The boy went pale and crept closer to his mother, who laughed and ran her fingers through his hair. Rodario fired off another batch of flames against a darkening sky which was indicating the approach of a spring storm. A few thunderclaps and some lightning would not harm the atmosphere in the great marquee one little bit. “Listen! The first twenty spectators to arrive will receive a free cup of wine, and also a glass jar with a breath of eoil fog. Watch it and wonder! But never dare to remove the cork, else otherwise…” He left the threat hanging unspoken in the air, and restricted himself to displaying a mysterious warning expression.
His brown-eyed gaze swept over the throng, who were hanging on his every word. As always, he had been able to win over the crowd by a mixture of personal charm and free offers. In every place he visited he would look around for a familiar face; but as always in these last five cycles that face was still missing.
Finally he noticed a beautiful woman in the second row watching him. This cheered his mood considerably and combatted his disappointment.
She looked to be about twenty, tall and attractive. Everything was in the right place for a woman, though a little more substance in the decollete would not have come amiss. She wore her long blond hair down; her face was narrow and full of expression; her green eyes were following him intently. He would have judged her to be of noble birth, had she not been so simply attired and had it not been for the laundry bundle in her arms.
Her visage showed a strange longing; it was less a matter of desire for himself as a man, more a question of sharp interest in what he was doing. Rodario was well acquainted with this effect. He had stood at the doors of a theater four cycles earlier with the same expression on his face, with no other thought in his mind than the need to appear on stage. And he had achieved his dream.
He took it as a sign from the gods. Following his instincts, he jumped down from the fountain edge and landed directly in front of her. Then he made her a deep bow and, thanks to amazing dexterity and meticulous preparation, conjured up a black paper flower as if from nowhere.
“Bring this flower this evening and you shall see the show for free,” he told her with a smile, raising one eyebrow and treating her to his famous stare no female yet had been able to withstand. “Tell me your name, my Storm Valley beauty.”
After a moment’s hesitation she accepted the paper flower. Then a young man pushed his way through in front of her, tore the gift from her hand and trampled it underfoot. “Keep your flattery to yourself,” he threatened.
“Sir, it is not courteous to interrupt the entertainment in this way,” Rodario responded smoothly.
“It’s not entertainment, you clown! You were flirting with my wife,” the man retorted angrily, shoving his balled fist into Rodario’s face. “Try that again and it’ll be a black eye you get, and not a black paper flower.”
“No?” Rodario bent forward swiftly, pretending to pull something out of the young man’s ear. To the delight of the watching crowd he extracted a second paper flower. “You see? You already had one.” He handed the flower to the young woman. “Here, madam, with your husband’s compliments. He is a lucky man to have such flowers growing in his head. It must be the futility, I mean the fertility, of his earwax that does it, methinks.”
Furiously the man snatched at the flower before his wife could grasp the stem. He hurled it into the dirt. “Enough!” he shouted. “You will pay for this!”
Rodario even pretended to extract something out of the man’s open mouth. He waved a coin in the air. “But why? You are so rich already. There is gold in your gullet.”
Now the crowd was laughing heartily at the performance: they shouted and whistled. The young man was the focus of their ridicule. For his honor’s sake he had to put a stop to this mockery.
“I’ll stick the money in your powdered arse,” he yelled, attacking.
Rodario avoided the wild blow and poked his walking cane neatly between the young man’s legs, bringing him down against the wall of the fountain. His own momentum swept the man into the water. Children roared with laughter and applauded, and all the grown-ups were joining in the fun by now.
Spluttering, the victim stood up and shook himself. Rodario helpfully held out his cane.
“Out you come now and let us forget our little quarrel,” he offered. “I’ll stand you a drink; what do you say?”
The humiliated husband wiped the water out of his eyes. He did not look any happier. Uttering a loud cry he launched himself at the showman, who again proved the niftier on his feet.
The man landed in the dust, which immediately caked his wet clothing. He clenched his fists, his fingers scrabbling in the dirt. “Wait, I’ll kill you, you jumped-up…”
Rodario bent down and fiddled behind the man’s ear, producing another flower. “See, the water has made the seeds sprout.” The crowd rocked with laughter and Rodario tossed the third flower to the pretty young wife. “Now that’s enough, my good man.” He stood up straight. “I don’t want you getting hurt just because you lost your temper.”
Enraged, the man got to his feet, wiped his filthy face and stomped off; his wet shoes squelched and leaked as he walked away. As he went past he grabbed his wife by the wrist and pulled her away.
The unhappy glance she gave Rodario was the loudest silent cry for help he had ever witnessed. The gap in the crowd closed up again after them, and the showman lost sight of the couple.
“There, you see what happens if you cross a hero,” he triumphed, grinning. He bowed. “Come to the show this evening and let me enchant you all. Until then, fare you well.” Like the noblest of courtiers, he whirled his hat around and indicated with a motion of the shoulder that the performance, for now, was over.
The audience applauded again and returned to their market-day tasks.
Rodario grinned at his herald. “Well cried, cryer. Do a couple more rounds through the back streets and make lots of noise. Let’s make sure the whole world knows who’s in Storm Valley tonight.”
His man returned the grin: “After a session like that word will get around faster than a fart in the wind.”
“Not a happy choice of simile, but accurate enough in the circumstances,” said Rodario as he went over to a market stall selling wine. He got himself a beaker, tasted it and nodded. “Exquisite little drop. Worthy of an emperor. Send me a barrel of this to the road that leads south out of here. That’s where we’ve put up our tents,” he told the wine merchant, handing him a heap of Bruron’s coins. “Will that cover it?”
“Of course, sir,” The man bent over the money to count it. With these show folk you could never quite be sure. He even took the trouble to scratch at the surface of one of the coins with a knife to check whether perhaps it was merely lead coated with silver. Satisfied, he shoveled the money into his pocket.
Rodario grinned, leaning back against the makeshift bar-a plank balanced on two wine barrels. “Don’t you trust me?”
“No,” replied the vintner in a friendly enough manner. “You wanted to try the wine before you ordered the barrel, didn’t you?” He filled Rodario’s beaker again. “There, that cup and the next for free as a bonus.”