"You have a visitor,” said the captain, terror wilding his eyes and disbelief trembling his voice.
"You're off your head. How much grog have you drunk?"
"Not nearly enough.’ The captain pointed back towards the tent with a quivering finger. “He's in there."
"Who are you talking about?"
"Him."
Ahnorr's confoundedness cleared and he paled too. “Get this tub moving west,” he ordered the captain, who was only too willing to busy himself with sailing chores.
"Up off your backsides, you lazy pack of bilge rats!” he yelled at his snoozing crew. “Light some lamps. Raise the anchor. Man the oars and be quick about it. Once we're back in Bornae Strait unfurl the sail. Steersman—hard a port! Look lively now. I want us in open water before daybreak.’”
Hitching up his weapons belt, the corsair moving sluggishly beneath his feet as the deckhands went about their tasks after jolting awake, Ahnorr commanded Robannur, “You're with me—and bring that bugle,” before ducking into the tent. Dathok, uninvited, lurched after them.
The inside of the tent stank of mold and watered down rum. The captain's cabin was a study of improvised crudity: an A-frame of stretched canvas erected over the sunken stern quarterdeck to shelter a dank mattress and blanket, an uncorked jug of rotgut, a padlocked sea chest, and a guttering whale oil lamp. Squished into that draughty space, the three Goblins crowded around the flickering flame and the halo of faint yellow it cast.
"There's nobody in here,” complained Robannur. He eyed the chest interestedly. “Does that box contain my gold? If so, don't trouble the captain for his key. I won't be needing it.” Robannur waggled his fingers and sidled past the chief of the Grizzlies. There was no lock made that could not be picked by a professional thief of his caliber.
"The Horn of Dunderoth first, my greedy thief."
"I told you on the beach, Ahnorr, after I get my money."
Ahnorr tapped Robannur on the shoulder. “I didn't say a word."
The sputtering lamp flared with a reddish tint as a ghostly face materialized. Old and bearded, it had the piercing eyes and look of a hunting bird of prey.
"Nice of you to drop in, Omelchor,” welcomed Ahnorr. “These surprise visits are such a joy."
The disjointed head of the spectral wizard glowered at Ahnorr and the two lesser Goblins shrank away from the targeted potentate. “I'm not here to be chatty, unless you care to explain the intolerable delay in getting my horn to me."
"Not especially,” said Ahnorr, responding with the right note of humility. It was unwise to anger a wizard without a conscience.
"He has the horn?” Omelchor asked his right-hand Goblin, ignoring Robannur completely.
"Lock, stock, and quarrel."
Overcoming his initial shock at the magical intrusion, Robannur studied the floating head and construed that this knee-high apparition, not the head of the Grizzlies, was his actual employer. “Omelchor himself, is it? I've heard of you. You're a little short in person."
The bodiless head rotated to regard the thief. “And you must be Robannur. I see your reputation for wisecracking wasn't exaggerated.” Omelchor gazed covetously at the package he was carrying. “Neither was your renown for thievery."
"You get what you pay for. Speaking of which...."
"Show it to me."
Robannur complied and unwrapped the Horn of Dunderoth for a second time.
"Give it to Ahnorr,” commanded the wizard.
"Not just yet. I'm getting tired of waiting for my gold and my fee just doubled."
The potentate drew in a sharp intake of breath. The thief was playing with fire and risked getting burned.
Robannur felt he was in a position to bargain further and said so to the glaring wizard-head, patting the pearl-grey horn. “This trinket must be worth a whole lot more if a wizard wants to get his hands on it. I originally figured that Ahnorr wanted me to perform this daring theft so that he could gloat about the Grizzlies sticking it to the Elves, maybe even blow a tune to shake up the Elks. But there's more to it. That's your own affair, Omelchor, but it is gonna bump up my price to sixty full govreans."
Ahnorr was livid. “Double is only forty govreans!"
"Not after you add my extra ten pieces. Thirty times two is sixty in my scroll of sums."
"This is highway robbery,” spat the Goblin leader.
Robannur was genuinely insulted. He possessed far more finesse than any common highwayman. “Tell your middleman to take a hike, Omelchor. From now on I deal straight with you."
Ahnorr was in the process of reaching for his swords when Omelchor brought him up short with a harsh word. The slighted potentate restrained his anger reluctantly.
"I like your daring, Robannur,” mused the wizard. “How would you like an entire shipload of gold? You've earned it."
"What's the catch?"
"Give the horn to Ahnorr. There are no other strings attached.” Omelchor's transparent eyes glowed with an eerie milky light and the thief was compelled to obey. “Hold on to the horn tightly,” the wizard told his pet Grizzly. “Dathok, grab on too.” Puzzled by the order, the shaman nonetheless did as instructed.
"My gold,” Robannur reminded the evil spellcaster, unsure why he had handed the horn over so readily but wanting his payment forthwith. “Where is it?"
The phantom face of Omelchor smirked maliciously. “At the bottom of the ocean. Go dive for it.” He began muttering something unintelligible.
Robannur's finely honed instincts as a thief served him well in what happened next. Constantly attune to danger, he made a frantic dash for the tent flaps as the musty air came alive with a vibrant hum. Omelchor's translucent head vanished with a callous laugh, along with Ahnorr and Dathok sharing possession of the Horn of Dunderoth. The thief blundered into the captain who, despite his misgivings, had been eavesdropping on the conversation in his quarters.
"Abandon ship!” Robannur yelled at him, grabbing the other's shoulders hurtfully to underline his urgency, before letting go and racing over the width of the cedar deck to dive overboard in between two startled oarsmen.
The longship's master was puzzling over his passenger's bizarre behavior when a fireball appeared high in the western heavens, plummeting down toward the sea, fronting a weaving smoke trail behind which came the loudening whoosh of scorched air. Too late the captain realized his doom.
"GET TO THE LONGBOATS!” he screamed at his startled sailors.
Neither he nor his pirates got that far. The flaming missile, easily the size of a wagon, smashed through the deck planking of the fated ship just ahead of the forty-foot tall pine mast and literally exploded. The mast shattered into a million toothpicks as the hull, bearing the brunt of the impact, broke in two to the torturous sounds of splintering timbers and boiling water, the superheated missile turning the surrounding sea to steam. The Skua Raider, pride of the Urcharrbi fleet, quickly sank like a stone, taking her captain, crew and passengers alike to a watery grave, marked only by chips of blackened wood and the odd charred body part floating on the rippled surface of the fired sea.
—
The blurry world shifted back into focus.
Ahnorr, to his credit, bounced back from the abrupt translocation remarkably swiftly once the indistinct grayness of his surrounds sharpened into the familiar silhouettes of dark trees. “I hate it when Omelchor does that,” he complained to Dathok.
The shaman did not recover quite so fast, his hazed mind reeling from the dramatic exposure to wizardry. The magic he practiced was one of spiritualism, not spellcasting, and Omelchor's casual and cold-hearted use of enchantments always shocked him. Giddy, Dathok slumped to the ground, maintaining his white-knuckled grip on the Horn of Dunderoth.
Prying the stolen horn away from his dazed shaman, who fell backwards to lie gasping for air, Ahnorr took a long, hard look around. The shadowy tract of woodland lay shrouded by the cape of night, utterly silent, but the overpowering pine scent of conifers betrayed
their locale. Omelchor had transported his minions 1,000 leagues northwest to Darkling Forest in the blink of an eye.
"But where exactly in the wood are we?"
"About a day's walk south of Ufan."
Ahnorr whirled, not bothering to draw his swords. Expecting to find Omelchor waiting for them, he was not disappointed. What did surprise him was the wizard not being there in the flesh but still an unattached, see-through head bobbing in an aura of magical redness.
"It would have made more sense to zap us directly to Grihaloecke,” reasoned the potentate, careful not to sound accusatory. Omelchor never took criticism, even constructive comments, well.
"Not when you're bound for Onayl,” rejoined Maldoch's opposite.
"Wolf territory? Not on your life!"
"Swallow your pride and get moving,” commanded Omelchor. “You'll be entrusting the Horn of Dunderoth to the Wolves."
"There's no way I'm surrendering that sort of power to Conerth and his pack. Are you forgetting the two thousand years of bad blood between our tribes?"
Omelchor had not. Goblins were legendary for holding a grudge, the Grizzlies undisputed champions at it. Way back in the First Epoch, before Carnach officially came into being, Onayl approached the six-year old settlement of Grihaloecke for support in its bid to depose the then dominant Otter Clan. Chiggar, founder of the Grizzlies and greedy for wealth and power, eagerly formed the alliance, the result of which saw Surrid defeated in a series of vicious clan battles. The Wolves then traitorously turned on their bear-totem allies and crushed them in order to be the unchallenged architects of the infant Goblin nation.
"Betrayal runs strongly in Goblin veins, Ahnorr. Or had your own treachery slipped your mind?"
That prompt made Ahnorr fume. Thirty years earlier he had single-handedly overturned the Grizzly chieftainship, cleverly setting up his predecessor for an unrecoverable fall from grace and power that ended with a lynch mob stringing up the outmaneuvered potentate—at the urging of Omelchor. “You strongly suggested that I leave Ghranu out on a limb."
"And for good reason,” the wizard admitted, unrepentant. “I saw your potential back then. Ghranu always had trouble seeing beyond the end of his nose, but you take in the big picture. You trusted me then by sacrificing your leader and I delivered on my promise to make you the new Grizzly Potentate. Don't get short-sighted on me now. Onayl hasn't jumped on the bandwagon for my plans to penetrate the East and I want all of the clans onboard. For them to join us Grihaloecke must mend some fences. The first is to welcome the Wolves back as pack brothers."
"That sort of ruins my plans for wiping them out after we mine Carallord. Pity. But why give the Elf horn to them?"
"Maratornuk is best placed to assail Northwood if called upon. They'll need help getting through Frelok Pass when the time for action arrives and if that happens to come from a trumpet-blaring Wolf it'll please me no end."
Ahnorr understood perfectly. The wizard wanted to rebuild two burnt out bridges in the one go, for Onayl had also fallen out with the deer clan of Maratornuk during the last century of the First Epoch. In actuality it had been the other way around, but perhaps that was understandable. Since when did Elks get along with Wolves.
"I didn't know you cared, Omelchor."
"I don't. The only way to soundly thrash the Eastern Realms is to merge this Goblin zoo into a single fighting force and that can't be done while you're still at each other's throats."
That made sense to Ahnorr. What did not was what he guessed had transpired down in Murant Basin after his unscheduled departure. “What happened to the boat I chartered?"
"I was wondering when you'd get around to asking.” With a perfectly straight face Omelchor claimed, “The Otters don't build ships like they used to. She sprung a leak and went down. You're lucky I was there to rescue you."
Not buying that for a second, the potentate surmised, “No witnesses, eh?"
"That's why I favor you, Ahnorr. You have the smarts."
"My men?"
"Drowned, if they weren't burnt to a crisp first. Don't worry, you've got plenty of replacements."
"Not for Robannur I haven't. An arrogant son of a rattorn, he was the best damn thief in Terrath. He showed that by lifting this precious horn right from under the noses of the Treesingers. We might well have made use of his talents in the future."
"I doubt it,” said the wizard. “Anyhow, what's done is done."
"Sure is. Sinking that big canoe will place a serious strain on relations with Surrid."
Omelchor scoffed at that recrimination. “Lyngorr knows what's good for him and won't make waves. He needs the continued friendship of the Grizzlies to keep his clan afloat."
"I think you went overboard, Omelchor.” The indictment, though tentative, was there.
The red nimbus the spellcaster's head floated in turned an angry orange. “Remember who your addressing, bear-man. I'm your boss. Everyone is expendable, even you Ahnorr."
"You won't obliterate me,” the potentate said confidently. “We need each other too much. We both have mutual designs on the East. This arrangement of ours is not one of master and slave, but a partnership beneficial to all concerned. Bear in mind that."
The glowing head grew yellow edges. “Have a care, or perhaps I'll unleash my Norg'kthar on your people if you get too uppity."
Ahnorr backtracked. He had enough on his plate planning a sneaky campaign against Dwarfs without having to contend with rampaging Ogres. “I thought the idea was to abolish all this infighting,” he said by way of placation to the offended wizard.
It worked. Omelchor's pulsing head changed back to its normal hue. “Be on your way, Grizzly chief. The sooner the eight clans are properly allied, the sooner our armies can practice commando techniques. It's taken thirteen years to get this far. I'm not prepared to wait a decade more to implement my scheme. The comeuppance of the Eastern Realms is long overdue."
"If you're sure.” Ahnorr still sounded dubious.
"I'll tell Conerth you're coming,” continued Omelchor, “and to grant you safe passage to Onayl on pain of death. As proof of your good faith you'll journey alone."
Ahnorr glanced at the woozy Dathok. “What of him?"
"Send your shaman home. Carlaw could do with some spiritual support in controlling the clan while you are away."
"Can't Dathok be the errand boy? I'm not keen on leaving my son in charge of Grihaloecke for very long. He's not entirely ready for leadership."
"Carlaw's more than ready for command. Grant him the experience."
The potentate shuddered, as if someone had just tramped over his grave. The unsettling feeling of being made redundant lingered afterwards.
"Rouse that sack of bones you call your adviser and get yourselves moving,” Omelchor ordered him. “There are a thousand things left undone and not enough time to do them."
"Such as?"
"The Otter's have to be whipped into shape to redouble their shipbuilding efforts. I've got to take time out to end a spat between the Ravens and the Lynxes, not to mention hatch a plot to subvert the Gnomes. Planning a takeover of the world is just one headache after another!"
"You have my sympathies,” muttered Ahnorr. He was surprisingly sincere. Orchestrating the burgling of Carallord was even more formidable a task than the ransacking itself was going to be.
"And then there's that goody two-shoes brother of mine,” added the burdened wizard. “Who knows what mischief Maldoch has been up to in the two years since that mysterious episode in Alberion. I never did get to the bottom of that overspill of magic. That crafty old sod has been keeping a low profile and is no doubt up to no good."
The Goblin leader kept quiet. Not professing to understand wizards, he upheld no real desire to change that. They had their uses and that satisfied him. Quarrelling spellcasters were none of his business.
"But those items can go on the backburner for now,” decided Omelchor. “I first have a theft of my own to conduct."
; "Robannur should've been kept alive then,” Ahnorr delicately admonished. “What are you going after?"
"A book."
Ahnorr laughed ... politely.
"Not just any book.” Omelchor elaborated. “Even if you could read, this one wouldn't interest you—it's not a picture book. I just have one small problem."
"What's that?"
The wizard knitted his bushy brows in vexation. “I've yet to pinpoint the place I need to steal it from."
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Chapter Thirteen
The skiff bobbed on the choppy water. Garrich shipped his oars and let the flat-bottomed boat glide to a halt, bucking the frothy waves of the black, undulating waters of Fragmere. It was late in the month of Rill, the blustery autumn wind whipping the normally oily surface of the lake into an outright frenzy. The weather conditions were perfect for testing Parndolc's latest theory.
Looking back at the island castle in the near distance, the Goblin anxiously scanned the overcast backdrop and found the steely sky empty. He immediately relaxed and lounged against the square stern of the rowboat, idly trailing a finger in the agitated lake water. His gaze never strayed once from Earthen Rise however.
In the two years since taking refuge with the wizard fraternity, the orphaned westerner had done a lot of growing up. Body-wise, Garrich filled out in all the manly places but remained gallingly short. Parndolc wittily called him ‘knee-high to a Troll'. The seventeen year old now sprouted facial hair proper, though the black fuzz framing his acne scarred jaw line could hardly be labeled a beard. He also exhibited a newfound maturity, accepting his role as the untested hero of Terrath and whatever trials that held in store for him. He chucked out any notion of a career in the professional soldiery of the Royal High Army early on, considering what he was and the certainty of having a price on his head, while facing the brigands responsible for Tylar's demise brought home to him the boyish nonsense of considering jobbing as a sword for hire. If he was destined to be the champion of the East, then so be it. That meant resuming his sword practice every day religiously at dawn and keeping his well oiled blade at his side constantly. Even now it was lying close at hand in the bottom of the skiff. Tylar would have been proud.
Wizard's Goal Page 20