Briarpatch by Tim Pratt

by Tim Pratt

  “That’s a natural response. But once you learn more, that kind of general fear, it’ll become a specific fear of specific things. Like, a useful fear.”

  Darrin nodded. That made sense. And once this fear passed . . . what would he feel then? Having found entry into a world he’d maybe been half-consciously searching for most of his life?

  “So tell me,” Arturo said. “How did you and Bridget meet?”

  The change of conversational direction surprised Darrin, and he wondered if Arturo was genuinely curious or just trying to set Darrin at ease, take his mind off their present circumstance. “I don’t . . . it’s not much of a story.”

  “So long as it’s a love story,” Arturo said. “There’s nothin’ in the whole wide world above or below or beyond I love more than a good love story.” He grinned his walrus moustache grin, and Darrin couldn’t help but smile too. He’d never had a drinking buddy, really. He thought Arturo might be a good one.

  “Okay,” Darrin said. It was a good love story, at least, as long as he stopped telling it in the right place, which was the case for most love stories, he suspected. “It was like this.”

  2

  “Have you ever heard of geocaching?”

  Arturo shook his head, and Darrin nodded, because Arturo didn’t seem like the most tech-savvy guy in the world. His universe didn’t involve things like geocaching and flash mobs, but Darrin had worked for a tech company—albeit one designed to bring people together in the flesh—and he’d always been an early adopter.

  “Well, geocaching is sort of like a high-tech treasure hunt. Basically you get a GPS unit of some kind—a global positioning system, like a handheld navigational tool that talks to satellites and tells you your coordinates, you know what I mean?”

  Arturo nodded. “I thought about gettin’ one of those for the Wendigo, but it wouldn’t work in the briarpatch anyway, so I figured screw it.”

  “Right. Well, there are people who hide little boxes or canisters around, with treasures in them, and then post the GPS coordinates on the Internet. Other people find the coordinates, and go out to find the cache. Now, it’s not like the coordinates are accurate to within inches or anything, so you still have to hunt around for the cache. Once you find it, there’s usually a little log book inside, so you can record your name, and when you found it. It’s okay to take the little treasures, usually, as long as you leave something just as good or better in its place. Lots of people take digital photos and post them online.”

  “What kinda treasures?” Arturo asked.

  “Usually nothing big. Candy, little toys, stuff like that. I got a bunch of glow-in-the-dark plastic scorpions once, and left a carved wooden frog in its place. Stuff like that. The point isn’t the treasure, but the hunt, you know? Some people do this solo, and some do it in groups, and sometimes there are really complicated hunts, where the GPS coordinates just lead you to a hint or a puzzle, and that leads you to another hint, and so on. Sometimes the caches are easy to find, like just hidden next to a rock or something, but other times they’re underwater, or forty feet up a tree, or on a roof, stuff like that.”

  “Sounds fun.” Arturo tapped the bar to get the bartender’s attention. He glided over and refilled Arturo’s glass, but didn’t leave this time—he polished glasses with a white rag, and seemed to be listening.

  “It can be,” Darrin said. “I used to have this group of friends—people I worked with, mostly, I don’t see them much anymore—and we’d do geocaching sometimes. There was this really big cache hunt a few years ago, put together by a guy who got rich selling his start-up company, and this time there was a really valuable treasure hidden, to be kept by the first group who found the cache. Nobody knew what the treasure was, exactly, just that it was worth a lot. Four of us got together to look for it, first thing in the morning when the coordinates were posted. The hunt took us all over—it started in San Francisco, with the first clue hidden in the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, buried near the base of this giant stone Buddha they’ve got there. We knew we weren’t the first to find it, because it had been dug up already and re-buried, but the people before us played fair and didn’t destroy the clue, and neither did we. It was just a cipher, and we had a guy with us named Rick who did cryptography for fun, so he cracked it in no time. That set of coordinates led us to the old fort by the Golden Gate Bridge . . .” He trailed off. He’d just seen Bridget die this morning, so how could the fact that she was gone keep ambushing him like this, taking the wind out of him?

  “Go on,” Arturo said, and the bartender nodded.

  Darrin drained the rest of his beer, and the bartender refilled it for him while Darrin resumed. “Anyway, there was another clue, a jumbled-up word puzzle this time, and I’m good at that sort of thing, so I solved it, and we had to go across to Marin, which took forever in the traffic, and we wound up at this little vineyard, with a stone wall. I thought we’d never find that clue. When we finally did, it was a quote from the Bible, which we didn’t have any idea how to interpret. But somebody turned the note over, and someone who’d gotten to the clue before us had written ‘Too easy,’ and some numbers that looked like coordinates. Turned out later it was the chapter and verse numbers of the quote—I don’t even remember it now, something about planting a vineyard but never enjoying its fruit? Nothing any of us would have known, but whoever beat us to it had, and had even given us a little help. We didn’t feel right using those coordinates, and Joe, who was sort of our leader, thought it must be a trick, but we followed it anyway. That took us back across to the East Bay. By then it was afternoon, and we were getting hungry, and Joe and Rick both decided to quit and get some lunch, since they figured there was no way they’d get to the cache first.”

  “That’s hardly in the spirit of the thing,” the bartender said.

  Darrin laughed. “Yeah. They got into caring about the treasure, which was stupid, because the company we worked for was pulling in money like crazy—never underestimate the money-making potential of a well-designed social networking site, that’s all I have to say. They didn’t need the treasure, whatever it was, but they wanted it. My best friend Nicholas was with us, but he’d been lured by the idea of treasure from the start, he never much cared for geocaching or urban exploration or things like that. He said he’d keep going with me if I wanted, but I could tell he just wanted to quit and get a beer or something, so I told him not to worry about it. Back then I had a car, so I wasn’t completely stuck. I lost some time in the hunt, but I knew I wouldn’t be first to the treasure anyway, I just wanted to figure it out, you know? I followed the coordinates and wound up at that little kiddie amusement park Children’s Fairyland, over by Lake Merritt—like, two miles from here.”

  “It’s farther away than that,” the bartender said. “And closer, too. But go on.”

  Darrin felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise, proving he could still be affected by reminders of the uncanny. “Well. Anyway. The whole thing about Children’s Fairyland is you can’t get in without a child, no unattended adults allowed. I was sort of standing around by the gate, wondering what to do—none of my friends had kids, and even if they had, what was I supposed to do, call and ask if I could borrow their child for a while? The person running the gate saw me and said ‘Are you another treasure hunter?’ I nodded, and he laughed. ‘It’s not actually inside. Check over by the dragon’s head.’ Outside the gate, actually part of the gate, there’s this giant sculpture of a dragon, and there was a cache buried at the base of the wall. The last clue wasn’t even in code, or anything, it said ‘Grand Lake Theater, upstairs left screen, third row from the back, centre.’ So I hustled over to the theatre, which was just a few blocks away, and bought a ticket to a matinee, and got there just as the movie was starting. There was someone sitting in the seat, a mother flanked by her two little kids—it was some animated movie. So I sat there for 90 minutes, wonder
ing how many other treasure hunters were waiting in the theatre. Finally the credits rolled, and the mother took her kids away, and I went straight for the seat. There was an old cigar box stuck underneath it, the wooden kind with a metal clasp, held onto the seat with duct tape, and when I opened it up, there was a sheet of folded paper inside, a pen, and a little necklace with a silver oak tree pendant. Once the lights came up, I was able to read the paper. It said ‘Bridget was here, treasure was plundered, but here’s a present for the second-best.’ That was the necklace. So I wrote my own name under hers, and a note that said ‘Here’s a gift for number three,’ and put a fifty-dollar-bill in the box. I doubted the necklace was worth that, but I was making good money at the time, so I didn’t worry about it. I just put the necklace on and left the theatre, and really did feel like I’d accomplished something. Because, hell, second best isn’t bad at all in things like this. I liked the necklace, too, the little tree with silver branches.” He touched his throat, where no necklace hung, and felt a brief but deep pang of loss. “I misplaced it, a while ago, I guess. It’s too bad. The first thing Bridget ever gave me.”

  “Wow,” Arturo said. “So that was your Bridget?”

  Darrin nodded. “I didn’t meet her in person for another year. I was in this group doing urban exploring, where you go out and sneak into places, like steam tunnels, old warehouses, condemned hospitals, stuff like that, just for the thrill of going someplace other people don’t. One day we were going to the old Amtrak station on 16th Street—there’s some awesome architecture there—and there was this beautiful blonde woman.” Darrin smiled, just thinking of that first time seeing her, the arresting clarity of her eyes, her upturned nose, the way he’d felt instantly drawn to her. “She was a friend of a friend, and had never gone out with us before. I was leaning over a railing in the Amtrak station, trying to get a good angle to take a photo, and the necklace fell out of my shirt, the little tree dangling. She said ‘Hey, where’d you get that necklace?’ So I told her about the treasure hunt, and she said ‘I’m Bridget, and that was my necklace.’ We got to talking, and it turned out she’d done the whole treasure hunt on her own, with no team. I asked her what the treasure was, and she said it was the biggest diamond ring she’d ever seen. She sold it and had enough money to pay her rent for months, and to buy, and I quote, ‘tons of really wonderful drugs.’” He laughed. “She was wild back then, really wild, but so smart, and she never stopped moving, she knew everybody, and it was exhilarating and wonderful and exhausting, just being with her. We hit it off, started going out, she said I made her feel peaceful, I said she made me feel alive, and, well . . . a love story, I guess. Like you asked for.” He took a drink, suddenly feeling self-conscious for talking so long. The bartender, seemingly bored now that the story was over, ambled back to his shadowy corner. “So, Arturo. Tell me about your wife . . . was it Marjorie?”

  “Yeah, that’s her name,” Arturo said. “But, nah, I want happy love stories, and it’s hard for me to talk about meetin’ Marjorie without gettin’ all sad, so let me tell you a different love story instead. Let me tell you about how I got my car.”

  3

  “I was workin’ in this little town where I grew up, nothin’ around really but fields and a couple factories, and I had a pretty good job runnin’ this garage. I didn’t own the place, but I was the one who came in every day, like the manager, because the owner was getting old. I figured I’d buy him out one day, you know. So the day after Marjorie died, I felt like I had to come in to work anyway, because it was my responsibility, and because I wanted to throw myself into some kinda work so I wouldn’t think about things so much. All our friends and relatives thought I was crazy, that I should take a few days off at least, but I convinced them to leave me alone and let me deal with things in my own way. I got into the garage at about 5 a.m., before first light, and the car was sitting there in the lot, big as life. Lots of people would get their cars towed over if they broke down at night, and just leave a note on the windshield tellin’ me what was wrong. But there was no note.” He tapped the bar again, signalling for another beer, and the bartender returned. Arturo continued. “So I opened the door, and the backseat was just filled up with papers, you’ve seen it, and while I was standin’ there a piece slid off the pile and fell into the driver’s seat, just a folded-over sheet of lined paper like from a school notebook. I picked it up, and written in, I swear, my own handwritin’, was a note that said ‘A man needs a purpose like a car needs a driver.’ So I sat down in the front seat of the Wendigo to think about that—”

  The bartender dropped the glass he was polishing, but since it was a heavy pint glass it didn’t shatter; it just thumped. “You drive the Wendigo?” the bartender said, and his voice was less soft now. There was something strange in it, some note Darrin couldn’t identify, something between reverence and terror.

  Arturo sighed. “Yeah, brother. I drive the Wendigo.”

  “Drinks are free,” the bartender said. “But I need you to leave now.”

  “Look, buddy, I been comin’ here for days, I know I never mentioned the Wendigo before, but I didn’t even drive her here, I just walked—”

  “Please go,” the bartender said, and for the first time his eyes seemed alive.

  “Arturo, the mirror,” Darrin said, and Arturo looked, seeing what Darrin had. Some form was coalescing in the glass where the bartender’s reflection should have been, something hulking and shadowed and fraying at the edges—the reflection of something monstrous, coming into focus.

  “Hell,” Arturo said, but resignedly. “Thanks for the drinks, pal. I won’t come back.”

  “I would appreciate that.”

  Arturo and Darrin left, emerging on the trash-littered, desolate street, and they heard the bartender noisily lock the door behind them.

  “What was all that about?” Darrin said, following Arturo as he set off down the street.

  “Not everybody knows the Wendigo like I do,” he said. “I get that reaction sometimes, but I didn’t figure a bartender who was part monster himself would care so much.” He swayed a little as he walked. “Anyway, I had enough beers. I’m gonna go back to the Wendigo and see if it’ll drive out of this neighbourhood yet. It’s been parked here for a while, refusin’ to go very far at all, and when I found those pages about your Bridget, I figured it had somethin’ to do with you. But I brought you back from that dark part of the woods, and got you a drink, and helped you figure out what was goin’ on, a little bit, at least. So maybe I did what I gotta do, right?”

  “Where will you go?” Darrin asked.

  Arturo shrugged. “I go out lookin’ for Marjorie most days.”

  “She died . . . it was a car thing, you said?” They reached the shrubbery-lined path, and the quality of the air changed, and Darrin realized they were back in the world he knew, and out of the almost-plausible world where the bar had been.

  “Yeah,” Arturo said.

  “But . . . you think you can find her, her spirit, or something, in the briarpatch?”

  “The briarpatch is a big place. I’ve seen signs there might be hope, yeah. But, when I’ve had a little to drink, I wonder. I think about what the Wendigo first said to me—not ‘said,’ but you know. A man needs a purpose like a car needs a driver. If you’re gonna get anywhere in life, you gotta be goin’ towards somethin’. I’m goin’ towards Marjorie. Maybe I’ll never find her. Maybe the whole search is just the Wendigo’s way of keepin’ me from killin’ myself. I—” He stopped speaking and winced. “Hell, Darrin, I’m sorry, I shouldn’ta said that, not after Bridget—”

  “It’s okay,” Darrin said. They reached the familiar expanse of Park Boulevard and went across, back to Darrin’s street. “If I don’t see you again, good luck,” Arturo said. “Or, if the Wendigo thinks I’m not done with you yet, then I guess I’ll see you sooner. You’ll be careful, right?”

  �
��Arturo,” Darrin said, hesitant to bring it up. “Do you think . . . I might be able to find Bridget in the briarpatch?”

  “You got as good a chance as I do,” Arturo said. “I bet you got some questions for her, at least.”

  “I guess I do.”

  Arturo stopped beside the Wendigo, which still just looked like a car to Darrin, albeit a strange and enormous one. Arturo patted the car’s roof. “Just . . . go in with the right kind of expectations. Dead isn’t necessarily gone, not in the briarpatch, but dead is changed. You know?”

  “I know,” Darrin said. “I do know.” Looking for Bridget . . . that was a possibility. A strange one, but something to consider. For now, though, he already had a project. Bridget’s death wasn’t a “car thing,” whatever that meant. Her death was an Ismael thing. Ismael was very likely the last person to talk to her before she died, he’d probably known she was going to die, had stood there and watched her fall. Before Darrin ventured back into the briarpatch, he wanted to confront Ismael. He was no longer undone by grief—the grief was there, crouching in wait, but for now, he would be able to outrun the curve of grief, and focus on something else. Anger, maybe, or maybe revenge, but he had a purpose. That purpose was finding Ismael Plenty.

  Echo Enquires

  1

  “Any sign of him?” Echo asked, for the third time in ten minutes. The repetition was pissing Nicholas off, she could tell, even as he tried to hide his annoyance. Needling Nicholas wasn’t much of an amusement, but it would do in a pinch.

  Nicholas didn’t turn around. He sat on a low couch by the windows that looked down on the street, peering out. “No. You sure you heard him head down the back stairs?” He’d asked her that three times too, but it didn’t annoy Echo, his attempt to bother her was amusing.