Prodigal Sons Read online

  Phargas looked at me, considering. “Your father would never forgive me if you drowned,” he said at last.

  “My father is not the forgiving sort,” I agreed, glancing to the idol. “Hanspur, however, has been known to excuse those who escape his realm if they host a feast in honor of his brides.” I paused. “That’s coming out of your purse, otherwise it’s not a sacrifice.”

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  The Third River Freedom is “Walk any road, float any river.” While this mostly means that no lord can hold the Sellen, it also means each riverboat is its own floating fiefdom with its captain as king. The Cornflower’s captain, a dwarf sporting the latest fashion in braids, was displeased until he saw we’d brought money. Booking passage was less expensive than arranging a feast, but soon enough, both were settled and the captain was all smiles.

  Phargas was less so, his purse now empty, and mine less half its weight. To make amends, I introduced myself as Pathfinder Ollix, but gave my companion a grander introduction, describing him as His Grace Phargas, former Abbot of the Shrine of Desna in Cheliax, forced to flee by devil worshipers. It was a story lifted from popular melodrama, but it made clear what I wanted implied: Phargas was a man of wealth traveling incognito, and I the same.

  “I thought you’d never been out of Kadria before,” my companion objected. We stood on the Festival Deck, the edges strung about with Tian lanterns in blue, gold, and white, giving the appearance of a string of unusually tractable will-o’-wisps limned against the night sky—a string, of course, being the proper collective noun for a group of Hanspur’s night lights, or however else you wish to term the demon’s lanterns.

  “No,” I explained, “but sometimes the pleasure barges dock there, and I know them well...”

  I should probably explain, as I did for Phargas: Nothing on a Sellen pleasure barge is what it seems. What seems a linnorm or river drake is in fact a boat. What appears to be an ignis fatuous is merely a bit of rice paper and a tea light. What seems like an unusually harmonious chorus of shrieking mushrooms is in fact a keyboard attached to a clever arrangement of whistles. And what seems a lovely debutante or daughter of a merchant prince may very likely be something else: a maid exchanging clothes with her mistress, a tavern wench who pulled The Cricket, The Peacock, and The Crows—the Three Center Keys—in a Harrow lottery, an aged sorceress wearing charms to give herself the seeming of youth, or even one of Hanspur’s brides crawled up from the river, disguised as the fairest maid of all. And, of course, there are always the resident harlots for the guests’ enjoyment.

  As was the custom, the ladies were allowed first access to the feast. Laid out on a snowy bier of boiled tubers and hard-cooked eggs was one of the great Sellen sturgeons known as Hanspur’s steeds, almost four ells long if it was an inch. I have seen larger, but not many. This specimen was beautifully cooked, its plates replaced with artful slices of cucumber. Its eyes were carved radishes.

  The obsequious swampers came forward bearing jugs brimming with green sauce such as my old nurse used to make. Blended with cultured cream were nine sacred herbs: three good—parsley, lovage, and chervil; three neutral—borage, dill, and salad burnet; and three evil—chives, cress, and sorrel. Ground fine, they gave the appearance of pond scum. As the sauce was poured down the sides, the sturgeon looked as if it were rising from the Sellen itself.

  "Oaths or not, never trust a leucrotta."

  This recipe is also known to be irresistible to Hanspur’s brides since, as old Laraen used to tease me, the sauce goes just as well with children as it does with fish. But this was the test: Which of the bevy of beauties lined up for the feast would reveal herself by taking the first taste?

  Of course, green sauce is hard to resist even for those who aren’t moss-colored beldames. Two slightly drunk halfling twins ornamented with starred tiaras and gauze butterfly wings in imitation of Desna, who either did not know the custom or else were amazingly petite brides, went up and began serving themselves, pronouncing it delicious.

  “Do you hear that?” said the fish. “I am delicious! Eat me! Eat me or sacrifice yourself to Hanspur!”

  One of Desna’s barflies squealed and dropped her fork. It clattered across the deck. The other picked it up, then jabbed underneath the tablecloth.

  Two half-elven children—likely older than me—ran out, laughing, and with that, the rest of the maidens descended on the banquet. And if Hanspur’s brides were among them, who could tell?

  Other dainties were brought out as well: a roast swan stuffed with a goose, stuffed with a duck, and so on with a chicken, a pheasant, a partridge, a pigeon, a woodcock, and finally a gilded hazelnut known as “the foolish lich’s phylactery”; succulent cardoons (fancifully presented as the frittered heart of a sentient plant-beast); an effigy of marchpane tinted, gilded, and silvered to be the very image of The Rabbit Prince and his broken sword; and even a brace of peacocks basted with saffron butter. They reminded me of Laraen’s nursery story, how the peacock tricked the cockatrice out of his beautiful tail, and why it is thus unlucky to wear peacock feathers, for even a single eye from the stolen plumage can send the monsters into a frenzied rage.

  Phargas loaded up a trencher, even having the temerity to break off the gilded hilt of the Rabbit Prince’s sword (the maidens having already made off with the tail and both ears), but as he’d paid for this largesse, I wasn’t going to begrudge him a bit of gold-dusted almond paste.

  I myself was partial to peacock, so had snagged a wing as my right as Pathfinder. But with privilege come expectations, and I found myself face-to-face with one of the maidens. She had a lovely form and features so long as you overlooked the horned hennin headdress and long skirts commonly used to disguise the horns and the tail of a hellspawn. “So,” she said with the accent of the Chelish aristocracy—another damning clue, likely one of Cheliax’s devilborn bastards sent out on a grand tour in hopes that she’d find a less discerning or more financially strapped lordling and not come back—“you are a Pathfinder, yes?”

  “Indeed.” I nodded. “You may call me Ollix, milady.”

  “You may call me Belshabba.” Her brief smile revealed small fangs and confirmed my suspicions of infernal parentage. “I have a question, O Pathfinder: What do you call more than one of those?” She pointed to the roast swan.

  I breathed a mental sigh of relief. Venery is a common pastime among the aristocracy, and as such, I have memorized a good number of collective nouns. Or at least more than enough for flirtation purposes, since “the venereal game” is also a euphemism for an even more amusing pastime, and is in fact one of the reasons my father kicked me out.

  I imagined his expression if I came back with a hellspawn bride, but knowing my father, he would simply sneer and make some tart remark about me doing things by halves.

  That said, one of my few duties as heir had been to attend to the annual swan-upping, an excuse to go boating, find as many cygnets as possible, and nick their beaks with the royal sigil of Kadria. As such, I knew the answer: “That is a trick question, dear lady. On water, ’twould be a drift. In air, a wedge, but on earth, a bank. Following that, while any swanning is an eyrar, roasted ’twould be a banquet.”

  “But there is more than one type of bird there.”

  “Then ’tis either a flock, as ’twould be for any number of birds, or, if it is to be considered one fowl, then a flight as for chimeras.”

  She nodded, tapping one red fingernail to her lips, then pointed to the crisped wing still in my hand. “And what would more than one of that bird be?”

  “Two of any bird or beast is always a brace, milady.”

  “But more than two?”

  I wasn’t certain if she was propositioning me to disport myself with herself and another hellspawn, or if this was simply more testing me as Pathfinder. “Well,” I said slowly, “more than two peacocks are a muster.”

  “What if they were cockatrices?”

  I racked my brain. With all apologies to Hanspur’s
green-faced brides, I knew it was a coven of hags but a covey of quail, a cete of badgers but a deceit (or pack) of leucrottas, and a pride of lions but a shame or cult of lamias. But cockatrices? “Well, were it a basilisk, ’twould be a colony...”

  “If it were a basilisk, there’d be eight drumsticks and we’d stuff it with royal morels so it would shriek for the Feast of Asmodeus.” She laughed lightly. “But cockatrices, O Pathfinder?”

  I have to admit I was momentarily stumped.

  “It would be another trick question, as a flock of cockatrices is simply a flock,” said Phargas, sweeping forward.

  Belshabba laughed. “I take it you are Ollix’s senior Pathfinder?”

  “Nay, milady,” Phargas said quickly, “merely a humble cleric of Irori, Master of Masters, Bringer of Knowledge, and Keeper of all History that is, was, and is yet to be.”

  “Not so humble if you could host this banquet,” she pointed out.

  “Render unto Hanspur what is Hanspur’s, and when in the River Kingdoms, do as the Sellenese do.” He laughed like a man who’d spent his last copper on a lavish feast. “Besides, I have no desire to be devoured by a swamp god’s green-toothed brides.”

  “Oh?” she said. “What about a humble daughter of Asmodeus?”

  I was uncertain whether to be relieved at escaping a hellspawn gold-digger or slighted at being passed over for someone older, uglier, and in all ways less favored than myself. I suppose it was a bit of both. But I took some small satisfaction in knowing that, apart from a feast and a diddling, there was nothing more Belshabba was likely to get from my traveling companion.

  I was also intrigued. My friend Phargas changed which god he said he worshiped more often than he changed hose—which from what I’d seen was never, as he simply prayed for them to be washed and dried without the usual step of taking them off first. I was beginning to suspect he in fact worshipped none of them, and while likely not a cultist of Hanspur—his unfamiliarity with the forbidden god of the Sellen more than enough clue there—he was likely priest of some foreign god no one spoke about in polite company either, even if you got the appropriate ambassador exceedingly drunk and then had courtesans ply their trade.

  I knew because I’d heard my father ranting about this on more than one occasion.

  However, just because Phargas was not a cultist of Hanspur did not mean there weren’t others, since it is said old opal-eyes grants absolution in advance for those who sacrifice early, and not everyone can afford sturgeon with green sauce. Pushing someone else into the Sellen, however, especially a drunken sybarite leaning on the rail of a pleasure barge?

  I insinuated myself into countless conversations, using all my wit and charm to tease out stories of mysterious disappearances, tragic drownings, even outright sacrifice. However, from everything I was able to gather, Phargas’s half-dip in the Sellen and feast in honor of Hanspur’s brides was the closest anything came on the Cornflower to forbidden cults. Those from the River Kingdoms thought Phargas’s propitiation only common sense, while those from outside found the whole business quaint and charming.

  There are many words to describe the Drowning King, but these are not the ones.

  It was then I realized there was something missing. “Where are the children?”

  I had seen some about earlier, taking treats and sweetmeats, threatening to topple what was left of the Rabbit Prince as they tore off his lucky left foot, in general getting underfoot and doing all the things noble and wealthy children do at court. But now they were gone. And, as old Laraen told me, just as cygnet is finer meat than swan, so is it with humans, halflings, and all the others: Hanspur’s brides find them more toothsome young. “The children?” I asked again, to the crowd at large.

  “Oh,” said one the drunken Desna devotees, “they’re in the hold watching the puppet show. They wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  The children’s hold was illuminated by magical torches with smokeless flame. Rows of benches were affixed in front of a blue-and-white-striped puppet theater, and transfixed in the former and by the latter were a multitude of uneaten children of every civilized race.

  The proscenium arch framed a beloved scene: Nella the rogue, Baby Zora the mandragora, and Grizzlebane the wicked leucrotta, who was in the process of eating a rolling pin.

  I stood transfixed myself. It was a Clever Nella show!

  “You’re out of weapons, girl!” declared Grizzlebane. “Now give me the baby and I won’t eat you!” His hinged badger head was painted wood, as were his gangly stag legs, but his lion’s torso and tail were stitched from tawny rabbit fur. He was a beautiful puppet and spoke with the classic voice for Grizzlebane: a cultured courtier with just the hint of a hyena’s mad laugh.

  “Swear it?” asked Nella. She looked like a human rogue forced to dress as a kitchen wench, which is exactly what she was.

  “I swear it on my mother’s heart,” laughed Grizzlebane.

  “Your mother’s Lamashtu,” Nella countered. “The Demon Queen has no heart!”

  “Touché,” said Grizzlebane. “What if I swear it on the Sixth River Freedom?”

  “That’s ‘You have what you hold,’” said Nella. “I’ve got a baby.” She swung Baby Zora by the hem of her gown, walloping the leucrotta over the head.

  The mandragora shrieked, as did the children in the audience, but the latter with laughter.

  “Ow!” yelled the leucrotta. “Is that baby made out of wood?”

  “Maybe,” said Nella, smacking him again. “She has a very hard head.”

  “Ow!” wailed Grizzlebane. “Then the First River Freedom?”

  “Wrong again!” Nella smacked him with Baby Zora a third time.

  “Children,” begged the leucrotta. “Have pity on a poor monster! Which freedom is it?”

  The children suggested one then the other, always the wrong freedom until at last the leucrotta did the math through his concussions and came up with the Second Freedom—“Oathbreakers die”—a lesson driven home in the first act when Nella swears to repay the Great Ga’zard, a gnomish wizard, for a timely teleport, only to find that, rather than gold or other services, what he really wants is a housekeeper, since it’s hard for the Great Gizzard to find help who won’t quit. But an oath is an oath, and the Second River Freedom is the only way around the Fifth—“Slavery is an abomination”—for while you cannot be sold into slavery in the River Kingdoms, you can willingly swear yourself into indentured servitude.

  Nella then battles Tor Whitemane, an angel-blooded paladin who is stupid to the border of delusional; Tor’s long-suffering steed, Jenny the Burro (who Tor insists is a white palfrey); and Lily or “Pickle Lily,” an elven sorceress who was a great beauty in her day, but whose day is centuries past, and who is angling for the horrified Ga’zard as her latest husband. Nella plays matchmaker for Lily and Tor, then maid of honor at their wedding, which mostly consists of Pastor Jackal, a hyenafolk cleric, and Nella beating each other over the head with a bishop’s crozier and the bride’s bouquet respectively. Then Nella finds her contract transferred as a nuptial gift. She’s forced to babysit Baby Zora, Pickle Lily’s spoiled mandragora familiar, which only Tor believes is a real baby. Or rather, only Tor and his arch-nemesis, Grizzlebane the leucrotta.

  Which was the scene where I’d walked in. I took a seat and watched as Grizzlebane ate the shrieking Baby Zora then coughed up the baby bonnet and gown, for as is well known, a leucrotta cannot digest anything that is not flesh.

  “That didn’t taste like any baby I’ve ever eaten...”

  “That’s because it was a baby mandragora! A mandrake root soaked in demon blood!”

  “You ate a vegetable!” I called out from the back row and the children took up the taunt: “You ate a vegetable! You ate a vegetable!”

  “A poisonous vegetable!” Nella agreed. Grizzlebane, horrified and sickened, proceeded to vomit up the rolling pin, the mop, the broom, and the carpet beater. Nella caught the last,
beating the sickened leucrotta offstage as I laughed and laughed.

  The rest followed the familiar script: Next came Giddy the goblin clown, perpetually late to the baby-eating party. Nella beat him until he put on Zora’s gown and bonnet, then presented him to Tor, returning from his honeymoon, with the classic line: “And look how she’s grown!” Tor rewarded Nella by releasing her from her contract, pronouncing her a fellow paladin, and giving her his holy sword. Finally, the Devil appeared, trying to get Nella to sign another contract, but our heroine had had enough, repeating the first and foremost River Freedom—“Say what you will, I live free!”—while beating him over the head with Tor’s sword.

  “This will never play in Cheliax!” yelled the Devil, an amusing line I’d not heard before.

  But soon enough, Nella beat him to death, crying out her final line: “Huzzah! Huzzah! The Devil’s dead! Now we can all do as we like!”

  A little black dog in a harlequin suit ran out the puppet theater’s front flap with a basket in his teeth to collect the children’s tips. I saw all manner of gold and trinkets thrown in, even the marchpane left foot of the Rabbit Prince, but it was another foot that paralyzed me with horror: a cloven one visible just before the blue-and-white-striped cloth fell back down. The puppeteer was a devil!

  My father told me to make something of myself, and though never the best student at the blade, I had been trained. While the children might have nothing to fear from Hanspur’s brides, the heir of Kadria wasn’t about to stand by while a devil preyed on children.

  At least that’s what I thought. It was like a puppet show: I found myself walking forward, stepping past children, pulling aside the curtain behind the proscenium arch. Then I cried out, my shock and horror turning to confusion, then back to horror as I revealed not the sinister horned head of a devil, or even the ghastly green visage of one of Hanspur’s brides, but the head of a large badger with a mummified hand on a golden chain around its neck. Looking past, I saw the body of a lion and the legs of a stag. The puppeteer was not a devil or a hag, but a monstrous leucrotta!