Behemoth (The Jharro Grove Saga Book 6)

by Trevor H. Cooley

  Justan sighed, knowing that he’d have to put up with it for the rest of the day. Maybe he would get the chance to visit Mage Vannya when they got back to Roo-Tan’lan. If not, he could reach out to Fist that night. Maybe the ogre would be close enough by then that he could heal it from a distance.

  Deathclaw? he sent.

  Talon is able to walk again, the raptoid replied. We will move faster than the gnome and be there ready to fight by your side if a war occurs.

  It doesn’t look like that will happen, but thank you for being available, he replied tiredly.

  He looked southward in the direction of the Troll Swamps and saw a mass of dark clouds swirling. He hoped that rain wasn’t heading their way. A distant roll of thunder echoed as if heralding trouble.

  When Aloysius’ small force arrived, the Roo-Tan formation had changed slightly. Instead of a narrow horseshoe around the road, the men were spread out in a wide semicircle, allowing the gnome’s hundred to march in close without being pressed. Justan was waiting at the center of the formation alongside Xedrion and his sons, watching as the Warlord arrived.

  Aloysius’ group stopped a fifty yards from Xedrion’s lines. Steward Farette stepped forward wearing a formal white robe with a black sash across her chest. She held out a scroll. “I announce Warlord Aloysius of the Third Great Alberri Empire, gnome warrior and scholar of House Mur, leader of the Mer-Dan Collective and at his side, Matthew the prophet, also known as the Stranger!”

  Xedrion send forth no herald of his own. He simply waited as Aloysius, looking regal in his black armor and wearing his slightly dented circlet, and Matthew in his silken robes, walked the distance between them. Steward Farette, caught off guard by the lack of protocol, turned to face the Warlord helplessly.

  “You may go, Farette,” Aloysius said in dismissal. He smiled at Xedrion as the black-sashed steward hurried away. “Protector, I am pleased that you have agreed to see me again.”

  “Sir Edge tells me that you have a proposal for me,” Xedrion said, his angry expression giving away nothing that Justan had told him. “You think that I will agree to your terms now that you do not have an army of twenty thousand behind you?”

  The gnome’s smile didn’t falter. “I propose that we table the original treaty I set before you-.”

  “Table?” the Protector said.

  “To be renegotiated at a later date,” Warlord Aloysius continued. “I know that my methods at our last meeting were heavy handed. You might even say under handed. And with the way that meeting ended, I completely understand why you may not want to deal with me again at all.”

  “You would be correct,” Xedrion said, shifting his gaze to Matthew. “Greetings, Stranger. It seems you had the sword removed from your back.”

  Matthew gave him a wry smile. “It’s a lot more comfortable for me to bend over and lace up my boots now. And yes, this means that Warlord Aloysius has no control over me. He removed the sword willingly, which is something that I would bet Sir Edge has already confirmed for you.”

  “He did say something to that effect,” Xedrion replied.

  “Then you can take my words seriously when I tell you that I believe it is imperative that the two of you come to an agreement,” his voice laden with authority and experience. “The threat that nears is one that neither of your nations can face alone. The fate of the Jharro Grove and the Known Lands is at stake.”

  “I am well aware of what is at stake, Matthew,” Xedrion replied, turning his attention back to Aloysius. “But I am hesitant to make an agreement with this gnome. Even if he is the warlord prophesied to come forth in this age, that does not excuse him for all that he has done.”

  Aloysius gaze turned hard and Justan wondered if Xedrion had pushed him too far in doubting his credentials. But the Warlord forced a smile.

  “I can see that you find it hard to take me at my word. As a show of good faith, I have pre-emptively ordered that all remaining Roo-Tan prisoners being held by the Mer-Dan Collective be released. You should be able to verify this. I sent the message shortly after Sir Edge first met with me.”

  Xedrion looked to Hubrin. Word passed silently between them through one of the rings the Protector wore. Xedrion inclined his head towards the gnome. “Word has come from one of my captains earlier this morning that some of our men have returned.”

  Aloysius inclined his head. “I did so with the hope that you would be willing to respond in kind once you had come to trust my intentions.”

  “We shall see,” Xedrion replied, but Justan knew that getting rid of the prisoners would be a relief. The number of Roo-Dan in Roo-Tan prisons was staggering and with the heavy losses that had been received during the treaty disaster, keeping control of the prisoners was a burden. “But I do wonder why it is that you wish to table the treaty that you brought to me.”

  “It can wait until our current threat is passed,” Warlord Aloysius said. “I propose an alternate treaty. An alliance between our two nations to take effect until such a time as our mutual enemy is defeated. We can renegotiate afterwards, when my people have had the chance to prove ourselves to you.”

  Justan realized as Xedrion had, that tabling the treaty until the war was over would take away the advantage that the Roo-Tan currently had in the negotiations. With the war won, the Mer-Dan would have a solidifying victory. Justan had no doubt that Xedrion would insist on a lasting treaty, but this wasn’t the time to bring that up.

  “In the meantime, I have information that I believe is crucial to victory over The Troll Queen and her behemoth,” Aloysius continued.

  “You have information that we do not?” Xedrion wondered.

  “For one thing, you may have heard that Matthew and his gorc assistant Durza have discovered a method of using bewitching magic to hide their presence from the behemoth. We used it in the swamps to journey here without incident as I am sure Sir Edge can attest. This is something that we believe can be taught to your witches.” Encouraged by the undisguised interest in the Protector’s eyes, he leaned closer to deliver his next words. “Even better, I can tell you how we can kill the behemoth!”

  Xedrion’s interest was piqued. “Come back to Roo-Tan’lan with me and we shall discuss this further.”

  Rain began to fall.

  Chapter Fourteen

  It had been raining all day in Khanzaroo. The downpour was torrential, which wasn’t an uncommon occurrence in the Troll Swamps. But it made working with the newborns even more difficult than usual. The combination of slime-coated limbs and heavy rain meant that holding on to screeching trollkin was a challenge.

  Djeri was hard at work at the king’s side when the strengthened bond hit him.

  A burning sensation started in his chest and though he tried to ignore it, the feeling grew stronger. A trembling started in his fingers and his face felt flushed. Despite the rain, he could tell that slime was sweating from his skin at a much faster rate than usual.

  He stepped back from the part-human newborn in front of him and turned to Murtha, his voice raised over the sound of the rainfall. “This one was Roo-Tan before. A warrior.”

  “Okay, Jerry!” she said with a grin that exposed her new sparkling teeth. Murtha had only one row of them in her mouth now. They were thick and only slightly pointed. Her jawline had been straightened as well and the hair of her downy red beard was so fine as to be ephemeral.

  Murtha pointed the newborn to the section of Solitude where the other warriors were being sorted. It was the largest of the groups, ten times the numbers of the others. This was the result of the Mother’s attack on the treaty signing. Feeding and clothing them was quickly putting a strain on all of the other trollkin.

  Murtha’s smile faltered when she saw the strain on Djeri’s face. “Something wrong, Jerry. You need to go and poo?”

  Djeri grimaced. “No. But I don’t feel good.”

  He went down on one knee, his hands gripping his chest so hard that his claws punctured his skin. The burning sensation began t
o spread from his chest to his spine and from there was quickly moving up towards his skull. He gasped, letting go of his chest to clutch at his head.

  His skull felt as if it were on fire, especially behind his eyes where his talent came from. A sound was ripped from his lungs, half scream and half screech. Maybe this was it. The end for him. The result of using his special sight too much. Now he would simply combust, perhaps taking half of the newborns with him.

  Gray rushed over and licked Djeri’s face, letting out a whimper.

  Murtha pushed the part-kobald dog away and clutched Djeri’s arm. “He’s hot! Too hot! Oh, my Jerry!”

  The Troll King came to his side and reached out to touch him. His own talent told him little of what was happening and he let out a curse. “Blast that Mellinda! She should be here!”

  Once again, the wizardess hadn’t shown up to work with the rest of the cullers. Welven had given them a message from her stating that she was busy in New-Kin, though he thought she was probably just staying out of the storm. The woman had left instructions that any newborns needing her ministrations should be brought to the Old Hospital where she would be able to see them later.

  “Do you want me to go and get her?” asked a culler, a blond-headed part-human.

  “Yes,” the king said.

  “Wait!” Djeri cried out. He struggled to his feet. “I think it’s going away.”

  The burning sensation was indeed fading. And with its passing had come a strange euphoria. He blinked and his vision seemed unharmed. He still felt a kind of pressure in his head, but he flexed his talent anyway and in his mind’s eye he saw the king as he had been before the Troll Mother. He had been handsome, with a full head of braids in the Roo-Tan style. Both of his eyes were that same striking green.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Murtha asked dubiously.

  Djeri straightened his back and stretched, rolling his head on his shoulders. “I feel pretty good, actually.”

  “Maybe you were sick?” she suggested.

  “Sick?” he said. Dwarves rarely got sick and Trollkin never did as far as he knew. “Maybe. But it’s over now.”

  The Troll King cocked his head, his face still concerned. “Do you want to rest for awhile?”

  “No,” Djeri replied. “More are being born.”

  And indeed more were. Three more trollkin ran from the Mother’s open womb, one of them hobbling on a leg that was shorter than its other one. It slipped and fell, striking the bank and falling back into the water of the lake.

  There was no shallow shoreline to this lake. It was deep throughout, a necessity for the Mother’s purposes. The newborn trollkin flailed, screeching in panic.

  Murtha jumped quickly into the water after it and helped push the confused newborn to shore. Djeri helped pull it out, ignoring the scratches and punctures that came from its grasping claws. Once it stood at the lake’s edge on its uneven legs, the Troll King touched it and the newborn calmed.

  It was a part-human, but with patches of reptilian scales on its torso. Its eyes were slitted and its hair a light green. Djeri’s talent showed him that it had once been a human male with blond hair.

  “This one was not from Malaroo,” Djeri stated. The person had been wearing a type of light leather armor and the hilt of a longsword had risen over his shoulder. “But he is a warrior.”

  “Your name?” the King asked him.

  The newborn blinked his snake-like eyes, a look of awe on his face. “My king . . . Uh, Aldie.”

  “Welcome, Aldie,” the Troll King said and pointed him towards the other group of newborns with deformities. “We will make sure that your leg is fixed.”

  As one of the cullers led the limping newborn to his group, Djeri bent and reached out a hand to help Murtha out of the water. She really didn’t need his help, but gripped his hand anyway, allowing him to pull her onto the bank.

  “Thank you, Jerry,” she said. “Are you really feeling better?”

  He nodded and cleared his throat. Murtha had been soaked before jumping into the lake but he was now finding himself keenly aware of the way that her clothing clung sheer to her body. Mellinda had done more than just alter Murtha’s face. The part-dwarf had returned to the wizardess twice since the first time to get further changes made. She was still powerfully muscled, but her figure was now less stocky and more voluptuous.

  Djeri swallowed. It was as if Mellinda knew exactly what he liked and was customizing her to his specifications. If only Murtha could manage to get his name right.

  They continued to work throughout the day, inspecting hundreds of newly made trollkin. Djeri felt great. That sense of euphoria that had come after the strange burning attack lasted until late in the afternoon. It wasn’t until the Mother’s womb had sunk into the water that the feeling faded.

  Even then, his spirits were high because the headache that plagued him daily was nothing but a faint throb. He told Murtha so as they were leading the latest group of potential magic users to their new home in New-Kin. She held his hand as they walked, something that now felt more normal to him.

  “Maybe my brain’s getting used to it now,” he theorized. “Using my talent so much. Maybe something changed up in there and that’s why I felt so funny.”

  “That’s probably it,” she agreed, though there was a slight disappointment in her voice. If he stopped having headaches then that meant he wouldn’t need her ability to soothe his head as much. Before her looks had changed that had been the one thing that she could do to make herself useful to him.

  They crossed over a series of short bridges linking the series of grassy islands that led to this newly uncovered section of the city.

  Gray raced by them, a writhing blue whip-snake clutched in his mouth. He brought it over to the procession and tore it apart, giving pieces to hungry and grateful newborns. Over time Gray had become the unofficial mascot of this daily march of the potentials. The part-dog did his duty well, cavorting around the newborns and making them feel welcome as they walked.

  Nevertheless, there was only so much he could do to distract them. Questions were inevitable. Djeri and Murtha fielded them as best as they could.

  Today there was a female part-imp that was particularly tenacious in her pestering of the burgeoning couple. She was tall for a part-imp at almost seven feet tall and her impish features were plastered onto a deep greenish skin. Djeri’s talent showed that she had originally been only five feet tall and had worn an odd spiky type of armor.

  “Why do we have to live so far away from the rest of our people?” the part-imp wondered.

  “Because we don’t know if you’ll have magic or what it’ll do,” Djeri replied. “Imps can usually use fire magic and that’s real dangerous out here.”

  “Even in this wet?” it complained. The rainfall had lessened to a light drizzle, but their every step sloshed even on the grassy islands.

  “The Mother makes a slime that can catch fire,” Djeri explained. “It clings everywhere. If one of you accidentally made a fireball or something, you could burn down half the city.”

  That was a bit of an exaggeration. According to the First, the volume of flammable slime exuded by the Mother had lessened greatly over the centuries. In addition, the king had set several protocols in place to lessen the threat. The trollkin kept opening up channels of fresh water to flow through the city and emptied every standing puddle of slime they found, but it was still a hazard.

  “But what’s to keep us from burning each other up?” the part-imp asked, her voice concerned. Several of the other potentials had similar concerns and had crowded up to the front of the procession, listening with fearful attention.

  “Don’t you worry,” Murtha assured them. “We got a place for you to live that’s made of rock that won’t burn down. You didn’t get to meet Mellinda today, but she’s already found a few of us that can use water magic. They’ve already put out two fires so far and nobody’s been hurt.”

  Djeri knew better, but didn’t
say anything. Mellinda had kept things quiet, but there had been many more than just two flare-ups of fire magic. The wizardess walked the edge of disaster with this particular group. She was always conducting experiments to pull out their talents. She had disposed of no less than ten smoking trollkin corpses that Djeri knew of.

  And that wasn’t all. The old stone Roo prison that had been converted into the home for potential magic users was just one of the places where Mellinda conducted her experiments. KhanzaRoo had become her secret playground. Keeping up with all her projects was a lot of work for one person, especially considering how much of her day was taken up with healing deformed newborns, but as far as Djeri knew, Mellinda never slept. Short rests in her room above the Old Hospital seemed to sustain her.

  Djeri and Murtha handed over this latest batch of potentials to Mellinda’s supporters at the base of the pyramidal ex-prison and Djeri noticed something that disturbed him. In the past, Murtha used to complain about Mellinda’s growing influence among the Trollkin. It had been a constant worry to the ex-dwarf. Now she accepted the wizardess’ actions without a gripe.

  Recks and Felberon had been among those of Mellinda’s people in New-Kin. Murtha had always hated those two as they were openly against the Troll King, but she had just passed by the two of them without so much as a frown.

  When he told her about his concerns, she laughed them away. Instead, she ordered Gray to stay put and pulled him to a secluded spot in a cluster of manGroves. That was when she brought up another of her new favorite subjects. “You gonna kiss me today, Jerry?”

  He swallowed. It was getting harder and harder to resist her and he truly had no idea why he should. They were both trollkin. They liked each other. Maybe it was just the fact that Mellinda was pushing him to do it that made him balk. “Turds, I dunno.”

  A frown formed on her brow. “Why not, Jerry? Don’t I look pretty enough for you yet?”

  Djeri blinked at her. “I never had a problem with the way you looked.”

  “You like how I look now, though, don’t you?” she pressed.