The reason they’d stopped was obvious: they’d reached another fork in the road.
The road split evenly in two directions around a bushy copse, and Gustave couldn’t discern a visible difference in either path. They looked the same, and neither one was hung with a helpful sign emblazoned with THE CAKE IS THIS WAY or SO MANY TEETH NOPE NOPE NOPE. The road to the Titan Toothpicks had at least been up front about such things. As far as Gustave recalled, the wizened map goblin had said nothing about annoyingly signless forks.
“We’re going to step off the path to powder our noses,” Fia said delicately. With her arm around Argabella, she disappeared among the golden trees. Everyone else continued to stare at the bristly cleft.
“Well, Grinda. You know everything. Which way do we go?” Toby asked, enjoying himself far too much.
Grinda glanced left and right and reached for a wand that no longer existed. “I don’t know, Dark Lord. My wand is sand. Do you perhaps know any navigation spells?”
“I know eeny meeny miney moe,” Poltro added, stepping into the circle. “Although you’ll have to indicate which side is eeny in this case.”
“Did your map goblin not tell you which path to take?” Toby pressed. “Or did you skimp on the magical jewels you tumbled into his paunch like they were cheap bars of nougat?”
“You know nothing of goblins, or maps, or nougat, you insignificant hedge wizard!” Grinda howled.
“How dare you,” Toby said, drawing his cloak around himself and using his magic to drop a half dozen day-old bagels on her head.
“Wizards, witches, and various friends,” Gustave said, daring to step between them. “This should be fairly easy to solve. We simply need to find the nearest river and follow it into the mountains because cities tend to be located along rivers by mountains or along the coasts. My highly refined snoot indicates we’ll want to take the path on the left.”
“Goats can smell water?” Toby asked.
“Of course. Do you know nothing of goats? Or, for that matter, how water works?”
“I KNOW MANY THINGS ABOUT MANY ANIMALS,” Toby shouted. “AND ALSO HOW DARE YOU?”
Poltro stepped up, her dagger in hand. “You know, my lord,” she said with a grin, “I know a way we can kill two goats with one stone. I mean one goat with two stones. Basically, you and I each take a stone, and we sneak up on the little freak, and—”
“You know I can hear you, right?” Gustave said, backing up, his rump coming increasingly close to the cleft between the paths.
Poltro looked at him, and he could see visions of goat curry bubbling in her eyes. Toby glared at him, and in the wizard’s eyes Gustave could see visions of victory dances and ads taken out in the local paper avowing that the Dark Lord had killed the Chosen One. Which Gustave personally didn’t believe he was and didn’t particularly want to be, but his current issues were a bit more pressing than whether he’d been formally anointed by a pixie wearing one blue sock.
“Whoa now,” he said, backing up until his rump hit a tree and then angling it so that he was pointed down the path he firmly believed to be the right one in that it was on his right and also correct. “I’m a contributing member of this traveling party.”
“What do you contribute,” Toby said slowly, “besides excrement?”
“And possible future deliciousness, provided I can find the right spices,” Poltro added.
It was at that moment that Gustave noticed the dagger rising in her hand and the rock held in Toby’s.
“I thought we were friends,” the goat said.
“Dark Lords don’t have friends.”
“Cor, but that hits me where it hurts!” Poltro whined. “We might not be bosoms, my lord, but many’s the evening we’ve dined together and discussed items of general interest, including chickens, animal husbandry, the dangers and delights of nougat, bread, and your plans to one day kill a Chosen One.” Gustave couldn’t help noticing that her current stalking behavior was the first thing he hadn’t seen her botch up.
“Grinda,” Gustave called. “A little help.”
“Honestly, goat, I just brought you along to pull the travois, and you see how that went.”
He was affronted to note that she was casually buffing her nails as she said it.
“Fia? Argabella?” he called. “Surely you two have something to say about the attempted murder occurring in your vicinity?”
But whatever they were doing, they didn’t respond.
“But I’m the Chosen One!” Gustave bleated.
The Dark Lord grinned.
“That’s kind of the point.”
As if on cue, Toby and Poltro lunged for Gustave’s throat.
Grinda reflected that it had been many years since her patience had been pushed to the brink, but this crew of misfits from Borix had done the job. Profoundly unprofessional, the lot of them. How they’d ever managed to survive meeting Ol’ Faktri was beyond her, and she’d never asked because she’d been so distracted by the news of her nephew’s death.
Their escape certainly couldn’t be thanks to this so-called Dark Lord and his fantastically clumsy rogue. When confronted with the simple task of slaughtering a goat—a talking one and a Chosen One, true, but still a mere goat—what did they do? The rogue stumbled on absolutely nothing and fell in the middle of the road, thereby tripping the Dark Lord and leaving the goat stunned for an entire second that he was still alive. But he recovered and took the opportunity afforded him, smartly ramming the hedge wizard in the head, knocking him unconscious and causing a few surprisingly soft dinner rolls to rain down by reflex. The rogue was trapped under her employer, and the goat backed up, said, “Nighty-night,” and rammed her in the head, too. Then the cheeky beast looked up at Grinda. “You want some?”
“No thanks,” Grinda said, flashing him a quick if fake smile. “I try to avoid attacking Chosen Ones. The odds are never in one’s favor.”
“That’s right—hey, yeah! I didn’t even need to be afraid there, did I?”
“Oh, no, you were right to be afraid. These powerful auras are a finicky business. They excel at keeping you alive until you turn everything upside down, but they’re notoriously bad at making sure you get to that point unharmed. They tend to lead your quest into ridiculously dangerous situations, like this turning fork, where your party inexplicably turns on you.”
“Say what now?”
Grinda motioned to the unconscious hedge wizard and his rogue snoring peacefully in the path. “When people act so strangely that you start to hate them, it’s worth looking to see what might be controlling them. In this case, it’s an enchanted path that craves blood. See how red the dirt is?”
“Gross.”
“All part of your aura. It led you here. And once you fulfill the aura’s intended purpose, it dissipates entirely, leaving you quite vulnerable. Most Chosen Ones die within a month of becoming king or waking the princess or whatever, so you have that to look forward to.” Her grin this time was much more genuine.
The goat cocked his head and glared at her with one yellow slitted eye. “You keep smiling, but it’s at all the wrong things.”
“We have different senses of humor, I expect.”
“We sure do. Look, I was grateful that you summoned some delicious chukka boots before—the doeskin was fantastic—but that’s done, and I kind of think you just did it to put me in your debt. Well, I’m not in your debt, and I’m going to be keeping a close watch on you.”
“Watch away, billy goat. Just help us get to Songlen so we can deal with Staph the pixie and Løcher, and then we can all lead blissful lives unencumbered by each other or troublesome enchantments or the machinations of power-mad men.”
“Oh. But the machinations of power-mad women are okay?”
That accusation caused Grinda to abrade a cuticle rather painfully. The goat’s gall was
simply goading her giddy. But she kept her tone civil as she replied, “I don’t seek power. You’ll note that I live very far away from the seat of local government. What I generally pursue is independence, the freedom to spend my time in peace and quiet on my beach with my crabs, reading grimoires and romances and the occasional recipe for tarts. But now I seek revenge for Worstley.”
She failed to mention that she also sought to end Løcher’s foul maneuvering against her by killing him once and for all. And she’d like the poor folk of the kingdom to be treated better, as she’d been poor growing up and had benefited greatly from a hand up. Now she employed hundreds of people and paid them well. Helping folks when they needed it was a good policy, and it would be one she pursued if she could. No point in mentioning any of that to a goat.
“Well, I suppose we can agree on revenge for Worstley. He was a good pooboy, I must admit, except near the end there, when he said he was going to eat me. And all the times when he came to take my barnyard friends away and I never saw them again. You know. Like my parents.”
A rustling of the shrubbery announced the return of Fia and Argabella, both of them smiling and slightly out of breath.
“Sorry!” Argabella practically sang. “Couldn’t be helped. So, what did we miss—oh. What happened?”
“They tried to kill me because Fia left me all alone with them,” Gustave said, bobbing his head at the two unconscious forms.
“What? But you had Grinda—” Fia began, but the goat interrupted her.
“Who was no help at all! We had a deal, and you shirked!”
The mighty Fia crossed her arms. “I don’t think we ever had a formal deal. I said you could travel with me, not that I would protect you. And you said you’d be some kind of superspy, but I haven’t heard a word of intelligence so far.”
“Fine! Grinda likes tarts!” Gustave yelled, rolling his eyes.
Argabella gasped in delight and clapped her hands. “Oh, do you? I love tarts, too!”
“Never mind dessert,” the goat said. “Let’s get back to the main course here. Poltro wants to turn me into curry!”
The rogue grunted and moaned underneath her employer’s weight. “Curry? Yes, please.”
“See?”
“I already told you,” Grinda said in that singsong voice people use to feel superior, “that it’s not her fault. Enchantments!”
“There is literally nothing enchanting about me becoming curry.”
Fia sighed and scratched the goat between his bony shoulders. “Gustave, I’m sorry,” she said soothingly. “I’ll try to keep an eye on them from now on as long as it seems they’re serious about doing you harm, okay?” She stomped over to the pair and lifted both up by the material bunched up at the backs of their necks. There was much groaning and wincing and rubbing of the head.
“Oh, I’m going to have a welt,” Lord Toby said.
Grinda felt no sympathy whatsoever and sought to steer the conversation productively. As long as they stood there, the others would continue arguing. But if she brought it up again, they’d just argue about that instead.
“So. Now that we’re all in one place and conscious, can we decide which way to go and leave the influence of this annoying enchantment? It doesn’t impact me, of course, as I’m attuned to the higher spheres, but action is the best course. We agreed we were going to head around to the east, so—”
“Mmf, I don’t remember agreeing to that,” Poltro interrupted. “I don’t think I was asked.”
“I didn’t agree either!” Toby added, though of course he would disagree with anything Grinda said at that point, the jealous little weasel.
“Aaaand while I don’t ever really want to be on their side again,” Gustave said, “add me to that list. Aren’t the giants eating people in that direction? No thanks. Had enough of that already. I don’t think we can count on them all to sneeze on us and then let us go because they’re embarrassed and grossed out. I’d rather take my chances on the danger I don’t know.”
“Wait,” Grinda said. “That’s why Faktri let you go? Because he sneezed on you?” She threw up her hands, helpless. “We’re doomed. We can’t handle anything serious. We need to go east from here.”
“We need to get this over with quickly,” Fia replied. “And that means taking the other fork.”
“You’d rather face the Catacombs of Yore?” Grinda challenged. She widened her eyes and tried to sound incredulous.
“Well, er,” Argabella said, “what’s in there, exactly?”
“Yore. So much yore.”
“That doesn’t sound…that bad?”
“Oh, sure,” Grinda said, waving her hand in the air, “everybody likes to make light of ‘days of yore’ because it’s in the past, right, and the past is perfectly safe because it’s in the past. But it’s not so safe when your childhood fears come to life. That’s what’s waiting for you in the Catacombs of Yore.”
“Moths?” Lord Toby whispered in the voice of a tiny little boy, his eyes unfocused in the distance. “Moths diving and swooping for the lights in my eyes, intent on sucking out my soul?”
Fia broke the long uncomfortable silence that followed. “Wow. Most people just have some kind of shapeless thing under the bed or something hairy in the closet. Extra credit for originality, Lord Toby.”
“I understand where he’s coming from, though,” Argabella said. “You know those little tiny bugs that live in your pantry and get in your oats and flour? Well, one morning a swarm of them flew at me and got in my ears and up my nose, and ever since I’ve been terrified of breakfast.”
“I know,” Poltro said. “Eggs, right? Eggs is horrifying, they is. Sinister future chickens. Never eat anything that comes from a cloaca.”
“Okay, I empathize with you all,” Fia said, “but I’d also like to point out that moths and gnats and eggs will not eat us and giants will. We’re better off going through the catacombs.”
“No, we’d be better off circling all the way around to the east and taking the ferry across the lake from Pikestaff, like the goblin said,” Grinda insisted grouchily. “That way there’s no giants, no catacombs, none of it.” If only she’d had her wand, she could’ve broken this enchantment and possibly reenchanted everyone to agree with her. It had been so long since she’d been cut off from magic, and feeling helpless put her in an uncommonly bad mood. Back home, she had several spare wands stashed about, but she’d assumed that this trip would be far easier, that these fools would be easier to control. Without her magic, she could already feel the various spells wearing off her joints and causing her spine to warp and her skin to sag.
“No matter which way we go, there will always be something,” Fia said. “Better we don’t waste any more time. I have some armor to pick up in Songlen, better than these half measures I’m wearing now. Besides, Groggyn is on the way to the catacombs. Maybe you can find something there to replace your wand.”
“I would have to make it,” Grinda said, shaking her head. And if she didn’t hurry, her body would grow too weak, her eyesight too blurry.
“So what do you need?”
Grinda deflated. “Sand. Soda ash. The use of a forge for a day.”
“Great! We can get all that in Groggyn.”
Grinda marveled that she had been outmaneuvered and isolated so completely in the group. Clearly she was out of practice and needed to pay more attention. Years of lounging on the beach with crabs had dulled her sharp edges. She considered striking out on her own but dismissed the notion almost immediately. She had no wand and therefore very little in the way of defense, so traveling with them at least to Groggyn made sense. Soon enough, she’d merely be a wizened old woman shouting about taxes. And the goat’s aura, she supposed, might see them all through the catacombs safely. And after that, he’d almost surely lead them to Løcher and Staph the pixie.
Resigned,
she followed as they took the left fork and saw that it did follow the river that formed the border between Burdell and Grunting. With Argabella using her song of speed to quicken their pace, they traveled upriver, far from Ol’ Faktri, to the river crossing at Fapsworth. They were able to sleep in comfortable rooms and reach Groggyn the next morning, though Argabella said she’d probably need to rest her voice after two straight days of singing. She took a nap while Grinda sweated over a glassmaker’s furnace all day, crafting a new wand that was the equal to the first if not its superior. Toby watched her in a creepy, hungry sort of way that suggested he had a longtime case of scepter envy. She would have to make sure he never got his hands on this new wand. The damage the hedge wizard might do when in possession of any real magical apparatus was stunning and terrifying. Challahs the size of cities might plummet from the sky should his steak be cooked incorrectly. He was simply one of the most dangerous creatures in the world: a person of small talent and large purse who was thoroughly certain that he deserved more.
Back in her room at the inn, Grinda carefully recast all her spells. Joints, bones, skin, hair, eyes, memory. She went from bent to statuesque again, grouchy to lively. With great relief, she realized that she no longer wanted to read newspapers to see who’d died and complain about what the weather might be. Finally, she was herself again, and she did feel most herself when she looked half her age. That night, free from the enchantments and worries that had nearly torn the group apart the day before, they dined on pasta and red wine, acting as if nothing horrible had ever been revealed in the magic net. Even Poltro didn’t mention the word curry a single time.
Leaving Groggyn, they skirted the Quchii Hills that formed the border between several earldoms, and almost as soon as they left Grunting, the land began to dry out underneath their feet and springy turf gave way to brown, thirsty earth with only occasional sad shrubs longing for a tall drink of water. And then even that meager substrate began to slip and break down until they were cruising across the rippling dunes of the Qul Desert, and Grinda exulted in the feeling of sand between her toes again. If she didn’t like the beach so much, she would’ve enjoyed living among these dunes and all the Qul people. Their penchant for gauzy, flowing fabrics and vibrant head coverings maximized her beauty, which was even further accentuated by the sultry gait of a leggy camel undulating over the dunes. Carriages were lovely, but there was something to be said for the poetry of a lolloping dromedary. And also for good old poetry: a single verse from a Qul poet could titillate or tantalize like no other, and their chapbooks made fantastic beach reads. For someone like Grinda, it was a win-win-win situation, with an extra win tacked on after a camel spat on Lord Toby.
Kill the Farm Boy Page 17
