The same waitress that served Amelia and I sat us at the table we'd used before. The surface was still damp from her wiping it down. Her raised eyebrows indicated she recognized me, but she possessed the couth to not inquire as to how or why I'd swapped the attractive local funeral director for a giant, homeless Viking. I ordered a beer and Clancy requested a pitcher. When the libations arrived, he waved off the empty glass and proceeded to hold the pitcher like an oversized coffee mug.
He took a long drink of the brew, downing more than my twelve-ounce glass held, and wiped the foam from his bushy beard with the back of his hand. "Ah, a little flat, but still heavenly. When you live on your own in the wilderness, it's the little things you really start to miss. Beer in big pitchers." He glanced up. "A roof. It's hard to build a good roof."
I had so many questions that they just clogged up in my brain and the result was that I sat there silently. It felt akin to the commonplace nightmare of showing up for an important test without studying. I didn't even know where to begin.
"Those men..."
"Followers of the Saint of Shadows. Typical cultists. Weak-willed assholes looking for someone else to make up for their life inadequacies."
"And the Saint?"
Clancy frowned. "She's the real deal, unfortunately. Part vampire. Part witch. She's had a blood feud running with your Uncle Simon for decades. Now that he's dead, I'm guessing she's making a quick run at taking you out before you consolidate power."
I started to inquire about so much of what he just said but decided to take a long drink of beer instead. The booze didn't help. "You can't expect me to believe in vampires."
He shook his head. "I get it. It's a lot to swallow. My advice—keep it simple. You don't believe in any of this magic yet? That's fine. Just remember that there's a whole cult coming for you that do."
That simplification made sense. I couldn't argue that I'd been the target of a kidnapping and Clancy had saved my ass. Even if the big man was a lunatic at least he was my lunatic. Opting to play along I said, "But I'm not an apprentice. I haven't seen my uncle in decades."
This surprised him and he rubbed his beard thoughtfully. "The communication I received said that Simon had died and had asked for me to defend you if the Saint came for you. I assumed that meant he'd taken you on." He shook his head. "No matter. It doesn't change my purpose here. Whatever the case, the Saint is after you."
I took a swig of beer. "All I did was come for a funeral," I mumbled.
"How was the viewing? Sorry I didn't make it in time but did I mention that I live in the woods? It took me a while to march back to civilization and catch a bus."
"It was...weird."
He laughed, deep and heavy. I imagined that if Santa Claus had a down-on his-luck, hard-living brother, his laugh would sound like that. "I assumed it would be. Not sure I would have been comfortable anyway. I don't do well with crowds."
"There wasn't a crowd. Only two other people showed up. And they were..." I struggled with the next word before settling on, "weird" again, as we'd established that as a safe description.
Clancy's eyes narrowed. "How so?"
I described McGavin first, as his oddities were more believable than a floating woman with changing skin tones. Throughout the rundown, Clancy seemed to be smiling, although it was hard to see past the beard.
"The Deadeye. I've met him. Insufferable in large doses but not a bad guy. Well, not anymore. Never did learn his first name."
"Deadeye," I repeated. "That's what Sil called him."
His eyes widened knowingly, and the bushy smile faded. "Sil? You said Sil came?"
"Yeah." I hesitated on her details, much the way someone would resist saying they'd seen a ghost out of fear of not being believed. "She was even weirder than McGavin."
"That she is."
"You know her?"
"Only by reputation. Nasty piece of work that one is. Or was, I should say. She's reformed to, from what I heard, like McGavin and I."
Reformed.
Sil had talked about being pulled off the road to ruination. It seemed to be a running theme in the lunacy of this day. "Reformed from what?"
"Killing," he said bluntly.
"What?" I'd heard him clearly but hoped he'd change his answer.
"Killers. We were all killers. Slayers of men. Shedders of blood. Sometimes for pay. Or revenge. Or pleasure. Or spite. Or just for the goddamned hell of it." He took a mighty slug of his pitcher, slammed it down, and then slumped his shoulders with a world-weary sigh. "We all were. And damn good at it, until we realized there was nothing good about it.
"You're murderers?" Considering how easily he'd dispatched my kidnappers this didn't seem so surprising. Only the implied safety of being in a public place kept me from panicking.
He snorted. "Did I miss that one, Mr. Thesaurus? Yes. Murderers as well."
"But reformed? Like, you did the crime, then did your time?"
Clancy waved a hand as if conducting an orchestra. "Well, la de da. He's a poet as well. Reformed? Yes. Punished? Never. Reformation is just a change. There's no redemption. No forgiveness. Souls can't be scrubbed clean and sin stains forever. I'm not sure if Sil and the Deadeye spend their days trying to right their karmic wrongs, but me, I simply wandered off into the woods and stopped killing people. It was the best I could do and the safest place for me to be."
"But you came out for Simon's funeral?"
"I had to. I owe your uncle."
"Because he helped you change your ways, right?"
Clancy tapped his temple. "You're catching on now. I had what you'd refer to as a serious anger control issue. A real beast in here." He thumbed his chest. "Admittedly, I misused my power on many occasions. Willfully. Negligently. But at certain times of the month, I had to surrender full control. It was those nights that finally broke me." He paused and his gaze drifted off me to nothing. When he spoke again his tone lowered. "I've killed so many, but I remember them all. Every face. Every scent. Except for those nights. On those nights I recall nothing. Those are the worst ghosts. The faceless innocents that I read about in the paper the next day and pretended I had nothing to do with it. The rage of the moon kept those memories, but not the guilt."
I drummed my fingers absent-mindedly on the table as I listened. I had no response to this confession, so I attempted to change the topic. "You want another pitcher?"
The offer snapped Clancy from his melancholic reverie. "Sure, unless they serve it in buckets."
As we waited for my sensibly small beer and his stupidly large one, I finally voiced my assumption to him. "How exactly did Simon help you?"
"It was your uncle that made me this." Clancy pulled down his shirt collar to expose a small figurine held around his neck with a leather cord. Crudely hewn, the statuette resembled a bear or a wolf or even some monstrous combination of the two.
I wasn't sure how to respond. The level of artistry was nothing to brag about. Maybe it had some sentimental attachment? But Clancy waited for a response, so I finally said, "It's lovely."
"Lovely? It looks like a caveman carved it by hitting a rock with another rock." He tucked it away. "But it's effective. Damn effective. It's a chain wrapped around the beast and I control the leash."
"So, it's like a good luck piece? A reminder to be good?"
He scowled. "You know better than that. It's a magical amulet."
I sighed. "Come on. I know you said to keep it simple but there are no such things as magical amulets."
"There are. This one helps me control the beast and prevents me from becoming a mindless animal on nights of the full moon."
That was the second time he'd referenced moon and rage. My powers of deduction connected the dots. "Now you're adding a werewolf into the mix? I think you've either had too many pitchers or not enough pitchers."
Clancy held up his index finger and then tapped it to the table. As I watched the digit swelled as if the knuckles had broken. The skin darkened, coarse hair sprouting like fast-growing grass. The nail blackened and lengthened, becoming a wicked talon with a razor-sharp hook. For emphasis, he dragged it along the wood, leaving a deep gouge in the surface. His point made, the process reversed itself until it became just a normal Clancy finger again.
"I don't normally like to show off, but I figured it'd put your mind at ease."
My mind just had a lot put on it, but ease wasn't really one of the weights. "Okay. Fine. I'd be stupid to not believe my own eyes." I traced a finger through the scratch.
He raised his pitcher. "Hurrah. Acknowledging one's own stupidity is the first step on every journey. Especially one like this."
"What do we do now?"
"Where were you going when you tried to leave earlier?"
"Uncle Simon's house." I patted my shirt pocket. "Amelia, the funeral director, gave me the key."
He drained his pitcher. "That's better than busting down the door. Let's go."
For the second time that night, I left the bar. This time I actually made it to my car. Clancy barely fit in the passenger seat, forcing his knees nearly to his chest and his shoulders almost into my seat. Thankfully, he knew where the house was, as I quickly surmised that I never would have found the rural property alone and at night.
Just as I turned onto the long driveway Clancy said, "Stop here."
I complied, thinking he possessed some kind of magical danger sense and an ambush awaited us. "What is it?"
"I'm going to get out here and cross through these woods. There's a ridge on the east side. I'll post up there."
"Good idea. What for?"
"Guard duty. I'll watch the house from the ridge."
"Ah. Right." I squinted my eyes up the lane that twisted through the woods. Even with my bright headlights on I couldn't see the house yet. "So, I'm going in the house alone."
"You'll be fine. Sure, the house was owned by a magician and possesses a deep, dark secret of some kind, but it's not like it's haunted." He slapped me on the shoulder. "Remember, acknowledge that stupidity."
Then he jogged off, disappearing quickly into the woods.
Chapter Words - 1804
Total Word Count - 10,113