Son of a Liche

by J. Zachary Pike

  As one, the warriors turned to a great red flag hanging in the corner of the tent. Char’s likeness was smeared across the fabric in black tar, looking up and to the right with a mixture of pride, defiance, and dramatic lighting. She’d seen the same image of her brother stenciled on huts throughout the village.

  “We will honor brother Char.” Darak looked to Grignot for reassurance. “His death must not go unanswered.”

  “I miss our brother, too,” said Asherzu. “But Char’s death was in answer to the Lightlings he killed, and they were killed in answer to other fallen Orcs, who died for killing other Lightlings. That is the Old Ways: a never-ending argument written in blood, a cycle of death that cannot end until someone walks away or nobody is left to stand.”

  “Did your father’s ways serve us any better?” asked Grignot. “Who else do we have to thank for our current plight?”

  “They did serve us better.” Asherzu pulled her scrolls and charts out, flashing numbers and graphs at the assembled warriors. “Under the reign of my father, the median income of Guz’Varda Orcs rose by sixteen and eight tenths percent! The average lifespan of a warrior increased by five years. The value of huts, the inflation rate, the whelp mortality rate; every index of prosperity went up in the years of my father’s rule. And what is more, all such measures have diminished lately. There are many correlations between our raids and the misery our people suffer.”

  Her charts prompted thoughtful looks from several of the Red Horde warriors, but Grignot only wore his reptilian grin. “Why must the sister of the chieftain go to such great lengths to bend the will of her own flesh and blood?” the wiry Orc asked the room. “Why does she not speak from the heart?”

  “I speak the truth,” Asherzu said.

  “The truth?” Grignot’s voice danced on the edge of mocking. “The truth is that we built a wealthy city, and the gold-hounds came and murdered our people and took our treasure. The truth is that our beloved chieftains lie dead, and their blood is on the hands of Lightlings. The truth is that we have brave warriors—mighty warriors!—ready to pay the pink skins back for their crimes. And yet you come to stop them because of the numbers you have written down? You would stand with the Lightlings for the sake of math?”

  Asherzu had to forcefully stop her hands from wringing Grignot’s neck. “These facts—”

  “The fact is that the truth is simple.” Grignot waved Asherzu’s charts away dismissively. “And deception must labor to be believed. I can see you have worked hard, lady, but you have lost your way amid the figures.”

  “What is there to be lost in knowledge?” Asherzu demanded.

  “Our principles, apparently,” said Grignot to the room. “But it is the chieftain’s decision whose counsel to take. Will he listen to his honorable warriors, brave and ready, and stand for the true path? Or will he lose himself in the scrolls as his sister has?”

  “Enough! We do not need such fighting amongst ourselves.” Darak’s face trembled, showing hints of the panic Asherzu knew he was feeling. But as he looked at the mass of warriors surrounding Asherzu and Grignot, the chieftain found a number he could wrap his head around. “We will go to battle for Char’s honor.”

  The warriors cheered. Grignot grinned.

  Asherzu stepped up to her brother and spoke softly in Shadowtongue. “Brother, I cannot walk with you into this madness.”

  Darak refused to meet her gaze. “Then, perhaps… Perhaps you will stand behind me, my sister. I would appreciate that.”

  “But—”

  Darak glanced at the warriors watching them. “You are dismissed, wise-one,” he mumbled.

  He may as well have hit Asherzu’s chest with his great warhammer. The air rushed from her lungs, and it was all she could do to bow and rasp a farewell before rushing from the tent. The laughter of Grignot and his Red Horde warriors followed her out into the night.

  “And just like that, you’re on the outside,” Burt muttered to himself. He watched the heroes ride away, their swift horses kicking up damp earth and dew in a cloud behind them. “They didn’t even bother to leave a little breakfast for their friend.”

  The sun was still rising, casting the high, wispy clouds above Andarun in various hues of amber and honeysuckle. The air was crisp and cool and smelled of the new grass just starting to push through the loam of the plain. Spring was well and truly underway.

  The beauty of the moment was lost on the Kobold. “Gods, I hate being up this early,” he grumbled as he turned back to the woods behind him. “All right, you can come out now. They’re gone.”

  The small clearing failed to answer, so the Kobold stamped across the campsite and into the undergrowth. After a minute or two of tramping through thick ferns and a few brambles, he found a mossy boulder that was roughly the shape of a kneeling humanoid. “Come on, come on. You know they’re gone,” Burt grumbled. He gave the stone a couple of light kicks for emphasis.

  “What do you want?” asked a deep voice from behind him, prompting Burt to leap high into the air with a yelp.

  “Don’t do that!” Burt panted as he turned to face Thane. The Troll was as tall as a young tree and heavier than the boulder, but he still moved silently as he stepped out from the shadows of the forest.

  “Sorry,” said Thane.

  “You should know I’m jumpy out here. Kobolds are supposed to travel in packs. I get the jitters when I’m alone.”

  “Gorm leaves you alone in his tent almost every night,” said the Troll.

  “Yeah, well, your visiting hours are usually well after bed time,” said the Kobold. “Beauty sleep, you know?”

  “He usually comes out just after dinner.”

  “Hey, it takes a lot of work and a lot of rest to look this good.”

  The Troll scratched his head. “Really?”

  Burt scowled. “Look, do you want my help or not?”

  “I don’t recall saying I did,” said Thane.

  “You should have, though,” said the Kobold, sidling up beside the hulking Troll. “I’m gonna help you out today, kid.”

  “I’m several hundred years—”

  “I’m gonna take you to get your noncombatant papers,” Burt continued, scrabbling up Thane’s forearm. “Now help me up. I’ll ride on your shoulders.”

  “Now, wait. Wait!” rumbled the Troll with enough force to give Burt pause.

  “What’s to wait for?” asked Burt. “It’s perfect. Everyone else is in the city. They’ll never see us. You’ll be an NPC by lunch.”

  “Who said I even want to be an NPC?”

  “I did,” said Burt, still clinging to the fur on Thane’s arm. “Look, having papers may not be much protection against the guild these days, but I still don’t think many heroes will give a guy like you trouble. But if you want to buy anything from a shop or get anything from a restaurant or travel through any of the city-states, you’ll need a little green book that says you’re an NPC.”

  “I don’t want to go to the city.”

  “Oh, really?” Burt’s unkempt eyebrows shot up in mock surprise. “I could have sworn you were head over feet for Kaitha, the sister of an ambassador to Andarun, the daughter of a queen of one of the biggest Elven city-states, and as cosmopolitan an Elf as I ever met. And you never want to visit the city with her? Take her out for tea? Have lunch on the Pinnacle?”

  “I… I don’t… I may not… why would… does she…” Thane blanched and stuttered at the mention of the ranger, unable to decide how his next sentence should start, let alone end.

  Burt took the opportunity to scramble up the Troll’s bicep and onto his massive shoulder. “Look, I’m not gonna try to tell you when you should come out of hiding. But when you do, if you want even a Goblin’s fighting chance of getting sweet with the Elf, you’ll need to treat her right. And to do that, you need to be an NPC. So let’s go.”

  The Troll’s feet shuffled toward Andarun, but his mind clearly hadn’t caught up yet. “I wouldn’t even know what to say to her,” he
muttered, staring at his own hands as if he might read an answer on them.

  “How about ‘Hello, Kaitha. My name is Thane,’” said Burt. He gripped a handful of matted fur with each of his claws and dangled his legs over the bony ridge of the Troll’s clavicle. “Now, hyah! Let’s pick up the pace!”

  “Hello, Kaitha. My name is Thane,” said Thane slowly, carefully. He repeated it a few times, turning the phrase over in his mouth. “Yes, that could work.”

  “It’s just telling someone your name. Of course it will work,” said Burt. “The hard part is getting her to go to tea with you.”

  “Why do we—”

  “Ergh! Why, why, why? Because it’s what they do,” Burt barked. “Trust me, pal. I’ve been in an Elf’s purse for more first dates than she’d care to admit. You want to impress an Elven lady? You introduce yourself. You invite her for tea, or coffee, or even lunch if you’re trying to look bold. If tea goes well, you have dinner. If dinner goes well, you do it again, and again, and eventually, if everything keeps going well, you let your handbag performer have the night off, assuming you’ve got any decency.”

  “What does that have to do with—”

  “I’m not going to explain everything to you,” snapped Burt. “But it all starts with telling her your name.”

  “Hello, Kaitha. My name is Thane…”

  “Right. You’re getting it.”

  “Hello Kaitha. My name is Thane.” The Troll held a meaty hand out to an imagined lady. “Would you like to join me for some tea?”

  “Oh, come on. At least offer to buy it for her,” said Burt.

  “Hello, Kaitha. My name is Thane. Can I buy you a cup of tea?”

  “Better. Try to make it witty.”

  The Troll’s meandering walk faltered, and he wrung his hands nervously. “I don’t think I can do witty.”

  “I don’t think any of it matters if you’re not an NPC,” snapped Burt. “Do you want to get your papers or not?”

  Thane thought about it. “Yes,” he said. “I do.”

  Burt smiled as they set off toward the city.

  Chapter 10

  Gorm didn’t realize how much he’d missed Andarun until he heard the familiar clank of its cobbles beneath his iron-toed boots. The smell of the street carts roasting meats with exotic spices. The alleys and shopfronts ringing with the calls of merchants hawking their wares. Vibrantly colored posters plastered every surface at eye level, advertising anything from mummers’ plays to the latest in enchanted armor. Andarun held innumerable delights for one and all, provided you could afford them.

  It didn’t take long, however, for Gorm to remember that he could barely afford a beef roll in the city, and so his mood had soured by the time he arrived at the meeting place. The rest of the party was doing their best to inconspicuously loiter near the gatehouse of a large compound amid the derelict homes and tiny shops of Dunedling Fens. Several large warehouses loomed beyond the black iron fence.

  Heraldin jabbed a thumb over his shoulder as the Dwarf stamped up. “Are you sure this is the place?”

  “Aye. This is Boomer and Buster’s company.”

  “This place?” said Laruna. “This industrial complex?”

  “That so hard to believe?” asked Gorm.

  “Yes,” said Jynn.

  Kaitha scratched her chin. “It just looks very… legitimate.”

  “So?” Gorm was starting to feel defensive.

  “Most of your contacts that I’ve encountered have had more, shall we say, legally ambiguous backgrounds,” Heraldin said.

  “Yourself included, given all the thievin’,” Gorm countered.

  “You wound me, friend.” Heraldin leaned in close to whisper harshly. “And if the wrong people hear you talking that way, Benny Hookhand will do so as well. So let’s keep quiet about our pasts, eh?”

  “Fine by me.” Gorm shrugged. “Ye were the ones who brought it up.”

  “I only meant to point out that these contacts defy the trend,” said Heraldin.

  “Aye, Boomer and Buster do that a lot,” said Gorm. “Let’s go.”

  The gate featured a large, brass plaque embossed with elaborate lettering. It read:

  CREATIVE DESTRUCTION INCORPORATED

  EST. 7.344

  “I think ye’ve been expecting us,” Gorm said to the gatehouse guard. “We sent word ahead.”

  The guard, a balding Halfling with heavy-lidded eyes, tapped an enchanted orb without ever looking up from his book. The gate swung open as though blown by an otherwise undetectable wind.

  They thanked the guard, to no effect, and made their way along a brick path to the main warehouse of Creative Destruction Incorporated. A doorman ushered them into a small lobby, where a loud shout greeted them.

  “Gorm Ingerson!” Boomer hollered. The old Scribkin striding toward them was almost as stocky as a Dwarf. He wore an elaborate set of goggles and a thick, white mustache so long it had to be tucked into his leather apron. Every inch of his visible skin was covered in runic tattoos. He stomped over to Gorm and shook his hand with a hearty slap to the shoulder. “Good to see you!”

  “Ye as well, Boomer,” said Gorm, before introducing the rest of the party.

  “A pleasure, a pleasure!” Boomer shook each adventurer’s hand in turn. “Oh, I could tell you stories about this Dwarf, and I guarantee they’re all at least half true! Ha! Now come on! Buster will be eager to see you, but I can sneak in a quick tour on the way.”

  The Scribkin led them past the receptionist’s desk, through a pair of oak doors, and into a jungle of steel and stone. Pipes and steel beams thrust up from every inch of the floor, towering all the way to the distant ceiling. Workers in white coveralls scurried through a thick canopy of walkways and rope bridges, congregating at workstations illuminated by floating sorcerous lights. The air hummed with the sounds of industry and magic: whistling steam, clanging tools, hissing sorcery, and an isolated scream from a careless employee.

  Gorm noted a pair of Gremlins packing sword after sword into an impossibly small bag, no bigger than his rucksack. A Tinderkin in a white coat took a swig of a purple potion and faded from Gorm’s vision, only to reappear a moment later to the disappointment of her colleagues. A Dwerrow blasted down a narrow track on some sort of iron sled propelled by a massive flame erupting from the contraption’s rear.

  “Bloody bones! What was that?” Gorm yelled, watching the stout Gnome rocket away.

  “A flame-jet propelled mechanical steed. Or a jet-steed, as we say,” said Boomer. “Gonna be huge. Everyone will be ridin’ jet-steeds.”

  There was a distant crash, followed by a siren ringing.

  “Once we figure out how to stop them safely,” added the Scribkin.

  “Seems like madness to me,” said Gorm.

  “Maybe so, but people were wary of firepots and grappling cannons back in the day, and now they’re standard adventuring gear. That’s the nature of progress, and at Creative Destruction, scientific progress is what we’re all about!” Boomer declared as he led the party along a bright, yellow path painted on the floor. “We use the very latest in wizardry and advanced technology to help enterprising heroes the world over decimate their enemies.”

  “And your facility, apparently,” said Jynn, nodding to a pile of rubble attended by a squad of Dwerrow in coveralls. The bearded Gnomes combed through the debris with strange devices, and one extracted a thin, silver rod from a pile of concrete.

  “Ah, that’d be the souvenir wind chimes,” said Boomer.

  “Really?” asked Kaitha.

  Boomer shrugged. “We made them to conjure their own wind, but then the breeze they make sets ‘em off and conjures more wind. Soon enough you’ve got a nasty chain reaction, and they go from a gentle gust to a hurricane in seconds. But we’re learning from the experience, and we’ll do better next time. Or bones, maybe we can weaponize ‘em! That’d make some money! Ha! It’s all progress at Creative Destruction! Why, look over here.”

  Th
e Gnome pointed to a thick glass window. On the other side of it was a small room, its walls and floor painted white. The occupants of the room were presumably Gnomes of one clan or another, but they were all wrapped head to toe in baggy white linens and thick goggles. They gathered around a small stone archway with a purplish-green crystal at the top.

  As the heroes watched, one of the Gnomish attendants traced a small rune on the arch with a gloved hand. The tiny portal flared with blue light, and a moment later another Gnome in white came into view through the archway, like a window to somewhere else.

  “Waygates,” breathed Laruna.

  “Yes indeed,” laughed Boomer. “That’s our facility in Knifevale that they’re passing fruit to. Ha! We’re going to revolutionize travel and shipping!”

  The attendants in white were gently nudging apples through the waygate with the sort of caution that monster handlers might use when feeding Flame Drakes. Three or four apples made it through before the crystal on top of the arch cracked. Gnomes dove for cover in all directions as the portal winked out of existence.

  “Once we work out a couple of small problems,” said Boomer, deflated.

  “Havin’ your door randomly disappear seems to be a big one.” Gorm watched the Gnomes in white stand again and cautiously approach the waygate.

  “Oh, it’s not random,” said Boomer. “Each hunk of thaumite can only pass so much matter through a portal before it starts to crack. We think we could get a lot more out of each crystal if we calibrate the thaumite’s setting better, but it’s an exacting science.”

  “Isn’t thaumite really expensive?” asked Laruna.

  “That’s the other problem. Moving a handful of apples costs a few thousand giltin.” Boomer nodded his head as they continued along the pathway. “Until we figure out those calibrations or get the price of thaumite down, we can’t mass produce the waygates. But we’ll get there! Progress marches on! Speaking of which, mind the path, son.”