"In that case," huffed Eddinray, still standing; "drinks! Long have I desired one!"
Harmony urged him to sit, but Eddinray paid no attention to her on his way to the bar. There, four creatures ordered drinks, and following Kat's example, Eddinray barged through the pack like a school bully — shoving both a salmon faced woman and inebriated peacock to one side.
"What can I do you for?" asked the barman.
"Drink,” Eddinray answered, purposely lowering his voice. "I'm thirsty. Real thirsty."
A tense looking barman flicked Eddinray a shot of black liquid, which he keenly knocked back.
"Blugh!" he suddenly exclaimed, spitting over the counter. "This is the most offensive thing to ever grace my lips! And I've ate bark for goodness sake! Bark!"
"Thank you!" said a delighted barman. "That'll be one dreg if you please?"
"One what? What are you raving about man?"
"Dreg of light,” stuttered the barman, reaching his hand under the bar counter.
"The price for the drink."
"What are you hiding there?" uttered Eddinray, pointing. "What skulduggery is this?"
"It's nothing sir!" declared the barman, his flames rippling nervously. "Nothing at all!"
"Liar! Show me — show me this instant you…blue person!"
Reluctantly, the barman pulled back his hand back to reveal a club gripped in his burning fingers. Eddinray considered, then with a queer smile said. "Dreg of light you say? You mean…this stuff?"
With a boastful grin, Eddinray raised his canteen and twisted off the lid. Immediately, starlight swooned out from the bottleneck, and hungry hands came to snatch before they could vanish. Nonchalantly, the knight resealed the canteen and every living thing hushed respectfully for this man of fortune — even the carpet playing piano halted play to enviously peek at the wealthy stranger, the knight who came from the desert.
"You've been to the labyrinth!" cried the peacock. "To the very centre! It's true, isn't it true?"
"He has!" declared the salmon faced woman. "No man carries that much dreg without seeing the labyrinth! Everyone look! Gather round!"
Wild fire whispers spread, and we at the table watched with concern.
"I have been to the labyrinth!" confirmed Eddinray, loud and proud. "What of it?"
The mob cheered and crowded him, with the hovering bee proclaiming over the pandemonium.
"Heeee is God's chosen one! Heeee is!"
"The chosen one!" they repeated, with sycophantic screams. "The chosen one! The chosen one!"
All drunks roused the saloon with the same eager chorus. "The chosen one! The chosen one! Here! Hurrah!"
Eddinray was suddenly a superstar, he was Elvis and the Beatles combined, and he was loving it.
"Tell us chosen one," asked an enthusiastic barman — "how did you survive the rat men? How did you evade their mother queen?"
"YES! TELL US! TELL!""
Eddinray beckoned a hand for silence, and his ego was overjoyed to get it.
"The labyrinth rat men," he started slowly; "I turned to mince. The mushy kind, you know! I turned them all to mince! Born to face evil — raised in the jungle — I fear no man or thing…"
Harmony blurted a laugh through her fingers, while I could only shake a flummoxed face at Eddinray's confidence. "People, I am Sir Godwin Eddinray! And those seated fools are my squires!"
An insulted Kat squinted back — maybe it was being called a fool by the fool of fools, or a squire to that fool. "Out of his wits,” he muttered to me. "I told you he was mad, Fox."
"Oh, no!" said Harmony, seemingly unaware of any potential danger. "He's just enjoying himself. Godwin is a natural entertainer!"
"Entertainer or not," I said, "this is no place to attract attention."
"Would the chosen one care for another drink?" asked the barman, eager to please. "My pleasure of course! Anything for the chosen one!"
"I should think so too!" he returned. "Pray tell sir, what do you know of the chosen one? Who dare speak of me?"
It was as if Eddinray asked the entire saloon this question, for every mouth shot answers at him.
"The chosen one sent to Hell for a great task! The greatest task!"
"A heavenly quesssst!" buzzed the bee in flight. "To lead the great and good in the second battle! The chosen one!"
"Here in Breakneck!"
"A knight!"
"Eddinray! Touched by God himself!"
Part amused, part disturbed, I badgered an agitated-looking Kat for more information.
"A myth!" Harmony interrupted. "The afterlife has its legends too, Daniel."
She was right — one of them was leading me to the 9th Fortress.
"I am the chosen one!" announced Eddinray, pounding a fist on the bar top to shake the pints of lesser men. "And I want everything what's coming to me! A bath for starters…with genuine soap!"
All of a sudden, the two saloon doors were flung open, and a substantial silhouette stood before the blazing glass-storm. Enthusiasm for Eddinray died an instant death for this new arrival, this authority awaiting all to acknowledge his attendance here. Once the man had absolute attention, he let doors swing shut and moseyed toward the bar.
He was a man, and hefty, the blubber begging to burst his belt and shirt buttons; he wore old leather from hat to boots and caressed a belt full of miniature knives. His face was crushed by overstuffed cheeks giving him a babyish and horribly unhealthy appearance. He strut with great wheezing breaths and rippling rolls of fat, but still the floorboards held. Surreptitious eyes watched his walk, and the distinctive musk of fear accompanied that of buttery sweat. "Usual!" the obese stranger cragged at the barman, who was already hurrying for the order.
Only now did Eddinray appear dismayed by the loss of his crowd, the nervous barman meanwhile burned red as he poured a pint for his new customer. "No trouble,” the barman whispered. "Not today…Deadeye."
"No trouble,” the greasy nosed man agreed. "Just the drink."
"And will you be paying today? I mean, you don't have to, but if you want to then…"
"I will pay,” answered Deadeye, revealing a watery pouch by his belt.
"Collected it this morning. Should cover the tab too."
"Deadeye you ssstink!" hummed the bee in the ceiling. "You won't run meee out! Deadeye ssstinks! Deadeye ssstinks!"
Oxygen in the saloon seemed to be sucked out of some unseen hole in space, and I watched many attempt to lurch unnoticed from Deadeye's radar, some even preferring to face the storm outside than the one brewing in here. Remaining expressionless to the bees insults, the stout man never once removed his eyes from his grimy pint glass. It was only when drinkers assumed a lenient Deadeye would ignore the bumblebees abuse that the fat man unleashed his darts, striking three knives with machine gun speed and pinpoint accuracy into the bees heart. Stunned customers held the drink in their gobs, and like a dying spitfire, the bee stuttered to crash land on a table.
"Charlie!" grieved the maggot. "What did I tell you? What did I say?"
Deadeye gave a hint to one drinker, who promptly scurried to the still twitching bee, recovered all three knives from its body before returning them to Deadeye's belt. The bee then receded to that common speck of plasma, leaving a pair of weightless wings and a handful of prickly yellow hair.
"No trouble!" urged the barman. "Hell this may be, but I run a joint free from the chaos outside! Free!"
Deadeye returned an accommodating squint, and another pint soon filled his chubby palm.
"Where was I?" pondered the knight. "Oh yes — what's coming to me! Let's see!"
"Shut up Godwin!" whispered Harmony, from our table. “Shush!”
"Deadeye?" said Eddinray, clearing his throat. "Never in my days have I heard such a preposterous name! If you are not the most ridiculous man here I will eat my own helmet!"