Maybe there were blizzards in the hot place and all the young devils were sharpening their skates.
Dean stuck his head into the Dead Man’s room. “Mr. Dotes is headed this way.”
“Morley?” It had been a while since I had seen Morley Dotes, my sometime best pal. He was trying to go high class, which apparently meant scraping old buddies off the soles of his shoes.
“Do we know another Dotes?” Dean does not approve of Morley. Of course, he doesn’t approve of much of anything but marriagable nieces and his friends Tinnie and Maya. But not many other people approve of Morley, either. Morley is what discreet, gentle folk would call a thug.
In the real world Morley is known as one badass bonebreaker.
Who has developed delusions and illusions.
Please await Mr. Dotes at the front door, Dean. Bring him straight here. I am certain we will find his news enlightening.
36
Morley Dotes is part human, part dark elf. His elven side dominates. His choice. He seems embarrassed by his human side. Can’t say I blame him.
He is short and lean and so damned good-looking they ought to jail him and lose the key. So the rest of us get a break. I have known him a long time. Sometimes we are best pals. Sometimes he does stuff like give me a talking buzzard that is possessed by an insane demon that causes diarrhea of the beak.
“Mr. Dotes,” Dean said, showing Morley into the Dead Man’s room.
“Egad,” I said. I’ve always wanted to say that. The opportunity never presented itself before. “Your boys knock over a tailor shop?”
He was dressed to the nines. Maybe even to the tens or elevens. He had on a silver-trimmed black tricorner hat, a heavy, bright red-, black-, and silver-trimmed cutaway over a white shirt wild with lace and ruffles at throat and wrists, a skinny sword cane, natty cream hose, and incredibly shiny shoes with huge silver buckles. He even had a little twitch of a black mustache coming in.
“Some high-class Hill couches must have died to make that coat.”
Morley removed a white silk glove, took out a scented little hanky, held it beneath his nose. He sniffed and eyed Cat speculatively, wondering if there was something between her and me. That is the one line he never crosses.
“Really putting on the airs now, isn’t he?” I asked the Dead Man.
A man has got to do what a man has got to do. The Dead Man’s sarcasm would have rattled the windows if the room had had any windows to rattle.
Morley took it in stride. We peasants could not be expected to appreciate his improved, refined station. “As you requested,” he told the Dead Man, flouncing that damned hanky like he belonged in the West End, “I inspected the site you specified. In fact, I soiled a perfectly beautiful...”
Nog is inescapable.
This one was a lot stronger. Nog was close. And his thought did not touch just the Dead Man and me. Morley lost his color.
I told him, “That’s not just another Loghyr. That’s a for sure howling petty pewter god whose specialty is hunting people down. Right now he’s looking for me.”
Cat had caught it, too. She started moving around nervously. “I need to get out of here, Garrett. If Nog finds me here...”
Show the young lady to the small front room, please, Dean. Miss Cat, I wish to speak to you for a moment privately before you depart. In the interim, I need to consult with these gentlemen.
“Where will I be able to get ahold of you?” I asked Cat, as though I believed the Dead Man really did plan to cut her loose.
“I’ll find you.”
“Sure you will. Good-bye, then. Behave yourself.”
She gave me a funny look, then went with Dean. She failed to take Fourteen with her. That had to mean something to somebody.
In the background Nog faded away, but he left no doubt that he was not far off and in a foul mood besides. His pals were bound to be around, too, and I couldn’t see their tempers being any more pleasant.
I fear it will not be long before they come visiting.
Morley asked, “Are you into something weird again, Garrett?” He stared at the cherub like he half expected it to come to life and snipe an arrow right into his black heart.
“Me? Into something weird? The gods forfend.” I told him all about it. And concluded, “It wasn’t my idea.”
“But then, it never is. Is it? I take it that was some other clown named Garrett who went chasing the skirt up Macunado.”
“Here’s the pot calling the kettle. You never saw a skirt you wouldn’t chase.”
“Technically incorrect, although true in spirit. If you will recall I was able to resist several of the old man’s nieces.”
“They’re a pretty resistable bunch.”
I remembered the owl girls. I chuckled. They would make a fine payback for the Goddamn Parrot. I could give him back birds with interest. If I could fix it so he couldn’t get away from them for a month or two.
“Great story, Garrett. Real interesting. I’m sorry I can’t help you with this one.” Dotes shrugged. “And I didn’t come over to trade insults.” He pumped a thumb. “That one asked me to look into something. I came to tell him what I found.”
That you have appeared in person leads me to believe that the treasure is, indeed, hidden exactly as Magodor suggested.
“There’s one to wake up to in the morning, Morley.”
When money was involved Morley trusted nobody. I have become so cynical I even wondered why he hadn’t just grabbed the treasure and reported it nonexistent. I wondered why the Dead Man had chosen to send Morley. I would have used Playmate. Morley’s ethics are not as flexible as Winger’s, but they still have plenty of elastic in them.
Actually, he wouldn’t do me that way. He might use me in a scheme without consulting me first, as he had done a few times already, and he might dump a Goddamn Parrot on me as a practical joke, but he would not steal from me.
Excellent. Then there is a possibility Garrett’s latest misadventure will not turn up a complete loss. Will you contract to recover the treasure for a percentage?
“Hey!...”
You will be busy running, Garrett.
I caught just the faintest parting echo of Nog. How long before he passed this way again?
“Mr. Garrett?” Dean was in the doorway. “Slim is here for his delivery and pickup.”
“Good.” I hadn’t gotten a chance to steal a sip off the emergency pony keg. Life is a bitch. “That gives me an idea. Go let him in.”
37
Slim doesn’t find my line of work believable, but the notion I tossed out captured his imagination. “All right, Garrett. I’ll do it. Might be fun.”
Might turn painful if some Godoroth thug got pissed off, but I forbore mentioning that. We need not trouble him unnecessarily. It might disturb his concentration.
“All right, Dean. Let’s get the barrel up here.”
I had a huge old wine cask in the cellar. It had been down there for ages. One day real soon now I planned to clean it up and fill it with water so we could withstand a protracted siege. I have all sorts of great ideas for that sort of stuff, like running an escape tunnel or two, but I never get around to working on them.
Slim removed a couple of beer kegs while Dean and I wrestled the barrel up from the cellar. Dean mostly kept his opinions to himself because he didn’t have anything positive to say. He did bark at Cat when she dared peek out the door of the small sitting room.
The barrel was thoroughly dried out, which meant its ends and staves were not as tight as they would be when soaked and swollen. That left me worried that the damned thing might fall apart while they were carrying it out to Slim’s cart. I wouldn’t look real dignified falling out of an exploding barrel.
As soon as Dean shut me in, I knew I had made a mistake. I should have just walked out the door. The results would have been less unpleasant. This was like being trapped in a wino’s coffin. And I am not comfortable with tight places. Smelly tight places are worse. Getting rolled
down steps inside a smelly tight place is worse still. And no effort to make me unhappier was spared when the bunch of them tossed my conveyance onto Slim’s cart. Vaguely, I heard Morley mixing complaints about what could have happened to his clothing with chuckles about my probable discomfort.
I should fix him up with Magodor. Maggie was just the girl for him. Snakes in her hair. Fangs. Claws at the ends of all those arms.
Matters did not improve anytime soon. The cart started moving. Slim did not ride it, he led his team. He had no need to ease the bump and bang of solid wooden wheels rolling over cobblestones.
It seemed I was in there for several infant eternities. Slim was supposed to head straight for his Weider distributor to get shut of me and my empties and reload with full kegs, but soon I became convinced that he was going the long way, looking for the princes of potholes. Every bump we hit made the barrel creak and move around the cart a bit.
Bang! We hit a big one. I thought I was going over. Slim growled at his donkeys. I swear one of them laughed — that honking bray they have.
Donkeys are relatives of horses.
Bang! again. This time we got the mother of all potholes. My barrel bounced off the back of Slim’s cart. It fell apart when it hit the pavement. I staggered up dripping staves and hoops, looking around fast to see if I needed to run. I didn’t see a cherub, let alone a full-fledged third-rate god.
“Sorry,” Slim told me. “These damned donkeys seem to be taking aim at every damned pothole.”
The animal nearest me sneered.
“Throw them to the wolves. Use them for thunder lizard bait. Don’t suffer them a minute longer. If you do, someday they’ll get you.”
Slim gave me a really strange look.
“Thanks for the help,” I told him. “You want what’s left of this thing?” A barrel is a valuable commodity even if it requires some assembly.
“Yeah. Sure.”
No danger greater than the bile of donkeys presented itself. I helped Slim get the barrel pieces into his cart. People who had watched me get hatched from a wooden egg just stood around and stared. They worried me only because they would brag about what they had seen and somebody somewhere sometime would realize that the clown in the barrel had been me.
Could not help that. Could get my feet to stepping.
The Goddamn Parrot swooped past, vanished without any comment.
I had my feet moving now but did not know where to let them take me. South seemed good. If I made the Dream Quarter, the Godoroth and Shayir would not be able to bully me without irritating all the other gods.
38
I got so close I began to think I was going to make it. But I hadn’t put enough thought into planning. I took almost the same route I had followed before. All too soon I began seeing strange shadows in golden light. I heard whispers just beyond the edge of hearing, though some of those emanated from the Goddamn Parrot, who was trailing me.
The bird swooped in, plopped onto my shoulder while squawking something about changing course right now. I told it, “I’ve picked up something that I think is called Tobrit the Strayer. Shayir. It’s more like a fear than anything. If it’s the same one, the one time I saw it materialize it turned into an oversize and over-ugly imitation faun that was hornier than a three-headed horned toad.”
I spoke in a normal voice. The Goddamn Parrot screeched. Naturally, people stared. I made the turn the bird demanded. I tried not to dwell on the nightmare that life could become if the Dead Man kept the bird on me all the time.
The Goddamn Parrot guided me to Stuggie Martin’s. That swillery, for all its lack of glory, had seen a dramatic improvement in business. Overflow guys were standing around outside, drinking and muttering. Some of their buddies preferred to mutter and drink.
Having failed to get so much as a taste off the keg delivered to my house, I decided to stop in, maybe revel in the ambience for one beer. My spirits were flying too high anyway.
It did not occur to me that the Dead Man actually wanted me to visit the place.
Yesterday Stuggie Martin’s had been depressing. Today it was like the dead of winter inside. I called for a dark Weider’s, then asked Stuggie’s successor, “What’s with these guys? They look like they just found out rich Uncle Ferd croaked and left everything to the home for wayward cats.”
“You ain’t heard? Got to be that you ain’t heard. It was your pal No-Neck, man. Most everybody ’round here liked that old goof.”
“Did something happen to No-Neck?”
“They found him a little while ago. He was alive, but that wasn’t ’cause somebody never tried to make it go some other way. They tortured him really bad.”
I smacked a fist down hard on what passed for a bar in there. “We tried to warn him. He didn’t want to listen.”
“Huh?”
“He did a favor for somebody that was sure to piss somebody else off. We tried to tell him they wouldn’t let it slide.”
The barkeep poured me another and nodded. He had been sampling his wares, no doubt making sure he was serving only the best. He was having trouble keeping up.
Hell, I was having trouble and my first few sips hadn’t hit bottom yet.
“You guys friends?” the barkeep asked, topping my mug for me.
“Not really. Just had things in common. Like the Corps.” This guy had the right tattoos. He could be diverted.
When I arose a while later I was in a bitter, black mood. No-Neck had been tortured to death only because his precognitive sense had failed him and he had gone walking around with me.
Thus we rail, in vain, against the whims of gods and fates.
Unless his killers were really stupid, one god-gang would have it figured out and would be out of control.
Getting into the Dream Quarter, fast, sounded like a really good plan now.
The barkeep asked, “No-Neck have any people?”
“I didn’t know him. Just met him yesterday. He never mentioned any.”
“Too bad. He was a good guy. Be nice to let somebody know. So somebody could do right by him.”
Had I not been at the bottom of a deep barrel with herds of gods out to get me I might have volunteered to find No-Neck’s family. But I was so far down there the open top looked no bigger than a bunghole.
So No-Neck would be seen into the great beyond by the city’s ratmen, who would cart his remains to the nearest public crematorium.
39
The Goddamn Parrot plopped onto my shoulder as I hit the street. “Shiver me timbers,” I muttered. “Do I live a blessed life, or what?”
“Awk. Something is following you.”
“Am I surprised.”
“Many of the presences are coming this way.”
People stared. It was not often you saw a man chatting with a parrot. “And I’m headed thataway.” I began trotting toward the Dream Quarter. Shouldn’t be that hard to make the safety of the Street of the Gods. Getting back off again might turn out to be a grand adventure, though.
Apparently the Dead Man had little trouble detecting gods once he took an interest. In fact, there was an amazing array of things he could do if you could just get him started. That was a secret I really wanted to crack. I might trade my keyness... Nah.
I wondered if the Dead Man being able to spot them meant that my divine acquaintances had chosen to manifest themselves especially strongly during their struggle or if, perhaps, TunFaire was always infested with petty gods and we were detecting this bunch only because we were watching for them. My guess was that these two gangs were obvious mainly because they were fighting for their lives.
The Goddamn Parrot fluttered up and away, off to I-don’t-know-where, once again leaving me to dread a future in which the Dead Man could tag along wherever I went through that bird-brained feather duster.
I walked around a corner and there was Rhogiro, bigger than life and twice as ugly, holding up a wall like your everyday garden-variety street thug. Obviously he wasn’t really waiting f
or me but was there just in case something turned up. I never slowed a step. I whipped across into a narrow breezeway. It dead-ended on me. I put my back against one wall, my hands and feet against the other. Up I went. Meantime, Rhogiro realized who he had seen, came to the end of the breezeway and did some holy thundering. He was too big to get into the crack and too stupid to recall that he had divine powers. At least in the moments it took me to get up top.
My luck, as always, was mixed. The climb was just two stories. Good. The roofs up there were flat and identical and stretched on and on. Excellent. They could be run upon almost like the street. None of the buildings were more than three feet from their neighbors. Fine.
But in this part of town the slumlords wasted no resources on maintenance. My foot went through a roof almost immediately. I didn’t get hurt, but I realized that I had to slow down or get down.
Slowing down gave me time to think about what I was doing, which, mainly, was heading away from the Dream Quarter. I needed to get down and head the other way.
I got down rough, after jumping to a roof so fragile I punched right through. I caught myself before I plunged into whatever disaster lurked below. I stared downward. My eyes were not used to the gloom there, but the area immediately below me looked empty. I lowered myself as far as I could, let go. The floor was not that far. And it held.
The place had been abandoned. Only the masonry was more substantial than the roof. Now that I was into the gloom I could see light leaking through the overhead in fifty places.
The walls consisted of plaster crumbled till it was almost gone, the lathing behind it mostly fallen too. The floor groaned and creaked. The stairway looked so precarious I backed down on all fours. I was interested only in getting out but did note that there was nothing left worth stealing except the brick itself and some wooden bits that would end up as firewood.
I was surrounded by things on their last legs. My partner was dead already. My housekeeper had one foot in the grave. The city where I lived seemed ready to commit suicide.
The street out front was almost empty. That was an ugly omen. These tenement blocks swarm with kids playing, mothers gossiping, grannies whining about their rheumatiz, old men playing checkers and complaining about how the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Where was the Goddamn Parrot? I could use a good scouting report.