The dog darted under the long table as a furious, red-faced dwarf burst through the door preceded by a string of vile expletives. Borik Deepstone saw the shorn tip of the dog’s tail disappear under the long, polished table. Using one of the chairs as a springboard, the dwarf leapt atop the table and ran down its length as fast as his stubby legs could carry him as his hobnailed boots gouged numerous divots in its polished surface.
With a furious battle cry, Borik launched himself off the end of the table with his arms outstretched before him. A loud yelp and a series of snarls and snapping jaws filled the spacious dining hall. Whether they were from the dog or the dwarf, Maude could not be sure. Maude watched the hound race out the door with its tail tucked between its legs as Borik appeared from around the end of the table wiping dog slobber off the sausage onto his shirtsleeve.
“Hey, Maude!” Borik greeted his leader. “What’s up?”
“Did the dog bite you?”
Borik waved off the thought with one meaty hand and spit out several dog hairs from his mouth. “That lily-livered mutt wouldn’t dare try and bite me.”
Maude was unable to keep from sighing and rolling her eyes. “Pack up your gear and meet us in courtyard in half an hour. We have a mission.”
Borik looked at the large woman before him suspiciously. “It ain’t undead is it? You know I don’t deal with undead!”
“No undead this time, Borik. It sounds like a pretty straight forward scavenger hunt this time,” Maude assured him.
“And no boats! I ain’t going on no boats ever again, and you know darn well why!” Borik swore, thinking about their last ill-fated adventure at sea where cannibalistic sea dwellers had captured them and forced them to fight to the death in their undersea arena. “No caves neither!”
“No boats, no caves. I got it.”
“All right then. I’ll be down in a bit,” Borik told her as he pried his axe from the doorframe.
It was nearly an hour later before they were all gathered in the courtyard sitting astride their mounts with heavy packs slung across the horses’ broad, muscular rumps.
“So what is the mission, Maude?” Malek asked. “I assume we are looking for another piece of Dundalor’s armor. What are the details?”
Maude looked about warily. “I’ll explain it later. I don’t want to talk about it here where certain ears may hear.”
“You think there are spies in the castle?” Malek asked looking around.
“Something like that. Even if there are no spies, there are some things that others just don’t need to hear,” she said, casting a sidelong glance at the dwarf.
The party of adventurers rode south for three days before taking a primary road to the west. On the second day of their westward trek, Borik became suspicious.
“Why are we going west, Maude?” Borik asked, his voice laden with suspicion. “I don’t know of any ruins to the west, Maude. It’s all pretty civilized in the west.”
“We’re just going west for a while, and then we’ll head off in another direction. It’s an easier route to travel, and less perilous than traveling directly there,” Maude explained.
“I still don’t see why you won’t explain where it is we’re going. Are you hiding something, Maude?” Borik demanded.
“Of course not. I just don’t have a lot of details to give you right now. After we go west, we’ll travel south to an old abandoned temple, search around, and bring back anything we find. A nice, easy job.”
Borik did not like Maude’s circumspect answer, but he could not find any use in arguing the point. A full week later, they neared the large city of Southport. They merged their horses into the stream of people and wagons pouring into and out of the bustling trade city.
“Why are we going to Southport, Maude?” Borik asked as they neared the city gates. “There are no abandoned temples in Southport.”
“We’re just stopping for supplies and to have a good, warm meal before we head south,” Maude reassured the dwarf.
They did stop off to re-supply themselves and have a hot meal and cold ale. Borik was feeling the effects of his multiple drinks, courtesy of Maude, as they walked their horses towards the docks before his alcohol-addled brain realized what had been nagging him. Maude was never courteous, and she never ever bought his drinks.
“Why are we headed towards the docks, Maude?” Borik demanded with a slur.
“We have to take a ship south to get to our destination.”
Borik’s face turned scarlet. “Damn it, I said no boats! I ain’t gettin’ on no boat! I told you I ain’t gettin no boat and I meant it! No caves, no undead, and no damn boats! No way, no how, and that’s final!” The dwarf swore, crossing his arms, planting his feet, and glaring defiantly up into the faces of his comrades.
The two humans and the elf led four horses up the gangplank and down into the hold of the ship. Two sailors followed close behind carrying a large wooden trunk between them.
“Geez, lady, what are you packing in this thing, anvils?” One of the sailors asked as he dropped his end heavily onto the deck and rubbed the small of back.
“Not quite, but it would work as one in a pinch,” Maude replied. “Just stow it in our cabin please.”
“You know it’s a long voyage, and we can’t keep him in there the entire way,” Malek told her.
“You’re right about that unfortunately,” Maude agreed. “Maybe we can keep him drunk enough to ignore the fact that we’re on a boat.”
The cleric shook his head. “I don’t think this ship could carry enough ale to accomplish that.”
The ship soon set sail with a steady wind pushing them southwest at a good pace. The last vestige of land disappeared over the curve of the horizon within an hour. Maude was relishing the wind and sea spray on her face as she watched the sun set when Malek walked up behind her.
“Don’t you think we should check on Borik now? He’s been tied up in the trunk for a couple hours.”
“I guess there’s no reason to put it off any longer,” Maude replied.
Maude and Malek went into the cabin they procured for their passage. The trunk was shaking violently while a stream of muffled curses echoed from within it. Tarth was lying in a hammock filing his nails while the smell of incense filled the air.
“He must have gotten the gag out of his mouth,” Malek observed.
“Oh yes, he has been spewing the most colorful language for the better part of an hour,” Tarth informed them lazily. “He is so funny.”
Several loud thumps were followed by the sound of splitting wood. The gleaming blade of Borik’s axe erupted from the lid of the trunk with a shower of splinters.
Maude sighed as she looked from the dwarf’s impromptu prison to Malek. “It looks like he slipped his restraints as well.”
Borik burst through the top of the trunk like an angry, bearded, four-foot tall genie from a lamp.
“You foul, evil, hateful woman!” Borik seethed, pointing his axe accusingly at Maude. “I said no boats and you drag me on a boat! I said no caves and you lock me in a dark trunk!”
“Look on the bright side, there aren’t any undead,” Malek supplied.
“You dwarf-napped me! I wouldn’t be surprised if this is a ghost ship and the entire crew turns into a bunch of zombies, the captain is a vampire, and they sail into a giant cave where they turn the rest of us into part of their undead crew by strapping us to a blood-soaked altar under a full moon!”
“Take a breath, Borik, you’re turning purple. The fact is we have already set sail and it’s too far to swim back, so you may as well just enjoy the trip,” Maude told him.
Borik was nearly to the point of hyperventilating, seething at the atrocities that Maude had visited upon him until he slowly lowered his axe. He forced himself to slow his breathing, and his face returned to its more natural color of wind-burnt tan with splotches of red on his cheekbones and the end of his prodigious nose.
“Where are we going anyway?”
; Maude braced herself for another tirade before answering. “Lazuul.”
“Lazuul! Do you mean other side of the world, cannibalistic savages, and giant, dwarf-eating lizards Lazuul?” the dwarf demanded.
“Do you know of any other Lazuul?” Malek asked.
“Of all the thrice-damned, harebrained, idiotic places to go!” Borik swore while stomping and chopping the remainder of the wooden trunk to pieces, venting his anger on the inanimate object.
His cursing and destruction went on until he reduced the trunk to splinters, the largest of which was easily concealable in the palm of a small child.
“I’m going to go find a drink!” Borik declared once he had vented enough of his anger.
Malek looked over at Maude and shrugged his shoulders. “He took that better than I expected.”
“The long vacation in Brelland must have mellowed him out,” Maude agreed. “How are you doing, Tarth?”
“Hm? Oh hello, Maudeline. When did you come in?” the wizard asked as he blew on the freshly applied apricot nail polish. “And what happened to the trunk?”
Maude and Malek stared in disbelief at the oblivious elf for several long minutes before deciding it simply was not worth the trouble to try to explain it to him. The pair returned to the deck of the ship and saw that the stars were out and moon was full overhead.
“So what is this mission, Maude?”
“It’s exactly as I said. King Jarvin and his advisors found a reference to an artifact that they believe might be the helm of Dundalor’s armor in an ancient temple somewhere in the jungles of Lazuul,” Maude explained.
“How are we supposed to find a temple in the middle of the most uncivilized lands in the known world?” the priest asked.
“Jarvin’s priest gave me a rough map and suggested that we may be able to learn more once we reach Borne’s Landing,” Maude told the amorous cleric. “Beyond that, we’re on our own, as usual.”
Three weeks later, the lookout shouted that he could see land on the horizon. It was most likely Borne’s Landing, so Maude went to find wherever Borik had found himself a place to hide and sulk for the entirety of the voyage. She finally located him in a corner of the hold surrounded and half buried in empty bottles. Maude picked up one of the empty flasks and took a sniff. Malek had been right, there probably wasn’t enough ale on ship to have kept the dwarf drunk and oblivious, but the rum had done the job quite well.
Maude was glad that King Jarvin had provided her with a significant expense account. A good portion of the gold would be required to pay off Borik’s bar tab to the captain of the ship. She glared down at the comatose dwarf clutching a half-empty bottle of rum in one hand and his axe in the other.
“Borik, wake up!” Maude yelled at the prostrate form.
Borik bolted upright, sending empty bottles cascading off his chest and sounding like a wind chime in a heavy storm. “I done told ye to keep away from me, ya toothless sea rats!” he shouted, swinging the bottle in his hand and sloshing rum on himself. “Oh, it’s you,” he said sourly as he tried to take a drink from the handle of his axe.
“We’re almost there. Sober up and get yourself together so we don’t have to take you home in a wooden box as well.”
Maude spun on her heel and climbed the stairs out of ship’s hold, not in the mood to argue with the taciturn dwarf. She figured the lure of getting off the ship would be sufficient incentive to get the dwarf moving once more. Her assumption proved correct as Borik clomped onto the deck and took his first breath of fresh sea air since they left Southport. Then he promptly ran to the rail and hurled the liquid contents of his stomach into the blue-grey water ten feet below.
The ship sailed into Borne’s Landing and signaled the tax inspectors that they were welcome to board. There were no real customs inspections to speak of, given the lax laws in Borne’s Landing, but there were two types of port taxes, inspected and not inspected. Not inspected was usually much more expensive, but worth the cost to those who wanted no record of their cargo.
Maude and her dysfunctional “family” stepped off the ship and onto the dock amidst the bustling, noisy, and foul-smelling city. Borne’s Landing was once a pirate cove and was now the largest of three settlements on the vast coast of Lazuul, and the only one that could come close to calling itself a city.
Borne was a pirate that had decided to retire, but instead of letting his personal cove pass on to the next captain, he disbanded his organization, created a government, and made Borne’s Landing a quasi legitimate trading town.
The rare exports and much needed imports quickly made him wealthy beyond his twenty-six years of successful piracy, and Borne’s Landing grew at a staggering rate. It was still a wild frontier however, and anyone walking its streets had better keep a tight hand on their purse and an even tighter grip on their weapon.
Maude led the way towards an inn that the ship’s crew had recommended. Borik kept his eyes peeled for pickpockets and thugs, Malek scanned the streets for attractive women that looked in need of absolution, while Tarth held the hem of his robes over his ankles, carefully dodging puddles of best not identified liquids that had accumulated on the hard packed dirt streets. Maude finally stopped in front of an inn with a painted sign hanging out front that identified it as The Murder Hole. The sign had a picture of a man impaled by a spear shoved through a small hole in a castle wall.
“Oh nice choice, Maude,” Borik grumbled. “What’s the matter, Slit Your Throat While You Sleep inn booked up?”
Malek laughed along with the dwarf and piped in. “No, it burned down when someone set fire to Cut Your Guts Open and Eat Your Liver tavern!”
Maude sighed, rolled her eyes, and stepped into the smoky interior, towing her giggling band behind her. The common room smelled of sweat, smoke, and stale, spilled alcohol. A skinny, razor-eyed man stood behind the bar wearing a filthy apron and wiping crumbs off the unpolished surface with an even filthier rag. Borik, Malek, and Tarth took a seat at a corner table, Tarth first laying a silk kerchief on the seat before sitting on the very edge of it, while Maude talked to the hawk-faced innkeeper about rooms for a couple of nights.
Maude came back and took a seat at the table. “I got us rooms for three nights, though by the price you’d think I just booked us in at the Marble Gardens in Brelland and not this flea-infested sewage pit.”
A heavyset serving woman with breasts large enough that she could have forgone the use of her hands to carry the tray upon which the four mugs of ale rested, approached their table, set down the drinks, and flashed Malek a broad smile before she turned about and returned to the bar.
“Looks like you have your first convert in Borne’s Landing, Malek,” Borik teased the cleric.
“I’m afraid some are simply too lost to the darkness to be saved by Solarian’s light,” Malek replied.
“Yeah, you would definitely want to keep that in the dark,” the dwarf quipped.
The cleric ignored Borik and asked, “So where do we go from here, Maude?”
“The bartender pointed me in the direction of a trading post where we can load up on provisions. We’ll ask around a bit about what to expect in the jungles and if anyone has any knowledge about the ruins we’re looking for before we charge blindly off on our expedition.”
Maude’s Marauders set out the next morning in search of the trading post the innkeeper had spoken of. People already packed the streets even this early in the morning. Street vendors hawked their wares at every corner and old men, women, and cripples held out their hands begging for coin or a scrap of food from everyone that passed by. Small children ran about without shoes and barely clothed, alternately begging and trying to cut purse strings. Hard-eyed, desperate men watched the streets for weak or tempting targets to take what they would not or could not earn with their own labors.
The trading post was near the docks, but thanks in part to the unplanned maze of streets, it took them a good portion of the morning to find it. As there were no sidewalks in
over ninety percent of the city, Maude and her small party stepped directly from the street into the ramshackle building. Although from the outside the building looked about to fall over with the next good wind, the interior showed it to be made of stout timbers and the door heavily banded and reinforced by iron.
Merchandise of all sorts was stacked seemingly at random among shelves that lined the walls from floor to ceiling. Shorter shelving units that allowed the proprietor to see everything in the store occupied much of the floor space. Other items filled open-topped shipping crates while even more was simply stacked into piles. Borik noticed a rope strung along the ceiling that ran from behind the tall counter where a grizzled, heavyset balding man stood with a crossbow cocked and within easy reach, to the front door.
As Maude and the others looked around the store for things they would need, Borik examined the spring mechanism attached to the door that the rope was connected to. The dwarf nodded appreciatively to himself at the clever design. With a simple tug on the rope, the door would swing violently closed, trapping any would-be thieves inside with the crossbow-wielding proprietor.
Maude and the others looked up as the man behind the counter addressed them in a coarse voice. “What d’ya folks be lookin’ for?”
Maude strode towards the counter behind which the storeowner stood. “We need rope, two light tents, and supplies for two weeks.”
The man looked Maude up and down then glanced at her three unlikely companions. “You goin’ out into the jungle?”
Maude’s first reaction was to tell the gruff merchant that it was none of his damned business, but she quickly thought better of it. None of them had ever been into the jungle and knew next to nothing about what supplies they would need beyond or in place of those to which they were accustomed.
“Yes we are, and any advice on what we can use to make a more successful or comfortable trek would be most appreciated,” Maude replied in her most polite voice.
Borik and Malek were so unaccustomed to hearing such a pleasant tone come out of Maude that both looked around the store to see who else had entered and answered the question for her. When they saw that they were still the only customers here, they simply looked at each other and shrugged.
The Sorcerer's Torment (The Sorcerer's Path) Page 34
