Varian noticed, however, that the small sidekick, while very animated, did not speak. This was either out of deference and respect to his master and chief storyteller, or else the man was mute.
“. . . and the mutations are still goin’ on in the Baadghizi Vale. Three winters back, Raim and I were there—weren’t we, my small fellow?—and we saw cockroaches the size of your boot, walkin’ around like they owned the place. And they do! But it’s not the roaches that’ll get you, no sir. It’s the lizards, by the gods, it’s the friggin’ lizards!”
Someone took the bait, asked about the lizards, and the man was off again.
“Big, ugly, scaly things! They’re slinkin’ and screwin’ in the Vale to beat all! Pretty soon they’ll be so many of them, they’ll be crawlin’ over each other’s back, spend their whole lives never touchin’ the ground. And I mean they’re big, too. Some of them are learnin’ to stand up on their hind legs like a man. Get to be five or six ems high, and they can outrun you and have you for breakfast before you can say Ben Hurlendsesk!”
“How’d you get away?” someone asked with a smile.
“Me? I’ll get away from everything, ‘cept Mr. Bones!” The man in the silver fur threw back his head and laughed. “No, you see, them lizards are big and fast and hungry, for sure, but they’re godsawful dumb, too! You can fool ‘em with tricks that even a hangclaw wouldn’t fall for. In fact, I caught a big one in a trap I’d set, brought back the head to a king north of the Scorpinnian. Called himself Richer the Third, he did. Funny-lookin’ little fellow with a withered arm, but mean as a cat! Gave ‘im that big bugger’s head and took off from there. That’s when Raim and I, we teamed up with an expedition on the Sunless Sea. Ship was The Pea-Pod, ever heard of her? No, I’d feature you haven’t, but she was a fine-rigged thing. Captained by a crazy man the name of Ajax. Raim got into a fight with one of the gunner’s on board—a big illustrated man, forget his name, and they cut some new pictures into each other’s flesh, didn’t you, my lad?”
The man laughed again and gestured for the small, dark Raim to display the knife wounds on the left side of his chest. After an appreciative round of ooohs and aaahs, the old man continued his tale. It was a nonstop, rollicking sea story, and Varian was caught up in it, despite himself.
Varian had heard variations of these stories for years. You did not sail the World, frequent the watering holes of every fellow nomad, and not hear them, but there was something different about this man’s delivery, his style. And most important, his appearance. He looked as if he had done the things he said. Varian’s keen eye for detail did not miss the thick, calloused palms, the “character” lines in the face, the young, vigilant eyes, and the heavy musculature of the shoulders and the neck. This old man was a man of action and experience; his knack for the well-turned tale was only a colorful talent, an added attraction.
“What’s wrong?” asked Tessa, reaching out and touching Varian’s sleeve.
“Oh, nothing. I was just watching him, listening. . . .”
Tessa laughed and sipped from her stein. “You don’t believe him, do you?”
“No, not everything. I never believe all that any man says.”
“But some things, yes?”
“Of course.” Varian gestured at the old man. “Just look at him. I mean really look at him. He’s real. He’s been there—wherever it is. He’s like Ques’ryad itself: there’s the smell and the look of adventure about him, and danger, too.”
“Varian, I think you do believe him!” She smiled, gave him a mock reproachful look.
“He is an interesting fellow, you can’t deny that,” said Varian, looking once again to the table where the narration continued.
“. . . and some say they were golems, but they’re probably not livin’ things at all,” said the old man, his eyes gliding suspensefully back and forth in his sockets. “For my money, they were robots!”
Someone in the crowd laughed, followed quickly by the guffaws and doubting remarks of others. Varian felt himself tense at the mention of the word.
“So don’t believe me! What hang do I give? I know it could be a robot, ‘specially since I seen one myself!”
More laughter and general loud commentary. The crowd believed that the old man was now openly playing with them, slipping from the mode of tall-tale teller to that of jester, buffoon.
Everyone laughed but Varian. In an instant he was swept back to the moment on board The Courtesan when the . . . the thing pulled back its robes and revealed its amber-glass chest, the sparkling patterns of the printed circuitry and LEDs.
“No, it’s true, I tell you!” said the man. “You can ask Raim, here. He saw him, too!”
Raim nodded his head solemnly.
“I was comin’ back from the wilderness north of the Shudrapur. Raim and me, we were lookin’ for First Age pieces for this merchant in Borat. Didn’t find a thing so far, when we stop at this outpost near the borders—about five hundred kays from Babir—and we get to talkin’ with some of the villagers. You learn to listen to what them village people have to say. They
