The Clockwork Wolf (Serial Story) - Part 1 (Patreon)

This is an older story I've had I'll be revising as I post it.

The badger grinned and swung the blood splattered executioner's ax in front of himself. "Off with her head," he said, a dark expression on his face, as he pointing to the woman. His simple dark robes were splattered with bright red.

The target of his rage, a badger wearing an elegant dress three hundred years out of style, put a ruffled sleeve to her chest, "But, I just wanted to let them eat cake!" she exclaimed.

I chuckled mirthlessly, trying to keep my thick tail still. "What made you decide to dress as Marie Antoinette for the costume party?"

"Well," she said, grinning over to her husband, "We wanted to make a splash and let heads roll."

"Charming," I replied, with a touch of annoyance in my voice. Maybe I should have stayed home. I smiled though, trying to keep in good spirits. The lace at my throat itched. The Elizabethan ruff I wore happened to be tighter then I wanted it to be, but it complemented my brown fur well. I felt it brought the look of an old, distinguished English gentleman together well.

"I don't believe we've met before, otter," said the executioner, holding out his hand. "Dennis Smith, head of accounting. This is my wife, Nora."

"Jon Conrad," I said, shaking the outstretched hand. The badger’s big paw easily engulfed my smaller webbed paw.

"What division of ReizTech do you work for?" asked the badger, tilting his head a little, possibly sensing that I was out of place in the crowd here.

I smirked. "I don't. I went to school with Kev."

"Oh," mumbled the badger, with a twitch of disdain in his nose. He didn't approve of my presence at the company Halloween party. I considered for a moment mentioning that I got to stay at the house all weekend, but I didn’t bother. The party was just Friday night.

I held up the wine glass I carried. "Kev and I go way back." I took a dainty sip. It wasn’t worth mentioning I was also the only one of Kev's old college friends that could still stand the stoat.

"It's nice that you two are still friends," Nora replied. "I hear Kevin is very engaged with his work."

"Yes," said Dennis, clearing his throat. "He’s a very diligent CEO. Everything is by the book."

I nodded. "His work keeps him pretty busy. I don't see him much myself."

When I received the invite to the party up at the old Dippel Manson, I called Charlotte, another old friend from school. "It's just Kev showing off his money again, Jon," she'd said, when I'd asked her if she was coming.

"Yeah, but you are going, right?" I pressed, when she didn't elaborate further.

She breathed in, and I knew her feline whiskers were twitching in thought. "No," she said finally. "I'd have to take Friday off in order to get over there in time and buy myself a nice dress that somehow doubles as a costume. All so Kev can go on about ReizTech? I can read the press releases if I want to hear about that. You boys can have fun."

"Oh come on, Charlotte, it can't be that bad."

"I went to the Christmas party you couldn't go to. It was just that bad. I had to listen to him go on for two hours about IT service contracts after the guests left."

I cleared my throat, focusing back on the present. "Where is Mr. Reiz anyway?"

"I haven't seen him," Dennis said. "You might want to ask the butler."

"Then I shall! A good day to you, sir, and to you your majesty."

"Wish the old boy well for me, sir," Nora exclaimed, with a flourish of her skirts.

The formal ball room was very fancy with three great chandeliers. The building dated to the roaring twenties and was full of brass art deco touches. In the ballroom, an intricate carved gear motif was built into the wood paneling. On one side of the room sat a large buffet table while on the other, the only modern component to the whole affair was a red fox who was DJing, running through the typical Halloween music. There was something gaudy about playing the Monster Mash in a space like this, but it wasn’t my party. Most of the guests though seemed to be enjoying themselves eating, drinking and dancing.

At the end of the buffet table, tending to the punch balls, I spotted the butler, a wolf named George. He hadn’t dressed for the party, but his suit was immaculate. He and the housekeeper had both welcomed to me to the house before I was ushered up to my room. Now George was in quiet conversation with the housekeeper, the ears of both wolves twitching as they talked. The butler had white and gray fur while the housekeeper was just gray except for some white on her ears. The housekeeper said something and George’s eyes narrowed. Only the tension in their tails told me they were having an argument.

“That is none of your business, Elizabeth.” I heard George say as I came up.

“Yes it is my business,” said the female wolf, growling low. “You do this, and there will be—" she glanced toward the party and saw me. “…concerns. We don’t have enough Port for this.”

“Trust me with the drinks, I know my reds.” He cleared his throat and addressed me. “Can I help you, Mr. Conrad?”

The housekeeper just rolled her eyes and didn’t say anything.

"Might you know where I might find our gracious Halloween host?" I asked.

“If you go back to the entrance hall, I believe you will find him on the veranda, sir. He appeared to be taking in the fresh air last I saw."

"Thank you," I said with a nod and made my way through the through the throng of people milling about and made my way toward the veranda. The double French doors at the back of the hallway were thrown open and light spilled out onto the large patio. At the back of the veranda, his back to the door, stood a stoat, looking over the ocean, taking in the night air. The wind off the water was comforting tonight, bringing the refreshing smell of salt water to me. I had been warm for October today so out here now, it felt refreshing.

"Kev, what are you doing out here? You brought your entire company here for a party, and all you are doing is standing out here watching the play of the moonlight on the waves? You could have gotten a beach front hotel room and spent a night walking in the sand if you wanted to do that," I quipped, walking up to the stoat.

Kev glanced to him and smiled. "I didn't realize how beautiful the crescent moon is on a night like this."

I leaned across the railing and looked down toward the water. The mansion was built on top of a cliff, and the veranda offered a great view of the waves as they broke against the rocky shore. It was beautiful.

"I confess, this is an amazing view, but you have guests. They seem to think you are their hard-working CEO."

The stoat tilted his head, ears flicking toward me. "And what do you think?"

"You're my friend, the hard-working CEO."

His ears titled and he chuckled. "Even you too?”

I nodded. "Yeah. Millionaire playboy doesn’t seem to really suit you, although the mansion is a little ostentatious don't you think?"

The stoat grinned. "My penthouse downtown is nice, but it's too modern. Plus, outside of the sweeping view of the waterfront downtown, it's not all that special. I wanted to do something special for the company’s Halloween party this year. This place has a rich history. It used to belong to a prominent industrial family, the Dippels."

“Maybe I was wrong about the millionaire playboy bit. I didn't know how much money it takes before 3,000 square feet of prime downtown real estate became plebeian, but I knew it is a lot.”

"You think I went overboard?" Kev asked with a twitch of his whiskers.

"You did just rent a mansion for a weekend, Kev."

He grinned sheepishly. "I got a great deal, honestly. It isn’t as much as you think. I do wish Charlotte could have come. She would have enjoyed herself."

I turned from my friend and leaned against the marble railing. "Did she say why she couldn't make it?"

Kev was still for a moment. "She told me she would be bored."

She had at least been honest with him. "Well, you did invite your employees; it's not like college anymore."

"I know, I just..." he lapsed into silence. Finally, he continued, “Sometimes I just wish we were all back in college."

"I thought the whole point of creating a startup was to keep that manic college work ethic going. You still do all-nighters, don't you?"

The stoat grunted. "Occasionally. I usually just work late now."

"You've accomplished a lot with ReizTech."

"Yeah, I have. There's something to be said for founding your own IT company. It’s a lot of work though, and I keep getting buyout offers."

"I didn't know you had received an offer."

"Yeah, but they only valued us at a quarter billion. I know we're worth more."

"They offered you a quarter billion for ReizTech?" I gasped, mouth falling open. I almost dropped the wine glass I was still holding.

The stoat grinned modestly. "Yeah, but I still have to pay the venture capitalists and stock options payouts with that money. We're positioned to grow and I know we can do more. I'm finally able to move in on the big players in our market. If you took that job I offered you back when I started, we could be doing this together."

"Don't take this the wrong way, but I would have tried to kill you by now. When you called me and told me you were quitting your job to found a competitor for your employer because you know you could do it better, I knew you were going to commit all your energy to this venture. College is one thing, but this, this is different. Why do you think Gary and Janet left after a year?"

He sighed. "How are they doing?"

"Okay, I hear. They're surviving."

"Surviving, what is just surviving like? Is that what you do, Jon?"

I grumbled, annoyed. "Surviving is not being able to rent a mansion just because you wanted to throw a kick ass party."

"And that sounds boring. You know I could still bring you on as a junior partner if you wanted. There's still time. I would have to lean on the investors, but you did give me some of the ideas that helped make ReizTech successful."

"Kevin," I interjected, using his formal name. "No. I like being able to go home at night. I like being able to have time to date."

The stoat looked disappointed and went back to leaning on the railing. "I'm not that bad a boss. You can ask any of my staff."

"We are friends, Kev." For a while we were even lovers, but that had fizzled out. The stoat had other priorities. "If I work for you, we won't be friends. This isn't college. You have a lot of money riding on this, and I don’t want to get involved. Plus, you already gave me a small amount of stock when you used some of my ideas. That's enough for me."

The stoat scratched his chin. "You know, sometimes I wonder if I should just sell it. I can walk away with more money than I know what to do with. I can go back to the old days, hacking behind a keyboard building cool stuff."

Now he was just being nostalgic. I could see the look he used to have back in college when he got to do a fun project. "You might not be able to rent mansions every Halloween."

Kev grinned and punched me in the arm. "That would be fine, but have you seen this place? The library is amazing with all those book shelves. It's a nice place to curl up by a fire and read ghost stories. That grandfather clock in the entranceway itself is an amazing piece of precision engineering. I've never seen a clock with such attention to detail. The housekeeper, Elizabeth, was telling me it only has to be wound once a month.”

I guess I needed to be the adult tonight. "Yeah, well you've got an entire houseful of guests right now, and they're not going to admire the furniture like you do."

Kev scratched behind his ears and grinned. In moments like this, he still looked like he was a college student. I remembered seeing that same grin the year we toilet-papered one of the local frat houses at school who'd been giving fellow nerds a hard time. "I'm sure we can slip off and go exploring," said Kev.

"You invited them, you might want to at least talk to them."

The stoat sighed and pushed himself away from the railing. "Yeah, I guess." He glanced back out across the waves. "Well, it's time to go rally the troops then. Come on, let's go bob for some apples."

I chuckled, and for the first time that night, I actually relaxed. "Sure."