Fat Barbarian: A Humorous Fantasy Adventure (Fat Barbarian Saga Book 1)

by Richard Hedley

  “That’s right,” said Mace. “Except it ain’t. I’m just going to call you ‘stupid motherfucker,’ motherfucker.”

  “Okay, fine. I didn’t call you bastard swords. I said you were bastards. What the hell is a bastard sword, anyway?”

  “Listen up, shitface. We’ve got two edges and a stabbing point. Get your shit straight and for sure, motherfucker, do not call me with a bastard sword,” said Mace. “I can deal if you call me a long sword, cause that’s just ignorant, like, confusing magazines and clips, but don’t call me a bastard or a broad.”

  “If you’re going to be around swords, you should understand that some swords, like broadswords, have one edge and aren’t good for stabbing. Bastard swords and long swords are similar in that they are used with two hands, like a great sword,” Aargh said. “A bastard sword is somewhere between a long sword and broadsword and you can use it with one hand or two, that’s why they call it a bastard sword. However, one-handed weapons also fall into distinct classes. An arming sword is a two edged, one-handed sword with a sharp tip, frequently used with a shield. A broadsword is just a cutlass that went to finishing school.”

  The barbarian sighed. “Let’s go kill the blue dragon.”

  Bardulf put the swords back down at his sides. Maybe they’ll shut up now that I’ve separated them, he thought. His hope dissipated after they were silent for a few minutes.

  "So… what's gonna happen after we do this shit,” asked Mace. "I was in a display case for a long fucking time. I don't know Jack anymore."

  "Well, I don't have a clue, I was stuck up in that castle floor. After we killed the red dragon, I stayed here. Guess, there’s something else for me to do,“ Aargh waited for a moment and continued. "You hear what happened to Skinny Pete?"

  "Last I heard, Jack turned the motherfucker into a mace. That's some serious shit, especially if you’re a rapier name is Skinny Pete."

  "Yeah, I wonder what he did to piss off Jack?” Aargh asked.

  "Rumor is Pete started to get cozy with a scabbard. Everybody goes to some scabbard at one point or another, but he started to become generous with his presence."

  "They say he was carrying on with one of the big guy’s magic scabbards,“ said Aargh.

  "It doesn't really matter, even if you're a rapier or a motherfucking katana, you don't mess with magic scabbards. That's something you do not do." Mace paused and continued. “I heard Jack did worse than turn him into a mace; he turned him into magic horseshoes and sent the motherfucker off to an old age home to fuck with the fossils."

  “That would be pretty cold," said Aargh. "At least he didn't get turned into a spatula."

  "I hate to interrupt this latest meeting of the sewing circle," said Bardulf. "But we're about to the blue castle and it's time to get to work."

  "Game face on," Aargh said.

  "Bring it on, motherfucker."

  Dragon Attack

  Princess Natalie walked in front of Skaal. He left his pike behind in favor of a giant longsword, which changed her thoughts about attacking him. The sword was huge, nearly as tall as she was. They didn’t find her to be enough of a threat to disarm her or take her buckler and they were right. It would take only a glancing blow to kill her.

  And how in all the Realms did this noisy creature sneak up on her, she wondered. It made as much noise as a company of soldiers. As she thought, she noticed a dozen dead Fosdickian soldiers on the side of the road. She stopped and stared at them.

  Most of the bodies had large wounds. One had an arm bitten off. Natalie knew it was the dragonmen who slaughtered them. In a blur of anger, she snatched a long sword from the ground and brought it around.

  The dragonman blocked her blow, stepped in, and pushed her to the ground. The Princess rolled backwards over the fallen soldiers and landed on her feet, sword in hand. Her enemy was upon her, sword arcing down in a killing blow. She grabbed her longsword half way up the blade and blocked the blow with the flat of the blade, then spun behind her foe in a flash, and smashed the monster's spine with the sword's pommel. The beast crumpled to the ground. She brought her blade around and thrust it into the foul creature’s back, again and again, exploring weak spots in its scales until she was certain the thing was dead.

  Panting, she looked at the dead dragonman. Respectable for her first actual combat, she thought. And her mother was right, the dancing lessons came in handy. At least the type the armors taught.

  She looked around the scene and saw one of the dead soldiers had a heavy crossbow. She used it to test the dragonman’s hide at a distance. Its scales proved to be ineffective armor. She could easily kill one from a distance. No surprise that the dragonman had lied to her. It seemed to be what dragons do, apart being large and scary.

  It was getting late and Princess Natalie was in no mood to let the other dragonman live through the night as she headed back toward the farmhouse.

  “You there!” bellowed Duke Farley at a gaggle of soldiers working on a scorpion bow. He stalked toward them to make sure they were doing things the right way. “How long till you’re ready to go dragon-slaying?”

  “Just one more test, m’lord,” said one man, who was too busy to stand up address the duke properly, not that either of them minded. Things like that are bad news in a fight. You don’t want the enemy to guess who is in charge. Though, come to it, the duke thought, being in plate armor is a clue that I’m important. No matter.

  “I’m not sure how I like this cabling though,” he continued. “It cuts our range.”

  “Range will be no good if the dragon takes wing, my man,” thundered Farley. “We’ve got to keep it on the ground and there can’t be a better way than to use the nasty barbs and a few heavy rocks. It can’t possibly fly then.”

  A man came running up. Duke Farley recognized him as Shires, a scout he’d sent to the village earlier to check on the dragon.

  “M’lord, something strange is going on near the dragon!” Shires fell silent. Duke Farley stared at him and made a 'go ahead' gesture with his hand. The man was still silent.

  “And the strange thing is…” Farley prompted. Shires was just like this. Farley suspected someone had yelled at him for talking too much when he was young or beat him or something. He never got upset because not saying too much could be a virtue.

  “There is a large wooden dragon beside the real dragon and the real dragon isn’t smoking,” Shires said as he removed his kettle hat and tucked it under his armpit. “And there's heaps of activity in the village.”

  “I need to know this because…”

  “Two things, m’lord,” he said holding up his right index and middle fingers. “First, it’s a green dragon and green dragons are known for smoking when they sleep. Second, they are sensitive when they sleep, so a bunch of villagers banging around doing things would wake it up and an awake green dragon is a pissed off green dragon.”

  “So you’re saying…”

  “Maybe there is something else going on. It might be talking with the villagers or something.”

  Farley rubbed his beard in thought. “It’s probably threatening them and issuing orders. What could it be up to?”

  Princess Natalie had just begun her trek back to the farmhouse when she heard two idiots behind her making so much noise she thought they might have guitars strapped to their feet. She ducked behind a tree to wait for them.

  “I’m not sure about that,” one man said in a reedy voice.

  “I am. She’s the one with the Yorkies,” the other man replied.

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s a sort of dog.”

  “I thought ‘dog’ was the only kind of dog.”

  “Well, it’s not. There are heaps of types of dogs. The dog you’re thinking of is a mutt.” Reedy voice seemed to be an expert on dogs.

  “Dog is not a mutt!”

  “Okay, fine. What sort of dog is he?”

  “I don’t know, but he isn’t a mutt. He’s a dog.”

  “You don’
t even know what a mutt is, do you?”

  “A kind of dog, I suppose.”

  “That’s just—”

  “Stop right there,” Natalie said as she stepped behind them, sword at the ready.

  “Oh, hello, Miss,” said the one didn’t know what a ‘mutt’ was. “We were just looking for you.”

  “In a good way,” a reedy voice said. “We watched you kill the dragonman and figured you were headed back to the Hendercram farm to deal with the other one. Figured we might help.”

  She regarded the two men. Reedy voice was tall with a huge soup catcher under his bottom lip. The other was shorter with a beard large enough to hide an arsenal. Both were dark haired and broad shouldered as the people of Farley typically are. Both carried well-used steel-banded clubs, a fine all-purpose weapon capable of handling most any foe.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I could use some help. Right now, I’m approaching from the East. I want you to circle around the long way and attack from the North. You'll need to wait for the right moment.”

  “How will we know when that is?” the bearded one asked.

  “I’m not sure, but you’ll know it when you see it,” Natalie replied. “We need to move. Go that way.” She pointed to the South.

  The men looked at each other, shrugged, and marched off.

  Natalie watched them walk away for a moment before continuing to the farm. The Hendercram farm, she reminded herself. Both her uncle and her father had taught her that it's best to personalize the people you are trying to defend. It was the best way to understand the cost of battle. She just hoped that she’d be able to dispatch the dragonman before those two wandered into the scene.

  When the princess arrived at the farm, her stomach immediately fell. The two idiots had ignored her and were climbing over the South East fence. They had their clubs over opposing shoulders and walked like they were back home, not in the backyard of a monster. The dragonman was on her side of the barn, looking around the corner at them. The monster was timing its ambush. Also, she was out of range by a hundred yards.

  The pair would be slaughtered.

  She ran down as quickly and quietly as she could. When she got within heavy crossbow range, she dropped and surveyed the scene. She was too late. The dragonman was walking toward the two fools, swinging his sword around his head. He would slice into the fool on his right first, his body would smash into the other idiot. It would be over before they even knew they were in a fight.

  She took aim and readied her first shot as they converged on each other. She didn’t have time to wait, so she shot her first bolt at the base of dragonman’s skull. If she hit, the worst that could happen was that he’d be distracted. As the bolt flew out, she rolled over to cock the weapon again, managing that just in time to hear the two men of Farley laughing and whooping.

  The dragonman was on the ground with two broken legs and a bolt through its shoulder. The two men stopped hitting it after a time. Even from a distance, she could tell the monster’s head was pulverized.

  Baels the Blue

  Blue Castle wasn’t as close as Bardulf had remembered. It should have taken about an hour to get there, but it was still in the distance.

  After a time, the Ramekin shifted both the swords into his left hand so he could make some adjustments to his impressive loincloth.

  “What the fuck are you doing, motherfucker? Do I look like I go that way?”

  “Mmmerfllefer!”

  “What?” said Bardulf as he put the swords back in each hand.

  “You just about put us together like — AGAIN, I don’t know, like you wanted us to kiss or something,” said Aargh.

  “Yeah, motherfucker. We don’t play that way.”

  “What?”

  “Look, Mr. Bardulf, it’s pretty simple. You tried to hold us in same hand, again, like we were, you know…”

  “I don’t know,” said Bardulf. “Like your swords and can't tell me what to do?”

  “No, motherfucker,” said Mace. “Like we were, you know, spoons or some shit. That’s just fucking insulting. Spoons.”

  “Is this a homophobia thing?” asked Bardulf. On other days, he might wonder about this, but today he'd rather sell the pair to the squirrels.

  “What's wrong with you, asshole? It’s a motherfucking respect thing.”

  “It’s about personal space, you see,” said Aargh. “Like what if someone took you and jammed up against someone else, like say your best buddy, whom you don’t want to get naked with, that is.”

  Bardulf wanted to rub his temple, but his hands were full of swords.

  “Look, you could put us on your back like you did with me,” said Aargh. “The problem is then it would be easy for the black dragon to steal us. He was made to find us once we’re together. Then he takes us away to the black castle or somewhere. Maybe another bar.”

  Bardulf decided that was a risk he could take and stopped to arrange a way to carry both swords on his back.

  “Oh, Mace, did he tell you about Drusilla?”

  “How the fuck would he do that and you not know about it? We’ve all been here since y’all sprung me from that frame job. What’s Drusilla?”

  “Not a what, but a… oh, wait. Yeah, she is kind of a what. She’s a wood nymph,” Aargh said. Bardulf thought he saw the red sword try to wink. “It seems she is also a wood nymph that Bardulf finds sexually attractive. He got some bark, if you know what I mean.”

  “Look at Big Bardulf! High five, motherfucker.”

  Bardulf looked at the blue sword and arched an eyebrow. Much to his surprise, the sword’s right cross guard twitched a little.

  “No hands, no high five,” Bardulf said. “Besides, what would I do with Aargh?”

  “All right. You’ve got a point, Big Bardulf,” said Mace. “Say, when are we going to see her again?”

  “I don’t know. What does it matter to you, anyway?”

  “If you can tap that, then I’ve got a good chance, too.”

  “Wow. I’m a barbarian and even I think that’s disrespectful,” said Bardulf.

  “How is that being disrespectful?” Aargh asked after a moment.

  “He’s objectifying her,” the barbarian said. “Making her into an object for his sexual desire.”

  “Wait just a minute, motherfucker. You are saying I’m ‘objectifying’ her like that’s a problem. Look here, I’m a sword. I’m a fucking object. If I’m referring to her like an object, that’s a goddamn compliment. She’s like me. How can that be disrespectful to say we’re the same?”

  Bardulf thought his hearing was getting defective, but maybe it was his nonsense alert firing. “Okay. Maybe she wouldn’t like being stabbed like that. Like you said, you’re a sword.”

  “Motherfucker, she… yeah, I see what you mean. I forgot about the whole sword thing for a minute.”

  When the swords were quiet for a moment, Bardulf put them on his back. When they protested, he told them not to worry. They continued in silence. After a time, the barbarian and his swords got close enough to see what was going on. Bardulf ducked out of sight because sometimes it's important to see them before they see you.

  He could see people milling about doing things in the castle. A retinue of guardsmen forming up as they approached, but they didn’t seem to be creating a formation to intercept him. Finally, as he got closer, Bardulf saw that there was a civilian crew unrolling a red carpet and the soldiers standing on either side of it. They were preparing to welcome him with honors, he thought.

  His barbarian instincts took hold and Bardulf snuck into the forest. He didn’t like approaching the castle like this without some idea of why they seemed to want to welcome him with honors. He crept through the forest, came up behind the crowd, and joined them from the rear.

  “Where do you suppose he is,” asked one of the rabble to no one in particular.

  “Who?” asked Bardulf, standing behind the man.

  “The fungent who was walking this way. We were told he was
some kind of big deal and we needed to show up and welcome him.”

  “I’ll be fucked,” said Bardulf. “You mean, you and all these people are waiting around for someone, you don't know who, and he’s disappeared?”

  “Yeah. What a shit nozzle.”

  A commotion got into motion around Bardulf. There was whispering. There was pointing. Soon, someone approached the man he was speaking with and whispered in his ear. His eyes grew wide with surprise and he turned around.

  “OhmygodOhmygodOhmygod!” he squealed and started jumping. “It’s really you! It’s Bardulf the Ramekin! Or should I call you Bardulf? OhmygodOhmygod! Can I have your autograph? I mean, if you know how to write.”

  The ensuing commotion got the attention of the blue dragon and his retinue, who made haste to welcome Bardulf.

  "Hail and welcome, mighty Ramekin,” exclaimed the blue dragon. "We know you have traveled long and far and faced many adversities. All of this is in service of completing your Adventure and we appreciate your work.”

  "Greetings, blue dragon," proclaimed Bardulf. "You are generous and wise, I have this blue sword and I'm told it is the only thing that can slay you. Yet I believe on this journey, I am not meant to slay you."

  The crowd murmured.

  "That is not the fate of you or the blue sword, Bardulf. The blue sword protects you from being killed while you are here. Without it, I would kill you where you stand. Unless you use your Icon first, that is. You have the blue sword and the red sword, those are needed to make the purple sword— perhaps the only thing that can harm the Sorcerer."

  The blue dragon turned and walked toward some people standing to one side of the crowd. The sky suddenly darkened, everyone looked up. A huge bat-like figure flew through the sky, blotting out the light as it passed in front of the sun.

  "What the fuck was that?" Bardulf asked.

  "The black dragon," said Aargh the sword. “He’s tracked us down and is going to try and steal us! This is awful.”