Tears of the Furies (A Novel of the Menagerie)

by Thomas E. Sniegoski Christopher Golden

  "You don’t believe me," he said, doing his best to stifle his amusement. "Fine, be that way. I’ll just keep my candid recollections of history to myself, though I think you might have been very interested in Genghis Khan’s phallus-shaped vegetable collection."

  When Eve glared at him, Clay couldn’t hold it back any longer and burst out laughing himself. The life he led did not often give him the opportunity for laughter, and he held on to the moment with both hands, truly enjoying himself.

  Eve grinned. "Think you’re pretty funny, don’t you?" she said.

  He nodded, wiping the tears from his eyes.

  "We’ll see how funny you think it is when I stick you for this bill."

  Clay had regained most of his composure by the time their food arrived. Two waiters brought their entrees: his the linguine with clam sauce, and Eve’s a Caesar salad. They were silent through their meal, and he could see by the way her brow furrowed, that she was thinking hard about something. This happened too often when they were together, but for once they were in a situation that allowed him to inquire about it.

  "Penny for your thoughts," he said finally, spinning the last of the linguine onto his fork.

  Eve shrugged, placing her napkin on top of the table, and pushed her salad plate away from her. "Don’t know what it is, but every time I’m with you, I end up thinking about things I’d rather not."

  "Such as?"

  She glanced away. "It’s hard to explain."

  "Then let’s distract you," Clay said, pushing away his own empty plate. "How about some dessert?" he asked, removing a menu card from the side of the table. "I hear they make an amazing brownie sundae, and I’d even be willing to share."

  There was a tinge of desperation in Eve’s gaze when she met his eyes.

  "I can’t remember . . ." she said. "I can’t remember what the garden . . . what Eden looked like." Eve turned her head away to watch the shiny, happy people stroll down the crowded sidewalks of Newbury Street. "I often wonder if this is another way that He intends to punish me, to take away the memories of the things I cherish, one by one, so only the bad stuff is left."

  Clay was at a loss. The Creator had a gift for punishment, there was no doubt about that. The punishment He had meted out to Eve had led to the horror that had made her what she was now. She had been raped and defiled and driven over the edge of madness by demons, and turned into a monster. Wasn’t that enough?

  "We’re old, Eve," he said. "Time steals everything eventually, memories in particular. You forget. And, in truth, I’d like to think that God has more important things to do with his time than to keep fucking with you."

  For a moment, Clay thought he saw the slightest hint of anger bloom on her face, her canine teeth elongating to nasty points. But as quickly as it was there, it was gone.

  "Do you remember?" she asked him.

  He didn’t want to lie to her. "Yes."

  "Not right now," she said, "but maybe sometime, we can talk about it . . . maybe jog my memory. It just seems . . . I mean, to be unable to erase the memories I wish I could forget, and not to be able to have even a glimpse of that in my mind . . . it just hurts."

  Clay reached out and laid his hand atop hers. He was not always comfortable with intimacy, but he could not ignore her pain. "I remember that there were a lot of plants, if that helps you any."

  He gave her a wink,m and they both laughed softly.

  "Thanks," she said. "That’s a big help."

  "Seriously. Any time. We’ll go somewhere humanity hasn’t completely destroyed nature, and we’ll talk about it. I’ll share everything I can recall."

  Eve took a long breath and let it out. "That would be wonderful." She fluttered one hand in the air. "Meanwhile, though, back to ancient conquerors and penis-shaped vegetables."

  "Actually, we were moving on to dessert. Now, about that brownie sundae —"

  He felt a sudden tug on the cuff of his pants and on reflex shifted the skin on his legs to resemble that of a prehistoric sea urchin, nasty spines rising up out of flesh as defense.

  "Shit!" he heard a familiar voice hiss from beneath the table.

  Eve heard it as well, rolling her eyes, and they both bent forward, carefully lifting the white linen cloth. From within a pool of shadow under the table, the gnarled, leathery features of the hobgoblin peered up at them. Squire was sucking on one of his sausage thick fingers, pricked by Clay’s defensive metamorphosis.

  "What do you want, you little creep?" Eve asked.

  "Nice to see you too, bitch," he snarled, turning to address Clay. "Sorry to cut into your lunch, but the boss wants you back at the house right away." He scrutinized his finger, squeezing a bead of blood from the wound. "Gave me a nasty prick there," he said, placing the injured finger back into his mouth.

  "How apropos," Eve remarked, dropping her side of the tablecloth, finished with Doyle’s errand boy. "A nasty prick for a nasty prick."

  Danny Ferrick studied his reflection in the mirror over the bureau. "I think they’re getting longer," he said, touching the curved horns growing from his forehead. He turned to glance at his mother.

  "What do you think?"

  Julia didn’t want to think about her son’s horns, let alone look at them, although it was impossible to ignore the black protrusions. "Could be," she said offhandedly, taking an overlarge New England Patriots shirt from the suitcase on the bed, folding it, and placing in a dresser nearby.

  Danny was almost completely unpacked, except for some cargo pants and his toiletries, and she found herself slowing down, stalling, not really wanting to complete the task.

  "You’re not even looking."

  Julia slid the drawer closed and reached for the cargo pants. "I looked, trust me, I just can’t say."

  Danny was suddenly at her side, his hand closed around her wrist, pulling her away from her task. "Look at me."

  Her heart skipped a beat as she let herself see him again. He looked like something out of a bad dream; completely hairless, with horns sticking from his scalp, skin the color of burgundy wine and yellow, hypnotic eyes. This couldn’t be her child — her baby boy — this was some kind of monster, a demon. But when he spoke, or looked at her in that certain way, there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that this was indeed the child she loved.

  A changeling. That was what Mr. Doyle had called him. A demon child, left in place of a human baby at birth by mischievous devils. The child she had given birth to was gone, long ago. Mr. Doyle insisted that her biological infant had likely been dead since shortly after his abduction. The weight of that knowledge might have killed her, the sheer black burden of it, if not for the presence of the boy left in his place. A demon child, to be raised as a human. How surprised those monsters would have been to learn that she had done exactly as they planned, and that she did not regret it. She grieved for the infant she had lost, but she loved her son, no matter how he had come to be hers.

  She loved him.

  Danny Ferrick was a demon, but he would always be her son.

  "I’m sorry, baby," she said, pulling him into her arms and kissing the side of his bald head. His skin felt different now, like the soft leather of an expensive car seat, and she was careful not to scratch herself on his horn. "I’m being rude to you, even though I don’t want to be."

  He hugged her back, and she could feel a frightening strength in those arms, but also a tenderness that proved she was loved, despite what they had learned about his origins.

  "Did I do something wrong?" he asked, gently removing himself from her embrace.

  Julia laughed and shook her head. "If only it were that easy." She again reached for the pants in the open suitcase and removed them, refolding them. "I don’t like this, Danny, any of this; your physical change, leaving home, living here." She turned toward the bureau, feeling his gaze on her.

  "But you talked to Mr. Doyle. It’s best that I’m here, to learn about what’s happening to me, what I am. I thought you understood that."

 
She pulled open the bottom drawer, where she had put his jeans earlier, and shoved the cargo pants in beside them. "It’s not that I don’t understand, Danny, I just don’t like it."

  "What’s not to like?" he asked, his voice louder now, his volatile teenage temper rearing its ugly head. "Look at me, Mom. These people actually want me here."

  She felt him move closer and, for the briefest of moments, actually felt afraid, and this angered her.

  "You don’t think I want you at home?" she demanded.

  He sighed. "You know that’s not what I meant. It’s just . . . with the assholes at school, and the neighbors . . . you know I’m better off here. It’ll be easier for both of —"

  "I didn’t raise my son to become part of some freak show," she snapped, turning to face him.

  Danny chuckled humorlessly and ran a hand over his deep red pate. His fingernails were black now, like the claws of an animal.

  "Okay, so I don’t stay here, I come home with you, and then what?"

  She didn’t have an answer, so she folded her arms defensively across her chest.

  "I go back to Newton and everything’s just fine, is that what you think?" He laughed unhappily. "How long do you think it will be before the villagers are surrounding the house with torches?"

  "Stop," Julia said. "Please, stop it." She closed her eyes, listening to the pounding rhythm of the blood in her temples. She was getting a headache; the kind that usually sent her straight to bed with all the lights out and the curtains drawn, not quite a migraine, but a bad, return to the womb kind of headache, as her ex-husband used to say.

  "No, I won’t," he said defiantly. "Things are different now — I’m different now." He pointed to one of the room’s windows with a clawed finger. "I don’t fit out there anymore."

  She still had her eyes closed, the pain in her head growing with every pulse of her heart.

  "Look at me!" Danny roared, and she had no choice but to open her eyes. He stood before her, arms spread, displaying what he had become. "Look at me and tell me I’m wrong."

  Julia didn’t know what to say. Deep down she knew he was right, but damn it she couldn’t bear to let him go, to release her only child into the care of Arthur Doyle, someone she barely knew — to become part of his . . . what did he call it? His menagerie.

  "What do we actually know about this Mr. Doyle?" she blurted out. "And the people who live here with him — don’t even get me started on them. I’d just feel better if I knew . . ."

  "He saved the world, ma," Danny interrupted. "And I helped." He touched the front of his Eminem T-shirt with a taloned hand. "I really don’t think you need anything more by way of character references."

  The world was pretty much back to normal since the bizarre occurrences of almost three weeks before, when a crimson mist had blanketed the region and the dead had crawled from their graves. Julia shivered with the memory, the hair at the back of her neck prickling to attention. It was hard to believe that everything that happened was anything other than a very bad dream, but when she looked at her son, she knew it was real.

  "I want to stay here," Danny said taking a step toward her. "I need to be here."

  There was a desperation in his voice that made her want to cry, as if the answers to all of his problems were right here, and she was the only obstacle standing in the way of his total fulfillment.

  "Danny, please." She weighed each word carefully. "Look at this from my perspective."

  "This isn’t about you!" Danny bellowed, and Julia could have sworn she saw sparks of orange flame leap from his eyes. He spun away from her, bounding across the room, and brought his fist down on the mahogany dresser, obliterating the toys.

  Julia was horribly torn. Motherly instincts told her to go to her son, to comfort him, but another voice inside her head, more attuned to self-preservation, whispered that it might be wiser to keep her distance. The moment was broken, however, and her quandary solved, when a spectral figure emerged from the ceiling, drifting down to float eerily in the center of the room. The temperature dropped several degrees, and she shivered.

  No matter how many times Julia saw the ghost of Dr. Leonard Graves, she couldn’t get used to it.. He was a kind man, and had been a noble example of humanity while he lived, but that was the problem. Dr. Graves was dead.

  "Is everything all right?" the specter asked, his gaze shifting from Julia to her son, who now knelt before his demolished dresser.

  "Danny?" Graves drifted closer to the boy, and Julia noticed how much warmer it was without him near.

  "I’m cool," Danny said, reaching down to touch the broken dresser. "My mom and I were just discussing how it would be best for me to go back home with her and live in the basement."

  Julia sighed. "I said no such thing," she said wearily, bringing her hands to her temples in an attempt to massage away the throbbing agony in her head.

  "It’s completely understandable if you don’t quite trust us yet," Graves said, turning his focus on her and drifting closer. "We are quite the unusual bunch."

  "It’s not that I don’t trust you per se . . . damn it this hurts," she moaned, and stumbled slightly to one side, sitting down on the end of the bed.

  "She called you all a freak show," Danny said with contempt.

  Julia started to deny it, but gave up, the pain inside her skull taking away her strength to defend herself. She grimaced. "If you can believe it, I meant it in the nicest way possible."

  Her eyes were closed, but she felt Graves approach, the temperature in the air dropping dramatically as he drew nearer to her.

  "No offense taken," the ghost replied. "You have another headache, Mrs. Ferrick?"

  She slitted her eyes open and saw that he was leaning forward to study her. Though a ghost, Leonard Graves was still quite handsome. He was a man out of time, a man of another age, but he had rugged, determined features that reminded her of Denzel Washington . . . only transparent. Julia couldn’t believe she was thinking such things about a dead man and chalked it up to insanity caused by the pain inside her head.

  "It’s Julia, Doctor, and yes, I’ve got a hell of a headache."

  Danny stood, holding a piece of the dresser top in his hands, and looked at her with concern. "She gets them when she’s stressed out. Mom, do you want us to pull the curtains and let you lie down for awhile?"

  "No, I’ll be fine. Maybe a couple of Aleve from my purse will . . ."

  "Squire often gets tension headaches," Graves stated. "And I’ve developed a slightly unusual, yet effective technique that helps to diminish his pain."

  She began to feel herself growing nauseous. "Does it involve sacrificing a virgin or cutting the head off a chicken?" She ventured a tremulous smile.

  The ghost chuckled. "Surprisingly, it doesn’t."

  "Would I be a candidate for this treatment, or does it only work on trolls?"

  "Squire is a hobgoblin," Graves said. "Quite different from trolls actually, far better hygiene, and, yes, if you’re willing, you would be a candidate."

  "I’m willing," she croaked, the acid in her stomach churning from the intensity of the ache in her skull.

  "All right," the ghost said. "If you’d be so kind as to remain seated and lean forward."

  Julia did as she was told. The headache was coming on hard and fast now, and the pain was such that if Graves had said that a very sharp axe would now be needed, she would have helped him search for it.

  "Now don’t be alarmed, you’re going to feel something a little strange."

  The icy sensation at the back of her neck was almost pleasant, at first numbing, but then it grew intensely warm. Five points of heat pressed on the cluster of pain inside her skull. Though her eyes were closed, Julia suddenly understood what Dr. Graves was doing to her; she could see it in her mind. He had put his hand — his ghostly fingers — inside her head and was taking her headache away.

  "That should do it," the doctor said, as she slowly straightened.

  Julia opened her eyes
and ran a cautious hand along the back of her neck. "It’s gone," she said, not without a little surprise. "That’s incredible." She smiled. "I feel great."

  Danny stood beside the apparition of the former adventurer. "Not bad for a freak, huh, Ma?"

  "Most headaches are caused by constriction of blood vessels inside the skull," Graves explained. "A little hot and cold therapy applied directly to the clusters is usually enough to alleviate the symptoms."

  "I feel as though I should write you a check or something," Julia said, relishing the relief from her agony.

  "The only payment I ask is that you extend the trust you gave to me to the others of this household."

  What he was asking her to do was likely to pain her far more than any headache ever could, but deep down she knew that it was indeed best for Danny. Besides, how could she be steered wrong by the one of the world’s most famous scientists and adventurers? Ghost or not, this was Dr. Leonard Graves. Not trusting him would be like calling Elliot Ness a crook.

  Julia smiled at the comparison, these two men from the annals of twentieth-century American history.

  "You’ll have to call me every other night," she told her son.

  Danny nodded. "I can do that."

  "And I want to be able to visit. Nothing crazy, just to be able to see that you’re doing all right."

  "That can be arranged as well," Graves responded. "I’ll see that you are given a key. And you’ll have a guest room at your disposal whenever you like."

  "So does that mean I can stay?" Danny asked.

  "Let’s just say I’m willing to try it," Julia answered, trying to quell a slight twinge of unease.

  There came a knock at the door, and it swung open. Squire ambled into the room without an invitation.

  "Sorry to interrupt. Hey, love what you’re doing with the place," he said sarcastically, nodding his potato shaped head at the dresser. "Fuckin’ kids today," he added with a disgusted grumble.

  "What can we do for you, Squire?" Graves asked, distracting hobgoblin from glowering at the boy.