Free Dreamlands by Scott Jäeger Page B

unmoving, his skin
already turning a sickly grey.  I plucked the spines from his skin with a scrap
of cloth.  They were not barbed and came easily, but the punctures bubbled, and
when I squeezed his bicep the blood was viscous with poison.
    I
was able to carry the man myself as far as the Asphodel, where I enlisted Erik’s
help.  Lurching down the street with our burden, I was nonplussed to see a boy
loitering in the entrance of my hostel, tugging at a prostitute’s skirts.  As
we reached the door, I recognized the smaller of the two as the dwarf who
lodged in the same building.  I did not know much about him, save that he
harboured a special envy for my pearl-handled dagger.  The girl wandered off to
ply her trade elsewhere, and he grumbled,
    “Your
friend’s having a rough night.”
    “He
may have gone a little too far, but morning will see him right.”  I assessed
the steep stair before us, and thinking to put an end to the conversation
asked, “Care to lend us a hand?”
    He
did not.
    Even
with Erik’s assistance, shifting the black man to my third floor room was a
feat of both strength and logistics, but at last we laid him out on my cot,
propping his dangling feet on the chair.  The dwarf followed, standing in the
door to watch us.
    “Ye
know there’s no guests allowed up here,” he said, rolling his eyes at the figure
on the bed, which by that time looked more like a corpse than someone needing a
flop.
    I
leaned forward to listen at the slack mouth.  He still breathed, but shallowly,
in fits and starts. 
    “Probably
owed the wrong people money,” Erik suggested, pretending to study the black
man’s staff while watching my neighbour, who was muttering into his beard.
    “No,”
I replied.  “I don’t think that was it.”
    “Given
any thought to selling us that pretty knife, have ye?” the dwarf asked.
    I ignored
him.  I was more concerned about the nature of the barbs I had plucked from the
fighter’s arm than the reason for the attack, but my mind was flitting about
like a hummingbird, and I couldn’t settle on a course of action.
    “I’ve
got coin right now.”  Black-beard’s pouch vouchsafed him with a musical
jingle.  “Had a good run in the gambling house.”
    “I’ve
told you a dozen times I’ve no interest in selling it,” I said, marching
towards him.  “Now get out, or you’ll get a closer look at my dagger than you’d
like.”
    Rather
than retreat to the hall, the dwarf stepped inside the door, and we engaged in
a slow and awkward tussle.  I planted my hand on his chest, but may as well
have been pushing a brick tower, while the oaf clumsily shoved his money pouch
between us.  When I felt him pawing at my sheath, I rocked back and boxed him
one on the ear.  At this the dwarf shifted to a fighting stance, and began to
call out a sailor’s encyclopaedia of curses, and fondled the wickedly sharp hand
axe at his belt.
    We
were an instant from coming to blows when the screech of the bō’s iron tip
on the floor cut his tirade short.  Erik straightened from where he leaned casually
on the fallen man’s staff and smiled.  The dwarf eyed him murderously but, as
he wasn’t ready to tangle with us both, satisfied himself with kicking the rope-hinged
door on his way out.  It swayed drunkenly behind him.
    “He
doesn’t look the forgiving sort,” Erik observed.
    “I’ve
enough problems right now without him skulking around.”
    “Keep
a watch here," Erik said, shaking his head at the whole situation.  "I’ll
see if I can scout out a healer.”
    It
was daylight when he returned with a ginger-smelling poultice.  This concoction
made the worst of the swelling fade, and the fighter’s coma changed to agitated
tossing and turning.  When we were able to fetch the local sawbones to wash and
dress the puncture wounds, he declared the raging fever to be a positive sign. 
I was instructed to give the patient water whenever feasible, but could do little
else but