Both girls rolled their eyes. “We know that,” they said in unison.
Hmm. He might have repeated the adage one time too many.
Lorel untangled the leash from her legs. “So you see a better spot?”
“Closer to the shipyard.” He laughed at their raised eyebrows. “The sailors asked for a magic show this afternoon, and promised to round up some children as camouflage.”
Tsai’dona giggled. “I knew you had something planned.”
“What’ll we do until then?” Lorel knelt and picked up the bothersome cub before it could get its claws into the hem of a passing woman’s skirt.
“Business.” He pointed at the jewelry shop down the street. “I have gemstones to sell.”
Lorel groaned. “He’ll spend hours dickering!”
Tsai’dona reached up and patted her shoulder. “At least afterward we’ll have something to guard. You know he always ends up with gold.”
“Hey, you’re supposed to be guarding me.”
The wretched serdil laughed silently at him from the safety of Lorel’s arms.
“He only ends up with gold if he ain’t spending it.” She patted the monster’s back. “We’ll be outside, kid.”
Praise the Thunderer. He always got better prices for his gems when she wasn’t standing around and squirming like she needed to find a potty.
∞∞∞
Two hours later, he’d bargained away every gem and semiprecious stone he’d brought into town. He crammed nine iron imperials and seven gold nobles into various cloak pockets. It had been a glorious bartering session, for all he couldn’t talk the shopkeeper up to ten imperials.
He headed outside to locate his bodyguards.
They were sitting on the stone curb and eating greasy meat. Worse, Lorel was sharing hers with the blasted cub.
So much for staying on duty.
He fought to keep the irritation out of his voice. “That thing will have the trots tonight, you know.”
Lorel snorted at him and held up the glistening, unidentifiable meat. “You’re just jealous. Here, we saved you some.”
After the monster licked all over it? “No thanks. I’m not hungry.” And wouldn’t get hungry until he bought a fresh-baked – and unlicked – fruit pie. “Let’s go back to the ship.”
She shrugged and handed the chunk of meat to the serdil.
The beast wolfed it down in one swallow.
That thing would fart putrid gas all night long. Praise the Thunderer he had his own cabin now instead of sharing with the girls. “I thought you were feeding it only fresh meat.”
Tsai’dona frowned at the creature. “He’s right. Was this a good idea?”
“Too late now.” Lorel shrugged and grinned. “Besides, she loves cooked food.”
What the beast liked was all that fat. He sighed and started walking. The creature’s diet wasn’t his affair, as long as Lorel kept it out of his wagon.
The girls leapt up from the curb and followed him.
Tsai’dona waved greasy fingers at him. “Bad bargaining session?”
What did she mean? “It went fine. We’re covering expenses.” Except for his book-buying addiction, but that didn’t count.
Lorel tugged gently on the serdil’s leash. “So how come you’re all cranky?”
Sniffing at everything along the way, the cub bumbled after her.
“I’m not cranky, I’m thinking.”
Both girls raised their eyebrows.
It wasn’t him, it was them being irritable. He shouldn’t have left them outside so long. How could he make it up to them?
They passed the weapons shop. Lorel’s dark skin turned bright red and she stared at the tobbo shop across the street.
Maybe he was the only one who thought the shopkeeper was good-looking.
They passed the bookshop. Tsai’dona frowned at him, but didn’t say anything. Maybe she didn’t like the cookbook? Its recipes did seem pretty obscure. Where would she find a spit-covered nest to make Bird’s Nest Soup?
His stomach growled, even though Bird Spit Soup didn’t sound the least bit appealing. He started watching for food vendors.
They reached the shipyard gate without passing a single pie seller. This simply wasn’t his day.
A mixed crowd of children and sailors stood around a low table outside the gate.
Shiloh waved at him. “Here be the childer I told ye about. My littles, and all my sisters’, too.”
He hadn’t guessed she had children of her own. When would a sailor have time for kids? He hadn’t seen them on the ship.
But here was a herd of nearly twenty children, all staring at him as if they thought he’d pull a bahtdor out of his nose.
Lorel nudged him. “Don’t just stand there, Loom lint. Start the show.”
Without the wagon and the distance it gave him from his audience, this performance would be even more challenging than the last one. “Move the table closer to the wall, but leave me room to stand behind it.” That way no one could hover behind him.
“Sure thing, Viper the Victorious.” Lorel hoisted the oak table over her head and bulled through the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, make way for the world’s best magician, Viper the Victorious!”
Everybody there, including him, peered at her doubtfully. They turned and peered at him.
“I don’t know about best,” he told the children surrounding him. “How about the newest?”
The children giggled. “You know any good tricks?” one shouted.
“Only a few.” At least this time he had cards to do play with. He pulled the boxed deck out of his cloak pocket and laid it on the table.
His heavy fur cloak would be in the way. He pulled it off and handed it to Tsai’dona.
She grinned at him, folded it over her injured arm, and whispered, “How much crap did you stow in this thing? It’s heavy.”
“Only a few books.” And toys. And iron coins. She better not lose any of it or he’d be out all of their profit.
“I should have known.” She shook her head walked to the back of the crowd.
Children were petting the serdil cub as though it were a real puppy. It licked them back, trying to get spit on as many of them as it could.
Laughing, Lorel scooped the creature up and wandered back to stand by Shiloh.
“You gonna do card tricks?” a little boy asked. He appeared to be around seven or eight.
Praise the Thunderer, he was a couple of inches taller than the boy. Maybe one inch. Or one half an inch.
His hands shook. He hoped his voice didn’t. “That’s the idea. This is a brand new deck, and I haven’t tried card tricks before.” He’d read about them, though, and he had a pretty good idea of what to do next.
The children ooohed and aaahed and crowded closer.
“Everybody loves to watch a sinking ship,” a tubby man at the back muttered.
Party pooper. He was already nervous without being called a shipwreck. He’d prove that guy wrong.
He wiggled the top off the wooden box and poured the half of the cards into his hand. The rest seemed stuck inside the box. Never mind, there were plenty to go on with.
What had he been thinking when he bought them? These cards were longer than his whole hand by two inches.
Blast. He’d planned to do his tricks from the safety of the driver’s platform. No chance of that, with the wagon inside the ship’s hold. At least he had a table to work on. He needed to rig a shelf up on the wagon’s platform to do tricks on.
A project for later. Right now he had to concentrate on these sandblasted cards. He tried to shuffle them.
Cards exploded in every direction.
Children screamed.
Lorel covered her eyes.
But his books had prepared him for such a disaster. “Everyone please examine the cards and confirm they haven’t been tampered with. When you’re done, pass them all back to me.”
An older boy tried to hide four cards inside his coat.
The boy threw a startled glance at Lorel (who frowned quite fiercely at him) and passed the cards forward.
When all the cards – he hoped – were back on the table, Viper scooped them up, turned them all face down, and patted them back into a pile.
What came next? Oh, yes, ask a question. What question? He couldn’t remember. Blast. He pointed at a little girl, the one with a grimy finger in her mouth. “Name a card.”
She pulled her finger free with a pop. “Six of Swans.”
He blinked and turned over the cards. What kind of deck had swans? “No swans here.” His eyes bugged. “No numbers, either. What kind of deck doesn’t have numbers?”
The children laughed.
“Pick something like the Merchant of Bells, or the Beggar of Acorns.” He spread the cards across the table. “We have stars, bells, and acorns, combined with beggars, merchants, priests, warriors, empresses, sorcerers, magicians, and wizards.” And who knew what else he hadn’t noticed.
“Oh, you have that deck. It’s terribly old-fashioned.” The little girl pouted. “The Empress of Bells.”
Old-fashioned? He’d never seen a deck like it in his life. Not that he’d spent much time looking at playing cards. Trevor called them ‘fraudulent fripperies’ and ‘toys Frujeur would play with’ – a mortal insult that compared the sandcrab-brained herbalist to a magician.
Viper, however, was gaining a great deal of respect for magicians. This performance business was harder than it looked.
But for now he had an easy task. He only had to pull the Empress of Bells out of the deck.
Wait, he didn’t remember how to do that.
Not a problem. He’d play the clown for a while. He had to get lucky eventually.
He cut the deck a few times and plunked the cards onto the table. “Turn over the top card.”
The little girl obeyed, and frowned. “The Merchant of Stars.”
He crossed his arms and glared at her. “That is the wrong card. Try again.”
The child pouted, but turned over the next card. “The Priest of Acorns.”
“Oh, come now, you can do better.” He whirled one finger above the deck. “Try again.”
The girl slammed her hands onto her hips. “You’re making fun of me.”
“One more time.” He prepared an illusion and affixed it onto the face of the next card. “Try again.”
She scowled at him, reached for the deck, cut it at the middle, and turned the whole pack over.
Hastily, he spread the illusion over the faces of all the cards.
The girl squealed and clapped. “The Six of Swans! Look, Mama, he picked my favorite card!”
The tall boy frowned. “You were supposed to pick the Empress of Bells.”
Oops. He’d forgotten that little detail.
The girl stomped on the boy’s foot. “It was my trick, and I wanted Six of Swans.”
“Ouch! Stop it! I’ll show you the right card.” The boy grabbed the cards and spread them across the table. And froze.
Six of Swans across the board.
Blast. Should he drop the illusion?
The little girl squealed and clapped. In seconds all the children were screaming and clapping.
This was such a friendly crowd. But he’d best hide the evidence before they got too curious. He gathered up the cards and started to drop them in their box.
The boy grabbed his hand and wrenched the cards away.
Really? Viper raised one finger theatrically and dismissed the illusion.
The deck squirted out of the boy’s hand and whirled face up across the table.
Neat trick. Too bad it was just slippery cards instead of his magic.
But now all the cards showed their real faces.
The boy’s jaw dropped.
How he wished he had paper and a pencil to capture the look on the rotten brat’s face. He’d try to draw it tonight from memory.
The crowd applauded again, and he bowed to them. He gathered up the cards and, after a threatening glance toward Lorel (who made a face implying she’d love to turn the boy into a pretzel) he got the cards into their box.
According to his books, at this point he was supposed to do tricks with the hoops, but he hadn’t yet figured out how they worked. It was safer to go for the Hat Trick.
Except nobody in the crowd was wearing a hat. Blast. Well, as Trevor would say, it was time to improvise. “Does anyone have an empty bag?”
No volunteers.
“A mostly empty bag? I promise to give it back.”
All of the children looked at an older woman at the edge of the crowd.
She sighed and passed it forward. “It’s full of onions.”
“Not a problem.” He only planned to do illusions with it anyway. No, he’d pull Izzy out again. That went over well with the last crowd.
He accepted the lumpy sack and set it on the table. It sat upright most conveniently, which should make the trick easier.
Viper took off his coat and laid it next to the sack. Hmm, it was chilly out here. No wonder Tsai’dona was huddled deep into her cloak. She’d slung his over her shoulders, too.
His jacket was large enough to hide things in its sleeves, which would spoil the trick. He took it off and rolled up his shirt sleeves dramatically. Sort of. He felt as silly as he’d feared when he’d read about this part. No matter, it didn’t take long, and the children were watching avidly.
Waving his hand, he plunged his fist deep into the bag. Or rather, into an illusion of the bag, which he stretched up to his shoulder, since the bag was three-quarters full of smelly onions.
He sneezed.
The children laughed.
These Kara kids laughed at the strangest things. But he needed to concentrate. He reached out toward Izzy with his mind.
Nothing.
Blast. He tried again. In the distance, he felt a tiny wiggle, as if Izzy was trying to come to him.
Lightning blast it. His old Boot was too far away. Now what could he do?
The pink wooly puppy was inside his cloak. Could he pull it out? He forced his will toward the toy.
Still too far away. But only a hair.
With his free hand, he waved Tsai’dona closer. “This demon wants to belong to you.”
The children gasped.
Tsai’dona’s eyes grew round, but she trudged forward.
Perfect. Now he could feel pink wool in his mind. When she was still three paces away, he yanked the wooly puppy out of the bag.
The crowd screamed so loud they brought Nashidran soldiers running into the courtyard.
Viper bowed and handed the toy to Tsai’dona.
“Bog swallow it,” she whispered.
He grinned at her and bowed to the soldiers.
Praise the Thunderer, their sergeant could see over the heads of the children. He grimaced as if he were hiding a grin and led his troops out again.
“The next demon wants to go to you!” He pointed at Lorel.
His turybird raised her eyebrows, but obediently strolled forward, still holding the wretched cub.
Before Tsai’dona – and his cloak – got four paces away, he pulled the cornhusk doll out of the bag. He presented it to Lorel with a flourish.
Her jaw dropped. “How did you know…?”
He grinned and motioned her back to her station at the rear of the crowd.
An older woman frowned. “Those look familiar.”
He frowned back at her. She better not rat on him. He’d curse her. Except he didn’t know any curses. He’d throw an onion at her. He had lots of those under his hand.
She must have read his expression because she shut her mouth.
“One more.” Too bad he didn’t have any more toys. He’d stock up on stuffed animals before he left town. “I’m fresh out of demons, though. Anyone want an onion?”
The children l
aughed, but no takers stepped forward.
“How about a – a –”A merchant with a wheelbarrow of fish lumbered by. Too far away, but a safe bet. “A dead fish?”
More laughter and shaking heads.
“Well, then.” He pulled an onion out of the bag. “I’m hungry. Anyone have a knife?”
Only snickers this time. But the tall boy offered his knife.
Good. He hoped the metal stank for weeks.
Viper laid the onion on the table and sawed it in half. He skidded the knife toward its owner and kept the onion halves pressed together. “Are you sure no one wants an onion?”
A skinny little girl in shabby clothing stepped forward.
He’d intended to slip a bronze beggar into the onion, but her thin face tugged at his heart. He wished a silver common to move from his pocket into the root and handed the onion to the girl.
Wait, commons were made of bronze. What had he done? Had his magic failed? He willed two normal commons into the onion.
The girl’s hands dropped a little. She frowned and peered at the onion. Pulled its halves apart a bit. “Mama!” she screamed, and opened the halves wide.
Three commons and a silver patron rested in the onion’s center.
The crowd went silent and backed away.
A ragged woman bundled up the little girl – onion clutched tightly in her tiny hands – and carried her away.
Viper rolled down his shirt sleeve and put on his jacket. He put on his coat.
The crowd stared at the bag.
Thunderer, his trick had totally flopped. Now what could he do?
Carry on. That was all. Just carry on.
He picked up the sack and strolled toward the old woman. “How much do I owe you for the onion?” he whispered.
She grinned and shook her head. “Nothing. Best trick I’ve seen in years.”
Best trick? With no applause?
He bowed and meandered towards his bodyguards. “Sorry, no tips this time.”
The children mobbed the woman. “Can I buy an onion?” “Me, too?” “Me, first!”
She grinned at him over their heads and started trading roots for coins.
Lorel patted his back. “Good trick, kid. We just gotta figure out how to make money off it.”
Alchemy's Child (The Mindbender's Rise Book 5) Page 10