Frank Tuttle - The Broken Bell

Fire hissed and smoked, but was clearly on the wane.

Mama looked up at me and cussed and turned on her heel and waddled away at full bore.

I charged after her.

Gertriss was alone. The fire was a ploy. Even Mama had been sucked in, not knowing I wasn’t home.

People tried to stop me and talk, and I shouldered them aside, caught up with Mama then passed her.

There were lamps and torches on the street. By the bobbing lights I could see Mama’s door standing wide open, and I knew damned well she hadn’t left it that way.

I had Toadsticker out, low and level, just like I’d been taught. I hit Mama’s threshold at a run and dodged immediately to my right, where the rickety little table she uses for card readings shouldn’t have been. It was there, though, and I sent it flying.

Mama’s was pitch dark. I thought I saw a faint hint of movement. I grabbed one of Mama’s thousand jars with my left hand, and I threw it as hard as I could.

It exploded in a shower of glass and a stench so vile someone in the dark actually puked.

I charged them, felt something solid slice the air on the left side of my face, felt the something sharp graze my shoulder. But then my right shoulder plowed into a chest and I knocked someone off his feet, and we damned near took down Mama’s wall by slamming into it.

Light flared. Mama screeched. She shoved the torch she was carrying right into a stranger’s face, and I whacked him good on the side of his fool head with the flat of my blade about the same time Mama used a stool to make the stranger’s ability to ever sire children a matter of considerable doubt.

He slid to the floor, vomit still running down his chin, his hair singed and smoking.

I grabbed him, threw him face down, put a boot on his spine.

Mama was already past me, howling for Gertriss and Buttercup.

She had the torch. I couldn’t do anything but stand there helplessly and wait.

Mama came trundling back, her face ashen.

“They ain’t here. Boy, they ain’t here.”

“Mama!” It was Gertriss, from the door. Mama whirled, and the light caught Gertriss in a flimsy nightgown, one hand at her neck, the other gripping Buttercup’s hand.

The tiny banshee yawned and rubbed her eyes.

Mama yelled and slammed her door shut in the faces of a dozen curious onlookers.

“How did you get outdoors?”

“Buttercup.” Gertriss shivered. “We went through a wall. Right through it.”

I raised an eyebrow. The banshee was getting stronger. She’d never been able to do that with me, though she’d tried.

The man beneath me groaned. The stink from Mama’s jar was spreading.

“Mama. You know this man?”

Mama leaned over, raised the man’s head by yanking on his hair, and shoved the torch close enough to singe him anew.

“I don’t. I knows you can hear me.” She emphasized her point with a kick to his side. “What’s your name?”

The man groaned, but offered nothing more.

“The Watch will be around in a minute. You. Nobody in Rannit is going to blink if I skewer an arsonist. Give me an excuse. I dare you.”

I hauled him to his feet, keeping his right arm twisted behind his back.

“Mama, get the door.”

She did. I shoved him through it, right into the small mob that was forming. A few greeted him with punches and kicks.

“Thanks for your help,” I said, keeping the man on his feet as he swayed. “Mama and I appreciate it.”

“We hang him here, no?” offered one of the Arwheat brothers.

“We have rope and a scaffold, yes?” exclaimed the other.

“Maybe when the Watch is done with him. And certainly if we ever see him here again.”

The Arwheats were eyeing an exposed beam on the building next to Mama’s.

“I fetch rope, just in case, no?”

The man I was holding finally processed the gist of the conversation and started to struggle. I twisted his arm until it nearly broke, and kept it that way until a tall, black Watch wagon finally rolled down the street and disgorged a trio of beefy, bleary-eyed Watchmen.

“Good evening, officers,” I said, cheerfully. “Look what we caught, just for you.”

First light, and there I was, still scrubbing the soot and charring off my poor abused door.

It wasn’t going well. The bottom of the door had caught fire. I was sure it was burned so deeply a determined foot could make a hole all the way through it. My prized glass pane and its painted lettering was a loss. The heat had cracked the glass and the painted letters were gone and among the numerous unpleasant tasks facing me on that bright and cheery day was buying a new front door.

Too, there was no sign of Three-leg Cat. He was missing his breakfast, and that was never done.

Gertriss read my thoughts.

“He’ll be back. I’m sure of it.”

She was seated in my chair, her feet propped on my desk, ostensibly keeping an eye on the street while I was occupied with the door. Gertriss had gotten no more sleep than I last night, but she looked fresh and rested.

Her skirt was slit up one side, and a lot of leg was showing. Maybe she read that thought, too, because she swung her legs down suddenly.

“So, what do we do if Mama is right?”

I dropped my brush into the bucket long enough to huff and puff a bit.

“If Mama is right and he was another hexed hillbilly like the Sprangs, then we need to start planning a trip to Pot Lockney. Doors are expensive. My cat has been discommoded. I shall surely vent my wrath upon those responsible.”

“You’ll need me to come with you, boss. Unless you’d rather take Mama.”

I grinned.

“You sat up all night waiting to deliver that one, didn’t you?”

“Not all night. But I do have a point. Don’t I?”

I shrugged. “I was planning on taking you anyway. Can’t watch you here and take on rogue sorcerers there. Too, you’ll need to school me in the homespun ways of country folk, lest I demand bacon from the haunch of a virgin swine, or something equally scandalous.”

“When will we be leaving?”

I grabbed my brush. “That’s a problem. I need to find Carris Lethway before I go. The wedding date is fast approaching.”

“True.” Gertriss bit her lip.

“Spill it. You’ve got an idea?”

“Sort of. You won’t like it.”

“You’d make a lousy salesgirl, Miss.”

“Why not ask Evis to let Mama and Buttercup stay at Avalante, until people stop marching here to set us ablaze?”

“Mama. At Avalante.”

“Surely they have a guest house?”

“Mama? At Avalante?”

“You said that once already, boss.”

“I may say it again. Right before I say no. Anyway, where would you stay?”

“With you. We could watch each other’s backs, boss. Darla wouldn’t mind. She knows it’s strictly business. And since everyone in Pot Lockney thinks we’re a couple anyway, what’s the harm?”

I shook my head. “Evis is my friend, Miss, but there are things I just won’t ask.”

“You don’t have to. I already have. Evis said yes.”

“What?”

Gertriss blushed a bit.

“I had…a feeling, boss. A Sight thing. Trouble brewing. So I sent Evis a letter, asking if Mama and Buttercup could stay at Avalante for a while. He said yes.”

“When did you do all that?”

“Yesterday.”

He’d known the whole time we’d been drinking last night, and the sharp-toothed devil hadn’t said a word.

Gertriss spread her hands. “Boss, I overstepped. I’m sorry.”

“No. No, you had a good idea, and you acted on it. That’s what I pay you for.” I got off my knees and sank onto my client’s chair. My door was a loss anyway.

“It’s a good plan, Gertriss. I’m just frustrated. Not moving too fast these days. Always a step behind.”