Enchanted

The Contract

Quinn had a habit he liked to engage in at the Nightingale grill. Drink himself silly, smoke himself silly, get high and drunk out of his mind. Stay in the bar until he was kicked out, then go and find somewhere to pass out.
He was dedicating the whole of his attention to these activities following Dylan's departure. Time passed in a blur around him, as familiars from the town who frequented the grill trickled in and out in small groups; romantic pairs and groups of friends, workers done with their jobs and loners prepared to drown out their troubles. The sounds of couples talking and laughing, the noise of the band on stage and the clinking of glasses at the bar melted into a blur of sound around him. He barely noticed any of it.
He hadn't quite made himself drunk or high enough however not to notice the man watching him from across the bar. He did his best to ignore the staring and hope that its source of it was just another overly curious mortal wondering if he looked like he was old enough to be buying drinks.
That hope died when the man began approaching him.
He raised his head from his drink slowly. The man was wearing a trench coat; he had long hair and icy, grey eyes. His face was lined with age, his emotions unreadable. A few of the regulars at the bar shifted uncomfortably as he passed; he was as unfamiliar to them as he was to Quinn.
Quinn had seen that reaction before; it was the way most people reacted when they were near something inhuman but did not know it. This man was an outsider, both to the town and the natural world.
'What are you,' he asked, without turning around, as the man stopped in front of Quinn. 'You're clearly not a witch; you don't look like a vampire and you don't smell like a werewolf or a shapeshifter. Are you one of those rare, exotic supernatural creatures we never hear about?'
'I suppose that would make me a little like you, wouldn't it?', the man replied. His voice was smooth and businesslike. He glanced at the glass of whiskey in Quinn's one hand, and the pipe, with smoke still drifting off of it, on the table.
'I must say, I'm disappointed. I expected a little more from this famous assassin I had heard so much about. You were the most relentless and ruthless killer in all of Vale's End, I heard. I was told you rivalled even the best of the Bloodkeepers and the vampire hunters.' He placed his hands on the table close to Quinn and breathed, 'you certainly don't look like it.'
'I'm deeply apologetic that I did not satisfy your expectations,' Quinn said, his voice slurring.
'Don't be,' the man said, straightening. 'You will have the opportunity to prove yourself to me in good time. In fact, this is why I came to talk to you. I have a job for you.'
'Sorry. I'm not interested,' Quinn said, without turning around.
'I didn't say I was giving you a choice.'
Quinn gave a long sigh 'Ask someone else to do your dirty work for you. As you can clearly see, I am trying to relax here.'
'Glaoim ort chun freastal orm. Folaíonn an marc fola go ngéilleann tú duit nó go bhfulaingíonn tú.'
Quinn stiffened as the man waved a hand in the air, drawing a sigil with the tips of his fingers. He felt a familiar, brief, icy pain on his shoulder, which he tried not to react to.
'Her name is Caroline Matthews,' he declared. 'She shouldn't be hard to find, she lives near the centre of town. I want her dead by the full moon.'
Quinn carefully put the glass down, and finally looked up at the man. He smiled.
'Maybe I'll kill her,' Quinn commented causally. 'And then maybe I'll kill you after. Or hey, maybe I could kill you right now.'
He raised his eyebrows. 'In front of all of these people, Quinn?'
His hand twitched. 'They see only what I want them to see.'
'The mark wouldn't let you kill me,' the man observed, sounding unimpressed. Quinn stood up, so fast he drew stares from the groups of people sitting nearby.
'Want to test that theory?', he snarled.
The man stepped back, smirking. 'I'll be seeing you again soon, Quinn.'
And with that, he turned and melted back into the mass of people milling about the bar.
Quinn watched him walk away, rubbing his shoulder half consciously with one hand, trying to ignore the attention he had drawn from everyone nearby.
The encounter had left him tense and full of energy. He only half relaxed when the man left, quietly shutting the door behind him, and disappeared from view down the street. Quinn took a moment to burn his face into memory; every detail of what he looked like, what he wore, how he walked.
Some day, he reminded himself. They will all pay. Every single one of them who ever used me.
With one hand, he yanked up the bottle of whiskey sitting on the table beside him and refilled his glass, cursing to himself quietly.