It was odd to, very suddenly, see how the other half lived.
Here we were, myself and my two closest friends, surprisingly dropped into the lives of fugitives. Less than a day after we had first uncovered signs of… something… going on within the hierarchy of the church of Morta, and we were now needing to hide from them. Especially when you consider that, prior to this, we had been some of their most capable agents within the city… it was beyond frustrating. “So, Sarge…” started Annette. “Don’t finish that question,” I responded. “I don’t know yet.” It was the morning after our battle to escape from the barracks and Scar’s death. At that moment, we were taking shelter under a bridge. Around us were the lowest of the city’s population – the infirm. Those whose body wouldn’t be worth anything when they died, because it wouldn’t be in good enough condition. They only survived as long as they did by begging, stealing, and know what to avoid and when not to ask questions. As soon as we’d arrived, they’d recognised that we were very much amongst those to avoid. “Sarge will sort it,” said Blade. “Sarge always does.” Somehow, their confidence in my abilities, whilst normally comforting, was anything but. I simply didn’t know how to sort the problem out. However, it did highlight that the two of them needed leadership and, like it or not, that was what I got paid for. Well – probably not anymore, but the principle didn’t change. “First things first,” I said, stalling for time. “We have limited resources now – really, just what we were carrying with us – and any movement in the city will be a risk. If we’re careful, we can afford to eat for a few weeks, but we’ll be living and sleeping in places like this. There are probably places in the city where it would be an acceptable risk to be more a part of society, but we obviously don’t know where those places are. “We know there is some kind of conspiracy within the priesthood – but we have no idea how far it goes, or what it is trying to achieve. Similarly, we don’t know whether we were targeted because we uncovered the conspiracy, or because the church thinks we are a part of it…” “Or simply because the church don’t want to us to know they are having problems.” Annette interrupted, but I didn’t mind. We’d known each other long enough that she knew that she could feel free to make her points without waiting for me to finish. “Right,” I agreed. “We need support from somewhere if we are going to make any headway there. For today, let’s split up and meet back here tonight. Keep a low profile, don’t draw attention to yourselves, and let’s try to find somewhere more comfortable than here that is still secure. Ideally somewhere we can also make some more money.” Annette and Blade both nodded and headed out into the city. For a moment, I wondered if I’d given the right order – it would be dangerous for us to be alone. Then again, we’d be more obvious as a group. I was completely out of my depth, but I couldn’t let them see that. They’d both been calling me ‘Sarge’ for so long, it had become more my identify than my actual name, and that title brought responsibility with it. They expected me to lead them, and so I had to. A few minutes after they left, I did the same and started to wander the streets. I decided to head towards the walls – the centre of the city was the busiest area and had the most churches and, therefore, a far heavier priest presence. Out by the walls there would still be shrines, but they’d each only have a couple of priests at most, and many of them not even that. If there was anywhere in the city where we could hide from Morta’s servants, closer to the edge would be it. It was, of course, easy enough to keep to shadows – the constant cloud cover let only a little sunlight into the city, and it was always dark to one degree or another. People gave me a wide berth, which I didn’t notice immediately, as it was quite normal. Only after I’d been walking for several minutes did I realise that this wasn’t a good way to blend in. However, there was little I could do – no matter how much I tried to change my stance and appear non-threatening, I was still wearing weapons, which would give anybody pause, as only somebody that could use them would carry them. I moved from street to street, always trying to choose the quieter options whilst still making my way outwards. It seemed bizarre that life, for most of the population, was still going on. None of these other people knew about what had happened, and I wondered for a moment what they would make of it if they found out. News would eventually get out – the church couldn’t hide the burning down of a barracks, or the use of the dead in the city, could they? As I moved, I lingered near taverns and listened to conversations. People going about their business and little of interest. Nothing about the events of the previous night, and if people did know how to avoid the priests, they were cautious enough not to discuss it in the open. There must be ways – the cremations didn’t keep organising themselves, and so there must be ways for those who didn’t agree with Morta’s doctrine to make contact with each other. Why had we never asked about anything like this before? We’d concerned ourselves with the incident before us, but never worked to stop them from taking place. We’d trusted that side of things to the priests. As I walked, my mind started to wander back to Annette’s theory of the day before. If the priesthood had wanted to find out about anything of that sort, they could easily do so – they could speak to the dead. The only thing that might stop them would be if the body belonged to an apostate from the faith. Could Annette have been right? Could there be a cult following of the Lords of Light somewhere in the city who could, through their own perversion of faith, hide their final thoughts from Morta? Was the alternative less likely? That the priests simply didn’t care to stop them at the source? As long as myself and other enforcers were always on hand to save the bodies, it was an excellent show of force, and nothing was lost. In fact, more bodies were gained as the penalty for organising an unlicensed cremation was death. It was an easy way to root out non-believers, or those who felt their own grief was more important than the war. As I moved further to the edge of the city, the crowds became sparser and the individuals rougher. More and more weapons could be seen, and the moving space around me that people didn’t want to enter started to disappear. I walked past several of Morta’s shrines, seeing them deserted. I walked for several hours in the north-east edge district and didn’t see a single priest in all that time. Perhaps we could be safe here, for a time. I heard sounds of fighting and turned to investigate. I entered a tavern, and the combat seemed to be below me, and so moved to the stairs. In an underground level, there was a fighting ring, where two men were locked in combat with each other. They held no weapons, relying instead on their fists, feet, heads and most other parts of their bodies. The battle was brutal, and desperate, and I found myself fascinated by it. After a couple of minutes, the contest came to an end – one of the men was on the floor, bleeding, and the second had raised his hands whilst the crowd cheered. Once the noise died down, he walked from the ring, was handed some money, and others moved to drag the bleeding man out. I glanced at him as he was moved past me – he would live, but it might be some days before he was comfortable again. This could be a way to make some money. I looked over at the winner and thought back over what I had seen of the duel. I was not confident that I could beat him – my training was mostly in the use of weapons, and without them I would be at a severe disadvantage. Blade might be good enough – they were excellent with their armaments, and I’d also seen them fight bare-knuckle when it was appropriate. I turned back to the ring and saw to more enter it – this time a man and a woman. They both brought in knives, which surprised me but the noises from the crowd indicated that this wasn’t only expected but anticipated. I watched again, eagerly. They both fought carefully – a knife is a terrible weapon to fight with unless you are significantly more skilled, or have some other advantage, over your opponent – feinting and dodging. The crowd cheered when blood flew – the man had not dodged swiftly enough and had taken a cut above his left eye. This was dangerous – there was far more chance of taking a permanent injury, possibly even one that would make the body nonviable for re-use. I wondered suddenly, and for the first time, if that was part of the point. The payment for fighting would presumably be higher, but perhaps these people were perfectly prepared to die in such a way that the corpse wouldn’t be sent to the war. If anything, it would make them fight all the harder because if they were permanently injured but survived, they might well be left destitute, like the unfortunates that we had spent the night with. The man’s attacks were getting clumsier now – the blood was flowing into one eye, and he clearly wasn’t seeing well. The woman was mostly able to dance around him, but his swings and stabs became wilder and wilder, and he managed to rake his blade along her ribs, bringing more blood and more cheers from the crowds. I found myself cheering along with them – their enthusiasm for the violence and the bloodshed was infectious. The two fighters moved together with a flurry of blows – the woman was now rushing her attacks, wanting to end the battle before she was injured again. Her knife moved quickly, and the man was dodging frantically, desperately trying to stay out of her reach, but it wasn’t working. She cut at him again and again, with each spurt of blood bringing with it a cheer. He clearly recognised that acting defensively was not going to win this fight for him, and so he also went on the attack, but the loss of blood had slowed him down. It was over swiftly, with the woman plunging her knife into the man’s chest and he fell with a quiet sigh, a thud, and the loudest cheer yet from the crowd. The victorious woman raised her arms, grimacing at the clear pain from her ribs, but elated that she would live to fight another day, and her wound should heal easily. Again, once the cheers died down, she left the ring and was given money. As others moved in to take the dying man away, I moved to follow them. “What happens to him,” I asked. “Somebody takes him to the priests once he dies?” One of the men leading the way laughed. “Hardly – what a waste that would be.” I looked down at the man who I was sure would soon be a corpse. He had dozens of scars on his chest and several of them looked like they would have been as severe as the one that was currently killing him. “You have a skilled physician?” I asked. The man looked to me again. “Look, friend,” he said as they continued to walk. “I don’t know you, so maybe ask less questions.” I looked around but quietened. They hadn’t yet told me leave them, and so I continued to follow. We reached a door at the end of a corridor, that had taken us, I estimated, beyond the edges of the tavern. The door opened as we approached, and the man that had silenced me looked to me again. “Time to go, friend. Our neighbour doesn’t like unexpected visitors.” I turned to leave. As much as I wanted to know what was through that door, I couldn’t afford to antagonise these people. Perhaps if I spent more time at the fighting ring – perhaps even entered it myself – they might start to trust me and to let me see what was going on. “It’s well, Dieter,” came a voice from the other side of the door. “I can see that this one is on the verge of seeing the Light. He will not betray us.” The man that had been speaking to me, Dieter, grunted and led me in. They placed the fallen man onto a table, and another man, this one in robes of white that seemed wrong in how clean they were, approached. I wondered how he was able to keep himself so clean given the work he was going to undertake. He looked directly at me, rather than his patient. “Watch, and learn,” he said, simply. He raised his hands and called out to a god – but not Morta. I didn’t recognise the names, and they passed so swiftly that I couldn’t remember them once he had spoken. As he chanted, his hands started to glow and, once they were brighter than any other light I had ever seen, he lowered them down to the patient, and I watched the wound close. I had seen magic before, and the effects of it. I had worked closely with Morta’s priests and had a rough idea of what they could do. As far as I was aware, they could not heal – as a god of death, it was a blessing that was beyond Morta. My eyes widened in surprise and my mouth dropped open. I looked up at the man in white. It seemed Annette had been right.
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The next part of my fae story - previous ones are A Fairy Tale and Honeydew. We were sat in the living room despite the warm day – Fern had insisted that it wasn’t safe in the garden. I wasn’t sure why but remembering the injuries that she’d had when my cat, Jack, had found her, made me sure that she knew what she was talking about. I had opened the windows, which let enough of a breeze into the room to make the confinement not too uncomfortable.
Fern was sitting, cross-legged, on a small footstool, facing me whilst I sat more comfortably in an armchair. Jack was, currently, nowhere to be seen, but this wasn’t unusual. I had a cup of tea to my side, whilst Fern had a bowl of water with a thimble to drink from. Her wounds were healing well, and this was the first day that she had decided to make good on her promise to share stories of her world with me. “Are you ready for your tale, Sir Thomas?” she asked after taking a drink. I nodded eagerly – my curiosity about the world of my strange little patient had only grown over the last few days since we had met. “Very well,” she continued. “Attend! “I speak to you now of earlier days, of times lost to memory and found only in story and song. I speak to you of those days when the Meadowlands and the Gardens were one, for there were no gardens, and there was peace. The dangers of those days came from the woods and the forests, and all of the realms of faerie were ruled by those who took up their homes on the rivers. “Whilst there were threats, life was not truly threatening. The woods continued to encroach, with each passing spring new trees would grow, and the Meadowlands would grow a little smaller, but we stood firm on our borders, and we removed those seeds we found before they could spring forth new life. The riverfolk maintained the peace, between we of the Meadows and the light, and those of the Canopy and the dark. We knew better than to enter the forest, and they knew better than to leave. “But time moves on and all things change – as the seasons continue their march, so does history. A time came when the rivers started to dry, and those that still flowed were soiled. The riverfolk became as sickened as their homes, and many of them died. Some escaped, travelling to the Meadows or the Canopy, for they had always been of both dark and light. The peace was threatened, and the forestfolk started to leave their lands to stop us from removing their seeds. “Of course, the peoples of the meadow and grass could not allow this afront – they looked to ways older still, to when they had needed to fight in earnest and picked up their ancient blades and shields. They flew to the borders, and for the first times in memory, fae fought fae. We of the meadows had the advantage – the fae of the shadows could not fight as strongly in the light of the sun, and so they attacked where they thought the border was only weakly defended, and we moved swiftly to counter them, only to see them slink back into the shadows of the Canopy. “However, whilst our peoples fought, a new threat was emerging and none saw it, or predicted it. When it came, it would herald the end of those days and put a stop to that which we had called war. “Fences were being raised and cutting off land that had been ours. The plantlife was being changed and soon, it could not be called meadowland any longer. Strange flowers were planted, and stranger creatures came to live amongst them. We had always lived in harmony with your own people, the tallfolk, but something had changed. It seemed you had forgotten us, and the old ways of living. And with those changes, a new people came to those lands that we call gardens. “These faeries were strange, and aggressive. Each garden came to be its own kingdom, and they fought amongst themselves as we continued our battles with the forestfolk. We paid it no mind, watching as more and more meadowland vanished in the rush to create more gardens, more kingdoms to continue their battles. Our land was shrinking, but there was little we could do, and so we redoubled our efforts to protect our borders from the forests. “Then, everything changed. The gardenfolk reached a stalemate, it seemed, and turned their attention to us. At the same time, they watched the forests, and craved that land. They launched their attacks with such ferocity, that any difficulties between meadow and forest were put aside, for there was a greater threat. You see, for whilst our skirmishes with the forestfolk had been long, they had rarely led to actual fighting. However, the gardenfolk had battled with each other for generations. “We were overwhelmed, and we still think and wonder on what leads the gardenfolk to be as they are. Our great thinkers wonder if it is the fences that bring it out in them – they are constrained, and they crave freedom and expansion at all costs. However, we cannot know. The forestfolk are very different to us, but we understand them – the ancient times allowed to speak to them and learn of each other. Sadly, with the end of the riverfolk, there has been no opportunity for peaceful discourse, and so the gardenfolk are still a mystery to us. “Yet still we fight. We have largely lost all contact with the forestfolk without the riverfolk to bridge our differences. We train our knights, and our soldiers and we defend what is left of Meadowdown. And yet, more and more gardens are built all the time, and more and more gardenfolk appear to live in them. We are fighting a losing battle, though few will admit it. Unless something changes, and changes soon, our way of life will come to and end. And with it, a history of story, and of song.” She stopped to take another drink from her thimble. “So, this is why you don’t want to go in the garden?” I asked. She nodded to me. “Yes – it was travelling through your garden that caused me to be injured. Fortunately, Jack was able to save me before it was too late.” I shook my head, a little bewildered at all of this activity that had been going on beneath my, or anybody else’s, notice. “Why were you there in the first place, if it is so dangerous?” She shrugged. “I hoped to pass through with stealth, so that I might reach the Greenwood. Once, Meadowdown and Greenwood shared a border, but that was long ago now. I hoped to reopen communications with the faerie that live there, so that we might find a way to end this conflict. It is possible that they have been able to learn more about the gardenfolk than we have.” “Couldn’t you get some kind of help, or protection for the journey?” She shook her head. “Nobody knows that I have left, though I am sure my departure has been noted by now. If I had told anybody, they would have refused me exit, and possible even imprisoned me for my own protection. A prince of Meadowdown is very fond of me and would not wish me to risk myself. “However, this conflict has gone on for too long, and we are no closer to finding a solution. Somebody had to do something…” “And nobody else was going to, then you had to?” I finished. She nodded. “Otherwise, as I said, we will lose this war, and there will be no more of us.” Miko was bored.
Everybody was talking about things that he didn’t care about. It wasn’t that he didn’t understand – he was far more intelligent than the average monkey – he simply didn’t care. All of this fuss about weddings, and disguises, and everything else. They were all human concerns. What he wanted was a banana. He had a bell which he could ring in order to get bananas whenever he wanted one, but he couldn’t ring it then – that would bring the banana lady into the room where the humans were talking, and he knew they wouldn’t want that. They liked to keep their secrets from everybody. So, he jumped down from Amy’s shoulder and went out of the door. Now, where had he put the bell? He was pretty sure that he hadn’t left it somewhere, which meant it was probably still in their bedroom. He bounded up the stairs, largely ignored by the staff of the noble house, climbed the banister across from the door before springing across the gap to pull the door handle. It opened with a satisfying clunk. Miko wandered into the room and looked round. He quickly found the saucer that usually held the bell, but the bell itself was missing. Where was it? He wracked his brain, desperately trying to think where he had last seen it. Yes – he was sure that it should be here. He’d taken it with him when they went out earlier in the day, and Amy had taken it from him, but she’d given it back when they returned. He’d used it since then. And then he’d put it back on the saucer. Who else might have taken it? It wouldn’t be Henri – he actively encouraged usage of the bell. Constance and Melinda thought it was funny – they probably wouldn’t have taken it. Who would want to deprive him of his bell? There was really only one possible answer. The banana-maid! He bounded out of the bedroom again and went back down the stairs, heading for the kitchens. He knew he couldn’t go in there – the cook would try to hit him with a broom and his most charming smiles had done nothing to stop this. He would wait – eventually somebody would call her for something and she’d come out. All of the staff seemed to spend their time in the kitchen when they didn’t have something else to do – it seemed a good place to be. Miko could be patient though. Several minutes passed before he decided that he had waited long enough. He left his post, and moved around to the back gardens to peer in through the window. Hmm – she didn’t seem to be there. Where might she be? With his bell! He sat back on a tree branch, pondering the situation. This was most unsatisfactory. His bell was missing. The maid was missing. He didn’t know where he could get a banana. Then, suddenly, he turned. There was somebody whispering behind the hedge at the end of the garden. He bounded over to a nearer tree and looked down over the edge. Yes – two men were crouched there muttering to each other. They didn’t seem to have any bananas on them. They did have some things though. Black powder in clay pots. Bombs? Why did they have bombs? Bombs were for exploding things. What might they be here to explode? The hedge? A tree? Wait – they’d been talking about this kind of thing. Henri had said that there was a group of people that were trying to kill him and his family. Maybe these two men were a part of that group. Well – Miko wasn’t going to let that happen. He liked Henri – he had given him the banana-bell in the first place! He bounded back to the bedroom quickly and picked up the pistol he’d been given. Drat – it wasn’t loaded. They never let him keep his pistol loaded. He could try to threaten the men with an unloaded pistol… but they might have their own pistols, at which point Miko would really like to be able to return fire. Hmm – that meant that he probably needed two pistols. This was getting more complicated. He went back to the room where he’d started. Everybody was still talking, trying to work out what to do next. He crept up behind Melinda. She always had pistols. And muskets, but they were too big for him. Being very, very careful, he slipped onto her seat beside her, and she absently started to pet him. He reached up to where her pistols sat in her bandolier. Everybody was concentrating on what Henri had to say, so they weren’t looking at Melinda or himself. He slipped out first one pistol, and then a second. Before she had a chance to notice, he leapt down again and returned to the garden. He jumped to his tree again, brandishing his two loaded pistols in his paws, and the unloaded one with his tail. Giving a screech, he got their attention. They looked up from where they were working to lay their bombs and almost jumped back in shock. Miko could see that they were trying to work out how to react to the heavily armed monkey that had just interrupted them. One of them pulled a pistol of his own and aimed it at Miko. Miko gave a snarl and aimed one of his own pistols right back. “The monkey is threatening me with a pistol,” said the man who was aiming at Miko. “So?” said his companion. “You have a pistol too. Shoot it.” “It might shoot me back.” “It’s a monkey! How good can its aim be?” “I don’t know, but it got three pistols from somewhere.” The other man pulled his own pistol and, without hesitation, aimed and shot it at Miko. The monkey dropped from the branch, avoiding the bullet, but fired his own pistol as he fell. One of the men gave out a cry of pain, and Miko heard running footsteps as he climbed back up. The two men had fled, but they had left a blood trail behind them. Should he follow them. Henri would probably want to know where they’d run to. At the same time, they had set up at least one bomb. That was probably more important. Miko jumped over the hedge to where they’d been working. There was a trail of the black powder leading into the garden and up to the house. That was probably bad. Miko followed the trail and found that it led to the cellars, but he couldn’t get in. He aimed his pistol at the lock and fired, but the bullet bounced off the metal that kept the door shut. He needed help. He couldn’t go to Constance and the others – Melinda might be cross that he’d stolen her pistols, and they were probably still talking about boring things. The staff would just ignore him or try to hit him with a broom. Could he threaten them with a pistol? Probably not a good idea. He returned to the house and bounded upstairs, heading for a different bedroom. This time, he didn’t let himself in but knocked at the door with the butt of his own pistol. It opened quickly, revealing Dahlia who looked surprised to see him, but let him in. He immediately bounced onto the bed. “What is it, Miko?” Dahlia asked. Miko bounced and chittered, trying to get Dahlia to follow him. She watched him carefully, trying to interpret his actions. After a few moments, she shook her head. Miko stopped and slumped onto the bed. Why, or why couldn’t these people ever understand him? “Just give me a second, Miko, then you can try again.” Dahlia concentrated for a moment, and to Miko’s eyes another presence appeared behind her – a tall, thin man who shifted in the air as if made from water vapour. A moment later he disappeared and Miko shivered. He didn’t care for Bangputis, Dahlia’s daeva. “Alright, Miko,” said Dahlia. “Try again, but slowly.” Miko again started to bounce and chitter. “I just scared away some men in the garden, but they’ve left black powder trails which lead into the cellars, and I can’t get in. I think they’re trying to blow up the house.” Dahlia nodded. “I see… that is a problem, isn’t it? Show me.” Miko was shocked. She had understood him! No doubt through some use of her sorcery, which he hated, but at least she seemed to put it to good use. And this was the best possible use! Anyway – time to go. He led Dahlia out of the room, and back to the garden where she also followed the black powder that led to the cellars. She tried the door and found it locked. “Alright Miko,” she said. “I’ll handle this. You need to find out where those men went – if we are to put a stop to these attacks, we need to track them down.” Miko nodded and prepared to jump into the streets. “Miko!” Dahlia called. Miko stopped and looked round. “Leave the pistols. You’ll attract enough notice as it is – you don’t want musketeers trying to stop you.” Miko, reluctantly, left the pistols with Dahlia and leapt over the hedge to follow the trail of blood. It went down the street in a weaving line. Miko was quite pleased – it must have been a good shot, especially since he’d taken it whilst falling off a tree branch. He hoped that this wouldn’t take too long – he had to get back to the hunt for his banana-bell, and he was certain that these two men hadn’t stolen it. He followed for several minutes before the blood trail led to a tavern and Miko wished he still had his pistols – you could find all sorts of nefarious types in taverns! And alcohol – which he’d recently had bad experiences with so he wouldn’t be touching – which made the nefarious people even more so! He went to a window and looked in. As Miko expected, the tavern was filled with people enjoying their drinks and, in some cases, dubious looking non-banana-based food. The blood trail was hidden beneath everything, but he had a stroke of luck – he spotted the two men from earlier going out the back. Miko quickly clambered up the wall of the tavern and over the roof to see the men getting into a cart. It looked like the injured one was going into the back, though the bleeding had stopped, so his wound must have been treated. The other was getting into the driving seat. The cart drove away and Miko leapt from rooftop to rooftop to follow it until, eventually, he was able to take the chance to leap to the cart itself and find a small niche under it to sit in. The cart rattled along for a while and Miko worked really hard to concentrate on what he was doing. He couldn’t go and find the bell now – he had to follow these people. Dahlia had said that everybody would want to know where they were going, and she probably knew best. Maybe, if he did this, Dahlia might get him a new bell. Then this would be a way of getting a bell without needing to find another one. That helped. The cart continued to bounce along and eventually everything went dark. Had the sun gone down? Miko looked out from his hiding place and saw that they had gone indoors, and now the cart was stopping. He hid again for a moment to make sure he wouldn’t be seen, and then left to explore the building. It was large and included stables with a few horses – he kept out of the way of those! Otherwise, the building seemed to be filled with boxes, each of which contained more of the black powder. Miko wasn’t sure what to do after that. The men had gone. It might have been fun to steal the cart, but he didn’t think he could open the large doors. There was a window high on the wall that he could escape through, but he certainly couldn’t get the cart up there. There didn’t seem to be any point staying – it didn’t have any bananas in it. He climbed up to the window and started to head back to the house. Thankfully, he’d done enough exploring with the others that he felt he could easily find the way back. And he might even find the banana-maid on the way! He started on his way, keeping his eyes peeled for the banana-maid and started to make good progress. He recognised the streets and only realised that there was a problem when he heard running feet behind him and calls of “Catch that monkey!”. He looked back over his shoulder to see what the problem was and saw two musketeers chasing him down. He shrieked in panic and ran for the nearest building to climb up it. It was very tall, with lots of stone creatures on top, and he didn’t need to go too high before he was confident that the musketeers couldn’t get to him. However, they did stand at the bottom and wait for him to come down. Miko started to get frustrated – all he wanted was a banana, and it was proving really difficult to get hold of one. He shouted down at the musketeers, even though he knew that they wouldn’t understand. In this case, it was probably for the best. Sitting on the building was getting boring, but the musketeers still weren’t going away. They were shouting something about a zoo, but anybody should have been able to tell that Miko wasn’t from a zoo – he was far too clever and sophisticated for that. He was a free monkey on a quest for a banana, and they weren’t respecting that. He had an idea though – he could get to the other side of the building, over the top, far quicker than they could run round it. Miko could create enough of a lead that he could lose them in the streets. He launched himself upwards and ran, hearing the cries of the musketeers behind him. He saw that the plan had worked when he jumped back down to street level, but not as much as he might have hoped – the musketeers were still in sight. He ran, weaving between people as much as he could, but many of them moved out of the way at the shouts of the musketeers. He ran to a fruit stand (no bananas) and tipped it over, which tripped one of his pursuers, but the other kept up the chase. Miko recognised that he was almost back to the house, and he needed to lose the man chasing him before then. Sadly, he’d picked up more pursuers, as the remaining musketeer had started to offer money to anybody that could catch the monkey. Miko continued to weave through the crowds, many of whom started to immediately chase after him when they heard the shouts of the crowd in pursuit. The next street had another crowd, and Miko almost stopped to turn another way. However, he saw that this crowd weren’t interested in him – they were watching two people fighting in the street with their swords. He kept running, weaving through the duel, surprising the crowd, and continuing to run. The musketeer stopped, also seemingly distracted by the duel, and the crowd that was chasing couldn’t get down the street. Once he’d turned the corner, Miko slowed down and calmed himself. Now – that was done and dealt with, so he could get back to the banana hunt. He needed to find the banana-maid, but he’d need to get back to the house to pick up the trail again. He proceeded and, when he got there, saw the banana-maid leading a small cart back to the house. It was filled with bananas! He leapt after her and onto the wagon, with its treasure trove and picked one out. He leapt from there to the shoulder of the banana-maid. She looked up at him in surprise and laughed. With a smile, she reached into her skirts and passed him the banana-bell. Miko took it with his tail, whilst he opened his banana. He looked back at the cart of bananas behind him and grinned. It was going to be a good few days. |
Flash FictionSome shorter fiction, usually based on some kind of challenge. Archives
October 2021
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