opportunity to burnish my character as a pathetic guy forever trapped in an adolescent fantasy land. “Oh,” I said, widening my eyes and then shifting them guiltily, shoving my hands into my pockets, “if you find any porn in there … it isn’t mine.” The look she gave me was three parts disgust and two parts revulsion. “I swear.” I edged away and carefully didn’t smile until I was back in the kitchen. Hal chuckled quietly.
“You are so full of shit,” he whispered.
“Hey, the care and feeding of an alter ego is an art form,” I replied in the same low tone. “Here comes the detective. Watch him ask about the scorch marks.”
Geffert strode through the door with a frustrated frown and seemed to notice the blackened portions of my cabinetry for the first time. “What happened to your kitchen, Mr. O’Sullivan?”
“Oh, that.” I rolled my eyes. “You know those little cooking torches you use to set
your crème brûlée on fire? Well, I was using one of those last night on my tasty dessert and bangin’ my head to some old school hair bands, you know? And the torch was still on as I was doing all these fist pumps and stuff and I didn’t realize it.”
Geffert scoffed openly. “You unknowingly caused all this damage with a miniature acetylene torch?”
“Well, when you’re rockin’ out with the Crüe, it’s like a religious experience, dude. I had my eyes closed. Haven’t you ever communed with the sound gods like that before, where you can feel the shredding in your bones?”
Geffert just shook his head and flipped open a notebook. He wanted Granuaile’s name and address to confirm my alibi for last night. I told him she’d have the bats in her car but neglected to tell him that he could find her at my shop right then. Another detective walked up and said they hadn’t found a sword anywhere yet, and the blunt weapons in the garage were covered in dust and showed no signs of recent use. They shuffled everything around for another hour but found nothing that would implicate me in last night’s Satyrn Massacre. I spent the time outside, watering my herbs and giving Oberon a proper belly rub, while Hal kept a wary eye on them. I also sank my toes into the grass and finally paid attention to the lacerations and bruises the Morrigan had given me. By the time they finally drove away, asking me politely to remain in town while they conducted their investigation, I felt good as new and fully recharged.
Hal and I popped open a couple of Stellas, clinked bottlenecks, and toasted a good bamboozle. Oberon got a few extra treats for his thespian activities, and when I inspected my DVD collection, I discovered that the female detective had actually alphabetized it for me. I got to feel good for about three whole minutes, and then my cell phone rang.
“Atticus, any chance you can get over here now?” Granuaile said. “Those two guys are back, and they say they’re not leaving until they speak with you.”
Chapter 16
“Those two guys are already more annoying than the police,” I said to Hal after I assured Granuaile I’d be right there.
“What two guys?”
