Changer (Athanor) (19 page)

Really.

Eddie sticks his head into Arthur’s office.  “Where’s Vera?”

Arthur looks up from something he’s been plotting on his computer.  “She took the Changer and his daughter out to a park.  Do you need her?”

“Not her specifically.  I was going to run over to that pawnshop on Central—the one the twenty-two came from—and see what I can learn.  I thought she might want to come along.”

“You could call her and see when she’s coming back.”

“No, that’s all right.  I can probably be there and home again before she could bring the others back.”

Arthur studies his friend.  “You are still uncomfortable with the Changer, aren’t you?”

Coming into the office, shutting the door behind him, Eddie slouches into the chair reserved for him.  “I guess so, Arthur.  He certainly hasn’t caused any trouble, but he’s so…”

“Wild?  Strange?  Unpredictable?”

“No.  I mean, yes.  He is all of those things, but so are many of our people.  I simply dislike having someone who is not sworn to you residing under your roof—especially now.”

Arthur strokes his beard.  “He is one of our people, Eddie.”

“By blood and gift, yes, but he is not one of
your
people.”

“At least he is honest about that, my knight, unlike many.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Talk with him, Eddie.  Consider it my request.  The Changer has been known to us for many years, but you are correct.  The Changer has never been of our court.  Perhaps you can win him.”

Eddie drums his heels against the floor.  “I am tempted, my lord.  I, too, was once of the wild.  There my potential would have been untapped.  Perhaps I can make the Changer see this.”

“If anyone can sway him, it will be you,” Arthur says fondly.

“Enough gossip.”  Eddie surges to his feet.  “I want to get back from the pawnshop before rush hour starts.  They’re tearing up Lomas again.  It’s going to make a mess of late afternoon traffic.”

“Good luck.”

Placing the cased twenty-two in the trunk of a modest sedan, Eddie drives over to Central.  Once a stretch of Route 66 that passed through the heart of Albuquerque, this road has seen better days.  The State Fairgrounds gives ample excuse for a number of seedy motels and questionable restaurants, but there are legitimate businesses as well.

The Golden Balls pawnshop, while sharing qualities with all businesses of its type, is definitely an upscale version.  Floors are swept.  A neat array of guitars, trumpets, and other musical instruments hangs on the walls.  The long, glass cases displaying jewelry, watches, and knickknacks are clean.

The air smells of glass cleaner and pine incense, not at all a bad combination.  A round-faced Hispanic woman looks up from her copy of the
Albuquerque Tribune
when he enters.

“Let me know if I can help you,” she says politely and returns to her crossword puzzle.  Eddie, who notices such things, sees that she is doing the
Times
puzzle in ink and is impressed.

Desiring to wait until the two other customers have left, Eddie browses at a case of silver jewelry.  A silver pin of an owl, inlaid with jet and shell, catches his attention.  Vera would like that for her collection.  

Southwestern Indian art rarely depicts owls—these being considered birds of ill-omen by Navajo and many of the Pueblos.  Recently, more work is being done for the collectors and non-traditional subjects can be found.  This piece, however, has a flavor of the old beliefs.  The hunched shoulders and orange eyes look as if they hold secrets.

When the other customers leave, Eddie clears his throat.  The shopkeeper looks up immediately.  Given that many of her clients are probably embarrassed at their need for quick money, no doubt she is accustomed to the desire for privacy.  Eddie’s neat clothing gives no real indication of his relative wealth—especially in the Southwest, where jeans can be formal wear.  In any case, with easy access to casinos, even the most prosperous might need a little quick credit.

“Yes, sir.  May I help you?”  When she stands, he sees that she is quite tiny, a doll of a woman.  There is a toughness to her, though, and a confidence that suggests that either she has backup somewhere near or a very good alarm system.

“I wanted to look at one of the pins here.”

She comes over, opens the case.  “Which one?”

“That owl.”

Without any reluctance, she hands it to him.  Then again, her superstitions would be different.  Although the Spanish and Indians have intermarried over the centuries since the Spanish first colonized New Mexico, the populations have remained distinct in many ways.

“Pretty,” he says, turning it over in his hands, checking the set of the tiny rectangles of inlay, looking for the maker’s mark and the certification of the silver’s quality.

“It is,” she agrees.

“A friend of mine told me about it,” he says, continuing his inspection.  “He saw it when he was here a couple of days ago to get a rifle—a twenty-two.”

The woman nods.  Perhaps bored by her crossword or eager to make a sale at this slow time of year she is inclined to talk.

“I think I remember him,” she says, “red-haired, very fair.  I told him he should watch that the sun did not burn him.  He said he burns very easily.  Is this your friend?”

“I think so,” Eddie smiles.  The red hair could easily be a disguise, so could the fair skin if the man has access to illusion magic or shapeshifting.  Still, the description could help.  “This is a pretty piece.  How much?”

She takes it, checks a sticker discreetly stuck to the back.

“Fifty-five dollars.”

The price is fair.  The person who pawned it certainly got much less.

“I think I’d like it.  Do you take local checks?”

“Yes, sir.  We like checks or credit cards.  Cash, too, though not so much.”

“Too tempting to thieves?”

“
Sí
.  Your friend wanted to pay cash for the rifle and the bracelets he bought, and my husband put it in the bank
pronto
.”

Eddie swallows a sigh.  So much for hoping to get an address or credit-card number from her.  He hadn’t been sure he could, but he had been planning to try.

While Eddie is inside the pawnshop, Sven Trout sneaks over to Eddie’s sedan.  Taking a small velvet bag from one pocket of his denim jacket, he sprinkles some powder into the defrost vents.  Then he takes a quarter-sized piece of carved limestone from another pocket.

Glancing at the door to make certain that Eddie hasn’t come out yet, he unscrews the cap on the gas tank and drops in the piece of limestone.

“Probably overkill,” Sven reflects, momentarily regretting the loss of the expensive charm.  Then he chortles, “But then, that’s what I want, isn’t it?”

When the mist first creeps up Eddie’s windshield, he takes it for smoke and glances around to see which old oil burner is the source.  He and Arthur have often joked that New Mexico has more old cars on the road than anywhere but Cuba.

No source for the smoke is visible, so he touches the car’s wiper controls.  The wiper fluid only seems to make things worse.  Craning slightly, he can see over the smeared area well enough to make the exit onto I-40.

As soon as he gets onto the expressway, he realizes that his problems are only beginning.  Neither brakes nor accelerator behave as they should.  He narrowly escapes being sideswiped by a pickup truck whose driver gives him the finger.

Traffic is compacting as the junction of I-40 and I-25, flippantly called The Big I by locals, rapidly approaches.  Designed by someone with a very unrealistic idea of how traffic patterns work, the junction includes exits that enter into the fast lane, merge lanes that vanish with minimal warning, and some of the tightest cloverleafs in the city.

Cars enter the junction half-blind even under the best conditions.  Eddie, struggling with a car that seems to speed up when he wants it to slow, to slow when he demands acceleration, to swerve right when he insists on left, is not driving under the best conditions.  Only long experience driving this stretch keeps him in a lane at all.

Coasting whenever possible, tapping brake and accelerator in reverse of what long training has taught him to do, Eddie strives to get to a shoulder from which he can call for help.  He is just daring to congratulate himself for achieving his goal when a tractor trailer, its driver intent on making his last delivery and getting home for supper, decides that he can slip in front of the erratically moving sedan.

Eddie just barely sees the looming white form.  Instinctively, he steps on the brake. The sedan charges forward.  There is a squeal of brakes, a crashing sound.  Then nothing.

 8 

Make yourself into a sheep, and you’ll meet a wolf nearby.

—Russian proverb

“H
as anyone seen Eddie?” Arthur calls out into the courtyard where Lovern, Vera, and the Changer are chatting.

“No,” Vera answers.  “He was gone when we got here.  I haven’t heard his car come in.”