by Elliott Kay
“What’s your clan?” asked the recruiter.
“No clan.”
“Guess that’s your surname from now on, then. Scars of No-Clan. You got that, Yargol?” she asked, leaning in on the scribe.
“Yes, sergeant,” came the reply. The hooded head never looked up.
“You look like an orc, but not. Kinda smooth, less bulk. Half-orc?” the sergeant guessed. She didn’t hide her disdain. “What’s your weapon?”
“Sword and shield, but I’m versatile,” said Scars. “I can shoot, too.”
“Shooting only matters if you provide your own weapon. Got any other skills? A craft or trade?”
He hesitated. Saying anything like “innkeeper” or “barkeep” would only leave him sweeping floors. He might end up doing that, anyway, but he knew the importance of showing strength here. Hiding his roots seemed wrong, too, even if they were buried under the ashes of home. A middle path seemed appropriate: “Bouncer.”
“That’s a trade?” the hobgoblin asked.
“It is if you have a tavern.”
“We don’t.”
“I’ve done some farm work. I can ride. I’m literate. Numbers, too.”
“Another one, huh?” grunted the hobgoblin.
The hooded head turned. “I could use another hand in the library.”
“You’ll use who you’re given, wretch,” said the hobgoblin. “You don’t make the decisions.” Her eyes returned to Scars. “You have no clan and no name I recognize. I’m guessing by the look and sound of you the orcs here aren’t your kin. If they don’t claim you, then you’ve got no one to speak for you. Cross anyone and you’re on your own. Step out of line, disobey orders, get caught stealing, or fall asleep on watch, you’ll be dealt with by the first chief, boss, under-boss or sergeant who finds you. Understand?”
“And if someone starts something with me?” Scars asked.
“Then I guess you’d better be able to handle it yourself and hope they don’t have anyone to speak for them, either. And that you don’t piss off any of your betters along the way.”
Shouts and rough laughter drew everyone’s attention. A handful of goblins and hobgoblins emerged from the gate, with two of them dragging a badly beaten and whimpering orc. “I didn’t do it,” the orc pleaded, blood running from his nose, his mouth, and even one swollen eye. “I was on watch!”
“We heard you the first time,” said one of the hobgoblins. “It’s your word against Sergeant Koril’s. Who are we gonna believe? The goblin king’s guard or a filthy orc thief?”
“It was only a bottle of wine! Sergeant Koril told me to go get it!” the orc protested. “I never even took a sip!”
“Accusing your betters without proof is another punishable crime. Only problem is we can’t do this twice.” The pack of hobgoblins dragged the orc to the ledge overlooking a steep fall down the mountainside.
Terror renewed the orc’s strength. He wrenched one burly arm free from a hobgoblin captor, twisting and punching the other to break free. More goblins and hobgoblins crowded in, but their prisoner battered the smaller ones aside and rushed for the trail. Recruits hooted and hollered at the entertainment without getting in the way.
He almost made it to the first bend in the trail. A ray of sparkling blue light shot through the air, flying right past Scars at the recruiting desk. It curved on the way to its target, striking the orc just as he reached cover. With a burst of light and dust, the orc disappeared, leaving behind a frightened and bewildered chicken.
“Really don’t see why I need to get involved in this,” grumbled a nasally voice. Scars turned toward the cave as the speaker emerged. Though his blue robes didn’t sparkle, the shade matched the magical ray perfectly. Long brown hair jutted out in a stiff goatee from his balding, pink-toned, entirely human face. “This looks like an internal dispute to me.”
“It’s important to show strength, sir,” counseled the hobgoblin beside him. “Your troops need to know who they work for. They need to know they can’t cross you.”
“Isn’t being on the payroll enough for that?” The wizard walked only a few steps past the podium before he stopped. “Last I checked, you goblins had a king of your own. Mierrek should be out here handling this, not me. I’ve got shit to do. That’s why I outsourced my personnel needs.”
“Yes, sir,” said his companion. He waved to the others. “Someone grab that chicken! Now!”
Scars leaned back to his recruiters at the podium and desk. “Is that…?”
“The great Innovator himself, Olen Zuck,” said the scribe. “Our employer.”
“And lord of this hold,” added the recruiter. “So watch your tongue. In fact, don’t use it here at all.”
The wizard didn’t notice the conversation behind him. He watched as several guards and recruits fell over one another trying to catch the panicked chicken. “Although the last thing Mierrek probably wants for his people is the sight of him running. This is tough enough for the young and spry types, huh?”
“Yes, sir,” the hobgoblin conceded. He flicked a glance over his shoulder at the podium, where Scars and his recruiters looked on. “Appearances matter.”
“Fine,” the wizard sighed. He raised one hand in a strange gesture, flicking his wrist twice before snatching at the empty air in front of him. Down the trail, the chicken jerked backward as if caught by an invisible hand. Then it flew through the air under no power of its own until its neck came into Zuck’s grasp.
“Everybody see this?” he asked, holding the chicken up for his audience. “Everybody get the message here? This guy stole something. I wasn’t paying attention, so I don’t know what it was, but that’s not important. What’s important is he stole, and he got caught, and then I got involved. You see what happens when you get the wizard involved?”
“Fire might be good, sir,” whispered the hobgoblin at his side.
“Oh shut up with the fire already,” said Zuck. He strode to the edge of the cliff, watched by every pair of eyes. Without so much as a backward glance, Zuck punted the chicken off the side of the mountain. It disappeared into the air with a burst of feathers and a final squawk.
“Everyone get it?” Zuck asked. “Good. Do your work. Mind your manners. All that stuff. And don’t get in my way.” He crossed the podium again on his way back to the entrance. “Hey, Yargol, make sure to cross that guy off the roster,” he said absently. “Don’t want his pay going to anyone else by ‘accident.’”
“Yes, sir,” said the hooded scribe.
The hobgoblin who’d been at Zuck’s side lingered. His gaze swept the crowd. “I am Sergeant Venko,” he said. “I work directly for King Mierrek as his bodyguard. Heed the words of the goblin king, pups: Do your work. Mind yourselves. Get your pay and your meals and stay out of trouble. Fuck up, and we’ll have all sorts of ways to correct you.” Then he nodded to the hobgoblin at the podium. “Sergeant Koril.”
“Sergeant Venko,” replied the recruiter. Her attention returned to Scars, though she reached under the podium to retrieve something. Koril’s eyes never left Scars as she put the wine bottle to her lips. “Stay in line and mind your betters, half-orc.” Some thought occurred to her then. She slid away from the podium to catch up to the other hobgoblins returning to the gate. “Wait here.”
Scars looked to the cliff. He thought about the lowland patrols and the last few humans he tried talking with. He thought about the borders and the lands on the other sides. The elves were said to shoot down any orc or goblin to come near their forest. He’d heard the other human realms were somewhat more accepting, but those who claimed such had never been there and seemed to have their own agenda when speaking of better places for orcs and goblin folk to be. And the borders were patrolled on all sides.
He wondered if he’d get even as much of a hearing from a human border patrol as the orc who’d gone over the cliff.
“If you have questions, now is the time to ask,” said the hooded scribe.
“Was that guy a sca
pegoat for the wine, or was he in for a fall before it ever went missing?”
“He stood up for himself,” said Yargol. “They don’t like that around here. Strange, for a place that prizes strength and courage, but I suppose it’s a matter of how and when you show it. The king and his circle don’t want that strength or courage turned upon them. It rolls downhill from there.” The hooded head tilted slightly toward the cliff. “Not to make light of his end. Unfortunate phrasing.”
“Does anyone think this is a good way to run an army? Or much of anything?”
“Those in power think it’s good for them. Those below are too concerned with keeping their jobs and their heads to do anything about it. I understand the lowlands are not so different.”
Scars let out a rumbling sigh to concede the point. Galling or not, none of this was a surprise. “What of the wizard? Is he the same?”
“Zuck knows, of course. Either he approves or he is reluctant to intervene. The result is the same. I would tell you to ask him, but that may be a transgression, too.” Yargol’s head tilted up. Scars almost saw under the hood. “You don’t know anyone here? How did you know of this place?”
“Rumors and inferences. I had a run-in with some goblin folk outside a village. And I can read a map.”
“Inferences,” Yargol chuckled. He scrawled a note in his book in line with Scars’s name. “I think you’ll be better off in the library. The king and his henchmen don’t go in there often. It’ll keep you out of sight.”
“I thought Koril there made the decisions?”
“So does she, but fortunately she never showed much interest in learning to read.” Yargol paused. “You don’t have a problem with gnolls, do you?”
“Only if they try to kill me or eat me.”
“Excellent. Then we’ll likely avoid killing one another. Around here, that’s practically friendship.”
* * *
“Scars,” said Yargol. The sound of his name brought him straight out of his dreams. The cliff was gone. That day had been three years ago, after a whole year on the run. After the riot. After the fire.
Now he was on the run again…this time from adventurers. A moment’s rest helped him see it even more clearly. “They’ll find their way down here,” he said. “Of course they’ll find a way down. We can’t stay. This is a race to the exit.”
“Damn it. You’re not wrong,” Yargol sighed.
“How do you know?” asked DigDig.
“I know adventurers,” said Scars. “All too well. We need something more to keep them off our backs. Something to slow them down.”
“You have an idea?” asked Shady Tooth.
“Yeah.” He flicked his gaze to War Cloud. “We didn’t do all of our work in the library.”
Chapter Three
“Oh for fuck’s sake. We have to deal with him?”
“Who?” asked Yargol. He understood as soon as Shady Tooth rolled her eyes. “How do you know he’ll be on watch?”
“Can’t you smell him? His stench reaches all the way out here,” Shady Tooth grumbled.
“It looks like nobody’s come down to warn anyone about the adventurers,” said Scars.
“If you had to deal with this asshole, would you?”
Scars couldn’t argue with that. Coming down here with a warning hadn’t exactly been his first thought, either.
A handful of broad steps rose to tall double doors of iron-bound wood at the end of the hall. Two goblins in dirty chain shirts and helmets stood guard at the base of the steps, leaning casually on spears as they watched the little crew approach. Their demeanor changed instantly as they caught sight of DigDig among them.
“What do you want?” asked one. She straightened as she spoke and leaned her spear over toward her companion, who mirrored the move. Plenty of room remained to walk between their weapons, but the gesture was plain.
“We have business in the dungeon,” said Scars. “Let us pass.”
“Nobody passes unless we unlock the doors,” said the other goblin, his scowl deepening. “We don’t open unless you give us reason.”
“Throwing in this garbage would be reason,” said the first, grinning at DigDig. Her ears stood out abnormally high for a goblin, pierced along the sides with little bones and tarnished rings.
“Garbage is thrown out, not in,” said the other. “A cell is too good for this wretch.”
“Taught you traps, Barklip,” DigDig objected. “Brought you food when you were sick.”
“Liar,” the other goblin snapped. His companion with the huge ears perked up with guarded interest.
“Only whelps, both of us. Didn’t get enough food for myself, but I shared,” DigDig continued.
“Liar!”
“Then when everyone picked on me, so did you,” said DigDig. “Loud about it, too.”
“You make shit up to sound important,” Barklip countered. “You’re nothing. Least of all the goblins. Everyone knows it.”
“If you had any worth, you’d have shown it,” agreed Ears. “You show nothing.”
DigDig’s eyes narrowed. “Anyone hear Barklip got sick with itch-rot from eating his own—”
Barklip snarled, dropping into a threatening stance with his spear pointed at DigDig. “Shut up! Shut up or get beaten again. Every court, every meal. The king hates you, anyway. Thinks it’s funny when you cry.”
“No more crying,” said DigDig. “And no more king. Never was a real king, anyway.”
At that, Ears tilted her spear and shifted his weight, easier than Barklip yet still taking a ready stance with obvious implications. “Goblins with no friends should know better than to talk like that,” she said. Her eyes darted back to Scars and the others. “Why are you here? What do you want?”
“DigDig,” said War Cloud, “all of this is over now. We’re never coming back here.”
“What?” asked Barklip.
DigDig returned the other goblin’s snarl with one twice as loud. His shovel came up fast and hard, sweeping aside the tip of Barklip’s spear before crashing into the guard with his shoulder. The other goblin looked on in shock, her ready stance more bluster than wariness. She wasn’t ready at all when Scars brought one boot up into her gut. The kick lifted Ears off her feet and sent her sprawling against the steps.
The other goblins were also on the floor. With the head of his shovel still over his shoulder from the swing, DigDig was in too close to swing it again. Instead, he thrust the other end into his enemy’s face. The blow jarred Barklip long enough for DigDig to disengage and slam his foot down on the spear, pinning it to the floor.
Barklip managed to shove DigDig back. He kicked at his attacker for good measure, but it was a weak contact. He’d only given DigDig room to move. “No more!” DigDig shouted, swinging his shovel in a full horizontal arc against Barklip’s head. The bigger goblin reeled, barely catching himself against the stone floor with his hands, but DigDig slammed the shovel down again. He kept swinging.
“No more! No beating! No crying! No taking! No lies!”
His foe didn’t get up. He didn’t move at all. Seven blows with all of DigDig’s strength were more than enough to finish the fight.
“This got a little loud,” Shady Tooth warned Scars quietly. She watched the doors at the top of the steps.
“Think it may have been worth it, though,” said War Cloud. “You alright, DigDig?”
The smallest of the crew stepped back toward the others, his breath heavy. “Told me they wouldn’t stop unless I cried,” said DigDig. “Made fun of me when I did. No other way out. Still made fun. Everyone. King, king’s children, others. Him,” he said, gesturing to Barklip.
“Why did they do that in the first place?” asked Yargol.
The goblin shook his head, still staring at Barklip. “Nobody to help me.”
“Sometimes they don’t need a reason,” said Shady Tooth.
“Not happening again,” said DigDig. “Right?”
“No more,” said War Cloud.
<
br /> “No more,” DigDig repeated. He turned to the other goblin, seething as he approached. Ears crawled backward up the steps. DigDig loomed over her. “Keys. Open the door. Now.”
“And drop the weapons,” said Scars. “All of them.”
The other goblin didn’t argue. She left her spear and shield on the floor as she rose and promptly shed himself of her belt with its pair of daggers. Though little of her gear was in good shape, it still represented an improvement on the crew’s collection. DigDig kept one hand on their prisoner’s collar as she put her iron key in the lock on the door and gave it a turn. As soon as she was finished, DigDig pulled her aside to push the goblin’s face into the doorframe.
“No time to tie you up,” DigDig growled. “Run or die.”
“Run! Run! I’ll run,” Ears assured him.
“She’ll run straight to the wizard,” War Cloud noted. He winked at Shady Tooth’s quizzical frown.
“Not worried about that. Not my problem,” said DigDig. He let go of the other goblin, who promptly ran as fast as she could down the hall and away from the danger. DigDig watched her flee. “Would beat them all if I could. Together. One at a time. Doesn’t matter. Would tear this whole place down if I could.”
“Do you want true revenge?” asked Scars.
“Yes.”
“Live a better life,” said Scars. “Live the life they don’t want you to have.”
DigDig nodded, seeming consoled by the suggestion. “Still like to beat them anyway.”
“We’ll keep that in mind if any of them turn up,” said War Cloud. “We need to move.”
“Can’t we just throw some burning oil inside and shut the door?” asked Shady Tooth.
“Keep cool in here,” Scars reminded the others as they ascended the steps. “He’ll poke at you and dig for your anger. Don’t let him. Don’t argue with him. Besides, you’ll only get your job done if he forgets about you, right?”