The Staff of Naught (7 page)

As he rounded the top of the cliff he spotted the two figures on their way up the face of the large hill. The distance was too great for him to make out any facial features but the size of the smaller one and the way the larger one moved gave him the realization that it was Lousa and his sister. He stood and watched them for a moment until they passed up the trail and under an overhang and thus out of his view and only then did he sprint towards the cave where Shamki, Hazlebub, Humbort, and the ghost idled away the time playing dice games that the tall simpleton seemed to win all the time. Unerus, an accomplished dice player himself, knew that Humbort cheated somehow but couldn’t spot the method.

He arrived in the cave with a great rush and saw that things hadn’t changed at all. Humbort washed some clothes in the big basin that they brought in from town yesterday with water fetched from the nearby stream, Hazlebub stood in the corner and rehearsed some enchantment or another her movements matched to the rhythm of the words, the big half-orc Shamki did his strange little ritual of movement that didn’t seem to have to do with swordplay but that the warrior swore was responsible for his skill with the blade, and the ghost hovered over the Staff of Naught staring at it intently as if unable to fathom its true nature.

“Lousa and Ariana are coming!” shouted the boy loudly the words echoed off the cave walls and reverberated throughout the area.

“My ears,” shrieked Hazlebub and clapped her hands over her them. “You don’t have to yell in here, the acoustics are just fine.”

“Lousa’s coming,” said Humbort as he began to frantically look through the pile of clean clothes. “Where is my green shirt?”

“I hope this means they’ve made some progress into finding out more about this staff,” said Khemer. “My memory is so clear in some things but so foggy in others. I wish I could help more.”

Shamki continued his snake like swaying and hand movements and apparently paid no attention to the fact that visitors were due to arrive any moment.

Unerus looked around for a place to sit and settled on the rock pile in the northwest corner that they used as a sleeping area, lay down with a feigned yawn, and closed his eyes. Moment later Lousa and Ariana burst into the cave, “Surprise!”

No one was surprised.

“Uney!” squealed Ariana and ran over to her brother. He blinked his eyes sleepily but hugged back just as hard as she flew into his arms. “I missed you; I’ve never been away from you so long. Lousa is teaching me to be a lady but I hate it, the mayor is scary, I remembered stuff about when I had the staff, she made me wear really tight shoes!”

The boy smiled as they hugged, “It sounds like you had a good time mostly.”

She smiled back at him, “She’s okay.”

“What happened to your hair?” asked Unerus, pushed her backwards, and took a good look at her cleanly scrubbed face for the first time.

Her hand went to her head and she looked down at his feet, “Do you like it?”

“I … its great!” he said. “I really like it.”

“You’re not just saying that?”

“No, no. You know I wouldn’t do that.”

“More like girlfriend and boyfriend than brother and sister,” said Humbort looking at the two.

“Shut up,” said Ariana and Unerus in unison and everyone laughed.

“Merchant come back?” asked Shamki without a pause in his ritualistic motions.

“No Shamki,” said Lousa with a shake of her head, “and that worries me. The trip to Lycidas is three easy days and he could have made it faster. If he spent a day in town looking things up he should have been back yesterday.”

“Maybe he found something and stayed over?” said Humbort dressed in his best shirt as he came over and stood near Lousa. His hand reached out to touch her shoulder but then darted back to his side. “He’s an okay guy, I trust him.”

“You’re a fool then,” said Hazlebub as she slid into the conversation. “He’s a merchant and they’re always out for their own profit.”

“I’m not a fool,” said Humbort his chin sticking out and his teeth and hands clenched.

“Everyone knows you are just that,” replied the witch.

“Enough,” said Lousa and stepped between the two her hand reached out and touched the chest of Humbort who gave a little shudder and closed his eyes. “We have important business. Khemer, what have you remembered about the ceremony to destroy the staff?”

“I’m afraid my memory is still quite hazy on that subject,” replied the ghost who floated several feet off the ground as he spoke. “I wish I could help more but I’m afraid the fog shows no sign of lifting from my mind.”

“We can’t go any further until we know more about the staff,” said Lousa.

“Have we really decided that destroying it is the best idea,” said Hazlebub a gleam in her eyes. “If this Seymour the Bright wants it so badly why not sell it to him. He is the son of the king and doubtless will pay an excellent price. Wouldn’t that get us in just as good with Tarlton, even more so?”

“It is an artifact of great evil,” intoned Khemer. “I don’t think giving it to Seymour is a good idea. He might use it for his own ends.”

“I thought Seymour wanted it destroyed,” said Unerus and looked at the ghostly apparition with narrowed eyes. “Your story keeps changing.”

“I am dead some thirty years,” replied the ghost. “My memory seems to shift like a dream and things that I thought were true last week seem now to be not.”

“Convenient,” said Unerus and tossed a perfectly sized throwing rock up and down in his right hand.

“This is all useless speculation until Tanner gets back with more information,” said Lousa. “I know being cramped up here in this cave can’t be a lot of fun but you’re going to have to put up with it until the merchant gets back. Except you Shamki and Humbort. The mayor has some official duties he wants you to look into.”

“Skullcrack,” said Shamki with a smile while his hand fingered the long sword that was always at his side.

“Probably, you and Humbort head back to town right away. Ariana and I will stay here with the staff until you get back. And if you see the merchant, tell him where we are.”

The big half-orc nodded his head and grabbed Humbort around the scruff of the neck, “We team, right!”

Humbort tried to squirm away from the heavy grip but the smile on his face betrayed his happiness at being included with his longtime companion. “You bet, as long as you don’t break my neck first you big galoot.”

After the two packed up their meager gear and headed out of the cave and down the hill to the town of Iv’s Folly, Ariana looked up at Lousa her eyes wide and her lips moved but no words came from her mouth.

“I know what you’re thinking little angel,” said Lousa with a pat to her head. “Why does Shamki put up with stupid Humbort and why does Humbort put up with bullying Shamki?”

The girl nodded her head her boyish bangs bobbed in time with the motion. “It’s love in a way,” said the woman and smiled when the girls face screwed up as if she had bitten into a juicy lemon. “Not that kind of love, love between men. When men like each other they are mean to one another, it’s sort of the opposite of the way girls are.”

“That’s stupid!” said Ariana.

“No,” interrupted Unerus and sidled close to the woman wanting to please her for reasons he couldn’t quite yet articulate. “Lousa’s right. It’s that way with all the guys back at the mission house where we stayed when you were little. If a guy’s not being mean to you then it’s probably because he doesn’t like you.”

“Like I said, that’s stupid,”

“Stupid it may be,” said Lousa with a tight lipped grin and a wrinkle of her nose, “but at least it’s a lot more straightforward than many of the things I’ve seen with girls.”

“Were girls mean to you?” asked Ariana.

“Girls are very cruel,” said Hazlebub. “Especially if you’re not pretty but you don’t have that problem Ariana.”

The young woman suddenly found that her face was hot and she was flushed. “Hazle has the right idea Ariana,” said Lousa and put her arm around the girl as Unerus suddenly felt like he no longer belonged in the conversation. “But she’s got one thing very wrong. Girls are cruel even if you are pretty and more so the prettier you are.”

“Girls were mean to you!” said Ariana, looked up at the beautiful woman her eyes wide, and, as she looked closely, she thought she saw a moment of sadness, the hint of a tear but then the older woman shook her head and smiled brightly with a tilt at just the right angle to the left.

“Eventually one must grow up and face the world on its own terms,” she concluded. “Now did I see a deck of cards around here somewhere? Has anyone taught you children how to play bridge?”

The small wagon crept down the road past an old farmstead left to rot as a young teen boy sat in the driver’s seat a whip in his right hand and the reigns that controlled a pair of old donkeys in his left. “What’s that farm?” said a feminine voice from the back of wagon.

“It’s just an old farm, mom,” said Tylan who leaned back and hurled the words over his right shoulder.

“Which old farm, you have to know these things if you’re going to be a caravan master someday,” replied the voice.

“Why don’t you ask dad,” Tylan said over his shoulder again. “He’s the one who’s been up and down this old road a thousand times.

“Your father is not feeling well and you know that!” shrilled back the voice and then in a lower tone presumably not meant for the boy, “Those damn Fen Druids and their wicker magic, I don’t know what they did to you my darling.”

A few seconds later a young girl just into her teen years climbed out of the back of the wagon holding a piece of parchment. “Is daddy going to be all right?”

“I don’t know Shalalee,” said the young teenager as he made a half-hearted swipe at the donkeys with the whip. “He’s sick I guess. After he talked with that Fen Druid about the shipwreck.”

“You shouldn’t listen to mom and dad talking,” replied the girl with a push of her right thumb into her left palm and a screwed up her face. As she sat next to Tylan it was clear that she was both the younger and taller of the two but while his arms dangled loosely she held hers rigidly constantly and dug her thumb into her palm. “What’ll happen if he dies?”

“I don’t know Shalalee; you’ve got to stop worrying about everything bad that might happen.”

“How do I stop thinking?” asked the girl and suddenly tears fell from her eyes. “How does anyone stop thinking about all the bad things that could happen?”

“I don’t know Shalalee, you just don’t think about it. Like right now, mom wants me to know every single burned out farmhouse on the road and I’ve got to try and memorize them even though they all look the same. So, when I think about that then I forget about dad being sick and that fen wizard with the stick dog.”

“Oh,” squealed the girl. “I’d forgotten about that dog, it was like a living stick. It scared me.”

“Everything scares you Shalalee,” said the boy.

“I know, but I can’t not be scared, you can’t just make yourself not think and feel,” she said her thumb worried more deeply into her palm.

“Figure out where we are on that map dad is always fiddling with then,” said Tylan who put down the whip and hugged his little sister. “Maybe if you did all the mapping for me you could stop thinking so much.”

The girl looked at her brother and smiled through white teeth that were spaced evenly and none showed any signs of rot or other disease. “Ok, dad’s handwriting is terrible though. What was the last town we went through?”

“Fell Drider Falls,” replied her brother with a glance towards the horses who continued to plod along at their pace unabated. “We took the Road of Bones heading to Valda’var. When we get to the southern trail is when we turn south heading for the Lake of Ghouls and Iv’s Folly.”

“Have we crossed the Vidas River yet?” asked the girl her finger traced a curvy blue line that bisected the map.”

“Yeah, that was this morning early after we started; I think you were still asleep. You remember that old stone bridge that is so bouncy?”

“Right, I remember going the other way. That was when we met up with that traveling halfing merchant who could blow the colored smoke rings, right?”

“That’s right, when we were heading northwest. He was funny and made those strawberry pies that dad liked so much and mom got mad when he said they were better than hers!”

Shalalee giggled and covered her mouth with her right hand. “Mom doesn’t like it when dad says someone cooks better than her.”

“Got that right,” said the boy and gave the whip a crack in the air well away from the rumps of the donkeys that pulled the wagon. The sound didn’t seem to affect them in any way at all as they continued to move forward at exactly the same pace.

“Don’t whip those donkeys too much Tylan,” shouted a male voice from the back of the wagon.

“I guess he’s feeling better,” said Tylan who squeezed his sister closer to him and the girl smiled brightly and began to examine the map closely again.

“I think it’s called the Old Mago farm or something. Old Nago maybe, does that make sense?”

The boy scrunched up his nose and scratched his forehead just above the right eye and finally shrugged his shoulders. “Could be Shalalee, sounds right. Isn’t there a family called Mago in that weird little village in the foothills of the mountains?”

“Yes!” exclaimed the girl and bounced in her seat. “I remember, there is that really pretty girl who is the daughter of the mayor and her name is Mago.”

“Was she his daughter or his wife?” asked the boy. “And remember that Monk of Thilnog we met up there? He shaved his head that weird way but he really knew how to use that staff of his.”

“His wife? That’s gross, she was eighteen, and he was old,” said Shalalee and wrinkled up her nose.

“Yeah, but he was the mayor and he had money. You can’t marry someone until you have money,” said the boy his eyes got a faraway look as he stared into space.

“I know who you’re thinking about,” said the girl in a sing-song sort of voice.

“Shut up, Shalalee!”

“Tylan and Lousa, walking down the road, first comes kissing, then comes marriage, then comes Tylan pushing the baby carriage!”