Someone at the foot of the bed started checking in on Lary. Judging by the sighs and moans reaching me from over there, he was fast asleep.
“Hey you, sleepyhead. Wake up, you owe us a penalty story.”
Lary yawned broadly, like a tiger. There was a pause.
“There was this pretty girl who once got run over by a train . . . ,” a husky and desperate voice finally said.
“Right, shut up. Go back to sleep.”
Lary snorted contentedly, crashed back wherever it was they had just excavated him from, and began snoring immediately. I laughed. My shirt was clinging wetly where I’d spilled the liquor. The boombox stared at me with its red eye.
. . . when Hairy needs to hear something she makes a hole in the wall, and when she needs to see she sends her rats to see for her. She is born of the foundation, and she is alive while the house is still standing. The older the house, the bigger and wiser its Hairy. For those she likes, she makes her domain benevolent and gentle, and for the others—the other way around. In the ancient times, people used to call her spiritus familiaris and made offerings to her. They hoped she would protect them from dark influence and the evil eye . . .
I wondered whose story that was. I couldn’t make out the voice. I even suspected that they’d switched off the lights specifically to confuse me. And that they were now telling these tales in resonant, disguised voices for the very same reason.
. . . because ever since the time that the knight nailed the two-headed skull up in the Grand Hall, he was beset by the dragon’s curse. The eldest sons in his line were born two-headed. Some said differently. That it wasn’t the knight who came out victorious in that long-forgotten battle, but the dragon, and that it was the lizard who lived in the castle now in the guise of a human, and that for this very reason he never allowed anything bad to be spoken about his two-headed progeny, but instead loved them more than all others . . .
The cry of the midwife toad is terrible and can be heard from far away. If you didn’t know beforehand, it would be impossible to believe that it is just a toad crying. It buries its eggs in wet leaves and shovels earth on top of them. You can find them wherever it is the dampest, by the roots of the oldest trees. When the little basilisk is about to hatch, the shell starts to smolder. You should never pour water on it or otherwise try to extinguish the fire, as it’s a very bad omen. It must be allowed to extinguish itself. The black slivers that remain can bring luck if sewn into leather or suede and worn constantly . . .
“I wouldn’t mind getting some of that shell,” I said, trying to chase away sleep. “Anybody here got any? Are there any basilisk hunters around?”
Everyone laughed.
“Or a two-headed dragon skull for you, maybe?” Tabaqui said indignantly. “That little nipper doesn’t miss a beat!”
“No. No skull, I don’t want to fall prey to a curse,” I said.
“But a bit of free luck would not be amiss?” the mysterious basilisk expert said.
“It’s luck, how could it be?” I said.
“Have it, then. But remember: you carry a part of the Forest with you now. May your desires be pure.”
Someone’s hand brushed my hair. I lifted my head and a pouch on a string slid down my neck.
All around me people rumbled indignantly, disapproving of my sudden fortune.
“Outrageous!” Tabaqui shouted.
Something bumped against the back of my head. It was small but expertly tossed. A quarter of an apple, as it turned out.
“I’ve been living here for ages, constantly at everyone’s pleasure, entertaining day and night. I’ve become all frayed and withered, and not a single wretched creature in this place has ever offered me to try on a piece of basilisk eggshell! This is the gratitude for all my pains, for years and years of misery,” Tabaqui ranted.
“I don’t think you’ve ever asked,” the former owner of the amulet said gently.
The voice made me shiver slightly, and that’s how I knew it was Blind. Even though the voice was not entirely his.
“Horse pucky!” Tabaqui exploded. “Are you saying respect must be begged and wheedled now? Justice! Where’s justice, I ask you?”
He was either really very deeply upset, or he was playing it up brilliantly. Either way, I felt uneasy.
“Would you like to have it for a while?” I said and reached for the string.
“No way!” he squeaked. “An amulet belonging to someone else? You’re off your rocker, dearest! Better a cursed dragon tailbone!”
“Speaking of dragons,” Sphinx interjected. “We got distracted. So what about those, the two-headed ones?”
“Nothing.” A lighter clicked and I saw it was Noble lighting up. “I am the last son in the whole stupid lineage. One-headed, as you can see. We’re freaking extinct, and I’m certainly not complaining.”
The ending of this story caught me a little off guard. I laughed.
“Cool. So was this a curse or the dragon himself?” I said.
The burning cigarette end zigzagged in the air.
“I’ve no idea. I only know the tale, and that we have a two-headed lizard on our coat of arms, with a supremely idiotic expression on both of its mugs,” Noble said.
“You’ve got a coat of arms?” I said.
“It’s on every handkerchief and every sock,” Noble admitted with disgust. “I keep trying to lose them everywhere and they keep coming back. Would you like a sock or ten? I’ll throw in a free lighter as well. And let’s talk about something else, all right? Like what happens to those poor idiots floating in the river?”
“Who knows?” Sphinx said. “They float. Maybe they wash ashore somewhere. Or maybe the Moon really takes them. It’s not about them, it’s about the water in the river.”
“Moon River!” Tabaqui exclaimed. “I knew it! I knew this was about the dear old concoction!”
I recalled the beginning of that story: Those who manage to drink the water turn into fools. I was just about to ask how come Noble didn’t turn into one when I felt his hand squeezing my elbow as a mute warning. An impossible trick, to move so quickly over a bed full of people. I was curious if he managed to shut up Jackal as well. Or did Tabaqui decide on his own to shut up? I definitely wasn’t going to ask that.
“How about we open the windows?” someone suggested. “It’s getting stuffy.”
The other end of the bed developed some movement, there were yawns and cigarettes being lit.
“And some more water. We ran out.”
“Let Smoker go get some. He’s not speaking anyway.”
“He won’t make it.”
“I’ll go,” someone suggested, jumping off the bed. “Give me the bottles.”
I heard bottles clinking. I grappled for the one sticking in my side, passed it over, and felt that I could breathe freely again. Turned out it had been making me really miserable all this time.
“Humpback, sing the one about the purple ghost. That’s a beautiful song.”
“I’m not in the mood. I’ll sing the one about being caught in the act,” Humpback said.
Someone jostled me and made me spill the wine again.
Please don’t hurt me, I’m a little old rat,
just a little old rat, I swear!
Only this piece of old yellow cheese,
and that’s the full extent of my sins,
I swear to you, yes, I swear!
“Wicked,” someone whispered and giggled softly.
Only a burrow, two runs in it,
my bedroom is at the very end.
There are four of us hiding inside,
I’m the oldest, Death will come for me soon.
Please, please, don’t hurt me tonight,
let me return, return to my hole!