by Robert Bevan
"I'm only half-orc," said Cooper.
The man's squinty eyes went round. "Bucky, Micah!" As quick as a flash, Julian found himself staring up at the points of two crossbow bolts aimed right at his face. Beyond them were the faces of two younger men. Their features betrayed a close blood relationship to the driver. No doubt his sons. "We don't want no trouble, hear?"
Julian stretched his arms out even wider, attempting to demonstrate that he couldn't be any less threatening. He twisted his head around to Cooper and mouthed the words "Shut the fuck up!" He turned to face the wagon driver again. "We don't want trouble either, sir. Honestly, we mean you no harm. We would only like to inquire about where you come from."
"What business is it of yours where we come from?" The old man spat on the ground again.
"Your personal affairs do not concern us," said Julian. "We simply require knowledge of the terrain in the direction from whence you came."
"Bucky," said the driver. "If'n he don't shut up all that fancy talk, you go on an' shoot him, hear?"
"You got it, Paw."
"Be clear now, boy," said the driver. "Just what is it you want?"
"I'd like you to take a look at this map for us." Julian shook the rolled up parchment in his hand.
"Micah, hop down an' get that map."
One of the younger men hopped down from the back of the wagon. The remaining son steadied his crossbow on Julian, as if daring him to try anything.
The one called Micah took the map out of Julian's hand and passed it up to his father.
The white whiskered man dug in his satchel until he found a small lens. He held the parchment at arm's length and scanned it with his lens. "The hell kinda map is this?"
"A treasure map?"
The driver glanced up at Bucky, who was peeking at the map over his shoulder. They shared a snicker.
"And what do you reckon this is a map of?" asked the driver.
"The lands south of Cardinia?" said Julian.
The old man flashed a wide grin. Two of the five teeth Julian could see were gold, and one was rotted away to a brown nub. "I think you boys done been had."
Julian lowered his hands and put them on his hips. He looked back at Cooper. "So there are no pyramids down that way?"
"We're from the south, boy," said the driver. "We're just headed up to Cardinia on a matter of business. I can assure you there ain't no pyramids down that way."
"How 'bout volcanoes, Paw?" said Bucky.
The old man tipped back his head as if in thought. "I don't seem to recall any volcanoes either. What do you think, Micah?"
"I think these fellers got about as much good sense between the lot of 'em as what the gods gave a bag of dog shit."
"That was uncalled for," said Cooper.
Micah's face went instantly serious, to the point of anger. He raised his crossbow right up to Cooper's snout of a nose. "You shut yer mouth, orc," he said. "I'll split that little brain of yers in two."
"You ever have an orc foot up your ass before, Billy Bob?"
"Micah!" snapped the driver. "Back in the wagon."
Micah backed off slowly, taking neither his eyes nor his crossbow off of Cooper. "You got a big mouth, orc. One day it's gonner get you into trouble."
"Try every day," said Dave.
"Shut it, Stumpy," said Micah, climbing back into the back of the wagon, his crossbow arm now shifting from Cooper to Dave. "You dwarves ain't any better than them orcs. I can't wait until you finally all kill each other."
"You have charming sons, sir," said Tim, his hands still raised.
"They got more spirit than sense at times," said the driver. He rolled up the parchment. "Listen, boys. I don't know where you got that map, but I hope you didn't pay too much for it. It ain't worth demanding yer money back for if'n you got to admit to havin' been stupid 'nuff to follow it."
"I'm sorry," said Tim. "Were you talking just now? Or just massaging your tooth?"
Julian threw up his hands and walked away from the wagon. "So much for diplomacy."
"It's startin' to get dark out," said the driver. "I had half a mind to offer you fellers a ride back to town, but now I think I'd rather see how those sharp tongues of yours defend you against the creatures that come out at night." He tossed the map to the ground and snapped the reins on his horses. "Yah!" The wagon started moving down the road toward Cardinia.
"Bite my little halfling ass!" Tim called out after them. "You toothless fucking hillbilly bastards!"
Tim was answered with a couple of lazily fired crossbow bolts. One sailed clear over the lot of them, but the other pierced Cooper in the ass.
"Ow," said Cooper, removing his finger – as well as an orange layer of filth – from his ear.
"You know," Julian said to Tim. "I can't really use my diplomacy skill if you guys are going to break into the conversation and insult people."
"I just can't stand rednecks. "
"I don't think I've ever seen you lose your shit like that."
"They're right about one thing," said Dave. "It is going to be dark pretty soon." The sky was pink as the sun touched the western horizon.
Julian picked up the map from off the ground. "Is everyone now satisfied that this map is useless?"
Tim sighed. "Yeah."
Dave nodded.
Cooper winced slightly as he plucked the bolt from his ass. "Maybe we were holding it upside down." He bent over and lifted the back of his loincloth to expose his grey leathery ass. Dark red blood – almost black – trickled out of the hole where the bolt had been. "Dave, you mind?"
"Jesus, Cooper!" said Dave. "It's magic. I don't actually have to touch the wound." He waddled over to Cooper's front and touched him on the shoulder. "I heal thee."
Cooper's wound healed over and was soon indistinguishable from the rest of his ass. Cooper farted in relief.
Tim took the lead on the long road back to Cardinia, but was soon outpaced by Cooper and Julian.
"The more I look at this map," said Julian, holding the map uncurled in front of him as he walked. "The stupider it looks to me. I mean, look at this. Even if we did find the volcano, there's just a curvy dotted line leading out into the middle of nowhere until it hits an X."
"How can you even read that?" asked Tim. "I can barely see where I'm going anymore."
"I've got like super elf eyes or whatever," said Julian. "I can see in almost total darkness."
"That must be nice," said Tim. "I can't see shit. Dave, let me hold your arm."
"Okay," said Dave.
Cooper turned around and snorted. "Fags."
Julian glared up at him briefly, but let it go. He had bigger issues with Cooper. "Where the hell did you get this map anyway?"
"In the open market," said Cooper. "There was a guy selling scrolls and shit, so I asked him if he had any treasure maps. I gave him a gold piece and he drew it right then and there."
"You spent a whole gold piece on that?" said Dave.
"It seemed like a good investment," said Cooper.
"How hard did the scroll guy laugh while he was drawing this?" asked Julian.
"He and his apprentice laughed quite a lot, actually," said Cooper. "But I thought it was because I farted."
"You are a piece of work, my friend," said Tim. "Remind me never to trust you with –"
A loud caw cut Tim off. Ravenus flew down out of the sky. Julian stopped to let him perch atop his quarterstaff.
"Trouble ahead," said the bird.
"What kind of trouble?" asked Julian.
"Those men in the wagon who stopped to talk to you earlier."
"Yeah? What about them?"
"A bunch of orcs came out of the woods and ambushed them."
"Good for them," said Tim. "Why should we give a damn?"
Julian furrowed his eyebrows at Tim. "I'll overlook, for the moment, that you are celebrating the murder of three human beings, but –"
"Oh come off it," said Tim. "They're not even real. Get it through your pale slender head." He
waved his arms around. "None of this exists."
"You don't know that," said Julian.
"He's right," said Dave. "Who can say what exists and what doesn't?"
Tim shifted his rant to Dave. "What are you, a fucking philosopher now?"
"I'm just saying that we're in a seemingly impossible situation right now," Dave shouted right back at him. "And I'm not going to rush into any snap decisions about what exists and what doesn't. We're all either suffering from some complicated mass delusion, or else –"
"Will you guys shut the fuck up?" roared Cooper. A flock of black birds erupted out of a nearby tree and flew away, but otherwise, they all stood in momentary silence. "I'm sorry," Cooper continued. "My head was starting to hurt from all of your bullshit." From the way he was rubbing his forehead, he might have been serious. "We've got more important shit to talk about."
"Like what?" snapped Tim.
"Like there's an angry mob of violent orcs between us and Cardinia."
"Oh, right."
"Yeah," said Dave.
"Yeah," said Julian. "That's pretty important."
"So what do we do?" asked Dave.
"We could just camp out here for the night," said Julian."Go back to town in the morning."
"No good," said Tim. "There's every chance we'll encounter something far worse than orcs if we stay out here tonight. We're not high enough level to be camping in the wilderness at night yet."
"We slept in the woods on our first night here," said Julian.
"And we got mauled by a fucking leopard," said Tim. "Anyway, that was back when Mordred was around to keep encounters level-appropriate. Mordred's not here anymore. There's no telling what we could run into at night."
"Could we go around them?" asked Dave.
"We could try. But if we give them too wide a berth, we risk getting lost in the woods, which is worse than camping out here."
"They're just orcs," said Julian. "Aren't they supposed to be first level mooks? Why don't we just smash through them?"
"I'm a half-orc," said Cooper. "The half of me that makes the big badass you see before you is the orc half. The other half is just as much of a pussy as you guys. The guys you want to 'just smash through' are all orc."
"But we've got intelligence," said Julian.
"Is that racist?" Cooper asked Tim.
"That's not what I'm talking about," said Julian. "I'm talking about military intelligence. We know their position, their plan of attack. That sort of thing."
Everyone spent a moment in silent contemplation.
"Shit," said Tim. "Is that the best we've got?"
Dave, Cooper, and Julian answered with halfhearted shrugs, nods, and grunts.
"Okay then," Tim continued. "We'll get as close to their position as we can. And then we'll wait."
"Wait for what?" asked Dave.
"Wait for them to spot a target."
"Oooh, I like it," said Julian. "Ambush the ambushers."
"That's right," said Tim. "Hopefully whoever they attack is going to have at least some power to defend themselves, and we'll hit those fuckers from behind."
"Aren't you guys forgetting one thing?" asked Dave. Everyone turned to look at him, but no one spoke. "How is waiting around in the wilderness over there any different than waiting around in the wilderness over here? Except, of course, that if we're randomly attacked by bears or whatever over there, we'll be sandwiched between angry bears and angry orcs."
"Even better!" said Tim. "If we get attacked by bears or whatever, we'll just make a run for it."
"How is that not an incredibly stupid plan?" asked Dave.
"We'll run right through where the orcs are hiding. The orcs will have to deal with whatever is chasing us, preferably before they deal with us. We might be able to escape them without a fight."
Cooper nodded slowly. "I like it."
"I'm still not convinced," said Dave.
"Then stay here, fuckhead," said Cooper.
"I'm in," said Julian.
All eyes turned to Dave.
Dave sighed. "Fine. I guess dying with you guys is a little better than dying alone."
They walked along the road for another half hour before Ravenus warned them that the ambush site was coming up soon. They took cover behind a large oak tree.
"I see one!" whispered Julian excitedly. "I think he's alone. He looks to be taking a dump."
"If we could take one out now," said Dave. "It would be one less we'll have to deal with if it comes to a fight."
Everyone looked at Tim.
"What?" said Tim. "Have you forgotten? I'm the only one here who can't see in the fucking dark!"
"You're the only one who has any chance of sneaking up on him. You'll be able to see him if you get close enough," said Dave.
Julian pointed in the direction of the lone orc. "He's next to that tree over there. Can you at least see the tree's silhouette against the sky?"
"Yeah," said Tim, licking his lips. "Which tree?"
"The coniferous one."
"Good," said Cooper. "Maybe it will eat him."
"What?" said Tim.
"Shut up, Cooper," said Julian. "Stay focused, Tim. We'll be here to back you up if things go wrong. I'll make a couple of Light stones to distract them. Are you up for this?"
"I think so," said Tim. "It feels weird. I've never outright murdered anyone before."
"Sure you have," said Dave. "Don't forget Mord–"
Cooper punched Dave in the head.
Tim didn't even bother to glare at either of them. "Okay," he said. "I've got this." After patting himself down the sides to make sure his weapons were in order, he bolted off into the tall dark grass. He was surprisingly quick and nimble for someone who couldn't see. And so quiet. If Julian didn't have super elf ears and wasn't actually focused directly on Tim, he probably wouldn't have heard him moving at all.
He slowed down as he got to within about forty feet of the squatting orc. Julian guessed that Tim knew he was getting close, but was still unable to see his target. Every step was deliberate, almost exaggerated, like someone in a silent film who wants the audience to know they were being sneaky. He slowly unsheathed his dagger and crept ever closer. When he was almost on top of the orc – maybe fifteen feet away at best – he stopped dead in his tracks. Four heartbeats later, he darted forward, leapt onto the orc's back, pulled back its head by the topknot of hair, and drew his dagger swiftly and silently across the creature's neck.
Julian heard the faintest hint of a grunt which quickly gurgled away into nothing. The next sound was the orc's bowels letting go, which told Julian that Tim's mission had... Julian thought of Cooper. No, an orc's bowels letting go didn't actually tell him much of anything.
The orc fell forward, and Tim tumbled off of its back and popped up ready and alert, dagger in hand. He had a quick look around, nodded, and started running back.
"He did it," Julian whispered to Dave and Cooper.
"Nice," said Cooper.
"I hope he's okay," said Dave.
Tim didn't bother with sneakiness as he sprinted back, but he was still remarkably quiet for someone running as fast as... well, as fast as a normal-sized person casually jogs.
When he reached the others, he bent over with his hands on his knees to catch his breath. "One down," he said between breaths.
"How..." Julian forced out the rest of the question. Insensitive or not, he had to know. "How did it feel?"
Tim looked up at him with big bright eyes. "It was exhilarating," he said. "That's actually got me a little concerned."
"I wouldn't worry about it," said Cooper.
"Yeah," said Julian. "At least not until we get out of this – Shit! Get down!"
The other three lay down flat as roadkill while Julian focused his ear in the direction of the dead orc.
The sound was like nothing Julian had ever heard before. It was like a pig choking to death. "What is that?"
Cooper answered. "He said the blood is still warm.
The kill is fresh."
"You can understand that?" said Tim.
"He's speaking orcish," said Cooper. "It sounds perfectly natural to me."
"Of course it does," said Dave. "Keep listening."
"Okay, um... I missed the beginning. Something about groups of four. Keep within visual range of one another. Do not engage."