by A. L. Sirois
Being rather tired from his labors, Guilhem settled down on the tabletop and went to sleep.
When he woke, night had fallen. A candle burned on the tabletop, and he found that the sight of the naked flame roused a sort of atavistic fear in him that he had never felt as a man. He wanted to get as far from the candle as possible, but controlled himself. He was startled, however, when Oriabel suddenly loomed over the table, dressed in a manner unfamiliar to him. Hoops of gold dangled from her ears and she had combed out her hair, securing it with a plain tiara. Instead of her usual ragged garments she wore a clean, short red tunic over a long skirt. She looked quite passable, he thought, if one ignored the dirt and grime.
She noticed him staring up at her. “Ah,” she said. “Now you see me more as I would look among my people, the Romany. Have you ever heard of India? Well, that is where we are from.” She sighed. “Though there are few of us hereabouts. It is a long journey from there.” She frowned, as though uncomfortable about revealing information of a personal nature. “No matter,” she said. “Let us be about our business, shall we?”
She gathered up his clothing and stuffed it into a cloth satchel that she slung over her shoulder. Then she urged him into the mouth of the leather bag containing her cards. He clung to the inner surface with all six legs as she abruptly lifted the bag and swung it through the air, secreting it inside her clothing. Then she began moving; he could tell by the sound that she crossed the room, opened the door, and went into the corridor outside. At the same time, a slow, regular sort of ka-thud, ka-thud, ka-thud came to his hearing. He puzzled over this for a while before realizing that it was the beating of her heart.
It wasn’t a long walk from the inn where they were staying to the Black Ox, but Guilhem, trapped in a lightless, airless bag, thought the journey would never end. His insect senses operated so rapidly compared to his old human ones that one of Oriabel’s paces seemed to take minutes. He fell asleep, and was roused by her finger poking him, gently but firmly.
“Time to go to work,” she said quietly, her face close to the opening of the bag. “I’ll let you out here. When I open the door, you run inside. I’ll try to attract attention so that you aren’t seen.”
She knelt beside the door, ostensibly to adjust a stocking, letting the small pouch slip to the ground. Instantly Guilhem dashed out and ran to the door. The witch straightened up and entered the Black Ox.
Guilhem, keeping close to the wall, ran for cover under a bench. He watched Oriabel mince deliberately into the room. Every man’s eye turned toward her, because she was one of the few women in the place.
She took a table to one side and sat without moving or making eye contact with anyone except the innkeeper’s maid, who came to take her order—her usual bottle of wine, Guilhem noted, overhearing her from his hiding place beneath the bench.
After downing a quick mug of the wine, Oriabel reverted slightly to type by belching and wiping her mouth on her sleeve. As far as Guilhem could tell, no one seemed to notice.
He wondered what he ought to do. The only thing he could think of was to find the kitchen and see if there were other insects there. He saw a fly or two circling in the air above the tables, but they ignored him or didn’t see him. In any event, he had never spoken to one, and felt instinctively that he’d be best served by finding one of his own kind.
I never thought to feel any fellowship with a stinking cockroach, he thought, creeping out from under the bench along the bottom of the wall.
Almost at once he came upon a small cricket sitting in a crack. He tapped it with his antennae in what he hoped was a friendly manner. The cricket simply stared at him.
Well, what’s the matter with you? Guilhem thought. Am I beneath your attention?
To his surprise, the other bug’s antennae also moved, flickering across Guilhem’s head and front-most shoulders in a way that, somehow, was intelligible to him.
mind your manners, the cricket “said.” what are you doing out of the kitchen
Guilhem had a bit of trouble understanding the creature’s expressionless idiom, and had no idea how he was “hearing” it at all, but at least it was communication of a sort. I am on my way there now, he replied.
then begone, the cricket replied in an obviously dismissive manner. i have better things to do than talk to the likes of you, vermin
Guilhem automatically reached for his sword to teach the creature a lesson but brought himself up short. There was no sword to be had in his current form. Swallowing his outrage, he walked by, not without a rude waggle of his posterior.
Behind him the cricket stridulated as if to show him who was the master when it came to noise. Guilhem suppressed an impulse to go back and tear the arrogant creature’s wings off. He put his attention instead on the kitchen, which lay ahead of him.
From his vantage, the place had an entirely different look than it would have had if he were in human form. The ground—it couldn’t be called a floor, because it was only dirt—was littered with cinders, small bones, splashes of congealed grease and old soup, vegetable parings, and other trash. Here and there were small dunes of spilled meal or flour. Various insects were at work eating or, in the case of ants, carting off bits of garbage. Flies circled overhead, alighting now and then on something succulent. Other insects lurked under the table or near the wall, awaiting a chance to dash out and snatch something.
Guilhem stood by the wall for a while, watching the insects at their labors. Could it be that there are these many vermin moving freely through the kitchen in my own home? The thought made him somehow uneasy. He resolved to see to it, once he returned home, that the servants kept the place cleaner. The cook here paid them no attention. At last a cockroach appeared, running so rapidly that it was halfway across the filthy floor before Guilhem noticed it. The creature grabbed a piece of gristle and headed back the way it came, with Guilhem in pursuit. He caught up with the roach near a crevice in the far wall.
“Pardon me,” he said, tapping the roach with his antennae, “can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Mine,” said the roach, assuming a defensive posture. “Mine mine mine.”
“I don’t want your morsel. All I want is to ask a question.”
The roach peered suspiciously at him. “I stealed this fair and square,” it said via its twitching feelers. But it relaxed its posture a trifle.
“I don’t dispute that,” Guilhem said, settling back on his rearmost legs. “I simply want some information.”
“All right; but come you in—I feels exposed out here in the light.” So saying, it vanished into the crevice.
Guilhem followed, somewhat reluctantly, and not without aiming a mental curse at Oriabel for putting him in this situation.
Inside the wall he found that, although he could not see a thing, he was nevertheless able to sense his surroundings. The tendrils on his head were marvelously sensitive, giving him a clear mental “picture” of the rough-walled tunnel through which he ran. It twisted and turned, and other tunnels opened off it in various directions not limited to the horizontal plane that he as a human would have expected. He was easily able to keep up with the other cockroach, and knew that he would have no trouble finding his way back out of the maze, thanks to some innate directional sense he now possessed.
At length, his companion ducked out of the main tunnel into a narrower side corridor. Guilhem followed. The other squeezed through a small opening into a surprisingly sizeable chamber in which were piled several egg cases. All were split open, empty, save one. A third cockroach, somewhat smaller than Guilhem or his new friend, crouched against the wall on the far side of the room.
“Welcome to me home,” said the roach. The other roach approached him, and ran its antennae over him. Noticing Guilhem, it did the same to him.
This cockroach, Guilhem understood at once, was a female, doubtless his new friend’s mate. The three roaches maintained touch with their antennae, which rendered them “audible” to one another.
“Ooh, honored, is it,” said the female, obviously impressed. “Such good manners, and speakin’ so grand, an’ all.”
“It’s how my parents raised me,” Guilhem said.
“‘Parents’? What’s that?”
“My mother and my father,” Guilhem replied. “They brought me up, taught me many things... you know. Parents.”
“That’s not how we does it,” the female said with contempt. “When mine hatches out, they scatter. Wouldn’t have it no other way. Who’d want all those nasty little sprats underfoot, eatin’ you out of house and home? No, they takes their chances in life right from the get-go, like the rest o’ us. Hmph. I don’t know what sort o’ way you growed up, but it sounds awful odd to me.”
The male roach said, “I gots to agree. I’m father to these eggs, but we just comes together to watch over ‘em until they hatches. After that it’s as she says.”
Guilhem, unwilling to take the conversation any further in that direction, said, “What I wanted to know was, are you familiar with the human named Vedastus? He is a brigand, and I need—”
“A what?” the female asked.
“A robber, a thief.”
“No, I knows what a brigand is, silly. I mean the other word—hoomun or whatever.”
“Human? I mean the... the people, you know, the big creatures on two feet who drop food all over the place.”
“Oh, you means the stompers.”
“Eh?”
“Stompers,” said the male, patiently. “Because when they see us they try to stomp on us.”
“Ohhh. Anyway, I was asking about the... stomper named Vedastus.”
“Oh, aye. What about ‘im?”
Guilhem controlled his temper with an effort. “I wants... want to know if you, either of you, have seen him or heard his name mentioned in the tavern out there, the Black Ox.”
The two roaches tapped each other with their antennae without including Guilhem in the interchange. At last the male turned his tendrils to him. “We doesn’t usually pay much attention to the doins’ of the stompers, but as it happens, t’other day I met a fellow who had come in with the saddlebag of one of your robber types.”
“A fellow. You mean a cockroach, like y—like us.”
“That’ll be it. Anyway, yeah. This chap and I got to talking over a piece of bread and it turned out he was living’ in this cave not far from here when one day a bunch of these here brigands, as you calls ‘em, came swoopin’ in and took over the place. Wanted it for a hideout. That was good for him, of course, because they had food and wasn’t very good housekeepers, if you know what I mean.”
“I do. So, where is this cave?”
“Anyway, he said that the leader of the band was this here stomper name o’ Vedastus. That’s the one you’s wanting, ain’t it?”
“That’ll be the one, yes. Where’s their cave?”
“Well, ‘ow does I know? Does I look like I goes out riding about on me ‘orse, prancin’ around and actin’ all high and mighty?”
It was all Guilhem could do not to leap on the stupid creature and tear his legs off, one by one. Quivering with fury, Guilhem said, “All I want to know is where the cave is.”
“Well, if you’d let me finish me story? So this Vedastus, he never come to the Black Ox, but his bully-boys does show up every night or two. I’d say that if you wants to find this here cave, you wait for them, then sneak into one’s boot or something, and just get yourself carried right there. Eh?”
“Hmmm. And you say they come in every night or two?”
“Yeah. Maybe less often, now that this Vedastus is so sick ‘an all.”
“What?”
“Oh aye, didn’t I mention it? His men says he is dyin’, like.”
Guilhem stared at the roach in dismay. Vedastus represented the only link he and Oriabel had found to the nobility of Bohemia, and, by extension, to Mojmir. If he were to die without telling them what he knew they’d be completely helpless, with no way forward.
I need to talk to the witch about this, at once.
“These men,” Guilhem said. “What do they look like?”
The roach shrugged two pairs of shoulders. “Like all stompers, more or less. Oh, one has an eyepatch. I never see’d no one else come in here with but a single eye, like.”
“One eye... hmmm. I thank you for the information, friend roach,” Guilhem said. He turned to go. “You’ve been most kind.”
“It were no trouble. Say, you wouldn’t want to breed with the female, here, would you?”
“Uh—thank you for the offer but I think not.”
“What? You’re turnin’ down simple hospitality?” the female said, obviously outraged.
“I thought you had better manners than that,” said the male.
“Listen, I—I mean no offense, it’s just that I am very busy just now...”
“Oh, I see! Busy, is it? You—”
Guilhem didn’t wait to hear more, but turned and fled. Fortunately, his newfound sense of direction did not fail him, and he soon found himself back in the inn’s kitchen, and, presently, the public room, where Oriabel still sat at her table drinking wine. Guilhem scurried across the floor, narrowly missing being stepped on, and climbed up the table leg. Oriabel spotted him at once him and popped him into her leather bag. She went outside, and into a nearby alley where she muttered a spell that returned him to human form.
As he struggled into his clothes, he described what the cockroach had told him about Vedastus. “And so, as I make it, there’s no guarantee that he isn’t dead already,” he said in closing.
“Do you be quiet and let me think on’t,” said Oriabel. She took a bottle out of her clothing and drank deeply from it. Guilhem watched with distaste.
“The problem is,” he said, conquering his scorn, “we need to question Vedastus, but we don’t know where his cave is. However, I think I can suggest a means of finding out.”
“And what might that be?”
“We must wait in the tavern until this one-eyed henchman of his shows up, then follow him, at a discreet distance, back to the band’s hideout. Or, better yet,” he added, as inspiration struck him, “have Rámon follow him and then report his whereabouts to us.”
Oriabel stared at him for a few moments. “That’s a better plan than I would have expected from you,” she said.
Guilhem scowled but held his tongue.
“We will put your scheme into effect this very night,” she said.
“That’s fine, but I’m not going to stand for being transformed into a cockroach again.”
She smiled. It went far toward dispelling her surly air. But the smile vanished as quickly as it had come. “To do so would afford me much enjoyment, but I admit that your idea about using Rámon puts you and I at considerably less risk from these no doubt desperate and dangerous men. Therefore, we will return to our rooms, where I will instruct Rámon as to his duties this night.”
Once they arrived there, however, and explained to Rámon what was expected of him, the parrot hated the idea. “It’s cold out there, mama,” it whined. “Poor Rámon! His tail feathers will freeze and break off!”
Guilhem, seated on the witch’s bed, watch the exchange with amusement. Oriabel said, “Poosh-posh—it is nowhere near that cold, silly bird. Huddle near a warm chimney where you can still see all, and you will be quite comfortable.” She opened the room’s small window.
The parrot flew off into the starry night, muttering imprecations.
Guilhem repaired to his own room for some privacy. The extra legs he had gained while trapped in the form of a cockroach seemed still to be with him, somehow, making his movements clumsy and awkward. He practiced walking, drawing his sword, and picking things up with his normal complement of limbs for more than an hour before he felt fully comfortable in his original body once more.
After that he lay down for some rest. Almost a
t once, or so it seemed to him, he was being roused by peremptory knocking on his door. With a groan, he levered himself up from his mattress. Oriabel stood in the corridor.
“Rámon has returned,” she said.
“Ah. What is the hour?”
“Shortly before dawn.”
He followed her to her room, where the parrot perched, shivering, on the back of a chair. “The one-eyed man came into the tavern not very long after I settled to my watch,” Rámon said. “When he left, an hour or so later, I followed him as you requested, mama. He rode to a cave perhaps three miles west of here, off the trail. He was careful... he dragged a branch behind his horse to erase the animal’s hoof prints. Did I not see him enter that cave, and flying closer smell the scent of wood smoke, I would have not known they were hidden within.”
The witch smoothed the bird’s feathers, crooning to him as she did so. Revolting, Guilhem said to himself, watching with curled lip. Aloud, he said merely, “Being brigands, they most likely work their criminal deeds at night. I think they will hole up there for the day, sleeping.”
“But this one-eyed man was out at the tavern tonight,” said Oriabel.
Guilhem shrugged. “If his leader is ill, they may be waiting until he regains his health to resume their business. In that case, why should they all remain in the cave? One or two can stand watch over Vedastus in his sick bed, while the others take it in turns to go out for whatever reason.”
“There is good sense in what you say,” Oriabel replied after thinking it over. “Nevertheless, it seems clear that Vedastus himself will not venture out. I wonder, therefore, how we may get in, to speak with him.”
“I cannot see how that is to be done.”
“Nor can I, at present. Unless—”
“Hold,” said Guilhem, snapping his fingers. “I have an idea. Oriabel, you possess healing skills, do you not?”
“I possess some knowledge in that area, yes,” she said cautiously. “What of it?”
“Simply this: cannot you present yourself to one of the henchmen as a healer, and thus gain entry to the cave?”