Mazerynth

by Jeffery Russell

“In the meantime I have to have a very level sort o’ conversation with you.”

  Mungo frowned.

  “I feel there is an important thing to establish afore we move forward so that in the future we’re able to make plans without it bein’ a tactical problem.”

  Mungo’s large eyes blinked once but the gnome remained silent.

  “Yer disguises are terrible.”

  Mungo blinked again.

  “They don’t fool nobody except for other gnomes.”

  “But…” Mungo finally said. “I passed among you for…”

  “No you didn’t. At no point did anyone on the team think you was a dwarf. We thought that YOU thought you was a dwarf and sorta played along so as to not overly perturb your balance o’ sanity. In fact, that beard was the main sticking point between Ginny and I when she wanted to add ya to the trap team.”

  “You thought I was insane?” The edges of Mungo’s voice thrummed like a cello.

  “Our other choice was you thinking you were actually fooling anyone? That ain’t any better. It’s a teeter-totter with both ends in a mud puddle.”

  “But gnomes are masters of disguise!”

  “No. They ain’t.” Thud’s voice was as flat as the thump of a mallet.

  “You only think that because you’ve been fooled by the disguises! We can even fool other gnomes, which is why I watch so carefully.” His eyes narrowed. “I have my suspicions about Giblets.”

  “You fool ONLY other gnomes. That’s the key part. The rest of us just been thinking gnomes had some odd fashion sensibilities. If nothing else you should have at least wondered why none of us mentioned the cats being bald all of the time.”

  Mungo’s lips pressed in a thin line that circled most of the front of his head. He looked on the verge of tears, perhaps running through his head all of the times he’d been in “disguise” around non-gnomes. Thud slid a glass of rum in front of him.

  “Take yer time,” he said. “I’ll go tell the team to start packing.” He stood, donned his top hat and maneuvered his way toward the door.

  Durham took the spot Thud had left vacant and discovered to his great sadness that the dwarf had somehow managed to take the bottle of rum with him. He waved for another round, an action which was soundly ignored by anyone in the room with the authority to do anything about it. He wasn’t sure how Thud managed it so easily.

  Mungo was drinking the rum Thud had left for him and glumly studying a knot in the wood of the tabletop. “I feel…” he paused and frowned. “Is this how unintelligent people feel all the time? How do you manage it?”

  Durham rolled his eyes. “We get by, somehow. There’s no end to the conversations we have about the intelligence of gnomes.”

  “It’s due to our collective brains.”

  Durham’s eyes stopped mid-roll. “What’s that?”

  Mungo hesitated, possibly due to collective brains. “You know how different variations of the fae are the result of their environmental bondings, yes?”

  “Yes, if that meant what I think it does. Merfolk are water fae, centaurs are horse-fae, that kind of thing?”

  Mungo nodded. “Gnomes are fae as well. Do you know what our bond is?”

  Durham hesitated. He’d been told once but had thought it a joke at the time and now was worried that it would be insulting. “…Mushrooms?”

  “Precisely,” Mungo said to Durham’s relief. “What many don’t realize is that a patch of mushrooms are the fruit of a single plant that grows underground. You’re only seeing a small part of it. I have thirty-two brothers and sisters but we’re just the visible fruit of the whole.”

  Durham was astonished. “Do you mean you all share thoughts? Like mind-reading each other?”

  “Not exactly, but we can use each other’s mind power. Imagine if I have an abacus and I’m sitting in a room full of gnomes each with their own abacus. If I need to solve multiple math problems I could either do them the slow way, one at a time on my own abacus or I could borrow as many other abacuses in the room as I needed in order to do a problem on each one. Individual brains, collective brain power. They can help me calculate the trajectory of an arrow mid-flight but they won’t know about the faults in our disguise techniques until I write and tell them about it.”

  “Mushroom-fae, eh?” Durham paused to consider. “That would explain the gnomaroma.”

  The jibe pulled Mungo out of his funk. “It’s preferable to having random hairy patches.” He considered a moment. “Admittedly the beard was nice when it was cold out.”

  Durham flipped the empty rum glasses upside down and stood. “The hour’s late. We should go pack.”

  Chapter Three

  The Pampered Eel was not a name for a barge that would have occurred to Durham. Maybe if the captain had a pet eel but Durham hadn’t seen anything of the sort in the hut that sat on the aft end of the deck. The hut served as the entirety of the barge’s interior and there were no eels present, just weathered tools and a grimy hammock. The Pampered Eel was carrying them for the final day of their journey. They’d taken a single night to recover from the two-week sea voyage, then debarked early from Mondol. The barge had an advantage over the ship they’d come in on, having no below-deck area to be crammed into, thick with stench and rats. Here it was warm sun and blue skies and the rats lounged around on the deck with everyone else.

  The rocking of the ocean was less pronounced with the wide hull but still enough that the stern rail behind the cabin was lined with heaving dwarves. Gammi, the team cook, had theorized that this would attract fish and was perched in the middle with a fishing rod. Durham had already made a mental note to not have the fish-course for dinner. He hoped that cleaning a fish caught from a trail of sick would be a standard step in the preparation but Gammi’s cooking ideas were full of surprises. The dwarf was just as likely to feature the fish contents in a soup.

  The sea calmed in the last hour of the last leg of the voyage and the land of Karsin was visible as a hazy silhouette on the horizon. The water in front of them seemed determined to out-blue the sky, and glittered with a ferocity that made it hard to look at. Durham had decided to save his eyes by spending his time leaning on a barrel and gazing over the side into the water below. It was crystal clear and he could see all the way to the bottom a hundred feet or so below. They were passing over mer-farms, acres and acres of green, purple and red seaweeds stretching out in rippled squares across the ocean beds. A few water elementals splashed and played in their wake. The center of the deck looked a bit like a traveling circus with the team’s ten wagons lined up two by two. Thud and Ginny’s multi-story command wagon with the balcony was the eyecatcher with its bright blue and yellow paint job. In front of it was Clink’s wagon, where Durham was usually stationed. It had a functional smithy on the back as well as one of the mounting stations for the ballista. It was parked next to the chicken-wagon and just behind Mungo’s wagon with its fold-out workbenches and portable workshop.

  Agent Mungo now, Durham corrected himself. It was officially team knowledge. Not that it had been a hard secret to keep. It had seemed important at the time but had been shelved in the back of his memory somewhere to make room for more pressing concerns. Mungo had spent most of the trip going from person to person and apologizing for the attempt at subterfuge.

  Cardamon was sitting atop the neighboring barrel, dangling his feet and contemplating the mer-farms as well. Or at least looking in their direction while he munched on something. Durham suspected he was actually cataloging a mental list of everything that could conceivably kill them at the moment. It was the sort of thing that Cardamon did with his spare time, expertly enough that he was paid to do it when he was on duty as well. He had his hood up, in spite of the sun.

  “What did you find to eat?” Durham asked. His stomach gave a hopeful gurgle.

  “Oatmeal raisin cookie.”

  “There are cookies onboard?”

  “Well, oat-cakes with weevils but a dwarf can dream. I think one of
my raisins just squirmed away.”

  “Watching for tentacles?” Durham asked, looking out at the pale blue water.

  “Not this time,” Cardamon answered. “Most of the tentacles around here are being served on plates. Barring a surprise storm or a rogue wave we’re pretty safe at the moment. The merfolk keep these waters and we’re on an approved trade-route.”

  “You must scarcely know what to do with yourself.”

  “Thinking ahead to Karsin,” Cardamon said. “The place is dangerous enough as is and we’re adding espionage to the mix.”

  “Mungo says there’s a dungeon, though.”

  “Right. Dungeons I know inside and out. But dungeons with spies in them? I’m not even sure where to start to get ready for that.”

  There was a whistle from the front of the barge. Thud was there, waving his arms to beckon everyone forward. Ruby the Scribe stood next to him, the only other human on the team. Her red robe was bright in the sun and she held her journal in front of her with gnarled hands. Durham knew from experience that if Ruby’s journal was out and she wasn’t writing in it then she meant to read from it. The gathering had the look of a forthcoming history lecture. Durham felt his eyes reflexively drop to half-mast and a wave of desire for a nap flowed through him, borne by the combination of a warm sun and a waffle breakfast.

  The rest of the team was moving up front as well. Nineteen dwarves, a gnome and two humans. The dwarves that were sick over the stern moved up to be sick over the bow instead.

  “As far as I know,” Thud called out, “no one here has been to Karsin. Ruby read a book about it once so that makes her the expert.”

  Naturally, Durham thought. The shortest book in the world was the one listing the titles of the books Ruby hadn’t read. He found a new barrel to lean on, Cardamon taking up position once again on the barrel next to it. Mungo claimed a spot just to the other side of him. Durham wondered how he was handling his new not-undercover status. He looked unfamiliar without the raggedy clumps of cat hair hanging off of his chin.

  Ruby cleared her throat. Though human she was not much taller than the dwarf next to her. Her age made it tempting to think of her as the team grandmother but the one time Durham had called her that she’d stabbed him in the arm with her quill, threatening to make it his eye next time. She wore her standard red robe and the black scapular that marked her as a scribe along with a straw hat that provided a curve of shade across her face.

  “I’ll skim over the things most of you probably know,” Ruby said. “Hot and lots of sand. Beyond that Karsin is a country ruled by gods and I mean that in the literal sense. They had a God-King pharaoh until a millenia or so ago when he was murdered by his children. The remaining Karsinian pantheon each tried to claim the throne, ultimately fracturing the empire into a land of city-states ruled by warlord God-Kings called Knearaohs. They’ve spent the last thousand years having wars against each other as well as trying to outdo each other by building elaborate monuments and temples to themselves. Karsin has a lot of rocks and the core of its economy seems to be paying people to stack them up. People actually travel to Karsin just to look at things.”

  Durham was beginning to feel the post-waffle coma threatening, the edges of his mental focus getting fuzzy. The approaching landscape was more distinct now. He could see pale buildings, glittering minarets and yellow sand with a brownish haze to the air above it. The scattered green of palm trees stood out against a pale hill that rose behind the minarets. A lighthouse tower stood watch over bright spots of color marking ship-sails in the harbor. There was a statue as well, as tall as the lighthouse and positioned so that the pair framed the city behind them.

  “We are landing in the city of Khomen-Te,” Ruby said. She turned and pointed at the statue. “And that is Knearaoh Khomen, the local deity.”

  The statue was more distinct now. It was huge, standing on a small island in the harbor. A figure in a toga, one hand on its hip and the other extending a fist toward the sea as if it had just thrown an awkward punch. The humanoid aspect stopped at the neck.

  “Is that a rabbit head?” Goin asked.

  “Yer the animal-handler, mate,” Clink said. “You tell us if you think it’s a rabbit.”

  “I know it’s a rabbit! Just wasn’t expecting it on top of a person.”

  “Hare, actually,” Ruby said.

  “You expect that on top of a person, though,” Goin said.

  Ruby closed her eyes. “The kind with ears that runs at high speeds through deserts.”

  “There’s a difference ‘tween them and rabbits?” Clink asked.

  “Rabbits are better eatin’,” Gammi called. “Hares is stringy.”

  “It’s a God-King,” Ruby said. “No one is going to be eating him. I doubt the pedigree of his head will have much to do with what we’re here for. The statue is just one of the local wonders. Khomen is the god of opulence and wealth.”

  “Not the god of rabbits?”

  “Don’t expect correlations there,” Ruby said. “Their god of the river has a ram’s head.”

  “How’s the food?” Gammi asked. Durham’s stomach lurched, anticipating a month of Gammi experimenting with Karsinian/Dwarven fusion dishes.

  Ruby shrugged. ”I’ve not yet gotten an opportunity to read a Karsinian cookbook. If you see one, buy it. We can loan it back and forth. I would direct your attention away from the statue, now, and toward the pyramid.”

  The word ‘pyramid’ shifted the landscape’s perspective in Durham’s mind. That wasn’t a pale hill behind the town. They were closer now and the haze was less obscuring. He could see the regular lines of cut stone, the glint of gold at the top.

  Ruby pointed toward it. ”That is The Mazerynth. The entirety of its construction seems to have taken place in the last five years which is about a quarter of the time it traditionally takes. That’s the beginning and end of what I know about it so I’ll now defer to Thud.” She took a step back.

  Thud expelled a cloud of smoke and stuck his lit cigar into one of the many pockets in his vest. It was one of Thud’s favorite tricks. Durham suspected that he kept a shot-glass in there to avoid igniting himself. “Got an odd one here,” Thud said. “It’s a dungeon with an ad campaign. Dungeons are usually made to keep folks out but this one seems to be just the opposite and that sets me beard hairs wrigglin’. It’s almost certain that it’s an elaborate trap of some sort but for what or who we ain’t sure. Seems a lot of expense and effort if it’s just to draw in gnomish spies.”

  Durham raised his hand and waited for Thud’s nod. “Could it just be part of the wonder-race that Ruby mentioned? The Knearaoh’s latest attempt to outshine the others? With the ads it seems like they’re trying to draw people in to Khomen-Te.”

  “It’s a possibility,” Thud said. “We don’t have a lot of information to go on yet. We’re supposed to meet a…gnome intelligence agent who I’m assuming can tell us more.” The phrase ‘gnome intelligence agent’ seemed a thing that Thud had trouble delivering. “Once we dock look for a gnome with a red hat and a yellow rose. Should be easy enough to spot, though, eh?”

  “I’m not so sure about that,” Ruby said. She pointed. They were much closer to the harbor now. Close enough that they could see the crowds of people bustling about. And not just any people. There were glittering suits of armor, glowing swords, elaborate robes in purple and blue. There were elves, humans, dwarves, gnomes and at least a dozen other species that Durham wasn’t sure of the names for. Warriors, wizards, priests, bards…

  “Adventurers,” Thud said. One of his eyes twitched.

  ***

  Durham had taken up position on the wagon to wait out the process of the ship maneuvering its way into the dock. He wondered if he should be trying to map the harbor. Officially he was the team cartographer. In actuality he mostly did whatever anyone asked him to. His limited sailing experience had taught him that his best means of helping was by staying out of the way and being ready to jump overboard if anything wen
t amiss. Sitting on the wagon and fiddling with maps was a safe bet as he knew the wagons were going to be unloaded at some point. Even if he went into a waffle-doze he’d end up successfully disembarking. He’d only been there a few minutes when Mungo climbed up onto the bench next to him. The gnome had a serious look about him. His goggles were pushed on top of his head and his eyes looked small as saucers.

  “I’d like you to be my secret-agent sidekick,” he said.

  Durham’s brain raced along a track, looking for a way out. "Why me?" he asked.

  “Traditionally the secret-agent sidekick is a potential romantic interest. There aren’t any gnome ladies, I’m not sure which dwarves are ladies and when I asked Ruby to be my sidekick she kicked me in the side. I’m sure she thought that was quite amusing. She’d be a poor choice because she’d do whatever she wanted regardless of mission orders.”

  “So you’re asking me?”

  “I’m out of potential romantic interests and you’re tops in the non-potential-romantic-partner-zone.”

  “You thought Ruby was a potential romantic interest for you?”

  “She’s the only one that understands most of what I say.”

  “Well, yeah, I can think of all sorts of benefits going in your direction. It’s more a question of what’s in it for Ruby.”

  “Access to my inventive genius!”

  “She already has that.”

  Mungo waved his hand dismissively. “Irrelevant now, she said ‘no’. Your law enforcement background as well as your skilled handling of maintaining my cover makes you the ideal candidate. I will even provide basic instruction in the art of spycraft.”

  “My law enforcement background was mainly watching sheep and shepherds going in and out of one of the back gates to the city.”

  “Precisely! You won’t have picked up any bad techniques that you’ll have to unlearn. A fresh parchment, awaiting ink! Ooh, that reminds me. You’re technically the king of Tanahael, correct? You’re now the founder and first spymaster of the Tanahael Intelligence Agency. I do recommend having a different name, however. Intelligence agencies are more effective when people think they’re something else.”