by Sean Heslin
“Delegation? How heroic. Fine, Perci, I would like you to meet Terand The Brave, foremost bounty hunter and restaurant clearer in most of this hemisphere. He is famous you know. Wonder if I can get an autograph when he wakes up?” Rancha mused for a moment. “Ah well. Apparently, he had a contract on Mr…” he riffled the papers, read the name, read it again, read it a third time and sighed. “Mister sorceror type guy here, which is why he is tied up like that.”
“And this interests us because…”
“Well if we bring 'em both to this town up the road that's on the map with the little noose mark next to it, we can claim a share of the bounty, and we can probably get the services of Mr Terand here for free because he will owe us.”
Perci looked at Terand in disgust. “Why would we want him? I mean look at him!” He shuddered visibly at the thought.
“Because he is a skilled mercenary, which will probably be useful at some point on this quest. Incidentally, what is it we are looking for?”
“Beg pardon?”
“The quest, what are we looking for?”
“You mean you don’t know?”
Rancha internally counted to ten with some strained patience.
“No, that is why I was asking you, so please tell me so I can be the guide I am supposed to be.”
“But I thought you knew! I got told I was The Chosen One…”
“A Chosen One,”
“…which I knew already of course, and I got sent a letter from my dead father when I reached my thirtieth birthday telling me I was supposed to go on some foolish quest and he had made all the arrangements. So, I waited on the battlements on the day it told me to, where you picked me up, and I assumed you would know what you were doing, so I could get home as quickly as possible.”
“Oh great, just fabulous!” Rancha started to pace. “Of course it’s a total fnug-up, it would be, there I was enjoying my holiday when that shnotdwar of a messenger turned up…”
Rancha descended into full-flow, debasing this and that and bemoaning and generally picking apart the last few days into a spoiled heap of verbal diarrhoea. Eventually he finished and panted for breath, sitting down while he gulped down air. He noticed that Perci had wandered off during his tirade and was now examining the broken walls of the shed, trying to work out the trick with the door. The Chosen One looked up at the sudden silence, giving Rancha his best imperious gaze.
“I am sorry, did you say something?”
Rancha sighed. “You just get better, don't you? Nothing important I'm sure. Oh well, if we are going to cart these two up the road I might as well change, make the job a bit easier. You should too; get that armour back on, I'm not bloody carrying it.”
Perci was duly indignant for a while, until Rancha did his rippling trick, reappearing in his natural large urglon state. Who was blind, as in his annoyance he had forgotten to undress first and the tatters of the silver suit were firmly wrapped around his head. Despite the temporary foolishness, the transformation must have had the desired effect as when Rancha had finally sorted himself out, Perci was struggling into the last piece of his dented ancestral armour, passed down through the knightly generations. Or at least passed down from his father, Rancha recalled. According to the story, the father had been the only member of the family for decades that could afford to own good armour. It was obvious to Rancha's eyes that Perci Senior had been quite a bit smaller than the current member of the family Yansul, as Perci had left most of the straps undone and his rotund belly was forcing its way through the gaps in the plates. It looked painful to wear. Grim satisfaction was taken. Rancha was tempted to take it further and say something witty regarding Perci's belly and a starving family from the Plado Republic, but he did not as there was another task to perform and he temporarily wanted to stay on Perci's good side.
“Very lordly.” Rancha nodded, forcing a smile through reptilian fangs. “Okay, if you could just lift the bodies and bags onto my back and strap them on, that would be..ah... helpful.”
“What? What do you think I am, some kind of packhorse?” said Perci, spluttering at the perceived indignity.
Rancha's patience snapped. “No, not really. No, you aren't a packhorse no. Because I'm the one that has to carry them, so seriously, shuttup and get on with it or I'll fly off and leave you here. Alone. Without the map.”
Rancha would not have done that, his body and glands would not have allowed him to, however, something in his tone must have sunk in as Perci immediately performed the task, but not without a lot of subvocal grumbling. Rancha could live with that. It was the stuff he could hear that annoyed him more. For a second he thought he heard someone else muttering harshly too, when something dropped out of a pack and thumped to the ground.
“What's that?” asked Rancha, distracted from his thoughts, tilting his head in the appropriate direction. Perci blurred strangely as he stooped and picked up a fake velvet bag, which had an interestingly lumpy shape.
“It’s the bag of stuff that I picked up in that room where the stupid purple thing was.”
“What's in it then?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you going to open it then?”
“Should I?”
“Well, it would be a good idea.”
“If you insist.”
“I do indeed.”
“I'll open it then.”
“Right.”
“Right.”
“What's in it then?”
“I don’t know I haven't opened it yet.”
“Get on with it then.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.”
A rustle.
“Oh.”
“What?”
“I'm not sure.”
“Let's have a look then.”
“I don’t want to touch it.”
“You already touched it when you put it in there.”
“So I did.”
“So what is it then?”
“It's…lumpy.”
“I figured that.”
“Oh.”
Something shifted in the air.
“What?”
What the...?
“I'm not sure.”
Wait a minute!
“Dig them out then.”
“I will.”
“Right.”
“Right.”
Oi, what are you doing with my voice?
“So?”
“Well…”
“Yes?”
“Um.”
“And it is…?”
Hold on, what's going on here?
“I can't tell.”
“Oh.”
“Do you want a look?”
HEY!
“Not really.”
“Why not?”
Ow.
“I don’t feel like it.”
“Oh.”
Perci is that you?
“Maybe I should, just to be sure.”
It's me, what the hell is happening?
“Well if you insist.”
“I do.”
“Good.”
I'm not sure, but I think its called playing silly buggers.
“Give it here then.”
“Ok, I will.”
“Right.”
“Right.”
Really? I don't like that game. What should we do?
“Oh.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Oh.”
“Let's have a look then.”
“Ok.”
Can you get over here at all?
“Oh, dear.”
I'll try, hang on.
“What?”
“I think I trod in something.”
“Oh, dear.”
“Yuck.”
“What is it do you think?”
“Could be from a direhorse.”
“No, wrong colour.”
“Rapli droppings?”
“No flies, can't be.”
Ow, is that you Ranch
a?
“Emula?”
“In this climate? No.”
Yep, it's me; feel this soft bit in the air here?
“Some sort of bird though.”
“Yep.”
“Yep.”
Got it, now what?
“Podgean?”
“No, wrong texture.”
“What's that bag?”
“Don’t know, have a look.”
PUSH!
There was a horrible popping noise as if a set of ears had turned inside out in stereo, combined with a choir singing “Fgrh!” and some great beast bellowing on its side. Rancha and Perci's bodies jerked once and started blinking rapidly. There was a sense of a medium-sized something running into the underbrush at high speed as they came back to themselves.
“Ugh, what the fnug was that?” asked Perci groggily.
Rancha shook his large head to clear the sudden fog that had sprung up inside it. “I don’t know, but it didn’t seem natural. Can you hear that muttering?”
“Course it wasn’t natural, we got kicked out of our heads!” exclaimed Perci.
“That isn't what I meant. I meant not natural as in something that doesn’t belong here in this narrative.”
“This what? Narrative?”
“Huh? I said forest, doesn't belong in this eyesocket” Rancha blinked again. He could definitely feel something gathering Ether nearby.
“What?” said Perci looking lost and beginning to blur again.
“Oh sod, it's trumpeting all surreal, I think we should bread now.”
“What's this bag?”
“No! Just flapjack everything you can and run!”
They ran down the path for about a mile, bags and bodies bouncing on the wing'ed lizard's back. There was a faint noise akin to a coconut being struck solidly and the world abruptly stopped blurring about the edges. Rancha eventually stopped at a crossroads to wait for Perci to catch up.
They panted at the non-descript forest junction. It had an old wooden sign pointing down each of the paths. When Perci had finally caught his breath he said but one word:
“Explain.”
“Well, it's probably one of three things,” said Rancha. Most likely I reckon we just met a Fairytale Beast.”
This revelation was greeted with silence.
“Fairytale Beast? Scientific name vulus incognitac, more locally known as a Dreamproj? Adjusts reality to fit its prey into some unalterable plot-line which usually ends with its eating them.”
Perci's next utterance was best described as “?” so Rancha continued.
“It effectively hypnotises its prey into following some basic story which enables it to kill them without a struggle. Unfortunately, it isn't too bright, so when it goes for more intelligent creatures like us it doesn’t know what to make us say, so the story loses credibility and we are able to get back in our heads like we just did. With other creatures like mice and stuff, it just projects an image of a clock striking one and sits at the bottom with its mouth open. With us it needs dialogue.”
“A fell beast indeed! You sure it was one of these things that did this to us?”
“Erm, no, could have been ancient spell trap or a highwayman with hallucinogenic dust or honestly, dozens of things, but the Dreamproj is my best guess.”
“Hmm. What's the going rate for their skins?”
“Bloodthirsty much? I suppose pretty high, lots of illusionists like to use them for well, illusions, but they are too cute to kill so nobody bothers much. They make nice family pets though. Defang and neuter them, entertains the kids, the usual”
“Humph.”
Rancha coughed. “Well, it looks like we are out of range of whatever it was. Fix these bags on properly would you? They are rubbing something terrible.”
Perci grumpily went to his task. “Hey, this one seems to be bleeding,” he said in disgust, as he prodded Yrinmet. “He looks pretty out of it. Looks like he was smacked by the bags while you were running.” Perci poked the lump on Yrinmet's bonce.
“The enchanter? Well stick a bandage on him, we need to be questing and we aren't doing it here.”
Perci grumbled some more and Rancha noted that Perci had added the knight's own bags to the pile loosely strapped to Rancha's scaly back. Still though, such minor hardships aside, if they were going to run into excitement this quickly, Perci would be dead within the week and Rancha could go on holiday again. The urglon beamed his draconic smile, whistling as they trudged on.
Chapter 18
“Work is only as good as a rest when you work on your back.”
- Cheris 'Legs' Smellgood, 2019 C.M.
It had been a day of drudgery, a week of pain, a month of horrors and ...quick count on the fingers... seven years of sheer numbing, ill-treated, ill-advised, soul-destroying excrement for the sake of earning a little more than a pittance on the last Glorfday of the month, paid direct. She knew that there was more to life, indeed she was reminded of it on a tooth-grindingly sore day by day basis. How could she not? With every coming and going, peoples and lifestyles coming in from every corner of the misbegotten world, for the sake of cashing in their exploits. Well, maybe not so many distantly flung people, but they might have been with all the excitement that managed to rub off on her. Most of the clientele were from the surrounding counties and a few from the next country over, but for all it mattered, their lifestyle was as distant as the stars for her. She snorted at that thought. People had already even been to the stars and back already, yet here she was, stuck in this (moderately wealthy) two-bit town, living on the last of her wits, day in, day out. Slaves had it better than she did! Well maybe not slaves per se, but certainly people who had more job satisfaction had it better than her. People who had travelled had it better than her. People who went to the theatre with an actual boyfriend had it better than her.
She craved love, needed it, desired it. She had read dozens upon dozens of trashy romances, titillating literature and plain old erotic fiction in an effort to get clues as to how it was done, but to no avail. At this point, after twenty-seven failed romances, she was no longer fussy about little things like species, age, or sexual preference. She would have anyone who could promise to whisk her away from it all and devote herself to them completely. Good guy, bad boy, cry baby, noble hero, she would have them and love them and squeeze them and name them honeybuns. But why would anyone look at frumpy old her?
Her lip wobbled again and turned her attention to the job at hand. Mail sacks, heavy, for the sorting of. There were flyers and bank statements and posters and news reports and political analyses and weather reports and all manner of things. She would sort them for the departments they belonged to and the rest she would give to the boss to digest. Literally. She grimaced at that memory, the time when she had not left that particular room quickly enough.
Sort, sort, sort.
She wondered, not for the first time, what sort of plan would let her finally escape? Being whisked away took out a lot of the work she needed to put in, but what if she was whisked away by a psychotic drug smuggler or something? Maybe a little vetting would be wise. A man of worth, she decided. Someone who was worth something to the world in many ways as possible, an achiever she could look up to, a man of means and ends. Heck, she would even try a lady at this rate.
But why would they need her? She sagged. She could not just simply leave her job and there were only a few bars left in these parts that she was not recognised on sight from her previous evening jaunts. In a spark of mature thought, she realised that it was not her, personally, that was the problem, more the dissatisfaction she encountered on a daily basis expressing itself in the way she moved, the way she talked, the way she would try and gaze winsomely into the other party's eyes, then start twitching. Her job, her life, that was the problem, not anything that she herself could be to blame for.
Yeah, right.
She hoicked another massive bulging sack onto her shoulder without really thinking about it and plodded up t
he stairs. Maybe she would go out again tonight. That might be for the best. An afternoon nap perhaps, so she was fresh and sparkling and witty for all the prospective... well, suitors was a strong description. Perhaps, victims. Her poor victims that she would inflict her little frumpy self upon. She caught her reflection, enormous sack upon a tiny body and a ridiculous skirt to boot. Who would want her? Who would give her the adventure she needed?
She set her jaw and threw herself hard into her work for an hour, buying herself time for a nap in a quiet corner. Yes, once she had gotten some sneaky sleep in, she would feel as beautiful as she was supposed to be.
Maybe, just maybe, today would be her lucky day.
Chapter 19
“Never allow new people to smile at you. You will end up having to give them something.”
- Oblandigo Scribbler, itinerant playwright and part-time gardener, just before taking his troope on their legendary tour, 1432 C.M.
The adventurous pair were travelling in silence. Perci was sulking because his armour was chafing his bulges and his feet hurt from the very-nice-looking-but-unsuited-for-actually-going-anywhere boots. Rancha, of course, did not respond to any of the gripes, moans or heavy tutting during the first hour, so silence it had been for the last three.
Eventually, Rancha felt a stirring on his back and craned his neck round to see. The human guy in the robes, who had mysteriously somehow redeveloped his hat, was blinking and peering around groggily.
“Lie still, we are nearly there,” Rancha told him gently. The man's eyes shot open, then closed again just as rapidly. He slumped. Rancha tsked and swung his head back around.
“What did you say to him?” said Perci, noticing the disturbance.
“I dunno, just said we are nearly there.”
“Are we? Oh good, my feet are killing me.”
Rancha did not rise to it.
A few minutes later they approached the outskirts of a dusty, rustic village, all log huts and planked walkways. One or two people who saw them coming glanced up disinterestedly, and looked back down at their own business just as disinterestedly.
“Must be used to visitors,” remarked Rancha.
Perci grunted in agreement. “Well, you did say that that thing was a bounty hunter, and was taking the other guy to here. Must be some sort of common meeting place for their sort of thing. Let's see if we can't find a tavern or something, I need a drink.”