Neal Barrett Jr. - The Prophecy Machine

The wispy fellow shook his head, which was not a pleasant thing to see. “This thing with the Nuccis, it's more than a quarrel. It's a plain blood feud is what it is. Old hates were stirring long ago, before I was born.”

“And when would that be?”

The spectral figure hesitated. “That's hard to say. Time doesn't work the same for the living as the dead. Sometimes it feels like tomorrow when it's truly yesterday.

“I worked real close to a Foxer whose name escapes me now. He was in beets, when I was in peas. He and his sort were hard to be around. They didn't much care for human kind. There'd been some trouble with their folk disappearing, simply dropping out of sight, never showing up again.”

“Disappearing how? You don't mean dying, you mean just- going , right?”

“That's it, indeed. And didn't anyone ever know why, ever know how.”

“And this had to do with the Nuccis somehow?”

“I'm near certain it did. Everyone thought so at the time. Bad blood is what I'm saying. I've no idea why.”

Finn took a breath. Lightning forked out of the sky and struck the ground far away. Finn could feel the tingle in his boots. And, for an instant, the Coldies seemed to blink away.

“Do you know a man here in town named Dr. Nicoretti? He's a Hatter, I don't know much more than that.”

“I know who he is. I wasn't alive in his time.”

“And a Mycer seer …”

“Well, certainly I do. How do you think you found us this night, Master Finn?”

Before Finn could answer, the ghost of Lucas Klunn began to shimmer and drift apart.

“One thing more, or maybe two,” said a chilly whisper in his ear. “You might stay among the living, there's a little chance of that. The Newlie, now, I doubt she'll make it through. And hear me, Master Finn: There is something in the Nucci house that's more like us than you … ”

“Wait,” Finn said, “you can't go and leave me with that!”

Finn scarcely blinked, and Lucas D. Klunn was gone. So was Captain Pynch, and so were all the rest …

Finn had been so intent on Lucas Klunn that he'd failed to notice the storm had swept over the town. Scudding clouds near touched the earth, and thunder was a drummer far away. Errant drops of rain plunked from ruined timbers overhead. Somehow, the silence now was more frightening than the raging storm itself.

There was so much stirring in his head that Finn feared it might burst at any time. Foxers, Bowsers, and sly Nicoretti, who was clearly a danger, though he couldn't say how. Dread revelations from the Mycer, doom from the apparition Klunn.

Reason said put it all aside. Stay alert, keep your mind free until you come safely back to Letitia's side.

“A fine idea,” Finn agreed with himself, “I'll surely have to try it some time …”

Finn damned and praised the mess the storm had left behind. His legs were weary from stomping through the muck and mire. Still, this misery was countered by the fact that he seemed to have the night to himself.

He wondered about the time. “Night” was likely not the proper word now. It had to be the very early hours, not too far from dawn. With this in mind, he quickened his pace as much as the rain-soaked earth would allow.

A good quarter hour after he left the shades, Finn smelled the strong, salty scent of the sea. Moments later it appeared, a darkness greater than the night, touched here and there with peaks of luminescent white.

He was very relieved at the sight. If the sea was to his left then he only had to turn a short angle to his right. The road from town to the Nuccis would appear, and he'd be with Letitia long before first light.

Finn had not allowed himself to dwell on her much until now. She had to be safe, had to be just as he'd left her, just as he saw her image now. Sabatino wouldn't harm her, wouldn't dare. Even that crazed old man had warned his son about that.

Finn hesitated, closed his eyes and drew in a cold breath from the sea.

“Bricks and Sticks,” he said aloud, aware at once of the foolish rationale he'd allowed to cloud his mind. “Letitia's all right because Calabus is there? Wake up, Finn, before you go as mad as all the rest!”

The day was coming much too quickly now. Moments before, Finn had felt secure in the safety of the dark. Now, things gray and indistinct threw off their nightly guise and donned their daytime shapes again.

He felt naked and exposed. He found a small depression and hunched down nearly to the ground. He could still see a slice of the sea, the low outline of the town etched against a sky tinged with purple, streaked with dirty blue.

Standing again, moving quickly but carefully across the wet ground, he saw a darkened smudge not far ahead below the last wink of fading stars-

The house of the Nuccis! It had to be! There was nothing, anywhere, that matched its warped and crooked lines, its odd delineation, its bizarre silhouette. Finn could have never imagined he'd be so pleased to see the place again. The road itself could not be very far. He was tempted to go straight ahead until it appeared. Even after the rain, the way would be easier than what he was crossing now.

Easier, yes-but more exposed as well. He kept to the low, muddy hillocks, the wet and marshy grass. The cover wasn't good, but it was better than waving a flag and letting one and all know he was there. A little closer, another few yards, and he'd be near enough to run for it, even if someone suddenly appeared on his tail.

He started walking, even faster than before, and then he heard them howling, huffing, making their way across the spongy earth, a small but noisome army of Hooters, stomping their way toward town before the day began. Finn cursed them soundly, muttered every oath he knew, and pressed himself against the sodden ground.

They were Hooters for sure. They hooted, hollered and danced about. Some, Finn could see, raising one eye above the mud, wore homemade feathers sewn to their arms. All wore Hooter beaks and goggle eyes, and all carried torches that they waved above their heads even though there was nothing anywhere dry enough to burn. Still, if you were a Hooter, Finn guessed, it was best to carry plenty of fire. One never knew what one might find.

He didn't move until they were clearly out of sight. They passed very close to the Nuccis, but caused no mischief there. Fortunate, indeed, for nothing he could think of would go up as quickly as that rotted, desiccated corpse the Nuccis called a house.

At last Finn came to his feet, miserable, cold and wet. He picked up his basket and scowled in the direction where the Hooters had disappeared. Cutting it rather close, he decided. It was nearly daylight now, and that meant Hatter time. Was it too much to hope that the louts in yellow hats would meet the oafs with goggle eyes, and start a religious war?

The house was closer now, grim and gray as ever, tilting every way but straight. He thought about what the seer had told him, about the blanket spell. Who was responsible for that? Sabatino, Calabus himself?

No, the Mycer lady had been too impressed. It was a powerful load of magic, and he didn't think either of the Nuccis could handle such as that.

Who, then? The more he thought about it, the more it seemed a peculiar spell indeed … It clouded a secret that even the Rubinella couldn't see, a secret so strong Finn couldn't even spit it out.

He'd been pondering that one ever since he left the seer. Why bother to protect the old man's Prophecy Machine, if it wasn't even real, but only a lunatic's dream? Was it something else, then? Something down there besides the mad device?

“Foxers can get in the house, and possibly anyone else … if the spell is so awesome, why can't it keep them out …?”