There seemed to be one of these in every big city in New England. A bar styled after an Irish pub, sometimes complete with a relatively competent Celtic band, but almost always with some sort of Irish-sounding name. This one's name was O'Flanagan's, and while it was still relatively early in the day it already smelled of beer and cigarette smoke. Most of the patrons were either third or fourth-generation descendants of Irish immigrants, or simply people who were enraptured by Ireland and her culture. As the door opened and he entered, no one took notice of the stranger with the walking stick. As he sat down at the bar, the white-haired bartender came over with a jovial smile. "Hello." he said, "What would you like?" "Guinness." O'Brian answered. The sound of an actual Irish accent attracted the attention of some of the patrons. The bartender poured a glass of the dark bitter beer and passed it to Donovan. He took one sip of it and grimaced. "What the bloody hell is this supposed to be?" the Irishman growled as he pointed at his glass. The old man tending bar was taken aback. "It's what you ordered." the bartender answered, "It's Guinness." "Good God, ye've watered it down." O'Brian complained bitterly, "Why is it that all Americans have to make all their beer taste like making love in a canoe?" "Sir?" the bartender asked confused, "Making love in a canoe?" "Right." O'Brian groused, "Fucking close to water!" At that some of the patrons laughed a bit nervously. Most however simply decided to move away from the bitter Irishman and drink elsewhere in the pub. As Donovan drank his Guinness sourly, from out of the corner of his eye he saw someone moving away from one of the two pool tables in the back to come over to him. He turned to see a thin young man who appeared to be in his early twenties with a goatee and his long light brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. He wore a pair of faded blue jeans, worn out sneakers, and a denim jacket over a tye-died shirt. As the Irishman watched, the youth boldly sat next to him, ordering a drink as he pulled out his wallet to prove himself to be of legal drinking age. As the beer was served to him, he took a long sip from the glass and turned to O'Brian. "Sir." the stranger said, "I believe we need to talk." "Humph." Donovan sneered, "And who are you s'posed to be, the bouncer?" The young man laughed heartily at that, shaking his head as he took another swig of his beer. "Good lord no." he chuckled out, "I mean I need to speak to you in private." O'Brian eyed him suspiciously, "What?" he asked, "Now what do I have to be saying to th' likes of you?" The young man leaned forward so that only O'Brian could hear him, "You've been cursed, haven't you." Donovan was speechless. As the young man watched the older one's jaw drop, he took yet another drink from his glass and continued. "Unless I miss my mark," he said, keeping his voice down so others couldn't hear them, "Something has cursed you. What was it? An elemental, an animal spirit.." "A pooka." The Irishman uttered. The young man nodded his head slowly. "Pooka?" he said to himself as he looked back down at his glass, "S'funny, I'm aware of a good deal of the immigrant folklorics in New York, such as the trolls and gnomes living in central park, and the brownies living with the high priestess of an English coven of witches over in the Bronx, but I was unaware there were any pookas on this side of the Atlantic." Taking another drink, he turned back to O'Brian, "Well sir, it's a good thing you ran into me; I can remove those nasty curses from you for say, oh I don't know, how does fifty bucks sound?" "Fifty dollars! Look, I didn't run into you, you sought me out. And I.." "You've been cursed by a pooka." the youth gently reminded, "And unless I miss my guess," he said, studying Donovan's face like a medical doctor, "The thing called the death shroud upon you." The Irishman's face went white, "Ye.. Ye take advantage, sir." he groused. Taking a deep breath, he narrowed his eyes as he studied the youth in front of him. Finally, he broke the silence, "Thirty." The young man simply smiled back, "Thirty?" he asked, "Who knows how long you have before the curse takes effect. Forty-five." "I have protection." O'Brian offered weakly, "I've got a blessed rosary on my person, and a four-leafed clover. Thirty-five." "Not all the Ave Marias in the world, nor a whole forest full of four-leafed clovers, will protect you from a pooka's curse, and you know it. Forty; that's my final offer and I refuse to go a dollar less." Donovan sighed defeatedly, "Very well, forty dollars it is." "Good." the youth said smiling once again, "I have everything I need on me, so let's go into the men's room now and I'll take care of you." With that, the gangly youth finished off his beer and stood up from the barstool, heading for the men's room. O'Brien took a drink from his Guinness and soon followed. As they entered the bathroom, O'Brian's face immediately scrunched up. Besides the cracked mirror on the wall and the obscene graffiti scrawled around the stalls, the place reeked. "It smells like shit in here." the Irishman grumbled as the young man reached into his pocket for something. "Of course it does." the young man said, "It's a New York City public restroom after all. What did you expect it to smell like?" he then pulled something wrapped in aluminum foil out of his denim jacket, "Before we go any further Mr.." "O'Brian, Donovan O'Brian." "O'Brian? Right, before we go any further Mr. O'Brian, there's the small matter of monetary compensation." "Huh? Oh, right." O'Brian grumbled as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He handed over a twenty and two tens, adding, "And what do they call you?" "They call me lots of things," the young man said as he pocketed the money, "But My name's Nick. Nick MacAulay." "MacAulay? That's Scottish, isn't it?" Donovan asked. "Scottish, Irish, what's the difference?" Nick asked as he undid the foil to reveal a hard-boiled egg. As O'Brian watched he held the object in both hands as his eyes rolled back and he began to mutter incomprehensibly. After roughly half a minute, he shook his head and blinked his eyes several times as he came out of his trance, and turned to the Irishman. "Take this," he said as he passed the egg to Donovan, "And rub it all over your body." O'Brian looked skeptically from the youth in the goatee to the egg and back. "I don't have to take me clothes off, do I?" he asked. Nick laughed as he shook his head. Relieved to hear he didn't, Donovan once again looked from the egg to the youth in front of him. Finally, he sighed and took the egg and proceeded to begin rubbing the egg on his chest. "What ye said earlier," the Irishman said as he now started rubbing the egg over his left arm, "Immigrant folklorics.." "Well," MacAulay began, "America is the great melting pot, remember. Along with the Irish, the Germans, the Slavs and every other ethnic group came the fairies, the gnomes, the pixies, the goblins, and just about every other being from the folklore of the Old World." "I see." O'Brian said as he quickly finished with his other arm and started on his legs, "And you, what are you?" "A very distant descendant of Druid stock. My ancestors served the High Kings of Ireland and Scotland for generations before Saint Patrick ever arrived at your Emerald Isle. Now give me back the egg and turn around." Nick ordered. Donovan did so and the young man began to rub the egg all over his back, "Just out of curiosity, exactly how did you manage to piss off a pooka? And I warn you, I'll know if you're lying." he added. "The damned thing was friends with an elf I was after." The older man explained as MacAulay finished rubbing the egg on him. The young man then went to one of the sinks in the men's room and cracked the shell on its porcelain rim. "An elf?" Nick asked as he began to peel the shell off, "I thought they were all gone." "No, not all. She is the last, I.." "Here." Nick interrupted as he passed the now de-shelled egg back to the Irishman. "Huh? What the bloody hell am I supposed to do with it now?" "Eat it, of course." MacAulay answered, "And then let nature take its course. When you pass it, the curses will pass with it." he explained. As O'Brian began to eat the egg, Nick leaned up against the sink. "So you're in some sort of a feud with the last elf, and she has a pooka on her side?" "Aye, a blood feud." Donovan answered, "Going back centuries between the clans. I've come to America from Ireland to finish it." "By finishing her." Nick added, "If you want my advice, I say let it go." "What?" the Irishman asked angrily, "I'll certainly not let it go, too many have been killed on both sides to ‘let it go.'" he said, spitting out the last words venomously, "And you, what business is it of yours? Why did you offer to help me in the first place?" "I offered to help because I'm a struggling college student and I needed the money." MacAulay answered, his voice now taking an edge to it, "And it's none of my business. I just hate to think of someone wanting to kill of the last elf. Besides, who knows how many other allies she might have on her side besides the pooka? You're out of your league, plain and simple." "Oh really?" O'Brian asked, "Listen, you need money for yer studies, right? Supposing I were to make it worth your wile?" MacAulay started to laugh, "What, me against a pooka? Removing and placing curses is one thing, but if you're going to try to take on the sidhe, you need more than me. You'd need a very special type of Druid, a Bard. A Bard could sing up a spell or two and stand toe to toe with a pooka. But I'll tell you now, I'm only aware of two Bards in this entire city. One's a man in his nineties living in a nursing home, and another is a middle-aged woman living in a Brooklyn apartment with about a dozen cats, and neither are going to be too willing to help you kill off the last of the elves." Donovan frowned at that, "Shit." he muttered, "Then what can I do?" "You're not going to give this up?" "No." Nick looked thoughtful for a moment as he scratched his goatee. "Well.. a golem might be capable of taking a pooka in a fight, but I'd advise against it. I've heard of a Rabbi in the Upper West Side capable of fashioning one, but he supposedly charges an exorbitant amount. Besides, golems are all brute strength and unpredictable.. Wait a sec," the young man suddenly said with a gleam in his eye, "I think I have a solution. We'll have to go into little Tokyo though." "Little Tokyo?" O'Brian asked incredulously "What the bloody hell for?" "Look," MacAulay said, "You don't have much choice. No one with a Celtic background is going to be willing or able to help you. You're going to have to go international on this." The Irishman frowned, "Very well." he grumbled, "Who, or what, is in Little Tokyo that would be able to help us?" "A Mountain Witch, a Yamanba." Nick answered, "I know where one lives on the top of one of the tenements there, and I can bring you to her for say.. oh.. a hundred." "A hundred!" Donovan bellowed, "Sixty maybe, but a hundred?" "Look," the young man said, "I know where the Yamanba lives, and you don't. Ninety." "Aye, but I could very easily go there myself and ask around. Seventy." "Anyone who knew where she was wouldn't give that sort of information out to just anyone, especially not to a stranger. Eighty, that's my final offer." O'Brian frowned as he narrowed his eyes, "Very well, eighty. Now let's get out of this filthy place." "Of course." Nick agreed as he headed for the door out of the men's room, with Donovan following close behind.
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