Fantastic Hope

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  The skeleton knight lowered his lance, pointing it at his opponent. The vampire knight showed no concern about the long wooden stake pointed toward his chest.

  When the Renaissance king waved a pennant, the two knights kicked their horses and charged directly toward each other like street racers playing chicken. The hooves pounded; the audience held their breath. We all stared, tense. The riders came closer and closer.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I watched King Dred hurry down the steps of the reviewing stand, as if he had an important appointment. I turned back to the charging horses. The lances were leveled; the demonic horses were reckless. The two knights seemed not to care for their own lives or safety.

  At the last moment, Sir Fangsalot raised his shield, knocked the threatening wooden staff to one side, but held his own pole firm and plunged it through the armored chest of Sir Anatomy. The lance skewered the skeletal knight and knocked him off his horse. He landed with a clamor of armor on the jousting field.

  The crowd’s gasp was like thunder. The vampire knight rode past and wheeled around, holding up a gauntleted hand in triumph. “Victory is mine!”

  The skeleton fumbled on the ground, grabbing at his metal breastplate, barely able to move due to the long lance thrust directly through him. He pulled his armor plate open to reveal that the wooden shaft had passed harmlessly between two widely spaced ribs.

  “You hit no vital organs!” shouted Sir Anatomy. “I demand a rematch.”

  “It’s all fake,” said Alvina, “like WWE.”

  “All in good fun, honey,” said Sheyenne. “No real knights were hurt during the performance.”

  Golems lumbered onto the field to extricate the long lance from Sir Anatomy. They rounded up the snorting demon horses and started to prepare the field for the two o’clock jousting round.

  Having finished her unicorn frappé, Alvina was hungry again. Leaving the jousting field, we strolled among the vending stalls, sniffing the odors, some delicious, some nauseating.

  I heard subdued shouting up ahead, clearly an argument that was not part of any performance. My eyes were drawn to pointy objects at a sword vendor’s stall. A scrawny old gremlin with patchy fur and immensely thick glasses squirmed on a stool behind a counter, surrounded by broadswords, throwing daggers, battle-axes, and morning stars. A sign in front of the stall promised GIFTS FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY!

  King Mortimer Dred loomed in front of the stall, waving his arms. “I want that sword! You were supposed to hold it for me.”

  “Sorry, sir,” said the gremlin in a raspy voice. “We can’t do layaway plans.”

  “I am the Renaissance king,” Mort insisted.

  The gremlin leaned forward like an astronomer peering through a telescope, but he couldn’t see much through his glasses. “I told you last week, and the week before, that someone already bought the sword.” He gestured toward his collection of weapons on display. “But I have plenty of others. Why not choose a different one?”

  “Because a different one is not Excalibur.”

  Attracted by the shouting, Robin, Sheyenne, and I approached the stall, ready to help if the situation grew ugly.

  “Can I have a sword?” Alvina asked. “A long, pointy one?”

  “Not today, honey,” Robin said.

  The gremlin brightened, sensing new customers. “I am Noxius, purveyor of sharp objects! I have blades of every shape and design, ranging from mortal combat weapons to kitchen cutlery. Talk to me if you see something you like.” He leaned forward on his stool, peering down at Alvina. “How about a double-bladed battle-ax for the cute little girl?”

  “Oh, so now you can see just fine?” Mort huffed.

  “She’s cute,” explained the gremlin.

  Alvina grinned bashfully, showing her fangs.

  I butted in. “What seems to be the problem?”

  Robin said, “I know several members of the Unnatural Quarter’s Better Business Bureau.”

  “I should file a complaint!” Mort glared at Noxius. I saw that the painted puppies and Elvis figures on his black velvet robes were quite well done. “Excalibur is missing, and I need to find it. The sword belongs to me! I am the proper king!”

  The gremlin shrugged. “First come, first served. The dragon lost the weapon from her hoard, fair and square. She just can’t resist a bet.”

  Mort clenched his hands and worked his jaw. His eyes became very hard. “That damned Alice and her gambling problem.” He leaned over the rickety wooden counter, and the gremlin flinched behind his thick glasses. “I’ll buy it back. I’ll pay you double. Just tell me who has it.”

  “I told you before, they all look the same to me,” said Noxius. “Couldn’t read his name.”

  “Why would a golem want a legendary sword in the first place? What are they going to do with it?”

  That immediately piqued my interest. “Excuse me, sir? I’m Dan Chambeaux, zombie private investigator, and this is Robin Deyer, my partner at Chambeaux and Deyer Investigations. Could you tell us more?”

  Mortimer Dred gave us a dissecting look. Alvina waved, and the king didn’t find her endearing. “I’ll do more than explain to you—I’ll hire you! If you’re a detective, I need you to find Excalibur, the sword of kings. He who holds the blade, rules the land . . . and the Real Renaissance Faire. I will pay you greatly if you find it for me.”

  As our business manager, Sheyenne immediately took charge. Somehow she produced a sheet of paper from her medieval costume. “This is our client engagement form. If you’ll fill this out, Mr. Dred, we can begin our investigations right away.”

  III.

  As a zombie detective it’s my passion to solve crimes, like golem murders. I liked keeping innocent monsters safe, and helping my BHF McGoo. But we did have to pay the bills.

  “We’ll find the missing sword,” I promised.

  “Always take care of the client,” Robin said, satisfied, “but our real work is in the name of justice.”

  “And keeping our business afloat,” Sheyenne added. The two didn’t always see eye to eye.

  “Don’t forget about my college fund,” Alvina said.

  Since Excalibur had been part of the dragon’s treasure hoard until it fell into the hands of the gremlin sword vendor, we decided to go ask Alice. The little vampire girl was eager to meet her very first dragon, even though fantastical beasts were commonplace in the Unnatural Quarter.

  Outside the main exhibition area, the dragon’s tent was impossible to miss, being big enough to hold a giant flying reptile with elbow room to spare. We made our way through the hubbub, passing a fire eater who was being heckled by an actual fire demon, and a juggler who was a multiarmed squid creature wearing colorful medieval clothes.

  Before our band of merry friends could get there, however, we encountered an unexpected attraction. Standing on a wooden crate, a golem raised clay fists to the sky and shouted in a hollow voice that belonged at a political rally. “Golems have been downtrodden for too long! We will no longer let our mud be trampled underfoot and tracked all over the house. We were made to serve, but we were not made to suffer. Golems have rights.”

  “Serve, not suffer,” the crowd chanted.

  I saw a handful of curious onlookers like ourselves, but most of the crowd consisted of golems dressed like peasants, laborers, beasts of burden. One wore a dress with a low-cut bodice, its rounded clay breasts scrunched up in a bad imitation of a lusty barmaid.

  “Serve, not suffer!” they chanted. Someone bellowed, “Three cheers for Art.”

  They all yelled, “Art! Art!”

  The golem speaker stood straight-backed, strong and confident, his clay smooth and moist. The name Art was imprinted on his forehead. “I am on a crusade for my fellow golems. We want better conditions at the Real Renaissance Faire.”

  “And in the whole Unnatural Quarter,” called an
other golem.

  There was something about Art. Though most golems were subservient walking lumps of mud, this one was a leader, filled with charisma.

  McGoo sidled up to me, dressed in his beat cop uniform, which meant he was on duty. I shuddered to imagine him in a Renaissance costume. “Hey, Shamble. Seen anything suspicious?”

  “If you don’t see something suspicious in the Quarter,” I said, “then that in itself is suspicious.”

  He tipped his cap toward the golem firebrand still shouting from his soapbox. “Who’s that?”

  “A rabble-rouser,” I said.

  “A crusader for justice,” Robin interjected.

  “That’s what I meant to say,” I corrected myself. “His name is Art.”

  McGoo nodded with mock seriousness. “You could frame him and hang him on the wall.” When I responded with a blank look, he added, “Then he’d really be art.” McGoo waited for me, or anyone, to laugh. He was about to explain the cleverness of his joke when fortunately we were interrupted by several huge ogre guards bent on violence.

  “Break it up! Break it up!” The ogres’ voices sounded like rocks rattling out of a gravel truck. They carried thick spiked clubs.

  The golem workers scattered, knowing they weren’t supposed to be on a coffee or crusading break. The burly ogres elbowed people aside as they pushed their way toward the defiant Art, swinging their clubs.

  One of the smaller golems, obviously a convert to Art’s cause, threw himself in front of the ogres, and they squashed him, bending his body and smooshing his shoulder and arm as they knocked him with a club. The damaged lump of clay twitched and crawled away.

  McGoo charged in. “Hey, I’m law enforcement here. I’m a peace officer.”

  “We’re chaos officers,” said the nearest ogre. “Private contractors.”

  Art sprang from his soapbox and ducked down as he melted into the milling crowd. He ran a palm over his forehead to smear out the letters of his name, leaving only a blank gray patch as he disappeared.

  The ogres—generally about as bright as golems—were easily confused.

  After the impromptu crowd dispersed and the ogres strutted in circles holding up their heavy clubs in search of something to do, I nudged Alvina along. “I better get you away from this.”

  Robin’s nostrils flared, and she flashed a venomous glance at the ogre guards. “We were all a witness to that!”

  While McGoo went to have stern words with the overenthusiastic ogres, I hurried my companions toward the big tent on the outskirts. “We’re off to see the dragon.”

  IV.

  Two more security ogres stood outside the dragon’s tent, though I couldn’t understand why an enormous creature like Alice would need bodyguards.

  “To keep the paparazzi away,” said one of the ogres.

  “And autograph hounds,” said the other. “Now, piss off.”

  Robin was incensed, but I tended to be calmer, more relaxed. After coming back from the dead, I found it easier not to be bothered by little things. I stepped forward. “We’ve been hired by King Mortimer Dred to investigate a missing sword that recently belonged to Alice. We’re here to interview her.”

  Alvina piped up, “It’s an important part of the case.”

  Sheyenne produced a copy of the client engagement contract, which enlisted our services for locating the sword called Excalibur, and thrust it in front of the ogres. “See, here’s proof.” They squinted, tugged on their drooping fat lips, and pondered. Ogres were too embarrassed to admit they couldn’t read, so they let us pass.

  Reptiles had a certain smell about them, and even though my senses were dulled thanks to the embalming process, I could instantly tell that some giant lizard lived within the tent. Of course, I could see the huge dragon, which was my second clue. Alvina pinched her fingers around her nose.

  “Oh, visitors!” boomed the dragon in a lilting female voice. “I’m on a break between performances.” Alice leaned forward with a gigantic scaly head, slit eyes the size of basketballs, and fangs that would have made a great white shark pee in the water. Her green and gold scales were like garbage-can lids. “Did you come to interview me? King Dred likes the publicity, but he never sends the press anymore.” She snorted. “Once, I ate a reporter who asked an embarrassing question. Is this a softball interview?”

  Alice settled herself on top of a pile of treasure—gold coins, chains, chests of jewels, battered suits of armor, swords with gem-inlaid hilts. The wealth I saw was enough for a comfortable retirement account, even for a long-lived dragon, but the amount did look a little disappointing. When Alice shifted her position, coins, chains, and gilded blades rattled beneath her. “Is this my good side?” She turned a head the size of a rowboat.

  “We’re here to talk to you about a sword, ma’am,” I said, using my best professional PI voice. “The Renaissance king hired us to find Excalibur.”

  Alice grumbled. “Excalibur, Excalibur! I have plenty of treasure, and all anybody wants to talk about is Excalibur.”

  “Isn’t the sword famous?” I asked. “From a movie, or something?”

  Alice blinked her huge eyes. “You don’t know the story of Excalibur?” Sheyenne and Robin both looked at me in surprise.

  Alvina sighed. “Excalibur was the sword of King Arthur. Only the rightful king can draw it from the stone.” The little vampire girl was constantly getting her information from the internet, so she was better informed than I.

  “That must be why King Dred wants it,” Robin said. “It legitimizes his rule over the Real Renaissance Faire.”

  “Isn’t it all just fun and games?” Sheyenne asked. “Costumes and jousting acts? It’s not a real legendary sword.”

  “After the Big Uneasy, who knows what’s real anymore?” I asked. “If dragons can be real, then Excalibur can be real.” I turned back to Alice. “So, can you tell us what happened to the sword?” I stepped closer, trying to be congenial. I could smell the dragon’s breath.

  “Excalibur was part of my hoard. So many riches! Once, I needed seven warehouses just to keep my treasure, but, alas, much of it is gone now, dwindled away.” She raised her head and snorted one small smoke ring. “This losing streak is bound to end soon, though! I’ll win it all back. I know I will.” She flapped her giant wings, rattling the tent fabric overhead, then settled back onto the mound of gold and jewels.

  Robin thought she understood. “You gambled away your treasure?”

  “And Excalibur?” I added.

  “I still have some riches.” The dragon sounded defensive. “A big win is right around the corner. I know it. Dragons can sense these things.”

  Sheyenne drifted close and whispered in my ear. “The dragon has a gambling problem.”

  Dragons also had extremely acute hearing, as I should have remembered from The Hobbit. “Yes, I have a gambling problem—I admit it! It’s the thrill, the risk . . . and the winning.” She clacked shut her fanged jaws. “Texas Hold’em is my preference, though it’s hard to hold the cards with big claws like these.”

  Alice raised a huge scaled hand. “I lost a chest of gold and Excalibur two weeks ago in a big game. That gremlin is a good player! Noxius would win a few hands, then I’d win, then he’d win a few more. He’d egg me on until I bet the whole pot.” The dragon snorted smoke, flapped her wings, and tried to settle down. “I don’t know how he can even see the cards with glasses that thick, but I kept raising the bet, because I knew I was about to start a winning streak!” Her slit eyes held a disturbing obsession. “I’ll win it back—I’ll win it all back.”

  “You need help, Alice,” Sheyenne said in a sincere voice. “It’s an addiction. Gambling makes you lose everything.”

  The dragon hung her head, and her groan of sorrow was a rumble deep in her throat. “I know . . .” Then she perked up. “Would you like to play a round now? Who’s got a d
eck of cards? I could use the practice!”

  “Sorry, ma’am, I’m on the job,” I said. “We need to find Excalibur.”

  “Talk with Noxius. He put it up for sale in his sword vending stand.”

  “He did. Sold it to a golem, but we don’t know which one.”

  “Sure you don’t want to play a game? Not even one?” Alice whined. “Low stakes, I promise! A buck a round. I’ll bet on anything.” She sounded desperate.

  Sheyenne looked concerned. “I think the Unnatural Quarter chapter of Gamblers Anonymous accepts legendary creatures.”

  The dragon’s need was so great she actually trembled. “It’s a terrible disease.” She closed her basketball-sized eyes. “Go away. I need to rest before my next performance.”

  Out of courtesy, we hurried out of the tent.

  V.

  Rettop the Cavewight had hands like lawn rakes covered with thick mud. A big grin crossed his pale, sallow face. Sitting on a stone bench next to a wheelbarrow of fresh clay, he whistled as he worked. He pumped his potter’s wheel with his feet and slapped on more mud, building up a mound that he shaped into a circular vase. His hands and fingers were so large he could manipulate a lot of mud at a time.

  Werewolves, ghouls, and vampires watched him with interest as he shaped the sides, pulled up a fluted oblong container, and then poked his fingers down inside to make it hollow, expanding the waist. Next to his potter’s wheel sat a table filled with his wares: pots, vases, and ashtrays.

  “Can you make canopic jars?” asked a curious mummy.

  “One of my specialties,” said Rettop. “I take commissions.”

  Alvina had paused to look at a crudely fashioned flowerpot. She looked up at me with those big eyes. “I’m thinking of getting a present for you and McGoo. Father’s Day is coming up. How about an ashtray?” She picked up a lumpy object that looked like a project I had made in third grade.

  If my heart were still beating, it would have been filled with joy. “That’s beautiful.”

  “I’ll take you shopping separately, honey,” Sheyenne said. “We’ll make it a surprise for both daddies.”