The Beggar King

by Michelle Barker

  “Oh, the life of a thief is the one I choose,

  I’ve got two-toned shoes and nothing to lose,

  I’m two steps down the river.

  Check your silverware,

  Hide your coin.

  Kit’s been here, your purse purr-loined.

  Find him? Ha!

  Bind him? Bah!

  He’s two steps down the river.

  Oh, the thing with a kitty when I sing this ditty

  I’ve got scribbler’s blues, and a mislaid Muse

  I’m two steps down the river.

  Lost — your golden bells,

  Gone — your jewels,

  Kit’s got keys and prying tools.

  Find him? Ha!

  Bind him? Bah!

  He’s two steps down the river.”

  Sarmillion looked as if he wanted to disappear beneath the bar but Piccolo hooted and clapped along.

  “Wrote it himself, that undercat did,” he announced. Then he turned to Sarmillion. “You bring me a laddie for some work?” He pointed towards Jordan with his chin. “Or is this just nuisance I sees at my bar?”

  Sarmillion opened his mouth, but it was Jordan who spoke. “I won’t work for you.” He glared at the greasy older man.

  Piccolo’s laugh was sharp and dangerous. “You will when yer hungry, laddie. Eh, Sarmillion? We all knows what it’s like to be hungry, don’t we? That dark hole in the belly that just don’t get smaller no matter how much you wishes.” He winked at Jordan. “You’re a proud one, are ye? Just like yer paps.” Then he left the room, passing through the swinging doors that led into the kitchen.

  Jordan straightened. “What did he mean by that? That man doesn’t know my father.”

  “Piccolo knows everyone,” said Sarmillion. “You’d better hope your father never made an enemy of him. He keeps a ledger — a brown leather folder he calls his big books — a record of every wrong that’s ever been done to him. And he pays them back, one by one. He never forgets the face of a man who’s crossed him.”

  “I’m not crossing him,” Jordan said. “If I have to steal a tomato or two to feed myself, that’s one thing. But I won’t be indebted to someone like him.”

  Sarmillion’s eyebrows rose. “Perhaps you don’t understand the magnitude of this situation. Every Brinnian Landguard is hunting you down. You won’t be going home for a while — maybe not a long while. Piccolo’s the sort of fellow who can offer you protection. He knows the right people. He has the power to make a Landguard look the other way. But he expects something in return. When he offers you work, you take it.”

  Jordan shrugged. “I won’t work for him. I’m a Loyalist. I plan to do something important. Something glorious.” He looked up to see Piccolo standing before him.

  “A Loyalist, he says. Now there’s a rag. Loyalists know better than to announce theirselves to the world, ye damn blatherskite. Ye still got yer slaggin’ milk teeth. Don’t worry, I’ll teach ye your occupation before long.” He set a plate of steaming food before Jordan. “There you are, now. Fresh fish, bit o’ scrambled egg, slice o’ bread, fine tomaties. On the house.”

  Jordan didn’t need anyone to tell him this meal wasn’t free. It was a down-payment on the job Piccolo would ask him to do as soon as he’d finished eating. “I’m not hungry,” he said, pushing the plate away.

  Piccolo’s face went red. He coughed, spat onto the plate of food, then said to Sarmillion, “Tell yer friend he’ll be paying for his meal whether he eats it or not.”

  Sarmillion opened his velvet sack, took out a gold coin and placed it on the bar.

  “No, undercat, I don’t want yer coin. I want his.”

  “I don’t have any,” said Jordan. “But you already knew that.”

  “Well then, my bootless little measle, we have ourselves a problem. See, I made ye a meal. I wants my coin.”

  “Come on, Piccolo,” said Sarmillion. “It’s his birthday. A round of Bloody Billy’s for everyone, my treat.”

  Piccolo kept his eyes trained on Jordan. “Ah,” he said with a smirk. “Sixteen, are ye? A man, now. Big man. Loyalist man. Too good for the likes of us simple folk, eh? Your mule-brained papa was the same. And that sweet young Tanny, wasn’t she just smitten by the skinny carver. Never had a real man, I reckon, or she would’a fancied me instead, eh?”

  Jordan slammed his hands onto the bar. “I don’t need to take this from you.”

  For an instant he panicked. You did it once. Why not do it again? For he had something Piccolo would never have. He thought of the modest vocation that he might have been stuck with: keeper of the cedar groves. Just the sort of thing a boy with no gift could be expected to settle for. But he’d been made for a greater purpose; Willa had been right about that. He reached behind him, pulled apart a corner of the air and waited for the rushing sound of wings around his head. Then he stepped out of the world.

  If the tavern had seemed dark and dank, it was nothing compared to this echoing passageway he entered for the second time that day. He rubbed his arms to keep warm, and breathed through his mouth to avoid the smell of rotting meat.

  “Greetings,” came a voice from behind him.

  Jordan wheeled around. There was that fellow emerging from the shadows, more like a shadow himself than a man.

  “I see you’re making good use of your gift,” he said.

  “It comes in handy,” said Jordan. He tried to make sense of this new place, though the light was poor. “Where are we?”

  “On the dead side of the world, of course.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” said Jordan. “Only spirits walk on the dead side. Everyone knows that.” Had Willa been right? “The dead side’s got its eye on you,” she’d said. But how could it be? He was alive.

  Behind him Sarmillion was dancing around in confusion as Piccolo thumped his meaty fists on the counter and yelled, “Where is he? You bring that dog’s body back in here and make him pay for what he done. I don’t like the look of him. Got too much of his own mind and not enough respect for his elders.” See? There was life, Jordan could hear it.

  In the background came the twanging of the Rubber Band as they sang something about a young rebel who that very morning had made the hanging tree bloom, and he realized with a start it was a song about him.

  The shadowy man was staring at him.

  “Everyone knows the dead side is for spirits, do they?” He let out a high-pitched laugh. “What everyone knows is a far cry from what is, wouldn’t you say? Everyone knows there’s no such thing as the Beggar King. Everyone knows a boy cannot disappear. That’s why no one will believe these things, even when they see them with their own eyes. They’ll search for every possible explanation, and deem impossible the ones that do not please them. They will believe anything except what is. Human nature works in our favour, does it not?”

  Jordan shifted his icy feet. Why did this man keep saying we and us?

  Just then a group of underrats burst into the tavern and sashayed towards the bar, rolling their hips and swivelling their shoulders, their long tails making lines in the dirt floor.

  “Oy!” called a shaven underrat. “You got enough jars o’ mug-wine to feed a thirsty lot of rodents?”

  “Aye, Jack-Jack,” said Piccolo, “for rodents with coin I gots a barrel-full.”

  “Show the man, Shasta.”

  Tottering in her high heels, the underrat named Shasta leaned towards the bar and pulled a velvet sack from somewhere inside her skimpy blouse, dumping several bronze coins onto the counter.

  Piccolo smiled. “My mood’s improving already. The Scribbler here did me a dirty.”

  “Confound you, Piccolo,” cried Sarmillion. “You know I meant no harm.”

  “What dirty?” asked Jack-Jack.

  Piccolo poured glasses of brown mug-wine. “Brings me the son of the scallywag that took my girl, and then he don’t even let me get my due.” He fixed Sarmillion with his small eyes. “I don’t want yer fancy explanations, undercat. I wa
nt my coin for that meal. You tell that little toad he’s in my big books now right alongside his warty-faced father.”

  “What boy?” asked Jack-Jack. “Who is he? Who’s he work for?”

  An underrat dressed entirely in leather leaned forward, his outfit squeaking as he moved, and said, “Shut up, Jack-Jack. The man’s talkin’.”

  “That Elliott boy. He don’t work for me,” Piccolo said with a growl. “But he’s gonna.” He turned back to Sarmillion. “You tell him, Scribbler. I wants a word with him.”

  “Yes, of course,” said the undercat with a small bow. “And in the meantime, feirhart, please accept this gold groder in payment for the food.”

  Piccolo pocketed the coin in silence.

  “The Elliott boy? He’s the one what stood on the black bridge,” said Jack-Jack. “Ain’t he, Piccolo? Ain’t he?”

  Jordan startled. He hadn’t realized anyone had seen him. And he’d never made the connection between being granted passage on that bridge and meeting this man who called himself the Beggar King. He checked behind him but the strange fellow was gone.

  The leather-clad underrat slapped Jack-Jack on the side of the head with a mug-wine coaster. “For the love of dried dung, how ye figure the man’s gonna know who was on that bridge? ‘Twas at least ten twin moons ago.”

  Sarmillion put down his glass. “What bridge? What are you talking about?”

  “Bridge of No Return,” said an underrat wearing a trench coat, his teeth made entirely of gold. “That be the Beggar King’s bridge.”

  “I know what bridge that is, Sardine,” said Sarmillion. He took a great gulp of his Bloody Billy. “No one’s been on it since Balbadoris was taken.”

  “Elliott boy was on it,” said a tall, thin underrat, nodding so that his goatee jumped up and down. “Yuh, we sees him with our own eyes. Cirran kid, wearing his shorty pants.”

  “Ridiculous,” huffed Sarmillion. “Jordan Elliott would never have been granted entry onto the Bridge of No Return. And if he had, he’d have been a fool to accept it.”

  Sardine let out a long burp. “Not our fault the kid’s a dullard.”

  “Nope,” said the underrat with the goatee.

  “Old Willa’s been saying the Beggar King’s coming,” Shasta said. “I’d say ‘twas him what let the Elliott boy on. I got eyes for that sort of thing.”

  “Shasta’s got eyes for anything in pants, eh girl?” said Piccolo, and he clapped, enjoying his joke. Shasta lowered her head and Jordan felt sorry for her.

  “Ain’t just anyone who can see spirits,” she muttered. “But I can. I saw one by the river that day, watching. Just sitting and watching. ”

  “Mice alive,” cried Sarmillion, clearly forgetting the company he was with. “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. Don’t any of you read Cirran literature?”

  “Ain’t none of us can read, save Marco, and he only do it real slow,” said Sardine.

  “Well,” said Sarmillion, “here is your lesson for the day. The Beggar King is a metaphor, not a real person; a way of thinking about darkness. The only one who ever crosses the Bridge of No Return is the scholar Balbadoris who dresses in black robes on the Great Light’s feast day as part of a ritual for cleansing the Holy City of evil. But you wouldn’t know anything about cleansing. I’d wager the lot of you hasn’t seen a warm bath in months.”

  “Nope,” said Jack-Jack with a howl of glee. “Ain’t no one ever chased us outta town for no rit-u-al cleansing.”

  Jordan, who was listening from far away, found himself drifting as if the underrat’s words had created ripples in time that could touch other ripples from other conversations. He heard his father say, “Tradition and ritual are the mainstays of our world.”

  “Your Cirran books is wrong,” said Shasta. “The Beggar King is real, and he’s coming. He’s been calling out to folks. I reckon someone’ll answer him sooner or later.”

  Calling out? Answering? What could she mean? Perhaps this hadn’t been such a great idea after all, accepting a gift from such a man. And yet, thanks to his new skill, Jordan had shown Piccolo — just like he’d shown those Landguards at the holy tree. He shivered.

  “They say he’s a sorcerer,” said Shasta. “Knows all the black spells.”

  “Bet he’s Brinnian,” said Jack-Jack. “Eh, Marco?”

  “Blasted bells!” Marco cried. “Brinnians don’t hold with neither cloaks nor spells. Don’t you know anything?”

  “Well I’m just betting the fella’s Brinnian,” sputtered Jack-Jack. “Got a feeling about it. It’s like Mojo. Eh, Sarmillion? Sometimes ye just get a feeling about a mongoose. Eh?”

  Jordan heard Sarmillion sigh. The undercat tapped a stubby yellow pipe with dried dung, lit it, and left the tavern with his head down. Jordan followed, making his way along the dark path.

  For a little while he trailed Sarmillion, finally emerging into the living world of the bazaar from behind a canvas partition. The light and warmth that rushed back to him were such a relief he forgot the circumstances under which he’d disappeared, tapped the undercat on the back and said, “Hey, there you are.”

  “You!” Sarmillion snarled. “You’re coming with me.”

  Twelve

  A TRICKSTER CALLED GLORY

  HE HAD DISAPPEARED. HADN’T HE? SARMILLION was certain that was what he’d seen, and yet his mind fought it. Boys do not simply disappear, no matter how much you might wish they would. But he resolved not to speak of it to Jordan right away. Sometimes things needed time to simmer, like a good fish stew. Simmering brought out the flavour of the herbs and spices, and then you knew what was what.

  “Blast you, boy,” he sputtered, forcing Jordan to keep up a good clip beside him. “Have you lost your wits? You call yourself a Loyalist but let me tell you, they don’t employ fools and what you did back there with Piccolo was imprudent, to say the least. If you want to accomplish anything useful you’d best start using your head. Oh, impulsiveness. Oh, short-sightedness. What am I to do with such a child?”

  “I’m not a child,” Jordan grumbled.

  “No? Then stop acting like one.” Sarmillion’s jaw was tense and he felt a headache coming on. “What’s going to happen now when the Landguards knock at Piccolo’s tavern? Do you think he’ll say he’s never seen you before? You’re on his slag list now. He’ll betray you the first chance he gets.”

  The undercat turned down an alley overgrown with black snakeweed and then doubled back onto the main street. He pulled Jordan behind him into a doorway and waited. If someone had been following them, he’d know it. Their breathing sounded loud to his ears.

  “I’m sorry,” Jordan said. “I just don’t like him.”

  “Who says you have to like the man? This is about your survival...to say nothing of the entire Loyalist cause. You could do things — great things. But first you’d better learn when to keep your mouth shut.” He peered around the doorway, then nodded to Jordan and they continued walking.

  “So you mean I should have used Piccolo,” said Jordan.

  “The way he would use you. Yes.” The way he uses me.

  “My father wouldn’t do that,” Jordan said, and the undercat thought he sounded a little self-righteous.

  “Welcome to Omar, boy. This is the way things are done. You don’t like it?” He threw his arms up in frustration. “Then you should have taken your tree-keeping robes when you had the chance.”

  “It’s a little late for that now, isn’t it.”

  “Indeed,” huffed Sarmillion.

  They proceeded for several minutes in silence.

  “So what should I do?” the boy said finally, gaping at Sarmillion with wide scared eyes.

  “I don’t know yet.” Sarmillion gentled his voice. “For now, you’ll stay at my place, and I mean stay. Indoors.” He led Jordan up a spiral flight of wrought-iron stairs to the undercat’s apartment. He’d never heard anyone speak to Piccolo like that before. He hated to admit it, but Jordan had courage. A fool’s co
urage, perhaps, but courage nonetheless.

  They stopped at an elaborate door constructed of swirling metal rosettes that were filled in with stained glass.

  “Who’s that in the middle?” Jordan asked, pointing to the carved face of a woman with unkempt hair and crazed eyes.

  “That’s Lady Destiny,” said Sarmillion.

  “I’ve never heard of her.”

  “She’ll catch up to you when you’re older. She always does.” He unlocked the door and stood aside. “Welcome to my humble quarters,” he said, and was pleased to see Jordan’s face go slack as he crossed the threshold. Sarmillion knew the Elliott home well; he’d spent many an evening with Jordan’s father in the reading room. Compared to this opulent setting anyone would say their home was dark and narrow and smelled of cabbage.

  Here were beaded curtains and colourful silks hanging from the ceiling, window after window opening out onto the bustling bazaar, candle sconces and tapestries upon the walls. It was the home of someone who’d made a great success of his life, depending on how you defined success. What it was not, was the abode of a struggling scribe.

  “Where are your parchments?” asked Jordan.

  Sarmillion’s whiskers fell and he dug his nails into his wrist. How could he tell the boy he’d had to hide it all away in a closet so that it wouldn’t stare at him in constant reproach? Only Balbadoris’s long blue sasapher pipe sat on display, collecting dust on one shelf like a souvenir.

  “You heard the song in the tavern,” he said. “I’m not a scribe anymore.” He cleared his throat. “Now, let’s get down to business. Considering we’ve probably alienated our best source of protection, we’ll have to move onto Plan B. You’ll need a disguise,” and he led Jordan to his closet — it took up an entire room. It made the life of a thief worth every black-gloved stolen-candlestick nerve-wracked moment.

  “At home I have a drawer,” Jordan sighed, “with three shirts and two pairs of short pants.”

  Sarmillion shrugged. “What good is life without a collection of smoking jackets?”

  He considered Jordan’s colouring and then selected a pair of ivory pants for the boy, and a long embroidered shirt made of silk and dyed the colour of jade. “And you mustn’t go out without a headdress,” he said, pulling one from a drawer.