Kingston
Kasie Llyn
Author of Enchantment’s Endgame: Magic’s Guardian
Cover image taken from www.stockfreeimages.com Dreamstime Stock Photos & Stock Free Images © Nfdx
Copyright © 2013 Kacie Llyn
Whispering Stars Press
Robert Moore stared at the bare white tiles. “Parquet,” his mother’s prim correction whispered behind his ears.
“Yes, Mother,” he murmured automatically.
There was no blood. The tiles—the parquet—was as impossibly spotless as always. Shouldn’t there be blood, or a shattered tile, a smudge in the perfectly waxed shine, something to show what had happened? The only sign of anything the least untoward was a single white peacock feather abandoned at the bottom of the curving staircase. He stared at it, blank and silent and in another place and time. He could picture Eleanor Moore as he’d last seen her, dressed in her favorite lightest charcoal business suit, her white hair in its customary subdued but stylish coif. A feather, perhaps this very one, rolled between her fingers as she stroked it along her jaw and still charmingly pink cheeks. “My pretty boy,” she crooned at its original owner.
The peacock tilted its head as if listening, rocking side to side as its blue eyes stared into Eleanor’s face.
His mother couldn’t get a dog. Oh, no, not Eleanor Moore. No four-legged fur ball could be elegant enough for her. “And they make wonderful watch dogs,” she twittered the day it arrived, stroking its glossy back.
Of course she had to be proven right when the creature’s harsh cries of “Heeelllp! Heeelllpp!” really did chase an intruder away. The high-as-a-kite kid had broken in through the back door and left the same way buffeted by angry wings, leaving behind the oversized knife he’d thought would intimidate any obstacle he might encounter. After that there was no separating her from the bird; it even slept in its own sacred corner of her bedroom.
Robert glanced at the carrier that stood in the middle of the floor. The big white bird watched him with those sapphire bead eyes. It still wore its collar, patent leather with the 24-carat gold name tag glittering just above its plump breast. Kingston, it read.
Kingston. Stupid fancy name for a stupid fancy bird.
But Eleanor would be heartbroken if something were to happen to her beloved. He could all too easily imagine her stinging disapproval, could almost feel her glinting stare catch him on the nape of the neck, goading as insistently as a cattle prod.
Sighing, Robert picked up the carrier by a handle as white as the bird and the room around him. “Come on, you.”
**
The ridiculous bird was just as at home in Robert’s small ranch style as it had been in Eleanor’s proud old colonial. As soon as the carrier opened, it jumped onto the back of Robert’s favorite chair with a self-important rustle and sat there surveying the living room like a prince overlooking his newly conquered kingdom.
Robert wasn’t sure how to move him without earning his noisy wrath, so Kingston sat there with that annoyingly superior smugness, only coming down to drain its water and empty its food bowl. “Eat like a bird my bum. You’re more like a pig,” Robert grunted once.
Kingston only ruffled his feathers, settling even more regally on his perch.
“Stupid bird.”
**
Robert sometimes felt like he was a pet instead of the master of the house. It was the way Kingston would look at him, rocking side to side, side to side, those strange blue eyes trained on him as though he were the most interesting thing in existence. It was unsettling. And Robert still didn’t have his chair. Impatient one day, he tried to push Kingston from the chair back he had claimed as a throne, only to receive a long, low hiss. “Thanksgiving’s on the way, you know,” Robert told him. “I don’t have to have turkey.”
Kingston tilted his head for one of his long stares, haughty as king, queen, and prime minister all in one. Robert walked away, muttering to himself.
**
The funeral was awkward and quiet. The priest most definitely did not appreciate being watched by a big bird with angelic beauty but a demonic cry, especially one with such a considering gaze. But Kingston seemed to sense the solemnity and kept quiet on his leash after the single scream, released when it sighted Eleanor’s white casket. Robert felt a little vindicated at the end when his mother’s friends lined up, making sure the glaring priest could hear their murmurs of appreciation and thanks behind the decorous tears. “She would have wanted him here. He was what she loved most in all the world. Almost,” they amended hastily. “After you, of course.”
Robert knew better. There was no almost, but he didn’t tell them they were right the first time, Kingston was what his mother loved best. It didn’t matter now, anyway. The two of them only had each other.
That thought did not bring Robert comfort.
Leaving the funeral wasn’t nearly as peaceful. Kingston didn’t want to leave the graveside and protested violently, proving an impressive lung capacity with shrieks that carried well past the cemetery fence. Finally Robert retrieved the carrier from the back of his car and stuffed the bird inside with the help of two sympathetic, or more likely annoyed, groundskeepers. They all earned several chastising pecks that left gouges in their hands and arms.
**
Life did return to normal, or as normal as it could get with a peacock running the household. Kingston quickly got restless, so Robert fenced his back yard and added a large pet door that allowed the bird to come and go as he wished, though he had to lock it after the first couple nights when his neighbors protested the calls that would warn of intruders, passing cars, falling leaves, or sudden breezes.
He gradually got used to the unwanted company. He had to admit it was easier than a dog; wash the food and water dishes every day, keep them full, and otherwise ignore his feathered companion. Kingston mostly returned the favor, though he would still occasionally spear Robert with his stare, rocking as he watched whatever business Robert was about.
Things were especially quiet and calm as Robert read through a report he hadn’t had a chance to review in sufficient detail at work. Kingston stared particularly hard, until Robert realized he’d forgotten to fill the food bowl. Dumping in the customary seeds, grains, and greens, he topped it off with the cat food recommended when the feed store told him they were out of the ridiculously expensive game bird protein meal.
“Don’t give me that look. You can eat it or starve,” Robert muttered at Kingston’s silent dagger gaze.
When he woke up the next morning, the house was empty. The oversized pet door leading into his tiny yard swung gently, but there was no other sign of Kingston. It was soothingly quiet as Robert showered, dressed, retrieved the newspaper, and pattered about the kitchen making breakfast. He was just sprinkling the usual liberal share of sugar on his otherwise tasteless bran flakes when an unholy screech exploded from the pet door. Kingston launched himself through the opening and spread his wings, fluttering around the kitchen in a mad flurry of feathers.
“Hey! What’s with you, you bucket of pillow stuffing?” Robert bellowed, covering his head as powerful wings propelled the bird on a wild, clumsy path, giving him a few good wallops in passing.
Kingston didn’t stop, howling his eerie cries for help as he charged from the kitchen to the living room and back, leaving fluff and feathers everywhere in his wake. Robert chased him with waving arms until the peacock finally stopped on his customary perch, pink beak open and panting. Robert watched warily for a few minutes until it seemed the bird was settling down from whatever fright had set it off. Probably old Mrs. Lipschitz’s dog in his yard again. The old pointer was a former hunting dog and had expressed interest in Kingston before.
Robert would have to find the weak spot that had allowed the dog entrance and make sure it was blocked.
“On a Saturday, too,” he groaned. “Stupid bird. Thank you, Mother. Thank you ever so much.”
He could still hear her stiff-necked sniff and ladylike but emphatic “harrumph.”
Returning to the kitchen, he surveyed the mess he would have to clean up. Even his sugar was spilled, granules scattered around his cereal bowl. Picking up the bowl, he poured in milk (fatty, bad-for-you whole milk, the only kind worth drinking) and stirred. He re-toasted the now-cold bread and poured his usual morning libation, coffee strong as his coffee maker could handle, sitting at the table to enjoy his cereal exactly as he liked it, starting to get soggy but not yet turned to mush.
After sopping up the last of milk with the last bite of toast, he sighed and retrieved his broom from its cupboard. Feathers, he discovered, were not the easiest things to sweep. They skittered away from the broom as if afraid and seemed to hop out of the dust pan, but eventually his kitchen was clean, or at least back to normal. Reaching for his dishes, he froze and grimaced as pain clenched him around the middle, then let go as suddenly as it had come. He waited for a minute, then shrugged and dumped his bowl and spoon in the sink, turning the water on hot.
Pain sank hot and cold claws into his gut again, throwing him to the floor. He cried out, arms around his belly to hold in the explosion that must be coming. It lasted much longer this time, and when it finally loosened enough to let him move, his face was slimy with sweat that stung his blinking eyes.
His vision cleared to the sight of Kingston crouched inches away, watching silently and rocking side to side, side to side. Robert used the kitchen chair to climb to uncertain feet, swaying and gasping for a moment before he could reach for the phone.
The receiver settled against his ear quiet and dead. Shaking his head muzzily, he tapped the release several times before noticing the frayed telephone cord dangling lifeless from the bottom. He stared at it for a long few moments before realizing what it meant, and then gaped for a few more, disbelieving.
His cell phone. It was in his suit jacket. He had to turn slowly to keep vertigo from overtaking him, and as he turned his eyes dragged across the counter top and the spilled sugar still glittering there.
Something made him look up. On top of the cupboards was a beat-up box. The red color, dulled by age and humidity, looked like an old wound. The black silhouette of a cartoonish rat with an X slashing through it was faded but recognizable. It lay on its side, top gaping as if in a belly laugh, a few granules spilling from its cardboard lip just over the scattered sugar.
Only it wasn’t sugar. The rat poison that was supposed to be in a deep corner of his garden shed seemed to be staring back at him. His chest ached and his lungs didn’t seem to want to breathe.
Taking a stumbling step towards the living room, he stopped. Kingston was still watching him, still rocking side to side. The bird’s stare seemed sharper, hungry. Looking from the spilled rat poison to the destroyed phone cord to the peacock, Robert gasped, remembering the day he found Eleanor.
Walking in after not being able to reach her by phone, he had been as frozen as now, seeing her crumpled on the floor like used Kleenex, the damned feather curled between her feet. Kingston had stood at the top of the long staircase staring down, rocking side to side, side to side, side to side. What had then seemed devotion now seemed . . .
Gulping as torment screamed through what seemed to be every nerve, Robert lunged for his suit jacket. He fell with it in his hands, fumbling for the pockets with hands that didn’t feel.
The pocket was empty. His streaming eyes rolled, finding Kingston standing over him, a white blur with a bright red blur held in its beak. His phone.
Kingston leapt onto the back of his usual chair, and from there fluttered to the kitchen table, then the counter. Watching the phone drop into the sink that was just starting to overflow, Robert could only scream.
**
Officer Dan Walters shook his head. “Sad. But stupid. Who keeps rat poison in their kitchen?”
“I know. But at least we don’t have to worry about a killer on the loose,” his partner said. Officer Stephens shook her graying blond head. “Are you sure you want this kind of responsibility, Dan? It really should go to the pound.”
“Yeah, but the poor thing’s been traumatized enough.: He ran a hand over his cropped, curly black hair. Did you see how it stood there, watching us take the body?”
“I know what you mean.” She smiled. “I bet Katie is going to be excited.”
“You know Katie. She’s been asking for a pet since she could talk. And I couldn’t bear to see such a pretty thing locked up in a cage. We have a big yard and a fence, we might as well use it.” Dan grinned in anticipation. “I’m glad the chief cleared it.”
“Me too. But with no known family and nobody coming forward to claim it, it was the easiest thing to do. I don’t think the pound is set up for peacocks. Hope Katie enjoys her new friend.”
“I have no doubt.” Dan picked up the carrier and strode to the waiting cab. “I’ll finish the report tomorrow. I want to get this guy home as soon as possible.”
“No problem. Your shift was over half an hour ago anyway.”
**
Hefting the carrier, Dan walked into the house. Katie came charging at him, her skinny brown arms open. She skidded to a halt, her dark eyes popping. “What’s that?”
“Let’s go out back and see,” Dan said, holding out his hand. She took it and they trotted out to the porch and down the steps. Dan set the carrier down, opening the door and stepping back. “Don’t get to close, we’re strangers to him,” he warned.
Katie obeyed, ducking behind his legs as the magnificent white peacock slowly emerged, clucking softly and looking around at his new surroundings.
“Oohh,” the little girl breathed, her brown skin flushing in pretty excitement. “He’s beautiful.”
The bird turned its head towards the sound, looking her in the eye. She eased out from behind her father, reaching out a tentative hand. Dan watched, ready to jump in, but the bird didn’t move when her gentle hand patted its back.
Katie grinned. “He likes me!” Bending lower, she fingered the shiny name tag hanging from the bird’s collar. “Kingston,” she read. “He looks like a king.”
Kingston stared at Katie, blinking slowly and rocking side to side.
**
For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind. James 3:7
Author website https://llynkc.wix.com/kacie-llyn#