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Silver Aegis

Subj: Silver Aegis # 14 “Slowly Making Way to The Tomb of the Ü-Wolf!”
Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2010 at 04:31:58 pm EST (Viewed 40 times)


Silver Aegis # 14 “Slowly Making Way to The Tomb of the Ü-Wolf!”



The Story So Far: Someone, or something, is stalking the Stavrosos Clan of Chaney Shores. Is it an Old World enemy, Jäger Räuberischer, the Unkillable Ü-Wolf; or a less legendary, but just as dangerous threat, the canny crimelord Augustus Waddel? That is what Silver Aegis seeks to learn. Helping him with this task are two special women: ace reporter Josie Hart and Desmerleda, princess of the Romany family under fire. Currently they are attempting to hire a boat to travel to what is supposedly the final resting place of the Ü-Wolf, in hopes of discovering the monster’s true fate.


“So ye wish to venture out to Nightmare Reef?” Captain Oliver Hazzard Quinto leaned back on his stool and considered the stranger before him. Tall, athletic, with a shock of unnaturally ashen hair, the man looked back earnestly.

“Myself and two friends. We need to rent your boat for the day, and bring along diving equipment,” Silver Aegis explained to the porcine man in the short sleeves and watch cap.

“I ain’t running a cruise line, now, Mister… Scoggins, is it? When I heave anchor it’s for the bugs, not to escort a trio of lubbers to a spot they ain’t got the sense to avoid. The reef be cursed, haunted by the damned souls of the men who could not free themselves from Davy’s grip.”

“You can still drop your pots while we’re aboard, captain. On my word we’ll stay out of you and your sternman’s way.”

“Yarr! Captain Quinto has no call to employ a coolie to fish these waters ‘adays. Deuces and jumbos are too scarce for such extravagance,” the old man scratched his ill shaven jowls, “Tell ye what, Mister Scoggins: I’ll take the fare, on your word I’ll not be held responsible for any calamity that befalls yerself or your mates. Savvy?”

“Agreed,” Scott said, before the two men shook on it.

*****


It might have been considered unbecoming for a king to be digging a six foot hole in the bottom of an already twenty foot deep abandoned well, but that’s exactly what Rajko, ruler of the Stavrosos Clan, was doing. This was a labor he could entrust to no other.

The shovel hit something. Rajko crouched down and swept away the remaining dirt. With a tug he uprooted the bundle which he had sought. He used his knife to cut the cord that held the oilskin cover in place, then unwrapped the item slowly, almost fearfully.

It was a copy of the Chaney Shores phone directory.

“No!” Rajko hissed, “Foolish girl, what have you done?!”

Climbing out one hole Rajko then exited the other, holding the book between his thighs as he pulled himself up the rope line he had used earlier for his descent. The athleticism he showed belied his age of nearly sixty. The man started to return into the pit for his tools when a voice stopped him.

“King Rajko! King Rajko! Come quickly!” a man in priest’s vestments implored as he stumbled into the forest clearing.

“What is it, Father Jean?”

The holy man stooped to catch his breath, so fast he had rushed to find his highness and give him the news, “There are men here from the bank. They say our loan is due, and are demanding payment!”

If possible, Rajko’s face became even more grim, “Of course. I should have expected this,” he thought before telling Father Jean, “Bring me to them. I wish to look into the eyes of Chaney’s agents. Then, they will discover the price of their perfidy.”

*****


Josie Hart’s eyes narrowed when she saw who already occupied the taxi she had hailed outside the Chaney Shores Town Hall, “Hello,” she grunted to Desmerelda Stavrosos as she slid into the back seat beside her.

“Hello,” the zaftig maiden greeted back, choosing to conceal her antipathy towards her fellow traveler, at least for the moment, “On your way to the docks to meet up with Scott?”

The features writer for the Parodiopolis Times-Picayune nodded and checked her cell phone for messages. After a fruitless attempt to get a quote from the Town Manager about recent land public land sales to the Waddell Development Group, she had hoped her call to the Kiwi’s attorney would have at least produced results. No such luck, “Yes, maybe this lead will pan out, unlike everything else I’ve tried today.”

“Well at the very least you managed to find a new swimsuit,” Desi noted the shopping bag Josie had set on the cab’s floor before holding up an identical one from the same upscale boutique, “We must have just missed each other.”

Josie smirked, “What a shame. I could have helped you in picking one out, given what I’m assuming to be your inexperience in making such a purchase. A gal needs to be careful to make sure to strike the right balance when buying a bathing suit; to showcase her assets without going too far overboard, while simultaneously covering her flaws.”

Clicking her tongue with irritation, Desmerelda cocked her head and asked, “And just what are your flaws, Miss Hart?”

“Well, I’m addicted to caffeine, follow professional wrestling religiously, and, just sometimes mind you, can be a bit brusque in my social interactions. But otherwise I’m perfect.”

“I see.”

“If you’d like, I could tell you what your flaws are,” Josie offered helpfully.

“No thank you,” the Roma princess turned to look out the cab window, “I am well aware of my faults.”

“Including the fact you’re a terrible liar?”

“I wouldn’t see that as a fault, even if it were true.”

Josie was ready with a reply when the taxi pulled into the parking lot set across from the dock from which the next part of their journey would begin. Any further discussion on the topic would have to wait until they were all at sea, where the reporter hoped many secrets would be revealed.

*****


The Amity was a thirty three foot Pot Luck design lobster boat, its stern crowded with a conglomeration of wooden traps and fiberglass buoys.

“This must be hard work for you to do by yourself, Captain,” Scott observed as he set down his rented diving tanks on deck.

“Aye. For going on thirty years I’ve cast me traps. It’s gotten so I can do it barefoot and blindfolded. Of course,” Quinto paused, “It helps to have a system, one that shouldn’t be interfered with by passengers that don’t know their crown from their dungbie. Savvy, Mister Scoggins?”

Silver Aegis grinned, “We’ll stay clear of you while you’re working, sir.”

“Ye better. One last query, ‘fore we settle accounts: these two guests of yours: do either of them happen to be of the feminine persuasion?”

“Both of them are. Is that a problem?”

“We’re already sailing into cursed waters, lad,” Captain Quinto doffed his hat and gave his scalp a consternated rub, “To travel with sallies aboard is tempting fate.”

“I wouldn’t have thought you were the superstitious type, Captain, given you’re the only man willing to take us out to Nightmare Reef,” Scott noted as he studied the man’s perplexed expression.

“There’s calculated risk, and then there’s spitting in the eye of Old King Neptune himself. Perhaps its best if they stay behind.”

“Trust me,” the Righteous Ranger of the Republic assured Quinto, “You will be asking for more trouble if you refuse to let Misses Hart and Stavrosos aboard.”

The lobsterman jammed his cap back on and sneered, “Is that a fact? Well, I’ll tell ye what, me bucko, there ain’t a woman alive that can tell Captain Ollie Qunito how he runs his ship! The one who tries will find herself kissing the gunner’s daughter, Begad!”

Out of the corner of his eye Scott saw both his comrades exit the taxi that had parked in the lot adjacent to the wharf. It was clear even from this distance that Josie was arguing with the cabbie, possibly the fare, while Desmerelda looked on. It seemed likely that any dealings with their subsequent exporter would be no less rocky.

*****


“So it’s not enough that Ronald Chaney sends thugs and police to threaten my people,” King Rajko opined coolly, “now he unleashes the lawyers.”

“Accountants, actually,” one man, who hadn’t stopped smirking since he had arrived in the gypsy camp, corrected, “and it was the bank that sent us, Mister Stavrosos.”

The second man, who appeared far more reluctant to undertake the task that was before him and his partner, explained further, “Mister Stavrosos, due to the inclement economy, First Parodiopolis Bank has no choice but to invoke the early termination clause in the loan you had taken with us.”

“Meaning what?”

“We want our money back. All of it. Which, according to our figures, comes to $31, 497.51,” the first man produced an envelope, which he offered to the thunderstruck Rajko, “Here’s all the pertinent whys and wherefores. Er, you can read, right?”

Rajko’s face darkened, “You are not accountants….you are assassins!”

“Now, sir, there is no need-“ the less glib executive held up his hands pleadingly.

But the King of the gypsies had had enough. Rajko may not have been able to stop the monster that was threatening his family, but this was one threat that, at least temporarily, he could address. Wrapping a powerful arm around each man’s neck he frog-marched the duo back to their car. A curious, appreciative crowd that had gathered followed their leader.

“Ugh! Let us go!”

“You can’t do this!”

WHUMPF! Rajko unceremoniously dumped the men onto the graveled parking lot.

“You bent my glasses,” one of them muttered, inspecting the stem of his spectacles dourly.

“Add it to your tally. Then leave. Go tell your coward of a master that King Rajko Stavrosos mocks this latest effort to destroy him. My people have lived through leaner times than this! We will survive, and thrive, as we always have. This, I swear!”

The bankers beat a hasty retreat. Rajko adjusted the sleeves on his tunic and faced his people.

“Usim, where is my daughter?” he demanded.

“We, uh, can’t find her, King Rajko. No one has seen her since yesterday, and she has not answered her door.”

“It is worse than that,” the Widow Magda stepped forward and gestured for her majesty to stoop down so she could whisper in his ear four fateful words, a declaration that would confirm Rajko’s greatest fear:

“My besom is missing.”

Next: Terror at the Tomb of the Ü-Wolf











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