Treachery of Kings

FIFTEEN

Finn had a great many questions, ques tions he felt called for answers at once. Panic, chills, fear of urination, gastric irritation, swept all thought from his head.

Shouts, howls, bellows and barks reached them from below. Discord, clamor, and harsh resonation filled the night. The flare of muskets, the smell of powder, the din of leaden shot stung his eyes, split his ears and burned his nose.

Then, with a terrifying, sound, a sound more fearsome than the rest, the fat sphere above ripped asunder, from the bottom to the top, burst its vaporous innards with a great unearthly fart.

Bucerius roared in anger as the basket gave a sickening lurch, tipped on one side and nearly tossed the pair to the ground.

Finn hung on for dear life. From the corner of his eye, something big, something dark, something more solid than the night rose up at him in a blur. The basket jerked to a stop, snapping wicker, shredding cords, slamming the Bullie into Finn, squeezing him nearly flat.

As he struggled for a breath, Finn saw a chimney rush by, saw the shattered basket fill with brick and soot, felt the clatter and the rattle as they slid down the steep-sided roof.

For another awful moment, they were airborne again. Then, wicker, brick, lines, an avalanche of slate, came to a wrenching halt on the ground. A shroud of fabric settled gently over the Bullie and Finn.

Finn rubbed his stinging eyes, spat a mouthful of soot. Wondered how he could possibly be alive.

“It is no way short of a miracle,” he said to himself. “And even then, I have my doubts”

“Don't be a'gabbin’, keep still,” Bucerius muttered, lifting him easily out of the mess. “You not be entirely livin’ yet, lest we hauling out of here.”

“Thank you, friend. I'm terribly grateful for your help.”

“Take a care, watch it where you step.”

“What? Pots and Pans, what am I stepping on?”

“I fear we be smushin’ a fair lot of chickens. More like a herd. Somethin’ bigger than a flock. Doubt anyone be thanking us for that.”

As if in answer, a florid face, round as a moon, appeared in a window overhead. The fellow shouted and flailed his arms about, cursing in a gruff, unknown tongue, a language that seemed to greatly rely upon spit.

Before the man's wife could join him, wide-eyed in a tasseled nightcap, Finn and Bucerius were out of the yard and into the dark, Bucerius stepping ahead, Finn doing his best to keep up, clutching the carefully bundled clock against his chest.

Even as the fair reached an alley some distance from the scene of their imperfect descent, it was clear there were deadly pursuers still about, determined to track them down.

Barks and yelps resounded from the street just ahead; Finn and Bucerius crouched in the dark and watched them pass by.

They were, indeed, Bowsers, as Bucerius had noted before their craft struck the ground. They were short, tall, bony, stout and lean, as Bowsers tended to be. Some had oversize noses, some had puglike features, perfectly flat. Most had tufted ears, and all had sad and droopy eyes.

Finn, though certainly no bigot where Newlies were concerned, didn't care for Bowsers at all. He found them irritating at best. Some were quite friendly by themselves, but the moment they came together in a group, in a horde, in a pack, they seemed to become mean of spirit and intense.

He had crossed their path before in a misadventure across the Misty Sea, and didn't care to meet them again.

All of these fellows, he noted, wore varicolored pantaloons, natty striped jackets, red bow ties and straw boaters tipped at a rakish angle atop their heads. Wherever Bowsers seemed to settle, one nation or the next, they all preferred this ridiculous attire. And, if Bucerius was right, and they were after the Heldessian King, Finn thought their clothes seemed improper for assassination wear.

“Why do they seek to do in the King?” Finn asked quietly, when the noisome bunch had passed. “And why, in all reason, on Tuesday and Thursday night? That seems peculiar to me.”

“They be doin’ it ‘cause someone paid ‘em to,” Bucerius explained. “Bowsers don't have lots of goals of their own. They be inclined to strong drink, filling their bellies an’ gettin’ lots of sleep. Someone'll give ‘em all that, why, they'll hire their ugly selves out to whoever comes along.”

“And who do you imagine is behind these louts now?”

Bucerius looked astonished at Finn's remark.

“Now how'd I know such a thing? Don't no one care for kings, I thought you be knowin’ that.”

“I suppose so,” Finn said. “That sort of thing goes on, wherever one happens to be.”

Bucerius didn't answer. He listened in silence for a moment, then led Finn down the darkened street. Far ahead, Finn could see a few pale, flickering lights above the high battlements of the palace of King Llowenkeef-Grymm.

Before they had gone too far, Bucerius discovered the shattered remains of a balloon in a small public square. The square was silent as a tomb. Shutters in every house were closed tight. No one, it seemed, dared to risk the streets with the Bowsers about.

Finn waited while the Bullie walked through the wreckage. His clenched fists, the rage barely suppressed upon his stocky features, told Finn what the giant had found.

“Sysconditi. He dealt in gems, which mostly be fakes. Never cared for the fellow, but he be a merchant, same as me.”

Bucerius stared past the crowded block of structures to his right, where a fire glowed against the sky.

“There be another one down over there. It'll take some doing to get to it from here. Not that anyone'll be alive. These louts'll pay dear for this night's work. They know we be traders, an’ not ships of the King. We got no part in the royals’ fight.”

“Could some be bandits, and not assassins as you say? Intent on loot from the goods merchants bring?”

“Could, I reckon. Bowsers, they got to eat regular, eat till they throwin’ up they guts. They need to, I guess they'd be turnin’ to this.”

“I don't know why the King's troops haven't shown up before now,” Finn said. “Or at least the city guards. Why, lawlessness seems to be unchecked in this land.”

Bucerius showed Finn his second curious grin of the night.

“You be new here, human person. There be a lot you don't know ‘bout Heldessia. Things you maybe wish you didn't know ‘fore you get home… “

Finn was near certain it was on the tip of the Bullie's tongue to add if he got home, but he'd kindly held the words back…

Best we be crossin’ here. We going any farther, they'll likely spot us for sure.”

Finn could see his companion was correct. They were closer to the center of the city, now, near a deserted market square, the close-packed houses and shops that hugged the walls of the palace itself. Bucerius wanted to reach the spot where the merchant balloon had burned, but knew they had to take the long way around.

“I be crossing first. Wait till I gets there, you hear? Count a couple times. No Bowsers seem about, you be coming too.”

“Good luck, then.”

Bucerius showed him a scowl. “We be talking ‘bout that before. Human persons not even hearin’ what anybody says. Luck's got nothin’ to do with me running over there. I be getting there or not.”

“Fine. Just in case-”

The Bullie was gone. For a giant, for a creature that easily made three of Finn, he seemed to move remarkably well, swiftly and silently across the cobbled street, vanishing into the dark.

Finn waited. Looked, listened, and counted as well. Taking a breath, he crouched low, staying in shadow as best he could, running quickly toward the spot where the Bullie waited in the narrow alleyway.

You can toss Fortune aside if you will, my fine enormous friend, but I wouldn't mind the Fates looking down and lending me a hand. I wouldn't mind if someone tossed me an amulet now, or cast a simple spell The light was as bright as a small and angry sun, the sound a crack of thunder after that. Finn felt the ball part his hair, heard it sing, heard it whine like a hornet as it struck the wall over his head and showered him with dusty bits of stone.

Luck, chance, instinct or what, made him duck, veer to the right, as the second blinding flare came quickly on the heels of the first.

The missile drilled the empty air, directly where he'd been-that was enough for Finn. He tucked the clock to his chest, went to ground and rolled, felt his hands and knees scrape the rough stone, smelled the foul odors of the street, odors that could trace their families back for years.

The Bullie shouted, somewhere to his left, words Finn couldn't hear. He came to his knees, scrambled to his feet. Heard the yap, heard the bark, heard the irritating howl. Looked up and saw them, not a dozen yards away, big Bowsers, little Bowsers, straw-hatted Bowsers short and tall, five of the brutes in all.

Two carried muskets, old-fashioned arms with barrels flared like silver hunting horns. Heinz-Erlichnok. 47s, Finn guessed, relics of the Love Wars, eighty years past. Old, but awfully good for maiming, laming, tearing off a limb.

The others carried blades, loping ahead, while the gunners charged their weapons again.

All this, Finn perceived in the barest snip of a second. Scarcely time to blink, time enough to spare, time enough to rise, slide his hand in a practiced fashion to his left, grasp the hilt of his sword and take the proper stance.

Or, as it happened, grasp empty air, and wonder if his blade was on the roof of the fellow with the pumpkin-sized head, shattered in the basket, or possibly among the dead and wounded fowl…