Croaker and Phoebus set out in the morning, traveling west to the mountain pass. Phoebus had changed to a light safari outfit, with tight jodhpurs and polished knee high boots. His pith helmet was strapped under his chin and a sidearm was on his hip, and a stout oak walking stick in his hand. Croaker wore his usual fare, but had added a variety of gizmos to his belt beside his leather tool roll.
By noon they had reached the abandoned stronghold. Two massive, square barbicans were joined by a stone archway which the road passed through. A set of rusted portcullis hung down like teeth stained with dried blood. The highway was cracked as weeds poked through it in many places, showing years of disuse.
The duo made their way to one of the towers and entered through the doorway, whose door was nothing more than broken planks on the floor. Norge took a steel rod from his belt with a glass covered funnel at one end and a metal conduit leading from the center of the cylinder to a power pack on his hip. Flipping a switch on the device, it lit up and cast a beam of light into the darkness revealing stairs leading up and down. Dust motes leapt up with each step they took.
They descended the circular steps, taking care as the wooden board groaned under their weight. The stone floor of the lower level was littered with rotting leaves and debris, and rats scurried from their light, squeaking in annoyance at the interruption of their foraging. The tunnel smelled of ammonia and musk. Insects wandered from piles of refuse to cracks in the walls, hiding from the intruders.
A cracking sound issued from underneath their feet, accompanied by the creak of a rope. Phoebus tackled Croaker to the ground as a wooden crossbeam with sharpened stakes jutting from it swung down from behind them. They lay on the ground as the trap slowed and came to a stop above them.
“Looks like we need to watch our step, old man,” Phoebus said as he stood and dusted off his now stained jacket.
“I guess we do,” Croaker said as he pulled a knife from his thigh and cut the ropes holding the trap, the wooden beam dropping to the ground with a loud crash.
“Now whoever set that will know we are here. Well done!”
“That is the point. We want whatever it is living here to come to us, so we can do what we came to do.”
“But the element of surprise would have been nice.”
“Nothing to be done about it now. Shall we go on and find this monster?”
The two continued forward and came to another set of stairs leading up.
“I think we missed something,” Croaker mumbled. “These lead up to the other tower. We need to double back.”
As they made their way back they inspected the walls. They had almost reached the trap they had set off when Croaker stopped and pointed at the ceiling.
“There,” he said, pointing his electric torch at a jagged crevice, “there is an opening. We need to get up there.”
“And how do you propose to do that?” Phoebus asked, hands on his hips.
Minutes later, and after a heated discussion of who should go first, Phoebus wiggled his way into the fissure, with Croaker helping boost him up. The older man tossed up a length of rope to his companion and began to climb.
Phoebus squealed, and was yanked backwards. The rope went taut and Norge was pulled up, holding on as best he could. As the older man crested the brink of the hole, the rope went slack, and he grabbed the edge to stop himself from falling to the floor below. Noises of a struggle came from the darkness ahead. Scrambling onto the downward sloping floor in front of him, he snatched his light and shone it into the gloom.
Phoebus was locked in a struggle with a misshapen form. A giant of a man stood over the young man, its hands locked on Buckroe’s wrists, the oak walking stick having been knocked aside. Phoebus fell backwards, kicking up with his feet and flipping the large opponent over his head and into the wall of the passage. The young man twisted to his feet and snatched his revolver from its holster, and pointed it at the foe. Croaker got to his feet and searched for a way to help his friend.
The fiend rolled upright and swatted the weapon from Phoebus’s hand, away from the fight and further down the roughhewn corridor. The monster was dressed in tattered rags and its nails were dirty and sharpened to points. Its face had a scraggly beard under a jutting nose, and it stood head and shoulders above Phoebus’s two meter tall form.
The combatants locked in struggle once again as Croaker turned a dial on the box controlling his electric torch, and turned the metal shaft in his hand around so the butt faced the creature. When Phoebus was knocked to the ground, Croaker pulled the trigger and a dart attached to a thin metal cable shot forward, sticking in the towering terror. Electricity traveled down the wire and brute screamed as the voltage entered its body. Pulling the barbed tip from its flesh, the creature turned and fled.
“Are you alright?” Croaker asked as he reached Phoebus, offering a hand to help his friend to his feet.
“Yes,” Phoebus said as he stood, panting. “We should get after him before we lose him.”
Recovering his gun and walking stick, Buckroe led the way down the hall. Norge followed behind him with the light, which was now flickering after being used to shock their foe.
They could see the receding form of their enemy in the distance, loping in long strides down the hall. It turned a corner and they gave chase. As they came around the bend in the passage, the floor disappeared from under their feet. They fell, and everything went black.
When the older man woke he could hear the sounds of a fire crackling and smelled cooking meat. Croaker sat up, reaching for his light only to find his belt and all his tools missing. Phoebus lay a meter away, unconscious. The only illumination was a small cooking fire. They were in a small cell, with metal bars which extended from floor to ceiling. A shadowy form was hunched over the flames and turning a spit. Croaker reached for his friend and shook him awake. Phoebus sat up and looked around, confused. Taking in the surroundings, he realized the situation. His hand went to his hip and found his holster empty.
“Your stuff is here,” came a voice like gravel from the other side of the bars.
“You talk?” Phoebus asked.
“And you learn quickly,” the creature answered.
They sat in silence for a few moments. Croaker stood and paced the cell, investigating as he went, poking into the cracks and crevices. Phoebus moved closer to the bars, staring at their jailor.
“So the hunter became the hunted,” Buckroe said.
“The hunter became the prisoner,” the figure growled as he turned the spit. The fire hissed as juices dripped into the flames.
“What will become of us?” Croaker asked, leaning against the wall next to the bars and watching the creature.
“You will have a choice between becoming a stew or serving me.”
“I am no servant!” Phoebus said.
“Serving you?” Croaker interrupted. “What do you mean?”
“I will require a year of servitude so I know I can trust you enough to release you,” their captor said.
“And if you don’t trust us at the end of a year?”
“Then you become stew.”
“How do we know we can trust you to not do it anyway?”
“Because you will come to know me, as I will come to know you. You won’t be the first people with which I have had this deal. Many have come hunting me in the centuries I have been alive. Lately though, it has been more than usual. I find bones of horses and children on my steps, and treasures from wagon trains tossed into the keep.”
“The Widow Winkley told us the truth,” Phoebus said, “you have been taking children and maidens, and attacking wagons.”
“The Widow Winkley? Oh, I think I know who you mean, though I would wager she looks different from when I last saw her. She has hunted me for decades, using her potions and spells to control men and cause them to attack me.”
“Wait, what?” Phoebus said, confused. “What do you mean, ‘control men’?”
“Oh yes, puts stuff in their t
ea, beer, or whatever they drink. Makes them mad with desire to please her and kill me. But I am not the one that attacks the people. That is her also, sending those same men into the hills to make it appear that I attacked the village and caravans. But it isn’t me, no sir.”
“Why would she do that?” Croaker asked, his voice quiet and thoughtful.
The creature looked at Croaker and their eyes met. The prisoner felt his mind swell for a moment, and shook his head to clear it. Phoebus was standing over him, holding him by the shoulders to keep the older man from falling to the ground.
“What are you doing, Phoebus?” Croaker asked, pulling away.
“You were standing there for almost five minutes, staring at that fiend,” Phoebus said, concern filling his voice, “then you shook your head and started to collapse. Are you alright?”
“I’m touched that you care for me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t care that you touched me. I am perfectly fine, and I know why he is hunted.” The question in Phoebus’s eyes made Croaker continue. “People call him a troll now, but it was not always like that. Once upon a time, to use your words, he was part of a great and proud race whose name is now lost to time. Thousands of years ago, before men rose to power again, his people were the perfect species: smart, strong, wise, agile, and masters of arcane arts. But they wanted more. They had their wizards, sorcerers, and mages seek a way to make them even better.
“They found a way that their children would be stronger, healthier, smarter, and more powerful in the ways of magic. Or so they thought. Instead of combining these things, each child was born with either a stronger mind and a weaker body, or a stronger body and a weaker mind. Their once supreme race began to fall apart as the children were born as either trolls or aeifain. But as the ancient lines began dying off, magic changed and began to spread to other races, no longer contained within just their people. They debated what would happen once their species died off. The elders felt that if all the Lords of Magic were to pass from this world, then magic would disappear or would be able to be rearranged at the will of whoever could harness the power.
“Concerned with this, the remaining Lords poured all their life force and magic into four of their own kind, each who had no magical ability of their own. They told these ‘chosen ones’ to protect what was given to them for the sake of the world, for if they were all killed, horrible things would happen. So he has been on the lam since that day, and this witch is only the latest in a long line of people that hunt him for his power.”
Phoebus stared at Croaker, and then looked at the creature by the fire, who was now nibbling on the roasted rabbit still on the spit. Looking back at his friend, the younger man burst into laughter.
“Magic?” he asked. “Trolls, Aeifain, witches, and other children stories? You expect me to believe all that?”
“Yes, because it is all true!” a female voice screeched from behind their captor. Surprised, all three turned to look. The Widow Winkley was rushing into the cavern, waving a willow rod in one hand and slashing at the air with a wicked, curved blade in the other. The wooden stick’s tip glowed and brightened as the knife came down and bit into the troll lord’s shoulder.
“It will all be mine!” She stood over the collapsed form of their jailor. “This blade drains the very life from anyone it cuts. And within minutes I will have all of his life essence and magic!”
“No!” Croaker sobbed, falling to the ground and rocking back and forth, holding his legs around the ankles.
Phoebus had never seen his friend behave in such a manner and looked at him in disbelief. Croaker winked at the younger man. Nodding in understanding, Phoebus picked up a rock and threw it at the witch, shouting curses and insults as he did. The woman ducked behind the larger form of the unmoving troll lord.
While Phoebus distracted the woman Croaker drew three brass tubes from his right boot and assembled them into a single long, thin pipe. Reaching into his left boot he withdrew a vial and three needles, a puff of feathers on the end of each. Uncapping the small tube, he dipped each needle into the liquid inside of it, and pushed the first into the tube, then set the brass pipe to his lips. With a puff of breath, it shot between the bars of the cell and flew wide of its target.
“What was that?” the witch screamed, standing up and looking at Croaker. She received a rock to the head from Phoebus for her trouble. She stumbled backwards and the second dart flew past the tip of her nose.
“Stop that,” Croaker yelled, “you made me miss!”
“Sorry,” Phoebus shouted back, throwing another rock at the witch. It careened off her head, making her spin in a circle. “I am trying to stop her from turning us into toads, roasting us alive, or whatever her magic stick will do if we give her a chance!”
The woman stopped spinning, and turned back to the two men behind bars. “With one word of power, I will enslave both of you!”
She readied the wand and drew back her arm. As she opened her mouth to shout the arcane phrase to set the spell in motion, Croaker puffed the remaining dart out from the blowgun. Seeing it coming in her direction, she weaved away from it. Her head met the rock that Phoebus had just thrown, and it knocked her noggin back into the path of the poisoned projectile. She opened her mouth to scream and the dart flew directly inside. Her lips smacked shut just as the paralyzing agent took effect. The witch froze in place, her eyes darting back and forth between the two men, and then she tumbled sideways to the cavern floor.
“So,” Phoebus said with a casual tone, “how long does that poison last?”
“An hour or so,” Croaker answered.
“I just hope the troll lord wakes before she does.”
“Oh, no need to worry about that. This is a poor cell, and all we need to do is lift the door up, and off the hinge pin. Why don’t you do that? I did all the rest of the work.”
“What ‘rest of the work’?” Phoebus said, outraged.
“The troll’s story, the witch’s betrayal, the paralyzing dart, and everything else,” Croaker said, raising his voice. “What did you do? Throw a few pebbles?”
“It was my ‘pebble’ that knocked her head back into the path of your lousy aim!” Phoebus shouted, towering over the older man and looking down at him.
“Harrumph,” Croaker harrumphed, “alright, I guess it did. Fine, I will help you with the cell door.”
Three hours later the two men sat outside the keep, the tied and gagged witch between them. The troll lord had woken to find them free and bandaging his wounds. They promised to keep his secret, and turn the woman over to the townsfolk, explaining that it was her that had been terrorizing the people of this town, and proof of the potions could be found in her home. They waited for dawn before traveling back to the village.
“You know what the moral of this story is, Phoebus?” Croaker asked.
“If you rescue a monster, he gives you treasure?” Phoebus quipped.
“No. Wait, did you get treasure?”
“Oh, you didn’t? Well, I may have mentioned a reward when you were tying up your blushing beauty here.”
“She isn’t my anything. And you are always getting into people’s wallets and making them thank you for doing it!”
“It is a gift I have,” Phoebus said, licking a thumb and slicking back his eyebrows.
“Never mind that. The moral of this story is, you never truly know who the monster is, and you can’t be fooled by looks.”
“That’s right.”
“Just like me and you.”
“That’s right, too. Wait, what? Are you saying I am a monster?”
The two were still arguing when the sun rose and they began on their way back to the village.
Shadows of Worlds
Aetheric Elements: The Rise of a Steampunk Reality Page 54
