by R J Hanson
Silas was still a novice in the ways of the world beneath the world, and thus the other two, Dru and A’Ilys, had taken point and rear guard. It was difficult for Silas to get his bearings, but he decided they were traveling east, for the most part.
Silas heard the sound of a claw or exoskeleton scrape against rock. The noise came from above them and perhaps thirty yards ahead of them. They had been following large tunnels and only occasionally had to slip through a tight aperture to pass into another series of tunnels and caverns. There was just such a crack in the stone ahead of them. It was less than a yard wide and perhaps four yards in height at the end of a narrowing pathway.
Silas could see/sense the open cavern beyond that small passage, but only from the limited angle of his approach. He could also smell… hunger. It was an odd sensation, but Silas was certain the aroma coming to him was the smell of hunger, or more plainly the desire to eat.
Dru had linked the three of them in an open channel of telepathy before they left for Rogash’s lair, warning them to take care when perusing their own thoughts, for they would be laid bare for the other two. Silas pushed the smell, also unfamiliar to A’Ilys but well known by Dru, through the telepathic channel. Silas then shifted himself into the ethereal plane as did Dru.
A’Ilys thought back to both of them, Velloch, sometimes called a Gray Plate. They have very thick body armor and are quite deadly.
A’Ilys then conjured a mental image to which Silas replied, Lobster?
Dru projected a mental image to Silas showing an adult human male standing next to one showing the creature's body length to average four to five yards in height with pincers two yards in length.
Oh, was Silas’s only reply.
Silas cycled through the index of Shezmu’s knowledge of such creatures and was interested to learn the velloch were spawned by the Demon Prince Tredch. The Fallen Champion of Famine had created the beasts to sink fishing vessels and shred fishing nets. However, the Great Men discovered the creatures were actually quite tasty themselves and hunted them almost to extinction. Now they hid in the dark waters and deep places of Stratvs snatching whatever meat strayed too close to their lair.
Being able to see into the ethereal plane did nothing to enhance Silas’s perception of the next cavern. An idea struck him. He thought about his studies of some of the creatures that lived in the dark places of the world and observations he’d made. Now he focused his mind on the image of one of them. Rather, on a single aspect of them. His ears thinned and spread out to almost two feet in width. His inner ear contorted to the same shape and consistency of the bat he’d dissected.
These changes completed, Silas screeched into the cavern, startling A’Ilys, to say the least. The images brought to his mind by the reverberating sound waves were magnificent. The subtle echoes had transformed into shimmering silver outlines in the deep black of silence. Silas had never dreamed such beauty was possible. He determined then that he must experience the world around him by these means more often.
In this perspective, he clearly saw the velloch backed into its hole no more than a few feet above the entrance into the next cavern, waiting for the first of them to stick their head through the stone portal. Silas held his finger up to A’Ilys and signaled that he was about to screech again. When he did, he was able to observe the layout of the rest of the cavern up ahead. He also noted a ledge about ten feet above the velloch’s hole.
I know some of your race can levitate, Silas thought to A’Ilys. Can you?
I can, the drow responded.
Can you teleport him to this ledge? Silas thought to Dru as he sent her a visual image of the ledge above the velloch.
I would have to terminate our telepathy, but yes, I could do that quite easily, Dru thought back.
I will distract it, Silas thought to the others. When he moves for the bait, you must plunge your sword into this specific gap in its carapace. Silas sent the mental image of the precise point A’Ilys’s blade tip must strike.
The telepathic channel was severed. Dru looked into the next cavern with her mind’s eye and sent A’Ilys blindly into that place. A’Ilys made the transition with ease; in fact, this was a conventional attack routine some drow had used, although he had not taught it to Silas. A’Ilys enacted his levitation abilities, and his sword whispered from its sheath. Silas’s head protruded through the crack in the stone, and the waiting velloch’s pincers snapped quickly. Silas’s head rolled free from his body and struck the stone with a sickly wet smacking sound.
A’Ilys almost missed his chance, so shocked was he at Silas’s foolish sacrifice he nearly moved too late. Nearly. A’Ilys was not the Master of Spies because he was slow or inaccurate. The needle tip of his sword found and pierced the gap Silas had described to him. The blade cut through a cluster of nerves that connected the creature’s brain to the rest of its body. The velloch dropped, lifeless, to the stone next to where Silas’s severed head lay. Queen Jandanero would not be pleased with this loss.
“Mighty Rogash,” Dru yelled into the great hall of the half-ogre warlord. “Hear me and hear word from Queen Jandanero!”
The din of three dozen ogres eating, arguing, and generally banging about dropped to absolute silence almost immediately at the single gesture Rogash made with his left hand. The large creatures parted, clearing the path between the visitors and the self-proclaimed Warlord of the Jet Hammer Clan.
Rogash stood only eight feet tall, making him at least four feet shorter than any other ogre gathered here, and weighed about six hundred stone. His dark green skin was stretched tight over thick muscle. His head was shaved, but his eyebrows and lush beard were of a deep, forge-coal red. The idea of a half-ogre half-dwarf struck Dru as comical when she’d first heard it. However, to stand in the Warlord’s presence, one was amazed at his natural charisma.
Of course, charisma was not the reason he was able to wield command of the rabble of ogres and a handful of giants in his clan. That power was derived from the simple fact that Rogash could kill any of them with his bare hands. Although much smaller than most of them, Rogash was deceptively strong. Furthermore, he was very skilled with the battle hammer, a masterful work with a head of mercshyeld and a pommel of polished jet stone, that was never far from his hand.
Dru had gone out of her way to describe Rogash as brutish and heavy-handed when she was in Queen Jandanero’s audience chamber. Dru understood the delicate balance between Rogash and Jandanero and the role she played in that balance. In fact, the only reason there was a ‘Rogash and Jandanero’ was because of Lady Dru’s significant diplomatic efforts. A’Ilys understood those facts as well.
“What message does the little dark queen send?” Rogash asked, playing to his crowd of ruffians.
“Me,” Silas said as he walked up from behind Dru and A’Ilys.
Silas, dragging the body of the velloch behind him, walked the gauntlet of sneering ogres to stand at the foot of Rogash’s quartz throne.
“I am Silas, servant of Lady Dru,” Silas said. “I bring you this delicacy of the sea.”
“That’s a grayscale,” Rogash said with a bit of disdain.
“It’s a velloch,” Silas said. “One that has not been bruised, nor has its shell been cracked. The last person to sit on a throne and enjoy such a delicacy was Lord Ivant, before the fall. You will be the first leader in a dozen thousand years to enjoy such a treat. The little dark queen, Lady Dru, and I offer you just such a privilege.”
“So, you can bring me food,” Rogash said, beginning to laugh. “Can you clean my loincloth as well?”
“Someone should,” Silas said. “For that matter, you should have someone see to the rest of this place. Perhaps that one,” Silas pointed to a battle-scarred ogre standing nearby. “He looks just bright enough to handle laundry and dishes.”
Silas was ready for it, of course, he was. He had caused it. He had triggered the event. Because, in addition to the verbal insult before his Warlord and kin, Silas had insinuated a thou
ght/smell into the nearby ogre’s mind. It was a new ability he’d discovered as a result of Shezmu’s new mental state. Silas had projected the smell of weakness, and the smell of a threat, both simultaneously.
The excessive stimuli confused the ogre for a moment. The verbal insult was the catalyst required to begin the reaction.
Silas stood perfectly still and did not take his eyes from Rogash’s. The ogre hauled up a mattock crafted from a discarded ship’s anchor, roared, and charged for Silas. Silas still did not move. Rogash raised a single eyebrow, showing his mild curiosity.
As the war mattock tore through the air toward Silas’s head, Silas enacted the great speed gleaned from the fallen champion. Silas slipped just inside the arc of the mattock and, in a lightning strike, cut the loincloth from the ogre, exposing his… well, exposing him to the rabble gathered in the main hall.
In the same instant, Silas changed the scent/thought being projected to the ogre from weakness/threat to cheerful/joke. The ogre, somewhat against his will, erupted in laughter. The laughter was contagious and soon spread throughout the hall.
“Warlord Rogash, I am a Lord of Chaos,” Silas began. “You understand and value strength and speed. I have carried the velloch and dropped it at your feet. I have taken your guard’s cloth with ease and could have just as easily taken his head. If you wish, I could further prove my worth by taking your right eye and his left testicle. Shall I?”
The laughter in the great hall ended as quickly as it had begun. All eyes were on Rogash. Dru sighed, having made up her mind that if it must come to it, she would kill Rogash and his whole clan before she would let them harm Silas. A’Ilys watched the entire scene carefully and took measure of all involved; his hands never straying far from his weapons, his eye never straying far from the exits.
Many were relieved that day to hear a roar of laughter burst from the heavily muscled throat of Rogash. Soon all of clan Jet Hammer were laughing together at the jest, although very few understood what they were laughing at. Silas began to relax the muscles in his wrists and feet, not realizing they’d been tensed for action until just then.
“What happened to your fingers?” Rogash asked, gesturing to the two missing from Silas’s left hand after the laughter had died away.
“Ah, well, that was the result of baiting the velloch,” Silas said.
“You baited a grayscale with your fingers?” Rogash asked.
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
Rogash roared more laughter at that. Silas, a close student of deception, noted that Rogash’s jovial nature was not exactly genuine, although he had no idea what the warlord sought to conceal.
“Warlord Rogash, may I ask a question?” Silas asked.
Rogash answered by shrugging and holding his hands out wide.
“Your hammer is remarkably well crafted and intricately engraved,” Silas continued. “It’s my understanding that you are half-dwarf. Do you keep dwarven smiths here, or do you trade with them?”
Rogash narrowed his eyes and leaned forward so that his fanged visage was mere inches from Silas’s face.
“Do you seek to insult me?” Rogash asked dangerously.
“No,” Silas said with a slight smile. “If I intended to insult you, rest assured I would make it plain and quite base in nature. I ask because we have an arrangement to sell crafts in Moras from questionable sources. The manifests for those crafts show them to have originated in our shops and mines. I thought, if you had a means of production, you might be interested in a trade agreement.”
“Manifests,” Rogash said. “Trade agreements. Fancy talk for us ogres.”
“Come now,” Silas replied, still smiling. “Let us agree that I’ll not pull your leg, and you’ll not pull mine.”
Rogash returned Silas’s smile.
“You would trust the drow with you to know of our arrangement?” Rogash asked as he cut his eyes to A’Ilys.
“I would,” Silas said. “He is the drow Master of Spies. I’d be surprised if he didn’t know about the agreement even before I proposed it. Besides, if I show him trust in a matter that I’m sure he is already aware of, I gain standing in his eyes without losing anything.”
Rogash nodded. He pointed to one of the ogres in the main hall and then pointed to the velloch on the floor. The ogre nodded and began dragging the giant crustacean toward an iron kettle big enough to hold three of the oversized creatures. Rogash waved for the three guests of Clan Jet Hammer to follow him.
They walked behind the long strides of the warlord through several winding tunnels until they came to what Silas presumed were Rogash’s private chambers. Silas had guessed Rogash more intelligent than he’d let on, but the young Chaos Lord had not been prepared for what he saw within those iron-bound doors.
The chamber was a large, open room with four alcoves carved out of the stone and well-lit with several torches and lanterns. In the center of the room was a large pile of hides Silas assumed Rogash used for a bed. In the four alcoves, Silas noted a blacksmith’s workbench and kiln, a large bookshelf and piles of maps on a crude but stout desk, a natural spring-fed basin of fresh water, and a stack of iron boxes Silas assumed were filled with coins and other types of loot. Silas also noticed that it smelled much better in here than it did in the great hall.
Silas, having been involved in a profession that required specific devices for specific procedures, appreciated the array of tools Rogash had assembled at his blacksmith bench. Silas now understood the insult inferred by Rogash. Silas had assumed his battle hammer had been smithed by dwarves. It appeared that Rogash had crafted it himself, down to the most delicate of inlays and jewel settings.
Silas, his vision enhanced by powers gleaned from Shezmu, was also able to read some of the notes on the desk across the room from them. Some of the notes referred to taxes collected from farms and ranches, which in and of itself was surprising. However, the item that caught Silas’s eye was a chart, or rather an attempt at a chart, designed to mark and calculate breeding characteristics. Silas had read about, and made use of, breeding charts in his studies and recognized the patterns of this rough draft.
“You didn’t want to see me because you heard I was a Lord of Chaos,” Silas said as he began putting the pieces together.
Rogash smiled, and A’Ilys and Dru exchanged a confused look.
“How many spies do you have in Moras?” Silas asked.
“There are farmers east of here that I keep safe and allow passage through the mountains,” Rogash said, dropping the dramatically gruff tone that Silas found suspect from the beginning, and now speaking in a much more refined voice. “They give me fifteen percent of their crops and livestock each season, and I see they are protected. It’s less than the Lady of Moras would tax them. From time to time, they bring me news from Moras. I’d like to hear about your Sanctum.”
“Burned to the ground, I’m sorry to say,” Silas said.
“Yes, I’d heard that too,” Rogash said. “But you studied herbs and medicines? You’re a physician?”
“I assume this has something to do with the breeding charts on your desk?” Silas asked.
Rogash took a great breath in and then let it out slowly. He scrutinized A’Ilys and Dru.
“For my help, you will need to take them into your trust as well,” Silas said.
“I seek to create a race of half-ogres,” Rogash said after a long pause. “Strong, powerful, but still smart enough to find their own buttocks with both hands.”
“Half ogres and?” Silas let the question hang.
“Half dwarf,” Rogash said. “There is the obvious influence of my unusual heritage, but, other than perhaps Great Men, dwarves are the only race strong enough to survive the cross-breeding. I don’t want to use the Great Men because…”
“Because their ability to have children is statistically unreliable, and you want a self-propagating race!” Silas exclaimed as the implications of the full idea struck him. “You don’t want to continue to cross o
gres and dwarves. You want to create a new race in which a half-ogre/half-dwarf father has a child with a half-ogre/half-dwarf mother. That’s brilliant!”
The looks on A’Ilys’s and Dru’s faces clearly indicated they were not as excited about the idea as was Silas. In fact, it was easy to see that the idea disgusted them. All three were surprised at Silas’s apparent enthusiasm.
“Very few know it, but Ingshburn has made his own race of creatures that serve him as soldiers,” Rogash said. “They’ve been isolated in Tarborat. The King has apparently forbidden any talk of them by any soldiers or knights that encounter them. But soldiers always talk. No one knows for sure what their capabilities are, nor their weaknesses. The only thing they do know is that they seem to breed quickly and obey without question. They’ve taken to calling them belliks, although I don’t know why. It got me thinking about my circumstances. It got me wondering about creating a race of my own.”
“This is wonderful,” Silas continued in his disturbingly cheerful tone. “We must get back to this race that Ingshburn created, but first, I have a question, if I may.”
Rogash shrugged and nodded. He was quite clever, certainly when compared to the others of his clan, but the ogre side of him was sometimes very prevalent in his style of communication.
“Why do you raid the Suthiel when you know it upsets the drow?” Silas asked.
A’Ilys was stunned at the blunt nature of the question. Dru was not.
“Of course, I raid the countryside and the Suthiel,” Rogash said. “And from time to time, they’ll send a paladin up here to clear us out. We pretend to clear out, and all goes on again. If I didn’t raid, they’d begin to wonder what’s that Warlord Rogash up to. Those are dangerous thoughts for small minds. Pretty soon, those thoughts lead to other thoughts like we’d better get a large force together and scour the mountains and see what they’re up to. Queen Jandanero wants me to lay low, this is me, laying low.”
