by Frank Tuttle
“Oh my.” Granny wasn’t looking at me, but to my right. “And who might you be?”
I looked around Granny’s tiny home. We were alone.
“I’ll play along if you want, but I thought you dropped the crazy act when you’re not in public.”
“Hush.” She spoke that to me. “This isn’t part of my act, as you call it. You’re not alone.”
Icy fingers caressed my spine.
“You’re kidding.”
“I am most certainly not. You are in the company of a spirit. A new one. He seems quite confused.”
Granny motioned me to a chair. I followed and sat while she stared at things I couldn’t see.
“I was about to send a lad for you anyway,” she said, not looking at me. “Three pigeons arrived just after dawn.”
“Three? Mama must have written quite a letter.”
“She did indeed. Here.” She handed me a trio of tightly wrapped cylinders of paper. Each was so large I wondered how a bird could have borne it without resorting to an awkward two-legged hop.
“Read. And pray be silent until I speak to you again. I have work to do.”
Granny set about rummaging through cabinets and drawers, gathering candles and bags and bundles of oddly fragrant sticks.
I unrolled the first paper cylinder. Mama had helpfully started her letter with This here is the first page scribbled across the top.
“Boy,” it began.
“Well, if’n you got my first letter, you knows all about the high-n-mighty wand-waver and his doings hereabouts, and you knows I put a stop to him by tellin’ that he was eating the souls of babies. I reckon you think that sounds mighty backward, but folks hereabouts took it deadly serious.
So I knowed he’d be coming for me sooner or later. I figured maybe he’d wait, skulk around a bit, get the lay of the land around Plegg House before he came charging in, but, boy, I reckon he was mighty full of his-self, because damned if he didn’t show up last night aiming to relieve this poor old woman of her head.
I didn’t know he was about until fire started falling from the sky. I means it, boy, great big balls of fire, just like the ones you seen during the War. They set the yard on fire and the roof on fire and one even sat there long enough to burn clean through the roof and land in my bed. That made me mad, since that was a fancy featherbed and I paid dear for it.
Well, I conjured up a thunderstorm, quick as you please, and put them fires out before they spread. I reckon I landed a bolt of lightning close to somebody’s fancy britches, too, because there come a mighty yelp and some mighty cussin’ out of the woods and the next thing you know I hears some strange words and the hairs on my neck raised up and when I peeked out a window I seen my porch was full of snakes.
Bad snakes, boy. Rattlers and cottonmouths and even them white as bone snow serpents what educated folk say there ain’t none of no more. Well, boy, I can tell ye there’s still plenty of ’em in the woods around Plegg House, because I seen them crawling under my door and coming down my chimney.
I ain’t one to kill critters that ain’t done me no harm, but I reckon the wand-waver had set them snakes against me, so I didn’t have no choice but to call down a forest-full of owls and hawks and suchlike. They flew right in, and it was a blessing I had a big hole in my roof, because they set about catching up snakes like nobody’s business and the only one I had to kill was a big old timber rattler that got too close to my fireplace poker. I’m saving his skin for a hatband, and no mistake.
I waited a while, all quiet, before I heard somebody tromping through the weeds out front. I was feeling a mite ornery by then, because I opened up my door and even though I couldn’t see nobody I opined that sending snakes against them what can call down owls is a damnfool way to say hello.
I reckon that didn’t set too well with Mister High-and-mighty, cause I heared them words again and no sooner did I get my door shut than every wolf and every bear in the whole of Pot Lockney came a’ howling and a roaring up at my house.
I tells you, boy, I ain’t never heard nor seen the likes of it. Wolves everywhere. They was jumping at the windows and scratching at the doors and I swears a dozen of them got under the house and was trying to force up the floorboards.
And bears! A dozen of the buggers, if there was one. All reared up on their hind legs and trying to tear down the walls. The din they raised was something I ain’t ever likely to forget, boy, I tell you that.
But Mama Hog ain’t no fool. I gots iron bars on my windows and them doors is two layers of blood-oak as thick as your hand and the timbers in this house is as big around as bears. So they clawed and they roared and all they done was break out some glass here and there and tear up my poor flowerbeds something fierce.
About the time one of the bears started to climb up on my roof I brung out something Mister Fancy Britches wasn’t expecting. Boy, there’s been five families of skunks living under this here house since the first stones was laid. I knowed them when I was a child and they knows me, and we gots an arrangement.
So they come out when I called, every last one of them, and by the time them skunks done their business there wasn’t a bear nor a wolf left as far as a owl can see. And, boy, the woods hereabouts is going to smell of skunk for the rest of the year, you mark my words.
I reckon that done it. The next thing I heared was boots on my porch and then my door blowed open and there he was, all red-faced and scary, holding a big bright axe and a’ swearin’ on his name to cut me down.
The first tiny parchment ended there, and I doubt it was by coincidence. I unrolled the next two and read.
Boy, I got me a damned fine axe now. I put his fool head on a pole right by the footpath to my door. That there fancy wand of his burnt itself to ashes when he blinked his last. I dumped out my night pot on ’em, take that, ye nasty old haint.
Then I brewed me up some tea and set lights in all my windows. It didn’t take long for people to come poking around. First thing they seen was his head on a stick. Boy, you ain’t seen the like of the apologizing and back-pedaling as was done that night. I reckon any of them what had forgot respect for the Hog name has remembered it now.
I sent a couple of boys down to the lawn ornament’s shanty and told them to bring back everything they could carry. I knowed you might be interested to know who was trying to put you in the ground.
Boy, what they brung back was disturbing.
He called his-self the Creeper. That don’t mean nothing to me. Maybe it does to you. Along with the usual spell-books and what-not, which is right now making a nice fire for me to write by, this here Creeper had maps. Maps of Rannit, boy. New ones. Ones what showed the walls and has all kinds of writing on them. I can’t ken what the writing says, but I don’t like the looks of it one bit.
It’s too heavy for birds so I’ll be a setting out for Rannit as soon as I gets some rest and some provisions. I reckon you’ll want to be a seeing all this. And don’t worry no more about folks from Pot Lockney coming for you and that niece of mine. All that is over and done and I told everybody what’s going to happen to anyone who starts talking foolishness about money owed on fields and the like. I even stuck a empty pole in the ground just so they can think about whose head might be goin’ there next.
I’m all out of room so you take care.
This here is a damned fine axe.
“You look as if you’ve seen a ghost, Mr. Markhat.”
Granny was seated across from me, smiling.
“Mama was full of news.”
“I trust she is well?”
“Quite.” She’d put a cup of steaming tea in front of me. I picked it up, pinky held out like a Peer of the Realm, and had a sip.
“My friend still with us?”
Granny shook her head no. “He has other business now. He asked me to tell you he doesn’t hold you responsible for what happened.”
“He said that.”
“He did. Mr. Mills was a gentle soul, despite his profession and
vices.” Granny took a sip of tea from her own chipped cup. “He did insist that he saw his body up and moving about. Isn’t that an odd thing to say, even if one is a newly born ghost?”
I just nodded. Granny didn’t force the issue.
“I hesitate to mention this, Mr. Markhat, but your deceased friend appeared to be rather more healthy than you do, at the moment. I have a cot in the back, if you would care to rest for a bit.”
I drained my tea. “No thanks, Granny. Miles to go before I sleep.”
She nodded. “I suspected you would say that. Still. Take a biscuit. And do be careful. Weariness leads to tears, my mother always said.”
“Good advice. Thanks for the tea.” She pressed a napkin-wrapped biscuit in my hand. I slipped it into a pocket and stood. “If my ghost comes back around, you might ask him if there’s anybody I can pay his last fee to. Mum or kids.”
“He had no one. Be careful, Mr. Markhat. I fear dark days are upon us.”
“That they are, Granny. That they are.” She unbolted her door, and I stepped out into the light.
Chapter Eighteen
I had several stops to make. Darla’s, for one. And I’d need to look up Mr. Pratt to see if Lethway was dragging his fancy heels in regards to setting up the swap.
But Mama’s letter meant I had another name to call on. Since Evis was lounging on a foredeck somewhere up the Brown, I couldn’t pass this visit off on him, either.
Try as I might, I couldn’t rationalize away the need to see the Corpsemaster and at least let her know someone with a dubious past and links to Prince was keeping detailed maps of Rannit’s walls and who knows what else.
The invaders from Prince would need as much intelligence as they could buy. Knowing what they’d been told, and by whom, might make a difference, even if I couldn’t see how.
I cussed and bade my driver head to the nearest construction site along the walls. Maybe, I thought, I’d get lucky and catch the Corpsemaster watching the progress, as I’d done once before.
All I was doing was stalling, really. The last thing I wanted to do was head for Hisvin’s door. That location was a secret so guarded even the Regent didn’t know it.
But I did. And even though Hisvin knew I knew, I was loathe to actually hammer the point home by showing up and knocking.
There is little comfort to be found in knowing where the monster lays it head to sleep.
I toured the site. Cannon were being lifted into place with cranes worked by bellowing ogres. People looked, pointed and speculated aloud what the things might be. None of their guesses were even close.
No Corpsemaster. No black carriage, driven by a dead man. I took my borrowed carriage on a roundabout tour of Rannit’s north side, and got nothing for my trouble but a bruised fundament and a generous dusting of grime.
I made a brief stop at Darla’s, where I occupied my customary chair long enough to consume Granny’s biscuit. Women spoke and laughed, all in low tones. Mary hummed a wordless tune as she re-arranged the gowns in front window, and I must have drifted off to sleep for a bit, because I was awakened by Darla gently closing my mouth.
“Sorry, dear. You were snoring.”
“I was not. Have you never heard my rendition of the Trollish greeting roar?”
She smiled. “Mary wanted to put a bonnet on your head.”
“Tell her I never wear bonnets after noon.” I caught her around her waist and, sneaky devil that I am, pulled her into my lap.
There may have been a kiss involved. Witness accounts vary.
“I worried about you all morning.”
“I know. Sorry. But I’m fine. See?”
She tilted her head. “You’re exhausted. That’s what I see.”
“You mistake my scholarly contemplation of matters lofty and arcane for a lack of sleep. I promise, hon. I’m fine.”
“Any closer to finding Carris?”
“Much. I may have him back in time for his wedding, after all.”
“I never doubted you would.”
“I’d never give my favorite client less than my very best effort.”
“Still, I expect a substantial discount.”
“Anything for you, my love.” Mary sidled up, blushing and hesitant, and informed Darla in a whisper that a customer wished to speak to her personally.
Darla sighed. “Another cancelation, then.” She rose, brushed the wrinkles out of her pants, and smiled a sad little smile at me.
“I won’t see you again today, will I?”
“I’m afraid not, hon. Because I want you home behind locked doors as soon as you leave work.”
She just nodded. A grim-faced noblewoman wearing a hundred yards of grey marched up, her jaw set and her mouth puckered into a frown.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said. I risked Scowling Woman’s ire by kissing Darla’s cheek. “Take care. Lock the windows too.”
I turned on my heel and departed.
We’ve got to find better ways of saying goodbye.
Finding Pratt was easy. I went back by my place, just to see if anyone interesting was sitting on my stoop, and damned if Pratt wasn’t there, pacing back and forth before my door.
I had the carriage slow to a halt, and then I opened the door and waved. Pratt saw and darted over and climbed right in.
“I’ve been waiting here for an hour,” he said. His face was red and oily. His suit was rumpled and redolent of too many fancy cigars. “Thought you said you’d look me up last night, after your talk with the Colonel.”
“Whoa there. I said I’d see you if I could. Turns out I couldn’t. Why the panic? Lethway catch wind of what you’re planning?”
“No panic.” He rubbed his grimy face with his hands. “Sorry. Been a long night. You lit a fire under the Colonel. I haven’t seen the man so mad since the War.”
I chuckled. “Good. He say anything to you about what his plans are?”
“He told me to be on the lookout for another letter from the kidnappers. Said he’d have a reply ready, this time. And he told me to start rounding up all I could about a certain finder named Markhat-where you live, who you know, where you can be found. Isn’t that comforting?”
I shrugged. “That’s something for another time, unless you think he plans to send for my head in the next couple of days.”
Pratt grunted. “No. He plans to have your head, Markhat, but he’s going to be sneaky about it. You’re safe right now. He told me to pick out five men we could trust to fight and keep their mouths shut. He said we’d need them in a day or two, after the reply is delivered.”
So. Lethway was planning to go along with the exchange, right up until Carris appeared.
And then what?
Set upon the kidnappers and anyone with them, I decided. Leave a couple alive, make them talk, find the rest, wipe them out.
I had no interest in the fates of the kidnappers, once Carris was safe. But since I planned to be at the swap myself, I’d make a fine target for Lethway and his men.
“What about you, Mr. Pratt? You going to be there when they meet for the swap?”
His face reddened a little more. “I haven’t been told. Which means I won’t be asked.”
“He doesn’t want the missus to find out if things go wrong, is that it?”
He nodded a silent yes.
“But you plan to be there anyway.”
“Damned right I do.”
“No talking you out of it.”
“No. You going to try?”
“Me? Perish the thought. In fact, I’m going to invite you to come with me. We both have the same goal in mind-bring Carris home. You don’t care what happens to Lethway and I don’t care what happens to the kidnappers.”
Pratt thought that over.
“You’ve got a reputation for being sneaky, Markhat.”
“Look. Lethway doesn’t care whether Carris comes home in a box or in a cab. The kidnappers are likely to kill Carris so he can’t go around pointing them out later. Hell, without
us, it’s a toss-up whether his father or the villains kill him first. The kid needs somebody sneaky on his side.”
“What have you got planned?”
“Me? Nothing. It’s too early to make plans. I don’t know the wheres or whens. That’s your job, to let me know. I trust Lethway to tell me what he wants me to know, but I trust you to tell me the truth. Because he’s got to know I’ll be watching. And if Lethway can kill me and the kidnappers at the same time, well, that’s a good night’s work, isn’t it?”
“I’ll do it. Tell you, I mean. And we might as well go together. Wouldn’t want to stab you by accident.”
“A touching sentiment. I should have it engraved on a tea service. But stomping around in front of my office? That’s likely to get talked about, Mr. Pratt. Next time, just slip a note under my door, or better yet, pay a kid to do it for you. I can read, you know.”
He grunted. We were rounding the clock, coming up on a weathered red cab that bore the Lethway Mining crest on its side.
“Seriously?” I shook my head. “Next time, hire a couple of bridge clowns and a trumpeter or two.”
“All right, all right, I get your point.” My carriage slowed and Pratt opened the door, then closed it and stuck out his hand.
“I’m trusting you, Mr. Markhat.”
I shook his hand.
“And I’m trusting you, Mr. Pratt.”
He grinned. It was weary, but real.
“I’ll be seeing you.”
I watched him hop out, shout his driver awake, and clamber inside. His bulk set the cab shaking.
I wiped my hand on my pants and took a deep breath and gave the driver directions to a part of town I’d never visited, and never wanted to see.
Once, a long time ago, I saw the Corpsemaster’s house in something like a waking dream. It was the same night I walked with the huldra in my hand, the same night I thought my Darla was dead, slain by halfdead, left bloody and ravaged to die and grow cold and then rise again.
I’d been mad with grief. So when Mama showed me the thing she called a huldra, I’d taken it up. Worse, I’d told it my name.
