‘Let me guess,’ I said, ‘you’re here to have a few dangerous scrapes so once you have been shoehorned into your cushy and undemanding job you’ll have something interesting in your past to brighten an otherwise unremarkable life?’
‘Pretty much,’ he said, completely unfazed by my assessment. ‘So listen, I know you run Kazam, so got any “S”? Y’know, something to while away the dull evenings between bouts of excitement and terror?’
‘S?’
‘Spells,’ he said in a low voice, ‘the weirder the better, but none of that “changing into animals” stuff because it can totally do your head.’
He laughed in a clumsy attempt to charm me. The use of magic for recreational purposes was stupid, dangerous and irresponsible. Supplying mind-altering spells to idiots like Curtis would also have you drummed out of the magic industry quicker than you could say Zork.
‘No,’ I said, ‘and here’s why: you’ll start with something simple like a Pollyanna Stone that tells you what you want to hear. Pretty soon you’ll be moving on to stronger and heavier spells that promote unrealistic levels of optimism and self-delusion. After that you’ll be dependent on them, always looking for the next spell, and then, when the spells lose their power, you’ll be lost, frightened and bewildered, and your life will tip into a downward spiral of recrimination and despair.’
‘Okay, okay,’ he said, backing away from my icy stare, ‘I only asked. Boy, some people are so square.’
He returned to where his friends were waiting and they went into a huddle, throwing the occasional dirty look in my direction. I ignored them, and entered the Tourist Information Office.
The woman behind the desk was middle aged and dressed in the traditional badger skins. She had a tattoo on the left side of her face to denote her clan and status, and wore the ‘ABTA Silver Star’ medal on her left breast, denoting Tour Guide valour, probably something to do with her missing left arm.
‘Welcome, noble traveller and adventurer,’ said the woman in a long-rehearsed patter, ‘to the land that Health and Safety forgot. In these risk-averse times, the Cambrian Empire is one of the few places where danger is actually dangerous. The possibility of actual death brings fear and excitement to even the most mundane of pastimes; the adrenalin surge in knowing you have cheated death by a whisker is a wild ride to which you will wish to return time and time again. Now, what do you fancy?’
She indicated a board behind her, with each activity outlined next to a price, and how dangerous it was by way of a Calculated Fatality Index. The most dangerous was a six-day ‘wrestling with flesh-eating slugs’ holiday at 58 per cent, which I took to mean that for every hundred tourists willing to risk the dangers, fifty-eight would end up as a sort of semi-digested gloop. Below that was Tralfamosaur hunting with a Fatality Index of 42 per cent, and the list went down in danger from there, past ‘prodding a Hotax with a stick’ to ‘searching for the source of the River Wye’ and then to ‘watching Tralfamosaur from a distance’ before the least dangerous activity of all, a shopping trip to Cambrianopolis. This, while relatively risk-free by Cambrian standards, could still lose one visitor out of a hundred.
‘Mostly to crush injury, hold-ups and food poisoning,’ explained the tourist officer when I asked, ‘and the Fatality Index does rise to 2.2 per cent during the January sales. Now, what are you after?’
I had to think carefully. If I just said we were going to Llangurig, I wouldn’t even need a guide. But if Quizzler was right and the Eye of Zoltar was with Sky Pirate Wolff, I’d need the best guide there was. I decided to opt for the most adventurous scenario.
‘Party of three to discover the legendary Leviathans’ Graveyard, please,’ I replied, ‘and when there to meet up with Sky Pirate Wolff – by way of Llangurig to visit a friend.’
The woman looked more amused than shocked.
‘Yes, yes, very funny,’ she said. ‘Seriously, what would you like to do?’
‘As I said.’
‘Listen,’ she said, lowering her voice and beckoning me closer, ‘the reason we don’t list excursions to search for the not-very-likely Leviathans’ Graveyard is because of Sky Pirate Wolff. The last two expeditions both suffered an 86 per cent Fatality Index. Risk of death is our selling point; almost certain death is not. Dead tourists don’t come back and spend more money.’
‘I’ll be okay,’ I said, ‘I’m big into peril.’
‘Oh yeah?’ she said, unconvinced. ‘How big?’
‘I … sleep in the same room as a Quarkbeast.’
The tourist woman blinked twice. The Quarkbeast’s fearsome reputation was known all over the Kingdoms.
‘Leviathans’ Graveyard and Captain Wolff, eh?’
‘If it’s not too much trouble.’
‘Okay, then,’ said the tourist office woman, ‘there is one guide I can think of who might be willing to help you search for the Leviathans’ Graveyard, but they won’t be cheap and this didn’t come through me. Wait outside and I’ll let them know.’
I thanked her and walked back out into the autumn sunshine and noticed the Bugatti had gone. Our luggage was sitting in the dust by the roadside, and sitting on top of our luggage was Perkins.
‘Where’s the car?’
‘Requisitioned by agents acting for Emperor Tharv,’ said Perkins meekly. ‘I tried to stop them but there were eight of them, and they all had very sharp swords.’
‘Couldn’t you have using a simple occluding spell or something?’
‘Yes, well, I could have done but it all happened so fast. But they did say thank you very politely and issued a receipt.’
Crime in the Cambrian Empire was always business, never personal. You’d not be a victim of crime here without an apology, an explanation of why you were being robbed and then a receipt to facilitate an insurance claim. Perkins passed me the receipt, which conveyed, in very official-looking language, that the car had been claimed by the Emperor as anything in the nation could be, but the note said that I would be compensated – to the value of one Bugatti Royale.
‘That’s a blow,’ I said, looking around, ‘what about the Princess? Don’t tell me they requisitioned her as well?’
‘No, she went shopping.’
The Princess returned a few moments later.
‘I had ID tags made for us so our bodies can be identified just in case,’ she said cheerfully, handing us the discs. ‘The man in the shop said they were Tralfamosaur gastric juice and flesh-eating slug ooze resilient. Where’s the Bugatti?’
I showed her the receipt.
‘Oh,’ she said, studying the piece of paper, ‘how interesting. Since it’s issued on Emperor Tharv’s order, technically it’s a one Bugatti banknote.’
‘And how would we redeem it?’ asked Perkins. ‘Go and ask Tharv for the equivalent in sports cars and take the change in motorcycles and hood ornaments?’
The Princess shrugged.
‘I don’t know. Shall I go and see if I can find a hire car?’
‘Make sure it’s good on all terrain,’ I replied, ‘and armoured.’
The Princess trotted off, enjoying her new-found freedom. It must have been quite a change for her, not being harassed by the press on her choice of boyfriends, her weight or who she would be voting for on The Kingdom of Snodd’s Got Talent.
While we waited, Perkins and I checked our budget as I hadn’t thought we’d be needing to hire a car, and a specialist guide was going to cost. We had enough, I figured, so long as we didn’t eat out too often.
‘Almost like a holiday, isn’t it?’ said Perkins, looking at the tourists moving here and there, organising their jeopardy gleefully.