Threadbare Volume 3

by Andrew Seiple

  “They are. That flyer was a dangerous, shitty contraption that almost got me killed the first few times I flew it.” Beryl grinned. “These though... these are about done. About ready. They’ll change the war once we get them out there, get us some wins...” Then she sighed. “And fucking bitchqueen supreme Bazdra Coaler is squawking about how they need more testing, first.”

  “I thought Montag Steelknife was the minister in charge of new weaponry,” Threadbare said.

  “He is, but the training for it goes through Bazdra. The... oh, we need a word for people who fly this thing. The flyers, the controllers, they need to be approved by Bazdra’s ministry. They choose who gets allocated to what jobs, and she’s arguing that this is a job. Even though it isn’t, you just need the flight skill.”

  “The flight skill, you say?” Garon remarked. “Hm...”

  “Yeah. They’re two seaters, and you need someone flying it. One person to fly, the other to drop bombs over the side.” Beryl puffed her lips and made a farting noise. “Easy as mud. Still pisses me off... Montag swore he’d back me up on this, ram it up Bazdra’s arse if he had to, and he hasn’t. Normally the dude’s braver, I don’t know what’s gotten into him the last few weeks.”

  “Could be he’s jus’ backed off ’cause Bazdra had a deaf in tha’ family,” Jarrik said, trying to console her.

  “Did she?” Cecelia squinted.

  “Yeah. ’er husband died accidental-like two weeks back. Didn’t get ’is coin, since it weren’t in battle. Word is she’s tore up somefing fierce about it.”

  “Which doesn’t matter because she should fucking do her job so fewer of us die!” Beryl thumped the wall in anger. “Bitch needs to calm her tits right the fuck down.”

  Threadbare listened, the light almost seeming to gleam in his button eyes. “You know, we’ve talked with both of them recently. And a fellow named Hidon Fingers, and a nice lady who’s putting us up in Yorgum’s house, called Gudrun Scarstone.”

  “Hidon? Yer sure?” Jarrik asked, eyebrows rising. “That guy’s been out a sight th’ last few months. He was in charge a’ the Oblivion run training until he disappeared for a while. Word is he was in some deep mission for th’ King.”

  “Black beard, wears a hood, smells of garlic?” Threadbare asked.

  “Yeah, tha’s him.”

  “Well regardless, if you got Gudrun looking after you, you’re good,” Beryl nodded. “Everyone knows Granny Guddy. She’s big on the home crafting part of Yorgum’s religion. And the most senior cleric in the faith who isn’t on the front.”

  The four toys shared a look. “Probably not de Lurker, den.” Said Zuula. “Is good. We probably not come back to house full of dead friends.”

  “Nobahdy knows we left anyway,” said Madeline. “I made sure of that. Stealth, camo, the wahks.”

  “Yes, but it’s The Lurker,” said Cecelia. “We have to play it safe.”

  “Yeah. About that. What the fuck.” Said Beryl. “The Hand?”

  “Yeah. This is the part it gets complicated,” said Cecelia. “We’re pretty sure the Lurker’s infiltrated this hold. We think he’s one of the four ministers. We think the King knows that and is playing some kind of complicated bluff to try and get him to reveal himself by taking a whack at us, or... well, me, because I’d be problematic to the Hand’s plans in the future.”

  “We’re here because we need some help stopping that,” said Threadbare. “If he just tries to kill her, we can soulstone her again, but there are some sneaky things he could do that would end up with her permanently dead. And that’s... unacceptable,” said the little bear.

  Beryl nodded. “Yeah, all right. How can I help?”

  “Some of us are going to run the dungeon soon.”

  “Whoa. Much as I’d like to go, that’s... no. That isn’t the Catamountain.”

  “We know,” Garon said. “Which is why we don’t want you going in. We want you watching to see who’s waiting to ambush us when we come out.”

  “Tryin’ a lure...” Jarrik nodded. “Da would’ve approved.”

  “It’s a lure what could go wrong,” Jarrik said. “This is one a tha Hand. You give him a shot at Celia, what’s ta stop him grabbing her an’ escaping?”

  Threadbare smiled. “I have an idea, there. Do you happen to have any green reagent?”

  “I can get some. Why?” Beryl squinted at him.

  He told them, and Zuula laughed. “Oh! Is perfect!”

  Jarrik went in the back and rummaged around. “I’ll go an’ be yer watcher. I’ll foller yer back, then shadow yer when ya ready for tha dungeon run. Jus’ wear somethin’ red on yer hat, Threadbare.”

  “Trust me, he’s way better at it than I am,” Beryl said. Then her eyes narrowed, and she moved up to loom over Cecelia and Threadbare, shaking her finger in their faces. “Just so we’re clear. If you get him killed I will fuck you and not in the fun way. I will find a way to screw you so hard your ancestors will be sore in the morning. You’ll go in our book of grudges, and if I don’t settle it, my children will. We clear?”

  “Ber...” Jarrik started.

  “Yes dear?” She looked at him and grinned, a manic smile wide on her face as her braids rustled from the sudden movement.

  He sighed. “Ne’er mind.” He turned back to the toys. “You do yer fing, I’ll back yer up when ’e strikes.”

  “Thanks bro,” Garon said, reaching up one wooden fist. “Just watch yourself, okay?”

  Jarrik grinned and reached down to bump his fist to Garon’s. “Oh, don’t worry ’bout me none. Picked up a few tricks since I got here.” His free hand found its way up to his bandolier and ticked down the curved wooden handles sticking out from it.

  “Pistols?” Cecelia asked.

  “Oh yeah. Let’s just say I don’t use a bow no more.”

  “Mordecai would not approve,” Zuula said.

  “Oh!” Cecelia said. “Speaking of him, there’s something you should know. He’s alive, too. And he’s free. I freed him.”

  Garon, Zuula, and Jarrik all turned to stare at her.

  “What?” Garon gasped.

  “It all started when Anise fooled me into thinking there was a test...” She related how the daemon had tried to trick her into killing Mordecai, and she’d freed him from his prison instead. “Father sent the Ninja after him, but he escaped. Father was furious after that, but he kept his word, and I went to the front.”

  “This is the first time you’ve mentioned that,” Threadbare said.

  “I know. I’m sorry. We’ve been so busy, and...” she sighed. “He was mad. They tortured him.”

  Zuula’s spear quivered in her hands, as she shook, rage filling her tiny plush body.

  “But he’s free now. I’m... I’m hoping he joined up with the rangers. He probably did. If Jericho was one of his old students, I don’t see-—”

  “Celia,” Zuula said, her voice low.

  “Yes?” The porcelain princess whispered.

  “We done with the talky and the planny and the dwarven shit and the plotty bits?”

  “I, er...”

  “Cause Zuula really want to go kill some stuff, and de sooner de better.”

  Jarrik laughed, and her son, her son who was a man now, knelt to embrace the tiny doll with both arms. Zuula bit irritatedly at him for a bit, then subsided, sighing. “Welcome back, Mom,” Jarrik said. “Missed yer.”

  “Miss you too Jarrik. You treat Beryl good, yah? Zuula want grandchildren.”

  “Uh, yeah, about that, it probably ain’t gonna happen—” Beryl started, but Madeline bumped her leg with her snout.

  “Sh. Trust me on this. Just shush.”

  “Yeah, okay, whatevs.”

  “Yes, I think we’re done,” said Cecelia.

  “Let me go find that reagent for you.” Beryl said, rummaging around.

  Ten minutes later, the toys were back in Madeline’s pack, while the little dragon returned to the temple of Yorgum, emerging in through the same u
pper-story window she’d left from. Zuula spent most of the trip silent and brooding. Cecelia tried to apologize a few times, but Garon stopped her, quietly pulled her off to the side.

  Threadbare, for his part, spent most of the trip thinking. They had a lot to do, before they went to the dungeon. Hopefully he could get a head start on it early tomorrow, when the supplies arrived.

  As it turned out, though, he didn’t get a start at all.

  *****

  “Ah, there you are!” Gudrun’s voice echoed through the work room. “I was wondering why someone had fired up the kiln.”

  “Oh. I’m just skilling up my sculpting,” Threadbare said, showing her the row of pots he’d just finished firing. It hadn’t been the main reason he’d started working here, but he’d finished THAT part of things an hour ago, right before dawn. “I’m impressed by your facilities.”

  Yorgum’s temple had every sort of crafting tool and workstation known to men, dwarves, or stranger races. Including a few things that were for purposes and crafts that were hard to decipher just by looking at them.

  “Now that you’re here, I can make golems. Would you like to observe?”

  “Ah. About that...” Gudrun sighed, and flipped her long silver ponytail back from where it rested on her shoulder. “The markets are out of yellow reagent.”

  “Really?”

  “There was a run on it late last night, evidently,” she frowned. “If you can wait a few days, the miners should have a new crop when they come in from the Western digs, that’s where most of it comes from.”

  “Hm.” Threadbare said. “I don’t know if our people can.”

  “I’m sorry,” Gudrun said. “I told them it was King’s business and asked them to put the next batches aside for you.”

  “Hey Mistah Beah, you gaht a bit?” Madeline poked her head around the doorway.

  “Yes, of course.” Threadbare pointed at the pots. “Here you go Gudrun, I’m donating them to the temple or whoever needs them. Please use them well.” He cleaned the tools, sat them down, and headed into the main room, with Gudrun’s thanks following.

  Once he got back to their communal room, Madeline shut the door behind him, with a snap and a twist of her wooden maw against the doorknob.

  “It’s The Lurker,” Cecelia said, examining a tangle of copper wire. “This is his opening move.”

  “Buying up all the reagents?”

  “Not just that. I gave Gudrun a list of components I’d need to assemble a new Steam Knight suit. The most important ones suddenly sold out just before this morning.”

  “She says,” Graves said. “What a coincidence, that she’s the one doing the buying, and we are suddenly unable to get what we need to help with the war effort.” He sighed and held up a sturdy steel shield. “At least the commonly available things came through, so I have arms and armor again. But the rest... it makes me wonder about the veracity of our hostess.”

  Kayin’s ears flattened. “You think she’s The Lurker? I don’t see it. She had plenty of chances to try something last night. She literally knows where we sleep. Well, where you sleep, desu.”

  “Maybe because she doesn’t want to get found out. Moving against us here would be too blatant, if she’s The Lurker.” Cecelia said. “But if someone else is, then they WILL move against us here, to frame her... Oooh, this is all twisty. I hate intrigue. It’s all complicated.”

  “Then let us make it simple,” Zuula said. “We go. We hunt giants as tribe. And when Lurker show, we stomp him to bits.”

  “Captured alive, if possible,” Garon pointed out. “We know he can come back from the dead.”

  “Right. Threadbeah, you got the thing?”

  “Oh yes,” The little bear handed Madeline her pack, pausing to pull the object in question from it. “I think it came out pretty well, all things considered...”

  *****

  After some quick logistics, the group suited up, equipped themselves, and headed out into the Hold. The dwarves they passed in the dim tunnels stared at them, gave them wide berths as the toys, their cats, and their lone human companion marched by.

  Four minutes into the trip, Gudrun came puffing up, racing until she fell in next to Cecelia at the head of the group. “What... what are you doing? Where are you going?”

  “We’ve heard good things about Jotunher. We thought we’d try our luck,” Threadbare explained. Cecelia ignored her, marched on without a word, face barely visible behind her doll-sized helm.

  “I...” Gudrun shook her head. “We need to know when you’re going to do things like this. The other ministers need to know!”

  “We’re old hands at dungeon raiding,” Garon reassured her. “We know our limits. We’ll be back in a few hours at most, it’ll be fine.”

  “I... Don’t go in! I’ll let the others know.” Gudrun said. “Please just wait until we get there.”

  “All right,” said Madeline. “Run fahst. We have lots to do, so don’t keep us waiting, okay?”

  Gudrun beat feet down the passage, and Fluffbear sighed to watch her go. “I feel bad for tricking her,” the small bear squeaked when she was gone. “She baked us cookies. I mean I couldn’t eat them, but they looked good.”

  “They were delicious,” Graves told her.

  “You checked them, right?” Garon asked.

  “Unpoisoned. Confirmed by my appraise,” Graves replied without missing a step.

  All told, it took an hour to wind through the hold. The tunnels got smaller and smaller as they went, until Graves was stooping full time and had to put on his helm to minimize the damage from collisions. Some of the tunnels were fairly dusty, and they passed by two guardposts, with suspicious eyes watching through stone slits as they did.

  “What ah they gahding foah?” Madeline wondered. “They didn’t even challenge us.”

  “They’re not here to keep people out of it; they’re here to keep watch out for things that come out,” Garon said. “Must be why the tunnels are barely dwarven size. If it’s a dungeon full of giants, no way they’d fit through here.”

  At last, they came to a final corridor. Beyond, the wind howled past a huge archway, built with curves and lines that were much cruder than the ones that filled the dwarven halls. Natural light, the first they’d seen in over a day, gleamed in from outside.

  And footsteps rang in the corridor behind them. “Hey!” Bazdra called, barely breathing hard as she ran up to them. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Hidon materialized from the shadows behind her, arms crossed, with a disapproving look on his face. “You do know where you are, right?”

  “Oh yes,” said Threadbare, glancing around from his perch on Pulsivar’s back. “We know it’s dangerous. We shall be very careful.”

  Hidon and Bazdra shared a look. “Is there any way we can talk you out of this?” Bazdra asked.

  “Nope,” Zuula said, folding her arms.

  “You have no idea how much of my time you’re wasting.” Hidon rubbed his eyes. “Fine, let’s get this over with quickly. Invite us in.”

  “What?” Threadbare said. This wasn’t the plan.

  “Invite us in. The King’s orders were to ensure your survival,” Bazdra ground out. “We know Jotunher, you don’t. We’ll even settle for half-shares.”

  “Hey now,” Hidon said. “Don’t go crazy there.”

  Threadbare looked at the groups and rubbed his head. “Ah. Garon, can you take them please?”

  The wooden minotaur thought it over. “I... suppose. I’ll have to... well, Fluffbear and Mopsy could transfer over to yours. It’ll mean that both groups are running without pets. On the upside we’ll both have a full seven.”

  The toys and their friends reshuffled, and Bazdra frowned. “You’re sticking me with the group that’s all golems? My party heals aren’t going to be much good there. I should go with the cats, and the human—

  “No, no, it will be fine,” Threadbare said. “He can heal himself, and Fluffbear will look after the c
ats. Please trust me, we’ve worked well together before.”

  “You’re sure?” Hidon squinted at Garon. “Because I only count six in Threadbare’s group. The two bears, the two cats, Mr. Graves, and Cecilia. She could shift over there easily enough.”

  “Oh, six, right, six,” Garon said. “Slip of my tongue. But no, no, it works better this way,” Garon said. “Besides, I’m a shaman and so’s mom. There’s enough healing to go around. We need you in a more tanky role,” he told them, as he led them forward, after inviting them into his party. “So, please tell me about your jobs and specialties, if you would...

  *****

  A few minutes after they departed, Jarrik heard Madeline’s voice whisper in his ear. “We’re in. You in position?”

  “Yeah,” he Wind’s Whispered back, keeping his back to the wall, and settling in for the long-haul. His camouflage and stealth skills, long-practiced these last five years, had let him slide past the auxiliary guard posts easily. And his Keen Eye was up, as he glanced up and down the hall, leather coat pushed back far enough that it wouldn’t creak and give him away.

  Now comes the hard part. Waiting.

  As it turned out, he didn’t have long at all to wait.

  After a few minutes, his ears twitched, as footsteps echoed down the corridor. He looked over to see a hooded figure run past, black beard flapping as he ran for the archway.

  That’s Hidon. But he just went by... Jarrik started to inhale as realization crashed in, then held his breath. Can’t make a sound.

  Hidon slowed anyway, stopped as he got to the archway, and glanced around. His gaze passed over Jarrik without registering and kept moving. Then a flash of steel as he pulled a dagger free, and he was gone.

  Well. That settles that. Jarrik drew one of his pistols, and checked the primer—

  —and barely had time to snap the chamber shut and freeze, as another set of footsteps pounded down the hallway.

  Silver hair trailing behind her, Gudrun ran like her life depended on it, hands holding her skirt up as her boots trampled the floor, puffing and panting.

  She too slowed as she came to the archway. Jarrik held his breath as she glanced around. Then a flash of steel, as she drew a pistol of her own, and she was gone into the dungeon.