by Craig Zerf
However…a few hours later - Nil, naught, zero, cipher, not a one. The captain stood in the centre of the town square and shook his head sadly at the number of townsfolk that had volunteered for duty. He counted again just to make sure but no, he had definitely been given the old bum’s rush. He turned on his heel and went back to his small but loyal band of hardened old veterans.
Chapter 26
The hard dull bitterness of the cold squeezed in on Plob like a large gelid playground bully, compressing his cranium and constricting his airways with its harsh brutal icy hands. It was worse for the dwarves who were, by their obvious physical nature, a lot closer to the ground and therefore had to constantly force their way through the thick snow and ice that covered the swamp for leagues in all directions.
The enhanced ‘air, freeze’ spell had unquestionably sorted the wraiths. One moment a squadron of putrid shrieking doppelgangers, the next a foot-thick carpet of decayed flesh icicles. (frozen at source for your pleasure and convenience).
The spell had ignited above them with a savage eruption of thaumatic energy, throwing them all to the ground as it screamed away from them in an ever-widening circle of furious glacial frigidity, both freezing and smashing the wraiths as it rampaged through them in an orgy of polar destruction.
It continued outward in its spherical path of frosty devastation, trees shattered as they froze in its path and feathered birds on the wing rapidly became frozen bird-shaped popsicles and plummeted frost-riven to the ground. Mercifully the smell and the swarms of biting insects were also frozen into oblivion so at least the team didn’t have to worry about them. This was fortunate as they were busy using all of their available worry on keeping from becoming a new and amusing line in frozen novelty lawn ornaments.
They couldn’t even start a fire as the cold had destroyed everything leaving them nothing to burn. Smegly advised that they proceed in the direction that they had last seen the smudges of smoke in the hope that there might be some form of civilization and perhaps a little shelter from the benumbing cold.
Before they had set out all of them had raided their luggage and put on every item of clothing that they possessed. Cabbie, for some reason known only to him, had put his overclothes on first and his underwear on last, making him look like some sort of woollen stuffed baby doll in nappies.
They trudged slowly through the icy wasteland, Biggest and Plob in front, in an attempt to flatten down the snow to make the going a little easier for the dwarves and Cabbie bringing up the rear with Dreenee, Legles and Smegly in the cab.
And they did not know where they were going so they continued their westward plodding, closer and closer to the centre of the domain of darkness, the deep dingy den of demons that was the dominion of Typhon.
To say that Typhon was having a wobbly would be an understatement of monumental proportions. (Turkeys have a mild dislike for Christmas. The Kennedys are a smidgeon gun-shy. The Pope has Catholic leanings. I’m sure that you get the picture).
Flecks of spittle flew zealously around the room. Breasts were beaten, hair was rent, spleen was vent, umbrage was taken and haemorrhages were had. In short, Typhon the Dark was considerably and enormously pissed off. His lycanthropic sergeant at arms cowered whimpering in the corner, bushy tail forced firmly between his legs and ears flat against his vulpine head.
‘Hundreds,’ screamed Typhon. ‘All of them.’ He raged back and forth across the stone floor of the dark dank cave of his lair and did a bit more rending and beating for good measure.
‘Look,’ he bawled at Lycan as he pointed at a sorry group of assorted beings that were gathered before them. ‘The rubbish. That’s all we’ve got left. Imps, pixies, sprites, gremlins and bad fairies. I’ve been reduced to being the leader of a band of children’s bloody fairytales.
I am Typhon the Dark. Typhon the bloody Dark. Capital T, capital D. The living embodiment of evil. Beelzebub made flesh. Look at me, seven foot of solid muscle, skin thicker than a crocodile and huge, black leathery wings. It’s pretty gods damn obvious that I’m not the bad bloody witch of the west. Give me demons, incubus, wraiths and banshees not Puck the naughty elf boy. This is all your fault you know, you stupid dog.’ He kicked Lycan in the ribs.
‘Yes, boss. Sorry, boss. It’s just that…boss…when you told me to get all but the most pathetic…boss…I took you literally. Sorry, boss. Sorry.’ Lycan tried, unsuccessfully, to squeeze into the corner even tighter and curled himself up bracing for the next kick. He wasn’t disappointed. Typhon rained a series of blows down on the quivering werewolf.
‘So now it’s my fault, you moronic trembling mongrel. You dull brainless dim-witted son of a she-dog…’
‘Bitch, boss,’ whimpered Lycan.
Typhon’s rave was stopped dead in its tracks. ‘What?’
‘A she-dog or wolf, boss. It’s called a bitch. My mother was a bitch.’
‘Well, she was,’ shrieked Typhon.
‘Yes, boss’ replied Lycan nodding his head in agreement, tongue lolling out and ears flapping up and down as he did so.
‘Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch,’ screamed Typhon as he strode outside into the cold spitefully batting a bad fairy out of the air as it flew past. Lycan padded along on silent paws behind him.
The Dark Lord stood outside in the frigid atmosphere for a while breathing deeply as he tried to settle his thoughts. He was in deep poo and that was a fact. Up the old faeces river sans an oar. The team of questarians were headed this way. They were a lot more powerful than he had expected and all that lay between himself and them was a gaggle of mischievous spirits that wouldn’t know real evil if it walked up and pissed on their stupid little green pointy boots. It was obvious what had to be done, after all he was Typhon the Dark and did have some sort of reputation to uphold. The decision made he beckoned to Lycan who was hovering around at the entrance to the cave.
‘Hey, pooch boy,’ Typhon yelled.
‘Yes, boss.’
‘I’ve decided to promote you. You are now to be known as General Lycan, leader of the band of subnormals.’
‘Ooh. Thanks, boss,’ Lycan ran around in a tight circle chasing his tail in excitement and barking.
Typhon held his head in his hands and despaired for a while. ‘Right. Now, General Lycan.’
‘Yes, boss.’ Pant, pant.
‘Take your troops and form a defensive perimeter about the camp and, if that group of questers come close, defend this place with your lives.’
‘Yes, sir boss.’ Lycan loped enthusiastically back into the cavern and started rounding up his fairy-tale team.
Typhon the Dark strode away from the cave towards the paddocks, stopping momentarily at the grain house to pick up a flagon of one by triple distilled grain spirits for the use of, and then proceeding onwards to the small enclosed corral that contained the sable black demon steed Incitatus.
As he approached the darksome stallion it reared dramatically on its hind legs and lashed at the Arctic air, red-rimmed nostrils aflair, clouds of superheated carbon dioxide pluming into the bitter environment, its very stance shouting out to the watching world – I am cruel, callous, uncaring and unquenchable. I am the dark steed and I don’t take no crap from anyone so just back off. Typhon strode up, cuffed Incitatus around its equine lug hole and vaulted onto its back.
‘Move it, you scrawny rackabones,’ he shouted as he dug his spurred heels in. ‘Let’s get going before those sanctimonious pecksniffing questarians get here. Upward and onwards, my steed of night. To Bil we go for it feels right.’
And with that the Prince of Darkness galloped cravenly (and a little Shakespeareanly) off into the sunset.
It is impossible for the truly insane, the genuinely rabidly monomaniacaly demented, to harbour feelings of doubt. This is why people like Mister Hitler (Remember him? Short guy, bad hair, really stupid moustache, thought that it would be a good idea to systematically kill every free thinking person, including his own guys, in the known world).
; Thought that he could justly go about saying that the globe should be peopled only by blond-haired, six foot two inch, lantern-jawed, highly intelligent Aryan gods, whilst looking in the mirror every day and not once harbouring sufficient self-doubt to consider the fact that he was the antithesis of all that he found good and proper.
This sort of attitude takes vast amounts of world-class insanity. People like this would win the Insanity World Championships without even breaking a sweat. And I mean the proper world championship, not some American version where they only play amongst themselves. Where do those people get off, really? Baseball World Series. Guys, no-one else plays. Remember the rest of the world, including Asia, Africa, the Soviet Union and Europe? No? Well trust me you can’t be the world champion if you don’t play the rest of the world and just because we don’t know how to play is no excuse. Anyway – I digress.
The point is that Bil was holed up in a castle with over three hundred rabid followers with limited food and water and he was convinced that things were all going his way. He was a little worried by the fact that his nice wooden bridge had been burned down but the shattered wheels of thought that powered his cognitive process were busy grinding out a reason for this that would dispel any fragment or feelings of doubt.
He was king. King indeed. He sighed happily to himself and leaned over to pull the silver tasselled bell cord in order to summon another servant to abuse in his own inimitable royal fashion.
‘I’m not sure,’ said Legles who was staring into the distance at the ragged line of defenders ranged around the ex-camp of Typhon the Dark. ‘It looks like a mixture of sprites and fairies and some sort of dog or wolf perhaps. It’s hard to tell at this distance.’
‘What’s the dog doing?’ asked Dreenee.
Legles shielded his eyes from the glare and squinted once again. ‘Seems to be running around in a circle chasing its own tail.’
Dreenee laughed. ‘Oh how sweet. Come on, chaps. Lets all go and say hello.’
The team made their way down the hill towards the camp; Biggest, Legles and Plob taking point, Cabbie bringing up the rear and the score of dwarves walking four abreast in the middle, broad-bladed battleaxes on their shoulders.
All in all it seemed like a group well worth steering clear of, in fact, a good group to lie down and avoid completely. Lycan, with his innate sense of animal survival, sensed this whilst they were still over a hundred or so paces away and, as a result, his planned command of ‘attack and fight to the death’ quickly metamorphosised into ‘welcome, masters, we have been expecting you’ followed by a bit of happy barking and the inevitable tail chasing.
Lycan’s band of subnormals were as happy as him with the sudden change of heart because, what mustn’t be overlooked, although they were admittedly on the side of evil they were so peripheral, so far removed from the chain of command, that they were almost on the side of good. Which made them more good baddies than evil baddies. Or maybe even bad baddies, as in they were no good at being bad. They weren’t very good at being good either due to the fact that they were, when all’s said and done, still a bit bad. But not that bad. Anyway, the upshot of the whole issue is, bad or good, they didn’t feel strongly enough about anything to take on a bunch of axe-wielding dwarves and a couple of obviously powerful mages. So when Lycan greeted them as masters – well then masters they were. The subnormals excitedly gathered together to greet their new superiors.
Chapter 27
Typhon the Dark had ridden hard all day and was starting to feel more than a little weary. One would think that the Prince of Darkness wouldn’t be subject to common and garden everyday varieties of human weakness such as hunger, pain and tiredness but, as he was fundamentally Evil made flesh he was subject to all of the foibles and weaknesses of the flesh.
So, Typhon was looking for an inn to rest his evil bones, partake of some much-needed victuals and get his demon steed watered. The problem was that, when all’s said and done, he was a seven-foot demon with a wingspan of over twelve foot and, whenever he did enter an inn, the reactions were always so bloody tiresome. Cacophonies of screaming, oodles of wailing and lashings of get-thee-hence-thou-devil’s-spawn, then he would be attacked by any and all comers and it would end with Typhon wading in blood when all that he really wanted was a good meal and a bed for the night because even he got a bit tired every now and then.
Mustn't grumble, he thought as he saw a dimly lit sign up ahead. ‘The Maidens Crotch’ – Typhon shook his head, it takes all sorts, he mused as he pulled back savagely on Incitatus’ reins and yanked him into the forecourt of the inn.
He tied the horse’s reins to the hitching post outside the dreary looking inn, walked up the rickety stairs into the reception area and rang the small tarnished brass bell.
‘Greetings, good traveller,’ called out a man from the room behind the counter. ‘Now, how can I be of service?’ the man asked as he bustled up to the reception desk busily polishing a pair of spectacles with a scrap of yellow cloth.
‘I would like a room for the night and a stable for my steed,’ said Typhon.
‘Of course, sir,’ affirmed the Innkeeper as he gave his eyeglasses a final rub and perched them on the end of his red-veined nose. He squinted short sightedly at Typhon, removed his spectacles, gave them a quick once over with the wisp of cloth, reattached them to his ruddy snout, squinted again and gave tongue to a stream of terrified invective that ended with the good old, tried and tested ‘get-thee-hence-thou-devil’s-spawn.’
Typhon wearily scrubbed at his face with his hands and shook his head sadly. ‘Oh well,’ he said resignedly. ‘I suppose it’s time for the old wading in pools of blood to start. I don’t know why I bother trying to be civil, I really don’t.’
He drew his saw-bladed black sword out of the scabbard strapped between his wings and nonchalantly beheaded the keep with an indifferent backhanded flick of his wrist.
The headless body slumped forward onto the reception desk and merrily pumped a gallon or so a bright red blood onto the floor. There was a scream from the door and the clatter of a dropped tray as a serving girl unsuspectingly walked in on the grisly scene. Typhon spun around to face her.
‘Quickly,’ he growled. ‘Go and fetch everyone from the common room and let’s get this travesty over with.’
The girl screamed once again for good measure and flew off to the common room for reinforcements whilst Typhon leaned on the pommel of his sword and waited. It wasn’t long before he heard the sounds of many booted feet thundering down the corridor towards him and he saw a group of perhaps seven or eight tough looking customers run into the reception area carrying an assortment of vicious looking bladed weapons.
‘Get thee hence, thou devil’s spawn,’ shouted a tall bearded man at the front of the group.
‘We’ve been through that,’ responded Typhon as he gestured towards the headless innkeep. ‘Your cranium-free companion here has already dispensed with the preliminaries so if we could just get straight down to the wading through pools of blood bit and I can get myself a decent night’s sleep then I would really appreciate it. Thank you.’
And with that he commenced the battle with a massive overhand blow that caught the bearded man at the juncture between his neck and his shoulder and clove him almost in twain.
Typhon’s attackers were hard and tough and dangerous and dead. They never really had a chance, what with Typhon the Dark being the Evil one made flesh and all. The odd lucky blow that did slip through his windmill-type attack just went to prove that, not only was his skin reptilian in aspect, it was also crocodilian in respect of its armour-like abilities. In short, it was one-way traffic.
Afterwards, the Dark One stabled and watered his steed and then found the kitchens, helped himself to a mammoth haunch of spit-roast beef the approximate size and weight of a nine-year-old male child and a hogshead of ale. He carried them up to the master suite of the now empty inn and, after stripping off his blood-soaked leather singlet, fell upon them wit
h a rapacious gusto born of a combination of exertion and natural avariciousness. After, his appetite sated, he threw himself across the down-filled mattress and fell into the deep conscienceless slumber of the truly wicked.
Legles walked along the untidy row of sylvan fairy-folk, glowering like thunder. ‘You lot are disgraceful, dishonourable, discreditable and downright disgusting,’ he told them as he nudged them into a less ragged formation. ‘You,’ he shouted, pointing at a small elvin figure dressed in a tattered brown tunic and carrying a small bow constructed from what looked like laminated pieces of bone and willow. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Puck, sir,’ responded the pointy-eared pixie.
Legles rubbed his jaw and thought for a while. ‘Puck you say?’ he asked.
‘Yes, sir,’ the Pucked one answered.
‘I think I knew your father.’
‘Puck, sir,’ acknowledged the pixie.
‘Yes, yes. I know. Now, let me think. What was his name?’ mused Legles to himself.
‘Puck, sir. Puck.’
‘Shut up,’ shouted Legles. ‘I heard you before. I’m not grotesquely stupid. Anyways, it wasn’t your father. It was your grandfather. Yes, I remember now.’
‘Puck, sir. Puck, Puck and Puck.’
Legles grabbed the hapless pixie by the throat and lifted him to his face. ‘Puck yourself, you little cretin. Puck you and Puck off.’ Legles threw the unfortunate pixie to the ground.
‘They’re all called Puck,’ interjected Cabbie. ‘Surely you’ve heard of the ancient line of Pucks?’
‘No I haven’t,’ retorted Legles. ‘I’m an elf not some sort of sylvanian historian. And stop calling me Surely; it’s not funny.’ The green-garbed elf stalked off in a strop.
