The Misplaced Mystic

Chapter the Fourth: Of Thieves and Drunken Spaniards

Author's Note: I would like to thank for more reviews of awesomeness, and for pointing out a couple of my silly mistakes! I seriously love you, really, and also, I am, at the moment, about halfway through the book. I've been using an online script for the quotes, which is why there have been a couple of mistakes where I should have edited lines. Amazon also conned me, saying that the edition of the book that I ordered contained the sample chapter of Buttercup's Baby, and it didn't. Very annoyed about that. Anyway, I'll not keep you from our epic tale of fencing, true love, revenge and really tight trousers any longer! Read on!

I looked all over – he couldn't have gone far. I asked a friendly-looking thug if he had seen a small, impossibly skinny Spaniard with a quicksilver blade. He said no, and promptly threw me in a ditch. How delightful of him. I picked myself up, dusted off the worst of the dirt and scolded myself, vowing not to be as naïve in this place again.

I was quickly deciding the Thieves' Forest wasn't the place for me. I wished I could find Inigo so Fezzik could hurry up and sweep us off to nice, civilised Florin in search of the six-fingered man so Inigo could have his long-awaited revenge.

I knew Inigo was a complete alcoholic, (give him a glass of wine or two and he's putty in your hands) and that if I didn't find him he would wind up passed out in some filthy tavern, stripped of anything valuable by thieves, but how many filthy taverns were there in the Forest? There was nothing I could do but search until we bumped into each other, but I had no idea where to start.

I ended up putting Vizzini's law into practise again. I went back to the beginning, (i.e. where I had been when I'd lost Inigo) and tried to put myself in his shoes. If I was an alcoholic fencing wizard being followed by an annoying 'mystic' girl, where would I hop off to?

This didn't quite work out, seeing as I didn't know my way around the Forest, so I went back to the original plan of aimlessly wandering around until I saw Inigo.

I diligently set about exploring the thriving village, but finding a lithe little Spaniard in a city full of rogues of all shapes and sizes was proving to be a lot like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

After a long time, I was reaching the point of desperation. What would I do if I could not find him? I knew no one else in this world, and I doubted anyone was likely to take in a fake mystic with a £2 pentacle necklace. I sat down despairingly on a conveniently placed crate and sunk into misery.

The next thing I knew – "Oi, wench, 'ow much?"

The man who had spoken was grubby, with mucky blonde hair and leering eyes. He looked twenty or so.

I blinked rapidly, waking up from my sorrowful thoughts. "What?"

"I said, 'ow much, come on now, I 'ant got all day."

"Wait, wait, what? Oh no, no, no, no. I am not what you think I am!" I exclaimed furiously.

"Well, 'ow's you afford that nice little bit of shine around your neck there?" He said, reaching out for my pentacle.

"It wasn't expensive!" I insisted truthfully.

The man looked at me doubtfully. "Then you won't miss it. I'll be taking it, then." He started to pull on the pendant.

"Get off me, you thief!" I cried, flapping uselessly at him. Strength and hand-to-hand combat were not my strong points. Yet another time my stupid mouth had got me into trouble.

He laughed. "Why d'you think they call this the Thieves' Forest, missus?" He continued to tug on the chain, which was now starting to dig into my neck badly. I was sure I was doomed to be robbed and beaten at the very least, when –

"Oi! You there! Get your hands of that lady!" I looked up the muddy street to see – who else – Inigo, standing there, brandishing his exquisite sword and looking most unimpressed with the dirty little robber attempting to steal my jewellery.

My attacker quickly pulled me to him, holding a long knife to my throat.

"You want to see her dead, huh?" He hissed at Inigo, who looked crestfallen. "No? Well, put away your weapon then."

"I don't want no trouble," Inigo said, sheathing his sword, raising his hands and taking a step forward.

The man shoved the point of his knife closer to my neck. I tried not to flinch.

"Stop walking or she dies," the robber said, practically stabbing me in the neck with the knife.

Inigo immediately halted. "Can we not come to some arrangement?"

The man paused, pretending to think. "Nope," he said, and resumed threatening my life.

It seemed I was about to die, for the second time that week.

So, I did what anyone in my situation would do.

I booted him right where it hurts most.

This robber was obviously very inept, because just one simple well-aimed kick had him bent over with pain, unable to even hold a knife to a hostage's throat. Inigo and I made our escape down a back alley.

"I got lost," I explained.

"Yes," he said, looking around disdainfully. "I thought as much. I hate this place."

"Can't say I fancy shacking up here," I agreed, frowning at the dilapidated buildings.

"So what do we do now?" he asked.

I thought back to my university days. "We do what anyone in our situation would do," I said.

"And what's that?"

"Get blind stinking drunk."

It was amazing what a few bottles of brandy could do to a man, I thought as I sat on the step of a wrecked building on the outskirts of the Thieves' Forest, many hours later. Fezzik was taking his time in coming, and Inigo was already ridiculously inebriated. I, too, was not in as good a condition as I would have liked. At first, I had been determined to not drink, and simply guard Inigo until Fezzik came to rescue us. Then, boredom had set in. Sitting around and watching a Spaniard drink himself into oblivion was not the most interesting of pastimes, and before I knew it I was joining Inigo on his little traipses to the tavern, and purchasing my own brandy.

Inigo had taken to talking to himself. I watched him with the expression of a curious monkey, swigging brandy all the while.

"We are waiting for you, Vizzini," he was saying, his words almost drowned by his drunken slur. "You told us to go back to the beginning. So we have. This is where we are, and this is where we will stay. We will not be moved."

"I'll drink to that!" I cried cheerily, raising my brandy bottle to the sky, before bringing it down for yet another deep slurp.

Suddenly, a brute with long greasy black hair came around the side of the building into our view. I regarded him with a look of disgust. "Ho there," he said.

"We do not budge. Keep your "Ho there"," Inigo reprimanded him. I snorted, once again gulping down brandy.

"But the Prince gave orders-" The yucky brute insisted, before Inigo interrupted.

He leapt forward, wielding his deadly sword. "So did Vizzini. When a job went wrong, you went back to the beginning, and this is where I got the job, so it's the beginning, and we're staying until Vizzini comes."

The brute pointed at someone behind us. "You! Brute! Come here!" He called.

"We are waiting for Vizzini," Inigo said slowly, enunciating every letter, as if he was teaching a toddler to spell his name.

"You surely are a meanie," came a voice.

Fezzik ambled slowly over to us and picked up Inigo by the back of his shirt. They squinted at each other, remembering their faces.

"Hello," said Fezzik.

"It's you," Inigo said, looking as if Christmas had come early.

"True," Fezzik rhymed. I rolled my eyes, guzzling down the last of my brandy. It was like a reunion in a bad chick flick, but with more alcohol and less tonsil tennis.

The dirty brute approached, club at the ready, ready to beat Inigo to high heaven. I, seeing my chance to earn myself some more Brownie points, helpfully whacked him over the head with my now-empty brandy bottle. He collapsed to the floor unconscious, as was my aim.

Fezzik saw me for the first time. "Hello, Isabel," he said.

"Hello," I replied, stumbling over the word.

"Are you drunk?" he asked. "Goodness, lady, I would have thought you'd have had more sense." He now sounded like a patronizing parent, and I didn't like it, so I played the all-knowing mystic card one more time.

"I knew you were coming," I slurred.

Fezzik turned back to Inigo. "You don't look too good either," he said. "And you smell even worse."

"Perhaps so. I feel fine." Inigo smiled weakly.

"Yeah?" said Fezzik, releasing Inigo from his grasp. The Spaniard promptly fainted, falling face-first into the ground. I sniggered and stood up, showing that silly drunk fool how it should be done. Then, of course, I fainted too.

When I came to, I was lying on the floor of a mucky alehouse in the Thieves' Forest, and my head hurt like a mother. Two men were sat at a table, one lithe, one large. It took me a moment to remember who they were and where I was. When I did, I called out, "Help me up!" but all that came out was "Mel de hup!" which made absolutely no sense to me nor Inigo and Fezzik.

Nonetheless, the gentle giant lifted me carefully off the ground and placed me softly into a chair. He placed a bowl full of stew in front of me. I gazed down at it blearily. It was orange and yellow and shockingly resembled vomit. I turned my eyes up towards Fezzik. "If you think I'm eating that garbage you've got another think coming," I told him. I wasn't a lot of fun to be around on a post-booze-up morning.

Fezzik rolled his eyes and shook his head the way parents do when they think you're being ungrateful. He sat down at the table and started to spoon-feed Inigo, telling him of the news about Count Rugen being the six-fingered man and Vizzini's rather inconvenient demise. Inigo handled the news pretty well, I figured, seeing as instead of getting angry and storming about, he just face-planted into his stew.

I slumped over the table and fell asleep. When I woke up, Fezzik was dunking Inigo's head in water, alternating between a barrel of steaming water and a barrel of cold water. When Inigo was fully sober, he pulled himself out of Fezzik's gargantuan grasp and cried, "That's enough! That's enough! Where is this Rugen so I can kill him?"

"You don't mess around do you?" I quipped, having recovered slightly from my hangover.

The two men ignored me. "He's in the castle with the Prince, but the castle is guarded by thirty men."

"How many could you handle?" Inigo asked him.

"I don't think more than ten." Fezzik said sadly.

The Spaniard turned to me. "How about you?"

I shook my head despairingly. "I'm a useless fighter," I admitted. "I don't know if I could beat one."

"That leaves about twenty for me," Inigo said, after counting on his fingers for a while. "At my best I could never defeat that many." He sat down on a chair, deep in thought. "I need Vizzini to plan," he continued. "I've no head for strategy." Neither of us did, either.

"But Vizzini's dead," said Fezzik, newly-crowned King of Stating the Obvious.

The three of us sat together, silent for a while, gloom heavy in the air, but I was remarkably cheerful, for of course, I knew all was not lost.

Inigo suddenly looked enlightened. "No, not Vizzini, the Man in Black!" he exclaimed.

"Bingo," I said, and of course, that confused them, because this was before bingo.

"What?" said Fezzik, stumped.

"He bested you with strength, he bested me with steel, he must have outthought Vizzini, and a man who can do all that can plan my castle's onslaught any day. Let's go!" He was jubilant with hope. It made me happy to see him so joyous, so I stood up, ready to set off in pursuit of this enigmatic Man in Black.

"Where?" asked Fezzik, ever the puzzled one.

"To find the Man in Black, obviously." The Spaniard answered.

"But you don't know where he is." King Obvious struck again.

"That's what we have her for!" He pointed at me. I looked up with the expression of a deer in headlights.

"I've never been to Florin before," I squeaked shyly.

"I thought you were brought up here?" Inigo replied, raising an eyebrow.

Oh dear. Look what I had done now.

"Er – er – I was, but not in Florin City. I'm a country girl." I babbled, pleading to the Gods above that they would believe my terrible lie.

Fortunately, they did.

"No matter, I will show you around. My ventures have led me many times to these parts…" Inigo said enigmatically, leading us out the door.

After a minute of walking in no particular direction, he asked, "Any ideas yet?"

I breathed in deeply, putting on my best meditative face. "I see…chains."

"Chains?"

"He's in a pit. A pit of… doom? Desperation? No, no… despair! The Pit of Despair!" I cried, hoping my acting was convincing.

"A pit? Underground?"

I nodded.

"That only makes it more difficult. How are we to find somewhere underground?" Inigo didn't look pleased with me.

I looked hurt. "I can only tell what I see," I said.

"You're right, you're right, I'm sorry." He apologized. I nodded, all was well.

We strolled on through the Thieves' Forest towards Florin City. It was when we were making our way through the Forest's busy courtyard that the terrible scream started up.

We stopped in our tracks. If Inigo was a cat, his ears would have pricked up. "Fezzik, Isabel, listen, listen, do you hear?"

Fezzik nodded, and I said, "I hear and I see," shuddering for effect.

Inigo looked at me sympathetically. "That bad, huh?"

I nodded stiffly, pretending to look tortured.

"That is the sound of ultimate suffering – is it not, Isabel?" Inigo continued. I nodded again. "My heart made that sound when Rugen slaughtered my father. The Man in Black makes it now."

"The Man in Black?" Fezzik questioned, confused again.

"His true love is marrying another tonight, so who else has cause for ultimate suffering?" Inigo asked, not expecting an answer. He tried to push through the crowd towards the origin of the sound, but people were not willing to go out of their way to let a skinny foreign bloke through. "Excuse me," he said to washerwoman who was obstructing his path. He turned to Fezzik and I, who were following close behind him. "It's too crowded."

"You don't need psychic intuition to figure that one out," I quipped, still grouchy. The bustling noise of the courtyard was reviving my headache.

Inigo ignored my stinging comment, continuing to try to push his way through the crowd. "Pardon me, it's important," he said to another civilian. He turned to Fezzik, his eyes large and pleading. "Fezzik, please…"

"Everybody MOVE!" The giant roared across the courtyard. The quietened, suitably intimidated citizens shuffled out of the way. Inigo strode purposefully through the parted crowd, looking like Moses having just parted the seas. "Thank you," he said to Fezzik, and the three of us made our way towards the fading sound of the Man in Black's scream.

Author's Note: I know! I know! Ridiculously long update gap! The two horrors of my life, writer's block and school, have come at the same time and made writing this chapter unbearably difficult. Anyway, sorry about that! Please review!