Fighting with fire

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Lex walked back into his own room to find Jesse cuffed to the bed, right where he had left him. He was gratified to see that the cowboy looked extremely uncomfortable and that he had twisted round on his side in an effort to rest his arm.

‘Well, it’s about time,’ Jesse said. ‘My arm feels like it’s gonna drop right off-’ He stopped mid-sentence, stared at Lex and said, ‘What the heck are you wearing?’

‘It’s called a disguise,’ Lex replied with exaggerated patience. Then he pulled the string of pearls out of his pocket and held it up to the light. ‘I got you these. They’re more than sufficient to cover the sum we agreed. If you try and get so much as one more piece of m-gold out of me then I’ll knock fifty off.’

‘Let me see them,’ Jesse said.

Lex walked closer to the bed and held the pearls out. Jesse took them with his free hand and examined them closely for a minute. Finally, he nodded, looked up at Lex and said, ‘These will do just fine. As long as Lady Luck keeps a hold of ’em for the duration of the Game.’

‘I’m disappointed that you don’t trust me,’ Lex said, holding his hand out for the stolen pearls. ‘But some people are just born that way, I suppose. It’s quite sad, really.’

‘Tragic,’ Jesse replied, replacing the pearls reluctantly in Lex’s outstretched hand. ‘Now let me outta these cuffs. My arm hurts like hell.’

‘I have to find the key first,’ Lex said. ‘Oh dear, I hope I haven’t lost it.’

‘You have, you little brat, and you’ll be sorry.’

‘Sorry is a word I only barely understand the meaning of,’ Lex replied, before turning on his heel and leaving, very much enjoying the fact that he was annoying the hell out of the cowboy. After an evening spent having to be so polite and likable, it was a welcome relief to finally be as obnoxious as he liked.

Of course, Lex knew exactly where the key to the handcuffs was. But he took his time finding it, anyway, because Lex Trent never did anything just because someone else wanted him to. There had to be something in it for him first.

‘Here we are,’ he said cheerfully when he walked back into Jesse’s room with the key. ‘False alarm. It wasn’t lost, after all.’

‘Ain’t that lucky for both of us,’ Jesse replied.

‘I hope you’re not going to sulk about this,’ Lex replied, throwing over the key. ‘My last companion sulked most of the way through the Game and it got quite tedious towards the end.’

‘Well, now, I guess I can’t really blame you for not trusting me,’ Jesse said as he unlocked the cuffs and freed his hand. He made to reach out for the glass of whisky at the side of his bed but it seemed that his arm was so numb that he clumsily knocked it to the floor instead. He scowled, looked up at Lex and said, ‘But if you ever handcuff me to somethin’ again, you little pipsqueak, I won’t take it half so amiably.’

Lex couldn’t help it. He grinned from ear to ear. A challenge! This was just exactly what he wanted.

‘I’ll get you another glass,’ he said, before turning back into the living room.

Lex ordered breakfast to his room the next morning. It was a bit awkward for, of course, he was supposed to be off his food and yet here he was ordering enough bacon and eggs to feed two people. But they had to eat. If anyone asked, he would simply say that the Goddess of Luck was joining him for meals. The Gods didn’t need to eat but they enjoyed doing so on occasion. And when they ate, they really ate, not having to worry about calories as mortal people did. If Lex put it about that the Goddess of Luck was spending a lot of time in the suite with him? trying to console him after Jesse’s death, or something? then no one would think twice about the fact that so much food was going up there.

Aside from the welcome dinner that first night, there were no other organised events the players would be expected to attend. This suited Lex as it would give him more time to focus on his lessons with Jesse. Lady Luck appeared in the bedroom shortly after they’d finished their breakfast and Lex quickly explained to her the new arrangement he had come to with the cowboy. Then he produced the pearls from his pocket and held them out to her.

‘So if you wouldn’t mind holding on to them until we’ve finished the Game? I know it’s a tiresome business but apparently Jesse doesn’t trust me to pay him when all this is over.’

‘Very sensible,’ the Goddess said to the cowboy. ‘Lex can’t be trusted at all, you know. He even betrayed me once. He wouldn’t think twice before stabbing you in the back.’

‘Oh, I wish you would stop bringing that up,’ Lex said. ‘I didn’t actually betray you, I just almost did. There’s a difference!’

The point was negligible and Lex had no interest in discussing it any further so he changed the subject and said, ‘If we win both the other rounds and come first in the Game, then he gets half of those pearls. If he teaches me well enough that I can pass as a cowboy at Dry Gulch, then he’ll get the other half. If he doesn’t play his part, then he gets nothing. Understand?’

‘Yes, dear,’ the Goddess replied.

She left them shortly after that and Lex and Jesse set about resuming their training. Jesse insisted that learning to drink strong black coffee was next on the list. Rather than ringing down for it, Lex decided to walk downstairs himself. It would give him the chance to show his face, and asking for strong black coffee to take back with him would contribute nicely to the impression he was trying to create of someone so stricken with grief that he was neither eating nor sleeping. It was a winning situation all round, for it would cause Lorella to underestimate him in the next round, it would cause public feeling to warm towards him even further and? best of all? it would half cripple Jeremiah with guilt, and serve him right, the arrogant git.

After dressing all in black and fixing the pained, strained expression back on his face, Lex went down to the lobby. He was pleased, on arriving there, to observe that there was a bit of a disturbance going on. People were flapping about and looking upset and asking questions in very loud voices. And the police were there. Lex tapped on the shoulder of an expensively-dressed man standing nearby and said, ‘Excuse me, but do you know what all the commotion is about?’

‘It’s the Wizard!’ the man said. ‘The famous thief who’s been terrorising the lands. It seems he’s struck right here in the Majestic!’

‘No!’ Lex replied, widening his eyes in shock.

‘Yes!’ The man nodded vigorously. ‘Took Lady Kale-Fortescue’s grey pearls right out of her safe! There was no sign of the lock being forced or tampered with. The pearls just disappeared right from inside the locked safe and one of those little hats he uses as calling cards appeared in its place.’

‘Astonishing,’ Lex murmured.

‘I don’t know if this chap is some sort of criminal genius or whether he really is using sorcery like they say, but those pearls just vanished right out of a locked safe that only her Ladyship knew the combination to! It really comes to something when your possessions aren’t safe from that villain even somewhere like the Majestic!’

‘Terrible thing,’ Lex agreed. ‘Terrible. Poor Margie. What a dreadful fiend this Wizard must be.’

Feeling well pleased with himself, Lex wandered off in the direction of the restaurant where he caught a nearby waiter and asked him to fetch a bag of the darkest, strongest coffee beans the Majestic had.

‘We can brew it for you down here and deliver it to your room, sir-’ the waiter began, but Lex shook his head.

‘No, I want to brew it myself. One cup isn’t enough; I’m going to be drinking it all day. I’d rather do it upstairs myself. Can you bring me a tin can, too, if you’ve got one? I’m… very particular about how I drink my coffee.’

‘Very good, sir.’

Very good, sir! Lex hated that phrase. It was so… so passive, so subservient! The only way he would ever use it himself was if he was in the process of scamming someone blind. The waiter returned a moment later with the can and a bag of coffee, and Lex went back upstairs with them.

‘You can have a go at getting a fire started,’ Jesse said. ‘And then, once you’ve done that, we’ll brew the coffee on it. You’d better try eatin’ beans cooked in the can, too, because they taste different, see, and you wanna be able to eat ’em without a spoon if needs be-’

‘Gracious, you’ll be wanting me to cook marshmallows on it next!’ Lex said. ‘Look, I can’t see that this is going to be at all relevant. I only want to get into Dry Gulch House and stay there. I’m not going to be riding through the desert having camp-outs and sing-a-longs round the fire!’

‘Don’t be so sure,’ Jesse replied mildly. ‘There ain’t no fancy cuisine at Dry Gulch House. It ain’t like they’ve got a gang of servants in the kitchens. Most who stay there cook their own food over the open fires in the rooms downstairs. So you gotta learn how to cook it, how to eat it and how to like it, too.’

‘All right, fine,’ Lex said. ‘Tell me how to make a fire.’

So Jesse explained the process of rubbing two sticks together to create friction, getting some dry grass, if possible, etcetera, etcetera. Lex tried for about half an hour before he got bored. He just couldn’t get the knack of it. As anyone who’s ever tried to do it knows, making a fire in this way is much, much harder than it looks.

‘Practice makes perfect,’ Jesse said smugly, clearly enjoying the fact that Lex wasn’t getting it. ‘Just spend a few dozen hours at it and then you’ll be-’

‘Hey!’ Lex said sharply. ‘What’s that on your face?’

‘What?’ the cowboy said, instantly looking alarmed at Lex’s expression.

‘Right there,’ Lex said, leaning forwards and reaching out his hand.

Jesse barely had time to take in what was happening as a match suddenly appeared between Lex’s fingers and he ran it down the cowboy’s stubbled cheek so fast that it instantly flared alight.

‘Arghh, shit, kid!’ Jesse yelped, jerking back and clapping a hand to his cheek. ‘What the hell’s the matter with you?’

‘I always wondered if that would really work,’ Lex said, looking interestedly at the match for a moment before holding it out to light the paper in the fireplace. Sometimes practice makes perfect,’ he said. ‘But sometimes cheating makes perfect, too. I never do it the hard way when I can cheat and do it the easy way.’

If the worst came to the worst, and he didn’t have Jesse’s face to hand, then he could always use one of the little Wizard hats by concealing it in the palm of his hand and muttering the magic word under his breath.

Glaring savagely at him, Jesse slowly lowered his hand to reveal an angry red mark stretching down his cheek.

‘Ooh,’ Lex said with a mock wince. ‘Well, hopefully it’ll leave a scar and you’ll have something else to compete against Popcorn-Face Billy with.’

‘Now, look-’ Jesse began, lunging towards Lex with the clear intention of grabbing him, his hat falling to the floor in the process.

Lex jumped to his feet but not quite quickly enough. The cowboy sprang up and in another moment had Lex’s shirt collar gripped in both his large hands. ‘Pearls or no pearls, you’re dangerously close to pushing me too far, kid!’

‘Get off me, you brute!’ Lex snapped, pushing at him ineffectually. ‘I’m not going to put up with being manhandled by you! You’re my companion; you have to do as I say!’

‘In your dreams, you little-’

They were interrupted, at that moment, by a knock at the door. Lex and Jesse both froze.

‘Just a minute,’ Lex called. Then he lowered his voice and hissed, ‘Into the bedroom! Quick! No one can see you here!’

There shouldn’t have been anyone knocking on the door, anyway. He’d left the Do Not Disturb sign out so that no maid would come bustling in, trying to clean the place up, and he hadn’t ordered any room service. Jesse let go of Lex’s shirt and, still looking rather put out, crossed the room to the bedroom.

Lex stomped over to the door. ‘What is it?’ he snapped, as he threw it open.

Tess East was standing on the other side but she shrank back a bit at Lex’s tone. Lex was a little bit shocked himself. That dratted cowboy had actually succeeded in making him lose control of himself! He? Lex Trent? not in complete control! The thought was almost too awful to contemplate! He could have happily throttled Jesse in that moment.

‘Tess,’ he said, softening his voice and trying to maintain a grip on himself. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I… I’m sorry to disturb you. But I wanted to… ask for the address of Jesse’s family,’ she said, looking him right in the eye. ‘I want to write to them.’

Of course, Lex had no earthly idea whether Jesse even had family and, if he did, where the heck they were. But he couldn’t say that to Tess when everyone seemed to have decided that he and Jesse had known each other for donkey’s years. He would have dearly loved to say, ‘Jesse didn’t have any family. And no friends either, come to that. He was such an insufferable man that no one but me could stand him for more than five minutes at a time. And even if he does have parents, they’re probably the sort of simple people who wouldn’t be capable of reading a letter, even if you did send them one.’

Instead, he said, ‘I’m afraid Jesse’s family are all dead. There’s no one to write to.’

‘Oh.’ Tess instantly looked crestfallen. Then her eye fell on something in the room beyond and she said, ‘You kept his hat?’

Lex glanced over his shoulder and noticed Jesse’s hat lying on the floor near the fire. Damn! He remembered now that it had fallen off when the cowboy had lunged at him.

‘Yeah, I kept it,’ Lex said, turning back. ‘To remember him by. You know.’

‘Have you buried him yet?’

Lex was taken aback by the question and the blunt way in which she asked it.

‘Er… no.’ Lex couldn’t very well say that Jesse was buried when he knew that the cowboy would have to have a ‘miraculous’ recovery in time for the second round. His plan was to say that the octopus bite had paralysed him for a week, rather than a few minutes. Unless someone happened to be a particular expert on the Squealing Blue-Ringed Octopii, then no one would be any the wiser. And hopefully they would also believe that this paralysis, for some reason, affected the Binding Bracelets so that they stopped working temporarily. ‘I’m going to do it before the second round,’ Lex went on. ‘At sea.’

‘Good,’ Tess said. ‘I want you to bury him with this.’ She lifted a chain over her neck and held it out to Lex. A little carved blue dragon dangled from the end.

‘What is it?’ Lex asked, as he took it and peered closer.

‘It’s called a Wishing Dragon. One of the Wishing Dragons of Desareth,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why.’

Lex looked at her sharply. Wishing Dragons of Desareth? He hadn’t known that there was such a thing. Lex was himself the owner of the three Wishing Swanns of Desareth and, now that he looked at the dragon more closely, he could certainly see the resemblance. Both were intricately carved and perfectly formed. Even though it was tiny, Lex could see the leathery folds in the Dragon’s wings, the noble expression on its face and the fierce look in its eyes. It was beautiful, it was priceless and it was? very probably? slightly magical.

‘Where did you get this?’ Lex asked.

‘My grandfather gave it to me,’ Tess replied. ‘There used to be three. He kept the silver one. He always wore it on his adventures. He used to take all of them with him for luck but, before he went away on his last adventure, he gave the white Dragon to Jeremiah. And he gave the blue Dragon to me. I’d only just been born so mother kept it until I was old enough. They gave it to me before I came away on this Game. I don’t want it anymore. I want Jesse to have it.’

It took all of Lex’s self control not to wince at the very thought of sending this indescribably beautiful, invaluable thing down to the bottom of the sea with a dead man. He glanced at Tess. She had a hard, determined expression on her face and, for a moment, Lex hesitated. She was Cary East’s granddaughter, after all. Before the falling-out with Jeremiah, Lex would have been quite determined to like Tess. He did like her, even now. It wasn’t her fault she had a prat for a brother. Lex himself had a wimp for a brother but he didn’t expect people to hold that against him. The blue Dragon was a precious gift left to Tess by the famous grandfather she’d never had the chance to know. Taking it from her would be a dastardly thing to do.

But Lex was a thief. He was the notorious Wizard and he’d been the Shadowman before that. And the girl had just handed it to him. How could he not take it? Besides which, she was the enemy for the duration of the Game. Jeremiah probably didn’t know she was giving away her Dragon. When he learnt, during the course of the second round, that Jesse wasn’t really dead then he would naturally want the Dragon back. It could act as potential leverage very nicely indeed.

‘Jesse would have been honoured,’ Lex said, closing his fist around the Dragon. ‘Thank you, Tess.’

She nodded and turned away at the same time that Jesse walked out of the bedroom so purposefully that it was quite as if he intended to say something to Tess. Lex was horrified. If she hadn’t turned around right when she did then Tess would have seen him. The cowboy opened his mouth and Lex knew he was going to say something to call Tess back. Moving faster than he’d ever moved before, Lex practically slammed the door shut before he whirled around, pressed his back against it, glared at Jesse and snapped, ‘What’s the matter with you? You were going to speak to her, weren’t you? Are you soft in the head when it comes to kids, or something?’

‘You shouldn’t have taken that Dragon,’ Jesse said. ‘Seeing as there ain’t gonna be no burial.’

‘I don’t know! There might be yet if you keep on like this! I’ll kill you myself before the week is out! But I wouldn’t send this Dragon down to the bottom of the sea with you or anyone else! It’s far too valuable for that. We can use this,’ Lex said, holding up his hand and allowing the Dragon to dangle on the chain through his fingers. ‘I’ll give it back. Eventually. But I’ll make Jeremiah work for it first, that’s all. You have to take every advantage that comes your way in the Games. This is no place for saints.’

Jesse clearly didn’t like it but he didn’t push the matter. Of course, Lex wasn’t really at all sure that he would ever give the Dragon back. It was too beautiful to give up easily. And it went so well with the Wishing Swanns he already had. But there was no point in telling Jesse that.

Lex had acquired the Swanns during the course of the last Game. He’d got them from an enchanter who had referred to them as the Wishing Swanns of Desareth. It was due to the fact that he’d got them from an enchanter that Lex believed the Swanns must be magical in some way. Enchanters didn’t tend to walk around with little ornaments in their pockets unless there was something special about them. But if they were magical then Lex hadn’t discovered that fact yet. It was true that he used one of them as a sort of key to fly his enchanted ship, but that just seemed to be a matter of the ship needing an ivory object. It was not a power of the Swann itself? it was simply that it happened to be made out of the right material.

After the last Game, Lex had experimented with the Swanns a bit in an effort to get them to do something. He’d tried wishing on them first, just in case. He’d done the obvious and wished for a million pieces of m-gold but it hadn’t worked. He’d tried saying magic words whilst holding the Swanns; he’d put them in water and in the sun and in moonlight; he’d tapped them against things and put them under the pillow whilst he’d slept. But nothing had produced any sort of response from them whatsoever and Lex had almost begun to suspect that they were just ordinary things, after all.

But, when obtaining books for the library he was starting on board the ship, Lex had come across a Magical Miscellany that catalogued some of the most famous witches, enchanters and other magical peoples. Whilst skimming through a chapter about a great warlock, he noticed the word Desareth in one of the footnotes. It seemed that there had once been a sorcerer by that name who went crazy and killed himself when he was just past fifty. That was the only mention the book made of him and Lex could find no references to the sorcerer in any of his other texts on notable magicians. Of course, it could be that the two were entirely unrelated, but the fact that there had once been a mad sorcerer named Desareth had made Lex wonder whether he was the one who had created the Swanns.

And now he was learning of Wishing Dragons, too. Dragons that had? like the Swanns? once been a set of three. After this Game was over, he would have to make a concerted effort to find out more about them. It could, after all, quite possibly be the case that he was in possession of something immensely powerful and he didn’t even realise it. And once he knew what these Wishing animals were, then he would decide whether or not he was ever going to give the blue Dragon back to Tess East.