by Alexey Pehov
“White. As white as chalk.”
Could this be my old acquaintance Rolio? If so, then it really was him I’d seen at the Large Market. The Nameless One’s followers had done the job for Paleface, and the Master’s servants had simply lain in waiting for their prey in the dark alley, shot the thieves with their bows, and taken the Key. Tonight the hired killer had done what the Master’s shaman had failed to do fifteen hundred years earlier in the Mountains of the Dwarves, and now the Master would at long last hold in his hands the artifact he craved so badly.
“Carry on, Honeycomb,” Egrassa said.
“Carry on with what?” Honeycomb asked with a shrug. “I’m not Tomcat, may his soul dwell in the light, I’m about as good a tracker as Hallas is a jeweler, but I managed to stick with the lad to the end. He’s in a huge mansion in the southern district of the city. And that’s the whole story.”
“What kind of house is it? Where exactly is it located?”
“The darkness only knows where it’s located. I’ve never been in this city before. I only just managed to find my way back here. But I can recognize it. It’s not a house, it’s a palace, and it has fancy gates, with some kind of birds on them.”
“That’s great! Now we’ll break those birds’ little wings!” said Hallas. He stuffed a piece of bread in his mouth and reached for his battle-mattock.
“Where do you think you’re going in such a great hurry?” Uncle asked, watching the gnome curiously.
“What do you mean? We have to get that Key back from them.”
“With one incomplete platoon? Without knowing who we’re going up against? Without knowing how many guards there are? Get a grip, Hallas! That smack you got in the teeth must have been too hard,” the dwarf quipped.
“Sit down, Hallas,” Alistan said quietly, and the gnome, who had been on the point of starting a brawl with Deler, went back to his seat, shamefaced. “We need to find out who we’re dealing with before we get into a fight.”
“Who we’re dealing with? I think I can probably answer that question for you, Milord Alistan,” I blurted out without thinking, and then bit my tongue, but it was already too late.
“Have you become a visionary, thief?” Count Markauz asked me.
“Oh no, Your Grace. It’s all much simpler than that. The man who took the Key from the Nameless One’s men who attacked us is my old friend Paleface. And Paleface, as you recall, serves the Master. I think we can assume that whoever lives in that house is another one of the Master’s errand boys, like Rolio.”
“Well now, that is logical,” Miralissa agreed, and snapped her fingers in annoyance. “So this Master has thwarted us yet again.…”
Alistan chuckled scornfully, making it very clear that he found my reasoning unconvincing.
“I beg your pardon, Lady Miralissa,” Eel drawled, speaking for the first time. “Just recently the lads and I heard you talk about this mysterious Master. Could you tell us a little more about him? We feel like blind kittens—we don’t even know which direction danger might strike from.”
“I think Harold can tell you more than I can.”
The Wild Hearts all turned to look at me.
“Mumr, pour me some beer,” I said to Lamplighter. “This is going to be a long story.”
“Well, I’ve already heard it, so I’ll be off to bed,” Kli-Kli said with a yawn.
“I’ll hit the hay, too,” said the gnome. “Just tell me tomorrow, that is, today, where this Master’s head is, and I’ll give it a tap with my mattock, so he won’t bother us anymore.”
“You’re a great hero,” Deler snorted.
“Sure, not like certain dwarves who wear stupid hats on their empty heads,” said the gnome, and walked out before Deler could come up with a worthy reply.
I had a potbellied mug of beer in front of me, and I began my story.…
“Mmm, yes…,” Deler grunted when he had heard me out. “This is an interesting business we’ve got involved in, right, Uncle?”
“Don’t whine,” the sergeant told the dwarf. “You knew what you were getting into when you left the Lonely Giant with us.”
“I did,” Deler agreed with a nod. “We’ve seen worse in our time. Survived ogres in snows of the Desolate Lands, went hungry for weeks at a time, walked all the way to the emerald green Needles of Ice. We won’t retreat now just because of some creep.”
“No, we won’t, dwarf,” Alistan declared quietly. “We have nowhere left to retreat to. There’s a good chance that the Key will leave the mansion before the night’s over. Are there any volunteers?”
“I’ll catch up on my sleep in the morning,” said Marmot, taking Invincible off his shoulder and handing him to me. “Take care of him. I’m with you, Honeycomb.”
“Wait, I’ll take a stroll with you,” said Egrassa, getting up from the table. He took his s’kash and walked out of the tavern with the two Wild Hearts.
“Mmm,” Deler drawled thoughtfully. “Am I imagining things, or did Tresh Egrassa really take a sword with him?”
“The law of Ranneng does not apply to elves, Deler,” Miralissa said with a smile. “We can carry weapons wherever we wish.”
The dwarf grunted in disappointment and muttered to himself, but not loudly enough for Miralissa to hear: “If you’ve got long pointy teeth you can carry a ballista around if you like, but they won’t let an honest dwarf take his own ax into town.”
I picked up the dozing ling and went off to bed.
4
THE TROUBLE CONTINUES …
The next morning I was woken by Invincible’s shrill, furious squealing. At first I was too sleepy to understand what was going on, but as usual divine enlightenment struck me out of the blue. The answer was very simple—I could hear Invincible squealing because a certain little green stinker had decided to annoy the formidable little mouse.
“Ai! He bit me! I swear by the great insane shaman Tre-Tre, the little rat bit me!” the goblin roared.
“You only got what you deserve. And when Marmot finds out you’ve been teasing his little friend he’ll tear your head off.”
“You’re a fool, Harold,” said Kli-Kli, licking his terrible wound.
“Oh, no. I beg your pardon,” I said, getting up off the bed. “You’re the fool here, not me.”
“True, I am a fool,” Kli-Kli agreed amiably. “But then, I’m wise, too. And you’re just a fool.”
“And how did you get to be so wise?” asked Lamplighter, who was listening to our conversation.
“What do you mean?” I snorted as I put on my shirt. “He was dropped on his head as a child, and ever since then he thinks he’s a wise fool.”
“Maybe I am only a wise fool, but you, Harold, are a genuine fool. And you know why? Because a wise man knows he’s a fool, and that makes him a wise fool. But people like you, who think they’re the cleverest and wisest of all, don’t even realize what absolute fools they really are.”
“What wonderful reasoning,” I remarked, feeling slightly confused. “Did you ever think of becoming a professor of philosophy at the university?”
“Oh, what big words we know,” said the little goblin, who found this exchange very amusing. “Phi-lo-so-phy! It must have taken ten years for a fool like you to learn that word. And as for reasoning, I can prove to you that you’re a fool in no time at all. Do you want me to?”
“No.”
“That’s because you’re a fool,” the goblin snapped back. “Are you afraid?”
“I just don’t want to hear any proofs from the king’s fool. You’re an idle chatterbox, Kli-Kli.”
“I’m an idle chatterbox? No, I’ll prove to you that you’re a fool who doesn’t listen to wise men,” said the goblin, getting furious. “Look here. Proof number one. Who would ever take on a Commission to get the Rainbow Horn?”
“A fool!” I said, forced to admit that the green midget was right.
“Oh, you grow wiser by the hour,” the jester said with heartfelt sincerity as he bo
und up his bitten finger with a handkerchief.
The handkerchief wasn’t exactly fresh and clean, and it had very vulgar little blue flowers embroidered along its edges.
“To continue,” the green bedbug said, “proof number two! When you refused to accept the authenticity of the goblin prophecies about a Dancer in the Shadows, that is, about you, you acted like the greatest fool of all time, didn’t you?”
“I acted like an intelligent man. Why would I want to be in any of your ludicrous prophecies? I became a fool when I allowed you to call me the Dancer in the Shadows.”
“Oh!” he sighed disappointedly. “Now you’ve started turning stupid again. But never mind, you may be a fool, but you accepted the name, and now there’s no way you can get out of it. The prophecy will be fulfilled.”
Kli-Kli simply adored the Bruk-Gruk—the goblin Book of Prophecies that’s supposed to predict every important event that will ever take place in Siala. And supposedly there’s a special cycle of predictions called “Dancer in the Shadows.” The goblin insists that these fairy tales are about me, but I don’t want to have anything to do with any crazy goblin shamans. The last thing I need for a happy life is to find that I’m the hero of some silly book.
“And how did he accept the name, Kli-Kli?” Mumr asked.
“How, Lamplighter-Mamplighter? Very simply. Because he’s a fool.”
Something must have got stuck in the goblin’s brains. He’s obviously going to repeat that word all day long now, like a green parrot. Lamplighter wasn’t satisfied with this answer from Stalkon’s personal jester, so Kli-Kli kept up his harangue: “I’ll tell you. The prophecy about the Dancer in the Shadows says that this dancer, who will definitely be a thief, will save the entire world from a nasty villain. But before he does that, a whole heap of events and signs have to happen. There are all sorts of ways you can recognize the Dancer, that is, our very own much beloved, absolute fool Harold, also known as the Shadow. First the Dancer has to bind demons using the Horse of Shadows, then he has to kill a purple bird, and then take up the name.”
“And what’s all this got to do with Harold?” asked Mumr, puzzled.
“Oh, it’s hard work talking with you fools,” said Kli-Kli, stamping his foot and pretending to be angry. “We can say that Harold bound the demons, can’t we?”
“Not me, the magicians of the Order bound the demons.”
“That’s not important,” said Kli-Kli, brushing aside my objection. The jester was riding hard on his favorite hobbyhorse—the prophecies of the crazy magician Tre-Tre, may the light be a curse to him!
“Did the Order bind the demons with your help? It did! Has the sign come to pass? It has! Was there a purple bird in Hargan’s Wasteland? There was, and not just one, either!”
“If goblins call those flying monsters birds…”
“It’s a literary expression, my lad. You don’t know a thing about art. So, was there a bird?”
“Have it your own way,” I sighed. I couldn’t be bothered pointing out to this cocky small fry that the creatures spawned by the Kronk-a-Mor used by the Nameless One’s shamans should be called nightmares, not birds. “Okay, so there was.”
“Right! And you have a name now, don’t you?”
“Aha! Ever since I was a child. They call me Harold.”
“Pah, you’re hopeless! Are you really a total numbskull or just pretending so well that I can’t tell the difference? I’m not talking about the name you were born with, I mean the name you were granted from above. Dancer in the Shadows—that one! You agreed that I could call you that. And so you accepted the name.”
Yet again I cursed the day when I told Kli-Kli that he could call me that. The only reason I did it was to make the little pest leave me in peace, but instead he started yelling out loud for all to hear that the sign had been fulfilled. And now I could expect more, equally stupid goblin prophecies.
“And what prophetic sign do you have lined up next?” I asked the goblin scornfully.
“Next?” The jester screwed his eyes up, gave me a cunning look, and declaimed:
When the crimson key departs
Like water soaking into sand
And the Path is lost in mist
There is work for a thief’s hand.
He meets at night with Strawberry
But who will be helped by the key?
“Right,” I said, and couldn’t help laughing out loud. “It’s like I’ve always said: Your crazy shaman Tre-Tre ate too many magic mushrooms for breakfast.”
“Let’s have a few less unjustified insults, if you don’t mind!” said the goblin, baring his teeth at me. “Tre-Tre was my people’s greatest shaman! Artsivus and his Order can’t hold a candle to him.”
“Maybe not, but I’d rather let someone else decide that. Have you even figured out what that little jingle of yours is all about? I didn’t understand a thing.”
“That’s because you’re a fool,” the jester reminded me yet again. “It’s a prophecy, so you get to understand it when it happens. But it’s about to happen any minute, because the crimson Key has departed. Or to put it in normal language, someone has walked off with our artifact.”
“That Key of yours? Is it crimson, then?” Lamplighter asked.
“Well, no…,” said Kli-Kli, confused by the question. “It looks more like it’s made of crystal.… All right, Harold. Go and fill your belly, you and I have got a job to do.”
“I only have one job to do, Kli-Kli, the one I swore on Tomcat’s grave to finish. I’m going to get the Rainbow Horn, hand it over to the Order, grab my honestly earned loot and charter of pardon, and start living the good life. Nothing else concerns me, unless, of course, it happens to be a threat to my life or a chance to pick up some money.”
“But we do have a job to do,” Kli-Kli said very seriously. “Mumr and Eel are going to relieve Marmot and Egrassa.”
“I don’t see the connection. What’s that got to do with me?”
“In the first place, you can give Marmot his ling back.…”
“I can do that here,” I said, interrupting the goblin.
“In the second place,” Kli-Kli continued imperturbably, “Miralissa has asked you to take a look at the house and say if you can get inside and filch the Key from under the very noses of the Master’s servants.”
“Filch it? From under their noses?” I asked like an echo. “Me?”
“Yes, you! You’re our thief, aren’t you?”
There was nothing I could say to that. I picked the mouse up off the pillow, put him on my shoulder, and said: “Let’s go. Do you know the way?”
“Honeycomb came back this morning and told me. Eel’s coming along. Lamplighter, are you with us, too?”
“Yes.”
“All right then,” I said to the goblin as I walked out of the room. “But there’ll be no strolling round the city until I get my breakfast.”
“You’ll get your breakfast. Master Quidd laid the table ages ago.”
* * *
Birds were singing their song of summer joy, flowers were blooming, the sky was blue, the grass was green, the sun was shining. If I could have forgotten that the Key had been stolen from right under our noses and we still didn’t know what had happened to Loudmouth, it would have been a wonderful day.
“Do we have a long way to go?” I asked the goblin.
“Not very,” the jester muttered.
He was holding on to my sleeve with his right hand and hopping along on one foot, amusing himself and all the passersby. I couldn’t tear myself free, because the jester had a grip on my shirt sleeve like a tick on a dog’s ear, so I had to try persuasion. But my polite and heartfelt request to stop playing the fool and walk on two feet like normal people was refused. Then I tried to ignore the hopping goblin; after all, I couldn’t fight him in the public street, could I?
“How far is not very far?” I asked my companion after another unsuccessful attempt to tear my sleeve out of his tenacious fingers.
“About an hour,” Kli-Kli replied indifferently, and hopped over a stick lying on the ground.
I groaned.
“We’re going to the southern part of the city on Motley Hill. It’s quite a walk to get there.”
“For some it’s a walk, for some it’s an excuse to skip about and play the fool,” I remarked.
But Kli-Kli was all set to hop on one foot for the entire hour. “I’m so sorry they didn’t give us the carriage today,” the king’s jester quipped, hopping neatly over a puddle.
The little creep had lied. It was no more than twenty minutes from the inn to our destination.
The street leading up Motley Hill was an incredibly steep climb. By the time we reached the region where the big cheeses lived, I was drenched in sweat. But at least, Sagot be praised, the goblin finally let go of me.
“We could take a ride down the hill,” the jester murmured dreamily when we were almost at the very top.
I followed the direction of his eyes. There was an old, dried-up cart standing outside one of the houses, with wooden chocks under its wheels to stop it accidentally taking off down the hill and crushing some unfortunate pedestrian.
“Don’t even think about it!” I warned him.
“You don’t understand a thing about lucky finds, Harold. A fool, there’s no other word for it. Just look at that hill. We’d go flying along like a hurricane.”
“I don’t like this little idea of yours.”
“What little idea? Flying along like a hurricane?”
“The idea that we’ll go flying along like a hurricane. You may have decided to commit suicide, Kli-Kli, but there’s no need to go tangling other people up in your crazy plans.”
“Harold, you’re a real bogeyman. Relax, there’s no danger. Why bring up the subject of suicide?”
“Because, my little muttonhead, that hill is more than four hundred yards long! We’d get moving all right. And we’d pick up speed, too! Fly like a hurricane!” I said in a squeaky voice, teasing Kli-Kli. “But how are we going to brake, my little peabrain? Our bones would be scattered halfway across Ranneng!”