There was a creak as the gnome pulled the hatch open. “Hmmm,” he said as he looked in, which was not good but better than a trap or alarm going off. The weight was relieved from Durham’s shoulders as Mungo pulled himself up. Durham followed after, tired of hanging on the ladder and curious to know what the ‘hmmm’ had been about.
He gave Cardamon a hand up as he let his eyes adjust. The passage beyond was dark. Mungo’s silhouette ahead of them was outlined by dozens of narrow beams of light, criss-crossing the darkness ahead of them. The gnome ducked under the first beam then spun to step over the next. The beams came from holes in the wall of the passage. Each cast a small spotlight on one of the fat orange mushrooms that lined the walkway.
“Moppetshrooms,” Cardamon said from next to him. He knelt to help Keezix. “They’re scared of the dark. Break the beam of light and they scream. If one of them screams it’ll scare all of the others and they’ll all scream too. Grow-it-yourself alarm system.”
Mungo finished a slow slide under another beam of light then arched his way over the next.
“Do you think we should tell him?” Keezix asked. She knelt to help Leery. “Or do you want to wait and see how far he can get?”
“No,” Leery said. “Let’s just do it before he gets to another butt-wiggle part.”
Cardamon stepped forward, stuffing a piece of fairy cake into his pixie lantern then holding it up as it flared into light. The mushrooms ignored him as he walked past, holding out his lantern in front of each of them as he passed by. He stopped just behind Mungo as the gnome was performing a complicated backbend that looked like an acrobat with a muscle cramp. Mungo stopped, then flopped to the floor with a sigh. Durham crouched next to him as the others filed past, lanterns held high.
“What’s going on?” Durham asked as he helped Mungo up. “You’re number two on the traps team. You should have known how to get past this.”
The gnome was silent for a moment. “A different solution came to mind first,” he said. His voice was quiet and carried a note somewhere in the gray area between apologetic and self-annoyance. He took a deep breath then headed down the passage after the others. Durham added more cake to his lamp to keep the mushrooms happy then hurried to bring up the rear.
The passage ended in another hatch. Mungo moved forward to give it the once-over again, silently this time. He was angry at Durham, mainly because Durham had pointed out something that had made him angry with himself. Mungo didn’t like being angry at himself. It implied that he had acted sub-optimally. He finished his examination then pushed the hatch open a couple of inches and peeked out. He gave a wave with his hand to indicate that the room was safe then hoisted himself through. Durham came after and held the hatch for the others following behind.
The room didn’t look like any secret spy headquarters that he would have imagined. Tables were spread through the room as if arrayed for individual small conferences. A long counter ran part way along the curved wall, lined with platters of vegetables, fruits and cheeses, sliced and ready to eat. It was a selection that looked like it had already been gone over by more than one person. Most of the strawberries and yellow cheeses had been eaten and crumbs and remnants on a couple of empty plates told him they were too late for the cold cuts and pastries. The broccoli and carrot tray was still mostly intact. A ringed railing at the center guarded against anyone falling down the stairs that led to the tower below.
“This isn’t the headquarters,” Keezix said in a flat voice. “This is a lunch room.”
“But…” Mungo began then stopped. His shoulders sagged. Wrong yet again.
There was a low, coarse laugh from the vicinity of the railing and a very large head came into view as its owner made his way up the stairs.
“Yorgi,” Durham said in a hushed voice.
The ogre grinned at his name as he thumped into the room, his thick eyebrow twisting into something that approximated happiness. There was a three-foot iron bar clasped in one of his fists, attached to an arm that looked like it could swing the bar with enough force to shatter a house.
“Little roaches,” Yorgi rumbled. “Right where tiny-man said.”
“Five of us, one of him,” Keezix whispered. “And he’s slow. We can do this…”
“Brought friends,” Yorgi said. Adventurers began filing up after him, weapons out, grins gleaming, shoes of blue. “You come with Yorgi, either walking or dragging behind.” He slapped the bar against his palm as if casting his vote for which of those options he hoped they’d choose.
Mungo’s ears were ringing and his face felt hot. Too many mistakes, all his. You didn’t get to be that sloppy without paying the price eventually. Capture had been inevitable. They fell in line and followed Yorgi down the stairs, the adventurers parting to let them through, interspersing with them so that they were separated out as the line descended. The ogre looked disappointed that he hadn’t gotten to hit anything but still chortled with glee at having captured them. They descended through the tower, circling round and round the spiral of the stairs. The tower was hollow but dark. Thin beams of light from apertures along the way gave just enough light to see the stairs but no view of whatever else the tower might contain. Mungo was sure it contained something. Why have a big hollow tower in the heart of your pyramid unless you had something to put there? A lunchroom on top wasn’t enough justification on its own. They descended past the work floor with all of its bustle and then deeper, past the support level at the base of the pyramid. Then deeper still. Mungo was certain they were passing the Mazerynth dungeon levels now. Were they being taken to an actual dungeon, deep in the ground? There was a certain amount of irony he could appreciate, putting a real dungeon below the pretend ones. A dungeon that was actually for locking people up. An old-fashioned idea beneath the new and glitzy. He stumbled on one of the steps. They were further apart than were convenient for the length of his legs and there were an awful lot of them.
“Keep up, shorty,” the adventurer following him snarled in a voice husky with gruff. He was wearing a full helmet with spikes glued all over the top and carried a wooden club with a dozen nails sticking through the end. He made a jabbing motion with it that made Mungo scurry to avoid getting punctured.
The end of the stairs was further than he’d expected. Mungo didn’t have the same depth sense that the dwarves did but it was easy enough to count stairs, each of which had a precise depth that was observable. They’d passed beneath where the dungeon levels were into a deeper place. They passed several doors on the last two spirals of the descent and then arrived at the bottom. The door here was made from heavy steel grating. Yorgi idly spun a winch on the wall and the portcullis rose into the ceiling with the metallic click of chains.
“In,” Yorgi said. Mungo felt Spikey’s blue boot nudge him in the back, shoving him forward. He stumbled through the gateway, barely keeping his feet. The rest of the group met with varying levels of success, from Durham sprawling on the gravel floor to Leery’s neatly executed dive roll. There was a loud clang from behind them as Yorgi released the winch and let the grate fall.
They were in an oval room, large enough that it could have easily accommodated dozens more prisoners. The walls rose twenty feet to an open ceiling with a ring of bright lanterns halfway up. The chamber above was large and dimly lit. A rabbit headed statue oversaw one end of the oval, a duck headed statue the other.
Mungo turned to help Durham up but froze at the sound of a mocking chuckle that echoed more than the acoustics should have allowed for. He knew that laugh. He could just make out Frothnozzle’s silhouette midway around the oval, standing up top and looking down at them. He adjusted his goggles to filter some of the light from the lanterns. Frothnozzle was smirking. The one-handed assassin stood sneering to his right and Givup Notachance stood to his left, arms crossed. Yorgi walked up behind the trio, the thump of his feet audible. The ogre’s adventurer squad filed their way around to line the edges above like an audience.
“Junior Postal Agent Mungo,” F
rothnozzle said. “What a completely expected turn of events. Sneak in through the maintenance tunnel. How could anyone foil such a clever plan?”
Chapter Thirteen
“You won’t get away with this.” Mungo yelled. It was calculated bravado. He was shouting in the hopes that one of the back-up teams was somehow hiding within earshot. Now would have been a good time for them to arrive.
Frothnozzle’s laugh was irritatingly genuine. “Get away with what, exactly? Tell me Agent Mungo—what nefarious plot have your amazing espionage skills uncovered? Lay it out for me.”
Mungo hadn’t asked this very question of himself yet and was taken aback by it. A thing he was good at, however, was taking a large number of observations and quickly assembling the pieces to reveal the puzzle. Or at least something that might resemble it.
“You’re using the stolen genie to try and start a war between Akhom and its neighbors. The loser will be defeated, the winner will be weakened and then Knearaoh Khomen will arrive with an army of adventurers to conquer them all. A conquest like that would give him the resources and djinnis to declare himself pharaoh.”
“I have to admit I’m a little impressed,” Frothnozzle said. “You managed to figure out Knearaoh Khomen’s secret plan. Small pieces of it at least.”
“How are you getting the adventurers to agree to it?” Durham asked. Mungo was relieved. It was a question he wanted answered as well but hadn’t wanted to ask as it would have shown he hadn’t figured it out.
“Ah,” Frothnozzle said. “That’s quite a question.” His voice dripped with glee. “The answer is that we don’t ask them. You see, there’s a desert daemon known as an ifreet. The remarkable thing about them is that they’re able to mimic anything that they’ve killed and consumed and they are thralls to the djinn. We’re not persuading adventurers, we’re replacing them with obedient copies.” He looked to the group circling the pit. “Adventurers! Kneel!”
Their captors all dropped to one knee with a punctuating clank of armor.
“Rise!”
They snapped back to attention.
Mungo felt his stomach lurch as he thought about how many adventurers he’d seen in the pyramid above.
“Your dungeon ain’t that lethal,” Keezix said. “We’ve seen it. A few deaths here and there, maybe, but hundreds?”
“We don’t need to kill anyone,” Frothnozzle said. “Only wound. See, one of the other things ifreet have no trouble mimicking is a health potion.”
There was silence as this sunk in.
“You’re selling bottled ifreets?” Leery asked. “They drink it…”
“…and Lo! Miraculously healed!” Frothnozzle laughed again.
“Let me guess,” Durham said. “If you defeat one it turns to sand.”
“The form, yes. But the ifreet doesn’t die. It returns to the City of Brass to await its next summons from the djinn. Thousands of them waiting for the next adventurer to want to fix up that cut on their arm.” Frothnozzle was rubbing his hands together. He seemed scarcely able to contain his joy.
“How do you fit into this?” Mungo asked. “You don’t seem necessary for any part of that plan.”
Frothnozzle threw his arms up. “Finally you ask! I’ve been waiting to show off my masterpiece and was starting to worry that you’d never manage to think your way to it.” He cocked his elbows in order to be able to throw his arms up again. “Behold!”
The cavernous hollow center of the tower above flared into light. It revealed a metal giant.
It stood motionless. Ten stories of gleaming brass and glass with joints of gears and pistons, the face far above a frozen mask dominated by two great luminous eyes. A war machine adorned with spikes and blades, rods and cables, its arms lined with tubes and nozzles.
“I have achieved one of the great works!” Frothnozzle crowed. “A pinnacle for which gnomekind has long striven. Behold the brass giant!” He threw his arms up again in case they hadn’t noticed the thing yet.
Mungo laughed. “An automaton? I can see from down here there’s no way that thing is ever going to manage to take a step. It’s far too big to have enough power.”
“Is that so?” Frothnozzle asked with a smirk. “Perhaps partnering with a god would be beneficial. Any god worth a prayer can whip up a small lightning storm when needed and I did put a great many lightning rods onto the automaton. I suppose we shall see how great of a work it is or isn’t as it lays waste at the head of an army of ifreet adventurers. And afterward? Well, he who pilots the giant automaton that leads the army is certainly going to have a lot of say in who runs the kingdom of Karsin. And that cockpit is built to my size.” He pulled out a pocket watch and gave it a look. “All to commence in the next hour. Not that you’ll get to witness any of it. I’ve enjoyed how complete your failure has been.” He rubbed his palms together. “And now, Agent Mungo, the time has come for you to die.”
“He’s been waitin’ to say that,” Keezix muttered.
Frothnozzle waved one hand toward each of the pair of god statues that loomed over the pit. “You will observe our two stone friends here. Khomen is built to dispense knife-asps...”
“Named that because that’s how it feels when they bite you?” Cardamon asked.
Frothnozzle sounded annoyed by the interruption. “No, they’re named that because they have a twelve inch knife-shaped bone on their head that they impale their prey with to hold them still so the snake can feed on them.”
“I liked my idea better,” Cardamon sighed.
The gnome spymaster either didn’t hear him or chose to ignore him. “Hauroin dispenses fire scorpions. The venom in their sting literally ignites their victim’s blood as it spreads. They like their food cooked.”
Mungo deduced Hauroin was the duck-headed statue by process of elimination.
Cardamon chimed back in, though his chime sounded more like a raspberry. “Why snakes and scorpions instead of ducks and rabbits? Flagrant thematic oversight, that.”
“Functionality over theme!”
“Says the gnome with the metal giant.”
Frothnozzle’s attention shifted to the dwarf. “The fire scorpions are natural enemies of the knife-asps. They enjoy roast snake and the snakes don’t like being roasted. The two species in the pit together? They’re going to fight like mad and you are going to be right in the middle. As more and more are dropped in, the fight will…”
“You left us our weapons and gear,” Keezix called up. “We’re just gonna squish ‘em as soon as they drop.”
Frothnozzle’s smile froze then cracked slightly. “As all of them are dropped in simultaneously…” he began again then paused and turned to Yorgi. “Why didn’t you take their weapons?”
The ogre shrugged. “No threat. Thought the ‘freetis would take them.” He pointed a thick finger at the adventurer audience circling the pit.
Frothnozzle ran his gaze across them. “And why didn’t any of you take their weapons?”
“Well,” Spikey said. “Figured they might need ‘em.”
He pulled off his helmet and replaced it with a top hat. It was Thud. The wizard next to him threw off his robe to reveal Grottimus and the monk on his other side was revealed as Dadger. All around the observation-ring adventurers began casting off their disguises as the entirety of Yorgi’s adventurer crew turned into a pack of grinning dwarves.
Many things happened at once as everyone above leapt into motion. There was the sound of weapons being drawn. Mungo caught a glimpse of the assassin leaping into the air and somersaulting backwards onto a ledge. Givup ducked low and vanished from sight. Yorgi roared and swung his hands about as dwarves scurried and rolled to not get hit. Mungo’s concern was Frothnozzle. The gnome darted to the base of the Khomen statue and stood there, hand on the lever at the statue’s base. He shot Mungo a look of pure hatred as he yanked it. The statue’s hands spread apart revealing an opening in its belly. A tide of snakes began pouring from it, writhing and whipping as they fell, the long kni
fe-bones on their heads scraping across the stones as they righted themselves and twisted into hissing coils.
The side of the pit opposite the snakes became very popular as everyone sought to get clear. Keezix and Leery took position in front, ready to swing hammer and sword respectively at any snake that thought to come their way. There weren’t many takers, yet. The snakes didn’t have a compelling reason to charge toward the people visibly carrying snake-bashing equipment. Above them Frothnozzle darted his way through the fighting toward the other statue. The assassin held the center of the battle, spinning and cartwheeling, holding off half the dwarves at once. The rest of the dwarves were occupied with staying clear of Yorgi as he stumbled around the room swinging his great fists and crashing into walls.
There was a grinding noise as Frothnozzle pulled the second lever. The team scrambled toward the middle as scorpions began pouring from duck-head’s belly in an avalanche of legs, claws and stingers. They clicked like dice as they scattered across the floor. There was a chorus of hissing from the other end of the pit as the snakes discussed this turn of events, their heads weaving in sync to see past the party and keep an eye on the new arrivals. Their head-blades gave them the look of a line of spearmen waiting for a cavalry charge. The scorpions spread into a line as they righted themselves. Their claws opened and closed, their stingers arched and quivered. The air was thick with the tension of a battlefield moments before the horns, drums and screams began.
The fighting up top was going strong. Everyone was too occupied to do anything useful such as toss a rope down. A dwarf got tossed down instead. It was Thud, landing with a crunch after being on the wrong end of Yorgi’s backhand.
“Oi,” he said. He sat up, rubbing the side of his head with one hand and replacing his top hat with the other. Durham helped him to his feet.
“What’s supposed to happen at this stage of the plan?” Mungo asked. His face felt hot. He hadn’t known about the disguised dwarves. He could understand the merit. Frothnozzle was as easily duped as Mungo was when it came to disguises. Not telling Mungo had helped keep it convincing. The sticking point was that the team had created and executed a plan without telling him. He was the liability. The plan’s results didn’t look great at the moment but that was often how Thud’s plans looked in the middle and for all Mungo knew things were going according to schedule. Not this time, however.
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