I was already in the car and heading back for Alice when she called me. I glanced at the clock and realized I’d been away longer than we’d hoped, she was probably annoyed about sitting at the church waiting for me.
“Hey hon,” I said, answering the call on speaker. “Sorry about the delay, I—” “The priest,” she gasped. My grasp on the steering wheel tightened at the pain in her voice. “It’s the priest. He’s in the cult.” “What happened? Are you okay?” “I’ll make it back to the estate if you can get here soon. He didn’t want to kill me, he wanted information.” “Where are you now?” I listened as she described the area, a place we’d walked past the night before, and where she was hiding. I promised I’d be there as soon as I could, then hung up and punched the gas. I tore across England completely oblivious to any cops, and if they saw me they apparently didn’t think it worth the effort to stop me. Maybe the Hudson name on the plates helped with that, who knows. The whole ride was spent thinking about what I was going to do to that priest, and to Michael, when I had the chance. The car screeched to a halt when I found the alley where Alice was hiding, and she limped out of the shadows and slipped into the passenger seat. Half her shirt and a part of her pants were burned off, exposing a large burn across her side. Once she was in and I was assured she was stable, I drove to the church. She insisted it was pointless, as he surely wouldn’t be there anymore, but I was barely listening. I had to try. I couldn’t risk not checking. She stayed in the locked car, parked a block away to avoid drawing attention to her, while I went inside to check. Sure enough, the doors to the office area was locked, and I kicked them off the hinges before storming through and tearing the place apart looking for any information. I found some records and notes that looked promising, and grabbed those, but the priest was clearly gone. Once I returned to the car, I gave the papers to Alice and made for the estate. As I was turning into the entrance of the estate, I saw a man walking with purpose, holding a notebook. Alice gasped and pressed herself back into the seat. I asked if that was the priest, and when she confirmed it was, I punched the gas again. He heard the noise of the engine, and turned just in time to see the car hit him. He was thrown off to the side, rolling over the corner of the hood, and I continued up the drive as Alice screamed. I slammed the brakes as we got to the building, set the parking brake, and jumped out without bothering to turn off the engine. The man was slowly getting to his feet, and on seeing me heading for him, he threw a fireball at me. I batted it away, hearing it fizzle out as soon as it left my hand, and neither slowed nor sped up as I approached him. His eyes grew large, and then he started to chant and I watched his form crack and shift, as his arms grew muscular and his body took on the form of a large serpent. I ripped my shirt off and tossed it aside, and we lunged at each other.
0 Comments
15 February 2007
We were all called to breakfast, and after we’d eaten Michael had Benedict, Akshainie, Alice, and me stay behind and sent the staff out. Once we were alone, he stood and addressed us.
“They’re after the Church of England,” he announced. None of us visibly reacted to that and I got the impression he was a bit surprised at that. There was a moment of silence where he seemed to be processing it. “So you got them to talk?” I asked. “How’d you do that?” “Runic circle of truth.” “That’s awfully convenient.” “What did you learn about their plan?” Akshainie asked. “Sadly, very little. They are waiting for a signal and are getting into position to attack both the crown and Canterbury.” “So first step is to get more information,” Benedict said, rising from his seat. “If you could show me the way to this circle of truth—” “The cultists are dead,” Michael said, flatly. Benedict stopped, then leaned forward with his palms on the table. “I must request a bit more information on that one.” “It appears to have been a defense against interrogation. Not unlike a poison pill, but in this case, a self-immolation spell.” “Self-immolation,” I said, leaning back and crossing my arms. “We can discuss the matter more later. For now, we have a lot of work to do, and I think it would be best if we focused on that.” Michael looked around to each of us, and we grudgingly agreed. Michael produced identity cards he had made for each of us so we could split up and still operate with the authority of the estate, and included one for Alice. She was hesitant, but Michael reminded her that she had expressed a desire to get involved and that they needed someone who didn’t stand out as magical to check on a nearby church. He handed out assignments to each of us, and within the hour we were all on our way.
Once Alice told me the others were done inside, I released the pressure I was putting on the ley line and stepped aside. I was asked not to enter, and feeling pretty drained from the effort anyway, so I sat down on a large stone outside and smoked a cigarette while I waited. Eventually, Benedict, Akshainie, and Alice emerged from the house.
“Where’s everyone else?” I asked, flicking my smoke into the street and standing. “Michael has taken the cultists in for questioning,” Benedict answered. He had a set of keys in his hand. “I’ll be driving us back to the estate. Would you two care for a ride?” “Yes, please,” Alice answered. She looked a bit shaken, and I touched her arm to get her attention and give her a concerned look. She gave me a weak smile, shook her head, and made for the car. I followed. We took the back seat and let Akshainie ride up front with Benedict, and no one said much until we’d been driving for a couple minutes. Alice squeezed my hand a bit. “Are you okay?” I asked. “What happened in there?” “He took them to a secret dungeon under the estate through a magical door,” she said, softly. Then, louder and to the whole car, “Does that bother anyone else? That he can just…do that?” “Wait he did what?” I demanded. Akshainie shrugged. “I don’t see what else you expect him to do with them,” she said, turning to look at Alice and me. “The police wouldn’t be able to handle them properly, and I’m not sure they actually broke any laws anyway,” Benedict said. “That’s worse! Please tell me you see how that isn’t better!” Alice cried. “It sounds an awful lot like kidnapping when you say it like that,” I said. “I don’t trust the Hudson any more than you do, but this is the Brood of Nachash we’re talking about!” Akshainie was starting to sound tense. “Okay but what about when it isn’t?” I asked. Alice pointed at me and nodded as I continued, “Is this just a thing they do? Take people whenever they feel justified about it? Do the people they take have any rights, is there any due process for people who deal with the supernatural? Isn’t that concerning to literally everyone in this car?” Akshainie turned back around and Alice leaned her head on my shoulder. There was silence in the car the rest of the way back.
We wandered into town, taking the time to have our first real look at the place and talk about the things we liked in the area. It was actually a pretty nice little town, bunch of buildings (and spirits) that looked older than my country. I needed to use the restroom after a bit, and she spotted some restaurant and suggested we dip in and she could ask if they had a table open while I handled that. They did, apparently, and by the time I got back to her they had pulled out a suit jacket that I needed to put on if we expected to eat there. I wasn’t super excited about the idea, but she seemed to be, so I accepted the jacket and we were led to our table.
“I thought places with rules like this take reservations,” I said, adjusting the jacket after we sat down and glancing around the room. It was nice, real nice, ‘blow my whole income from the trip on our dinner’ nice. I was having regrets. “Yeah, well, they generally do,” she answered. She was beaming, and I suddenly realized how little time we spent in her world and how much time we spent in…or, I suppose is more accurate, adjacent to mine. This was probably a rare treat for her, which I should probably fix, and while I was pretty sure she had made arrangements ahead of time—no place like this just gives up a table to people walking in off the street, sure as hell not on Valentine’s Day—I decided to let her play her game and dropped the subject. God, she was beautiful when she smiled like that. So dinner went well. When she realized that I was skipping past the most expensive parts of the menu she finally confessed that the whole thing, including the tab, had already been arranged and I didn’t have to worry about it. So we had a nice dinner and some wine and dessert and spent some time talking about something other than cults and magic, and it was really nice. By the time we left the restaurant, I had been able to completely clear my mind of the reason we were in Britain to begin with. Then, as we were walking kind of the long way back to look for souvenirs or something, I felt a surge in the air and dead stopped. “John? Are you okay?” She asked, resting her hand on my shoulder. I stood for a moment, trying to parse what I was feeling, before it clicked. “It’s the magic from that site,” I said. “I can feel it. It’s being activated.” We made our way to a park bench and I called the others. “Matteson,” Benedict answered. “The site’s been activated. I can track it. Where are you?” There was a sudden clinking sound and then I heard Benedict repeating what I’d said, but muffled as if he was trying and failing to cover the receiver, and then his voice dominated the background chatter and shuffling. “We’re at a pub in town. Where are you?” “In town. Heading,” I paused and pulled out my keys, which had a little compass ball on them, “Southwest, probably along a ley line.” He informed me they would head in that direction, and I promised to tell them if I had to change direction or where I ended up. 14 February 2007
The problem with knowing, or at least being pretty certain, that the Brood of Nachash is working in an area is that you then have to figure out what they’re doing there. And where they’re doing it.
I had only directly engaged with the cult either during a summoning or in the wake of a summoning, and Benedict had similar experiences but with the addition of that lost town. Akshainie knew more about their day-to-day operations, having spent a couple years hunting, and finding, them before meeting Benedict. We knew their larger goals involved the eradication of religion, or at least had that on good authority, but had never seen what that really looked like in action. So if they were doing a summoning, we had to figure out where. If they weren’t, we had to figure out what they were doing and what that would look like in time to stop it. For the first time in a while, I really felt out of my depth. But I was there partly as an investigator, so I was going to do my best with it. Alice helped on and off, sometimes slipping off to do something with family or call home. I spent the whole time in the library, even eating in there when I didn’t realize how long it had been and a servant showed up with a lunch for me. It felt weird having servants around, but I tried to not disrupt them too much with my concerns. I had a map of the British Isles where I was attempting to draw a map that would hopefully show a target, but didn’t have enough to go on for that yet. The Church of England seemed a sensible target, but how would you even take that down? There was the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Queen, but it didn’t seem like just killing one of them outright would do the trick, and I didn’t even know what they would need to have in place to aim for a larger scale attack than that. Alice tried to teach me a trick for sensing magic she had learned from Jackie. She felt it was a logical option, given that I’d been learning how to recognize the trail of things like ghosts and that I was built to work against magic, I should be able to sense it in a way that allows tracking. So if I could track the network of power being amplified by the site we’d found, maybe I could find points of interest along it. We spent most of the afternoon working on that, and I finally did start to sense something, but the house itself was so loud with magic that I couldn’t make out anything else. So we had to drop that for the time being, and by that time we realized it was coming up on evening and we hadn’t even settled plans for Valentine’s Day, so we left the work behind and headed out to find somewhere we could do dinner and maybe have some time on the town. 13 February 2007
We had taken the rest of that first day off to get situated in the estate and adjust to the time difference. We had rooms in the Guest Wing, because these people have an entire fucking Guest Wing, and Alice and I slept in a room that looked like it had as much stuff in it as my entire house. I could barely sleep, the bed was so soft. Benedict and Akshainie were given different rooms, but kind of nearish each other and down a different hall than our room, but Lord knows if they even used them. They were still in the library when we went to bed, and by the time I saw them the next morning they were coming from the library.
So now we were in the car again, sans Alice who stayed behind from our “field trip,” as she called it, to talk to her family. Which makes sense, she hasn’t seen them in years, and didn’t think she had anything to offer for what we were doing. This time there wasn’t some staff driver taking us there, though. Michael was at the wheel, and I had shotgun. At least he let me smoke in the car. I don’t know if I was allowed to in that room or not, but I know for damn sure I wouldn’t be able to do anything about it if they got pissy about the sheets smelling like smoke and trying to charge me to replace some million threadcount Egyptian silk bullshit, so I refrained. When we arrived, he led us through a work site and down through a hole in a wall that led to a chamber awfully similar to the one where I first met Benedict and Akshainie. “We have got to stop having all our social functions in places like this,” I told them as I pulled out a flashlight. Michael moved his hand like he expected something to happen, looked at his hand confused for a moment, then glanced at me and sighed. “What’s your radius?” he asked me. “My what?” “How far must I stand from you to use magic?” “Oh,” I said, then thought for a moment and shrugged. “I dunno. Never really thought about it. Jackie can usually cast something if she’s like ten feet away or so?” “You can restrain that, though, can you not?” Benedict asked. “I mean, yeah, but it’s tiring.” “I’m not paying you to come here and keep your power restrained,” Michael said, stepping away from me and trying the spell again every couple steps until it worked. “How do you do that? Everyone I’ve known who does magic needs a focus.” “Well, there is a certain family advantage to being in a line of powerful sorcerers, but also, I have tattoos that serve as foci for certain common spells.” He explained to us what he knew so far, about how the site was active and seemed to be connected to the Brood of Nachash, but he didn’t know what it was for. While he talked, I walked around looking at the symbols and taking pictures of them. They weren’t like the ones I’d seen in Ohio, but they looked familiar. “What do you know about the Brood?” Benedict asked. “Not much, I’m afraid. I only got the name when I got yours.” “Well then,” Benedict said, summoning a large fire hovering in the center of the chamber, illuminating the whole place. I grumbled and turned my flashlight off. “Let’s not focus too much energy on your spell there.” “I didn’t know the Pope was so permissive of magic,” Michael said, dispelling his light. “It is debatable if what I do is magic.” “It’s magic,” I said. “Do you think everything a spirit does is magic?” Akshainie asked. “Do you think it’s magic when I use my swords?” “Can I dispel your swords?” I asked. She grumbled and I smiled. “Anyway,” Benedict continued, “in short, the Brood of Nachash is a cult devoted to their idea of the serpent of Eden. They believe mankind is enslaved to God or the gods, and that the freedom they began to receive in rebellion is just and incomplete. They use sites like this to summon and bind powerful entities, and then siphon off that power for their own purposes in attempting to remake mankind into a fully fallen race.” “And you oppose them on, primarily, religious grounds, I presume?” Michael asked. “That is a significant factor. But I fundamentally believe they are not only wrong, but dangerously so.” “They are a danger to all spirits who use serpent iconography,” Akshainie said. “By associating their actions with serpents, they create an image in the minds of mankind that affects us.” “And you?” Michael called over to me. “They’re assholes,” I answered. “I suppose that will do. What are you doing over there, anyway?” “Taking pictures of this script.” “Ah, yes. We’ve not been able to interpret that. It seems there are no surviving records that use it.” “Well, not in your collection anyway. I’ve seen this before.” “You must be joking.” “His family has amassed quite the occult library,” Benedict said. “Its size is not comparable to your own, but I would argue its importance may be.” “What, exactly, is the nature of your family’s involvement in the occult, Mr. Matteson?” “It won’t leave us alone,” I said. “You have a very peculiar manner of approaching these things,” Michael said. Akshainie laughed. “At any rate, I can’t do anything with this information right now. I’ll have to send it to Jackie and ask her to check the books at the house, and she won’t be up for a couple hours yet.” “Very well. Father de Monte, you said sites like this would be used for summoning and binding?” “That has been my, admittedly limited, experience so far,” Benedict answered. “So there is some chance we have a great spirit locked away somewhere on this site?” “Some chance, yes.” Benedict pointed toward the collapsed remains of a large archway. “My guess would be down there.” We all walked over to the archway, and then Michael asked me to step a bit further from him. He produced a bit of pelt from his pack, pressed it to the stone as he closed his eyes, and began speaking in Latin or something very close to Latin. When his eyes opened again, they were glowing, and he lifted his hand to reveal a little blue mole. Its eyes were also glowing, and it looked around briefly before slipping between the rubble and vanishing. We all stood in silence for a few minutes, until the mole emerged again. Michael’s eyes returned to normal and the mole vanished, the bit of pelt dropping back into his hand from where the creature had been. “Well. There certainly is a chamber that looks to have been intended for that purpose,” he said, putting the fur away, “but whatever it was meant to house either never arrived or eventually escaped. But then, how is this site still active?” “It’s likely part of a network,” I said. “They can’t exactly have one of these things in every town, right? They probably cycle power around, and sites that lose their power generator would still be on the grid.” “Well. Unless anyone else has anything to note,” Michael said, walking back toward the entrance, “I suppose we should regroup at the estate and discuss what we know so far.” We all agreed and followed, the fire in the center of the room disappearing as I went to pass through it. 12 January 2007
Jackie had found a shop where she could get some incense, crystals, or whatever else she needed for her magic, and for whatever reason decided to invite Alice and me to come check it out with her. They entered, excitedly talking about some of the questions Alice had and heading straight upstairs, while I milled around the register area trying not to touch anything. I found a small altar off to the side, with a sign warning that it was neither for display nor sale, and to please leave it alone as the owners of the shop used it for their own purposes. The things that resided near it hissed as I stood there reading the sign.
“Fine, fine. I get it. Just give me a second.” I went upstairs and told them I was going to wait outside, then headed out and lit a cigarette. I was leaning on the window smoking when an older lady rounded the corner, walking her dog. They stopped in front of me and seemed to be reading the window. “How much does it cost?” she asked. I narrowed my eyes and looked around. “How much does what cost?” “The tarot readings,” she said, pointing at some words I hadn’t noticed next to me. “Do you do those?” “Oh, no. I don’t work here. I’m just waiting for some people inside,” I said, pointing vaguely toward the window with my cigarette. “Oh. You looked like you work here. Why don’t you wait inside?” “It’s...not really for me, in there. Why are you asking about the readings?” “Well, I--I wanted to get one.” “Why?” “To, uh...to know the future, I guess.” I tossed the butt away. “Where’s the adventure in that?!” She adjusted her grip on the leash and seemed to be holding it a little tighter. “The...adventure?” she asked, taking a half step backward. “What’s the point of knowing the future? What’s good about that? There’s no fun, there’s no surprise, just the same old crap. And that’s if you actually get told your future instead of scammed. Knowing the future is overrated, we as a species need to learn how to appreciate the mystery.” She opened her mouth, then watched me for a moment, closed it again, and led her dog briskly across the street and down the block. Alice and Jackie came out as I was lighting another cigarette. “I hope you weren’t too bored,” Alice said as they approached. “Nah,” I replied, “There’s always something to do.” 31 December 2006
The music was throbbing through the whole house, Alice was having a great time meeting the rest of my friends and no one was walking on eggshells around me as if they were trying to avoid reminding me of my father, which was a nice change. Jackie’s theater people were here and pitching the idea that some improv show they apparently did the year before could be a tradition. The New Year’s Eve party was going really well, and I was glad for it, but I was outside with a beer and a smoke, leaning on the porch railing that Dad and I had built, staring up at the stars.
What a fucking year. It seemed like the whole thing had been overshadowed by Dad’s cancer and death. I could barely put half of what happened this year in order in my head, and I knew that part of it was simply the fact that I hadn’t even had time to process what happened with Lori, or Alethea, or whatever before I was dealing with Dad, and I wasn’t entirely sure now that I ever did process it. And now some goddess is on my ass? I’d’ve completely forgotten that bit if Jackie hadn’t reminded me. What kind of a mess has this year been, that something like that would seem like a minor issue? I heard the door open and glanced over to see Alice peeking out. “You okay?” she asked. “Just thinking.” “Do you need to do that alone?” I smiled to her. “I’ll be back inside in just a minute.” She gave me a weak smile back, but went inside. I flicked the butt of my cigarette into the street and finished off my beer. Hey, whatever else happened, this year also brought me into contact with proper allies in Benedict and Akshainie, and helped me learn more about my power and what my dad was training me for, and now there’s Alice. I don’t know where that’s going, but it feels good so far. I looked up to the stars again. “Let’s do this,” I muttered, before heading back inside. 21 December 2006
We had done some more coordinating by text the next couple days, with Jackie commenting by Tuesday that she’d never seen me look at my phone so much. Alice told me it wasn’t a formal affair, but it was a classy one, so I made sure to wear a nice suit and give it a go with the iron before I headed out. There was a quick stop at a car wash to make sure Alpha was as nice as it gets, and then I picked Alice up at about 5. It took me a moment to compose myself and talk to her once I saw the dress she was wearing. I suddenly felt concerned that I was underdressed, but she insisted that I looked good and we left. Besides, there wasn’t much to do about it now, my closet was two hours away and the party was not.
We arrived at the college, with Alice directing me the whole way, about a half hour later. She seemed surprised I didn’t have a GPS, and I informed her that Alpha was bought out of a field and I’d only had enough money so far to get it running. Besides, I told her, I was way more interested in getting body work and some mechanical stuff done to it than adding new gadgets. She asked about some of the stuff I wanted to do with it, and I told her a couple things I knew were wrong and how I’d like to repaint it and stuff. I didn’t mention that the speedometer is screwy. I’ve found that bit of information is usually best taken while Alpha isn’t moving. The party was probably the most swanky affair I’ve been to in recent memory. There was a proper punch bowl and everything. I met a number of her friends from class, and we danced some, and there was a whole door prize thing that we didn’t win, and they served one of those dinners where you just picked between chicken, beef, or fish and then they brought you whatever that meant. I picked beef. She picked chicken. We ended up trading. I slipped out to a balcony for a smoke while she was off talking to some friends, and chatted with a couple other people out there smoking until they went inside. I was looking out toward the rivers and leaning on the railing when I saw Alice lean on the railing next to me. “Those will kill you, you know,” she said. “Nah, they won’t.” “Why do you say that?” “King and Queen told me that’s not how I die.” She turned and looked out toward the rivers with me. “You really never get away from it, do you?” “Away from what?” “The spirits.” “Nope.” “Do you ever wish you could?” I thought about that for a moment. “It would probably be nice to turn it off, once in a while, I guess. But I don’t think I’d even know what to do if I pulled that off at this point. Would you turn off your ability to see in color, if you could?” She thought about that for a moment. “Colors don’t almost burn my house down,” she said, jokingly, with a jab at my ribs. I chuckled. “No, I suppose not.” We stared out at the night while I finished the cigarette. “Why did you ask some spirits how you’ll die?” “I didn’t. I was smoking and they were getting lippy and I asked if they were going to tell me the smokes would kill me and they said that that’s not how I die.” “Is it because you quit before that happens?” “I…didn’t think to ask that.” “Well,” she said, turning me around and hooking her arm in mine, “maybe you should give it a shot.” I told her I’d consider it as we made our way back inside.
I couldn’t believe it. Of all the places to stumble upon on my very first case as some kind of professional paranormal investigator, it had to be the house where Joanna and Aaboukingon lived. Well, not the exact house. That specific house didn’t really survive this next few moments.
“We need to follow them,” I said, as the spectral man lifted his wife into his arms and made for the door. “Why?” Alice asked, but she didn’t hesitate to move as soon as I started walking. “Because the house where this happened burned down.” “It’s not going to burn my house down, is it?” “I don’t know. I don’t think so. But it definitely won’t if we get outside.” We went through the front door and down the stairs from the porch while the echoes we followed stayed at the level of the floor, finally reaching their own front door and doing the same. “Why would that matter? What did you do?” “I…well, I changed the rules a bit.” “What!?” “Look, it’s not easy to explain, but…just follow them, I think if we let the memory play out it’ll be easier to make it stop repeating.” The man stopped and fell to his knees, crying out to Joanna, until two ravens—one who looked normal, if a bit large, and the other glowing faintly blue—flew down and began talking to him, though for some reason I couldn’t quite make out their voices or words. Alice’s jaw fell open as they talked, and then the ravens were flying again and the man followed and we followed him. We made our way back to a creek in the trees behind Alice’s house, where Aaboukingon called the water up and onto Joanna and healed her wounds. The ravens, at this point, seemed to be looking right at us, and I found myself for the first time in a very long time deeply disturbed by the notion that what we were seeing might be able to see us. Having healed Joanna, Aaboukingon collapsed. Joanna screamed, grabbed him, and started to drag him away before the vision suddenly ended. Alice had her hands wrapped around my arm and was pressing in close to me, and we stood there in silence for a few minutes. “Okay,” she finally said, between deep breaths. “Now. I think you owe me one hell of an explanation.” “Yeah. Yeah, okay. Let me just clean this up first.” She exhaled hard and finally let go of me, adjusted her shawl, and then stood bolt upright. “I will be in the house. Where it’s warm.” With that, she was gone, and I began trying to reverse what I had done to make the echoes more visible. As I did so, I realized the ravens were still there. “Do you need help?” the blue one asked. “You don’t happen to be that King and Queen, do you?” “We are.” I groaned and paced around in a circle. “What’s your deal, exactly?” “It’s not time to answer that question.” “Fine. Then what are you offering?” “You’re trying to stop this echo from repeating, yes?” I nodded. “Then we can help you do that.” “Yeah? How’re you gonna do that?” The blue raven flew closer, suddenly becoming the woman from the beach and floating just above the snow in front of me. She reached out and touched my forehead. “Let me show you. I cannot affect an Anchor without permission.” “Oh, the great and mighty King and Queen, don’t have purview over me?” “It is complicated. Just, let me in.” I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and tried to drop my guard as much as I could. Finally, there was just new information, suddenly there, in my head. I knew exactly how to make the echoes stop. I snapped my eyes open, and both of them were gone. I reached my hand out, closed my fist, focused on the echo, and felt something in reality pop. I went into the house, to where the scene had begun, and did the same thing. On my way by I saw Alice sitting on the couch with a new coffee and a blanket, so when I was done ensuring there would be no more noises anywhere in the house, I returned to the loveseat. There was a hot tea on the coffee table in front of me. “Thanks,” I said, softly, testing it. She had already sweetened it. “Tell me what you did,” she said, coldly. I cleared my throat. “Um, okay. So it goes like this.” I explained that I’m an Anchor, and everything I now knew that meant. I didn’t mean to go into too much detail, but I just kind of started talking and then couldn’t stop. She listened, attentively, almost never stopping to ask any questions. Just taking it all in. I told her how I had recently learned that I may be able to alter the rules of an area in the metaphysical realm, and how what I had done here was try to enforce a new set of rules that amplified the echo and made it visible so we could both find out what was happening, and how I had finished up by adjusting the rules again so the echo was gone, or at least, pushed deep enough that even if it did happen again no one on this side of the hedge would know it. “I’m still kind of learning what I did just here,” I confessed. “So was there really any danger of my house burning down?” “I don’t think so. The bullet didn’t affect us.” “Oh shit! The bullet! You didn’t think to warn me we might get shot?” “I…well, I didn’t know. I didn’t realize that was the scene until it was kind of too late.” “So. Tell me about these two. The man and the woman. And the ravens! I want to know about the ravens.” “You and me both,” I grumbled, raising my mug for a sip. “Do you mind if I smoke?” She pulled a clean ashtray out of a cabinet under the tv and handed it to me. For guests, she explained. So I told her everything. I told her everything I knew about Aaboukingon and Joanna, and what had happened here, and who those men were. I told her about Joanna coming to me as a ghost, when I was a child, and telling me all these stories, and how they had a son together, and that was my grandpa, and she didn’t trust him one bit, and how my dad had been in some kind of battle with him that I only recently realized he had been training me to pick up. I just poured everything out. I cried, when we got to the bit about my dad’s recent death, and how that was when I found his books and pieced some of this together. I told her about meeting the ravens in Erie, and what had happened just then outside her house. We talked for hours, she had so many questions and I didn’t realize how badly I’d needed to talk about some of this stuff. She heated up some food for us both, and we talked well into the night, and by then it was getting so late and I was so tired that she insisted I sleep there on the couch instead of driving the two hours back or, God forbid, being stopped by the cops again after dark. When I woke in the morning, there was an envelope on the coffee table addressed to me. I opened it to find a check and a note. The check was for well more than I would have thought to ask for. The note informed me that she had something important to handle that morning, and explained that we hadn’t come to an agreement on price so she just made her best guess. I grabbed my coat and hat, locked the door behind me, and went home. |
AuthorThe blog of John Matteson. Boost on TopWebFictionTall Tales: Volume Two now available
Archives
September 2022
Categories
All
|
Story Blogs |
Resources |