The Beggar King

by Michelle Barker

  Prying? Jordan had opened that door without any effort at all.

  “Now, the night may be made of time,” Mars said, “but none of it belongs to us. You’ve made an enemy of Piccolo. Landguards come calling, he’s gonna tell ‘em he seen ye, and this is the first door they’ll knock at.”

  “Where can I go?” Jordan asked. He couldn’t disguise the tremor in his voice.

  Sarmillion and Mars exchanged a look.

  “Best place to hide something is under their noses,” said Mars. “No one suspects a simple gardener. They all reckon I’m lowly and dumb. I’ve got a cave down near the river. We hide Loyalists there sometimes if they’re in danger. I say we go there.”

  Sarmillion collected the whiskey glasses off the table. “I’ll pack my bags.”

  “Ye won’t be needing yer smoking jackets, underkitty.”

  “I don’t expect you to understand,” the undercat replied. “You wear overalls.”

  Mars slapped his hands on his thighs. “I’m a gardener. What do ye think I’d wear? Meditary robes?”

  Jordan followed the undercat into his walk-in closet.

  “Put your headdress on,” Sarmillion said. “You’ll need it.”

  Jordan tried to fix it the way Sarmillion had shown him but his hands were shaking too badly and it ended up a twisted mess.

  “Let me,” said the undercat, and he arranged it in less than a minute.

  Jordan regarded himself in the looking glass. There were the same green eyes staring back at him, the same mole on his cheek, the same dimple in his chin. “This isn’t going to work,” he said.

  Sarmillion zipped up his bag and put on a straw fedora hat. “It has to, old friend. It’s all we’ve got.”

  Fourteen

  CROSSING THE BALAKAN

  ONLY NE’ER DO WELL WOULD GRANT Jordan, Sarmillion and Mars passage across the Balakan River. As they negotiated the dangerous bridge of uneven planks, anxious about it supporting their weight, Jordan could make out the stooped silhouette of a person standing on a distant bridge, watching them. Which bridge was he on? Jordan counted them. After Ne’er Do Well there was the glittering structure of Amethyst, but apparently no one at this hour possessed the tranquility required to use it. The person must have been standing on the next bridge, which was — but no, that wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.

  Jordan’s heart thudded above the loud rushing of the water. It was dark. He wasn’t seeing clearly. He looked again. The silhouette was still there. A musty smell drifted towards him on the river breeze.

  When Sarmillion murmured, “Oh, slag,” Jordan’s eyes widened, thinking the undercat knew, had deduced everything through his long straight whiskers. And then Jordan saw the knot of black-booted men waiting for them at the other end of the bridge.

  “Get behind us,” Mars whispered to Jordan. “And then use yer gift.”

  Jordan crouched to hide himself.

  “Three Omarrians wish to pass into Cir,” said one of the Landguards in a thick Brinnian accent and a mocking tone.

  “On the contrary, feirhart,” said Sarmillion, “on this lovely evening we are only two.”

  “I saw three,” said another guard.

  “Aye,” said yet another. “So did I. He was wearing a headdress.”

  “Look for yerselves,” said Mars.

  As Mars and Sarmillion parted, Jordan held his breath, curled his fingers around the air, and heard the rush of flapping wings as he entered the now-familiar passage.

  This time there were icy puddles of fetid water on the pathway. It was so dark he could scarcely see his hand when he held it to his face. He braced himself but the dark-robed man didn’t appear. He exhaled a sigh of relief, and then he heard footsteps cracking the sheen of ice.

  “Who is it?” Jordan called. “Who’s there?”

  “Little boy wearing too-big shoes,” came a snide cackle, and Jordan felt a chill spread throughout his body. He had heard that before, but where?

  “Little boy thinks he’s a big man now.”

  “Who are you?” asked Jordan. “I can’t see you. What do you want?”

  Jordan was feeling dizzy. A stench like rotting meat hung in the frigid air. He teetered, and then remembered he was on a bridge. If he fell, there was bound to be trouble. He peered into the world he’d left behind. Sarmillion and Mars were gone, but the group of Landguards was now trying to come across.

  “These damned Cirran bridges,” said one. “I can’t even get my foot on it. What’s the point of building bridges you can’t use? Answer me that.”

  “Clear off. Let me have a go.”

  Jordan watched them struggle at the bridge entrance. They looked ridiculous, hurling themselves into thin air and hitting an invisible wall.

  The Landguards weren’t giving up, and Jordan decided he had better concentrate on getting to Cir himself. There wasn’t room to pass them safely, so he turned and headed back to the Omarrian riverbank. He would have to enter Cir by another bridge. He considered the row of structures that spanned the river. Unfortunately, even though he was not part of the world, it seemed he still had to use it to get to where he was going.

  The Bridge of Resolve refused him, which was no surprise, but when Peril wouldn’t allow him on, Jordan got nervous. He ran all the way back to the gleaming golden entrance of Amethyst, even though he knew he was too agitated for it to admit him. He gazed some distance away to the next bridge, the Bridge of No Return.

  Jordan would sooner have swum across the Balakan, but the bridge emitted a force that pulled at him. He couldn’t have gone another way if he’d tried. His feet moved him so quickly he tripped and almost fell, and soon he was facing the terrible black bridge and putting his foot upon it. There was no one on the bridge, no one on his dim path. Whoever that silhouette had belonged to, he was gone now. And yet, Jordan felt him like icy breath against his cheek. As he crossed, something spoke to him. It was not the same voice he’d heard a moment ago; this sounded more like the man who called himself the Beggar King.

  “You could be great, Jordan Elliott . . . if you dare. Are we so inclined, boy? Do we have the blood for it?”

  The words burned in his throat like fireweed whiskey, they weakened his knees and made something inside him glow. “Come, come,” said the voice and it drew him and he came towards it as if it were a fire and he wanted so badly to be warm, even if it might burn him. He knew that if he made it to the end of this bridge something would be decided, although he didn’t understand what it was, and yet he couldn’t do otherwise. “Are you worthy to cross here?” The world fell away, and he walked.

  As he stumbled off the Cirran end, doubled over and breathing hard, he spied the hunchback and the undercat in the distance, their backs to him. Jordan ripped the air apart and reappeared in the world. In that instant Sarmillion turned, and Jordan could see everything on his face: the realization of which bridge he had taken, the confirmation that it had indeed been he who’d stood upon this bridge one year ago. And then, just as suddenly, Sarmillion resumed his conversation with Mars as if he’d seen nothing. As if he had decided to ignore the evidence before his own eyes.

  They need me to disappear. It was the Loyalists’ only chance of getting the information they so desperately wanted. The courier hawks had still not come back from Ut. It was possible the spies were dead. If the Loyalists couldn’t send someone into the palace, their cause would be doomed.

  He’s using me. For a moment Jordan was insulted. Using people seemed to be the way of Omar. But Jordan wasn’t Omarrian, and neither was Sarmillion. He wondered what Mars would have done if he’d seen Jordan coming off that bridge. How far would the gardener go to get what he wanted?

  Jordan hurried away so that when Mars caught sight of him, he couldn’t possibly know which bridge had granted Jordan passage.

  “Great Light,” cried Sarmillion, wheeling around a second time as if it were the first, and rushing towards him. “Where have you been?”

  “Straighten up,
” said Mars. “Let me see yer face.” He held Jordan away from him at arm’s length. “You’re as pale as the Cirran stone.” Then he reached forward and plucked something from Jordan’s headdress. “What’s this?” He held up a small black feather.

  Jordan shrugged. “Crow, I guess.”

  Mars brought it to his nose, then shook his head and let the feather fall to the ground. “Come,” he said, wrapping an arm around Jordan and leading him off the riverbank footpath. “We’ll get ye to safety. I’ll make ye a draught of herbs. And then, feirhart, I think we’d best have a chat.

  The cave entrance was so well hidden behind rocks and large shrubbery that even Mars passed it the first time and had to backtrack to find it. Once inside, he made Jordan lie on a bed of pillows while he set about lighting candles. They were in an elaborate cavern with blankets and carpets upon the ground and a grate in the centre for a cook fire. Herbs hung drying from hooks in the ceiling. One wall was lined with shelves, many of which held clay jars and boxes filled with Mars’s plant remedies. One of the shelves even housed a row of parchments.

  “Stolen property,” said Mars with a lopsided grin, “thanks to our scribe.”

  “Former scribe,” said Sarmillion, clearing his throat. “I took what I could in the early days, when a fellow could still sneak in through the back door.”

  “Now to work,” said Mars and he opened several bottles and ground their ingredients with a mortar and pestle. In a few minutes he brought Jordan a cup full of cold brownish liquid.

  “Drink,” he ordered. It was gritty and tasted faintly of moss, but Jordan did as he was told and gradually some of his strength returned. For a long time Mars sat there watching him, saying nothing. His strong calloused hands rested in his lap. Jordan’s breathing slowed and steadied. Having the gardener nearby was almost as peaceful as sitting in Somberholt Forest.

  “‘Tisn’t a gift you’ve been given, I reckon,” he said. “‘Tis more like a curse. It does ye harm, Jordan. I don’t know where or how ye’ve come upon this peculiar power but I fear for you if ye use it too often.”

  “What are you talking about?” said Jordan, but he knew only too well. Every time he disappeared he felt worse.

  “Tell me what ye sees when ye goes away,” said Mars. His eyes were trained on Jordan, who began to squirm.

  Tell no one. “I don’t know. It’s dark, I don’t see anything. Look, you’re worried for nothing. When the guards showed up at the bridge, I panicked. I ran back to Omar and then lost my nerve. Ne’er Do Well wouldn’t take me. I had to go all the way back to the Walkway to get here.”

  Sarmillion was nodding and saying, “That’s a very long way.”

  Mars studied the far wall where the roots of a tree protruded from the dirt. “Can ye sees the world ye left behind? Can ye hear people talking?”

  “Yes,” said Jordan, “but . . . at a distance. Almost like through a tunnel. It’s not like hiding around a corner and listening in on a conversation. It’s more like I’m in another place.”

  Mars gave him a grim frown. “You look as if ye’ve been with the spirits, child.”

  The dead side — that was what the beggar had called it. Surely that wasn’t where Jordan had been. The fellow had just been trying to scare him. He exaggerated, like the way he called himself the Beggar King. It made everything sound impressive and ominous.

  And yet Jordan had crossed the Bridge of No Return, and it had been both terrifying and glorious. Somehow he’d been deemed worthy. The secret glowed inside him.

  “I’m tired,” he said. And though he was wide awake, he made a show of flopping onto the pillows and shutting his eyes.

  Fifteen

  THE RIGHT THING

  MARS WAS OBLIGED TO SHOW UP to work in the nearby Balakan Gardens every morning. As for Jordan, he was under strict orders to stay inside. He would not be dispatched on his mission to the palace until the storm he’d created with his act of rebellion had passed. Sarmillion feared it would be a long wait.

  “Door to door searches,” the undercat reported after his second eavesdropping foray to the Cirran Common. “Rabellus has even offered a reward to anyone who brings you to the palace alive: a hefty velvet bag of gold groder. Less, if you’re dead.”

  “That’s encouraging,” said Jordan.

  “Indeed. Considering we plan to send you there ourselves. Oh, foolishness,” Sarmillion cried, throwing up his arms. “Oh, imprudence.”

  “It was your idea.”

  “True,” said the undercat, but he was beginning to wonder if he had gone too far. “You should see the likeness they’ve posted of you. Hideous. I’d complain if they did that to me.”

  Sarmillion kept his tone light. In fact, for the past five days the Landguards had been conducting a campaign of terror, banging on doors at all hours, arresting anyone who showed the slightest tendency towards defiance. At least the guards were ensuring that everyone found out about the boy’s courageous act. They were, in their own way, spreading hope.

  Every whispered word on the Common was about Jordan and the flowers he’d left at the holy tree. Arrabel’s name, which had not been heard in months, was flying through the air like a Cirran dove that had been set free.

  Now, all of this was interesting and important, but it was not what was keeping Sarmillion awake at night. Sarmillion’s mind was fixated on the idea that the brass door could be his path to redemption.

  Using the undermagic might be the Cirrans’ only hope of defeating Rabellus and the Brinnians. There were fewer sources of good magic in the Holy City now that the Book of What Is had been burned, the holy tree compromised and so many of the Somberholt cedars felled and deer killed. The seers were complaining that their powers had weakened, and there was only so much sasapher Mars could filch. Even if Arrabel and Theophen returned, they would be no match for the hordes of Brinnian Landguards that now populated the Holy City. They would need the undermagic — regardless of its possible dangers — or else they would be Brinnians for life.

  Sarmillion knew what he had to do: go back to his apartment to find his trusted prying bar. That sturdy tool had gotten him past many locked doors in its time. And seeing as how his apartment was in Omar, and Grizelda was in Omar, well . . .

  The air was mild that night, and the moons a little more than half-full. Sarmillion dressed in his finest black velvet suit, complete with fedora. Mars had gone out, and Jordan lay napping on his bed of pillows. The undercat had just about reached the cavern door when there was rustling behind him.

  “Where are you going?” Jordan asked.

  Sarmillion took a deep breath. He considered confessing — everything. It was I who gave Rabellus our precious Book of What Is, I who was the first to forsake our Cirran people. And I saw you standing at the Bridge of No Return and said nothing.

  Probably it was the right thing to do, to tell Jordan the truth about why he wanted him to go to the palace. But Sarmillion and the Right Thing had an understanding — it could show up as often as it liked, and he would continue to ignore it. He knew Jordan wouldn’t understand the truth. No, Jordan would see him as a traitor.

  So the undercat swallowed hard and said, “I’m off to see the little lady.”

  “Griswold?”

  “Mice alive, boy, it’s Grizelda. And yes, her, if you must know. Don’t wait up.”

  Jordan smirked and Sarmillion remembered he wasn’t a little boy anymore.

  “Do you have a special someone?” he asked, grimacing at how old and fusty it made him sound. Next we’ll be exchanging love potion recipes.

  But Jordan was too busy blushing to notice. “I suppose so,” he said. “What’s she like?” asked Sarmillion.

  “She wears the veil,” said Jordan, and Sarmillion groaned. Another fellow who wants what he can’t have.

  “You realize that’s a lost cause, don’t you?” said the undercat.

  “Don’t care,” mumbled Jordan.

  Sarmillion took his leave and slipped out as quickly and
quietly as he could. Further along the footpath he spied Mars with his back to him, burning small piles of herbs. It sounded like he was chanting something, but Sarmillion didn’t hang around to find out.

  Crossing the Balakan was easy: once he’d smooth-talked the Landguards with mention of the famous Omarrian fish fry, Ne’er Do Well practically beckoned him along its uneven surface. And then, before he could fully prepare himself, he was back in the noisy colourful circus that was Omar, and he wondered, not for the first time, how he would ever adapt to living in the Holy City after having spent so much time here.

  He decided upon a roundabout route to his apartment. He didn’t fancy a run-in with Piccolo and anyway, the alleys and back passages of this part of town were as familiar to him as fond memories.

  In the distance shone the torches of The Pit, and from the high-spirited chatter carrying across the river he realized it must be the weekend. He thought of Mojo and the cobra, and wondered if Grizelda was already there. Behind him three men were lighting a fire in a large metal bucket. At the dock were the sounds of a riverboat pulling in, the swish of oars in the water, the calls back and forth for lines to be thrown and tied off. Passengers began to disembark. They were wearing the long white robes and stifling headdresses and veils that were customary in Ut and left only the eyes exposed.

  Sarmillion slunk closer to the boat and tried to listen in on conversations, but the Uttish dialect was guttural and made the words hard to decipher. Something wanted his attention here — the boat from Ut, the white clothing. Something bothered him about this scene.

  He’d almost grasped it when a husky female voice said, “Hey, underkitty, what’cha doing slumming in these parts?”

  Sarmillion wheeled around. “Good evening, Shasta.” The underrat was alone, dressed for trouble in a short black skirt, high heels, and rhinestones everywhere. “I thought you creatures traveled in packs.”

  There was a glint in her eye that made Sarmillion feel like a hunk of cheese. “Marco’s at the boats. He’ll be back in a few minutes.”