Christopher Golden - The Nimble Man

Slowly, he brought a potato chip to his mouth, eyes riveted to the television. One of the Night People had seen the cameraman, its mouth opening incredibly wide in a silent roar. The gnarled, twisted, leathery thing sprang across the brick as though in a dance, needle teeth bared for attack. The picture turned to static, and an anchorwoman who usually looked too damn cool for the room came on as the broadcast returned to the studio. Her face was pasty, and she was sweating to beat the band.

"How long ago was that?" Squire asked the set, listening to the woman's trembling voice. The goblin rose from his chair and went to the window. The red, billowing fog seemed to have grown thicker in the square below, practically hiding the park from view. There was a kind of glow about it now that reminded him of weird creatures that lived so far below the ocean's surface that they had developed their own luminescence.

"No more than a fifteen minute walk from Government Center to here," the hobgoblin grumbled, though his words trailed off as he noticed dark things moving in the blood red mist. "Shit!" Squire pressed his face against the glass for a better look. Corca Duibhne darted about the unearthly fog with an uncanny swiftness, converging upon the townhouse.

Conan Doyle's valet stepped away from the window. There was no way that the Night People could get inside the townhouse. Conan Doyle had set up all kinds of magickal wards and barriers so that nothing that didn't belong could find its way into the place. The image on the television screen again caught his attention. The anchorwoman was crying now, mascara running down her face in oily streaks. She was in the process of confessing her sins to the camera.

"I've got my own problems, sweetheart," he said, reaching for the remote and clicking off the set.

A thunderous clamor came to him from the first floor, as if something were pounding on the door to get in, but of course Squire knew that was impossible. Isn't it? Son of a bitch, it had better be.

He jumped feet first into a square of shadow thrown by the entertainment center, becoming immersed in a world of perpetual darkness.

The goblin scrambled through the shadowpaths toward an exit that would take him closest to the front door. Again came the pounding, the violent sound muffled within the realm of shadow. Squire drew himself out of a patch of black behind the refrigerator in the kitchen, the hot coils at the back of the unit pressing against his face as he hauled his body from the shadow, and squeezed out from behind the appliance.

Two Corca Duibhne scouts crouched in the center of the kitchen. He knew they were scouts because the symbol of their rank was carved into the dark flesh of their faces. No stars or stripes on lapels for these guys. Heads tilted back, eyes closed, their noses twitched as they sniffed the air in search of potential danger.

It wasn't an instant before they got a nose full of him.

I knew I should have showered this week, the hobgoblin thought, scrambling across the tile floor to pull open one of the counter drawers.

The scouts began to shriek, a high-pitched, ululating sound that warned others of their stinking kind that there was trouble present.

Squire spun around, glinting metal cleaver in hand, meeting the first of his attackers with relish. It had been a long time since he had killed a Corca Duibhne, and as he buried the blade in the skull of his adversary he realized he was long overdue.

"Look at that, a perfect fit," Squire growled, as the creature continued to fight. "What's that? You'd like seconds?" He drove a stubby knee savagely up into the Corca Duibhne's midsection, yanked the cleaver from its head, and brought it down again. "What a greedy little piggy."

The scout went rigid as the metal blade again shattered its skull, sinking deep. Finally hitting the tiny piece of fruit these shitbags call a brain.

The second of the scouts was across the room. It had been jockeying around, looking for space to attack. Now it pulled back its leathery lips in a ferocious snarl that revealed nasty black gums and needle sharp teeth. "He was my brother," the creature snarled, its oily eyes shifting from the corpse of its sibling back to Squire.

"Sorry," the hobgoblin apologized, bracing the heel of his foot against the corpse's shoulder, and pulling the cleaver from its head with a slight grunt of exertion. "Did you like 'im much?"

The Corca Duibhne shrugged, its long clawed fingers messaging the air. "Not especially," it hissed. "But blood is the strongest bond. I will take your life in exchange for his."

"Is that so?" Squire asked, hefting his weapon, stained with stinking black blood. "I guess it's good to have goals, even if they are fucking ridiculous."

How is this possible? the goblin wondered. Conan Doyle's magick was some serious mojo, but these bastards had breached the house's supposedly unbreakable defenses. Not good. Not good at all.

The scout began to move and Squire prepared to counter its attack, but it lunged away from him and bolted through the doorway with a hiss, fleeing the kitchen. The goblin swore beneath his breath. Night People. Buncha pussies, he thought, hopping over the body of the dead scout in pursuit.

"Wait up," he called, careful not to slip in the blood pooling upon the tile floor. "I've got something special for you."

Squire did not have far to run. The scout had only fled as far as the corridor that led out toward the foyer. It stood, its back against the wall, holding in its spidery hand the crystal knob from Conan Doyle's front door. The Corca Duibhne looked at him, and smiled an awful smile. Tendrils of crimson fog drifted into the corridor from the foyer. For the first time, Squire felt the draft, the breeze.

The door was open.

He could not see it from his vantage point, but it was clear these two scouts were not alone. Squire brandished his cleaver, ready to do combat with whatever else had invaded his employer's home. From the foyer came the sound of splintering wood, and then the heavy, plodding tread of many feet. There was a solid thump and a muttered, feral curse, and in his mind he could picture a cluster of Corca Duibhne carrying something massive and heavy.

Squire was not going to let this happen.

Cleaver clutched tightly in his grip he started down the corridor toward that single Corca Duibhne, who now tossed the crystal knob idly into the air and caught it as though it were a lucky coin. Squire wanted to tear its heart out. But a moment later he came within sight of the foyer.

"Son of a monkey's uncle," he whispered.

Eight Corca Duibhne emerged from the red fog, grunting with exertion as they hauled what looked to be a large chunk of jagged rock between them. They looked like pallbearers carrying a coffin at a funeral. The failing light from outside glinted off the object's surface, and Squire saw that it wasn't rock at all, but a kind of amber, for he could see the shape of a man imprisoned within. At that moment, he knew how his enemies had gained access to the townhouse. It was all so frighteningly clear.

"Sweetblood," he said aloud as the Night People let their load drop to the hardwood floor of the foyer.

A part of him wanted to stay, to defend the homestead from invaders, but another part of him, one far more intelligent than that stupid half, suggested that it might just be wiser to get the hell out of there. He began to search for an exit, a patch of shadow through which to make his escape.

"What, leaving us so soon?" came a voice as smooth as silk, speaking the tongue of the Fey.

Squire turned to see a statuesque female emerge from the scarlet fog. The Corca Duibhne cowered as she passed them, as if afraid she would slap them, or worse. The woman was dressed from head to toe in black leather, her hair covered in a stylish kerchief of red silk, as if to match the fog. Even though her eyes were hidden behind sunglasses, Squire knew her at once.