"Just a friend of mine." I stepped forward. "We're all from out of town, you see."
Klout swung around, staring at me wildly. "You! Who are you?"
"Just travelers." I worked at being way too casual about it.
"Stopped at the tavern for lunch, but it seems they've gone out of business - no food to sell. So I got interested in the situation. Think I'd like to check on the details."
"The queen has sent you!" Klout cried.
"I never said any such thing!" But I wasn't about to stop him if he wanted to believe it. "I would like to see your books."
"Books?" Klout turned ashen, and a murmur of gratification went through the crowd.
"Your ledgers, your accounts! So we can all see whether or not the village has paid the tax due! Come on, trot them out!"
"You have no authority to demand this!" Klout said. Gruesome stepped up beside me, grumbling with his mouth and rumbling in his stomach.
"Just an interested bystander," I agreed. "Call me a visiting magician, asking for a professional courtesy."
Klout took another glance at Gruesome and didn't seem disposed to dispute my claim. He only turned a lighter shade of ashen and snapped to one of the soldiers, "The ledger!"
"Cook the books!" I whispered at Frisson. He stared at me as if I'd gone crazy. "What, Master Saul?"
"Give me a verse to make his accounts show he's lying! Quick!" Frisson formed an O with his lips and turned away, pulling out his charcoal pencil and a scrap of parchment.
The soldiers were collecting their nerves and themselves, pulling together into a knot in front of Gruesome, who grinned and licked his chops. The soldiers faltered, and the ones standing guard at the back and sides of the crowd began to pull together into clumps. That left some unguarded peasants, who began to sneak away between the huts.
The soldier brought the book from a saddlebag and set it in Klout's hands. He opened it and held it out before me. "There! You shall see every penny that each of these villagers has paid, and shall see that each has rendered no more than the levy set for him!" Beside me, Frisson was muttering.
I paged backward, frowning. "Where does your tenure in this office begin?"
"On page thirty-one," he said.
I found it, and saw the change of handwriting - but I also saw the handwriting change. Nothing obvious, just a few Roman numerals transforming, two Is close together turning into Vs, two Vs merging into an X, and so on.
Now, I'm not exactly skilled at Roman numerals, so it took me awhile to puzzle it out. It certainly turned out to be cumbersome - I had never realized what a blessing the Arabs had given us when they invented the zero, and the decimal system that went with it. Doubleentry bookkeeping would have helped, too - this was just a list of figures, and I began to appreciate the layout of the checkbook I never kept up.
I took my time turning the pages, checking out all three of the years Klout had been in office, and he began to get nervous - I could tell by his fidgeting, while the crowd eroded at the edges. Finally, he snapped, "Will you study it all day?"
"No," I said. "I'm up to date. Each person in the village has paid more than he owed, by anywhere from one penny to ten - and the extra more than covers the town tax."
He stared, then whipped the book around and started doing his sums. His eyes grew wider and wider as he paged backward through the book, growing more and more frantic.
"In fact," I said, "it looks as if you owe the village some money."
"Witchcraft!" he bawled, and hurled the book away from him, "Liar and thief! I know what I wrote there!"
I was sure he did - always less than the person had really paid. I looked up at Frisson. "You saw the figures?"
"Well enough," Frisson agreed nervously.
"Do those figures show anything more than any of the peasants really paid?"
"Not a penny," he assured me, and he sounded much more certain about it.
" 'Twas the foulest of magics!" Klout was turning hysterical.
"Vile twisting of ink stains and marks! You cannot come from the queen, or you would not seek to make taxes less!
Any peasants who hadn't taken to the tall timber were tiptoeing away now. The soldiers let them go, gripping their weapons tightly and edging around to surround Gruesome, with Gilbert, Frisson, and me around him.
"Smite them!" Klout pointed at us. "The queen shall not shield them, but my magic shall shield you!"
I pulled out my sheaf of Frisson's verses.
The soldiers roared with delight and pounced.
Gilbert knocked aside a sword and sheared through the leather jerkin behind it in one blow. The soldier screamed and fell back, as Gruesome reached over the squire's head and picked up another soldier in each hand. They screamed and struck at him with their halberds, but he only laughed as the steel glanced off his hide. Then he squeezed, and the men screamed even louder. Gruesome threw them away and reached for two more.
Klout shouted something in the Old Tongue, pointing at Gruesome with both forefingers. Gruesome froze. So did Gilbert, in midswing - for a split second, just long enough for me to yell out,
The soldiers roared with vindictive rage and swung, but Gilbert came alive again, parrying two cuts with one swing, then chopping back to shear through two halberd handles. Gruesome came alive, snatching up soldiers and hurling them, Their mates yelped and leapt back.
Klout turned purple. He pointed at me and screamed,
They did. They really did.
Like a fool, I was holding the book again, open-and I saw the Roman numerals pry themselves off the page. That was enough; I threw it away with a shout, but the Xs and Vs were arrowing through the air to stab at me, and the Ls and Cs were growing diminutive jaws and biting. Sharp little pains shot through my skin, none more than all over my face, my arms, a mild nuisance by itself-but they were and my hands! I had never been so glad that I wore denim and boots!
I flailed at them, trying to swat them, and shouted, "Frisson! Take over! Don't worry about me, just knock out the soldiers!" Frisson stared, taken aback, then shook himself and yanked the sheaf of poems out of my pocket.
Fortunately, Gruesome and Gilbert were keeping the troops too busy for them to take advantage of my being out of the action. The troll gathered up two more soldiers in each hand, knocked their heads together, and threw them at the five who were charging him. They went down in a tangle of steel and limbs, and Gruesome waded in, stony talons stabbing.
Klout wasn't idle, though. He was making mystic passes and chanting in the Old Tongue.
Frisson flipped frantically through the sheaf of poems, found the one he wanted, and chanted.
The numbers froze in midair, then turned and arrowed toward Klout and his soldiers.
"Flee!" the lead soldier bellowed, and suddenly the remaining soldiers were scrambling to their feet and running in panic. Gruesome yodeled with joy and ran after them.
They looked back, saw him, yelped, and ran faster. They pulled away - they were much quicker than he was - but he kept it up for a while, having fun, shouting and blubbering and chortling like a whole chorus of haunts.