by Farris, John
Chauncey was admiring Tom Sherard's mopane walking stick, with the gold lion's head the size of a child's fist.
"Is that yours?"
"No, but I have the use of it, sometimes. Like this jet."
"I'd swear that lion is keeping a close eye on me," Chauncey said with a knowing grin. "Enchanted, huh? Enchantments can be a heck of a lot of fun. Or is it serious business today?"
"Serious business," Eden said, closing her eyes for a few moments.
"Let's do it" Chauncey said.
When Eden opened her eyes again, the sound of the jet engines was just a whisper. Chauncey was smiling at her a few feet away. Eye to eye, both of them unblinking, and between them rose a mirage: the redwood house of the McLains, saturated in sunlight on a treeless headland overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Memorial Day. A dazzling sea, storm clouds building in the east. The McLains were hosting a barbecue for about forty people. The entire community, for all Eden knew. She hadn't been in Moby Bay for very long.
Now she saw the two of them; Eden and Chauncey, walking up the slant of the lawn from cliff's edge to the patio. A wind was whipping up, paper plates and napkins beginning to blow. Chauncey was holding Eden's hand, and Eden felt chilled. She shuddered, glancing at the sky.
What did you hear, Eden?
I heard Geoff's voice. Geoff McTyer Trying to warn me. His father was the head of the FBI. They thought I was dangerous. Geoff said, "I can't stop them, Eden. Get away!"
You know what happened next. But you don't have to be afraid anymore.
(There on the patio. Eden's gaze jumping to Chauncey's face as Chauncey raises her other hand to brush hair out of her eyes, jumping back to the sky. Seeing the first of the helicopters, the sniper's bullet coming from a third of a mile away. Eden seeing the bullet whole, as if it has become suspended in air.
(Then the sharp-nosed jacketed bullet ripping through Chauncey's upraised hand and head. Her falling weight pulling Eden's arm taut as she slumps to the patio floor. Some fragments gleaming like fish scale in the welling-out of blood and cerebrospinal fluid near the middle of the dead girl's forehead. Eden's head moving downward with the slumping of Chauncey's body, so that the second shot from the sniper's rifle misses Eden, instead flattening an elderly guest of the McLains' standing behind her.
(Eden spiraling into shock, leaning over Chauncey and trying hopelessly to wipe away the gore with the edge of her palm. The pupils of Chauncey's open eyes fixed and expressionless. Then suddenly coming to life and focusing on Eden. Her small breasts swelling as she takes a breath. And reaches up to touch the hole in her forehead.
("Jeez. That'll give you a headache.")
That's as much as I remember I guess I freaked.
I promised to explain. In terms of your life span, all of us in Moby Bay are immortal. And maintenance-free, you might say.
Oh. Immortal. That's an explanation? But what happened then? To the helicopters, and the men who came for me?
Who tried to kill you, don 't forget. To satisfy the obsession of Geoff's father We destroyed them. All but Geoff and his old man. They escaped in one of the choppers. But it ran out of fuel, or something, twenty minutes south of Moby Bay in a wilderness area. Where we found them, later that night. Near their wrecked helicopter it must have been a rough landing.
Was Geoff killed?
No. But his father was badly injured.
Then you—and the others—finished them off.
That's not allowed, off our turf. We permitted them to redeem themselves. Listen. And you will understand everything about the fate of your lover You will know all you need to know about me and my kind.
Small foaming waves were coming farther up the spit of beach, washing across the floor of the helicopter. If there'd been an electrical fire aboard, an automatic suppression system had smothered it. Geoff moved his father to a dry ledge twenty feet wide and a few feet above the high tide line, gathered wood, and built a fire inside a ring of stones. There was no liquor in the survival kit. He made strong tea and scrambled eggs from an MRE pouch. His father drank some of the sweetened tea but wouldn't eat. Geoff choked down a high-energy bar. He was wearing a flight jacket. That and the other blanket should get him comfortably through the night, he thought, if the air temp didn't fall below forty degrees.
(He gathered more wood to feed the fire. By then it was past nine o'clock and a few stars had come out above the darkening sea. Closer to shore the sky was hazy. His father needed to relieve himself but couldn't stand without help. He complained of pain in his kidneys. With the flashlight Geoff looked for blood in the fitful stream of urine. It was darker than it should have been. After making his father somewhat comfortable again, Geoff also examined his head wound. No further external bleeding. There was no way to tell what was going on inside his skull. Some men could absorb hard blows with no significant damage to the brain. For others survival could just be a matter of luck. His father was conscious and restless, hot but not sweating. Unresponsive even when Geoff tried to talk to him.
(Then Geoff lay down exhausted on the mossy ledge, using one of the survival kits for a pillow. He had a flare gun in a pocket of the flight jacket. He resolved not to close his eyes. He hoped the caffeine from the tea would keep him awake.
(An hour and a half later he was awakened from uneasy sleep by his father's scream.
("Dad!"
(Sounds of fearful weeping froze his heart, and the next thing he saw as he looked frantically around almost shattered it.
(The narrow bay, filling with the tide that had nearly submerged the helicopter, was misted over. The forest rising steeply on three sides of the bay was shrouded. The moon was directly overhead, its light giving some definition to the tall straight trees, like Christmas cutouts in black paper, through which the sea mist flowed. Here and there rocky ravines cut back into the mountains away from the creeping water. There were some huge boulders at the mouth of the largest ravine. Atop one of them, as if it were a rounded stage, stood several still figures unrelated to humanity [that much was clear in spite of the mist] and, at their feet, another figure all too human and recognizable, writhing slowly, an arm held above his head to ward off whatever violence or terror the silent watchers threatened.
(Geoff reached for the Glock automatic he had put beneath his flight jacket, but it wasn't there.
(His father sobbing. Pleading.
(He couldn't find the pistol. All he had was the flare gun with a single load, and a flashlight.
("Dad!"
(Geoff splashed down off the ledge into ankle-deep water and started toward the ravine, aiming the beam of the flashlight at the creatures on the rock.
("Get away from him! Leave him alone!"
(Instead they changed positions, coming closer together with their backs to Geoff, blocking Geoff's view of his father. They kneeled slowly around him. Then the sobbing stopped abruptly.
(Geoff slipped and fell on the slick rocks of the beach, losing his grip on the flashlight, which flickered out as it rolled away down a sloping shelf underwater. Screaming in frustration, he lunged to try to retrieve it, getting a face full of water that stung his sore eyes.
(Groping beneath the surface, he touched a bare foot and an ankle; his hand slid higher, to a slender but sup-pie calf, before he snatched it away and scrambled back, opening his smarting eyes.
(Girl, blond, pretty, early twenties, standing in a slosh of seawater that came nearly to her bare knees. Standing where no one had been moments ago, hands at her sides, looking calmly down at him. She had a very small face that made her eyes seem as large as the plummy eyes of children in a Keene painting.
("Oh, shit!"
("Scare you?"
("Where'd you come from? Fall out of the sky?" No idea why he had said that, but it made her laugh.
("Yes. But not like you did," she replied, glancing around at the swamped Conan helicopter. She turned her face back to him. She would have been pretty, but there was something wrong with her mouth; it had
an ugly twist to it. And there was a mark of some kind, a round scar on her forehead that gleamed like the moon that was in and out of clouds above their heads.
(As if she knew what he was staring at, she covered her mouth with one hand.
("I know. It's not pretty to look at. Can't seem to get the lips right, but I will. Takes practice. I need a mirror, but I haven't had time to just sit and work at it. Try to imagine what you'd look like if you had been shot twice in the face today. Oh-oh. Sorry. That scared you, didn't it?"
(Geoff's lungs felt like sacks of cement in his chest. He made strangled noises trying to breathe.
("Don't worry, bud. I wasn't implying you were going to get hurt. What happens to you from now on is your choice. I'm Chauncey. What's your name?" Behind the hand held loosely to her mouth it looked as if she were chewing.
("Geoff," he said with a winded sigh. He tried to get up. He was only in about two feet of water, but his knees had washed out. He couldn't stand. This frightened him more than her supernatural appearance.
(Chauncey showed him her small mouth again. "This look any better to you?" She smiled. It was a terrible-looking smile, but he nodded. "Okay. Like I said, I'll work on it. That's the thing about suffering trauma when you're in an alter shape. I don't think I'll be able to do anything about my left foot for a while."
(She lifted her leg slowly out of the water. It was as shapely as the right leg down to her ankle. But she had, instead of a petite foot, the paw of a lion, beads of water dripping from the ebony claws.
("Like walking with a bucket on my foot," she complained. Her grimace of a smile shot halfway up one cheek as if her face had suddenly become highly plastic, unmanageable. A shattered front tooth gleamed wetly in the long gap of her mouth. Chauncey felt the anomaly and with her thumb smoothed her mouth back to approximately where it belonged. But now it was too big, grotesquely wide. She softly patted her lower lip, reducing an ugly lump. "Oh, damn," she fretted, licking and patting. "But I don't want to bother you with my little problems; it's all cosmetic. We should be talking about your future. Your father has already made his decision, as you can see."
(Geoff had forgotten about his father and the shadow-creatures surrounding him. But when he looked he saw that his father was alone on the boulder at the mouth of the ravine, sitting up cross-legged. His face, white by moonlight, was turned toward Geoff. Were his eyes open? Geoff was too far away to tell.
("Dad? Are you okay?" He made another attempt to get to his feet.
("Better than okay," Chauncey said. "He's recovered his honor."
(Geoff tried to wade through the water, but it felt thick and heavy, dragging at his legs, holding him back. He paused, trying to catch his breath, and in those few seconds he saw his father raise the Glock automatic, muzzle first, beneath his chin. Holding it in both hands, he pulled the trigger, and the mist flushed red around him as what remained of his head pitched forward.
("Dad… ddddyyy!"
(Chauncey's hand was on his shoulder.
("It's all right. Our honor has been satisfied, and your father has redeemed himself in the most honorable way left to him."
("No! Get away from me! You're a fuckin' freak show, all of you! You made him kill himself!"
("Not true. We don't have that kind of power. We can't make anyone act against his will. We may not seek revenge, or kill in cold blood."
("You did a good job of it today!"
("That's where you're wrong. We can defend ourselves on our ground, in our home place, by whatever means we find necessary. That dispensation ends at the boundaries of the home place. You're angry and you're frightened, but I can't hurt you, Geoff. All any of us can do is reason with you. Explain your choices."
("What are you talkin' about! What have you done to Eden?"
("We gave her sanctuary. Which you violated today. I don't know where Eden is. While we were… busy, the others of your force took her away."
("What others? You don't make sense. None of this. Why did he have to die?"
("Don't you know who they were?" Chauncey persisted.
("No!"
("Or where they've gone?"
("Oh, God!"
(There was no sound accompanying the appearance of flames. He noticed them first reflected in Chauncey's large dark eyes. He felt the heat; then the mist of the bay was tinted orange. He looked around and saw the body of his father engulfed, still seated on the boulder like a holy immolator at an Asian protest rally. Standing well away, almost into the trees, were small groups of watchers, dark except for the vivid amber of their slanted eyes. The flames leaped and whirled. The heat was intense. The heat and the burning father, corpse though he was, made Geoff dizzy from nausea and despair.
("So you have nothing to tell me."
(Geoff stared at the pyre, swallowing, weeping.
("Just leave me alone."
("You haven't heard your choices."
("There'll be search teams. They'll find us in the morning. I have to get through the night, that's all."
(She nodded. "That's one choice. To be rescued."
("Yes."
("Geoff, you see the Auditors waiting over there, don't you?"
("The what?"
("If you choose rescue, then we'll go away and leave you here. All of us but one, whom the Auditors will choose from their number to be your companion for the rest of your life. Give yourself a few moments now, look the Auditors over, and try to imagine what that life will be like. You'll be constantly watched, by eyes that never blink. Never close. The Auditor won't speak to you. He'll have nothing to say. He will only watch, and wait."
("Wait for what?"
("For you to go balls-up, dungeon-style paddy crackers. Forty-eight hours to fracture time is about average, I'm told. That's when you'll begin to talk to your Auditor. Talk, talk, talk. Plead, moan, and whimper for him to forgive you. But forgiveness is the Pardoner's game. He's only an Auditor. Your Auditor, until the end of your days."
(Geoff ran his tongue over his broken front teeth. His lips twitched into a frozen position, a kind of snarl.
("Or—" Chauncey had been working on her smile. She almost got it right this time. "You can go back to Moby Bay, and live there. A few mortals made that choice, and many of them adjusted nicely in time. You will be… tolerated, and we're not so hard to take, really, in our everyday appearances. You might even marry one of us. It's a simple, undemanding life in Moby Bay, except for occasional disturbances like today's. There are always problems with the Bad Souls, the Fallen of Malterra. Those who have no hope of God's forgiveness. I'm telling you, it makes them mean."
(Geoff was trembling. He couldn't look at Chauncey any longer. He looked instead at the flames, at the diminished wisping remains of his father.
("The third choice, of course, is the best one," Chauncey said. "It satisfies—"
("Your honor? What sort of honor do monsters have?"
("There you go, confusing appearance with evil. Not all of the Fallen were evil. The Bad Souls are permanently locked into human form. All except Mordaunt, who is Deus inversus, the Darkness of God. All of you mortals can consider yourselves lucky that this is so. Gives you a fighting chance, at least, although evil has had the edge for the last hundred millennia. Maybe because it's never boring. Why we are shifters is part of the whole Redemption package. Unlike the Malterrans, eventually we may return to a state of Grace. First we do our lessons. In order to understand the nature of all creatures that swim, fly, walk, or crawl, we assume their identities." Her smile was okay now, somewhat rueful in tone. "But damn it can be tricky! Learning how to shift, I mean. Want to see my paw again? I guess not. I've been working on this damn gryphon for the last year and a half. Mom says I've always been too ambitious. She's probably right. Combining different parts from the avian and animal worlds and getting them to work together, kind of a hoot but it's exhausting. My brother says I should have started with a chicken, the little jerk.
("But anyway, getting back to you.
That third choice. If you're buying the total Redemption package. It's really a bargain. Spare yourself in this life, you wrestle a lot of heavy baggage into the next. You go with scabs, murk, and mildew. The soul deserves a clean delivery, Geoff."
(His eyes were smarting. He rubbed his throat, trying to ease the choking tension there. He turned away from Chauncey, seeing the flames on the rock again like radiant branches of a tree nourished by the consumed heart of his father.
("Oh, Geoff?"
(He turned back to her. Chauncey's right hand was out. He saw a compact Glock automatic lying in her palm.
("This is yours, isn't it?"
(He stared at the pistol for a few seconds, then waded three steps toward Chauncey. The surf beyond the misted bay was like the blood rushing through his heart. His fingers closed over the dull black slide of the Glock, fingertips grazing Chauncey's wrist. It was unexpected, that touch, comforting in a way. Imagining himself blind and finding a flower in the dark. A single beat of his heart said courage.
(Geoff looked up and into her eyes.
("Thought I'd lost it," he told her. He lifted the Glock from her hand. Held it as he might've held a key poised at the threshold of a lock on a mysterious door. "Thanks."
("What you think is the end is only another place to go to."
("I wanted to see Eden again." There was no strain in his voice, no sorrowing notes. His mind felt clear, open to possibilities, raised remotely above the ruck and misery of self-pity and other merely human perceptions, immaculate as an observatory. The reality was clear as well, like the gleam of new stars; his purpose now etched plainly in firmament but only large enough to accommodate the humble event.
("I know," Chauncey said. "I can promise you this. If she ever needs our help, she'll have it.")
"That's enough," Eden said. "Don't show me any more. I don't want to see him die." Chauncey's small face had a rosy flush; there was a touch of euphoria in her blue eyes from the residual energy of psychic communication.
