The Hundred: Fall of the Wents (23 page)

“Ah yes, terribly old, terribly old!” chuckled Pomplemys, unperturbed by Tully’s tone. “It is well that Wents live to such an age or Pomplemys would be a lonely Eft indeed.”

Tully was about to ask another careless question, but Aarvord, to his surprise, beat him to it.

“So, my friend,” said Aarvord. “Where have all the rest of the Wents gone?”

Pomplemys stopped in his tracks. He turned around and faced them.

“This question,” he said, “must be asked in its proper time. To know where the Wents have gone, and what they are intended to do, requires knowing the history of the enemy. You do know that, yes?”

“Which enemy?” said Tully carefully. “The Shrikes?”

“Pfah, Shrikes!” said Pomplemys, clearly disgusted. “Their history is a weak and worthless one. They are evolutionary oddities, useful for their blind obedience. Are you hungry again?”

Tully and Aarvord were, but neither one was in a hurry to sample Pomplemys’ food again; it had made them too stuporous and sleepy. They shook their heads. Elutia had received all her nourishment from the sun, so she was uninterested as well.

“Perhaps you would care to sample some of my homemade tea?” Pomplemys offered, as he led them back into the large living room where the fire burned. A stooped UnderGrout, a dullard like those who had served Hen-Hen, had just finished tending the fire and sloped out of the room without a word. Tully wondered if the creature was a willing servant or a slave. The latter would not surprise him given Pomplemys’ superior attitude and belief in his own wonderful nature. Hatch had spoken of a companion, however, made in Pomplemys’ own image. Wherever that creature was, he was not showing himself.

Without waiting for their replies, the Eft went to a large jug that had been placed on a table and poured each of the companions a cup of tea. He handed them around, spilling a bit as he went in his eagerness. Tully took a surreptitious sniff and peeked into the brown and viscous depths of the liquid. Tea, indeed! This was the same intoxicating liquor that Pomplemys had been gurgling down since their arrival and he could smell its sweet and stupefying odor. He noticed a potted plant and thought that he might find a moment to pour the tea into its pot, then wondered if this was another dumb cousin of Pomplemys’ false Wents. It would hardly do to turn the poor thing into a drunkard!

Elutia gamely sipped a bit of her tea, and Aarvord tossed his back with one hearty gulp despite Tully’s blinks and winces to ward his friend off the stuff. No matter; Fantastic Grouts digested things that Tully would have choked on.

“Sit! Sit!” coaxed Pomplemys. The three took seats again on the various chairs covered with hide. “The tea is spectacular, eh? My own brew. My Wents help pound the herbs that go into it, but I am the cook. I fancy a bit of cookery now and again.”

They nodded assent.

Aarvord asked for another glass and Pomplemys obliged him. This one, too, he took in one quick swallow. Tully was worried. What was Aarvord up to? Surely he could sense that the liquor was a type of poison.

After Aarvord’s third glass, and a bit more talk about Pomplemys’ vast collection, Tully noticed that his friend was swaying a bit in his chair. Aarvord’s voice became louder and more jovial, and occasionally unnecessary appendages and tools shot out briefly from his forehead or palm, as if he longed to make use of them. At one point, his nose became a small but very sharp saw. At another, his hand doubled in size to make a mighty anvil, which he pounded fiercely with the opposite hand, itself having taken the shape of a hammer. Pomplemys, too, was growing louder and more effusive. He and Aarvord seemed to be good old friends. They laughed over the skins and bones that the companions had earlier found ghoulish and repulsive. Tully and Elutia, who had not drunk their tea, cast quick thoughts at one another:

Elutia thought: He is making a play for the old Eft’s affections. Watch and wait.

Tully thought: He is a fool and a drunk. Look at him!

Elutia thought: But look at Pomplemys. He is worse. He can no longer hold his head up.

Tully thought: He will surely collapse soon. Maybe this is Aarvord’s game.

So the two of them watched and waited, and laughed appropriately at certain jests, although their discomfort and sense of urgency was growing by the moment.

Around what must have been the midnight hour, Pomplemys gave a low sigh, bent his head into his chest, and fell into a dead sleep. Aarvord turned instantly to the others, clearly sober.

“Exhausting!” said the Grout. “I thought he would never give in. The old devil can drink more hellish brew than anyone I have met. Is he really asleep?”

Elutia focused her attention and tried to enter the old Eft’s thoughts. She sat in silence for a minute or two, and then lifted her head and smiled.

“He is dreaming of his Sea Change,” she laughed. “I could see him swimming with his trim of Efts as a young one, and he looked a good deal more alert then! He has gone to another place and will not bother us. But take care,” she added. “I could sense another’s thoughts very close by. Not one of the false Wents, for they are sleeping in their stupid flower-state and not able to wake until he commands them in the new light. There is someone else. That someone may be dangerous.”

“What of the UnderGrout who was tending the fire?” asked Tully.

“Not likely,” mused Elutia. “That creature looked stupid. There is another mind at work in this place. A very wise one, who knows many of Pomplemys’ own thoughts.” She glanced around her nervously, her humor at peeking into Pomplemys’ dream now gone.

“We must get to work,” said Aarvord grimly. He went straight to Pomplemys and gently, with the aid of a delicate hook he extended from his right paw, pulled a ring of keys loose and away from the Eft’s neck. They looked them over: there were at least ten keys of varying shapes and sizes.

“We can’t get them off his neck without waking him,” warned Elutia. “His sleep may be deep but he guards these with his life.”

“No need,” said Aarvord, speaking as quietly as he could. (In all the years that Tully had known Aarvord, he had never heard him speak in such low and careful tones.) Aarvord bared his left arm and, taking each of the keys in turn, pressed an imprint of it into his flesh. Like moist clay, his arm took the impression with ease, and held it. It took about a minute to copy each key, during which Tully and Elutia nervously watched the entrances to the room, waiting to see if an intruder would appear. It could be anything or anyone, given the strange nature of this place. Both of them realized how pitifully small and weak they really were if facing a staunch enemy—and they shared this thought silently with one another.

The copying complete, Aarvord strode to the cabinet where Hindrance’s magic box was contained. He was single-minded on the task, almost furious in his intent. Cle
arly, the loss of Copernicus had pained him more than he admitted. Key by key, he pressed his index finger into the impressions left on his arm, the finger quickly forming a hard and fast shape. He repeatedly inserted the finger into the lock without success until he reached the sixth key.

Pomplemys stirred in his sleep as Aarvord opened the cabinet and carefully extracted the box, which gave a low chiming sound. “Yes, Snell, come and find me!” said Pomplemys, no doubt calling to his fellow Efts within the dream. He snorted and slipped lower in his chair, a sleepy smile on his face.

“To fix the box,” said Aarvord urgently, “I think we should leave this room. There is too much danger that he will wake up.”

“There is more danger if we leave the room,” said Elutia, more nervous than ever. She felt that someone was watching them, from some unknown location within the house. But she could not say who or where.

“Where can we go?” said Tully. “We don’t know the rooms. We don’t know what is out there.”

“Down the hallway, there,” suggested Aarvord, gesturing to the hall that they had traversed to enter the garden, earlier that day.

“You’ll need light,” said Tully. The hallway was pitch-black.

“I have light!” said Aarvord savagely, and the wand on his forehead blazed brilliantly, casting a spotlight over the sleeping Pomplemys. Aarvord twisted his head just in time before the light illuminated the face of the old Eft.

“Follow me,” he said. “I will need your help to hold the box still while I work on it.”

They hurried after him in anxious anticipation. Could it be that soon they would be seeing their dear friends Copernicus and Nizz again?

“Forgotten and be bothered is I,” groused the Sand Louse for the fiftieth time, as he buzzed angrily within the bottle in which the Shrikes had captured him. For as many days as he could count, he had been thrust inside a dark closet with no light, inside a bottle that had three rough breathing holes punctured in the top of the jar. For the first five days he had waited amiably, singing happy little songs to keep himself company. But, after that, he had fallen into silence for two whole days. Even his eternal optimism could not hold for terribly long. But, eventually, Fangor rallied and sang again. He sang every song he had been taught in his youth, and then began to compose his own fresh tunes.

Fortunately, his captors had left him one large leaf with a puddle of water in its center as sustenance. For a creature as small as Fangor, that was a 40-day feast. He had eaten around the leaf in circles. But he grew worried as he drew nearer to the puddle of water at the center. Soon the leaf would be gone, and with it his drinking water.

Many other creatures would have fallen prey to complete despair by now, but Fangor was made of sterner stuff. As a baby Sand Louse, he had been raised with his 125 brothers and sisters to sing, morning and night, the patriotic songs of the Louse Kingdom. Singing was encouraged at mealtime, during play, and at all other times of the day. Fangor had taken it to heart. Where there was song there could not be true sadness and where there was music there could not be despair. So Fangor sang, even as his throat grew parched. He had started to ration his water.

If only it were not so dark! The absence of light was bleak and painful. He would simply have to keep singing until someone came to find him.

He wondered if anyone remembered him at all. What use was he, after all? He was a tagalong and a stowaway, and certainly not a member of the original trio that had been commanded by the Council at Bellerol to defeat the Hundred. He knew quite a bit, as his ears were always perked, but they wouldn’t get this information out of him, no sir. He would keep singing until he drove them mad! He wouldn’t give away his friends or their mission. Whatever that mission was, he wasn’t sure. Fangor nibbled a bit of leaf and, then, sang a snatch of his favorite tune again:

I’m a louse, oh a louse, oh a louse is me

I’m the lousiest louse, I’m as lousy as can be.

One day, to his great surprise, a loud creaking noise preceded a brilliant flood of light into the dark cupboard. It was so bright and shocking that he couldn’t see at all. He cowered under the curling corner of the leaf, despairing that, now that the light had come, he couldn’t even enjoy its glow. How had he ever tolerated such brilliance?

As he cowered and closed his eyes, he heard a gruff voice and the rattling of items above and below him.

“Provisions, heat-candles. Where are the heat-candles?” said the voice, talking to itself, which clearly belonged to a deplorable Shrike. Fangor had been forgotten, but now he would be found, if he could make enough noise. Would the Shrike eat him, then? Did Shrikes bother with mites as tiny as Sand Lice? He started to sing again in a most piteous tone:

I’m a louse, oh a louse, oh a louse is me.

I’m much too tiny, so don’t eat me!

The rummaging about stopped, and the voice spoke again:

“Haw! What’s this? What are you, and what are you doing here?”

Fangor managed to open one eye and gaze directly into the face of the Shrike who now held the jar. It was squat and ugly and furred, like all of them, with its flagrant feathers all askew on the top of its head. This Shrike had a funny hatch mark above one eye—a black splash that made him look vaguely derring-do and adventurous, and gave him a questioning look.

“I’m Fangor, sir,” squeaked the Sand Louse. “Don’t know how I got here but I’d be much obliged if you would let me out. It’s very dark in here, sir. Well, not now, but it was very dark, and I don’t like the dark anymore, and I wish to be let out and to find my way home nice and quiet-like and I won’t trouble any of you and…”

“Do be silent!” said the Shrike. “Fangor, you say? Did you know Tully, and the rest of them? I heard them speak of you.”

“Them! Yes!” said Fangor. “They are my friends. Oh, not terrible good friends, mind you. I hitched a ride. I’m not on their side or nuffink; I don’t know what they’re up to, mind you. What did they say about me? Did they miss old Fangor? Did they say their lives are sad and short without me? Did they say I sang the best songs? Did they?”

“You do talk a lot,” said Hatch coldly, “but seeing as you know them I had best take you with me. I have to leave, you see, because I helped your friends escape, and the Shrike-force is onto me. They are your friends, then?”

“Oh, yes! Oh, yes!” spluttered Fangor. “Bestest friends and best of all bests! I will follow them to the ends of the earth!”

“Fine friends they are to leave you here,” muttered Hatch. “But very well. Can you be of use? Do you make light? Can you navigate?”

“I know my way around!” said Fangor proudly. “I could make light I suppose if I wished but never tried, but I am useful in all kinds of ways. All kinds! As you can hear, I can sing, and I am small and can hide and listen where others cannot—”

“Then let’s not hesitate. Stop talking now. Your voice is little but it could alert the rest of the Shrikes. Hide in my feathers and make yourself scarce.”

Hatch unscrewed the lid of the jar and Fangor jumped out in one quick leap, pushing aside his repugnance at being asked to ride on the body of a Shrike. A Shrike! Terribly disgusting. But at least he was out of the dreadful jar. The light was not so bad now that he was getting used to it. Hatch smelled damp. As Fangor tucked in beneath the feathers on Hatch’s head he thought he could smell a trace of fear as well.

“Why are you running?” he asked, creeping down toward the face of the Shrike so he could be better heard. “Who is after you?”

“The rest of them,” said Hatch grimly. “They are meeting in the main chamber to source out the traitor, and it will soon be seen that I am not there to stand and defend myself.”

“What happens to traitors?” said Fangor, deliriously afraid.

Hatch did not even bother to answer; he just kept stuffing supplies from the closet into a large sack. Fangor sank down in the feathers, which were warm and not as sharp and oily as he would have guessed from sight alone. Where the feathers emerged from the skin of Hatch’s head it was shadowed and cross-hatched with light, and he clung to one of the shafts and counted himself lucky to have met the right Shrike at the right time. There was warm fur down there, as well, scrubby and dank.

“I’ve always been a lucky sort!” thought Fangor. “I’ll get out of this scrape, yes. Just see if I don’t!” He thought that it might be nice to see his friends again, as well, although they had always been a bit rude to him and discounted his many gifts and strengths. “I am a good friend! A solid friend!” he thought.

“I know my way around,” Fangor repeated. “I can navigate. Yes, I can. And I have a fine sense of smell. Don’t you forget it.”

“Silence,” said Hatch. “For now you must learn to be quiet.”

*

Hatch and Fangor escaped from the Shrike stronghold, via an airtube, to the snowy surface. Fluffy drifts that had fortunately not solidified into ice blocked the tube. Hatch was about to start sweeping the snow out of their path when a huge puff of warm air gusted up the tunnel and blew the snow clear, and them with it. Hatch tumbled into the snow and Fangor just managed to cling to a feather shaft with grim strength. If he fell into snow this deep, he realized, he would never be found again. Hatch was his whole world now, his planet. All warmth and sustenance would come from this odd Shrike, who had betrayed its own kind.

Fangor nibbled gently at one of the feathers and bit off a frond, knowing that the Shrike would notice only a tickle. It wouldn’t take much of the Shrike’s body to sustain him—just a little. Although the taste was unusual, it would have to do. Unbeknownst to his friend Tully, Fangor had also snacked on the Eft’s hair and scales while riding with him. They would be shed anyway, and a louse had to stay alive after all.

Hatch shouldered his pack and set off through the snow.

“Can I speak now?” asked Fangor, his mouth filled with chewy feather bits.

“If you must,” said Hatch sourly.

“Where are we going?”

“I do not know. As far away from the stronghold as I can muster. I have no friends out here. I have ruined my chances at anything.”

“Perhaps,” said Fangor, “we could try to find my friends? They must be your friends, as well, if you helped them escape?”

“I don’t think they will wish to see me,” said Hatch. “My courage failed me.”

“All the same, where did they go?”

“They were traveling to meet Pomplemys—an Eft who lives on the far side of the river. He is known in these parts as an oddity, but his powers are great. He has deep magic,” said Hatch.

“Then that is where we should go, also,” said Fangor.

Hatch laughed: “
Haw haw haw
!” It was an ugly sound, rough and bitter, with no trace of real humor. Fangor shuddered as the sound reverberated through his tiny body. “By all the Lice! Please let him not make this sound again!” he thought.

“Tell me,” said Fangor. “How do we get to Pomplemys? Where does he live?”

“Out there,” said Hatch, gesturing into the blinding whiteness. “West and south of here. If you can navigate as you say you can, guide my steps to the west, where we will meet the river.”

So Fangor did, his body carrying a magnetic impulse that told him unerringly where the four directions were. He had not spoken in jest. He had never been lost, nor had his 125 siblings. They marched on, with Fangor squeaking small directions when Hatch appeared to wallow and step blindly in the snow.

When Hatch was marching straight, Fangor would sing.

I’ve bitten in the east and I’ve nibbled in the west,

The north and the south, for I am the best!

“Oh, do stop,” said Hatch. “Stop the infernal singing!”

Fangor tried, but he could not. Singing was like breathing to him. He finally took to whispering his songs close to the butt of the feather shaft, but even that tickled Hatch and enraged him. The Shrike began to plod along furiously, wishing the journey to be over. He wished that the awful louse had been left behind, but was also thankful that he had been found. For it was true that Hatch had no friends and nowhere to go.

Fangor observed and thought: “Good! My singing builds his speed!” So he did not stop, but slyly raised his voice now and then to set the Shrike into a hasty run.

After a time, Fangor asked: “If you have feathers, why can’t you fly? We would get there much faster if you flew.”

“Indeed,” said Hatch, stuttering with anger. “I am sure we would. Shrikes cannot fly. Our feathers are left to us from another time when we were some other kind of beast altogether.”

“Were you flying things?” asked Fangor. “Or were you Squirredges? You look a bit like a mix of both. No wait—not Squirredges, but Gruff-Badgers! Woodhogs?”

“I don’t care to discuss this with you,” said Hatch.

“Go left a bit,” reminded Fangor. “You have steered off the west. We are headed too far north.”

Hatch obeyed, but not without rancor. This awful louse!

Shrikes may have flown, once upon a time, but Hatch had no deep memories of this. All in all, he thought sourly, Shrikes were useless creatures. They had not the skills of one of their ancestors the birds, nor the wits of their other ancestors, the rodents. They were an evolutionary mistake—doomed to serve a master who depended on their stupidity and capacity for cruelty. Hatch hated his own kind. He would see them destroyed, he thought, before he would go back and face a tribunal for his treachery.

There was not even love among the Shrikes. They were all bred in pods, with no families as other beings knew, including the Trilings whom he had been taught to hate. Hatch had never had a mother and father, not to mention a Triling family of three. Even this wretched louse had had better than he had. Hatch was filled with hatred and remorse, yet again. If he had been able to better fit into the collective, he could be satisfied now! Dumb, yet satisfied. His complacency would have brought him peace. Jealousy would have been unknown to him; Shrikes considered themselves marvelous and wondrous above all creatures, save their masters. They never even saw these masters but listened to their
droning and persistent instructions at all times. Fools! They ought to know that they were used as tools to satisfy a greater desire. Perhaps they did know and didn’t care.

“A trace more to the right now,” said Fangor merrily, breaking into Hatch’s reveries. “Onward! To Pomplemys! Find our friends!” Fangor paused and added: “Even if you think they will not forgive you, they will. Did you say that Aarvord was with Tully? He had betrayed him, but if they were together, then Tully has forgiven him. And, therefore, I, too, have forgiven him.”

Hatch gave no sign that he had heard, but he did. Capacity to forgive? This was unknown to him. He would try to hope that those he had rescued would remember the first part of his effort, and not the last. He had returned to the stronghold thinking that this was the wiser course. Because, of course, he had fed on the young Went’s mind and could no longer face any of them after that. They would despise him.