The Dungeoneers

by Jeffery Russell

  “How did he destroy a town with...” Durham looked at the journal again. “...livestock reanimation?”

  “Well,” Dadger said, sucking at his mustache. “I imagine having yer dinner come back to life in yer stomach and expressing its displeasure might be the gist of it. Along with the bones from all your prior dinners knocking around the place. I’m hypothesizing though.”

  “And the mace?”

  “What about it?”

  “What is it? What gives it artifact status?”

  Dadger shrugged.

  “Don’t really know. In facts, our employers tends to keeps things like that pretty close to the vest, if ya know what I'm saying, lest we be tempted to keep it, I s'poses. We tends to find out anyway. Thud will give us the inside whisper afore we go in after it. He considers it a matter o’ safety, regardless of what our employers might think.”

  “An artifact, though,” Durham said. “I imagine that they tend to be worth quite a bit...”

  “Don't go thinkin' like that. We gets paid well for our services and successful jobs leads to more jobs down the road. Plus, we gets to keep anything else we finds and you'll gets yer fair share.” He puffed his diminutive chest out. “Dangerous artifacts removed, treasure obtained, dangerous places made safe. That's the Dungeoneers, lad. That's what buys our moles 'n' ale.”

  “So this mace is with this necromancer lich?”

  “Aye, seems he was known fer carryin' it. Locked away in his crypt, somewheres. Ruin the size of Tanahael is bound to attract adventurer types and if they recover the mace, well, who knows what they'd do, eh? So we're gonna get it first 'n' yer king can lock it up nice 'n' tight in his vaults.”

  “So, people can actually do this? Necromancy?” he asked.

  “Don't figger it comes easy, lad, but yeh, fella with a bit o' talent in the sorcery department and a cracked nog gets the notion and next thing ya know yer ancestors is walkin' 'round the town.”

  “But...why? What use do walking dead people have?”

  “Slaves, maybe? The sort that don't rebel or need feedin'. Secrets that were lost. Key to immortality of sorts, if'n ya don't mind not takin' yer own meat along with ya. Armies, too. Surely you know the Daemonwars, no? The skeletal army the Hermits raised to turn the tide?”

  “Yes, but...I guess I thought that was mostly myth. Or just not possible anymore. That kind of magic is gone, isn't it?”

  “Well, not so much gone as controlled by The Hermits, mainly so's we don't have more Daemonwars. But, believes me, 'controlled' and 'eliminated' 's two diff'rent things. Meanin’ no offense but you’re a city lad, ain’t ya? Once you’re out in the wilds, out near the fae mounds and the daemon hollows, well, magic is a bit thicker, if’n ya get my meaning. I don’t reckon this Alaham fellow is powerful enough that he has an army, on account of his not being one of the Hermits, but there’s bound to be a couple dozen at least.”

  “So you're seriously expecting walking skeletons in this place?”

  “More concerned with the sword-swingin' skellies, frankly.”

  “How do they even move with no muscle?”

  “Well, that's the magic part, ain't it? Thinks of 'em more as poppets where you can't see the sticks an' strings. Can’t really say much more than that, as I ain’t too learned on the subject of neckermancy. I expect we’ll get briefed on that too. Thud likes to be thorough”

  -4-

  They camped that night on the lee side of a grassy bluff near where a stream burbled its way across the road. The dwarves were slightly more formal with their dinner arrangements than they had been with lunch, producing eight small stumps from one of the wagons, setting them out in pairs and laying boards across them to form benches. They sat five abreast and laid another board across their knees to form a table. Durham’s knees were too tall to fit under the board and the clay bowls were too hot to hold so he ended up sitting on a wet log and using his helmet as a soup bowl. The meal was stew which Gammi had let bubble away all afternoon over a coal box in the back of the cook wagon. It was thick, brown and lumpy and tasted good but Durham made a point of not asking what was in it for fear of finding out. The sun wandered behind a low range of hills to the West as they ate and a few pixies began flitting around at the edge of the firelight. Goin caught a couple of them in nets and popped them into fairy lanterns. The lanterns were spherical in shape, a design Durham hadn’t seen before. Goin hung the lanterns from poles and gave each pixie a bit of cake. They glowed with blue light, bright and happy. The dwarves produced decks of cards and began playing a game that Durham found hard to follow. Dwarven decks had the usual suits of mugs, coins, swords and wands but had two additional suits as well, chains and stones, which made dwarven card games excessively complex.

  Thud sidled up next him as he watched. He was puffing on one of his cigars and his rings glittered in the faelight.

  “Much for cards?” he asked.

  Durham shrugged. “Not often. The guards usually play dice instead.” The truth was that most of the guards in Karthor were a bit on the mentally thick side and found the rules of most card games a bit too much to manage. Durham had always felt that the strategy in dice had more randomness than he was willing to put money on. Consequently, he didn’t play much of anything.

  Thud settled onto the bench next to him with a flourish of coat arranging. “Being a guard a family sorta thing? Was your father a guard?”

  Durham shrugged again. “Not sure. Never knew my father.”

  Every conversation in the camp instantly ceased. Thud recoiled back from him. Durham felt a surge of panic. Had he violated some sort of obscure dwarven rule of etiquette?

  “No father? And your mother?” There was a note of urgency in Thud’s voice. Of fear, even a tinge of anger.

  “Didn’t know her either. I was apprenticed from an orphanage to a carpet weaver. I wasn’t much good at it, though.”

  “Dammit, lad, we’re going into a dungeon after an artifact. Why didn’t you tell me you was an orphan?”

  “I didn’t…uh…”

  “Know of any prophecies concerning you? Got any strange birthmarks at all? Weird dreams? Peculiar old men acting grandfatherly? Unusual pets or trinkets?”

  Durham sat with his mouth hanging open.

  “No?” he finally managed. He thought for a moment. “I had a cat that used to puke in my boots but I thought that sort of thing was typical as far as cats went.”

  Thud was pacing back and forth, furiously puffing at his cigar. “The whole reason kingdoms hire us is to keep artifacts out of the hands of people like you,” he said. “Ain’t you never listened to a bard before? Every story that begins with an orphan ends with a destiny. And there’s always an artifact along the way. Deliberately putting the two together is like throwing coals at a powder barrel. If we wasn’t a day out of Karthor I’d be of half a mind to send you walking back.”

  “Sorry,” Durham said, lamely. He wasn’t quite sure what he was apologizing for. His parentage, or lack thereof, hadn’t been something that he’d felt he’d had much say on.

  “Well, can’t be helped now,” Thud said. “Orphan, here through unusual circumstance, menial background. Don’t look good.” He shook his head. “No good at all. Least we got a scribe here in case some history is about to happen.”

  Ruby certainly had her journal out, which wasn’t, however, particularly unusual. She was sitting on the far side of the fire, quill dancing across the page.

  “Damned if that didn’t turn this from just another week on the job into a potential adventure,” Thud went on. “We’ll have to lay in some extra precautions.” He clasped Durham on the shoulder. “Nothing against you, lad, ain’t your doin’ but you did just mightily complicate things. Whether you're meant to be here or not you still gets to do the job, eh? You’re here representing our employer. In some small ways that makes you our boss, but mostly it means that you’ll be along with us every step of the way inside the dungeon. Once we’re on site you think of yerself as me
shadow, got it? Someone's gonna expect you to be able to make an accounting of things when ya git back, so we wants to make sure you actually do get back as well as have something to give an accounting of. You stick with me like lichen on stone so I can keep an eye on ya. That way if any kind o’ destiny pops up might be I can at least steer it clear o’ me team.”

  Dwarves, it turned out, were difficult to sleep next to. Durham lay on his bedroll beneath one of the wagons, contemplating the wooden slats above him. Clink and Cardamon slept near him, in hammocks strung between the axles, inhaling through their anterior ends with great gargling honks and then exhaling from their posterior ends with equally disturbing sounds. To make matters worse they were out of sync with each other. He’d tried jamming tufts of grass into his ears and nostrils but this turned out to not even slightly improve his chances of sleeping.

  Yesterday a guard, today an under-qualified expedition escort with possible prophetic complications. Next up a dungeon full of death and horror. He suspected that even if the dwarves were the most pleasant of sleeping companions he wouldn’t be resting any easier. Thud had made it clear that sitting on the wagons and waiting while the dungeon was explored wasn’t going to be an available option. Not that Durham would have wanted to do so. Even if I’m not supposed to be here this is still an opportunity to prove myself. His guard posting was the bottom rung of a tall career ladder and he’d been stuck there for years. Just because he now found himself on a different ladder didn’t mean that he couldn’t climb it. Surely returning from a dungeon expedition would be worth something in the guard promotion department, wouldn’t it? The trick is managing to return, ideally in and with the same number of pieces. Thud had also made it clear that Durham would be next to him the whole way and it wasn’t in Thud’s best interests to get killed which offered a small sliver of solace. He pictured himself alongside Thud, kneeling before the King, presenting the mace.

  “Who is this fine young guard,” the King would say.

  “Private Durham, sir.”

  “A mere private?”

  “He saved the expedition, your Highness,” Thud rested his hand on Durham’s shoulder.

  “We must recognize this mighty achievement.”

  And then the sound of the royal sword being drawn, the taps, one on the right shoulder, one on the left.

  “Rise, Sir Dorham.”

  “Durham, your Highness.”

  “Er…Durham. Of course.”

  At some point the darkness of the underside of the wagon turned into the darkness of the inside of his eyelids. Dawn came along about five minutes later.

  -5-

  Late morning saw them leaving the area under Karthor’s influence and entering into the long wild stretch that lay between Karthor and Iskae. Fir trees grew thick to either side of the track, towering overhead, slicing the sky into a gray ribbon of watery light. It was a damp morning, less of a rain, more of a mist with a surly attitude. Durham rode on the second wagon with Ruby, Gong and Nibbly, the dwarf who had checked him in the prior morning. The back half of the wagon was enclosed into a compartment like a carriage, the front half stacked with empty barrels. Ruby was inside the compartment. The wagon sagged slightly toward the front right corner where Gong was sitting, methodically shelling and eating hazelnuts. His melonesque physique was clad in partial plate mail and the front right wheel creaked on every bump in the road. Nibbly was squeezed to the side of the bench to allow Gong ample room but didn’t seem to mind. He was whistling cheerfully, his turban bobbing back and forth to the tune. Durham sat atop the wagon’s compartment which gave him a good view over the lead wagon of the road ahead. The front wagon was Thud and Ginny’s, nomad style, a bright green and blue home on wheels that looked fresh from a circus. It matched Thud perfectly. The shadows grew thick around them as they moved between the trees and the wagon train began lighting up with fairy lanterns which mainly served to turn the gloom blue. Thud clambered into view atop the front wagon and made a complicated series of hand gestures. Nibbly reached under his bench and pulled out a crossbow.

  “Is that what those hand gestures meant?” Durham asked.

  “I’ve no idear wot them hand gestures meant but typically they all boils down to ‘get yer crossbows out’,” Nibbly said.

  Gong sighed with a noise like a pipe organ in need of a wash.

  “I do know what them hand signals mean and would be more than happy to correct you but, in this case, you’re actually right.” He cracked a final hazelnut, popped it in his mouth then pulled his own crossbow from under the bench. It was quite a bit larger than Nibbly’s and bristled with accessories, the cup-holder being the only one that Durham was able to readily identify.

  “I don’t have a crossbow,” Durham said. “Just my truncheon.”

  “You thought you was escortin’ a caravan and you left without a crossbow?” Gong asked. He was working a lever on the side of his that ratcheted the string into the cocked position.

  “It’s recommended gear for caravan duty but I couldn’t afford the rental fee.”

  “Well, if anything gets past Madame K’chunk here I’ll be sure to refer ‘em to you.” He slotted a bolt the size of a baguette.

  “Here, take mine,” Nibbly said, handing it back. “I ain’t much in the crossbow department. Me eyes ain’t so good for much more than ten foot or so. Besides, I got a spare.” He pulled a much smaller crossbow out from under his kilt.

  Nibbly’s crossbow was smaller and lighter than the ones Durham was used to but seemed to almost vibrate with constrained energy. It didn’t look to have ever been fired before. The string was still coated with beeswax.

  Thud hopped off the front wagon and stood alongside the road until they caught up to him. He grabbed onto the side of the wagon and hung there as they rolled on.

  “What d’yer know about this area?” he asked Durham. “Bandit problems? Any fae?”

  “I think there are supposed to be some forest elves out here,” Durham said after a moment’s thought. It was his first opportunity to be of any use and he didn’t want to flub it. “They’re peaceable enough as long as you follow the usual elf rules. No bandits, on account of that. No fae mounds that I’ve heard of, at least not close to the road. The East road doesn’t see much travel, as there’s nothing really out here to travel to. Nothing for a long ways, at least. I suppose that the big stretch of nothing is where Tanahael was?”

  Ruby appeared from the compartment behind them. She squinted at him. “What did you learn growing up about Tanahael?” Ruby asked. She had her journal out and quill poised.

  “Just that it was the name of a kingdom that used to be to the East. And that it was haunted. I expect you have a better idea of its history than I do.”

  “Well, yes,” Ruby said, “but we like to hear local accounts of regional history in case there is a detail mentioned that we’d not heard before. Sometimes the smallest detail can open up an entire new scope of understanding of a piece of history.”

  “Did I add much?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “You even knew about the elves?”

  “The Nallach Fae. Peaceful, deciduous. Omnivores, but not of sapients.”

  Thud gave a satisfied nod. “Wood elves likely means we won’t run into much in the way o’ beastie problems either.”

  “Aren’t dwarves a type of elf?” Durham asked. He seemed to recall having heard that once.

  “Just as fair warning that’s the type of question that could garner you a punch in the nose, depending on who you’re asking,” Thud said. He cast a sidelong glance at Gong, who looked ready to punch Durham in the nose. “But yeah. Lot of dwarves don’t like to admit it but we’re part of the fae too.” He got a look in his eyes that Durham was coming to recognize as Thud warming to a topic. “See, the place you’re born determines what type o’ fae you are. Meaning your environment. Dwarves is the fae o’ the mountains. Wood elves is forests, obviously. Then you got yer merfolk, yer harpies, trolls and whatnot. We all
basically get crossed with our environment, or some with types of creatures. Pixies is the bug fae, goblins the rodents. But us bein’ related don’t exactly mean we see eye to eye on much. We has as much common ground in our thinkin’ as you humans do with monkeys. Forest elves is concerned with keeping the forest protected as if you cut down too many trees then you ain’t got a forest. Dwarves, on the other hand, ain’t too worried about a mountain going anywhere. We dig down in and pull out all the shiny bits. The forest elves see that as being exploitative, whereas we see them as being basically useless. Fortunately we don’t cross paths too often being as there ain’t too much in the way o’ forests under the mountains.”

  Durham looked at the deep shadows between the mossy trees suspiciously. “Do you think they’ll cause us any problems because you’re dwarves?”

  “Naw. They’re watching us, most certain, but as long as we don’t go lopping trees down we should be fine. Don’t bother looking too much. If they don’t want to be seen then you’re not likely to spot one. Wood elves is all barky looking with leafy hair. If they sit still they just look like a shrubbery.”

  “What about the mounds? What type of fae are they?”

  “Them’s the fae of magic and they’re right bastards. You see one o’ them you put a crossbow bolt between their eyes and start running.”

  “A crossbow will kill one?”

  “Nope. But the bolt in their head might catch on a tree branch or something and slow them down for a second or two.”

  “What do they look like?”

  “Depends on who’s doing the looking. They usually look like someone you desire. Someone you’d want to follow, accept an invitation from. And then you’re not seen again for a decade or two or ne’er seen again at all, depending on if they make you a guest at their feast or the main course. Every century or so they has an extra big feast and they sends out the Wild Hunt. And they ain’t huntin’ for deer. They’ll clean out a whole village if they come across one.”