Fairly Wicked Tales (36 page)

In absence of a stern father, elder brother, or even a second cousin to correct him, Al-Adrian let go of all pretense to decency. He gambled with captains of reeking manure barges, he drank the fermented fruit of the vine, and if he ever observed the interior of a mosque it certainly wasn’t in company of his mother.

In this wise Al-Adrian reached the age of fifteen years, and he was a truly well-shaped boy, with eyes as flashing black as a midnight pearl, skin like rubbed sandalwood, and the supple tread of an assassin or a desert prince.

Well, on a certain day of days, while standing in the middle of the village square, in front of the Souk, he noticed a Norse derwish keenly inspecting the playing children. His gaze slipped past the other rascals and came to rest on the face of Al-Adrian. No doubt he is looking for a guide, Al-Adrian mused, because it was easy indeed to lose the way in the twisting alleys of the Souk. Or perhaps this stranger isn’t a lover of women and is looking for a sweeter joy? For a fistful of dirhams Al-Adrian was quite willing to assist the stranger on his quest.

The dervish, or shaman as these men are called in the chilly North, though, was a mighty magician, steeped in the lore of wandering stars and capable of speaking the language of Jinns and stone-skinned Trolls. But all his wealth and powers didn’t seem nearly enough to him as is often the case with gentlefolk.

He kept looking at Al-Adrian’s face and thought: “There is finally the boy I have been searching for during nine-and-eighty years! The face for which I have left my beloved country, the Lapland of a Billion Singing Mosquitoes.”

Then Dagmar perceived the dawn graying the sky above the towers of the palace and ceased to say her permitted say.

3

But then came the Seven Hundred and Three-and-thirtieth Night and Dagmar cleared her throat and said:

“There is finally the boy I have been searching for during nine-and-eighty years! The face for which I have left my beloved country, the Lapland of a Billion Singing Mosquitoes.”

He ignored Al-Adrian and the boy turned away disappointed and listlessly rolled a new pair of dice. The dervish strolled to one of the boys and slipped him a dirham, asking from the corner of his mouth: “Tell me the name of the black-eyed boy who is rolling his dice so earnestly. Tell me all about his family.”

After the boy had told him all he knew, even that the dead tailor had a missing left thumb, the dervish stepped in front of the boy, his face radiant.

“O my child, could you be Al-Adrian, the son of the tailor Mustapha Dirkson? Mustapha One-Thumb as the villagers often called him?’

Al-Adrian replied: “Yes, I am called Al-Adrian, but my father, he has been dead for simply years!’

At these words the dervish embraced the boy, kissed his forehead, and the toes of his scruffy slippers, while the tears streamed freely across his cheeks.

“Why do you cry, grandfather?” Al-Adrian asked him, astonished and also more than a little embarrassed. ‘Did you know my father?”

And the dervish answered with a trembling voice. ‘Ay, my poor boy, why shouldn’t I weep hot tears? I departed our village while your father was little more than a stripling, to seek my fortune in far and cold countries. Now, in the autumn of my life, childless, and with my dear wife torn apart by a wolverine, I suddenly felt a deep longing for my old family. I remembered my dear brother and how we rolled our hoops across the square, and later peeked under the chadors of giggling Christian girls. How sad to hear he died!’ And he paused, clearly overcome by emotion, before he continued. “But Allah is great! The moment I beheld you I felt my heart miss a beat. I recognized the shape of your proud nose, your cleft chin, and I knew you must be kin. Not that I have ever known you. Your father was still unmarried when I left, but blood calls to blood.” He once more embraced the boy; his smile was radiant as a ray of sunlight spearing down from a roiling thundercloud. “I am your uncle, but now, with my dear brother gone, I’ll be, not your uncle but your father in his place. All my wealth has not been gathered in vain! In truth it is as the wise men say: He who has a son to call his own shall never die!” He opened his purse and poured silver dirhams in Al-Adrian’s hands. It was more money than Al-Adrian had ever seen before.

“O my son,” the dervish said, “tell me where she lives, the wife of my brother?”

Al-Adrian hesitantly pointed to the corner of the square, to the shagging hovel next to the troughs the tanners used to let their urine thicken and ferment. “That is our house.”

“Please bring the money to your mother and tell her I, your uncle, give her my heartfelt greeting and implore the blessings of all the angels on her sainted head! Tomorrow I’ll come to visit you and you can show me the grave of my brother.”

Al-Adrian ran into the house, so hastily he overturned the bowl with suds where his mother had left the turbans to soak.

“O you nail in my coffin!” his mother raged. “O you thorn on my miserable path! Begone! It is hours yet before the evening repast!” She grabbed her oak wood stick with which she was wont to chastise her wayward son.

“No, mother, no!” Al-Adrian cried and he opened his hands. Sunlight made the coins glitter and the eyes of his mother widened until they threatened to roll out of their sockets. “We are getting a quite high-ranking visitor. Our uncle from the Far North. The wealthy brother of my father!’ He looked at her. “Why did you never tell me I had an uncle?’

The woman shook her head, greatly surprised. “He sometimes talked about a brother, little Hassan. But that brother died when he was only seven. Of the galloping consumption. He never mentioned a second brother.”

“He knew father had only one thumb,” Al-Adrian said. “So he must be his brother.”

That evening his mother threw the washing bowl into the harbor and bought two brand-new red leather boots and a coat made of the finest marten. They filled all their oil lamps to the brim with whale oil and let them burn down to last drop. They gobbled honey cakes and drank so much mead the liquor spewed from their nostrils. Even Al-Adrian’s mother giggled when he told the joke of imam Hansel and the Three Donkeys.

The next morning the dervish was waiting for Al-Adrian on the square. He handed him two pieces of gold so soft even the boy’s nails left an impression. ‘Give them to your mother so she can roast a suckling pig with three-year prunes. And buy a jar of red wine. Tell her I’ll come to visit her tonight and that I would like to have a feast with my new family.”

“Could a lamb be possible?” Al-Adrian asked. “And beer? Our religion forbids us the meat of pigs and the pressings of the vine.” Al-Adrian might be a wastrel and a good-for-nothing but he hadn’t sunken so deep as to eat unclean food.

The dervish hit his forehead with the palm of hand and wailed: ‘Too long I have lived among the savages. How could I make such a stupid mistake? Buy only halal food by all means.”

And then Dagmar fell silent not because she witnessed the dawn graying the sky above the towers of the palace, but because the snoring of her lord and master made her suspect speaking on would serve no earthly reason.

“You are stopping?” the dwarfish jester asked, clear disappointment in his voice.

“The rest tomorrow.” Dagmar leaned back in the cushions. “Are there any honey-cakes left?”

“A whole bowl.” The dwarf handed her the bowl made of translucent porcelain and then reached into his turban. “I have something here for you.”

“The envoy?” She unrolled the thin strip of parchment. “Ah, eyes like the wide blue sea but deep enough to drown a thousand fleets.”

“Not bad. Not bad at all.’ She looked at the dwarf. “Do you think he is serious?’

“The king stuffs his bed with dancing-girls but it’s to you he pens a poem.” He grinned. “I rest my case.”

4

On the Seven Hundred and Six-and-thirtieth Night Dagmar cleared her throat and said:

“The lamp!” the dervish roared. ‘Son of a filthy dog, obey me! Hand me the cursed lamp!”

“Wait!” the king said. “What is happening now? Last night Al-Addin …”

“Al-Adrian.” Dagmar sighed soundlessly. Telling wonderful stories to a drunken lout with the memory of a flea was a fate she didn’t wish on her worst enemy.

“The dervish spoke a mighty spell and the earth split open with a frightful roar,” the dwarf summarized. “On the bottom of a deep hole a marble slab shimmered, set with a copper ring. Al-Adrian lifted the trapdoor and went inside, yes? Underground he found the treasure of Loki. All the gold and jewels that had been given him in exchange of the otter skin. The treasure of the Nibelung’s as the dervish called it. He ordered Al-Adrian to give him a tarnished oil lamp before he would pull the jewel-laden boy from the hole.”

“O, yes. And that lamp was a magic lamp?”

“Of course.”

5

On the Seven Hundred and Nine-and-fortieth Night Dagmar said:

“New lamps for old!’ Al-Adrian’s mother heard a vendor cry from the street. ‘Brand-new lamps from yellow gleaming copper in exchange for the most tarnished fish oil lamps. With a full jar of oil for free!”

The king lifted his hand. “Wait.”

“Yes?” Dagmar said.

“You called your hero Al-Adrian. The name of the Varangian envoy is Adrian Ulfsson. That was not exactly clever of you. He departs in the morning. With the first sun.” He touched a tassel of his turban, sucked on it. “An envoy is inviolable, of course, but perhaps I’ll present him with your head?”

“The envoy leaves in the morning, that is right,” Dagmar said. “He is leaving with me. And not exactly in morning, more like right now.”

The king reached for his scimitar because a king is never without his weapons, not even in his bed. He stiffened and the sword fell from his numb fingers. With an unmistakable death rattle he fell back into his cushions.

“Poison in his wine?” the dwarf inquired.

“Well no, he has too many food tasters. I dipped the tassels of his turban in poison I milked myself from one of his pet snakes. He is always sucking on the tassels, I noticed the very first night. A filthy and extremely annoying habit.’

“But not the real reason you poisoned him?’

“He fell asleep in the middle of my best stories! During the Five Sisters and the Sultana of the Jinns. When I told him about clever Maruf the Cobbler!”

“Some actions are unforgivable,” the dwarf nodded. “Come, Lord Adrian is waiting for us at the Third Gate.”

About the Author

Tais Teng
is a Dutch sf writer and illustrator with the quite unpronounceable name of Thijs van Ebbenhorst Tengbergen, which he shortened to Tais Teng. In his own language he has written about everything from radio-plays to hefty fantasy trilogies. He has sold a dozen stories in the English language and one novel,
The Emerald Boy
. Most recently the Night Land site ran his novellas
Embrace the Night
and
And The Sky Is Filled With Eyes
. Most of his English stories are collected in
Lovecraft, My Love.
You can connect with Tais on:
taisteng.atspace.com
,
taisteng.deviantart.com
and
www.facebook.com/taisteng

The Fisherman and His Wife

A retelling of the story “The Fisherman and His Wife”

Bennie L. Newsome

Long ago—back when soldiers wore clanking armor and the latest technology incorporated wood—a poor man named George Anderman lived with his wife and four kids in a shanty stationed near the sea. If you asked George his profession, he would claim to be a fisherman; however, that would be a lie. Never once had he captured anything in his nets. Nothing ever tugged on the man’s fishing lines. He lacked the most essential thing needed to be called a fisherman—captured fish—yet George felt qualified to don the title. Every day he took his boat out on the waters and fished for hours, and every day he returned home empty handed. George professed to be a fisherman, but he was nothing more than a poor man living in a shanty near the sea.

Then came a day when George’s fortune changed—from bad to worse. He happened to be sitting in his boat, staring at the calm, reflective water like he did every other day. A slight breeze blew across the sea, carrying the aroma of saltwater and creating ripples on the surface. Despite the peacefulness, George was in no mood to enjoy the scenery. He had been stationary for hours with his line in the water and not one fish so much as nibbled his bait.

Curse my rotten luck … or dumb luck—same thing really. I go from being a poor smithy in the city to being an even poorer fisherman near the sea. This would be a good move, I thought. Get myself a boat, a net, and a fishing rod. Go somewhere not already crowded with fishing boats. Prosperity is guaranteed, I told Isabell.
George sadly shook his head.
How could I have known water didn’t necessarily mean fish?

Dusk began to settle upon the land, prompting George to call it quits for the day. He cursed his misfortunes some more while grabbing an oar from the bottom of his boat and angrily thrusting the wooden paddle in the sea—
POP!
Instead of sinking easily, his oar connected with something solid, yet yielding.

George reflexively pulled back his oar, then peered over the side of the boat and into the water. Something big and dark floated just below the surface.

What the hell is that?

Overwhelming curiosity caused George to reach in the water and grasp the large object without even thinking about his actions. It felt slimy to the touch, repulsive. George ignored the offensive sensation and dug in his fingers. He pulled, only to discover the item weighed more than he had guessed.
What the hell is this? A baby whale?
George repositioned himself in order to put a bit more effort into pulling. His second attempt—aided by much grunting and straining—proved fruitful. Both he and whatever he hauled out of the water fell inside the boat.

“Holy hell!” fell from George’s mouth as he gawked at what now shared his boat. He scampered all the way to the bow of the boat, putting as much distance between him and what appeared to be (
Lucifer’s goldfish!
) some demonic breed of fish.