The Staff of Sakatha

by Tom Liberman

  “They might still be watching us,” said Sorus with a pat to his head to test the bandage.

  “Don’t play with it,” said Proteus. “You could be right. There are plenty of places to get a good vantage point. They probably had scouts at the pass waiting for the next group of knights to come up. Then, whoever is in charge ordered last night’s little show.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” said Sorus and suddenly sat upright which made him dizzy for a moment. “Bury me and head back.”

  “What?” said Jon.

  “Not really bury me, make a cairn while I hide somewhere, and then ride back like you’re giving up. Then I’ll stay here and watch who comes along. Head back a couple of hours and then get in a fight or something and pretend to change your minds. When you get back I can report what I saw. I might even overhear something important!”

  Proteus looked to Jon and nodded his head while he tucked his lower lip under his upper, “That’s actually a pretty good idea, Sorus. Jon, what do you think?”

  “It’ll be dangerous,” said the gray knight and looked intently at Sorus. “You’ll have to be very quiet and don’t do anything heroic. Just watch and listen.”

  “My head hurts so much I’m not sure I want to move around all that much anyway,” said Sorus with a wan smile.

  “We need to get going with this then,” said Jon as he suddenly stood up and looked around. “If they are watching us it’ll be light soon, so you need to figure out a hiding spot while Proteus and I build a cairn.”

  Sorus looked around, “There are plenty of spots, over there behind those rocks, back there beyond the tree, somewhere overlooking this camp is probably good because that’s the first place they’ll come.”

  “Here,” said Proteus, “take your blanket, some food, and water too. You might be there for hours depending on how long it takes Jon and me to get down the mountain a ways and turn around. I think we should go a couple of hours at least to convince them we’ve really quit.”

  “Good idea, Proteus,” said Jon. “Take that stuff and get yourself hidden. We can check if you are visible. Get a decent distance too or they’ll hear you breathing. But, not far enough away you can’t hear them talking. Proteus, maybe we should start talking like Sorus is dead.”

  “Right,” said the older knight with a nod of his head. “Here Jon, help me with these rocks. We’ll bury Sorus and then decide what to do.”

  The two busied themselves building a rock pile until light began to filter in from dawn, and then saddled their horses and headed back down the mountain as they continued their phony conversation. Sorus waited in the shade wedged between two large boulders partially under a massive tree root. It seemed like a comfortable spot when he first chose it but as the minutes wore on it became less so as a colony of ants began to stir and wander around. “At least they don’t look like the biting kind,” he muttered to himself as they wandered over his boot. “They’ll be in my pants before too long.” He tried to tie his cuffs off with some string he had in his pocket and managed a moderately effective job. He also took a few sips from his water flask and ate a bit of leftover goat meat from yesterday. The voices that came from down near the camp didn’t sound much different from the songs of the morning birds and it wasn’t until they were almost on top of him that he noticed.

  “I’ve heard Whitebone is here,” said the voice suddenly and almost in the ear of Sorus. The boy almost jumped up but managed to control himself, although his breath sounded suddenly extremely loud. He peeked through the small crack in the rocks, towards the clearing where they spent the night, and saw the shadow of a man but nothing else.

  “Once the dragon died that was inevitable,” came a softer voice, more like a whisper and Sorus barely heard it. “We need to find the staff before he gets here or sending it off to the High Priest will be that much more difficult.”

  “Our soldiers are overdue as well,” said the first voice. “General Pharrassa and the others were to arrive by now.”

  “We cannot count on them,” said the soft voice. “Their ships might not clear the Dorian peninsula, they all might be drowned.” At that moment the two figures suddenly appeared in the clearing. One wore a heavy brown cloak up over his head and soft leather gloves on his hands.

  “It must be a darkling,” thought Sorus to himself, as he knew the creatures did not like to expose themselves to the intense light of the sun. The second figure was very thin and his head looked like a snake with a narrow, green-scaled neck, and no ears. There was a mouth, thin little slits for a nose, and its body appeared more humanoid although the heavy green cloak with red trim around the arms and neck hid almost everything from Sorus’s view.

  The darkling spoke next as it pointed to the rock pile, “One of them died in the night,” it said. “We ordered those damned goblins not to attack but simply steal the map. I’ll have Ugred’s hide, we want them alive.”

  “It’s no matter,” said the soft voice, its strange snake’s tongue flickering out to taste the air. “The others survived and have fled for the moment. They will be back with reinforcements eventually and without the warriors of Sakatha to aid us we cannot stand against them in the open.”

  “Why face them in this awful brightness,” said the darkling. “We can lure them underground where my people have every advantage. We will slay them all.”

  “Advantage or no,” said the snake creature as it turned to face the darkling. “How many of your men did you lose capturing that first group of knights?”

  “We underestimated their strength,” said the darkling. “A mistake we will not make again. We killed them in the end though.”

  “Yes,” said the snake. “You killed them in the end against my orders. I wanted prisoners. We must find out how much they know about the Staff of Sakatha and what they intend to do with it if they recover it.”

  “Why must we waste time with such things, master,” said the darkling. “You will find the staff and we will transfer it to your high priest so that he might awaken Great Sakatha from his slumber.”

  “It is not so simple as that,” said the snake man. “With Whitebone on his way, he brings not only his power to the task but also that of the delusional mistress who currently occupies the throne in the Abyss. Against undead armies we might well lose the staff forever and potentially Great Sakatha himself might fall under her sway. This must not happen. We might be able to use the freeriders to our advantage. Let them take the staff back with them to their capital and then wrest it away for delivery to the high priest.”

  “That is a dangerous course,” said the darkling.

  “There are no easy paths,” said the snake creature with a little hiss. “There never are. Both of the children of dragon are dead and we don’t have access to the dreams of the Toxic One anymore. The staff is somewhere nearby but under who knows how many tons of rock in some hidden chamber of the Old Empire. Your excavators work hard but without those dreams we are simply flailing about like a blind man in a brothel.”

  “As you so correctly point out, master,” said the hooded creature with a shrug of his shoulders and the two men began to move again and quickly left Sorus’s view. “There is much rock and even with great effort the chances of stumbling on the site is unlikely. Given enough time the slaves will dig into the right chamber but the work is difficult and killing them is a costly procedure. We have to bring up new ones from the lower levels and train them in the use of the tools.”

  “I’m well aware …,” said the sibilant voice that slowly trailed off into the distance as the creatures continued their conversation, but Sorus could no longer hear them.

  The hours passed slowly after that and the young knight of Elekargul began to get cramps in his left calf at about the same times the ants penetrated his defenses and began to clamor up his right leg. He gritted his teeth and bore the discomfort for a time but began to shift restlessly as the minutes dragged slowly by. “It’s been like eight hours,” he said to himself in a small whisper b
ut a look at the shadows cast by the trees told a different story. “By the Mare, not even midday yet,” he muttered to himself. “I’ll be bitten to death by the time they get back.” After a bit longer he decided to change the dressing on his wounded head and carefully unwrapped the bandage, put a splash of the liquor on it, which almost made him shriek in agony, and then tried to rewrap it. The bleeding seemed to have stopped at least, although as soon as the sharp pain cooled, the dull ache returned.

  More time dragged by with no sign of any activity when he suddenly felt a strange presence in the clearing and then a tall shadow fell across it as he peered through the rocks and held his breath.

  “Lord Whitebone,” said a quiet voice that sounded like the snake creature but might not be the same as the one earlier.

  “Speak serpent mage,” said a cold voice without any inflexion.

  “This is where the second group of knights camped,” said the snake creature. “Our goblin servants attacked them in the night, slew one of their numbers, and took the map. I fear that there will soon be more of them in the region. They know about the Staff of Sakatha and clearly have their own designs upon it.”

  “The survivors fled?” said Whitebone.

  “That is accurate, Lord Whitebone,” said the snake mage in its sibilant voice. “I sent some of the goblins down after them to make sure they did indeed move off the mountain. But, as I said, I’m sure they will return with reinforcements. My own darkling allies are unreliable on the surface. If you could loan me some of your undead warriors I might make an effective defense.”

  “The first group you captured,” said the first voice as the two suddenly moved into the clearing and gave Sorus his first look at the skeletal master, Lord Whitebone. He looked like a normal man with a heavy cloak, boots, and thick gloves but one look at the skull that served as his head made it clear this was not the case. Sorus again managed to keep his gasp mostly muffled but for a moment it appeared the strange boney creature looked in his direction.

  “Sadly, my message of their capture was premature, Lord Whitebone,” said the snake beast. “The entire group died in the battle along with a number of darklings and the last of the dragon children. We no longer have access to the dreams of the great green dragon.”

  Whitebone turned to the creature and stared at him for a long minute and even Sorus could see a faint red glow around the eye orbitals. “I want the creatures that killed my dragon, serpent priest. You can have the staff for your own ends if you desire, but I shall have vengeance upon those that slew my dragon.”

  The snake mage gave a strange little hissing sort of laugh and flicked its tongue out several times, “As you wish Lord Whitebone. I can bring forward the slave who stumbled across the scene of your pet’s death but there are no witnesses as to the men who did it.”

  “That is not good enough,” said Whitebone. “Once you have the staff you have in your power the ability to raise great Sakatha not as an undead minion to that vile creature in the Abyss but as a living dragon child capable of leading your people in the new empire. Great Sakatha has much knowledge of the Old Empire buried in his brain and this is an incalculable advantage.”

  “I am not a child of the dragon,” said the snake creature. “I am a child of great Nechustan the World Snake. The children of dragons are our slaves and have been ever since the fall of the Old Empire.”

  “Of course,” said Whitebone with a strange little bow. “How terribly ignorant of me to forget that fact. Yet, you work with the lizards who want the staff to bring back Sakatha as a living entity.”

  “Just as you work with the Mistress of the Abyss who wants to bring back Sakatha in his undead state and thus increase her own power,” said the snake creature. “We are all looking for our own advantage; perhaps you and I can work together in this case. I do not wish either your mistress or the lizards to have the staff. My people want it for another purpose.”

  “And what purpose is that?” said Lord Whitebone as he turned to face his companion.

  “I am not willing to divulge that Lord Whitebone,” the snake man replied, “perhaps if you told me your own plans for the thing I might prove more accommodating.”

  Whitebone laughed, a clack of sorts, and shook his head no, “A valid argument. No, I do not want the staff in the hands of the eternal ruler of the Abyss. You haven’t seen a dark cloud of a creature named Tenebrous hanging about by any chance?”

  The child of Nechustan shook its head for a moment, “I’ve heard the name but never had the pleasure of meeting the thing myself. I understand it escaped from the Deathlands a dozen times before the Mistress of the Abyss allowed it stay?”

  “I’m not particularly familiar with its history,” said Whitebone with a shrug. “In any case, if you see the creature, inform it that I want a meeting with it.”

  “As you command, Lord Whitebone,” said the snake beast starting to say something else when the sound of hurried footsteps suddenly came from down the path. Within a few moments the footsteps came close, then suddenly stopped and although Sorus could not see the creature, a third party joined the conversation.

  It began to speak in some sort of strange language that Sorus did not understand, but the snake creature gave it a sharp rebuke and it then started talking with a strange accent in the language of the local traders. “Master Shill, Master Shill,” said the voice.

  “What is it?” said the snake.

  “They return, the big one and the freerider,” said the voice. “They come quickly, they surprised us, they killed …,” it went on apparently ready to continue its speech.

  “I do not care who they killed,” said the snake creature. “Lord Whitebone, we must make haste back to the old ruin before they catch us here.”

  The skeletal creature looked at the snake man for a moment, then turned his gaze to the hastily constructed cairn, looked around in all directions and, for a moment, his hot red eyes seemed to come to rest on the exact spot where Sorus lay hidden. “I,” it said, “I sense something.”

  “We cannot wait,” said the snake creature.

  “They’re coming,” said the goblin, its voice quaking with fear, “you didn’t see the big one with his awful sword, Smasher. He killed my brother!”

  Whitebone waited a moment longer, his terrible gaze finally lifted from Sorus’s hidden spot, and darted to a small rocky outcropping above them, but then nodded his head. He started to say something but turned with a twirl of his heavy cloak and the group was gone from Sorus’s vision. Just a few minutes later Jon and Proteus trotted up the trail, their horses making enough noise to wake the dead.

  Jon came into the clearing first and looked around, “Sorus? Did it work?”

  Sorus popped his head out from the rocks, a huge grin on his face. “Better than I ever imagined,” he said and then began to slap at his leg where apparently the entire colony of ants had decided to roost. “I’m infested!”

  Chapter 16

  “We should attack the little village and slay them all,” said Melharras Yushhha as his spectacularly bedecked uniform glistened in the sunlight that shone at the edge of the large cavern. The less finely dressed priest of Sakatha, Usharra Dushallama, stood a step back in the shadows and the sounds of reptile men filtered from further back in the cave.

  “Our job,” said Usharra not for the first time, “is to get to the Mountains of the Orc where the dreams of Chusaursea guide us to the Staff of Sakatha. It is not to engage the Freeriders in battle.”

  “Battle,” said Melharras with a sneer as his lips curled back and exposed long, sharp teeth. “They are but women and children. The scout told us that two days ago when he first encountered the little village. Their warriors wait in the flats, bicker with one another, and stink so foully that the birds refuse to nest in the trees near them. We descend on the village, take a few prisoners, then lure the men into an ambush and kill them all. It is a simple matter really,” finished the general with a nonchalant wave of his hand.

 
“And when the entire nation of Freeriders comes to avenge this affront?” said Usharra.

  “We shall already be in the Mountains of the Orc with the Staff of Sakatha in our possession. With the staff you, no doubt, can wield enough power to defeat such simple barbarians,” said the general and smiled at the priest. “I grow weary of traveling at night and avoiding detection by these people. They are weak and need to feel the poison of our bite!”

  “Moving this many warriors at night to avoid alerting the inhabitants of this land are our orders nevertheless,” said the priest with a shrug of his soldiers. “The Mountains of the Orc are but two or three more nights of travel ahead. Perhaps you can cool your fighting ardor until then. I suspect that your soldiers will find themselves with quite a bit to do once we arrive in the mountains.”

  “I find your cowardice quite distasteful,” said General Melharras in a rather bored tone, “and I shall report such when we return to Darag’dal.”

  “I would think your braggadocio might be lessened after watching a third of your fighting force drown off the coast last week,” said High Priest Usharra in an equally bored tone of voice.

  “Warriors die,” said Melharras as he turned to face the priest. “A veteran like me knows that most of them die of disease or mishap and only the smallest percentage die in combat or of their wounds. Besides, many of them managed to swim to the other two ships so it was hardly a third of my entire force.”

  “Your compassion for your fellow soldiers is admirable,” said Usharra and turned away from the general with a shake of his head.

  “Your foolish sentimentality is distressing, Usharra,” said Melharras as he followed the priest and put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “We are here to do a job and that is all. If men die then they die. If you die then I take command. Now that we’re off those vessels I allow you to command, but I will tolerate it for only so much longer. If I wished to kill the women and children of that town I would do so and there is nothing you can do to stop me. Have I made myself clear to you, priest?”