Arcana

by Cooke, Edward

  ‘Then it wasn’t murder. He’s a prince. He can kill anyone he likes.’

  ‘The wind of change doesn’t blow much around these parts.’

  ‘Hence all the cobwebs.’

  ‘You want to climb on a big enough rock and clean them out.’

  ‘I’d need a good woman to do it for me.’

  ‘If you’re too damn lazy to do it yourself, a good woman wouldn’t come near you.’

  ‘You seem like a nice kid,’ I understated. ‘So I’ll level with you. I’m no private eye. What I am is an avenger. You understand?’

  ‘My people don’t squander education only on muscleheaded men. We raise our daughters right. I’ve seen Beowulf. I know all about revenge.’

  ‘You don’t know squat about revenge. It’s nothing like in your fancy drama. Revenge is a rat in the pit of your stomach that gnaws away at you at the bottom of the night. I don’t sleep. I don’t eat. All I do is wait until someone brings me proof my father’s climbing accident was no accident.’

  ‘So that’s why you look like you’ve been through a dino. Come back to camp with me. Help us pitch our tent and I’ll cut you in on the best dinner you’ve ever had. Only if you try leaning over me to help stir the soup, my sister will chop you up and add you to it.’

  I liked the idea of a tent: the wind was flinging rain like widows’ tears into my cave. And I liked the idea of dinner: I’d had slim pickings that day on the mountain. And I liked the idea of this girl having a sister: that doubled my chances of getting dessert.

  My father used to say he liked a certain wildness in a woman. What he really meant was he liked it when they played hard to get for five or ten minutes. If they didn’t intend to be got, that made him sore and he would go off by himself and look at his risqué cave paintings for solace.

  My client was Aenea. The sister was Dido. When I first arrived at their camp, they pointed to the sewn skins and whittled bones that a practised touch could make fall into place to produce their tent. Then they sat back and left me to it.

  Fine as far as it went. But my people dwell in caves for a reason: we can’t be bothered with upping sticks just because the weather takes a turn for the worse. We tough it out, storing up food for when it gets really bad. When the stored food runs out, we go head-to-head with the winter and we always win. Some years it is a close contest. So there was something to be said for women, physically weaker, following the sun. But I didn’t know how or why the men put up with it.

  After the five longest minutes of my life I could no longer conceal from those two shrewd dames that I hadn’t the faintest idea how to put their damned tent up. They had suspected as much, and after watching me stew a little longer they told me to go and kill something for their pot, and leave them to apply brainpower.

  I resented the idea I didn’t have a brain to do my thinking. I was sorely tempted to kill one of them and possess the other, but the rest of their tribe was nearby, keeping a close eye on me. Even though I fancied my chances against that bunch of Boy Scouts, there were a great many of them and it would get very messy very soon. So I did as I was told. I went and found two dumb rabbits rutting, interrupted and killed them with my bare hands. That made me feel better somehow.

  When I got back to camp, the tent was up and a fire was going. I began to wonder what sorcery these women knew, besides the usual tricks of large breasts and firm thighs. There is much less actual magic in the world than men generally suppose.

  What there is is quite enough, in the right woman’s hands. All through preparing the dinner, Dido flirted with me mercilessly. Meanwhile Aenea ignored me. I recognised that trick for what it was: the old Good Girl–Bad Girl routine. I bided my time. Some of what my father had taught me still held good. The secret was to discover which of them I could have first without ruining my chances with the other.

  So I ate my dinner like a good little boy, and went home afterwards and looked at the old man’s faithful paintings. It is a basic tenet of modern medicine that the cure must resemble the affliction. I felt afflicted by Aenea. The women in the paintings resembled her in bare essentials, though if I’d had some chalk I might have changed the hair a little.

  ‘I can animate them for you if you like.’

  Fortunately it was no important visitor: just that pansy Merin the Mage.

  ‘No thanks,’ I said.

  ‘Then you’ll just have to go on using what passes for your imagination.’

  ‘My imagination works fine.’

  ‘We made a great detective team, Sam. Whatever happened to us?’

  What happened was I figured out Merin was falsely accusing people he didn’t like of my father’s murder, just so I’d kill them for him. I was a little slow on the uptake: I killed so many of the strongest men of our tribe that we almost didn’t make it through that winter. My mother made me hunt and gather so much food to widows and orphans that I almost didn’t make it through that winter. And all because Merin had a chip on his shoulder.

  When I didn’t answer him, Merin said, ‘It’s too bad we don’t work together anymore.’

  ‘There are worse evils abroad in the world.’

  ‘I know who killed your father. I’m not kidding this time.’

  ‘Aren’t you? You’re sure it’s a real person you’re accusing, not just a speck on your crystal ball?’

  ‘I’m absolutely positive. And I don’t ask much in exchange for the information.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘That Aenea’s a nice girl. She’s got spunk. I just don’t think she’s right for you.’

  ‘Don’t skulk around after me.’

  ‘I wouldn’t, even if I could keep up with you. I’ve been watching you in my crystal ball. As a matter of fact, I can watch your new friends whenever I like. Would you like to take a look? I hear their tribe goes in for some very interesting nightwear.’

  ‘You stop spying on them.’

  ‘Or what, hero?’

  I shook Merin by the throat. He just laughed, although it came out more of a croak. I slackened my grip.

  ‘Why don’t you make some good use of your magic and find out who offed Aenea’s old man?’

  ‘As a favour to you? Of course. But I’d like a little something in return. I love it when you hold me tight.’

  I dropped Merin. Magic is woman’s work: Merin could only tap it in so far as he was in touch with a womanly streak in his own soul. In his cups he would try to claim every man had a feminine side. But I knew I didn’t. I knew what it meant to be a man. It meant you settled your differences as quietly as you could, and if you couldn’t then you went out into the Valley of Decision and stood either side of the Boulder of Reckoning and settled them in front of everyone.

  I figured Merin would settle quietly. I took hold of him once more. He gave a little gasp. I threw him out of my cave and listened to him bounce off down the mountainside.

  #

  The next day I wanted to begin my investigation. It would have been ideal to catch Aenea’s tribe while they were still tired from their migration. Someone would have let something slip.

  I never made it out of my cave. My mother wanted a word. Or words.

  ‘Merin’s mother says you two haven’t been playing nicely.’

  It was my ill luck to have known Merin a long time. We were close enough in age to have played together, until he stopped wanting to talk about girls and started playing voodoo dolls with them instead. That had delighted my mother: in her eyes, the sun shone out of the mouth of Merin’s cave.

  ‘You remember how he put me up to killing all those people.’

  ‘That’s all over and done. You’ve said you’re sorry. Made amends.’

  ‘Nearly killed myself making amends.’

  ‘You’re always so strong when it comes to doing something stupid. When I ask you to run the slightest little errand for anybody else, it’s as if I’d troubled you for all the labours of Hercules. Fame and glory is all you’re after. Just like your father.
’

  ‘Don’t you speak ill of him!’

  ‘Why not? I’d’ve said the same and worse to his face if he were still alive. And he’d still be alive if he hadn’t had such an insatiable appetite for tomfoolery.’

  ‘When I find his murderer, I’m going to bring you his head on a platter.’

  ‘Can you scrub it and scalp it first? The last thing I want is hairs in my casserole.’

  Sometimes I wondered whether my mother had done my father in, or egged his murderer on. She had the opportunity to sabotage his climbing gear: loosen one of the knotted sinews in his ropes, or fracture his bone pitons. She had the most to gain, at least with hindsight: she seemed to be riding the wave of modernity that was sweeping through our tribe. For a start, she hadn’t remarried. An acceptable period of widowhood, allowing full reverence for my father, would have been about a couple of hours.

  But she had loved him. I was sure of it. And she loved me; she just had funny ways of showing it.

  ‘I’ve got to go out,’ I said.

  ‘Oh yes? And where are you going on a day like today?’ It was raining. In our parts it was always raining. ‘I don’t suppose you had any ideas about chasing those two new hussies. Because if you did, you can forget it.’

  ‘How do you know about them?’

  ‘Merin showed me in his crystal ball. It was quite hard to see: you put a crack in it when you knocked him about last night. But they looked quite shameless. Living in tents, so everyone can hear all your business. They’ve no privacy.’

  ‘They have secrets. There’s a murderer among them.’

  ‘According to you there’s a murderer behind every boulder. I think it’s quite morbid. You should put it out of your mind. Now come with me and help with some chores for Merin’s mother. Merin doesn’t feel up to them today and I can quite understand why not.’

  Merin’s mother’s chores turned out to be as onerous as they were trivial. By the time I was done, night had fallen. I slunk to the edge of Aenea’s campsite. There I learned how they managed without the privacy a good cave provided: they got drunk and had an orgy out in the open. They weren’t going to let rain stop play. The party was well enough advanced that I considered slipping in among them, but both Aenea and Dido had already found partners for this dance.

  I enjoyed watching them, especially as I didn’t have to try too hard not to be seen. I was attentive enough that I noticed one man not participating. He sat on the ground, far enough from the fire that I didn’t spot him at first. He was simply watching. Wise chap.

  The next time Aenea dropped by my office, I asked her about him.

  ‘That’ll be Prince Halfbane. Since he’s our prince, he can hardly enter into the revels with the common folk. When he wants to spend some time with a woman, he chooses one and takes her far enough away for privacy’s sake. Then that woman is forbidden to take part in any more orgies until we’re sure, one way or the other.’

  ‘Quite some Royal Family you’ve got there. It sounds like a drag. I can see why you’ve only got the one prince.’

  ‘At least we’re not still living in caves, deferring to men or any other prehistoric twaddle.’

  I couldn’t see that either of these things had materially harmed my tribe, but I forebore from saying so.

  Aenea said, ‘How did you know about our revel anyway?’

  There was no use being coy about it. ‘I spied on you.’

  ‘Filthy pervert!’

  ‘I could well be,’ I said. ‘But at least the case is closed.’

  ‘It is?’ Aenea looked surprised. Frankly I had been hoping for something a little more in the way of gratitude.

  ‘You don’t have an old man. Nobody in your tribe does. Not for more than a night at a time—just as long as it takes to keep the tribe going and no more.’

  ‘Do you blame us?’

  ‘I don’t think you’ve solved any problems. Where more than one person tries to live together, with or without marriage, there will be power.’

  That made me think of something and it wasn’t, for a change, the prospect of making an honest woman of Aenea.

  ‘Do you blame me?’ Aenea asked. ‘For making up an excuse to meet you?’

  I indicated she should leave. I had business to take care of.

  ‘Is that it? Is that all you can do for me?’

  Professionally, that was all I could do for her. Personally, I had other rabbits to throttle.

  She wept, and I watched her weep. She went, and I watched her go.

  #

  ‘Mother,’ I shouted, ‘when you said everything was honky-dory between you and Dad, who were you trying to kid?’

  ‘You, kid. And it worked.’

  My mother was hunkered down on one side of the Boulder of Reckoning. I was hunkered down on the other. Every now and again, Merin the Mage would hurl a fireball over the top of the Boulder. Merin was a terrible shot, but given enough time I believed he could hit me. The Boulder was big, but there was only so much room behind it for me to hide. And just for once, it had stopped raining.

  I didn’t care. It was already too much to take in that my mother had killed my father. Not by proxy but in person. The only thing I didn’t know was why she had done it. At times like that, I am often glad I am a great detective.

  ‘Why did you do it?’ I yelled.

  ‘For the sake of the future, Sam!’ Merin hollered. He sent a brace of fireballs my way. One of them burnt the hairs off my arm. My skin is tough old stuff: I am often out in the sun, such as there is of it around here. He wouldn’t be able to finish me off with anything less than a direct hit. ‘Who’s the future? I’m the future!’

  ‘The future of what? With excuses for men like you around, our tribe doesn’t have a future.’

  ‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ my mother said.

  That made me mad. Mad enough to get ready to run around the Boulder of Reckoning. That’s what it’s there for: you and your adversary taunt each other until one of you chooses to fight or flee.

  I was ready to fight. I clenched my fists.

  The Boulder of Reckoning rose into the air.

  At first I thought Merin had been taking magic lessons, but I soon saw its levitation was no magic. All the women of our tribe—who were forbidden to come near the Valley of Reckoning—were standing on the clifftop hauling the Boulder up on a rope.

  Merin drew back his fiery fist to deliver my coup de grâce. My mother said, ‘Wait.’

  For a moment I thought she was giving me a reprieve, but then I realised she just wanted to show off her own cleverness, like all second-rate villainesses.

  ‘I killed him,’ she said. ‘Because he was choking the very life out of all of us women. The tribe was only half a tribe under him. He didn’t care that some of us could run as fast as a man, could shoot a damn sight straighter because we hadn’t been carousing all night—we’d been stuck in our caves looking after our kids, without even the right to rub the dirty pictures off the walls. While your father lived, there was no hope for women. Worse than that: there was no hope for men either.’

  ‘We enjoyed ourselves well enough.’

  The undeployed fireball started to burn Merin’s fingers. He yelped and blew it out.

  ‘You thought you did,’ my mother said, ‘but you didn’t know any better. Your father had this one idea about what it meant to be a man. But there are other models of manliness. Men in other tribes don’t act as dumb as you. There must be more to a man than a set of muscles and a limp dick.’

  I winced at my mother’s vulgarity.

  ‘But you—you were his favourite of my sons. Because you took all his dumb ideas without question and you fashioned yourself after them. The apple didn’t fall nearly far enough from the tree.’

  ‘What are you talking about? I’m your only son.’

  Merin coughed.

  ‘You have got to be kidding,’ I said.

  ‘Dad wouldn’t have me,’ Merin said, ‘because I am so in touch wi
th my feminine side.’

  ‘Faggot,’ I said.

  Merin spat. ‘I learned how to wield magic. Women’s work—exclusively so, in our neck of the woods. But there are such things as warlocks. In some tribes, the leader has to be one.’

  ‘Not in this tribe,’ I said.

  ‘The wind of change is blowing,’ my mother said. ‘Think of it as a mighty wind that blew your father off that stupid cliff he was climbing for no reason, goofing off from his family responsibilities.’

  ‘Because it was there—that’s a perfectly good reason.’

  ‘Oh please. Why are you so loyal to the old fool anyway? Merin’s the only one I know for sure is your brother. There are probably plenty more where he came from.’

  I put my hands over my ears. ‘I don’t have to listen to this.’

  ‘Not for much longer,’ Merin said. He clapped his hands together and grew an enormous fireball, too big for one palm alone. He lifted it over his head and stepped forward.

  An arrow sang through the air and cut the rope in twain. The Boulder and Merin had their Reckoning.

  Aenea was standing on top of the opposite cliff. She was a fine shot for a woman.

  I began to climb the cliff to be with her, but she shouted, ‘Don’t think I’m going to solve all your problems. You need to stay right where you are and work things out with your mixed-up tribe. My crowd is here until spring, and after that we’re off south out of the rain.’

  Aenea turned and walked away.

  My mother said, ‘That’s the kind of girl our tribe needs. Don’t let her get away!’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘She seemed kind of determined.’

  ‘She’s just playing hard to get. She wants you to chase her.’

  I was not happy about taking girl advice from my mother, though come to think of it she must have been a girl once, must have fallen for my father before my father fell from her esteem to his death.

  ‘It’s been kind of a rough day,’ I said. ‘My feelings have been kind of hurt. I don’t want to rush into anything. I need some quality alone time to think things through. Maybe I’ll go and take a bath.’

  The women of our tribe looked at me so approvingly that I could have invited any of them to come and loofah my back. But that wasn’t what I wanted.