Timothy Boggs - Hercules Legendary Joureneys 01 (2 page)

Markan was a village of fair size and reasonable prosperity. Its businesses were located on three sides of a cobblestone square, while the open, southern side allowed a sweeping view of rich grassland, distant forest, and the towering, now snowcapped mountains beyond, perpetually swathed by pale mist. In the center of the square was an ancient well around which had been set hard-carved, slightly curved stone benches for the comfort of local and traveler alike.

The homes of the village's inhabitants were set primarily behind the square, reached by narrow streets and alleys most felt perfectly safe in walking alone, even at the darkest hour of the stormiest night. There was no fortress wall here; even the farmers and herders in the valley had little fear of raiders and thieves.

It wasn't that such bloodthirsty men didn't exist; it was simply that the vigilance of the king's patrols didn't permit them to exist for very long.

Most Markans agreed in public and private that King Arclin was, except for the occasional tax and tithe, a pretty fair man for a king. Like his father before him, he never executed anyone who didn't deserve it, and, like his father, he knew how to throw one hell of a party when the harvest was in.

On this particularly warm afternoon the square was busy and pleasantly noisy. Brightly clothed women gathered at the well for water and gossip, strapping young men gathered at the well for water and the women, some shopped, some haggled, some laughed, and a demented flock of wild-throated children pursued imagined monsters and evil warriors in and out of the area in a manner just shy of chaos.

Comfortably nestled at the north side was the Bull and Bullock Inn. Outside, beneath an overhanging roof of well-kept thatch, the owner had placed a quintet of small tables for use during pleasant weather, or when the air inside grew too stifling. Within were twice that number carefully placed across the constantly swept floor; plus lanterns on the roof posts to keep the large room bright, a long table that served as a bar for those who didn't want to sit at the tables, decorations on the walls, and a barmaid whose beauty had been measured against the best the kingdom had to offer, and not found wanting.

Nikos Veleralus was content.

Business was good, especially now that Markan had taken long strides in establishing itself as a regular stopping place for travelers going south to escape the harsh winter. Nikos had six fair rooms upstairs and a four-stall stable behind the main building, and they were always filled. His barrels of wine and ale were regularly tapped. And his food, while perhaps not the same elegant cuisine as might be served to a king, sufficed to keep a good man's belly filled without complaint. Even now, during that part of the afternoon when the inn was usually empty, a man sat at one of the tables, enjoying the daily special.

Life, in other words, was pretty much perfect.

Except, Nikos noted sourly, for the urchin racing through the doorway.

Nikos couldn't stand urchins. They were short, they were unbearably noisy, their clothes were disgustingly filthy, and they had the tactless habit of pointing out at the tops of their shrill voices that his nose was too big for the rest of his face. Much too big.

This particular one, who couldn't have been more than eight or nine, fell heavily against the bar, gulping for air. "Nose," he gasped breathlessly, his grimy face puffed with exertion. "Nose."

Nikos glared. "What?" he said flatly. Although he wasn't more than average in height and looks, and noteworthy for nothing other than his nose, he had an experienced bartender's grasp of moderately sincere expressions, ranging from sympathy for a man's troubles with his wife or cattle to if-you-cause-any-more-trouble-ITl-belt-you-senseless-with-my-club.

For the urchin he used the tolerant mode, but only because one couldn't belt a child with the club.

"Bones."

Nikos rolled his eyes. "Sorry, lad, but I gave them to the dogs last night. You have to be quicker than that."

The boy shook his head as he tried to catch his breath again, and Nikos shuddered when something fell out and crawled erratically across the floor. "Bones," the boy repeated. His large eyes blinked wildly, his grimy hands fluttered dangerously over the just-cleaned bar. "Bones."

Experience finally suggested that something was wrong. Urchins generally didn't hang around the Bull and Bullock gasping "Bones" every day. "Nose," maybe, and once in a while "Beak," but never "Bones."

He dipped a small cup into a bucket of water, walked around the bar, and sat as he handed the drink to the child. Gingerly. "What bones?" he asked.

The boy drank gratefully, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and said, "In the forest."

The innkeeper put a thoughtful finger to his chin. "Bones in the forest, eh?"

"Yes."

"Animal bones were they?"

The boy's eyes widened further, and he shook his head vigorously. Luckily, nothing else fell out.

"Oh no. People bones."

Nikos' eyes narrowed in suspicion. "People bones? Are you sure, boy?"

"Oh, yes." The boy gestured feebly toward the door and took a deep breath. ' 'We were playing Hercules, you see, and 1 was a cyclops and Dorry was Hercules and he chased me into this clearing and I almost got away except he jumped on me, which he wasn't supposed to do because 1 wasn't supposed to get dirty today, but Dorry didn't know that, so he jumped on me and we fell down and we landed... we landed on—"

The boy hiccuped as soon as he ran out of air.

Nikos, who was still lost somewhere back in the just-getting-to-the-clearing part, waited patiently.

Smiling as only adults can do when they haven't the faintest idea what a child was talking about but didn't want to admit it.

Then he saw the unmistakable glint of a tear in the corner of the boy's eye.

More accurately, he saw the pale track the tear made through the grime on the boy's face.

"All right, lad, all right," he said gently, putting a hand on the boy's shoulder before he realized what he was doing. "You take it easy, take your time, tell me when you're ready."

"But I already told you!" the boy wailed in exasperation. "We was in the clearing, Dorry jumped on me, we fell on some bones, they were people bones, Dorry got scared and ran home, and so did I."

Nikos blinked in astonishment, squinted, and looked closer, prepared to be appalled.

He was.

"Bestor, is that you?"

The boy, who, as it turns out, was Nikos' son, nodded, and hiccuped, and another tear track began to work its way toward his chin.

"By the gods, boy, you're filthy!"

"We was playing."

"You look like an urchin!"

Bestor lowered his head contritely. "Sorry, Father."

An urgent shout outside distracted Nikos for a moment, just long enough for his son to throw his arms around his waist, bury his face in his chest, and begin to sob. The innkeeper patted the boy's back awkwardly, torn between the realization that his very own son had turned into an urchin when he wasn't looking, and the news that human bones had been discovered in the forest.

He sighed loudly. Life had been a lot simpler when the boy's mother was alive.

Bestor lifted his face. "Father, what shall I do?"

"Take a bath."

The boy gasped in horror.

Nikos scowled, not at the boy's reaction but upon hearing another shout, this one rather frantic, and coming from the square. "Wait here," he ordered as he rose.

"But, Father, the bones!"

Nikos didn't respond. He strode angrily to the doorway, determined to find out who was disturbing his peaceful afternoon. Probably more urchins. The selfsame urchins who had seduced his only son into for-getting his manners, his lessons, his station in life.

He stepped outside just as a woman screamed.

He put a hand to his chest and muttered, "Oh my."

It wasn't urchins.

It was the Corsco brothers.

For well over a year, the two Corsco brothers had, for some unknown reason, made it their profession to terrorize the village whenever they needed a few dinars, some free food, or some illicit recreation. Homes had been damaged, bones and skulls broken, purses snatched, and women defiled. While the Markan men certainly weren't cowards, neither were they, singly or in groups, capable of taking on ill-tempered men whose arms and legs were broad as boulders, and whose strength was such that tables had been split in half with a single one of their blows.

"Oh my," Nikos said again.

The brothers had cornered two women by the well, and the square, in a disturbing fit of self-preservation, had emptied without a fight. Every few seconds a foolhardy man would
race
in,
wave
his arms threateningly, and race out again.

The brothers only laughed as they pushed the women back and forth between them.

Then Nikos growled.

The women were Lydia Cember and her younger sister, Dutricia.

"Father," Bestor exclaimed from the doorway, "look, it's Lydia!"

Nikos nodded grimly. Both he and the boy were in love with Lydia, and she, it appeared, with them. It had been his plan, in fact, to propose a union before the season was over, and he had no doubt she would accept.

"Nikos!"

She had seen him, started to run toward him, and was grabbed from behind by Francus Corsco, who immediately began a disgusting, and loud nuzzling of her neck.

Enraged beyond reason, Nikos whirled, raced inside, reached over the bar, and grabbed the hefty club he used to keep the peace on nights when his customers threatened to become rowdy. He had never actually had to use the thing, just display it, but this was an emergency. He smacked it against his palm and, once outside again, saw that Sinius Corsco had lifted Dutricia onto the well's lip, held her by one arm, and laughingly threatened to shove her over the side. Lydia was on a bench, Francus snorting and pawing hungrily at her skirts.

Nikos howled and charged.

Francus looked up, grinned, and stood.

Nikos swung the club.

Sinius shoved Dutricia into the well, still holding her by her wrist and laughing.

Francus caught the club on its downward swing, wrenched it easily from Nikos' grip, and said with a mirthless laugh, "Die, toad."

Bestor shrieked.

Lydia shrieked.

Dutricia shrieked, her voice echoing a little from within the well.

Nikos wanted desperately to shriek, too, but Francus had one hand around his throat, squeezing mercilessly, while the other rose and fell as it measured the distance between the club and his skull.

"Toad," Corsco whispered.

Nikos could barely see. Most of his air was gone, the bright sun had begun to dim alarmingly, and all he could hear was the blood bellowing in his skull, Lydia bellowing on the bench, and, oddly, a man's amazingly calm voice say, "I'm trying to eat, do you mind?"

Suddenly the innkeeper was free. His knees buckled instantly and he sprawled on the ground, shading his eyes just in time to see the man from the inn snatch the club out of Francus' hand and toss it away, take Francus by the tunic and toss him away, step over the bench, grab Sinius by the scruff and toss him away while, at the same time, grabbing Dutricia's arm and hauling her safely out of the well.

It takes longer than that for a bird to blink.

The square was silent.

Finally Nikos pushed himself groaning to his hands and knees, glanced around fearfully, and gaped when he saw Francus lying motionless atop the wreckage of one of the inn's outside tables, Sinius lying motionless atop him. A faint cloud of dust drifted over their backs and heads.

He looked at the stranger.

The stranger smiled as he assisted the two shaken women to a bench, sat them down, whispered something, and turned. "Are you all right, innkeeper?"

Nikos nodded mutely.

One by one the villagers returned, whispering among themselves, trying and failing not to stare at the stranger who had saved their women.

The man extended a hand and hauled Nikos effortlessly to his feet. Nikos nodded his thanks and dropped onto the bench beside Lydia, who immediately threw her arms around his neck and began to sob in relief. A moment later Bestor was on his other side, a trembling hand on his father's leg while he stared up at the man.

"Wow," the boy said.

"Thanks," the man answered.

He was fairly handsome in a smoothly rugged sort of way, if, Nikos thought, you liked that sort of thing, which women tended to these days. Long light brown hair parted in the center and neatly brushed to the shoulders, nice eyes, a friendly smile, arms that bulged but didn't brag, a yellowish shirt open to expose a chest that bespoke strength but, like the arms, was too modest to brag. He even had a nose that fit the rest of his face.

"I—" Nikos coughed and massaged his injured throat. "We owe you our lives, sir."

' 'You were doing just fine. I just kind of butted in, that's all."

Nikos blushed at the polite lie even as Lydia stirred against him.

"Mister?" Bestor tugged at the man's vest. "Can you show me how to do that?"

The man's smile broadened. "I don't think so, son."

"Your name," Nikos said hoarsely, abruptly remembering his manners. "To thank you properly, we really should know your name."

This time it was the man's turn to appear uncomfortable. He shrugged one shoulder, scratched his neck, sighed.

"Hercules," he said at last.

Bestor gasped.

Lydia and Dutricia gasped.

Nikos gasped, but that was because his throat still hurt and Lydia's arms had tightened convulsively around his neck.

Before he had a chance to say anything, however, Hercules turned to the boy and said, "So what's all this about bones in the forest?"