Clayton had been wrong. People didn't stop talking when they entered the bar. Instead, the whole room flew into chaos as everyone tried to escape by any means available to them.
One enterprising fellow dove between Clayton's legs—probably because he was blocking the door—so, of course, Clayton sat on him.
“If you value your lives, you'll sit your butts back in your seats!” Eira's voice rang out. “This guardian has some questions for you lot.”
Clayton had never felt so in charge before. He found he quite liked it. “Gentlemen. And gender unknown person...” He gestured toward the person to draw closer, and when they refused to budge, he whisper-yelled, “Could I trouble you for your pronouns?” They scowled at him and gave him the finger, so Clayton bowed and proceeded to pretend that nothing hadhappened. “Everyone, I am here to question you all about some missing toys.”
The entire room, including Eira, gaped at him.
“That is to say, several things have, ah, turned up missing... in this part of town, right?” The last bit was directed at Eira for confirmation. Perhaps he should have gathered more details before entering the bar.
Eira sighed and took over. “Half of the people on the west end are missing some of their personal effects. Random things, watches, eggbeaters... toys.” She threw an irritated look at Clayton. “Most of the missing items are worthless, but some have sentimental value. You lot have been pushing the good folks of this town around for too long, but that stops right now. Someone who matters actually cares about what's going on down here for a change. Now, one of you had better start talking, fast, or this guardian is going to level this hovel to the ground, and some of you might even be lucky enough to survive the experience—if in pieces.” Satisfied she got her point across, she crossed her arms over her chest and waited.
Hearing her rousing speech made Clayton almost believe he was capable of such things. He could probably manage to turn over a table if he really exerted himself. They did look terribly sturdy and dense, though. Definitely a chair at the very least. The occupants of the room seemed immune to the speech, and their dirty faces looked everywhere but at Clayton.
Clayton leaned back and gave his best man spreading pose—courtesy of hours spent watching Marshall and Jack lounge around the chapter house. Clayton’s squirming chair didn’t make it easy on him, but he managed a reasonable facsimile.
Well, Clayton thought he’d done a good job, but no one else seemed to be impressed.
“No one?” Clayton sighed.
How frustrating. This sort of thing never happened to Marshall. The most Clayton had ever seen him need to do was...
“You there,” he said to his chair, giving it a poke. “Help a fellow out and be my demonstration.”
His chair declined. When Clayton insisted, it tried to escape again. The ensuing scuffle went in Clayton's favor for once, more likely due to a hiccup in fate and not because he had the high ground and some fancy Guard defense classes under his belt. Whatever the case may be, he swiftly had the ruffian planted firmly under him once more.
“Ok, Fair Gentles, a demonstration.” Clayton held out a finger. “As you all know, I am a guardian, and being a guardian, I can do many powerful and mysterious things to the mind.” He emphasized the word powerful and waggled his finger, hoping that—like most people did—the barflies would assume being a guardian and a dreamwalker were the same thing. “This gentleman here...” He trailed off.
“Chester.” His chair bleated out, flinching from the waggling finger.
“Yes... er, Chester?”
“It's a family name.”
“I'm sure it is, dear boy.” Clayton shook his head and continued. “Right now, Chester is mentally unspoiled—relatively speaking—but if I wanted, I could nip inside and do whatever I liked.” He looked around. Everyone in the room was watching Clayton like he was about to strip, but no one appeared ready to spill vital, case-breaking information. “I didn't want to have to do this...” He really, really didn't, but held up his index finger.
“I know things!” Chester began thrashing around under Clayton's hold. “I know lots of things. What do you want to know? I know that George over there is sweet on Evie!”
The gender-neutral person looked up with surprise at a suddenly bashful bruiser of a man, whom Clayton assumed to be George.
George, who looked to be part troll, kneeled to the floor and nervously pulled off his cap. “I didn't want you to find out this way, Evie.” He took their hand. “But it's true, every time you smile at me, my heart dances inside.”
Evie's grimy face recovered from their shock and gave him a gap-toothed grin. “George, all this time, I never guessed. Every time I poured you a drink, I was telling you I loved you.”
George swept Evie into his arms, plopped their ample bottom on the table, and began kissing them soundly.
“How… lovely,” Clayton managed after a moment. He had to swallow several times before he could continue. “However, that was not the information I was looking for. In fact,”—he looked over at the enthusiastic couple making out on the bar—“that was something I never needed to know.”
“I don't know anything else!” Chester tried to cover his head, nearly bucking Clayton off in the process.
Clayton held out his finger again, only to have it covered with a sweat-stained shirt that came from the direction of the bar.
“For Vis’s sake, get a room!” Clayton flung it away like a venomous spider and spent a full minute shuddering before coming to his senses.
It was the closest he’d ever gotten to sex in his short life, and that was the saddest truth he’d ever encountered. Someone needed to pay for the blow his poor psyche had just taken.
Clayton’s eyes narrowed at his chair—the reason for his ugly confrontation with the truth—and decided instant karma for Chester was called for. He reached out and bopped Chester on the nose.
