Gift of Gold (The Year of Churning Bloods) (68 page)

There was a music to this town. I half closed my eyes and smiled a bit the sounds pulled me to the center of the city. There was a group of traveling musicians standing on a circular stage in the middle of everything. Completely forgetting about Gregor, I stumbled towards them just as the audience broke into loud applause. I stood in polite silence as the travelers started their next tune. The giant with the drum erupted into deep earthy note, while the rest gradually filled in, until even the shrunken man with the miniature violin was singing in his tightly strung voice.

             
“What’s a war?

             
To a child who’s never lost?

             
What’s a game?

             
to a man who’s always won?

              Why do the loved ones,

             
sit with eyes so glossed?

             
Why do the loveless,

             
fight wars that can’t be fought

              We are all free men,

             
yet chose to stand alone,

             
despite the hunger

             
clawing at our babes.

              The jubilee that we can see

             
Is love known by you and me

             
yet we could be better.

             
There’s always more to give.

Life is an odd place to live.”

Although the song was remarkably somber I couldn’t help but smile at the obscurity of the last sentence. I cheered loudly along with the rest of the crowd as the performers all finished with a grand bow. The leader of the band smiled modestly and stood up to engage with the crowd. He spoke oddly, replacing all of the ‘th’ sounds with something close to a ‘z.’

“
Z’tank you, z’tank you very much,” the man said humbly. “For our next performance we will need a single volunteer.”

The people surrounding me suddenly burst into childish pleading, despite the majority of the crowd being large adults.

The band leader looked around the sea of hands being flung before him before staring straight into my face and pointing slowly.

“Would you be willing to stand up kind sir?” he asked over the din of the onlookers.

I glanced around shyly, hoping he was pointing to someone else.

“Don’t be so bashful!” he insisted, lifting me up onto the wooden stage. “I don’t bite!”

I turned to face the vast array of different faces below me and suddenly felt sick with worry. I had to wonder how in the world these people mustered the courage to stand here and make such beautiful sound with everyone watching.

“Honored guest!’ the man bellowed, leading me to one section of the stage. Suddenly, the crowd parted as my furious companion stormed onto the platform beside me.

              “Jacob, stop fooling around,” Gregor growled as if I’d decided to leap up onto the stage. “We have something incredibly important to do.”

              “And who pray tell is z’tis?” the man asked, leaping forward with his hand outstretched.

Gregor ignored it. “I’m his second cousin and sadly, he’s been shirking work around the house. I’m afraid we really must be going.”

The leader of the band snorted though his throat and threw a hand off to one side as if he had just smelled something disgusting.

              “Surely not? Work is always later for when z’he ‘Mighty Misfits’ come to town!” the crowd roared in approval at these words, giving me the impression that a large portion of them were expert procrastinators.

Gregor took my arm like a stubborn child and tried to march me off the stage but was quickly blocked by the large man saddling the drum.

He shook his wide head in wordless disapproval before shoving the both of us back into the center of the platform with one effortless movement.

              “I’ll tell you what,” the accented man decreed, wringing his hands like a shifty merchant would. “I’ll let you go if z’he big one can tell a joke z’hat’ll make z’he entire audience laugh.”

The crowd’s roar of approval drained the little color out of Gregor’s pale face. He glared at me with an expression of pure hatred but I only shrugged, perfectly content to watch my companion struggle. “This entire town is a joke! Why do you need more?”

A stray tomato landed with a loud splat on Gregor’s chest, followed by many boos and multiple insults. For a moment, it seemed as though he was going to reach out for his sword, however Gregor was simply scraping away at the spare bit of tomato that landed in his eye. “Alright,” he said quietly. “You want a real joke? Well you’re going to get the best damn one there is.” Gregor then told a foul joke about female barmaids in a booming voice that got mixed results. The younger ones in the crowd urgently tugged on their mothers blouses, asking what ‘that word’ meant, while the mothers themselves shrieked in horror. The only people that ended up laughing were a few younger guys, however even they didn’t carry on for long.

              Gregor seemed shocked out of his wits with what he had just seen. Perhaps he had told the other prefects a joke like that. Little did he seem to know that he was dealing with the public and not a bunch of brain dead Grimlar trainees. In desperation, Gregor tried a slightly different variation of the joke which produced similar results, except this time, the crowd began to quietly dilute. The man with the accent seemed to sense this change in attitude and managed to scoop a few members of the audience back with a retort about the way Gregor looked.

“Let’s see if bad joke telling runs in z’he family aye?” he said, prodding me up to the front of the stage. “Give ‘em your best shot!”

I trembled slightly on the stand as in one clueless moment, I seemed to have forgotten how my tongue worked. “Well... Erm... This one time I was being held hostage by a monster.”

The crowd continued to look up expectantly as I swayed from side to side.

              “And this monster was made entirely out of vegetables,” I said with a nervous smile. I had heard this joke once from the other members of the Montrose and seriously doubted it was going to do me any good. Unfortunately for me, it was the only thing in my arsenal, so I pinched my arm, forced a grin and continued despite myself.

              “When I asked him if he’d set us free, he said he’d never lettuce go.” An awkward silence filled the air around me, as this last sentence left me with a spectacular jump in my voice. A few people in the crowd guffawed, giving me the tiny bit of extra support I needed to continue. “I begged him, I said ‘peas peas lettuce go’!”

Gregor groaned loudly as he shamefully buried his head into his arms. A few more started to giggle uncertainly. Warmth flooded back into my chest, and with this extra energy I made my voice a little louder.

              “The monster was going to make me work in his in forest for an incredibly low celery. You could say I was in quite a pickle. I tried to escape into the river made out of fruit, but the currants were too strong.” Nearly the entire crowd was laughing now. Holding back a sheepish smile, I launched into the finish. “I grabbed onto a nearby plant but let go because the object was cucumbersome!” The people around me burst into loud applause and from all around I could see merry smiles and cheer filled eyes.

I had become a warlock. I had become a member of the quenched. I’d even entered a competition and tied for first place, yet for some odd reason this one point in time had become my most proud moment. All I had done was tell a bad joke. I looked back at Gregor who was red with exhaustion and embarrassment. Seeing as now we were free to go, he grabbed me by one ear and threw me off the stage without any more objection from the band members. He lead me to an empty alleyway, and proceeded to slap me across the face, not even having the decency to take off his gloves, which smelled faintly of over-ripened tomatoes. After throwing me to the ground, I still managed to get the last say in:

“You have to admit though, ‘cucumbersome’ was a stroke of genius.”

Gregor smiled sweetly, before kicking me sharply in the ribs.

***

              “So where are we exactly?” I asked him for the second time. It was nearly a half an hour since the joke telling incident and during this time, Gregor had been leading me around town while he whispered with various innkeepers and store owners.

              “We’re in a town called Euphradies,” he said, putting emphasis on the ‘yew’. “It’s the town to the south of the Charlie-Horse woods. It’s famous for its ports and its bad taste in humor.” Gregor sniffed bitterly before directing all of his attention back to the map clutched in his hands. We entered a warm little eatery before Gregor approached the young guy who appeared to be in charge. “Have you seen this man?” he asked in a hushed voice before giving a brief description I couldn’t quite hear. Nearly all the people he had asked so far had laughed and walked off without answering his question. This man however shook his head sadly and gestured across the roadway.

              We left immediately and approached our last destination, which was a small little pub half buried underground. There was a large sign hanging at an odd angle from the door which read in burnt letters:

“Port Drink-a-lot.

No minors without money allowed.”

Gregor took me to one side and spoke in a very slow, careful voice, trying to make sure that I would understand. “Now listen Sunshine. You have no purpose here. You are meant to stand still, not talk, and not touch anything while I negotiate these taborthodox deals with the man inside. Do you understand?”

              “Why does this man live in a tavern?” I asked innocently.

Gregor’s lips suddenly pursed together. “From what I understand, he’s a very sad sort of character who’s simply down on his luck.”

              “Some army,” I said, snickering quietly. Gregor made a movement of a throat being cut, before storming into the building while I trailed behind.

The horrible smell in the tiny enclosure made me wretch and cover my mouth with the front of my shirt. The source of the stench appeared to a stocky looking man with mugs upon jugs of empty ale surrounding him. The pitiful excuse for a human being was humming to himself slightly. It was entirely possible he was even proud of how drunk he was. A matted black beard was hastily stitched into his face, along with tiny bits of food and froth from meals long since gone.

Although his eyes seemed to be swimming in a sea of pungent alcohol, there may have been a glimmer of intelligence somewhere inside them. He was wearing a well tailored maroon overcoat that suggested he’d once been moderately wealthy, yet the jacket was now covered in so many stains it was  like it’d been used as a baby’s bib. The dozens of overcoat pockets that were scattered over his limbs and chest did their best to de-emphasize the size of the man, however his gigantic belly still poked out of his front.

Gregor stared around the room uncomfortably, before apprehensively marching up to the man before him.

“Now what do you want?” the bearded fellow bellowed, throwing down a metal tankard. “If you're here to tell me I’m your father; tough luck. I haven’t had any for fifty years.” He downed his glass and looked at the bottom as if surprised to see it empty. “Fifty long years,” he repeated stupidly.

Gregor coughed prudently before carefully withdrawing his folders. “No, nothing like that,” he said, carefully thumbing through each individual sheet of paper. “I’m just here to claim the money that you had taken out of Tyrannus loans almost sixteen years ago. You do owe us... Don’t you Button?”

              A loud chortle, like the whine of a donkey unexpectedly shot through my lips. “Your name’s Button?” I asked in disbelif. The moment seemed so anti-climactic and ridiculous that without even realizing it I began to snort with laughter. A nearby knife was suddenly stabbed onto the table, narrowly avoiding the tips of my fingers. I shut my mouth immediately and promptly turned a ghostly shade of white.