by Jared Kerr
in Issue 147, April 2024
Father Samuel shivered as he walked, his breath seeming to freeze in the air around him. Midnight was not the time to be wandering, especially in winter, but the bishop’s letter had stated concretely what Samuel was to do if he wished his parish cleansed. A creak of movement forced him to swing his lantern round, its light illuminated row after row of empty pews before falling upon the church’s mighty door. Its timbers were strong, but one swipe of the beast’s mighty claws had rent a gap wide enough for man to climb through.
Teeth chattering, Samuel crept down the church’s central aisle. He would not stand here catching his death of cold waiting for this Brother Michael to arrive, nor would he abide by the absurd set of rules the man had set forth. The man’s letter, delivered a day after the bishop’s message, had been downright rude. To be addressed by some lowly monk in such a way had roused Father Samuel’s ire, and the suggestion of this clandestine, moonlit meeting had cemented the father’s poor opinion of Brother Michael. This monk was surely not a true man of God, not if he could possibly suggest—
“I told you,” growled a voice from out of the darkness. “No lanterns!”
Father Samuel jumped with fright. His lantern flew out of his hand and smashed upon the stone floor. The priest had only a second to register the candle sputtering amongst the shattered glass before a hulking figure pushed roughly by to extinguish the flame with a few stamps of his massive boots.
“You are Brother Michael?” The bear-like man did not answer. “It is one thing,” Samuel continued waspishly, “to keep a man from the warmth and comfort of his bed, but it is quite another to—”
Brother Michael turned on Samuel with surprising speed. Strangely, light still existed within the church even after the lone source had been extinguished. Father Samuel could make out the monk’s features quite distinctly.
Brother Michael was draped in a brown robe that could have clothed two lesser men with ease. His hood was pulled back to reveal a heavily bearded face and a thinning laurel of black hair that wreathed an extensive bald patch; his hands were enormous; his fingers long and strong-looking; and four items dangled from his belt: a large, ring-hilted sword, an ornate dirk, a silver beaded rosary, and a strange iron cage, in which a single light pulsed weakly through the gloom of the darkened church.
Samuel bristled with indignation. “You say no lanterns, yet you carry one?”
As if in response to his words, the light winked out, leaving the two men in complete darkness.
Brother Michael let out a hoarse laugh. “That’s no lantern, priest.”
Samuel shivered, and, after Brother Michael laughed once more, singed with barely contained fury. “Lantern or not,” the priest hissed, supremely doubting that the thing could be anything but a lantern, “ I beg you light it again! We are helpless here in the dark. The beast could return at—”
“You are a fool, Father Samuel.”
“What did you say?” Samuel said warningly.
You heard me!” snapped Brother Michael. “You still believe that evil can be frightened by a flame? It is faith not light that cows the creatures of the Otherworld. To the monsters of shadow and blackened soul, a light means people and people are prey.”
“Then your light could have—”
Michael interrupted the priest with a snarl. “None but the pure of heart can see that light!”
“Then light it again!”
“I never doused it, priest! The fact that you are left in the dark explains much.”
Father Samuel felt as if his blood had turned to ice. What did this man know?
“Evil seldom arrives unbidden,” said the monk. “This beast of yours must have been drawn here by someone.”
“That is preposterous!” Samuel squawked. “None in the parish would have dared summon the beast!”
“I will remove the creature.” Brother Michael continued as if Samuel had not spoken. “My terms of service will—”
“I have plenty of gold,” Samuel blurted without thinking. He could feel his face coloring; he could have whipped himself for his own stupidity. He could tell, even in the darkness, that Michael was grinning.
“I’m sure you do, priest, but I do not require gold. Just a pledge.”
“What kind of pledge?”
“Once I have dealt with the beast you will grant me a bequest, one that will nary increase my wealth, ease my travels, nor grant me comfort. Many have paid my price and no man has found himself lessoned in the eyes of God for doing so.”
“And if I refuse?”
“I’m sure the beast will pass you by, ” Brother Michael said, his low voice dripping with sarcasm. “Once it is satisfied.”
“Satisfied?” Samuel crossed himself. “I will pay your price.”
***
Brother Michael found his horse well enough by moonlight, and gave the mare a settling pat before removing the scrip bound to her saddle.
“I need light,” he said, looping the scrip over his broad shoulders.
In an instant, the iron cage at his belt burst into dazzling and pulsating life. A light as powerful as a hundred hearth fires illuminated the leather scrip and the mare’s saddlebag.
Michael shielded his eyes against the glare. His mare gave a startled whinny at the sudden flood of light, her grey flanks twitching as if she yearned to flee, but she was quieted by another touch from Brother Michael.
“Be calm, Virtue,” he cooed at the mare. “When I wish to be blinded,” Michael hissed toward the cage at his belt, “I’ll say so!”
“Well, pardon me,” said a musical, yet biting voice. “Only the pure of heart can see my light?” continued the voice, this time with a note of laughter. “Really? If that were so, you’d be stumbling in the dark forever.”
“He thought you were a lantern, Vyra.” Michael smirked. “The truth would have been more… difficult to explain and far less—”
“Amusing?” Vyra finished. “You take too much delight in teasing your clients, human. It’s not proper for one in your vocation.”
“He deserved much worse,” said Michael. A weighty, judging silence was given in answer to the monk’s words. Michael rolled his eyes. “I’ll do a penance for it later. Happy? “Come out of there.” Michael flicked open the small door of the iron cage with a single broad finger. “We have work to do.”
A blur of golden sparks and the flutter of tiny wings announced the presence of Vyra a split second before the fairy came into view. She was small enough to rest comfortably in Brother Michael’s hand; her dark-green, dragonfly-like wings shimmered reflectively as they beat to keep her level in the air; her hair, bound in a long braid, was black as night and bound with a crisscrossing pattern of slender and malleable strips of willow reeds; and she had startlingly green eyes. Michael would have called her beautiful if not for the haughty smirk that nearly always curved her lips.
“I thank you, oh wise and powerful lord,” Vyra snarled sarcastically, “for allowing me to stretch my wings.” Her eyes narrowed dangerously as she fingered the long, coiling, silver leash that connected the collar fitted around her neck to the iron cage that bound her. The collar too was iron, a metal that worked to entrap the fairy as securely as an intervention from God himself.
It was not easy to trap a fairy, especially a member of the Thornbite Court, and even more difficult to outsmart one once it was cornered. A single wish was given to a mortal who captured a member of Fae royalty, a wish that a noble fairy was forced by ancient code to honor. Most men wished for wealth, or beautiful Fae-blood brides, but Brother Michael was not like most men. Brother Michael had wished Vyra bound to his battle against the creatures of the night, sworn to his service by iron and holy oath for 13 years.
“What shall I gather?” she asked impatiently. “Your silver munitions and powder, I assume?”
Michael raised his voice as Vyra dove, headlong into the bag: “This isn’t that simple, Vy!” He caught a pouch of gunpowder reflexively before a small bag of silver buckshot came soaring out of the pack, bounced against Michael’s ribs, and dropped neatly into the scrip at his side. “Stop! I need to think!”
Suddenly Vyra emerged from the saddlebag, her arms crossed before her and her left foot tapping impatiently in midair. “This creature is of the Otherworld and it has assaulted a priest,” she said acidly. “If past experience is any indication, the beast must die. What more need be thought about?”
“I need a pot of graveyard dirt.”
“That doesn’t answer my question, human!”
“Just get the dirt!” Michael quickly unsheathed his dirk to check the blade. Like the rounds Vyra had fetched for him, the blade was pure silver and death to any monster, specter, or demon. Vyra stuck her tongue out at Michael before plummeting into the saddlebag once more. He smiled; no matter how strong her oath of service, Vyra would sooner swallow iron ore than follow any order meekly.
“It would be at the bottom,” she called bitterly. “I bet that’s the only reason you’re asking for it.” A cascade of discarded items flew from the saddlebag to punctuate each of Vyra’s slightly muffled complaints and curses.
“Language!” Michael barked at the rustling saddlebag.
“I’m 127 years old!” Vyra soared from the saddlebag with a burst of sparkling color, a small, cork-stopped vase clutched in both her hands. “And no uncultured, wingless ruffian like you will take me to task for my language. Now here’s your damned dirt!” She flung the bottle of graveyard dirt with such force that Michael barely managed to seize it before it struck him between the eyes. “Anything else, master?”
“Licorice root.”
“Licorice root?” Vyra’s sharp green eyes flitted swiftly between the scrip, where Michael had just placed the pot of graveyard dirt, and the saddlebag before meeting Michael’s gaze with a suddenly dangerous stare. “You mean to bind this creature. You don’t even know what it is and you mean to bind it!”
“The beast has not killed!” The heat in Michael’s voice forced Vyra backward with several beatings of her translucent wings. “It is not wholly evil. That much is clear.”
“So you mean to collect this…thing, as you have collected me?” Vyra’s tiny, chime-like voice was as ominous as a death knell. “Will you start a menagerie of the Otherworld for the delight of your kind?”
Brother Michael ignored her. He was looking toward the Woods of Killamora, the place where this creature was said to dwell. The gloom of night seemed to swirl and pulse within the darkened shadows of Killamora’s ancient trees. Those trees would offer no shelter tonight. Michael grabbed hold of Virtue’s reins and led her into the churchyard before tying her lead to a nearby tree. Those woods were no place for a horse, even one as valiant as Virtue. He patted the mare lightly on the nose, vaguely aware of Vyra fluttering beside him.
“You should be better armed,” said the fairy moodily. “This mad plan could go poorly.”
Michael took the silver rosary from his belt and twined the beads between the fingers of his left hand. “Faith is my strongest weapon, Vyra, but I’m not fool enough to believe it’s my only one.”
Michael smiled as he walked toward a saddle scabbard at Virtue’s dappled shoulder and brought forth a massive, flared-muzzled blunderbuss. Michael smiled as he clutched the mighty gun and admired the dragons inlayed in ivory that stretched sinuously from comb to muzzle. “We hunt!”
***
The wide canopies of aged hollies and oaks rustled in the wind; their wide branches reached like claws to cast sinister shadows in the muted glow of the distant crescent moon. Michael moved with silent steps, while Vyra flew well ahead, her thin silvery leash stretching forward to mark the path of her soundless flight. Silence was key in Michael’s line of work, but the sheer emptiness of these woods unnerved him; it was as if life itself had fled these woods. There should have been the cry of a night bird, or the swoop of a bat on the hunt. Even death had its sounds. Michael had heard that final song many times from man, beast, and monster alike. He despised those sounds, but even the rattle of life’s final breath would be welcome if it banished this accursed quiet.
Suddenly a tiny shriek rang out from amongst the trees before him. Michael readied his b
blunderbuss and began to run. With a wrench, his scrip caught on a branch, but he could not waste time untangling it. With a roll of his shoulders, Michael slipped clear of bag and branch before speeding forward, his mind focused upon one terrible truth: Vyra was in danger. A dense fog settled around him as he skidded into a wide break in the trees, a fog not of this world.
He waited for the fairy’s beacon to pierce the night, but she had grown dim. He wanted to call for her, but his shout would have spelled death as readily as a poisoned blade. Vy yet lived. He knew it by the continued shifting of her tether, but… Suddenly she had soared to his side, her light almost completely doused, her eyes wide with fear. The padding of heavy footfalls seemed to echo all around them. Michael shifted the muzzle of his blunderbuss, tracking the beast as it paced a perimeter around its would-be hunters. Without warning, the steps ceased, replaced by a heavy silence.
“Still feel like binding it?” Vyra hissed from his side.
Michael brought back the twin hammers of his blunderbuss with a click. “Not particularly. Couldn’t even if I wanted too. I lost the scrip on the way to save you.”
“Not your finest rescue attempt.” Vy laughed bitterly “Any more bright ideas?”
“Yes.” Michael smiled. “Light, Vy! Give us a new dawn!”
Michael closed his eyes tight as Vyra blazed like the sun beside him. A snarl sounded from his left. Michael fired a blast of silver in answer, but there was no cry of impact, no final thud that told of a foe laid low.
Michael opened his eyes. The fog had dissipated, but his target yet remained. A colossal, black dog stood before Michael, its wild eyes burning deepest red, its teeth bared. The beast had been directly in the path of his blunderbuss, yet there it remained as healthy as if the gun had fired a spray of water rather than deadly silver. Michael backed away, casting his gun to the forest floor before unsheathing his silver dirk. He lunged forward as the beast drew nearer, the blade poised to pierce the dog’s heart, but…
Frigid cold wracked Michael’s sword arm, and pain forced him to drop the dirk from frosted fingers. He had struck true, but the blade —and indeed his sword arm— had passed through the beast as if it had been vapor. Vyra flew forward, attempting to sweep the dog’s legs with her chain, but, like Michael’s dirk, the chain passed through the creature completely. With a rumbling growl the dog seemed to ripple, its shaggy, black body fading from view as Michael drew forth his steel sword.
The brief heat of putrid breath on his neck was Michael’s only warning before massive paws crashed against his back. He flew forward and landed in a heap upon the ground. He scrambled to his feet just in time to see Vy hurl a branch with all her mystical strength toward the beast. The wood soared through the creature and slammed against an oak.
The dog stalked forward, drool cascading down teeth the size of daggers, its fiery eyes blazing like Hell’s furnaces. Michael searched the ground for his sword, but the steel blade was feet from him and any move to seize it would see him bound in the beast’s fearsome jaws. The dog pounced, and, with a fervent prayer upon his lips, Michael flung his hands forward in a desperate attempt to hold back what steel and silver had failed to touch. Miraculously, his fingers curled around thick black fur as the rosary wrapped around his left hand made contact with the beast. The smell of burnt hair and singed flesh hung in the air as the dog recoiled.
“Catch!” Vyra tossed the pot of graveyard dirt down toward Michael before fluttering and zooming around the dog’s skull, flashing and burning like a torch. The beast blinked and staggered backward, snapping its teeth in agitation as Vy flew ever higher, baiting it before darting downward once more.
Michael sprang into action, uncorking the bottle and casting the graveyard dirt around the spot where the dog attempted in vain to trap Vy within its jaws. Too late, the beast noticed Michael and flung its weight forward. It was as if the dog had crashed into an invisible wall; the graveyard dirt had formed a barrier around the creature.
“Well done!” The fairy panted as she fluttered down to land on Michael’s shoulder. “You were right to think of binding after all.”
“I touched the beast, Vy.”
“What?” Vyra looked simply flummoxed. “But how? Nothing could strike it.”
In answer, Michael pointed to a spot upon the dog’s cheek where fur had been burned away and a smoking cross was imprinted upon scalded flesh.
Vy looked from the dog’s wound to the rosary clutched in Michael’s hands and whistled appreciatively. “I never would have believed it. When you said faith was your strongest weapon, I… By the gods…” She shook her head and let out an incredulous scoff. “You humans and your…” she eyed the rosary warily, “trinkets continue to surprise me.”
Neither of them spoke for a moment as the dog thrashed wildly against its invisible confinements.
“What on earth are we going to do about him?” Vyra jerked a tiny thumb toward the dog before fluttering closer to the ring of graveyard dirt that bound it.
“Him?” Michael smirked.
“Just an assumption.” Vyra rolled her eyes. “Forgive me if I neglected to check the beast’s undercarriage before I spoke. Michael, we can’t simply leave it here.”
“I know.”
The black dog lunged wildly against the mystical barrier, but to no avail. It gave a dejected whine and sat back on its haunches. Michael sighed as the dog turned its bright red eyes upon him, eyes that widened, not with unholy rage, but with palpable fear. It sank to the ground, despondent and bone weary, its gaze still fixed upon Michael, its long, pointed ears seeming to droop.
“I pity this creature,” whispered Michael.
Vyra let out a hollow laugh. “You’d hardly pity the mongrel if it had tried to make you into an hors d’oeuvre.”
“Don’t let anger blind you, Vyra. Not when lives hang in the balance. You have had enough time to study the creature?”
“Too much time,” answered Vy sourly.
Michael pointed toward the dog with his rosary-twined hand. “What is it?
The fairy fluttered backward and forward, the dog watching her progress with wary eyes. “It’s a barghest, a grave guardian. Their nature is malleable. They are not inherently evil, though…” Vy snarled as the barghest showed its teeth. “Not wholly virtuous either.”
“Few are,” Michael grumbled.
Vyra gave Michael an appraising look. “Indeed. The barghest is a changeable being. Evil perpetrated in its domain can draw forth the evil buried deep within in its soul, whereas noble actions summon the dormant good.
“So, another’s evil caused the rosary to burn the beast?”
Vy nodded.
“Would the barghest be drawn to the evildoer?”
The fairy raised an eyebrow. “It would be compelled to expose the evildoer.”
“Can it understand us?”
“Barghests are quite intelligent, but it would have an easier time comprehending Fae speech than it would this guttural tongue.” Vyra’s pouting lips twisted into a sly smile. “Why? What scheme are you brewing?”
“One that will rid this land of two monsters, but I’ll need your help, Vy, and his.” Michael smiled toward the barghest, whose shaggy head titled as if already considering the proposal Michael and Vyra would soon offer it.
***
Father Samuel had been dreaming. It had been a good dream, filled with the glitter and gleam of his earthly rewards. He had always been astounded by how readily the poor gave what little they had to the church, and even more astounded with how little they seemed to care where those riches went; but this was not a night for peaceful slumber —someone was in the rectory.
Father Samuel shot out of bed and quickly pulled his boots over his stockings. Father Samuel knew the groan of those hinges, knew the swing of that trap door more completely than he knew his scripture. They had discovered his treasures.
Brother Michael was behind this intrusion! Samuel was certain. How had the monk discovered a secret Samuel had spent years concealing, a secret he had risked all to keep? Picking up a lantern from his bedside table, Father Samuel marched toward the door with rage-filled strides, but as soon as he had reached it, Samuel was flung backward onto his bed in a heap. The lantern smashed to pieces.
“I told you!” growled Brother Michael. “No lanterns!”
Father Samuel stared perplexed at the sodden floor, upon which some unseen force had dumped his wash bin. Stranger still, the room had not fallen into darkness when Samuel’s lantern had broken. Brother Michael’s strange pulsing orb provided illumination, but this time it had departed its iron cage and was suspended by a silver cord.
Rage banishing the questions that sprung to his mind, Father Samuel began to shriek in a blind fury: “How dare you barge into my private quarters!? How dare you…”
But Father Samuel’s words died in his throat, shifting into a spluttering gurgle as he looked up toward his unwelcome guest for the first time. Brother Michael was not alone in the doorway. Beside him loomed a snarling, black dog with gnashing fangs and gleaming, red eyes.
“You!” Father Samuel shouted, pointing a trembling figure toward the bear-like, bald-headed monk. “You are in league with the beast! I knew you for a sinner the moment I saw you!”
Brother Michael laughed, and, as he did, the massive black dog moved forward, inching ever closer to where Father Samuel sat cowering upon his bed. “You will find that you, not I, are the sinner here!” Brother Michael’s snarl was as fearsome as any from the dog. “Vyra!” he called. “Show the good father what we know.”
Father Samuel goggled as the bobbing ball of light zoomed out of the room toward the rectory, leaving the room in a darkness penetrated only by the looming glow of the beast’s devilish glare. In seconds, the ball of light returned and deposited a satchel into Brother Michael’s hands, a satchel that was strikingly familiar. Samuel blinked and shook himself.
“That’s my private property,” Samuel protested. “You can’t…” He quailed as the black dog lunged forward, snapping its jaws.
“The barghest will trouble you no more, Father Samuel.” Michael smiled as the black dog punctuated this unlikely pronouncement with a ferocious bark. “Assuming you honor your pledge, of course.”
“What would you ask of me?” Father Samuel felt shame bubble within him at the timidity of his trembling tones.
“This gold will be returned to those you stole it from.”
“I didn’t steal—”
The dog growled fiercely.
“You stole,” Brother Michael continued, “church funds and they will be returned. Never again will you govern a parish or lead a congregation.”
“But how will I—?”
“You,” Michael snapped, “sniveling worm that you are, will be sent crawling to the bishop. What will happen to you is his concern. But consider this, Samuel.” Michael drew his sword with a flourish and pointed it at Father Samuel’s throat. “If you sin against God’s flock again, I will know it.” The black dog suddenly loomed before Samuel, and its eyes dominated his vision. “And the barghest will know as well.”
Father Samuel nodded in agreement.
“Good.” Brother Michael smiled and pulled at the dog’s collar, which Father Samuel realized was a silver rosary. “Consider our business concluded.” Brother Michael turned to go, the dog fading from sight at his side, until all Samuel could see was a coiled, silver rosary floating in the air.
Just as Father Samuel let out a relieved sigh, the monk turned to face him once more. “And count yourself lucky, Samuel. You have time to reform, time to spare yourself from a much worse fate.”
“How can anything be worse than this?” Father Samuel asked before he could stop himself.
Brother Michael laughed as he walked away, that odd ball of light bobbing along beside him. “Take it from a man who knows,” he said. “There’s always something worse.”
©April 2024, Jared Kerr
Jared Kerr is an award winning historian and has previously published fiction in Savage Realms Monthly. This is his first appearance in Swords & Sorcery Magazine.