by Dyrk Ashton
“Hi! Hi!” Peter greets them all. The Rottweiler jumps down and growls at the newcomers, but Peter “ruffs” again and all aggression ceases.
Then Peter starts jumping up and down, swinging his arms and spinning, all the while shouting exclamations like “yay! and “woo-hoo!” There are close to a dozen dogs now, and more are arriving by the moment. They bark and bounce around him, some hopping on their hind legs, others whirling in circles, all yapping gleefully.
One of the Pit Bull owners says, “What--the--fuck?” He’s still incapable of closing his mouth.
Peter beams at Fi and Zeke from the center of the doggie melee. The look on Fi’s face sobers him. He glances around to see people stopping in the street to watch. More come out of storefronts, others lean out of upper story windows.
He sees the meek Pit Bull face away from him in a submissive squat, her tail cocked to the side. “O-o-o-kay,” he says. Then, loud enough to be heard over the barking, he looses another commanding “ruff!” All the dogs immediately sit and become silent.
Peter waves Fi and Zeke toward him. They approach with trepidation. Surprisingly, the dogs scoot out of their way. Peter puts his hands on their shoulders when they reach him. They proceed up the sidewalk, the dogs parting as they go. The owners of the first three dogs stare after them as they pass.
When they round the corner the dogs leap up to follow, but Peter leans back around, holds out a hand and whistles softly. The dogs all lie down and put their heads on their front paws. The female Pit Bull whimpers.
Halfway down the next block, Peter feels the eyes of Zeke and Fi upon him. “Dogs like me,” he retorts. “I can’t help that, can I?” They don’t look at all satisfied with his answer. “Well I like cats too!”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Mendip Hills 3
“It’s thicker than I thought,” Bödvar says aloud, then realizes he’s speaking to his rucksack, which still sits on the ground against a nearby tree. These are the first words he’s spoken to his hidden “partner” on the entire mission, other than “hush” and “be quiet.” Eerily sweet humming emanates from the pack in response, accompanied by the muffled slosh of water. Oh, what the hell, Bödvar concedes. “Almost there,” he tells the sack.
He’s bashed a hole five feet deep in the face of the cliff. How much more can there be? He kicks away rocks, claws out loose chunks, then resumes hammering in rhythmic, tireless strokes.
The rucksack hums in time with the percussive blows, a different tune than it did before. This one sounds like a funeral march.
* * *
PHOOOOOOM! PHOOOOOOM!
Myrddin forces himself to his feet, completely naked and frightfully thin. The dim light of the glowing rock illuminates him from below in a most unflattering manner. Dust sprinkles from the ceiling of the cave, shaken loose with each pounding beat. He listens, then titters to himself and claps his hands, imagining an enormous heart beating in the earth. The heart of his beloved, beating for him. He does a little jig, shuffling in a circle, stops and gazes at the area from which the sound originates.
Could it be her? Finally, after all this time, come to set me free? A single word escapes his thick dry lips, “Nyneve...”
Myrddin blinks, his eyes glaze...
* * *
Sunlight through autumn leaves dappled his robe and the path beneath his feet as he walked through the wooded hills. No, not walked. Skipped. And he was singing. His beloved had sent him a message, received clandestinely in his study, received with a leap of his heart. Then he was there, at the mouth of the cave, their secret place. She had set out a picnic of roast chicken, a loaf of bread and wine. Lovely beyond description. The Lady Nyneve. She’d been his apprentice until things turned amorous. Until he turned amorous.
He attempted a kiss, but she was coy and turned her cheek with the slightest smile. When they finished their meal, he ushered her into the cave to describe once again his plans to transform it into a spectacular home for them, a veritable mountain palace. She listened kindly. Then she told him he could have his kiss, the first of many to come, if he would prove that he loved her as much as she loved him, that he trusted her--if he would tell her the last of his secrets, the ancient words that were the key to unlocking the mysteries of his grimoire scrolls.
Though he had sworn a blood oath to his mentor not to tell anyone, he revealed them to Nyneve. She kissed him on the lips for the first time, and the last. She placed a hand against his cheek and smiled--but there was a sadness there, too. Then she spoke just two words and he couldn’t move. Gently, like a nurse undressing the wounded, she removed his shoulder bag of “magical” items, the ones he kept near at all times, including his scrolls and precious gambanteinn. She even lifted the talisman from around his neck, the one made by his mentor, his teacher, his friend, The Prathamaja Nandana.
Nyneve stepped lightly out of the cave, placed her hand on the stone and spoke archaic words. His words. The stone flowed and hardened, sealing in the darkness. The darkness, and The Madman. The Old Fool.
Once he’d overcome the shock at Nyneve’s betrayal, Myrddin tried every arcane phrase he knew, then brute force, to escape this prison, but there was no undoing the incantation that trapped him here. Not from within.
Though he knew the risk of winding up stuck in solid ground, he tried to slip away. It didn’t work, no matter how hard he tried. By some method even Myrddin cannot fathom, she’d stripped him of that rare gift along with his freedom.
* * *
PHOOOOOOM!
Bits of rock fall as the steady assault continues. Is that a crack, forming in the wall? Do I imagine the slightest glimpse of natural light?
The last time Myrddin saw the sun, moon or stars, it was an agonizing time for the kingdom. Not because there was war, there had been a rare lull in the otherwise continuous fighting that beleaguered the land. The drought and famine saw to that. There was nothing to feed armies. Or the king’s people.
The king slouched in his throne, worried and wasted away. Myrddin knew the hard times would pass and tried to convince him. If there is one truth Myrddin has learned in all his many years, it is that things always change. But the king didn’t always heed Myrddin’s counsel. He sent his knights out on a foolish, dangerous quest--including the best of them, the one most dear to Myrddin’s heart. A kind, brave boy who did not know the real secret of his father, Launcelot, or who his grandfather really was.
Myrddin drops to his knees, clasps his hands and presses them to his broad wrinkled forehead. In Latin, he prays, “Dear God, if I do escape this place, if my wretched life is to be saved, I will devote the remainder of it to finding the boy and telling him the truth. This I swear to you, O Lord.”
If the boy still lives, it occurs to him. He squeezes his eyes tight “Dirige, Domine, Deus meus, in conspectu tuo viam meam” ("Direct my way in thy sight, O Lord, my God"). He drops his hands to the floor, his dirty hair and beard hanging almost to them. A single tear drops in the dust.
Myrddin has always been a little mad. Maybe a lot. But right now he truly fears for his sanity. The betrayal, longing and loneliness have taken their toll. And the guilt. He wonders if he is imagining things at this very moment. Is anyone here at all? If so, perhaps they’ve come to punish me for my sins. My many, many sins.
With a mighty crack! a portion of the wall gives way. Moonlight pierces the darkness, a beam in the billowing dust that freezes Myrddin Wyllt like an escapee pinned by the searchlight of a prison guard.
* * *
Bödvar watches the opening he’s made in the cliff warily, sniffs at the stagnant air. The scent is unmistakably that of The Madman. And he’s alive. But not for long.
He hoists a stone and wedges it into the hole, scoops rubble to hold it in place. Myrddin Wyllt has always been a tricky bastard and is not to be underestimated. He looks to his oversized rucksack, which is now eerily silent, and heaves a fretful sigh. It’s time to let it out.
* * *
Bödvar ging
erly sets a sizable urn on the ground, constructed of hard white oak, banded in iron, stained with dark water, mildew and dried blood. The key turns reluctantly in the antique padlocks that hold the lid into place. A moment of hesitation, then he tugs the hasps loose, lifts the latches and stands back. With a glub and gurgle the lid begins to rise. An iridescent vapor creeps out.
Bödvar backs away a bit more. He’s never actually met this Firstborn. It never travelled openly or often, and hadn’t participated in the Magnificent Holocausts. It also preferred hot wet climes and The Bear kept mostly to cooler regions of the world. He’s passed near to where it dwelt a few times, but went out of his way to make sure he didn’t come too near.
It’s Bödvar’s understanding that this is possibly the most repulsive of all Firstborn, and though by no means the oldest, one of the most feared. He has nightmares just from hearing folks tell of their nightmares about it. In fact, he feels like he’s having one right now.
The lid slides back in the ghostly moonlit mist and drops to the dirt. A thick glob of milky gray flesh slithers out, covered in translucent mucus, wet with water from the urn, and puddles on the ground. Finally the last of it slops down the side.
Bödvar takes yet another involuntary step back as one end of the creature begins to rise. When it reaches five feet, the top blooms and sucks in sharp gargling breaths, the swaying body expanding and contracting as it respires. The open mouth turns toward Bödvar, wet breath rasping across concentric rings of yellow, scalpel-blade teeth. The mouth closes, to Bödvar’s relief, and he sees that it has full thick lips, soft and moist, of the palest pink. Nostrils slit open above the mouth, then two lumps bulge and open to reveal bloodshot eyes of light blue, with thin white eyelashes that wriggle like tiny tentacles.
Bödvar can’t tell if there is a single bone in its body, but it does have limbs--rubbery and fluid with undulating strips of flesh for fingers at the ends of its ribbony arms. Viscous eyelids blink sluggishly as it gazes at him.
Then she smiles.
So this is Lamia. Bödvar shudders. This is The Leech.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
Flowers & Figs 9
“Excellent, it is here,” Peter observes with gratification.
The impressive signage on the twenty story building reads Empyrean Transnational Bank.
“I thought it was a Third Fourth Fifth Bank,” says Fi, “or Buffington Trust Credit Union.”
“Yeah,” Zeke responds, “banks change names once a month these days, I swear.” Then he sees another sign, in the front window. “See, they’re closed,” he tells Peter. “I really don’t need that money right now, I told you--”
“Nonsense,” Peter scoffs. He hurries along the sidewalk to a young woman with thick glasses who is encouraging passersby to sign a clean air petition. He interrupts her spiel, “I’ll sign!”
“Oh, okay,” she replies, as if surprised anyone would, and hands him a clipboard and pen.
He flips over the top sheet with signatures, tears out the blank one below and hands the clipboard back to the woman. “I’ll be back,” he promises. “You have my word,” and he bolts across the street.
Watching Peter dodge traffic, Fi observes that he moves with powerful grace and poise, perfectly balanced, self-assured and completely at ease. She and Zeke aren’t quite so physically adept, so they’re much more careful crossing. They arrive as Peter bangs on the glass double doors.
“Peter,” Fi admonishes, “you can’t just knock on a bank door!”
A uniformed guard approaches from inside, shaking his head and mouthing the words, “We’re closed.”
Peter scribbles something on the back of the petition, presses it to the window. The guard squints through the glass and reads a single word, ROSTRUM. He frowns and says, “Go away.”
Peter scribbles on the paper again. Please call the manager.
The guard mouths again, “No.”
Peter calmly writes, Contact your manager now or lose your job. The guard snorts but pulls a radio from his belt and speaks into it. After a few moments he apparently gets a reply--and not the one he expected. Obviously perplexed, he clips his radio back to his belt and holds one finger up to Peter--not the middle finger, as Fi and Zeke would’ve thought, but his index finger, in a gesture to wait.
Peter grins and bobs his eyebrows at Fi and Zeke.
Across the polished granite floor of the lobby, an office door at the end of the empty tellers’ booths opens. A pudgy man with a mustache peeks out, speaking urgently into a mobile phone while peering at the front door. He finishes the call, straightens his tie and approaches. Meanwhile, the guard unlocks the doors and pulls them open. Peter steps right in.
The man with the mustache finishes clipping a name tag to his lapel with jittery fingers. It reads Robert Jenkins, Manager. He eyes Peter’s bushy beard and ratty apparel. “This is quite unexpected, I--”
“They’re with me,” Peter interrupts, indicating Fi and Zeke while grasping Jenkins’s hand and shaking it. “They will receive every courtesy afforded to me.”
“Of course...” Jenkins wipes his forehead with a handkerchief. “Absolutely, sir.” He seems every bit as confused as the security guard, who closes and locks the doors behind them.
“This way, please.” Jenkins shepherds them to a half circle of plush leather chairs. “You’re very lucky to have caught me here on a Sunday, I just stopped by after a church function to...” but he sees by the look on Peter’s face that he isn’t interested. “I’m, er--not familiar with this particular--procedure--you understand--but I phoned my superiors and have been instructed to make you as comfortable as possible and afford you every courtesy... as you said yourself...” The poor man is terribly flustered, but Peter is gracious.
“I thank you for your kind hospitality,” Peter offers with a small bow, which seems to distress Jenkins even more. “How long do you think it will be?”
“I’ve been told no more than half an hour, sir.” He mops his forehead again. “Can I get you anything to drink?”
Peter grins, “Bourbon on the rocks?”
* * *
Apparently some banks do indeed serve liquor, to Fi and Zeke’s surprise. Peter has downed three drinks and Fi and Zeke a cup of coffee each when the elevator at the opposite end of the lobby dings. Jenkins is greatly relieved.
A tall man with gray hair steps out, wearing a charcoal sweater over a pink shirt. Following him is another man, stockier and bald, in a jacket and tie, carrying a thin metal briefcase. They beeline across the lobby, the tall man scrutinizing Peter, Fi and Zeke, the expression on his face revealing no opinion of them one way or the other. He walks straight to Peter, holds out a hand.
“Welcome to Empyrean Transnational,” he says. “I’m Kenneth Hashi, Vice President, North American Op--”
“We’re in a bit of a hurry, Ken, if you don’t mind,” Peter interrupts, shaking Hashi’s hand firmly.
“Of course,” Hashi replies. “May I first inquire as to your name?”
“No, you may not,” Peter answers without malice.
“Very good sir,” says Hashi, giving Peter a knowing nod.
“I’m Kalb, Regional V.P. of Security,” the stocky bald man says, offering his hand. “It’s a pleasure to serve you, sir.” Peter greets him in return.
Hashi addresses the manager. “We’ll be using your office, Jenkins. With me.”
“Yes sir. Whatever you...”
But Hashi is already striding away, Peter right behind him. Fi and Zeke hurry to keep up. “One of these two will be your party’s witness?” Hashi asks.
Peter turns to Fi. “Will you do the honors?”
“The honors of what?”
“Just watching.”
She looks at Zeke, who shrugs.
“The young man should be comfortable here,” assures Hashi, indicating chairs against the wall next to the door, then ushers Peter, Fi, and Kalb into the office and follows, closing the door behind him.
Zeke si
ts, a little jealous he’s being left out of whatever it is they’re doing in there.
Jenkins offers him a weak smile, clears his throat, “Another coffee?”
“That would be great, thanks,” Zeke replies.
Jenkins wipes his sweaty palms on his jacket and hustles off.
Zeke groans and rubs his face, then looks at a newspaper laying on the seat beside him. The headline reads: Nicaragua Votes for Statehood.
“What?” he says aloud. He picks it up and reads further: Final Central American territory achieves majority vote for a petition to Congress. If accepted, Nicaragua will become the 73rd U.S. State....
He checks the date of the paper. It’s today’s. He glances at the guard, who’s watching him warily from his position by the door. Zeke heads toward him, clutching the paper. He’s planning to ask what the hell this news story is all about but stops dead as something else catches his attention.
On the sidewalk outside, a lanky young man with the hood up on his sweatshirt is sauntering past the windows. The blood drains from Zeke’s face.
The man stops, setting a guitar case down to light a cigarette. He turns toward the glass to shelter his lighter from the wind. In the flare of the flame, Zeke sees enough of the man’s face to make his insides squirm cold. The man retrieves the case and walks away. Zeke rushes the guard, his heart beating like mad.
“Open the door!” he shouts. “Open the door!”
“Hold your horses,” the guard replies. He slips a key into the lock and barely has it turned before Zeke shoves through.
* * *
Inside the manager’s office, Peter sits at the customer’s side of the desk next to Fi, typing energetically on a secure briefcase laptop Kalb has given him. Sitting in Jenkins’s chair, Hashi leans close to a monitor, reading the screen. “So, there’s a series of 36 questions, each randomly chosen from a pool of 100 that you yourself have created and entered answers for.”
