The Pardoner's Tale Page 7

  "Not here," Alex said. He took hold of my sleeve and pulled me toward a breezeway between two houses. It was barely wide enough for the two of us to stand face-to-face. Alex put his hands on either side of my face to keep me from turning my head. "Just trust me," he said as he leaned in close.

  "I don't really have a choice, do I?"

  "Not really, no."

  His nose brushed against mine and I felt his tongue tracing my lower lip. It nudged gently against the corner of my mouth and left a wet trail along my chin. Alex's tongue was slightly rough, like a cat's tongue, and probably for much the same reason. I held my breath. The hairs on the back of my neck started to rise, so I tapped Alex on the shoulder. "None of that, please."

  "Sorry," he muttered against my cheek. He pulled back and even in the dark alley I could tell he was eyeing me critically. "It's swollen. I can't do anything about that. But the bleeding has stopped and it shouldn't hurt as much." He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  "Thank you."

  Alex laughed. "No, thank you. I've never had shifter before. That was high test." He peeked out of the alley. "It's clear. Let's go get something to eat."

  Alex ordered while I locked myself in the tiny, dark restroom of the Drunken Sailor and washed my face. The water smelled sharp and metallic, but it was cold and clean. I looked like a man who had been punched in the face, but I wasn't bleeding. I joined Alex in the shabby dining area. He pushed an order of fries and a foam cup of soda into the center of the table. He handed me a cheeseburger and unwrapped his own.

  We ate in silence. The electric clock that hung over the grill ticked out the seconds and a fat man in a greasy chef's jacket wiped down the counter with a rag that had been sitting in a pan of grayish water. He hummed and thankfully kept to himself. It was probably the fact that we looked like we'd been in a fight that made him keep his distance, but I wasn't going to encourage him to chat. Alex and I had business to discuss.

  "What happened out there?" I asked.

  Alex frowned and chewed his food. He reached over and touched my left cheekbone. "You're going to have a black eye."

  "Yes, I'm aware of that. Thank you. Now focus, Alex. What happened to us?"

  He shrugged one shoulder and took another bite of his burger. "Possession, I suppose. Something passed through us and upped our anger levels."

  "What was it, though?"

  "I don't know. You're the brains. I'm just the looks, remember?"

  "It wasn't a vampire."

  "Not my sort, anyhow. Psychic? Something that'd feed off the aggression? Or needed blood that it couldn't get on its own, so it makes people draw blood." He floundered as he tried to find the word he wanted. "Non-corporeal!"

  I gestured, indicating that Alex needed to keep his voice down. He looked apologetic. "You're on to something. But what is it?"

  "What's it matter? Do you really think it's a good idea to go after it, Nicky? I mean, we don't want to draw attention to ourselves."

  "Someone's got to do something about it." Out on the street, an ambulance and two police cars shrieked past. People who weren't us had been inspired to violence by the unseen force.

  "Why us, though? We've got nowhere to stay, no weapons, limited access to cash...."

  The man behind the counter let out a long, slow sigh. "Okay. Which one of you is the vampire?" he asked. For the second time that night, Alex went completely pale.

  Alex and I broke for the door. Alex got there first and tried to shove it open. The cook had locked it. Alex threw himself at it again and the metal started to pull away from the frame. I stood between Alex and the cook, ready to attack. The cook didn't move an inch. He just stood behind the counter, meaty arms folded across his broad chest, and a thin trickle of sweat running down the side of his face. He shook his head, ran one hand across his buzzed scalp, and lowered himself onto a stool behind the counter.

  "Y'all going to buy me a new door if you don't stop that."

  On his fourth go at the door, Alex pulled back and thunked against the thick Plexiglas. He lightly beat his forehead against it, muttering "no" over and over again. I backed up against him. Two against one. The guy was old, in poor health, and unless he had an assault rifle behind the cash register, I was certain we could take him.

  Please don't let him have an assault rifle behind the cash register I begged whatever might be listening.

  "You could bounce open the truck, but you couldn't get through this?" I hissed.

  "That was older, in bad shape, and wasn't locked" he murmured back.

  The cook continued to stare at us. "Well?" He asked again. "Which one of you is the vampire?"

  "Maybe he's not a threat," I said.

  "Maybe he is," Alex replied.

  "Maybe he's in the room and can hear you," the cook said.

  The cook's name was Buck. He said he had worked in this restaurant for four years and he was familiar with whatever it was that had put us at odds. He said they called it Howler. When it would drift through the neighborhood it'd make all the dogs bark and howl. If it came across any people it would encourage them to fight until blood was shed.

  "I don't know if it likes the blood or the fight," Buck explained, "but it ain't uncommon here. There's a fight almost every night. Sometimes they end with the cops showing up. Sometimes ol' Howler gets distracted and lets them go before they cause too much damage. But it happens. At least once a night it'll happen. Sometimes more, depending."

  "Depending on...?" I coaxed.

  Buck shrugged. "Weather? Time of day? How much blood it got the night before?"

  "Why'd you ask which one of us was a vampire?" Alex asked.

  "Heard Barb's dog barking up the street. Knew that meant Howler was out somewheres, then you two come in here looking like you've just been in a war. Neither of you was bleeding, but that gash on his lip," he pointed to me, "should have been gushing like a busted faucet."

  "So naturally you assumed one of us was a vampire." Alex raised one eyebrow.

  "Wouldn't you?"

  "Do you get a lot of vampires around here?" I touched the back of my neck, hoping that Alex would pick up on the signal I was trying to give him. Charm him. Enchant him. Do whatever it takes so we can get out of here. I felt like I was screaming it, but the word seemed to sail past Alex.

  "Not as many as we used to. One or two every year, maybe." He spoke very matter-of-factly, as if he were describing the weather.

  "And, uh--" I cleared my throat. "And what do you do with these vampires?"

  "Me? Nothing. Ain't my business. They come, they go, that's it. Maybe a few people go missing, but that happens all the time. Kids run away from home. Wives leave husbands. Husbands leave wives. People die from perfectly normal homicide." He shrugged his beefy shoulders. "Long as they don't bother me and mine, I don't care."

  "So, if someone came in here and asked if you'd seen two people like, oh, let's say us, just for the sake of example. If someone came in here asking about us, what would you tell them?"

  "Depends. What you going to do about my door?"

  As it turned out, the worst thing that happened to the door was some of the paint was flaked off and there were fingerprints (and forehead prints) on the glass. Alex took a rag and some window cleaner and took care of that.

  Once Alex had done his penance, the three of us sat down at a booth with a pot of coffee and several very stale doughnuts. "Tell us about this Howler thing," I said while Alex loaded his coffee with powdered creamer and sugar.

  Charles "Buck" Whitmore spread his fat fingers on the table. "I don't know what else to tell you. It's only at night, usually after two in the morning when the bars are closed. If you're out by yourself it can't do much to you. Might make you go look for a fight, but if you can't find one, it's got to move on. It don't ever seem to go much outside this area. Like I ain't never heard of it in Dundalk or even Little Italy. Just mostly Fell's Point and Canton, right down here at the water. Maybe up at the park."

  "D
o you have a map of the area?"

  "There might be a street map in the cabinet under the cash register somewhere." He started to unwedge himself from the bench, but Alex stood first.

  "I'll look. You talk." Alex said.

  Alex found one that was fairly old. Buildings had been put up or torn down in the time since the map was drawn, but the street names were the same. That was fine with me. I wasn't looking for an address; I was establishing a territory.

  "You seriously want to go after this thing?" Alex whispered in my ear while Buck marked off boundaries on the map.

  "We can't leave this thing roaming around," I responded just as quietly. One of the first things we learned while working together is that we've both got extra-sensitive hearing. The lowest mumble comes through loud and clear, almost telepathically, especially when we're sitting very close together.

  "Sure we can!" Alex used his chin to gesture at the map. "Look, it's not a big area at all. Easy enough to avoid!"

  "We can avoid it, but what about the people that live here?"

  "They've lived with it for who knows how long. They'll be fine."

  "I can't do it. I can't work like that."

  "We've got Xyj'Ru to worry about. We've got a key that needs a lock. My life is in danger already and you want to stop a bunch of dicks from beating each other up on the weekends. You know what your problem is, Nicky? You're too fucking noble."

  Alex actually shouted 'You're too fucking noble'. Buck looked up and squinted at us. "D'you mind?" He shoved the map across the table, turning it to face us. "That's it. Roughly. Some places I just don't know no one, or just never heard nothing, so I can't be sure."

  It was a relatively small area, running from the water to the far side of the park, and to something he'd marked "The Underpass" to the edge of downtown, right where an interstate began. Very clear boundaries, at least. This didn't mean it couldn't leave the marked area. As Buck had so elegantly stated, "he never heard nothing". But it gave us an idea of where we were likely to find it.

  The next step would be finding out what "it" really was.

  Actually, I tell a lie. The next step was finding somewhere to sleep. The next, next step would be finding out what it really was, after a good night's (well, morning's) rest and something other than stale doughnuts and burnt coffee to eat. Buck offered us crash space in his house. The "club basement," he said, would be the perfect place for us.

  We waited at the restaurant a few more hours. Alex swept up and did a few dishes. I counted cracks in the Formica tabletop and used the undetermined stains on the ceiling like stars, creating constellations. I was just about to name The Great Splot of Understanding when the door opened and a scrawny guy in jeans and a T-shirt came in and called a greeting to Buck.

  "Awright, Bucky," he said as he went around behind the counter and tied on an apron. He was so skinny the belt wrapped around his waist twice before tying in the back. "Quiet night?"

  "Yeah, 'cept for these two. Howler made a pass at 'em. Let them wait here until the sun started coming up. We'll get out from under your feet."

  Buck stepped carefully to the sidewalk, already wheezing with the exertion of going down a step. I hoped he didn't live far, because I didn't think Alex and I could carry him home. Not even with above-average strength on our side.

  It was not a long walk. Just up to the far corner, around, and two blocks toward the park. We were about one block East of where we bumped into Howler. No wonder he knew so much about it.

  Alex and I hung back while he carefully worked his way up the three steps to his front door. The screen door wasn't locked. The storm door behind it opened into a vestibule. There was one more door ñ wood with stained glass ñ that opened into the house, almost directly into the stairs to the second floor.

  Buck went to the kitchen and poured a glass of water. "Want anything?" our host offered.

  "Just sleep," I said. I knew Alex was hungry again - it must've been minutes since he ate ñ but I wanted to rest and then get started looking for Howler. Buck indicated the stairs to the basement.

  We marveled at the utter tackiness of the room. Shag carpet. Dark, wood paneling. A drop, fiberboard ceiling. The sofa was brown, ugly, itchy, and pulled out into a double bed. There was a yellow and brown afghan and several home-crocheted pillows "decorating" it.

  I'm sure there were other crimes against nature and interior design, but I didn't notice most of them and didn't care about the rest. I set to work moving furniture and pulling out the sofa while Alex took a long look around.

  "I was worried this might be a trap," he said. "That he'd get us here and then sneak down and kill us. Now I think I'd like to die rather than wake up and see this again."

  I kicked off my shoes and crawled into the bed. "That can be arranged."

  ***

  Buck didn't kill either of us and I still didn't get around to killing Alex. Instead, we slept for a few hours and then went back into Fell's Point. I'd seen a sign offering free wi-fi in several of the bars, so I took my computer and we settled in for an afternoon of drinking and research. Two good things that go great together.

  Alex sat across from me, using my mobile phone to play games, asking and answering questions as needed. He was also in charge of keeping the beers and snacks coming.

  The plan was simple. Now that we knew what to look for, all we'd have to do is wait for it to go hunting, then draw it into one of the iron balls. The trouble would be figuring out where it was hunting. While the territory it covered wasn't huge, it was still more than two men could cover on foot.

  Driving, we'd miss feeling it. We had to be outside, where we could be in it.

  When Buck went back to work that night, I sat down at the counter and outlined my plan.

  "Won't work," he said as he dumped fries into the wire basket.

  "Why not?"

  "It's touched you once. I don't think it's ever gone for the same people twice. Maybe it can't. Maybe it only gets one shot and then your body don't fall for it again."

  "Demonic immunity," Alex said. He was watching the progress of the fries into the hot oil. He was practically drooling.

  "So, we need bait." I shrugged.

  Buck shook his head and shook the basket of fries. "Don't even look at me. I had my run-in with Howler about six years ago. 'S why I don't mind working here."

  The idea of roping anyone else into this, especially when we didn't know anyone in the city, was out of the question. That left only one option.

  "We'll just have to wander around until we see a fight, I guess. Maybe get a little portable police scanner. See where the emergency services are going and hope we can get there in time."

  This time, Alex shook his head. "Remember what happened to us? By the time the cops come, Howler will be gone. He takes off once there's blood spilled."

  My simple plan suddenly got a lot more complicated. We had no choice but to roam around and hope we'd be in the right place at the right time. I slapped a five dollar bill on the counter. "Give Alex those fries in a to-go cup, and add two sodas. We're going to be out a while. We'll meet you back here at the end of your shift."

  Buck flipped a salute and dumped the fry basket into the warming tray. He piled fresh, salty fries into a foam clamshell and filled two waxed paper cups with cola. "Good luck, guys."

  "So how come you trust him?" Alex asked through a mouthful of fries.

  "Don't really have much of a choice, do I? He knows what you are and he knows what we're looking for. He's nice enough. He's gone out of his way for us for no reason. I get a good vibe from him, too."

  "You just operate on instinct, don't you? You just sniff out who's good and who's evil?"

  "And what's a demon, and who's a vampire." I shot him a sideways glance. "It hasn't failed me yet."

  "You ever kill anyone by mistake? Like exorcise someone and have them die, or wolf out and..." he made a clawing gesture in the empty air.

  My face got hot. This wasn't a conversation I was read
y to have, but since he brought it up, I figured it was best to get things out in the open. I took a deep breath, and then exhaled slowly. "Actually, yes. I killed my father."

  Alex stopped walking and stared open-mouthed at me. "The fuck you say!"

  I spread my hands and shrugged. "You asked."

  "How? When?" He backed up a step. "Why?"

  "Come on, Alex."

  We walked into the park and up a hill. Eventually we stood next to a pagoda that seemed very out of place in the middle of an American city. Alex wandered around in small circles, staring up at the sky. I sat down and leaned against the fence that surrounded the pagoda. I lit a cigarette and watched the smoke rise and pull apart in the breeze.