Heroics for Beginners Page 8

  He gave the reins a shake and cheerfully guided his horse into the valley. There were no signs along the road, but his map labeled the cluster of buildings as the Village of Angst. Kevin found a stable for his horses and carried his saddlebags into a hostelry that identified itself as Muldoon’s Inn of Despair. It consisted of a half dozen rooms over a typical country tavern, a place framed in rough wood, smelling of old cheese, new sawdust, pickles, and smoke. It was only late afternoon, but the tavern was doing a good business already and starting to fill up. Farmers and tradesmen were rubbing elbows at the bar, drinking ale from tankards. Other guests were sitting at small tables, sipping wine from glasses. Muldoon’s appeared to be the social center of the village. A pretty barmaid, her hair in braids and wearing a kirtle, was working the taps. She brought Kevin a tankard of ale, then returned with a bowl of pottage and soused pork.

  The Prince had left his flashy court clothes behind. He was dressed in a nondescript gray traveling cloak, plain soft-sided boots, and a slouch hat. He looked like any other wanderer, but the barmaid gave him a curious look. Kevin was not surprised. It was unlikely that anyone here would recognize the Prince of Rassendas—his signet ring was in his pocket, and he wore no badge of office—but his horses came from the royal stable, and horseflesh of that quality was bound to attract attention. There was no way to avoid that. When an older man, wearing an apron, entered from a back room, the barmaid whispered to him. The man wiped his hands and sat down at Kevin’s table, introducing himself as Henry Muldoon, owner of the Inn of Despair. The Prince offered to buy him a drink. Muldoon got right to the point. “Come about the Fortress, have you?”

  Kevin showed neither concern nor surprise. He allowed that the Fortress was interesting.

  “Thought so. It’s been bad business ever since Lord Voltmeter moved to Angst. We’ve been expecting the King to take action for some weeks now. We’ve had a terrible time of it, what with the goings-on at the Fortress of Doom.”

  “Lord Voltmeter, you say? Hmm. At least he followed your naming conventions.”

  “Oh, he didn’t name it. The old Castle of Doom was already there. He just expanded it and built it up into an Invincible Fortress.”

  Kevin reflected on this. “The Castle of Doom in the Village of Angst. The Inn of Despair. I sense a trend.”

  “That’s right,” said Muldoon. “Across the street is the Foreboding Market and down by the stream is the Melancholy Mill.”

  “I take it there’s a reason for all these depressing names.”

  “The tourists love it.”

  “They do?”

  “Yes indeed. We get a lot of artists and poets coming to take a holiday in the mountains. You know, your existential types. They like to do a little fishing, a little climbing, hike through the woods, contemplate suicide.” He jerked a thumb back toward a corner booth, where two men in paint-spattered smocks were talking over a carafe of white wine. “German expressionists. They really go for the depressing stuff.”

  “Uh-huh. Okay, so what about this Evil Overlord? Is there anything about him that you care to tell me?”

  There was sudden silence throughout the tavern. Kevin looked around the room. The other patrons avoided his eyes. They glanced nervously at the doors and windows and pulled their cloaks closer around themselves. The young barmaid hurried over. “Don’t say him,” she whispered. “Say Lord Voltmeter. Lord Voltmeter is He Who Must Be Named.”

  “Um, right,” said Kevin. “Lord Voltmeter. He Who Must Be Named. Sure. I’ll remember that. And the Fortress of Doom?”

  There was more silence while the men at the bar gave each other questioning looks. “It’s a foul place,” said one of them at last. He stared hard at the murky depths of his tankard. “And Voltmeter’s an evil man.”

  And then they all started talking.

  Once they got started, they had a lot to say. It was a good half hour before Kevin could cap his ink bottle, wipe his pen nib on a crust of dry bread, and motion to the barmaid to refill his mug. “Okay,” he said, consulting his notes. “To sum it all up, the main reasons you hate Lord Voltmeter are because the tower he added to the Invincible Fortress ruins the view, he lets his dogs bark all night long, sometimes he doesn’t take in his trash cans for two or three days after pickup, and because he tortures, enslaves, or kills every villager he can get his hands on. Is that about right?”

  The townspeople exchanged glances. “Well yeah,” said Muldoon. “I mean, you didn’t say to list them in order of importance.”

  “No, that’s fine. Anything else you can tell me?”

  Someone spoke up. “There’s that alchemist he kidnapped.”

  “Alchemist?”

  “A professor of alchemy at some fancy university,” said Muldoon. “Mercredi was his name. He said he came up to do a little fishing. And then Voltmeter’s henchmen grabbed him and dragged him away, right out of this very inn. Oh, it was a terrible thing. They carried him up to the Fortress, and no one has seen a trace of him since. Terrible, terrible.”

  “Sounds awful. The poor guy. It must have given all of you quite a shock.”

  “Well, he paid for his room in advance. But I was letting him run a tab at the bar.”

  “That’s when the real horror started,” said the customer with the big pewter tankard, the one who had first spoken up. He had been standing at the bar. Now he pulled up a chair and sat next to Kevin. “After Voltmeter grabbed that alchemist fellow.”

  “All right, Pete.” Muldoon shook his head. “Let’s not get into that again.”

  “I tell you it’s true!”

  “What’s true?” said Kevin.

  Pete leaned over the table. He held his hands apart and brought them together, squeezing an imaginary balloon. “Lord Voltmeter made the air disappear.”

  “Of course.”

  “He did! I was taking my goats up the cliff trail. You know, letting them get some of the sweet grass up on the cliff. We were getting close to the walls.” Pete paused, trying to add dramatic tension to a story that was not, after all, particularly dramatic. “Anyway, it was getting dark, kind of twilightlike, so I didn’t figure they could see me from the fortress. And then all of sudden, I couldn’t breathe.”

  “It’s a steep trail,” said Muldoon. “You were out of breath, Pete.”

  Pete made an angry motion, as if to slam his tankard on the table. Before it connected with the wood he thought better of the idea, looked into the bottom, and drained it in a gulp. Then he slammed it on the table. “I wasn’t out of breath,” he snapped. “I’ve been climbing that trail my whole life.”

  “Which has been fifty-two years. You’re getting old.”

  “My goats aren’t old. Some of them are just kids.”

  “You said you couldn’t breathe,” prompted Kevin.

  “Right. But I wasn’t out of breath, not that way. I mean, there was nothing to breathe. My lungs were working fine, but the air was gone.”

  “Maybe a touch of hay fever?”

  “No, no, my head wasn’t stuffed up. I’m telling you the air was gone. I turned and ran back down the trail, and at the bottom I was breathing just fine, even though I had been running.”

  “When was this?”

  “About a fortnight ago.”

  Kevin pondered the information. The barmaid came over, set a mug down in front of Muldoon, and took Pete’s tankard. “Fill you up again, Pete?”

  “Yeah. Thanks, Cherry.”

  She looked at Kevin. “You ready for another?”

  “Hmmm? Yes, please.” Kevin made a few more notes. Muldoon bent his head around and tried to read them.

  “So,” he said, after deciding that Kevin wrote too fast for him. “Don’t believe you gave your name, traveler.”

  “Timberline,” said the Prince, looking at Muldoon carefully. The man gave no sign of recognition, nor did any of the other customers.

  “Well, Mr. Timberline. I expect that you’re working for our King.”

  “You cou
ld say that.”

  “I thought so. And you came here to survey the Fortress. I figure you’re some sort of scout for the army. An advance man, I think they call your type. Or maybe a spy.”

  “Maybe a bit of all three,” said Kevin, smiling.

  “I thought so. Sometimes they send a Hero to slay an Evil Overlord, but it’s obvious you’re not a hero.”

  Kevin frowned. “Oh really?”

  “No surprise to us, of course. As I said before, we’ve been expecting the King to send an army. You don’t fool around when you’re dealing with someone like Lord Voltmeter. Troops, and plenty of them, that’s the way to go. The word is that Lord Logan will be leading the campaign.” Muldoon watched Kevin carefully when he said this.

  Kevin was noncommittal. “Is that what they say?”

  “Not talking, are you? Well, I guess I shouldn’t expect you to. Not if you’re Logan’s advance man.”

  “I’m not,” said Kevin shortly.

  “Oh, I do hope it’s Lord Logan,” said Cherry, from the bar. “He’s supposed to be very handsome. And so tall. And covered with muscles.”

  “He’s not so tall.”

  “I’m going to see him. I’ll travel to the city. I have an aunty there who said I could stay with her.”

  “You’re going to see him?”

  “In the parade. There’s sure to be a parade after the wedding. When he marries our Princess.”

  “I don’t think that’s a certainty.”

  “Oh yes, there’s always a parade. Logan and the Princess will travel the streets in an open carriage. We’ll throw flowers, and they’ll wave to us,” Cherry went on dreamily. “It will be beautiful. All the girls think Logan is a total hunk.”

  “Just get the beer, will you?” snapped Kevin.

  The barmaid looked hurt. “What’s your problem?”

  “Of course, there’s still that other chap,” said Pete. “The one from Rassendas. They say he’s a crafty one.”

  Prince Kevin the Crafty? Kevin rolled it over in his mind. It didn’t sound quite right.

  Cherry came back and slammed a mug in front of him. Ale sloshed over the side.

  “War is a terrible thing,” said Muldoon. “The death of so many fine young men, the women and children left behind. And the crippling injuries. Sometimes the injuries are even worse than death. Terrible, terrible.”

  “True,” Kevin said. “And then there is the devastation that accompanies a prolonged siege. The destruction of crops and forests, pollution of the streams, the potential for epidemics, the possibility of lawlessness and looting, all that can happen when large groups of soldiers are camped in one spot for months. We can only hope it won’t come to that.”

  “All those soldiers buying beer?” Muldoon got a dreamy look on his face. “No, hopefully our peaceful valley will not have to suffer from a long military encampment. Thousands of men getting drunk on my beer. Perhaps tens of thousands. Buying beer from me. And ale. And my wine, cider, and brandy. That would be terrible.”

  “Buying my milk and cheese,” said Pete.

  “My bread,” said someone else.

  “However,” continued Muldoon, “if the King does choose to get rid of Lord Voltmeter, you may assure him that the Village of Angst will do its part. We know where our duty lies, yes sir. Why, we’ve been hard at work already, preparing for the arrival of the military.”

  “I’m sure,” said Kevin. “Hard at work raising prices, you mean.” He pointed to a corner of the room. A half dozen freshly painted signs, stating OFFICERS ONLY, were stacked against the wall.

  “Oh, don’t let those mislead you,” said Muldoon quickly. “Everyone is welcome here at the Inn of Despair. I’ll put up a tent for the enlisted men. That reminds me . . .” He called back to the bar, “Cherry, when you’re done watering that wine, don’t forget to add more saltpeter to the sausages.”

  “Sure thing.”

  “Voltmeter’s up to something terrible,” said Pete. “My story is true, and Voltmeter’s behind it. The King has to do something.”

  “His Majesty is on top of the situation.” Kevin thought for a minute and decided to let slip some information, to see how the villagers would react. “He knows that Lord Voltmeter has an Ancient Artifact.”

  “Which model?” said Pete instantly.

  “Um, a model seven.”

  The room fell silent. Pete and Muldoon raised their glasses thoughtfully and took tiny sips. Even Cherry stopped wiping the bar and stared.

  “What?” said Kevin. “Does everyone know about these things except me?”

  “A model seven is bad,” said Muldoon. “Very bad. And dangerous. That is not good news. The model seven is a very powerful Ancient Artifact.”

  “I’ve heard that.”

  “Although, in my opinion, still not as good as the old model three,” said Pete. “Now that was an Ancient Artifact.”

  “The model three kicked ass, all right.”

  “I rather liked the model six,” said someone.

  “The model six was for wimps,” someone else objected. “It was just a model five tarted up with extra chrome.”

  “I like chrome. And it handled better than the model five.”

  “Oh, like that’s supposed to be impressive? Now, if you want an Ancient Artifact that really packs a wallop . . .”

  “Yes, well thank you,” said Kevin, excusing himself. He slipped out the front door and looked toward the Fortress. The sun was setting behind its walls, and the Fortress showed as an ominous black mass against a backdrop of pristine mountain peaks. He could understand why the villagers hated it. He judged there were still several hours of daylight left and decided to get a closer look. Going back to the stable, he signed out his freshest horse and soon found the trail that Pete had spoken of. It was more a narrow road than a trail, wide enough for two or three men to walk abreast. It was cobbled with stones that had once been rough but had worn smooth over centuries of use. They made the horse’s shoes ring. The road switchbacked up the cliff face, ending at a tree-studded escarpment; but for the most part it was in full view of the Fortress walls. Kevin reflected on this, then turned his horse onto the path. Actually penetrating the Fortress would have to be done at night—the book described all the standard methods of getting in—but it wouldn’t hurt to do a reconnaissance in daylight. If Voltmeter’s men questioned him, he could tell them that he was lost, or that he just came up for the view.

  In fact, he didn’t need to tell them anything. The trail led right to the walls of the Fortress of Doom, ending in front of a single, intensely heavy door, covered with black iron plates. It looked quite formidable. Even the small bronze plaque reading NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC FORTRESSES seemed forbidding. Two guards, armed with pikes and armored with mail, barred his way. Up on the wall, more guards with cocked crossbows looked down. Above flew Voltmeter’s flag, a banner showing crossed thumbscrews on a bloodred field. Kevin stopped his horse and swept off his hat. “Good evening. Is Lord Voltmeter in?”

  “We’re closed,” said a guard.

  “Closed?”

  The guard stepped aside to reveal a wooden sign, posted on the wall in back of him. He jerked a thumb at it. It said, FORTRESS OF DOOM and underneath OPEN MON TO FRI, 9:00 A.M. TO 4:00 P.M.

  “Sorry,” said Kevin. “I thought it was open late on Fridays.”

  “That’s only for the holidays. During the summer we go back to normal hours.”

  “You’ll have to come back Monday,” said the second guard. “And don’t try sneaking in, either. All the entrances are heavily guarded at all times by elite soldiers.”

  “Like ourselves.”

  “Right,” said the second guard. “Except . . .” And here he paused to wink at the first guard. “Except for the main ventilation shaft.”

  “That’s right,” said the first guard, smirking back. “Every door and window is locked, barred, and guarded. But not the ventilation shaft.”

  “How disappointing,” said Ke
vin. “Still, it’s a nice view. Do you mind if I have a look around?”

  “Not at all,” said a guard. He pointed along the wall. “The ventilation shaft is that way.”

  “Thanks.” Kevin followed the direction the guard was pointing, past a sign that said, LOCKED OUT? TRY OUR EXTENDED HOURS. VENTILATION SHAFT OPEN UNTIL 10 P.M. He turned a corner and was out of sight of the guards. Even the ones up on the ramparts seemed to have disappeared. Ahead of him was a small courtyard, walled on three sides, with another sign that read VENTILATION SHAFT. FREE VALET PARKING MON-WED. An iron drainpipe led to the roof. Kevin looked it over carefully.

  “Ventilation shaft,” Kevin murmured to himself. “Hmmm.”

  He turned his horse back to the village and thought about this, riding slowly, letting the horse pick its own way in the gathering dusk. By the time he reached the inn, he was pretty sure he could get into the Fortress. He looked up at the massive shape hanging over the tiny hamlet, its black walls blotting the stars from the clear sky. He smiled. It would just take a little bit of planning, a little luck, and a few pieces of equipment that he could get in the village. He left his horse at the Stable of Sorrows and went back into the tavern.

  Becky was waiting for him.

  She was sitting in the corner, wearing breeches and some sort of brown leather jerkin that laced up in front, over a man’s wool shirt, and on her head was a peaked green forester’s cap with a feather in it. She was studying a small book, hunched over the table with her elbows on the rough wood. Scattered in front of her were half a dozen cups, of various sizes, most of them untouched. Kevin pulled out a chair and sat down across from her. She appeared not to notice him. “Becky, what are you . . . ?”