Keep on the Borderlands

by Ru Emerson - (ebook by Flandrel; Undead)

  It was very dark here. One of the Keep men lit his lantern and opened the shutter, just enough that they could make out the way ahead of them. There were stairs here, rough-cut and uneven. The passage turned right, and another, shorter flight of cracked stairs went into a flat passage blocked by a heavy door. Skulls were nailed to the walls and door, and someone or something had scrawled a message in Common: come in! We’d love to have you for dinner!

  Kadymus stared at the message, looked at the skulls, and licked his lips. “Have you for dinner? Who’d eat with whatever lives in there?” he mumbled.

  Eddis felt Blorys bite back sudden laughter. She swallowed her own mirth and murmured against the thief’s ear, “Wrong meaning. Not to dinner. As dinner.”

  He gave her a sick look and moved away.

  Jerdren eyed the door for a long moment. He stiffened as faint, coarse laughter came to them from the other side, followed by what sounded like a snapped order, then silence. He stepped cautiously back and beckoned the others close.

  “Someone’s on alert in there. Mead, can you tell how that door’s locked?”

  The mage nodded and moved toward the portal, hands spread wide. He was back in a moment. “It’s both locked and barred. I have a device that will move the bar, quietly, but the lock is a fairly simple one, I think. Your business,” he added to Kadymus. “If I explain this thing, will you be able to move the trigger and open the door?”

  “Open?” Kadymus looked at him, round-eyed. “Me? Open that? You see all those skulls? See what it says on that door?”

  Eddis tapped his shoulder with a hard finger, silencing him. “Open the door, little man,” she said softly. “Because we’re going to open it one way or another. You do a good job like a nice little thief, we just might surprise whatever’s in there. Probably more goblins.” She couldn’t resist adding, “Get the door open, and yell bree-yark! They’ll drop their weapons and surrender.”

  He glared at her but went with the elf, drawing his lock picks from a small pouch at his belt.

  “Ease up on the lad,” Jerdren murmured. “I think his first ogre startled him.” His eyes stayed on the door, and a moment later, Mead held up a warning hand.

  “Stay alert, people,” she said quietly as she freed her sword and a throwing knife. Blorys came up and settled in at her left shoulder, two long spears in his right, sword in his left. He still looked a little pale, she thought, but he no longer sounded winded.

  Kadymus had the door ajar. He and Mead stepped back as Jerdren took their place. She could hear low, rough voices—not goblin voices—and a sudden yell as Jerdren pelted into the chamber. Eddis and Blorys were right behind him, then Mead, who moved along the inner wall, two of the Keep men between him and the room’s occupants.

  She had no time to see where anyone else went.

  “Hobgoblins!” Jerdren shouted the warning. Hulking, heavily armored and armed brutes leaped to their feet as what must have been females caught up little ones and backed away behind a pile of broken furniture.

  “I hate hobgoblins,” he snarled and ran straight at the nearest, attacking before the creature could bring his sword up.

  Blorys swore in frustration as he and Eddis came after, blocking the poleaxe of a second hobgoblin who was trying to get behind Jerdren. Eddis’ sword rebounded, but so did the long pole, and Blorys jammed his spear at the monster’s eye. Eddis brought her blade back around, slashing at his knees. The brute fell back, startled and bleeding but not badly hurt.

  The company swarmed into the room, driving the startled hobgoblins back, but only for a moment. The fellows had been clad for a fight. They were big, fast, and skilled. That lousy goblin guard must have warned them, Eddis thought. She lunged and slashed at a huge back as one of the hobgoblins roared past her, but hardened leather foiled the blow, and the thing turned on her, teeth bared. She swung again, and this time the blade clove through leather and deep into the arm beneath it. The monster bellowed in anger and pain, slapping the sword from her hand. As good as gone, Eddis thought as she shook out her hand and tried to free up another throwing knife. Her fingers wouldn’t cooperate.

  “Change sides!” Blorys shouted.

  She nodded and took the spear he held out. He shifted his sword to the other hand and turned to check on the brute she’d wounded. The hobgoblin was staggering a little and bleeding heavily but still full of fight. When one of the Keep men ran at it with a boar spear, the monster batted it aside, snatched at the man, and threw him against the wall. He wobbled there, trying to gain his balance, but when the hobgoblin started after the man, Kadymus came up behind the creature and plunged a knife deep into the back of its neck. He skipped nimbly aside as it howled and slapped at the air, trying to grab him.

  “Cover me!” Blorys yelled and brought his sword down two-handed on the brute’s neck. The first time, the blade hit something hard and rebounded with a clang, nearly flying out of his hands, but the second time it cut deep. Blood poured from the long wound, soaking into the shuddering monster’s clothing and hair, pooling around the suddenly still body. Another of the hobgoblin’s fellows came running, eyes fixed on Blorys, who freed his sword and let Eddis guide him back with a hand clutched in his near sleeve. The hobgoblin’s boots slid across a suddenly slick floor, and it went down, hard. M’Whan and another Keep man were there to make certain it didn’t rise.

  Eddis yelled as something slammed into her left arm. She stared in surprise as blood welled from her sleeve and ran from a long, ugly cut just above her elbow. Blorys swore, snatched at the long knife caught in her torn sleeve, reversed it and threw, hard. The dagger sliced the ear of the hobgoblin who’d thrown it at her. If the brute hadn’t ducked, it probably would have hit its eye. Eddis set her teeth against her lip and tried to press her sleeve against the cut. Ugly, not dangerous, she thought, but it hurt damnably, and from the elbow down, her arm wouldn’t respond. M’Baddah had her by the other elbow, drawing her back out of the fray. He thrust her into Flerys’ trembling hands and strode out to take Eddis’ place at Blorys’ side.

  “Hurts?” Flerys asked. Her voice trembled.

  “It hurts,” Eddis agreed, “but it won’t so much if you can tie my sleeve around it.”

  The child nodded and leaned her spear against the wall, but it took her three tries to get the ends fastened.

  “Better,” Eddis managed, with what she hoped was a reassuring smile, though with the added pressure, it hurt considerably worse. “You stopped the bleeding, and my father used to say that if it doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t hurt.”

  Flerys clearly didn’t understand a word of the weak joke, but the smile did seem to reassure her, a little. She retrieved the spear and scrambled to her feet to guard the swordwoman. Though I don’t know what she can do against one of those, Eddis thought. Or what more I can do. Her left arm hung limp, and the fingers of her right still smarted, but they’d hung onto Blorys’ spear, somehow. She tightened her grip and watched the fray.

  The fight was nearly over. The last two hobgoblins were tottering, and as she watched, they fell, one to a Keep man’s spear, the other to a joint attack by Blorys and M’Baddah.

  Jerdren had already sent Willow over to listen at the far door. “Bless me if the entire cave shouldn’t be down around our ears by now, all the noise we made in here. Maybe we’re still in luck, and that door’s as thick as the one we just came through.”

  He eyed the cowering huddle of females and young. “And bless me if I don’t want to run ’em through. I’ve had enough of killing beast babies and their cowering mothers. Suggestions, Mead? Panev?”

  The priest came forward, mace in hand and his eyes glittering. “If you cannot kill them, I shall. The females of their kind often fight and kill as well as the males. The young will grow up to become fighters. But—” he shrugged. “If you choose to bind them instead, I will strengthen your ropes with a charm I have that will keep them enthralled for several hours.”

  “All we need is enough time to se
e what’s beyond that door and get back out this way, if we need to.” Jerdren’s brooding eyes fixed on one of the fallen hobgoblins.

  Blorys picked his way across the room, his eyes dark with anger.

  “Beyond? Are you mad, Brother? We have injuries here, and Eddis is bleeding! And all you can think of is—?”

  Jerdren’s head came up at that, his color high. Eddis dragged herself to her feet and stepped between the two men.

  “Let’s not waste time arguing. Blor, I’ll be fine, M’Baddah will tend this. Blor, remember the description Zebos gave of the way to that torture chamber, where he was chained to the wall? I think this is it, and I still say we are bound by honor to free prisoners. This is a cut, nothing more. It’s not—” She became aware of Flerys right behind her and shook her head, her eyes warning Blorys. “It’s nothing. Let’s finish up here and go.”

  “She’s right, Brother,” Jerdren said. “There’s the least chance new guards will find that dead ogre or the dead guards just back there—or this room. We’re leaving a trail, and I wager they’d be ready and waiting for us if we came back tomorrow. With things like hobgoblins, I’d rather have surprise on my side when I attack.”

  “Never mind that,” Eddis said. She bit her lip as M’Baddah began working on her arm. “These creatures might simply kill prisoners, once they realize we’re here. I’d hate that.”

  “If there are any prisoners alive,” Blorys said as he retrieved her sword and wiped it clean.

  “We won’t know until we look,” Eddis told him.

  The rest of the party members were tending wounds or working their way around the chamber, looking for coins and other wealth. Panev watched two of the Keep men tie the unresisting females and young. When they were all knotted together, the priest waved a short black wand over them and spoke under his breath. Moments later they all slept, and when Jerdren nudged the nearest female with his foot, she didn’t move.

  “Good work, man,” he said and headed toward the far door. Willow had it open and was already out of sight. “Good work, all of you. Eddis?”

  She nodded. Her arm still throbbed, and she might be weak for a while, but her fingers and elbow were working once more. Blorys patted her shoulder awkwardly and went after his brother. Eddis stayed back with Flerys and Mead as the brothers strode through the door.

  A long, shadowy corridor, cut into the rock, meandered ahead of them, fire or torchlight turning the stone ruddy some distance away. No sound, except for their own breathing. Eddis listened intently. No good. She wondered where the goblin had got to. If it had gone on this way, it could be anywhere by now. They could be heading for an ambush.

  They were moving slowly, making as little noise as they could, but the passage was dark, the floor uneven, and complete silence impossible. Eddis’ boots shuffled aside a spill of gravel. Someone else’s foot scraped across stone. Each sound seemed loud in the narrow place.

  When they halted so Mead, Willow, and Kadymus could check ahead for side passages, Eddis leaned against the wall. Her arm throbbed despite the thick stuff M’Baddah had rubbed across the cut, and she felt lightheaded. She dredged up a smile as Flerys tugged on her sleeve. The child looked worried, and not much reassured when the woman breathed against her ear, “I’m fine.” She took a sip from the water bottle the girl held out to her. Beyond Flerys, M’Whan looked no less concerned.

  The passage seemed to go on forever, but Eddis felt a little better for the water, and her sword hand no longer tingled. A short jog right, then immediately left, another right a short distance beyond that—places where a small group of enemies might lie in wait, but each was deserted. All at once there was enough light from well-spaced torches that they could make out the hallway for quite some distance ahead.

  They paused again while Mead, Willow, and Jerdren scouted. The three were back in short order, and Jerdren beckoned the party close.

  “A tunnel cuts off to the left, just short of that second torch. No guards near, Mead says, but there’s hobgoblins down there, he thinks. Willow could hear someone wailing. I think you’re right, Eddis. This might be where Zebos was held.”

  Blorys leaned forward. “What Zebos told me—if that’s where we are—is that there’s only one way into that chamber and only a couple guards. But if you keep straight on this way, you’ll come to a guard room beyond that last torch somewhere. Hebold and his men were taking him that way, said it was how they’d come in, when they were attacked. The guards came from their left, I think, but he could see daylight at that point.”

  Jerdren nodded. “Good, but one thing at a time. We’ll be able to tell if it is a prison cell, once we get closer. If it is, we hit it hard, fast, and quiet as we can. Grab any prisoners. Kadymus, that’ll be your task. Once we distract the guards, you find keys for the cells or manacles, and be ready to use ’em once we’ve killed the guards.” He met Eddis’ eyes. “You all right?”

  She nodded.

  “Good. In and out as quick as we can, kill the guards fast and quiet. Prisoners will be our only concern here. If there aren’t any, we kill the hobgoblins and make sure we find any wealth they’ve got on ’em. Let’s go.”

  Eddis stayed with Flerys as M’Baddah went ahead with Willow. The child clutched a spear nearly as long as she was tall in her right hand—one she’d picked up during that last fight. She gave the swordswoman a round-eyed look and a faint smile that was gone as quickly as it came, but she seemed merely awed by the strangeness of her surroundings and not afraid of them. She’ll probably have nightmares for the rest of her life if she survives this, Eddis thought.

  And if we’re headed into a dungeon, a prisoner’s cell? She’d seen what was left of tortured, dead men just once, and it had sickened her to her very soul. Better if Flerys didn’t see. How to shield her, though?

  They reached the branching of ways without incident. Once they stopped, Eddis thought she could hear faint noises down the left passage. Mead went on ahead but came back almost at once, shaking his head. No one that way—at least close by. Jerdren indicated the left way with a jerk of his head, and started off at a ground-eating long stride. As he fetched up against the first bend, he set his back to the rough stone and listened intently. Eddis could now see her companions clearly. There was plenty of light ahead. Someone down there moaned non-stop, and someone or something else was jabbering in what sounded like Orc or Goblin to her. A deep voice snarled threateningly, and the shrill one was momentarily still.

  Willow took the lead then, arrow nocked to the string of his longbow, and stopped just short of the light, Mead right behind him. Blorys slid into place at Eddis’ left and gave her a questioning look. She held up her right hand, flexed the fingers, so he could see they were working again, then drew her sword.

  He murmured against her ear, “Good. All the same, stay out of this fight if you can. Keep the girl back.” She nodded, drew the child to her side, and let Panev go by. The priest’s eyes were black, his face stern, and his lips moved silently.

  M’Baddah knelt to draw on his thick gloves and hooked the leather envelope of sh’khuris to his belt where he could reach them. That done, he tested his bowstring and joined Willow. M’Whan followed, one arrow nocked to the string, a handful stuffed up his sleeve where he could grab them quickly and fire. How he can do that without losing them all or slicing his arm? Eddis wondered. The youth’s points were long as her finger and wickedly sharp on all four sides.

  Tense silence as Willow held up a hand and touched it briefly to his lips, then held it out as a warning to be ready. The high-pitched voice was whimpering once more. It sounds like a dog that’s been beaten, Eddis thought. Flerys bit her lip. Her hands tightened on the spear. The elf brought his hand down sharply and sprinted around the corner, Jerdren and M’Baddah right on his heels, the rest following. Eddis kept the girl back with her.

  The passage bent once more, then opened out into a small, brightly lit chamber. Eddis could make out humans shackled to the far wall, and near them
, a gnoll hung from chains. The wall was pale rock, splattered with blood. Eddis drew Flerys aside with her as men and elves slammed into the hobgoblin guards. Already the fighting was so fierce that it took the woman a moment to figure out there were only two of the monsters, but both were armed with thick-bladed swords. They were swinging the blades with vicious intent and not much skill—which could be just as deadly in close combat. One of the Keep men fell back, sword dangling from his hand, blood pouring down his arm. Mead dragged him aside, and Jerdren bellowed an order for the swordsmen to get back.

  “No arrows!” her co-captain yelled. “You could hit the prisoners!” He pulled back himself, freed up his short boar spear, and waited for an opening.

  One of the guards slashed a wild path through the attackers and charged past the Keep men. Eddis drew Flerys farther into the chamber in case the thing was trying to escape, but it turned sharply, sword still swinging, and threw itself at Blorys. Blor parried an overhand blow with his blade and was sent sprawling. Eddis started but subsided against the wall as Flerys snatched at her arm.

  Somewhere deep in the turmoil of bodies, M’Baddah shouted, “Down!” A moment later, he broke free and began working his way around the creature, a glittering, deadly metal star gripped in one gloved hand. M’Whan’s spear broke against the brute’s armor. Another hit and clattered harmlessly to the floor.

  The hobgoblin was starting for Blorys once more when the sh’khuri thudded home, lodging in its throat, just above the armor. Blood ran down the monster’s throat, but it seemed merely enraged by the wound. A second deadly missile sank in deeper, just above the first. Men and elves scattered as blood sprayed everywhere. The hobgoblin pawed at the sh’khuri but succeeded only in slicing its hand open. It toppled slowly backward. Blood shot high briefly, slowed, and stopped.

  The second hobgoblin was trying to gain the entry and escape. Eddis brought up her sword, took two long steps to put herself squarely in the creature’s way, and thrust Flerys behind her. The priest was back in the hallway. He was armed, and a good fighting man, but if he was distracted by prayer, he’d be caught unawares and probably cut down. Not, Eddis thought grimly, while I’m here to prevent that. She was aware that Flerys had moved a pace to one side, could see the steady spear. But two of the Keep men knocked the brute flat from behind, swinging mace and morningstar in a smooth, precise maneuver. Before it could struggle to its feet, Blorys and Jerdren finished it off.