A Company of Heroes Book Three: The Princess

by Ron Miller

  Beneath her coating of clay the princess turns a very pale green. “No, no, I don’t think that I could do that.”

  “If we open the bag, he might just . . . ah . . . sort of pour out.”

  “Stop it, I said! I don’t want to hear any more about that.”

  “Then I don’t see any other recourse but to continue on to whatever the name of that town is.”

  “Slintner. Up the Orn.”

  “Yes, Slintner. It can’t be much more than another day away. Surely we can stand this one day more?”

  “If my army isn’t there I’m going to slit my wrists.”

  Her army is not there when they arrive the next afternoon, but Bronwyn has, of course, by then forgotten her rash alternate promise of the day before. They take the abbot directly to the local church, whose squat bulk had been easily visible as they descended from the forests into the broad, undulating plain, which shimmered beneath the unrelenting sun like the surface of a hot stove.

  Their arrival is greeted with lamentations when the nature of their burden is explained. There is a well beside the church and while the churchmen circle the cart, wringing their hands, Bronwyn and the professor pour buckets of tepid water over each other’s heads, sluicing away layer after layer of impacted dust, dirt, clay and sweat. When the princess finally produces the letter given her by the assistant abbot, Spleenbottle, there is clear disbelief on the face of the priest when the missive identifies the letter’s carrier. Bronwyn sees him glance at her briefly over the top of the page, assessing her unprepossessing appearance. She feels a wave of embarrassment she has not experienced in some time; she is suddenly very self-consciously aware of what she must look like: a tall, rangy-looking girl, her filthy copper mane as knotted and matted as a freshly coughed-up hairball, sunburned, dry lips crusty and scabbed, dressed in ill-fitting rags, her long bare calves stuck into the tops of a pair of huge, loaf-like boots. None of this is improved by her expression. Before the priest can ask to see it, she shows him her ring, which evidence he seems to accept, if a little reluctantly and not a little sceptically.

  The church is tended solely by an elderly, crippled priest and two assistants, equally elderly. They too appear to be unable to deterrnine exactly how to remove the distended contents of the cart. Even had they had the imagination, they are physically incapable of implementing any workable idea. One of the ancient priests (they seemed interchangeable to the princess) shuffles down the dusty road to a cluster of houses nearby to see if he can recruit some assistance. One of the remaining priests explains that due to the Great Storm the harvest had been a disaster and the subsequent heat and drought has made the failure of this year’s crop a foregone conclusion. There are, therefore, any number of out-of-work field hands and disconsolate farmers whose time can be put to better use than moping around the taverns absorbing all manner of evil wines, spirits and liquors. Especially if such good work holds the promise of a few poenigs or a loaf of bread as its reward.

  Soon, a half dozen husky-looking figures appear, marching in a cloud of ash-colored dust, followed at an ever-increasing distance by the priest who had summoned them.

  When they arrive, the spokespriest explains that it is only necessary for the body of Abbot Flatnoy to be transported into the church, where he can be interred in one of several crypts reserved for the clergy that are inset into the floor. Bronwyn explains that the cart is, at least for all practical purposes, Church property anyway and that it does not matter in the least to her what they find necessary to do to it in order to disengage the by now enormous sphere. She does not particularly care to be present during this process, since she is certain that to be eyewitness to any accident would be something that would haunt her for years. The eldest priest invites her into the church, while the other two remain outside to oversee the work.

  The interior, while as uninspiring as any other Musrumic church, is at least cool. Bronwyn collapses into one of the hard wooden pews while the priest offers her a huge cup of impossibly cool well water. She downs this almost without swallowing, allowing it to spill over her face and chest, and it is while she is more temperately sipping her second cupful that the professor comes in and joined her. He has grown almost as pale as he had the day before and she offers him her water, which he accepts with gratitude.

  “How are they doing?” she asks.

  “Well enough. They should have the body in here in a few minutes.”

  “Well, I want to be leaving as it comes in. As soon as the priests are less occupied with the burial, I’ll try to see if they know anything about the army.”

  A few minutes later, the workmen enter the broad doorway of the church. They have rigged a kind of sledge and are sliding the bulk into the building by brute force. The bag, nearly twelve feet in circumference, jiggles as precariously as a child’s water balloon, but with certainly a far less entertaining and refreshing surprise inside. To her distress, the princess notices that the canvas seams are leaking, and a nasty-looking trail is being left behind, like that of a sweaty snail.

  The men drag and push the body to a point in front of the altar, where a slab has been removed from the floor, revealing a cavity that even from where she sits the princess can see is far too small to contain the now enormously swollen abbot.

  “The volumes are incompatible,” observes the professor.

  “Let’s step outside. I’d rather not see this.”

  Stepping through the church door is like entering a furnace. The dusty heat seems to strike her like a solid object and the humidity makes breathing feel as though she were trying to inhale an unflavored aspic. She blinks and squints against the sudden glare. As she steps away from the threshold, Bronwyn hears something which to this day she has not, despite all her efforts, been able to forget: a vast, soft, wet, flabbily flatulent sound, something like an enormous pudding might make if dropped to the floor, or perhaps a rotten pumpkin or watermelon, followed by a prolonged gaseous sigh.

  The men and the priests burst from the doors, and Bronwyn and Wittenoom are only just able to step out of their way. To a man they throw themselves into the spidery grass and vomit violently for several minutes.

  Bronwyn watches this until the figures are exhausted, then turns to the professor and says, “Perhaps we’ll stroll into the village and see what we can find there.”

  “Not a bad idea,” agrees the scientist, “as these gentlemen appear to be preoccupied.”

  Slintner proves to be what on more equable days would have been a pleasant stroll of a mile or so away from the church, but is a draining trudge for the two tired travelers. The Orn that Slintner is up is a dreary little stream that drools wanly beneath a scarcely necessary and overadequately massive bridge. Immediately on the far side is a tavern, the Cockroach and Mallet. Beyond is a fairly sizable village, at least in comparison with anything Bronwyn has seen since leaving Hartal-around-the-Bend. Evidently they have at last reached the furthest outposts of civilization. She ignores the remainder of Slintner, however, in favor of the immediate presence of the tavern.

  The squat, two-story building is made of massive stone blocks covered with an overhanging slate roof and the interior is as cool as a cave. There are already four or five people inside who look at the tall girl and the taller man with some surprise, since they are evidently expecting the return of the men who had gone to help the priests. The tavern is as quiet inside as only a place can be in which there has recently been loud conversation.

  Bronwyn goes to the bar and asks the tavernkeeper for something to drink, settling for a warm beer as the only thing available. Professor Wittenoom seconds her order.

  “Tell me,” she asks the man behind the bar after her first long draught of the tepid, bitter liquid, “how far are we from the coast?”

  “Kind of depends on which way you go,” the barkeep replies with some deliberation. “If you’re going east, maybe twenty, thirty miles. If you’re going north, maybe fifty, maybe seventy miles.”

  “Would yo
u get any news from the coast, this far inland?”

  “Depends on the news,” the man replies reasonably.

  “Shipwrecks?”

  “Depends on the shipwreck.”

  “This might have been a large number of ships, all at once.”

  “Three ships went aground on Desperation Point, oh . . . when was that, Old Ferd?” He directed this last to one of his customers, a withered wisp of a man who looks like a curled wood shaving. Old Ferd cackles, “I remember that well, I do. When I was a lad in eighty-eight, or maybe eighty-seven, but no later than eighty-nine. Terrible affair.”

  “I was thinking of something more recent, during the storm a couple of weeks ago.”

  “That was no storm!” crackles Old Ferd, swinging his cup indignantly, though not so much so as to spill a drop. “Not like the Great Storm of Aught Aught. That was a storm that separated the adults from the pupae.”

  “I remember it, of course,” says the tavernkeeper, ignoring Old Ferd. “The storm you’re speaking of, I mean. But I didn’t hear of any shipwrecks. There must’ve been some, I’m sure, in a storm like that, but they must’ve been further away. We usually hear about such things, eventually, at least if they occur within fifty miles in either direction.”

  “What does this mean for your . . . for the army, do you think?” Wittenoom asks the princess. “I’m no help to you if the Barracuda and its cargo are lost.”

  “We’ll have to travel on to the coast and see what we can discover there,” answers Bronwyn tiredly.

  “What army?” inquires the sharp-eared proprietor.

  “What?” says the princess, feigning ignorance ineffectively.

  “You mentioned an army.”

  “Oh. Well. We were just talking.”

  “I think perhaps you are interested in the army. Half the young folk and most of the old ones town have gone off to join it, it seems.”

  “What army?”

  “Beats me, no one tells me anything.”

  Bronwyn tries without a great deal of success to contain her excitement. She can scarcely permit herself to even consider the import of the tavernkeeper’s words. What army? she repeats to herself. How many armies can there be?

  The tavernkeeper gives Bronwyn instructions, no more complex than pointing them in the proper direction, and wishes them well. The day is growing late and they are spared the direct glare and heat of the sun. They carry food and beverages purchased with the last of the traveling allowance provided by St. Woncible’s. The road is much better than anything they have been accustomed to during the previous week and a half, and the going is relatively easy. The countryside undulates like heavy swells at sea, a resemblance increased by the wavering strata of hot air. The landscape quivers liquidly. As the travelers continue east, the undulations increase until the they are ascending and descending veritable hills. Night has fallen, but both moons have risen, one nearly full and the other a fat waxing crescent, and their light is more than sufficient for walking. The air has appreciably cooled and it seems a waste not to take advantage of it. They have been hiking for about four hours, including one or two breaks for food and refreshment, and midnight is approaching. The moons are too bright for many stars to be visible. The road is now reduced to zigzagging up the steep hills and the exhausted girl has decided to make a camp at the summit of the one they are now climbing. As she reaches the crest and sees what lies on its farther side, however, she feels her knees suddenly grow weak and a wave of almost dizzying elation sweeps over her. She sits on the high bank beside the road before she falls.

  “My goodness,” whispers the professor, as he joins her.

  “My goodness, indeed,” agrees the princess.

  The valley that lies below her looks like a bowl filled with stars. Lights by the hundreds, perhaps thousands, how is she to know?, twinkle redly, yellowly, brightly, as though she were looking directly through the earth into the starry spaces beyond. They are the campfires of an army, and she knows for a certainty whose army it is.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  MEANWHILE

  As Thud Mollockle is being tied to the stake atop the funeral pyre, it begins to occur to him that his situation might be a precarious one.

  He had lost much intellectual interest in life once it had finally occurred to him that it was unlikely that he would ever again see his princess, and has therefore lived as circumstances dictated with a kind of machine-like tranquility. He had allowed himself to be recruited into someone’s army, he had no idea whose army it was or who they are fighting, nor what the fight was about, and had done as he was told as unquestioningly as though he were some newly invented infennal device. It is, unfortunately, just this inhuman quality that has gotten him in the uncomfortable position in which he now finds himself.

  He has no idea where he is; neither the name of the city nor even that of the country is known to him. It is someplace he has never seen before, he is certain of that. But then, since he had never ranged further than a three- or four-block radius from his home and job in the first thirty years of his life, it is to be expected that most of the world would be new to him. He has a fine view of the central square of whatever city he is in, which in any other circumstances would have been picturesque. However, at the present he is tied to an enormously thick tree trunk by cables that could have moored a battleship. Beneath his feet is a pyramid of lumber, neatly stacked. The whole arrangement is twelve or fifteen feet in height, so Thud has an excellent panoramic view that might have been envied by many of the thousands of spectators who jammed the square, but probably wasn’t, given the circumstances.

  There is a holiday atmosphere to the auto-da-fé that is infectious to the point that even Thud feels his spirits rising. The periphery of the flagstoned square is lined by the colorful booths and stands of hawkers selling lemonade, beer and wine, and grilled sausages and chickens (the smell wafting unfairly to Thud, who had only been given a breakfast bowl of gruel by a frugal city govennment who can see no point in wasting a better meal), and souvenirs of all kinds, to say nothing of the booths and tables of a score of different games whose general illegality is being overlooked on this gala occasion. The milling uniformity of the crowd is brightened by the sellers of balloons, pennants, candy and peanuts, as well as those who have been enterprising enough to spend a few long nights producing ceramic or stuffed cloth caricatures of the doomed giant. These sold very well; in fact, they are still popular and are being produced to this very day. They are called Thudlets, a registered trade name, and are distributed throughout Guesclin..

  There are three or four bands playing, each a different tune. Many people are singing along, though not very well, not that it makes a great deal of difference.

  It is a beautiful summer day: a deep blue sky decorated with exactly the proper proportion of fat, white clouds. There is just the right amount of breeze that will keep the flames hot but not enough to send smoke into the houses and shops downwind. No one wants to have to spend days airing the scent of cooked kobold from their establishments.

  It really seems like a perfect day.

  Even Thud is beginning to think so, until the representative of the Tribunal that had condemned him mounts a low platfonm at the base of the pyre and reads the death sentence. It is short and to the point, with very little of the convoluted legal language that would have lost the crowd’s interest. As soon as the Tribune has finished speaking, a half-dozen men, spaced at equidistant points around the wooden pyramid, ignites torches and began kindling the oil-soaked straw that has been stuffed into the interstices between the timbers. As the black smoke boils up around him, Thud’s suspicions that the princess might be forever beyond his reach develop to a level of certainty that entirely ruins the mood of the occasion. What must the princess think of me? Probably that he has deserted her, that he has run off and left her. He feels his heart breaking at the realization that the princess must be terribly disappointed in him. She would never know that he had really, truly tried his best. />
  He has not tested his bonds before this, and he gives the ropes that tie his wrists a tentative tug. He is a little amazed to feel them give at even that insignificant application of his strength. While certainly daunted by Thud’s vast size, his imprisoners were deceived by his docility into appreciably underestimating the big man’s latent power . . . even had they known to allow for his debilitating mental outlook.

  What do you know? Thud thinks, no little amazed, as he tries his restraints once again and feels strands of hemp snap like threads. He tries a little harder, just out of curiosity, and with a crack like a gunshot a half-inch-thick rope parts. No one in the crowd below seems to be aware of his experiments, since it is to be expected that a victim of an auto-da-fé would writhe and twist as he perceives the flames creeping toward his feet; the billowing smoke hid a great deal, too, and the sounds of the musicians, fireworks among the mob and the snapping and crackling of the bonfire disguise all other noises.

  Three things happen more or less simultaneously: Thud concludes that no matter how much he may feel that he has failed his princess, as long as he is alive there will always surely be some chance they might yet be reunited, whereas there would be no chance if he were burnt to a crisp. Following this decision, and the second happening, Thud finds that he can snap the ropes that bind him as easily as though they are wet noodles.

  The third thing is far more unusual.

  With a motion ponderous, deliberate and cetacean the mountainous funeral pyre begins descending; so slowly and precisely that more than a dozen feet have disappeared into the pavement before anyone notices. Someone shouts, another person screams, the shouts and screams spread like echoes or ripples from the disturbed center. Once that expression of surprise, shock and undoubtedly superstitious horror has swept through to the outskirts of the mob it leaves an uncanny silence behind. Those who can clearly and unwillingly see what is going on press back against those who are leaning forward to discover exactly what all of the excitement is about.