Tall, Dark and Hairy (The Necro-Files Book 3) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Look for these titles from CL Bledsoe

  Copyright Warning

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ~ About the Author ~

  Also by CL Bledsoe

  More Fantasy from Etopia Press

  Look for these titles from C. L. Bledsoe

  Now Available

  The Necro-Files Series

  The Necro-Files: $7.50/hr + Curses (Book One)

  Bloody Sexy (Book Two)

  Tall, Dark and Hairy (Book Three)

  Sunlight

  Tall, Dark and Hairy

  The Necro-Files Book Three

  C. L. Bledsoe

  Copyright Warning

  EBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared, or given away. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is a crime punishable by law. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded to or downloaded from file sharing sites, or distributed in any other way via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000 (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/).

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

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  Etopia Press

  136 S. Illinois Ave. Suite 212

  Oak Ridge, TN 37830

  http://www.etopiapress.com

  Tall, Dark and Hairy

  Copyright © 2015 by C. L. Bledsoe

  ISBN: 978-1-941692-57-8

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First Etopia Press electronic publication: February 2015

  PROLOGUE

  Night. The woods are dark with only a veiled moon struggling to shine through the clouds that block the stars. He runs because they chase him, crashing through the underbrush too fast to know where his next step will land. A creek appears, and he hurtles across, falling and clawing himself out of the water and onto his feet. Paws fill his sodden footprints—one of a shoe, one of a naked foot—a moment after he clambers away. His breath steams in the wintery air. He is a young man, fit and fast, but their hunger is far wiser.

  A clearing emerges ahead, and he doesn’t have time to wonder if this will help him gain on his pursuers or vice versa. He has no weapons—he left his musket in the jaws of one of his pursuers after emptying it into another’s coat. He thinks he might pause long enough to pick up a stick if he sees one, but part of him wonders what good it will do. His clothes are in tatters, and he can feel the cool dampness of blood running down his legs.

  He crashes into the clearing, looks for anything of use but can see next to nothing in the darkness, imagines—or hopes he imagines—the breath of the things on his back. He sprints across the clearing. He can hear them panting behind him, too tired themselves to howl. He pushes his muscles harder and actually gains speed across the mostly level terrain. He knows the teeth will come any second, but he is almost to the tree line again, where he hopes the tangle of native underbrush will at least give him an opportunity to gain a momentary lead, though the things behind him—he refuses to call them just wolves—will quickly destroy any true lead he gains.

  The trees are a few steps away. He picks up speed, thinking he’s going to be eaten any moment, and then he is not alone.

  A groups of shadows step from the tree line. He can’t tell anything about them other than that they seem tall. He certainly can’t tell if they are Protestant or Catholic, and he doesn’t care.

  He doesn’t stop. He runs between two of them, expecting the sounds of battle or of anything, but stops short when he perceives nothing and falls to the mossy ground, his legs screaming with an agony he hadn’t noticed until this moment.

  He turns. The figures are still—stone still—and silent. In front of them, he hears the barest growl of ferocity and recoils when he realizes it is being answered by these dark figures. The two lines stand, growling at each other, so quiet the man has to force himself to stop panting so he can even hear it, and then the growling stops. Somehow, though they left in silence, he knows the wolves are gone.

  He struggles to his feet, immediately falls, and lies huffing for breath. The line of figures turn to him, and at that moment, the clouds part enough for the moon to lay its feeble light out upon the eyes of the forest, and he sees that these figures aren’t men.

  * * *

  He doesn’t know how he gets back to the stockade surrounding the settlement in St. Mary’s; his experience of the trip is odd, his awareness ebbing and flowing like waves coming into a beach. One of the beasts takes him into its arms, and then his awareness fluctuates as though one moment he is in one place and the next in another.

  He finally arrives at the wall of felled trees surrounding the fort and is set down. He turns and sees clearly for the first time the things that have saved him, great, hairy beasts that resemble apes he’d seen on safari but stand tall like men. He nods to them and offers his hand. One—he can’t distinguish between them other than that this one has silver hair on its back—takes it. He forces himself not to flinch as it engulfs his hand in its own. When its furry palm touches his, an ocean of images, memories, wash over him: memories of his wife and child; his life back in England with his father, who is not so much a man as a living title; his new life, here, where he has become something of his own man. He jerks away, and the images cease. He’s not sure this even really happened.

  Summoning up some of the presence of mind he’s witnessed so many times in his father, he speaks. “My name is Leonard Calvert. I am the governor of Maryland, son of the Lord of Baltimore, acting in my father’s absence as the Baron of Baltimore.” He adds mention of his father to legitimize himself, but then realizes how ridiculous this is, since his present company is unlikely to have kept up with English peerage. “I rule this territory. If you ever have need of me, you have only to ask. I owe you a great debt.”

  The creature bows, and they are gone. He stands there a long time, trying to make sense of what he’s witnessed.

  * * *

  Months pass. The settlement at St. Mary’s grows to a true fort, and with its growth, comes violence. The once-friendly natives have fled from the encroaching settlers, and Calvert has seen no trace of his erstwhile saviors since that first night. A nearby settlement, founded by traders from the Virginia colony and ruled by a man named Claiborne, denies the Catholic Calvert’s claim to the land. They squabble over petty things: power, religion, trade, titles—always more titles—but Calvert suspects Claiborne’s true goal is maintaining his own power. Claiborne arms a ship and fires on the settlement, and Leonard Calvert flees for his life with his wife and children. He returns to the colony at the head of a small army, only to receive word that the leader of the rebellion has abandoned his men and fled back to Virginia. Calvert and his men return to St. Mary’s, and that night, Calvert finds himself restles
s, as he does many nights in this new world. Ignoring his own earlier edict against wandering off alone, he leaves the safety of the town walls and ventures into the woods, searching for peace, but led on by something more. It isn’t long until he notices the night is strangely quiet. He has been walking for several feet in the near silence when a creature appears in front of him.

  Calvert is calm.

  “I wondered if I’d see you again. Or one of you,” he corrects himself.

  The beast nods and reaches one long, hairy arm out to Calvert, mirroring Calvert’s actions when they’d returned him before. The moment the beast’s fingers wrap around Calvert’s hand, his mind fills with images. He sees a small group of the beasts in the woods. Something makes him think that this is a family. The scene shifts. The youngest wanders off. The adults are foraging. They found a patch of wild raspberries and are busy filling a woven basket he senses was made by the creatures. Before he can investigate this further, the image follows the little one. These scenes aren’t as clear. The child encounters a small group of men. This shifts to the men carrying it away… The parents reappear—the image not fuzzy anymore—basket full, hooting for their child.

  The thing lets go of Calvert’s hand and Calvert steps back, cradling his head as a bright pain flashes through it.

  “Your child was taken,” he says, when he’s able to.

  The beast nods. It reaches for him again, and Calvert flinches. Its eyes, though, hold such sadness, such worry, that he acquiesces. This time, he sees the water’s edge. These woods border a vast river, and he watches as the image moves over the water to a boat with the men inside. He realizes, though he hadn’t noticed before, that these men don’t have faces, and understands that he’s seeing a dream of what happened, which helps but doesn’t completely relieve his alarm. The scene skips forward and the boat docks on an island with a stockade. The men enter with the child.

  “I know these men,” Calvert says.

  * * *

  The eastern shore of the Isle of Kent looms out of the early morning fog after the voyage north from St. Mary’s up the Chesapeake watershed.

  “It’s a mistake, Leonard.” Cecil Calvert’s calm voice carries across the deck.

  “Father appointed me governor of Maryland,” Leonard Calvert says. “For better or worse, it’s my mistake to make.”

  Cecil is quiet a moment, perhaps giving Leonard time to hear the lack of conviction in his own words. “No one is doubting your judicial right. No one on this ship,” Cecil adds before his brother can correct him. “I’m merely positing the possibility that the esteemed lord governor’s current course of action isn’t, perhaps, the most advantageous.”

  Leonard gives him a look. “This is a new world. The rules of mother England fit about as well as a little girl’s bodice on a grandmother’s chest. They are too strict.”

  Cecil grunts at his brother’s analogy. “Careful, brother, if those words fall on the wrong ears…”

  Leonard holds his arms out and looks around. “What ears? Do you suggest the king’s noble ears might reach this primeval isle? I think not. The king would have us leave political power in the hands of the aristocracy—”

  “Not just the king; our father as well. You’re already flouting aristocratic tradition. It was bad enough when you refused to levy taxes or divide the land into manors.”

  Leonard waves away his argument. “Manors! I ask you, where is the aristocracy? How shall they rule the manors? In this new land, there is no aristocracy to lead, and there shouldn’t be. The freemen should rule themselves. If that is to happen, we must free them from the tyranny of men such as Claiborne, and we must engender their trust.”

  “The king would have your head for that.”

  “Let him come and take it.” He sees the concern on his brother’s face and adds, “There are ten score of us in this wilderness, Cecil, miles from any other Englishmen. If we make enemies of our fellow countrymen, how shall we survive?”

  “But Claiborne is a pirate and a villain.”

  “Who abandoned his men to their fate. We have an opportunity to bring these lost sheep back to the fold, and to add useful trading partners and knowledgeable allies.”

  “They aren’t terribly good fighters, though.”

  The brothers share a laugh.

  “You’ve clearly made up your mind about this. I just hope you’re right.”

  “So do I, brother. So do I.”

  * * *

  They land and are met with a closed stockade door. Calvert strides to the wall and shouts up at those manning it.

  “My name is Leonard Calvert, son of Lord Baltimore, on whose behalf I now act. It has come to my attention that you have been misinformed by one Claiborne. I am here to correct these lies. We are not Spaniards come to steal your trade goods. I have been, in fact, ordained by the king himself to govern this land, which is not part of the territory of Virginia. It is Maryland. And look at what we’ve brought to this new land. The natives have fled from our insanity. The wildlife moves deeper and deeper inland to escape the noise and stench of our pursuits.” He pauses. “You men, under Claiborne’s leadership have committed acts of barbarism and piracy. And where is Claiborne?” He looks around dramatically. “Your leader has deserted you. You have been misled and abandoned. My men and I could lay siege to you if we saw fit, but that’s not why I’m here. I’m here as governor of Maryland to hear your grievances, to meet with you and talk this out without the need for bloodshed.”

  One of the men calls out over the wall, “You’re not my governor, sir, I didn’t vote for you.”

  “Ah, well that’s the problem, isn’t it?” He removes a letter from inside his jacket and holds it up. “This is the charter for Maryland, signed by Charles II, the King of England. This charter gives me the right to make whatever laws I see fit, to rule this colony however I choose, so long as those laws aren’t repugnant to the laws of the King of England. So long as this colony turns a profit.”

  There is some grumbling at that, which he expected.

  “It is easy for the king over the water to declare a marriage of monarchy and democracy, easier for them to make laws in England than it is for us to have to live with them here.” With this, he grasps the paper in both hands and tears it in half. “But we are not in England, gentleman. We are in a strange and unforgiving land. We are few, and we are surrounded by many dangers untold. All that we have here, gentleman, are our wits and each other. If we lose either, we perish. Now, I ask you again, would you rather open the door to a man who is willing to talk out your grievances and seek solutions, especially considering that your leader has long since fled and is, as I am given to understand, on his way back to England at this very moment…

  “Or would you rather my men do the knocking? They are not as kindly disposed as I.”

  A moment later, the gate opens. A man—Calvert assumes it is the one who’d been conversing with him earlier—appears.

  “We’ll talk.” He holds his hands up to show that he is unarmed.

  “One other thing,” Calvert says. “I heard a rumor that you captured an exotic beast, and I’d very much like to see it.”

  * * *

  Calvert is led to a makeshift cell they’ve devised, which is a pit with a circle of supplanted saplings around its perimeter.

  Calvert’s guide speaks quickly, enthusiastically, perhaps trying to ingratiate himself. “A foraging party caught it on the mainland. The savages have a legend about them, but we never believed them. Until now.”

  “Show me,” Calvert says.

  The guards, nee Claiborne’s men, pull up a small section of stakes that have been bound together to make an entrance through the small wall. Calvert peers into the pit. At the bottom, perhaps ten feet down, a small form huddles in obvious fear. It resembles an animal, though when it catches his scent, it stands on its back legs, revealing itself to be bipedal. It looks up to Calvert and raises a hand in greeting.

  The guard laughs. “Like th
e little bugger knows you.”

  “Bring me a ladder,” Calvert says.

  While he waits, the small figure never ceases watching him.

  “What is it?” Cecil asks. Leonard hadn’t heard his brother approach.

  “I don’t know the name they give themselves, but I’ve encountered them before. And I’m in their debt.”

  Some of Claiborne’s men bring a ladder, and Calvert climbs down into the pit. The beast has the body of a young child, old enough to walk, but still shaky on its feet. He climbs down, kneels before it, and reaches gingerly. It continues to stare, wide-eyed, in a way that cements Calvert’s impression of a child.

  “I’m just going to check you for wounds,” Calvert says.

  It remains still. He puts a hand on its furry head, tousling its hair. It smiles, revealing teeth that resemble Calvert’s own. He feels images in his mind, but weaker than he felt from the adults. He’s able to ignore them as he examines the child. Mud and blood have caked its hair in places, and Calvert is careful not to pull any of it. He checks its head, which seems whole, apart from one healing gash in its forehead. He checks the rest of its body as well as he can, and then tickles the crook of its underarm. He sits back with a smile when it laughs and clamps its long arms around itself. There is more caked blood on its arms and side. Calvert can’t help but notice it seems to have been heavily mistreated. But it can stand and seems in decent health. He also realizes that it’s a girl. He rises to his feet and turns to the ladder, only to feel a soft hand slipping into his. In his mind, he feels the relief, the joy of the child. He looks down at it—and then corrects his thinking: her. He gathers her into his arms. She clings like any small child as he climbs up out of the hole, to the amusement of Claiborne’s men.