The Two Artefact Discs: Azabar's Icicle Part 1

by Jem I Kelley

  “That’s rich coming for you. You’d have shrieked louder than Weever. Anyway, like I said, Marti acted odd. You know, he’s not as simple and carefree as he makes out.”

  Bliss scoffed. “He hasn’t got an evil bone in his body. Those skeletons close by gave you the shivers, you imagined it.”

  “No I didn’t, and I haven’t said he’s evil. He acted normal after asking me about the threat, too. But, we can’t totally trust him.”

  The afternoon shift ebbed, and they were taking a container from a warehouse in the docks to Saib Izbar’s stall in the market. The sun hung low in the sky and shadows engulfed the esplanade. Above, clouds of birds exercised in swirling waves: a final dance before roost.

  The container, the friends moved, resembled a coffin; a coffin for someone who stood fifteen feet tall. It rested on two trolleys. Aden pulled the front and Bliss guided the rear. Aden didn’t know what lurked inside this container, but he did know it weighed heavy. A waft of something rotten escaped from hinged sections on the top. Once, Aden thought he felt movement from inside the container.

  “Weever,” said Bliss after Aden told him what he’d said about the threat, “Is a dork. Munter is too.”

  “Munter’s always been a dork; what’s he done now?”

  “I was taking the fish scraps from Ernie Hobbs stall with Munter earlier and he kept coming out with all the ‘slow’ stuff again. ‘Oh, Ernie’s trade must have been slow today, Bliss. He has many fish left over. ‘Oh, slow down, Bliss, you’re working too fast!’

  “Sure he was trying to annoy you?”

  “He sounded different when he said ‘slow’. As if he needed to speak the word carefully, so I’d notice it. He also looked at me in the same way as he looked at me the only time he ever beat me in a catapult-shooting contest: like he’d got one over on me.”

  “You didn’t... do anything?”

  “I slipped and fell into him holding a hand full of fish heads. He got a face full. He said I was a black, ugly, slave-girl and I did it on purpose.”

  Aden laughed at the picture of a Munter being covered in fish heads, and then caught himself and looked carefully at his friend’s face. A ‘slave-girl’ insult could set Bliss into a mood for hours.

  Bliss did frown; but, just a flicker and it passed. The thought of the indignation heaped on Munter was clearly too much to cast her down. She laughed along with Aden.

  “Better watch out though,” said Aden as their lungs recovered, “He’s bigger than us and he likes to fight people – even girls.”

  They guided the box down the incline in the Merchant District, past the buildings with their honey coloured stone. They skirted the bronze statue of Kurt Hardcastle negotiating with the Adventurine King Olan. They paused, to let a red-coated troop of guard cavalry clatter past at a trot.

  When they reached the Market, they wheeled the object towards Saib’s stall. A mid-evening breeze was shooing the warmth of the September day from the air. The stalls were shuttered, and the stall-owners going home.

  “Grokkin eck! What’s in this?” said Bliss. “Saib sells nuts, grains and pulses. You don’t need a container like this, for that.”

  Aden shrugged.

  “It came from the Grey Hind too. The warehouseman said it’d been held up by customs for two weeks.”

  The friends turned off the main market-way, and came to a stall selling pulses, grains and nuts. The front of the stall displayed an enticing range of colours: reds, oranges and browns. A wholesome smell hung in the air.

  “Ah,” said a man, with a bald head, white sideburns and the largest ear lobes ever.

  “You have arrived. Most good. Place in front of stall please. Good. Now, lift over front of the stall and into space beyond. Take one end, and I grab this. Ready? Right, lift.”

  Aden strained. He thought his arms might snap at the elbows, and something around his lower stomach would go pop. He’d seen it once before; a porter have something pop in the lower stomach, leaving a bulge.

  He and Bliss strained and managed to move their end. They inched the container up over the front of the stall and then lowered it to the floor.

  Saib Isbar clapped his hands: “Yes, is good, thank-you friends.”

  Aden stared at the box

  “What’s inside there?”

  A happy smile formed on Saib’s face.

  “I have imported this from my homeland, Dazarian. It is a present for the Haverland Zoo; unfortunately, its living quarters are not quite made yet. The builders are behind schedule and it has to stay somewhere now it has been released by the customs men.”

  Aden continued to stare at the box as if by doing so he might see past its wood panels to what lay within.

  “Yes... but what is it?”

  “I show you.”

  Saib bent and unfastened catches at his end of the container. The lid divided into ten sections, any of which could open separately. Saib lifted the section he’d unfastened. A wave of rottenness hit Aden’s nostrils, and he felt his guts heave.

  “It is this,” said the stall-holder proudly. Inside the container Aden and Bliss saw the head of a large snake; a head as large as their own.

  “Isn’t she a beauty? Now let me see,” said Saib, “I’d better get chicken tomorrow off Ted Dixly, just to tide her over until she reaches the Zoo on Thursday.”

  Aden held down his nausea and stared at the snake. Its eyes were dark motionless orbs. From its mouth, a red tongue flicked like sparks from a grindstone.

  Aden couldn’t help but think what this beast could do if it were set loose in the market.

  Could this be the danger to Haverland Tanest had hinted at, and not the Yeccozin?

  Chapter 27: Lost Property

  Sergeant Plumbert stood beside a rack of shelves, which held shoeboxes, with a mug of tea in his hand. He finished off the tea, putting the mug down on a counter. On the other side of the counter, the friends waited. Aden glanced inside the cup and noticed the interior probably didn’t know what soap was.

  “Bit dirty, this cup.”

  Plumbert scowled.

  “It’s when you’re teeth turn the same colour you have to worry.”

  He pulled at the shoeboxes on the shelves, inspecting their contents. In one shoebox, he found one boot in need of a polish.

  “Is there a one shoe’d thief around somewhere?” asked Bliss.

  Plumbert gave her a dry look.

  “This is no good,” he said. “I know I put the Disc-Artefact here somewhere.”

  …It was the day after Bliss and Aden had taken the snake to Saib’s stall. A miserable day when rain hammered at the roofs and stallholders decorated the floors of their stalls with water catching buckets. An day when Hacknor stayed dry in his office and gave the friends as many outside jobs as possible.

  It was also the day when they’d learn whether they’d get to keep one of the discs, and even Hacknor couldn’t affect their mood. Come Dinner-time they'd gone as fast as they could to the police-station.

  Plumbert had told them the news as soon as they arrived. Yes, they’d get to keep one Disc-Artefact.

  “For Sardohan to withdraw the complaint,” Bliss had said, as Plumbert led them to the lost property office, “must mean he knows the artefacts have already been tested. Dazarian would move heaven and hell to get back untested discs…”

  Plumbert put the shoebox with the unpolished shoe back in the rack. Aden rested his arms on the counter and watched.

  “Sergeant, why did you store the artefact in a shoebox in ‘lost property’, anyway?”

  Plumbert muttered under his beard, something about the police safe being full of recovered booty.

  “That, and the old plod don’t give a fig for tested discs,” said Bliss. “If they’d thought the artefact had any chance of working it’d be under lock and key quicker than you could say rhubarb crumble.”

  Plumbert cast a sour eye in Bliss’s direction.

  “Stop whining, Bliss, I’m trying to think.” />
  Bliss’s brow furrowed.

  “He’s put it in a shoebox, in a large shelf full of shoeboxes, and he’s only gone and forgotten which one.”

  “If you keep moaning, I’ll kick the ex-contents of a shoebox, which just happens to be on the end of my leg, right up your backside.”

  Bliss gave Aden a wry look.

  “You did tell Inspector Thomas about the drug we found on the Grey Hind, and what Sardohan and Tanest talked about when we overheard them that time?”

  “Yes, Bliss, I did.” Plumbert pulled another shoebox from the shelf to examine it. Unfortunately, the shoeboxes on either side came out with the one Plumbert pulled.

  They hit the floor.

  From one box exploded wooden pegs. From the other rolled, a swarm, of what Aden thought were marbles. Then as one drifted close to him, he realized the round white things with coloured spots were false eyes.

  “Ugh. How do people lose those?”

  “Being surprised, Aden.” Plumbert bent down, and gathered the glass eyes together. “Being surprised is marvellous for causing the eyes to open fast, a great way to lose grip on them too, if they’re false ‘uns.”

  Aden fought the urge to chuckle at the picture painted by Plumbert.

  “I didn’t know there was so much surprise in Haverland.”

  “I think grown ups have more to be surprised about,” said Bliss.

  “Have you found out where the caskets of Yeccozin were taken yet?” asked Aden, watching Plumbert getting the eyes into a pile.

  “Yes, a warehouse belonging to Saib Isbar, we’ve got a docker watching the place now.”

  Saib Isbar! Aden reeled at the news.

  “Don’t tell him or anyone else.”

  “Course not, Sergeant.”

  Plumbert looked at the friends.

  “We’re going to wait and learn what’s going on before we make our move. Saib might be innocent.”

  “We’ve known him since we were kids,” said Bliss. “He’s a miserable tipper, but friendly.”

  “Poor man lost his wife last year to the fever, did you know? I wouldn’t want to give him more grief. So I’m hoping for the best; but, the law’s the law.”

  Aden made a quick reassessment of Saib. It seems Bliss did too.

  “Aden and I took a snake to his stall yesterday; Big, evil looking bugger; what if he sets it loose on the city, after drugging everyone?”

  “When Bliss said ‘big’ she meant ‘BIG’, Plumbert. The thing could eat you and have room spare.”

  Plumbert collected the pegs into a pile and put them in their shoebox.

  “It wouldn’t like me, Police officers taste bitter, it’s all the tea we drink. I know about the snake too, it’s been properly imported. The zoo’ll be keeping it, and there are people there who know how to handle the beasty, in or out of a cage. I doubt it’s a threat. And you, Bliss, watch your mouth or else I’ll be speaking to your mother about the filth which comes out of it. You might have ended up using all sorts of language when you was in that prison. Back in Haverland words like ‘bugger’ ain’t encouraged from children.”

  Aden pointed out a few eyes Plumbert had missed and the Sergeant dropped them back in their box.

  “Why did Saib donate a snake to the zoo, if he’s a criminal? Surely that’s not the sort of thing criminals do?”

  “If I understood the criminal mind, Aden, I would be sitting in a plush office somewhere instead of getting flat feet pounding the streets.”

  “So what’s Inspector Thomas going to do about the threat from the Dazarians?” asked Bliss.

  Plumbert squeezed the shoeboxes back into the rack.

  “That’s the eyes and the pegs sorted. The Inspector, young Todd, sent a message by carrier pigeon to our agents down there.”

  “And we get to come when you do the drug raid on Saib, like you promised?”

  “I expect so.” Plumbert paused. “By the way, we’ve received a message that this Mr Savernake friend of yours walked into our embassy in Dazarian a few days after you were there. He asked if you two reached Haverland safely, and then walked out again.”

  “Savernake!” said Aden. So the man had been released from prison – or escaped. This was great news. He wondered what the scientist would be up to now. Probably investigating the information he found in the ledger.

  Bliss narrowed her eyes at Plumbert.

  “I expect Savernake will find out what the Dazarians are up to.”

  “I’m sure he would,” replied Plumbert unperturbed. “Now, if the investigatory abilities of the Haverland Police department meet your demanding standards, I’ll be bidding two of Haverland’s finest good day?”

  “Once we’ve got the disc,” said Aden.

  Plumbert rolled his eyes.

  “The disc, sorry! It’s all these questions you’re asking me, putting me off me thoughts.”

  He pulled a lidless shoebox from the rack, and looked into it. He pushed the shoebox back, and started on another, paused, and pulled out the previous one again.

  “Thought it was somewhere around about here!”

  He lifted a Disc-Artefact from the shoebox.

  Plumbert placed the artefact onto the counter, and Bliss took it.

  “Don’t press the button on the thing yourselves, or else you’ll find the toe of my hobnail boot kicking you all the way back to Dazarian. Find someone who knows about artefacts. Like a disc-man.”

  Chapter 28: The History of Discs

  “Beautiful,” said Granddad Todd, when the friends returned to Bliss’s house with the artefact. The granddads were sitting around the kitchen table. They had been playing cards; toothpicks had been bet and there were two small piles of the things.

  “All those wonderful patterns,” said Grandfather Eavis. “Course,” he added, turning to the two friends, “I’ve seen Disc-Artefacts before, way way back, before Disc-men existed. Did you know the first caches were discovered under the ruins of an Amari estate as long as thirty years ago?”

  “Yes,” said Bliss.

  “Farmer it was; ploughing the land one minute, falling down into a buried cavern, the next. Broke both legs, an arm and had concussion; lived alone too, so no one noticed him missing for a week. Despite getting rich from finding the place, he never had a good word for the Amari after that.”

  “We know,” said Bliss.

  “Then a few men snuffed it after experimenting with them buttons and the king was about to order the whole lot reburied because they was dangerous. But, the day before that happened, one of the King’s Captains in charge of sealing the place, accidentally knocked the button of a Disc-Artefact he was carrying; some idiot must have left the dots facing each other. That Captain, Harald the Stout, was transported to the world of Tropica. The King had second thoughts about burying the rest then. Wanted more artefacts tested, he did; course, as some of the things could kill, there weren’t many volunteers for the job.”

  Bliss was making a card tower in a bored manner.

  “We’ve heard the story.”

  “That’s how I got to test artefacts.”

  Aden blinked. Bliss stared at her Grandfather Eavis, who sat on the chair in his short sleeve shirt still tracing the pattern on the Disc-Artefact with his wrinkled old finger.

  Bliss’s card tower collapsed as her hand, no longer the subject of her attention, nudged the nine of hearts which stood as bottom prop.

  “Tell ‘em the whole story,” grumbled Granddad Todd. “About time they knew. Be useful if they understand why only disc-men can to test the things now. The whole story mind, none of your tales.”

  Grandfather Eavis scowled and put the artefact down on the kitchen table; it connected to the hardwood with a crisp clink. Rain beat down on the wooden window shutter as Grandfather Eavis assumed the posture of a storyteller.

  Aden felt anticipation surge through him. A confession of sorts was coming, this much was obvious; but, testing of Disc-Artefacts and travelling to other worlds didn’t really
tally with old granddads who got out of puff going up a flight of stairs.

  Grandfather Eavis began to speak.

  “Back in those days friends, well I was a little wayward; not a real troublemaker mind, I leave that sort of thing to the Todds.”

  “Hey! Wash your mouth out.”

  Eavis smiled at the elder Todd, before fixing an expression of gravity and turning to the friends.

  “I’d been, well, I’d been playing a lot of card games friends, and well, grown-ups sometimes bet on the result. Sometimes they win, and sometimes they lose...”

  “Sometime they lose a lot,” said Granddad Todd.

  “Yeah, right. Sometimes Lady Luck don’t shine down on you, and you lose more than you can afford. That’s what happened to me, and I ain’t bet on a game since; not with real money, anyhow. But, I had to pay those debts didn’t I?

  The men I owed had large friends, the sort that’d as soon break a knee cap, as shake yer hand. Adventurine, the 4th disc-world, had just been discovered, five weeks after Arachnie, and the King knew he had a lot of artefacts on his hands, most of which did nothing when their button was pressed, some of which killed outright and a few of which, possibly, led to other worlds. He was running out of volunteers to test the things seeing as how they was dangerous.

  So, he offered ten gold coins as an incentive to anyone who’d test one artefact. Ten gold coins is a lot of mullah as you know. Heck, you could shovel horseshit from a stable all day, for a year, for less money. It was also almost as much as I owed. No one could lend me more than five gold coins in total. I had my wife and fifteen year old daughter to support. I had no choice. I volunteered to press the button on one of the King's untested Disc-Artefacts.”

  Bliss eyes were wide. “What! What happened?”

  “What do you think? I’m still here aren’t I?”

  “It was a dud.”

  “Course it was a dud. I got ten gold coins; pressed four more buttons and got forty more, then decided I’d pushed me luck. I paid off the debt and had enough left over to buy this little place on the edge of the poor district; ain’t gambled since.”