by Bill McCurry
Sakaj said in a nurturing voice, “Daughter.”
The Freak sat up like a prairie dog. She flipped back her dark-brown braid and gazed around. She was a beautiful woman, not yet middle-aged. “No. Leave me alone. I have nothing for you. No deals.”
Sakaj grinned and whispered, “She’s resisting me. I forgot how cute she can be sometimes.” Sakaj closed her eyes. Several seconds went by as her grin devolved into a grimace. At last, she snapped, “You come here right now, young lady!”
The Freak formed from a bank of darkness. She stood a head taller than most men in this part of the world. “What?”
Sakaj wiggled her shoulders lovingly. “Is that any way to greet your mother?”
“You are not my mother. That is a game you play. You do not call me Daughter—you call me Freak.”
Sakaj poured love into her voice. “But you are my daughter. My favorite daughter.” She winked at Fingit.
The Freak laughed, but it was as humorous as a slap in the face. “You called for me, so say what you want. I was about to pick my nose on the other side. I don’t want to wait, since that is infinitely more important than this.”
Fingit whispered, “Why do you let her talk to you that way? You’re as bad as Harik.”
Sakaj ignored him and spoke out loud to the Freak. “Fine. Now that our reunion is past, I must bring a distressing issue to your attention. Your little friends—your brother’s boys—have become lost and will be murdered before the day ends.”
The Freak blinked twice. “I find that unlikely.”
“Because your father attends them? Because he carries a bone enchanted by Fingit? You know how Fingit is. He builds flying chariots that crash; he makes impervious armor that causes impotence. Failure is inevitable.”
Fingit whispered, “That’s not fair at all! That armor wasn’t my fault. I didn’t know the steel had been mined in the Harpy Mountains!”
Sakaj showed Fingit her teeth. “Hush. It’s a bargaining tactic. You mewl like an infant sometimes.”
The Freak almost smiled. “Failure or success. They mean nothing to me. Kill them or not.”
Sakaj whispered, “Shit.”
“What? What?” Fingit dropped to his knees in front of her.
“Nothing! I just cleared my throat,” Sakaj whispered. Then she spoke to the Freak. “Well, dear, perhaps you don’t care at all about those children. But another boy will soon be tortured, and that boy knows my name. He will talk. One cannot doubt that.”
Fingit glared at Sakaj. Speaking the Goddess of the Unknowable’s name ranked as the second worst thing a sorcerer could do. Such an act invited Sakaj into the world of man. During her visits, Sakaj always killed at least ten thousand people, and no visitation could be complete without destroying a major city or two. She sometimes left behind poisoned or haunted places that continued to kill and maim once she had departed.
The worst thing a sorcerer could do was put a magical object inside a magical creature in a magical location—also known as the “Stuff a Wand at the Standing Stones Blunder.” As an example, a foolish sorcerer might lure a fairy or troll to the Majestic Standing Stones of Lipp and then place a magic wand inside the creature in some expeditious manner.
While all celestial and numerological indicators said that this would grant fabulous power, in fact every one of the sorcerer’s progenitors would be instantly and retroactively destroyed going back a thousand years. That would snuff out the sorcerer in a handy fashion. It would also wipe out a colossal swath of human beings descended from any of those who had been eliminated.
A sorcerer first committed this error in the distant past. It remained a cautionary tale until another ambitious sorcerer attempted it again just six hundred years ago. She achieved the same result, which says a lot about mankind’s ability to pay attention.
Fingit grabbed Sakaj’s jaw and whispered, “The Nub knows your name? Really? You couldn’t have said something?”
“Of course he doesn’t know it!” she whispered.
The Freak didn’t answer. She stood motionless.
“But you, my dear daughter,” Sakaj murmured, “you can prevent all of this carnage. Only you can forestall it. Don’t you feel the tiniest bit of responsibility?”
Again, the Freak kept silent.
“You can stop it. I offer you power. Destroy your enemies, save your family, and seal off this horrible, world-rending knowledge. All you have to do is make an offer.”
After a long pause, the Freak said, “I will make you this offer. I wish for you to have vengeful termites infest every opening in your body—yes, including that one. I wish for you to hear the screams of your dying children. I wish for you to weep for ten thousand years. That is my only offer to you.”
“What? You will condemn your own kin?” Flecks of spit flew as Sakaj shouted. “You’ll risk thousands of deaths, or hundreds of thousands? When you could save them?”
“Let them die. I have nothing left that I will trade.” The Freak faded out of the arena.
“What the hell’s going on?” Fingit beckoned as if that might bring the woman back.
Back on the plains in the human world, Fingit heard the fat man say, “What the hell’s going on?”
The Freak said, “My mother just visited me. The boys have been killed. My mother meant for me to think there’s time to save them so that I would trade with her. But they are dead. When I denied her, she made up some ridiculous story about a boy revealing her name.”
Fingit glared at Sakaj and shouted, “Wow, you really foretold the hell out of that, didn’t you?”
Sakaj’s head dropped forward and flopped around. She howled, “That shouldn’t have happened! She should have made the deal! Her entire life points to her making that deal!”
“Well, she didn’t! Who’s going to save the Nub now? Maybe I should bring Harik into this. He can get the Murderer to save the Nub.”
“Do not dare go to Harik!” Sakaj said. “If you get anyone else involved, I will find ways for you to suffer that the universe has never seen.”
“Well… the Murderer doesn’t have hands, anyway.” Fingit thought about that for a moment. He realized he was pouting and reset his lips into a hard line. “What do you suggest we do now?”
“Let’s keep watching. I’ll think of something.” Sakaj cleared her throat and panted for a while.
Fingit plopped onto the grass near Sakaj’s head. I deserve this. I did what I’ve seen so many humans do. I let my penis lead me down the path of destruction. What an idiot.
Twelve
(Fingit)
Fingit stood over the flattened Sakaj in Unicorn Town. “I’m telling Krak about every willful, disobedient, ridiculous thing you’ve done since… ever since you were born!”
“You will be right in the tale with me, brother. Everything will work out. Just watch.”
The Nub had been kidnapped fewer than twenty minutes before. The young sorcerer’s head still flopped around as the Farmer’s men carried him through the sad, human buildings. They took him into one side of a squalid, rotting wooden structure and through to a yard on the other side.
The Farmer, a short, ice-pale, black-haired man, frowned at the Nub. “Louze, attend to the leg.”
One of the men, squatty and long-armed, removed the Nub’s false leg and tossed it onto a disintegrating woodpile thirty feet away. Then the Farmer directed that the Nub be tied to some kind of brightly painted wooden scaffold. Wildflowers and children’s playthings dotted the nearby grass, including a yellow ball and a gaily painted wooden porpoise the size of a stout raccoon.
“Seems awfully cheery for torture,” Fingit said.
“Perhaps he’s a poor torturer. An amateur.”
The Farmer grunted and waved. Louze ripped off the Nub’s shirt. An old man brought two buckets of water, and Louze tossed both into the young man’s face one after the other. The Nub’s head rolled a bit.
“You’re awake. How delightful.” The Farmer gave a little smile
and rubbed the stubble on his jaw with the back of his hand. “I thought I might have to send for a third bucket of water. We’ve not been formally introduced. I am Vintan Reth. What is your name, sir?”
“Desh Younger,” the Nub croaked.
“Lovely! And did that miserable chunk of flesh you once called a leg have any other names before we destroyed it?” The Farmer stepped close to examine the Nub’s squinting eyes.
Louze snickered. The Nub didn’t answer.
“Before we say anything else, I must extend my deepest apologies. I couldn’t find a proper dungeon, and I had to make do.”
The Nub glanced around at the gentle scene.
“I know, it’s terribly improper. Not even any mold.” The Farmer hmphed. “Apparently, no one tortures anymore…”
Fingit whined, “If this torturing is just a slap-dash affair, he may kill the Nub prematurely. I don’t like this.”
“Stop!” Sakaj put as much power into the word as her smashed-flat lungs could manage. “By the sucking sounds of the Void, shut up! It will be fine. I promise. Look how abashed and contrite the torturer is about these circumstances. I’m certain he will take all possible precautions.”
The Farmer was saying, “. . . does lead us here, for which I must again apologize. I am truly sorry that you will be tortured to your shrieking death while strapped to a child’s plaything.”
The Nub said, “Try not to get any blood on this thing. You might upset the children.”
“Shrieking death?” Fingit pointed up at the Nub and glared at Sakaj. “He said shrieking death!”
Sakaj pursed her lips. “Hyperbole.”
The Farmer smiled. “Thank you. I misjudged you, Desh. You’re the kind of man it’s a pleasure to torture. I regret that I will be busy elsewhere soon, but you can feel well cared for since I am leaving Louze with you.” The Farmer nodded at his near-simian henchman.
Louze stepped close to the Nub, reached up, and broke the young man’s left thumb. He uttered a short scream.
The Farmer laughed and strolled back into the soggy, wooden building.
Louze patted the Nub’s cheek. “That thing with the thumb was to let you know I’m serious about this. Some folk like to dink around, start with the little finger and work up—shit like that. Got too much respect for you. I can see you’re serious about this. Serious as I am.” Louze leaned back and grinned. “Desh, tell me every little thing about your friends, their army, and their plan of attack.”
“I don’t know any of that. I never saw the army. We rode ahead of them the whole time. That should be obvious!” The Nub scowled at Louze. “You’re not really thinking this through, are you?”
Louze laughed and punched the Nub in the eye. “Damn, you don’t mind talking it up tough, do you? Your answer makes sense, it does. You could be telling me the truth.” Louze ran two steps forward, unleashed a thundering punch into the Nub’s groin, and then slipped aside as the boy vomited.
The Nub moaned, “Why did you do that? I told you the truth!”
“Learn this quick, little friend. Sometimes I hurt you when you lie, and sometimes I hurt you when you say the truth. You’ll never know which. Crazy, isn’t it? The only way to stop the crazy is to tell me every damn thing you know. Don’t hold back, and don’t make me waste time asking. Then it’ll stop.”
Louze bent to pick through the items on the ground. He came up with a toy crossbow and a green triangular wooden block. “Tell me everything you think I might want to know. Even stuff you’re not too sure about.”
The Nub closed his eyes. Fingit heard the Nub mentally call him. “Fingit. Fingit. Fingit! Fingit!”
Fingit, unable to answer, glared at Sakaj.
“Fingit, you worthless bastard!” the Nub called out to Fingit in silence.
Louze chuckled. “Don’t just hang there. I bet you haven’t fainted or nothing. And you for sure aren’t asleep. Tell me everything.”
“I don’t know anything!” he said to Louze.
“Well, that was sure as hell a lie.” Louze paused. “Like I said, I won’t hurt you at every lie. Let’s talk about the leg. Son, I hear you can scoot right along, especially for a fellow minus a leg. Almost like you never were hurt. That peg leg of yours, which, pardon me, is uglier than the mole on my grandma’s ass, has got to be magic. Tell me all about your leg.”
The Nub craned his neck to look around. “Where is it?”
Louze grabbed the Nub’s jaw hard. “Never you mind that. Answer.”
“I made it,” the Nub mumbled.
Louze pushed the Nub’s face away. “Well, I figured that out already. But Lord Reth told me to ask you in particular, what did you trade for it?”
“Odd and ends.” The Nub shrugged. “Nothing I’ll miss.”
“Uh-huh.” Louze held up the two toys, moving them up and down as if they were on a scale. “Choose.”
The Nub shook his head.
“I saw the blacksmith has a big goddamn pair of pliers a while ago. I could fetch them for us.”
The Nub squirmed and silently called out, “Fingit! You come talk to me, you mangy horse’s whang! I want to deal!”
Fingit looked away.
The Nub indicated the toy crossbow with his chin.
Louze dropped the block and held the crossbow up to the light. “Doesn’t promise much. But the crosspiece is real iron and even a little sharp. Would you give such a thing to a child for him to play with? I’d think it was risky. Well, let’s figure out something to do with it.”
Sakaj said, “Don’t worry, Fingit, we’ll… find something.”
Fingit hissed. I can’t believe I’m about to ask this, but shit, he’s dead anyway. “Sakaj, would you try to contact him?”
The Goddess of the Unknowable smiled. “I wondered when you would beg for my help. It’s the logical solution.” Sakaj closed her eyes and gazed up at the Nub through the window onto man. “Nub, heed me,” she muttered. “Nub. Oh, Nub… I, a mighty god, call you. Nub! Nub, answer me!”
Fingit waved and turned away. “Give it up. The Veil must be blocking you.”
“Bah! I almost got his attention. I could feel his mind! I’ll try again.”
“Don’t bother. In my opinion as the greatest engineer in existence, you have no chance unless you already have a relationship with him. Like me. The one who can’t talk to the hairy little stalk!”
Sakaj tried twice more to call the Nub to her. She brushed his mind at a level too deep for him to notice, but nothing more. “Oh, damn him, the inattentive little rodent! Damn him, damn Krak, and while we’re damning things, damn you too!”
Over the next hour, Louze elicited answers from the Nub, often using the toy crossbow to inflict bruises, scrapes, and shallow cuts. The young man provided some bits of knowledge, but overall, he resisted. Sakaj began deriding the man’s torturing skills.
At that point, Louze used the tapered edge of the crosspiece to cut the skin between the Nub’s thumb and forefinger. That proved a successful tactic, if the Nub’s yelling and writhing meant anything. Louze then wandered away for a few minutes and returned with the previously mentioned pliers.
Fingit saw that Louze was now torturing in earnest. Of course, he wasn’t surprised when Louze used the pliers to apply crushing force to the Nub’s left nipple. That was almost compulsory in these types of affairs. Then Louze began sawing at the young man’s chest with the iron crosspiece.
Sakaj raised her voice over the Nub’s screams. “Is he attempting to cut the nipple off entirely?”
Fingit nodded. “I think he is. That shows a smidge of creativity. At least it does in my estimation.”
“I won’t be convinced until he accomplishes it. That’s going to prove vexing with that marginally sharp bit of iron.”
Two minutes later, Louze was still sawing away while holding the Nub’s nipple in place with the pliers, even though everything was slippery with blood. The Nub howled and wept as he tried to twist away from the pain. Louze worked with a smil
e and showed no signs of fatigue.
A minute later, the Nub passed out. Louze kept at it until he had sawed the nipple off entirely. In the end, the task had required about five minutes, and it left the Nub dangling unconscious. As Louze washed his hands, he muttered, “Something ought to come out of that, eh? Shame I don’t have days to do a full job on him before I kill him. Can’t do everything you want, I guess. That’s why they call it work.”
Fingit stared at Sakaj, his mouth open. He allowed the world of mankind to fade from his hearing.
“Don’t worry, I’ll think of something!” Sakaj shouted, her body quivering.
Fingit stood and stalked a few steps away. “You and your stupid rat-puking ideas!”
“Are you going to quit now, coward?”
“Oh, I don’t know! When the Nub’s dead, do you think we can fix this by dancing his corpse around like a puppet? Moron!”
Sakaj looked away, at least as far as she could with her entire body below the shoulders reduced to a gooey rug.
“What made you think that the Freak would deal?” Fingit shouted.
“She should have!” Sakaj shouted back. “Everything in her entire life, in her whole being, led up to that moment. There was no way she could have resisted.”
“Well, I guess there was some way, wasn’t there?” Fingit said in a singsong voice. “Now he’s being tortured to death, and I’m going to lose the little meat chunk! He still has a lot of good trades in him!” Fingit sighed. “What are we going to do for power? What am I going to tell Krak?”
“Don’t tell Krak anything! We can salvage this.”
“Stop saying that! How in the nasty corners of the Void do you think we can we fix this?”
“I don’t know yet, but I know we can. Trust me.”
“Like I trusted you before? Like the Nub trusted me? Like anybody trusts anybody around here? Are you still insane? I trust you as far as I can piss whiskey!” Fingit’s voice broke as he screamed at her.
