The Malaise Falchion

by Paul Barrett

  I sighed in resignation. The orc would have made life so much easier if he had left the hole uncovered.

  I stared at the iron circle and pictured it lifting into the air. The familiar tickle started between my eyes. It soon turned into a pinpoint of pain. The cover rose with a whispery sigh as it rubbed against its metal collar. I stopped it about four feet off the ground, level with my eyes. I concentrated on it remaining there while I walked over and stared into the sewer. The smell hit me first, a scent everyone knows. The shaft went down about ten feet. A rusty iron ladder offered passage to the water-covered bottom. I knelt and leaned over the hole to listen. I heard them walking, at least a hundred feet away. Splashing echoes rang back to me. They had entered an area with a diameter wider than the sewer pipe.

  I spun around, put my feet on the ladder, and climbed down slowly. The sludgy water covered the top of my boots as I stepped on the bottom. I looked up and lowered the lid. It settled into its nest with little more than a hiss.

  As soon as I let go of the cover, the headache hit. Not a bad one, just enough to be annoying. The head pounding was less irritating than the sudden hunger clawing my stomach. Before I had been famished; now I was ravenous. The need to gnaw on red meat made me dizzy.

  That’s why I use my “gift” as little as possible. Though I never had the aptitude for wizarding—most dwarves don’t—I can do things with my brain that would turn master Thaumaturges green as an ogre’s ass with envy. Nothing comes for free, though. Headaches and hunger are the prices I pay for doing business with my talent. My head always throbs with a dull drumbeat of pain, but it gets worse when I make it work.

  I pulled out my flask and took a swig of grog. I like to drink. I also need to drink. It’s the one thing that keeps the spikes drilling into my skull at bay.

  Once the pounding receded, I glanced both ways into the culvert. Mage City is unique in that its sewers are smooth and round, created by dwarven engineering and Wizard magic. The circular tunnel glistened with moisture. A stream of six-inch deep water ambled down the center of the pipe. Multicolored fungus covered the top where the water that flushed the tunnels twice a day couldn’t reach. I looked at the floor for signs of recent passage. The imprint of spiked boots pressed into the thin sludge that bracketed the sewer’s creek.

  I had no trouble following their path. orcs aren’t known for their stealth. I straddled the water and waddled down the tunnel like a bowlegged, bearded monkey. After two hundred feet I spotted a larger opening to my right. The sewers are filled with offshoot channels and tributaries that connect the public privies to the central tunnel. This was something different.

  The jagged walls weren’t circular. They had been formed from picks and mallets, and it was larger than any of the usual branch tunnels. I’m not an expert on the sewers, but cases brought me into the depths on occasion. This opening hadn’t been on the original plans.

  I laid on the floor. Cold, fetid water soaked through my shirt and hit my skin. I scooted closer until I could put one eye around the corner. My hat’s wide brim blocked my view, so I lifted it. The room extended at least a hundred feet across. The floor sloped down on all sides. It gave the chamber a bowl-like appearance and a twenty-foot depth. Rough steps led from the opening to the bottom. Spheres of sorcerous light emitted a soft blue glow in the room’s center. A slight breeze stirred the air through the doorway. Studying the far wall revealed entrances beyond the reach of the light. I couldn’t see anybody, so I dared to inch further around the corner.

  Quinitas stood before a rough wooden table, flanked by his thugs. Three humans walked into the light, armored in black plate mail. Spikes protruded from the knees, elbows, and shoulders of the armor. They didn’t wear helms. Each had a shiny black beard that all but hid their fair-skinned faces. Three pairs of small eyes took in the room as the men moved toward the table. They were Malaks from the southern lands, beyond the Goblin Reaches. A curious turn of events. The trio was a long way from their jungle home. The pattern of the vines twined in their black hair marked them as fighters. They weren’t here to open trade negotiations.

  The tallest of the warriors spoke, softly enough that I couldn’t hear him without help. I belly slid back from the doorway so I wouldn’t be seen. Hidden, I pressed my right ear against the wall. The legends that dwarves can hear a whisper through stone are true. Handy for situations like this, but there’s a certain lack of privacy if you live in a mountain Clanhold.

  “—will be here in a moment.” the soldier said. “Were you followed?”

  “No,” Quinitas said. “Despite my sister’s meddling, I managed to either intimidate or bribe people to avoid me.”

  I frowned. The jerk hadn’t tried to bribe me.

  “That is good,” the soldier said.

  No one spoke or moved more than a shuffle for five minutes. I resisted the temptation to look again. I would only risk discovery to do little more than see what I had already seen. Head on my chin, I kept my ear against the wall so I didn’t miss anything important. The group was waiting for someone. Elves, being pretty much immortal, had infinite patience.

  “He is here,” the soldier said. No sooner had he spoken than the room’s light grew green, bright enough to spill into the tunnel. It flashed three distorted shadows on the opposite wall and then dissipated. The orcs grunted in astonishment. I had to see what had shown up. Orcs were usually too stupid to be impressed.

  With my eye around the corner again, I saw the largest ogre I’d ever encountered. He was ten feet tall with shoulders the width of three of me. No doubt this was needed to support his two heads, which was one more than ogres usually had. Ogres are ugly creatures, but peeling off this one’s dark green skin to the gore beneath would have been an improvement. Large knots of bone covered his muscled arms, and barnacles covered those. Dull ivory tusks and black horns stuck out from the appropriate places on his heads. One head had a broad flat nose, with two holes beneath that only vaguely resembled nostrils. The jaw hung slack, revealing more teeth. Tiny eyes looked from underneath ridges so protruded a bird could nest on them. His whole face reeked of ignorance. The other head, though still ugly, showed signs of intelligence. The bright eyes studied the chamber, as if the ogre found the location of great interest.

  Even if Quinitas didn’t belong to a cult, he certainly had exciting friends.

  The ogre carried what most people would call a tree. He no doubt considered it a staff. Forked at the top, it had a piece of jet nestled in the crotch of the silvery wood. I almost whistled involuntarily. Fifty-carat stones cause that reaction in dwarves.

  Quinitas looked up at the ogre. “My sources tell me you have news that may aid us,” he said in a deferential tone I would have assumed him incapable of producing.

  The ogre nodded, his heads like the motion of waves. The duller looking of the two heads spoke. Its voice sounded like rocks being crushed by a hammer. “The Time of the Twins approaches and the device is almost complete. We have news of one who knows the whereabouts of the Falchion Trigger we seek. You must go and ascertain the truth of this information.”

  “Do our enemies know of this?”

  “There has been no movement, so we believe not.”

  “What must I do?” Quinitas asked.

  The ogre shifted his staff to his other hand. The head on that side spoke. Its light voice reminded me of a brisk breeze on a summer day. “In Stinkhole, on the edge of the Black Slag Mountains, there is a tavern called the Armored Scorpion. The owner is a gnome named Silas One-Eye. He is willing to sell this information. I suspect the price will be dear. You must go and persuade him it would be in his best interest to offer this information without compensation. For his own security.”

  “And if he does not listen?”

  Both of the ogre’s heads frowned while the side with the staff spoke. “Then do what you must.”

  I smelled them before I saw them. The ogre must have, too. He looked up. The dull face appeared curiously alarmed as he picke
d at his broad nose. The intelligent one flailed in outright panic. He was smart enough to know they were in deep shit. “We are betrayed,” he shouted as skeletons and zombies poured into the chamber from multiple entrances.

  4

  Time for me to leave. Battling the undead had explicitly been left out of the job description. I had dealt with them enough in the final year of the war. Once the demon brothers Aznag and Azrog realized their goblinoid allies weren’t going to cut it, they began a program of battlefield recycling. Fighting the zombies of the enemy you had just killed became the order of the day.

  Wandfire erupted and weapons clashed in the chamber as I turned away. Both ogre voices rumbled. Vibrant red light spilled into the tunnel, followed by the unmistakable whoosh of Wizard magic. Thuds and splats told me the ogre had hit at least a few of the undead.

  The crimson glow threw my shadow forward, where it landed on a shambling zombie. The rottenness of withered flesh backhanded me, and I stumbled. One of the few times I was thankful for an empty stomach. Then I wondered how I had not previously noticed the five zombies lurching toward me.

  My answer came in a deep hum, a dull burst of gray light, and a sixth zombie. Someone was teleporting them in!

  In addition to strange friends, Quinitas had powerful enemies. Or at least rich ones. Teleportation on this scale required rituals, specialized components, and a cabal of sorcerers. Well past time for my departure.

  The people in the chamber were on their own. I made escaping alive my priority. That meant getting past the zombies. Being an unexpected guest, I suspected I was not a primary target. If I could flee past the six…no, seven zombies in the tunnel, they wouldn’t pursue me. I could escape.

  Given open ground, I could have easily outrun the fleshbags, even with my short legs. They’re slow as stained glass. But they’re dangerous in numbers. These filled the floor of the tunnel. I’m not exactly a butterfly when it comes to manual dexterity. I didn’t trust my ability to run around them on the curved wall without ending up on my ass and in their mouths.

  Out came my trusty Firestarter 7. There are bigger wands with more charges, but I like the ‘starters balance and feel. I go for accuracy over quantity. A firebolt to the head is worth three to the chest.

  The head is where I aimed when I took my first shot. Head wounds don’t kill--or re-kill--zombies. The only way to do that is sever the spine or remove the heart. Something to do with releasing the animus from the spirit. Spellcaster mumbo jumbo. Don’t know, don’t care.

  A shot to the head doesn’t destroy zombies. It does inconvenience the hell out of them. They rely on sight and smell almost as much as we do. They also sense body heat. Take their eyes and ears away, and it severely decreases their ability to turn you into lunch. Especially if you manage to catch their mouth in the blast.

  I wasn’t so lucky with the first shot. Caught the dead thing right between the eyes and splattered pieces of its head and brain against the wall. Perfect for something living. Useless on a zombie.

  “Slejumwok,” I screamed. A tough word to translate into Plainspeak. Let’s just say we don’t use it in polite company. I fired another bolt. This one turned the right half of the thing’s face into bloody shredded strings of meat and knocked it to the floor. Seven of them left, all drawing closer.

  I aimed at the one next to the fallen creature. The bolt slammed through its jaw. Torn muscles flew in chunks. The jawbone cracked in half and hung in two like a door on broken hinges. Busted teeth did a dice tumble across the floor. The stench of burned meat and rotting flesh bordered on unbearable.

  One down, one missing its jaw. This was the best time to break for it. If I could slip between the two useless ones, I could be gone before the other six--no, it was seven again—could turn on me.

  I ran toward the mob.

  And slipped on a pile of brains. I fell on my ass with the moaning creatures five feet away.

  Primary target or not, I was too much for them to resist. Expecting them to leave me unmolested was like asking an elf to pass a field of dandelions without running through it.

  The first one leaned down, mouth open. He got a face full of bolt for his trouble and fell back as his head did an impression of a sledgehammered watermelon. The others were on me before I could get off another shot or reach the hand axe I kept for close work. Terror threatened to take me down, but I had been in such tight spots before. In desperation, I turned to the one thing that would keep me alive where most would have become bloody chunks.

  Bloody chunks were what I pictured. I locked on to the image of the zombies as cubes of meat and pushed the thought toward the slavering monsters.

  And within seconds they went from zombies to filets.

  I stood up and grimaced as I brushed gobbets of flesh off my doublet. The meat had exploded from their bones. Nine skeletons had clattered to the floor and now lay motionless. A fine mist of blood hung in the air. The headache from my effort slapped me like an orc nanny. I staggered, appearing drunk and wishing I was.

  The gray fog of the teleport spell had disappeared. So no more reinforcements would be coming. That was good news. It sounded like the fight in the chamber was drawing to an end. The grunts of living creatures outweighed the moans of dead things. I wasn’t too surprised. Quinitas and the Southerners certainly had skill, the orcs were veteran bruisers, and ogres are no slouches when it comes to a ruckus. Quinitas’ ugly friend knew his way around a spell or two. Just one more reason for me to disappear before I got spotted.

  I held my breath to keep from sucking in the blood floating in the tunnel. No mean feat after the exertion of combat. I snagged my hat from where it had landed when I fell and trundled toward the sewer exit. I moved as fast as my stubby legs, headache, and gurgling stomach would carry me. Twenty feet away I sucked in a breath of air that wasn’t blood-laden. Dizziness turned my head into a butterfly ready to flit away from consciousness. I needed to eat soon, or someone would find a passed-out dwarf in the street.

  I hoped Quinitas and his force took time to recover before leaving the chamber. He would quickly catch up to me with his long legs. Before he stepped into the tunnel, I wanted to be nothing but a memory of someone he frightened away.

  No sounds of pursuit followed as I reached the ladder. They were staying behind to lick their wounds or count their victories. Or maybe they had a different exit. Either way, fine with me.

  I scuttled up the ladder and shoved the cover out of the way, no longer concerned about noise. I did take the time to replace the cover, so as to return the inconvenience the orc had paid me.

  Time to find the lovely Siralanna and tell her she had the wrong dwarf. I could deal with the Assassin’s Covenant, ogres, and even her brother. But I had dealt enough with undead during the war and never wanted to see them again. You try forever to forget that smell. I had managed to bury the memories of atrocities committed by skeletons, zombies, and other foul things summoned by the demon twins. The fight in the sewer brought the recollections from their shallow graves to haunt me again.

  I reached for my whisky flask only to find the greatest atrocity of all: it had broken. I considered pulling the tunic up to my mouth and sucking out what I could get from the wet spot on my chest. Then I decided that would look too strange even in this wretched quarter. Besides, whisky wasn’t the only thing dampening my clothes.

  I promised three things as soon as I resigned from the case and collected my day’s pay. I’d find the nearest tavern. I’d eat a whole barbecued pig. I’d crawl under a keg and open the spigot. The thought of those wonderful activities helped chase away the thought of the slaughterhouse I had just experienced in the sewer.

  Despite Siralanna’s negligence in giving me her address, it wouldn’t be too difficult to find her. Clan Greenstreet was well known throughout Mage City. They would be especially prevalent once I returned to Silver Fountain.

  I sloshed my way back to the ritzy part of town, occasionally shivering as the air turned chilly. The da
rkness hid the state of my attire. I still got strange looks from the few people who passed close and got a whiff of me.

  Unfortunately, as I drew closer to Silver Fountain, darkness disappeared where the street lamps took over. I had some luck. My clothes had stopped dripping, so the only visual effect was that I looked dark brown with black patches where the blood stains had soaked in.

  Nonetheless, I kept to the dim areas as much as possible. I had to find Siralanna’s house quickly. The longer I stayed in the streets, the greater chance of nosy guards questioning me, whether they recognized me or not. In my bedraggled state, I could easily get classified under “public nuisance.”

  I spotted a lamplighter. Perfect. Those little brats knew the city almost as well as the thieves.

  He was maybe ten, tall and lanky with clipped blond hair. He carried a thin red wand that he stuck into a hole on the light poles and turned, which in the less wealthy sections of the city resulted in a low-burning flame growing higher to provide nighttime illumination. Here in Silver Fountain, home to a plethora of rich merchants and noble families, it fired up a magical light bright enough to burn your eyes if you looked at it too long.

  “I’m looking for Siralanna Greenstreet’s house,” I said to his back.

  He turned to me and didn’t even try to hide his disgust at my appearance or smell.

  “What’s it worth to you?” the little snot asked as he came up on his toes, poised to run.

  My recent encounter and the resulting aches and pains made me disinclined to engage in the usual haggling banter, especially with someone younger than most of my clothes. I glanced around and saw no nearby guards. Quicker than the brat probably thought I could move, I jumped forward, reached up, and snagged his yellow tunic with its little orange flame embroidered over the right breast. Before he could so much as gasp, I pulled him down and put his face against mine. He dropped his wand. His arms flailed as he grabbed my hand and tried to pry loose.