30. It’s a beautiful day, Mor-eldal…

I went directly to Swift’s refuge and found that the dead end was now closed with a palisade and a gate.

“Blasthell,” I muttered, surprised.

I went forward and groped. I looked for an opening. There was none. Then a voice came from a dark corner:

“Gwak! Are you looking for Swift?”

I perceived a silhouette at the back of the porch of a house. The face was half hidden behind a worn-out hat.

“Dead round, I’m looking for him,” I admitted. “Do you know where he moved to?”

“Two days ago, there was an quarrel with the neighbors, and it was decided to wall off the dead end,” the man commented. “It’s a pity, because that Swift isn’t a bad guy. If I were you, I’d go to the Wool Square, surely you’ll find someone who knows. As they say, nobody knows where the gwaks are, but, of all people, the gwaks know where everybody is.”

I smiled.

“Natural. Thank you, sir. Good night.”

“You’re welcome. By the way,” he added in a low voice. “I don’t know if you’re aware, but there’s someone following you.”

I stiffened and turned my head very slightly to one side. I saw nothing, but I said:

“Blasthell, thanks, grandpa.”

“What grandpa? I’m thirty-two springs. Happy festival.”

“Happy festival to you, comrade!” I replied mockingly then bellowed away:

The neighbors don’t want us around.

Despicable isturbags!

They chase the gwaks off.

Are they devils?

La-ri-lon, la-ri-lan.

We’re not devils.

You guys are!

Beetle-headed clumps,

bunch of nail-lickers,

intolerant people,

house snatchers.

One of these days, I swear,

they’ll rob us of the street!

I took the opportunity to bang my fist on a nearby door, and ran off. After a while I felt myself limping a little, and I started walking, hoping that whoever was following me would have lost sight of me.

Before going to the Wool Square, I decided to pass by The Drawer. I didn’t have a nail to buy food, but I had information. I could always throw out some promising phrase, convince Sham to buy me dinner, and tell them something like: the Ojisaries are gone and they’re not coming back. With an air of mystery and a good story to tell, no doubt someone would feel sorry for me and agree to buy me a meal. On the way to the tavern, I fabricated a story that the Ojisaries had been attacked by the Spirits of Vengeance themselves and had run off. I was still working out the details when I pushed open the door and said:

“Ayo, ayo! A meal for the starving bard with an exciting story to tell about the Ojisaries! How are you, Sham?”

I walked over quickly and sat on a stool at the counter, and the tavern-keeper gave me a forced smile.

“Ayo, bard. Uh… you’re not going to tell us any more wild stories about uh… the Oysalians?”

I frowned, and only then did I notice the strange silence in the tavern. I turned my head and found myself face to face with a bald, tattooed giant. He was accompanied by a bearded man with a purple headband that held back an impressive head of braids and a young woman with blue hair wrapped in a long black cloak. All three carried swords. Guards? They didn’t look like guards. They looked more like mercenaries, killers, or hitmen… And they weren’t regulars at The Drawer. I stared at them, bewildered.

“Kid. Do you know anything about the Ojisaries?”

It was the blue-haired woman who had spoken, in a voice that was both soft and urgent. I swallowed and made a strangled sound before saying:

“Ojisaries? Did I say Ojisaries? I meant the…”

I glanced at the tavern-keeper, and he kindly came to my aid:

“Oysalians.”

“That’s right. I was talking about the Oysalians,” I asserted. “The Oysalians of the Spirits, may they be blessed this day with autumn, grapes, wine, and their mothers and all their ancestors. The Ojisaries!” I exclaimed indignantly. “Let them go to the dragon’s cave and see if he warms their calves!”

The regulars burst out laughing, and I took advantage of this moment when the atmosphere was relaxed to ask Sham for dinner again, saying in a fluent tone:

“If you don’t mind, put it on my account; I haven’t any money on me tonight, but tomorrow I shall have some for sure.”

Sham pouted and put a plate full of porridge in front of me anyway.

“It’s okay because it’s you, bard; I only do this for good customers.”

“Well, precisely!” I smiled, taking the spoon. “Thanks, Sham.”

And I began to gulp down the porridge and chew my bun as if I had not eaten for days, which obviously was not the case: the alchemist might be able to scare me to death, but not starve me.

Still, my dinner was a bit spoiled by the presence of the foreign mercenaries. I paused when I heard the bearded man clear his throat. He called out to the entire tavern:

“We would be grateful to anyone who could inform us of the whereabouts of the Black Hawk. If you have any information on him, come to The Ballerinas and you will receive twenty siatos.”

The majority turned a deaf ear. Only Sham leaned over the counter and said in a voice that was nevertheless quite audible:

“Sorry, sir, but I don’t think these people know any more about the Black Hawk than I do. He was the kap of one of the many bands in the Labyrinth. It ended badly, apparently, but I have no idea what happened. Sincerely.”

I didn’t care if he was sincere or not. The only thing that bothered me was the intense gaze the blue-haired woman was giving me. She seemed to be reading my mind.

The bearded man gave the tavern-keeper a skeptical pout and muttered through his teeth:

“Let’s get out of this den.”

The giant with the tattoos emptied his cup in one gulp, the blue-haired woman looked away from me, took one last look at the tavern and, without altering her inscrutable face, nodded. As soon as the three of them walked out, the tavern came back to life with guffaws.

“You’ve made us one of those entrances, bard!” old Fieronilles barked. “We were waiting for those strange fellows to go away, and you just come barging in talking about the Ojisaries.”

“Oysalians, Oysalians!” I corrected him, scratching my head. “What did those guys want?”

“You heard him,” Sham said, leaning on the counter with a dish towel and a glass. “They were looking for information on the Black Hawk. More than one is looking for him. Apparently, there’s a nail-pincher who wants to locate him because that damn smart one allegedly walked off with a fortune that belonged to the nail-pincher. That’s what the bad tongues say. Where the hell did this crook go now? What’s clear is that I wouldn’t look for him in Estergat. He may well have gone to Doaria or Azach. Wherever the gust of wind does not reach him, you know what I mean.”

“Let him hang himself straight if he’s isturbagged enough to have stayed in Arkolda,” snorted Yarras, the White’s ruffian. And he casually left the cards on the table as he turned to me. “So, bard. You said you had an exciting story to tell us?”

“Oh…” I pouted and gave everyone a cautious look. “Well… to tell you the truth, I can tell you a lot of stories, but none of them really… specific to the Oysalians. Let’s just say that I was looking for an audience to fill my plate,” I confessed quite frankly.

My reply was greeted with smiles and appreciative exclamations like “look at that trickster!” or “not stupid!”, and old Fieronilles assured:

“It doesn’t matter! Anyway, the Ojisaries don’t exist any more than the Oysalians now. To me, it’s like they’ve turned into toads.”

Several nodded loudly in agreement, and seeing that interest in the Ojisaries and me was waning, I pushed the empty plate back toward Sham, slid off the stool, and tossed to the tavern-keeper:

“I didn’t forget I owe you one, Sham.”

“I didn’t either,” he replied with a small smile. “Sleep well!”

“You too!” I said, and I came out of there with an, “Ayo, everyone!”

As soon as I closed the door I turned my head to the left, to the right, and looked to the left again. There stood the strangers at the end of the street. And there were not three of them. There were five. And all were armed. Good mother…

When I saw that one of them was taking a step towards me, I took my heels in the opposite direction.

“Hold on, kid!”

I did not listen. I turned the corner and ran down the stairs as fast as my infuriatingly lame leg would allow. I was thinking that the strangers were not pursuing me when suddenly someone grabbed me roughly by the arm and hurried me against the wall. I screamed, and my attacker growled in my ear:

“Shut up or I’ll kill you.”

I closed my mouth and was already preparing to give him a mortic discharge when I recognized his voice and terror overcame me. It was Warok. If only I could touch him with my right hand… I struggled, and he elbowed me in the ribs. As soon as I heard growling, I stood still as a statue. The dogs, I realized, horrified. Warok was with Adoya. Adoya and his seven dogs. I let out an appalled yelp and heard Warok’s little laugh.

“Listen, you filthy scum. I’m going to feed you a deadly poison that will kill you in minutes if I don’t give you the antidote. But, if you tell me where my brother and the Black Cat are, I will give you the antidote. Only if you tell me where they are, understand?” He slammed me against the wall again, and I felt the hard rock against my cheek. “I know you’re friends with Manras. He betrayed us because of you. Talk or I’ll rip out your eyes and entrails before I kill you.”

And I’m supposed to buy that you’re going to give me the antidote, I thought wryly. Everything went very quick. First, Warok asphyxiated me with whatever it was. I struggled to get air, but no sooner had I opened my mouth than he put a bottle between my teeth. Much of what he poured out was lost, but I had to swallow the rest against my will. There it was. The deadly poison was in my body. I was already, so to speak, dead. A sort of demented, vindictive gravity came over me. What did it matter now what I could do?

I cast a harmonic spell of intense light, and taking advantage of the surprise, I managed to free myself enough to grab Warok by the arm and send him a mortic shock. The dark elf fell to the ground. I saw the vial slip from his hand, picked it up in a rage, and poured what was left of the poison down Warok’s throat, shouting:

“Murderer!”

“That’s enough!” Adoya shouted.

I looked up abruptly and saw the seven dogs lurking about, perplexed, waiting for their master to join them. My madness faded for a second. And I ran away. It was a mistake. The dogs, seeing me move, threw themselves at me, barking loudly. I didn’t know which was better: to be eaten by the dogs or to be poisoned. I hoped that if they ate me, at least the poison would kill them too.

I fell to the ground in the middle of the pack and felt teeth grabbing my arms and legs. I screamed, and threw out random harmonics, and even made harmonic sounds, I think, but I was probably the only one who could hear them. Finally I stopped moving because the more I moved, the more it hurt. The dogs were just biting to keep me from leaving, but all I knew at the time was that they were going to eat me alive, and I was gasping for air, feeling like I was suffocating, and my head was reeling with horror. I understood at that moment why some people said that sudden death was a blessing.

Then I heard a voice that was both powerful and distant:

“Tell them to let go!”

I did not hear what Adoya said, but in any case, the dogs released me one after the other. The problem was that I could not see anything. Well, yes, I could see trunks. And I could see a slope with grass and a wonderful sun. But I couldn’t see what I was supposed to see in an alley of the Labyrinth. And while thinking that, I said to myself, but what alley are you talking about, Mor-eldal? You are in the valley, can’t you see it?

Yes, I could see it. And I could see the squirrels too. And my master. He was there! His skeletal figure, wrapped in a dark green cloak, was walking down the slope towards the stream I was lying beside.

“It’s a beautiful day, Mor-eldal,” he pronounced. “I’ll bet there are plenty of crayfish downstream. Are you going to go hunting?”

I straightened up and nodded.

“Yes, yes. I’m going. Do you want me to get you a rabbit?”

“No, son, no. You already brought me one four days ago. Surely you don’t want to make me overweight!”

He laughed, and I laughed happily too. Something caught in my throat, and I coughed, and then I heard a dull growl, and I turned, my heart racing. There, between the bushes, I saw fangs appear. It was a wolf. I screamed.

“Elassar!”

I got up, and knowing that my master was safe, I ran off to find a tree. There was a beautiful tree there, with a branch not too high that I used to climb when I was little…

However, I never reached the tree, and it was not because of the wolves, but because I ran into the air. An extremely hard wall of air. I was stunned, and I heard a voice say:

“He’s gone mad.”

“Tell me right now what was in that bottle, you devil!” a female voice cried.

I blinked, felt arms grasp me firmly, and saw, like a flash, a most disconcerting scene. I was standing by a wall, surrounded by the bearded man and the giant with tattoos. The one with the bluish hair was crouching beside Warok’s inert body, a dagger in her hand. And a red-haired caitian and a blonde who looked suspiciously like the Blue One were facing Adoya and his seven dogs, swords in hand. And Adoya looked visibly frightened.

“Nothing,” he replied. “Drugs, apparently. They were probably fighting over it. That’s all I know. My dogs smelled drugs, and they didn’t like it… I had nothing to do with it. Good night.”

To my astonishment, he turned around and simply walked away with his dogs. The mercenaries let him go.

“You rotten sack of bones,” my nakrus master spat in my ear.

I nodded with a sneer of hatred. Adoya was a coward. Okay, at least he hadn’t ordered his dogs to eat me. But he was a coward and a wretch. He called me a raging drug addict, and on top of that, he abandoned his companion to his fate.

The Blue One broke the silence with a slightly strained voice.

“You know what? I don’t want to alarm you, but we have a problem. This elf is dead. I don’t know if it was the drugs or something else… but he’s dead.”

Dead? I blinked, but could not make out the meaning of her statement. I heard the bearded man hiss a curse.

“What are we gonna do?” the caitian muttered.

“Are you seriously asking? Let’s get the hell out of here,” the bearded man replied energetically. “Sarpas, take the kid.”

“We’re going to take him?” the Blonde wondered. “He looks so dazed I don’t think he’s much use to us.”

“He’ll perk up,” the bearded man assured. “Zoria. Let’s go. You won’t resurrect the other one.”

“I didn’t intend to,” the Blue One replied, standing up. “It’s clear that this guy attacked the boy first and not the other way around. Let’s get the hell out of here right now,” she added.

The whole conversation was nothing but a confused buzzing that my mind could hardly grasp. The scene in the alley seemed far, far away. My eyes could see with far greater clarity my squirrel friends rapidly climbing a log; and the splendid blue sky of the valley; and my nakrus master, quietly climbing the hill towards the Cave, perhaps to take one of his books and sit on his trunk or at the entrance, to enjoy the beautiful afternoon…

I barely felt this giant called Sarpas lift me up in his arms and pull me away from… I am not sure what from.