Talbot turned to Ak’San, his ruddy face almost crimson in anger.
“Is this yours?” he asked, brandishing a small black object at the merchant.
“Mine?” bristled the merchant. “Mine? Are you accusing me, faun? I sell only top quality merchandise. What would I need with such underhanded tricks?”
Lucy was slowly regaining her senses. It was like treacle being poured out of her brain, or fuzzy fog lifted by a shore breeze.
“Did you buy anything?” the faun asked her. She shook her head, no.
Her eye was drawn to the black object Talbot had removed from her neck. It was a small, leech-like beetle. Its front mandibles clicked and bit at nothing. Its grasping legs flapped uselessly as he held it by its carapace.
“What is that thing?” she said, disgust pulling her face into a gargoyle mask of horror.
“I’ll tell you later, but you didn’t buy anything?”
“No, faun, she didn’t. Even so, she was about to buy.” Ak’San proffered the box.
“Is that what I think it is?”
“Yes. It is, and one of the finest, I might add,” said the merchant snootily.
“What is it?” Lucy asked.
“It’s a riddling box,” sighed the faun.
“You know quite a lot, for a stupid faun,” said Ak’San, smiling and showing his honey teeth again. “It is a riddling box, and a very fine one too. Some very fine riddles inside, very hard to open, which is a shame.”
“A shame—why?”
“Because your little friend put a thing inside it.”
“A thing? What thing?”
“A shard or perhaps a crystal. It looked like it was on a broken necklace, and that is a pity. Once the box is closed it can only be opened by the purchaser. Those are the rules of the market, as I think you know.”
“The key,” Talbot asked, “you put the key inside the box?”
She nodded, ashamed.
He turned back to Ak’San’s greasy smile and asked, “How much for the box?”
“Well, this is a very precious item.”
“How much?” asked Talbot.
“A mere fifty flints,” smirked the merchant.
“Fifty… I should have your hide for this. What about this?” said Talbot thrusting the beetle at the merchant.
“That is not mine,” he sneered. “That little urchin might have picked it up anywhere. Some of these traders are rogues, you know? You should be more careful with your friend if she is not used to such places as this. You never know what trouble she might get into. The box is fifty flints.”
The faun stared at the merchant for a moment, but he had no proof and both knew it. He turned to Lucy looking crestfallen. They were in trouble. The merchant had the amethyst key, and Talbot didn’t have anything like enough money to get it back.
Try bartering, suggested Conscience.
“How about a trade?” she asked.
“A common trade?” Ak’San laughed. “What could you possibly offer the great Ak’San, little urchin?”
Err. What have we got to trade?
Try something out of your rucksack. It’s from another dimension, maybe you brought something that will interest him? The scissors? I don’t know, try anything.
Umm, Okay. Hold on lads, I’ve got an idea.
Hey, was that a quote?
Shh, not now.
“I have a genie,” she said, as triumphantly as she could manage. She was flying by the seat of her trousers but there was just a chance it might work.
“A genie?” said Ak’San surprised.
A genie? said Conscience, equally surprised.
“Yes, a genie. I keep him in here.”
Lucy felt in her rucksack and pulled out the old pair of binoculars. She placed them on her upturned palm for Ak’San to inspect.
The merchant stared at the plastic binoculars for a few seconds, then he sniffed, “That is no genie!”
Lucy watched the merchant closely. His body language said he was not interested in such trifles as binoculars, but his eyes kept darting back to the black plastic on her palm.
Ak’San broke first. “What magic can he do?”
“He will let you see with the eyes of a hawk,” she said, seeing the merchant dribble in anticipation of this new marvel.
“I will need proof before I trade a riddling box for such a toy.”
Lucy took the binoculars in hand and addressed them.
“Genie, let me see with the eyes of a hawk,” she held out the binoculars for the merchant.
“By the six hallowed Sancta!” exclaimed Ak’San, as Lucy put the binoculars to his eyes and focused them. “There is a genie in there.”
“Do we have a trade?” she said, trying to press her advantage.
“Yes, yes. By all the Sancta, we have an accord,” chuckled Ak’San.
He spat on his hand and, before she could do anything about it, the merchant grabbed her palm, pressing his spittle greased hand together with hers. “I will trade the riddling box for this wonder. Take the box. It is yours.”
We should probably get out of here before he finds out that the genie won’t do anything else.
Talbot’s steadying hand was already on her shoulder guiding her away from the enthralled stall owner. The box she gripped in her hands was heavy, much heavier than it really should have been with only the amethyst key inside it. The wood was dark, almost chocolate brown, intricately carved with reliefs of brambles and blackberries. Lucy could get her fingernails into the lid’s indentation, but it just wouldn’t open.
“I wouldn’t bother doing that,” said Talbot, in a voice that was a rain cloud of resignation.
“Why not? It’s just stuck.”
“No, it isn’t. It’s locked.”
“Well, where’s the key? Has Ak’San got it?” she asked, half turning around to go back and get it from the merchant.
“No he hasn’t. There is no key.”
How can you have a lock without a key? asked Conscience.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“It’s a riddling box. They do not open with keys of metal. Come on,” said Talbot, as he pushed his way through the market throng.
She was left baffled as people criss-crossed in front of her. No key? Talbot wasn’t stopping. He just kept on walking away.
“Hey, where are we going?” she asked, as she zig-zagged her way to his side.
“We are going in there for a sit down and a think.”
He pointed towards the mighty clock tower in the shadow of Black Crack Mountain.
“We’re going to a pub?” she asked the faun.
“Yes,” he answered, flatly.
“I’ve never been in a pub,” said Lucy, a little lost.
Neither have I. I wonder if I’ll like it.
The faun stared at her as if she’d just clubbed a baby seal to death. “Never been in a… You never… Well, I… What have you been doing all your life?” he asked.
“I’ve been busy not going into pubs.”
Wind in the Willows, said Conscience.
Yes, I got that one.
“We’ve got to set this to rights at once,” announced Talbot. “There’s nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing about in pubs.”
He was striding towards the door in the clock tower. Lucy had to scamper and dart her way through the crowd to keep up with him as he expounded on the virtues of drinking.
“Wait, wait, wait,” she stopped Talbot, “am I allowed in a pub? I’m sure I’m not.”
Talbot looked at her quizzically. “Of course, you’re allowed in. Why wouldn’t you be?”
“Because I’m not old enough. Don’t you have to be eighteen years old to drink in a pub?” she asked.
“No,” said the faun, looking more puzzled than ever. “Who made that rule up?”
“Err, the government, I think. In 1933. So it was probably McDonald.”
“Well, this the government, and particularly McDonald, don’
t sound like they know what they’re doing, and I don’t think they should be allowed to make up rules. If you don’t allow people to drink until they are eighteen how can you expect them to be any good at it?”
She couldn’t answer.
“You don’t expect people to be instantly good at something like math, do you?”
Lucy shook her head.
“Well then, why should drinking be any different? You have to learn. You need to find your own limits, your own style of drinking. If you just let people drink once they reach the arbitrary age of eighteen, then all you’ll get is a lot of drunken eighteen-year-olds. You’d have social anarchy!”
She thought of her home, of Warminster, on Friday and Saturday nights, chip papers and part eaten kebabs littering the main street. People, sitting in doorways, drunk, throwing up all over the floor and themselves. It did feel like social anarchy. Talbot’s argument sounded reasonable.
Pushing her way through the bat-winged doors Lucy stopped in amazement. The Water Clock Inn’s innards were all wrong. Outside was exactly like a Medieval town, all peasants and nobles. The inside was as she had seen in hundreds of Wild West movies.
There was the large mirror behind the bar which would inevitably be broken during any ensuing fight. There were little round tables for the patrons to sit at. Liquor bottles and playing cards festooned all the tables. It was all as she’d seen in the movies.
She remembered seeing those old films on Saturday afternoons with her grandfather. John Wayne, Henry Fonda and James Stewart cleaning up towns with fast guns and slow talk. She’d always preferred the time spent with her grandfather, rather than the movies, but it still brought back happy memories. Those happy memories of Grandpa Will before his accident.
Talbot was pointing her towards one of the tables as he went up to the bar.
Well, this doesn’t look much like the rest of the town, said Conscience.
It isn’t. It’s out of place. The whole town has been a sort of Medieval fair, but this? This is a Wild West bar. Look, there’s even a man playing a honky-tonk piano in the corner.
The goat doesn’t seem to have noticed.
He’s probably not a good pianist. It’d be hard to play with hooves.
Haha, Conscience said sarcastically, I meant, about the change of ambiance.
Well, of course, he hasn’t noticed, she thought. He’s part of the story, so it’s all normal for him.
Back to that again? It could still be a coincidence.
You seriously can’t be thinking that. It’s just another shoddy piece of writing. Whoever is doing this can’t seem to decide on when the story is set; they keep mixing metaphors and they continually steal characters from other stories.
Talbot came back to the table and slammed down a mug in front of Lucy. At first glance, she thought it was just full of foam.
“This is the best beer this side of Cantab. Get a glass down yourself girl. It’ll warm you up in places you didn’t know were cold,” said Talbot, with rosy cheer. Then he drank in a style that could only be described as quaffing.
Lucy lifted the ale to her lips and sipped at the brownish juice. It reeked like a combination of stale bread and old feet. What was worse, it tasted largely the same as it smelled.
That is horrible, said Conscience. It’s sent all the dials into the red! I’m turning your taste buds off.
“You don’t like it?” asked Talbot, registering the look of disgust on her face.
“It’s not really my cup of tea.”
He drained the dregs from his pint, reached across and began to drink her pint for her. “I’ll go back to the bar in a bit. What would you like this time?”
“I want to get into this flippin’ box,” she said, trying to prize the lid open.
“I told you, it’s a riddling box. It has no key.”
“I’m sorry Talbot. I don’t know what came over me.”
I did try to warn you, but you wouldn’t listen, interjected Conscience.
“It wasn’t your fault,” said the faun. “You were bitten by a Consumer Bug.”
“What’s a Consumer Bug?” she asked, looking at the box with more intensity. Maybe it had a secret lock mechanism.
“A Consumer Bug is the insect I removed from your neck. That merchant was using it to influence you, to control you. Once bitten by the bug people become more susceptible. Less-reputable merchants, like our friend there, use them to get people to buy the rubbish on their stalls. It’s a kind of market ploy.”
“So, how do I open the box?”
“You’ll have to ask it,” he said, in gloom.
“Ask it?”
He nodded and drained her mug.
“All right,” she said. She’d never been one to talk to inanimate objects, but she’d been forced into many unbelievable situations. Talking to a box seemed quite normal by comparison.
We’re stalling again, said Conscience, quietly.
“Box? Open for me?” she hesitantly tried.
I am a box without key for my lid.
Inside all your secret treasure may be hid.
The box’s voice was high, pedantic and haughty. It reminded Lucy of her school music teacher.
“Is it always going to speak in rhyme?” she asked, darkly.
Talbot eyed her over the very last drop of his beer, nodded and looked longingly at the empty mug.
“Box!” she commanded. “Open for me.”
There is little need to talk so loud,
I can hear you above this rowdy crowd.
If shouting is all we can do today,
then perhaps I shall not come out to play.
“Box, how do I open you?” she asked, through gritted teeth.
I think you can do better than this.
A simple please would not go amiss.
We could smash it with an axe, suggested Conscience.
“Maybe we should burn it,” threatened Lucy.
If violence is going to be your attitude,
then I can live without that gratitude.
If my inside treasures you wish to see,
you must answer me these riddles three.
“It’s worse than I thought,” growled Talbot. “It’s a three riddle box. We have to get all three riddles correct. Otherwise it won’t open.”
That is true as white is white.
You must get all three riddles right.
If wrong in just one you be,
then never shall the inside you see.
I told you. We’re being stalled, sang Conscience.
Don’t you ever get tired of being right?
Sometimes I do, he conceded.
Lucy’s head sank into her hands, as she tried to work out what to do next.
Chapter 16 Riddles and Fire
Riddle, riddle burning bright,
deftly tricky to recite,
what immortal eye or hand,
all your inner cunning planned?
From “Poems of the Eternal”
By Yerux Xandu,
Year after Ice 17855
Alice, riddled ever more,
but answers she did lack,
a burning flame,
a running game,
the Ega on her track.
Found engraved, anachronistically,
on the inside of a suit of armour
belonging to Lord Falcrum after his victory
and his death at the Battle of Cantab,
Year After Ice 15099
“All right,” Lucy said, lifting her head from her hands. “What’s the first riddle?”
Conscience was at full attention in her head.
Talbot put down his empty beer mug and sat up. Lucy prepared herself for the onslaught of nonsense which the box was about to utter.
It was obvious really. She was being stalled. The key had been stolen, either by the author or the Dimn, depending on if she or Conscience was right about the nature of reality. Now, she had to go through a trial to get it back. A trial by riddles.
She steeled herself and waited for the drivel to begin.
To begin with a trick is not much fun,
so to start with, have an easy one.
If inside you must persist,
firstly, you must riddle me this.
We are little creatures.
All of us have different features.
One of us in glass is set,
one of us, you’ll find in jet.
Another you may see in tin,
and the fourth is boxed within.
If the fifth you should pursue,
it can never fly from you.
What are we?
The tone of voice the box indicated anything but an immediate response would lower Lucy’s IQ score by ten points for every second’s delay.
She stared blankly at the box.
Maybe it’s a jewel, guessed Conscience. You set jewels in glass and sometimes in tin, don’t you?
“Conscience thinks it’s a jewel,” she said to Talbot.
“You don’t set jewels in tin,” he replied, rather flatly.
I hate that goat.
“No, I don’t think he’s right either,” Lucy said, ignoring Conscience. “Besides, jet is a precious stone, so why would you set a jewel in it? Jet is a black, coal-like stone.”
“Yeah, I know the stuff. Widows wear it in pendants,” chipped in Talbot.
So, you don’t find it with tin? asked Conscience, more out of persistence rather than any hope of being right.
No, she thought to the spell. Tin is an element. You use it to make alloys. Jet is a stone. It’s made up of different elements. And before you ask, none of them is tin.
Ravens and Writing Desks: A Metaphysical Fantasy Page 18
