by Alex Bell
After a few moments of silence, Lex grinned and raised his eyebrows at his old employer in the most insolent manner he could muster. Schmidt scowled, leant forwards across the table and hissed, ‘Is that you in there, Trent?’
Lex was unprepared for the strength of the distaste he felt at hearing his voice coming from someone else’s mouth like that. Especially as he could almost hear Schmidt’s voice beneath it — in the manner of his pronunciation, the clipped precision of the words and the particular way he pronounced his vowels. But he recovered well with a broad grin. ‘My dear Monty, I hope so, or else we have both gone mad.’
‘What do you mean by this?’ Schmidt hissed.
Lex wasn’t sure if the lawyer was talking quietly for fear of being overheard or whether he just hated hearing his words coming out in Lex’s voice.
‘I suppose having me arrested would be a bit futile now, wouldn’t it?’ Lex said, with a nasty smile as the thought occurred to him.
‘So that’s it!’ Schmidt snarled. ‘You’ve done this to escape arrest, you depraved boy!’
Lex was impressed. He hadn’t realised that his face could look so vicious. He must practise in front of a mirror as soon as he got his body back. Viciousness could be useful at times. Of course he was going to get his body back, of course. Of course. He turned his mind away from those thoughts quickly. They must be kept for a more private place.
‘You flatter me,’ Lex drawled. Or tried to. Schmidt’s cold, rather high voice was not built for drawling. ‘But this is no deliberate ploy of mine. The logical conclusion is that it’s the enchanter’s bracelets.’
‘What the hell were you doing fraternising with enchanters anyway? Don’t you know they’re dangerous?’
‘That’s what makes it fun,’ Lex replied, being deliberately flippant in his attempt to irritate. The truth was that he was regretting his recklessness himself at that moment.
‘We’re going back anyway, ’ the lawyer snarled with sudden vehemence. ‘We’re going back to the Wither City, Mister Trent, where you will be locked up and-’
‘Where you’ll be locked up, you mean,’ Lex said. ‘I am Montgomery Schmidt, the great litigator. I have captured and returned the notorious criminal, Lex Trent. Aren’t I clever?’
‘You fool! I’ll explain to them what happened. I’ll tell them-’
‘You know, I’ve heard that Lex Trent will say anything to get out of punishment,’ Lex said pleasantly.
Schmidt gave him an incredulous look. ‘Do you honestly think you could pass yourself off as me? You haven’t the discipline!’
Discipline! Ah, but that was the one thing Lex did have!
He removed his elbows from the table, sat up straighter, narrowed his eyes just a little to give himself a haughtier look and gazed down his hooked nose at Mr Schmidt.
‘I did inform you that that boy was without a stable sense of moral awareness, Inspector, did I not? I believe I did warn you as to the chain of events that would occur should you release him on bail. It is only fortunate that I managed to capture the delinquent before any more atrocities could be committed. Pray, do not lose him again. I did not go to all this tedious bother to watch him slip through your incompetent grasp a second time.’
It was an excellent mimicry. Of course, Lex was helped immensely by not having to alter his voice, but he got the facial expressions just right, the nuances of every sentence, the cold hostility. It was Mr Schmidt down to the very last hair. It threw the lawyer, Lex noted with satisfaction. He suddenly looked much less sure of himself.
‘What do you think?’ Lex asked. ‘I think it could do with being toned down slightly. And there was something a little off about the pronunciation of the rhetorical question. Still, with a mirror and a little practice, your own mother would have believed me to be you.’
‘There is more to it than mimicry… ’ Schmidt began, but there was uncertainty in his voice. ‘There are things I know that you don’t-’
Lex pounced on the uncertainty instantly. ‘I’ll improvise, ’ he said, smiling only with his mouth. ‘I’ll invent a medical condition if I have to, Mr Schmidt. After all, you’re getting on a bit now, aren’t you? Who do you think they’re going to believe? I mean, who do you really think they’ll choose to trust? What about your old pal Mr Lucas? He’ll be hating me by now, I’m sure. Lots of people will. All those angry victims of all my heinous crimes. We can go back to the Wither City right now if you like but it will only be a temporary detour for me — to put you behind bars. It would be satisfying, I’ll admit, but something of a tedious waste of my time. For I will lie, Mr Schmidt. And I will lie convincingly. I have never been blessed with modesty, so believe me when I say that there is no one who can beat me when it comes to lying, thieving, conniving and cheating, Mr Schmidt.’ He leant back in his chair with a slight smile. ‘I’ve had a lot of practice. As an honest man, I would advise you not to attempt to beat me in this particular game. You’ll never win it, sir.’
Lex would worry about this situation later but, for now, he was unashamedly and immensely enjoying himself.
‘You say this is not your own doing,’ the lawyer said quietly after a few moments. ‘You do want your own body back, I presume?’
‘You would presume correctly, Monty. I am certainly not so fond of yours that I would wish to-’
‘Yes, yes, all right,’ Schmidt snapped. ‘Could you stop trying to be clever for just two minutes? Do you know how to get the bracelets off?’
‘No.’
‘Do you know anyone who might be able to help us?’
‘No.’
‘Do you know anything at all?’
‘No, not really. Except that the bracelets were made in Khestrii, the gypsy woman said. The Khestrians might know something.’
Mr Schmidt gazed at him coldly. ‘I am not travelling with you all the way to Khestrii. I am not that eager for your company.’
‘Nor I yours,’ Lex replied smoothly. ‘But I don’t need to tell you that it’s not a good idea to show the bracelets to anyone around here. We were lucky with the gypsies because of their isolationist ways. But if anyone else discovers this little… problem we have-’
‘Yes, all right; discretion is obviously paramount,’ Schmidt agreed irritably.
‘Look, neither of us wants to stay this way,’ Lex said reasonably. ‘I’ve got years of life left in that body, but who knows how much time you’ve got left before you cop it?’
To his surprise, Schmidt did not go instantly red with anger this time but leant back in his seat with a smile. ‘I daresay I would become accustomed to the lice, given time,’ the lawyer drawled. Lex’s voice was well suited to drawling. ‘But even so, it will be really quite blissful to return to my own hygienic self after this-’
‘I have no lice!’ Lex snapped and then scowled, annoyed with himself for the slight lapse of control.
‘Oh dear, have I touched a nerve, my boy?’ the lawyer sneered.
Lex cursed inwardly. Hygiene was a thing with Lex. He hated… he loathed and detested being unclean, but sometimes it was necessary for the role and sailor boys were not known for their cleanliness.
‘Khestrii is the province of the enchanters,’ Lex said brusquely. ‘And any Khestrian will be able to translate the runes for us. The bracelets came from there, we may be able to find someone who can get them off. The mantha beast you purchased is tethered outside. If we can buy a wagon from someone we can travel to the harbour in Gandylow and buy passage aboard one of the enchanters’ magical boats. Well? What do you think?’
‘I think you’re crazy if you think you’re going to find an enchanter willing to allow non-magical people on his boat,’ Schmidt retorted.
‘Well, we can sort the details out later. Don’t worry, I’ll get us there.’
They stopped talking as Jani arrived with their food. Lex stirred the soup with his spoon, enjoying the smell and watching in immense satisfaction as Schmidt picked angrily at the dry crust of bread he had been given.
One spoonful told him that it tasted just as delicious as it smelt and he had been about to make a smug remark to Schmidt when the lawyer put a piece of stale bread in his mouth, there was a shing and suddenly it was Lex who was chewing on the dry piece of bread.
It was only then that Lex realised how stupid he’d been to only order a crust of bread for Schmidt, for now that he had his own body back he had nothing to eat. The thick, delicious, nourishing soup was on the table before Montgomery Schmidt and, by the attitude Lex had assumed as the lawyer, he would not now be able to order soup for himself without drawing attention. Very much aware of the suddenly smug expression on his employer’s face, Lex tore the bread in half and ate it, trying his best to look like he was enjoying it.
Half an hour later, Lex locked himself in the little shower room where Jani had agreed to let him have a wash.
‘Are you there?’ he said softly.
‘Yes, darling, indeed I am,’ the Goddess of Luck said, appearing in the little room beside him.
Lex scowled at her. ‘Well you’ve made a right cock up of this, haven’t you?’ he snapped. ‘I thought you were going to help me get out of the city. Why didn’t you stop that crone from dragging me into that tent?’
‘She hardly dragged you, dear. You went in willingly. Anyway, I was the one who sent her to you in the first place.’
‘You what? Why? Look where it’s got me!’
He held up his wrist where the black obelisk bracelet gleamed in the light from the small window.
‘It’s exciting, isn’t it? The Game has begun!’
‘G-Game?’ Lex repeated, his mouth dropping open as he gaped at her in delight. ‘You don’t mean…?’
‘Yes, Lex. One of the Games.’
Lex was so thrilled — so beside himself with excitement — that he actually hugged the Goddess. He just couldn’t help himself. A Game! A Game at last! He had made a lot of money on them in the past but betting on them was hardly the same thing as actually playing in one! And he had longed to take part for such a long time.
‘I can’t believe it!’ he beamed. ‘When does it start, my Lady? When can we begin?’
The Goddess smiled. ‘Well, I can see that I’m not going to have to threaten to turn you into a chessman.’
Playing in the Games held by the Gods brought fortune, fame and glory — if you were the winner. But it could also bring… well.. danger, death and loss of limb. It could bring suffering, misery, discomfort and hardship. In short, if you were not a natural winner then the Games could be very unpleasant indeed. Many players were motivated by vanity and greed but others didn’t think the chance of glory was worth the risk of painful death. More and more people had started refusing to play, which hadn’t been much fun for the Gods at all. They couldn’t force them because all players had to be willing. So they came up with the idea that potential players would have a choice — either they could agree to play the Game or they could choose instead to be turned into life-sized chessmen, which the Gods would then put on display in their own churches. No one could quite tell whether these chessmen had any degree of sentient awareness but the general consensus seemed to be that it was better to take your chances with the Game than to resign yourself to being turned into an inanimate lump of wood. So not many people got turned into chessmen nowadays, but most Gods had one or two pieces in their churches from the olden days when people had half thought the whole thing was a bluff. One thing it’s always worth bearing in mind is that Gods very rarely bluff.
‘How do the Swanns come into this?’ Lex asked.
‘What Swanns?’
‘The Wishing Swanns of Desareth,’ Lex replied, pulling the velvet pouch from his pocket. ‘The enchanter gave them to me with the bracelet.’
‘Oh, I don’t know anything about any Swanns,’ Lady Luck said with a touch of impatience. ‘Perhaps the enchanter wanted to get rid of them for some reason, the silly man. I just sent you to him because I knew he had a Binding Bracelet for sale and we need one to secure you a companion for the Game.’
‘Companion?’ Lex repeated, pulling a face. ‘I’ve never heard of that before.’
‘Yes, it’s new. From now on, all players must have companions.’
‘But why?’
‘It was felt that companionship and camaraderie would add a little something for the spectators, dear. And… they’ll also act as a backup in case the first player should become… indisposed. Not that you need to worry about that, Lex. I’m sure you’ll do just fine. I fully expect you to win.’
‘I will win,’ Lex replied vehemently. ‘But I don’t want a companion. I don’t need one.’
‘It’s compulsory, I’m afraid. You must have one. The two of you must eat every meal together, until the Game is over, otherwise you’ll switch bodies. It’s a companionship thing.’
‘All right, but why Schmidt? If I must have a companion, why can’t it be one of the raven-haired, doe-eyed variety-’
‘Yes, I did think Schmidt was an odd choice. I rather thought you might go for that little gypsy girl but the lawyer was the first person you had direct skin to skin contact with and that’s how the Binding Bracelets work so-’
‘But nobody told me!’ Lex wailed, thinking of Cara and mentally comparing her to Mr Schmidt.
‘I am sorry, dear. I meant to let you know but it must have slipped my mind.’
Lex could have shaken her. Instead, he gritted his teeth and said, ‘What do the runes say?’
‘ So Begins The Game,’ she said, dropping her voice dramatically. ‘Of course. It starts at Khestrii the day after tomorrow. Make sure you are there at the Black Tower by sunset. When you get there, everything will be explained and it will be announced to the stadiums. It will be glorious, Lex. You and I are going to win this by a long shot.’
CHAPTER SIX
THE SOULLESS WAKE
Lex decided not to say anything to Schmidt about the Game or anything else the Goddess had told him. After all, he didn’t owe the lawyer anything. He hadn’t asked him to come chasing after him across the sea to try and arrest him and drag him back to the Wither City.
Lex had talked Jani into letting them purchase a wagon she had stored in the courtyard. The mantha beast was tethered to it and was plodding along a country road out of the Farrows with the slow, consistent gait peculiar to its kind, seemingly oblivious to Gersha’s cold winds whipping about them. Lex and Schmidt were sitting on the narrow wooden seat at the front, with some food and their bags stored in the back. It was not a particularly comfortable way of travelling, but it was certainly preferable to travelling on the mantha’s back.
It was an odd thing because, in Lex’s experience, no one was usually that upset in the aftermath of his crimes. After all, most of his thieving in the Wither City had been limited to large museums that would be insured anyway. He’d never managed to successfully steal anything from Schmidt himself or the partners of his precious firm, so why all the fuss? It surely couldn’t stem only from dislike, for Lex was likeable. People liked him. He had an honest, open face, he could be charming and he was accomplished in the vital art of showmanship.
‘What was it?’ he asked, suddenly eager to know, raising his voice to be heard over the gales that whipped about them.
‘What was what?’ the lawyer snapped.
‘What gave me away?’ Lex asked. ‘How did you know that I was a conniving thief rather than a hard-working sucker-of-a-student?’
When he was playing a part, Lex was always very, very careful not to give away just how clever he really was. He wanted to appear industrious and hardworking at the law firm, certainly, but not clever. Clever people were watched and accused and suspected and Lex had to be careful not to draw unwanted attention to himself. He had to appear incapable of hatching devious plots, let alone carrying them out. He had learnt, right at the start, that one of the most important things a fraudster should aim for was to be underestimated. If they were scorned and ridiculed as well then so much the better.
/> Before coming to the Wither City, when he’d still been travelling across the Globe, moving from place to place and scamming people blind, he had almost always chosen to play the part of a young man who was fabulously wealthy but at the same time extraordinarily dim, with a dash of rakishness thrown in as well. The trick was to make the merchant or the jeweller or the pawnbroker or whoever think that they were the ones scamming him.
One scam he often used was to buy a brooch — the cheapest he could find — and then dirty it up with some grime, put it in a velvet box and cover the whole thing with dust. Then he would put on his poshest clothes, his sulkiest, most superior expression and saunter into a jeweller’s with the most arrogant manner he could summon up — which was not such a very difficult thing for Lex. And then came the fun part.
‘Ai say!’ he would whine as soon as he was in the door. ‘Is someone going to attend to mey or am ai just to be left standing hereyah all day? Ai am not accustomed to being treated in such a mannah!’
‘I beg your pardon, sir. How can I help?’ the jeweller would ask, hackles raised already.
Lex would give him a haughty stare. ‘Ai am Trent Lexington IV of the Galswick Lexingtons.’ Of course, there was no such family but the jeweller would nod anyway and look suitably impressed. ‘Ai’ve come to talk about a brooch that was recently discovahed in the attic at the country home, you know.’
‘Very good, sir. Do you have the brooch with you today?’
‘Yaas, naturally. Ai made the discovery maiself and ai would like to sell… ah, that is… ai have come to get it valued at the bequest of mey parents.’