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BACK TO FRASER'S FRACTURED FICTION Follow That Falcon!by A. Fraser
© Copyright 2004 A. Fraser. All rights reserved.
Francis was just leaving the bar he'd been visiting in order to catch the football
game and heading for his Harley when a heavy arm fell on his shoulder.
A normal human would have made some exclamation of surprise or alarm, and
tried to get away. Francis wasn't a normal human being. Although he hadn't
sensed anyone around him, he wasn't that terribly surprised by the arm. He
knew whose arm it was even before the arm's owner spoke.
"Ah, my son!" exclaimed a hearty, slightly accented voice, "You are a very
neglectful son! You have not been to see me!"
Francis sighed and turned to face the heavy features of Rigo Smith. "I'm not your
son," he protested.
Rigo thumped him across the shoulders, staggering the slender young vampire.
"I told you," he boomed, ignoring the curious stares from the other patrons of the
sports bar, "that you shall be as a son to me. And a son should visit his Papa,
no?"
"No," Francis replied firmly.
Earlier in the year, Rigo had kidnapped Francis, bound him, locked him in a steel
cage, kicked and beaten him, and tried to force information about the
Brotherhood out of him. None of this had been calculated to produce any sort of
filial affection.
Rigo sniffed, but made no further reaction to Francis' reply. Instead, he draped
his arm around the younger man's shoulders again.
"Come," he said, "we must talk where these..." he hesitated, looking for a word
that would not draw attention, "... strangers cannot hear."
He drew Francis aside into a little clump of trees.
"What do you want, Rigo?" Francis asked, with little grace. "You were told to
behave yourself."
Actually, Rigo had been threatened with annihilation from the Nameless Ones
should he step out of line again.
"My niece is in trouble," Rigo said, dropping his voice and letting his worry
show. "And your friend the magic man."
"Ray and Estella are in trouble?" Francis stared at him. "Why didn't you just
say so?"
"In front of the cattle?" Rigo didn't bother to hide his contempt for humans now.
"Where are they? What kind of trouble?"
"More than just you and I can help with," Rigo answered. "We need others.
The protector. That little magic man. The other vampires."
"What kind of trouble?" Francis asked. "The Brotherhood will want to know."
"We are wasting time! Take me to them!"
If Ray and Estella really were in trouble, Francis thought, then the Brotherhood
needed to know. He took his cell phone a present from Michael after the
kidnapping in the summer and called Fairlawn.
"Michael, get everyone together," he said, "I'm bringing in Uncle Rigo. He says
Ray and Estella are in trouble. Call a meeting." Francis ended the call and
looked at Rigo. "Is your van here?"
"Nearby," Rigo nodded.
"Then follow me."
Francis didn't really want to introduce Rigo to the whole Brotherhood, after
spending an entire night protecting his friends from this intimidating vampire.
But Francis felt he had no choice. Ray was his best friend; and, after some initial
misunderstanding, Francis and Estella had come to cautiously like each other.
However, when the current crisis was over, Francis was really looking forward
to telling Michael that Rigo had described him as "that little magic-man."
Thus it was that Rigo's van followed Francis' Harley onto the Cliff Road, up past
all the houses to Fairlawn.
Francis counted cars. Everyone was there, with the notable exception of Ray.
But then, he and Estella were off visiting her mother, right?
The meeting-room of the Brotherhood of Darkness had its own private entrance,
so that members would not disturb the household. Francis guided Rigo to this
door.
Michael met them there. "Come in," he invited Rigo. "You are welcome in this
room."
The careful wording was noted. Rigo nodded, and entered the room.
Everyone was looking at Rigo; it was the first time most of the Brotherhood had
seen him. Rigo scanned the room, looking mostly at the vampires. They looked
back at him, not with any great enthusiasm. They all knew what he'd done to
Francis.
Rigo surprised everyone, even possibly himself, by going to stand in front of
Gideon and dropping to one knee.
"Forgive me, my lord," he said. "I erred when I took this boy." He indicated the
thunderstruck Francis.
Gideon was aware that now everybody was looking at _him_. He felt slightly
bewildered, but was careful not to show it. He'd had a lot of experience in not
showing his emotions. He nodded regally and gestured that Rigo should rise.
"It is not my place to forgive you," he said. "Francis is not of my line."
"But you are the senior most vampire," Rigo said.
Gideon looked at Francis. The younger vampire shrugged. He didn't know what
was going on here, either.
"Let us say no more of it for the time being," Gideon decided. "Tell us your
news."
"My niece, Estella, and the magic man were going to visit Estella's mother,"
Rigo said, just suppressing a slight tremor. "I was to join them for dinner when
they arrived. They did not arrive."
"Could they have met with some accident?" Michael asked. It was a hopeless
question. They would have heard about an accident by now.
Rigo shook his head. "Estella's mother called the highway patrol, the hospitals,
everywhere. Nothing. Their car has not been found."
Michael nodded resignedly. He had not really expected any other answer. "I
tried raising Ray through the Trumps," he said, "as soon as Francis called me.
Nothing."
"Someone's got them," Francis said angrily. "Kidnapping seems to be a real
sport around these parts." He glared at Rigo.
"I had nothing to do with this," Rigo protested. "I would not hurt Estella."
"What can we do?" Mitch asked, leaning forward. "Could we trace their route?
Do you know which way they went?"
"I know which would be the most direct way," Rigo nodded. "But that is the
way I came, to find you. There was no sign of them."
"There's got to be _something_ we can do," Nicholas said.
"It's been at least twelve hours since they disappeared," Michael sighed. "They
could be anywhere."
"Estella's mother has received no ransom demand, I take it?" Josh asked Rigo.
He shook his head. "This is not a normal kidnapping," Rigo said.
"Well, it was worth a shot," Josh said defensively.
Gideon patted his hand. "If they took Raymond's cards," he said, "then they
know they are dealing with a magic-user. Obviously, there is witchcraft at
work."
"Can you do anything?" Francis looked at the four other magic-users in the room.
The Druids exchanged glances. None of them looked very hopeful.
"This isn't our kind of magic," Pandora replied, getting up and giving Francis a
hug. He looked like he needed it. "We'll try, of course."
"Ironically, this is a situation where Estella would be useful," Michael said.
"She found you, after all." He nodded at Francis. "Still, we will try."
"If we only knew _where_, exactly, on the route they were taken," Mitch
growled, his normally blue eyes glowing amber, "I could probably find the trail."
"I imagine that whoever took them thought of that," said Michael. "They seem
to have been very thorough. Whoever has them knows about the Brotherhood,
you may depend on it, and they'll have taken measures to block us from a
rescue."
"We're all thinking the same thing, aren't we," spoke up Alex gloomily. "This is
the work of Matthew's old coven."
"Who is Matthew?" Rigo asked.
The four who had been in Boston, fourteen or so years earlier, and encountered
the coven master first-hand, all nodded. Alex, Michael, Gideon and Francis
knew Matthew.
"Matthew's dead," Francis said. "So's Cassandra," he added with a certain
amount of relish. Cassandra, who had been a very intimate follower of
Matthew's, had done her best to kill Francis. She had ended up falling off the
edge of the cliff.
"That leaves 10 unaccounted for people, assuming the coven had the traditional
number of members," Nicholas pointed out.
"Please, who is Matthew?" Rigo asked again.
"Ray's master," Michael replied. "And as vicious a snake as you would never
want to meet. The type who gives wicked witches a bad name." He raised a
hand in anticipation of objections. "I was just making a point," he said.
"Mitch and I will follow their route," Evan said. "We might pick up something,
after all."
Evan was a man of action. Sitting around doing nothing was against his nature.
He did remember to look at Gideon for approval. The Baron, still slightly
stunned by Rigo's apology, nodded.
"But stay in touch," he warned his employees.
Michael stood up, as did the other Druids. "We will see what we can do," he
said. "Meanwhile, the rest of you might as well go home."
Rigo looked around. "I cannot," he replied. "It is too far and the night is already
nearly over. I beg your protection."
Everybody looked at each other, knowing there was no way Michael would
invite a strange vampire to stay in Fairlawn. Not with Mary and the kids there.
"You may stay at Oakwoods," Gideon sighed. "Under your word of oath that
you shall not raise a hand to anyone in my household or the Brotherhood."
"You have my word," Rigo said. "And my gratitude."
"I'll wait til morning to go out then, with Mitch," said Evan, firmly. "We
couldn't find a trail in the dark, anyway."
Evan could have found a trail, had one existed, in the ocean in pitch black.
Gideon wasn't fooled. But he nodded.
The meeting broke up. Francis looked particularly disconsolate, and Pandora
gave him another hug before disappearing into the house with the rest of the
Druids.
"Chin up," Evan told him. "We'll find them."
"Why did those bastards wait so long?" Francis asked, not comforted. "Ray
thought he was safe, damn it."
"Perhaps that's why," Evan answered.
"Why don't you come along to Oakwoods, too?" Josh asked. "Then you won't
have to wait alone for news."
The platinum blond head came up, contemplating this. Then Francis looked at
Rigo, and scowled. "Not as long as he's there," he replied. "Thanks all the
same."
Rigo watched the young vampire stalk out. "I apologized," he said, in a hurt
voice. "And still he does not forgive me. I told him he shall be as a son to me,
and he does not treat me as his Papa. What more can I do?"
"Just leave him alone," Josh suggested. "I don't think he's ready to forgive you,
let alone be your son."
"That's a relationship that has to be earned," Mitch added, with a wink and a
grin at Josh.
"And tying someone up and beating them is not a good way to earn it," Gideon
contributed, with a certain amount of feeling.
Rigo sighed, and followed the Oakwoods residents back to the mansion.
Back in Fairlawn, Mary looked up as Michael and his three friends came into the
living room. One look at their faces told her how the meeting had gone.
"Is there anything I can do?" she asked.
Michael shook his head and kissed his wife. "Not that I can think of," he
replied. "I'm going to scry, to see if I can locate either Ray or Estella. I doubt it
will work, but it must be tried."
She nodded, and answered, "I'll wait upstairs, then. Good luck."
"Night, Mary," came a chorus of three.
The four Druids left the living room and went down to the basement of Fairlawn.
This held the usual debris of a household with children Bess' old rocking horse,
a smashed bicycle, the soccer equipment that seemed to be everywhere, tools,
old furniture, and boxes piled treacherously. But through a locked door there
was a different basement. Michael kept his goldsmithing equipment in the
locked room; but mostly it was given over to his other vocation.
The quartet changed into the long, plain white woolen robes that hung on hooks
in this room. There wasn't any embarrassment about changing in front of each
other. They'd been doing this together for far too long. Pandora and Maggie lit
candles and set them around the room. Nicholas retrieved a large, plain ceramic
bowl from its shelf and filled it with clear water. Michael stood in the middle of
the room and chanted, raising the power.
Nicholas set the bowl carefully down on the floor. He and the ladies closed in
around Michael in a small circle. The Archdruid sat on the floor and gazed into
the bowl, still chanting to focus the scrying.
It wasn't like a television screen, where pictures came with clarity. The most he
could hope for was impressions, clues. The water remained still and clear,
yielding not even a hint of the fate of his friends.
Finally he stopped chanting and stood up. He felt every one of his two thousand
plus years. Something was blocking his vision. SomeONE. And they were very
good.
"It's no use," he sighed as the others looked at him in concern. "There's
someone keeping me out." What he didn't say was that he'd felt brief contact
with that someone, and it was disturbing him to the marrow of his bones. The
contact hadn't felt strong enough, _adult_ enough, for the amount of magic
involved. He needed to think about that.
"Now what do we do?" Maggie asked.
"Hope that Evan and Mitch find something," Michael replied. "And pray."
"You did the best you could, Michael," Pandora told him.
"Yes," he sighed. "I know."
"Go and get some rest," Nicholas advised his old friend. "You look done in.
We'll let ourselves out."
Michael nodded, too dispirited and contemplative to argue. The four changed
back into street clothes, and the other three dispersed without a word. The
Archdruid climbed the stairs up to the kitchen, noting that Andrei was restless on
his perch. The kitchen had been decided as the best place for falcon sitting
because of its easy to clean tile floors. The falcon's hooded head turned towards
Michael.
"You know something's wrong, don't you?" Michael asked, feeling stupid for
talking to a bird.
He kept walking, though, on his way to the main stairs up to the bedrooms. So
he didn't see Andrei flap his wings in agitation, or hear the falcon's annoyed
screech.
"This is a very nice house," said Rigo, upon his first view of the interior of
Oakwoods.
Gideon just nodded. He wasn't all that certain that inviting this strange vampire
to spend the day was a good idea, but there'd been nowhere else for Rigo to go.
Fairlawn hadn't been an option, and Francis's shack was completely out of the
question. There was Valley Mansion, of course, but Alex hadn't looked very
eager to play host, either. Neither had the other Druids.
"Remember that we have his word that he will behave," said Evan, as usual
reading his employer's mind, or at least interpreting Gideon's posture. "Plus, I'll
stake him and cut his head off with a dull paper knife if he steps out of line."
"I will behave," Rigo promised. "You are the vampire lord here, your word is
law."
"There you go again," said Joshua amiably, noticing that Gideon still looked
astounded at the title. "What's with this vampire lord business?"
Rigo turned to Joshua. "You are very young," he said kindly. "You would not
understand. In the old country, we have a ... I do not know the English word.
Many levels of power, with one lord or lady in command."
"Hierarchy," Gideon supplied, suddenly understanding. "Yes, I've heard of that.
We don't practice that over here."
Evan and Mitch exchanged looks, smirking. That wasn't precisely true. The
other vampires in the Brotherhood quite often deferred to Gideon as the senior
most. They wouldn't call it a hierarchy, of course, they'd just say it was
seniority or good manners. And when Genevieve visited, generally anything she
wanted got done and Gideon deferred to _her_. He would say it was because
she was a lady and his mentor.
Josh caught the smirk. Gideon, fortunately, didn't. Rigo was too worried to
notice.
"All the same," Rigo said. "To me, you are the vampire lord. I am in your
command while I am in your house, and in this valley." He carefully didn't
mention that this was precisely the reason he had not previously entered
Fletcher's Valley. He'd known the vampire lord was bound not to have
approved of what he'd done to Francis.
"Estella's mother," said Josh, changing the subject and noticing Rigo wince.
"She scares you?"
"You have not met her," the gypsy replied with a shudder. "Or you would
understand. She is a most formidable woman."
"But only human, I gather."
"I think I understand," Evan said. "Gypsies are matriarchal, for one thing."
"Even if we were not, Estella's mother would be formidable." Something in
Rigo's voice conveyed his utter conviction.
"She must be very worried about her daughter," said Mitch. "Has she called the
police?"
Rigo shook his head. "She knows that whatever happened, it is not for human
police to help. She did call them to ask if there had been any accidents, but that
is all. She believes that I and you can save her daughter and the magic man."
"Not if we can't find them." Gideon sighed with worry and frustration.
"Someone has covered their tracks very well."
"Not well enough, maybe, for a werewolf," Mitch growled. "Evan and I will
leave at first light."
"I have the horrible feeling that whoever took Ray and Estella thought of that,"
Evan said. "All the same, little thief, we shall try. Go get some sleep so you'll be
fresh."
Mitch opened his mouth to argue, realized this would be stupid, and got up off
the couch he'd flopped on. "Night, everybody," he said.
"Why did you call him 'little thief'?" Rigo asked when the werewolf had gone.
"Caught him breaking into the house, years ago," Evan replied. "The idiot."
"He robbed you and you hired him?" Rigo stared at Gideon in amazement.
"Truly, you are a great vampire lord."
Gideon shrugged in embarrassment. "I couldn't really send a werewolf to jail,"
he replied. "He didn't actually steal anything."
"Because I was there," said Evan smugly.
"Why don't you go on up to bed, Evan?" asked Gideon, a very slight edge to his
voice. "Early start, after all."
Evan's expression conveyed his extreme reluctance to leave his employer, whose
safety was paramount, unprotected with Rigo in the house.
"I have his word," said Gideon quietly.
"Right you are." Evan rose up. He coincidentally brushed past Rigo on his way
upstairs. "There isn't any place on this _planet_ you could hide if you do
anything to harm Gideon or Josh," he whispered, in the friendliest possible way.
The gypsy nodded. Evan left the room.
"He is very fierce, your protector," Rigo commented.
"He sometimes leans to the overprotective," Gideon said, allowing himself a
smile. "Would you care for a drink? My special stock?"
Rigo looked from Gideon to Joshua. Josh's normally open expression was
guarded. It was a test, then.
"Thank you, my lord," Rigo said. "I would very much like one."
A bottle was opened and poured. The liquid that came out was thick and had a
smell that had nothing to do with fermentation.
"Animal blood," said Rigo, working very hard on not allowing any disdain into
the words.
"We have an ... arrangement," said Gideon. "The Brotherhood, and other like-
minded vampires. We hunt very seldom, and never kill." He saw Joshua's grin.
"Almost never," he amended. "And only when it's completely necessary. We
drink animal blood, which is obtained for us by the Nameless Ones, many of
whom work in the meat packing industry. This way, we can stay in one place
longer, without worrying about discovery."
"People no longer believe in vampires," Rigo snorted. "There is less fear of
discovery now."
"Stay in one place for a hundred years, never age, and have people die or
mysteriously disappear in noticeable numbers, and the humans will believe," said
Gideon.
"That is why it is wise to move around." Rigo shrugged. Then he took in his
surroundings. The comfortable wing chairs. The deep, expensive carpet. The
animals lolling around underfoot. "You do not wish to move around."
"I enjoy my comforts," Gideon said. "I've earned them."
"There are vampires who would call you traitor."
An elegant shrug. "Words do not concern me."
Rigo looked at Joshua. "And you?" he asked. "You are still so new to the blood
that I hear it sing in your veins. Does the blood not tell you that this way, your
lord's way, is wrong for us? That the blood calls out for more blood, for the joy
of feeding?"
Joshua thought about it. "A very small part of me might admit that you have a
point," he confessed, ignoring the astonished look on his lover's face. "But that
part is overruled by the knowledge that this way is better, safer and more
civilized."
"Civilized!" Rigo snorted. "We are wampyr!"
"That's no reason to act like monsters."
Rigo threw up his hands and subsided. "Of course," he said, a bit sadly, "you
follow your lord's dictates. A good fledgling, to obey his sire so."
"I'm not Gideon's fledgling. I certainly don't consider him my vampire lord."
The gypsy opened his mouth. "You are not?"
"I agreed to be turned," Joshua said, "in order that I could stay with Gideon,
because I love him. And because I love him, I wouldn't let him turn me.
Someone else did it."
Rigo couldn't think of anything to say to this. They sat in silence, wine glasses
in hand, watching Smoke, Pumpkin and Warg vie for the most comfortable spot
in front of the fireplace.
"Would you like to see your room?" Gideon asked eventually, when the silence
had stretched beyond comfort.
"Yes, my lord," Rigo nodded gratefully.
"You don't have to call me that," sighed the Baron. Nobody had called him that
for many long years. His title was less than meaningless, here in America,
especially since he was dead and somebody else was the Baron of Redoak.
Rigo bowed. "I must," he replied. "My lord."
"You don't seem to be much with names anyway," Josh noted.
"Names have power, fledgling."
"This way," Gideon said.
They put Rigo in the Willow Room, one of the interior guest rooms with no
windows, and which incidentally was several twists and turns and two corridors
away from the master bedroom. The interior of Oakwoods was a maze.
"I'm afraid we don't have any pajamas that would fit you," Gideon said. Rigo
topped him by nearly a foot.
"Is okay," the other vampire grinned. "I sleep in my skin."
"Well, good morning, then."
"My lord," Rigo bowed again. "Fledgling."
They left him to his own devices and made their way to the master bedroom, full
of doubts and worries.
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