Bedlams edge, p.22
Bedlam's Edge, page 22
part #8 of Bedlam's Bard Series
Leather-jacket stopped. “The hell with you.” He turned and ran to the little beetle-car, and was in the driving seat and doing a U-turn before you could say “Knockmealgarten.” The elderly brown car did not have the wherewithal to race away from the scene, but the thief did his best.
Turning, Rúadan saw that Moira had sat herself down. By the looks of it, she was fainting. Well, he’d nothing against those who fainted after the fact. She was, by a stroke of fortune, now inside his limits—off the concrete road full of steel reenforcing bars, and in the weeds next to the telephone poles. He was not at his strongest here, so far from the blocked Node he was supposed to watch, but he could carry a little-bitty thing like a barmaid easily enough. And he’d better see if the other lass was still in the wood. Problems never came singly, did they?
* * *
Moira blinked. The last she’d been aware of was Red threatening some thug who’d then run off with her car. Now …
She was lying on a mattress in a dimly lit place. She sat up, found her feet. She was in a tiny room of some sort, without windows or a door. Light, such as it was, came in through a small round hole higher up. Dimly she could make out a battered copper kettle that would have fetched a fortune at an antique fair, some wooden pegs with clothes hung on them, and Red’s old fiddle-case.
She was bright enough to figure that this must be the old fiddler’s mysterious den. Well … So she’d be the one who finally got to see where he hid himself. Pity it had to cost her her car, she thought bitterly.
A crack opened in the far wall, and Red stumped in with a girl. The one with the blond ringlets, broad silver bracelets, and the bad taste in lipstick color, who hadn’t joined in with “Wild Rover.” She had a purse of dimensions that made Moira envious, though. You could pack for a week in something that size.
“You’re awake and you haven’t even put the kettle on?” Red said, grumpily. “Well, there’s some bottles of beer in the corner. For emergencies.”
“I can’t sit around drinking beer! I need to do something about my car …” Moira fumbled in her handbag, producing a cellphone.
“No reception,” he said apologetically. “Anyway, your stinker ran out of fuel about a hundred and fifty yards from the Curragh. It was the best I could do. Too much iron in it otherwise.”
She sat down on the mattress again with a thump. It was covered with a tatty quilt in, needless to say, shades of red. “Best you could do? I filled it up yesterday.”
He shrugged and snagged three bottles of beer from a nook. “I’m sorry. I owe you. Mind, if you hadn’t interfered I’d have had only one problem.”
He pointed with a thumb at the terrified-looking blonde, while he popped the top and handed her a beer. “Here, drink this and take heart, and tell me what happened without so much tears and clutching of my finery.” He patted his scruffy old coat.
Moira had to laugh. Only Red could call that old jacket “finery.”
“I don’t drink beer,” Blond ringlets said tearfully. “I don’t like it.”
“‘Tis a cruel world,” replied Red, unsympathetically. “Drink it anyway, hating every mouthful, for the good it does you.” He cracked the other bottles and handed one to Moira.
She took a long pull on it, reflecting on what an odd fellow the fiddler was, now that you saw him in daylight. He was short, plump, and scruffy with a long nose and sharp, mischievous eyes. And his face was nearly as ruddy as his clothes. He always wore red and tatty clothes. A variety of them.
The blonde was—fair enough—distressed. If she’d been assaulted by that thug, it was hardly surprising, reflected Moira. She’d fainted herself, although it was something she’d have to have a word with old Red about keeping quiet. A barmaid couldn’t have stories like that getting around.
He must have carried her here, she realized. Either his hideout must have been very close or he must be inhumanly strong. And then, like a set of tumblers falling into place with that last thought, she understood.
This wasn’t a shack—it was a hollow tree. Too much iron …
It wasn’t possible. Granny O’Hara’s tales were just for kids! Red, three-foot-high fiddlers with tails and the skull of some unknown beast on the end of their blackthorn sticks who lived in hollow trees did not exist! She looked at one and spluttered as beer fizzed up her nose.
Red produced a large handkerchief from one of his capacious pockets, and handed it to her. It was vermilion with a yellow border, and was both clean and neatly folded.
“Waste o’ good beer,” he said disapprovingly. He raised an eyebrow and shook his head meaningfully. “It’s why I avoid daylight. Let’s say no more of it while we’ve got guests. Now, missy, do I have to feed you some of my poteen to get a rational explanation out of you as to why you didn’t want me to show you the route to the Curragh, but to hide you? I’m thinking yon boyfriend of yours will likely be far away by now.”
“He wasn’t my boyfriend! And even if he’s run, the others will be waiting.” She was getting through the beer quite well for someone who didn’t like it.
Moira bit her lip. If she’d somehow fallen in with Granny’s “fair folk” …
“I could use that poteen,” she announced firmly. “And your story—who is looking for you? That bunch who weren’t singing or drinking?”
Blond-ringlets nodded. “They were waiting for John. My boyfriend. He was supposed to bring the stuff. Only he didn’t show up. He’s run off with their money,” she said, bitterly.
* * *
The tale finally came out, lubricated by a few lavalike mouthfuls of clear liquid from an unlabelled bottle. It was the tale, Moira decided, of a dim bimbo and a rotten-egg boyfriend she should have left years back. He’d gotten himself into debt with a gambling syndicate. Then he’d tried to buy his way out with an offer of several kilos of coke at wholesale prices. The gambling-boss had taken the bait, provided half the money up front, and demanded a hostage as surety. The exchange was supposed to have happened in the Curragh last night.
He hadn’t shown up. And Susan—the blonde—had been taken to the woods. Her executioner had orders to rape her and kill her, to make it look like a sex crime. She’d gotten away when he tripped over a tree root, and lost him in the darkness. Then, when she’d been too exhausted to run anymore, Red had arrived on the scene.
The criminal gang knew she was alive, and that there were witnesses. Moira reckoned that blond-curls Susan should change her name to Collateral Damage.
“Why don’t you go to the police?” she suggested unhopefully.
The girl started like a frightened deer—a reaction totally out of proportion with the efficacy of the local cops. “I … I can’t do that. What am I going to tell them? They can’t protect me.”
That was true enough, Moira thought sourly. The cops around here couldn’t catch anything more dangerous than a cold, so far as she could tell. They certainly hadn’t been able to catch the creeps who’d burgled her apartment in Plett. Besides, what could Blondie tell them? She’d run away from a guy who’d planned to rape and kill her?
Evidence? Witnesses? Besides, those Manolo Blahnik stilettos showed no sign of being run in. The girl looked too much like an Elle fashion plate.
“Now, there’s no need for panic,” said Red peaceably. “Or involving these pollis-fellows. I daresay I’ll think of something. In the meanwhile, you’re safe here. No one has ever found my home, unless I let them.”
Moira stood up. “I need to get my car and some sleep. Drugs and murders are all very well, but I’ve got a job to be at and rent to pay. Can you show me how to get out of here?” She hoped she’d said it casually enough … she had owned a pair of stilettos once. She needed to talk to Red. Without an audience. There was something worrying about that blonde.
Red nodded. “I’ll take you along then. You’ll be all right here, Susan,” he said reassuringly.
It was a tree, sure enough, just as she’d thought. A huge yellowwood, hundreds of years old. The crack they stepped out of snapped shut behind them.
Moira waited until they were some distance from the tree before stopping. “There’s something wrong with her story, Red.”
He stopped too and took a deep pull on that vile old pipe of his. Whatever he was smoking, it wasn’t tobacco—or any other weed she’d ever smelled. He blew a perfect smoke ring around an early bee. “And what’s that?”
“Her shoes. No one can run in those things. Two steps and you’d kick them off. And her face. Are you telling me she didn’t even get scratched running through the undergrowth? Besides, someone who has gambled all their money away wouldn’t be buying new Manolo Blahniks for their girlfriend, now would they?”
“Ach. I thought I was smelling a tracery of magic about her. No wonder she’s carrying so much Cold Iron. A cleverly laid-on trap,” he said with admiration, and resumed walking.
“Magic? There’s no such thi …” She reconsidered. “Who are you, Red?”
He looked quizzically back at her. “Don’t you mean ‘what are you’? I’m the Faer Dhaerg. The Red Man.”
“Like a sort of leprechaun?”
He looked faintly offended. “That’s even more of an insult than ‘the Rat-boy’ those lowlifes from Leinster landed me with. I am what I am, despite the fact that children of men have given me many names.”
“So what do I call you? ‘Red’ seems wrong somehow.”
He puffed on his pipe. “You always were the one for the asking of too many questions. Rúadan Mac Parthalón was the first name I was given. I still think of myself as that. But Red’s fine by me. It’s a fair translation.”
“And what are you doing here?”
“A little drinking. A bit of fiddling. I brew some poteen once in a while.”
She stamped her foot. He grinned.
“Ach. I’m a guardsman of sorts. The door is closed, but the Seleighe Court wouldn’t be after having someone open it by accident. It leads out into Chaos Lands, and could be a powerful source of trouble. Enough magic leaks around the edges to keep me in good health. Also, it got me out of Underhill, which was not a bad thing from their point of view. And mine, I’m thinking.”
They’d arrived at the road margin and her Beetle. Leather-jacket hadn’t even bothered to close the door. Lowlife! A good thing they’d come along this early before most people were about. It was a pretty safe area, but people weren’t above a bit of petty theft from an unlocked car. True, she had her cellphone, wallet, and her tape recorder with her, in her bag. There really wasn’t much worth stealing in the brown-job.
The key was still in the ignition. In fact, it was still turned on. She swore. So were the lights. The rattletrap’s battery would be flat by now. Well, a tank of petrol and scrounging a jumpstart was better than losing her car. Still, it left her with a problem. It was five in the morning and her flat on the outskirts of Plett was a good fifteen miles away. The Curragh would be empty and locked up by now, and she couldn’t think of a friend who’d like to have a lift begged off them at five in the morning, although phoning her ex was tempting.
The red fiddler had plainly had the same thought. “I’ve a spare mattress,” he said gruffly. “And I owe you for pointing out a thing that might have tripped me up.”
“A pot of gold would do nicely,” she said, grinning.
He shook his head. “And what would I be doing with one of those, then? I said I’m not a leprechaun. I’ll stretch to breakfast and a bed. Besides, I’d not mind an extra eye on that lass.”
“She’s stuck in your tree, isn’t she?”
“Ah. And there is a temptation to leave her there. But it’s a fine old tree, and it’s not her, but what’s at the back of this that needs to be dealt with. For now I think we can harvest a few mushrooms for breakfast,” he finished cheerfully.
He showed her which ones to pick—several deadly-looking ones—and made her avoid some that just about had eat me written on them. He made a sack for the mushrooms from his shabby coat, and they walked back to his unremarkable tree.
The crack opened, and blond Susan fell out. “I couldn’t get out,” she said accusingly.
“And your foes couldn’t get in,” said her host. “We brought some breakfast.”
He cooked mushrooms and bacon—cut from a whole side with a brass-bladed knife—on a fire inside the tree. And then he made herbal tea, a different kind for each of them. Moira had to admit, it was fragrant and nasty. She quietly poured most of hers out when no one was looking.
Susan had, it appeared, recovered from her earlier fright. She was sweetness and light now, handing teas around and praising the food. By the time they’d eaten and drunk—and Moira had belatedly remembered the injunction against eating faerie food—all Moira wanted to do was sleep. Red produced another mattress and tatty patchwork quilt. And yet another. By then Moira had got her head around the fact that the tree was bigger inside than out. Or they’d shrunk.
She didn’t care. All she wanted was sleep.
Her dreams were troubled.
* * *
Ah, the challenge of it all was sweet! Rúadan had almost forgotten that. And now to rest. Full-belly humans did that well.
But someone really should warn them about eating faerie food. His mother had warned him about eating human food, after all. Some of it contained caffeine, and that would have him helpless in a dreaming trance, deeper than their brief mushroom sleep. The two women were snoring already, in a ladylike fashion. The Faer Dhaerg was reputed to send nightmares. He supposed he’d better live up to some of his bad reputation or next thing he’d have women taking advantage of him.
He did that, not that there was any real need, after what they’d eaten, and did a few other little things, before settling down to relax himself.
* * *
Moira dreamed of spiders. It was not that she was afraid of them. More like mortally terrified, but never going to admit it in public. But in your dreams, when the spider has you cocooned—maybe you could scream. Only she couldn’t, and she wanted to really badly. She opened her eyes and tried to sit up, and found she wasn’t going to be able to do that, either.
She was in a cocoon of sorts, wrapped up in Red’s patchwork quilt. And by the looks of it, someone had made sure that she wasn’t going to accidentally get out, by wrapping it with parachute cord. She had a gag in her mouth, too—by the taste of beer, it was Red’s large handkerchief.
Why had the faerie done this? She’d trusted him. And then Moira realized she’d been blaming the wrong person.
Susan was leaning over another cocoon, tied with, by the looks of it, a lot of thin wire. There was a metal collar around Red’s neck—recognizably made from Susan’s broad bracelets. What looked like a dog chain attached to it was looped around her wrist. In her other hand she had a small walkie-talkie. “You’ve got to be able to find it. I’ve given you the GPS position.”
“We’re within fifteen square meters of you,” said a male voice. “Trouble is there are a lot of trees in this area.”
”Cut them down. Get me out of here.”
“Are you crazy, Susan? These trees are big. This is the forestry reserve. The sound of a chainsaw around here and we’d have forestry officers down on us. We’ll try knocking on the trees. If that doesn’t work then you’ll just have to wake him up.”
”No chance. Rennilt said that that amount of caffeine would put him out for about a week. Call him.”
“He said not to until we were absolutely sure that the Faer Dhaerg was secure.”
”He’s wrapped in baling wire, I’ve got the iron collar around his neck, and the chain in my hand. And I’ve got him doped. How much more secure does the elf need him, for goodness’ sake?”
“He’s dangerous.”
”So am I when I get angry. Maybe I need to try shooting holes in this tree.”
“You’d probably hit one of us. I’ll call the master.”
Moira kept her eyes nearly closed, and struggled with her bonds, trying not to make it obvious. If she got out of them, she was going to kill that blond fraud. First, for what she’d done to Red, who’d done his best to help her. And second, for what she was busy with now—emptying out Moira’s bag and sneering at the contents, Red’s chain looped around her wrist.
As the knot on her wrists gave up the unequal struggle, the blonde looked at her. Red gave a groan, drawing Susan’s attention away.
“You can’t be awake!” she protested.
“I wish that I was not,” said Red.
As he said it, Moira noticed something distinctly odd. She didn’t know why but it caught her attention. His fiddle-case was no longer hanging on its peg. In fact she couldn’t see it anywhere. Then she saw the blonde kick him, hard. “Tell me how to open this dump, you little elf-scumbag!”
“Arrah. Just tell the tree to open,” he said, and it did.
Blinking in the sudden brightness, Moira saw a group of some seven or eight people knocking on trees. By the looks of things, it was late afternoon. The shadows were already long. She recognized some of the people from the nearly dry party of last night.
“We’re here!” Susan called. “Help me carry him out.”
They came running—including, Moira noted through slitted eyes, the car thief. He’d gotten fresh clothes on, but it hadn’t done much for his face. He hauled off and kicked Red.
Despite herself, Moira grunted a protest. “Who is this?” demanded the kicker, pointing at her.
“Some barmaid. Friend of his.” The blonde looked curiously at Moira. “I didn’t think she’d be awake yet, either. I put enough tranquillizer in her tea for a horse.”
The car thief looked carefully at Moira. “I owe you for a kick in the balls,” he said, savagely. “And for having a crappy little car with no petrol in it. I’m going to enjoy this.”
Moira heard the sound of horse hooves, coming closer. Somehow, she knew it wasn’t going to be the Seventh Cavalry to the rescue, by the eager way this nasty bunch had turned to look.
