Orcs

by Stan Nicholls

  “Who —” He cleared his throat. “Who are you?”

  She didn’t answer him directly. In a thin, pure voice she said, “Leave this place. Quickly.”

  “Into the storm? We wouldn’t stand a chance out there.”

  “Believe me,” she implored, “the danger is worse in here. Go while you still can.” Suddenly she gasped, cowering against the banister. Sheer terror twisted her beautiful face as she cast a glance behind her. “Go! Go now!”

  “What’s the matter?” Stryke said, moving to the foot of the staircase.

  She didn’t answer. He began climbing the steps, taking them two and three at a time.

  When he reached her, he offered, “We’ll protect you.”

  The woman gave a despairing laugh. “Too late.”

  Out of the doorway behind her came a pack of hideous creatures.

  They looked like everybody’s idea of demons, the tormenting spirits said to rule the halls of Xentagia with whips of fire.

  Down in the hallway more of them poured out to surround the orcs.

  No two of the creatures were entirely alike. Slithering, sidling, striding on spider-claws, their bodies subtly changed shape, moment by moment. Even their faces melted and reformed, now with one eye, now with tusks and snapping beaks. Some had wings like a bat, but without exception they all had fearsome claws. Their grey skin rippled continuously. They were so hideous Stryke couldn’t look at them without courting nausea.

  They must have numbered fifty or more.

  Every member of the band viewed them with superstitious dread.

  “Throw down your weapons!” the woman urged.

  “We don’t do that!” Haskeer responded.

  “But it’s your only chance! How can you fight them? The Sluagh won’t kill you if you don’t attack.”

  Stryke backed away from her and slowly retreated down the steps to his band. If he was to die, he didn’t want it to be alone. Two of the beings undulated down the stairs behind him, snapping their fangs at his heels. As he reached the other Wolverines, the Sluagh reared above him, mouths agape.

  “Do it!” Stryke snapped, throwing down his sword. It rang like a bell on the stone. His Sluagh guard drew back a little, coiling and uncoiling.

  Outnumbered, the orcs reluctantly laid down their arms. The creatures stayed close until every last weapon rested on the floor at their feet.

  “I thought the Sluagh were just fireside tales,” Coilla whispered.

  “I thought they were creatures from hell,” Alfray said.

  Looking at them, it was easy to believe that they were.

  Fear surrounded them like a miasma. Out of their dark aura thoughts slicked into Stryke’s mind. He whirled around but could not locate which creature had spoken.

  “Give us the instrumentalities,” it said.

  From their startled reactions, it was obvious that the whole band heard it, if heard was the word.

  Stryke said aloud, “I don’t have them.”

  This time the voices seemed to come from behind. “You lie! We can feel their power.”

  “They reach out to us.”

  “They call to us.”

  “Give us the instrumentalities and we may let you live.”

  Dizzy, the Wolverine leader fumbled beneath his tunic. His hands were clammy, slipping over the spiky mass. Nevertheless, he managed to break one of the stars from the meld. The rest were stuck as solidly as if they’d been soldered together. He touched the single one. It was the five-spiked green object he had first rescued from Hobrow in Trinity. It seemed an age ago. Gingerly, he held out the group of four.

  A snaking tentacle plucked it from his grasp.

  Something like a sigh whispered echoing to the ceiling.

  “And the other? Where is the other?”

  Stryke swallowed. “We haven’t got it.”

  “Then you will suffer for all eternity.”

  Agony gripped Stryke’s head. He felt like a firebrand had been thrust inside his skull. Clutching his temples, he fell writhing to the floor. Around him, the other Wolverines were equally in pain.

  “Wait!” Stryke managed to say. “I meant we haven’t got it here. But we can get it.”

  The anguish lessened. “When? When can you get it?”

  “It’s with the rest of our band,” he lied. White heat jolted through his brain. “They’re coming, they’re coming,” he gasped.

  “How soon?” the hissing voices demanded.

  “I don’t know. We got separated in the blizzard. But they’ll be here. Tomorrow, if the storms hold off.”

  “Then we can kill you now.”

  “You do that and you’ll never get it!”

  “If they are coming here they will not be able to stop us taking it.”

  “If we don’t give them the signal, they won’t enter this place.” He directed a cold gaze at the nearest Sluagh. “I’m the only one who knows what it is,” he bluffed. “And I’ll die before you get it out of me.”

  On the fringes of his mind Stryke heard them conversing but he couldn’t make out what they said.

  At last a pug-faced demon said, “Very well. We will let you live until tomorrow.”

  “At dusk,” another one said. “If we do not have the instrumentality by then, you will never leave this place alive.”

  “And you will loathe every heartbeat that you live.”

  The Sluagh herded them up the stairs. As they passed the white-robed human, she started as though coming awake. Silently she fell into step between Stryke and Coilla.

  It was a long way up. The woman was visibly shaking with exhaustion by the time they reached the top. No doubt they were in the top of one of the turrets that had reared so high above the plain. If anything, the air was even chillier up here than it had been down in the hall.

  As the first Sluagh reached the tiny landing a door swung open without a touch. Stryke saw that it had no handle, no latch. He stored the information for later, gazing into the circular chamber beyond. Again it was filled with golden light though he couldn’t see where it came from, unless the air itself was glowing. Once more the walls were covered with carvings, hideous gargoyles this time that looked like Sluagh captured in stone. Long yellow curtains hung at random from the arched ceiling.

  Now the demons crawled aside. Taking a deep breath Stryke led the band through the gilded door, the woman collapsing immediately with her back against one of the drapes.

  Once they were all inside, the door slammed shut. Abruptly the pain left them. Jup ran back to where the door had been. Before he even touched it a wall of light threw him halfway across the crowded room.

  Alfray came to kneel beside him. “I think he’s just stunned. At least I hope so. His heart’s still beating.”

  They fanned out, looking behind draperies for another exit. There was nothing but endless carvings. For all their probing they couldn’t find a key, a knob, anything that would let them out.

  Eventually they gave up and slumped down to rest. The woman hadn’t moved.

  Shivering in the unnatural cold, Stryke wrenched a curtain loose and wrapped it around him like a shawl. Some of the grunts did likewise.

  “You knew there was no way out, didn’t you?” Stryke said, coming to sit beside the woman.

  “But I still hoped you’d find one.” Her voice was high, ethereal. “And now you want to know who I am.”

  Coilla came to squat at her side. “You bet we do.” Her tone was harsh.

  “Can’t you see I’m just as much a prisoner as you are?”

  “You still haven’t told us your name,” Stryke said.

  “Sanara.”

  Realisation took a few seconds to soak in. “Jennesta’s sister Sanara?”

  “Yes. But don’t judge me by her, I beg you. I’m not like her.”

  Coilla snorted. “Says you!”

  “How can I convince you?”

  “You can’t.” Coilla stood and walked away.

  “You are not like her,
” Sanara told Stryke. “I sense the power of the land flowing around you, like the orcs of olden days. But that child has none of it.”

  “I wouldn’t call Coilla a child to her face,” he replied shortly.

  She shrugged miserably. “What does it matter? At sundown tomorrow she’ll be dying just the same. You didn’t really think the Sluagh would let you go, did you?”

  “I’d hoped they might.”

  “Dream on, orc. They thrive on the pain and suffering of others. They’ll spin your life out in endless agony until you’re begging to die, but still they’ll feast on your terror.”

  “My name’s Stryke. If we’re going to die together, we ought at least to be on first name terms.”

  In answer she waved a languid hand.

  “So, Queen Sanara,” he said at length, wishing he could pierce her shroud of indifference to find some answers that might get them out of here. “Am I supposed to call you Your Highness or something?”

  As she shook her head a faint perfume of roses wafted from her hair. “No. I haven’t been called that in a long time. Not since the humans ate the magic of my land.”

  “Your land?”

  “My land. My realm.” She smiled sadly. “Jennesta had the southlands, Adpar the nyadd domain. This is what my mother willed to me. But you see what it has become: a desert of snow and death. Whole cities lie imprisoned beneath the glaciers. Once this land was rich and good, a place of forests and meadows. Every single one of my subjects fled or perished when the ice swept down. It started when I first came to the throne, coming closer day by day. How could they not think it was my fault? Do you know what it’s like, to be blamed for the death of the land? Can you imagine how sad it is seeing your friends, your lovers, turn away from you and die one by one?” Her eyes misted. “I tried to counter it but I have very little power now. All that remains of my capital, Illex, is this fortress.”

  “Why didn’t Jennesta help you?”

  She made an all too human sound of derision. “If you know my sister you know she doesn’t help anybody but herself. That was why Mother sent her away. She hasn’t been back to my realm for generations of your kind.”

  “Your mother?”

  “Vermegram.”

  “The sorceress? The legendary Vermegram of old?”

  Sanara sighed and nodded.

  “Then you’re not as human as you seem.”

  “Indeed not, no more than my brood sisters. But Vermegram died many winters ago. And I was watching when you saw Adpar die by Jennesta’s power.”

  “How did you know I was there?”

  She gazed at him mysteriously. “I’ve had my eye on you for a long time, Stryke.” But when he pressed her, she wouldn’t say why.

  Not liking where the conversation might be heading, Stryke fell silent for a time. At last he said against a background of orcish snores, “How come you let the Sluagh in?”

  “What a strange question! How could I keep them out?”

  Stryke conceded the point with a grimace. “Where did they come from? And why are they here?”

  The former Queen sighed again and lay down, pillowing her head on her arm. She looked up at him with limpid green eyes that reminded him a little of Jennesta’s. There was no scaling on her face though, just soft, milky skin. “They’re an ancient race from the dawn of time. What they are is evil incarnate. You think Jennesta’s bad? Compared to them, she’s just an amateur. And they’re here because they knew that sooner or later Jennesta would find out about the instrumentalities. They’ve held me prisoner here for longer than you’ve been alive. And I’ll still be here when the Sluagh are chewing on your bones. They thought that she would seek them out —”

  Trying not to dwell on the image of his demise, Stryke said, “She tried.”

  “And then the Sluagh would bargain me for them.”

  “Why do they want them?” he asked. “What do you know of the stars? The instrumentalities?”

  Sanara seemed to look through him to some place that only she could see. Lost in her reverie, she hardly noticed Jup and Coilla drifting back to Stryke’s side.

  “They want to use them, of course,” the pale Queen said dreamily.

  “What for? What do they do?”

  “All together they exist throughout the planes.”

  Jup thought he grasped some of that. “Is that what they do then? Move about from place to place? Is that how we got here?”

  Sanara brushed her hair back from her face. “They don’t move. I told you, once they’re joined they exist throughout the planes.”

  The Wolverines looked at her, baffled.

  “Throughout space,” she said. “Throughout time.”

  “And they brought us here?” Coilla asked, casting a bitter glance at Stryke.

  “I presume so, if you did not walk.”

  “And is that time thing why it was night when we left and day a heartbeat later when we arrived here?”

  The Queen nodded.

  “Is that what they’re for, then?” Jup wondered before Coilla could get another word in.

  Sanara shook her head. “No. That’s just . . . a side effect. It’s not their main function.”

  “What is their main function?” the dwarf said.

  “It is beyond the mind of mere mortals.” She didn’t seem to have taken to the dwarf.

  Before any of them could respond, the perspective on the far wall shifted. It seemed to retreat into blue distances before snapping back into place.

  Then a figure stood where before there had been nothing. He was swathed in shadows that obscured his face but could do nothing to disguise his height.

  “On your feet!” Stryke cried. “Intruder!”

  The orcs had no weapons. But there were almost thirty of them and only one opponent.

  Besides, they were ready for a good fight.

  23

  The figure stepped out of its cloak of shadows, hands held up in a gesture of peace.

  As it approached, the room’s buttery light showed its face, revealing a human. The silver embroidery on his jerkin glinted and his belt held no scabbard.

  It was Serapheim.

  One or two of the warband shuffled back, casting sideways glances at each other and reaching for their swords, only to remember their sheaths were empty.

  But their surprise was nothing compared to Sanara’s. She turned even paler, if that were possible, and one hand went to her throat. Green eyes wide with shock, she sagged into Stryke’s arms.

  Serapheim moved forward to take her weight, folding his arms tightly around her. Her hands encircled his waist and she rested her head briefly against his shoulder. Almost at once she recovered her poise, drawing herself up as if to maintain some long-forgotten protocol. “I thought you were dead,” she told him.

  “You know this human?” Stryke said.

  Serapheim and Sanara exchanged a look, laden with a meaning the Wolverines couldn’t read. Then she acknowledged the question with a nod.

  “How did you get in here?” Coilla asked, blazing suspicion.

  “That’s not important now,” Serapheim replied. “We have more significant issues to deal with. But what I can tell you, I will. You must trust me.”

  “Yeah,” Haskeer sneered cynically.

  “I might be your only hope,” the human said, “and you have nothing to lose by hearing me out.”

  “We do if you’re going to spout nonsense again,” Jup replied. “We’ve no time for your fairy tales.”

  “It’s true I have a story. But it’s no yarn spun by wordsmiths.”

  Serapheim took in their expectant faces. “All right. How about, you’ve stolen a world?”

  While the rest puzzled over that, Coilla exclaimed, “What? Us? That’s rich coming from your kind.”

  “Nevertheless, it’s true.”

  “This does sound like another of your tales,” Stryke judged. “You’d better explain yourself, Serapheim, or our patience gets revoked.”

  “The
re is much to explain, and you’d do well to attend. That or face death at the hands of the Sluagh.”

  “All right,” Stryke relented. “Long as you keep it quick and clear. What’s this about stealing worlds?”

  “What would you say if I told you Maras-Dantia wasn’t your land?”

  One or two of the grunts laughed derisively.

  “I’d say you humans haven’t got it all yet.”

  “That isn’t what I meant.”

  Stryke was beginning to show his frustration. “What do you mean? And no more riddles, Serapheim.”

  “Let me put it this way. Do the Sluagh seem to you as being of this world?”

  “They’re here, aren’t they?” Jup countered.

  “Yes, but have you ever seen anything like them before? Up to now, did you believe that they existed? Or were they the stuff of legend to you?”

  “Take a look around Maras-Dantia,” the dwarf advised. “You’ll see one hell of a lot of very different races. Apart from being plug ugly, what’s special about the Sluagh?”

  “In a way, that’s my point. How do you think this land came to be shared by so many different races? Why do you think Maras-Dantia’s so rich in the kinds of life it holds? Or should I say Centrasia?”

  “Only if you want your throat cut!” a grunt called out. “This is our land!”

  Stryke shut him up. Turning back to the human, he said, “What kind of a question is that?”

  “Probably the most important one ever put to you.” He held up a hand to still their response. “Bear with me, please. You’d understand me best if you concede for a moment that all the elder races came here from elsewhere.”

  “The way the humans came here, you mean, from outside?” Alfray asked.

  “In a sense. Although we mean different things when we say . . . outside.”

  “Go on,” Stryke said, intrigued despite himself.

  “The elder races came here from other places. Believe that. And the artifacts you call stars are part of how they came here.”

  “This is making my head hurt,” Haskeer complained. “If they, us, don’t come from here, then where?”

  “I’ll try to put it in a way that can be grasped. Imagine that there are places where only gremlins dwell. Or pixies, nyadds and goblins. Or orcs.”