Unfortunately, a rather nasty bar brawl broke out before he even got to declaim the first “O!” He spent the whole afternoon hiding under a table and hoping no one would hit him.
* * *
It was a magnificent chamber, tiled in black and white mosaics which portrayed the impossible in several easy steps. Kassa’s eyes could hardly take in the elaborate images of staircases going nowhere and inside-out clockwork twisting in every direction. She squeezed her eyes shut.
“That’s what I usually do,” said a mournful voice. “Gets a bit much, doesn’t it? Hang on.”
There was a swishing sound. Kassa opened one eye, and then the other. The entire chamber was now swathed in black velvet curtains which mostly concealed the disturbing mosaics. And sitting on a jet-black throne was a tallish man, long-nosed and droopy of features. He was wearing…
“Great dress!” said Vervain enthusiastically.
“It’s a robe, you little insect,” snapped the long-nosed man. “It’s supposed to symbolise grandeur and dignity.”
“It’s a very nice robe,” said Kassa, for wont of something sensible to say. The robe was high-necked and full-skirted, made of black velvet. She couldn’t help scanning the room to see if there was a robe-shaped hole in any of the curtains.
“It helps me look the part,” the long-nosed man said, not sounding too pleased about it. “I’m forgetting my manners. How do you do, I’m the Dark One.”
Something clicked in the back of Kassa’s brain. “Hang on a minute,” she said accusingly. “You’re a god! You’re not supposed to be here!”
“I assure you, I am,” said the Dark One reproachfully.
“Oh, no you don’t!” Kassa declared. “My brains may have turned to porridge since my unfortunate demise, but I know my Comparative Mythology and you, sir, are not supposed to be governing the Underworld.” She frowned. “I’m not sure what it is you should be doing, but I do know that there are no gods in the Underworld. Everyone knows that!”
“That’s what I tried to tell them,” sighed the Dark One. “Nobody ever listens to me.”
He explained, and Kassa tried to get her already-fuddled brain around the concept. “You’re temping?”
“That’s right,” said the Dark One bitterly. “The King of the Imps had some vital mission, apparently. And who do they think of? Do they send in Amorata, or Wordern, or whatsisname, the Zibrian fellow who keep turning into a shower of gold and seducing women? No. The first one who springs to mind is Muggins here. Good old me. Just because I’m the Lord of Darkness, they assume I must know something about dead people! Not only that, but I can’t vote in the God Council for as long as I’m allied with Underworld. Something about compromised neutrality. Hah!”
“So where is the King Imp now?” Kassa asked. Her mind was starting to clear a little, probably the influence of all the black velvet.
“Gone,” said the Dark One. “I don’t know where. I don’t think he’s coming back. Why should he bother? I’m stuck with it now. Lord of Darkness, Walker in Shadows, Slayer of the…oh, whatever it is I’m a Slayer of. I’ve got hundreds of titles like that, you know. All dark and dismal and thoroughly depressing.”
Kassa nodded sympathetically and perched on the edge of his throne. “You know what? You don’t sound like someone who’s very happy with his self-image.”
The Dark One laughed hollowly. “My self-image? How could anyone be happy with my self-image? I’m the Harbinger of Horribleness, the Despot of…”
“So change it!”
He broke off and stared at Kassa, his long nose twitching slightly. “Change what?”
“Listen,” she said patiently, “All you need is a good propaganda agent. Trust me, I know. Look at the Lady Emperor. She started out as nothing but a calculating courtesan with no interests beyond boys and clothes. Now she rules Mocklore, and is halfway to being taken seriously. Propaganda. That’s all it takes.”
“You mean it could work for me?” said the Dark One enthusiastically. “I could have a—new image?”
“No problem,” Kassa promised him. “First of all, we have to do something about your clothes.” She leaned forward, whispering conspiratorially. “You know, just because you’re called the Dark One, you don’t have to wear black all the time.”
“I don’t?” said the Dark One, his eyes lighting up. It took him a moment to get the hang of it, but eventually he managed something approximating a smile. “I never thought of that!”
“Gods aren’t used to new concepts,” Kassa agreed sympathetically. “Skeylles—you know, the Fishy Judge, Lord of the Underwater—anyway, he’s my godfather, and I’ve been trying to convince him of the benefits of wearing dolphin-friendly fishing nets for years now. He just can’t wrap his head around the idea.”
“I could wear—brown,” said the Dark One hesitantly.
“Or blue,” Kassa said encouragingly. “Even yellow, or crimson. The world is your book of samples. The image always starts with the clothes. Right, Vervain?”
The sprite leaped forward, eager to be of assistance. “Abso-lutely, your Dark Majesty,” he babbled. “We’ll get you kitted out in no time. Some nice suits, big lapels, bright colours, I can really see you in a lime green and pink ensemble. Then maybe for more casual events, we could get you a twin-set and pearls…”
“Is he serious?” the Dark One interjected with a worried frown.
“Mostly, but we’ll work on it,” Kassa promised. “We’re going to have to work on that ‘Dark Majesty’ bit, though. You need a nice, unthreatening name.”
“Like what?” asked the Dark One.
“Like…” Kassa picked a name at random. “Gerald! Or—Gervaise is very nice at this time of year. Something that’s not ostentatious”
“I’ve always liked the sound of…Glorius the Third,” the Dark One suggested tentatively.
“Cool!” Vervain chipped in.
“I can see you’re both going to get on just famously,” Kassa sighed.
The Dark One and Vervain fell into a deep discussion about the merits of vinyl as opposed to real leather, and whether it was suitable for men to wear silk (Vervain argued furiously that it was, but the Dark One remained unconvinced).
Eventually, Kassa took a deep breath and joined in the conversation. “As we’re being so helpful, I was wondering if you could possibly show me if there were any back doors to this place.” She smiled hopefully.
The Dark One regarded her suspiciously. “You’re dead, aren’t you? I can’t just let you out. What would the neighbours say?”
Kassa made a face. “I don’t actually believe that I’m dead. I certainly don’t feel any different to when I was alive—my brain keeps turning into marshmallow, but I’m sure that will pass.”
The Dark One sighed. “You’d better look out a window. Maybe that will sort you out.” He gestured towards a particular expanse of black velvet. “Over there, fourth curtain from the left.”
Kassa looked at him suspiciously. “I thought windows were against the rules.”
“They’re allowed by prescription.”
“Oh. Fair enough.” It took quite a while, but Kassa finally wrestled the black velvet out of the way and found herself staring through a panel of something which might in another reality have been called ‘glass’.
The Mocklore Empire stretched out like a watercoloured map. The trouble was, it was several metres above her, hundreds of fathoms below her, right up close and a million miles away all at the same time. It was over to the left, under her feet, out of sight and, to complicate matters, everywhere else in a thousand different directions. Kassa struggled with the conflicting images which filled her head, pounding and pounding to make themselves understood.
The porridgy-marshmallow feeling lifted from her brain for an instant, and Kassa understood everything.
She turned to face Vervain and the Dark One, tears streaming out of her luminous golden eyes. “It’s true,” she said wildly. “I really am dead, aren’t I?”<
br />
“Never mind,” said the Dark One absently. “There, there. Come and explain what this Vervain chap means about pink lycra. It’s all rather fascinating, but I can’t make head nor tail of it.”
* * *
It was evening now, and Aragon Silversword had spent the whole day on his own. There was no mad Emperor bursting into his room to demand opinions of his latest fruit salad sculpture, no smelly jailers making faces at him through the bars, no Lady Emperor breathing seductively down his neck, no Kassa bloody Daggersharp trying to mould him into some kind of hero.
There was no Kassa.
He hadn’t taken it in yet. He was free, that much was certain. Free of the witchmark she had burned into his chest during a weak moment, sealing his ‘loyalty’ for all time. Free of her youthful expectations of the man he ‘could be’ if he started caring about anything other than himself—in other words, if he had a personality bypass.
Aragon sat on the thin, ordinary bed in the room above the tavern. His left hand slowly clenched and unclenched. He was free now, he told himself, free to do what he wanted, free to be his own man for a change. No one’s champion, or liegeman. No one’s slave.
But he wasn’t free. Not in the least. Every time he closed his eyes, an image of golden eyes and tangled red hair filled his mind. “That bloody witchmark of yours,” he said aloud in the grubby little room. “It won’t even let me forget you now that you’re dead.” That wasn’t in the rules. It wasn’t fair. But then again, when had Kassa Daggersharp ever played fair?
“Talking to yourself,” noted a voice from the window-ledge. “It’s the first sign, you know. I’m not sure what it’s a sign of, but it certainly can’t be good for you.”
Aragon stood very still. After a suitable pause, he flicked his eyes in the direction of the window. He wasn’t surprised. Why should anything surprise him now? “Hello, Bounty.”
His unexpected visitor smiled her sexy smile, and said nothing.
5: The Priestess and the Profit-scoundrel
The explosion billowed and crashed and generally exploded. Bits of temple rained everywhere. The spindly trees bent and blistered. Daggar Profit-scoundrel hid himself under his many possessions and waited for the noise and the heat to go away.
Eventually, it did. And all was silent.
Daggar picked himself up, his ears still ringing, and looked around for Singespitter. As was usual in stressful situations, the sheep had sprouted purple wings and was currently flapping his way towards the nearest mountains.
The debris of the temple now cluttered the grassy area in a disorderly fashion. Daggar absently scooped up a piece of statue and picked off the burnt bits. It was a severed finger sculpted in bronze. He tucked it into one of his sacks and headed towards the biggest pile of rubble, peering this way and that in search of a handy bargain or three. If a swindle was out of the question (and he hadn’t fully discarded the idea) he certainly wasn’t averse to a bit of general profitmongery. There was some good stuff here, even if most of it was lying in pieces and steaming.
Wondering vaguely if it counted as desecration to rob a temple after it had been razed to the ground, Daggar tried to lever a nicely rounded statue off the still-smouldering pile of ex-temple without burning his fingers. It was then that he saw the hand.
A slender, female hand pushed its way up out of the rubble, moving tentatively around in the open air. Slowly the fingers felt their way across the top of the debris as if searching for an easy way out.
Due perhaps to his warped lifestyle, Daggar couldn’t help thinking that this hand was the most alluring object he had seen in his life. A moment later, he pulled himself together and caught hold of the hand, calling some vague reassurances to whoever it was had been inside the temple when it blew up.
He began his rescue attempt, heaving the larger pieces of masonry and statue to one side (pocketing the smaller, more valuable bits). Finally, he uncovered a mass of tawny-blonde hair, and a young woman’s face emerged from beneath the rubble. She was swearing. A long chain of obscenities issued forth from her attractive mouth, and didn’t stop until her entire body (clad in a purple priestess’s robe) was uncovered and pulled away from the hot stone remains of the destroyed temple.
What really impressed Daggar was that she didn’t repeat any of the words.
Finally she fell silent, coughed weakly and sat up. Only then did Daggar realise how extraordinarily attractive she was, despite a harsh expression and a long scar on her face. He could have fallen into her jade-green eyes, and indeed was already hoping that such an opportunity would arise in the near future. He watched in something close to shock as she dragged her slender hands through her long crop of tawny-gold hair, and found himself wondering if the priestesses of this temple were a chaste order. He had heard that such oddities existed in the strange northern wastes of Mocklore.
“Well?” rasped the priestess finally in a strange accent, melodic but entirely unplaceable. “You are going to offer me a drink, yes?”
Daggar automatically drew his best salt-whisky flask from his belt and handed it to her, without shifting his gaze from her jade-green eyes.
She unscrewed the flask, sniffed suspiciously and then handed it back untasted. “Thank you, but I think I will prefer my own.” To Daggar’s amazement, she reached under her purple robes, drew out a similar flask and took a healthy gulp of the contents. Noticing his reaction, the woman offered him a taste.
Daggar took a cautious swallow from her flask, and gasped as the white-hot liquid clawed its way down his throat. He could still feel it burning as it passed various vital organs on its way down. “Whah—whah—” he choked wildly, waiting for the pain to stop. It didn’t. Not for a long time.
“Troll-brandy,” she said, not sounding particularly sympathetic. She took back her flask and swigged again before tucking it out of sight. “An acquired taste. Who are you?”
He tested his vocal cords for permanent damage. “Daggar,” he managed to say.
“Daggar,” she said thoughtfully. “A good name. I am Sparrow. We will travel together for a while, I think. You do not object?”
“I have to find my sheep,” Daggar croaked.
She shook back her golden hair. “Very well. First we will find your sheep, and then we will travel together.”
Daggar shrugged weakly, and agreed. What choice did he have?
* * *
Officer Finnley McHagrty stared at the flying carpet. “Are you sure this is safe?” The Blackguard’s manual hadn’t mentioned flying in the name of duty.
“We got it from the Hidden Army in exchange for half a barrel of invisible ink,” replied Mistress Opia. “And no one attempts to palm shoddy goods off on to the Brewers.” A hard edge appeared momentarily in her sweet voice, but it vanished as quickly as it had arrived. “On you get, dear,” she said briskly.
“But those things are lethal,” McHagrty protested. Flying carpets had been officially classified the most dangerous life-form to have evolved in the Skullcap Mountains, and that was really saying something. This particular flying carpet was a tightly-woven rug the size of his ma’s kitchen, sporting pin-striped motifs of the legendary Battle of the Eaglesbog Trenches (with Wildebeests). It lay innocently on the steps of the Brewer’s Pavilion, rippling its fringe in a less-than-menacing way.
Mistress Opia loaded her big black bag on to the back of the carpet and climbed on, settling herself and looking at the carpet with a fixed smile as if daring it to do something she wouldn’t approve of. “Now you,” she said to Finnley. “Look sharp, we haven’t got all day. And you, Hobbs. The rest of you can stay here.”
The gnome looked outraged. “I can’t go adventurin’ now! I got stuff to do, profits to make…”
“You’re not a profit-scoundrel yet,” Mistress Opia reminded him. “But you are a Brewer, young gnome. Besides, did you really think I was going to leave you unsupervised with the cash register?”
Muttering under his breath, the gnome clambered on to th
e carpet.
“Oh, I say,” said Elder Grackling suddenly in his wavery voice. “Can’t I come too? I used to be a great explorer, you know.”
“You’ve never been outside Dreadnought in your life,” said Mistress Opia firmly. “The Soothsayer is tracking the thief in her Pool of Wonder and the boy has a lot of sweeping to do, so you have to look after the business for me, Dad. Be good.” She turned, and fixed Officer Finnley with a sugary smile. “Well? Are you coming, lad?”
Finnley took a deep breath and stepped on to the carpet. To his amazement, it stayed still. Not even a flutter. “Well,” he said in vague relief, “I suppose these things can be trained…ahhahhhahahahhghghh!”
The carpet, sensing the young Blackguard relax slightly, took off from a standing start, whizzing up and over the city of Dreadnought. It was only by clutching at Hobbs the gnome that young McHagrty managed to keep himself from falling off completely.
“She’ll be heading for Zibria,” stated Mistress Opia, hanging on to her travelling hat which was large, squat and floral in nature.
“How do you know that?” questioned Finnley, his heart sinking. They had to ride this deathtrap all the way to Zibria?
“Humph,” she said. “I only know one person who is crazy enough to pull a stunt like this, and that’s the Sultan of Zibria. He’s been trying to get my attention for years. Hobbs, would you make the tea?”
The gnome, who had not ceased muttering mutinously during the entire trip, now muttered even more as he crawled over to Mistress Opia’s big black bag and pulled out a kettle, teapot, several tins of things and a few handfuls of kindling.
Finnley, who had been busy staring with horror at the wildly colourful Skullcap Mountains below, now stared with equal horror as Hobbs the gnome prepared to light a small campfire in one corner of the flying carpet. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he spluttered.
“You stick to your job, dear, and we’ll stick to ours,” said Mistress Opia with a click-clack as she pulled her knitting out of her bag and started in on it. “If you’re very lucky, I might let you arrest the young lady when I’m finished with her.” The flinty look behind her little horn-rimmed spectacles suggested that there would not be much left of the tawny-haired thief afterwards, grandmotherly smile or not.
The Mocklore Omnibus (Mocklore Chronicles #1 & #2) Page 31
