by Sam Ferguson
No merchants dared call out to Torgath or the Kuscans. They walked through the intermittent crowds and came to a mud brick building with red and white curtains billowing from open windows. A wooden sign in front of the building marked it as an inn, but it didn’t have a particular name. Chances were it was the only inn in Brinsmouth. Refreshingly, the building was well maintained. The inside smelled only faintly of smoke, and the tables were clean and polished.
Three women hopped from table to table, serving the guests with food and drink, wearing sheer baggy pants that hugged the waist but flowed freely from the legs. Jewels and tiny cymbals hung from their waists, as well as from the bottom of their midriff-displaying shirts made of slightly thicker fabric than the pants. Torgath didn’t care for women with such delicate appearances, but Tui seemed more than slightly interested in one dark-haired woman that had a jewel dangling from a belly button ring. The large Kuscan watched her walk from table to table, and urged Kiuwa to find a table in what Tui thought was the section the dark-haired woman serviced.
Torgath had to stifle a laugh with the blonde haired woman greeted them instead, for so sour was Tui’s frown that he looked like a young orc child jilted with a bad present at winter solstice.
“We are hungry, and thirsty,” Kiuwa said matter-of-factly without much regard for the woman.
The woman nodded and then turned to Torgath. She looked as though she wanted to ask about the mask, but if she did she thought better of it and instead listed the three different types of soups they could order to accompany their lamb or beef.
“I’ll have the lamb with leek soup and black bread,” Kiuwa said.
“I’ll have the same,” Torgath added.
Tui grunted. “I’ll take the beef and the lamb, but keep the soup in the kitchen for weak-stomached men and leave the bread for the children.”
The woman gave a half-smile and turned to deliver their orders without so much as a glance in Tui’s direction.
Torgath quietly watched the room, noting that Tui hardly took his eyes away from the dark haired woman even after the food came. As they were about half way through their meal, the women each stopped serving and moved to an empty space in the center of the room.
Everyone stopped eating. Card games were abandoned, and drinks were set down as music rose up from somewhere in the back. A drum beat once, then twice, then the women began shaking their hips and moving to the beat as stringed instruments played out a melody.
“Cash me out, I’m in love,” Tui said, leaning forward.
“Tui...” Kiuwa sighed, rather than finish his intended lecture.
Torgath smiled, amused by the sight of the stoic Kuscan brought low by a dancing woman with delicate hips and soft eyes.
“I’m going to make her my wife,” Tui said.
Someone from the table behind Tui leaned over and nudged the Kuscan. “Pipe down,” he groused.
Tui paid the man no mind, leaning farther forward in his seat and locked onto the dark-haired woman’s every move. As she shook, her cymbals ting-tinkling and gems swaying around her, the woman saw Tui’s stare and blushed.
Interesting reaction. Torgath folded his arms and wondered whether the woman was new at her profession, for surely a veteran entertainer would not be so distracted by a man’s lustful stare. If anything, she would play it up in the hopes that he would throw money at her. Such was not the case here. The dark-haired woman glanced from Tui to a man off to the side of the room, and then Torgath guessed the problem. She’s taken. Torgath reached across the table and patted Tui’s shoulder.
“We should go upstairs,” the orc said.
“After the dance is finished,” Tui said, waving his employer off.
The woman glanced to Tui once more, and the blush increased, darkening and covering more of her cheeks. She turned from Tui, but seeing her backside only encouraged the Kuscan, who let out a holler of delight.
Torgath shifted his eyes, not wanting to turn his entire head.
The man he had spied earlier was now starting to stand, as were the four others with him. The man who had apparently laid claim to the woman first wore expensive clothes and had gold bracelets dangling from his left wrist, but he didn’t look to be a fragile noble. In fact, the sword at his hip, the way his eyes seemed to bore into the back of Tui’s head, and his proud, squared shoulders identified him as a warlord of sorts, and the men with him were his personal guard.
Torgath kicked Kiuwa under the table and then used his left index finger to tap out five beats.
Kiuwa arched a brow and looked to Torgath. The Kuscan understood the coded message and gave a nod. He reached forward to grab Tui, but the large Kuscan had apparently lost all self-control as the song and dance ended. Tui jumped up and crossed to where the dark-haired woman stood as others applauded and threw gold, copper, and silver coins at the dancers.
“Icadion’s beard!” Kiuwa said as his hand grasped air.
Tui reached into a coin purse and brought up a handful of gold. Torgath couldn’t hear what the Kuscan was saying to the woman, but judging by her nearly purple cheeks, she was at the outer limits of embarrassment, and she glanced up and around to the warlord for help.
“And you were worried about me causing trouble,” Torgath said, rising from the table and moving to intercept the four warriors heading for Tui.
“Gentlemen, allow me to fetch the errant lad, he isn’t right in the head,” Torgath said as Kiuwa rushed for his brother.
The four men didn’t slow their pace. Two walked directly for Torgath, each pulling curved daggers from their belts, while the other two circled around a table to avoid him.
Torgath sighed and quickly cracked his neck to each side. Very well.
The orc held his hands out, empty palms facing the warriors as he pleaded with them once more for understanding, but when the warrior on the left slashed with the knife, Torgath’s years of training kicked in. His right hand shot out and seized the warrior by the wrist, then he jerked the warrior’s arm straight and came in hard with his left palm, snapping the man’s forearm like a twig. The knife now easily maneuvered by Torgath via the disconnected lower wrist, the orc turned the blade toward the second warrior and plunged it into the man’s chest with enough force that both warriors flew backward to crash into another table.
The orc then picked up a chair in each hand and flung them with deadly accuracy. The first chair caught the third warrior in the head, snapping the man’s skull back and gashing the side of his head as he fell to the ground. The second chair was blocked by the last warrior, but not before knocking the man back two steps off balance. A dagger flew across the room and sunk into the fourth warrior’s throat. Torgath glanced over his shoulder to see Kiuwa pulling a second blade.
The dancers screamed and ran away as the rest of the room erupted in chaos.
The warlord pulled a crossbow, but his bolt errantly struck an innocent man in the back when the bystander stood from his table to flee, thus putting himself between the warlord and Torgath.
A pair of city guards stood from a nearby table and glanced between Torgath and the warlord, obviously trying to decide which person to side with. Their decision became visibly easier when the table next to the warlord produced three more warriors.
Torgath drew his own crossbow and fired, striking one of the three in the forehead. He then drew his sword and made his way toward the warlord. Kiuwa and Tui crashed through people and tables alike, throwing anything dumb enough to stand in their way and making the already chaotic room much more so as bystanders became enraged at their brutality and tried to avenge friends thrown aside. Twice Torgath saw Tui using an entire table as a club, batting away multiple foes at once. A massive smile stretched across the Kuscan’s face. It wasn’t the lustful sneer he had worn before the fight, but it appeared to Torgath that this smile was no less genuine.
Kiuwa brought out his blades and went to work, incapacitating those who came at him with fists, and killing the few that pulled sword
s on him or Tui. Torgath was intercepted by the pair of city guards. His blade cut through one from right shoulder down to left hip, severing the man in half as easily as a boneless fish. Upon seeing this, the second guard pissed his pants and threw down his weapon. He turned to run but tripped and slammed headfirst into the wall.
The other two warriors advanced quickly, but Torgath blocked their attacks easily, turning their blades aside and carefully keeping them between himself and the warlord, hoping the man wasn’t careless enough to try and shoot through them to get to him.
Another dagger flew through Torgath’s field of vision so quickly that at first he didn’t know what the object was, but once the blade sank into a warrior’s neck and the handle stuck out, quivering and turning red with blood, he knew that Kiuwa was closing in as well.
Torgath let his rage flow through him. He chopped the last warrior’s sword when the man came in with a direct thrust. The blade broke and left the man unbalanced. Torgath wheeled around and took the warrior’s head clean from his neck, sending the body to the floor while the head spun in place for a half-turn, spraying blood out to the right.
The warlord fired his crossbow at Torgath, but the orc had taken note of the weapon before dispatching the last henchman, and was able to dodge to the side.
Torgath and Kiuwa reached the warlord at the same time. To his credit, the man dropped his crossbow and wielded two scimitars deftly enough that he was able to parry the first three attacks, but in the end he was no match for either Kiuwa or Torgath, let alone both of them at the same time. Kiuwa used his brute strength to hack off the warlord’s left arm at the shoulder, burying his blade deep into the man’s torso, and Torgath snaked his blade up over a clumsy parry to drive the tip through the man’s eye socket and into the mush beyond.
The two of them pulled their swords back and let the warlord’s corpse slump to the floor. They then gave each other a quick nod and turned to find Tui pummeling three large men with his bare hands. Judging from the bloody tunics they wore that held the same symbol that was painted on the sign outside, Torgath understood them to be bouncers.
“Tui, that’s enough,” Torgath shouted as the last of the bouncers fell to his knees, barely able to keep a hand up as he begged Tui to stop.
The Kuscan turned around, his stupid smile still painted across his face.
“Is this similar to what happened last time?” Torgath asked Kiuwa.
“Pretty much the same thing,” Kiuwa grunted. “Except last time it was a red-haired woman married to a merchant. Destroyed half of the market.”
Torgath surveyed the damage in the room and nodded. They had easily destroyed more than half of the furniture, and some of the still boiling side-brawls that had apparently broken out had managed to take out a couple windows and a door besides.
“Something tells me we’ve worn out our welcome,” Torgath said.
A group of twelve men gathered near the exit, each shakily holding swords or makeshift clubs formed of broken table legs. The three dancers were huddled in the far corner behind a pair of additional bouncers, and horns were sounding outside, no doubt a call for additional city guardsmen.
“Come on!” Tui shouted, making a show of smacking his own chest with his bloody fists.
“Get your brother and go out the back, now.”
Kiuwa turned and shot Torgath a look, but then rushed off to grab his brother by the elbow and yank him toward the back door, Tui all the while spitting and cursing at everyone he saw.
The remaining men seemed to take heart with two of the three now gone. They started to close in a step or two here, a nervous third step there. Torgath twirled his sword and then tilted his head to the side. He knew the three of them could have taken the rest, but there was no honor in killing half-drunk patrons that had only come to watch dancers while eating a nice meal. No, these men were not warriors. These men were soft. Torgath didn’t need to touch any of them to defeat them.
He waited for another couple of seconds, until he could hear the heavy stomps of approaching guards with their rattling chain mail coming down the street outside.
Now was his time.
He ripped off his mask and gave the most bestial roar he could summon.
If any of the men had had the courage to fight him before, none of them did now. Screams and shouts filled the room. Swords and clubs fell to the floor and everyone scrambled for the door, even the dancers and bouncers. Those too impatient to wait for the bottle neck to clear broke windows and leapt to freedom screaming and yelling. Torgath smiled and slipped out the back, knowing that the confusion out front would slow the guards just enough to allow him and the Kuscans to escape.
Chapter 9
Once the three of them made it a safe distance from the town, they stopped to rest. They had lost the last of the trackers for now, charging their own horses up a narrow stream and then into the desert hills north of the city. Still, Torgath knew it wouldn’t be long before someone found their trail once more. The only question remaining was whether the town guard would pursue them, or the warlord’s men.
“I have to ask,” Torgath said as he offered some crumbly biscuits to his horse. “What possessed you to do what you did?”
Tui shrugged.
Kiuwa grunted and shook his head, offering no defense for his brother.
“I hear this is similar to the kind of trouble you got yourselves into the last time you came out this way?”
Tui smiled faintly and gave a nod. “I can’t help it,” he said. “Something about the desert women. They captivate me.”
Kiuwa elbowed Tui and shot him a disapproving frown. “Except last time Tui was captivated all the way into a married woman’s bed.”
“Ah,” Torgath said wryly. “And what about all that talk of not wanting to get into trouble?” Torgath stepped toward Tui and grabbed the large Kuscan by the shoulder, his fingers digging in tight to display the true chain of command. “You chided me for defending a boy’s honor, and yet you risk everything for what, a desert flower?”
Tui stared back at Torgath, their eyes locking for a moment. Torgath felt his blood quicken as they stared each other down, but it didn’t rise to the level of a fight. Tui blinked and looked away.
“It was foolish... but...”
“Forget it,” Torgath said. “We can make our way to the next stop without resupplying, but this isn’t what I hired you for. Chase dancers on your own time.”
“I’m sorry,” Tui said. The stunned expression on Kiuwa’s face told Torgath that this was a rare offering from Tui. “I didn’t notice the warlord until it was too late.” The orc accepted and released his grip, patting the Kuscan twice to let him know the row was at an end.
“Not to worry,” Torgath said. “I gave his men the chance to hear an explanation while we tried to put a leash on you. It was their actions that forced my hand.”
“And Tui that forced theirs,” Kiuwa commented.
Torgath shook his head and removed reached for his mask. “I am choosing to lay blame with the men who challenged me. Tui had not yet done anything so far beyond salvaging the situation by the time they drew weapons on me.”
Kiuwa shrugged and let it go. The large Kuscan crept up over a hill and peered outward the way they had come. “No sign of trackers yet.”
Torgath took a drink from his water skin. “No time to rest tonight. They’ll undoubtedly keep pursuing us. This isn’t something a warlord would forgive. Whoever succeeds the warlord will be honor-bound to hunt us.”
The trio refilled their water skins at the stream’s mouth and then continued on toward their next destination, each of them falling silently into their own thoughts. Torgath watched the yellow and tan hills of rock and sand around him as they meandered their way north east, and then he focused his eyes on those jagged peaks at the horizon, separating him from his final quest. His eyes rested on his future, but his mind drifted to the past. Taking him back to a different mountain climb. A time when someone else pursued hi
m, threatening to derail his quest.
*****
Torgath had spent three days traveling northward from his village, finding the jagged mountains where his target was known to live. Four orcs accompanied him, but given that this was his quest to prove his honor, none of them were allowed to help him. They were his witnesses. They would travel with him, record his actions, and then report to the council.
If they survived.
Torgath wasn’t even sure he would survive.
Conquering a dwarven army and slaying their king was one thing, but meeting a dragon was quite another. At least dwarves and humans were bound to the same ground that Torgath walked. A dragon, however, could use the mountains to its advantage, and attack from the sky.
He wasn’t scared, for an orc never admitted fear, but he was concerned. In his mind he devised a thousand strategies to sneak up on the beast, but in his heart he knew none of them would work. A dragon is rarely surprised, and those that were usually won their battles anyway.
The four witnesses talked amongst themselves, each commenting on when and where Torgath chose to stop and make camp. As they offered him no advice, he offered them no choice in the matter. He traveled until he felt like resting, and that was that. At night, near the campfire, he sang the old songs, prayers put to music for the First Father. He sang for strength. He sang for honor. He sang for guidance. Torgath knew the First Father could hear him, even from the Place of Exile that Icadion had banished the First Father to. The orc could only hope that his god had the strength to answer his pleas.
Upward they went into the mountains, but they were still days away from their destination. They traveled between rocky spires and up over massive mounds half as tall as the towering peaks capped with snow. They had prepared themselves for the colder weather, each orc bringing fur coats and gloves. They had planned for extra food and supplies. What they hadn’t considered, was that a group of dwarves hunted them as they neared the dragon’s domain.
