‘Hello,’ he called out. There was no answer. Then he caught sight of a warthog barbecuing on an open fire.
‘Hello,’ he called out again even louder. Still there was no answer.
Sniffing the mouth-watering aroma, he sauntered across the room towards the roasting piglet and leaned forward. ‘Yum, yum, yum,’ he said licking his lips, watching the fat drip into the flames, making them sparkle and dance even more brightly than a firework.
‘Hello! Is there anyone here?’ he called for a third time.
Suddenly, a door at the far end of the room swung open with a crash and bang. All hell broke loose. Four Silezian pirates and one young female came bursting through. She was slapping one of the pirates faces as she entered the room backwards, cradling a new-born child with her other arm. They all charged in after her, cheering and jeering, trying to fondle her. She was beautiful and slim with dark, close-cropped curly hair, bright green eyes and full red lips, the lower one pierced in the middle by a small Zerconian ringlet.
‘Get off me! Leave me alone! I’ll kill the lot of you, I so swear it!’ she screamed with a surge of willpower. Snatching a carving knife from an upturned table, while gripping the infant tightly with the other hand, she flashed it in front of their ugly, scarred faces. Then she stumbled and tumbled backward onto Vinn taking him down to the sawdust-covered floor. He broke the fall of the woman and child and took the brunt of the impact. But thinking that he was one of the pirates she screamed at him too. ‘If my husband were alive, you’d all be dead by now you miserable cowards.’ As she tried to climb to her feet to escape, she elbowed Vinn between his legs causing his eyes to water. His whole body stiffened. The pain surged through his body, swamping his mind. Pure agony.
‘Oh why is it always me?’ he groaned, declaring all kinds of colourful profanity.
The pirates laughed, watching the young female spitting and screaming at him like a she-cat.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ he shouted, rolling to his knees. ‘I was just trying to help.’
Paralysed with fear, she stared at him and then made a run for the door. As her fingertips reached the handle, she was seized and dragged back screaming. She dropped her baby down into Vinn's lap.
‘Ruffians!’ he shouted, placing the child down onto the soft rug by the fire, an inherent feeling of compassion bubbling up within him for the plight of the mother and child. He had always been a philanderer, but the one thing he couldn’t stand was a male who hit a female. Females must be respected at all times, just as I have respected and revered my saintly mother, he thought, climbing back to his feet and full height of seven feet, four inches. He straightened his broad, muscular shoulders. Shouting furiously he roared. ‘Excuse me!’
The pirates stopped dead in their tracks, staring at each other. They glanced behind them. Then around the room. ‘Is he talking to us?’ the leader asked.
‘Yes,’ said Vinn, hands on hips, anger in his voice, ‘I am.’
‘Go away, pretty blue-blood,’ said one pirate with a deep scar branded across his face. ‘She isn’t worth it. And you're no match for the likes of us. So back off, while you still have skin on your bones.’
Vinn smiled, folding his arms across his powerfully built chest. ‘Come now, let’s behave in a civilised manner. We’re not animals are we?’ he said with an air of calm.
‘You might not be mate, but we are,’ said one of the pirates. He burst out into a fit of mad laughter.
Vinn’s eyes narrowed. His shoulders slumped and he sighed heavily. ‘Then I think a lesson in manners is long overdue. So I’m going to take it upon myself to instruct you in the blue-blood art of fisticuffs, as taught to me by my sainted father, short in stature though he may have been.’
‘Get lost, before I change your pretty features so radically that even your own mother won’t recognise you,' countered the leader.
‘Silezian Pirates, you’re all the same – uncivilized. If you were sat on a dung heap you would add to it. Then, step forward and give it your best shot,’ said Vinn, straightening his shoulders. He clenched his fists in front of his face.
‘You really are asking for it, aren't you’ said a pirate stepping forward.
Vinn by now was up on his toes, ducking and diving, nimbly shadow boxing and rotating his hands in front of his face. ‘I am Vinn of Verbainia: ex-serviceman, ex-seafarer, ex-mercenary and a blue-blood of good name and long-standing in the community. And you my four foul-mouthed fellows are about to be taught a lesson. The rules of this fight are – there are no rules,’ he said kicking the other between the legs, ballet like. Then he punched him solidly on the end of his nose.
The Silezian howled dreadfully. The kick was so hard that it made him feel sick. The punch broke his nose. Dizziness swamped his mind and his legs buckled beneath him. He dropped to his knees groaning, shaking his head. He hadn’t even seen the ferocious blows coming because Vinn’s kick and punch had been lightning fast.
The pirate screamed in a high-pitched voice. ‘Get him! Cut off everything that protrudes from his body. And I don’t mean just his ears and nose!’
Vinn took three steps backwards, drawing his sword. ‘Did I forget to mention in my verbal résumé, that I’m unbeaten in over two hundred fights and have killed more Silezian pirates than you could count on all of your fingers and toes? That is, if you can count. Which I seriously doubt very much by the mere fact that you have trouble speaking your own language coherently. Luckily, I have learned to understand your dull mutterings over the millennia.
‘Never heard such rubbish. You’re just saying you're good to try and scare us,’ said the second in command lunging forward, slicing air wildly. He crossed the room in one huge leap.
‘Why, my dear fellow, you’re having no such luck,’ said Vinn in a mocking voice, parrying and blocking the pirate’s clumsy sword strokes effortlessly. ‘I speak the truth. And you are about to feel my wrath.’ He sliced air, crossing the dining room floor with fancy footwork, smoothly and accurately cutting the wicks off three wall lanterns, extinguishing them. The Silezians blinked in disbelief. Then blinked again.
Their leader, still on his knees groaning, suddenly shouted to his men. ‘Get him. Cut him to pieces – now – all of you.’ At which point, they released the female. She plucked her child from the fireside rug and ran screaming from the room.
Instantly, Vinn found himself surrounded. If they have ever managed to pull off the hijacking of a ship, or the dubious task of robbing a grave even, it would surprise me. For they seem to be witless. A puppy dog would have more grey matter between its ears than these four halfwits, he thought. ‘Silezian sleezeballs you are,' he said, his sword slicing air in fancy style again. ‘And I have no doubt that you think you can overpower me by sheer brute force. Four against one are usually good odds. And in most circumstances you would be right. However, you four idiots are like bells with wooden tongues. You make nothing happen very slowly, and are loud mouthed, brutal scoundrels and witless fools, all of whom would be much improved by death. In fact, it would be a good career move for the lot of you.'
The leader climbed to his feet and they all charged like maniacs, slashing the air wildly. Vinn did a back somersault out of harm’s way, his sword slicing one of them, cutting his shoulder down to the bone.
The man groaned, blood dripping from the wound. Vinn landed back on his feet as gracefully as if he were a professional acrobat. ‘What say you now?’ he asked, staring defiantly.
‘You play us for fools,’ snapped the injured pirate, ‘but I’ll run you through.’ He lunged forward awkwardly, missing Vinn by a mile as he shifted from one foot to the other, sidestepping the blade.
‘But you are a fool. Your three old comrades are a joke too,’ Vinn countered with a smile. ‘I could beat the four of you with a blindfold on and one hand tied firmly behind my back. Or would that be too much of an advantage for you to bear?’ He kicked the man’s backside with his booted foot, launching him from his feet. He crashe
d into the only table still standing and fell to the floor on his face.
His shipmate sliced air in front of Vinn, trying to cut off his head. He ducked and tripped the man up with an outstretched leg, making him look ridiculous. Both Silezians climbed to their feet quickly and all four charged at him again. He stood up straight and roared, ‘Stop!’ at the top of his voice, putting a hand up in front of the leaders face.
Stunned by the sudden gesture and the loudness of his voice they all came to a grinding halt in front of him. He hesitated for a moment. Choosing what to do next. He shot a big cheesy grin at the four men who were standing shoulder-to-shoulder. Quickly he slapped all four faces going from right to left. Then he backhanded them going from left to right. Not quite happy with that, he tweaked each man’s nose in the blink of an eye as they stood stock-still, stunned and speechless. He chuckled with genuine humour and his voice dropped to a husky whisper. ‘Don’t you get it? Don't you realise you’re not even in the same league as me? If one man can make such a fool out of the four of you, you’re obviously doing something very wrong, don’t you think?’
At that moment a horn sounded in the harbour.
‘The ship’s leaving without us,' shouted one of the pirates, panicking.
‘It looks like we’ll have to finish this unfriendly discussion another day,’ replied their leader, glaring at Vinn, the light of madness in his eyes. They all spun around and ran.
Vinn gave a sigh of relief watching them scramble for the door. Yanking it open, three of the men sped off. ‘Wait! Wait! Don’t leave without us!’ they shouted. But on reaching the door their leader spun round, his bright green eyes staring coldly at Vinn. ‘We’ll meet again. Count on it!' he snapped, spraying spit. He too sped off towards the harbour cursing, ‘Wait for me, you idiots!’
Vinn slumped to a stool, giving an even bigger sigh. He sheathed his sword and picked up a partly filled tankard of ale, swilling it down in one big gulp. He glanced over at the roasting piglet. The aroma was even stronger now. He picked up another partly filled tankard of ale and drank thirstily, finally wiping his lips with the back of his hand.
Within an hour he was drunk, his belly stuffed to bursting from eating a whole piglet leg. He burped richly, patting his full stomach. Then he lay down on the rug in front of the fire and he sank into a deep sleep, while a typhoon lashed the whole harbour. Thunderstorms and heavy rain swamped many ships and they sank with their cargo holds flooded. But Vinn was so drunk that he never twitched the whole night long. Oblivious to the squall, he snored and dreamt of his true love at home in Verbainia. A wild wench he'd met one summer’s night at a close friend’s wedding.
*
With the rising of the morning sun, new hope came even though ships had floundered in the harbour, leaving many sailors dead from the wild night of storms. However, Vinn slept on until the dawn of the next day when the high warm sun shone down.
He awoke with a start to the sound of the harbour bell tolling out across the seafront. Now Vinn remembered the Oracle’s voice drifting into his head. I must be on my way, he thought, wiping his eyes. He climbed to his feet and spun on his heels, heading for the door. Opening it he stepped outside into the morning sunshine. Then he marched off, unblinking, his gaze fastened on the north. And without thinking he headed towards an ancient monolith known as The Colossus of Talus – a gigantic tower filled with the strangest creatures, so he’d heard. He never even bothered to consult the runes as to where his destiny lay. He just knew.
Marching on, he couldn’t believe the damage the typhoon had caused.. Huge structures had crumbled in the wind. Trees were levelled like so many straws. Cattle and sheep lay dead by the roadside, drowned, crushed to death or suffocated by the storm. Anything that had been in its path was now destroyed.
And so, for over an hour he carefully picked his way through the debris of the city, angling his journey towards the ancient tower in anticipation of finding one of the sacred Firestars, thus beginning his Quest. However, it was with more than a little trepidation. He had heard that the bizarre creatures dwelling there could drain all knowledge from a blue-blood's mind, leaving him a witless dolt.
Finally, he stood at the base of the soaring tower looking up. It was grey, stark, ill-omened and ominous looking. A cold chill screamed though his whole being as he stared down, wide eyed at thousands of snakes of every kind and colour, slithering within a waterless moat. How can I cross this wide pit, he thought? There's no drawbridge to walk over. No water to swim through. And it’s far too wide to jump across. He wiped the sheen of sweat from his brow, certain in the knowledge that he wasn’t going to climb down into the snakes, walk across them and try to climb up the other side. Someone had put the deadly things there to keep that very thing from happening.
Realising now that his quest wasn’t going to be as easy as he had first thought, he struggled to find a solution to the moat – his first real obstacle – and he hadn’t even begun his journey yet. He shook his head in dismay. ‘What now?’ he whispered. ‘How, by all that I hold sacred am I going to get across this damn moat?’
He sat down cross-legged, contemplating his dilemma, watching storm clouds stacking up, casting an evil darkness over the tower. It made it look even more sinister as a web of lightning illuminated the sky and a wild wind blew in from the north-east. Then hundreds of wooden-shutters began to bang noisily on every level of the three hundred-story structure.
And as he searched the halls of his mind for a solution to his plight, he was unaware of the monstrous silhouetted outline approaching silently and flickering hazily behind him. Chilled he rolled to his knees and climbed to his feet, ill at ease, feeling a presence nearby. He swung around and stared in horror. A dagger slammed into his chest, the blade driven in up to the hilt. He staggered back. Then he fell to his knees, his mouth hanging open, his long upper body slumping forward until his brow thudded against the cold stone floor. Dead.
The almost invisible monster knelt by the corpse and pushed it to its back. ‘I have no time to waste on fools who find the Quest beyond them,’ it hissed, flickering hazily, disappearing from sight.
Chapter 10
Baltar stood at the edge of a yawning canyon staring down, eyes wide with fear. He was cold and miserable. A bone chilling wind was blowing in from the south-east over the rolling mountains and balls of dry weeds tumbled along the sandy trails haphazardly behind him. It’s shear madness even to contemplate climbing down such a terrifying bottomless chasm, he thought. And to do it on such a fragile looking vine.
No one in their right mind would even consider such an impossible task. Well, no one it seems except Baltar.
However, at this moment he really didn’t have much of a choice. It was either face the chasm and the endless drop. Or the monstrous spider approaching him from out of the dense undergrowth to his rear. There was no choice. He knew he had a slim chance of surviving the chasm. But little or no chance what-so-ever against the terrifying spider.
Paralysed with fear, and with less than a heartbeat to spare before the spider descended upon him, he dived out into thin air on the tough but spindly vine, praying under his breath as he did so. Will it hold my weight, he wondered. Well, it was too late now for anything but prayer.
That first swing out into empty air seemed to last an eternity. He held his breath. He tumbled one hundred feet in the blink of an eye. Then a further hundred. And his heart almost stopped when the vine creaked and stretched as if it were about to break. After stretching, the vine snapped back, slamming him hard against the chasm wall, punching the air from his lungs, stunning him. He shook his head to regain his senses and quickly glanced back over his shoulder at the spider. It had reached the edge of the canyon wall and was climbing down towards him at dizzying speed.
‘Sweet mother,’ he whispered, fear shining in his eyes.
Normally, spiders didn’t bother him. They were purposeful little creatures, ridding the world of tics, mites and worst of all, flies. However, this
spider was anything but small. In fact, it was so large that it made the rock face echo and shudder as it crawled down.
Now what, he thought? I can’t beat the spider to the bottom of the chasm, and besides, even if the vine is strong enough, it certainly isn’t long enough. Desperately, he slid down the vine as fast as possible. But the spider was descending even faster, its huge legs unfaltering as it crawled down the sheer wall.
Four hundred feet below the spider, he stopped fleetingly to survey the wall, trying to find a crack large enough to hide in. There was none. He slid down another fifty feet and stopped again. He looked up at the spider. It was much nearer and he was fast running out of vine. Now he knew if he couldn’t find a way off the wall he would soon be a dead hero-warrior. And the thought of being torn to pieces or injected with venom to keep him alive just long enough for the spider to suck his insides out made the fear of falling pale in significance.
There's never a good way to die. But some ways would be slightly more preferable than others, he thought. He began swinging frantically from side to side, hoping to find an escape route. There was none. Casting his eye over the spider he watched it getting closer. Razor-like mandibles snapping repeatedly. Then he stared down, wide eyed with terror at the long drop beneath him.
Suddenly, a thought drifted through his mind. The Mage’s lamp. I can use it only once, but I won’t be using it at all if I don’t get out of here now.
The spider stopped to get a better look at him. It was almost within striking distance now. He snatched the oil lamp from his waistband, uncorked it and began reading the inscription on the side. He recited quickly:
‘When all hope is lost,
And your life is in fear,
Just read from the lamp,
And I shall appear,
To protect and serve.'
Everything seemed to go into slow motion and stop. The spider was frozen in time. He breathed a sigh of relief and his eyes assumed a vacant expression. There was a rush of cool air… WHOOSH. A moment later, his eyes focused on something growing within the vapour. The Mage materialised quickly and grew gargantuan in size to well over a hundred feet tall. He appeared to be a Narok warrior. He had narrow slit eyes, a wide coarse nose, high broad cheeks and the familiar tell-tale pointed ears. He wore only a loincloth about his waist and looked meaner and more menacing than the spider.
The Blackhawks Impossible Quest Page 11
