Макс Фрай - The Stranger

When I looked at the head chef wheeling his cart in the direction of our table, I was nonplussed. The fellow’s cart was laden with something that looked like Chinese dumplings, except that each dumpling was about three feet in width.

“Sir Kofa, I do love to eat, of course,” I whispered. “But I’m afraid you have overestimated my abilities.”

“Don’t be silly, boy. It’s going to be all right. Be quiet now, and watch.”

When he stopped at our table, the cook bowed in a dignified manner and placed two relatively small plates in front of us. I had no time to wonder how the small plates could accommodate the Big Puffs before the cook grasped the uppermost dumpling carefully between two small shovels. Then he began to blow on it. He blew as gently and patiently as a grandmother blowing on a spoonful of oatmeal, begging her beloved grandchild to outdo himself and take just one more bite.

Unlike a grandmother’s spoonful of porridge, though, the “dumpling” began shrinking rapidly. When the Big Puffs had become the size of a statistically average pastry, the cook quickly transferred it to Kofa’s plate, and he began to eat.

“Start right in, boy!” my culinary “Virgil” informed me with his mouth full. “Its best to eat it straight away.”

I considered it wise to heed his advice, so as soon as the pastry landed on my plate, I got down to business.

Inside the Big Puffs I discovered an ample, but light meat filling and a whole ocean of aromatic juices. It was divine!

The cook kept tossing more and more Puffs onto our plates, but we didn’t give up. Finally, the cart was empty and we were alone.

“Remember, Max, you should only order the Big Puffs here. It’s not the same in other taverns. Believe me, I’ve tried it.”

Kofa rolled his eyes to the heavens in delight.

“Once upon a time, it was the most ordinary dish imaginable. Over the last hundred years or so the cooks of the capital have forgotten the finer points of their profession. Never mind, they’ll make up for lost time and pick up their tricks again now. Time heals all. Let’s go, boy.”

And off we went.

“I’ve never failed to give the Skeleton cuisine its due,” Sir Kofa Yox said. “Of course, with legitimate magic alone they could never outdo Madame Zizinda or the Hunchback Itullo, may the Dark Magicians protect him. They’re Old School—without a good spell they don’t know how to butter a piece of bread. Aye, what’s true is true. Now their time has come again, though.”

“By the way, how could Goppa have been allowed to keep the cooks? Why didn’t you throw them in Xolomi?” I asked.

“In Xolomi? For what?”

“Well, you said yourself that they prepared food like in the ‘Good Old Days.’ They must have used plenty of spells, I imagine.”

“Ah, that . . . You see, Max, the cooks were just carrying out orders. They didn’t even have to try to defend themselves. Their superiors presented them with a paper that stated that they took all the responsibility. If any of the Tallaboonas had survived, they’re the ones we would have ‘thrown in Xolomi,’ as you put it.”

“Where I come from, everyone would have to bear the blame: the ones who gave the orders, as well as the ones who carried them out.”

“That’s absurd! How can you punish a person if he’s not acting on his own volition? What a system you have there in the Barren Lands.”

Kofa stared at me so attentively that I realized: he doesn’t believe Juffin’s legend about my origins. He doesn’t believe it, but he’s keeping mum. So I did, too.

Our next stop was the Happy Skeleton. Sir Kofa nodded toward another niche at the opposite end of the hall, just like the one we saw earlier. It was occupied by a solitary smiling skeleton.

“Here we’re going to eat ‘Hathor’ turkey,” Sir Kofa announced.

“What’s it called?” I wanted to make sure I had heard correctly.

“‘Hathor.’ It’s a completely baffling sort of animal god from another World. I can’t figure it out. I don’t know whether anyone can. One thing for sure—it has the head of a bull.”

“A cow,” I corrected him. “‘Hathor’ is female, so her head is that of a cow, not a bull.”

“Where did you study, boy?” Sir Kofa asked in astonishment. “The things you know!”

“Well, I certainly didn’t learn it in school,” I admitted. “I just read everything I that came my way. A good way of fighting insomnia.”

“Everything that came your way! Do you go out of your way, by any chance, to dip into the forbidden library of the Seven-Leaf Clover? Come on, you’ll never get me to believe that!”

I thought that informing Sir Kofa that the goddess Hathor was one of the many zoomorphic figures in the Egyptian pantheon probably wouldn’t be such a good idea. What if it was some kind of sacred mystery?

This time two hefty kitchen boys plunked down a huge platter on our table. On the platter was a horned bull’s head. A “braised” turkey’s carcass hovered between the horns. At first I thought it must be resting on a skewer, but then I realized that the delicacy really was floating weightless in the air.

“Don’t even think of putting the turkey on a plate,” Sir Kofa whispered. “It has to stay right where it is. Slice the meat with a knife using a fork to hold it steady . . . And don’t touch it with your hands. You’ll ruin the taste!”

I obeyed for that would truly have been a sin.

After the fourth tavern, I began to beg for mercy. I felt there was a good chance I would share the sad fate of the Tallaboona family.

“What a weak stomach you have, boy! I never would have expected it. There’s one more excellent establishment I want to show you. They have delicious desserts, and very small portions. Honest!”

“All right,” I grumbled. “But this is the last one. For today, anyway.”

The tavern was called the Irrashi Coat of Arms Inn.

“Who’s Irrashi?” I asked without thinking.

“Come off it, lad! You know who Hathor is, but forget the name of the neighboring country?”

“I just ate so much I can’t think straight anymore.”

I felt ashamed. Even though the eight-volume Encyclopedia by Manga Melifaro had long ago found its way from the bookshelf to my bedside table, the geography of the World was still not one of my strong points.

Sir Kofa Yox shook his head disdainfully, and we entered.

“Xokota!” a friendly bartender called to us in greeting.

“Xokota!” Sir Kofa answered solemnly.

“What did you just say?”

“Ah, that’s one of the the nice customs of this place. The proprietors are all locals, from Echo. But the cuisine is Irrashi, and they try to speak to the customers in broken Irrashi, to the best of their abilities. It’s funny—Irrashi is one of the few countries where they don’t speak in normal human language. Our homegrown snobs consider their babbling to be the height of refinement.”

“Right. And you just greeted each other, as I understand it.”

“Of course. Look over there, Max. You see that fellow in the gray looxi? He’s dressed very strangely, don’t you think?”

“Strangely? Why do you say that, Kofa?”

I looked over at the modestly clad, middle-aged stranger who was hunched over his mug at the bar.

“You didn’t notice? And the belt?”

“I can’t see any belt from where I’m sitting. Move over! Ah! Sinning Magicians, that’s beautiful!”

The stranger was wearing an elegant, broad belt under his looxi—a remarkable thing that glistened like bright mother-of-pearl.

“That’s what I was talking about. Hm, it really is quite strange. The fellow is dressed modestly in the extreme. He couldn’t be dressed worse, in fact. His skaba is downright tattered, did you see?”