So Spoke The Wanderer Pt. 2

[rivlee]

Anger

Sledge dragged Leckie to some support group meeting where the punchbowl tried to eat his hand and the hall was full of flickering orbs of light. Dinner was some version of Shepherd’s Pie that gave Leckie the runs and introduced him to the terrifying concept of the Other Side’s bathrooms. It was a complicated procedure which had Snafu actually rolling around on the floor laughing.

He didn’t bitch in the morning when his plate of bread and warm milk appeared.

“Maybe you’ll listen to me next time,” Hoosier said as he bit into what looked like a grey papaya.

“Food isn’t supposed to be grey,” Leckie shot back.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a person chew bread with such petulance,” Eddie said from the doorway. “Snaf, Roe’s requested your help again. He’s up at the Ville Healers’ Ward. Hoosier, Shifty needs you to check out some suspicious stone circles. Leckie, you’re with Haldane.”

“You’re not babysitting me today?” Leckie asked.

Eddie shook his head. “Ship’s coming into the port at Lough; I’ve got to be there to meet it.”

“Bring back taffy,” Snafu called.

“Only if you don’t piss Roe or Vera off,” Eddie answered.

Eddie disappeared through a side door, whistling something reminiscent of a sea shanty as he left. Leckie turned back to the table to make a comment, but it was already empty. People here had a knack for moving silently.

Leckie walked out into the hallway and looked around. The pictures on the walls were shaking as a thumping sound resonated through the stone and wood architecture. It sounded like claws were clicking on the floor. He cautiously peered out into the main hall. There was a large polar bear running through the house. Leckie slowly blinked and shook his head.

The polar bear was still there.

Leckie did what any reasonable young man would do when confronted with an apparently raging polar bear. He backed into the kitchen, snuck through one of the secret passages and hauled ass to Haldane’s office.

“You do know there’s a polar bear running through your hallways,” Leckie said, sitting down smoothly and trying not to hyperventilate.

“It’s a werebear,” Haldane explained. “You just met Jay in his other form. He’ll be fine once the sun goes down. He’s a really good archivist, even if he does get overly concerned with semantics.”

“There is so much wrong in that sentence I don’t know where to begin.”

Apparently that was the kind of statement that made Haldane look up from his infinite piles of paperwork and flashing tablets.

“It troubles me that you think of it as wrong rather than different. Have you been to the Support Group?” he asked.

Leckie crossed his arms over his chest and stared Haldane down. “The punch bowl tried to eat me,” he said.

“There are no punch bowls-” Haldane paused. “-Leckie, we really need to sign you up for a species identification class. Of course a fruit sprite would try to eat you if it felt like you were attacking its home.”

“Fruit sprites?”

Haldane held out a flyer. “Please, for the sake of your limbs, sign up for the Beginner Courses at the Academy.”

“What did I just do yesterday?”

“That was part of the standard welcoming procedure. It is what you’ll need to become a citizen, if you so desire.”

Leckie pointed at the flyer. “And that’s what exactly?”

“It explains the University’s degree programs.”

Leckie snatched the flyer and stuck it in the pocket of his borrowed trousers. “Don’t you think it’s a bad reflection on your border security that so many people from my world have ended up in yours that a university program was created?”

“When the veils are thin there is nothing anyone can do to stop who they take. Few people deliberately crossover, but the exchanges go back past the Dark Days,” Haldane said.

“So, this is some mystical, universal, eye for an eye type thing?” Leckie asked.

Haldane just shook his head. “Sign up for the classes, Leckie. If nothing else, you’ll get a few new books to read.”

The library was tempting, especially if he had an excuse to spend hours traveling its halls. He did need something to do; he’d never been one for idle times. It’s not that Leckie didn’t appreciate time to think, or being alone with his thoughts, but he needed a purpose. Two days of sitting on his ass and meeting new people was rattling his nerves.

“Can I sit in on a real class or something, see if I like it?” he asked.

Haldane smiled at Leckie like an owner smiled at a puppy who managed to pee on the newspaper. It wasn’t exactly complimentary.

“I am sure Professor Luz won’t mind having a visitor in his lecture hall. You will need to take your Handbook.”

“But it makes such a good doorstop,” Leckie said.

“Have you even bothered to read it?” Haldane asked.

Leckie flinched under the direct gaze. It was like sitting in front of Sister Maria Agnes again, explaining just why he had to let all the lizards out of the biology classroom.

“You’re a grown man, Leckie, and I shouldn’t have to tell you what to do with your life, or give you an ultimatum, but you need to open that book before you walk into Professor Luz’s classroom.”

“You’re giving me homework?”

“I will not have you disrespect the University and Professor Luz by walking into the classroom and assuming you know better than everyone who has lived here for years.”

Leckie rolled his eyes. “You know me so well, Haldane.”

Haldane stared Leckie down. He didn’t need to say anything, it was clear, there in his calm, glowing gaze, that he’d seen many men just like Leckie, and seen them fall and fail under their bravado.

Hubris did always come with a sharp sting and an occasional falling on a sword.

Leckie stood up and dusted some invisible lint off his shirt.

“I’ll just go look over that book.”

Haldane was kind enough not to say anything in response.

********

If Bob Leckie ever met the editors of The Wanderer’s Handbook he would personally love to break every last one of their fingers. He was only four pages in and he’d already found fifty grammatical errors and seventy-eight typos.

Though it did kill part of his soul to realize a land possessed of magical fairies did, in fact, have better computer software than anything on his side of the divide.

“Aren’t you people supposed to have issues with technology and science?” Leckie asked.

He was camped out in Sledge’s home office. It was much easier to concentrate and read here than any room in the Manor. For one thing, it was warmer. For another, it didn’t have any raging were-animals.

“Half of magic is science, the rest of it involves replacing things common in our world with their own, but let’s face it, they have longer lives and more time to redesign and perfect the minutiae,” Sledge said.

“Or we have a bunch of intellectual spirits instead of 0s and 1s,” Hoosier said.

“Why are you here again?” Leckie asked.

“Shifty wanted to see his good friend. I just thought I’d tag along.”

“Because it’s not like you have a job to do or anything,” Leckie said.

“Someone has a short temper this afternoon. Did Papa Haldane give you a scolding?” Hoosier asked.

Leckie’s retort was ruined by the loud laughter that came from Shifty. Leckie didn’t know what Shifty was, besides a male who appeared human, but he wasn’t making any assumptions around these people. He knew one thing though; he sure as hell wasn’t a regular being. Shifty had a stillness about him no human could naturally achieve, and occasionally, when he turned his head there was a flash of something in his eyes, an ancient knowledge hidden behind his youthful face. There was certainly more to Shifty than he presented to the casual passerby.

Leckie turned back to the book in his hands. “Sledge, will I get publicly flogged for editing this book?” he asked.

“Not unless you want to,” Sledge said.

“What about burning?” Leckie asked.

“That might get you dragged into the town square for a punishment,” Sledge said.

“Which means Haldane will just look at you very sadly and shake his head,” Hoosier said. He was throwing a crystal ball up and down in the air and it took every last ounce of Leckie’s
restraint not to make an obvious wizard joke.

“And the woodland dwellers might look down on your burning one of their cousins,” Shifty said. He sat perched on the edge of Sledge’s fireplace, a sketchbook in his lap and fingers covered in the dust of drawing charcoal. Shifty was studying something in the distance, occasionally chiming in on the conversation.

“Woodland dwellers?” Leckie asked.

“Basically Ents,” Sledge said.

“Ents or Apple Throwing Monsters from Oz?” Leckie asked.

Sledge paused in his notes. “I honestly can’t say. I’ve never bothered the Walkers of the Woods. Haldane told me to stay away, so I did,” he said.

“There’s a whole section on them in your Handbook,” Hoosier said. “You could try reading what’s within the pages instead of criticizing it.”

“I have an editor’s eye,” Leckie said.

Hoosier smirked. “I can’t wait until you meet Webster.”

Shifty guffawed at that, shaking so hard he dropped his sketchbook, a visible glow encasing his person before fading away.

Leckie really just wanted one hour to pass where he didn’t feel like he was stuck in an acid trip.

*********

Two weeks on the Other Side had Leckie’s nerves at their final end. He could feel himself approaching the edge and staring over into the abyss. He needed to get the hell out of here, but everyone was pretty damn quiet about when that would be. No one, not even Runner or Chuckler, would give him a straight answer. Everyone just told him to read the Handbook-cum-doorstop and adjust.

Leckie didn’t want to adjust, he just wanted to go the hell home.

Haldane was apparently trying to distract Leckie from his thoughts by introducing him to all sorts of characters. He’d finally met the elusive Roe, he who somehow managed to keep Snafu and Hoosier in order and compliant. Their meeting hadn’t been for long thankfully. Something about Roe made Leckie want to flee. His unflinching gaze was completely unsettling; it contained a knowledge and a perception similar to the way Snafu looked at people. Or looked through and into them, rather.

“So what are Roe and Shelton exactly?” Leckie asked Haldane one dark and stormy morning.

Haldane was clearly struggling to find the easiest way to answer, which was never a good sign.

“Uh,” he paused. It was never good when Haldane resorted to an uh. “Roe is what happens when a Reaper and a Healer produce. It creates a unique duality in the soul that very few can survive with their sanity intact. Shelton is our closest equivalent to a coroner. He’s not a Reaper, he’s not Death himself, but he can read the body of the dead, discern the last images in their minds. Officially he’s a Reader of the Last Thought.”

“He must always be in business.”

Haldane smiled. “Not so much, really, not on this side of the divide. We aren’t exactly lacking in ghosts and undead populations here.”

Leckie sat back, sinking into the plush chair of Haldane’s study. “I hope you know how very fucked up this all is.”

“Maybe to you,” Eddie said, emerging from a side door. “You must remember, Robert Leckie, this is not your world. To us, you’re the fucked up one.”

“Hell, Eddie, I’m fucked up in my own world too.”

“Then maybe it’s time to embrace a change,” Eddie said. His eyes glowed; shining with that hint of other-worldly that surrounded him.

“I think dropping into another world and not losing my mind is enough change embracing for a decade,” Leckie said.

“I would agree with you if you didn’t spend every waking moment thinking about getting home,” Eddie said.

“Then tell me, All Wise and Powerful Oz, what would you have me to do?” Leckie asked.

Eddie smiled, it was more dangerous than friendly, but his answer was one sentence. “I would have you open yourself to the wonder of our world.”

Leckie was about to give him a very crass counter-argument about where he could take his wonder but he was cut off by a slew of guttural sounding words from Haldane.

“Translator didn’t pick up on that one,” Leckie said.

“It only works with the modern tongues,” Eddie said, his jaw visibly clenched.

Leckie instinctively shrank back into his chair. He’d never seen Haldane or Eddie angry with each other. It didn’t feel right. There was a tangible charge of electricity in the air as they waged a war through dark glares and grim expressions. Obviously no relationship was perfect, but no one liked it when the parents fought.

Eddie left the room after stating something that could only be a curse. Leckie swore he heard the sound of rolling thunder as he left the house.

“Trouble in paradise?” Leckie asked.

Haldane looked at him as if he couldn’t imagine the gall. His nostrils actually flared before the spell broke and he shook his head.

“Your mouth will cost you your life one day, Leckie,” Haldane said.

“My mother always said something along those lines,” he agreed.

“Do not worry yourself over my partner’s actions. He is not himself at this time of year.”

“There’s more to it than that,” Leckie said. “That wasn’t just a fight for a fight’s sake. Pardon the language, but he’s pissed the fuck off.”

Haldane shrugged. “I love him like no other and he feels the same. That does not require that we always like each other or our personal actions. A life shared is a practice in compromise, but there are times, no matter how hard you try, where no easy resolution presents itself.”

“Spoken like an old married man.” Leckie gestured to the doorway. “How long have you two been looked in matrimony anyway?”

“Honestly,” Haldane said, staring out at dark clouds, “I lost count after the first five centuries.”

Leckie dropped his book on the floor. “Your marriage is older than my country.”

“I have told you, time flows differently here,” Haldane said.

“Right, which means you’ve been married far longer than a lifetime,” Leckie said. “How the hell have you not killed each other yet?”

A small smile finally made its way across Haldane’s lips. “I assure you, being with him is not a hardship.”

***********

Hoosier woke Leckie up one morning by turning his mattress over.

“What the fuck, man?” Leckie asked as his face met the floor.

“Apparently the Archivists in the big castle need more documentation on you and your unique entry into our world. We’ve got to go see Jay.”

“And you couldn’t wake me up like a normal goddamned person?” Leckie asked, untangling his covers and stalking over to his dresser.

“Little cold?” Hoosier asked, openly staring at him.

“Fuck you,” Leckie muttered as he pulled on a pair of pants.

Hoosier smirked. “Don’t know if you can with that,” he said.

“Do you people have any sense of boundaries or common decency?” he asked through the fabric of his shirt as he pulled it over his head.

“We’re not ashamed of our bodies,” Hoosier said. “Hell, if Snafu had his way, that boy would never put on clothes.”

“Good for you,” Leckie muttered. He’d never put on shoes while so pissed off before, but hell, Eddie told him to embrace change. So here he was, embracing it just fucking fine.

“You going to do something about that hair and breath?” Hoosier asked.

Leckie gave him the finger as he stalked into his bathroom. He was used to starting his morning with ice cold water. There was a way to heat it, but Leckie didn’t want to mess with a fire element before breakfast. With the luck he had lately, he’d end up burning half the place down. He finished cleaning up and stomped out of his room, Hoosier trailing behind in his typical silent smugness.

Jay De L'Eau was the were-bear who also ran the University’s library. Leckie didn’t know the proper protocol for greeting someone who spent half their time as Ursa Major, but apparently it involved a lot of sniffing.

“I just have to catalogue you,” Jay said. “This way we don’t have to worry about you getting eaten.”

Leckie laughed.

“That wasn’t a joke,” Jay said. “Why does everyone always thing that’s a joke.”

“The last time I saw a bear was on TV,” Leckie said. “I just, I’m used to my bears being in nature documentaries, not sitting across from me in human form asking me how to spell my name.”

“And do you prefer Robert or Bob?” Jay asked.

“Leckie,” he said. “Everyone always calls me Leckie. I can take the other two just fine, as long as no one calls me Bobby.”

“Do you find the name degrading?” Jay asked, stylus poised over his tablet.

“For anyone over the age of ten? Yes.”

He didn’t have to look at Hoosier to see the smile forming.

“Don’t even think it,” Leckie hissed.

“Too late, Bobby,” Hoosier said.

“Why is this necessary?” Leckie asked, turning back to Jay.

Jay sighed, a sound only perfected by administration staff and clerical workers. “Besides the fact that your entry into our world involved you in an unconscious state, unheard of in all the archived crossings, your lack of any activity outside of the Manor worries the Council.”

“The Council?” Leckie asked.

“The Council of Wanderers,” Jay said, “it’s headed by David Webster.”

“Everyone keeps mentioning that name, but I’ve never met him. Look, if I have to meet him and shake his hand so you guys don’t make me do a piss test once a month, point me in the right direction. I just want to get home and I’ll do whatever it takes to make the process go faster. I don’t want to be stuck here because of bureaucratic red tape. It’s already been a month of waiting.”

“You’ve not read the Handbook,” Jay stated.

“I started it,” Leckie muttered, “but it made my literature loving soul weep. Forcing me to finish that would be both cruel and unusual.”

“Your doom shall lie in your own hands,” Jay declared, making a notation on his tablet.

“You’re a cheery little bear cub, aren’t you,” Leckie said.

“Bobby, don’t piss the bear off,” Hoosier said, laying a hand on his shoulder. “We done, Jay?”

“For now,” Jay said. He gathered up his documents, plucking a single hair from Leckie’s head, before exiting.

“Are all the bears like that?” Leckie asked.

“I think it’s just you,” Hoosier said. “You ready for a lunch? I’m ready for a lunch, soup, I think. We should go to Malark’s. Makes the best soup this side of the mountains.”

“You’re rambling. I sense avoidance,” Leckie said.

“Just want to keep that wool over your eyes for a bit longer,” Hoosier admitted.

“So, soup?” Leckie asked.

Hoosier nodded and led Leckie out of the city gates, toward the river source. It was mostly open land out there. Some ominous woods in the distance and mountains even further out. There were few homes out here, though a rooftop or two could be seen over the hills' crests.

“Who is this Malark exactly?”

“He runs the kitchen at The Grounded Brigantine. It’s a tavern,” Hoosier explained.

“Can’t make much of a business out here,” Leckie said, looking around at the emptiness.

“His clientele doesn’t exactly want to pass through the city walls,” Hoosier said.

“Does Haldane know you break your bread with thieves and highway men?” Leckie asked.

“He might not, but Eddie sure as hell does,” Hoosier said. “They don’t exactly keep the same company, if you didn’t notice. Eddie’s a bit rougher around the edges and can get restless trapped on land too long. The Grounded Brigantine’s probably the closest he feels to home out here.”

Hoosier pointed to a dark shape in the distance. “We’re almost there.”

The Grounded Brigantine was indeed just that. Leckie had never been in a bar that was a ship, outside of that time on the Queen Mary, but this brigantine was now fused with the earth. Leckie didn’t even want to try and figure out how it all fit. He had a feeling the sailors over here weren’t dressed up like Doughboys.

Hoosier pushed Leckie up the ramp and on to the deck, where the tables were bustling with card and dice games, bills and coins passing through hands under the burning sun.

“Wizard,” a laughing female voice called out, “I hope you don’t plan on starting any fires again.” A woman emerged from inside the galley, her eyes amused but still darting to Leckie, sizing him up like the outsider he was.

Hoosier bowed low. “My gorgeous, generous, gregarious Captain Stella, I swear to you I shall not allow Grant to get me so drunk again. I brought a good influence with me,” Hoosier said, gesturing to Leckie, “and am merely here to sample Malarkey’s great soup.”

Stella shook her head. “It’s a good thing you don’t depend on your bardic skills for your supper,” she said. She held open the door. “Come inside then, no need to let in all that sunlight.”

It was only his years of ingrained New Yorker Indifference that kept him from gaping at the inside of The Grounded Brigantine. It was huge, easily equal to the size of Haldane’s welcoming hall, and far too wide from what the exterior showed.

“The ship’s magic, isn’t it?” Leckie asked.

“It was built by Sidhe and Siren hands they claim,” Stella said. “All I know is that I won it off Malarkey in a bet. I don’t know why he bothers. He’s a horrible gambler.”

“Aren’t pirates supposed to kick off and murder the remaining crew?” Leckie asked.

“Not when they’d need to hire a whole new wait and kitchen-staff,” Hoosier said. He sat down at one of the corner tables, forcibly pulling Leckie down with him. “Stop overanalyzing. It’s just a bar where you will eat soup and enjoy some truly filthy sea shanties.”

“Is that an order?” Leckie asked.

“I doubt you’re the type for taking orders Leckie, unless they’re ones you want to follow,” Hoosier said.

“You think you know me that well?” Leckie asked.

“I think you’re not half as mysterious as you like to think,” Hoosier said.

Leckie didn’t have a proper response to that and was too tried to engage in yet another battle of words with Hoosier. So he sat back, enjoyed his atrociously good soup, and listened to the bawdiest ballads this side of the Dark Ages.

********

There was a fury burning under Leckie’s skin. He knew it was coming, biding its time to explode at the most inopportune moment. He’d always had a temper, hard not to, being the youngest child in a family of too many kids, doing everything to get attention. Doing anything to be heard. If there was one thing, just one simple thing, Bob Leckie absolutely abhorred, it was being ignored. It turned him from a slightly short-temped but rational man into an emotional version of the Hulk.

And right now? He really fucking felt like he was being ignored.

All his requests to find out more about when and how he could go back home were rebuffed, shrugged off, or redirected. He was one good argument away from yelling I’m not going to be ignored, Dan and it was never, ever good when Fatal Attraction levels were reached.

No one would tell him the exact way and manner of how he’d get home. Everyone seemed unable to provide an accurate timeline, even people who clearly knew things things like Little Bear himself, Jay De L’eau. And he couldn’t decide what pissed him off more, the knowing smirks on Hoosier and Snafu’s faces, the disappointed looks from Haldane, or the fact that Sledge, who knew exactly what the hell Leckie was going through, wouldn’t give a concrete answer.

So Leckie had taken to avoiding them all. He woke up angry, he went to bed pissed off, and in between he spent his days enraged, livid, and irate. He passed far too many hours at The Grounded Brigantine, learning the rules and perfect cheats for Mermaids and Spades. He’d taken to sitting next to Chuckler while he took up his guard duty station. He just couldn’t understand the general lack of response. Ignorance might have been bliss but it grated on Leckie’s nerves. He had to know. He had plans to make, damn it. He needed an end date.

“Have you read your Handbook yet?” Runner asked, flopping down beside him.

“If one more person asks me that I’m going to punch them in the face,” Leckie said, shredding a blade of grass in his hands.

“You sure you don’t have troll blood somewhere in your family?” Chuckler asked.

“Aren’t you supposed to stay silent?” Leckie asked.

“He’s physically incapable of that,” Runner said.

“You really want to go there?” Chuckler asked, nudging his partner with a booted foot.

Leckie was far too annoyed to deal with a lover’s spat so he just threw a hand up. “Frank, Alice, focus here.”

Chuckler sighed and straightened up. “Haldane’s forbidding us from telling you,” he said.

“What the actual fuck?” Leckie asked.

Runner rested a hand on Leckie’s shoulder. “It’s not something as simple as being supplied with a date on the calendar or by the phase of the moon. You have to be ready.”

“I am ready,” Leckie bitched.

Runner and Chuckler both stayed infuriatingly silent.

“There you are,” Sledge said, settling down beside him. “Haldane was worried you’d hitched a ride down the river.”

“The only river rafting I know of comes via Mark Twain,” Leckie said.

“You’re definitely no Huck Finn,” Sledge agreed.

“What brings you out here?” Leckie asked. He was in no mood for banter or bullshit.

“The head of the Council wants to see you.”

“Which Council? City, State, School Board, Watcher’s?” Leckie asked.

“Wanderers,” Sledge said, barely amused. “Webster wants to meet you.”

“Should I be honored?” Leckie asked.

“Webster would certainly think so,” Chuckler muttered.

“Not a fan,” Leckie guessed, noticing the rare pass of annoyance on Chuckler’s face. Anyone who ruined Chuckler’s sense of humor had to be an asshole.

Runner shrugged. “Depends on how far you like you head up your ass.”

Sledge tsked in disapproval. “Webster’s a proud man, there’s no way of denying that, but his intentions are good.”

“Surely I don’t have to tell you about good intentions and the road to Hell,” Leckie said. Sledge had a whole collection of bibles in his home, all full of worn covers and penciled notations.

“Then I suppose it’s a good thing you don’t have to worry about Judeo-Christian ideology over here,” Sledge said. He looked up at the sky. “It’s time for us to go.”

“And where does this Webster live?”

“He’s going to meet you in the library,” Sledge said.

“Doesn’t trust me enough to welcome me into his home?”

“Webster knows nothing of the rules of hospitality,” Chuckler said.

“He sounds like a charmer,” Leckie muttered.

Sledge’s lips briefly quirked into a smile. “No more so than you.”

********

Webster looked like any poor little rich boy you’d find ordering fruity drinks in some fancy Manhattan bar. He wore clothing that looked more expensive than Haldane’s, and had the type of chiseled jaw that could make him handsome if it wasn’t for his arrogant expression. He looked like the poster boy for hipster ennui. He hadn’t even spoken yet and already Leckie was desperate to get out of here.

He could see why people compared the two of them. They both had curly dark hair; though Leckie had a feeling Webster wasn’t so proud of his possible Irish genes. They both had light eyes and an apparent penchant for sarcasm, arrogance, and smirks. Leckie couldn’t help but note that while he was more prone to crooked smiles, Webster seemed incapable of keeping his mouth shut, even while flipping through documents. The only thing he could think was mouth breather.

It was clear, as Webster sat behind his grand desk, that he felt important in his position. From what Sledge told him earlier, Webster was forced into the position, never actually campaigned for it. The former Council chairman got tired of having all his decisions so verbally derided. Apparently Webster owned quite the busy printing press and had no problem distributing pamphlets full of his own opinions.

“Robert Leckie,” Webster said in a tone of voice that grated on his nerves. “It appears you are having trouble adjusting.”

“Beg pardon,” Leckie said, sprawled out in his chair. “I thought you were a Councilman not a shrink.”

“I am a bit of both,” Webster said. He held up a copy of the thrice-be-damned Handbook. “You refuse to read your Handbook, why is that?”

“Because my senile Aunt Matilda could do a better job editing it,” Leckie said.

“I was the main editor of this book,” Webster said, “and I can assure you it is up to all academic standards.”

Leckie scoffed. “If you’re talking about academic standards from the time of Thomas Jefferson’s and Patrick Henry’s epic run-on sentences, than, yes, you are correct. A whole team of editors and ghostwriters couldn’t make that tome a best-seller. If it wasn’t required reading for the university courses, I’d doubt anyone would finish it.”

Webster jaw tightened and he looked down at this tablet. “Mr. De L’Eau notes you are a journalist. Clearly you’ve yet to learn the difference between reporting stories and being a true writer.”

Somewhere in the back of his mind Leckie could hear a voice clearly stating oh, no he didn’t. It sounded scarily like his cousin Evan.

“I’m pretty sure it means I actually know a thing or two about writing and editing,” Leckie said. He tried, desperately, not to throw one of the books on the floor at Webster’s head. “What are your credentials other than editing some verbose instruction manual?”

“I went to Harvard,” Webster argued.

Leckie felt his brow rise. “You have a degree in Creative Writing from Harvard?”

“I attended,” Webster clarified.

“Oh, that doesn’t make a slightest bit of difference,” Leckie muttered. He ran a hand through his hair. “Look, I don’t care if I have to kiss your ass and claim your writing deserves a Pulitzer if it gets me out of here. I just want to go the hell home. Don’t any of you people understand that?”

“We understand just fine, Mr. Leckie,” Webster said, voice condescending and monotone. “You seem to misunderstand why we can’t just let you wander off. This world has a right to its protection, just like the one we come from, and no one is going to let you march off back to your home planet if you’re clearly a maladjusted individual and a security risk.”

“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” Leckie asked. He stood up and started pacing. “Don’t you people have some sort of Bill of Rights here? Couldn’t this all be construed as keeping me against my will.”

“It’s clearly stated in the Handbook that withholding the decision to return is for both the protection of the Wanderer and this world. And furthermore, you are essentially a visitor in these lands. Your rights are limited, save what the Council will do for you, and with your behavior I honestly don’t see the need to put my neck out for someone so ungrateful.”

“Do you understanding the fucking insanity that is coming out of your mouth?” Leckie asked.

“I believe that it’s only idle minds who allow themselves to use crass language. Mr. Leckie, do you honestly think your case is so special that it doesn’t deserve the same treatment of everyone who crosses over here?”

“Considering the fact I was fucking asleep at the time, something your bear cub friend Mr. De L’Eau confirmed isn’t natural, I’m going to have to say, hell yes.”

Webster shook his head and made a notation on his tablet. He stood up from his desk, gathering his papers and stuffing them in a leather case. “Mr. Leckie, no one desires to keep you here against your own will, but it will be irresponsible to let you return next year with you flatly refusing to acknowledge and process what’s going on around you.”

“Next year?” Leckie asked.

“Read your Handbook,” Webster said.

“I didn’t fucking ask for this,” Leckie spat at as Webster passed him.

Webster’s face was somber and honest if only for a brief moment. “None of us did,” he said. He nodded and left Leckie alone in the office.

**********

Leckie was still fuming when he burst into Sledge’s house. He couldn’t spend the night at the Manor. He needed to be around someone who, at the very least, understood just why Leckie was so pissed off.

Sledge was sympathetic, like always, his eyes telling more of what he’d seen than conversation. He simply led Leckie to the fireside, pressed a glass of rum into his hand, and let him have his silence.

“How did Webster get here?” Leckie asked, twirling the tumbler between his fingers.

Sledge looked up from his latest drawing, eyes going unfocused as he thought. “Webster came from California, though a few decades prior,” he said, taking up his charcoal again. “You were probably just a kid when he arrived. The way I hear it told, he just went out sailing one day and wound up here.”

“He actually sailed into Fiddler’s Green?”

“Or something like that,” Sledge said. He dusted off his hands and stood up, walking over to one of the massive bookshelves until he found his prize. “A ha,” he said and handed Leckie a worn and tattered book. “Webster doesn’t really talk to anyone except the Sirens, but this is his journal, or Captain’s Log, whatever you want to call it.”

“Sirens, eh? That’s not just a tribe name, then? They really are real.”

Sledge stared at him.

“What?” Leckie asked.

“Bob, you’ve met a Siren. Hell, you live in his house.”

“Andy’s not a Siren.”

“No, he’s not. Andy’s by all means a Changeling. Eddie, however, is a very much a Siren.”

“But,” Leckie said and shook his head. “Hell, I forgot that. He introduced himself that way. I just thought he was, like, connected to them. Not a Siren-Siren.”

Sledge sighed and pulled out a stack of magazines. “Snaf could tell you what issue it’s in, but one of these copies of Which Witch contains the write up of how the child of an Autumn Sidhe and Bard met a Siren from the Seventh Sea.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Leckie said.

“You don’t know how much I wish I was. It was a royal wedding, biggest thing to hit here since chocolate.”

“A royal what?” Bob asked.

“Wedding. Prince Aindrea of the Sidhe and Prince Eideard of the Sirens. It was an arranged marriage, a political coup that the Council wanted for centuries.”

“Which Council was that again?” Leckie asked.

“Elders in Ville,” Sledge replied.

Leckie leaned back, resting Webster’s journal on his lap and pressing the cool glass against his forehead.

“Sledge, this is all so very fucked up.” He started laughing; he couldn’t stop, not even when the tears started running down his face.

“What the hell am I going to do?” he asked.

Sledge rested a warm hand on his shoulder. “We’ll get you home, Bob, I promise. I’m on your side, so are Haldane and Eddie. If push comes to shove we’ll make Hoosier force Webster to sign your transfer papers. But we’ll get you home, Leckie, and we’ll get you there whole.”

1|| 3.1|| 3.2|| 4|| 5|| Mixes