The Golden Shield of IBF Read online

  Alan Garrison wondered what nationality “Creath” might be...

  Upon entering the hall, Swans attention was immediately drawn to several handsome warriors engaged in furious battle on a raised platform. They wore armor and emblazoned on their battle-worn shields were symbols of dragons and other beasts. One of the fighters was brought down with a two-handed blow from his opponent, his shield beaten aside. The victorious warrior was chivalrous. Rather than taking the fallen man’s life, he let his vanquished foeman yield.

  At this point, an oddly handsome fellow with no hair at all on his head but a neatly trimmed beard at his chin stepped onto the platform. “That’s Hank Reinhardt,” the half-cat, half-woman Brenda informed Swan.

  “Is he the leader of these warriors?” Swan asked.

  “He runs Museum Replicas and those guys are the Museum Replicas fight team.”

  “Then they always fight beside one another and this is a practice bout only?”

  “It’s a demonstration, Swan,” Alicia said.

  “With swords so mighty, one of these warriors could cleave the chains which bind you, Gardner,” Swan suggested to her new friend who wore the manacles and leash.

  “These are good handcuffs! Why would I want somebody to screw ’em up?” Gardner declared.

  Swan merely shrugged her shoulders. Whoever this warrior Reinhardt was, he knew the language of steel, and the use of steel as well. He demonstrated a draw cut, executed as deftly as she had ever seen. Were these people who watched him from their seats wishing to train under him as warriors, Swan wondered? If so, some of them looked as if they would do well. Others, sadly, looked nearly beyond hope.

  “This Reinhardt raises an army against whom?”

  “He isn’t raising an army, Swan,” Alicia told her. “He’s just telling people about swords and stuff.”

  “Oh.” Swan looked around the hall.

  And she saw the handsomest man she had seen in all of her life. He was tall and well set in the shoulders and chest. His hair was the same red-brown color as her own. His eyes—she needed her second-sight to be sure—were a deep brown. They were clear, somehow strong and good. He wore a short brown leather jerkin of some sort, with a leather collar, long sleeves of leather and what appeared to be knit trim at the cuffs and at the bottom. If he wore hose, she could not see them, each leg covered instead with a medium blue material, the tops of his boots disappearing beneath. He seemed to wear no weapon, but that he was a warrior was beyond doubt. Using her second-sight, she read the runes emblazoned on his badge, “Alan Garrison.”

  “Who is Al’An Garrison, Alicia?” Swan asked.

  “Al-on? Oh! Alan. He’s cool, even if he is a Fed.”

  “Is Fed his ancestry, or the name of his village?” Swan inquired further.

  “You are cool with the way you talk, Swan! Alan’s one of these guys who keeps telling himself he’s gonna be a writer someday. See him here every year and at some of the other cons, too,” Alicia informed her.

  “He has never learned to write!”

  Brenda told her, “He wants to write stories and books and like that.”

  “Be a teller of tales! Yes! There were such people once where I come from. Perhaps, someday, there will be again.”

  “Anyway,” Brenda continued, “if he was illiterate, I don’t think he could be a Fed.”

  “A Fed,” Swan repeated.

  Gardner finally spoke. “He’s got a shield, right? You know, like Dan Akroyd in that old Dragnet movie? He’s got a shield with writing on it, says he’s a Fed.”

  Swan still did not understand, but decided that she should change the subject before her ignorance of this world became too much more obvious than it already was. When she looked back toward the corner, Al’An Garrison, the Fed, was gone.

  The warrior leader Reinhardt was wielding a different sword now and cleaving through a large white object. Swan refrained from asking her companions if the white object was an enchanted block of snow...

  The liberal regulation-mongering idiots with their no-smoking regulations were his unconscious allies this time, Bill Brownwood mused. Whether the doors leading out onto the segment of roof were supposed to be opened or not, they were, and for the last hour, while Brownwood sweltered in the afternoon heat, a parade of people in small groups had exited the doorway and stood around smoking.

  Bill Brownwood did not smoke, but wished that he did. Allergic to cigarette smoke ever since childhood, he had nonetheless tried smoking on several occasions and only become terribly ill. Lighting up was a way of saying, “Fuck the establishment,” and he liked that. At last, with no one else in sight, a solitary smoker of appropriate size emerged onto the roof, the man dressed in some sort of movie swordsman get-up with a big, ugly mask clutched under his arm.

  Brownwood walked from behind the air conditioning unit and toward the railing, looking out over the downtown area. “Would you look at that!” Brownwood said as loudly as he could without sounding fake. “What the fuck next, huh!”

  “What do you see, man?” The voice from behind Brownwood sounded interested.

  Without looking back, Brownwood said, “Topless right out there for everybody to see! Wow, what a pair, too!”

  In the next moment, the costumed man was beside him, peering down into the street. “I don’t see anything at all.”

  Brownwood glanced over his shoulder. No one had come out onto the roof. Brownwood started saying, “She must have ducked inside. Knockers like you’ve never seen.”

  The man Bill Brownwood was about to kill leaned out further over the railing.

  Brownwood looped the piano wire garrote over his victim’s head in one motion while hammering his right knee into the small of the man’s back. There’d be a little blood, but that couldn’t be avoided...

  Alan Garrison had mentioned to certain of his friends as he encountered them, “I’m looking for someone who might be extremely dangerous. Take a look at this photo. If you see him, call this telephone number immediately and get patched through to me my radio. Try to keep an eye on the guy, but don’t be obvious. And under no circumstances should you attempt to apprehend the guy or even approach him. Got it? Also, if you see something odd—yeah, I know—but I mean like somebody in a costume that just doesn’t look right on him, or a costume you’re familiar with but the wrong person seems to be wearing it. We think the guy might have tried to disguise himself so that he can get out of the con without being recognized.”

  Several different variations on the same general speech secured promises of cooperation and caution.

  Alan Garrison kept plying his way through the corridors of the con, going through the hucksters’ room—too enormous to be covered by one man, he realized—and going through the art exhibit.

  By late in the afternoon, Wisnewski’s voice buzzing in his earphone like some sort of fly, Garrison stepped outside, lit a cigarette (he smoked very rarely, less than a pack a week) and got on his cell phone. “Yeah, maybe it was a bad idea. Got a better one?”

  Wisnewski’s voice paused for a moment, then said, “I’m giving you until six p.m. You’ve got almost an hour and forty minutes to find this guy your way, or we seal the convention and send in the HRU and bomb disposal.”

  In the middle of eighteen thousand people, a Hostage Rescue Unit looking for a man who might be in costume would make a Three Stooges routine look like something out of Henry V. Garrison almost said that, but realized there was no use in arguing. And, in the final analysis, Wisnewski’s idea might be the only chance they had. “Fine. I’ll call you at six, but don’t send anyone in until I call. We could get a lot of people hurt for no reason. And start telling HRU now that guys with swords or axes or rayguns or empty tubes from LAW rockets aren’t bad guys, they’re just in costume, okay?”

  “Six. By five after, we’re going in.” Wisnewski clicked off.

  Garrison closed his cell phone and put it away. “Shit,” he murmured.

  “What is shit?”

&nbs
p; Garrison was so startled, he almost reached for a gun. It was the girl named Swan, the exquisite girl he’d seen at Hank’s demonstration, the loveliest woman he had ever seen in his life. Her voice was like music, a lilting alto. And she had just asked him what was shit.

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I’m Swan.”

  “I’m Alan.”

  “Al-An, yes.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Whatever? Whatever is shit?”

  Her syntax had lost him totally. His mouth was very dry. He thought, “My God, is this love at first sight?” Instead of saying that aloud, he asked, “Want to have a drink with me?”

  “Yes. I am thirsty.”

  Brenda the cat-girl, standing beside Alicia and her idiot boyfriend, Gardner, gave them a wave. Alicia grinned and called, “See ya at the masquerade, Swan!”

  If Alan Garrison had just been set up, he was happy.

  Garrison touched at Swan’s shoulder, starting back inside with her. He ground out his cigarette under his boot heel.

  Swan asked him, “What is a Fed? Oh! And don’t forget to tell me what is shit!”

  Soberly, Alan Garrison reflected upon the fact that he was still chasing a lunatic bomber and that the woman who might be destined to be the great love of his life was a complete ditz. “I’m having a great day. Let’s start with what a Fed is,” Garrison began.

  Chapter Three

  Bill Brownwood rose from behind the air conditioning cowling, adjusting his mask. He was some sort of burly creature who walked and dressed like a man, but had the face and short tusks of a wild boar. There was a sword belted at his side, which was probably dull as a butter knife, and a pistol on his other hip. The pistol was an elaborate toy, about the same size as his Beretta 92F 9mm. Brownwood took the raygun from the flap holster and slipped his own real pistol in its place. The flap covered the gun completely, not good for a rapid draw but great for hiding a real gun where a fake should have been. He dropped the raygun beside the body of the man he’d taken it and the costume from, someone named “Wilton Hyde” according to the convention badge.

  Wilton Hyde wouldn’t be needing his cap pistol anymore, nor anything else ever again.

  Brownwood bent over, finished stuffing Hyde’s corpse into the housing, then lowered the cover. The air conditioning on this side of the building might be a little screwed up, but it would be several hours at least before anyone thought to look for a body in the ductwork.

  Brownwood was already warm under the mask, and going inside into the air conditioning wouldn’t help that much. He started inside, anyway...

  “This tickles my nose,” Swan announced happily.

  “It’s Coca-Cola. You’ve never had a Coke before?” Garrison asked.

  “No. It tastes very good,” she told him. They’d found a table in a small snack shop and sat huddled around it, Garrison’s eyes dividing their attention between the face of this funny, gorgeous girl named Swan and the faces passing by in the corridor. “Then you don’t like being a Fed? Alicia said that you wanted to write stories and be a teller of tales.”

  “Alicia’s got a big mouth, sometimes,” Garrison observed.

  “She is able to change the size of her mouth? Is that common here?”

  “That’s just a figure of speech. Where are you from?”

  “Creath.”

  “Creath?”

  “I was fated to come here and find a champion who will fight beside me with the Company of Mir against my mother, the Queen Sorceress.”

  “I don’t think I’ve read that book. Who’s the author?”

  “I wasn’t talking about a book, Al-An.”

  “All right. Sure. Swan. That’s a lovely name.”

  “Thank you. Al-An is a strange name, but I like it,” she told him. This girl had the most wonderful smile Garrison had ever seen. Her eyes lit her entire face with a radiance unlike anything he’d ever imagined in a woman.

  “So, you know I’m an FBI Agent, now. What do you do?”

  “I make magical spells, potions and incantations.”

  “Oh. So, are you a witch?”

  “No, I’m not a practitioner of the old ways. These were taken over by my mother, Eran, and are used now only for evil by the Handmaidens of Koth.”

  “Now, I don’t understand,” Garrison told Swan.

  “I am the Virgin Enchantress, Daughter Royal, Princess of Creath. And, as I said, I have been fated to come here in search of a champion who will go with me to Barad’Il’Koth and fight with me against the Horde of Koth, in order to free the people of the Land from my mother, Eran, Sorceress Queen of Creath, Mistress General of the Horde of Koth. It’s very simple, really. Will you come with me when my magic is fully restored? That shouldn’t be very long.”

  “Come with you where?”

  Swan shook her head, for all the world looking as though he were the one saying goofy things. “To Creath, to fight beside me with the Company of Mir, as I’ve told you.”

  “Okay—wait a minute. How come you speak English, or is Creath like one of these sci-fi movies where everybody has a British accent?”

  She smiled patiently again. “I merely used a spell so that I could read the runes of your world, then another so that I could speak and understand your tongue.”

  “Sure. So, where is Creath, exactly? How many light-years away in space?”

  “What are light-years? What sort of space?”

  “What? Did you beam down or come here in a UFO?” He was being sarcastic and the last thing in the world that he wanted to do was be offensive, turn her off to him. But time was running out and he was terribly on edge. “Look, Swan. I think you’re the most incredible girl I’ve ever met. I want to see you again, and again, and probably again and again. But I’ve got something I’ve gotta do. Can I meet you at the masquerade, or send word to you if I can’t get there? What’s your phone number?”

  “So many questions. I want to see you, Al’An, very much again and again. I don’t have a phone number, at least I don’t think so. Why can’t I go with you?”

  Telling her what he felt compelled to tell her was sheer stupidity. “Look.”

  “At what?”

  “No, I mean listen to me. You know I’m an FBI Agent, a Fed. A cop. I go after bad guys and I’m after one right here and now. He’s a very bad guy.” Garrison lowered his voice. “He’s a bomber. He thinks the government is plotting to kill him and he’s fighting back. He’s killed three people at least and he’s ready to kill a whole bunch more people. You can’t go with me.”

  Swan smiled benevolently. “Oh, Al’An, you are a champion! It is only right that if I expect you to fight beside me with the Company of Mir against the Queen Sorceress, that I should fight beside you against this evil person. I pledge to your cause my magic,” and she stood, grasping the hilt of her sword with her tiny right hand, “and my sword, Al’An.”

  Alan Garrison didn’t know what to say. But she was still standing there, waiting for him to say something. He couldn’t hurt her feelings. So, he stood up and said something, something wholly in character with his actions as he interpreted them so far this day—stupid. Garrison told Swan, “All right, but you do exactly as I say, and when I tell you to run for it, run for it.”

  “What is it that I am to run for?”

  “Never mind. Just come with me.” And, under his breath, although he wasn’t Jewish, Alan Garrison murmured the familiar Yiddish expression, “Oy veh.”

  Stopping in her tracks, Swan enthused, “I know these words well from my own tongue! But, Al’An, what does what we are doing have to do with the poison bladder of an ice dragon?”

  Garrison just kept walking, his hand at Swan’s elbow.

  Al’An told Swan, “It’s almost half-past five.” From the worried look in Al’An’s beautiful brown eyes, this “half-past five” must have something to do with “six” which was a designation of the passage of time here. And at six, something bad was to happen unless Al’An located this
evil person before then.

  “It is time that I use my second-sight, Al’An.”

  “What?”

  They had been walking rapidly along the passageways, looking inside every room that they passed, persons who were writers such as Al’An wished to be sitting at tables at the far ends of these rooms, facing a host of other persons who were listening attentively or asking questions. But the face for which Al’An searched was not among these faces.

  Al’An had shown her what was called a photograph, a very accurate seeming picture of a face, this face very unfriendly looking, as she imagined the faces of her mother’s masked killers, the Sword of Koth, had been when they had come to take her life.

  “What are you talking about with second-sight?” Al’An asked again.

  “If it is that important that this evil man be found before this six happens, perhaps my second-sight will help. I have never used it with a picture of any land, but I can try. I will need a spell which is usually quite difficult if I am to look other than in a straight line.”

  “You mean remote viewing, or clairvoyance?”

  The trouble with a language spell of any sort was that, like much of magic, it was only the acceleration of natural processes. So, despite the spell, less commonly used words or expressions were more difficult to understand. But the concept of viewing something remotely became apparent to her in the next instant. “Yes, Al’An. Remote viewing.”

  “The Navy did it to track Soviet submarines. Fine. Try it, Swan.” Al’An took the picture from the pocket of the jerkin he called a “bomber jacket.” She supposed that he wore a bomber jacket because it might magically aid him in pursuit of this bomber. She began reciting the spell.

  Al’An handed her the picture.

  Swan appraised every feature of the man’s face. His hair was dark and even shorter than that of Al’An, his forehead high, but combined with very deepset wrinkles, the effect being that of a forehead that was very low. His eyes were deepset as well, and furtive seeming, as if trying to avoid the gaze of the device or entity which replicated his features on this piece of paper. His chin was remarkable, extremely broad but pushed-in seeming, as if it were withdrawing into his throat. His lips were thin, drawn out very long from side to side, ending in deepset creases in his cheeks.