Page 84 of The Thrice-Bound Fool

“Yah. Or maybe he just heard someone coughing.”

The Erydon chuckled at that. But we wanted a proper laugh from them.

“Anyway,” I said, “I BEAT. Him to DEATH. With a STICK!”

Now they laughed, the vicious cunts. All you had to do to amuse the Erydon was to hurt something, or talk about hurting it, and if you could do it to rhythm of threes, all the better.

“Tell me, Hasp!” I’d say.

“Aye, Kinch?”

“How’s that new lover of yours doing?”

“Hardly new!”

“How’s your old lover, then?”

“Oh, you know he won’t stop complaining it’s cold at night.”

“Did you knit him a coat, then?”

“No,” he’d say, wait three heartbeats, almost too long, and then blurt out, “A glove.”

Most all of them would laugh, but if one seemed not to get it or not to be amused, he’d skip up to that one and make like he was having a wank up at their face. If they started looking angry about it, the king and his daughter would laugh so hard the courtier or minister would know they’d just have to bear it.

Sometimes after we’d made the court roar, we’d go back up to our quarters and maybe we’d chat for a bit, or maybe the kitchen-boy, Xander, a lad of twenty or so, would come to visit Hasp and I’d hide under my covers ’til I heard them talking low and chuckling.

Once, when we’d both had a bit of mead, Hasp had tried to kiss me. Well, to be honest, he did kiss me, and I let him for a moment, so surprised was I, then pushed back from him saying, “Now we’ve talked about this, and you know my wants run elseward.”

“Aye,” he said, “and besides, it would be bad for business.”

“What business is that?”

“Why ours, sprumlet! When we get back to Galtia. We’ll get a traveling cart and a sweet old donkey or a pair of goats. And we’ll be welcome in every tavern and even a court or two for our jokes and tricks and gambols. Two Galts a’ Ganny we’ll be, and the ladies will swoon for you and the fay-fellows for me. And between us? Just coin and mirth and brotherhood.”

It wasn’t a bad couch-dream as such things went, and he never tried me again for a kiss, which made him more respectful than most men who’ve had their affections rebuffed by those of either sex.

The very worst thing that happened during my apprenticeship was when Hasp tried to teach me to fart musically, which he had great talent for. I never learned well under his tutelage, or tootage, though it’s fair to say I never tried very hard either. I’m not sure which of my questionable skills I’d like to be remembered for, but sure and it’s not that one. On the first try, I failed to find the right note, and the second time, I karked myself while straining to push through a dry spell. He shook his head wearily and said, “Fine, you just do vocals and percussion.”

He had a pair of pantaloons he used for these occasions, with the image of a dandy man on its seat. Mouth open, and even a little mustache above it made with wire and wool that would quiver when he tapped his foot. The care with which he had painted on the lips, and even shaded under them to give them the illusion of depth, made one think he might have gone to Gallardia to study painting in another, better version of our world.

But alas.

He had been a traveling performer once, but, on a drunken night in Lamnur, had found himself kidnapped and pressed into service in the Holtish navy. He’d awakened on a fastship sent west between the First and Second Goblin War trying to find passage through the Boiling Sea. There is no passage through that shallow hell of rocks and whirlpools, however, and he’d ended up shipwrecked past the Thralls. You can guess the rest.

Not much of a fighter.

Good with a joke.

The king had bought him when both of them were young.

Now neither was young, and one was unwell.

And he had passed to the hand of Princess Renata, whose hand held my leash also.

The stampery stood near the center of town. The princess loved to go and watch the presses run, for Erydon had a great industry making books, and also making leaflets like those that bore the schedule of the Lunar Games. Only they weren’t made by a pen but rather inked letters made of metal and pressed onto the page. It was brilliant, like half the things these geezers did.

“Look, Kitch!” the princess said to me. “I know they don’t have such things in the small kingdoms, because Hasp told me. But see? They put different letters on, and they can make a thousand pages just the same.”