The Lure of Fools

by Jason James King

  The sword would be inside that tent, but how was he to get at it? Perhaps he could ambush one of the patrolling guards and take the man’s uniform? It was a cliché that always found its way into every bard’s tale, and Mulladin wasn’t sure how effective it would be in reality. Especially with Aiestal helmets being opened face. But he couldn’t…

  A woman approached the two soldiers standing guard in front of Loeadon’s tent. She had long dark hair and was wearing a peasant’s shift that was unlaced on the top so that it kept falling down her right shoulder–and probably giving the guards a privileged view of her cleavage if not her entire chest. The middle of the shift was incongruously tight, unabashedly celebrating the woman’s perfect hourglass shape, and didn’t even fall far enough to fully cover her backside.

  Mulladin shoved down his feelings of male appreciation by taking in a deep breath, and then gagging at the taste of oxen sick. It turned out to be a very effective turnoff. The woman–a camp whore by her choice of outfit–was speaking with the guards. They nodded and one held the tent flap open for her as she ducked in. In spite of the dim light of pole torches, Mulladin had recognized the woman. Keesa was making her move. The question on just how far Ez’s daughter would go to get the sword from the renegade polymath both disturbed and intrigued Mulladin, and it took another deliberate whiff of oxen diarrhea to refocus him.

  Mulladin crept around the outer perimeter of the camp, staying in the trees and trying to be stealthy. He might as well been an Ursaj in a glassblower’s shop. Leaves crackled, twigs snapped, and he even startled a hare out of hiding, causing it to streak across the camp and attract the barking attention of two hounds. Fortunately, the guards weren’t really on their guard, and no one came to investigate his blundering.

  Loeadon’s tent was closer to the wagons, which were parked only a stone’s throw away from the tree line. This let Mulladin sneak into the camp, crawl under a wagon, and almost right up to the renegade polymath’s tent. He pocketed his one weapon, the crossbow bolt plucked from Old Genzin’s rump, and scooted forward on his stomach. He found a cloth bundle lying in the grass underneath the wagon; rolled up clothes still caked with dried egg yolk and bits of tomato. These were Keesa’s clothes. He’d found the wench’s path of escape.

  He looked up at the tent. Its interior light cast silhouettes of Loeadon and Keesa, and Mulladin was close enough to hear them softly talking.

  “As soon as your friends get here, we can begin,” Loeadon said, sounding as though he were talking about a meeting of the village council instead of rendezvous for sexual debauchery.

  Mulladin was very relieved to hear that nothing had happened yet. For some reason the thought of Keesa debasing herself to get the sword stung him with a mixture of sadness and… jealousy?

  “Stand over there, and strip.” Loeadon’s silhouette waved Keesa away.

  Mulladin ground his teeth. He already hated Loeadon, and knew the man was a total bastard, but his ordering Keesa about like she was an animal invoked a hot rage like nothing he’d ever felt before. Why was that? He hated Keesa, didn’t he?

  Mulladin shook his head. Ever since he’d awoken with the mind of a man, his emotions were erratically shifting, and surging. One moment he’d be saddened to the point of tears, and the next he was murderously angry or laughing like a drunk. Perhaps eighteen years’ worth of memories and experience seen all at once through new eyes was causing this “mood-storm?”

  Keesa’s silhouette moved away, but didn’t start to disrobe as far as Mulladin could tell. He berated himself for feeling disappointed at that. Now really wasn’t the time for such thoughts. Loeadon’s tall silhouette turned his back on Keesa, and leaned down to open what looked like a trunk on the floor. He reached in with his one good arm and stood, holding the shadow of coiled rope, or was it a whip?

  Sick bastard!

  Loeadon began to turn around, but Keesa’s silhouette surged forward, reaching up to the tall man’s head. The shadows bled together, and Mulladin couldn’t tell what was happening, but if he had to guess, it looked like Keesa covered the renegade polymath’s mouth with something which quickly caused the man to collapse.

  Keesa’s silhouette bent down, and Mulladin heard her rifling through a trunk. He glanced down at the bundle of clothes and then crawled backward out from beneath the wagon. He crept around the wagon bed, and waited for Keesa to find Jekaran’s sword, which only took her a few moments. She used it to slice a line in the back wall of the tent and emerged and went straight for where Mulladin had found her bundle.

  He stepped out from his hiding place. “Looking for your clothes?”

  Keesa jumped, raised the sword and gripped the handle with both of her hands. “How the hell?”

  Mulladin grinned and then made a show of looking her up and down. “You know, I like you better with your hair down.”

  “Give me those!” she hissed.

  “Give me the sword,” Mulladin replied.

  She scowled at him.

  “Or not.” Mulladin shrugged. “Personally, I like what you’re wearing.”

  Keesa’s jaw tightened.

  “We can fight here and be captured… again. Or you can give me the sword, I can give you your clothes, and we can leave together.”

  Keesa sighed and then drove the sword point first into the ground. Mulladin chuckled and tossed her the bundle of clothing. She unrolled it, and held out her breeches. She lifted one leg, and then scowled and Mulladin.

  “Turn around!” she hissed.

  Mulladin chuckled again, and turned his back to give Keesa a bit of privacy. “You know, I really did mean it.”

  “Mean what?” The rustle of cloth and crinkle of leather conjured up all sorts of improper images that Mulladin had to strain to expel from his mind.

  “I like your hair loose.”

  The air blasted out of Mulladin’s lungs as something slammed into his back. He fell to his knees, eyes wide as he struggled to draw in a breath. Keesa sprinted past him, still wearing her loose shirt, but now clad in trousers and holding Jekaran’s sword in her right hand. She paused to look down at Mulladin, flashed a grin, and then screamed at the top of her lungs.

  “Shyte!” Mulladin wheezed.

  Guards called to one another, and the sound of jingling mail grew louder. Mulladin scrambled up. The world swam as his sudden exertion in an oxygen deprived state made him dizzy, but his fear and anger were enough to compensate. Each successive step become steadier until he was sprinting through the trees.

  “Lord Loeadon’s been attacked!” A shout echoed behind Mulladin. He didn’t turn to look, but kept his focused on Keesa’s barely visible outline.

  He gritted his teeth and channeled all of his rage into pumping his legs, but it wasn’t enough. He caught up with Keesa just as she was mounting her ghern. She held the sword with her right hand, and snapped the beast’s reins with her left. The ghern leapt into a sprint, dodging and weaving through the trees and disappearing from Mulladin’s view.

  How was he going to catch her now? He clenched his fists, and turned sharply to his right, running back toward the camp. There were gherns there. Not as many as oxen, but he’d seen a couple while he’d been scouting the perimeter. He just hoped Jesh hadn’t fed any of her poisoned apples to them. As far as he could tell, only the oxen had been sick.

  A torch came into view ahead of him, its flame illuminating a white tabard painted yellow by the flickering yellow light. Mulladin didn’t stop his run, but instead lowered his shoulder and turned it into a charge. The guard’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth to say something, but never got the chance. Mulladin crashed into him, knocking the man into a nearby tree. He slumped to the ground, unconscious.

  Mulladin considered stealing the man’s uniform and armor, just like in the bard’s tales, but had no time. The sounds of soldiers crashing through the trees already echoed behind him. So, he picked up the man’s torch and sword and sprinted back toward the camp. The light would make him a target,
but he needed it for the diversion he was planning. That was another tactic he’d learned from storytellers; the hero always needed a diversion to escape. Well, fire worked for him before.

  Two wash women dropped their baskets as Mulladin exploded out of the trees and back into camp. He ran past them, ready to toss the torch onto the nearest canvas tent, when a woman emerged hand in hand with a child that couldn’t be older than two.

  There were refugees from Aiested in this camp.

  Ez’s voice echoed from his memory–a moment when he was still dim, and the two were sitting in front of a hearth awaiting execution.

  For while the fool always looks to his own regard, the hero for others is aware.

  Mulladin ground his teeth, and held onto his torch. He couldn’t set the camp on fire if there were women and children in it.

  Two guards spotted him, and charged. Mulladin quickly located the picket lines and ran as fast as he could, dropping the torch on the ground where it harmlessly guttered. There were three gherns tied to a separate picket near a watering trough a furlong from the sick oxen. Mulladin pumped his legs like a madman and covered the distance in what had to be record time. He raised his sword, swinging it down and severing the rope tethering the nearest ghern. The animal snorted and bucked in protest as Mulladin climbed on.

  The beast lacked reins and a saddle, so Mulladin wound his hand into the tuft of white hair on the top of the ghern’s head and smacked its side with the flat of his stolen sword. The ghern leapt over the trough and ran into the trees. Mulladin had a difficult time steering it, but when the animal learned that a yank on its hair in one direction meant to turn that way, it became easier.

  Guards called to one another, but their cries grew distant the farther away Mulladin fled into the trees. They weren’t giving chase, probably on account that they’d been caught so unprepared. Sure, they were patrolling the camp, sort of. But it was clear by their bored yawns and their drinking and gambling, that they weren’t expecting a raid.

  Mulladin didn’t know which direction Keesa had ridden off in, but it didn’t matter. There was only one place Ez’s daughter would go–Erassa, the closest Apeira well. She’d made a critical mistake sobbing out her story to him, for by it he knew how desperate she was to charge and bond Jekaran’s sword.

  He smacked the flat of the sword against the ghern’s right flank and it had the desired effect of spurring the animal into a faster gallop. He had to catch up to Keesa before she reached Erassa. If he believed Jesh’s story about the talking flower–and Rasheera help him, he was starting to–there was more at stake here than just recovering Jekaran’s sword.

  Mulladin ground his teeth to stave off a bout of cold nausea. Until now, fear had been the one emotion that hadn’t surged or overwhelmed him. In fact, it’d actually diminished since his transformation. The fact it assailed him with a potency to rival the time Maely lost him in the woods was definitely not a good sign.

  Jesh’s words abruptly came to his mind. …you have to take it to the secret city. It’s really important. He nodded to himself. He had no idea how, or why, but what the little girl had told him was true. He had to get Jek’s sword back, and then he had to do the impossible–find the legendary city of the fey folk, a place hidden from humans for centuries by powerful magic.

  “Shyte.”

  Tyrus sat on the most comfortable chair he’d ever sat upon. It had no pillow or padding, but was made entirely of one piece of material he couldn’t identify, like a statue sculpted from marble. The substance from which it was crafted was soft, and pliable, yet firm at the same time. This allowed for the seat, back, and arms of the chair to mold to fit Tyrus arms, back, and posterior. It was comfort like Tyrus had never known.

  If there was a theme to Allose, Tyrus thought, it would be that–comfort. Or perhaps convenience would be a better word. Talises were everywhere, often built into the very architecture itself. Doors opened for him, the air always had a fresh floral perfume about it, and there were even small automatons in the likeness of humans to fetch food, drink, or whatever he desired.

  The refreshment served to him, however, did leave something to be desired. The food the Allosians ate consisted primarily of fruits, sweet breads, nuts, and some kind of edible grass–no meat. Tyrus could get used to it, he knew, and in fact all their foods were likely healthier than his usual diet. It was sure to make him live longer. But Tyrus wasn’t sure he’d want to live for very long without alcohol; not a drop of which could be found anywhere in their waiting lounge. Nor did any of the ivory-colored automatons know where to get some. He’d asked nine of them, and even a real, live, Allosian, but no one recognized Haeshalan brandy, or Tolean wine. Hell, he’d settled for the disgusting barley swill his peasants called ale. But not a drop of liquor was available.

  Kybon always did accuse me of being dipsomaniacal. Perhaps his cousin had been right.

  Tyrus glanced at Jekaran. The boy was lying on a very comfortable looking couch that was really more of a bed. He looked peaceful, with his hands folded over his stomach, and a silk pillow propping up his head so he didn’t choke on his drool. If it hadn’t been for his unfocused stare, and his shallow breathing, he could’ve been a corpse in repose.

  Tyrus hated that arrogant child. Or, at least he had. He wasn’t sure what he felt now. You couldn’t really protect someone without coming to care for them a little bit. Or was that just him projecting his love for Kybon onto Jekaran? The two were so damned alike in their brashness, and cocky “spit in the eye of the gods” attitude, that he very well could be confusing his feelings.

  Tyrus was surprised to find himself crying. The boy might be nearly intolerable, but he had something Kybon lacked–nobility. Oh, not the status granted to them by their family’s house, but true nobility of character. Jekaran was selfless in his determination to protect the Allosian woman, Kairah. And he’d spared Hort instead of executing the man. Tyrus didn’t think Kybon would’ve been so merciful. His cousin had always been a bit of a bully. Jekaran, on the other hand, stood up for the weak and vulnerable. Could Tyrus have been mistaken? Was what he named brash arrogance actually courage?

  He found himself standing next to the ivory-framed bed upon which Jekaran lay, tears still pouring down his cheeks. He looked into the boy’s vacant eyes. “You are an infuriating little snot. You’ve always caused me stomach pain, and driven me to drink on more than one occasion. I’ve aided your family and protected you the best I could for sixteen damn years, and all I ever got in return was ridicule and vitriol! At first I did it for him. But now…” Tyrus wiped his leaking nose on his forearm. “I’m not sure why I’ve given up everything for you. You fight me and hate me.”

  He started to sob. “Your father was my best friend. I loved him. We were as close as brothers. We spoke everyday no matter where in Shaelar we were. Well, he mostly did the talking, and I mostly listened.” Tyrus hiccupped a laugh. “He was everything I wanted to be: Handsome, athletic, charming. And then one day he was gone, and I didn’t even get to say goodbye!”

  Tyrus was aware of Irvis, Graelle, Hort, and the Vorakk shaman watching him, but he didn’t care. “Then I found out about you.” He laughed again. “Did you know I actually considered coming for you when Anarilee died, and raising you as my own? I was even going to name you Kybon, after him. But your uncle beat me to you. Since then I just watched from afar, trying to help where I could, but not out of any kind of love.”

  Tyrus shook his head. “No, I hated you even when you were a bawling brat. And in time, you came to hate me back. I never really understood why. After all, you were my kin. I should’ve been an uncle to you. But now it’s clear to me. I hated you because you remind me so much of him. Seeing your face, so much like his, always stabbed me in the heart.”

  Tyrus gave another hysterical laugh. “And when you started acting like him…”

  He was sobbing now, right hand covering his eyes while he leaned on the left for support. “Damn you, boy! Losing you is like lo
sing him all over again! Wake up! I can’t relive that pain!”

  Words failed him, and Tyrus just stood there, shoulders shaking as his whole body was wracked with the force of his weeping. He started when an arm gently pulled him into a half hug. It was the chubby man, Irvis. He didn’t say anything, but just stood by Tyrus, letting him weep.

  After a few minutes Tyrus dried his eyes, and Irvis let him go. A door opened and Kairah strode in trailing four Allosians dressed in long white robes. She herself was wearing a lavender dress, like the one she wore when he first found her half drowned and unconscious. Praise the goddess for that. Seeing her prance about in a shift that showed off her cleavage and didn’t even fully reach below her thighs was a distraction Tyrus didn’t need. He was disgusted with himself for those thoughts. The world was ending, and here he was failing to control urges invoked by a beautiful, half-naked woman. Well, she wasn’t half naked anymore, but even now her dress accentuated her form, and made his cheeks feel warm. He had to look away.

  “This is the human child?” A male Allosian with a square jaw and dark violet hair asked.

  “His name is Jekaran,” Kairah answered.

  The Allosian man smirked and shared a glance with his three companions. “And when I was a child I had a very colorful parrot, but I did not name it.”

  “Why you sanctimonious son of a bitch!” Tyrus snapped.

  The man’s eyebrows raised and his mouth hung open. A beat later his infuriating smirk returned. “That same parrot also knew some words, and could even sing a song or two.”

  Tyrus’s fists balled and he surprised himself by taking several steps toward the Allosian man before Kairah intercepted him.

  She pressed her hand gently, but firmly on his chest to stop him. “They are here to help,” she said quietly.