Page 105 of The Queens and the Kings
Time to come about.
Chapter Thirty
BRITT
Early the next morning,flies swarmed the outside of an arbor stretched across a rounded door frame. The pack of insects, so thick they droned, repulsed most people away from the nondescript arch.
Britt wrinkled her nose.
Thisis where the famed Teller lived?
The Teller that, per Pedr’s cryptic note, wouldhave answers for you.She glanced at the paper again, but it still said only,Go to the Teller. He will have answers for you.Below that, equally vague instructions led her to this general area on the mainland. She found thearbor with a lot of flies and smells like pissby wandering.
Presumably, Pedr had visited the Teller once long, long ago. Before he refused to step foot off his ship—or was that a curse, too?
Before her parents died.
Before, before.
Doubts arose. The Tellersupposedly knew things others didn’t. He memorized the stories of old and told them to thenext generation. She’d heard of him, but never met him. General Helsing sniffed when younger Britt asked to hear one of his tales.
“Frivolous and lazy,” she said once. “Never.”
The refusal and condemnation only stoked her curiosity, but Britt hadn’t mentioned him again. She knew better than that.
After a father with a gaggle of children around his knees passed by her, there was no other sound except the flies. They buzzed around two metallic bowls on either side of the trellis. The faintest hint of vinegar drifted in the air.
Sprawling to the left and right of the arbor was a stone fence, hidden by ivy, and noticeable only if she looked hard. The scraggly, black rocks were the same that littered the ocean, as if someone had daily dragged sea stones from the beach and stacked them into a warning fence.
She really should heed more warnings.
The outer edges of Klipporno didn’t offer much by way of traffic. Along these craggy shores, there wasn’t room for roads or houses. The sandy shore amounted to smelly rocks and mud, which most avoided. Safely docking a boat here was impossible with the boulders jutting from the waves.
Rallying her courage, she slipped a shawl off of her neck and wrapped it around her nose and mouth. Aiming toward the interior of the trellis, which dripped with lovely emerald rope vines and far fewer flies, she held her breath and plunged inside.
Bugs buzzed into the fabric, escorting her through the arbor and into lush foliage. She closed her eyes, plunged blindly through the insects, and lifted a hand to anticipate obstacles. Greater racket awaited—how could there bemoreflies?—before the rustling ivy gave way to open space. Through the slit of her shawl, a burst of sunshine warmed her skin.
Ten seconds of stumbling later, she tentatively opened her eyes. The flies dropped away with each step. She peeled the shawl off her face.
A smooth stone trail meandered, flat and easy, through a winding lawn that led up to a stone house, not unlike the wall. Behind her, flowers bloomed along this side of the wall. Moss dropped from ledges in charming displays, cut into repetitive designs. The repulsive vinegar dissipated into a delicious, light fragrance.
“Lovely.”
“Only,” croaked an aged voice, “to those willing enough to chance it.”
She whipped around to find an old man who definitely hadn’t been there before. White hair, downy as northern snow, lay like wings on his shoulders. Time and arthritis distorted his hands, leaving a gentle tremble as he peered at her with eyes like a summer sky.
She gathered her frantic heart back together.
“Ta.”
He lifted a finger to his forehead: the Klippornian equivalent.
“My name is Britt. Forgive me for trespassing. I heard . . . I heard that the Teller lived here, but I didn’t know . . .”
She trailed away, lost in her own explanation. Studiously, he kept his gaze on her before he inclined his head. “You are welcome, Britt. It’s been a while since I’ve had a visitor.”
You should try something besides flies and vinegar to inspire people,she thought.
