The Prophecy Machine (Investments) (21 page)

“Now, if I could only find a Mycer, I could leave this
odorous place and get back to Letitia, alone in that hideous house …”

First, though, he knew he'd best purchase another jar of jam and some more oatcakes, as there was little of either left. That, and a gown she could wear, though where he'd find that, he couldn't say. The females here, Newlie and human alike, seemed to favor ill-fashioned garments made of scraps, patches, and snatches of straw.

Letitia wouldn't care for that. Letitia didn't dote on clothing, but she wasn't fond of sacks. If he could
ask
someone, if someone had the courtesy to talk instead of sneer …

“Ah, looking at who is here, looking who is out to see the sights in our most lovely town.”

Finn stopped, pulling up short as the Foxer stepped right in his path. One, and then another, and another after that, all arriving quickly without the appearance of intent, yet clearly designed to box him in.

“I fear you're in my way,” Finn said, “I ask you to kindly step aside.”

The Foxer closest by showed Finn a toothy grin. “He askits we are stepping aside. He fears wes in his way.”

“In his way,” said the second, who was shorter than the rest.

“Steps aside,” said the third, who walked with a limp. His voice was a rasp, much like that of his companions, voices that were scratchy and dry.

Finn had seldom been around Foxers, except for a few at home. Foxers didn't care for the west, they'd mostly settled south. To him, these three looked much alike. Gaunt with red eyes, amber hair and tufted ears, and mean little mouths. Still, the bloody slash across a brow, the scar above an eye, a limp and a twitch, told him he had met this trio before.

“That's a wicked cut indeed,” Finn said, addressing himself to Short, yet taking in the rest. “I'd get a stitch or two, drink lots of water, and get plenty of rest.”

Short reached up to touch his scar, thought better of it, and simply glared at Finn.

“We wishes to tell you,” said Limp, “you listen real good.”

“No harm will be coming,” Toothy said. “You gets far aways from here.”

“Far aways,” Short said, “far aways from here.”

“A most excellent idea,” Finn said. “I've considered that myself. As soon as possible, I'll be gone from here, far across the Misty Sea. Until that time, I've something to say to you.

“Last night you woke me from a dream of melon pie. One of your lot is quite good with a blade, and the other two are not. None of you are nearly as good as I. Come at me again, by damn, and I'll slice your hairy ears off and have them for lunch.”

None of the three moved. Limp shook his head. “You might be besting us we have a fight. I'm not believing you eat ourselves, though. We are not foods.”

“Most clearly we are not,” Short said.

“What I'm thinking is, that was not a true,” Toothy said. “That was a humor, was it not?”

“I don't ever do a humor. It was nothing of the sort.”

“Ah, I see.” Toothy looked at the others. They came to him at once, speaking in low and rusty tones.

Finn wondered what they'd do if he simply walked away. Still, just because they couldn't tell jokes didn't mean they weren't agile, fast on their feet, cunning and sly. He'd learned that much the night before. They were dressed in ordinary clothes now, shabby vests and pantaloons instead of black. Except for the blades at their sides, they looked harmless and benign. They didn't even smell as they had
when he'd fought them in the hall, an odor that was rank, alien and foul.

All Newlies smelled, some good and some vile. Bullies smelled like grass and sweat. Vampies, Squeen William's kind, had an odor like meat, like mold, like the sickly smell of death.

Letitia, on the other hand, smelled like musk, like old attic dust. Sometimes she smelled like clover, like brittle winter leaves, like earth turned in the spring.

Human folk had odors too, odors that offended, or attracted, others of their kind. And what did the Newlies think of human smell? Letitia Louise said Finn smelled nice, or most of the time, and he hoped that this was so.

“We has come to a decide,” Toothy said, turning to Finn once again. “Our decide is this. We doesn't think you contend against our kind. We doesn't think you do a quarrel. We believes you had a hostile because you was there.”

Finn felt a sense of relief, but he didn't let it show.

“What you say is true. I am pleased you understand. It was dark, and there was little time to reason things out. I had no idea who you were, or what you were doing there. It is clear now, you did —you had a quarrel with the Nuccis. I'm not too surprised, but there's no need to go into that. After I'm gone, do feel free to break in anytime.”

Toothy looked at Short. Short looked at Limp.

“You are a gone? We thinking you are here.”

“Gone from
there
,” Finn explained. “Gone from the Nuccis when a ship arrives again.”

“That is not a gone …”

“No, that is like a then …”

“This calls for a change of our decide …”

“This is not a pleasant,” Short said, “but this is how things is. If you be not a gone when we is coming, you be
there again. Best thing to do, wes thinking, is us be sticking you now.”

“What?”

“Will you journeys to the alleyway, please? It is plenty darker there …”

F
INN HAD NO TIME TO THINK, NO TIME AT ALL TO
blink. All three Foxers drew their blades at once. Finn ducked as Limp shaved the hairs atop his head. Toothy came at him from the left. Finn stepped on his toes and sent him reeling into Short.

“Lunatics, crazies!” Finn shouted. “I'm stranded in a madhouse here!”

And, with a solid kick that impaired Toothy's very vital parts, Finn was off and running through the horde, through the rabble, through the packed marketplace.

The crowd cleared before him, parting like water before a schooner's bow, parting, as any crowd would, before a man howling, growling, shouting out curses in some unholy tongue, clutching his blade and waving it about.

Bold, short-tempered men, men who liked to have a drink without a lot of noise, hastened to find a brick or a sharp-pointed stick, hastened to stop this brazen oaf. Hastened, then paused, paused and hesitated, mindful of the rage, of the fierce determination in the man's clearly homicidal gaze, mindful of the yelpers and the yappers, of the barking
berserkers on his tail. Thinking it wise to stay out of this mess, the stout and burly men shook their fists, dropped their bricks and sticks, and let their anger chase the man instead.

Finn knew that a man with any sense would let a madman have his way. Especially a loony who came from out of town. Everyone knew they were a dangerous lot, even when they seemed to be sane.

Turning a corner into a narrow, murky way, Finn stopped in his tracks, stopped and felt his heart beat fast against his chest. A team of worker Bullies, seven, eight, or maybe ten, were dragging an enormous building stone down the cobbled street. Each was a giant among his kind, great ponderous creatures with broad massive chests, and scarcely any necks at all. Each grasped a rope across his shoulder, grasped it in two chunky hands, strained so hard against the burden of the stone that a deep and awesome thrum resounded from their lungs with every step. Their thighs were as big as the torso of an ordinary man, and the veins in their arms were as thick as killer vines curled about a mighty tree.

Each of the brutes looked solemn and grave, and each wore a heavy ring through his nose, some lost tradition from the past, some rite now centuries old.

Finn knew he couldn't get through, knew the narrow street could scarcely contain these fellows now. Knew the manic Foxers were howling on his trail. Knew he could beat them one and all if they'd only fight him fair. He paused, took a breath and plunged into the fray …

He ducked, weaved, scrambled through columns of meat, under crotches, under legs, over bare and smelly feet. The fleshy hulks kicked him, cursed him and growled. Finn gagged and choked, staggered under body odors foul, under flatulent attack.

Finally, gasping for breath, stumbling to his feet, he came out the other side. The air was still vile, a near visible cloud.

The streets were close to empty, everyone at market, Finn supposed, leaving their doors and windows open wide. Trusting their neighbors, no doubt, for their goods were so shabby no one wanted whatever lay about.

The lane here was narrow, narrow and cramped. The stories from one side leaned out drunkenly to meet shaky structures tipping the other way. The street was a tunnel shut off from the sun, a place too wretched to live, Finn thought, unless everyone wore gray.

The Foxers, he guessed, wouldn't be fool enough to come the way he had. They'd go around and try to cut him off, and they'd know the town better than he.

Which way, then—left, right, the street that smelled of cabbage, or the one more like a sewer? The sewer, he decided, for a bit more light leaked down through the arches overhead.

Three more byways, and three dead ends. Finn wished he'd gone the other way—he couldn't keep going, couldn't go back the way he'd come.

An old woman passed with a bundle of wood, a child strapped tightly to her back. The child stared at Finn in wonder. The woman didn't bother to look his way.

Finn studied the shop behind him, the building overhead. The shop had a sign that read
TALLOWS & LAMPS
. The one across the street read
CLUB
. Another place that wouldn't let him in. Only the people at
CLUB
could drink there. He was, it seemed, beginning to understand these alien ways.

He plunged his hand into the basket, coming up with half a loaf of bread. He ate half of that, and put the quarter back. All of the tomatoes were squashed. Getting through
the Bullies had ruined all the cherries and the berries, and the sweetcakes had crumbled into shreds.

He heard the sound of his foes before he saw them, the yipping and the yowling and the stomp of heavy boots, the clatter of buckles and swords.

He looked to his front, to his left and to his right. Finally, he looked at the arches that loomed up above.

“Up it is, then,” he said aloud, chiding himself for pausing to eat, “up is the only way there is …”

The first story up was chunky stone with plenty of handy holds for hands and feet. The second was ancient wood, which rotted and crumbled, and nearly spilled him to the ground.

Once at the top, he could see a small corner of the market, a blue slice of the sea.

“The sea would be west. When we were still in open water, the sun always set behind the stern. Except, I think, when we went through Blue Butter Strait. Unless I'm mistaken, the sun on that occasion came up in the
south.
I knew that couldn't be, and meant to ask about it at the time …”

Not for the first time, Finn had to sadly confess that he scarcely knew his left foot from his right. That sort of thing was not required for a man in the lizard trade. He surely didn't know his way back to Julia and Letitia Louise. Back to Squeen William and the Nucci maniacs. What he knew was the sound of his pursuers was growing much closer all the time.

Leaping from one roof to the next was as simple as could be. The thatched, patched, tiled and slatted shops were hardly a quarter inch apart, and often closer still. The clatter of the Foxers was fading with every step he took. Finn,
however, knew that he was fading too. His throat was dry as sand. He'd had a little food, but not a thing to drink. If you can't get in
BAR
or
TAVERN
or
CLUB
, there's little one can do.

He jumped from a roof made of shingles to a roof made of pebbles to a roof made of plaster and sticks. Some roofs were steep, and others were flat. One had a hole that he nearly fell through. A man down below looked up at Finn and stared, said, “What the hell you doin' up there?”

“Pardon,” Finn said, and noticed the man was cooking an ugly fish.

Someone shouted and told him to stop. Finn thought it was the man, then saw it was a Foxer running straight at him across the rooftops. Another appeared, then another after that. Then, worse still, three more, and that added up to six.

“They've brought in help,” Finn muttered. “That doesn't seem right.”

With a leap and a yell, the nearest foe came at him, twisting his sword in a high and fearsome arc. Finn met him with the flat of his blade, pushed him aside, broke into a run and didn't stop.

This appeared to anger his pursuers. They jeered and called him names. Finn didn't care. Honor was scarcely an issue here. The Foxers were no great fencers, but six of them would surely bring him down.

One came at him from the left, two closed in from the right. Finn feinted toward the loner, then surprised them all by going for the pair.

A moment's hesitation, an instant of surprise gave Finn a small advantage and he took his foe out, blooding him deeply from his knee down to his thigh. The Foxer gave a cry and stumbled back. Before he hit the roof, Finn turned on his companion—whom he recognized as Toothy—and drove him savagely away.