Locke Lockhart’s Lamentable Legwork, Part 2: Loathsome Leeches
Locke trudges through the fungal swamps of Bugsby’s Marshes, cursing the string of poor decisions that led him to this wretched place. Scarcely an hour out on the fringes of London and his trousers are soaked through, his borrowed wellington boots filled to the brim with fetid water. His passenger, the accursed Ninefold Cat, squirms irritably in his rucksack.
“You sure this is the right way, cat?”
“How should I know?” The Cat scrabbles his way up Locke’s back to rest his paws on the man’s shoulder. Locke winces at the claws digging into him. “You’re supposed to be the expert tracker, Mister Lockhart. I can’t see a thing from your rucksack.”
“Tracking a single bloody tramp through a swamp is easier said than done, even for a fearless monster-hunter like yours truly,” says Locke. He stops on a muddy island rising from the ankle-deep water and surveys the landscape. The cat peers over his shoulder. Bugsby’s Marshes stretch before them, the muddy landscape shrouded in rolling mist. Ahead is a thick copse of tree-sized grey mushrooms enclosed on both sides by rocky cliffs. The wide fungal caps obscure the marsh ahead in gloom. An ideal place for an ambush, if you’re feeling paranoid.
Before moving on, Locke tries to get the worst of the mud and water out of his clothes, shaking like a wet dog. The Ninefold Cat hisses and clings onto his rucksack as he bends over to extract the fat leeches stuck to his thigh, tossing them into the reeds.
“If I didn’t know better,” says Locke, “I’d think you sent me out here just to get soaked. If this tramp is working for the Shade, what’s he doing out in the arse-end of nowhere? Nothing here but mushrooms and marsh-wolves.
“Bloke down at the Bomb With Two Necks said he caught a blemmigan in Bugsby’s Marshes once, but when he showed us it was just a sorrow-spider with a mushroom glued to its back. That’s how One-Eyed Phil got his name, you know. The bugger would have done for me too – no weapons allowed in that joint for health and safety reasons – but I had a knife in my boot for just such an occasion.” He mimes throwing a knife.
The Cat gives him a desultory scratch on the back with one of his claws and slumps back into the rucksack to sulk while Locke squelches his way into the mushroom forest.
“So are you the one of yourself that gets all the rubbish jobs, then? Do the other eight pick on you, or is it more of a drew-the-short-straw sort of scenario? I can get behind that line of thinking. Proper democracy, that’s what I’d like to see in this city - or failing that, a lottery. Fat chance of that with the Masters around, though. The whole Mayor job is a sham. As far as I can tell – the view from the streets, as it were – the only thing Jenny managed to achieve all year was starting up a posh school. It’s nonsense, I tell you.”
Locke’s squelching continues. The fungal stalks close in around him, the air heavy with drifting spores. It quickly becomes dark under the shade of the tower-caps. Locke stops to light his lantern, fiddling with damp matches in the dark; he continues on with a dim aura of candlelight casting deep shadows in the tangled undergrowth.
Under the shade of the mushrooms, all is quiet and still apart from Locke’s own footsteps and ragged breathing. The silence is deafening after the lively sounds of frogs and crickets in the marsh.
A soft voice speaks from just behind him. “I have the scent now.” Locke practically jumps out of his skin before he realises that it is the Ninefold Cat.
“Jesus, cat, you scared the living daylights out of me!” he whispers.
“I’m sorry, I thought you were supposed to be a fearless monster-hunter,” says the Cat sardonically. If it were a human, it would have cocked an eyebrow. Perhaps it’s doing it anyway, just to spite me.
“Well… just get on with it, okay? There’s a time and a place for sarcasm. Can you point me in the right direction or not?”
“I can smell the man we’re looking for about three hundred yards ahead. Stale sweat and staler wine; there’s no doubt. He probably doesn’t know we’re here yet, but don’t push your luck – the light’s a dead giveaway.”
“Aren’t you forgetting something? It’s bloody dark!”
“Pah. I sometimes forget you humans have worse senses than a new-born kitten. You can’t see in the dark, but neither can he. I’ll be your eyes.”
“Brilliant. Do you want to go on ahead, Your Highness, or should I carry you on my shoulders so you don’t get your fur all muddy?”
Without answering, the Ninefold Cat scratches his way up Locke’s back again and curls around his neck. Despite his irritation at the wretched mog, he can’t help but appreciate how fluffy the Cat is. Like a living neck-warmer.
Locke shutters his lantern and creeps forward, wincing at every little twig snapping in the brambly undergrowth. The Cat directs him with whispered instructions. Before long, a dim orange glow can be seen ahead, tell-tale smoke rising past the fungal canopy – a campfire.
The Ninefold Cat and Locke look at each other. The Cat’s hungry eyes glow with reflected firelight. “The hunt,” he purrs, “is on.”
Locke nods and checks the weapons strapped to his belt. Debate at swordpoint is his speciality, but for tougher arguments he carries a revolver. The worst disagreements require a certain amount of overwhelming force, so he also carries a few spare grenades. Judging by what the Cat told him of the vagrants’ unnatural vitality, they may come in handy.
He parts the brambles ahead with a rustle and spies the tramp sitting at his campfire, a lone point of light in the dark clearing. The mushrooms loom low here; the campsite would be impossible to find if not for the Cat’s nose.
The vagrant would not look out of place on the streets of London. He has a long beard and ragged clothes which are covered in grime and still wet from trudging through the marshes. He is muttering to himself, also not an atypical feature.
Despite his wild and deranged appearance, he is not the most concerning aspect of the camp at present. It seems he is not the only one encamped in the arse-end of nowhere; there are a good dozen tents pitched behind him in the clearing. Boxes of weapons and supplies – and overflowing gunpowder kegs – are stacked all around. Not just a lone fugitive, then, but a whole gang of them on the warpath.
Locke ducks back behind the brambles. “This is bad. Properly bad. If they’re all as bonkers as the one that sawed off that poor woman’s head, there’s no telling what they could get up to in London. I’m all for a bit of rough-and-tumble, but these people are sick.”
“Indeed,” says the Cat. “This sort of thing is bad for business. This may be our only chance to deal with them. I can only smell the one man in there – the others must have gone off somewhere. If you’re half the fighter you say you are, you should be able to incapacitate the guard – preferably in a permanent fashion. Do you still have any matches left in that book of yours?”
“I’m not sure I like where this is going, cat…”
“Come on now. What sort of anarchist is put out by a few explosions?”
“Quite the opposite! It’s just a shame that I won’t be the one causing them for once.” Locke flashes a brilliant grin and passes the matchbook up to the Cat, who holds it in his mouth.
He pushes through the brambles and surveys the approach more closely, the Cat still draped on his shoulders. The clearing is raised slightly above the surrounding forest, with a reed-filled stretch of knee-deep water in the way. The tramp has his back turned to Locke, still babbling gibberish to himself.
Without further ado, Locke strides bravely forwards. Immediately before entering the water, his foot catches on something. A trip-wire! And so, bravely, he trips and falls with a yelp into the mucky swamp water, the Ninefold Cat following him into the trench as a yowling airborne ball of claws.
Once he claws his spluttering way out of the water, he is thoroughly drenched and dripping with cold, wet mud. Something is causing a great commotion beneath the surface, splashing and bubbling vigorously – he gingerly reaches in and extracts the sodden Cat. Fur plastered to his body, flailing and scratching with the most outraged look Locke has ever on an animal, the Ninefold Cat is thoroughly unamused.
“Do you think he heard that?” says Locke to the dripping Cat.
An incoherent cry bursts forth from the camp.
Locke chucks the cat off into the safety of the shadows of the camp – thoroughly appreciating the further caterwauling – and attempts to compose himself following his undignified fall. His weapons are, fortunately, still where he left them. He has just drawn his sword from its sheath when the shrieking tramp charges towards him, his hair and beard flying wildly and his mouth trailing spittle.
“Now listen here…” he begins, and then thrusts his outstretched blade into the vagrant’s stomach as the man collides with him, knocking him to the ground.
“I think there’s been some sort of terrible misunderstanding!” says Locke.
“For the Shade!” roars the tramp, seemingly oblivious to the blade stuck through his torso and jutting out of his back.
Locke rolls to one side, shifting the tramp’s weight off him, and stands upright while the man struggles on his back.
“Could you point me to the way out, my dear fellow? I fear I’ve become rather lost.” Locke’s hilarious banter fails to elicit a response from the vagrant besides a growl, so he tugs at his sword’s hilt and extracts it from the man’s stomach with a squelch. The blade comes free reluctantly, trailing gold-flecked blood.
The sword-wound is hard to make out in the deep shadows of the firelight, but its edges are wide and ragged. Not something that you can just walk away from, even in the Neath.
The tramp, however, does not seem to be aware of that. He merely stands up and roars again, utterly unimpeded. As Locke watches in growing horror, the sides of the wound creep together until the man’s body is whole again. Out of the corner of his eye, he catches a silhouette padding towards the fire – the Ninefold Cat, still thoroughly bedraggled, with a match in his mouth.
“Nice trick, that,” he says, forcing himself to smile nonchalantly and keep the tramp’s attention. “Fancy teaching me? Might come in handy down at the Bomb on Friday nights.”
Behind the tramp, the Ninefold Cat has lit the match from the fire and is now making his way towards the tents, where a bright orange light glints inside some sort of small frame. How is that blasted cat supposed to blow up the barrels without scorching off his own hide?
The tramp stares blankly at him and chokes out the words: “Funny man, eh? You’ll not stop us. You’re too late. We found the shed where your friends fled after our Lord scattered them. The others went to burn it down. You… you’re the only one left. Now die!”
The tramp pulls a rusty dagger out of his belt and swipes at Locke. In the glow of the campfire, the shifting shadows of the men move in a deadly dance. The tramp is faster than his dishevelled appearance suggests – he is almost too fast for Locke to keep up a defence, even with the greater reach of his sword. He laughs, exulting in the challenge. This might turn out to be an excellent night after all!
The vagrant is relentless, jabbing and slashing with his dagger whenever Locke lets his guard down. The dagger may not have reach, but its wielder knows how to take advantage of underhanded tactics. Locke can barely keep up with the frantic stabbing, and he soon takes some skin-deep slashes. Any wounds he inflicts on his opponent soon close up. This is a losing battle, he realises. He hazards a glance over to the rows of tents and sees no sign of the cat.
“You’ve died before, haven’t you? You don’t deserve another life,” says the tramp. “The Shade is almighty, and he has but one life. This he told us when we drank of his blood. When I kill you, I’ll take your head.” He grins maniacally.
Locke’s arms are tired. The vagrant refuses to let him catch a breath. Every parry is slower. The feverish, hollow face of the tramp grins wider, and he misses a sharp jab of the dagger. It sinks into his right arm, severing tendons, deadening nerves. The arm hangs useless and his blade drops into the grass. Pain shoots through him and he sinks to the ground. The tramp walks around behind him and holds Locke’s head up by the hair. The pain scarcely registers compared to his arm.
The dagger glints in front of his eyes. I’m done for, then. This wretched tramp will slice me from ear to ear, and there is nothing left to be said.
BOOM!
The barrels of gunpowder erupt in a thunderous explosion. The sudden brightness of the fireball is eye-searing, spectacular. The whole camp goes up, and the tramp forgets all about slitting Locke’s throat. He gawps. He howls in anger and shock.
Then he does it all again when Locke stands up and kicks him between the legs.
It seems that even for undying nutjobs, there are some reactions that are universal. The tramp yelps and doubles over, clutching the affected area with both hands.
Sword? No time. Gun? Won’t do a thing against him. Only one thing for it, then. Locke plucks a grenade from his belt with his left hand, pulls the pin and slips it into the wailing hobo’s top pocket.
“Hold onto this for me, would you?” he says. Then he runs like hell in the opposite direction.
As he dives onto the muddy ground, a second explosion echoes round the clearing. The tramp is abruptly silenced as he disappears in a ball of flame. When the smoke clears, he is widely distributed across the campsite, and profoundly dead.
That takes care of that then. Locke picks himself up and considers brushing off the mud, but at this point he is so thoroughly sodden it doesn’t matter. Then a thought occurs to him. The Cat!
He combs the wreckage for a few tense minutes. All the tents and supplies are obliterated, leaving little but charred debris and drifting ashes. The campfire still gives him enough light to search by, but there is no way anything could have survived such a monumental detonation. Wait – what’s that? Something glints orange among the cinders. He bends down and picks it up. It is a triangular shard of a mirror – this must be the light he saw earlier, reflecting the campfire.
As he holds it up to his face, he does not see his reflection. Instead he sees a view looking upwards into a verdant jungle under a livid orange sun. Something peeks into view – a cat’s eye! Something seems oddly familiar about it. The eye draws back to reveal the face of a leopard.
“Good,” says the leopard in the voice of the Ninefold Cat. “You survived. And, as you can see, so did I, although I look a bit different on this side of the mirror. I’m afraid it’s too fragmented for me to come back this way, but I can make my way back to London from Parabola.”
“You travelled through a mirror… and now you’re a leopard? You know what; I’m not even going to question it. This is a mad day all round. Listen, cat – the tramp’s friends aren’t here because they’re going to burn down Gideon’s Shed! Can you get one of your other selves to warn him? He’ll get roasted alive, and that’s something I’d prefer to avoid if possible.”
The Ninefold Cat nods – “Consider it done, human.” – and withdraws.
Locke puts down the mirror shard and looks around the dark fungal forest. I suppose I’ll have to walk back by myself, then. This is simply not my day.