Neal Barrett Jr. - The Prophecy Machine

Even as these thoughts crossed his mind, as his boots began to slosh and the rain began to trickle down his neck, the houses and the shops began to thin. Ahead lay lone and shadowy remains, dark skeletal structures, blurred and indistinct, warped and distorted by the unremitting gusts from overhead.

Finn ducked beneath his chill and sodden cloak, dashing through the storm to the cover of a nearly roofless frame, the sad and darkened bones of some hapless farmer's barn.

It was very little shelter, but better than being drowned. Maybe he could take his boots off, pour the water out, let his socks dry.

“So where am I, then?” he asked himself aloud. He remembered, roughly, how far the Nuccis were from town. The ruined barn seemed near enough. If he knew which way to go, to the left or to the right …

Finn turned swiftly, suddenly alert, suddenly aware. Someone, something, was in there with him in the barn! Nothing he could see, nothing he could touch, but the overwhelming presence was something he could feel.

For a moment, he froze, stood perfectly still. Hand on his weapon, eyes on the dark. Saw them as they slowly, silently appeared, saw them of a sudden, saw them growing near, figures made of vapor, vague and indistinct. And with this spectral vision came the chill, musty odors of days unremembered, lives lost and spent …

“Oh, it's you fellows, then,” Finn said, with a great sigh of relief. “You had me there a minute, I'm somewhat jumpy tonight.”

“Food for the departed, sir?” said a voice like winter, like gravel in a can.

“I've got this basket,” Finn said. “I'm afraid it's not as full as it used to be.”

“Good enough it is, we're grateful as can be.”

Finn set the basket on the ground and stepped back. There were five of them, five or maybe ten, phantoms, chill apparitions frail as smoke. They gathered round the basket, drawing out the essence, the dream of oatcakes, the vision of leeks. They hummed off-key as they fed, wraiths with old memories of bread. Some people said you shouldn't eat anything sniffed by those who'd passed on, but Finn knew this wasn't so.

He'd been so absorbed in his troubles with the living, he'd given little thought to the dead. There would be a Coldtown here, of course, like anyplace else …

“I'll bet you don't remember me at all, Master Finn. It's been quite a spell.”

“I'm not certain,” Finn said, peering at the ghostly shape that had suddenly appeared, trying to recall. Shades had feelings, he knew, like anyone else.

“I waved at you from the ship,” the figure said. “I thought you waved back.”

“Now, I do remember that,” Finn said, recalling the phantom schooner he'd seen from the Madeline Rose.

“And I know who you are. It's Captain Pynch, yes? Kettles and Pots, Captain, what are you doing here?”

A wispy smile told Finn the fellow was greatly pleased.

“I'm here to see a dear departed aunt who crossed some time ago. It's not a very lovely town. Not like the one we know. Still, in my condition, it matters little anymore. Death and corruption's not all it's cut out to be, Master Finn. It's a worrisome thing at best. And not all the living are as tolerant as you, sir, not by a mile they're not.”

Finn would never say it, of course, but Pynch looked even worse than he had when they'd seen one another before, not long after the officer's tragic death, back on Garpenny Street. The parts he had lost were missing still- the arm and the foot, the eye and both ears. His ghastly flesh was a pale and tattered gray.

Only a shade of himself, so to speak, Finn thought. A soldier without a purple vest, without crimson pantaloons. A warrior stripped of crested helm, and a dashing plume of tangerine.

So, too, were the others in his group-so wan and indistinct there was little way to tell what any might have been.

“I have found no consolation in this foul circumstance,” the captain said. “I miss the war, I do, the bracing thrill of combat in the air. I was with the Royal Balloonist Fusiliers, as you recall.”

“I do indeed,” Finn said.

“And how is the lovely Letitia Louise? I took quite a fancy to the lass back then.”

“Yes, I know you did.”

“Didn't take offense? You, I mean, Master Finn.”

“Not at all,” Finn said, though in truth, the captain's attentions had annoyed him at the time.

“She used to give me tea.”

“I recall that as well.”

“And spicecakes, too,” Pynch said with a spectral sigh, a chill and fetid breath that nearly brought Finn to his knees.

Moments before, a wraith had detached itself from the crew above Finn's basket. Now, he stood just behind Pynch.

“I hope I'm not intruding, sir. I'd speak if you've the time.”

“Damned impolite, I'd say,” said Pynch, “but no one has manners these days.”

With that, the captain floated over to the basket to whiff some emanations himself.

“I am Lucas D. Klunn,” the misty figure said. “I lived here all my life, and I have to say the town is as dreadful for the living as the dead.”

“I can only speak for the former. But I'd likely agree with that.”

“I felt the need to speak when I learned who you were. You're in great danger, sir. I don't suppose I have to tell you that.”

Finn was taken aback. “You know me? You know who I am? From Pynch, I suppose. You overheard our talk.”

“No, there was no need for that. A Coldie hears things, sir. There's little else to do, you know. It takes up the time, whatever that is, the meaning's slipped my mind.”

The wraith had a grisly, terrifying demeanor. Worse, even, than the gruesome Captain Pynch. Very little head, and the features that were left were awful to behold.

“I think I said I'm Lucas Klunn, which will have no meaning to you since the Fates have kindly set your life in other realms. I was a merchant, once, and made a small fortune in the export of peas. My church affiliation was Hatter, though I seldom went full-time.

“In my early middle years, I was struck with dread disease. Either that, or poisoned by my wife, I've often wondered which. She left soon after, with a fellow who dealt in beans.

“But I digress, sir, and apologize for that. What you'll want to know, or maybe not, is that I feel you've little chance of leaving here alive. If things come to that, you're welcome in our little band. Or, if you'd care to go home, the vessel Irrational Fears should be putting in soon, the one Captain Pynch came on-”

“Master Klunn!”

Finn was greatly startled, stunned, and given a turn by the apparition's words. “If you could get to it, I'd be pleased. I'm anxious to hear what dangers I face, besides those I know about myself.”

“Oh, well then …”

Klunn, what there was of him, looked disappointed that his dire and dreadful tidings might not be news at all.

“You know, I guess, that the Foxers here have posted a reward for your fingers and your toes …”

“For my what? ”

“Fingers and toes. They're not your ordinary folk, you know. They have their own manner, their own peculiar ways.”

Finn tried to set this disturbing image aside, but it failed to depart.

“I know they have a quarrel with me, I'm quite aware of that. We had a run-in the other night, which you've likely heard about. Apparently, everyone has. I had thought they were angry merely because I was on the scene. I'm no longer certain of that. I don't know if there's more to this or not. If anyone else is behind this thing, someone using Foxers to get me out of the way …”

The shade began to fade, flicker, shake and shiver all about. Finn looked away before he got terribly sick.

“That I can't answer, sir, but I can tell you this. You got the Foxers on your trail, you don't need anyone else.”