The Stranger - Max Frei [104]
“I can only imagine the blow she got.”
“No, it wasn’t so bad. For her benefit I demonstrated my ‘Primary Shield’—though I could really have lost my temper. I have to hand it to her—the girl came to her senses in under an hour. She’s a fine damsel, that Melamori.”
“What is this ‘Primary Shield’?” I asked. “Is it something you can teach me?”
“The ‘Primary Shield’ is a poetic name for my own kind of Secret Weapon, Max. ‘Primary’ means it’s the least dangerous for my opponent. What can I teach you? You’ve got stronger shields than any person in this World. Stronger than I dared hope. And you’ll gradually learn to use them, but only through experience. Don’t sell yourself short. You just lack the terminology.”
“What a formidable character that Lady Melamori has turned out to be,” I sighed, pouring myself a comforting portion of kamra. “Such potent gifts at her disposal, yet she behaves like a little child.”
“Are you angry with her, Max? Don’t be. It’s not worth it. The poor thing is already moping around as it is.”
“No, I’m not mad. Just bemoaning my broken heart.”
“I warned you from the start that choosing her as a sweetheart wasn’t a very wise move. Does it never occur to you to listen to your elders, Sir Max?”
I sighed and cut myself a second slice of the Glutton Pie. I’m a callous human being. No broken heart can spoil my appetite—it’s been proven time and again.
“You don’t have anything to add regarding this incident except the sad story of your broken heart?” Juffin asked when we had polished off the pie.
“I don’t know. Actually, I should be asking you. How can it be that I don’t feel anything? Strange things are afoot.It seems that if I commit some crime, I can just calmly flee the scene. I’m a dangerous guy.”
“Yes, much more dangerous than many,” Juffin observed with a satisfied air. He looked like an artist whose hands had just put the finishing touches on a masterpiece.
“It’s all so strange. When I lived at home, I didn’t notice any miraculous inclinations in myself at all. I was as ordinary as the next person. I had peculiar dreams, but that was a personal matter. Maybe others dream the same way, but they just don’t talk about it? But as soon as I end up here, some novelty or other surfaces every day. Maybe you should just cut me in half to find out what’s inside!”
“Excellent idea, Sir Max. But you aren’t as invulnerable as all that. You’ve got your limits. Remember what happened to you in the Old Thorn?”
“The place that funny lanky fellow runs? What’s his name—Chemparkaroke.” I smiled, feeling a bit sheepish.
What happened there wasn’t an achievement I wanted to recall. Juffin had taken me to the Old Thorn when I was still waiting for my appointment to the service. He decided that I just had to try the Soup of Repose, a dish favored by all citizens of the Unified Kingdom.
As far as I understood it, this soup had a light narcotic effect, so harmless and pleasant that the whole family was accustomed to partaking of it, even the littlest tykes.
For that reason I plunged into the psychedelic adventure with no trepidation at all, although my whole life I had felt a cowardly antipathy toward drugs and drug users. My smattering of experience in this area was acquired, of course, in the last years of high school, and was so unsuccessful that rather than developing a habit, I developed a phobia.
I really fell face-first into the Soup of Repose. All my foreignness, which I simply forget about from time to time, came to the surface as soon as I had finished slurping up the first serving. Juffin suddenly found himself in the company of a blithering idiot, giggling over his empty bowl in a fit of hilarity. For me it wasn’t the most pleasant experience, either. In an instant I had become a hallucinating nutcase with compromised coordination. The respectable habitués of the Old Thorn, I imagine, were shocked by my behavior.
After this incident followed twenty-four