[1X1] Welcome to the Graveyard Circle

"A lot, actually. But that's in the day." Helois leaned back in his chair. "At night it's pretty empty. This is a fairly small town, after all. It's small enough that there are rumours someone's child got kidnapped and replaced with an evil changeling and that still hasn't been disproved." A failure if there ever was one. He'd put the town under effective protection hours after discovering the theft.

"Boss is weird about the rumour," Berwald supplied unhelpfully. Helois shot him a glare that actually did mean trouble this time and he shut up.
 
Leigh's interest was instantly piqued. She pushed thoughts of those missed calls and the papers out of her head. Leaning forward, she rested her elbows on the table. She didn't miss the look that passed between the two men. Helois and Berwald looked like they were more than workmates. They spoke like real friends. But that look Helois shot him was certainly one of boss to underling. It wasn't something she was used to seeing, having barely any boss to speak of. Janet liked knitting and the only way you could get in trouble with her was failing to accompany any notes on her flashes of genius with appropriate illustrations.
The rumour and the relationship intrigued her more than she cared to admit.
"Who do they think the evil changeling is?" she asked. Surely if someone had been changed for an evil fairy, then there was some kid high on red cordial somewhere.
 
"Scott Lucas, 23rd Street, the white house with the yellow roof and the purple curtains. Reportedly involved in his last incident, actually from a few days ago, was a flintlock musket with black powder, one the last city's gun shop mentioned being stolen. Rumours began a week after-" the disappearance, he was going to say, but a second's thought and it was changed, "-he started acting odd. Apparently he was a very polite, quiet child, and now?" Helois shuddered.

Now he wasn't human. Now he had to be the fae's slave. Now he would never see his parents again. Now-

Berwald filled in pretty quickly. "He's got an underling in the new transfer student to his school and the last escapade involved somehow getting a gun and teaching said underling to use it. He's in juvie right now for shooting Dean Jameson, the homeroom teacher for his class." The blond winced further. "He's thirteen."
 
The grin dropped off Leigh's face. This wasn't some fairy story. This was a legitimate criminal case. Her brow furrowed. "Why the hell would people say that's a fairy story? The kid needs serious help."
She got now why Helois would be taking it so seriously. Why had they even been joking about that?
Leigh's mouth tightened. It wasn't the first time she'd heard of a crime like that. Shootings happened in big cities. And sometimes, kids got hold of their parents guns when they weren't supposed to. But saying some evil spirit had gotten hold of this kid. What could have happened to him?
 
"He was also apparently painting rituals in blood on the walls, and all of them involved Gaelic fairy summonings, if those even exist. And the gun was made of pure gold. And he panicked when touching pure iron, plus his hands got burned when he touched it. That plus the crime meant the local conspiracy theorist getting very involved." Helois glared at the ground like it would change the past if he made it frightened enough. "Thing is, the article online was surprisingly plausible. So, um-" he made a vague hand gesture, not knowing what to really do in this situation. "Yeah. Changeling."

That teacher, though, he probably hadn't expected the gun. In his defence, very few had.
 
Leigh sat back in her chair. "The iron burnt him?" she asked. Everything else, she could account for. The kid was nuts. He'd read about changelings and fairy stories online, and in a delusional break, this was what had he'd fallen back. Where he'd gotten a golden gun or access to blood or even Gaelic fairy summonings, she had no idea, but she could see how it was possible. But burnt by touching iron?
"Changeling. Right. But why would some evil fairy want to kill his homeroom teacher?"
 
Helois shrugged, fists clenching reflexively. "Maybe he was the first person on the to-kill list. There's a very high chance a vindictive child could make one, no matter if they could carry it out or not, and an even higher chance they'd use it when given access to working, effective weaponry."

Berwald continued on his own. "Yeah, it burned him. Scott actually came in here once. Slept the whole night in the café because it was the one part of town where the doorknobs aren't iron." The blond shuddered. "He tried to buy everything with blood. He just offered, of course I didn't let him, but he said he'd rather not be in our debt. Something like that."

Helois had actually been off shift that night, something neither of them deigned something to say. He was eternally thankful for that. Having to explain to this child that they only took metal, possibly burning coins, was ridiculous.
 
(Sorry I got mixed up and thought I'd already replied to this)

Leigh was shaken. She'd known that a lot of small towns had this kind of story floating about, but she'd never realised that they coud actually be true. This story was gaining detail after detail, edging its way from fun fairy tale to something very close and very scary. "Why was he trying to pay you in blood?" she found herself asking. Of everything they'd just said, it possibly wasn’t the most notable part, but it was what had stuck there. "Wouldn't giving someone your blood indebt you to them more?" she asked. At this stage, theorising about thungs was easier than thinking about them.
 
(It's okay. I get that a lot with this device, heh.)

"Incorrect. You're offering them your life blood. That contains all kinds of magic, and can be used for so many spells you'd need a book the length of The Order of the Phoenix to list them all." Helois almost laughed. The changeling must have been desperate if he was offering blood. He'd die soon in that juvenile holding facility. "A name alone can do immeasurable damage. Blood? A world could be ended with enough." Exaggeration, maybe, but rooted in truth.

"He's a bit of a nut about... this," Berwald murmured, rubbing the back of his head. "Ignore it. Nothing too important."

"Right." Helois sighed. "Do you need to get home? It's late and I'm not sure it's safe for you to be out at this time."
 
Leigh felt a cold shiver root in her belly. Helois knew a little too much about this. The way he was talking-like blood magic was real. Like he knew the kid. There was something in his tone, an almost paternal disappointment. Maybe if he'd said the same without that tone, she wouldn't have found it so chilling, but how he said it...did he really believe in this crazy magic stuff? And on some level learnt and trained to keep wide open and accept new ideas, she had to wonder. He had her name. For some reason, knowing that made her shudder.
Placing her fork on her empty plate, she pushed it away and wiped her hands on her jeans as she stood up.
She shot a smile at Berwald. At least he seemed to be trying to put her a little at ease. Helois didn't seem to be bothered.
"Yeah, I feel real safe after that story," she said, trying for a laugh. She wasn't entirely joking though. The cold and the dark outside were even less welcoming now than they had been when she had run away from them at the start of the night. "I'm pretty close to home here," she promised them as she started wrapping her gloves and scarf back on. "Thanks for the concern," she said, before adding abruptly, excited, "And for the drink and the cake!"
Pulling her beanie on, she headed towards the door. "I might see you tomorrow, then."
 
"Tomorrow." Helois waved to her, watching as she left. Hopefully she didn't read too much into what he said. It was just basic knowledge, right? Nothing too major.

Judging by the look Berwald was giving him, he wasn't helping. Damn it. Maybe he should have just stayed quiet about the situation.
 
The cold was shocking. After the warmth of the cafe, the wall of frozen air hit Leigh like a slap to the face, one that shivered past her layers and into her bones. Wrapping her arms around herself in an attempt to trap some of her body heat at least somewhere in the general vicinity of her body, Leigh glanced both ways and tried to remember where she was going.
Turning left, she felt her shoes crunch and scurried along the sidewalk in the encroaching dark, barely held back by the streetlights. The neon of the Graveyard Circle soon faded behind her. The world was a blanket of greys then, punctuated by the occasional flare of light from shops or headlights. Byt every shadow held glimpses of dark eyed little boys, of guns glinting in the moonlight, of lights that never quite made it past her peripheral vision. She walked home quickly. Fingers cold, Leigh fumbled her way into unlocking the door to her apartment, immediately going to the radiator and switching it to high. That poor radiator had certainly gotten a workout since she arrived.
Finally able and willing to remove her outer layers and focus on something other than not getting mugged by devil children, Leigh settled into her seat by the window and sighed. She couldn’t tell if her ragged nerves were due to the cafe, to Helois, or the story he had told. But she knew that despite her misgivings, something about it excited her. Why did Helois seem so involved? Why didn’t he have iron doorknobs? There was more to this. More to Helois. And damn, if those two didn’t make a good cake and hot chocolate. She knew she'd be back. Sighing again, she checked the time on her phone. Another two texts. She swiped them away. Opening her laptop, she started on her work for the night before she could slip into her warm, comfy bed.
 
"I think you scared her, boss." Berwald's voice was soft, a forced joking lilt to his words. "It's rude of you to do that to new customers."

"H-Hey, it might help? I read somewhere that being scared somewhere is frequently misinterpreted as excitement in humans. It makes them want to go there more." Helois knew he was just covering up his mistake- they both did- but he was already on this tangent, so he might as well continue. "Besides, she said she'd come back. That has to be true."

"That's questionable," the blond responded, turning back to the kitchen. "What's with the whole "in humans" thing, anyway? Every time you say something like that, there's a "humans" thrown in. You talk like you're not one."

"That's none of your concern." Helois returned to his place behind the counter, already a little wary. "Sorry about this whoke thing tonight, by the way. I'll make it up to you."

"You'd better. This did not go well." Berwald disappeared back into the kitchen, leaving Helois alone to his thoughts.

Well, he had a night to kill. A few more notes on the newest recipes wouldn't hurt.
 
Leigh did not return before work. Instead she made it into the building and showed off the papers she had finished the night before, practically sitting on the radiator. It hadn’t really been a conscious decision. Leigh just hadn't gone in. At least she kept telling herself that. Eventually, however, they came across a snag in their new framework, and several coffee orders and a company credit card were shoved into Leigh's hands. Greg threw her her beannie as she left. "Don't forget my soy milk!"
Once more in the cold outside air, Leigh sighed and glanced across the street and away to where she knew she was going. Then she started walking.
The bell rang as she walked into Helois' cafe. There were a few more people in today. It was still early, and there was even a harried looking intern trying to load up a coffee tray. Glancing down at her long list of orders, Leigh got in line.
 
At the ring of the bell that signalled the door opening, Helois turned, handing off the last order to John- he'd come in early today- and dusting his hands off on his work apron. "Welcome to the- oh, Leigh! Good morning. I thought I'd managed to scare you off last night, heh. Sorry about that."

There was a mass of paper in her hands, writing scribbled across it in varying scripts, and the fae had to shove down his bubbling excitement at the sight. More orders! Oh, this was turning out to be a great morning.
 
Leigh smiled as Helois caught sight of her. She didn’t know why him remembering her was exciting-she'd only met him the night before. But for some reason it was different during the day. The dark stories were something if the night. With a warm hum of people and sunlight streaming in through the window, it was a cheery place. And it smelt like coffee.
"No, I believe I promised a big order in the morning. And lucky for you, the others gave me one." She spilt the papers onto the counter and sorted through them quickly, reading out the orders. She even remembered Greg's soy milk. "Busy morning?" she asked. Her brain was relieved to be in the sunny morning and relaxing for a moment.
 
"No, not quite. A little less busy than expected. Must have been the cold last night." Helois took the lists of papers. There was... an amount, to say in the least. And the names. He'd heard a lot of these names in the past. But from where?

"Probably will be a busy morning when I'm done with all this. I'll have to ask Will to get some more supplies when this is done. You work at the think tank? I think I remember a few of these people."
 
"There you go then, I'm doing my service for the town's local economy," Leigh said. She pulled the company card out. "Well, the company is, anyway." She glanced around. It was still reasonably full of people coming and going. That was promising. If this wasn't busy for them, it meant the place was probably very good. Good thing-the others would put her on printing duty for the week if they got rubbish drinks and snacks.
"Yeah!" she said. She was still uncertain about the think tank's place in the world, let alone this town. It was a weird idea anyway, full of very interesting characters. She wasn't surprised Helois would remember some of them. "Are any of them from here?" she asked. She should probably know, but she wasn't much good at remembering facts about people.
 
"From... here? Oh, you mean from this town, right?" Helois almost laughed. For a second, he thought she meant if they came from the café. "Yes, some of them. Can't quite remember their names, though. For as much as this is a small town, I don't know everyone. I remember that the think tank brings people in from a bunch of other areas, though. How is it in there?" he asked, readying the first few cups as quickly as he could. Usually, that was pretty fast. He was reasonably sure this'd only take... ten minutes? If he rushed.
 
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