Writers -- D

David Carpenter writes urban fantasy with a touch of humor.

 

A Visit to the Shrink

​

“So, Ms. Moreau, may I call you Emelda? Dr. Faber says in his notes that you’ve experienced two panic attacks in the past six months.”

“I don’t know why he would say that, there was absolutely no panic involved. I just couldn’t breathe.”

“And the second time it happened you passed out? “

“Yes. He ordered all the usual tests, but when everything came up negative, he palmed me off on you.”

Joyce glanced at her notepad. 

If I had a dollar for every client who started out in denial…

“According to the ER report, the hospital’s senior heart surgeon concluded that it was a panic attack. Have you been under much stress in the past month?”

Emelda tilted her head back and produced a sound that was part laugh, part shriek.

High energy type. Look at those wide-open eyes; she probably drinks coffee by the gallon.

“Have you ever worked on a presidential campaign, dear? “

“No. But that does sound stressful. Has it been particularly bad lately?”

“No more than usual.”

“What do you do for the campaign?”

“Oh, curses and charms, potions and portents. Although nowadays it’s mostly curses, if you know what I mean.”

Speaking in metaphors and euphemisms. Trying to distance herself???

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m a witch, dear. A practitioner of the Dark Arts.”

Ah. A pollster.

“Ha, good one. So you’re a political consultant?”

“No.” Emelda’s voice became very firm. “I’m a witch.” 

A little too emphatic. Self-esteem issues?

“Okay, a witch. Uhm, what kind of witch are you?”

“I started out as a swamp witch.” She glanced out the window. “I’m not sure what I am now.”

“You mentioned it’s mostly curses nowadays. Has the nature of your work changed?”

“Oh, my yes. It was all so simple in the old days. Luring the unwary into the Underswamp so that Bu’gg-Ka’Shash—” she traced a symbol in the air with her hand “— could devour their souls and use their fleshly remains in his eternal war against the Elder Gods. But, then, the developers came, and they drained the swamp and bulldozed all the trees…“ 

She sighed. 

“Until, one fine summer day, there was no place left to hide, and Bu’gg-Ka’Shash was exposed to the unrelenting fury of the sun.” She sat quietly for a moment, staring down at her hands. “Bu’gg was one of the really Old Ones, you know. He was never quite able to grasp the implications of the secondary mortgage market.”

Delusional. Creative though…Is she talking about her father, the loss of her childhood home?

“What happened to him?”

“Oh, he evaporated into a foul miasma of stench and shadow that dissipated in the early morning light.”

“Did that upset you?”

“No, not really. It was liberating. It’s a shock, you know, when you’re suddenly freed from the thrall of an eldritch horror.“

“What did you do first?”

“My hair. After all those years, it was quite a mess. And then I went out and found myself a really good dentist.”

Joyce chuckled. I did the same thing after my residency.

“So you took some ‘me’ time.”

“Absolutely. And then I had to go about paying for it. Getting your teeth capped isn’t cheap, you know.”

“How did you get into politics?”

“I was working at LSU, luring naïve young athletes into the football program. One of the alumni was a big-money donor to the state political machine. I did him a couple of favors, so he recommended me to an eccentric billionaire and his psychotic daughter.” She smiled. “The three of us really hit it off; they hired me on the spot.”

“What did you do for them?”

“High-level stuff. Subversion of the rich, the weak and the gullible, corruption of the religious and the righteous, calling them all to a grand crusade to ‘save the country’.” She smirked as she made the air quotes. “What my new employers really wanted, of course—” she leaned forward, her eyes bright with glee “— was to watch the country burn.”

She actually seems happy about it. Could the delusion be a coping mechanism to deal with suppressed guilt?

“And the presidential campaign?”

“Oh, that was an accident. I sort of fell into it when one of the populist madmen I had enthralled unexpectedly became the nominee.“

“That was a surprise, wasn’t it? So, has anything happened lately that upset you?”

“Well, they are about to fire me. “

“I’m sorry to hear that. Did they give you a reason?”

Emelda’s fingers dug into the arms of the chair, small slivers of wood curling beneath the shiny black nails.

Shit. I’m going have to put some vinegar and olive oil on that.

“Oh, they’re not calling it that. No, they’re saying they need to ‘go in a different direction’. They’re going to replace me—” her voice dropped to a hiss “— with a social media consultant!” She paused to recover her composure. “Tomorrow is my last day.”

“Oh, my.”

“Yes, well. It’s a competitive business. Why pay me when there are witches in Russia who will do it for free? Just between us, the whole thing has begun to drift rather badly. Charms and curses will only take you so far, you know. And the Russians— don’t get me started on the Russians. Those awful cookie-cutter spells! What do they think they’re doing, working in a tractor factory?”

“You sound angry. Do you blame the Russians for your job situation?”

“Of course I do. They’ve been poaching on my territory, doing things they would never get away with if my hands weren’t tied.” Her face brightened. “But that’s all right. Sooner or later the little dears are going to get what’s coming to them.”

“You mentioned earlier that you weren’t sure what you are now. And you say your hands are tied. Do you feel like you’re losing control? Of your job, your career—”

“I don’t know. I’m already getting offers from people in the cryptocurrency industry, so it’s not like I’m worried about finding another job. It’s just that—"

“What?”

“Oh, I mean, what’s it all for? Last summer I took a sabbatical, spent a whole month squatting in utter darkness in a cave in New Mexico. I thought maybe I was just getting too much sunshine, and a few weeks in a cave would take care of it. I did the whole thing: eating bats and spiders, curling up with rattlesnakes, luring spelunkers into dangerous cul-de-sacs and then hexing their flashlights.” She chuckled. “Thatwas fun. But being down there, in the sweet, unrelenting Dark, I began to question where my life is headed.“

“I mean, I’m just not feeling it, you know? When I first got into this business, I was an acolyte to the Old Ones, seeking to spawn fresh horrors to usher in a Final Age of Madness, Cruelty and Chaos. And now here I am, working for some clueless ivy league twit, with a law degree from Harvard, casting charms to give his insipid girlfriend blonde hair and a suntan so she’ll look good on TV. “

“So you’re regretting some of your career choices.”

“I don’t know, maybe I need to get back to my roots. Get away from politics and just do the work for its own sake. Get rid of the penthouse and the slaves and just strike out on my own. Maybe find a nice doomsday cult somewhere … “

“Slaves?”

“Oh, I keep forgetting. They call them interns now, don’t they?”

Yep. That is what they call them now.

“Do you worry about money?”

“I’d be lying if I said no. And I would certainly miss the pastries from Veniero's. Have you ever had one?”

“That little Italian place over on 11th Street? Yes, I have, actually. And you’re right, the cannoli there is incredible.”

“Yes. It’s easy to lure people to their doom when you have something like that to work with.”

Joyce paused as a quiet chime sounded from the desk.

“Our time is about up. I want you to do some homework. Whenever you find yourself ruminating on what you should do, jot your thoughts down in a notebook. What you might gain, what you‘d have to give up, and how those thoughts make you feel. And we’ll pick this up again next week.”

“No, that’s not going to work. I need to be in St. Petersburg next week.“

“St. Petersburg Russia? Are you going there for business or for pleasure?”

“Oh, a little of this, a little of that. I’m planning on paying some dear old friends a visit." 

Her eyes glittered, the lights dimmed and the resonance of that final word swept across the office, cracking the glass in the window and rustling papers on the desk. 

Joyce was looking down at her calendar, and didn’t notice.

Emelda checked her phone. She absent-mindedly waved a hand at the window; the crack disappeared. “So will Thursday two weeks from today work for you?”

“Uhm, yes. Yes it will. I’ll see you then, Emelda. Have fun on your trip.”

“Don’t worry, I will. And my little friends will, too!” She let loose with another shrieking laugh, waggled her fingers good-bye and swept out of the office.

As soon as the door closed, Joyce frowned and opened the window. There was a faint smell of sulphur in the room and her four-o’-clock was due any minute. She fanned the air with her notepad.

She must have eaten eggs for breakfast. Why does Faber always refer the political cases to me? Oh, well. At least it’s not another Wall Street wanna-be. 

Joyce closed the window, took a deep breath, and began reviewing her notes on the next patient.

​

 

The Epiphany

​"Monica and Jerry are assholes."

It had been two weeks, and I was still muttering about my feud at work when I climbed up the tree with a chainsaw. They were the ones who had screwed up, but I was the one who ended up on the hook for it. It had taken me over twenty hours to clean up their mess. Twenty unpaid, uncredited, working-while-everyone-else-goes-home hours. A whole weekend, shot to hell. The anger welled up, making it made it hard to focus.

And lack of focus was something that a man in my position could not afford. 

Because I was eight feet off the ground, gingerly climbing an extension ladder propped against the big oak tree in my front yard. I'm afraid of heights, so for me, the top of a ladder is not a good place to be. But a windstorm had damaged one of the branches, and I didn't feel like paying two hundred bucks for a tree service. 

I was perched precariously with one foot on the second-to-last rung, clutching my chain saw and reaching a shaky hand for what I hoped was a sturdy branch, when I looked up to see a squirrel sitting six inches in front of my face. 

I froze in shock, standing perfectly still while a battle raged between my fear of heights and my instinct to jump. 

Fear of heights won.

"Whoa! Just take it easy, there, fella,” the squirrel said. “I'm here to help.”

An eerie, almost lethargic sense of calm settled over me. “Huh. A squirrel that talks.”

“Hey, I’m not just any squirrel, kid. I'm an extra-special, once-in-a-lifetime magical squirrel."

I squinted at it. It had been thirty or forty years since anyone called me 'kid'. "Magical, huh?"

"That's right. And today's your lucky day, because I'm here to do you a favor."

"Uh-huh." I stepped down to a more secure position and rubbed my forehead with my free hand. I had never had a hallucination before. I wondered if my insurance would cover a psychotic episode. Probably not. Maybe I could claim it was the result of migraines. It was October, that lovely time of year when my head hurts non-stop every time a cold front blows through. I could blame it on the migraines, and maybe get an MRI. 

Yeah, I should definitely get an MRI.

"Hey, fat boy! Look at me! Yeah, I'm talking to you, pal."

I shifted my feet on the rungs. The talking rodent was right, I needed to lose some weight. I hadn't been on the ladder five minutes and my feet were already starting to ache. I looked up at the splintered branch. Is it okay to use an electric chainsaw when you're hallucinating? 

The squirrel snapped its fingers. "Hey! You're not going to fall off the ladder, are you? Nah, I would know it if you were."

"And how would you know that?" 

Wait, it had fingers? I squinted at it again, trying to get a look at its paws. I don't wear glasses, but I probably should, it was a strain to focus on something so close. Why was my hallucination out of focus?

"Never mind, you wouldn't understand. Look, let's cut to the chase. You know that feud you're having at work? The one with Monica and Jerry? You need to let that shit go, man."

"Are you kidding me? After what they did? No way."

"Way. You need to let it go. And get yourself some glasses, you're walking around squinting at the world, not seeing jack." It held up a paw. "How many fingers am I holding up?" It chittered out a laugh. "Just kidding. But seriously, get your ass to an optometrist. And do the right thing, make nice with Monica and Jerry."

"Oh, right. And why should I take advice from a talking squirrel? You don't even exist."

"I'm your totem animal, dimwit, the sacred guardian of your clan and its soul-steering spiritual guide. This feud is eating you up, making you into an even bigger asshole than usual. You're taking it out on everyone around you, including your wife. Honestly, I don't know how she puts up with you."

"Of course you don't. Because you— " I poked a finger in his face " are just— a figment— of my imagination." I found myself swaying on the ladder, and immediately made a panicked grab for the tree.

"I've been trying to go easy on you, pal, but I can see that ‘easy’ isn't going to work."

It cocked its head and glared at me with its flinty black eyes, causing a chill to run up my spine. All the nasty remarks and mean-spirited gestures I had inflicted on the world over the previous two weeks flashed through my mind, an odious Parade of Awfulness that lasted less than a second but left me feeling nauseous and more than a little ashamed.

Monica and Jerry had made a mistake. And I had been a complete asshole about it. To everyone. For two whole weeks.

"Aw, crap."

"About time the light came on. You get it now, right?"

"Yeah."

"Then my work here is done. You know, I like you, kid. You're adorably clueless, but never in a boring way. More of a weird and awkward kind of thing." 

"Um, thanks?"

"It's all good. But I wouldn't turn down some pecans, if you happen to come across some."

And with a flick of its tail it was gone, leaving me with wobbly legs and a lot to think about.

The next day I buried the hatchet with Monica and Jerry, basically by owning up to my bad behavior and asking for their forgiveness, which they willingly gave. They made a big deal of it, actually. Told me how grateful they were for all the extra work I had done. And they made a point of saying that in front of everybody, including the boss. I still blush a little whenever I think about it.

Everything's cool at work now, people don’t look the other way when they see me coming. 

I went to a cut-rate optometrist and got a pair of glasses. Bifocals. I never wear them, but they're on the shelf by the TV if I ever need them. I'm still fat and I still get migraines, but the MRI came up clean, and the insurance company paid for it.

The doctor said my 'vision' was probably the result of stress and sleep deprivation. He wrote me a prescription that I didn't bother to fill. 

I know what I saw. 

What I did do was buy a big bag of unshelled pecans and put them in a bucket underneath the oak tree.

You know, for the squirrels. 

 

Unfinished Business A Second Visit from The Squirrel

​

Squirrels can't talk. Everyone knows that.

But maybe sometimes they can. There’s an exception to everything, right?

Because there is one in front of me right now, sitting on a branch, nodding his head at a grey, yellow-breasted bird that is chirping away at him.

"Uh-huh. Oh, that's awful."

I recognize the voice. It is the squirrel from the oak tree in my front yard.

Only that isn’t possible. The talking squirrel in the tree had been some kind of hallucination. It had spouted a line of nonsense about being my totem animal, the sacred guardian of my clan, my soul-steering guide to the spirit world. And then it told me to clean up my act. Transference, the shrink called it. Projecting my real-world problems onto an imaginary rodent.

Thing is, it gave me some pretty good advice. Which I took. And my life got noticeably better as a result. 

Hence the shrink.

And now my little furry hallucination is back, carrying on a one-sided conversation with a bird.

I try to get closer and discover I can’t move. This is a dream. Just a stupid dream.

The squirrel swivels its head. "About time you figured that out."

It turns its attention back to the bird, nodding and responding with sympathetic noises to a cascading series of whistles and chirps.

I try to wake up. I pinch myself and it hurts. What does it mean if your dream feels real, but you can't wake up?

The bird flutters away, lost in a blur of dusky wings.

The squirrel fixes me with a flinty-eyed stare. "You catch all that, pal?"

"Huh? You mean the bird noise?"

"Bird? Oh, yeah. Sometimes I forget you can’t see things as they really are. That was Chat, one of my fellow spirit guides. "

"Chat?"

"As in Yellow-Breasted, get it?"

I most certainly do not get it but decide to play along. "So, what did Chat say?"

"You have a problem, pal. A big one."

I sigh. "What is it this time?"

"Unfinished business. From way back. It’s holding up your spiritual growth, so you need to clean it up, pronto. "

"You're going to have to be a little more specific."

It speaks slowly and distinctly, like it’s talking to a moron. "Un.Finished.Business."

"Oh, come on! That could be anything."

"It's your dream, pal. Figure it out."

There is an audible click and my wake-up alarm starts blaring.

Ever had a dream that was so vivid you can't get it out of your head? I spend the rest of the morning trying to forget it, to no avail. 

It is bugging me, so I stay at my desk for lunch break, drinking diet Cokes and chugging peanut M&M's while I watch funny cat videos on the Internet. You know, trying to shake myself out of it.

And then, when that doesn’t work, I do a search for 'Yellow-Breasted Chats'.

A whole page of images comes up, showing yellow-chested birds taken from various angles, along with cautions not to confuse them with New World Warblers. I click on the first image. It is a promotional shot for the local library, which is co-hosting the Thirty-First Annual Chat Roundup at a nearby park.

Thirty-one years. A cold, prickly line of goosebumps goes up the back of my neck. 

I know that library, it’s in the neighborhood I grew up in. And I have unfinished business there, something I have never told anyone, ever. Something I buried a long time ago. 

Something I wanted to forget.

When I go home, I go straight to the garage and climb up into the attic, slithering through a hot, narrow space filled with cardboard boxes, boxes that are bulging with things I no longer want or need. Things I spent good money on, and which therefore cannot be thrown away.

But over there, in the corner, is the big, heavy-duty plastic box, the one that contains old high school yearbooks, a letter jacket from college, and other assorted junk that, for one reason or another, has acquired sentimental value. Stuff that money can’t buy.

I squat over it, shoulders hunched up against the rafters, lungs rasping from the dust. There is a whoosh of air when I unseal the lid. The plastic is dull and faded on the outside, but on the inside, it is still as smooth and shiny as the day it was made. It isn’t much to look at, but there was a time when I kept pretty much everything I owned in it.

There are some old photographs on top, color prints that are hardly faded at all, pictures of a much younger me smiling at the camera. I resist the urge to go through them, plunging my hands down through the layers, down to the dreck that lies at the absolute bottom of every barrel.

There is a book there, with an old, crackly plastic dust cover. I pull it out and squint at it.

The Influence of Sea Power on History, by Alfred Thayer Mahan.

A library book, checked out from my old neighborhood library. Checked out, but never returned.

There is a little piece of paper stuck between the pages, with the due date printed on it. Nothing special about that date, except for the fact it was the same year my dad lost his job, and a few days before we got evicted from our house. 

We ended up living in a windowless one-room apartment in the back of an upholstery shop. 

I lost the book during the move.

And then, months later, when I found it again, I was too embarrassed to take it back. I had never gone back, to any library in the city. Ever.

But I kept the book. Through senior year in high school, my hitch in the Army, then college, my marriage and career. I kept it. 

Buried at the bottom of the big plastic box.

I heft it, feeling the weight of it as sweat trickles down my face. 

This has gone on long enough; it is time to pay the piper.

I crawl down out of the attic, get in my car, and return to the scene of the crime.

The place hasn’t changed much. The brickwork is worn in places, and a couple of trees have gone missing, but the layout is the same.

I march solemnly up to the desk, take a deep breath, and place the book in front of the librarian.

"I would like to return an overdue book."

She glances at it, frowns and then flips open the back cover. There is an empty pocket for a signature card, which libraries no longer use. She raises an eyebrow.

"Been a while, has it?"

I look down at my shoes. "Yes, ma'am."

She turns to her keyboard and rattles away for a moment, pauses, and then rattles some more.

There is a bulletin board behind her, with pictures of Yellow Breasted Chats and posters promoting the Audobon's 31st Annual Chat Roundup. It started the exact same year I checked out the book. 

One of the pictures includes a squirrel, which is staring straight into the camera, making it seem that he is staring straight at me.

"We no longer show this book in the system."

"Huh? Oh. How much is the fine?"

She shrugs. "It's not in the system."

The bulletin board squirrel’s relentless black-eyed stare makes it hard to think.

"Oh. Well, uh, I guess I really ought to pay something..."

She shakes her head. "Sir, we don't show this book in the system. There's no way to calculate a fine."

"How about a replacement cost?"

She gives me a long, cool look and then rattles around on the keyboard again.

"The current volume is listed at 37 dollars and ninety-one cents."

"I'll pay that."

She doesn’t say a word as I count out the money, but she does give me a receipt.

And she does keep the book. She obviously doesn’t want it, but she keeps it.

Because, being a librarian, she understands. This isn’t about the book. It’s about unfinished business, and I am finally free of it.

Squirrels can't talk. I know it, you know, it, we all know it. That’s not in dispute, okay?

But as I turn to go, I could swear that squirrel on the bulletin board winks at me. 

  

Big Dwayne Harris

​

Dwayne Harris swung the heavy, six-bar bull gate closed behind his truck.  As the local game warden, he didn’t need to ask permission. But as a one-time ranch hand, he considered it a distinct privilege to be allowed to pass through another man’s gate. There was a kind of a mystical aspect to it, a recognition that gates mark boundaries, boundaries that should only be crossed with prudence and respect.

That was especially true here on the Tres Colinas Ranch, a high-desert grassland that flowed gently up to rugged, rock-strewn mountains that rose from the desert floor like islands rising from the sea. It looked desolate, but there was all manner of game here: mule deer and antelope, turkey and quail, along with more exotic animals, like bighorn sheep. The terrain could be deceptive—the open, rolling plain concealed a complex network of gullies, dry creeks and arroyos that had been carved by centuries of late-summer rains.

You could hide almost anything in some of those arroyos.

Dwayne slid back into the driver’s seat, his breath condensing in the cold, dry air. It was still dark, but there was a faint line of red on the eastern horizon.  This section of the Tres Colinas was one of the more remote areas butting up against the Sierra Diablo: thirty miles off the highway, plus another hundred to the nearest town.  Most poachers knew better than to trespass here, but the lure of bagging an exotic sometimes attracted a darker, more dangerous breed.

His quarry would be just ahead, waiting for daylight. It was an odd time of year for hunters, and odder yet that Felipe Mondragon would give anyone permission to hunt his fifty-thousand-acre spread. The old man fiercely guarded his privacy— even the Feds had to get special permission to enter the property. Legend had it that Felipe once chased a Shell Oil geologist off the ranch with a shotgun. 

There was, however, one exception to the rule. The local game warden had unfettered access, based on a century-old arrangement between the Mondragon family and the State of Texas. That warden was hand-picked by Colonel Masterson, Director of Law Enforcement for Texas Parks and Wildlife, and personally approved by Felipe Mondragon. It was a one-of-a-kind appointment, complete with lifetime tenure and a whale of a non-disclosure agreement.

There were a lot of tall tales surrounding the Tres Colinas, ghost stories of hunters who went out and never came back. Hunters who weren’t prepared for some of the weirder things that could be found in the foothills of the Sierra Diablo. Bestias Monstruos, the old-timers called them.

Once, back in the 1980’s, some trophy hunter from Boston offered a much younger Felipe Mondragon a suitcase full of money for an unsupervised hunt. They found the trophy hunter’s empty truck a few days later.  The game warden, half a dozen ranch hands and a DPS helicopter scoured the area for a week, but the man’s remains were never found.

Dwayne wasn’t about to let something like that happen again.

He put the big Chevy Silverado into gear and eased on down the rocky, unimproved road, driving slow with the headlights off. After about three miles, he stopped in a low spot and shut down the engine. Like all game wardens, Dwayne preferred to maintain an element of surprise. You could tell a lot about a man’s intentions by how he reacted when a lawman popped up out of nowhere.

The three out-of-staters were standing around their rented Nissan crew cab, facing the sunrise, hands shoved in the pockets of their jeans to ward off the cold. None of them were looking his way. He glided silently around a patch of creosote bushes and approached them from behind.

“How you boys doin’ this mornin’?”

Dwayne’s voice was a basso rumble that climbed up to a pleasant East Texas drawl, and the unexpected sound made all three men jump.

The closest exhaled loudly and exclaimed, “What the hell, mate?”

“Crikey, he’s a big un’, ini’ he?”

“Quiet, you twits. That’s him. The one the clerk told us about. Big Dwayne, the game warden.”

Young, fit, and British. That’s how Molly described them.  She ran the Day’s Inn in Van Horn, and had tipped Dwayne off about three strange young men who were talking about hunting the Tres Colinas. There was something about these boys—he couldn’t bring himself to think of them as men, despite the muscles bulging beneath the flannel shirts— that set his instincts buzzing.  Young bucks, looking to make their mark.  He had seen their kind before, but it had been years since any had ventured into his jurisdiction. Old Man Mondragon had a soft spot for the old days, and if Dwayne’s hunch was right, these young men would be about as old-fashioned as you could get.  It was the kind of thing that might make it hard for Felipe to say no.

Dwayne kept a professional smile on his face and an easy-going tone in his voice. Nearly everyone in the county referred to him as ‘Big’ Dwayne, although most were too polite to say it to his face. At six foot six, he towered over the trio of young, athletic-looking Brits.

“Texas game warden, gentlemen. Would you mind showing me your licenses and ID’s?”

They shuffled around, rummaging in a leather satchel that contained their money and documents. Molly claimed that all they had were long guns, but Dwayne kept an eye on their hands anyway, using a flashlight in the pale pre-dawn light. They presented passports instead of driver’s licenses, but everything was in order.

“What you boys gunnin’ for today?”

“Scaled quail.” The tallest of the three grinned up at him, trying to look confident.  His passport listed him as James McAvoy. His friends were William Butler and Allan Cumming. All three had just turned eighteen years of age.

“Blues, huh? A little off the beaten track, if you don’t mind my sayin’. But you’re likely to find some, down in that arroyo.”

Butler and Cumming exchanged a furtive glance at the word ‘Blues’.

McAvoy flashed a guileless smile. “My thoughts exactly, officer. Would you mind if I asked, sir, how you knew to look for us here? We were under the impression that this is private property.”

“Word gets around, you know how it is. And you’re right about it being private property. I’m going to need to see your letter.”

“Oh, you mean from Mr. Mondragon? Of course.”

McAvoy pulled a folded piece of paper from his shirt pocket and handed it over. 

Dwayne read it briefly and handed it back. “It doesn’t specify quail. In fact, it doesn’t say anything about what you’re huntin’ today.”

“Oh. Is that a problem?”

“No, not if all you’re gonna to do is shoot a few quail. I’m going to need to take a look at your guns. Are they in the truck, there?”

McAvoy moved quickly towards the truck. “No, sir, we’ve got them here, in the bed. I’ll hand them down to you.”  He dropped the tailgate, revealing three shotguns. He handled the weapons with care, opening the action before handing each one over, making sure he kept the muzzle pointed in a safe direction. Young Mr. McAvoy was no stranger to firearms.

The guns were all brand-new, TriStar Hunter EX’s, a cheap over-under sold by Wal-Mart. None of them were loaded.

“These guns belong to you?”

McAvoy held up a wrinkled receipt. “Yes, sir. We purchased them in Del Rio.”

“Uh-huh. Let’s have a look at your ammunition.”

Mister Cumming hauled out a crate with half a dozen boxes of shotgun shells inside. “Here, sir. Do you want me to open one up?”

Dwayne checked the label and shook his head. “Nope, these are fine.”

There were three lariats lying in big coils near the back of the truck bed.  A pretty common sight in ranch country, but these boys weren’t cowhands.  And lariats didn’t usually have hooked chains in place of a loop.

“Everything all right, officer?”

“Yup, you’re good to go for your quail hunt. Just one thing, though—I’m gonna need to take a look inside that truck.”

Any doubts Dwayne might have had were instantly banished by the look on McAvoy’s face. 

“Ah, inside the truck, sir? Well, ah, I--”

The tow-headed one, the one named Butler, stepped off to the side and pulled a small stick from his sleeve. He pointed it at Dwayne and began muttering in what sounded like Latin.

Dwayne covered the distance in one long, sudden stride and dropped a hand the size of a shovel on Butler’s shoulder.  Butler stared up at him in wide-eyed amazement, his weird chant frozen in mid-word.

“Mr. Butler, I’m gonna have to ask you to stop doin’ that.”

He snatched the stick out of the young man’s hand as easily as he might have taken it from a child, tucking it into his belt with one quick, efficient motion. Butler tried to twist away and gasped in pain as the warden clamped down on his shoulder. Dwayne’s other hand moved to the butt of his sidearm.  “You boys step over there where I can keep an eye on you. You too, Mister Butler. And keep your hands where I can see them. “

Dwayne had a pretty good idea what he was dealing with now, sure enough to forgo cuffing and frisking them.  These young gentlemen weren’t used to being recognized; Butler had assumed he could finesse the situation.  But they weren’t likely to try anything serious— Virtue, Chivalry, and Service was their motto. Or soon would be if they managed to pass their test. 

McAvoy tried to smooth things over.

“Sir, I apologize for this unfortunate misunderstanding--”

Dwayne cut him off.

“Interferin’ with a law officer is a serious offense, gentlemen.  Am I makin’ myself clear?”

They nodded glumly as he opened the door and began rummaging around on the back seat. He grunted and pulled out a sheathed long sword. 

“Who does this belong to?”

Allan Cumming raised a hesitant hand.

“Vorpal blades are not allowed in the Sierra Diablo, Mister Cumming. I’m afraid I’m gonna have to confiscate it, along with Mr. Butler’s wand. I’ll write you out a receipt, and you can take it up with Judge DeLeon if you feel like contesting it.” He waved a hand at the truck. “The enchanted crossbow is a gray area, but according to the Scottish Addenda of 1840, that’s at my discretion, and I’m gonna allow it. The rest of it’s fine, although your chain mail is a little on the puny side, if you don’t mind my sayin’.”

McAvoy and his companions gaped at him and then at each other. “You know what a Vorpal Blade is?”

“I guess you could say I know a thing or two about the Order of Saint George. Been a while, though. You boys part of a new crop of Initiates?  Uh-huh, thought so.  All right, I’m going to need to see your huntin’ license.  The other one.”

The three Initiates exchanged glances, then McAvoy fetched the leather satchel. Inside was a small piece of rolled parchment, covered in sigils and signed with a wax seal.

Dwayne examined it carefully, nodded, and handed it back.  These boys were green, but they had a valid license, and Felipe had given his permission. And the Order wouldn’t have sent them here if they weren’t ready.

“All right, gentlemen. This license is good for catch-and-release only, and that means no souvenirs, not even a claw or a scale. Just so you know, I’ll be keepin’ an eye on you, and Judge DeLeon goes pretty hard on that sort of thing.  Mister Butler—”

“Sir?” Butler was trying to take it like a man, but he couldn’t keep a faint quaver out of his voice.

“I’d be within my rights to arrest you for assault on a law officer. It doesn’t matter one bit that it was just a Spell of Lesser Deceit.”

Butler looked sad. “Yes, sir.” 

“But if I arrested every two-bit yahoo who tried to lie to me, Judge DeLeon would run out of space in his jail.  So I’m gonna let it go, this time.  But you can pretty much kiss that wand of yours goodbye. Are we clear? Good.”

Dwayne tucked the longsword under his arm and wrote them a receipt for their confiscated property, along with a warning citation for William Butler.

“Now listen up. You want to hunt rock dragons, you’ve come to the right place.  They’re ambush predators and are well-nigh impossible to spot in some of these stone formations, so keep your eyes open and your wits about you.  If you do manage to find one it pays to remember that they have a real short temper. A typical specimen in the Sierra Diablo will weigh in at around twelve hundred pounds, and their scales will turn anything from a longsword to a thirty-ought-six, but they will go down if you can clap ‘em on the back of the head hard enough.  You can expect to get roughed up some, there’s a pretty good emergency clinic in Van Horn, if it comes to that.  But-- “He pointed his index finger at them “-- if you see something with a blue frill, you turn around and go the other way. You hear me?” The big man chuckled. “You mess with Old Blue and he’ll eat the three of you for breakfast. Chain mail and all.”

He left them gaping open-mouthed as he strode back into the brush, maintaining the illusion that on the Tres Colinas, a Texas Game Warden can appear anywhere, at any time, from any direction.

Especially when that Game Warden happens to be Big Dwayne Harris.

                   

Say the Words

 

It had been a bad year, a year spent hunkered down while the worst epidemic in a century cut a nasty swath through family and friends. 

But I had made myself a promise, all those years ago, so here I was. Again. In a silent, wintery graveyard hundreds of miles from home, shuffling through four inches of snow to a marker I always had to look for.

You'd think I'd remember after visiting the thing 29 times.

The sky was low and gray, a jumbled mass of dark, swollen clouds that seemed to fade into a haze of tiny snow crystals that hung motionless in the air like an icy fog, reducing the grave markers to shadowy lumps of brown, gray, and white. In this light, the dim shapes all looked alike; I had to peer and squint to make out the inscriptions.

I stubbed my toe on something, causing my sciatica to flare, which sent a sharp pain shooting up my leg. I still wasn't used to it—it had been a little over a month since I hurt one of the discs in my back. I had been taking down Christmas decorations when I fell off the stepladder and twisted, trying to protect my knee, which I had hurt the week before. I blamed it on the ladder; my wife thought it was because I was starting to get old and needed to be more careful.

Like I said, it had been a bad year.

But bad year or not, I was here, limping through four inches of crunchy graveyard snow, looking for a particular marker. A small unpolished granite stone, with a simple inscription that was burned into my memory: 

Jeremy Putts 

Born: September 16, 1970 

Died: February 25, 1991 

Jeremy was a veteran, but the marker didn't mention it. His mother didn't want any references to the Army on her boy's grave. Can't say that I blame her: the Army was responsible for his death.

I know, because I was there.

He was my squad mate, but we didn't have much in common. Under normal circumstances, I would never have considered him a friend—he was a goofball with crooked teeth and a weird sense of humor. But we deployed together, so I came to know him fairly well.

His death wasn't particularly heroic. Our squad was working a mortar when something went wrong, and the round exploded in the launch tube.

Jeremy went down, riddled with shrapnel. Three or four others went down at the same time, but Jeremy caught most of it.

I was half deafened by the blast, but I did what I could—I got up off the ground, dragged him to the Humvee, and tried to stop the bleeding. I got a medal for it.

Jeremy died, and I got a medal.

Turned out I had been hit, too, but in the heat of the moment, I hadn't noticed.

I wasn't able to make it to the funeral, but I had made the trip to the cemetery every year since.

I spotted the marker and shuffled over to it, being careful not to slip and fall.

A squirrel was sitting on the gutter of a nearby mausoleum, its fluffed-up neck fur covered in a loose collar of snow, peering down on me with hard, beady black eyes. 

I recognized it right away: it was my spirit guide, the totem and symbolic guardian of my clan. At least, that's what he said he was. My shrink says he's just a projection of my subconscious. He's probably right—I mean, come on, everyone knows that squirrels can't really talk. But this particular squirrel had given me some pretty good advice, so I was curious about what he was going to say this time.

I gazed up at what was probably a figment of my imagination. "You again."

"Yep. "

"Can it wait?" I nodded at the headstone. "There's something I need to do."

"I know. That's why I'm here."

"Swell."

I turned and stared down at the stone, fingering the Commendation Medal in the pocket of my jacket. I hated that medal: most of the time it resided in the big plastic box I kept in the attic. But once a year, come Hell or high water, I got it out, put it in the pocket of my jacket, and drove four and a half hours to this lonely little cemetery.

So I could stand here and remember Jeremy Putts on the anniversary of his death. I never said anything because there was nothing to say. I would just stand there, thinking about Jeremy, the explosion, and its aftermath until my feet got cold. When it reached the point where I couldn't stop shivering, I'd get back in the car, crank up the heater and drive home again.

But today was different: the squirrel was here.

And it was looking at me. I could feel those beady little eyes boring into the back of my skull.

I turned around and glared up at it. "What?"

"You gotta say the words, man."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Don't give me that. You know exactly what I'm talking about."

The squirrel leaped to the ground and scurried over, paws flinging bits of snow behind it.

It hopped up on the gravestone, whiskers and tail twitching, breaking the gloomy spell that the dark, sullen landscape had cast on me.

Which irritated the hell out of me. Cemeteries are supposed to be sad.

"Look at me." 

I met his gaze and found myself staring into two tiny little voids of black. 

"Say it." The squirrel hopped to the left side of the stone. "Go on, say it."

I looked down at the inscription and sighed. "I should have done more."

The squirrel hopped on the right side of the stone- "But?"

"But what?"

"You know what. "

I sighed again, reliving memories of my hands, slippery with blood, desperately trying to apply pressure as the light faded from his eyes.

My voice cracked a little as tears welled up.

"I did the best I could."

The squirrel hopped back to the left side and hit me with the stare again.

"Nope. Try again."

I blinked rapidly, the cold stinging my now-wet eyes. I choked a little as I said the words.

"I'm sorry you're dead. I should have done more."

It hopped back to the right, tail twitching.

"And?"

The squirrel was right—I knew what I needed to say. But it had always seemed too trivial, too trite, too inadequate to mean anything. I gazed down at the stone.

"Forgive me, brother." 

The world blurred as the tears poured forth in earnest.

It was weird—until this moment, I hadn't realized just how badly I needed to say that. Jeremy had been torn up inside; the only thing that could have saved him was a full-blown medical team. A medivac was on the way, but it didn't get there in time. Intellectually, I had always known that. But I hadn't believed it. Not really. 

Deep down, I had always felt guilty about Jeremy. I failed, and he died, end of story.

I pulled my hands out of my pockets, took a breath, went down on one knee, and gently placed the medal at the foot of the gravestone.

And then I straightened up, staring at what I had done. I'm not sure why, but it felt right. This is where the damn thing belonged: in a graveyard.

I wiped my eyes and heaved a heavy sigh. "Rest in peace, bro." 

The tears welled up again. But then, in the middle of the hazy blur, I saw Jeremy nodding at me. 

It was just for a split second: I blinked, and he was gone. When I looked up, the squirrel was gone, too. 

I glanced around. I was alone, standing all by myself in the middle of a snowy field of cold, silent tombstones. 

Which was reassuring, in an odd kind of way. 

I took one last look at the inscription. I didn't need to see this anymore: I was never going to forget Jeremy. I would carry the memory of that gap-toothed goofball until I was laid into a grave of my own. 

I squared my shoulders, turned around, and started limping back to my car. 

My feet weren't cold yet, but I had done what I came here to do. It was time to move on.