Authors: S. E. Zbasnik,Sabrina Zbasnik
"There's talk of the walking nose about," Brother Tincture said solemnly, pointing to his nose.
"Really?" Aldrin covered his nose with his hand.
"Oh yes, most dangerous. It could cause a prolapse of your entire digestive tract," the Brother folded his eyes in concern at the boy scrambling to bury his entire face in his shit collar, "but you are in luck, I have here a potion that, if applied twice daily to your undercarriage, would protect you."
"My undercarriage?" Aldrin asked cautiously through green linen.
"Surely you know what your," the Brother's voice dropped to a whisper, "undercarriage is." Aldrin felt a red burn growing up his stomach. This was another one of those things he was supposed to know that everyone conveniently forgot to tell him.
The brother pulled a small vial from his pocket, glittering as red as liquefied rubies. "I'll give it to you for...ten Ravens. That's not much to stop your ovaries from exploding now is it?"
Aldrin shook his head no, afraid he stepped into quicksand and had no way to pull himself out. A naked hand snaked out from behind him and grabbed the red vial. Aldrin spun to find the Bishop holding it up to the light.
"Crushed berries and a bit of ethanol," he muttered, "Brother..." Tincture's head dropped down and he tried to look mournful at being caught trying to fleece their guest, but just on the edge of that frown were the hints of something more.
The Bishop tossed the vial back and ordered the man to go scrub down the bedpans and feed the leeches. Tincture bowed deeply and shuffled off, occasionally glancing back at their leader and muttering under his breath.
"That one was always destined to be a handful. I hope you can forgive the...playful nature of some of our brethren."
Aldrin nodded slowly, uncertain as to what just happened, but he suspected he could extricate his face from out of his shirt. A thousand questions died on his lips as those snake eyes turned back upon him.
"And how has your research been proceeding, Mr. Corwin?"
"Fine, fine. Good. Ish," he muttered self-consciously covering his neck with his hands. He felt like one of those teenage girls facing down the murderous vampire before the monster fell into a plot hole and became some dashing hero in tight pants.
"Excellent. We would not want you to feel inconvenienced in anyway for your Lord," the Bishop smirked in a way that suggested they were engaged in a battle of chess while Aldrin was still trying to figure out how the horsy moved.
"No, no we wouldn't," he said, trying to say nothing but filing the void the Bishop left.
He glanced once more at Aldrin, taking in the profile, then said, "The hour is late, you should be turning in."
"Yes, I was just going to do that," the boy sighed, hoping he hadn't just gotten all his pointy hats gobbled up by ravenous hippos.
The Bishop turned crisply and began to walk down the hallway towards the administration office, a shallow mumble following behind him. "May you sleep like the dead."
Aldrin wiped the flop sweat that persisted upon his brow and, taking no chances, ran for the shared room, gathering more glares from the few patrons and the other brothers who took to storing their own stuff in the empty patient rooms. If he didn't feel as if he just snatched his soul away from the Raven Lady he might have noticed the red knot hanging from the door handle. But his mind's eyes were focused on an almost stone bed he could burrow under and forget about the man stalking for his blood while the other half of his mind was still trying to figure out what his undercarriage was.
He cracked open the door and his stomach dropped down to his undercarriage then back up to his throat at the vision of the slender sliver of a beautifully caramel nude back. A very nude back.
Back
, his brain screamed at him,
go back. Turn back now. Step out, close the door. Run back. Just back.
Amazingly, Ciara didn't hear the stuttering fool trying very hard to not do what he was doing, and she kept dabbing a sponge over her skin. As another round of cool water hit her burning skin she sighed in relief.
That small sound was enough to snap Aldrin's feet to attention even as his brain chased after itself trying to memorize every moment his eyes captured. He stumbled back, pulling the door shut with him and lightly fell to the floor. It was a few minutes before blood drained from his undercarriage and then it all went straight to his cheeks.
It wasn't as if he'd never seen girls before. Some of the older maidens that flocked to royalty as a career move, would wait around trying to wrestle with his brother and would get the younger son by mistake. Most would laugh to themselves, pat his head and then ask if he had any idea where Henrik was. It had been just a wash of pink flesh, nothing to get too excited about, especially as the shame of being little more than his brothers keeper burned much brighter than any fledgling hormones.
But Ciara was...something. Something different. Something important. Gods, maybe he should have paid better attention during Pajama's random sonnet interludes. Was he supposed to compare women to flowers, or was it specific times of the day? An enjoyable fall rainstorm? A snappy hat?
His musings skittered to a halt as the door swung open and a now dressed girl began to pick the warning sign off the handle. She glanced down at the prince scrabbling to his knees and trying to get up without looking at her. Ciara took finding Aldrin ass planted on the ground in front of their room in stride and extended her hand to him. He took it sheepishly and stood, tottering like a baby deer.
"Where's the witch?" she asked him quietly.
Down to brass tacks and what not
, Aldrin wiped away at his bruised backside, "Breaking into every lock box in the library. Possibly every lock in the church." Isa went on a spark spree once she'd been let off her reins.
Ciara sighed, "Here's hoping she knows to play dumb if any of the priests catch her." Something told her any true witch worth her broomstick wouldn't get caught in the first place.
"I ran into Bishop Bezoar," Aldrin whispered.
Her head snapped around, expecting listeners to come skittering out of the walls. She leaned back and grabbed Aldrin's shoulder, pulling him into their shared quarters. Dragging a third bed into the already cramped room meant one had to crawl over Aldrin's to even get inside. The only standing room was a small scrap of open floor space already covered in their cast off clothes.
Ciara settled upon her bed, which normally had a set of leopard print blankets that she kicked to the floor in the middle of the warm nights. Aldrin began to lower himself onto the witch's bed but, as his eyes caught the perfectly sharp edge of a tucked in cheetah blanket he thought better of it and stood.
"That guy makes my skin crawl," Ciara said, rubbing her arms.
Aldrin did his very best to not think about skin and anything associated with that whole region that clothes keep well covered. He just nodded a bit and gulped. The air in the dead city was dry as grave wrappings and played hell on his still flaring allergies. Her fingers tented up and she laid her head upon them, massaging her forehead.
"You all right?" Aldrin asked, trying to figure out what to do with his impotent hands. He sucked in a breath as her knee grazed his in the tight quarters.
A weary face broke free from her lap and Ciara said dismissively, "I'm fine. I'll be better when we get out of here and back...funny, I almost called the caravans home."
"We've covered over half of the library. Less than a week before we find something useful or accept it as a dead end."
"Then on to Tumbler's End," Ciara said quietly.
"Yes," Aldrin agreed, masking as much pain as he could in his bottomless eyes. "Back to my father's men."
He'd welcomed this side quest, this journey to redeem himself from the witch's pricking fingers. Not because he honestly feared her power; as watching Isadora showed, the most they seemed able to do was get into poorly locked boxes and cause people's hair to stand up. No, despite playing the part of the biddable fool, what he really wanted was any excuse to keep on the trail, to keep as far from the crown hanging precariously over his head like the blade on a guillotine. Aldrin had no way of knowing if and when it would finally slip and sentence him to a lifetime of royalty but he was fighting it every chance he had. Being on the run provided him with a freedom he didn't realize he was missing.
Duty was one of those four letter words Chase and Chance did their thesaurus-like best to never use. To return to the real world, where his father was murdered, his brother missing, the Queen turning farm boys to soldiers to meet the rising arm of the Empire. It was the scorpion hidden inside the Soulday pudding (a favorite prank of his sister).
As he turned away from Ciara, who was putting her feet up for a rest, the door burst open. Isa stood there, her hair an extra half foot taller as small sparks jumped from her fingers. She climbed over the third bed. "I found it," the witch said excitedly, dumping a small book into the reticent prince's hands.
Aldrin touched the cover, little more than calf leather with a small marking of "JP" branded onto the bottom right corner. He glanced at Ciara, who sat up with the news, and -- trying to feign excitement -- cracked the cover.
"Well..."
Aldrin flipped through the book, his fingers grazing past chapters, headings, and very expensive type setting. He reached the end and turned the pages backwards, hoping to find understanding that way.
"It's a book of recipes?" his voice lilted, confusion clinging to every syllable. "Fantastical recipes. Here's one for Unicorn Horn Stew. 'Do not simmer for over ten hours or carrots will break down and horn will explode.'"
He held the book up to Ciara, who risked a glimmer of hope at being able to finally free themselves of the dead's hospitality. The moaning and cries for an end to their fresh agony (especially gelatin day) kept her up most nights, staring up into the shattered ceiling trying to not fall under the growing pressure of her hips pressing into the stone bed. Getting as far away from the blue robes clustered together like hens, pushing small carts overloaded with torture devices, was a balm to her overheated soul. Even the witch seemed excited to leave, throwing her considerable weight behind the project. It tugged on Ciara's ear that Isa seemed both knowledgeable and ignorant of their cause, tossing aside books from the wrong eras but balking at the name of Humphrey or some of Casamir's greater exploits.
"This one's for gnome flambé," Aldrin continued reading the cookbook aloud, as if it would help, "and here's a descriptive account on the butchering cuts for a troll." He raised the book and pointed to a small drawing of a rock outline with limbs. The caption simply said "None."
Ciara turned to the witch and rolled her eyes, "Some big find. Soon as we catch one, we can have harpy hair pasta."
Isadora ran her fingers back through her over excited hair, trying to style the pale mess into place, "For all the demons," she cursed, "check the front flap, you moron."
The book fell open and the prince's finger found a plain note, long ago carved into the leather cover. "'If Found Please Return to Khud c/o Immir, 506
th
St and Leighton; Cas's Tomb and Gift Shoppe.'"
"Well that would be helpful if we had any idea where this Immir, or Leighton or 506
th
street were," Ciara said, trying to throw a cold bucket of reality on the tempting words "Cas's Tomb."
Now the witch smiled, a small thing that sent most trickster gods scurrying under their thrones, "Read the appendix."
Aldrin flipped back through the pages, leaving behind entire lost sections on the art of plucking griffins and what wine goes best with dragon liver. His fingers followed along old notes, scribbled from one of the past owners, a chef who seemed to really enjoy the bits involving faux halfling. At the back, just before the review of a local eating establishment
"Whoever owned this book must have really wanted it back. His map included some mountain ranges and larger cities. Like Ostro," Isa said, glancing at the Prince of the backyard that supposedly housed the body of the world's greatest hero.
Ciara took the map from Aldrin's trembling hands and tried to read the unknown divots and hills, "So we take this back to the Historians, compare it to Medwin's other maps and find the tomb."
"Sounds almost too easy," Aldrin said softly, glancing up at the ceiling.
"After the past months we've had, I'll take easy," Ciara admitted, "And if this is deep in Ostero land, then your armies should have no troubles taking you there."
She was trying to be encouraging, pointing out just how close he was to actual freedom from this life of subterfuge and being owned by "magic." But Aldrin only nodded quietly, falling surprisingly obtuse.
The prince ran his finger once more over the cover, around the loop of the "P." His mind wheeled about before he nodded and reached for the pack long tossed to the ground, "Right, we leave tonight. Grab everything we can quickly."
"Are you certain?" Ciara asked, hoping that the promise of a partial night's sleep might finally shake off the weariness settling in her marrow.
His muddled eyes focused perhaps for the first time in fifteen years, "Yes."
It didn't take long to stuff their meager belongings into the two packs, Isa directing them along the way. "This would go much faster if you'd help," Ciara huffed, knotting a pair of socks whose owner she was uncertain of.
"I am helping, there's a shirt under the bed," the witch grinned, enjoying this rare chance to observe others in new habitats. The most she ever got was the occasional lost woodsman raving about grandmothers eating wolves or Baba Yaga's bi-yearly "Chicken Legs Extravaganza! Bring Your Own Broom." An extroverted witch didn't last long unless she was one of those "speaks to woodland animal" types.