I perused the shop while waiting for Vivian to return with Grygg. The dwarf kept his shop very tidy. Signs offering cheese-tastings stuck out of refrigerated barrels and there were even little placards detailing where each cheese or cured meat came from. Hank watched me, and then picked up a sample chunk of cheese on a chilled platter with a toothpick and began to munch on it.
“Wow. That’s strong.”
“Dred, mon amie!” said a male voice in a sing-song tone. The timbre was such that operaphiles hearing it would climax on the spot. He seriously had a gorgeous voice. It was annoyingly enthralling.
I turned to watch the dwarf stride out of the backroom, the curtain fluttering shut behind him. Grygg was chest-height to me, with forearms that had seen many a pickaxe and a braided black beard that reached his solar plexus. The dwarf performed a quick bow with a flourish, like an actor in a curtain call. He was affected like that.
I glanced at Hank, then back at the dwarf. “Grygg, hello! Love what you’ve done with the place, adding a human to the mix and whatnot.” I jerked my thumb toward my partner. “So, yeah, this is my new partner, Henry Stone. Call him Hank.”
He gave Hank a quick nod and a hello, then looked back at me.
“Where’s my greeting, Dred?” Grygg asked, dropping his arms. He always wanted a hug and a kiss, because well, aside from being a cheesemaker, Grygg was a womanizer. He didn’t care about race, either. In fact, I worried about Vivian now that I thought about it.
I sighed and bent over to act like I was going to give him a kiss on the cheek. Instead, I swatted him on the ass.
“There’s your greeting.” I couldn’t give him what he wanted, because that just wasn’t like me. First of all, he didn’t deserve a kiss, and second, he smelled like cheese and I wasn’t going to get too close to that. I’d given him the cheek-kiss greeting once and suffered the memory of it for a week after, avoiding all physical contact in that time like I’d gone through serious trauma.
He jumped and let out a whoop. “My, my, Dred. Getting frisky, are we?”
“Not even remotely, but keep dreaming, old friend.” I straightened and crossed my arms, aware of the audience watching us. “We need information, Grygg. No time for small talk. What’s the word on the street? Anything strange or notable happening?”
“What, you cut out the small talk so quickly? I disagree, we need to proceed the right way—first with tea and finger foods, a relaxing pipe, and then we discuss work. How does that sound? Can I interest you in cucumber sandwiches or a charcuterie plate? I have imported mustards from Germany, olives from Crete, and wines from the Bordeaux region. A lovely spread that is often too sophisticated for the types we get around here. I’m still surprised they appreciate my cheeses.”
“Keep working, friend, I think you’re turning things around here. They need your education. There’s no better teacher, I’m sure.”
“Lovely, lovely, Dred. Thank you. It’s an uphill battle, you know? These people, they prefer meats. Potatoes. Things with too much salt or spice. No subtlety.”
Vivian perked up hearing Grygg’s despondency about the complications of his art being lost on the good citizens of Gingerbread.
“We’ve started a dining club, to educate the town on cuisines. They already like cheese, because of Grygg, but they’re learning new combinations and styles.” Vivian looked from the dwarf to me and Hank. “It was my idea. We plan a dinner once a week and sometimes a lunch.”
I narrowed my eyes. “How long have you been living here, Vivian?”
Vivian clamped her mouth shut.
“Ah, the girl? The girl has been with me for six months.”
“Has it been that long since I came by?” I asked, reflecting back to the last time I’d been through.
“Vivian, is it?” Hank interjected, gently. “You’re what? Sixteen? Seventeen? Does your family know you’re here?”
I stared at Hank. Maybe she’d answer him. At that point, I’d take any answers, however we got them.
“They don’t understand her,” Grygg said. “Their plan, she tells me, was to send her to live in one of those desert camps where they force the kids to survive in the wild. I took her in. She’s breathing new life into the village. A celebrity. Increased my sales by two hundred and fifty percent. Eh? Can you believe that?”
“A runaway, then. What was it? Drugs? Sex? Refusing to conform to whatever religion your parents foisted on you?” I paced, sauntering past the cooled barrels of cheddars. At the selection of brie, I stopped and looked across the room at her.
“I’d say, probably none of your business. I don’t even know who you are, Dred. What is that? A pirate name?”
“Ooh, a pirate. I like that,” I said, grinning.
“You should try it. I hear the pay is excellent. The sea-life, invigorating,” Hank remarked. “Vivian, do you know where you are?”
Grygg’s eyes narrowed and he stared at Hank. “Of course she knows where she is. There’s a sign on the road. Gingerbread.”
“Yeah, Gingerbread,” Vivian said, defiantly.
“But you know humans can’t see Gingerbread? Unless they have some kind of paranormal gift or blood in them.”
Vivian blinked, then tried to smooth over her features at the revelation.
Of course she hadn’t realized it. It was probably her first run-in with the supernatural at all. Likely the cause of her rebellion, some kind of awakening that led her to feel trapped and frightened.
“Go to hell. I know where I am.”
Or not.
“Alright, well, look,” I said, deciding to move on. If the girl wanted to keep living among a bunch of supers in the mountains, who was I to stop her? She wouldn’t tell us her age, either, so it wasn’t like I could get human law enforcement on my side, and besides, why would I want to? “Grygg, anything you’ve picked up you can tell us?”
Grygg blinked and hoisted himself up onto a stool behind the counter to sit down.
“Now, let me think. Hmmmm, hmmmm,” he put his palms together and touched his mouth with his fingertips, bending his head like he was about to pray as he sorted through his thoughts. I was used to this display.
I caught Hank’s sunglasses looking my way and rolled my eyes. He nodded, smiling faintly.
Grygg suddenly looked up, dropping his hands into his lap. “Nope. Nothing.”
I cocked my head, ignoring Vivian. Not to be rude, after all the girl had dug a hook into my heart when I realized I’d hit pretty close to the truth when I asked about the source of her rebellion. I saw myself in her—insecure, tough as nails, but also unsure and looking for someone to take her under their wing. “Not even a rumor about, I don’t know, a madman stirring up trouble across the supernatural world?”
Grygg’s eyes lit up. “Oh, well, yes, yes, I have heard that one.”
“Bingo,” Hank said, drawing everyone’s gaze. “Or, eureka, I like that one too. Little less right on the money, though. I’m back to bingo. Bingo!”
I couldn’t help it. I laughed. “So, Grygg, you’ve heard something then? A madman? Yes?”
“Yes, certainly,” he nodded. “There’s no shortage of madmen around. This one, I hear, is down St. George way. Building a utopia in what humans call the Virgin River canyon.”
I leaned toward him, waiting for more. “And?”
“And what?”
“What else?”
“That’s it. Building a utopia. Recruiting supers to join him.”
“Human? Troll? Sprite? Fae?” Hank asked, backing up to a stool near a display of dried meats, and leaning against it. “The madman, that is.”
“Oh, I see. Er, you know, boy. I haven’t heard what his race is. Nor have I heard if it’s a man this time. It usually is a man you know, all those hormones make them tetchy and given to battle.”
I flicked my gaze to Hank. His lips were pursed like he didn’t appreciate the commentary on men. Well, who did? But what Grygg said was true.
“I heard it is a man,”
Vivian interjected. I shot her a look. She was leaning against a counter, one hand in a pocket, her foot turned on its side like she was struck suddenly with shyness, but also like she didn’t enjoy being overlooked so soundly in the conversation.
I considered saying, “Thanks, but the adults are talking.” But I knew how dickish that sounded, which was surprising for me. I often spoke before thinking—something I was working on not doing, for diplomacy’s sake.
“What else have you heard?” I asked, thinking that maybe she’d be easier to pump for information than my actual agent, who was failing spectacularly. Perhaps it was time to think about replacing Grygg.
No, that wouldn’t work. I needed the agent to look like they belonged in the supernatural community, so the other citizens trusted him or her. A human female didn’t look that way…
“Did you hear the same thing, about him building a utopia in the canyon that Grygg mentioned?”
She nodded, her eyes eager as she watched Hank and me.
“Oh, and one more thing you might like to know that I recently heard, Dred,” Grygg said. “Willie Nelson is moving back into his former ranch, just a few miles down the highway. Isn’t that lovely? Willie Nelson.”
I would have gaped at Grygg, like Hank was currently doing—before he noticed it and shut his mouth with a loud snap—but I was used to Grygg’s random one-off useless pieces of information.
Often it was about some tiny spat between giant royalty or a wedding between a wood nymph and a water sprite, which, I guess, might lead to something like a mud nymph or, I don’t know, a flower sprite?
“Oh wow, Willie, eh? That might shake things up around here.”
“Who the hell is Willie Nelson?” Vivian asked.
Grygg chortled. “Betraying your age, young one. Willie Nelson is a legendary country singer—also, a druid. He’ll live much longer than normal humans. Perhaps that’s why he’s gotten his old ranch back and is moving in. To hide his agelessness from everyone.”
Vivian crossed her arms. “If he’s so legendary, how come I’ve never heard of him?”
“Because you’re only seventeen. Haven’t lived enough yet to have absorbed these cultural gems.” I watched her to gauge how my guess about her age struck her.
“Good guess, Dred.” Hank lifted his hand for a fist-bump, I crossed the rug covering the wooden floor to engage the official fist-bump.
“So what?” Vivian said, petulantly. “I’m seventeen. Big deal.”
“Ah, little Vivian. You’re very young. We’re just worried about you. If you were more experienced you wouldn’t have fallen for that old trick, but you did because you need someone to look out for you and train you in how to get by in a dangerous world full of supers that don’t care that you’re a young human girl. They’ll mess you up.”
“I’ve got Grygg,” she said, beginning to genuinely look concerned.
“Sure you do, kid,” I said. “Look, we have to go hit the oracle. Then we need to see to a dragon. On our way back north, we’ll stop by and take you home.”
“Dragon?” Vivian repeated, looking between the three of us, her eyes glimmering with interest.
No one offered to explain. I didn’t have time and the dwarf was suddenly worried about losing his money-maker.
“You can’t take her from me? She’s mine!” Grygg cried. “She’s raised my income. I need her!”
“And that right there, Vivian, is why you can’t stay with Grygg. It’s about the money for him. Not you at all, sweetheart.” I headed for the door. “Let’s go, Hank. The oracle awaits!”
16
Hank confessed that he’d never been to an oracle, so we went over how to behave in that setting—just be quiet and follow my lead—and I explained to him why I was interested in seeing the oracle as we hiked up the hill.
Before we got to the oracle’s temple, we purchased some iced tea at a little cart run by a gnome. While we waited for the vendor to make our drinks, I alternated between watching Hank staring at the denizens of the fair village and watching them myself.
Gingerbread was one of my favorite things about the supernatural world in Utah. Of course, I’d never been to other super-only villages outside Utah, so I had no idea how it compared. But this one was kind of mine. Yes, I divided the world into Things Belonging to Dred Dixon and Things that Did Not Belong to Dred Dixon.
This was one of mine. Not that I’d tell other people as much (and if I did, I was happy to arm-wrestle anyone who disagreed).
A herd of centaurs mingled across the street, holding steins of beer and watching us, like we had the plague. We probably did. I smiled and waved, and they shifted nervously, their backsides colliding with each other as they moved in unison. The sound of hooves clopping against the cobblestones ringing across the street.
“You’re scaring them, Dred,” Hank said, accepting his tea from the gnome.
“I know. But at least I’m friendly.”
Others had come out to ogle the humans waltzing through the middle of the village and I scanned them, looking for Out of Place Things and Things that Did Not Belong. A cloaked and cowled figure emerged from the Nymph’s Nipple, one of the many taverns along the high street, and slipped through afternoon, dodging from cluster to cluster mysteriously. I was intrigued and followed it, waiting to catch sight of the face beneath the cowl.
“Here you go,” the gnome said, shoving the iced tea against my arm till I glanced at him.
I accepted the cold beverage and when I looked back to find the figure, it had vanished. I muttered a curse under my breath for losing sight of the ominous figure. We paid and continued on up the winding high street. I’d keep an eye out for the figure. I wasn’t pleased at losing sight of it, but maybe it was nothing, after all.
I soon forgot all about it, what with my partner moaning in pleasure with every sip of his drink.
“Alright, I get it, Mr. Stone, you’ve never had a better iced tea. Would you quit with the sounds?”
“What did they put in it? Some kind of . . . addictive chemical that makes you crave it fortnightly? Cocaine?”
“I love that quote, and yes, of course. Together we’ve discovered a village run by giants who also peddle in drugs.”
“Or where the Colonel lives. With his wee beady eyes…” he laughed and sighed. “It’s just heavenly.”
“I know. It’s like the nectar of the gods.”
“Is that literally what it is?”
“No, it’s just Starbucks.” I teased.
“Now there’s a commercial enterprise with addictive chemicals.”
“True—this stuff is actually just standard tea. Grown here, in healthy soil, with no pesticides, that sort of thing. Maybe they enchant it or something. Oh and also, it’s not Starbucks.”
At the temple with the oracle, we paused outside the entry colonnade. Around us supernatural villagers gaped—a few satyrs and a cluster of dwarves dressed in mining attire with pick-axes balanced on their shoulders—intrigued by the official looking humans waiting outside their sacred edifice. We didn’t really look that official. We were both still wearing the clothes we’d had on that morning. Thinking of that, I had the sudden realization of how long the day had stretched. Had Hidden Peak and the dragon and the Hawaiian shirt guy really been that morning?
I smiled and waved at the gawkers, because they loved it, just loved being acknowledged.
Actually, they didn’t. When I waved they ignored me and their pace quickened as though they were trying to put as much space between us as possible. Some of them stopped twenty feet away and glanced back over their shoulders, suspicious of us.
Hank noticed this behavior and laughed, sipping the faint, orange tea through the straw. “Fae. And dwarves. So uncomfortable with humans.”
“Alright, mister,” I said, taking off my light jacket emblazoned with the Flamehearts logo, feeling the sweat roll down my sides. My spaghetti-strap linen tank was much cooler. “Time to get our vibes on the right wavelength.”
>
Someone nearby shrieked and the foot-traffic hurried away from the area as though frightened. I remembered that my Colt was in an underarm holster. I sighed and put my jacket back on. For a moment, the mountain breeze had felt really good across my bare shoulders.
“Way to go, Dred, you frightened half the townsfolk.” Hank mused, his lips flinching with mirth around his straw.
“OK, so look, mister,” I began again, “No talking out of turn. No sudden movements. No laughter, no sarcasm, no interrupting me, no outward signs that anything is odd about this at all. If you do any of that, the oracle won’t work for us. Capice? We need this, if she can tell us anything we need it. Right?”
“Of course, Dred. Relax. I honestly don’t know what you’re so worried about.”
“You’ll see. That’s why I’m prepping you.”
I led the way inside, listening to the soundtrack of Hank’s love affair with his iced tea. I bit my lip and rolled my eyes again to prevent myself from openly laughing. The glance over my shoulder as we headed through the shadowy colonnade communicated that he needed to shut up, and now.
The place was designed like a miniature structure straight out of Greece. I was sure that this small version of a sacred building was more like one that people would find in a tiny Greek village in the hills—the local oracle to whomever—or whatever, but I’d never been so I was only guessing.
The back of the building opened to a roofless area with a penned off section. The ground was dirt, and there was a trough and a pile of straw in in the corner.
Inside the animal pen, a llama grazed, straw sticking out of her mouth. When we stood beside the fence the animal turned its head, pointing its fuzzy snout at us. I nearly laughed. I did, but I caught myself, which was a good thing because that would destroy the vibe and potentially disrupt any reading the llama could give.
Flames to Free (Dred Dixon Chronicles Book 1) Page 9
