Wolf's-head, Rogues of Bindar Book I (8 page)

A cunning
smirk sprang across Nuzbek’s face. “I regret to inform you that a
reversal for Weavil is out of the question.”

“And why is
that?”

“A collision
of asteroids is not scheduled for an astrological
ibit
, not
to mention, a similar celestial conjunction in Cygnus X, which is
necessary for transformation and is not to occur for another 444
lunar ecliptics—if my mathematics is correct.”

Graves gave a
sour snarl. “How long is a ‘lunar ecliptic’, Nuzbek, and what time
period are we talking?”

Nuzbek
scratched at his brow with calculation. “I would guess, in the
nature of fifty years.”

Weavil bounced
forth to take a bite out of the magician’s leg.

The magician
raised his foot and booted Weavil aside, like a pesky rat.

The sounds of
cackling and rummaging alerted the officers elsewhere. Baus peered
sideways. He saw two crones robbing Nuzbek of the contents of his
fullest chest. The Captain jerked his bulk over to shoo the women
away. In mid-step, he caught a glimpse of one of the
sinister-looking jars propped on the shelves and glared at Nuzbek
in cold disfavour. “What is the meaning of those eldritch
things?”

“Oddities
only,” explained Nuzbek. “Do not disturb them. It is better to pay
those dead things no heed.”

Tilfgurd,
closest to the glass-encased Ulisa, gaped at the finger of
movement. He prodded gingerly at the foremost jar and gasped.
Nuzbek rasped out a warning. “Take care, Officer. The pursuit is
dangerous!” The officer’s hand quickly retracted. The display
seemed to excite a thrill in his blood. “How do you know these
things are dead, Nuzbek?”

“They were
certainly never alive,” answered Nuzbek laconically.

Tilfgurd
paused. “I thought I witnessed some macabre movement within.”

Nuzbek hurled
a sardonic hoot. “Ordinarily puppets do not move of their own
accord, Deputy. Now if one appears to fidget or jerk, then I would
treat it as a trick of the eye, or at best, the brine’s
movement—possibly a hint to stay away.”

“That is not
what I heard,” Baus chimed. “In fact, Weavil was the next to become
victim of a similar fate, courtesy of your diseased
jocularity!”

Graves
started. He caught another movement coming from Ulisa’s jar and his
eyes fluttered. He saw the robed figure’s lips part, and the hair
ripple.

“Nuzbek,” he
growled impatiently, “I am beginning to lose all semblance of
patience. Either you explain these weird conjurations or I will
personally escort you to the gaolhouse.”

Weavil gave a
rousing cry: “Arrest the mutilator! He has committed indefensible
crimes.”

“Do not forget
the humiliations imposed upon my own being!” cried Baus.

“Order, pips!”
cried Graves, cracking down his whip.

A voice cried
out from the sidelines: a whining, familiar bleat.

Baus peered.
He saw an excited face, a squat form jumping out with scornful
intent. The oafish Uyu! He now spoke with precise words. “We are
members of the tradesmen’s grey guild. Honoured glassblowers and
shellamists of Hilgimi.”

“No need to
announce yourself, Guyu,” grumbled Graves. “I remember you. Return
to your tent. Police business is in order.”

“It is not
‘Guyu’,” corrected Uyu icily, “but Uyu. And you may call my
colleague ‘Migor’.”

“Yes, I know
him too!” growled Graves impatiently. He stretched a hairy fist to
haul Baus up from his hiding spot. “Well, you claim that Baus
destroyed your shellames or shellooks. He deserted the booth
without furnishing you recompense. Is this correct?”

“Absolutely.”

Baus put on a
sulky frown. “Guyu speaks from impassioned perspective. In
technical terms, yes—but more an issue of incompetent
recounting.”

“Then in
probable words, ‘yes’, a crime,” snorted Graves. “The law being
what it is, obliges you to reimburse these men’s loss—after which,
we deal with the magician and his deranged torturings upon
Weavil.”

Baus plodded
forward. “Forget Weavil for a moment! How do you propose that it
was not some other miscreant who damaged the glassblowers’
artifacts? Where is the proof against me?”

Uyu called:
“Perhaps these broken shards pulled from my pouch? Or these
bystanders, Glysod and Pisp, who claim to recognize your
rapscallion features from those earlier committing the deed?”

Baus threw up
his hands. “The outlander drivels on. Can you be duped by his
yarns?”

Graves gave
his head a frowning shake. “I’m not sure. Having spoken to the
alleged witnesses in question, I have verified their accounts.
Unless you procure a settlement, Baus, which is your best option, I
am compelled to charge you with a double count of vandalism, and
fleeing the scene of a crime.”

Baus swelled
with rage. “This is insufferable!” Hardly ten cils did he have to
his name—and here he was terrorized with an obligatory visit to the
‘Yard’.

How twisted
affairs had run! He shook himself with wrath. The hidebound Graves
and Tilfgurd demonstrated a mulish insistence. He gave vent to a
loud series of complaints and regretted the act for Graves began to
snapplewhip him into submission.

“You are a
mean, inebriated disgrace!” roared the Captain. “From what I hear
of your conduct, you are in just dessert of a chastening. Your
atrocious behaviour is on a par here with Weavil.”

“Do not mix me
in with Baus’s transgressions!” cried Weavil.

Graves wagged
a didactic finger. “Pipe down. Baiting vendors, inciting mobs,
promoting violence, incurring vandalism—is it not enough to desert
your post and leave the townsfolk prey to a drake?” The Captain
shook his head. “You ignored your watch, and thus, ill-protecting
children’s feet from razor clams; now you have rendered yourself
culpable of a misdemeanour.”

“If I may
kindly point out,” hissed Weavil, “during the time of my leave,
such ‘children’ were rollicking at the games tent. Mouths were
steadily chomping on candy floss or bobbing for apples in Winslow
the Clown’s barrels. Forsooth, rendering my duty moot.”

Graves shook
his head with regret. “The beach monitor knows no down time. If it
were my decision, I would have you put in the stocks, in spite of
your despicable midgetness.”

Weavil’s cry
morphed into a gurgling expostulation. Unable to master his
emotion, he booted Graves in the heel, favouring contact with a
special nerve, a blow which caused Graves a spasm. He hopped on one
foot. Weavil, for all his midgetness, seemed unable to avoid
chuckling.

Nuzbek snorted
laughingly. “You see what a peevish nuisance this weasel is?
Perhaps now you are more empathetic, Captain. My frustration has
reached no end.”

Graves gave
his head a jerking shake. He mopped furiously at his brow.
“Tilfgurd!” he roared. “Take this whole lot over to the yard.”

“The task is
menial,” declared Tilfgurd, rising on his heels. “Why should I?
Nuzbek is fey—even a lout, and Weavil, is well, just a pest . .
.”

“I don’t care!
Take them all!” Graves yelled. “Do you hear? Nuzbek, Weavil, Baus
and all of Nuzbek’s cronies. They are loons! Weavil is no more
exempt from crimes than Baus, having committed an act of aggression
upon me. On the morrow we shall sort out this business, starting
with a rendering of relevant particulars. A day or two in the
stocks shall teach all these rogues some manners. No less this
starved owl of a magician Nuzbek. I grow to dislike the look of
him.”

Nuzbek took
offence to the remark. He struggled to gain access to his tubs of
adjuncts but the Captain gripped his arm and twisted it aside. A
sallow gleam flickered in his eyes, which caught a surreptitious
movement from the edge of vision, involving Boulm and Nolpin
attempting a retreat in the midst of the commotion.

“Where do you
think you two’re going?” Graves demanded.

Boulm gestured
toward the foggy air. “A wee walk, Captain. The night air is fresh,
and I am sleepy. Too nice to miss.”

The Captain
smiled. Nolpin tendered a similar response. “My foot too is aching
with all manner of gout, and all the more needing of a good
stretch.”

Graves
extended a jovial laugh. “A couple of comics. Remain in the tent,
you gomers, so as to clear up any extraneous mysteries.”

Nolpin winced.
Weavil attempted a sidelong sneaking of his own, but was curtailed
by Deputy Tilfgurd who caught him by the scruff of the neck and
averted another important law-breaching.

Graves gazed
wonderingly from Weavil to the contents of Nuzbek’s bottles. “I am
at a loss to explain this voodoo—or sorcery. It is best yet to
determine how to handle your deviancies, Nuzbek. Your careless
treatment of human life is abysmally ghoulish.” He fixed a
disgruntled glance upon Baus. “And you! I expected more of your
lot. Fisher-elder Harky is beside himself with wrath at your
skipping of duty and total irreverence for the dignity for the
elders of this community.” The Captain snapped his fingers.
“Tilfgurd! Fetch Sergeants Madluck and Skarrow. We will collect
these rogues and be off.”

“But sir, who
shall watch the offenders? I don’t trust any of these hooligans,
least of all the magician. If Nuzbek can wreak such devastation
upon Weavil, I shudder to think what he might do to others.”

Graves
muttered a disparaging remark, swatting Tilfgurd on the ear. “The
prestidigitator shall do nothing more! Charlatans and hucksters
they are. No more threat than a bunch of drowsy bumblebees. But”—he
added, gnawing at his upper lip—“let us bind the villain’s wrists,
in case he elects to craft some thaumaturgy or escape.”

Nuzbek choked
on the idea. He lifted back a black-draped arm. “As for my
capabilities, Captain, you are in grave error. ’Twould be wise to
employ some respect.” The saturnine face pinched inward; the amber
eyes gleamed with a wickedness that made the gathering sway back
with misgiving.

Graves made a
brief inclination of head. He motioned toward the two brawny seamen
who had recently elected to poke their heads in. “These are Leaster
and Jubben, fine seamen, who I’m sure will keep an eye on your
hides—capabilities or not.”

The two men
nodded amiably. “Nuzbek is indeed without his toys, Captain.
Entertaining any cunning tricks while we are in charge is not to
happen.”

Graves
mustered a gratified grin. “Very good, Jubben. Fetch the others,
Tilfgurd.”

Tilfgurd
strode off in a black mood and returned shortly after, conveying
three civilians and seven Constables, two of whom held fire
lanterns and tallow-torches. By virtue of the white tags on their
uniforms, Baus identified them as Officers Mulfax, Madluck, Smiss,
Dunkin, Loops, Canjun and Burkothes. They were strapping,
steely-muscled individuals with well-built thews and biceps, yet
their normally ruddy cheer was gone at being extracted from the
pubs.

Mulfax, a lean
wolf with a distrusting face, thrust a blazing torch upon the jars.
“What are these sea krakens?” he growled. His eyes bulged like a
frog’s.

Graves spoke
with smiling irony, “Oddities only, eh Nuzbek?”

Nuzbek only
grimaced.

“I suppose we
must lug the grotesques back with us,” sighed the Captain. “Gather
them up, lads, whatever they are—quick and clean.”

The jars
gleamed in the sepia light and even Baus had to suppress a shiver
that ran up his spine. Greenish in hue, the odd, unearthly
interiors were populated with four floating distorted countenances,
cargoes nothing that any of the officers wished to hoist on their
backs, Tilfgurd showed a grimace of distaste. White-haired Skarrow
was elected to be first and he hauled one jar out onto the grass.
So followed Mulfax, then Madluck, and finally Tilfgurd, though he
handled his jar with finicky aversion, which Graves rewarded by
boxing his ears with an impatient hand.

Officers Smiss
and Dunkin secured Boulm and Nolpin while Jubben and Leaster helped
control Nuzbek. Graves ordered Canjun and Loops to help Burkothes
tackle Nuzbek’s wooden trunks which they heaved forcibly onto
Nuzbek’s wagon. Graves lumped the bulk of the material into the
category of ‘spoils’, though in terms loosely applied, ’twas
undoubtedly a broader term for ‘evidence’.

Nuzbek was
appalled at the sight of his treasures being hauled away.
“Captain!” he cried. “This procedure is irregular. Why preoccupy
your valuable time carting away worthless gewgaws?”

“The procedure
is self-evident,” declared Graves. “To secure contraband, and
collect possible case material.”

Nuzbek
rejected such rationale. “We have overstepped your laws, agreed. My
aides Nolpin, Boulm remain apologetic for this fact and are
penitent. But arrest us for tomfoolery! It is absurd. We shall be
on our way and not take the law into our hands. You have our solemn
pledge—and you never shall see us again!”

Graves fixed
the magician with a smiling stare. “As desirable as this is,
Nuzbek, I cannot comply.” He faced the magician, locking eyes for a
sinister second, then turned to his officers, giving a tired
bellow, “Canjun, Burkothes! Hump it up! Are you laggards? We wish
to be in our sacks before dawn.”

* * *

The hour was
old; the moon, a blurry wedge in the sky. Clawish clouds obscured
the growing moonlight which glowed from the west like a sullen
sconce. The troupe, illuminated under the ephemeral light, formed
an odd procession. Several stooped figures struggled with their
loads in the sticky fog, while Baus, jabbed along by Graves’ baton,
muttered and cursed. Weavil was bumped along by Burkothes, and
remained in joyless humour. Nuzbek and his aides were herded
roughly along by Smiss and Dunkin while the others hoisted the jars
on their shoulders and struggled to keep up with Nuzbek’s
wagon.