Dragonproof - 7. Chapter 7

The north end of town featured single-family homes with small back yards and postage stamps of green in the front. There was perhaps five feet between houses, unlike the row houses downtown, which tended to share walls. The homes were very similar in build. Though some were two story and had been converted to multi-family homes; most of them were single family.

The home in question wasn't difficult to find, given the literal cloud forming over it. If one were to picture a cartoon character with a cloud over its head, following them – this would be the same idea, just over a house. As I left the shared sidewalk and approached the front door, I felt the air pressure drop the way you do on a warm day when a storm is coming.

I had debated whether I should try to convince the owner they were in supernatural danger or if I should just try to nonchalantly set up my traps and hide until this thing popped. While I debated, the front door opened, and a thin man in work pants and a tee shirt looked at me, up at the sky and back to me.

“You see this shit?” he asked, looking back up and to either side of his home, presumably at the building thunderhead.

“Yeah,” I said. Well, fuck it. Things went SO well with Connor. “So, remember how your boat pretty much got sunk the other night? And that screaming you thought you heard?”

His eyes narrowed. “How the fuck'd you know that?”

“Newspaper.”

“There were no reporters.”

“Police blotter? Online blog? There's cell phone video.” Probably.

He turned his gaze to me and frowned. “I still don't know what the fuck happened.” He leaned forward a bit. “ The fucking boat was covered in seaweed. I mean...over a hundred miles from the ocean, right? Seaweed?”

“Yeah. So...did you, like, see anything?”

He shrugged. “Saw a bunch of things. Boat – like a rowboat – cracked in half. Like...half of it was gone, like some Jaws kind of thing just ate the other half, you know?”

I grunted. “Anything else?”

His eyes got a bit wider, and he said, “Lot of rain, man. Wind was whipping – came outta nowhere. Couldn't really see much.”

I rubbed my jaw.

“Hey, what are you here for, exactly? I just opened my door and-”

A scream ripped out through the fading light – though it was much darker under the big cloud over this guy's house.

“Oh, fuck,” he said in the silence left in the air after the scream had died. “That was the sound we heard.”

“Okay. I need to get to work,” I said, pulling a jar of oil from my backpack and a small, flat paintbrush. “Is anyone else inside? You should gather up. We'll try and fend this thing off.”

“What thing?” he demanded.

“Dad? What's going on?” A girl appeared behind the man, and I did a double take. It was the girl from the other day that made that poor kid come in his pants a few times.

“Oh, it's you,” I said without thinking about it first.

“How do you know my daughter?” He whipped his head back toward his daughter. “How do you know him?”

“I don't!” she protested, looking at me with suspicion.

I rolled my shoulders and looked back to the adult. “Look, I don't have time for convincing. I have to mark the traps-” and I was interrupted again by the sudden rain coming down. I mean, like one moment nothing, and another moment it was a fucking downpour. Not your everyday raining cats and dogs. More like goats and elephants. “Shit!” I exclaimed, hurrying under the cover of the entryway.

“The fuck?” the guy said, poking his head out and looking up and then across the street. “It's only raining on our side of the street.”

“It's only over your house,” I told him. That was immediately followed up by that horrible scream – nothing natural about it. I looked at the girl. “Okay. Have you gotten into anything weird lately?”

“Hey!”

The girl backed up a step. “Like what?”

I held a finger up to the parent, but he slapped my hand aside. “Who the fuck you think you are, buddy?”

“The person trying to help you,” I snapped. I looked at his daughter. “Your daughter has some talent, but she messed with something and got the attention of a Draugen, which is more strange when you think about all the weird creatures that have been terrorizing people lately.”

“A...what? What are you talking about? And what's making that noise?”

Staring at the girl, I said, “ A Draugen. It's mostly known for guarding burial sites.” The girl's eyes got a bit wider. “What did you take?” I asked her.

She opened her mouth and shook her head a little, but she must have some kind of history, because her father actually looked at her when I asked what she'd taken, and he caught her expression.

“Are you stealing again? God damn it, Char!”

“Fight later,” I snapped and stepped into the home. Char – probably short for Charlene – looked past me, and her eyes grew wider. I didn't bother to try to look; I just whirled around to slam the door shut – but I still saw it. As undead things go, it was fucking awful. A long beard, sunken eyes so deep there may not have been eyes. The body, it looked male, was covered in junk; if I had to guess, I'd say it looked like it walked up the Hudson River all the way from the Atlantic Ocean to our little city, with various bits of dead vegetation and detritus being accumulated on the way. The thing screamed that other worldly scream and rushed the door, slamming into it as I got it closed without much time to spare.

The door rattled in its frame, and I muttered darkly about talking to Hugo about the definition of 'doing quite well' in these situations. I slung my pack from my shoulders and pulled out a bottle of eldritch oil and a flat paintbrush. Kneeling down I started to mark the hardwood floor.

“The fuck are you doing? I'm calling the cops,” the guy said. I ignored him and looked to his daughter.

“What did you take?”

She opened her mouth a bit and then closed it. The door rattled again, and I painted faster, then set the brush aside and pressed my fingers to the oil, muttering the spell that enabled this particular trap. It was identical to the one I'd laid for the Babaroga, and I figured since these things were likely made up from the magic of the stones that VanHouten had made, they'd likely just be ectoplasm that these traps would disassemble. Trap properly energized, I looked up again.

“Okay, never mind that right now – back door? I need to put a trap down.”

“Back here,” she said, and I stood to follow her.

“Hang on, buddy! I don't even – damn it, Char!”

Dear old dad got no farther, as the door burst open behind us. The jamb had shattered, and the door stood open to the wet nasty that was standing on the stoop with a backdrop of a solid wall of water, the rain was so hard.

I should have brought my staff.

The thing screamed again, and I dropped to my knees, the ear-splitting sound making it feel like my head would burst. Why hadn't I grabbed my staff? I struggled to focus, to try and at least prepare a shield that might act like it had earlier, but that random bitch Lady Luck seemed to step in just then. The beast stopped screaming and lurched through the doorway right into my trap. Oh, it was gross, sure. Melted like a candle on time-lapse. In just a minute or so there was nothing left but ectoplasm mixing with the oil from the trap.

“What the fuck was that? Whatthefuckwasthat?”

Well, dad was going to lose his shit.

“Look,” I said. “We don't have time for a lot of explanations. Do you hear that? The rain stopped?”

His eyes were bugged out, but he did glance through the open doorway, and indeed, the rain had stopped. He nodded at me, though it wasn't smooth – more like a rusty robot whose neck hinge was sticking a bit.

“Okay. That means it's gone for now. There's a possibility it'll come back, though, so we need to deal with that first.” I looked away from him and at the girl. “You and I need to talk.”

Her tongue pushed around inside her mouth, and then she glanced at the seating in the living room. Deciding that her father wasn't in a frame of mind to make any decisions, I moved to an open chair and waited for her to take a seat on the couch. Her dad trailed behind, looking confused.

“I'd ask about other things, but I'm just going to focus on the issue at hand, okay?” I said to her.

Her eyes were a bit wide, but she pressed her lips together and nodded.

“So. There's been an issue around the city with all these strange, mythical creatures showing up. The thing is, this one seems to be drawn to you. From what I've been able to figure out, it usually has to do with a burial site. Have you had...anything to do with anything like that?” I held up a hand to forestall her protesting. “I'm not the cops, and whatever we do here isn't about judging. Let's just figure out the issue and solve what's in front of us.”

She glanced at her dad and then back to me. “I found some...information about a woman that...it seems like she was connected to occult things here. I found where she was buried.”

It wasn't uncommon to look at the dead or their burial sites for items of power or perhaps some written documentation – a spell book, for lack of a better term. Or the remains of the deceased might have power lingering that could be extracted or adapted, something along the lines of harvesting a living caster's power. I nodded. “Okay, that makes some kind of sense to me. What did you find?”

She opened her mouth and glanced at her dad again before looking back to me. “It was a mausoleum. I went a few times at night and got into her...tomb. She had a necklace on. It felt...there was some power in it.” She reached inside the top of her shirt and brought out a stone in a cheap setting, something a bit bigger than the one I had in my apartment. Shit. That meant there was another stone out there besides the one I had and the one she had. Connor had said as much – one had been sold at the store before I'd gotten there. How many stones had survived?

“Uh. Have you had that thing pressed against your skin?” I eyed the stone.

She swallowed. “Yes.”

I tried not to sigh. “Okay. Can you just...put it on the table here?” I pointed to the coffee table between us.

“You stole from a corpse?” her dad burst forth suddenly. “Charlene! What the fuck?”

“Let's deal with the grave robbing thing later,” I said to him. Looking back to her I asked her again to put the necklace on the table. She slowly lifted it, the stone reflecting light dully, and set it on the table.

“My kid is robbing the dead, and you want to wait?”

I stared at him. “We have some funky supernatural shit going on. Right now, we need to get that dealt with, yeah? Unless you want that damn thing to show up again.”

He stared. “It's gone. Isn't it?”

“For now. There are no guarantees.” I looked away from him and back to the stone. Like the one I had, it wasn't a great example of a gemstone. It didn't refract light like it might in a commercial, but maybe that's a more modern thing. This might be more like something you dug out of the ground, prior to polishing and cutting.

I looked up at the girl and finally did sigh. “Charlene, here's the deal for now. I have a gem like this. A guy with really weird inclinations did some awful things to make these gems. Problem is, the magic he used to make them is breaking down, and the things they used to store are leaking out. The only part I can't make sense of right now – and I might never figure out – is why this particular folk tale is coming after you. I don't know why others were targeted, but...okay. I'm going to examine this thing and see if it's in the same state of decay. We'll go from there.”

“You're not saying you're taking it, right?” she asked with suspicion and perhaps fear. I think she wanted the power it had but was fearful of the situation she found herself in.

“Trust me, I wish these things never came into my life,” I said firmly. She didn't look like she completely believed me, but I didn't need that. Just her cooperation – or lack of interference. I let out my breath slowly and worked to clear my head. Randomly, Connor's face popped into my mind, looking confused when I showed up at his store earlier in the day.

No time for that.

“What're you doing?” Char asked.

I opened my eyes and sighed. “So, this stone is an imbued item. It's holding energy, which is what you're feeling when you handle it. The guy that made these imbued items killed people to make them, or at least to fill them with energy originally. His next attempt was to use the strength of memories. These things steal memories, using them like...life force, I guess? Storing the power of those memories. The thing is, the binding process he used to make these is breaking down. Make sense so far?”

“I mean...I understand what you're saying, even though it's...creepy and...hard to believe.”

“Yeah. Well, given you're a witch and hiding that from everyone, you should have some kind of belief in this. I mean...you broke into a grave for a relic, right?”

She licked her lips and glanced at her dad and then back to me. “I mean, yeah. So, this thing is...leaking? Like, will it explode or something?”

Her father kept moving his gaze to whomever was speaking, so I decided to put him out of my thoughts unless I had to deal with him.

“That's one scenario, for sure. The first one the...creator of this stone made exploded when he tried to extract the energy inside. Leaking seems more controlled in theory, but we're seeing these lethal manifestations in the meantime.” I thought for a moment. “I may have a way to deal with them, but I can't be sure.”

She glanced over her shoulder at the front door and then back to me. “What about that trap you put by the door? That's what you called it, right?”

I nodded slowly, thinking. “Yeah, it's a trap for things that are manifested on this plane – things that don't exist without magic and focus to create and sustain them.” I thought again. “So, this Draugen...the trap can beat it, but it might not be due to the stone, exactly. At least...it's some weird coincidence that the stone called up a European folk tale, unless...”

I wonder where Hugo's mother was from?

“So...would the trap work or not?”

I shook my head side to side. “Can't be sure. It'd trap whatever was manifested – once – but these things aren't walking out of the stone.” I sighed. “See, there's two ways to look at this. Either the stone you have is manifesting all these monsters from folklore, or it's a coincidence of some kind and the other manifestations are separate from yours.”

“You keep saying 'other manifestations'. Like what?”

I let out a breath. “I've been killing, basically, monsters in the city. A few nights ago it was a troll. He killed a guy before I got him down. I think the monsters are tied to a stone like this one,” I said, pointing to the one on the table. “I got one from a shop downtown and the, um, clerk told me that there had been another one like it that had sold already. The one I have contains memories, and one of them leaked right in my apartment.”

She stared at me for a moment with her mouth open. “So. Wait. Okay.” She took a breath. “If my stone is causing this, then it has to be contained until we can figure out the problem. Right? I mean...but if it's not - causing these problems - then that means that thing will come back again because it's attracted to this stone.”

I bobbed my head. “It might not be the stone; it might have been caused by the burial site being disturbed. We might be able to put things on hold if we get that stone back into the mausoleum. That might buy us some time.”

She looked away for a moment, and I assumed she was thinking. I appraised her as she did, though I felt her answer would be telling in terms of what kind of a person she could be. It seemed like she was abusing her power right now – trying to make that guy horny for her, for instance.

It started to rain outside.

“Oh, damn,” I said, gaining my feet and opening the front door. The rain was just starting, but it for sure wasn't raining across the street. “Is there a basement?”

“Uh, yeah. Shit, does that mean it's coming back?” she asked, her voice shaking.

“Are you fucking serious?” her dad asked, looking to me.

“Yeah, serious as a heart attack. Okay, let me grab my bag, and let's hit the basement.” Char grabbed the stone from the table, and I took my bag with my brush and oil and followed them down steep wooden steps into a cinderblock basement. At the bottom of the steps, I opened the jar of oil and started to brush the symbols for the trap.

“Can I help?” Char asked.

I shook my head. “I can show you at some point, but right now I just need to get this thing down.” Outside the sound of rain coming down intensified.

“Don't the neighbors think this is weird?” her dad muttered.

“They might, but they probably just figure it's a weird weather thing and stop thinking about it from there.” I glanced at his daughter and went back to my work. “There's a lot we'll tell ourselves to avoid something we think can't have any real significance.”

I finished up the last of the oil and pressed my fingers into the trap, willing its purpose into being. The scream from the Draugen rent the air, and the dad shook his head.

“Can't anyone else hear that?”

I thought for a moment. “Good question. They probably can, but they'd just think it was a wild animal or something mechanical, like I think you did when you heard it in your boat?”

He lifted his chin a bit. “How did you know that?”

“Police,” I said offhandedly. “Now I – what the hell?”

The other two turned to look where I was focused and I'm guessing were just as confused. There was a young guy, nice looking, with a regretful look on his face. “I'm sorry, Char. I'm really not trying to be a bad guy here. I just...I don't feel like that for you.”

“What the fuck?” Char said softly. “Charlie?”

The boy turned a bit, focusing on her. “Yeah. I mean. I'm really trying to do the right thing, Char. Really.”

I glanced at the girl. Her father, seemingly forgetting we had a supernatural death machine within moments of attacking us – probably – was instead focused on this boy and Char's apparent interest in him. That's probably because that was a problem he recognized versus one he couldn't quite grasp. I don’t think he was making rational decisions just then; he was just riding out the weirdness, because he didn't know what else to do.

“Char. Charlene,” I said, speaking her name firmly and getting a bit louder. She turned to look at me. “This is a memory. It's from the stone you've been wearing. Remember I told you about the memories?”

She looked back at 'Charlie' and said, “I don't remember this, so...it went into the stone?”

“Yeah. Working theory is the stronger the memory, the more likely the stone stores the energy.”

“Charlene, please. Don't cry,” the memory said.

“What do I do? I can't leave him like that,” she whispered.

I let out a sigh. “Last time the owner of the memory just...touched it. It might hurt, because you're going to remember this, now.”

“Who the fuck is Charlie?” her dad demanded.

Char ignored him and with a quick glance at me, went to Charlie and tried to hug him. The memory brightened and then seemed to flow into her. She covered her mouth, holding back a sob. It was sad, yes, but we had more immediate concerns as the door overhead banged inward.

“Shit? Is that thing back?” her dad exclaimed, looking up at the floorboards.

Wet, heavy steps let us track the progress of the Draugen as it moved steadily through the house, making its way inexorably to the basement door. Water began dripping down the basement stairs, and the creature stepped down with a wet squelch. It moved steadily to the small landing and looked to us. It hadn't changed from the previous encounter, though it did appear to be a bit more cautious. I'd hoped it would just come down the stairs and go right into my trap, but it seemed to have gained a bit of awareness – something like the Babaroga had. That old girl had avoided my trap by scaling the building. Or maybe it had been dumb luck.

The creature took a step down and then leapt, screaming that god-awful, rusty nails on sheet metal sound that will probably give me nightmares. The girl made a quick motion, and I tried to scream at her to stop, but it was too late. Her unfocused magic blasted a part of the stairs into splinters, throwing jagged wood through the space and leaving a hole in the wall just beyond.

“You have no focus! Don't just fling magic around like that!” I snapped and picked up a laundry hamper full of clothes and pressed the open end to my chest as I rushed the creature. I hit it just off center, and it spun, bounced off the basement wall, and fell, the tips of its fingers landing in the trap and sloughing off into clear ectoplasm. It acted kind of like a zombie, in that it wasn't in pain, and just moved back to its feet. I shifted, thinking I'd charge it again, but it slapped at the hamper – which was an unwieldy shield – and when I tried swinging it back toward the creature, it was on me.

It was cold. So cold to the touch. I felt magic go off again, and another hole appeared randomly in the basement wall, but I didn't have time to yell at the girl again. The thing was squeezing my neck, and I was fighting to breathe, punching the creature in the head with seemingly no effect. Wet vegetation was sliding against my face, partially blocking my vision, but that wouldn't matter much longer if I didn't get this thing off me.

Dimly I heard a yell, and I got yanked as the Draugen's fingers slipped from my neck. I tried to sit, and spots swam before my eyes. I heard a wet smack to one side, and I turned toward the sound, my eyesight slowly clearing.

“Motherfucker,” Char's dad said, slowly standing up. “Christ, that stinks!”

I swallowed and gained my feet. There was ectoplasm on the floor inside the trap – I think the dad tackled the Draguen and landed in the trap, more or less. “Thanks,” I said, my voice scratchy.

He put his hands on his hips and looked at me, nodding. “Least I could do.” He held a hand out. “Vern. No fucking clue what's going on, but God damn.”

I shook his hand. “Nico Bosch. I can explain another time, but we have to get moving before that thing comes back.”

He sniffed and ran the back of his hand under his nose. “Figured it wasn't over. I do want to know what's going on – and why Charlie Rowe was in my basement and then wasn't.”

“Yeah. I'll give you the short version on our way.”

“Okay. On our way where?”

“We have to get that trinket safely stored back where it was,” I replied.

“But it’s mine,” Char said, reaching for the stone around her neck.

I turned toward her, but didn't approach.

“Charlene! That thing is gonna kill us!” her dad exclaimed.

“Char,” I said quietly. She turned her gaze to me. “There are ways to focus your magic. I can teach you to control it and be smart with it. Imbued items are...well, they're dangerous. This one might get you killed. We put it back, and then we can talk about honing your magic so you don't blow yourself or anyone else up trying to learn, okay?”

Her tone suspicious, she said, “Blow myself up?”

I crossed my arms. “Wouldn't be the first kid to turn themselves into red paste.”

“I need some damn explanations, but can we get moving? Do that in the car?” Vern demanded.

“I'm ready,” I said and rubbed my neck. “Thing had a grip on it.”

“Fine.” Char moved quickly past us and up the stairs two at a time, navigating past the part she'd blown to splinters.

“Damn kid,” Vern said and rubbed the side of his face. “Every day seems harder than the last. Nothing works for discipline. Now – what? She's a witch? What the fuck do I do with some out of this world shit like that?”

I patted his shoulder. “You get help. I'm going to help.”

He shook his head. “Well, you just became my new best friend if you can teach me to understand my daughter.”

I smiled as we headed for the stairs. “I wouldn't go that far. I'm not a miracle worker.”

We piled into the family sedan, and Char explained where the cemetery was. A city this old has more than a few old cemeteries, and I was kind of impressed that she'd managed to figure out where this person was laid to rest. Damn odd that it was a local woman who was into the occult that Char had dug up, literally and figuratively.

“Char, what was the name of the woman you discovered was into the occult, locally?”

“Simone Bledet,” she said uncertainly.

“Hm.”

“Hey, someone explain the whole 'Charlie in my basement' thing, please?” Vern asked.

I sighed. “There was a man named Charles VanHouten a few hundred years ago that was trying to imbue certain stones with power,” I said, figuring I'd go for the short version. “To gather power, they'd steal strong memories from whoever wore the stone.”

“What? Why?” he asked.

“He thought that memories are slices of life and life is power – and that the power of life could be transferred. He wanted to live forever.”

Vern looked at me and back to the road. “How does that get to Charlie?”

I glanced at Char, but she was looking out the window and fingering the stone. Turning back toward Vern, I said, “The necklace Char has contains a stone. She had a... strong memory of Charlie turning her down. The stone took the memory.” I licked my lips. “Thing is, the threads of power that created the stone are weakening, so it's leaking even as it tries to fulfill its primary function of stealing memories.”

“Jimminy Cricket,” Vern said quietly.

“I didn't remember,” she said quietly.

I turned to look at her, but she was still looking out the window. “Did the conversation we saw happen before I saw you the other day?”

She turned to look at me. “Yeah.”

I nodded and looked forward again.

“What happened the other day?” Vern asked. “Or do I want to know?”

I sighed. “Vern, you ever have a girl you crushed on as a boy? Wish like anything you could change her mind, make her see you standing there?”

“Yeah,” he replied, voice laced with suspicion.

“Well, your daughter feels that way, too. Only she has some power, and so she tried to make him see her, only...it didn't work quite like she planned.”

Vern looked straight ahead. “Okay. I think we can stop there.” He glanced at me. “You can teach her? So she doesn't hurt herself or anyone else?”

“I can teach her so she doesn't do it by accident,” I amended. “Sometimes I hurt people and I mean it.”