They reached the bottom of the staircase just as I did. They both looked surprised to see me, but I am sure that they did not look nearly as surprised to see me as I did to see them. After all, Ellwood was probably only surprised that I had arrived so late, as he had expected me earlier. Queen Elleena might have been surprised that I was not in the process of stabbing Ellwood or murdering him in some other way. But I on the other hand, was surprised not only to find them together, but to find them arm in arm and coming down the stairs in back of The Tumbling Stone.
“What is the meaning of this?” I asked.
“Who are you?” the Queen asked me, scrunching up her nose in a very pretty expression of bewilderment.
Suddenly something zipped past my ear with a zipping sound. Zipp, and a long black-feathered arrow embedded itself in Ellwood’s chest. He fell back down onto the steps as Elleena squealed in fright. I turned to see four men rushing at me, swords raised in the air!
Chapter Thirteen: Wherein I save Ellwood Cyrene from a death by poison.
The four men rushed towards me. Reaching quickly down into my boot, I whipped out my dagger and launched it at them. I didn’t particularly care which one of them I hit, and with the four of them coming at me like a wall, which is to say like something that is wide and tall like a wall but moves, I couldn’t miss. I can’t think of what might be like a wall that moves, except perhaps for a moving wall, though moving walls usually move to cover or uncover a secret passage and don’t usually move at you. As luck would have it, my dagger went straight into the heart of one of the four. I had just enough time to reach back and pull my sword from Ellwood Cyrene’s belt, before the others were upon me.
I barely parried a thrust at my head and kicked the first opponent away. The other two men reached for the Queen and Ellwood respectively, which is to say the first one reached for the former and the second one reached for the latter. The man, which is to say the one reaching toward Ellwood, was obviously planning to do more than reach, because he had a long, pointed dagger in his hand. Before he could stick it into my friend, I swung my sword downward, lopping off his hand between the wrist and elbow.
I couldn’t do any more about those two, because I was struck from behind by the man that I had kicked away a moment before. He hit me a glancing blow on the side, but I could feel the unpleasant sensation of my skin parting. I do hate that feeling. There was one time when I was writing on Lythian parchment and I gave myself a very nasty paper cut. I can still remember the sensation and that split second between realization and pain. This injury was worse in a way than a paper cut, because a sword is bigger and more deadly, but there is something about a paper cut that makes my skin crawl. It’s much harder to get a paper cut in Aerithraine, where they mostly write upon vellum, which is to say calfskin, and is altogether a better experience unless you are the calf.
“Shut up and fight!” growled the ruffian, swinging his blade at my head.
“I didn’t say anything,” said I, blocking the blow.
“What about all that stuff about paper?” he demanded, swinging at my middle.
“You’re hearing voices,” said I, blocking and then swinging around full circle to decapitate him.
His body stayed just as it was for about five seconds, as his head rolled away toward the outhouse, then it fell over backwards with a thud, his sword still in hand. I turned back to the other men but they were gone, and so was Queen Elleena. Kneeling down next to Ellwood, I pressed my ear to his mouth and heard strong breathing.
The arrow, still lodged in Ellwood’s chest, right between the folds of his jerkin, might have missed either the heart or the lungs. I could only hope. I unfastened his jerkin and pulled it open and then ripped his shirt aside, careful to avoid pulling at the arrow. There before me were two…”
“Eaglethorpe?”
Two perfectly formed, beautiful, if a little on the small side…
“Eaglethorpe!”
“What?” I asked.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m looking at two beautiful bosoms, even if they are somewhat on the small side.”
“Is there an arrow stuck in them?” he asked.
Oh, I cannot do it! I cannot continue to call Ellwood “he” when there are two beautiful, perfectly-formed, if somewhat on the small side, bosoms right out there where everyone can see them. Editing be damned!
“Is there an arrow stuck in them?” she asked.
“Well, it’s kind of stuck in one, I guess, but it’s really a bit high and mostly in the unbosomy part of your chest.”
“So you know.”
“Yes, I have known for a long time that you were… you know.”
“What?”
“A woman.”
“Oh, that,” she said. “Yes, but you don’t know anything else, right?”
“Like what?”
“Nevermind.” She reached a hand up and grasping my shirt, pulled me toward her. “Kiss me quickly before I die.”
“You’re not going to die,” said I, kissing her on the forehead. “I don’t think the arrow hit a vital organ
“Kiss me on the lips, you stupid ass,” said she.
This time I kissed her on the lips and it was a very good kiss. I haven’t had time enough to reflect upon it and decide where it fits on the list of the greatest kisses I have ever experienced, but it is certainly on that list. It was far better than the kiss of any princess and might have rivaled one or two of the kisses I received from the Queen.
“You know it was the best one,” whispered Ellwood.
“What?”
“It was the best kiss,” she said. “Now kiss me one more time.”
What could I do? I kissed her again. This kiss made all of Queen Elleena’s kisses seem like kissing a hog wallowing in its own filth or like kissing an overflowing cuspidor in a cheap dockside bordello, neither of which is as unlikely as one might expect.
“Thus with a kiss, I die,” said Ellwood.
“You’re not dying,” said I, and taking one of her daggers from her belt, I dug out the arrow. Ellwood hardly flinched. “There, you see? It’s out.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said she. “The arrow was poison. I can feel it doing its work.”
“No,” I gasped.
Pressing my mouth over the wound, I sucked out a mouthful of warm blood. Spitting it onto the ground, I repeated the procedure. I didn’t know if it would work for arrows, but I knew that it worked for poisonous snakes. I once had to suck the poison out my horse’s leg after a snake bite, which is to say out of the leg of my horse, and not to say one of my own legs which is equine, because they aren’t. I think Hysteria got the wrong idea about it, because she still looks at me funny when I get near her feet. I continued sucking out the poison until we were both a little dizzy—me from lack of air and Ellwood from lack of blood. But I judged that any more loss of bodily fluids might be too much, and I pulled out the wad of soft cotton cloth that I keep in my pocket for just such an emergency and bandaged the wound. As I did so, a small pouch fell from my pocket onto the step beside me.
Disconsolateberries! I had been carrying a small pouch of them since I had left Lyrria, unsure what to do with them, since I hadn’t enough to make a pie. Disconsolateberries, I remembered, were a natural counteragent to all poisons, as well as being full of antioxidants. You may think that I simply made this up to fit the plot, but it is true. Besides, I would never make up something like that just to fit the plot.
“You do it all the time,” said Ellwood.
“Do what?”
“You make up things all the time to fit the plot and some things that don’t fit at all.”
“Either die or get well,” said I. “In either case, stop your editorializing.”
“Someone has to. This is a ridiculous tale.”
“Swallow this,” I told Ellwood, opening the pouch and pouring the somewhat dried and somewhat moldy disconsolateberries into her shapely and well-formed mouth.
&nb
sp; Almost immediately, her pallor, which is to say her sickly white color, began to give way to a naturally healthy glow. She sat up and pulled her shirt closed with one hand.
“What was that?”
“Disconsolateberries,” said I. “A natural counteragent to all poisons.”
“Yes, I heard that already,” said she. “So what was all that before—just a chance to suck on my bosom?”
I shrugged. “Not just…”
Chapter Fourteen: In which we chase after kidnappers.
“Hurry and help me up, Eaglethorpe,” said Ellwood. “They’ve taken Queen Elleena and we have to rescue her.”
Taking her hand, I pulled Ellwood to her feet, and helped her cover herself with her now torn shirt and then helped her tie shut her leather jerkin.
“Stop looking at my bosoms,” said she.
“I wasn’t,” said I.
“Yes you were.”
“I only looked to help you fasten your jerkin, which is to say looking in the line of duty.”
“Well, you can stop looking now. I have my clothes on.”
“Yes, you do,” I agreed unhappily.
“Come on,” she urged, starting off.
“But they are very nice, if somewhat on the small side,” said I. “And how do we know where they went?”
“How do we know where my bosoms went? I assure you they are right where they are supposed to be.”
“No. How do we know where the kidnappers and Queen Elleena went?
“They’ve left a rather abundant blood trail,” she said, rounding the back side of the stable.
“Yes, that seems to happen when a limb is cut off,” I mused.
“Hurry up, Eaglethorpe,” she said, passing through an empty lot. “The only woman you will ever love is in the hands of a pair of evil varlets.”
“I suspect that you can no longer count them as a pair of varlets, as one has left his hand behind—maybe one and a half varlets, at least as far as her being ‘in their hands’ goes. Now if they were kicking her, you might well say she was in the feet of two varlets.”
“Faster, you fool,” she hissed, racing down a dark alley.
“Besides, I never said that she was the only woman that I would ever love.”
“I’ve heard you say that on a number of occasions,” she said, climbing over a wooden fence.
“Nope.”
“Sure I have,” she said, dashing through the cemetery. “The Queen of Aerithraine, in whose company I blah blah blah.”
“I said she might well be the only woman I ever loved. Not ‘would ever love’.”
“What does that mean,” said Ellwood, skidding to a stop.
“Just what I said. She is the only woman that I’ve ever loved.”
“But…”
“But,” said I. “I might well meet another woman that I could love or fall in love with or love in the future.”
“Well, you love your mother and Celia and Tuki, right?”
“Yes, but not like that—not romantically.”
“You don’t love the Queen romantically. You can’t. You hardly know her. You’ve only kissed her three times.”
“I once had the pleasure of spending a fortnight in her company.”
“That never happened!”
“Yes, it did. She even reminded me about it when I secretly met with her in chapter eight.”
“She was teasing you. If you had any shame, you would have blushed. If you had been any less an idiot, you would have confessed to all the lying about her that you have done over the years.”
“I never lie,” said I.
“So you love the Queen—romantically?”
“With a deep and abiding love, um… I admit that we are not as close as we once were, and probably won’t be in the future, particularly if she is killed by kidnappers. Come on.”
“Just wait a minute,” said she. “So you don’t love anyone else?”
“Not romantically. Come on. Let us be on our way.”
“You don’t love me?”
“I love you like a brother, or a sister, or a hermaphroditic cousin, which is to say not romantically. After all, I didn’t know you were a… I thought you were a… We need to hurry.”
“Hold fast,” said she. “So you could love some other woman? Some woman at some point in the future?”
“Hypothetically?”
“Yes, some hypothetical woman.”
“Of course,” said I. “Now come along.”
“Stay. Hypothetically speaking, what kind of woman would it be?”
“Would what be?”
“What kind of woman would be the kind that you might fall in love with?”
“Queen Elleena is in danger,” said I.
“She’ll keep a moment. Now tell me.”
“Well, she would have to be attractive, athletic, and a skilled adventurer.”
“Of course.”
“She would have to be smart, and resourceful, and have some kind of talent, maybe musical.”
“Naturally.”
“She would have to love me and find me attractive.”
“No problem,” said she. “You are a very handsome man.”
“And she would have to listen to my stories, and appreciate them, and of course believe them.”
“There is no such woman,” she said, starting off again at a jog.
“It’s just as well,” said I. “I hear the women in Hypothetica are all grotesquely ugly.”
Chapter Fifteen: Wherein we discover the kidnappers’ lair and there might be zombies.
We crossed a small muddy creek, another vacant lot, and another fence. We ran down a winding street, through an alley, and then up another slightly less winding street. Finally we arrived at the back door of a small house.
“This is where the blood trail leads,” said Ellwood Cyrene.
“It is remarkable that we were able to follow it all this way,” said I.
“Not really. We are skilled trackers.”
“It is remarkable that the man we are following has any blood left,” said I.
“Not really. A grown man could be expected to have a good eight pints of blood in him. I suspect this fellow has lost not more than two, though he may well be quite weak by this point.”
“I guess you are right,” said I.
“What is remarkable,” said she, “is that we are neither one of us, out of breath.”
“We are in good shape.”
“I have just passed through an empty lot, raced down a dark alley, climbed over a wooden fence, dashed through a cemetery; crossed a small muddy creek, another vacant lot, and another wooden fence; and ran down a winding street, through another alley, and up another slightly less winding street,” said she. “I am in excellent shape, notwithstanding the fact that I am suffering a chest wound, but even the greatest athlete would be out of breath after that, and you, Eaglethorpe, are not in excellent shape. In fact, you are getting quite a pair of love handles.”
“Poetic license,” said I.
“Quiet,” said she. “Listen.”
I could hear voices that seemed to be coming from the house, but then I could hear other voices coming from other houses too, and shouts and singing from the ale house down the street, and still more voices and snoring from the nearby flophouse, and a late night hymn from the local church, and low moans that could only come from zombies in the cemetery.
“What do you think?” asked Ellwood.
“I hate zombies,” I replied.
“What do you think about our situation here vis-à-vis breeching this structure and rescuing the Queen?”
“I lost you after versa versa.”
“Vis-à-vis,” said she. “It means literally ‘face to face’, but is usually used as ‘in regards to’.”
“Why didn’t you just say so? I don’t speak Dwarvish.”
“It’s not Dwarvish. It’s French.”
“There is no such language,” said I. “Now quit fooling around. You go
to the front door, and count to 100. I will stay here and count to 100. Then we both enter and kill everyone inside.”
“Except Queen Elleena,” she said.
“Well, of course except Queen Elleena.”
“One other thing,” said she.
“What?”
“If I don’t start counting to 100 until I get around to the front door, but you start counting to 100 right now, won’t you get to 100 before I do?”
“I’ll count slower.”
“How will you know how fast I count?”
“I’ve seen you count before,” said I.
Nodding, she ducked below the only window and snuck around the corner of the house. I counted to 100, all the while listening lest any noise from inside should warrant my entering earlier than 100, and also all the while, watching behind me for zombies. When I got to 77, I got up and readied myself. When I got to 89, I raised my sword. When I got to 96, I leaned my shoulder toward the portal. And when I got to 100, I slammed my weight into the rather shoddy excuse for a door. It splintered as I burst into the room. I could see Ellwood entering from the other side.
Inside the room were four men—the two that I had encountered before and two more—the same two that I had seen in the baths, which is to say the ugly one and the fat one. Standing amid them was the Queen, her hands tied behind her back and her mouth gagged. The ugly one and the one that had kidnapped Queen Elleena, which is to say the kidnapper with both hands still attached, leapt toward me, while the fat one and the other kidnapper, which is to say the one handed one, leapt toward Ellwood.
Many Adventures of Eaglethorpe Buxton Page 15
