Wolf Incarnate (Shadows Over the Realm) (2 page)

Big Momma put down her cell phone, frustrated. Whenever someone didn’t pick up on the other end of one of these contraptions, she wondered whether she was operating it properly - or, perhaps, on the fritz.
More like that stubborn girl isn’t taking my calls. Again.

She sighed, sitting in the rocking chair on the front porch of the house she’d grown a family in. Big Momma had tried her best to follow her daughters’ final wish in raising her granddaughter, but it seemed a normal life simply wasn’t in the cards for Amber. Things were stirring in the shadows. It was becoming a time for evil things, and those things were beginning to gather.
They couldn’t sense Amber’s power directly - not yet - but it wouldn’t be long before Big Momma could no longer hold them at bay. The only place that was entirely hidden, entirely safe, was her house. The wooden shingles lining the rooftop and bevel siding didn’t look like much, but it was strong. The same could be said for Big Momma.

Her husband and she had built it with just such dark times as were coming. Just such dark times as had already come in Amber’s mother’s time.
But keeping the fool of a girl on the grounds had been a harder task than Big Momma had realized.

“I don’t know why I expected her to be any different,” she said to herself aloud, watching the cars go by a half a mile out on the road.

“Indeed, I don’t know why you did.”

Big Momma was up in a flash, much faster than any woman her age should have been able to move. Her careful eyes scanned the bushes in front of her porch, spotting a figure. Whoever had said it was a man, but his voice did not sound entirely human.

“Come out, whoever you are. But know that if I don’t like what you have to say, you won’t ever leave.”

The voice chuckled, stepping
out from behind the large push on the front of her raised porch, at the bottom of the stairs. It was young man in a polo shirt and sun shades.

“I wouldn’t dare start trouble here,” he said smiling.

Big Momma, never taking her eyes off the man - no not a man,
creature
- reached behind her and grabbed the broomstick leaning lazily against the house. It wasn’t her strongest tool, but it would do in a pinch.

Whatever it was, it was powerful. Getting onto the grounds of the house was no small feat considering the many securities that protected it. Still, this was her place of power. She liked her odds in a fight.

“
Sugar, you got five minutes to explain yourself and be off these grounds,” she said tersely.

“Then I’d better not waste any time.
I am the emissary. I come for your unconditional surrender.”

The stranger
paused, but Big Momma remained tight-lipped and resolute, ready to spring at slightest sign of trouble.

“The first condition, of course, is that you turn over the girl. I can personally assure you that she will not be harmed,”
said the emissary.

“And I can personally assure you that
if you don’t get your ass off my lawn, ain’t gonna be but a burn mark where you stand,” she said, eyes burning with a sharp fire. The emissary looked unsure. This clearly wasn’t the response he was expecting.

“I - I had thought that after what happened with your daughter, you would be more….amenable.”

The emissary had to dodge as a lightning bolt struck where he had just been standing. She had telegraphed her intent to him, raising the broom slowly before tapping it on the ground. The war hadn’t started yet, and she wasn’t quite ready to fire the first shot by frying the messenger - not until Amber was more ready. However, the Dark One needed a little reminding about who he was dealing with.

Big Momma tapped the bottom of the broom stick handle on the wooden porch again, straw ruffling near her face. The emissary looked in shock at his hands as they grew feathers, and shouted in exclamation when he realized he was shrinking. After several moments, a rooster stood where the emissary had been.

As it ran off, fluttering its wings clumsily as it headed for the road, Big Momma shouted after it:

“You tell the Dark One to stop acting so cocky!”
and her laughed bellowed over the grounds, a shield proud and strong.

Chapter Three

Amber found herself relaxing despite the events of earlier that day. Trying to push the indecipherable happenings out of her mind, she tried her best to focus instead on
having a good time.

“Girl, are you on drugs? That’s the t
hird time I’ve called your name.” It was her friend, Tonya. Erica and Janice laughed from their side of the booth. The club lights sprayed and dotted over them, changing hues and direction in time with the music. Amber found that such environments made it impossible for her to think. Luckily that was exactly the point, tonight.

“I’m sorry,” she said, shouting slightly over the music. “I’ve had a pretty stressful day,” and Amber laughed at the last part. Stressful was a pretty large understatement.

“Well girl, go on and get yourself another drink from the bar. Put it on my tab - courtesy my new job!”

Tonya had been promoted recently, and that was the official celebration for tonight. Amber suspected, however, that they would have been out drinking, regardless.

The bar was packed, as most club bars are when you think to go, and people were either ordering or searching patiently for a space. Amber spotted a space next to a man who was sitting at the bar drinking silently.

“Excuse me,” she said to his back, squeezing in next to him.

“Oh, go ahead,” he said, turning to face her from the side. Amber froze. The club music seemed to fade into silence. Next to her sat the handsome stranger from earlier that day.

The man, it turned out, was named Thomas. He had mistaken her reaction for pure attraction, and had taken it as an invitation to keep talking with her. She obliged, waiting calmly for him to mention the events of earlier that day. He talked as though he remembered nothing, however. He was nice enough, but there was something different about his vibe. More timid, less cocky. She wondered if, in the dim club lights, she had made a mistake.

Moments passed. He continued talking, she giving minimal responses as she continued to study his face, wondering. She ordered a drink and received it, and began to feel that she was being rude to her girlfriends.

“So, uh…Could I get your number?” Thomas asked, smiling nervously.

Amber hesitated. She wanted so badly to bring up the incident in the car, but didn’t know how. She gave him her number, being sure to have him text her then and there, and saved him under ‘Thomas’
-putting ‘Houdini’ in the notes.

She headed back to the booth where the girls had been chatting, but found it empty. Checking her phone, she saw one text from Tanya:

Janice and I went the bar next door to get us some seats and some drinks. Do your thing girl, we left Erica to settle the tab. We’ll see you both here.

Amber caught
Erica settling the tab at the bar, she seemed more interested in flirting with the bartender than settling the check, and Amber decided to go wait for her outside. She needed fresh air, anyway.

It was nice outside, and the wind felt good on her legs. She forgot how much she liked showing a little leg, but also remembered how much she disliked wearing heels.

Next to her, a little further down the driveway, was Thomas. He was smoking a cigarette and talking to a man in sun shades and a polo shirt.
What kind of asshole wears sunshades this late at night?

Still she was curious about their conversation,
and got closer so that she could hear it.

“…you emissaries are all the same,” said Thomas, clearly trying to look more relaxed than he was and smoking his cigarette a little too much.

The other man smiled.

“If only you knew, Mr.
Lykos.”

“So, you and I, were done right? I mean, I got it for you, so now all that’s left is my payment,” said Thomas
Lykos, lowering his voice slightly.

The other man was still smiling. There was not a trace of warmth behind the expression. It was almost plastic in its falsity.

“Not quite, Mr. Lykos. First, your employer would like a word. In person.”

Thomas stiffened, ash falling from his cigarette unnoticed.

“That wasn’t part of the deal.”

“It is now,” said the other, and Amber’s eyes were forced to witness yet another impossible thing that evening.

The man with the shades lowered them, his eyes a glowing, glaring red. They flashed, and Thomas exploded.

Amber screamed. Where he had been, there was nothing more than a small, smoldering crater.
At her scream, the man in the shades looked up in surprise. He calmly walked away, passing Amber and putting a finger to his lips. He shushed her as he went by, disappearing around a corner.

She didn’t remember calling the cops. She was barely aware of explaining to the girls that she wasn’t joining them for the rest of the evening. She felt that time passed, evening as she stood in that exact same place on the sidewalk, staring into space.

“Ma’am? Ma’am, could you explain to us again what happened?”

She looked up, startled. It seemed that, the more ridiculous the world got, the harder the time she had focusing in it.

“Um. Well, two gentlemen were having an altercation and one…One of them…”

“Yes?” asked the officer. He was a young man, seemingly of Chinese descent. She wondered vaguely if he’d been sent to the scene as “rookie” work. She had to admit, even if it had happened, there probably wasn’t much the cops could do. Of course, at this point, she had to entertain the possibility that she was losing her mind.

“One of them beat the other up. Badly,” she said. Amber might be in shock, but she wasn’t stupid. Until she knew exactly what was happening, she would play it safe. Calling the cops had been a reflex, more for her psychological good than anything else. The feeling of safety she had at the sirens and the uniform made her feel a bit more grounded. She gave herself a mental pat on the back for not involving the girls. When Erica had come out, she’d told her as calmly as possible that she was calling a cab home, then proceeded to call the police.

“Then what happened?” asked the officer.

Then? She looked over and saw that another officer was talking to a valet, nearby. Someone else must’ve seen what happened.

“What did he see?” she said, nodding toward the valet.

“Well, he says he saw one man shoving another into a vehicle,” he said, eyeing her closely.
But no beating
.
And certainly no exploding men.

The officer scribbled something into a notebook, and smiled politely.

“Thanks for reporting, ma’am. Would you like a ride home?”

Later, as the police car pulled up to her driveway, she thanked the officer.

“No problem,” he’d said. “Here’s my personal number in case you see any more, uh…altercations.”

She held the piece of paper in her hand as she made the walk up to her door. He’d been cute enough, if a little young, but she was far from a romantic state of mind.

Inside, Amber stepped out of her heels, laying her keys and purse on the counter and heading to the living room to fall asleep to the background noise of late night television infomercials.

When she turned on the light, she screamed for the second time that night. Sitting in her recliner, staring into space, was Thomas. He was dressed differently, and had a five o’clock shadow. Turning to look at her, there was something different about him. It was his expression, the way he carried himself.

“Tell me what happened,” he said, simply.

Amber decided not to run figuring, for some reason, that it might trigger the same response from her intruder as from a dog.

“Get out of my house right now, or I’m calling the police,” she said calmly, realizing her cell phone was in the kitchen.

“Relax. I’m not going to hurt you. I don’t have much time. There was a man. He looked like me. What happened to him?”

He was too still. She dared not move. His eye was fixed on her, never blinking. Maybe if she just told him, he would go.

“Today, after what happened in the car --”

“The car?” he said, confusedly.
So, he doesn’t remember, either. How many of this guy are there?

She went on, deciding not to mention the car further.

“We chatted at the club. He gave me his number. Outside, I saw him…”

They stared at each other intently. There was
a terseness in the situation that made them both speak in short bursts, sentences. He looked at her a while, seeming to come to come kind of conclusion.

“I see.
Sunshades and a polo shirt, yeah?”

Amber nodded.

The stranger got up. Amber moved to keep her distance, still facing him. When he opened the front door, he turned for a moment, smirking.

“
Thanks for the help,” he said.