The Black Lung Captain - Chris Wooding [158]
PINN WOKE WITH AN explosive snort to find that everything was sideways.
It took him several seconds to locate himself and work out which way up the world was meant to be. The smell of tobacco smoke, grog, and sweat hung in the air. A badly tuned piano plinked and clunked in the background. He heard laughter, snarls, and curses.
He was lying facedown on the bar, one chubby jowl spread out under him like a cushion. His chin was wet with drool and spilled beer.
His head felt heavier than usual as he lifted it. It lolled this way and that, too weighty for his neck to support. He got it under control with some effort and blinked the crust out of his eyes.
“You look a little the worse for wear, sir,” beamed the bartender, “if you don’t mind me saying.”
Pinn did mind, but he didn’t have the energy to do anything about it. He decided he needed a drink instead. He had a vague memory of putting some coins on the bar in front of him, ready to buy his next drinks. His last two coins in the world. He’d been staring at them glumly at some point before he passed out. Now they were gone. He couldn’t even remember what he’d spent them on.
“Stand me a round, friend?” he mumbled, more in hope than expectation.
The bartender, a tall mustachioed man with an annoyingly lively character, just grinned ever wider. “No need, no need! Hold still a minute.” He leaned over the bar and peeled the missing coins off Pinn’s face. “There you go. That should cover it! A rum and a beer, was it?”
“Right,” said Pinn. The bartender busied himself with the drinks.
Pinn wiped his chops with his sleeve and gazed blearily into the mirror behind the bar. Something resembling a bewildered mole stared back. The little thatch of hair atop his head had been crushed into an unflattering slope. He licked his palm and tried to do something about it. When he couldn’t work up enough saliva, he dipped his hand in a nearby beer spill and used that.
The bartender put the drinks down in front of him. “Forgive the observation, sir, but you’ve got about you the air of a man who doesn’t quite know where he is. Am I right?”
Pinn looked around the bar again. “Yeah. Where am I?”
“The Grog Hatch, sir. Finest tavern in town.”
Pinn thought for a moment. “And what town is that, then?”
The bartender was impressed. “You are a free spirit, sir. Well, then, I have the pleasure of informing you that you find yourself in the fine port of Kingspire. Home of the best spitted dive-hawk in Vardia. I urge you to try it, if you haven’t already. Might I ask what brings you to this place?”
The bartender’s conversation was making Pinn’s head hurt. “I was going somewhere …” he mumbled. “My sweetheart’s getting married.”
“Oh, how terrible! And you, sir, are racing to prevent it?”
“I was,” he said. “Dunno how I ended up here.”
“Perhaps you were inclined to have a drink to steel your nerve?” suggested the bartender, who’d begun cleaning glasses.
“Yeah.”
“And after several drinks … Why, a man alone in a place like this, he has needs, doesn’t he? Needs a woman can’t understand. Perhaps you took a fancy to one of the local doxies?”
“More than one,” Pinn grunted. He swigged his rum to clear the taste of previous rums out of his mouth.
“You must possess a surfeit of manly desire, sir.”
Pinn wasn’t sure what that meant, but he liked the sound of it so he agreed. “Damn right.”
“Perhaps you gambled a little too?”
“Gotta do a bit of gambling after you’ve done a whore,” said Pinn. “That’s the time to hit the tables. A man thinks best when his pods are empty.”
“And, if I may venture to extrapolate from your recent attempt to solicit refreshments, perhaps you’ve been here several days, spent all the money you have, and now find yourself stranded, without a shillie to your name, and many kloms still to go to your sweetheart?”
“That’s it,” said Pinn. “Exactly.”
The bartender sighed dramatically. “You have my sympathy, sir. Fortune is cruel to romantics.”
Pinn raised his mug of rum to that. This bartender was one wordy