Rancor: Vampyre Hunter (Rancor Chronicles) (4 page)

Sam turned on the overhead lamp, looked at his den, and smelled the musk from the time he had spilled his aftershave. The carpet still stank, but he kept it because he and his wife had chosen it together.

He’d once used the room to prepare for hunting trips. Along one wall was a large bookcase for his hunting guides. Directly across from it was a desk used to reload shells.

But every time he entered this place of solace none of these things caught his eye. To him the dominant item was his wife’s portrait that hung over the mantel. Resting below it, placed before his hunting rifle, was the urn holding her ashes. Sam stared at the urn. As a familiar pain welled in his chest, he knew that he would never be able to take that one final step and remarry. Since he could not live out the rest of his days with Trina, then he would spend them alone. He would never replace her.

He walked to his sitting chair, slumped his shoulders, and sighed. His grasp on hope weakened. Staring at the portrait, he collapsed into his leather recliner. Sam wondered if he’d get through this night, let alone the rest of his life, without a drink.

He didn’t even realize that he had grasped the bottle of whiskey he kept stashed beside the chair.

The evening quickly matured into night. Though Sam had advertised in the local paper as well as with the local employment agency, no one had come about the job.

Alix rested upstairs in her room with the lights off, and cuddled her giant Pooh Bear in her cozy wicker chair. She knew by now that Sam would have lost heart.

Staring out her large glass window at the constellations so far away, she glimpsed a star shooting across the heavens. She wished upon it that there might be something she could do to help Sam. She feared greatly that she might lose him again. A single tear tickled as it made the lone journey down her cheek. She dared not touch it. She allowed it this sojourn. It reached her chin, and clung as if for life. She prayed that Sam, like the tear, would cling to his life.

Her alarm clock read 9:22 p.m. The evening had grown too late for anyone to come about the job, and that surprised her. She knew many people, mostly fellow students, who needed the work. She wondered why no one had come.

Then she remembered: Sam’s reputation as a drunk. It saddened her that, though there were many in the small town who needed any kind of employment, no one wished to work with that “Conway loser.”

Alix caught the clinging tear from her chin and held it gently in her palm. She closed her fingers over it; its cool touch on her warm skin was not unlike her sorrow for Sam. He must be aware that the town thought of him as nothing more than a drunk. And that, worse yet, so did she.

CHAPTER SIX

A loud, shrill ring ended the silence. Alix leaped from her wicker chair and flew down the staircase. She wished she’d come down earlier to bring the phone to her room, as the noise might disturb Sam. Before answering the phone, she peered down the unlit hall at the den. She saw that the light emanating from the bottom of the door didn’t flicker. The ringing hadn’t bothered Sam, after all. By the beginning of the third ring, Alix picked up the receiver.

“Hello?” she sang, grabbing a folding chair. She waited for the person at the other end of the line to speak.

Alix opened the chair to face south toward the front door, with her back to the den. Again she said, “Hello?”–this time a little louder.

Hearing Betty’s voice, she relaxed into the plastic folding chair. “Hi, Betty! Guess what? Sam’s reopening the store! Isn’t that great?”

“Whatever. Are you going to Carl’s party or what? Last chance, baby!”

“Uhm, I was, but now I don’t know.”

“You will if you want him to ask you to Friday’s school dance,” Betty warned.

Alix leaned against the cold wooden door, wishing the conversation could have been about Sam. But she did want to be popular. And, no matter how much Alix hated to admit it, Betty knew the inner workings of boys more than she did.

“Can we go later?”

“Duh! Of course we’ll go later. Meet me at my house and we’ll fix you up. Baby, Carl won’t be able to resist!” Betty burst into a loud fit of giggles.

Even Alix giggled as she asked, “Do you really think he’ll ask me?”

A loud knock returned Alix to the moment.

“Betty, I’ll be there in half an hour!”

Alix sprang from her place against the door, hanging up without waiting for a response. As the loud knock resounded again, Alix faced the entryway, frozen like a statue. She was relieved that, at long last, someone had come for the job. She knew that above anything else this would lift Sam’s spirits!

Sam could not move. The knock on the door made him wonder if someone in the town still believed in him. He pressed the bottle’s mouth firmly against his lips. Breathing the heavy smell from the baiting liquid, he closed his eyes tight. Sam wondered if he still believed in himself.

Some unseen demon had magically petrified his legs and bound his neck. A whisper, one that lived deep in the part of his soul that he had hoped to end, reminded him how much easier this interview would be if only he’d take one drink. Just one . . . The bottle was so close by, the liquid so easily accessible. A third and fourth hand closed around his own, and they forced him to grip the bottle tighter.

“
This is no longer your choice
,” the demon told him. “
One won’t hurt. You will stop at one
.”

Suddenly, he heard the door to his den creak open and his daughter’s light footsteps enter the room. Red-faced he turned to her–noticing for the first time how much she resembled her mother, especially in her eyes. It was in that solemn gaze that he found his will to force the demon to lose his grip and vanquish.

“
I’ll be back!
” the demon said as it left, and Sam knew it would make good on that promise.

Sam rose from his leather recliner just as his daughter opened her mouth to voice her obvious hurt. He gently capped the bottle as if he were afraid it might shatter, and left it to rest on the recliner’s arm. Wrapping his arms around his chest, he slid his hands inside his jacket to hide the shaking that now besieged his entire body.

“Should I get the door?” she asked, holding her tears back.

“No.” Sam answered in a deep throaty whisper, unable to meet her gaze. “I’ll get the door. You dispose of this.” He indicated the bottle with a nudge of his head. “As well, clean out the cupboards–including the hidden compartment under the kitchen sink.”

The knock again resounded from the front door, and they both knew they had to put this moment into the past. They followed one another from the den and parted, Alix toward the kitchen and Sam toward the front door. Alix paused to see who had come.

It was that new kid, Rellik. Or, at least that’s who she thought it was. A shadow cast from the darkness outside made him appear more like an apparition than a person. He stood away from the doorway as if he didn’t want the light from the house to touch him. His eyes, narrowed against the light, glowed. Alix met them, but only for a moment. He slapped on a pair of dark sunglasses as if to hide what his soul might betray. In that moment fear held her fast, as though paralysis had overtaken her.

She wanted to flee, but fright began taking shape in her mind. It became a series of images, ones taken from the story she’d written earlier that day on her blog. Alix thought to speak to him. But when she tried, her voice failed.

Rellik wrapped his arms tightly around his chest and sighed, his breath spitting in a low, raspy growl. “I’m here for the job.” But whether the voice had come from him, or from some deep recess in her mind, she did not know.

She wanted to answer for Sam, who just stood at the door. But as her hands were trembling, it was all she could do to hold on to the bottle. Alix felt like a prisoner to the outsider’s strange power. Though she finally did break free enough to escape into the kitchen, the captor never did fully leave her heart.

When she heard the door to the den close, Alix crept back to eavesdrop. She wondered what Rellik wanted with this job, as customer service hardly seemed his thing. She listened to him and her father speak.

Sam said, “What’s your name?”

“Rellik. Rellik Faolchú.”

“What education do you have?” Sam’s voice sounded monosyllabic. Alix wished she could see what was happening.

“I’ve enrolled at Fillmore High to complete my senior year.”

“What about family? Where do they live?” This time her father sounded more in control of his words. Alix waited impatiently for the answers. But there was a lull in the conversation before the outsider said:

“I have no family. As for my living arrangements, you will let me stay in the loft above your garage instead of giving me full pay.”

“I would need references–”

“I have no references.”

“I’m sorry, Rellik. Without references, I don’t think. . .” Sam paused, and Alix knew something very odd was going on inside that den. But what it was she just couldn’t figure.

“You’re hired,” her father then said, his words robotic. Like someone who was hypnotized.

“And the loft?” Rellik asked with obvious confidence, as if he had pre-written the conversation and had only asked it to please himself.

“Of course.” Sam’s tone gave away what it was in his voice that seemed so familiar. It was the sound of being under control. An absolute, unyielding control.

Alix wondered what kind of power Rellik possessed to grant him such dominion over another human being. She was reminded of the supernatural voice that had impersonated her conscience, and of how it had convinced her to show Rellik to their class.

Then she remembered Carl squaring off against Rellik. Carl had just started shaking his head from side to side, as if he was fighting something within his mind. Had he, too, heard the commanding voice?

Alix heard them move toward the door. The interview had ended. Not wanting to be caught eavesdropping, she hurried toward the kitchen.

Yet, when Rellik exited the den, she stopped and turned back to him. The door to the den remained open; her father was still inside. As Rellik faced her, they found themselves caught in the same position as when he had first entered the home. His gaze from beneath his shades penetrated her defenses. Alix shrank from him. He turned away, slumped his shoulders and sighed.

Without uttering a single word he left.

Sam still had not emerged from the room. Alix ran to shut the front door. After locking an extra bolt, one they had never bothered using before, she turned her back on the secured door to face the den. She wondered if something had happened that she hadn’t heard. Walking toward the quiet room, she contemplated whether to enter, but she didn’t want her father to think she didn’t believe in him.

Just as she reached the doorway, Sam suddenly bustled out into the hall.

Alix knew he hadn’t noticed her, so she moved aside. He headed straight for the coat rack. When he grabbed his trench coat, she thought,
Where is he going?

He turned and glanced into her eyes, conveying an apology by his very stature.

“I never said this would be a miracle,” Sam whispered, just before he left.

Alix ran to her room, tears filling her eyes. Had Sam witnessed that, he would have remarked at just how much his daughter had turned out like her mother.

“I have been told by many people, usually by those who claim to be close to one deity or another, that to find true happiness one must stay away from all of Earth’s pleasures. ‘What, I would implore, are these things which you deny?’ Wealth, promiscuity and power over individuals, they tell me.

“It is those people for whom I feel the most pity. Not because they have denied themselves life’s pleasures, but because they know not what pleasure is.

“
When you love someone so much that even their imperfections move you, and they love you the same, that is when you learn true pleasure.

“And it is that very thing which is denied to one who lives forever.”

-Wulfsign

CHAPTER SEVEN

Rellik sat upon a wooden crate inside his loft, staring at a painting on an easel. Dawn broke through a window, caressing the painting’s half-finished, tender face. Doe eyes, a Mona Lisa smile, and long blonde hair came together to create more soul than in any other painting he had seen.

For a bed Rellik had placed four crates together and cast a tarp over them. He had no pillow, nor any blankets. All his belongings, except for a palm-sized, intricately carved wooden box, he had left inside the trunk of his car, hidden in the woods.

His makeshift bed was hard and uncomfortable to lie on, but it was not the worst place he had ever slept. Rellik was too tired to care about something as simple as furniture. He wondered where he would ever find the strength to complete his task.

Wondering if the identity he had once clung to had slipped away . . .

Rancor walked along the cliff, with one side a sheer drop to the ocean below and the other side rolling hills and woods as far as the eye could see. The salty air Rancor breathed in did nothing to wash away the grief that weighted his heart so heavily he had to sit. The ocean broke against the rocks below him, and though he sat too far away from the cliff to see below, he could hear the waves crash against the rocks. As he relaxed, every sensation came to him, from the salty ocean air to the tiniest blade of grass as it blew in the gentle breeze.

“Brother!” he shouted, when he smelled Kendil behind a tall, mossy rock.

Kendil laughed and walked out into the open. “Forgive ma impudence, but way’s da story?”

Kendil sat beside Rancor.

“I be tinkin’, Kendil. When I walk along dese paths, I do so ta clear ma mind.”

“Tinkin’?” Kendil asked as if the very word had a sour taste in his mouth. “Ya need ta find a one, brother, so da she can do da tinkin’ for ya.”

“I killed six men yesterday.” Rancor’s words carried with them the sadness he felt in his chest. But, as fast as that sadness left, it created more, as if to crush him.

“Ya fought well in ya first battle, roy! Ya fought like a lion!”

“I fought like a wulf.”

The two brothers stayed quiet and still for as long as it took for Kendil’s shadow to move with the setting sun away from Rancor.

“It’s time for ya to watch da prisoners. Forget ya foolishness.”

“Ya angry?” Rancor asked.

“Rancor, ya got kindness in your ’eart. Admirable ta other clans per’aps, but dangerous ta an Alsandair.”

“I ’ave no fear o’ death!”

“But do ya fear da gods? Tey are da ones who will punish ya should ya not make a sacrifice.”

Rancor thought about the men who had attacked them, and how the Alsandair had taken them prisoner. He also thought about the reasons why the men had attacked.

“Dey tried ta save da children, just as you would ’ave tried ta save me. What roy do we ’ave ta judge dem guilty o’ an action we would ’ave done ’ad da situation been reversed?”

“Dey murdered one o’ us!”

“Dey attacked way farm tools! Dey’re not warriors. Dese men are noy different dan us. I spoke way dem.”

“Spoke way dem? ’ow could ya understand deir gibberish?”

“Dey taught me.”

“You spend too much time learning way your mind and ’eart. Ya speak way de animals too, do you not? Yet ya do mind dem on ya plate! Give dese men to da gods for deir plates, just as ya would an animal to ya stomach.”

“Dere is a difference, Kendil.”

“Man understands the evil he is. That is the difference.”

Rellik stared hard at the painting as he rolled onto his side. He could only meet the portrait’s gaze for a moment before he sat up and smothered a shout.
Memories!
There was no escape from them, no running from them, and sometimes there was no forgiveness from them.

“How can you treat us with such malice? Have you no kindness in your heart?”

Rancor stood on guard outside the cave where the prisoners were locked. Only days ago the words from these men had sounded like no more than guttural utterances, the same as any beast from the land. But it had not taken long before Rancor learned the villagers’ tongue as easily as his own.

The prisoner said, “You seemed interested enough yesterday to learn our tongue. You have an incredible mind, friend.”

“It be me curse, and don call ma friend!” Rancor turned on the man, gritting his teeth and throwing a fist at the bars. When the prisoner shrank away, Rancor calmed. In a near whisper he said, “I understand ya. Please leave ma be, I do way I do because da gods command.”

“You follow false gods then. Why would a god create such beauty if he wanted men to spoil it?”

“’Tis not ma duty ta question.”

“Serve a god that says you must serve others. Do not question. Seek.”

Rancor faced the two men within the prison. One sat weeping on the floor while the other who spoke stood grasping the bars. He said again, “Seek.”

“I would ’ave ta leave ma clan, ma life. I cannoy.”

“You cannot lose what was never yours.” He reached through the bars and grasped Rancor’s shoulder. “But whatever you choose know this: I forgive you.”

A voice from behind startled Rancor, “If it is ya wish ta set dese men free, I shan’t stand in ya way.” It was Kendil, his brother. “But if ya do, ya must say farewell to da Alsandair and never royturn.”

“Farewell? For what?” Rancor turned to face his kin. “Your ma clansmen. I amn’t turn away ta save da innoycents.”

They stood before one another, Kendil wearing his best sword as did Rancor.

“Innoycents? Sooner or later ya words will see ya ’ang on ta gallows. Ya do noy belong ’ere, brother.”

“Ya would see ma banished?”

Kendil turned his back to his brother. Staring into the rising sun, he said, “Ya never belonged ta us. ’Tis not da way o’ an Alsandair ta show mercy.”

“And is thoy all we are? Mirror images o’ one anoyther?”

Kendil laughed. “Still you pose such questions on ma. Rancor, my dear, kind brother, I will let ya do dis deed, but only if ya vow on ya honor ta noy return.”

“Are you ashamed o’ me?”

Kendil, his body silhouetted by a crimson horizon, turned back to his brother. “I love ya, brother. Enough to know da gods mean ya for greater things.”

“Ta gods? What madness in such belief! If dey be real, would dey noy ask, noy, demand us to love one another?”

“Thoy demand is noy ’ere, Rancor. Especially–” Kendil fell short, suddenly unable to meet his sibling’s gaze.

“Especially? Tell me.”

“I ’ave seen ya change,” Kendil whispered, still without meeting his brother’s gaze.

Rancor turned away. “Roy! Ya eyes trick ya!”

“What would da gods ’ave granted ya such power, and such mercy, if da ’ad meant ya to live ya life as one o’ us?”

“And what o’ you? Did da gods mean ya for dis bane? Let us both flee da evil in which we live.”

“Ma blood dances when it spills another. ’Tis only yours da mourns.”

“Ansgar will kill ya should you stay.”

“I will bear them false witness. I shall bear ya put a spell on me.”

“And if the Council does not believe you?”

“I shall die.” Kendil placed his hands on Rancor’s shoulder and whispered, “I was born Alsandair, and will noy die anything but.”

“So dis means–”

“Farewell, dear brother.” Kendil embraced Rancor and sighed. “Take with ya this.” Slipping a ring from his finger, Kendil placed it in his brother’s hand.

“Your wedding band! What would ya one tink should she noy see it on ya?”

“She cares noy for me as I ’ave noy love for ’er. It should be worn for love, and you, Rancor, will find da love. Go. Now, before ’tis too late.”

Rellik opened the box and took out his brother’s band.

He remembered his indecision that day, and the fear he could not overcome. How could he leave the only life he had known to venture into a world he did not understand?

Most of all, he recalled what he had seen when he returned, too afraid to leave the only people he knew as family. The only place he had called home.

Ansgar, standing on the gallows, pushed Kendil to the ground. He glared at his son and sighed, brushing a hand through his hair. First he shouted to his son, “Ya were in charge, Kendil!”, and then to his people: “Ma kinsmen, ya ’ave come dis dawn ta witness our gods’ vengeance. But woy we ’ave found is ta betrayal o’ one o’ us. We ’ave war ahead, and t’would do us much impudence ta engage our enemy before we ’ave appeased ta gods.”

“’ow are we ta appease ta gods woy no sacrifice?” shouted a clansman.

Kendil looked at his kinsmen, then at his father. “Ansgar, ’tis noy ma fault! Rancor poy a spell on ma dat made me ’elpless.”

Ansgar turned to the villagers who had gathered at the gallows. Drawing his sword, he raised it to silence them, and said, “Ma people! De escape is noy me son’s burden, but ’is brother’s. Doy no blame Kendil for dis travesty, lest you shall feel de wrath a’ ma steel!”

“We came for a sacrifice!” called another voice.

“And so shall there be one.” Ansgar brought the tip of his sword to rest on his son’s neck. “Kendil o’ the Alsandair, we be noy a clan da blames our kin, but we be one da dies for our corruption.”

The crowd cheered so loudly with approval that a rumble from heaven went unnoticed. But what did not go unheard was a voice that said, “Corruption? What da ya know o’ dis?”

They turned to the cave. Standing upon its roof, Rancor stared at them. Silence again took hold over the clan.

“Brothers!” Rancor said. “What be dis madness? Ya so bloodthirsty ya wode sacrifice an innocent man in place o’ two who only wished ta right ya wrongs?”

“Ya must be as daft as ya are weak,” Ansgar snarled.

“Daft? Ya are about ta ’ang ya son, because he let ma free people who acted noy different than you would in deir place?”

“Rancor, ya confuse self-righteousness foy honor. Did ya not participate in da slaughter? Do ya now believe da because ya set two free, ya are absolved of the six ya murdered?”

Rancor sighed, and looked at each of his kinsmen. In their eyes he saw himself and found his destiny in their damnation. “Per’aps I shall never escape ta evil within ma.”

“I can tell you woy makes dis man unlike us,” Kendil spat. “Rancor, ya ’ave already escaped our evil. Dis clan wonders woy it is ta make you unlike us? Simply this: unlike da Alsandair, ya hates da sin within ya.”

“Kendil is under a spell again!” This time the unknown voice was softer.

“I see truth fa da first time since I opened ma eyes as a babe. And I know ma brother is absolved o’ our sin.”

Ansgar laughed. “We shall test such virtue. We shall kill but one man, and you, Rancor, shall decide which.”

Rancor bit his lower lip and stared at the sky. His brow furrowed as he whispered, “I surrender ma life. Set ma brother free.”

“Noy! ’Tis I who should die,” Kendil said.

Rancor leaped from where he stood and ran to the gallows. He stood before his brother and smiled. “Would it be anything less than just for us ta die together? Let’s both go ta Other World, and see woy honor waits us there.”

Kendil took his brother’s hand. “We die together, as it should be. If kindness be a sin, I take its punishment gladly. Thank ya for finding that virtue in ma.”

“We meet our end with honor.”

But though it was an end for Kendil, there was no such escape for Rancor. Rancor had spent a week on the gallows, swinging next to his brother’s lifeless body, the memory of his brother choking to death echoing in his mind every hour of every day. When at last his kin came to release him, to bind him in shackles and take him to his father’s tent, he went without a fight.

As Ansgar paced inside the tent, his muscles tensed like rocks. “I cannoy understand the likes o’ ya. I trained ya ta be one o’ us. Why deny woy I ’ave taught?”

Outside, two armed guards barred the tent’s entrance. Throughout the village, Rancor’s clansmen waited for the sentencing of the first man to have survived the gallows.

“’Tis not me birthright. I was never one o’ you. Not in mind, not in spirit, not even in ancestry.”

“Did Kendil tell you we stole you from another clan?”

“’E did noy. ’e did noy ’ave ta.”

“You are Rancor o’ the Wulfsign, not Alsandair.” Ansgar spoke softer this time. “What I tell ya is truth. I stole ya from a village o’ demons.”

“Tell me of them.”

“T’was during our spring move. Da land we ’ad settled te previous autumn no longer provided food, so we sought fertile ground. We came upon a valley we could ’ave settled fa generations, but we ’ad first ta drive out a clan tat was already settled. The Alsandair ’as never been defeated in war, but we came close tat day. But dese were noy men we fought. Tese were demons thoy could turn to a wulf at will.”