by neetha Napew
“What is this . . . this corruption?”
“They think to provoke us into letting them go.” The badly unsettled Kimmilpat was wheezing weakly.
Multhumot glared at the prisoners as he steadied his associate. “That is not going to happen. Not while I have convicted power left in my body.” Covering his broad nose as best he was able, he advanced purposefully on the reeking cell, his other hand upraised. Miniature lightning crackled between his spread fingers as he commenced a deep-throated invocation of profound import.
He was barely halfway through the first sentence when Squill, taking unabashed aim and demonstrating extraordinary accuracy even for one so obviously skilled in such matters, proceeded to anoint the wizard with the remaining contents of the water jug via the conduit of his own body. Initially struck square in the face (hard as he strained, Squill couldn’t maintain the flow for very long), the wizard stopped dead in his tracks, blinked, realized fully the extent of the ultimate unhygienic act which had been performed upon him, and fainted clean away.
Not the similarly debased Kimmilpat, nor the commandant, nor any of the ordinary guards had the courage to advance to the woodchuck wizard’s rescue. Meanwhile the otters, employing the relentless energy and enthusiasm of their kind, did their best to exacerbate the despoiled condition of bom their cell and the adjoining corridor. Throwing himself into the spirit of the moment, Buncan participated as best he could. Gragelouth simply could not bring himself to do more than occasionally expectorate on the cell floor. Most of the time he simply kept his face averted from the fray and let out an occasional moan.
Eventually a trio of guards crept down the corridor. Improvised masks covered their mouths and nostrils. They hustled the still-heaving Kimmilpat out of the hallway before returning to drag the comatose mass of his colleague to safety. Pandemonium reigned in the antechamber, clearly audible to those within the cell.
Exhausted but exhilarated, the otters finally took a break from their noxious exertions.
“That ought to give the buggers somethin’ to think about,” Squill declared with satisfaction. “Wonder ‘ow they’re goin’ to react to our little party.”
Buncan was pinching his nose tightly, trying not to inhale any more than was absolutely necessary as he peered up the corridor.
“Whatever they do, I hope they do it soon. It’s hot in here and I’m having a tough time maintaining my own equilibrium.”
“ ‘Ere now, Bunkins,” said Neena worriedly, “don’t you up an’ pass out on us.”
“I have to confess,” came the voice of the distressed merchant from the back of their cell, “that I cannot imagine you spellsinging up anything worse than this.” He waved feebly to take in the ravaged cell and hallway.
“Crikey, guv, go easy on the compliments.” Squill grinned modestly. “We just improvised as best we could.”
“They’re coming back.” Buncan nodded toward the far end of the corridor.
The commandant was alone, stumbling and hesitating as if he was being urged on (not to say pushed) from behind. The rat’s demeanor was as thoroughly disheveled as his previously spotless uniform. Behind the handkerchief he kept tightly pressed to his muzzle, his narrow, pointy face was decidedly green. This was unsurprising given the fact that the city’s moist heat had invaded the cell block, the atmosphere of which had already graduated from ripe to rank.
Swaying slightly, he stumbled halfway down the corridor, at which point he could advance no farther. “I am,” he emitted a curdled gurgle, fought not to swallow, finally gathered himself, and began afresh, “I am pleased to inform you that a decision has been rendered in your case.”
Neena winked at Buncan.
“Is that right?” Squill responded innocently.
“Yes. Through the infinite magnanimity of the Justice Court of Hygria and by special dispensation from the Council of Cleanliness, it has been decided that you will be allowed to recover your worldly possessions and depart unhindered without having to face the formal prosecution you so richly deserve.”
Neena leaned against the diagonal bars. “Cor, wot a generous lot o’ folks. I almost ‘ate to leave. Wot do you think, Bunklewit? Maybe we ought to ‘ang around a while longer?”
“No, no.” The commandant spoke hastily, before Buncan could comment. “The streets have been cleared for you. This entire borough of the city has been sealed against your presence. Just take your belongings and leave.”
Buncan’s gaze narrowed as he regarded the trembling rat “I dunno. I think we’re owed something for our trouble, for being accused of something we weren’t aware of and for being shut up here while—” He broke off. Gragelouth was shaking him persistently.
“If you do not mind, I would rather not strain our current luck,” the merchant hissed. “We should get out while we can.”
Buncan smiled and whispered. “I know. I just like to push the envelope.”
“A peculiar expression.”
“One of my dad’s.”
Gragelouth stepped past him, waving at the bilious commandant. “Very well. We accept your offer. Now open up! We’re ready to leave.” He turned to the otters. “While I personally would have opted for a less unconventional means of resistance, I have to admit that the outcome has been congenial. Please try not to puke on anyone as we make our way to freedom.”
“Relax, guv. I don’t think I ‘ave it in me anymore anyways,” Squill informed him. “So to speak.”
Advancing with the pointed toes of a ballet dancer—or a lone scout traversing a mine field—the commandant worked his way down to their cell and fumbled at the lock with a large, ornate key. With more of a metallic clank than a click, the door swung aside. Weaving unsteadily, the rat watched them exit. Buncan almost felt sorry for him.
Squill paused, breathing directly into the rat’s face. “Wot about the guards outside?”
“The antech—” the commandant staggered under the impact of the otter’s breath, “the antechamber has been cleared. All doors are open and unbarred to you. Also all windows and every other ventable opening in the building. Now please, go!” He clung to the cell door for support.
Proving that the rat’s declaration was as genuine as his nausea, they found the outer chambers deserted. So was the main boulevard outside, and the square with its intricate fountain. As they hurried along the white paving stones, Buncan sensed eyes following them furtively from cracks in shutters and barely opened windows.
“Would you look at this,” Squill ventured as they jogged along. “They’re bloody terrified of us. I think we could ‘ave the run o’ the city if we wanted it.”
“Our actions must seem not merely outlandish but incomprehensible to them.” Gragelouth puffed along in the lead. “We are not free yet. Keep a watch for cocked bows or poised spears.”
“Naw, they wouldn’t try anythin’ now, guv,” Squill replied confidently. “Be afraid we might spit on “em.”
They passed the inn whose hospitality they wouldn’t have the opportunity to sample, taking note as they ran past of the barred doors and shuttered windows, and turned up the street leading to the tethering spot where they’d left Gragelouth’s wagon. The vegetable seller had deserted her stall, as had all her fellow vendors. After the clamor and noise which had greeted the travelers upon arrival, they now found the avenues eerily silent.
Squill and Neena’s exertions had made quite an impression on the local authorities.
CHAPTER 10
They took their leave of sterile, whttewashed Hygria without regret. No pursuit was mounted once they were beyond the city walls, not by vengeful guards nor nauseous sorcerers. It was clear that none of them had, so .to speak, the stomach for it.
Well south of the metropolis, they stopped in a shady glade of nut trees to bathe in a clear, cool stream. Duncan relaxed in the shallows while brother and sister otter frolicked in deeper waters. Gragelouth used a cloth to daintily scrub and wash his fur, then set to combing himself out with a square brush as bi
g as his hand.
When the otters had finally had enough of the water, they dried themselves and dressed, then helped themselves to a bushel or so of the ripe nuts; this in lieu of the supplies the town itself had been so unwilling to furnish. When they had enough, Gragelouth once again set a course northwestward.
A week passed before the grassy, scrub-flecked plains gave way to the foothills of a rugged range of unknown mountains. There were no trails leading within, and they had to pick their way carefully around boulders and over rough spots. The dray lizards hissed and jerked violently, but the merchant kept them under admirable control with well-chosen tugs on the reins and sharply barked phrases of command.
“Easier for a mercenary fox on foot than for a vehicle to get through this way,” Buncan commented as they bounced and rattled through the notch Gragelouth had chosen to explore.
“I do not know for certain that he came this way,” the merchant replied unencouragingly. “Only that this seems to me the only possible avenue through these mountains.”
Buncan pursed his lips thoughtfully. “It’s your wagon, Gragelouth. So we go your way. What’s this range called, anyway?”
“I have no idea.” The sloth wrestled with the reins.
“Interestin’ name,” Neena quipped, but her heart wasn’t in it. The path was too rough to inspire ready humor.
As the travelers progressed, the crags overhead clawed more determinedly at the underbellies of the scudding clouds. Their flanks steepened. Unless they chanced upon a formal road or track of some kind, Buncan couldn’t see how they were going to wrestle the clumsy wagon through the increasingly rough terrain.
In all mis time they encountered no other travelers. If any commerce passed through these mountains, it was by a route different from the one they were traversing. Gragelouth surmised that any such travel probably passed to the east and north. In their case they sought not commerce anyway, but revelation, and the path to that is always more difficult.
Days later the hitherto peaceful atmosphere was interrupted by a steady sussuration. Initially a loud whisper, it intensified with their advance until it had become a roaring in the ears, like a steady gale. It carried with it a becoming freshness to the air which invigorated tired spirits. Even the dray lizards picked up their pace.
The otters recognized it from the first. “Nothin’ mysterious or sorceral about that noise, friends.” Neena stood behind Buncan, her paws on his shoulders, trying to see into the distance. “ ‘Tis a river, and a big, fast-flowin’ one.”
“Not as big as the Tailaroam,” Squill ventured, “nor maybe even the Shortstub, but steeper o’ drop than either. White water!” Clearly the otter relished the prospect.
The narrowing pass they had been following ended at the river, which funneled swiftly but not impassably to the west through a steep gorge. Gragelouth inspected the terrain with a practiced eye.
“It cuts through these mountains more or less in the direction we must take.” He pointed downstream. “See, there is a contiguous beach. If it is sufficiently compacted, we can parallel.” He chucked the reins, urging his team onward.
As they swung out onto the sand, Buncan uneasily eyed the torrent on their right. “What happens if it rains upstream and the river rises? We’ll be trapped in this canyon.”
“Better work on your stroke, mate,” Squill said cheerily. Buncan was not amused.
The wagon rattled and rocked but did not sink into the firm mixture of sand and gravel. Gragelouth kept a steady eye on the surface ahead, watching for any soft spots. As the canyon closed in around them, Buncan found himself glancing worriedly back the way they’d come. If the river came up the wagon would float . . . until it struck the first submerged boulder.
They hadn’t traveled far before the beach spread out to form a shallow plain complete with trees and grass. Just ahead a tributary, slow-moving but too deep and wide to cross, entered the main current from their side. There was no way around it. The beach down which they were traveling, which had looked so promising at first, was a dead end.
Someone, or something, had found the little valley at the junction of the rivers conducive to permanent habitation. Neena pointed out the house and bam, both of which had been fashioned out of river rock and driftwood. The home had a single sharply raked roof facing the main stream.
Behind the bam a corral had been staked out. Its reptilian occupants looked healthy and well-fed. Buncan identified them as a species bred for consumption rather than work. There was also an extensive garden and small orchard, irrigated with water from the tributary by means of two small canals.
Gragelouth indicated the network of stakes in the shallows. “Shellfish farming. Whoever has taken residence here has done well. This is not the abode of traders or transients.”
“Not just shellfish.” Neena pointed to the double rack of skinned and filleted fish drying in the sun behind the house.
As they drew nearer, several cubs came tumbling out to greet them. They were followed by two adults. No one exhibited any fear or apprehension at the wagon’s approach, which suggested that visitors to this place, while probably infrequent, were not unknown.
Buncan had never seen their like before, but Gragelouth recognized them readily enough.
“They are of a tribe called platypi,” he informed his companions, “who are noted for their love of privacy.”
“Bloody weird-looking, they are.” Squill stared at the youngsters, with their grinning, duck-billed faces and slick fur peeping out from beneath their clothing.
“You should have much in common with them. They are as at home in the water as yourselves, though not, I mink, quite as quick.”
The otter hopped down off the wagon. “If they’ll sell or trade us some fresh fish and maybe a cray or two, I’ll concede ‘em any race.”
“They look friendly enough.” Buncan climbed down to join his friends. “Think it’s a ploy?”
“No,” replied the normally suspicious sloth. “There would not be enough traffic through here to make banditry a paying proposition.”
Cubs and adults alike jabbered incessantly at the travelers as they escorted mem toward the house. As Gragelouth surmised, they didn’t get many visitors and were delighted at the prospect of company. Their remarkable bills made mem difficult but not impossible to understand.
“Tho you go to the northwetht?” The male of the household addressed them as they all sat on the beach, resting on boulders which had been carved into chairs. His spouse kept the chattering cubs away from the meeting.
The platy put his thumbs through suspenders, nodding downstream. “Your vehicle will never make it through theth mountains. Even if we could raft it across, the beach endth not far downstream.”
“We are open to suggestions,” Gragelouth told him.
Their host considered. “I have plenty of wood and am experienthed with my handth. Perhapth we can come to an agreement. I could uth a good wagon and team.”
“Oh, no,” said the sloth. “That wagon is my livelihood. It contains all my goods, all my worldly possessions.”
“I wouldn’t take your goodth. You could take them onward with you. I jutht want the wagon and team. Those for a good, thound boat. A fair trade.”
“Seems fair to me, it does,” said Squill without hesitation. “Let’s do it,” his sister added eagerly. “Be grand to travel in a boat for a change. I’m sick of dust and dirt.”
Buncan eyed the platy evenly. “Have you actually been downstream? Is it navigable?”
The sloth regarded him approvingly. “Ah. You are learning. I see that being in my company has done you good.” “I’ve traveled a ways,” their host told him. “I have no need to go far.” He gestured at the homestead, with its shellfish farm and orchard and garden and animals. “My world ith here. The dethithion ith up to you. I can only tell you with athuranth that you cannot continue to follow the Sprilashoone by land. A boat ith your only real opthion. Unleth you want to go back the way you came and try a
nother route.”
“I worry about chancing a heavy load of trade goods on an unknown watercourse,” Gragelouth muttered.
“I will thtore them for you,” said the platy. “No extra charge. I am a farmer, not a trader. You can return for them whenever you with.” “Rapids?” asked Buncan.
“Not for at leatht two dayth. Farther than that I have not been. And at that point it turnth more to the northwetht, ath you would want. Bethideth, two among you are otterth. Even in the wortht waters they can manage.” “BloomuV right,” Squill agreed expansively. “If you have trouble with the boat, you have among you two who can go over the thide to fix or recover thingth.” “You’ve ‘andled the land portion of our little sojourn,” Neena reassured Gragelouth. “Leave it to me bro’ and me to look after things while we’re waterborne.”
“We might follow the river on foot,” the merchant murmured, reluctant to the last, “but the terrain is difficult and becoming more so, and I confess that the prospect of an extended hike does not thrill me with anticipation.” “Then ith mettled.” The platy extended a hand. Buncan had to admit the thought of traveling by water instead of land was an inviting one. His battered backside and jostled spine certainly approved.
The platy family proved to be excellent hosts, and the travelers spent the most relaxing evening and night in days luxuriating in their hospitality. In exchange for some selections from Gragelouth’s stock, the fanner additionally provided them with substantial supplies of dried fish, fruits, crayfish, and freshwater oysters, as well as vegetables from the garden. Even Gragelouth had to admit that the riparian hermits had been more than fair in then’ dealings. As a result, they did not miss the supplies they bad been unable to obtain in Hygria.
The boat was sturdy and larger than expected. There were four sets of oars, which since they were traveling with the current no one expected to have to use save perhaps to fend the craft off the canyon walls should they grow unexpectedly narrow.
The single lateen-rigged mast was stepped solidly into the keep fore of the cabin. Its sail remained furled as they pushed away from the rustic rough-hewn dock and rode the tranquil waters of the tributary into the fast-moving current of the Sprilashoone.