A Fool of Sorts

by Taylor O'Connell

  “You have a point,” said Bartley. “You certainly are that. Unwanted, that is.”

  “You ought to join me,” Sal said.

  “I’d as soon keep the god of my father,” Bartley said.

  “Suit yourself. But if you change your mind, I imagine the Lady will be right here waiting.”

  28

  The Plan

  “A diddler will diddle, that’s what diddlers do,”

  The fiddler sang, accompanying his words with the jaunty tune of his fiddle.

  “That doesn’t mean it should happen to you.

  Piddle on the diddler, tell the vagrant, ‘shoo!’

  No, say I, and no, say you.

  Piddle on the diddler, for that’s what we do.”

  The taproom livened with the song. Some clapped or stomped in time while others sang along to the bawdy words.

  “And if a diddler diddles your mum,

  you’ve a right to feel it wrong.

  Piddle on the diddler, it’s what he deserves.

  Piddle on the diddler, we’ll all take turns.

  A diddler diddles on and on,

  he’ll diddle till the piddling’s all but done.

  Piddle on the diddler, do what’s right,

  the diddler won’t put up a fight.”

  Sal crossed the taproom of the Hog Snout and took a seat across from his friend.

  Vinny brushed a blonde lock of hair behind his ear and nodded before he went back to clapping.

  “A diddler often diddles his own;

  It chafes the gods deep to the bone.

  Piddle on the diddler, the man is sick.

  Piddle on the diddler, it is no trick.

  A diddler’s riddle is oft done alone,

  he’ll touch himself ‘till he’s full grown.

  Piddle on the diddler, in the name of the gods,

  he’ll diddle himself by all the odds.”

  “The others coming?” Sal asked.

  “Far as I know,” said Vinny. “They all agreed. Valla, though—”

  “I know,” Sal said.

  “For when a diddler diddles a dame,

  to his house there falls great shame.

  Piddle on the diddler if you know what’s good.

  Piddle on the diddler as right you should.

  A diddler tries to shrug the blame,

  but all who know will curse his name.

  Piddle on the diddler, for all do see,

  the diddler’s ways bring infamy.”

  Sal began to tap a foot along with the rest, letting the song settle his nerves.

  “And if the diddler diddles your sis,

  well go on now, give the diddler a kiss.

  Don’t piddle on the diddler, give him a pass.

  Don’t piddle on the diddler lest you keep the lass.

  Now everyone knows there is no crime,

  half so bad as a woman diddled in blind.

  Though before you go piddle, consider you this:

  If not for that diddler, who’d diddle your sis?”

  Odie entered the taproom, his broad shoulders casting a shadow upon the entire entryway. The big man was followed by Aurie and Valla, the latter of which looked none too happy to be there.

  “ ‘Hypocrisy,’ the diddler would scream,

  for diddling is not all diddling seems.

  He’d point the finger, they’d fall to their knees.

  The diddler would smile, for the diddler’d be pleased.

  At long last the diddler would be, vindicated and piddle free.

  He’d hold up his hands, and he’d make a big scene.

  Then out from his mouth would come the obscene:

  ‘Everyone’s a diddler, you fools, don’t you see?

  We all ought to piddle on you, not me.’ ”

  Odie took the seat next to Sal, while Aurie and Valla took the seats on either side of Vinny.

  “Oy then,” said the big man, clapping Sal on the shoulder. “What’s this meet up all about?”

  “All in due time, my big friend,” Sal said.

  “I’d like to know now,” said Valla. “Want to know if I shouldn’t just be on my way.”

  Sal shrugged. “How much do you like living?”

  Valla stood. “Is that a threat, Lorenzo?”

  Vinny put a hand on her arm.

  “Easy now,” said Odie.

  “No threat,” Sal said. “A solution.”

  “Go on,” said Aurie.

  “I—we’re still waiting on one more,” said Sal.

  Just then, the door of the Hog Snout swung open. A short, muscular man, with arms like a smith and a neck thick as a bull’s, stepped through the threshold. He stalled, looked about the taproom, and caught Sal’s eyes.

  Dominik D’Angelo crossed the room and took a seat at the table.

  “I’ll need to go underground for a tick,” Sal said.

  Lilliana eyed him with one-part worry, two-parts suspicion.

  “Go underground where?”

  “Right here in the city. Like I told you, I’m not going anywhere, not ever again. I’ll be here, but I’ll need to disappear until I’m able to clear our names.”

  “Clear our names?” asked Lilliana. “What might that entail?”

  Sal sighed. “Much and more.”

  “Will it take you long?”

  “Every moment it keeps me from you is too long.”

  Lilliana narrowed her eyes, but there was a flicker of a smile at the corner of her mouth.

  Sal leaned close. His heart beat so fast, it sent throbbing plugs in his ears. His head went light, his knees started to shake, and he felt the blood start to go to his groin.

  Her soft lips puckered so close to his, he could practically taste them.

  He put a hand on her back and pulled her close.

  “My Lady,” said Damor Nev, appearing around the corner. “We needs be going.”

  Lilliana flushed and swept a lock of hair from her eyes. “Take care of yourself, Salvatori Lorenzo.”

  Sal winked at her, nodded to Damor, and turned to leave.

  Thus ends

  A Fool of Sorts

  Fall of the Coward, Book Two

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  THE MAN IN SHADOW

  Fall of the Coward, Book Three

  CHAPTER ONE

  VENDETA

  “What in Sacrull’s hell is taking them so long?” Vinny asked as the sun sank beneath the horizon, and dusk slowly settled in. The torch in his hand aflame, black smoke willowing into the night.

  “It shouldn’t have taken—you don’t think someone stopped them?” Aurie asked. She wore all black, tight fitting cloth that hugged the subtle curves of her slender figure.

  “We should go around the other way,” Vinny suggested.

  “She’ll be here,” Sal said, putting his ear up against the cellar door and listening for footsteps. “I mean, it’s Valla.”

  Odie leaned against the alley wall and shifted from foot to foot. His great war hammer was unslung, the well-defined muscles in his massive forearms rippling as he tightened his grip on the leather wrapped ebony stalk. The polished iron head of the hammer, forged in the shape of a fist, glinted with the torchlight. The big man snorted and spat to the cobblestones.

  “Lad’s right,” said the big man. “We all need to take a breath. They’ll be here.”

  Neither Vinny or Aurie looked convinced, but Sal thought it best to move forward regardless.

  “Right, then. You two,” he said, motioning to Vinny and Aurie. “It’s time yo
u took care of our little dog problem, and I’ll go ahead and get myself set up. Big Man, you just wait here for Valla and Dominik, and the three of you can make your way in together.”

  It seemed no one had any objections, until the Vinny raised his hand high for attention, a broad grin spread across his visage.

  “That was the white one needed poisoning, right?”

  Sal smirked, and the big man let out a little chirp of a laugh.

  Aurie narrowed her eyes. “You had best be japing.”

  Vinny winked and clicked his tongue, but Aurie only shook her head, unimpressed.

  “Right, then,” Sal said with a nod.

  He waited a moment at the alley mouth, took a deep breath, and slipped out, rounded the corner, and went through the door of the unmarked building.

  The foyer was empty, but he could hear the faint hum of a crowd somewhere close by.

  As Sal moved down a hall the noise grew louder. He went down a stairway through a door and into a big open room.

  The man on his immediate right put a hand out to halt him. His look was skeptical. He seemed to be readying himself to speak when Sal cut him off.

  “I was just in here,” Sal said. “Had to find a place to piss.”

  The door guard grunted, his brow wrinkling. After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded, and slowly pulled his hand away.

  The arena hall was massive, and filled with shouting men. Even still, due to the slanted floor, Sal could see the arena all the way from the back.

  At center of the hall was a shallow pit, a sand floor and a short fence that lined the edge of the circular arena. Men leaned up against the iron grates, spitting and shouting, jeering and laughing.

  Two dogs, massive beasts that rippled with slabs of muscle, fought at the center of the pit. Powerful jaws snapped as slaver flew. Growls rumbled like rolling thunder, barks pitching above the cacophony of crowd noise as they fought on.

  Sal made his way through the crowd, a hardened lot of alley pushers and dock thugs, cheering on the dog fight. He approached a solitary man, smoking a wooden pipe.

  The man seemed as focused on the crowd as he was on the pit. On his neck was the tattoo of a black raven, the sign of the notorious street gang: the Rooks.

  “Who’d you put in on?” Sal asked the Rook, nodding to the dogs in the pit.

  The Rook looked to the fighting pit. “I didn’t bother. Pot was too low. Everyone knows Barbari fights them too young. That black is a big boy, but he’s a pup yet. The mottled bitch is just biding her time. You’ll see, soon as she gets an opening, this one’s over.”

  Sure enough, just as the man stopped speaking, the black hound yelped and reared. The mottled bitch dropped low and lunged, sinking her massive jaw about the black dog’s neck. The mottled bitch’s entire body snapped taught, as though she were an iron padlock.

  The black hound arched, and for an instant looked as though he might wriggle free before he hunched, and the mottled bitch dragged him to the dirt.

  Sal turned away. Not wanting to watch the rest.

  “What did I tell you,” said the Rook, as Sal scanned the crowd for any sign of his mark. “Hope you didn’t have your krom on that black pup. Age will out over beauty everywhere ‘cept the whorehouse, and don’t you forget it.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind,” Sal said absently, his eyes still flicking through the faces of the crowd.

  “Next fight should be something more of a crowd pleaser,” said the Rook. “Two of the dons going to go at it. Well, Dvorak, he’s a don, the other’s just a don’s whelp. Still, aiming up to be a fight with some real promise. For a tick I was worried it wouldn’t happen.”

  “Oh, and why is that?” Sal asked, feigning ignorance.

  “It’s that whelp, you see. Garibaldi is his name, Don Giotto Scarvini’s boy. But the boy ain’t his father, and it ain’t no secret the fop is craven. Way I hear it he hasn’t left the Scarvini stronghold in a week, and well, on account of what happened to his brother and all—guess I’m just saying I didn’t think he would show.”

  Sal flashed the man the emptiest smile he could manage, hoping it would convey the proper amount of pitiable stupidity to keep the Rook talking.

  “You do know what happened to Giuseppe, don’t you?” the Rook asked.

  Sal shook his head. “Who?” he asked, as the memory of burning hair and charred flesh, blood and viscera flashed through his mind.

  “The Shark,” said the Rook looking somewhat incredulous, loud enough to turn a few of the heads around them in their direction. “You telling me you don’t know Giuseppe Scarvini?”

  Sal frowned and shrugged.

  The Rook’s eyes went wide, lips pursed. He shook his head and took a draw from his pipe. “How can a man live in this city and not know of Giuseppe the Shark?” he asked, smoke rolling from his mouth. “Gods be damned if you ain’t new to Dijvois.”

  “What gave it away?” Sal asked.

  The Rook scoffed, and nudged Sal with a friendly elbow. “Just you wait. This next one is going to be something. Don Dvorak himself is pitting one of his own. Dvorak, their one of the Five Families of the Commission, you know?”

  Sal nodded. “Sure, sure, the Commission, right.”

  The Rook smirked and shook his head. “Top level gangs around the city. This Don Dvorak is a pretty big deal. Shit, even that Scarvini whelp has a name with some clout, not on account of anything he’s done, mind you. But around here, not even Don Novotny, the Golden Dragon himself, is more important than Don Giotto Scarvini. This is the Pit, and the Scarvini Family owns the Pit.” The Rook took a hit from his pipe and shrugged. “Still, Kael Dvorak has raised more champions than any other breeder in the city. Some think the pup he’s brought today could be too young, but he’s come from a champion’s line. The stud that sired him and the bitch that whelped him were both undefeated in the Pit in their time.”

  The way the Rook went on about it, one might almost think he was speaking of something other than a Sacrull damned blood sport. Sal hated dog fighting, it was truly sadistic. Yet, there was something in the way the man spoke that peaked Sal’s interest, even while it made him queasy.

  Sal almost felt bad, for what he was about to do—for what Vinny and Aurie were doing that very moment. Yet what was the value of one hound’s life? Surely, it was a small price to pay in exchange for the lives of six people.

  “And the other one, this Garibaldi Scarvini?” Sal asked as he watched a pair of young men turn the soil in the pit, where a pool of bloodstained the sand from the previous match.

  The Rook wrinkling his nose. He looked over both of his shoulders conspiratorially, before he leaned close and spoke in low tones. “Everyone knows Garibaldi’s not half of what his brother was. He’s craven, but this beast of his is nothing of the sort. A red-eyed mongrel that looks to have been fatted on whole sheep and unwary children. A right monster, he is. This will be his third fight in the Pit, and let me tell you, the last two didn’t live long enough for him to show half of what he’s capable of doing.”

  An uproar sounded, and Sal looked toward the pit, as a sharply dressed man stepped onto the sand. He wore Miniian leather boots, a silk cravat, and a sharp tailored coat. Sal recognized the man. His name was Don Kael Dvorak

  The don looked down at the dark patch of sand where the black dog had laid dead moments before. Dvorak then looked out at the crowd, raised both arms above his head, balled his hands into fists, and roared like a savage beast. He then straightened his jacket, slicked back his hair, and exited the arena, poised as though he had just delivered a manifest diatribe, rather than acted like some war leader of a barbarian horde.

  “It’s been good chatting,” Sal said to the Rook. “I appreciate the advice.”

  “What, just as it’s getting going?” The Rook asked. “This is the big one, you’ve got to stay and watch.”

  Sal wordlessly slipped through the crowd and down the slanted floor to the lower-level. He cut back, and went through a door that led
him out of the main arena room and into a hallway. Sal could still hear the noise of the crowd, though it was dulled to a hum by the closed door. He knew what he was missing, and he wasn’t the least bit sorry.

  Very soon, Garibaldi Scarvini and Don Kael Dvorak would release their dogs into the fighting pit. The beasts would come out snarling, hackles raised, teeth bared.

  Sal moved along the hall and down another stairway before he found himself in another hallway, three doors on either side, and a pair of neckless guards at the other end.

  One of them turned around slowly, as though the very effort taxed him. “Oy,” said the guard, reaching for the cudgel that hung at his hip. “What are you doing down here? The fights going to start, you know.”

  A burst of excited cheers, shouts and boos, expelled from the room just beyond the door. Sal imagined Garibaldi Scarvini releasing his red-eyed beast, a smug smile twisting his peevish features. Don Dvorak roaring as his hound padded onto the sand, the blood of champions flowing through its veins along with the poison. A tension over the entire crowd, bated breaths awaiting the outcome—an outcome that Sal already knew. One he’d known since before he’d even set foot in the Outers that evening.

  So long as Vinny and Aurie managed their part, that is.

  “Which room is Garibaldi Scarvini using?” Sal asked.

  “And why should I tell you that?” said the neckless guard, his shelfed brow wrinkling.

  The other guard turned around. He was equally as fat as his companion, only every bit of his exposed flabby flesh was tattooed in the Dahuaneze fashion.

  “I have a gift for Garibaldi,” Sal said. “He’ll be expecting it after his bout.”

  The guards shared a look, then the first man turned back to Sal. “Ain’t going to tell you to bugger off, but I can’t go letting you into people’s rooms and all. See, that’s what we’re here for. To, uh, stop that from—well, you know.”

  “I was told to give it to Garibaldi in his room, directly after his bout. Win or lose he’ll be expecting me. How I can I do what I’m supposed to do if you’re unwilling to tell me which room is his?”