Chapter 2: Sparrow Got Bit By A Gypo
My prior life as a handyman went largely unrewarded, and while I lived like a king in comparison to my current conditions, my skills with hammer and trowel meant my sister and I lived enviable lives by street people standards. The pair of us bustled about our back alley fiefdom preparing breakfast. Rose pulled out four rolls of bread heavy with grains and seeds from a brick oven I built out of a few sacks of mortar and the bricks from a nearby screen wall a drunk rammed a barrel laden cart through. Poor guy actually died, but he lived on in our hearts and minds and in the barrels of salt pork I managed to haul away before the rest of the neighborhood descended on his wares.
While that sweet preserved meat is long gone, I still contributed to this meal six fried eggs from my coop and a wedge of hard cheese. That my mittens had a few feathers stuck in the knuckles this morning is between me and my dickhead rooster. He didn't even object to me devouring his offspring, the cock is just a territorial animal. I might feed him to Dogmeat before we split, but that feels a tad too ungrateful. My loyal hound usually eats the boiled meat of whatever vermin we manage to slay each day, a meal fit for human consumption, but God awful gross. Wiping up the last of the yolk and butter with our bread, I broke the peace of the day with the bad news.
"I murdered Arfur last night. We need to leave town before anyone finds out."
Like many here in Albion, Rose possessed an expressiveness uncommon in my prior life. Almost cartoonish. As such I observed her experience several powerful emotional phases before she settled on a mix of anxious, afraid, mildly angry, and regret.
"Why?" she hissed.
"I have lots of good reasons to gut that bastard." I shrugged, "I'd like to think I was just being petty."
"Why, Sparrow?" she teared up, not enjoying my own good humor about the situation, "Why would you do something that could ruin everything we have right now?"
"Why can matter later, Rose." I stood up and grabbed one of our wool bags off the wall, "Right now we need to pack up and run."
"Maybe they won't know you did it?" Rose sobbed as I began tightly rolling up my spare clothing and stuffing them into my bag, "Maybe we don't have to go anywhere? Did anyone see you do it? Lots of people hate Arfur."
"Yeah, and a lot of people like us, but dead bodies tend to shift who people like and don't like fast, and while a lot of people hate Arfur, you and I are the people he's been messing with recently. Better they suspect I did it and be far away than stick around and be here for 'questioning'." law enforcement in Bowerstone may be on the ups if Derek manages to rise up to become sheriff, but even with a good man like that in charge, justice in this world is a swift and callous affair, and circumstantial evidence is often 'good enough' when condemning suspects to interrogation with methods anyone would confess to stop.
Children not exempt.
"No." Rose helplessly denied the situation.
"Listen, we pack up and make a big noise about how we're going down to Bower Lake to stay with the gypos, then we quietly head out north to Rookridge." I told her as I continued packing supplies.
"Rookridge?" she scoffed, "Why would we go to Rookridge? The road that way is more dangerous."
"More money in Rookridge." I told her, "We go to Bower Lake and all we have is the hope that whoever is down there this winter takes pity on us and has enough to share. I hear things are rough in Rookridge, but they'll put anyone to work there."
"Great, more work." Rose huffed and got with the program.
"Mhm, and mining is rough on clothes. An apprentice seamstress will probably have more demand than her fingers can take." I offered some small condolence and finished my packing.
My sister may lack the presence and potency I have as the Fourth Hero, but she figured out over the years how to utilize the people influencing aspect of our bloodline watching me work. It only took a week or so for her to wheedle her way into someone's good graces, and so she often embedded herself with the tradesmen and women of Old Town, learning their skills for herself, the longest of these relationships being with the local seamstresses and resulted in our warm outfits this winter.
While I kept my daggers hidden beneath my coat, I hung my steel hatchet and leather sling openly along with two belt bags of lead shot. Depending on how much cord and wind up I use, I can break the sound barrier with my sling and pull that off twenty or so times a minute, striking with the supernatural Accuracy of a Skill Hero. Predator, monster, or outlaw, I feel secure in my ability to defend Rose and myself from most threats, but trouble usually comes in groups in Albion. Despite the danger out there, it's safer for us to run, and so we must.
Rose and I paid our cozy hut one final parting look before we made our way into the back alleys of Old Town with the sound of a bustling crowd ahead of us. Ironically, the lack of my foe's red and white robe filled me with more dread than the sight of her. The blind seeress is out there, reacting to me, looking for the right angle and hook to land me on her line.
Murgo the Trader descendant of Murgo the Trader and his mobile Mystic Emporium gathered a fairly cynical crowd from the NPCs of the neighborhood, but a fool is born every minute and the tubby man in the burgundy outfit made his living separating them from their coin five gold at a time. Rather than listen to his spiel I started pushing people out of our way and my sister followed in my wake, the bodies not packed so tightly as to stop us from leaving.
Nearby I saw the guardsman, Derek - a man built like a pile of bricks - as five slips of parchment blew out of his hand in the cold wind, today a bad day for a butter fingers. With a snap of my fingers Dogmeat's tricolored form ran after them as they were sucked into one of the various backstreets. A few moments later the hound returned with them crumpled in his muzzle and upon inspection I deemed them still readable.
"Keep a tighter grip on something this valuable to the community, Derek." I chided the gob smacked guard.
"Ah, yes. Sorry about that, Sparrow." Derek lips upturned in a conciliatory smile, "You and that hound of yours are a true friend of the law, and I won't forget that. Hmmm…" he sounded as he considered our bags, "Going somewhere?"
I nodded, "Aye, got bit by a gypo. Now I've gotta leave town before I turn. My sister is kind enough to make the journey to their camp with me, and live among them despite the risk of being bitten and turned herself."
"A gypo you say? Didn't know that is how they come about." Derek nodded solemnly, "If I catch you round here stealing stuff in the future, I'll try to let you down with a soft sentence for old time's sake."
"Thanks, Derek." I faked a tear in my eye and shook his hand, "It's nice to know that people won't forget the boy I am now, even when I become a gypo."
"Aye, you've been nothing but a fine upstanding citizen, young Sparrow, and your sister is a saint going with you to live among those folk. Fare well children."
Derek went off to continue his search for the five most notorious criminals in Old Town while Rose and I went the other way.
"Bit by a gypo? For real, that worked?" Rose snarked as we moved on to another small crowd gathered gawking at an early model camera on a tripod.
"Ever been in a fight with one, Rose? They're quick to bite." I shrugged and continued our trip to the North Gate.
"Yeah, but the part about turning into one. I didn't know Derek was that gullible." Rose continued and I stopped and looked at her funny.
"How do you think gypos come about?" I questioned rhetorically and led us up to Barnum, another of the more gullible examples of the population, but a good sort just like the guardsman.
As Rose contemplated whether gypos are like balverines or not, I convinced Barnum to pay us a gold coin to model for his his new picture taking business despite wanting to strangle the well meaning man as he butchered the English language with the help of a thesaurus he bought from the conman for five gold. One double bicep later we left while jeering laughter broke out when Barnum announced we only needed to wait three months for the picture to 'develify'.
Poor Barnum. I believe in you, mate.
We'd made it nearly to the stone staircase that leads down to the North Gate and the Cemetery Road, when a man ducked his head over the wall on the level above us and shouted, "Oh thank the gods, it's you!"
"Keep it down, Balthazar!" I shouted back and the man's face filled with panic.
"Help, please!" he called down more quietly and the pair of us had to backtrack a bit to climb the stairs up to his warehouse.
"Sparrow!" he hissed, "Giant beetles have gotten into my warehouse!"
I crossed my arms over my chest and smirked, "Last I heard, we were done doing business together."
"I was wrong to doubt you, Sparrow." the man pleaded, "Truly wrong, and now I've seen the light. Please help."
"Double." I made my offer.
"Done." the lanky man quickly agreed.
"And you let us leave through the back of the warehouse." I continued.
"Done!" he quickly interjected again.
"And you tell anyone who asks that you saw us leaving on the road to the marketplace." I finished.
"Whatever, just get in there before they ruin any of my stock!" Balthazar screamed and wrung his apron.
"This won't take long." I told my sister and unfastened my sling.
Balthazar operated a two level warehouse used by merchants taking goods to and from the mining town, Rookridge. Lots of finished textiles that giant beetles can chew threw in seconds, wooden handles for tools they can knaw on. Quite the economic disaster for our excitable manager. Though only mildly dangerous to adults, giant beetles are monstrous in appearance and evolved to spit acid in the last six hundred years. They scared the warehouse owner half to death. I find them delightful boiled and dipped in garlic butter. The lobster of the land.
My twisted leather sling came to hand with a lead load nestled at its apex, and after following the awful buzzing the beetles use to communicate the first shot whipped out with a rotation of my wrist, elbow, and shoulder. I didn't need to put a real crack into it, not for this prey, and still the shell exploded on contact and the head of the little beasty vanished in an explosion of yellow gore. Its nearby kin increased the volume of their chittering in their agitation and sought to find the murderer for vengeance. I killed another before the remaining three triangulated my location and began building up acidic pink globules in their mandibles for launching.
I simply sidestepped the slow moving projectiles and launched another lead shot. Perhaps six hundred years from now the beetles will evolve a more powerful throwing system. Till then, they are a lucrative and delectable prey. My sling loosed once more before I needed to take the next step of the dance, and a final high speed launch sighed 'The End' on this brief hunt. With a bit of cord I gathered up the hefty bodies for Balthazar's confirmation and my dinner.
I charged a fifth for a beetle, meaning Balthy owed me two gold coins at double the rate, and though we could eat for a week on five, we'd be eating only porridge for that week, and usually Rose and I ate two coins a day at least. Sometimes more, making us very well fed street kids.
The man shuddered at the sight of the giant bugs, death not removing their terror from him, and paid his dues before jabbing leading us through the labyrinth of crates and barrels to the back entrance. He jabbed a big iron key into the rusty lock on the wood and iron backdoor, the system creaking loudly. Behind the door was a small dark alley, smaller and darker than the noticeably small and dark streets of Old Town, one often used by smugglers breaking off from merchant caravans entering the city hiding their contraband under coats and cloaks.
Balthazar did brisk business with these types, hence the rusty lock and door hinges to sound loudly incase someone stops by to surprise him. The door groaned as it slammed back into place behind us, and Rose and I waited in that dingy damp alley until a horse drawn cart came through the gate. While it drew eyes, I led us out creeping quietly under the window to the gatehouse after which we power walked onto the North Road.
Once a goodly distance from the city gate I took a deep breath, hoping that going to all this trouble was more than just chasing the wind. I waved Rose to come walk alongside me and announced, "Hard part is over. Just sixty seven miles of winding windy hilly road between us and our new home."
"That's the spirit, Sparrow." Rose responded, "Don't even think about all the hobbes, bandits, and other nasties too."
"I believe those are called speed bumps, sis." I gave her a 'rakish' smile.
Nervous eight year olds don't pull off rakish very well, but Rose was kind enough to smile back at me.
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