by Jeff Grubb
Toede quietly untied the horses and led them a short way from the oak. One of them whickered softly but followed without further complaint. Toede was about to saddle up and ride off when all the hellish Abyss seemed to rip open and dump its contents into his life.
The first thing he was aware of was the scream, or screams, that came from all sides. Blood-curdling howls that would have frozen the blood of a lycanthrope. Then they were all around him, huge creatures swarming over him.
Had Toede mounted up and tried to ride away, he would have gotten fifteen, maybe twenty feet before a dozen spears pierced him. He didn't have the chance anyway; he was immediately swept up by a huge set of furry arms, then thrown roughly on the ground. He heard the horses neigh in panic as the wind was knocked out of him.
Then three spear points pushed roughly on his chest.
Toede looked up into the faces of three large gnolls, their faces caked with reddish mud in lines and swirls. A larger gnoll stood behind them, bellowing.
"King of Little Dead Frogs!" shouted Charka. "Charka thought you starve by now!"
Kill me now, thought Toede, careful not to voice his desire.
Chapter 13
In which Our Protagonist makes threats he cannot carry out and promises he does not intend to keep, and also places his fate in the hands of greater powers, and is not surprised as to their performance.
The other gnolls looked at Charka, and the large gnoll barked something at them in some swamp-tongue that Toede could not follow.
Charka, draped in a broad swath of quilted armor that could have been used to make blankets for fifty kender, with a wide belt and sword hanging on the side, was more impressive now than before. A steel skullcap ornamented with a single blood-red gem was fitted between the gnoll's hyenalike ears.
Whatever Charka had said had its effect, for Toede was pulled up and frog-marched back to the oak. Other gnolls were holding Groag under spear-point guard. Toede noted the tatters of the bedrolls and decided that Charka's goons had cut his companion out, probably after Groag wrapped them tightly around himself in hopes that their attackers would ignore him.
There were about thirty gnolls, all told, dressed in quilted armor that was significantly more faded and less flashy than that worn by Charka. Charka got the best and the newest material, which indicated a stature not evident when they had first met.
The gnolls tossed Toede against the tree trunk next to Groag and leveled their spears on the pair of them.
"Friends of yours?" muttered Groag.
"We've met," said Toede quietly, then added, "I heard a noise and went to investigate."
"So you took the horses with you so they wouldn't get lonely," suggested Groag. Without looking at him, Toede could imagine the arch of his eyebrows.
Charka squatted in front of the two hobgoblins. "Charka wonder one question," he said. "Where get horses?"
Toede managed the broadest smile he could manage with a dozen well-armed gnolls around him, and asked, "Charka kill Bartha?"
Charka's smile widened in a happy grin that made Toede think of a duck-sated hunting dog. "Charka kill Bartha!" The gnoll's face immediately dropped back into a somber mode. "Where get horses?"
Toede hesitated as the gnoll spears lunged a few inches closer. Groag made a gurgling noise. The spears drew back slightly.
'They belong to some humans," said Toede in as neutral a fashion as possible. "They're loaners."
'They're the property of Chief Scholar Renders," Groag interjected. "We are under the humans' protection, and you'll be in great trouble if any harm falls to… Aurk!"
Charka started frowning the moment Groag started speaking, the furrow in his forehead growing craggier by the instant. He gave a hand signal, as one of the gnolls drove his spear into the wood by Groag's head, accounting for the "Aurk."
"I think they want me to do the explaining," said Toede quietly.
"I think you're right," gasped Groag, trying to force the blood back into his face by sheer mental effort. "Carry on."
"Human horses," said Toede, motioning at the two mounts for effect. When none of the gnolls proceeded to stab him for his actions, Toede tried rising to his feet. "Powerful humans," he added.
A few of the gnolls growled, but Charka gave them a dismissive chop of the hand. They silenced at once. Impressive. "Powerful humans?" asked Charka. "Muscles and swords?"
Groag made a rude snort despite himself, and Toede inwardly cursed for not having left the area five minutes sooner. Apparently Charka did not notice the snort. He asked, "Humans in forest of stone?"
Toede tilted his head to one side. "Hur?" he said, trying not to smile.
"Forest of stone!" said Charka loudly, then motioned with sharp-taloned, furry hands, vertically, to indicate trees. "Forest of tall rocks. Carvings. Forest of stone!"
"Ah," said Toede. "Forest of stone. Yes, humans in forest of stone."
Charka snarled. "Forest of stone taboo. All who see must die. Humans. Horses. You."
"I knew that was coming," muttered Groag. "Call it a premonition, but I just knew it."
"If you don't mind, I'm bargaining for our lives," Toede shot back.
"Go right ahead. You're doing a good job so far."
Toede moved his wish of departure up to ten minutes before the gnolls had arrived and said to Charka, "Charka not want to kill humans. Humans powerful wizards."
"Hur?"
"Wizards," said Toede, grasping for synonyms. "Magic-users. Magicians. Thaumaturges. Juju priests. Charlatans. Shamani…"
Something sunk into the gnoll's skull. "Juju? Humans have great juju?"
"Moby juju," nodded Toede. "Humans seek more juju in forest of stone. Angry if gnolls disturb them."
Charka rocked back on his heels for a moment, deep in thought. Toede could almost see the steam leaking out of his pointed ears from the stress the thought process was placing on his brain.
"Human in forest of stone… humans must die. Humans have great juju… humans kill gnolls." Toede saw the coin mentally flip. Charka smiled. "Charka think you lie, King of Little Dry Frogs. If humans have big juju, humans attack gnolls first."
"Incredible logic," noted Toede for Groag's benefit. To Charka he said, "Humans not care about gnolls. Humans care about forest of stone. Gnolls attack humans, humans care about gnolls. Humans kill gnolls."
There was another pause as Charka digested this last bit of information, pondering for a good two minutes. Toede imagined the two parts of that gnollish brain swatting the concept between them: sacred tradition versus a palpable fear of possible death. Then Charka leaned close to Toede and snarled. "Prove."
"Prove?" said Toede, surprised.
"Prove humans have great juju. Prove humans worthy to be in forest of stone." Charka shot a glance at the other gnolls. Toede saw they were nodding back, stern-faced.
Toede held his hands out, empty palms upward, "Well, gee, guys, I didn't pack anything with me…"
Several of the gnolls brought their spears around, but when Charka chopped the air they lowered them. They kept the spears pegged on Groag, however, Toede noted. Charka gave his "confused-dog" look, and Toede didn't wait for the "Hur."
Toede stepped forward a half pace and thumped himself on the chest. "King of Little Dry Frogs get proof. Get moby juju from human chief." As an afterthought, he put in, "From human chief Renders."
Charka was impressed by the name, at least. "Human chief name is Boils Flesh?"
"Great chief of juju, Boils Flesh." Toede nodded. "King of Little Dry Frogs go to Great Chief Boils Flesh, bring moby juju for Charka."
"When did we stop speaking a common language in this conversation?" muttered Groag, earning himself another mild poke with a spear.
Charka thought for a moment. Toede sighed deeply and added, "Or…" He paused for effect. "Charka kill King of Little Dry Frogs, and Great Chief Boils Flesh turn Charka to chutney." Toede was unsure if "chutney" was part of gnoll cuisine, but Charka got the point.
"What if King of Little
Dry Frogs go warn Great Chief Boils Flesh, so humans attack Charka here, eh?" asked Charka. "What if, "the gnoll added, "King of Little Dry Frogs just fly away?"
Toede smiled. "Charka keep friend of King of Little Dry Frogs as hostage. Kill hostage if King of Little Dry Frogs not bring moby juju back."
"No, you don't, damn you!" shouted Groag, rising to his feet in one motion and trying to charge Toede. "You're going run off on me… oof!" One of the gnolls had grabbed Groag around the waist and flung him full-force into the oak trunk. Groag hit the tree and slumped to the ground, silent.
Charka turned to Toede and said "Hur?"
Toede smiled reassuringly. "King of Little Dry Frogs' friend thinks he should go to Forest of Stone, talk to Great Chief Boils Flesh, risk anger of Boils Flesh instead."
Charka was impressed. "King of Little Dry Frogs' friend loyal."
'That he is," said Toede, smiling. "That he is." Then he added, "And by the way, my friend is carrying all my money. Could you fetch that pouch of coins for me?"
*****
In the end, the gnolls gave Toede the pouch and one of the horses. Charka told him (in his unique, preposition-less way) to return by dawn or else Groag would be killed. Charka went into some detail over the nature of gnoll ritual slayings, which impressed even Toede. It was surprising what a culture could come up with without the benefit of fire, cold steel, lead weights, or kender poetry.
Toede rode out from the gnoll encampment like a flying mammal escaping the Abyss, though as soon as he knew the flying hooves of his mount to be out of earshot, he slowed to a comfortable canter. Of course, dawn would come, he would be nowhere to be found, and Groag would regrettably perish. Regrettably, after a great deal of suffering and torture. Then the gnolls would move on to the human encampment in the gnolls' sacred rock garden, and, regrettably, rampage through them with a minimum amount of mercy.
All of this was regrettable in that Toede couldn't hang about to watch.
There was an off chance that Groag could convince Charka of Toede's escape earlier than dawn, but it was an off-off chance. Toede chuckled as he played out the possible conversation aloud.
"But I tell you he won't be coming back!" Toede imitated his subaltern's whiny voice.
"Too bad," replied Toede-as-Charka. "Charka start skinning you now. Hold hostage down, boys. Charka get rusty knife."
All in all, a win/win situation. Transportation, money, and elimination of all witnesses, without so much as bloodying his own hands. Earlier, Toede had spotted a western path that broke from the main route, not as well traveled, but still serviceable. That western path promised relief from gnolls, scholars, kender, assassins, Hopsloth, and Groag. All in all, a good day.
Except for a grumbling in his stomach, but that was brought on more by Groag's cooking than anything else. There was still some jerky in the saddlebags. He could probably find some farmstead or army post long before he hit Balifor, someplace where a few coins would wangle a hot meal and a decent bath.
These assurances did nothing for the present state of his stomach however. Toede leaned back and rummaged through the left saddlebag, looking for the jerky.
Instead, his fingers closed around a disk hanging from a chain.
He hauled it out to examine it, even though in the pit of his stomach he knew what it was the moment he touched it, and a sympathetic pain shot up from his belly, stabbing at his heart.
The disk had an engraved picture of Hopsloth on one side. On the other was a deep, crudely etched T, some lighter, spidery writing, and numbers.
It was the holy symbol he had pulled from the assassin in the Jetties back during his first reincarnation.
When, exactly, Toede had lost the device was unknown to the highmaster. Probably when we were jumping around trying to avoid being toasted by Gildentongue, he thought. But how would Groag have found it? Either in the heat of the battle, or perhaps in the burned debris afterward. More likely one of the scholars had found it near his smoking body.
Then why did the device have the hand-drawn T?
Toede held it up to the russet moonlight, tilting it to catch the faint illumination. To the lower left-hand side of the T was the date, about six months ago, give or take. And in the right-hand corner, more faintly inscribed in Groag's spidery hand, were the words: DIED NOBLY.
Live nobly, the shadowy figures had said, the mountain-high being and sea-wide creature. Well, if he needed proof when they came calling, perhaps this was it. Somebody had certainly mourned his passing this time, unlike the previous occasion with its festivals and general relief. He pictured Groag laid up in a cot with the scholars bustling around him, turning the disk over and over in his hands, finally inscribing it as a small memento to crystalize his feelings of regret and loss.
Groag would probably be telling the shadowy beings about these very feelings firsthand by the end of the day tomorrow, tops, after the flesh had been scoured away from his quivering form (Charka had been very explicit, and though gnollish vocabulary was limited, on the matter of death it was quite expansive). Of course, between now and then Groag might quite possibly change his opinion of Toede.
The pain in Toede's stomach flared, and he dropped the disk back into the saddlebag, finding a chunk of smoked beef in the process. He chewed it as he rode. The meat was the best thing that had landed in Toede's stomach for six months, but did little to abate the vast hunger there.
"Only a fool," Toede said aloud, presumably to the horse, "would fail to take advantage of this situation. To escape and start a new life, where one can 'live nobly' without danger of one's past biting one on one's backside."
The horse, respectful of its place in the scheme of things, said nothing.
"And," said Toede, "and… it's not as though Groag didn't have a chance to join me. No, we could have both been gone, have taken the western fork, and never have met the gnolls. He made his choice. I cannot deny the right of any creature to determine its own destiny, and verily, he determined his."
The horse remained silent, but it seemed an accusing silence, pregnant in its damning hush.
"Not to discount the influence of the gods," added Toede quickly. "Gods are important." That he said loudly enough so that, if any were resting in the trees among the slumbering squirrels, they would hear his affirmation. "But gods are subtle and show their works best in signs and portents. I mean, dropping a mountain on Istar was a definite message, if you follow my meaning."
The horse continued to impugn Toede silently.
"So indeed, if the gods did want me to hang about here, they would have given me an obvious sign, right?" Toede asked.
The horse refused to be drawn into Toede's line of argument. The branch to the western path appeared up ahead.
"So if the gods are paying attention," said Toede, "then it wouldn't be out of line to ask them for guidance. Correct? I mean, the words were "live nobly" not "prove your faith in us, whoever we are."
The fork was upon them. To the west lay freedom, to the south more problems than Toede wanted to think about.
He pulled back on the reins, and the horse halted. "So we have a decision to make, and need guidance, and are willing to leave it up to the will of greater powers. Should the mount turn west, we shall go west. Should it turn south, we will follow the trail to wherever it leads us." Toede eased his grip on the reins.
The horse did not move. Toede dug his heels in its sides to spur it forward, but still the horse did not move. Toede slapped its flanks with the ends of the reins, and even then horse did not move.
Toede pulled lightly on the right rein, the one that would lead the horse west, but the horse remained immobile. He pulled again, harder, then gave a firm tug. Nothing. Toede gave the slightest tug on the left rein, the one that would lead south to the scholars. The horse swung, as if it had been fixed on a pivot, immediately in that direction.
"Stupid horse," said Toede, realizing at once that the animal would rather travel a well-worn route than one never trod before. N
ot a fair test, all in all, he reasoned. Toede pulled the defaced symbol of the Water Prophet out of his saddlebags again and held it up in the moonlight. "Right then. Toede-side up, we go south. Hopsloth-side up, we go west."
He flipped the disk as best as he was able from horseback, the symbol spinning and dragging along its chain in a loose elliptical orbit. The flip carried it out of Toede's reach, where it landed among the debris of fallen leaves and dead ferns by the side of the path.
Toede squinted into the dark to see on which side the amulet had landed. Then, seeing the result, he snarled, and thought for a moment of just riding on anyway, of defying the coin-tossed decision influenced by the gods.
"Dark Lady in ribbons and bows," he muttered. "Probably a rock slide would fall on top of me if I went west anyway," and with that, he turned the horse south.
In the forest debris, the abandoned holy symbol shone in the crimson moonlight, the etching of the faceup T deep and visible from a surprising distance away.
Chapter 14
In which Our Protagonist heralds a warning, learns that some discoveries are best left undiscovered, and resolves to trust in his own instincts and abilities as opposed to those of greater powers.
They can make me come back, but they can't make me stay, thought Toede, guiding the horse back toward the forest of stone. By "they" he meant the gods, or the shadowing, shadowy beings, or whatever perverse creations were responsible for acts of fate and luck. A short mental list of true gods failed to reveal any whose personal province might be making his life miserable, but Toede felt there had to be one or two who were gripping their sides, trying to keep their intestines from bursting loose from the elation they felt at his ordeal.
It was nearly midnight. More than enough time to alert the camp and convince them to start running and running hard in the face of an imminent gnollish invasion. Unless the gnolls were willing to engage the scholars in a penmanship contest, there was little chance the humans would last more than fifteen minutes.