Gilead made to step forward, but Fithvael caught his arm. Gilead placed his hand over his friend’s and said, calmly, ‘It’s Mondelblatt.’
‘Has it been so very long?’ asked Fithvael as the two elves stepped out, taking one of the old man’s arms each and propelling him along the walkway and out at the south gate.
‘Yes and no,’ said Gilead.
‘I heard he was quite mad,’ said Mondelblatt.
‘He is,’ said Gilead, ‘but not in the way that his own kind mean.’
Fithvael looked across the insignificant little man between them at his old friend.
‘He’s paid a price?’ he asked.
‘A high price,’ said Gilead. ‘But only to our advantage.’
‘What now?’ asked Fithvael.
‘Now we take him back to our lodging and tease out more of his truths.’
‘Truths?’ asked Fithvael. ‘Does he know anything about the truth?’
‘Sometimes it is only the dishonest who finally know the meaning of truth.’
‘I hope you’re right,’ said Fithvael.
‘What are you keeping from me?’ asked Mondelblatt. ‘I know you are keeping something from me… the most important something… the key to everything.’
‘Not so loud, old man,’ said Fithvael, holding Mondelblatt’s wrist so that his agitated hand couldn’t knock over the drinks on the table. The elf gestured with his other hand for the serving girl, the innkeeper’s daughter, to replenish the old man’s beaker yet again.
The girl had looked at Mondelblatt in disgust more than once and had kicked a chamber pot under the table, sure that the old man must need to use it soon, and knowing that she’d be the one to scrub the floors clean if he should lose control of his bladder. She wondered just how much liquid the old man could hold in his gaunt, fragile frame.
The ale she poured was pale and cloudy and tasted of fermentation. There was no distinctive flavour to suggest what it had been made from, but it was as honest as it could be in these troubled times, and they were lucky to have anything to brew with at all.
‘The blonde child, the sky clematis, the orb and egg. I understand them all, but only as parts of a puzzle,’ said Mondelblatt. ‘Humankind, flora, the dwarf, insects, the elf – all are represented by the best, purest examples of their worth in the world, but there is more. There must be more.’
Gilead thought back to the Rat King’s dank chamber deep below ground, of the niches in the wall of the strange ante-room, of the visions that had come so strongly to his mind, of the princess, of the destruction of the plant, of being inside the dwarf’s head, of the shimmering carpet of the insects’ carapaces. He thought of his reflection and of the depth of darkness of the obsidian ceiling in the great underground hall. He thought of the ratman and of his amulet, the same amulet that nestled in the cuff of his breeches, inside his boot.
He had known all along that he would have to show the amulet to Mondelblatt, but he had also known what it had done to the Rat King, how sad and sorry his end had been… And he knew the scholar’s weaknesses.
Gilead knew the prematurely aged man to be weak of will, greedy, selfish and filled with his own importance. He knew that those had been his key character traits fifty short years ago, and he believed that mankind was too brutal and too arrogant even to desire to change, let alone to accomplish any fundamental shift in personality. He doubted that Mondelblatt had changed enough not to be drawn in by the powers of the amulet and by the immortality it seemed to offer.
The elf was also unsure as to how the amulet was activated, since it seemed to have little or no effect on him or his companions. He had taken it out several times, tossed it to Fithvael, held it up to the light, breathed on it, polished it and subjected it to various tests of a more arcane nature dictated by the tenets of his kind.
The amulet had remained inert, dull.
He had also seen its effect on the skaven, on their king, and he had seen the magic that it could produce. He wondered how close to the skaven humankind really were. He wondered what triggered activity in the little stone.
Gilead sighed.
‘I could wonder forever,’ he said, ‘but I fear we have precious little time.’
Gilead motioned to Fithvael and the two put their heads together and lowered their voices.
‘Are you quite sure of our old friend, te tuin?’ Fithvael asked.
‘No,’ said Gilead, ‘I am not. I am sure that this plague must end and I am sure that time is of the essence. There has been enough destruction, and if we can put an end to it, sooner has to be better.’
‘We have time,’ said Fithvael as he saw the dull little stone, extracted from Gilead’s boot, turning in the elf’s fingers.
‘No,’ said Gilead. ‘With Baneth’s death, time, even in our terms, is running short.’
They watched Mondelblatt rubbing his eyes and blinking.
‘What is it, old man?’ he asked.
‘My eyes are dry,’ said Mondelblatt. ‘So very, very dry.’
Fithvael almost felt sorry for Mondelblatt, who seemed older and more frail than he should after fifty years, even for a human. He placed a reassuring hand over one of the old man’s.
‘You’re tired,’ he said, ‘and it’s late. I’ll find a balm for you when we’re done, and take you home to bed.’
Before Mondelblatt could answer, Gilead leaned in, his closed fist resting on the table’s surface, close to the old man’s trembling hands. The human looked from Fithvael to Gilead, then down at the elf’s fist.
‘You have brought me something?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Gilead. ‘I want to show you something. It is not mine to give, but if you can tell me something – anything – about it…’
Mondelblatt turned his hand over for Gilead to drop whatever he was concealing in his fist into it. Instead, the elf simply held the amulet between his finger and thumb, one digit on the bottom of the oval stone and one on the top. When Mondelblatt reached out for it, Gilead moved it out of the old man’s range.
Mondelblatt blinked once more, and when he opened his eyes, Fithvael noticed that large, salty droplets sat upon his lower lashes. Another blink and two bulging tears trickled down the old man’s cheeks.
Mondelblatt blinked again and sighed.
The hand that had been wrapped around his beaker, constantly bringing it to his mouth for long gulps of the poor ale, uncurled and relaxed and both of his hands stopped trembling.
With the last of Mondelblatt’s long exhalation, the small room fell quite quiet.
Then the serving girl with the large jug of ale shouted out.
‘Hey!’ she said. ‘Someone’s got to clean that up. Can’t you make him go in the pot?’
Fithvael looked down to where the serving girl pointed at a growing puddle of pale liquid that was inching out across the worn flags of the floor.
On the other side of the tavern wall, Laban te tuin Tor Mahone started from a light sleep as the horses began to snort and sniff and paw at the smooth-worn cobbles of the yard. The young elf got up and looked around as the first fat raindrop fell from the sky, landing on his shoulder and trickling down the front of his cloak.
The larger horse rocked its neck and stamped its foreleg. As a second drop fell from the sky, then a third, Laban bent to look at the horse’s leg. He was surprised to see a rainbow-sheened, carapaced insect, its shell as black as an oil-slick and iridescent with reflected colour. As he bent to scoop it away, the carapace opened to reveal large bright wings and the insect made a clicking noise before flying away.
Laban patted the horse’s shoulder and whispered in its ear, trying to reassure the beast, while the palfrey huddled as close to the wall under the ramshackle roof as she could manage.
The rain was unlike anything the elf had ever seen. The drops of water were unfeasibly large a
nd apparently filled with light, shining whitely out and then spraying across the darkening cobbles as they landed. As the frequency of the drops increased, the noise became almost deafening.
Laban wanted nothing more than to pull his cloak tightly around him and run to the entrance to the inn, in the hope that he wouldn’t drown in the process, but he dared not disobey Gilead or Fithvael.
Seconds later, as the elf stood with his back pressed against the wall, he felt the water rising around his ankles, falling too fast for it to run off into the drains and soakaways at the lowest points in the yard.
He felt sure that the whole city would be flooded if the rain lasted for more than a few minutes and he dreaded the death and destruction that would inevitably result from such a disaster.
He looked hard through the rain and into the sky beyond and saw clear, bright moonlight, as if the rain was falling in a narrow band that he could see the edge of. He turned and looked in the opposite direction.
Laban stepped out into the rain and dashed over the step and through the opening in the wall. By the time he had crossed the street, he was standing on pale, dry cobbles. He looked up and could see only the blackness of the sky, punctuated by the light of twin moons and the stars that filled the firmament. The elf could see no rain clouds, and certainly none that could produce such a downpour; such clouds would surely have obscured the stars and moons.
Then Laban’s mouth fell open as he watched the progress of the band of rain sweep away across the street and over the yard. Two minutes later, and certainly no longer, Laban was leaning into the yard through the arched opening. The cobbles were bone dry and the horses, standing side-by-side under the awning, seemed as relaxed as ever. The palfrey looked up at him and blinked, then walked across the yard and dropped her head down to drink from the shallow trough in the opposite corner. Laban noticed that it was about half-full, just as it had been when the elves had arrived at the inn.
Laban pushed his cloak over his shoulder and, without a second thought, strode into the tavern. His head was uncovered and his thick, pale hair, cut in a straight line at chin level, looked almost like spun silver in the lamplight.
There was an almighty clatter and splash as the serving girl dropped the half-full jug of poor ale that she was carrying and it fell to the flagstone floor, sloshing its contents into the puddle of urine and making even more mess for her to clean up.
For such a little person, she let out a surprisingly loud scream.
The girl was indeed small, even by human standards, and feisty, too, but her lazy father worked her hard, so she was generally too tired to bother noticing the few odd people that found their way into his tavern. She was only glad to be able to earn an occasional tip from them, since her father always seemed to have some good reason not to pay her; today, it would no doubt be her own fault for spilling so much perfectly drinkable ale, even though her father never touched it and kept the decent stuff for himself.
As the scream and the clatter of the tumbling jug filled the small, low room with a cacophony of sound, Laban, who had to stand with his feet apart and his knees bent to avoid his head coming into contact with the room’s ceiling beams, turned back and forth at the waist. He looked first to Gilead and Fithvael, who scowled at him, and then at the girl. When he looked at Gilead and Fithvael for the second time, he noticed the little old man who sat between them, wearing what appeared to be a nightcap and looking at the oval stone in Gilead’s hand. Still, his companions offered him no assistance.
Before Laban knew what was happening, the girl’s father had vaulted the table that stood across the corner of the room and served as a counter. The short, bulky man had what looked like an ancient musket in his hands, but he wielded it expertly and its working parts were clean and well-oiled.
‘The rain!’ exclaimed Laban. ‘Did you see the rain?’
The serving girl’s face was red and her hips swayed as she began to wield a mop as if it were a deadly weapon, lunging it towards Laban’s legs as if she would take them out from under him with one keen sweep.
‘Never mind the rain,’ said the girl. ‘Did you ever look in a mirror? What’s the likes of you doin’ in a place like this? What’s the likes of you doin’ anywhere in this city?’
Laban looked down at himself as if perhaps he hadn’t looked carefully enough in the mirror, and might be inappropriately dressed.
‘I…’ began the elf. ‘I… It was the rain. You’ve never seen such precipitation!’
‘I’ve never seen the likes of you, neither, and I don’t plan on seein’ you again,’ said the girl, still jabbing at his legs with her filthy mop as her father watched from a slightly safer distance.
Gilead and Fithvael looked at one another, but said nothing. They had been together for long enough to know when their thoughts were in accord without the need to speak, and speaking now, cutting the tension in the air with more singsong elven tones, might not be a good idea. It was never their intention to disturb the people they came into contact with and, in these poorest of places, people rarely looked at one another or listened too carefully to accents and speech patterns.
So far, Gilead and Fithvael had gone more-or-less unnoticed, and they did not want to cause any harm by allying themselves with Laban’s foolishness.
Fithvael still had his hand over Mondelblatt’s, unwilling to make a move lest he draw attention to himself. Mondelblatt blinked and looked around.
‘Foolish girl,’ he said, rather too loudly, cutting the air and causing the owner of the inn to swing his musket back in his direction.
‘Who’re you callin’ foolish?’ asked the innkeeper. ‘And what’s the likes of you doin’ ’ere at this time of night, dressed like that? You’re not one of us. You don’t belong ’ere.’
Emboldened by his speech, the innkeeper stepped closer to the table.
Mondelblatt stood up in a single, rather jerky, movement, but the action coincided badly with his general equilibrium and the pool of piss and poor ale, and his foot slid out from beneath him. His chin came down with an almighty crack on the table and he collapsed into a heap, falling onto his stool before sliding inelegantly to the wet floor.
The crash triggered a series of events, beginning with the serving girl thrusting hard with the end of her mop at Laban’s legs. The elf jumped instinctively over the obstacle, but seemed to have forgotten just how close his head was to the ceiling beams. The impact made a loud cracking sound and Laban, his momentum suddenly halted, landed unceremoniously on the floor. Seeing his daughter strike out at the strange creature, the innkeeper shot at Laban. His aim was good, but his reflexes were somewhat slower than they had been when he was a member of the city watch and the musket shot sprayed in a wide arc over the elf’s head as he came down suddenly, landing on his backside instead of his feet.
Fithvael and Gilead glanced at one another and, with a swivel of the eyes and a slight nod, they silently agreed on their course of action.
Gilead got up from the table, turned and took the warm barrel of the innkeeper’s firearm in his hand. With a tug and a deft twist, the elf had freed the weapon and with one short swing he cuffed the innkeeper across the neck with the stock of the weapon, rendering the man unconscious, but essentially unharmed.
At the same time, Fithvael planted a foot heavily on the head of the mop that the serving girl was still wielding in anger. Her face was flushed and she was clearly more ferocious than afraid, but she should be easy enough to subdue.
The girl raged when she couldn’t free the head of the mop and within moments she had thrust away the handle and flown at Fithvael, fists flailing, screaming like a banshee. He had not expected the assault, despite other experiences that had shown him just how fiercely protective human women could be, how resourceful and how vicious.
Fithvael pulled his head and shoulders up so that the hail of blows fell harmlessly on his chest. Harmlessly to him,
at least, but he also gave himself away.
The serving girl gasped, pulled her head back and then spat in his face.
It was enough.
Fithvael stopped playing nice.
He grasped the girl by her shoulders and pinned her arms to her sides. She had landed in the elf’s lap when she had lunged at him and sat there now, pink-cheeked with fury, but also blue-lipped.
Fithvael quickly realised that his grip on the girl was constricting her breathing and that if he hung on to her much longer, she might suffocate. He looked her in the eye and smiled, but when he loosened his grip, she took a deep breath and let out a scream that split the air in the room. The noise roused Mondelblatt, whose head suddenly appeared above the table-top.
Fithvael let go of the girl’s left arm in order to place his hand over her mouth to quiet her, but as soon as his grip loosened, she brought her hand up to slap the elf or pull his hair, or gouge his eye. Fithvael didn’t know what form the attack would take, but he had no trouble seeing it coming and caught the girl’s wrist before she was able to do any damage.
She screamed again, but the cry subsided into sobs and Fithvael couldn’t help feeling sorry for the feisty girl, as well as rather impressed by her. He allowed his grasp on her to slacken a little and, glancing down at his right hand, he noticed that the flesh around the girl’s wrist was already darkening with the bruising that had resulted from his strong, lean hands.
Then Fithvael noticed the girl’s hands. They were misshapen and badly swollen and black bruising was appearing around her knuckles.
‘You’re hurt child,’ he said. ‘Calm yourself. Be still.’
‘What are you? Who are you?’ asked the serving girl between sobs. ‘Take your hands off me! What have you done to my father?’
‘Enough,’ said Gilead, sloughing off the hood of his cloak, and sitting tall in his chair.
The girl stared at him. Between his exotic looks, the pains in her hands and the alien and authoritative tone of his voice, she fainted. She slumped in Fithvael’s grip and he arranged her gently against his narrow chest.
Hammer and Bolter: Issue 23 Page 6
