Fool (2 page)

The ladies scurried out of the room.

“Punishment?” I asked. “For what?”

“I don’t know yet,” she said, “but by the time I’ve thought of the punishment, I’m sure there’ll be an offense.”

“I blush at your confidence.”

“And I at your humility,” said the princess. She grinned, a crescent too devious for a maid of her tender years. Cordelia is not ten years my junior (I’m not sure, exactly, of my own age), seventeen summers has she seen, and as the youngest of the king’s daughters, she’s always been treated as if fragile as spun glass. But, sweet thing that she is, her bark could frighten a mad badger.

“Shall I disrobe for my punishment?” I offered. “Flagellation? Fellation? Whatever. I am your willing penitent, lady.”

“No more of that, Pocket. I need your counsel, or at least your commiseration. My sisters are coming to the castle.”

“Unfortunately, they have arrived.”

“Oh, that’s right, Albany and Cornwall want to kill you. Bad luck, that. Anyway, they are coming to the castle, as are Gloucester and his sons. Goodness,
they
want to kill you as well.”

“Rough critics,” said I.

“Sorry. And a dozen other nobles as well as the Earl of Kent are here. Kent doesn’t want to kill you, does he?”

“Not that I know of. But it
is
only lunchtime.”

“Right. And do you know why they are all coming?”

“To corner me like a rat in a barrel?”

“Barrels do not have corners, Pocket.”

“Does seem like a lot of bother for killing one small, if tremendously handsome fool.”

“It’s not about you, you dolt! It’s about me.”

“Well, even less effort to kill you. How many can it take to snap your scrawny neck? I worry that Drool will do it by accident someday. You haven’t seen him, have you?”

“He stinks. I sent him away this morning.” She waved a hand furiously to return to her point. “Father is marrying me off!”

“Nonsense. Who would have you?”

The lady darkened a bit, then, blue eyes gone cold. Badgers across Blighty shuddered. “Edgar of Gloucester has always wanted me and the Prince of France and Duke of Burgundy are already here to pay me troth.”

“Troth about what?”

“Troth!”

“About what?”

“Troth, troth, you fool, not truth. The princes are here to marry me.”

“Those two? Edgar? No.” I was shaken. Cordelia? Married? Would one of them take her away? It was unjust! Unfair! Wrong! Why, she had never even seen me naked.

“Why would they want to troth you? I mean, for the night, to be sure, who wouldn’t troth you cross-eyed? But permanently, I think not.”

“I’m a bloody princess, Pocket.”

“Precisely. What good are princesses? Dragon food and ransom markers-spoiled brats to be bartered for real estate.”

“Oh no, dear fool, you forget that sometimes a princess becomes a queen.”

“Ha, princesses. What worth are you if your father has to tack a dozen counties to your bum to get those French poofters to look at you?”

“Oh, and what worth a fool? Nay, what worth a fool’s second, for you merely carry the drool cup for the Natural. What’s the ransom for a jester, Pocket? A bucket of warm spittle.”

I grabbed my chest. “Pierced to the core, I am,” I gasped. I staggered to a chair. “I bleed, I suffer, I die on the forked lance of your words.”

She came to me. “You do not.”

“No, stay back. Blood stains will never come out of linen-they are stubborned with your cruelty and guilt…”

“Pocket, stop it now.”

“You have kilt me, lady, most dead.” I gasped, I spasmed, I coughed. “Let it always be said that this humble fool brought joy to all whom he met.”

“No one will say that.”

“Shhhh, child. I grow weak. No breath.” I looked at the imaginary blood on my hands, horrified. I slid off a chair, to the floor. “But I want you to know that despite your vicious nature and your freakishly large feet, I have always-”

And then I died. Bloody fucking brilliantly, I’d say, too, hint of a shudder at the end as death’s chilly hand grabbed my knob.

“What? What? You have always what?”

I said nothing, being dead, and not a little exhausted from all the bleeding and gasping. Truth be told, under the jest I felt like I’d taken a bolt to the heart.

“You’re absolutely no help at all,” said Cordelia.

The raven landed on the wall as I made my way back to the common house in search of Drool. No little vexed was I by the news of Cordelia’s looming nuptials.

“Ghost!” said the raven.

“I didn’t teach you that.”

“Bollocks!” replied the raven.

“That’s the spirit!”

“Ghost!”

“Piss off, bird,” said I.

Then a cold wind bit at my bum and at the top of the stairs, in the turret ahead, I saw a shimmering in the shadows, like silk in sunlight-not quite in the shape of a woman.

And the ghost said:

“With grave offense to daughters three,

Alas, the king a fool shall be.”

“Rhymes?” I inquired. “You’re looming about all diaphanous in the middle of the day, puking cryptic rhymes? Low craft and tawdry art, ghosting about at noon-a parson’s fart heralds darker doom, thou babbling wisp.”

“Ghost!” cried the raven, and with that the ghost was gone.

There’s always a bloody ghost.

TWO – NOW, GODS, STAND UP

FOR BASTARDS!

I found Drool in the laundry resolving a wank, spouting great gouts of git-seed across the laundry walls, floors, and ceiling, giggling, as young Shanker Mary wagged her tits at him over a steaming cauldron of the king’s shirts.

“Put those away, tart, we’ve a show to do.”

“I was just giving ’im a laugh.”

“If you wanted to show charity you could have bonked him honest and there’d be a lot less cleaning to do.”

“That’d be a sin. Besides, I’d as soon straddle a gateman’s halberd as try to get a weapon that girth up me.”

Drool pumped himself dry and sat down on the floor splay-legged, huffing like a great dribbling bellows. I tried to help the lout repack his tackle, but getting him into a codpiece against his firm enthusiasm was like trying to pound a bucket over a bull’s head-a scenario I thought comical enough to perhaps work into the act tonight, should things get slow.

“Nothing stopping you from givin’ the lad a proper cleavage toss, Mary. You had ’em out and all soaped up, a couple of jumps and a tickle and he’d have carried water for you for a fortnight.”

“He already does. And I don’t even want that thing near me. A Natural, he is. There’s devils in his jizm.”

“Devils? Devils? There’s no devils in there, lass. Chock full o’ nitwits, to be sure, but no devils.” A Natural was either blessed or cursed, never just an accident of nature, as the name implied.

Sometime during the week, Shanker Mary had gone Christian on us, despite being a most egregious slut. You never knew anymore who you were dealing with. Half the kingdom was Christian, the other half paid tribute to the old gods of Nature, who were always showing promise on the moonrise. The Christian God with his “day of rest” was strong with the peasants come Sunday, but by Thursday when there was drinking and fucking to be done, Nature had her kit off, legs aloft, and a flagon of ale in each hand, taking converts for the Druids as fast as they could come. They were a solid majority when the holiday was about, dancing, drinking, shagging the virgins, and sharing the harvest, but on the human sacrifice or burn-down-the-King’s-forest days, there was none but crickets cavorting ’round the Stonehenge-the singers having forsaken Mother Earth for Father Church.

“Pretty,” said Drool, trying to wrestle back control of his tool. Mary had commenced to stirring the laundry but had neglected to pull her dress up. Had the git’s attention hostage, she did.

“Right. She’s a bloody vision of loveliness, lad, but you’ve buffed yourself to a gleam already and we’ve work to do. The castle’s awash in intrigue, subterfuge, and villainy-they’ll be wanting-comic relief between the flattery and the murders.”

“Intrigue and villainy?” Drool displayed a gape-toothed grin. Imagine soldiers dumping hogsheads of spittle through the crenellations atop the castle wall-thus is Drool’s grin, as earnest in expression as it is damp in execution-a slurry of good cheer. He loves intrigue and villainy, as they play to his most special ability.

“Will there be hiding?”

“There will most certainly be hiding,” said I, as I shouldered an escaped testicle into his cod.

“And listening?”

“Listening of cavernous proportions-we shall hang on every word as God on Pope’s prayers.”

“And fuckery? Will there be fuckery, Pocket?”

“Heinous fuckery most foul, lad. Heinous fuckery most foul.”

“Aye, that’s the dog’s bollocks, then!” said Drool, slapping his thigh. “Did you hear, Mary? Heinous fuckery afoot. Ain’t that the dog’s bollocks?”

“Oh yeah, the dog’s bloody B. it is, love. If the saints are smilin’ on us, maybe one of them nobles will hang your wee mate there like they been threatening.”

“Two fools well-hung we’d have then, wouldn’t we?” said I, elbowing my apprentice in the ribs.

“Aye, two fools well-hung, we’d have, wouldn’t we?” said Drool, in my voice, tone to note coming out his great maw as like he’d caught an echo on his tongue and coughed it right back. That’s the oaf’s gift-not only can he mimic perfectly, he can recall whole conversations, hours long, recite them back to you in the original speakers’ voices, and not comprehend a single word. He’d first been gifted to Lear by a Spanish duke because of his torrential dribbling and the ability to break wind that could darken a room, but when I discovered the Natural’s keener talent, I took him as my apprentice to teach him the manly art of mirth.

Drool laughed. “Two fools well-hung-”

“Stop that!” I said. “It’s unsettling.” Unsettling indeed, to hear your own voice sluicing pitch-perfect out of that mountain of lout, stripped of wit and washed of irony. Two years I’d had Drool under my wing and I was still not inured to it. He meant no harm, it was simply his nature.

The anchoress at the abbey had taught me of nature, making me recite Aristotle: “It is the mark of an educated man, and a tribute to his culture, that he look for precision in a thing only as its
nature
allows.” I would not have Drool reading Cicero or crafting clever riddles, but under my tutelage he had become more than fair at tumbling and juggling, could belch a song, and was, at court, at least as entertaining as a trained bear, with slightly less proclivity for eating the guests. With guidance, he would make a proper fool.

“Pocket is sad,” said Drool. He patted my head, which was wildly irritating, not only because we were face-to-face-me standing, him sitting bum-to-floor-but because it rang the bells of my coxcomb in a most melancholy manner.

“I’m not sad,” said I. “I’m angry that you’ve been lost all morning.”

“I weren’t lost. I were right here, the whole time, having three laughs with Mary.”

“Three?! You’re lucky you two didn’t burst into flames, you from friction and her from bloody thunderbolts of Jesus.”

“Maybe four,” said Drool.

“You do look the lost one, Pocket,” said Mary. “Face like a mourning orphan what’s been dumped in the gutter with the chamber pots.”

“I’m preoccupied. The king has kept no company but Kent this last week, the castle is brimming with backstabbers, and there’s a girl-ghost rhyming ominous on the battlements.”

“Well, there’s always a bloody ghost, ain’t there?” Mary fished a shirt out of the cauldron and bobbed it across the room on her paddle like she was out for a stroll with her own sodden, steaming ghost. “You’ve got no cares but making everyone laugh, right?”

“Aye, carefree as a breeze. Leave that water when you’re done, would you, Mary? Drool needs a dunking.”

“Nooooooo!”

“Hush, you can’t go before the court like that, you smell of shit. Did you sleep on the dung heap again last night?”

“It were warm.”

I clouted him a good one on the crown with Jones. “Warm’s not all, lad. If you want warm you can sleep in the great hall with everyone else.”

“He ain’t allowed,” offered Mary. “Chamberlain says his snoring frightens the dogs.”

“Not allowed?” Every commoner who didn’t have quarters slept on the floor in the great hall-strewn about willy-nilly on the straw and rushes-nearly dog-piled before the fireplace in winter. An enterprising fellow with night horns aloft and a predisposal to creep might find himself accidentally sharing a blanket or a tumble with a sleepy and possibly willing wench, and then be banished for a fortnight from the hall’s friendly warmth (and indeed, I owe my own modest apartment above the barbican to such nocturnal proclivity), but put out for
snoring
? Unheard of. When night’s inky cape falls o’er the great hall, a gristmill it becomes, the machines of men’s breath grind their dreams with a frightful roar, and even Drool’s great gears fall undistinguished among the chorus. “For snoring? Not allowed in the hall? Balderdash!”

“And for having a wee on the steward’s wife,” Mary added.

“It were dark,” explained Drool.

“Aye, and even in daylight she is easily mistaken for a privy, but have I not tutored you in the control of your fluids, lad?”

“Aye, and with great success,” said Shanker Mary, rolling her eyes at the spunk-frosted wall.

“Ah, Mary, well said. Let’s make a pact: If you do not make attempts at wit, I will refrain from becoming a soap-smelling prick-pull. What say ye?”

“You said you liked the smell of soap.”

“Aye, well, speaking of smell. Drool, fetch some buckets of cold water from the well. We need to cool this kettle down and get you bathed.”

“Nooooooo!”

“Jones will be very unhappy with you if you don’t hurry,” said I, brandishing Jones in a disapproving and somewhat threatening manner. A hard master is Jones, bitter, no doubt, from being raised as a puppet on a stick.

A half-hour later, a miserable Drool sat in the steaming cauldron, fully-clothed, his natural broth having turned the lye-white water to a rich, brown oaf-sauce. Shanker Mary stirred about him with her paddle, being careful not to stir him beyond suds to lust. I was quizzing my student on the coming night’s entertainments.

“So, because Cornwall is on the sea, we shall portray the duke how, dear Drool?”

“As a sheep-shagger,” said the despondent giant.

“No, lad, that’s Albany. Cornwall shall be the fish-fucker.”

“Aye, sorry, Pocket.”

“Not a worry, not a worry. You’ll still be sodden from your bath, I suspect, so we’ll work that into the jest. Bit of sloshing and squishing will but add to the merriment, and if we can thus imply that Princess Regan is herself, a fishlike consort, well I can’t think of anyone who won’t be amused.”

“’Cepting the princess,” said Mary.

“Well, yes, but she is very literal-minded and often has to be explained the thrust of the jest a time or two before lending her appreciation.”

“Aye, remedial thrusting’s the remedy for Regan’s stubborn wit,” said the puppet Jones.

“Aye, remedial thrusting’s the remedy for Regan’s stubborn wit,” said Drool in Jones’s voice.

“You’re dead men,” sighed Shanker Mary.

“You’re a dead man, knave!” said a man’s voice from behind me.

And there stood Edmund, bastard son of Gloucester, blocking the only exit, sword in hand. Dressed all in black, was the bastard: a simple silver brooch secured his cape, the hilts of his sword and dagger were silver dragon heads with emerald eyes. His jet beard was trimmed to points. I do admire the bastard’s sense of style-simple, elegant, and evil. He owns his darkness.

I, myself, am called the Black Fool. Not because I am a Moor, although I hold no grudge toward them (Moors are said to be talented wife-stranglers) and would take no offense at the moniker were that the case, but my skin is as snowy as any sun-starved son of England. No, I am called so because of my wardrobe, an argyle of black satin and velvet diamonds-not the rainbow motley of the run-a-day fool. Lear said: “After thy black wit shall be thy dress, fool. Perhaps a new outfit will stop you tweaking Death’s nose. I’m short for the grave as it is, boy, no need to anger the worms before my arrival.” When even a king fears irony’s twisted blade, what fool is ever unarmed?

“Draw your weapon, fool!” said Edmund.

“Sadly, sir, I have none,” said I. Jones shook his head in unarmed woe.

We both were lying, of course. Across the small of my back I wore three wickedly-pointed throwing daggers-fashioned for me by the armorer to be used in our entertainments-and while I had never used them as weapons, truly flung they had spitted apples off the head of Drool, nipped plums from his outstretched fingers, and yea, even speared grapes out of the air. I had little doubt that one might find its way into Edmund’s eye and thus vent his bitter mind like a lanced boil. If he needed to know he would know soon enough. If not, well, why trouble him?

“If not a fight, then a murder it is,” said Edmund. He lunged, his blade aimed for my heart. I sidestepped and knocked his blade away with Jones, who lost a bell from his coxcomb for his trouble.

I hopped up onto the lip of the cauldron.

“But, sir, why spend your wrath on a poor, helpless fool?”

Edmund slashed. I leapt. He missed. I landed on the far side of the cauldron. Drool moaned. Mary hid in the corner.

“You shouted bastard at me from the battlements.”

“Aye, they announced you as bastard. You, sir,
are
a bastard. And a bastard most unjust to make me die with the foul taste of truth still on my tongue. Allow me a lie before you strike: You have such kind eyes.”