Hugh Cook - The Walrus and the Warwolf

'Yoo-hoo!' cried Drake, jumping up and down, waving frantically. 'I'm over here!'

'Demon-son!' screamed the Flame-robed stave-man, spotting him.'That's me!' yelled Drake.And the chase was on again.

Drake led the single stave-man a merry dance through the backstreets, alleyways, mews and ditchleaps of Jone, the dockland area he knew by now as well as he knew the back of his own hand.

(Or better, in fact – for if he had been shrunk down to near next to nothing, then set beside the first knuckle of his own index finger, he would have had the devil of a job finding his way from there to his thumb – whereas he could have found his way round Jone blindfolded.)

Finally, Drake led the single stave-man into a friendly tavern, where half a dozen of Drake's drinking cronies helped mug the hapless hero. He was taken to the cellar, trussed up tightly (having been first stripped of his robes of Flame) then interrogated under threat of torture.By evening, Drake knew everything he wanted to know.

'I'm off,' he said, pulling the robes of Flame over the set of serviceable leathers he was wearing.'What happens to me then?' asked the stave-man.

'Why, at midnight the tide rises,' said Drake. 'Aye, then this cellar floods, and the rats come up with the waters. They'll eat your corpse to bones and gristle.''There's no tides in the Velvet River.''Oh isn't there just? Haven't you heard of the eagre?''The what?'

'Nevermind, man,' said Drake. 'Its waters will have you soon enough, aye, and the rats.'

After a bit more bluff and bluster equally as grim and heartless, he picked up the stave-man's stave and took to the streets, looking every bit the enforcer.

It was deep night by the time Drake had made his way from the backstreets of Jone to Libernek Square in Santrim. The gates of Muck's temple were open, but guards kept watch on the platform above the gate. Drake hung back in the shadows. Would there be a challenge? A password? or what? In the Old Courthouse, a scattering of lanterns held out against the tyranny of darkness. He could hear a woman softly singing; he wondered if it was Zanya.

Suddenly someone slapped an arm over his shoulder. Drake was about to fight when a drunken voice slurred:'Tovarish.'

'Darling,' said Drake, taking stock swiftly. A trio of them. All wearing robes of Flame. All stank of the strong liquor Muck preached against so vehemently. 'Bedtime,' said one. 'Aye,' said Drake.

Together they rolled toward the gate. As they went in under the platform, all tried to straighten up, doing their best imitation of sobriety. Inside, one said to Drake:' Come have a drink.'

Nothing is more persistent than a drunk who wants to get drunker.

'Sorry, man,' said Drake. 'I've got a yen for purity tonight.' 'Purity?'Hooting laughter and renewed insistence.'Hush, man!' said Drake. 'You'll get us in trouble!'

It was no good. The noise increased steadily until a challenge came from the platform. Drake ducked into the shadows under a single courtyard tree as platform-guards scrambled down to have a reckoning with the drunks.

Drake made himself one with the bark of the tree. Wished himself to the thinness of a needle. Heard a prolonged altercation, a short scuffle, a brief protest, a sound of something heavy hitting meat. Then peace. But for a single nightingale in the branches above, testing its tessitura. And someone, quite close at hand, urinating copiously. Another drunk, no doubt.Time to move.

Drake slipped toward the stairway which, if his captive stave-man had spoken true, led to the female quarters. Up the creaking stairs he went, to a lantern-lit corridor. He heard, from behind one closed door, the rhythm of a bed riding in heavy seas. Elsewhere, suppressed laughter. A door opened without warning and a young woman burst out, giggling. She was in a state of advanced deshabille. After her came a muscular young man who was entirely naked.

Both stopped and stared at Drake. ' You!' said Drake, curtly, pointing his stave at the man. 'Your name?''Prothon. Who are you?'

'That you'll learn tomorrow,' said Drake grimly, 'when you answer for your actions before the Holy One himself. Don't make things worse for yourself. Get back to your own quarters!'

Drake thwacked Prothon over the buttocks to emphasize his point. The sinner fled.

'You,' said Drake, to the woman. 'Aren't you ashamed of yourself?'

'I'm not religious,' she said, in very poor Galish, pouting as she did so. Her face was gaudy with paint, her body lush with perfume. 'I'm just a maid. Why make trouble over a simple of simples? Ease your hard back, why don't you. Do we have to have trouble?'And, without warning, she kissed him.Heavy boots sounded on the stairs.'It's the Patrol!' she hissed. 'Are you in, or out?''What?' said Drake.'Will you denounce me or – '

'We'll talk about it inside,' said Drake. They fled into her cubicle, closing the door on the Patrol. Inside, there was nowhere to sit down but on the bed.

Some considerable time later, Drake kissed his maid-minx goodbye, made an assignation for the following night, and set off for the room supposed to be Zanya's. On arrival, he entered without knocking. Saw her. Saw her bedroom.

Her chamber was large, and warm. Around the walls were pictures of lewdness. She had an enormous bed, canopied with silks. The air was heavy with perfume. The place would have reminded Drake of a high-class brothel, but for the fact that he was innocent of the charms of any establishment so elevated.

As he entered, Zanya was sitting on a padded stool, peering at her reflection in a bronze mirror. She was unfastening an earbob. She had let down her hair, which flowed about her, reaching in a tide of fire almost as far as her waist. She turned, slowly, and looked at him.'Surprise!' said Drake.

'Not so,' she said. 'It's just like you to try something crazy like this.''What am I trying?'

'I don't know yet. But I'm sure it's madness.' After that unpromising start, they simply stared at each other for a few moments. A contest of wills. Then Drake

dropped his gaze, telling himself he did so to admire the loft of Zanya's breasts beneath her free-flowing silks, the strength of her thigh and the turn of her ankle.'So what do you think you're doing here?' said Zanya.

'Looking for my wife, as it happens,' said Drake, cool as cucumber bathed in liquid helium.'Your wife. Have you married, then?''Darling! I married you!''We were never married.'

'Weren't we?' said Drake, thinking. Then: 'No, I suppose we never were. But does it matter?'

'It matters that you can't remember one way or the other!'

'I've been as good as married,' said Drake. 'I've never had another woman since I met you.' 'Oh yes!'

'Why so sharp, my sweet? Come, my dearest cony, my-''I'm not your cony!'

'Why so cruel?' said Drake. 'So cruel to your dearest treasure-snake? You were always my cony, nearest and dearest.'

'Oh, grow up!' said Zanya. 'I'm not your cony. I'm not your anything.'

'Then what are you?' said Drake, with a touch of anger in his voice. 'Something of Muck's, perhaps?''Perhaps,' she said.Hard. Defiant.

'Is this where he takes you, then? Preaching for prudery then rutting his balls dry?'

'It is Permitted,' said Zanya, angry herself. 'It makes me proud. Yes, proud! I am the guardian of his purity.'

'You screw!' said Drake, in fury. 'With him! How could you?''It is holy!' she said.Hot. Fierce. Unashamed.'He's a dirty old man,' said Drake, savagely.'Who stole .your whore. Right? That's what I was to you, wasn't it? A hole. A cheap hole. A whore who didn't need to be paid by the night.' 'Dearest sweet-'

'Oh yes, it was "dearest sweet" to start with. But once you were sure, then you forgot about me.'

'Forgot?' said Drake. 'I lavished attentions on you! Most tender skill imaginable!'