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 Posted: Mon Dec 26, 2016 11:33 am
 The Name
“Why do they call me Lightbreaker?” asked Cesc. The leaves did not crunch under the stride of the mighty stag beside him—he seemed to float atop them just as Cesc did, although his hooves did touch the earth. The leaves did not rustle, nor did the twigs snap as they did when the fawns galloped: a learned grace, then.
Bucephalus turned his head to look at Cesc, the heated-molten gold of his eyes impenetrable as always.
“It is your given name,” he said, simply.
“My name is Rhedefre,” said Cesc. “Or, Cesc, if you prefer.”
Bucephalus shook his head.
“No,” he said. “Those are the names the human woman gave you.”
Cesc smiled, the expression lopsided. “All the same,” he said. “That’s what I’m called.”
Bucephalus seemed to suppress his own smile. “Out there,” he said, nodding toward the edges of the forest. “They may call you the names they have given you. But you—you are the Lightbreaker, are you not? Adonis saw your wings shatter. We have seen you manipulate light. In the graveyard in Durem, you cracked light with your elbow. In your home, your kitchen. You snap off beams. When you used a sword—it was one made of broken light.”
He paused in the lane, his ears perking. “Do you deny it?”
Cesc slowed, his brows knitting. He was still smiling, but it was more from impulse than mirth. He looked at Bucephalus, his skin suddenly feeling warm and uncomfortable, the forest too small, the air too thin to breathe. “How long have you been watching me? How?”
Bucephalus said nothing.
“Spies?” asked Cesc. “Crystal ball or something?”
The stag continued to march forward, its great golden antlers navigating branches without so much as a bump. “We needed to make sure of you, Lightbreaker.”
He turned toward Cesc, his forehoof lifted. “Can you blame us? You yelled at Adonis. You shattered light in his presence.”
“I don’t deny that,” answered Cesc slowly. “But to spy on me like that is kind of… it’s kind of creepy.”
Bucephalus snorted, his nostrils flaring. “Your privacy does not supersede our need for secrecy and safety. If you were who you say you are, then we wish to know you. But we know hunters here. You do not know our struggles, Lightbreaker. We have had to contend over centuries with hunters and those who do not wish us well. To be safe—this is all we crave.”
“You thought I might do you harm because I couldn’t control my powers back then?” Cesc asked, incredulous. “Look, I don’t know what your history is like, but—“
“How were you made?” interrupted the stag. “How, if not with the death of one of our own? And you feel we were meant to trust you from the start? To welcome you back into the fold?”
A flush came over Cesc’s cheeks, and the hair on his neck stood. He opened his mouth to rejoin, but there was nothing for him to say—nothing of use. He remembered nothing of his formation, had little stories only of Vivi’s stag—Vivi’s stag, he always thought it!—that could help. He snapped his jaw shut, letting out a hard breath.
“What happened before wasn’t my decision,” he said with warmth. “It’s not fair to judge me on what happened before I was born.”
“We know that now,” said Bucephalus serenely. “And we do not continue to watch you now, Lightbreaker. You need not fear. We know what we must know.”
Cesc shook his head as Bucephalus pronounced the given name again, his eyes dropped. Culture shock, he thought. He hadn’t been quite ready for that.
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Posted: Tue Dec 27, 2016 5:48 pm
The Ties that Bind
The rain fell at a quick pace just outside the window Vivi sat beside, her legs curled as she reclined to the side on the overstuffed armchair in her bedroom. Nestled in the crook of her knees was Grumpaws, who managed to squeeze himself into a comfortable sleeping loaf, lulled by the sound of the storm.
A book reposed on the worn red velvet of the chair’s arm, the spine up to the ceiling, forgotten. Her head was turned and her hair was loose, and her eyes focused on the windowpane and the grey and the rain.
Cesc hovered just outside her door, watching her.
It was funny, he thought. On the second floor of the bakery, where Cesc’s room and Shepard’s things were, there were no boundaries. They freely bothered each other in their spaces, freely crashed into bathrooms and bedrooms—although Shepard no longer slept in his—without much thought.
But neither he nor Shepard much made their way to the third floor when Vivi went to her space alone. Up there, they were quietly terrified to bother her own mismatched things, her old costumes, her relics of the circus. It was an odd thing. She never forbade them or asked it of them. They just didn’t. Even Guy hardly ever made the trek up the narrow stairs.
For a long moment, nobody moved. Vivi watched the rain and Cesc her, and Grumpaws gentle snores and the rain’s pitter-patter were the only disruptors of the stillness.
“Hey,” said Cesc into the silence, smiling from beyond the threshold. She started, the curtain of her hair rustling, and turned a smile toward him.
“Rhedefre!” she greeted, and Grumpaws let out an unhappy chirp, adjusting himself. “Come in, cheri. I listened to the storm. How it rains!”
Cesc floated in. “Sure does. I guess the plants need it, but it’s a drag for the rest of us.”
“Is it?” Vivi laughed. “You wish to keep all the fine autumn days for your sport, I suppose! For me, I enjoy it. It is a call to relax.”
“I’m not great at that,” said Cesc, taking a seat on her ottoman, facing her and the window. “I like to do.”
“My fault, perhaps,” Vivi murmured, settling her chin on one hand. “I should not have let you work so early in your life.”
“My fault,” amended Rhedefre with a smile. “I think it’s just part of me.”
“Mm.” Vivi shrugged her slim shoulders and smiled into her palm. “Perhaps so.”
She paused a moment before continuing. “Grandmere, she says you have met a stag. Is this so?”
“I did,” he confirmed with a nod. His palms came together, the heel of one hand grinding into another. Why did it make him nervous to admit?
“How fortunate,” murmured Vivi. “Were you impressed?” Her smile returned. “Their size is impressive, if nothing else—which there is much more else, I think!”
Cesc’s smile grew a touch, although there was still a self-consciousness at the edges of it. “Yeah, they’re huge. The one I met, at least. I also met some fawns.”
“Fawns,” sighed Vivi. “Are they adorable?”
“Overwhelmingly,” laughed the stag. Vivi smiled in return and for a moment they did not continue.
“Hey,” said Cesc, scratching his nose. “Hey, when you—when you met my soul, did he… talk to you?”
Vivi’s head tipped to the side. Her eyes narrowed slightly, like a cat’s. “Mm.” She shook her head. “No… I do not believe so. I was not aware that the stags, they can speak. Perhaps only to you? But no—they help others, this is true.” She paused and laughed, but it was not a genuine sound. “Perhaps he did not wish to speak to me in that time! After all, he did run. It was a worse storm than now back then—he did run.”
Cesc pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, nodding slowly. There was an awkwardness to his posture, to the way he wore his shoulders stiffly and his elbows felt like he suddenly had no idea what to do with them. His curiosity had overruled his sense of decorum, but he did not like the furrow that appeared in her brow when she spoke of the experience.
“Sorry,” he said. “I know that must have sucked. Not that I could really regret it.”
“Oh!” Vivi lifted her head, waving one hand. “Do not think it! It is nothing. Look what I have received for my troubles.” She opened both hands to him, as though revealing him to a crowd. “For such bounty, I think he, too, could not have felt a moment’s regret!”
Cesc’s cheeks warmed as she spoke, and he rumbled a laugh from deep in his chest. He was unsure how to reply, the words jumbling in his throat. “Now, that’s—“ he started, then laughed again. “Thanks, Vivi.”
He wet his lips again. “Do you think… do you think he knew? Or do you think he just wanted… to… end everything?”
Vivi’s smile slowly melted. She looked down, then splayed her fingers on the spine of her book, letting her nails drum across it. At last, she spoke. “Ah. I think he must have known, the stag.” She sighed. “There are many ways for an animal to die, if that was all he wished! Even one so splendid. But no, he found me before. He looked for me. He wanted me to know that, you know? That he knew to whom he was surrendering. I felt this.” She put her hand over her chest. “I felt he knew I would look after him.”
She lifted her head then, her fierce dark eyes on his. “But, Rhedefre—do not misunderstand me. He is not you! He passed a soul to you, but you are wholly your own, sweet Rhedefre, my darling Rhedefre. I would care for you in any path, in any way, that you fell to me.”
Cesc’s ears pricked and his cheeks colored and he leaned forward to her, putting a hand atop hers.
“I know,” he whispered.
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Posted: Wed Dec 28, 2016 8:00 am
Fawns
The does were still shy around him, nosing the ground and keeping their children close to their flanks, even as the fawns blinked owlishly at him and whispered amongst themselves. There were six does, and more amongst the larger heard, Bucephalus had said. There were other stags, of course, with their own full families and protected ones. He would meet them one day, perhaps.
“My does are shy,” said Bucephalus, although his voice rang with pride, “but they are still bolder than others. You see how they will be in your presence, Lightbreaker, although you are only half one of us.”
Cesc smiled wanly. “I don’t suppose you’ve told them you’ve watched me extensively and that I mean them no harm?”
Bucephalus smiled. “You see them before you. You would not otherwise.”
With a short, barked laugh, Rhedefre shrugged his shoulders. “I’ll take what I can get, I guess,” he said.
He watched the herd another moment. The fawns continued to look at him, even as they grazed, their tails flicking.
“The fawns seem to like me enough,” he mused. “I guess these things take some time.”
“Fawns are always curious,” said Bucephalus. “Their immense speed allows them to run from predators at extreme lengths—if you threaten a fawn, the next moment they may be half a continent away from you. They can afford their curiosity. They know they can run before a crocodile snaps his teeth around them.”
Cesc nodded at this information, watching the fawns continue their dance around their mothers, and turned toward Bucephalus to comment again. The stag was looking at him intently, and only then did Rhedefre realize the slight inflection of his tone as he’d spoken, as though the words were a warning to him.
The Sigel lifted his hands in a helpless show of surrender. “I wasn’t looking to pet one or take one home or anything.”
A mild frown crossed Bucephalus’ face and cleared again, like a cloud passing over the sun. When he spoke again, it was with less confidence than he had before, his tone almost apologetic.
“The morning has grown cold. I shall take my herd somewhere warmer for the day, now that they have eaten. Forgive my lack of hospitality, Lightbreaker.”
“That’s alright,” said Cesc, dropping his hands. “It’s getting a little cold for me, too.”
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Posted: Thu Dec 29, 2016 8:24 am
Ashley Gable
Cesc put his hood up as he looked over the ferry’s railing. The sky was threatening still, and his phone told him that he could expect a good day’s rain for the rest of the day.
The water made the air colder and the sky loomed dark. He blew into his hands as he boarded and made his way inside the shelter.
A poster tacked onto the inside bulletin board caught his eye. There was a grainy, black and white picture copied onto the paper sign, beneath a bolded heading: MISSING.
MISSING
Ashley Gable: 5’9”, brown hair, green eyes.
Last seen on the Ascension trail at the National Forest Preserve at Barton-Gambino, 11/24/16
Experienced hiker
Please call the park ranger if seen.
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Posted: Fri Dec 30, 2016 1:39 pm
Offering Help
“Did you see this?” Cesc asked Azu later that day at the precinct, lifting the picture of the sign he’d taken on his phone. Around them, the precinct bustled with movement--policemen talking to one another, witnesses giving statements, complaints being lodged with the receptionist. It was so terrifically different from the times Cesc had come at night, when the relative silence and florescent lights gave the place an otherworldly feel.
Today, it was not otherworldly--it was very, almost comfortingly, present.
“Of course,” answered the detective, taking the phone only momentarily as he made his way from the coffee machine to his desk. “Or I’ve heard of it from my friends at missing persons. Very sad.” He took a sip of the coffee and made a sour face.
“So they haven’t found her yet?” pressed the stag, frowning.
Azucar shook his head and continued his walk to his desk, where he sank into his comfortless office chair. “Not to my knowledge, no.” He slumped back in his chair, pursing his lips. He put the coffee cup on his uncluttered desk--not even a name plate--and poked it away without interest. He looked up at Rhedefre and gestured to the opposing chair with one hand, then smiled wryly. “I told you—the preserve is not as well-kept as it could be. This happens every year.”
Cesc frowned, looking down at the photograph, as he sat down. A photo of a photo was only so good, and the face of the black-and-white girl was grainy and indistinct. He could not have placed her age within ten years from it, would probably have passed her on the street.
But he didn't have to rely on sight recognition. Rhedefre looked back up, his jaw set. “Let me help.”
The detective straightened. “Come again?”
“I can help," Cesc insisted, lowering his phone. "I can feel lost people—if she’s alive, still, out there, I should be able to find her.”
Azucar’s gaze dropped. “Cesc, my friend… it is a very large preserve. The sign says she is a very experienced hiker—she may have gone for miles.”
“I should still be able to feel her,” pressed the stag, undeterred. “And if I can’t, I can ask the stags for help. That’s what we do.”
It seemed incomprehensible to Cesc that Azucar would still hesitate, that his expression didn’t turn into one of grateful relief. The detective instead looked at him with some apprehension, his brow still knit.
“We have to do whatever we can to help,” said Cesc. He wanted to continue, wanted to say: this is what stags are supposed to do, what's supposed to be our purpose. This is what I've done before. This is something that usually, usually, I don't ******** up. But he stayed silent, watching the indecision on his friend's face, wondering why it stayed so immovable.
“…Alright,” Azucar relented. A breath went out of Rhedefre, a feeling of levity taking its place. Azucar lifted a finger and tapped the desk, before the stag could respond. “But you let me come with you this time. I do not want you to go alone.”
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Posted: Sat Dec 31, 2016 12:00 am
Asking for Help
Cesc stood at the top of Ascension trail and, although the altitude had turned the cool weather colder and the wind blew strong, he felt a line of sweat crawl down the nape of his neck and trace his back. Still, his nose and cheeks were red and his ears turned and fidgeted and swiveled at every noise.
He felt, if he was honest, a little sick.
Beside him, dressed in a down coat and gloves, Azucar stared out into the great vista before them: a stretch of trees that seemed to extend as far as the eye could see. But neither of them could revel in the view, and it became only more uncomfortable as Azucar gently prompted: “Well?”
Cesc swallowed and shook his head, his eyes dropping to the trail below him.
“Nothing,” he managed.
Azucar let out his breath in a slow exhale, a stream of white rising from his lips like a cloud of smoke.
“So she is dead,” he pronounced, kicking idly at the loose stones in the ground.
“That’s—“ Cesc looked back up. “That’s not…necessarily true.”
“Oh?” Azucar’s voice didn’t hold much hope.
“I mean, it’s possible you were right,” said Cesc. “It’s possible I just… can’t feel her. If she went too far. I couldn’t always feel…” His voice faltered. “Dr. Kyou, in the jungle, back then. Not until I had something of his—or when I was closer—after the hunter.”
“This is what I was afraid of,” said Azucar, and there was a touch more steel in his voice than he’d intended. He stopped, and softened it in his next words: “I know how that experience was for you, my friend. I know that it was one that does not need to be repeated. That’s why I have not asked you to consult on other cases—and certainly not on one like this.”
Cesc looked at him, stunned, his lips parted and eyebrows drawn.
Azucar shook his head, his hands still in his jacket pockets. His voice dipped. “Sometimes it can be too late. Sometimes they’ve already…”
Cesc licked his lips. His throat felt tight. He nodded.
“Let me just ask them for help,” he pleaded. “Even if all they can find is what’s left.”
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Posted: Sat Dec 31, 2016 12:37 pm
No Help
Cesc went alone.
It would be better, smarter, he told Azucar. The herd didn’t like outsiders. They’d taken their time before they approached him, even. They might never show up at all with Azucar handy.
The detective had only acquiesced after Cesc promised to text him and given him a time that they would meet up at the ferry, with or without the herd’s help. And they’d parted, both tugging along a glumness that seemed to bump along the ground behind them.
For Cesc, that weight lifted as soon as he’d gone off the Ramshead trail path and through the clearing, and waited there, silent, for Bucephalus and his family to approach him.
The fawns heralded his coming, sneaking along the brush as they had the first time, their ears and flicking tails giving them almost immediately away. Cesc suppressed a small smile.
“Hello again,” he greeted them.
“Hello, Lightbreaker,” they chorused.
Behind them, Bucephalus stepped, his nose down at the ground for an instant in his own nudging of his children.
“Lightbreaker,” he greeted. “I thought I felt you in the woods. What do you do here?”
“I’m looking for someone,” said Cesc, his breath hurried. There had been plenty of time for the stag to catch his breath, but somehow neither the lack of movement nor the stillness of the air had helped him. “I need your help.”
Bucephalus stopped mid-stride, then straightened. “You have similar powers to feel what is lost, do you not?”
“I do,” admitted Rhedefre hurriedly. “But I can’t feel this woman—this lost hiker. I know there’s a possibility she may be dead, or delusional trying to get back—or just out of my range, I don’t know. But I figure, I’m only half of what you are. You have to be better able to find her than I can, even if she’s… gone, already.”
Bucephalus blinked slowly, and the look of confusion again grew on his face. A silence stretched between them, one unbearably long. Cesc stared and waited without patience, the cold and the gravity of his request hurrying his heart.
“Are you—trying to find her?” he ventured.
“No,” said Bucephalus, half-breaking into Cesc’s words. He continued to stare at the Sigel for a moment longer, then shook his head. “You wish me to help you find this girl, this hiker? What if she has done misdeeds? Is she blameless?”
“Does that matter?” asked Cesc, drawing back in surprise. “She’s lost, and she doesn’t deserve to freeze to death in the forest, even if she has done something wrong in the past sometime.”
“Do you know this?” pressed Bucephalus. “Do you know she has not hunted us, hung our heads for trophies? Perhaps the forest exacts a vengeance.”
“This is not about karma,” said Cesc impatiently, lifting and dropping his hands. “Are you willing to let her die if she hasn’t?”
Bucephalus’s forehoof lifted and then dragged against the ground. He shifted his weight on his back legs, stepping aside in agitation.
“We do not do this,” he told Cesc, his voice warming. “We do not act for those who may wish to cause us harm.”
“But you have just as little proof as I do!” shot Cesc. He ran his fingers through his hair, his eyes scanning Bucephalus’ face, his light eyes filled with disbelief. “What if she’s dead, huh? You can’t even check that? You can’t try to give her family back her body, in that case?”
Bucephalus half-turned from Rhedefre, his tail up. For that instant, Cesc thought he had him—but then the stag whipped back, his eyes bright with anger.
“You cannot lecture me. You have not seen those helpless hunters who would take our paths to freedom and return with bows and arrows meant for our hides. We do not operate like we did once!” snorted Bucephalus. “We have lost enough to know that to do nothing is our own preservation. To help is no help to us! This you should know as well, Lightbreaker!”
And with that, the stag jerked back his head and disappeared.
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Posted: Sun Jan 01, 2017 11:01 am
Cowards
Cesc often wished he had legs. When he watched baseball, when he went to the beach, when he caught himself desiring a woman fully-formed.
Right now, he wished he had legs so that he could kick something.
He sat in the ferry slouched deep in a booth, his hands in his pockets. He glared out the window and said nothing until halfway through the trip, telling his ever-patient companion:
“They’re a bunch of cowards.”
“Mm?” Azucar lifted his head and plucked an earbud from his ear.
“The stags,” Cesc seethed. “They don’t help anyone anymore. They’re a bunch of fu—freaking cowards!”
“I’ve heard the word <********> before; you can use it if you wish,” said the detective.
“I can’t believe it,” ranted Rhedefre. “All my life I’ve thought of them as these paragons of virtue and they’re just these insular—self-serving—rude—cowards! They’ve been hunted by people they’ve helped before, and now they don’t do a damn thing. They just use their powers to spy on people like me, I guess, and make sure I’m good enough to be in their royal bullshit presence.”
He slammed the heel of one hand against the windowpane, where the sound of the ferry and the sound of the waves drowned it out.
“I was wondering if you were going to get around to getting mad about that,” said Azucar with a small smile. “What an invasion of privacy.”
“Well I hope they were bored to tears watching me decorate cakes,” snorted Cesc. “They won’t help us with the hiker at all. That’s why they have powers? To watch some poor woman die, just in case she ever took an interest in hunting? That’s bullshit. I’m sorry, that’s such bullshit.”
“It is,” agreed Azucar. “I’m sorry they let you down.”
“It’s my fault,” said Cesc, sliding back down the booth. He shook his head roughly, his jaw tense. “I built them up so high in my own stupid head. I thought they’d teach me how to control my powers better. Be a mentor, I don’t know. I thought they had culture, not…”
He lifted the fingers of one hand and drummed them back down, sighing.
“And we didn’t help her at all,” he moaned. “We couldn’t help her.”
Azucar leaned over the booth, patting Cesc’s shoulder. He sat back down, smiling gently, encouraging. “My friend, I hate to remind you of this, but we don’t all have powers,” he said. “Police work is rarely done with it. And Missing Persons, they find people a lot of the time without any help from magic. We have honestly never had a stag lead us to anyone. So don’t beat yourself up.”
Cesc cracked a small smile, although the annoyance was still burning his stomach and heart behind the steadiness of his ribs.
“I’m still sorry,” he said.
“Don’t be,” said Azucar. “Be proud of yourself for wanting to help so bad. We’ll find her yet.”
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Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2017 9:05 am
An Offer
Cesc went back to the woods again the following day.
So what if the stupid stags weren’t going to help him? He had his own powers. They were raw and barely cultivated. Who was to say he couldn’t feel the dead? He’d never really tried. And besides, he wasn’t even sure she was dead. If she was just out of range, he’d try to feel her from another point in the forest. He’d exhaust his own possibilities before he threw in the towel.
Who gave a s**t about what the stags wanted or didn’t want? He was only half one of them, after all.
He waited in the bus until it reached the extreme southern end of the park, closest to Barton, and made his exit there. Cesc had with him the hiker’s picture and his cell phone, and a Camelbak filled with water for his hike. He went, and went slowly, trying to fill his head full of meditative, expanding thoughts.
You can feel her presence, he told himself soothingly. You can feel her out here somewhere. Just let her lead you.
Well, it had never really worked like that before, but who was to say that it wouldn’t this time?
As he went deeper into the trail, a flash of white entered his peripheral vision. With a snort, he turned to the color, but did not stop his hike.
“Spying on me again?” he called out, continuing down the path. “I’m not here to ask you for more help.”
“What a shame,” replied a disembodied voice. “Because I am here to offer it.”
Cesc stopped and turned around. The voice had not belonged to Bucephalus. It was lilting, pleasant, warm. It reminded him, strangely, of Azucar.
Out of the wooded glade stepped another stag, slimmer and of smaller build than Bucephalus, with an inhuman grace. He had a proud, broad chest, like a thoroughbred horse and not a wild stag. In looks, Cesc was reminded of Luka—it was a creature made of sunlight covered in flesh and skin and hair, a body made to conceal what the eyes would be blinded to see. There was brilliance in this one’s eyes and antlers and hooves, but the slender face and lashes Cesc suddenly recognized.
It was the stag from two years before, the one standing in the park near his home, the one that had wordlessly left him when his wings shattered.
Bucephalus and the fawns had said his name. It was…
“I am Adonis,” greeted the stag, stepping forward. “It’s been a long time, Lightbreaker.”
“My name is Rhedefre,” Cesc replied.
The stag seemed to smile. “You are still out here looking for the woman? Ashley?”
Cesc drew in a breath and filled his chest with pugnacious confidence. “I am,” he baited. “I’m not going to stop trying to find her.”
“Oh, no,” said Adonis, his eyes opening wide. There was more brightness to his eyes than the gold of Bucephalus—nearly white. He let out a clear laugh. “We are getting off on the wrong—well, neither of us have feet. Let’s start again. I want to help you find Ashley. That’s why I am here—me, and not Bucephalus.”
Cesc paused, some of the air deflating from him. He said nothing, eyeing the stag with suspicion.
“I wish Bucephalus hadn’t told you of our… keeping tabs,” said Adonis, lilting. He dipped his head, closing his eyes. “That was a mistake.”
“Him telling me or you doing it?” asked the Sigel.
Adonis lifted his head. “Clever,” he laughed. “I see why he’s fond of you. But I am being honest. I am happy to help you find Ashley, if it will make you feel better, Lightbreaker.”
“Rhedefre,” insisted Cesc. “And you’re willing to risk the wrath of the herd?”
Adonis smiled. “They’re my herd, most of them, you know, Lightbreaker. Bucephalus, he helps me—not the other way around. He won’t have any wrath for me to risk.”
He moved forward, slowly circling the Raevan. “And anyway, if it would make your sense of justice feel better, I am not doing this for free.”
Cesc stayed silent, watching Adonis’s deft movements, his hooves barely disturbing the ground.
“I help you find this Ashley girl—she’s not dead yet, by the way—and she goes home safely. And you, with your mostly-human face and hands and ability to call the police—you help us get rid of a poacher in these woods,” said Adonis, his tone becoming grave. “We may not try to put ourselves into the light any further, but we are willing to step into it if it will help us in the long run. Some hunter has found us in this preserve and means to make trophies of us. Get rid of him—and I’ll deliver your girl to safety. Fair?”
Cesc’s brows drew low. He turned the stag’s words over in his mind as Adonis continued his slow circular walk, their eyes on one another. He chewed the words, but there was a heavy paper in his pocket with a lost woman’s face on it—and he was no closer to finding her alone.
“I understand you were disenchanted when Bucephalus rebuffed you,” continued Adonis, lowering his head. “I am sorry for that. Truly, I am. But you must understand: we can no longer serve in light. We would become extinct. You see that we have not helped—and we are still hunted.”
“You’re telling me a poacher is in this preserve and the rangers haven’t heard of him or her at all?” tested Cesc. He slid a hand into his pocket, where the missing poster continued to burn a hole.
“They don’t know or they don’t care. Come—I will show you something.” The stag nodded toward the forest and began to step within. Cesc hesitated and followed, stepping off the path and into the wild terrain.
They walked in silence for a few minutes. Even floating, the terrain was difficult to navigate and thick, branches threatening Cesc’s antlers and eyes and clinging to his clothes as though to beckon him back to the trail. In the thickest part of the woods, sunlight struggled to reach the ground, and the trees reached their hands up to it, meeting it in the middle.
Everything teemed with life—bugs and birds and everything in between. It was close to the path and yet far enough away that it may as well have been miles.
“You should know better than most,” said Adonis quietly, his graceful step silent in both sound and pressure, “that we are hunted. That some cannot even help themselves but to do it. To be secret, Lightbreaker, that is safety.”
“If you have the power to help people,” insisted Cesc, “you’re meant to use it.”
Adonis stopped. “Those are very charming words.” He turned toward the Sigel, his eyes narrowed. “Do you really mean them? Could you mean them to the extinction of what was once your own kind?”
“You don’t have to die for every person you help,” said Cesc. “You’re willing to help Ashley—you know she’s not a threat.”
“Do you doubt that we die, despite our efforts to remain secret? That is why I brought you here, Lightbreaker. Come. See.”
Adonis turned in his pathway and before Cesc was a canopy of trees, a curtain of what looked to be vine, cascading between two giant branches in an arch. From it, for a moment, he took the vine to be flowering with strange, large white flowers.
As he stepped forward, his eyes focusing, he noticed what it was.
Antlers.
Small ones, large ones—a macabre garland of antlers, some old, some velveted, crisscrossed and hung there for all to see.
“This is our cemetery,” said Adonis, his voice quiet beside Cesc. “These are what remains of those who have tried, charmingly, optimistically, to push us back into the light. Do you see, Lightbreaker? This is the fate that befalls them.”
Cesc stood still, his eyes trained on the macabre display, his lips parted. His eyes were wide and the wind blew cold against his cheeks, roughing his hair, but he did not move.
“It is our memorial and our warning—our warning against those noble impulses,” sneered the stag, stepping forward into the shadow of the memorial. He turned his body again toward Cesc, lifting his head high, the picture of the nobility his words tossed aside.
“Let me ask you again, Lightbreaker,” he said. “If I help you find the girl, will you help us find the poacher?”
The Sigel’s eyes could not leave the memorial. How many were there? He counted ten and then fifteen and then stopped, squinting, shaking his head. Where were their bodies? Did they burn in their own sunlight and leave so little behind? How many were there?
…and, deep in the garland, were his soul’s antlers among them?
Cesc could only breathe his quiet response.
“Yes.”
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Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2017 3:42 pm
Calm and Pedestrian
“I’m just saying, I understand them if that’s what’s really going on,” said Cesc. “If they thought Ashley was the one trying to get them, then obviously they wouldn’t want to reveal themselves to her.”
“But if they can spy as well as you tell me they can, how could they not have known after relatively little time that it wasn’t her?” asked Azucar. He pulled back one corner of his mouth, unimpressed. “I don’t know, my friend.”
“Well, all I’m saying is that he said there’s a poacher in the woods after them, and if we can get rid of him, he’ll lead Ashley out. He says she’s still alive,” said Cesc, gripping the metal arms of the chair across from Azucar’s desk.
“What if there is no poacher?” asked Azucar. “This could be a way to make it impossible for you to give Ashley any help while they bide their time and send you on a wild goose chase.”
“Then the police keep looking for her like they are and we’re back at square one,” said Cesc with a shrug. “And I just get wild goose chased. I can handle that. Besides, if I don’t find him, I can call them out on their b.s. and see what they have to say then.”
He paused. “But you didn’t see that memorial, Azucar. They’re definitely being killed.” He suppressed a shiver as he spoke.
“Your antlers fall out every year, don’t they? They could have been pulling one over on you.” Azucar propped his head up on one hand, looking up at the ceiling. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But the stags seem kind of obnoxious to me.”
Cesc let out a helpless laugh. “Did I get those genes?”
“No,” sighed Azucar, pushing back against his desk to straighten his posture again. “You seem to have inherited much of the dawn, my friend.”
“Well, I’ll take it,” said Cesc with a grin. He then sighed, and the expression became wry. “You know, it’s weird. I saw Adonis two years ago, you know? In the woods? He didn’t look this impressive then. Is that weird to say? He looked more pedestrian then, just like you’d think a white stag would. Not this big shining creature made out of light.”
“I guess he peaked in the time apart,” mused Azucar. He shrugged his shoulders. “In any case, Rhedefre—I would go ask for more details on this poacher. Don’t get too overexcited though, alright? No need to pick extra fights. I’ll set things in motion about it on my end, see if there’s any reports of an illegal hunter in those woods from what the park rangers know.”
He drummed his fingers on the desk. "We'll do things the calm and pedestrian way, alright? No rushing headlong into magic."
Cesc nodded. "I can live with that."
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Posted: Tue Jan 03, 2017 8:25 am
Time to Look
It was five a.m. and the sun was still stirring from its bed. Azucar, however, had already stirred from his own, drinking coffee on his front porch. He was dressed for hiking, with long johns under his hiking pants and silk socks beneath his boots. He zipped up his down coat a little higher and enjoyed another sip of his coffee before he closed his thermos.
He hated the cold. Never had liked it—that’s why he enjoyed working in Gambino. There wasn’t much of a winter most years, although this one had been surprisingly wet and cold this year.
Beside him, Perp waited at attention, his leash in his mouth. As Azucar rose, the dog’s tail thumped on the wood below.
“You ready to go look? A woman or a poacher—or both, if you want to impress our friend Cesc,” said Azucar to the dog with a smile. “You want that?”
Perp smiled and let the leash go easily as Azucar took it in his hand.
“Alright, Perp,” said the detective. “Let’s go.”
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Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2017 8:25 am
Ashley
Cesc stood at the top of the falls, the turnaround point of Ramshead trail. He had called for Adonis—and Bucephalus—multiple times throughout the hike, although that had caused a fair amount of embarrassment as hikers passed him, eyeing him with unrestrained amazement as they went past.
He felt like an idiot, and he was still alone.
Sitting at the top of the falls, he closed his eyes.
There’d been no news from Azucar yet about the poacher. He’d told Cesc he meant to go out sometime that day or look with the morning search party, but there had been no communication since then—nothing good or bad to report.
Cesc sighed.
Ashley.
Where could she be? It had been over a week. Unless she was a particularly good survivalist, she must have perished by now, no matter what Adonis had told him. Poor woman.
Cesc opened his eyes, looking down at the falls.
If only he could feel her. There had to have been desperation. A desire to be found. A desire for help. If only it had projected beyond the sound of the forest and the waterfall.
He stared at the falls, at the movement of the water, the glint of light against the sheets that fell from it.
help…
Cesc’s head snapped up, his ears straight. What was that? What had that been?!
He floated upward, wings splayed.
help…
It was faint. It was anguished and small and hopeless.
He took off upward, his wings beating once powerfully, his eyes bright. Where was it coming from? He turned in place, looking around him. Another time—call another time!
There--! It was coming from the east, from the densely-clustered trees. He took off with speed, his heart pounding against his ribs, his breath caught in his throat. He could see it, a faint line that connected him to her, to the one who needed his help. Ashley! It had to be her.
He crashed through the tree canopy as the call became stronger, without grace or care, one hand brushing away the remaining leaves from the branches. He dove into the thick of the forest, far from any trail, his heart climbing his neck.
He saw a figure, thin and shaking, against the roots of a tree. Cesc recognized her hair first, then her face as she turned up to look at him with surprise and awe and a note of fear.
“H—help!” she managed as she saw him, lifting herself, one hand curled over a wound in her side. Tears filled her eyes and she began to sob, her shoulders shaking.
“I’m here!” Cesc called, landing beside her, his face flushed and his words tight. “Ashley? I’m here.”
“Oh, ohmygod,” she slurred through sobs, her hand finding his. “Ohmygod. I thought—I thought…”
What she thought dissolved into sobs, and as Cesc threaded his arms around her shoulders, he could feel only relief.
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Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2017 8:41 pm
A Missing Week
“I don’t remember anything,” said Ashley in her hospital bed, looking far gaunter than the picture on her missing poster. Beside her, a tall man held her hand. She was hooked up to an IV, and there were bandages covering her arms. “I must have fallen somewhere—I got off the trail, I remember. I don’t know. I must have fallen onto something sharp, on my side. I just remember waking up wandering around, exhausted and cold and bleeding like this. Frank told me it’s been over a week?”
The man beside her pressed her hand. His eyes were shining.
“Thank you for bringing her home,” he told Cesc for the third time.
“It can’t be over a week,” Ashley was murmuring. She shook her hand and looked at Cesc with a plea in her eyes. “I don’t know how it would be… I just don’t know.” She touched her temple, gingerly. There was a note of bewildered hysteria in her voice. “I must have hit my head.”
“It’s okay,” assured Cesc. “Don’t worry about it. You just need time to rest for right now. But if you remember anything, you’ll…?”
“I’ll tell the park rangers,” she promised. “And you. You’ll come over for dinner soon, alright? Very soon. You have to come by.”
“Please,” echoed Frank.
“Of course,” said Cesc, smiling. “Whenever you’re feeling up to it.
He left the hospital room and gently shut the door behind him.
For the third time that day, he tried Azucar’s cell phone to no avail.
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Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2017 8:25 am
Scatterbrained
“No,” said the park ranger to Cesc later that day, shutting a book of comments and complaints. “I can’t say I’ve heard anything about any poacher—same as Ranger Carl told your friend, that detective, this morning. We’d know if someone was trying to go after the eagles or anything. We monitor that stuff pretty carefully. We try to keep track of migrations and patterns and all that stuff. We know the trails can be hard to follow but now that this has happened, we’re trying to shore that all up.”
“Wait, you spoke with Azucar?” Cesc broke in, frowning. “He told me he’d let me know if there was any news.”
“That’s his name? I remembered it was something weird…. Thought it was something else, though,” mused the ranger, rubbing her ample chins thoughtfully.
“It’s not—we’re talking about the same man,” said Cesc impatiently. “When did Ranger Carl talk to him?”
“Oh, Carl’s got the earliest shift,” said the ranger with a shrug. “Way before mine. Said a nice Spanish detective came to talk to him earlier. Had a big black Lab with him. He’s kind of a scatterbrain, you know that?”
“I don’t,” said Cesc. The hair on his arms lifted, and he was beginning to feel cold, uncomfortable. “Why do you say that?”
“Well, he did his duty and he went out and searched for the girl and then I guess he left without signing out of the official log book like Carl told him to!” sniffed the ranger. “All I can say is he better not have left the dog behind! Probably leave his head behind if it weren’t attached…”
Cesc’s frown deepened. “Thank you,” he said, turning and letting himself out of the room.
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Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2017 8:50 pm
Scatterbrained II
Neele sat down at his desk, cleaning his reading glasses with a small microfiber cloth. He smiled at the stag as he did so, unconcerned.
“This afternoon to tomorrow afternoon’s his time off,” he said with a nod. “He tends to go out on hikes and—I don’t know if you know this, but he’s not the most organized man on the force.”
Cesc smiled uneasily, hovering down to the seat across from the senior detective’s desk. “I’ve called him a few times, but he hasn’t responded.”
“He’s done that to me before, too,” said Neele with a shrug. “Did you know he’s broken his phone seven times since we’ve been partners? Seven times. That I know of, at least.”
Some of the tension slid from Cesc’s shoulders. “That’s kind of a surprise to me. He always seems on top of things.”
“On top of the things that matter,” corrected Neele. “Don’t ever go to his house.” He smiled warmly at the stag, and there was something in the expression that radiated steadiness and safety and calm. “Wait until he’s back on duty. We all need a break sometimes. And if you need anything, let me look into it. He told me you were worried about a poacher—I went in with him this morning and talked to the ranger.”
“Oh, you were together?” More tension slid away from Cesc. His smile became easier, more earnest. “That’s great to hear.”
“Yes, and we didn’t hear anything that the rangers were concerned about.” Neele opened both his palms in a show of emptiness. “Nothing on our side.”
“Well… alright,” said the stag, slouching back in his chair. Relief made him feel a touch boneless, although he couldn’t quite say what he had been afraid of. “Thanks for letting me know, Detective Neele.”
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