Tales: The Benevolence Archives, Vol. 3

by Luther M. Siler

  "Central chamber of a building riddled with traps means trap," Brazel pointed out.

  "So we'll be careful," the halfogre said, and headed down the stairs into the room. Brazel followed, cursing under his breath.

  * * *

  "It's called the Book of Zaumg," Grond said, carefully examining the open page. "You ever heard of Zaumg?"

  "Not once," Brazel said. "You can read that?" The script wasn't anything he recognized. The book was open to an illustration, with little text on it other than a few lines across the top. The image was of something horrible and insectile, with dozens of legs, sharp fangs, a stinger, and a few too many wings. He found himself hoping the book was a reference text on entomology.

  "You can't? Are you serious?"

  Brazel looked closer. "No. I've never seen that script before."

  The halfogre's eyes widened a bit. "That's just basic script, Brazel. It's in Talk. Just ordinary normal Talk."

  "It's not," Brazel said. "I promise."

  "That's interesting," Grond said. "Keyed to ogre genetics somehow? Is that even a thing? This looks like it's made from proper vellum. Ink looks like ink. Cover's some kind of wood. How'd they incorporate the tech to figure out who was reading it?"

  "Magic, maybe?" Brazel said.

  "This ain't a Benevolence tomb," Grond said. "Doesn't make sense."

  "Maybe," Brazel said. "You recognize this?" He pointed at more carvings on one of the tombs.

  "That's elf," Grond said. "I can't read elf, but I know it when I see it."

  "I am suddenly liking this place less," Brazel said.

  "I'm gonna open one of these," Grond said. "Then we can decide what to do with them." He looked around. All the sarcophagi had elf writing on them, but the inscriptions looked different. He and Brazel spent a few minutes carefully examining the sarcophagus for anything suspicious. Eventually the gnome stood up and shrugged.

  "Stand back," Grond said, and shoved the lid. For a moment, even his strength was insufficient, and the lid didn't move. He reset his feet and pushed again, and this time the heavy gold lid was forced aside.

  The sarcophagus was filled with a thick, viscous green fluid.

  "Do not touch that," Brazel said. Grond pulled out a long, thin knife and prodded the surface. The knife hit the bottom of the sarcophagus without resistance. When Grond pulled it back out, not a drop of the fluid stuck to the blade.

  Suddenly the liquid began bubbling. Simultaneously, a loud grinding sound shattered the silence in the room. The doorway was beginning to close, a huge stone block dropping from the ceiling. Grond turned and sprinted to the door, but wasn't close to being in time.

  The light from the book winked out, leaving them alone in the dark.

  "Can you smell— oh, hell," Brazel said. The bubbly liquid was turning gaseous, the mist rolling out of the sarcophagus and pooling on the ground.

  "Time to go," Grond said.

  "The way out just closed," Brazel said. "You have another grenade?"

  "Don't need one," Grond said. "We need a way out. And we have a spaceship. Namey, you out there?" The two retreated to the top of the stairs. The gas from the sarcophagus had already filled most of the floor of the room, and was beginning to rise.

  ARE YOU READY TO BE PICKED UP? the Nameless answered via comm. I DO NOT SEE YOU YET.

  "Yes and no," Grond said. "We kinda need you to blow a hole in the bottom level of this thing. Like, now."

  A CARDINAL DIRECTION WOULD BE USEFUL, Namey replied. WHICH PART DO YOU WISH ME TO BLOW UP?

  "Triangulate us and blow up the other side," Brazel shrieked. "I didn't bring a compass!"

  FINE, the boat said. I SUGGEST YOU GET UNDERNEATH SOMETHING.

  A moment later, there was an enormous explosion and the room suddenly flooded with light.

  "Go!" Grond shouted. "I'll be right behind you!"

  Brazel fled, then realized why the halfogre was behind him.

  "LEAVE THE DAMN BOOK, GROND!"

  His partner had the book off of the podium and closed, and was staggering under the weight. Meanwhile, the gas from the sarcophagus appeared to be acidic. He heard a frightening hissing sound that seemed to be coming from his pants. He had a moment to think I've never worried about my pants dissolving off before and then the Nameless flew into view, the open cargo bay door visible through the dust from the explosion. He leapt, scrabbling onto the ship.

  He heard "MOVE!" from behind him, and barely managed to scramble out of the way before the book hit the floor of the bay, landing alarmingly close to where his head had been. A moment later, Grond pulled himself aboard, quickly rolling onto his back and kicking his ruined boots and steaming leggings off his body and off the boat.

  "Ow," he said. HIs legs and feet would be acquiring a few more scars.

  "You saved the book. You nearly died to save the book," Brazel said. "You understand that means we're selling it. We didn't grab anything else."

  "I grabbed a handful of jewels off one of the sarcophagi," Grond said. "That's gotta count for something."

  "We'll argue about it later," Brazel said. "Stow that thing and then get yourself into the medbay. I don't need your legs rotting off. And we're charging whatshername for my pants."

  Grond checked the book for damage, then ran his hand over the cover, admiring the detail in the woodcutting. He'd have time to read it when they were home, after he'd won the inevitable arguments with Brazel and Rhundi over getting to keep the thing. Hopefully the jewels would be enough to mollify their client. They hadn't guaranteed anything, after all.

  Below them, in a room now dense with green mist, the lids of three golden sarcophagi slid open and clattered to the floor.

  * * *

  Debut

  "Are you sure about this?" the halfogre said.

  "As sure as I'll ever be," the gnome responded. "She'll be fine. It's a milk run."

  "Every time anybody says milk run around here somebody ends up getting shot, Rhundi."

  "Which is why I keep saying it," she said. "Gotta keep you boys on your toes, and all."

  "We telling Brazel?"

  Rhundi chuckled. Letting her husband know that their daughter Darsi was getting sent on a run was probably the right thing to do, but she was pretty sure that Brazel would spend every moment between finding out and her departure filling her head with advice and suggestions. Rhundi needed the kid's head clear, and she had a job or two for Brazel along the way anyway.

  "We are not," she said. "Not until after she's gone."

  The big halfogre leaned back in his chair in her office, smiling and knitting his hands behind his bald, scarred head. He was twice her size, and the chair was the largest piece of furniture in the room. It made for an interesting sight. "You got something for us to fill our time with, then?"

  "Something for him to do," she said. "I'm not sending you along with either of them, and I think it's best if I don't know where you are for the next few days. There's gotta be a chess tournament around for you to get involved in, right, Grond?"

  Grond nodded, reading between the lines easily enough. "I'm sure I can find something if I look hard enough," he said.

  * * *

  Darsi Tavh're'muil was on her way back to her quarters after school when the comm message came through from her mother.

  "My office," Rhundi said. "Right now. Unless you have something more important to do."

  "You know I don't," Darsi said. Rhundi owned a decent-sized chunk of the planet they lived on, and the intergalactic resort they all lived in was the center of her empire. There was no point in even pretending that Rhundi wasn't fully aware of where she was or what she was doing at any given time; she probably had nanocameras sewn into her clothes.

  Not that she minded overly much. Being the boss's oldest daughter had its advantages, and one of those advantages was an overly protective 2.4-meter tall halfogre. It was worth the trade for a little parental surveillance. She sent a quick comm to her next-youngest sister letting her know she'd
be late getting home and headed toward her mother's office. She was there in a few minutes. Gorrim, her mother's secretary, waved her past when he saw her.

  "She's waiting for you," he said.

  "Any idea what this is about? Is Dad in there?"

  "He came in the back way, if he is," Gorrim answered. He had an amazingly deep voice for a gnome. She'd known him for years, and it still took her by surprise every time he opened his mouth. "Grond came out a few minutes ago. Said he was taking a couple of days off and not to go looking for him. Didn't look too happy."

  That's weird, she thought. Darsi's mother had known Grond since before Darsi was born— she'd met the halfogre before she'd met her father, even— and in all that time she'd never known the two to argue. Grond was fiercely protective of Rhundi even considering that he was technically one of her bodyguards, and he'd transferred that allegiance to her husband and each of their many children as they'd come along. She hoped nothing was wrong.

  The door slid open, and Darsi went into the office.

  Her mother sat behind her desk, which for the moment looked like a giant slab of reflective stone. Rhundi's desk had a holoprojector built into it and she was fond of altering its appearance, sometimes going through several styles over the course of a single week. Atop the desk sat a silver box, a cube perhaps forty centimeters on each side.

  "Hi, Mom," Darsi said. "I like your fur." Rhundi's fur was normally a golden-brown color, slightly darker than Darsi's, but she rarely went with her natural shade. The last time Darsi had seen her she'd had the tips of her fur tinted green; the green was gone now, replaced with handprint-sized blue rosettes scattered everywhere. One of them surrounded one of her eyes. The effect made her look less like the mostly-legitimate businessperson she thought of herself as and more the smuggler she'd been before Darsi was born.

  "Thanks," Rhundi said, pointedly not mentioning her daughter's look, which involved shaved patches. Darsi noticed the omission and didn't bother mentioning it, as irritating her parents was half the reason for the hairstyle.

  "Is everything okay?" Darsi asked. "Gorrim said Grond left here earlier looking angry."

  "Okay enough," Rhundi said. "Don't worry about Grond. He's taking a couple of days off. We need to talk about you."

  Darsi looked around. "Unless Dad's hiding in a corner somewhere, you don't want him here for this talk." She brightened. "Are you sending me on a job?"

  Good girl, Rhundi thought. "If you think you can handle one," she said.

  "I could have handled one two years ago," Darsi said. "But you wouldn't let me go anywhere without an escort."

  "Well, you're old enough now," Rhundi answered. "I'm issuing you a one-person skiff. This is a delivery job. You take this box, meet with your contact, hand it over, accept payment, and come back. Simple."

  "What's in the box?" Darsi asked.

  "A datapad that scrolls the sentence you have failed at your mission across the screen," Rhundi said. "None of your business, and I'm not giving you the code to unlock the case, either."

  "So it's a milk run," Darsi said. "You could give this job to a 'bot if you wanted to."

  "I'm giving it to you, which had better be good enough," Rhundi said tersely. Her eyes had suddenly turned steely. "If you intend to be a part of this organization, young lady, you'll learn first that you take the jobs I give you."

  Darsi lowered her eyes. "Yes ma'am. I'll get it done."

  "Good," Rhundi said, her tone returning to normal. "One more thing. I want you to take this with you."

  She laid a pistol on top of the box. Darsi's eyes widened slightly and she picked up the gun. It was an expensive little number; dual-chambered for energy or projectiles, but somehow small enough that even a gnome barely into adulthood would have little difficulty concealing it.

  "This isn't the one you gave me last time," she said. It hadn't been that long since they'd last had to flee the resort, and Rhundi had left Darsi in charge of all of her siblings. She'd sent her armed.

  "No," Rhundi said. "That was more of a last resort. You're not going to have one of my security teams as backup this time. You need something with a bit more stopping power."

  Darsi nodded, then leaned forward and put the gun back on the box.

  "I don't want it," she said.

  "Interesting," Rhundi said. "Explain."

  "I'm not a good shot," she said. "You know that. If you thought there was a chance I'd need to fire that thing, I wouldn't be going, or at the very least you'd have me seconded to Dad or Grond or both of them. Which means you're offering it to me to see if I'm scared enough to take it."

  She looked her mother directly in the eye.

  "And I'm not," she said. "I can take care of myself."

  "And if something goes wrong?" Rhundi said. "I'm not sending backup with you. You know that."

  "I get out of it without killing anyone," she said. "I didn't say I was going to go completely unarmed. I'm just not taking a gun. If I take a gun, it's going to find an excuse to get used."

  Rhundi nodded.

  "Talk to Tarrysh about your boat," she said. Tarrysh was the resort's head of security. "You leave tomorrow."

  "Is there a dossier?" Darsi asked. "I'd like to know where I'm going before I leave."

  "In your quarters already," Rhundi said. "Any other questions?"

  "You're really not going to tell Dad?"

  "I'm leaving that up to you," she said. "You know how he'll react. If you want a constant stream of advice between now and you leaving, let him know."

  "Grond already knows, doesn't he." It wasn't a question.

  "Yes," Rhundi confirmed. "He wanted to go with you. I told him to take a couple of days off."

  Darsi nodded. "All right," she said. "I'll be ready."

  "You already are," Rhundi responded. Darsi nodded, and turned to leave the office.

  "You gonna take this with you?" Rhundi asked, pointing at the box.

  "I wasn't, actually," Darsi said. "If that's sensitive enough that you don't want me poking around in it, I figure it's safer in here than around my brothers and sisters."

  "Right answer," Rhundi said. "Go on. I'll see you for dinner in a few hours."

  * * *

  Darsi considered comming her father, and then decided that finding him in person sounded like a better idea. She was pretty sure that she knew where to find him anyway: he'd recently acquired a new ship, and so he was probably in their private hangar tinkering with it. There was, despite her mother's concerns, no chance that she was leaving the planet without talking to Brazel first.

  She was right; she could hear swearing before she even got into the hangar. Good, she thought. It meant he was enjoying himself. Her father got deadly quiet when he was genuinely upset about something. Loud swearing meant he was relaxing.

  She still hadn't gotten used to the new Nameless. The boat was an odd combination of cargo ship and warship, or perhaps a warship that wanted to be mistaken for a cargo ship at a safe distance: the cockpit was in the front, sweeping back to a wide rectangular storage bay, with all the engines together in one mass in the back. And it bristled with weaponry; she'd heard that her father and Grond had actually managed to shoot down a few Benevolence spiderships in their last engagement, which was amazing. Every previous time they'd encountered the Benevolence in deep space, the goal had been to escape them as quickly as possible. The previous Nameless had been caught by several spiderships at once and had been blown to pieces practically without even fighting back.

  It also featured active camouflage, meaning that the color could be altered by the pilot however she or he wanted. It had been a riot of red and gold when Brazel had acquired it; he'd toned it down to a deep golden-brown. She wondered if he'd matched his own fur deliberately or if that had been an accident. The ship certainly looked nice in the new color.

  Brazel was at the top of a set of wheeled stairs, energetically doing … something on one of the ship's side panels. Darsi watched him for a moment, then grabb
ed a toolbox full of power tools and climbed up the stairs to him.

  "Anything I can help with?" she asked.

  Brazel turned toward her, and Darsi immediately understood the reason for the swearing. He had been cleaning something off of the side of the ship and whatever fluid he'd been using had managed to get all over him, ruining a pair of what he probably thought of as his good work coveralls. Her father was one of the toughest people she knew, exceeded probably only by her mother, but his one weakness was a love of expensive, stylish clothing. Grond would go to repair the ship wearing whatever he happened to have on and barely notice what happened to it; her father was the type of gnome to have more than one pair of "good coveralls."

  She snickered. Her father glared at her.

  "I'm actually almost done," he said. "Just had a little mishap. Had to get the shit off the ship before it started setting on the armor."

  "I'm surprised you didn't clean yourself off first," she said.

  Brazel shrugged. "Gives me an excuse to buy another pair," he said. "And an excuse to visit the baths. What's up?"

  "There's a dossier waiting for me at home. Mom gave me a job."

  Brazel raised an eyebrow. "I didn't know about that. Which I assume was intentional."

  "She said it was up to me whether to tell you or not. She was worried about unwanted advice."

  Brazel laughed. "No. Well, okay, yes— I've been thinking about it and I have a list somewhere of about fifty things you need to consider before you head out."

  "Thinking about it?" she said. "What, did Grond tell you?"

  "No," Brazel said. "I've been thinking about it since you were a little girl. It was obvious really quick that you were going to take after your parents."

  "So, no advice?" she said.

  "C'mere," Brazel said, heading back down the stairs. Darsi followed him down the stairs and into his quarters on the ship.

  "I have two things for you," he said. "The first is this." He handed her a thin, leather-bound notebook, tied closed with a ribbon.