Chapter 40
Chris Gordon had made the luring of a legendary monster from folklore sound easy.
Turns out he was exactly right. The sheriff convinced an older couple in a house at the end of a cul-de-sac to stay at the community shelter for the night, and Vesta prowled around outside in wolf form for a solid hour before retreating to the living room.
Inside, we had four deputies and the sheriff, all kitted out in special weapons tactical gear and armed to the teeth…
and me. The tech guy from the department had set up monitors that were getting live feeds from Omega’s network of drones.
The rest of the department was spread around town, in pairs, heavily armed and watching from heated vehicles, also able to access the feeds.
“Listen; I need to emphasize this,” Vesta had said when we were getting situated. “Craig will sense this thing long before anyone else. He will then kill it. Just stay calm.”
“I thought you were the powerful one?” Deputy Smith asked.
“I am. I could raze this town with a thought. But my beloved is a specialist in surgically killing things.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” Smith questioned.
“Sniper versus a thermobaric bomb, Smith,” Sheriff Brower said.
“Exactly,” Vesta agreed.
“It’s coming,” I said, clutching my stomach. The intent was powerful—an awful, awful hunger that cramped my midsection with its need for food. “Two miles away, coming in from the northeast, straight for the town.”
“But not this house?” Brower asked.
“Hasn’t caught her scent yet. And it’s awful.”
“All units be advised, killer is approaching from northeast of town,” the sheriff said into her communicator.
“It’s veering our way,” I said. “Drooling, I’d guess.” I could absolutely feel its sudden overwhelming need to consume my girlfriend. Nope. It was still blocks away but I had a lock on its head and oddly opaque heart.
“When are you…” Brower started to ask and I killed the wendigo.
Now, my go-to move for this situation was a left-handed Apporting pull to yank its head off its body.
But that’s not what I did, and I don’t know why.
Instead, a rolling wave of heat wrapped around my body from my back, flowing up my right arm and then leaving in a rush when I Apported something into its heart.
The result was a flash of light so bright that it whited out the two drone feeds that were pointed in the right direction.
It was so bright, it flashed in all the east and north-facing windows of the house.
“Ah, I think it’s dead,” I said, not finding any indication of intent out there.
“I can confirm that the organism ceased to exist,” Omega said.
“What did you do?” Vesta asked, staring at me in an almost accusatory way.
“Um, something new,” I said.
“Do you think now was a good time to experiment?” she asked.
“It just happened, alright. Like the axeheads on Church Street.”
“But what was it?” she asked. The deputies and the sheriff were all dead silent, watching with wary curiosity.
“New stuff,” I reiterated, not wanting to speak in front of the cops.
“I am speaking through only your nanos, Vesta and Craig. It was a plasma explosion in the temperature range of fifty to seventy-five thousand degrees Celsius,” Omega said. “Nothing remains of the wendigo… or the lamppost it was clinging to.”
“Oh,” she said. “Okay, ah, I guess that’s it for the night. Unless you’re picking up any other wendigos?” she asked me.
“Nope. Nothing.”
“Okay, well, I’m starving. Any good places to eat, Sheriff?”
Twenty minutes later, we were in the town’s only all-night diner, but then, how many twenty-four-hour eateries does one small town need? It was rustic and had a massive woodstove that made it snug.
I was happily laying waste to a small mountain of meatloaf and mashed potatoes with corn on the side and an absolute river of rich, beefy gravy.
Vesta’s eyes were covered by a set of nano goggles and she was having a silent conversation with her parents, mostly her dad, about my recent demonstration of new abilities.
Sheriff Brower was clearly very interested in what had happened to the wendigo, but when the Steward’s daughter says she needs to have a confidential conversation with the Steward himself, you don’t force your way in.
Still, she sat with two of her deputies, ostensibly having her own late-night meal, but with a sharply curious intent focused on us.
The lone waitress, who looked as old as the wendigo’s victims had been, side-eyed us from behind the counter.
The door opened and a young woman came in, spotted us, and with a visible stiffening of her spine headed in our direction.
She was early twenties, Asian, with black hair and black eyes, about five-foot-four, and slim in her down parka and heavy winter boots.
Her intent was fierce excitement mixed with enormous anxiety.
It was the exact mixture of someone going for a vital job interview or getting the one opportunity to turn their life around.
I tapped Vesta’s foot with my own, my mouth full, and when her goggles went transparent , I nodded at the young woman who was almost upon us.
Vesta touched the side of her nano, likely requesting a pause.
Her family’s nano was unlike anyone else’s.
It actually worked below the skin level and allowed silent communication via Omega.
Meanwhile, I managed to swallow my food.
“Let me guess,” I said as the woman arrived in front of us. “You’re a reporter?”
She slammed to a stunned halt, whatever pitch she had been going to say instantly frozen by my words.
“Craig, that’s rude,” Vesta said, getting up and sliding in next to me. She waved a hand at the open seat she had just left in obvious invitation.
The young lady sat down and looked at us and then her mouth unfroze.
“I’m Lauren Casselman, and yes, I’m an independent reporter.”
“Who got trapped by the storm?” Vesta guessed.
“Well, I was here to investigate a story. A rumor of something north of here. A creature sighted by people in the wilds.”
“Wendigo,” I said.
“Yes,” she answered, looking at me closely. “I heard there were some people missing, taken from their homes.”
“Terrible stuff,” I said sincerely, thinking of the bloody window in Tammy O’Brien’s home.
“But there was an explosion tonight, not long ago,” Lauren said.
“Oh,” Vesta said.
“But you know that because you caused it,” Lauren said. “You killed the wendigo because you’re the Steward’s heir… Vesta O’Carroll.”
“Vesta Reynolds-O’Carroll,” I corrected. “Her mom gets peeved when she’s left out. You don’t want her mom peeved.”
“And you… the witch from Golf Alpha,” Lauren said.
“Am I though? A witch? Not sure,” I said, taking another bite.
“Oh, stuff it all ready,” Vesta said to me, thoroughly done with our never-ending debate. “Get over it.”
“My dad’s brother—my uncle—is married to an Earth witch,” Lauren said.
“Her daughter—my cousin—is best friends with the top young witch of their generation in their circle. She attends Arcane. She told me last semester about a new freshman girl who even the seniors walked carefully around. And then the boy from another planet.”
“Man,” Vesta said. “He’s a man. Hasn’t been a boy since he was twelve. Partly why he was different. All these eighteen, nineteen, twenty-year-old boys and here comes a young man. No excuses, no shirking, just accountability and competence.”
“Yeah, the man witch who killed six axeheads on a street in Burlington,” Lauren said. “Four of them without visible weapons.”
“So what can we do for you?” I asked.
“This. Let me interview you. I promise it has to be better than Chatterjee’s debacle.”
“Why? The press hasn’t been all that great for us,” Vesta said.
“And yet you still trend higher with more positivity than any other celebrity couple. I can add to that. I’ve already been covering your aid to this town by heating it; now you’ve removed a monster that even werewolves have difficulty handling.
Tougher than axeheads. No offense,” she said aside to me.
“None taken,” I said
Vesta snorted. “You need to give me the draft before you go to print. I’ll not have another Chatterjee situation.”
“Agreed,” Lauren said.
“Then we consent. Now, you think we killed the wendigo?”
“Tell me you didn’t,” Lauren challenged.
“Maybe we did, maybe we didn’t,” I said.
She pulled back a bit at that. “My cousin’s friend said you were a conundrum. A male who didn’t look for attention yet still somehow is always in the thick of things.”
“Trouble magnet,” Vesta agreed, nodding.
“Can I ask how you find life on Earth? My understanding is that you were never here before you started at Arcane,” she added.
Vesta’s hand squeezed my leg under the table. Message received – caution required.
“Wow, first person to ask me that,” I said, a bit bemused.
“It’s gotta be different, right?”
“Oh, enormously. The biggest difference? It isn’t the gravity or the lack of predators. It’s the people. Greenies are very, very intentional. Earth folk, at least the ones I’ve mostly met, are… not.”
“Really?” Lauren exclaimed, glancing at Vesta. “Can you explain?”
“Vesta kinda hit it on the head. People here don’t seem to have the focus or accountability of Greenies.
Makes sense really, because who would choose to go to a frontier planet except people making a very intentional choice.
But here, people are free to sort of escape responsibility and accountability.
There’s, like, no consequences for bad behavior, irresponsible actions, or inaction. On Greenacres, you die.”
“Surely not everyone here is that bad?” she asked.
“No, but many. The majority so far.”
“You’re talking about stuff like that death Challenge you accepted?”
“Wow, you are well informed. Who did you say your cousin’s friend was?” I asked.
“I didn’t,” she said with a serious expression.
“Hmm, yeah, like that. My surrogate brother will turn eighteen before I do. He may have a Challenge almost instantly. A death Challenge. He’ll win it, but still.”
“Would you go back? If he had to fight?”
“I would be his second. So yeah.”
“And if you had to step into the ring in his place?”
“Of course.”
“Without magic?”
“Greenacres has low magic, not no magic. I’d be fine.”
“And I’d be with you,” Vesta said.
“Off planet?” Lauren asked, astounded.
“If he goes, I go.”
“Which means I go too,” Omega said from Lauren’s own nano bracelet. “However, if you have fully eaten, there are some others who would like to converse with you securely.”
“Ah,” Vesta said, looking at me with a significant expression. “Let me finish mine and we’ll go. The Bludgeon?” she asked.
“Affirmative.”
“If you’ll excuse us Lauren, we have work to do,” I said, as Vesta started to eat.