"The Prince and the Dragon"
Philadelphia – 1984
The little thing struggled with its awkward and ungainly legs, gripping at the edges of the sleek tile wall. Its limbs danced about as it sought some purchase in the surface, desperate to climb another centimeter or two.
Noirbarret smiled as he watched it. He leaned over in his chair, his black eyes focused on the tiny spider like a wolf surveying its prey. Calmly, clinically, he let a puff of air escape his lips, hitting the spider with enough force to make it tumble back down to the drab police station floor. No sooner did it hit the ground than it tried again, clawing its way back up the wall. Noirbarret's smile deepened.
"The itsy... bitsy... spiiiiiider..."
One of the detectives sitting across from him looked down from his copy of the newspaper. He sighed as if he were scolding a small child.
"Why don't you just crush 'im and get it over with?"
The agent looked up at the man, his face showing insincere shock.
"'Crush him'?" He clucked his tongue and shook his head. "That'd end the fun, wouldn't it? I'm not such a spoil-sport."
The detective muttered something under his breath and returned to his paper. For a time the only thing that passed between them was the dust motes in the room and the stale scent of bad coffee clinging to the air.
Minutes later the man Noirbarret was waiting for arrived: a disheveled detective in a bad suit shuffled into the squad room and motioned to him. Noirbarret was off his seat like a shot and he followed the man down the busy corridors of the station.
"We've got a hard perimeter set up all around the area," he explained. "If your 'Headsman' is in the vicinity, we'll catch him." He looked over at Noirbarret, his beady gray eyes curious. "I was a little surprised to hear that you've been hanging out down here at the station; the way I figure, you'd wanna be in on the hunt—"
"The way I figure," Noirbarret grumbled, "our witness's testimony might be the best lead in tracking the killer. Coincidentally, about that witness..."
"Kid's been cleared by medical," the detective said. "Apparently your perp had him holed up in the Grundy Museum, right off of Radcliffe. You know it?"
Noirbarret shook his head.
"Got ourselves a real 'comedy of errors' here," the detective led Noirbarret into the interrogation wing of the building. "So, after you got your federales to ring the alarm bells and issue the alert word gets around to the curators of this museum. They figure that they should have their rent-a-cop go by and make another check of the place, just to be safe, but the only problem is they don't have a rent-a-cop. Their security guard's some limp-wristed academy washout with more 'wannabe' in him than 'is'. That's putting it politely, too."
The detective chuckled, stopping Noirbarret for a moment with a hand in the air.
"Oh, and you'll never get this: know what kinda gun our washout wannabe-cop takes with him on his 'security patrols'? What kinda 'heat' he packs?"
Noirbarret tilted his head very slowly, like a bird contemplating a worm. It was obvious he couldn't care in the slightest, but that didn't stop the detective.
"A friggin' .44, that's what!" The detective shook his head. "Can you believe that? Joker must think he's Dirty Harry, or something. Anyway, he hears a noise and it's shoot first, ask questions later. Managed to wing your perp, and but for the grace of God miss the kid. Oh, that's the best part, too: stupid clown thought he did hit the kid at first, what with all the blood coverin' the brat. Kid was in shock, too: all stiff as a board, not moving, looked like he wasn't even breathing, and the only thing that moron was sayin' to my boys when they showed up was 'Oh, Jesus: I shot a kid! I just shot a little kid!' Well, maybe that idiot'll think twice before firing wild, in the future. Maybe he'll get himself a more practical gun, too."
"Who could say," Noirbarret muttered. "Still, though: it's not exactly a 'comedy of errors', is it?"
"How you figure?"
Noirbarret had to force a smile away as he whispered.
"Those usually don't end in tears..."
The pair reached an anonymous metal door in the hall and the detective ushered Noirbarret in; beyond was a very small and narrow room, dominated entirely by a glass window.
And sitting in a chair on the other side of that window, hands plastered against a grubby tabletop, was Penance Cameron.
Noirbarret exhaled a stuttering breath; he resisted the urge to press his face to the glass.
Only his salivating grin betrayed his thoughts.
"Boy's rattled from the ordeal; no surprise there." the detective said. "And he's clammed up tighter than a... well, a clam. He won't say a word to anyone, not even the nurses who tried to give him a lollypop." The detective chuckled, shaking his head. "He even fought our cops tooth 'n nail when they took him off to the hospital. He's as fierce as a Rottweiler, some of the boys say—"
"Or a Rabid Fox," Noirbarret cooed.
The detective looked at Noirbarret, squinting oddly.
"Uh, well, yeah, guess you could say that, too. Anyway, the kid's in fine shape, physically, so it doesn't look like your killer mussed him up during the time he had him. Had him checked out for everything, too, including signs of, well, y'know—"
"Sexual assault is not part of my perp's MO—"
"Neither is kidnapping random kids, if I read your reports right—"
"Which is why this boy's testimony may be so crucial." Noirbarret motioned to the door behind him. "And it's also why everything he has to tell me must be kept classified and under the Bureau's control, alone."
The detective grit his teeth.
"Are you... are you trying to kick me out of my own interrogation room?"
Noirbarret smiled.
"Point of fact: I am kicking you out of your interrogation room. What I was trying to do, detective, was be polite about it."
X
X
X
The distant drone of fluorescents whined overhead, their buzzing right in time with the faint flicker of the lights. The room smelled of mold and industrial cleaners; beneath it the faint scent of urine permeated all. It was a cramped place, claustrophobic, and the walls themselves conspired to close in on him.
Penance blinked as he stared forward, his pale blue eyes cemented on the glass before him.
But for that shiny glass the room had all the comforts of a mausoleum.
Given his situation right now it might as well be one.
He still wore a pair of green scrub bottoms from his time in the hospital. When the police transferred him to this station they tried to bribe him to talk with donuts and sweets; one of the cops got the bright idea to engage the boy's 'confidence' by offering him an honest-to-goodness official police shirt to replace his itchy green medical patient top. He took it, for nothing other than comfort, but it was only later he realized it must've been a shirt for female recruits: the sharp 'v' plunge along the neckline gave it away, since the men's shirts all had a uniform 'u' shape to the necks.
He didn't really mind; it was likely that a woman's shirt would be the only kind that even remotely had a chance of fitting him, anyway, and it was still too big.
Comfy, though...
He willed his hands not to tremble, and his legs not to shake. He'd been here before, of course, in situations like this. Maybe not quite as bad as this, but still: police interrogation rooms were old hat to him. Now was not a time for action; it was a time for acting. There were hundreds of ways this could go in the next few minutes, and he had to make sure things went his way. Everything else was irrelevant.
He blinked. In the back of his head he thought about Whip.
That's right, Galabeg would tell Penance, if she was here. Whip's especially irrelevant. Doesn't matter what happened to her, or where she is, now. You can't ask, and you can't even let on that you know her. If she's dead, then she's dead, and you can't help her. You can still help yourself, you stupid little idiot.
The boy nodded, microscopically, as he let the words sink into his head. He did not blink, and his eyes did not waver.
But one of his legs did shake.
The door beside the window squealed on rusty hinges; a man stepped into the room, yawning and scratching at his temple. He held a manila folder in that hand, and it obscured his face.
"Cold in here, isn't it?" The man asked as he walked to one side of the room.
Penance shrugged, avoiding looking up.
The man walked to a nearby camera positioned in one corner of the room and switched it off; he stood with his back to the boy.
"Seems cold, anyway..."
Penance lazily looked up at the back of the man's head. This was the moment: he needed spot-on reading, precise acting, and flawless execution. Composure was the key, as always, and a cool head stays attached to its body, after all—
The man turned around.
He sported a mile-wide grin.
"Seems cold to me..."
The pair stared at each other, and instantly Penance's eyes bulged like dinner plates. The boy's jaw went slack and he instinctively pushed back from the table, falling off his chair and landing hard on his rear; he skidded backwards on the floor in an undignified crab-walk, his lips trembling like vibrating violin strings and his breaths coming in quick, ragged gasps.
Noirbarret merely walked around the table, moving slow and tapping the table top playfully with his fingers.
"Hello, Penance, my dear..."
Penance reached the back wall, and by now he was hyperventilating. Steam rose from the ground between his legs; a large wet spot blossomed on the crotch of his pants and a trail of hot urine moved down the concrete floor. Noirbarret knelt down and considered the stream, its vapors winding up around his face.
"It is cold in here, isn't it?" He laughed. He inhaled deeply, his nose sucking up all those ammonia-heavy vapors, and when he exhaled he disturbed the sedate waves rising off the boy's urine, his breath stuttering with pleasure. "Well, that's not as nice a bouquet as chamomile," he said, "but, oh, it's just as relaxing!"
Penance merely stared up at the man, his face scrunched in horror, lips still quivering. Noirbarret got to his feet and absently tossed a trinket into the boy's pee-soaked lap: a braided chain of sterling silver, with a honey-colored bauble at its center.
And the bauble was as cheap as chalk.
Penance looked down at the thing, and when he did he quickly hung his head, mewling like a wounded kitten.
"Well, then," Noirbarret reached into his coat and retrieved a set of wrist and leg chains. "Shall we go?"
X
X
X
He bundled Penance into the back of a loaned-out squad car, meeting only the faintest of struggles from the boy as he put him into the seat. He got several odd looks as he escorted Penance, in chains, through the building in his urine-soaked pants, but the demand of 'Bureau business' was good enough to get them both out of the station without too much fuss.
And it's not like Penance would raise any hint of protest, either.
Noirbarret popped the trunk and tossed Penance's backpack inside, taken from the station as more 'Bureau evidence'. He briefly rifled through the contents— the boy's little Scottish knife, stuffed fox head and some clothing— and then he approached the rear passenger door, dutifully reciting the contents of the backpack to the boy.
"That sound about right?" Noirbarret asked. "Wouldn't want to short-change you; those low-paid donut-munching cretins can have sticky fingers, you know..."
Penance merely stared at his lap, his eyes distant; he said nothing.
Noirbarret went back to the trunk. He pushed the backpack up against a bundled-up tarp. The backpack only pushed a few inches against the tarp before meeting resistance, and in the back of his mind Noirbarret wondered how the cops in Philly could get by with such little trunk space. He slammed the trunk shut and then got into the driver's seat.
He drove out of Bristol, heading south on 413. Dense trees shuttled by the windows as the car sped on, both driver and passenger completely silent.
And only one of them smiling.
Soon the car reached a metal bridge spanning the width of the Delaware River. Noirbarret slowed the car as they reached the middle of the bridge, and then stopped it entirely. He shut the engine off and looked back at the boy.
"Well," he said, "if we go any farther we'll wind-up in New Jersey. Don't worry, though: I'd never do such a vile thing to you, my dear."
He chuckled, stepping out of the car, and then he walked to the side of the bridge. Large chunks of stone dotted the side of the bridge at regular intervals, most as big as a man, and many with pipes of rebar sticking out of them at odd places. He surveyed each of these in turn, like a snobbish critic at an art gallery, until one particularly large boulder caught his eye. He sauntered back to the car and opened the passenger door.
"They've been 'beautifying' the bridge, here, giving it some nice stone facing," Noirbarret explained as he led the shackled boy to the large boulder. Penance merely shuffled forward like a corpse, eyes cast down. "But plenty of the stone they bring in isn't up to snuff— it cracks as the rebar sets, or it's got some other flaws— and they leave it to the side, here, for the time being. Of course they're not working today: I've got the whole road shut-down, entirely, on account of the 'manhunt'. Gotta find that 'vicious serial killer', don't I?"
Noirbarret produced a key and un-cuffed Penance's wrists and ankles, removing the chains. When he did the boy made a half-hearted attempt to bolt, but the man easily gripped Penance by the throat and slammed the back of his head against the stone.
"Ah, ah..." he playfully wagged a finger before the boy's face, and with his free hand reached into his coat and brought out some coils of thick, braided rope. He easily forced Penance's wrists to either side and bound them to the exposed rebar poles, then he did the same with Penance's waist and his feet. Penance struggled a bit, but after Noirbarret was done he placed that silver necklace down around Penance's neck, and that brought all the boy's struggles to an end.
"Did you know that she loved you, Penance?" The man asked. "I mean, really. She really thought you were something special; she wanted you to be her kid. More'n anything, I imagine..."
Penance's eyes widened; again he exhaled another mewling breath, hanging his head.
Noirbarret went back to the trunk and retrieved Penance's backpack, along with a large watertight plastic bag. When he returned to Penance he retrieved the boy's little knife from the backpack, and he turned it over in his hands.
"Been taking good care of your equipment, huh?" He looked up at the boy with a devilish smile. "I'm sure this must be as sharp as ever..."
The man brandished the knife and pointed the tip against Penance's throat; he traced a few delicate lines around the boy's flesh, not deep enough to break the skin. Penance didn't react.
With a sudden, violent downward slash Noirbarret rent the boy's shirt in two, barely even grazing Penance's chest as he did so. He ripped the shirt away with his hands, then gave the boy's pants the same treatment. Once he'd dispossessed the boy of all his clothing Noirbarret stood before him, leering at him with an unsavory smirk on his lips.
"And you've been taking good care of your equipment, too, huh?" He laughed, tousling the boy's blond hair. He paced before Penance, wagging his finger. "Oh, this was a good, good hunt this time, Penance! You really pulled out all the stops, didn't you? Lone Horn certainly had your number, didn't he? Must've been stalking you for months. But then ol' Lone Horn was always more 'talk' than 'action'; I can see why he underestimated you." He looked back at the boy, and his eyes beamed with something akin to pride. "But what about the Hunter! My God, did you know I was terrified? That's right: terrified! When I learned that you tangled with him my heart just sank: was it the end? Was it all going to be over?"
Noirbarret stopped pacing; he leaned against the large boulder and idly played with the fingers of one of Penance's bound, limp hands.
"But no: not even the Hunter had your number, did he? Nobody's got little Penance Cameron's number, do they?" The man still played with Penance's fingers, until finally he took the boy's ring finger and ripped it back, snapping the bone clean. The boy showed no response, other than a small flutter of the eyes.
"Nobody except me, of course..."
Noirbarret lovingly stroked the boy's broken finger with a delicate hand. In one precise motion he re-set the bone, bringing another flutter to Penance's eyes. When he was finished he even kissed the wounded digit.
"But, still, it's just as well that the hunt ends here, for now," Noirbarret said. "See, you've been moving north, and you probably don't know this, but there's something... peculiar up in Trenton, just across the water, and if you'd stumbled into that, well..." the man shrugged. "I have faith in you, dear little Penance, but not against the likes of Carlin Gay. Oh, you'd have lost your head, dear one! The hunt would be over! Perish— oh perish— the very thought!"
Again Noirbarret tousled the boy's hair, beaming with a sunny smile.
"Now, as it is, we can keep on going, can't we?" He lazily cracked his neck and popped his knuckles, then motioned down to his own body. "'Connall Noirbarret' is almost ready for retirement; I'm already getting a reputation around the Bureau as the 'eternally baby-faced Noirbarret'. Eh, so it's about time to move on." He drew a long, luxurious breath. "But I do have some work to finish up here first, don't I, Penance? You see, there's still the girl to deal with, isn't there?"
For the first time since the interrogation room Penance raised his head and looked Noirbarret in the eyes; an expression of cold terror replaced his numbness.
"That's right," Noirbarret inspected his fingernails as he spoke. "Your little freckle-faced black friend. Pity she had to get mixed up in all this." The man looked at the boy and wagged his finger. "Pity you had to become friends with her."
Penance again hung his head, teeth grit. He shut his eyes, willing himself not to cry.
"Ah, well," Noirbarret shrugged. "Such is life. You know, I think I'll lop off that lovely French braid ponytail of hers when I'm done with her, maybe hang on to it until we meet again. Something for you to remember her by." He motioned to Penance's restraints. "Won't have to wait too terribly long, this time around; I'm guessing that those ropes'll last about a decade, maybe 12 years at most before they degrade. The Delaware's not the cleanest river in the world, you know."
Noirbarret carefully wrapped Penance's backpack in the watertight plastic bag and then affixed it to one of the rebar poles. He held up Penance's liquid steel knife.
"Ah, and I almost forgot: can't have you going into hibernation without your trusty knife. You probably feel naked without it!"
The man chuckled at his own joke, and then he violently rammed the knife clean into Penance's left shoulder, right at the blade. Penance hissed and flinched, but didn't scream as the man twisted it in, ensuring it would stay in place. As Noirbarret stepped back to survey his doings he tapped his chin, like an artist considering his work.
"Heh! Maybe I should've stuck the knife in your side, you think? More biblical, that way. Give you the whole 'crucified hero' treatment?" The man leaned down and whispered into Penance's ear. "Of course, you're not the hero, are you, Penance? If you were, well, you'd stop getting involved with so many nice people out there. You'd stop getting them killed."
Noirbarret leaned back, and he shook his head as he laughed.
"On second thought you look more like 'Andromeda' than 'Christ' right now, don't you? There's no one to save you from the sea serpent, though..."
The man lifted Penance's chin with two fingers; Penance didn't meet his eyes.
"Well, Penance: you got anything to say, this time around? It's been so long, my friend, since I've heard your lovely little voice. Will I hear it this time? Do I have to wait until next time? Well?"
Penance met the man's gaze, but he said nothing.
"Ah, well," Noirbarret released the boy's chin. "Maybe you'll have something to say next time we meet, when I give you another gift. Young 'Whippoorwill's' hair is so silky and smooth, isn't it? Bet if I work it just right I can make a nice noose out of it. Would you like that for next time? A noose, Penance?"
Noirbarret looked over the edge of the bridge, gazing into the murky depths of the Delaware.
"...'cause, all things considered, I really think that drowning rather smarts."
Penance didn't respond to this. Noirbarret merely shrugged, and then he bent down and planted a long, 'loving' kiss on Penance's forehead, patting his cheek afterward.
"It's been very fun catching up, Penance. I always enjoy our little talks, even if they're a touch one-sided. I'll see you later, my good little friend..."
Noirbarret gripped both sides of the bolder and forced it back; the rock tilted unsteadily at the edge of the bridge.
"...and I'll see your little girlfriend even sooner than that!"
With a vicious kick to Penance's bare stomach Noirbarret forced the boulder over the edge. Penance felt his body succumb to gravity's whim, and the rock tumbled through the air in an awful freefall. Just as he thought he might vomit he hit the water, and he sank like a stone.
Or, more precisely, like a boy tied to a stone.
It felt like an eternity before the stone reached the bottom of the inky water. Penance struggled in futility, unable to loosen the ropes that secured him. After a painful minute bubbles exploded from the boy's lips and nose, and then it happened, that terrible thing:
He took water into his mouth and nose, and it filled his lungs. His whole body went to spasms as his throat heaved.
Of all the 'deaths' there were in this world, drowning really had to be one of the worst.
Even in his horror and his panic Penance's mind wasn't focused on his body; he was miles away even before he landed in the water. He wanted to be anywhere else— be anyone else— than who he was right now.
His eyes bugged; there, in the cold water above him, he saw shadows swirling in the dark current. Shapes moved up there, dancing in the waves.
No, not shapes. It was one shape. Only one shape.
A dress of gossamer swirled in the water like an oil stain, and a face came down to meet him. It was thin, with delicate eyebrows and radiant blue eyes touched with gold along the edges. Atop her head was that long comb training white lace.
It was the woman in the white mantilla.
She reached out to the boy, her face ineffable, and Penance scrunched his eyes shut in terror, deathly afraid of her touch.
Times like this a normal boy his 'age' would be begging for his mommy.
In his mind as his vision faded and his body went limp Penance desperately tried to think of different waters than the Delaware, and different places than his watery grave.
He thought about a loch named 'Arkaig'.
And a woman named 'Gilbarta'.
And a clan named 'Cameron'.
