Marshall Conrad: A Superhero Tale Read online

  “I goings now, okay? Wife is going to be pretty mad,” said the Ogre.

  “All right, Dennis,” Ruby nodded. “Go home and stay in your G-D cave because if Grim Geoffrey finds out about our bargain, you know what will happen.”

  The Ogre nodded and made a slicing motion at his neck with a hairy finger, and then looked at me. “You stick to Ruby, Mister Vanguards. She good people.”

  “Yeah, I’ll get right on that,” I muttered.

  The creature stumbled off into the shadows and bounded into the air with a giant leap, then disappeared into the night. Ruby pulled her pewter flask out of her purse and took a slug.

  “Okay, that was weird,” I said, still wondering if what had just happed was real. “What now?”

  Ruby’s frown deepened as she stared at the shallow grave in the distance. “We split up,” said Ruby. “You consult with your witch friend and I’ll leave an anonymous tip about the body.”

  “And then?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said grimly. “Right now I’m just not sure at all.”

  Chapter 21

  Stella Weinberg was snoring loudly in the leather armchair next to the front counter with a large gilded book entitled Chroniclus on her lap. The Curiosity Nook was open for business, but Stella was out like a light. Were there any negative ramifications associated with waking a sleeping witch?

  “Stella, wake up. We need to talk,” I whispered, as I gently nudged her shoulder.

  She didn’t budge.

  I decided to grab the book and read up about the cataclysm that occurred in Outremont, and as my fingers brushed the cover, a sharp electrical jolt surged up my arm as an iron grip fasten around my wrist.

  Stella yawned.”You’re lucky that book is set on stun.”

  “I wanted to have a peek at what you were reading. No harm intended,” I said, rubbing my arm.

  “You look like you slept in your car,” she said, with a stretch.

  “Thanks, I’ve been up to my ears since we last talked so you’ll forgive my haggard appearance.”

  Stella got up from the chair and walked behind the counter with Chroniclus under her arm. Stella had a worried look on her face.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Gee, where do I start?” Stella asked, sarcastically. “You haven’t seen Storch, have you? He’s been gone since yesterday.”

  “Funny you should mention that,” I mused. “I have concerns about our cat.”

  “What kinds of concerns?”

  I thought about how I should convey my suspicions about Walter’s loyalty and immediately felt like an idiot because the mere fact that I was even contemplating that a cat might be a double agent seemed insane.

  “Your face is betraying your feelings, Conrad,” she said. “Out with it.”

  “All right then,” I said, cautiously. “As you know, I don’t know a damned thing about your unseen world—”

  “Wait a minute,” she snapped. “It isn’t my unseen world. Don’t take that tone with me, pal.”

  “Fine,” I muttered. “You’ll forgive me if I’m just a tiny bit flustered.”

  “Why? If you exist with all of your remarkable abilities, it stands to reason that similar beings exist, even those whose area code isn’t listed anywhere in this realm.”

  “Cripes, I’m doing the best I can,” I growled.

  “Do better,” Stella shot back.

  “Okay, this isn’t going well. Let’s start over.”

  “Good plan.”

  Stella crossed her arms and gave me a stern look as I decided to take a more diplomatic tone.

  “Walter—Storch, I saw him last night.”

  “Go on.”

  “Have you read today’s paper? About the third body?”

  “Yes, that’s where Storch wound up.”

  “That’s right—I’d like to know why your familiar hasn’t reported to you,” I said. “I mean, he should be keeping you informed, shouldn’t he? Walter wouldn’t be keeping information from you, right?”

  She made a huge effort of rolling her eyes as she shook her head in frustration.

  “Are you daft?”

  I blinked and gave her a confused look. “What do you mean?”

  “Look, I am a witch, and you aren’t,” she exhaled. “I have a familiar, and we’re paired for life. That’s how it works.”

  “Yeah, but he’s not here, and before last night, I hadn’t seen him since—”

  “Since you were lying on your couch with a sleeping mask over your face,” she said.

  “How did you know that?”

  “Storch is my familiar. I see what he sees—right from his eyes and into my mind. I thought I’d already established this fact.”

  “So you know about last night?” I asked, half-wondering if she’d seen me in the nude.

  “Yes, I know about last night. I know you weren’t alone, and I know you ran into some unpleasant company,” she said in a businesslike voice.

  “Our cat didn’t happen to see the killer, did he?”

  “Nope. If he did, our cat would be dead and I would probably be next on the hit list.”

  I looked at the copy of Chroniclus under her arm and decided to inquire if the book contained any clues about what was going to happen in Greenfield.

  “You mentioned you had to consult with the elders, and that Chroniclus would offer some insight. Any news?”

  “We’ll get to that,” she said, as she placed the large volume on the countertop. “Why don’t we compare notes first. What have you got so far?”

  “Well, you obviously saw me on my couch,” I said.

  “Yeah, what was that all about? You looked like you were on your deathbed.”

  “Oh, just more crippling visions of bad juju in Greenfield. When it ended, more than twenty-four hours had passed. Someone from the Guild came to my door.”

  “That’s who you were with last night?”

  “Yes, Ruby Thiessen. She’s a Chieftain.”

  Stella spun around and glared at me.

  “The Ruby Thiessen?” she said, sounding less than enthused.

  “Yup. Apparently she’s been assigned as my sidekick. Do you know her?”

  Stella’s face darkened and she dug her nails into the countertop. “Sidekick, huh?” she said in a suspicious voice. “I guess she must have really pissed off someone in the Guild.”

  “She told me they were stretched thin and she knows everything about Grim Geoffrey.”

  “Grim Geoffrey!” she gasped. “Jumpin’ dying Moses, that’s our guy!”

  Stella started leafing through the pages of Chroniclus as I sipped my coffee and waited for her to offer yet another startling revelation about the unseen world. I was troubled by her reaction to news that Ruby Thiessen was on the scene. Clearly, at some point in the past, Stella Weinberg and Ruby Thiessen had known each other, and it was obvious they’d had a falling out. It was only a matter of time until the two met, and I wasn’t looking forward to the potential fireworks that would ensue.

  “Here it is.” She spun the book around for me to get a better look. “This page tells you everything you need to know about him. This is starting to make sense.”

  “Why?” I scanned the page.

  “Grim Geoffrey is a Púca, but he’s not your average run-of-the-mill Púca.”

  “Yeah, Ruby confirmed that to me earlier. She told me she’s had a run-in with him in the past.”

  “Grim Geoffrey has a nasty reputation for consuming the souls of those poor saps who get in his way. Few survive to tell the tale.”

  “She told me he’s a hybrid. Something about being part demon and part Púca,” I said, as I examined a morbid woodcut showing faeries impaled on pikes. “Ruby mentioned that his interest in the near world has a lot to do with real estate.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Something about civil strife in the unseen world—battles for land and followers,” I said, carefully scrutinizing Stella’s response.
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br />   “She’s half right.”

  “Oh?”

  “There are many beings in the unseen world who’d love nothing more than to relocate to our realm,” she said. “It’s one reason witches are still around.”

  “What about the other part? The civil conflict in the unseen world?”

  “It mimics what occurs daily in the near world,” she said.

  “I’m not following you.”

  “I don’t expect you to understand,” she said, closing Chroniclus. “The near and unseen worlds are connected through living energy that is responsible for what happens here and there. Both worlds exist in the same physical place, and both experience similar conflagrations.”

  “So the unseen world has experienced war throughout history?”

  “Has there ever been a period in human history when a war wasn’t raging somewhere?” she asked.

  “I’m not an academic, but I’ll say no.”

  “Why do those conflicts occur?”

  “Because of everything from greed to religion, I guess,” I said, still unsure of where she was heading.

  “Because the near and unseen worlds share the same physical space, good and evil binds both worlds to similar fates but for different reasons,” she continued. “War exists in both realms because war is the supreme manifestation of darkness. The difference, however, is that our realm does not exist in a permanent state of war. It’s a way of life in the unseen world”

  “You’ve lost me,” I said, shaking my head. “A way of life?”

  Stella shrugged. “When you wake up in the morning, do you brush your teeth?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do most people go to work every day and come home each night?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “That’s what I mean by it being a way of life,” she said. “While war and strife might be obscene to the casual near world observer, it’s how things are done in the unseen world.”

  “What happens when someone from the near world ventures into the unseen world?” I asked. “Ruby said that we have to find a portal to the Netherworld and confront Grim Geoffrey on his home turf.”

  Stella’s eyes darkened and she glared at me. “Oh really,” she chortled. “I recommend that you abandon that notion right now.”

  “Why?”

  “First off, you need dark magic to find and then open a portal, and dark magic is completely forbidden. Secondly, assuming that your immortal soul isn’t ripped to shreds by a journey through the portal, you’ll have to contend with entities I’d rather not even think about.”

  Her cryptic warning made my skin crawl. “Just what the hell am I supposed to do then?” I groaned. “Ruby says one thing, you say another. I’ve got faeries that live in a shoebox telling me that I’ve got the right stuff. A twelve foot tall ogre got his ass handed to him by a little old woman, our cat is missing, and I’d like to know why it’s suddenly my job to take this guy down when there are others who could do it.”

  Stella opened her mouth to say something when we heard a loud crash from the back of the store and a drunken female voice shouting obscenities.

  “That wouldn’t be...” Stella began.

  “Yep,” I interrupted, “It’s Ruby.”

  Chapter 22

  The many years I’d spent living in relative seclusion hadn’t prepared me for what might happen when two dominant female personalities clash, particularly if both of them possess inhuman abilities. Stella Weinberg, who I’d initially believed to be a nuisance, had proven herself as a valuable resource since she was the person who’d discovered the spiral engraved rocks scattered throughout town. She’d opened my eyes to the existence of the unseen world and committed herself to helping me prevent Grim Geoffrey from running amok during the summer solstice.

  Ruby, on the other hand, while abrasive and annoying, provided helpful insight into my abilities as a Vanguard. She was a battle-hardened veteran whose sarcastic bearing and sharp tongue reminded me that despite my feelings about the nature of my powers, the task of confronting and eventually defeating Grim Geoffrey was not insurmountable. Where I lacked confidence, Ruby made up for it in sheer determination.

  What I hadn’t prepared myself for was the possibility that these two headstrong and stubborn women would meet and combine their experiences to the task at hand when there was bad blood between them.

  “What the hell kind of broken-down G-D firetrap is this place, Conrad?” Ruby shouted, from the backroom of Stella’s store. “I’m tipped off about this place being of interest to Grim Geoffrey, so I peer through the skylight to take a look and the G-D roof crumbles beneath my G-D feet!”

  Before I could answer, Stella’s face flashed with intense anger as she grabbed a small green crystal from underneath the front counter and stormed down the hallway leading to the backroom.

  “Oh crap.” I groaned and hopped over the counter and raced after Stella. “This is going to be ugly.”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” Stella snarled. “Chieftain or not, she has no right to invade my sanctuary.”

  We emerged through the beaded partition that separated the hallway from the back of the store, and found Ruby Thiessen brushing broken chunks of roofing tar from her red pleated skirt. A large cotton duck backpack hung from her shoulders as she stood atop of a crumpled storage shelf that she’d landed on when she fell through the ceiling.

  “You call this dump a sanctuary?” Ruby complained as she stepped over a pile of overturned boxes. “Looks more like a supernatural fire hazard if you ask me.”

  “Nobody’s asking you, Ruby,” I warned, trying to keep the peace. “You could have come in through the front door, you know.”

  “If I had done that, your good friend Ms. Weinberg probably wouldn’t voluntarily disclose what she’s hiding in the back of her store, now would she?” Ruby’s eyes narrowed. “Nice little collection of odds and ends you’ve got here Castalia. Why don’t you tell Marshall why you’re holding out on him?”

  Stella was apoplectic. “I’ve had just about enough from you,” she growled, as she prepared to throw the green crystal at Ruby.

  “I wouldn’t toss that crystal at me, Castalia—I’ll be forced to shatter it with a clap of my hands and the energy that would be released is enough to smash the spell you’re using to keep that creature in here subdued.”

  I grabbed Stella’s arm just as she was about to throw the crystal at Ruby.

  “Wait a minute!” I shouted. “What the heck is she talking about?”

  “It’s none of your concern,” she snapped, as she tried to pull away. “Don’t listen to her.”

  Ruby cocked an eyebrow and her mouth formed a malicious smile. “Why, Ms. Weinberg, you haven’t told him, have you?”

  “Told me what?” I demanded. “What’s she talking about, Stella?”

  “Nothing, let go of me.” Stella snatched her wrist out of my hand.

  “All this time you’ve been presenting yourself as a wise old sage to our Vanguard friend and you haven’t told him why The Guild monitors all practitioners of magic,” Ruby said, flowing with sarcasm. “You probably didn’t mention how the future of your order depends on Marshall, did you, Ms. Weinberg?”

  “Help me out, here, Stella,” I pleaded. “What’s she getting at?”

  “That’s why you sent your G-D cat to live with him, isn’t it?” Ruby chided. “Your people wanted to keep a close eye on him, didn’t they?”

  Stella began shaking and the temperature in the back room of her store suddenly shot up. Her eyes flashed with rage as Ruby walked to within arm’s reach.

  “Your people don’t have the capacity to understand why Marshall was selected,” she hissed. “You’re filling his mind with notions of conducting exorcisms and you haven’t the slightest idea what you’re up against.”

  I wedged my way between Stella and Ruby in hope of defusing the situation. I’d already had a sample of what both of them could do. One of them might wind up dead if they came to blows
.

  “Enough!” I shouted. “If what Ruby says is true, then Stella, you’ve got some explaining to do.”

  “Damned right she does,” Ruby snapped.

  “Shut the hell up, Ruby!” I spun around and looked her straight in the eye. “This union of super-powered beings or whatever the hell you call it is also to blame. If your people were so damned concerned about me, you wouldn’t have waited until I was forty to seek me out.”

  “It’s not that simple!” she barked.

  “I don’t give a rat’s ass!” I barked back. “Now listen, for better or worse, we’re all involved in this dog and pony show. Now I want some answers!”

  “There’s nothing for either of you here,” Stella shouted, her voice shrill. “Both of you, get out of my store!”

  “Weinberg, that’s a load of crap and you know it,” Ruby said, as she pulled the cotton duck backpack off her shoulder. “I can prove it, too.”

  “Get out of my store!” Stella demanded, her voice coming close to a shrieking sound. “There is nothing for you here!”

  Ruby opened the flap of the backpack and reached inside. “I grabbed your hairball friend here after Conrad and I had our little meeting with Dennis the Ogre,” she said, as she pulled out a dazed Walter. “It took me a while to get your G-D cat to spill the beans, and it would appear he’s none too crazy about what you’re hiding back here.”

  “Storch!” Stella cried. “Nooo!”

  “Walter?” I asked, rubbing my eyes in astonishment. “Ruby, if you harmed one hair on that cat’s head, I’ll...”

  “Calm down, both of you,” said Ruby. “I have two cats of my own. He’s fine.”

  Walter jumped out of the pack and tore through the beaded curtain toward the front of the store.

  “This is nuts,” I said. “I was under the impression that witches were the only people who can communicate with a familiar.”

  “You’re right,” said Ruby. “Who said I wasn’t a witch?”

  “Come again?”

  “Long story, Conrad. I’m surprised Ms. Weinberg didn’t tell you that I used to be a member of her order. How the hell else did you think I knew so much about the unseen world?”