oye como va, mi ritmo
bueno pa gozar, mulata
Mallos paid dearly for his trick at the beach. Sperantia waited until as he was getting up that morning and, just as he stood up to full height, she leapt from her tree onto his back. By the time her only half-awake fairy had realised what was happening, she’d gauged ten deep scratches which ran from just beneath the shoulder all the way down to the bottom of the back. Purring, the cat had leapt down to the ground and sprinted swiftly away, taking with her a smug satisfaction and the sound of the deity’s Latino curses ringing in her pointed ears. His shirt had been destroyed. Still swearing, Mallos had had to don another one before beginning the day.
Not that there’s much of a day to begin. Compared to his old life on Earth (prior to Gwythr locking him under a palace), Shaman is extremely provincial. Life is a little more exciting without magic because he has to think about how to get sustenance, where to shelter safely for the night and other mortal concerns. When he isn’t busy surviving, though, entertaining activities are few and far between. Most fairies are occupied with rebuilding their homes after the war, leaving Mallos to fill his days chatting casually with the homeless and the aimless in the Silver Cove.
This morning he turns habitually towards the ’Cove, but before he’s taken more than a few steps he changes his mind and turns back towards the centre of the island. The unfamiliar walk is pleasant enough, if a little cold for his taste, and the patchy forest canopy forms an attractive dappled light effect on the path. The sun is nearing its peak when a gap in the trees displays a fine picture of the royal castle some distance away, and on impulse Mallos turns towards it. The royal grounds are extensive, containing several grassy fields as well as nicer gardens, a paddock, stables and training grounds. Mallos has to jump a couple of fences before he finally reaches the castle itself, looming impressively in its stone bulk. Since the front door will undoubtedly be locked, he casually scales the wall and vaults in through an open first-floor window, using a ground-floor window and a few cracks between the stones as foot- and hand-holds.
He finds himself in an empty room which, judging by stacks of dusty arrows, is probably being used to store excess weaponry which was created for the war but never used. So far, he hasn’t seen anyone in either the grounds or the palace, and the building stands still and silent. If he’s around at all, Arthur is probably out the back playing with his sword or something. This suits Mallos just fine, since he hadn’t come here for any particular reason, least of all to speak to the king. The castle is a change from the Silver Cove, at least, and it would be interesting to see how Arthur lives. He’s only met the king a couple of times, but on both occasions he had gotten the impression that Arthur is a rather reserved, private type of person; and of course, the temptation to rifling through the possession of private people is too great to pass up.
After about half an hour of wandering around, popping in and out of rooms, he finally locates the library. Old-fashioned books with multi-coloured spines adorn some of the shelves, while on others rolls of yellowing parchment are stacked, gathering dust. Bored, Mallos pulls a book off the shelf at random and flicks through it, frowning at the spiky black ink decorating every page. He can speak fluent English because English was the last language he’d been speaking before his magic was taken, but his brain is hard-wired to Spanish and he can’t read or write in English. He can work out some of the words by speaking aloud the sounds, but many English words are famously non-phonetic so most of it is a mystery. English questions only use a single question mark at the end of a sentence, he notices, suitably baffled. What’s the point of that? That means you start reading the sentence as a sentence, get to the end and realise it’s a question and so have to return to the beginning to re-read it in an interrogative voice. What a stupid language. Returning the book to its place on the shelf, he pulls another one off which looks as if it’s written in Latin. Latin is similar to old Spanish, so as before he can work bits of it out, but not enough to be able to read fluently.
There has to be other languages here. Thumbing the spines, Mallos passes over the Latin and French sections before finally spotting a few words in his native tongue. The book is small and old and only contains a few Bible stories written in simple language, probably to help children practice their literacy skills, but it is at least in a recognisable dialect of Spanish. Mallos flicks through it absently, letting the familiarity of the language wash over him. In a predominantly English-speaking world, surrounded mostly by Britons and Americans, this humble book feels like a little piece of home.
