One of the Damned: Finnegan #2 (Midnight Defenders)

by Joey Ruff

  “What’s going on?”

  The bearded man turned to us, and Charlie only smiled at him. To me, he said, “Just watch. Try not to interrupt. I’ll explain everything after.”

  I nodded.

  The bearded man turned away and held the gaze of each of the five figures in turn.

  “It’s been nine years,” he began, “since we’ve last been gathered this way. This year’s competition was…interesting, to say the least. As you know, the rules were simple. Within the town of Valentine, Nebraska the one with the greatest ploy shall be crowned the winner. As in previous years, the theme reflected the location. This year, the acts were to reflect the holiday with which the town shares its name.” He paused for a moment and looked back at me. “It was brought to my attention that one person directly violated the theme and is, therefore, immediately disqualified.”

  The pharmacist looked directly at the leprechaun. “Chocolate cream eggs?”

  The leprechaun’s eyes grew wide.

  “This is not a contest purely of trickery and deception, but of wisdom. If you have no knowledge of human customs, you have no hope of winning, nor any entitlement to the office that is bestowed to the winner.” He snapped his fingers, and the leprechaun shrieked and vanished in a plume of white smoke.

  He turned to the others and said, “The rest of you appeared to have fared better.”

  He stepped toward the man in the green cloak and said, “Loki.”

  I looked at Charlie and asked, “The Loki?”

  He nodded. “This is the finals, man. Best of the best.”

  The figure stepped forward. “You attempted irony. You assumed the form of an Erote and shot heart-tipped arrows at quarreling lovers.”

  Loki nodded.

  “You violated the universal law by taking human life. This office cannot condone such actions.”

  Loki shook his head and held his hand out. “Sir, if I may?”

  The pharmacist studied him for a minute and then nodded.

  “No human life was ever taken. I only maintained the illusion of murder. Each of my victims has been kept in a state of rest and transported to a cave on the other side of this park. Their bodies were replaced by logs.”

  Logs? It sounded so strange, but then I realized what he meant. It was the same idea as the Changelings. When the Sidhe would steal human babies, they would often replace the infant with a piece of wood that was enchanted to resemble the child and duplicated some of its baser functions. The illusion never lasted long, and the babies were always reported as dying soon after birth, though the real child had been spirited away.

  The man nodded and said, “So be it. Your ruse has stumped even myself. Very well done.”

  Loki smiled from ear to ear, bowed, and took a step backward, making a grand, regal sweep of his cloak as he did.

  The man turned next to the faun. “Puck…your entry?”

  “Love songs,” the faun said. His voice was low and gravelly.

  “Frogs, fish, and birds,” the bearded man said, “All reported to be heard singing the love songs of the 1950s. Jukebox hits such as Earth Angel.” The man smiled. “Humorous.”

  The faun moaned, and the bearded man turned to the black man. “Anansi,” he beckoned.

  I felt shivers crawling down my spine. Anansi, the African spidergod. I didn’t do well with spiders.

  The black man bowed and stepped forward.

  “Title holder and reigning champion. Much was expected of you.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “You disappointed.”

  The man called Anansi maintained eye-contact with the pharmacist, but said nothing. His appearance remained calm and collected.

  “You had a single trick. Turning all of the flowers into roses.” He paused. “In the next county over.”

  “Yes,” Anansi said.

  “Unfortunately, the rules explicitly state that the act must take place within the city limits.”

  Anansi said nothing.

  The pharmacist turned my direction and said, “Coyote.”

  Charlie nodded and stepped forward.

  My head began to spin and it took me a minute to collect my thoughts. Loki, Puck, Anansi, and Coyote. Somehow, I’d become grouped with the greatest tricksters of lore.

  “State your submission.”

  “I did hearts,” Charlie said. “Cow hearts, mostly. A couple of ranches had their fields mutilated in what looked like an animal attack, but all of the hearts were removed an arranged in the shape of a…well, a heart. In their fields. While we never wanted it to make national news, it did get a write up in a few local papers, and many of the local farmers and raising the alarm on space invaders. So, chalk one up for widespread panic.” He paused for a second, looked like he might be thinking. “Oh, and then I exploded when a truck hit me, leaving behind only a still-beating valentine-shaped heart. That was baffling not only to my guest here, but an entire county of law enforcement and medical examiners.”

  The bearded man nodded. I didn’t know if he was impressed or what, but there was a faint smile on his face. From what I could tell, the cattle actually had been murdered, and there wasn’t any apparent scolding for that.

  After a few moments of awkward silence, the man said, “Well, it appears the winner is clear.”

  “Sir?” Anansi said suddenly. He stepped forward and bowed low. “If you will allow me an audience.”

  The pharmacist considered him a moment and then said, “You may speak.”

  “Thank you, your Grace.” Anansi righted himself and said, “Before you make your final deliberation, let me fully discuss my submission.”

  “Get out!” Loki said from beneath his hood. “We heard your flower story.”

  Anansi didn’t look at him. He addressed only the man I knew as the pharmacist. “Your Grace. The rules state simply that each ruse must be performed within the confines of the city limits of Valentine.”

  “Yes,” the bearded man said. “And yours did not.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir. But the town limits of Valentine are, I believe, not as they appear.”

  Confusion fell across the bearded man’s face as he considered Anansi. He turned and walked back through the tree line beside the falls and lifted an old scroll that might have been found at the library at Alexandria over two thousand years ago. He unrolled the parchment and studied it for a few minutes, then rolled it back up and set it down.

  “He speaks truth.” He stepped toward Anansi and said, “You did this?”

  Anansi nodded and bowed low.

  “You, also, have deceived even me.”

  As rumbling came from Puck and Loki, I saw only a knowing smile spread over Charlie’s face as he said, “That sly dog.”

  “What happened?” I asked. “What did he do?”

  “He moved the town lines.”

  I remember the patch of cold I’d gone through while leaving the city on my motorcycle and understood.

  Charlie began clapping loudly and stepped forward with a shrill whistle as he did. “Bravo! So now, for cheating, Anansi maintains his title?”

  “I did not cheat,” Anansi said without looking.

  “The rules are clear,” the bearded man said. “All submissions must be entered within the city limits. Since the city limits were moved, only one ruse occurred within the city itself.”

  “Anansi maintains the title of The Trickster.”

  Even as the words were spoken, the man’s eyes seemed to apologize for them.

  Puck protested while Loki fumed in silence. Charlie only stood there, stoic and calm. Anansi smiled and headed for the nearest treeline.

  As soon as his back was turned, Loki's face broke into a cheshire grin. In the next breath, Loki appeared to shimmer, and then before I could blink, a glowing blade appeared in his hand and he charged straight at Anansi.

  There was a distance of maybe twenty yards between them, but Loki closed in so quickly he may have teleported. Ten years of training urged me
to act, but reason told me that both Anansi and Loki were gods and getting between them would be suicide. So I hesitated.

  As fast as he moved, I never had a shot of stopping Loki anyway.

  As the blade in Loki's hand fell against Anansi's back, there was a sudden flash of light, and it sprung unexpectedly into the air. Loki flew fifteen feet backward and landed on his butt in a daze.

  Anansi turned with a startled expression, but before he could act, the bearded man stepped between them. There was a fire in his eyes and an old wizened staff in his outstretched fist. He looked pissed.

  "How dare you," he said, staring directly at Loki. His voice was like thunder echoing off the hills. "Do not dare violate the sanctity of this ruling. Doing so would mean offending the awarded office as well as the governing council. The latter would have very serious consequences for you."

  Loki looked up in what could have easily been mistaken for a cower, if gods like him were capable of cowering, which said something about the bearded man -- whoever he was. Loki, being a proclaimed god, would have to be either a fallen angel or a korrigan so powerful to associate with them. He wasn’t easily frightened.

  Loki said nothing, but after a few heartbeats, his look turned from fear to defiance. Slowly, and with renewed confidence, he stood. "Be easy, Lawkeeper," he said. "One may mistake those words as threat." His smile widened. "I observed the rules of your contest. Now that it has proven to be little more than a cheap charade, I will show no further courtesies."

  "Be gone," the bearded man said. "The next time we meet, it will be as enemies."

  "We already are," Loki said, and then he turned and disappeared into the forest and was gone.

  The bearded man looked between Charlie and Puck and said, "Any other complaints?" Silence. "Very well then. The ruling has been passed. Anansi will maintain his title."

  "So that wasn't cheating?” I asked Charlie, trying to keep my voice low so as not to arouse the bearded man’s anger.

  “What Anansi did?" he said. “No, though obviously Loki doesn't see it that way. Anansi outsmarted us. That’s exactly how the game is played. The best tricksters in the world, and he fooled us all.”

  “Does that mean you have to honor him?”

  Charlie nodded. “But it doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

  The pharmacist walked back to his scroll, took it in his hands, and waded out into the water, disappearing into the falls. I watched him go. Once he was gone, I noticed that Anansi and Puck had vanished as well. Charlie and I were alone.

  “So, what was all that about?” I asked.

  He smiled. “Every nine years, a competition is held. Anyone can enter. It’s a test of wisdom and cunning, and it lasts the better part of a year. All this stuff in Valentine for the past month has been the finals.”

  "And Loki?”

  "Contested the verdict and was asked to leave. I don't think he'll be back for the next one."

  “So…what’s the prize?”

  “The title of The Trickster.”

  “But you’re already a trickster. Everyone I saw here was.”

  “Yes. Little T. Like gods, little G. There can be many lowercase tricksters, but there’s only one capital T, grand-master daddy. Lucky for us, it’s a revolving position.”

  “So what?”

  “So what?” He laughed. “The so what is that whoever holds that title has access to unlimited power and all of the secrets of the universe.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Knowledge, Austin. It’s what it’s about. It’s the greatest weapon there is. Tricking someone is not enough. It’s not even the point. The world sees it as just a trick, but in reality, it’s outsmarting that counts. Anansi won because he outsmarted all of us. Sure, his winning gesture was the tiniest, most inconsequential act, but it was the only one that counted. When we thought we were playing by the same rules, it was all about one-upping each other. I thought my submissions were effective, but in the end, Loki would’ve won purely because he’d tricked the facilitator.”

  “The guy with the beard?”

  Charlie nodded.

  “Who is he?”

  He shrugged. “Someone very old and very wise.”

  “And he decides?”

  “He speaks for the office of The Trickster, yes.”

  “Have you ever been?”

  “The Trickster?” He seemed to sadden. “No. I’d hoped this year would be my shot.”

  “So…if this happens every nine years, why doesn’t it make the news?”

  “We try very hard to control that. No point in freaking people out. But sometimes, it does. Raining frogs, crop circles…that kind of thing. Typically, we can keep it to the tabloids. Nobody takes those seriously anyway.”

  I nodded. “What happens now?”

  “I go and sulk for a little bit. Then maybe I start planning for the next one.”

  “You seem determined.”

  “When you’ve been alive for thousands of years and are, for all intents and purposes, immortal…you find meaning apart from career choices and reality shows.”

  It struck me that there was an irony in his statement, but said nothing about it.

  "So what did Loki mean? About not following the rules any more?"

  Charlie shrugged. "Loki's always been an ass-hat."

  "But this sounded specific, like a threat." I thought about what i just seen and heard and said, "Oh, fuck."

  "What?"

  "Loki only kept those people alive because it was part of the rules not to kill.” I thought back to what he said. “They’re being kept in a cave somewhere in the park. There’s no way to find them in time.”

  Charlie, or Coyote, smiled a wolfish grin. “I know the cave.”

  “We’ve got to go.”

  He shrugged. “It’s not my thing.”

  “You wanna be the Trickster, right? Allowing him to kill those people is the same as killing them yourself. You want to honor that office, this is the way to do it.”

  He was about to say something else, but stopped and closed his mouth. “I feel like you just tricked me again.”

  “That’s what the truth does.” I smiled. “Now, take me to the cave.”

  ***

  Charlie, or maybe I should call him Coyote, gave me a solemn look and nodded his head. He seemed to study me for a minute, and then he smiled his wolfish grin.

  As I watched him, he appeared to grow taller...along with the trees and the waterfall. No, I was growing smaller. I tried to ask him what was happening, but found I had lost the ability to speak. All that came out of my mouth was a low whine. It took me a minute to realize what had just happened.

  Coyote took a knee and began to rub me on the head. That’s when I realized I was standing on four legs, and I understood that he had done something to me. Turned me into – what? A dog or a wolf?

  “This will be the fastest way to travel,” he said. As he stepped behind a nearby tree, he shimmered, and what came out the other side was not the man Charlie, but an actual coyote.

  Cold, gray eyes looked at me, and a voice spoke directly into my head. “Follow me. I’ll guide you to the cave. But that’s all I’m doing. You’re on your own from there, pal.”

  He began to run, and not knowing what else to do, I followed after, quickly realizing how fast I could go in the sticks and underbrush, how easily I could navigate the large, thick grouping of tree trunks.

  Within minutes, we had crossed miles and stood before an open cave mouth. I couldn’t hear anything – not even the birds in the trees around us. I tried to sniff the air, realized suddenly that the overabundance of smells I’d been picking up on had suddenly stunted. Four legs had turned to two, and I was human again.

  I turned back to see a blonde Coyote not four feet from me, standing just on the edge of the tree line. It winked at me, and I nodded toward it. Then it bowed its head low, turned, and disappeared amongst the bramble of the forest.

  I turned toward the mouth of th
e cave, steeled my nerves, took a deep breath, and drew one of my Colts, holding it in both hands. Then I walked into the cave.

  After a few feet, it became clear that it was too dark to see, and I slipped a pair of glasses out of my inner jacket pocket. At first glance, they looked like designer sunglasses, but once i slipped them over my eyes, the darkness ahead of me turned bright, allowing me to see. The glasses weren’t nightvision, but thermal imaging, registering the differences in ambient heat signatures into a spectrum of colors. It wasn’t like a flashlight, showing me the actual terrain, but it gave me an outline of the winding cave path in shades of gray and purple, with the occasional red plume of steam rising from cracks in the floor. Even better, it showed me the doppler-effect reds, oranges and yellows of nearly a dozen figures maybe two hundred feet away.

  I couldn’t run in the darkness. One, because it would be noisy and if Loki was already here – which was likely – he would be quickly alerted to my presence. Two, because the glasses didn’t reveal the exact path before me and the ground wasn’t quite level, but struck with ruts and divets in the turf. So I took it slow, and as I neared, I realized that one of the figures was moving slowly.

  The heat signature of this one was different than the others. It was mostly purple, which meant cooler than normal humans and caused it to blend partially with the rest of the cavern. In the center, there was a blindingly bright specter of white light, which meant very hot. With a signature like that, I doubted very much that this figure was human.

  “Loki!” I called, aiming my Colt squarely at the center of the white mass. “Step away from those people.”

  The movement stopped for a moment, and then turned to me. I could see a face of sorts in the middle of the violet image, two white spheres where the eyes were and a white line for a mouth that turned quickly into the shape of an upturned banana as it looked my way.

  “You,” he said coldly, and I recognized Loki’s voice from the clearing. “For a mortal, you know very little about staying clear of affairs that do not concern you. This intrigues me. Most in your position would not have pursued me.” The purple form grew quite tall then, just over six feet from the look of it, and I could tell that he had stood. “You must be one of those hunters.” He laughed. “I know of you. Your kind does not scare me.”