Shadow Blizzard

by Alexey Pehov

  “I didn’t want to upset you before I had to,” the goblin began cautiously.

  “Glo-Glo,” I began, speaking from the heart, “when were you going to tell me?”

  “This evening,” he replied promptly.

  “So how many times altogether do I have to go down into that darkness-damned Labyrinth?”

  The goblin hesitated and tried not to look at me.

  “So, how many?” I asked, determined to be pitiless.

  “The festival starts in mid-autumn and lasts for eight days.”

  “Eight days?” I repeated after the shaman, like an echo.

  So we had to entertain the Firstborn and risk our skins another seven times.

  “Well, if I’d told you about it this morning, just think what a state you’d have been in when we entered the Labyrinth!”

  “Eight days?” I still couldn’t believe in such an absolutely swinish twist of fate.

  “There, you see?” the goblin sighed. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

  “So tell me, has anyone ever managed to last that long?” Naturally, I asked the question rhetorically.

  “Actually, no,” the shaman replied reluctantly. “No one ever has. The longest is three days.”

  “Then what are we hoping for?”

  “Maybe I’ll be able to think of something.”

  “How did you manage to avoid the troublesome attention of the orcs during your first visit to the Labyrinth?”

  “A-a-a-ah…,” said the goblin, with a smug grin. “That time I escaped straight after the first run. There weren’t any pits back then, and the orcs did a poor job of guarding us. And bearing in mind that the orcs got truly plastered in honor of the festival, then in the distant halcyon days of my youth it was fairly easy to escape. Not like now.”

  “But that means the orcs will have more than a few drinks tonight, too.…”

  “Yes, but you and I can’t soar up into the air, and even if we could, that grille wouldn’t let us out.”

  At that very moment the grille slid to one side and Olag and Fagred looked down on us.

  “You run well, little monkeys. Bagard and Shokren are very pleased with you.”

  The orcs lowered a bag full of food and two flasks down to us.

  “Eat and build up your strength. You have to run again tomorrow.”

  The grille slid back into place, but Fagred still felt he had to remind us that he was keeping his eye on us.

  That evening we had a real feast. They’d given us heaps of food, all sorts of things. One flask was full of water, the other was full of wine.

  The orcs weren’t just sitting about doing nothing, either, and every now and then we heard singing and drum rolls. The rotten snakes were making merry and, basically, they had every right to. They weren’t the ones sitting a damn lousy pit!

  * * *

  “Pssst! Psssst! Hey! Harold, are you there?”

  Through my dream I could hear the hissing of a frantic skillet. I decided to take no notice of this extraneous noise and sleep a bit longer, but it was hopeless! The hissing carried on, and then it was joined by pokes in the ribs. That was Glo-Glo. I had no choice but to wake up.

  “What?” I asked the goblin.

  “There’s someone up there!”

  I looked up, but the clouds had hidden the stars and moon, and the night was dark, so there was no point in trying to make anything out. I heard that squeaky sound above me again.

  “Pssssst! Harold, are you there?”

  “Who’s tha— Kli-Kli, is that you?”

  “Well, at last!” the royal jester jabbered in delight. “I was beginning to think that flinny had lied!”

  “Are you alone?”

  “No, with Egrassa.”

  “Can you shift the grille?”

  I never thought I could ever feel so delighted. I almost launched into a dance!

  “No, Harold,” Egrassa replied. “There’s a lock on it. If we break it off, the orcs will hear. Do you know who has the key?”

  “Wait a moment! If I get your mittens off, can you shift the grille quietly?” I asked Glo-Glo, who hadn’t said a word all this time.

  “Yes.”

  “We don’t need a key. Have you got anything thin and sharp?”

  “I do! A nail!” Kli-Kli informed me.

  “Throw it to me!” I said happily, trying not to think about what the goblin would want a nail for on the march and whose boot he was planning to put it in when the time came.

  The nail was very, very small and very, very thin. It could have been made to order.

  “Have you found it?” a voice asked from above.

  “Yes, now wait.”

  “Get a move on! The orcs could turn up at any moment.”

  “Don’t rush me!” I hissed, and started desperately fiddling with the lock on Glo-Glo’s left mitten.

  The shaman waited patiently.

  “How much time is there before it starts getting light?” I asked him in a quiet voice.

  “About two hours…,” he replied just as quietly. “Maybe a bit more. It will start to rain in about ten minutes.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Shamans have to know when it’s going to rain.”

  “Like frogs?” I asked with a stupid giggle.

  Was it my imagination, or was the goblin really smiling in the darkness? Just at that moment the lock gave a gentle click and the shaman took the mitten off. I started on the other lock.

  “If it starts to rain and the alarm hasn’t been raised, we have an excellent chance of covering our tracks.”

  “And if that doesn’t work?”

  “Imagine what the Firstborn will do to us for ruining their festival after they sober up.”

  I gave an involuntary shudder, but then the second lock clicked. Now Glo-Glo was free of his mittens.

  “That’s great,” he muttered. “Get back against the wall and tell your friends to move away from the grille.”

  “Egrassa! Kli-Kli!”

  “Yes? How did it go?”

  “Fantastic! Get away from the grille. About ten yards! There’s going to be a bit of conjuring!”

  “But you…”

  “Kli-Kli, for once just don’t argue!”

  “But…”

  “We’re moving,” said Egrassa.

  The elf probably just grabbed Kli-Kli by the scruff of the neck and dragged him away. In the darkness I couldn’t see what the goblin was doing, but a wind suddenly started humming in the pit, then it darted upward, and the grille went flying off and up into the sky without making a single sound.

  “That’s all,” Glo-Glo sighed. “Call your friends and get them to hoist our backsides out of here.”

  “Won’t it fall back down on our heads?” I asked. I must admit, I thought the demonstration the old man had given was marvelous.

  “Don’t worry, my boy.”

  Then the ladder was lowered down into our pit, and I clambered out first. At the top I was grabbed by a pair of strong hands and there it was—the surface of the earth. There was much more light up here than down below, and I could make out the contented faces of Kli-Kli, Alistan Markauz, and Egrassa.

  “Alive, thief?”

  “Yes, milord.”

  “That was some conjuring trick you just did!” Kli-Kli jabbered. “Whoosh, and it went flying up into the sky! I couldn’t believe my eyes!”

  “I’m not alone,” I warned my rescuers, and just then Glo-Glo appeared. “This is the venerable Glo-Glo, a shaman.”

  “Oi!” Kli-Kli squeaked when he saw my friend, and for some reason or other, he hid behind the elf.

  “Pleased to meet you,” Milord Rat said with a nod. “And now, if nobody has any objections, let’s get away from here before the orcs turn up.”

  “They’ve got the Horn,” I announced.

  “Not anymore,” Egrassa contradicted me, and handed me my bag.

  “But how?” I asked, unable to believe my own eyes.
>
  “The flinnies made a special effort. For that ring you gave them they’re indebted to us to the grave,” the elf explained.

  “And Shokren?”

  “What Shokren?”

  “The shaman who had my bag,” I explained.

  “He got an arrow in the throat,” Milord Alistan said, and I felt delighted. “So we’d better get away from here before they raise the alarm.”

  I didn’t ask them how they’d managed to steal into the heart of an orc village, then kill the shaman and take the bag with the Horn, all without being noticed. And I also tried not to think about the fact that they’d saved the Horn first, and then me.

  “Follow me, but quietly,” Egrassa warned us, and set off.

  I followed straight behind the elf, but Kli-Kli overtook me and installed himself in front of me. Glo-Glo and Alistan brought up the rear. We could see fires burning somewhere on the edge of the village and hear singing. Eel rose up out of the tall dry grass like a phantom. He noticed me and gave a sight nod, then looked Glo-Glo up and down in surprise, but didn’t say anything until Alistan Markauz asked him, “All quiet?”

  “Yes, but these two were going toward the pit, so I had to deal with them.”

  I saw the two dead bodies now, and I couldn’t resist going closer. I was right. Olag and Fagred. Both killed with throwing knives borrowed from Kli-Kli.

  “Was there any noise?” Milord Alistan asked anxiously.

  “They never knew what happened,” Eel said with a chuckle.

  Glo-Glo spat juicily on Fagred’s body.

  “Everyone into the trees!”

  We crossed the clearing at a run and took shelter under the sleeping maples. Two short figures detached themselves from tree trunks.

  “I told you they’d do it, beard-face!”

  “And if we hadn’t been stuck here in the forest, it would have been done even better, hat-head! Cheers, Harold! I haven’t seen you for ages! Ugh! You’ve grown yourself a beard, just like me! And who’s this with you?”

  “Looks like a goblin,” said Deler, moving closer.

  “I couldn’t stand another jester!” Hallas groaned, but Egrassa promptly told them both to shut up.

  Something rustled through the leaves of the maples and the first drops of rain fell on my face.

  “We need to get away, honorable sirs, and get away quickly!” said Glo-Glo, taking the initiative.

  “So now a goblin’s going to tell us what to do!” Hallas grumbled.

  “We should go east now,” the old shaman continued as if he hadn’t heard. “As soon as we get past the cliffs, we can walk along the stream, and I can try to confuse our tracks.”

  “Agreed!” said Egrassa—for some reason he trusted the goblin straightaway. “Will you show us the way?”

  “Yes, let’s go.”

  We moved deeper into the wet forest. The rain whispered a lullaby to the leaves. It was wet, cold, and very dark. I was walking behind Hallas, so I didn’t notice when Mumr joined the group. He simply appeared beside me, gave me a friendly punch on the shoulder, and hurried on ahead to report to Alistan.

  “Eel,” I called to the Garrakian walking behind me. “Didn’t the orcs set any sentries for the night?”

  “We took out five of them round the perimeter, but otherwise things were quiet,” Eel replied. “What would they be afraid of in their own home, and at the start of the festival? I think without it we wouldn’t have got you out of there so easily, never mind the Horn.”

  “The flinnies told us everything,” said Kli-Kli, appearing beside me. “About the Horn and about you.”

  “Is that ring worth so much to them?”

  “Yes. And by the way, we had to hurry to get here in time. Galloped all the way to rescue you, and you haven’t even said thank you!”

  “Thank you, Kli-Kli.”

  “Don’t mention it,” the jester replied magnanimously. “I’m very glad you survived, Dancer in the Shadows. Wordofonner.”

  “Me, too.”

  “By the way, how did you come to meet him?” the goblin asked, nodding toward Glo-Glo, who was walking at the front.

  “We ran through the Labyrinth together.”

  “Aaaaah,” the goblin drawled in surprise, and left me in peace for a while.

  After that we walked on without speaking. Glo-Glo kept pushing up the pace, and sometimes we had to run after him. The rain kept falling, getting stronger all the time, and I wrapped myself tighter in the jacket of the newly deceased Fagred, may a h’san’kor devour his bones! We walked for an hour without any rest, and I imagined what it must have been like for the warriors who had rushed halfway across Zagraba to help me, and were now running away from the orcs with me. Just as it started to get light, we left the area of the old cliffs and found ourselves beside a very wide stream that babbled merrily. Our path now lay along its banks. About twenty minutes later Egrassa asked Glo-Glo to stop and raised his hand to ask for silence.

  “What’s going on?” I asked Kli-Kli.

  “Shhh,” he hissed at me.

  Like everyone else, I started listening to the morning silence and the sound of the rain. And eventually I heard that other sound, too. It almost merged into the rain, so I didn’t realize what it was at first.

  Boo-oom! Boo-oom! Booo-oom!

  Very faint, barely distinguishable—the rumble of the orcs’ war drums, sounding the alarm.

  “So they have noticed the pit’s empty and the shaman’s turned his toes up!” Hallas said, and spat.

  “We have to hurry.”

  “How can we hurry any more, Harold?” Deler grumbled.

  “Go in under the trees, I’ve got to do a bit of work here,” said Glo-Glo.

  Milord Alistan was about to object, but Egrassa shook his head. The count frowned in annoyance, but decided to follow the elf’s advice.

  By this time the rain had changed to a fine drizzle, which made things a bit more pleasant, and the trees at least offered some sort of protection. Everyone walked away from the old goblin and started watching as he twirled like a top, waving his arms about and stirring up the leaves. All this went on for quite a long time, and Milord Alistan started getting a bit nervous—and so did all the others.

  “How long are we going to watch the old crackpot prancing about?” Lamplighter asked when he couldn’t take any more.

  “He’s not an old crackpot,” Kli-Kli snapped. “He’s Glo-Glo, one of the very greatest shamans of our time!”

  “So how do you know?” Hallas sneered.

  “I just know, that’s all!” Kli-Kli said sulkily, and stared down at his boots. “And by the way, he happens to be the keeper of the great shaman Tre-Tre’s Book of Prophecies.”

  Boo-oom! Boo-oom! Boo-oom! The orcs’ drums sang faintly in the distance.

  “We have to be sure they don’t overtake us, milord!” Now it was the patient Eel whose nerves were feeling the strain.

  “Oi!” Kli-Kli squealed and put his hands over his eyes.

  Lamplighter swore. Everybody stared at what Glo-Glo had done. And there was something to stare at! The goblin finished casting his spell, and for as far as we could see, all the leaves fell off all the trees and hung in the air. Then they were joined by the leaves that had been lying quietly on the ground.

  And what came after that was really strange—I had the impression that thousands of hands started tearing up the poor leaves and didn’t stop until every leaf had been reduced to a hundred little pieces. In another instant they were transformed into thousands and thousands of winged creatures. A thick, dark cloud rose up and hung, trembling, above the forest. And then every part of this vast cloud started to grow, and grew until it reached the size of a large fist.

  “May the gods save us!” Hallas exclaimed, trying to shout above the droning roar.

  “They won’t!” Eel shouted.

  And then the goblin waved his hand in the direction of the rumbling drums and the cloud of magical hornets went darting away. There were thousands a
nd thousands of them, and it really was frightening. One of the hornets broke away from the cloud and flew to us. I got a very clear look at its impassive, glowing silver eyes, its shaggy black and yellow belly, and fearsome purple sting.

  We only moved again when the drone of hornets’ wings had faded into the distance.

  “Well, what kind of leaves do you call those?” Hallas blurted out, looking at Glo-Glo warily.

  “I’m glad you liked it, gnome,” said the shaman, scowling wearily as he walked over to us. “I spent a week preparing that spell, so I was curious to see how it would work out, myself. Now I have to rest for half an hour. You don’t need to hurry anymore. The Firstborn will be too far busy to think about you. Gnome, do you have any water?”

  Hallas hastily held his flask out to Glo-Glo, who took a mouthful, handed the flask back, and said, “Everyone take a stroll in the rain for half an hour, and I’ll sit here under a tree and recover my strength.”

  Egrassa agreed with the goblin again, and we walked off, leaving the shaman alone. Without its leaves the forest was naked, and it seemed colder.

  “Did you see that?” Deler asked Lamplighter in amazement.

  “Did you? I wouldn’t change places with the orcs for all the vessels of Sagra.”

  “I told you he was the great Glo-Glo!” said Kli-Kli, with his eyes staring wildly. “Be thankful he didn’t turn you into worms!”

  Hallas gave the goblin a frightened glance. Glo-Glo was sitting with his eyes closed. He looked as if he was asleep.

  “He is a very powerful shaman. The most powerful I have ever seen. To work the Hornets of Vengeance would have taken five of our First Ten sorcerers,” the elf told Milord Alistan in a low voice.

  As usual, the count nodded without speaking, and sat down under the nearest maple.

  “I don’t think we’ll lose anything by waiting for him to recover.”

  “Have you noticed the drums have stopped?” the jester yapped from under his hood. We listened. He was right. Zagraba was totally silent, not a sound apart from the cautious babbling of the stream trying not to attract the great shaman’s attention. A very interesting little thought was gradually taking shape in my mind. Supposing that …