Dodger didn’t have to wait long for that to happen. He easily parried the bearded man’s very first strike with a sharp beat against his blade and before he could even react, Dodger sliced at his now exposed wrist, making good his threat to sever the man’s hand from his wrist.
The big man dropped to his knees, grabbing his bloody stump.
“You cut my bloody ’and off!” he howled.
Dodger pointed the tip of his blade at the man’s Adam apple. “I warned you!” he said angrily. “Try anything else and your head will join it!”
“I think you need to leave, stranger,” came a voice from the bar.
Dodger looked up from his opponent and saw the innkeeper standing behind the bar nervously pointing a loaded crossbow at him. Every eye in the place was staring at him and Miranda.
Dodger didn’t think it was fair that they were being kicked out when they didn’t start the fight. He would have argued the point despite the loaded weapon aimed at them, but Miranda’s soft touch on his arm made him reconsider.
He lowered his sword, and with a flick of his wrist cut the bearded man’s coin purse from his belt and batted it over toward the innkeeper with the flat of the blade.
“Sorry ’bout the mess,” he said, slowly began backing himself and Miranda toward the door. “We’ll just take our meal and go,” he added, grabbing a few loaves of hard bread from a nearby table as they passed and handing them to Miranda.
No one made any attempt to stop them, and once they’d made it outside, Dodger resheathed his sword and grabbed Miranda’s hand, and together they ran back into the woods.
“I’m sorry you didn’t get to spend the night at that inn. I know how much you were looking forward to it,” Dodger apologized once they’d made camp far away from the road and inn.
Miranda tried to hide the disappointment on her face behind a smile. “It’s not your fault, Donatello. You were right. We shouldn’t have gone in there. But at least you managed to get us something decent to eat!” she said, nibbling on one of the loaves he’d stolen on their way out. “Besides, you’ve done my father’s sword proud, the way you fought for my honor back there. I know you’ll always keep me safe.”
It was those few words which would haunt our friend the rest of his life. For while he did manage to keep Miranda safe for perhaps a month longer, word of their exploits at the inn finally made their way to the agents of Lord Wraithbone, and his men finally caught up with the pair as they tried to board a ship to Thac.
By all accounts, Dodger fought well—preventing any of the wicked lord’s dozen or so men from men from grabbing Miranda. But Lord Wraithbone wasn’t a patient man, and when it became clear his men couldn’t quickly subdue the elusive elf, he decided to take matters into his own hands.
“You have proven yourself to be quite a nuisance, little thief, and have stolen something very valuable from me! Something which someone like you has absolutely no right to possess!” he began.
“Miranda is not some prize you can win, nor a jewel you can steal and place under glass to admire in some secret vault! She is a person who has a right to choose her own destiny!”
“How little you know of her true worth and destiny!” Lord Wraithbone replied, beginning to form symbols in the air with his hands.
Dodger recognized the motion. Lord Flynn’s priest used to make the same pattern every time he wanted to immobilize him, something he seemed to have cause to do quite often. That priest always seemed to know when Dodger was up to some scheme and he’d inevitably appear at the last minute, putting an end to his plot with that blasted immobilization spell.
Well, this time Dodger wasn’t going to get caught by it. Quick as a flash, he drew his dagger and hurled it at the dark lord before he could complete summoning the blue bands of magical force which would wrap around him tighter than any rope.
Any other man would never have been able to deflect such a lethal projectile. But Lord Wraithbone was no ordinary man. Some say he consorted with demons, while others claimed he was part demon himself, but whatever the case, the evil man was protected by charms that easily turned aside such missiles.
Lord Wraithbone stopped mid-gesture and cast his evil gaze upon Dodger. “I was going to let you live,” he began icily. “But after such impudence, I think you shall have to die,” he said emphasizing the last word and pointing a crooked finger at him.
Unseen by anyone else, four great tentacles suddenly rose up from the ground and grabbed each of Dodger’s limbs and began trying to tear him apart, while another set of four rose up and began viciously slashing at him with razor-sharp barbs on their ends.
Dodger immediately fell to the ground, crying out in pain as he struggled with his unseen assailant. Miranda immediately knelt down beside him, unsure of what sudden terror had overtaken her hero.
“It’s okay, Donatello! Nothing’s there! It’s not real!” she said, half trying to comfort him and half trying to shake some sense back into him. Her words however, were no match for the dark vision Dodger imagined was killing him, and before she could try again to break the spell he was under, Lord Wraithbone’s men-at-arms grabbed her and began hauling her back to their master.
“See what becomes of your latest ‘protector,’ My Lady, and how easily he succumbs to phantasms of his own making. You should have chosen a better hero. Neither your father and his sword nor this fool can keep you from me!”
Miranda looked at Lord Wraithbone in horror. “You killed my father?” she sobbed.
“He went back on his word, then tried to prevent me from going after you,” he began. “There are consequences for crossing me. Your father needed to learn that the hard way, just as this thief is learning now.”
Miranda looked back at Dodger writhing on the ground. He didn’t look like he’d last much longer. She’d already lost her father and couldn’t bear to lose another person she loved.
“Stop it!” she pleaded. “Stop it, and I will go with you and be your bride.”
Lord Wraithbone looked at her dispassionately. “It appears, My Lady, that you’ll be coming with me regardless.”
“Spare him, and I promise I will never try to run away from you again and I’ll willingly do whatever you ask of me!” she pleaded again. “Just promise me you won’t kill him!”
Lord Wraithbone raised an eyebrow and gazed at his soon-to-be bride with renewed interested. “Do you swear it?” he asked. “On your family’s honor?”
“Don’t!” Dodger managed to cry out through his agony. “I’m… not… worth… it!”
“He’s right, you know,” Lord Wraithbone agreed. “He’s not worth it. This lowly thief, who deems himself a noble knight, isn’t fit to be in your company, and doesn’t have even a tenth of your potential, my dear!”
Miranda took a last look at Dodger writhing on the ground. The sight of her love in pain made her decision easy. She steeled herself and looked up at the evil man in front of her.
“I don’t care!” she said defiantly. “I’d rather have a hundred lowly thieves with noble hearts like him, than even one of you! But if you promise to spare him, I’ll swear to anything you want!”
“Noooooooooooo!” Dodger cried.
Whether it was Dodger’s despair or Miranda’s acquiescence that made Lord Wraithbone pull his lips back in a gleeful smile, we will never know. All that’s certain is that he accepted the bargain.
“Done!” he said, snapping his fingers, and the imaginary tentacles choking the life from Dodger vanished, his struggles ceased, and he went limp on the ground.
“Donatello!” Miranda exclaimed, trying to break free from the grasp of the men-at-arms who were restraining her and run over to her lover. But the guards held her tight.
It took a moment, but Dodger finally began to stir. He looked over at Miranda and weakly reached out his hand to her. “I’ll find you!” he promised. “I’ll… never stop looking… for you! I will… free you!”
“Oh, I very much doubt that!” Lord Wraithbone sa
id, making another sign in the air with his hands.
Instantly, Dodger’s hands were drawn tight to his sides and he stiffened out straight as a board.
“You promised not to kill him!” Miranda cried, looking at him with hatred in her eyes.
“Fear not, my dear,” he said, stroking her cheek with his boney fingers. “He is not dead. Only unconscious and immobile. The effect is only temporary, I assure you. But he soon may wish he was dead.”
Miranda looked up at her new husband-to-be, eyes wide in fear. “What do you mean by that?” she asked.
“Well, I did promise you I’d keep him alive, and unlike your father, I don’t go back on my word. But your pet seems to be bound and determined to follow us and ruin our ‘wedding,’ and we can’t have that, can we? So I’m taking you where no one from Lanfor is ever going to find us—the Isle of Deimos. And just to make sure we never see his filthy elven face again, I’m having him sent to the pirate coast, where he’s bound to spend the rest of his days chained to an oar as a galley slave!”
4
The Black Pearl
“Pirates!”
Everyone around the campfire suddenly turned to look at the brash twelve-year-old boy who’d suddenly jumped up from his seat. He was holding his hand up in the air in victory.
“Yeesss! I knew it! I told you Donatello came from pirates! Didn’t I? Didn’t I?”
“Yes, my young Sir, you were correct,” the Old Bard said crustily. “Very clever of you indeed! Perhaps you would like to tell this part of the story yourself? I know the others are anxious to hear its conclusion, as am I.”
“Um… Ah,” the boy stammered as he looked around at all the faces staring at him in annoyance for interrupting the story. He slowly sat back down on log and nodded at the Old Bard.
“Uh, you’ve been doing—uh—an adequate job so far. Why don’t you um, continue, Sir Bard,” he said sheepishly but still trying to retain some dignity.
The Old Bard smiled to himself and nodded his head deferentially at the boy. “As you wish, young master,” he said, then returned his attention back to the rest of his audience.
Dodger didn’t know how long he’d been unconscious, nor did he remember being taken to the Pirate Coast, but when he finally did come to, he found himself shackled hand and foot in the hold of a large wooden ship. He was surrounded by at least five handful of men, all dressed in rags and similarly shackled. One of them was standing over at him, trying to pluck the last copper button off his jerkin.
“Oiy! Dis one’s alive after all!” the man said when Dodger suddenly sprang into an upright, sitting position and instinctively swatted away the hand plucking at his buttons.
One of the other prisoners turned a disinterested eye toward the elf. After a second or two, he shrugged and turned away. “Won’t be for long,” the other said. “All skin, bone, and ears, that one. Bet ya your ration he won’t last a week.”
Dodger didn’t like the sound of that.
“Surprised they threw one of their own kind down ‘ere with us,” a third piped up.
“Naw, he ain’t one of dem,” replied the man who’d tried to steal his buttons.
“He ain’t got no webs between his fingers like dey do,” Buttons continued, holding up one of Dodger’s hands so everyone could see it.
Dodger immediately pulled his hand back and stood up and began brushing himself off.
“Look gentlemen, I hate to disappoint you, but I don’t intend to die. At least not here, and not anytime soon.”
Dodger’s pronouncement was met with a chorus of laughs.
“No one ever intends to die here,” a new voice said. It belonged to a tall, young human with a raggedy, newly grown black beard. He was dressed in the remains of once-fine clothing and spoke proper common. From the way he moved and spoke, Dodger guessed he could have once been a well-to-do merchant or a lesser noble. “Nevertheless, they do. You’re a prisoner of Black Pearl, and her heart’s just as black as her lovely raven-colored locks…”
“Who?” Dodger interrupted.
“You ain’t heard o’ da Black Pearl?” Buttons asked in disbelief.
“I don’t get around much,” Dodger said.
“She’s just one of the most notorious cap’ns in the Sphyrena pirate clan, ain’t she? She and that devil-taking brother of ’ers’ll sooner slit your throat than give you a second look.”
“Well then,” Dodger said pulling a loose nail from a nearby wall. “I’d better be going.”
“No one escapes from the Black Pearl,” the young merchant said.
“You only say that because no one has,” Dodger said pausing for effect, then pulled his hands free of the shackles he’d picked while they were speaking. “Yet!”
The young merchant looked unimpressed. “Nice trick, but I think you’ll find escaping a ship at sea a bit more difficult than picking your way out of a pair of rusty manacles.”
“Just watch me!” Dodger said with bravado while freeing himself from the shackles around his legs. “And for your information, these shackles aren’t rusty. They’re just patinaed from the salt air,” he said, tossing them at the young man. “I hear some people pay more for things with a nice patina!”
Speechlessly, the young man watched as Dodger made his way over to the door, pressed his ear against it, then jiggered the lock for a second or two. Then with a quick smile back at his companions, he cracked opened the door and slipped out of the cell.
Now the hallways in a pirate ship are cramped and dimly lit, but that didn’t bother Dodger one bit. He was used to “skulking around in the dark” as his former master, Lord Flynn, used to say. In fact, the shadows cast by the few flickering lanterns that lit the lower decks actually worked to his advantage, letting Dodger fade away into the inky blackness whenever one of Black Pearl’s men came wandering by.
But as he made his way up toward the top of the ship, it became harder and harder for him to avoid detection. At one point, he was even forced to duck into a random room off a hallway when he spotted a trio of ship’s officers headed his way. Luckily for him, the lock on the door proved no harder to open than the one on the hold’s door, and he was able to slip inside the cabin, unseen by the men.
The cabin’s sole occupant however, did notice his abrupt entrance and let out a startled yelp.
“Who are you?” she asked, reflexively trying to cover herself with her arms.
Equally surprised, Dodger whirled around at the sound of her voice and saw a short woman with a curvaceous figure and long black hair standing before him. She was dressed in a long, sheer white chemise and had a silver comb in her hand that she’d been using to brush her lovely obsidian locks.
“Who are you?” she asked again, this time sounding less startled and a bit more haughty.
“I… ah… I… um,” he stuttered. He couldn’t ever recall seeing anyone as lovely before in his life. Even his true love, Miranda wasn’t as pretty as the woman who stood before him now. He was speechless and didn’t know how to answer her.
Up until now, the only person who’d ever really called him ‘Donatello’ was Miranda, and introducing himself that way seemed wrong, especially after he’d failed to save her from Lord Wraithbone.
Nor did introducing himself as “Dodger” seem right either. He’d been given that name as part of The Fagin’s gang of youthful cutpurses, and he no longer considered himself a lowly thief. He was an elf on a mission now. An elf out for revenge against the evil caster who had stolen away his true love, and the name ‘Dodger’ didn’t fit that persona. Neither did any of the other names Lord Flynn used to call him—even the ones he could repeat in polite company.
The woman deserved an answer, and Dodger recognized the unmistakable tone of a high-born unaccustomed to waiting for a reply. So he just said the first thing that came to mind.
“I’m… um… I’m here to rescue you, M’lady!” he said, extending his free hand to her. “I’ll get you away from these murderous pirates and see you
safely back to your father’s household.”
The woman raised a delicately arched eyebrow and smiled at him. When she did, Dodger could have sworn her teeth sparkled.
“So you’re to be my hero, then?” she asked, setting down the comb and slowly walking over to him. “Aren’t you a bit short to be my knight in shining armor?” she added running a finger slowly down his chest.
Even this early in his life, Dodger was no stranger to the womanly wiles, yet the lovely young creature who stood before him now made him feel all flustered and he had a difficult time thinking straight.
“Um… I’ve been… um… told that… um… good things come in small packages,” he began.
The black-haired beauty standing uncomfortably close to him smiled again, and this time Dodger was sure her teeth did sparkle when she did it.
“Well, I look forward to unwrapping you and seeing how big your package really is…” she said, fingering the clasp of his belt.
“My lady!” Dodger said practically slapping her hands away. He was shocked by her forwardness. He’d have expected such a thing from tavern wench, not a woman of courtly values, but the surprise helped clear his head and return his thoughts to that of escape. “This is hardly the time! We must be gone before anyone realizes we’re missing!”
“And just how do you propose we do that? We’re at sea, you know.”
Dodger nodded. “I saw the bottom of a small boat hanging off the side of the ship on my way up here. If the Lady of Luck is still smiling on me, we might be able to slip into it, cut it loose, and drift away before anyone notices that it—and we—are gone.”
“That’s your plan?” the woman asked, unimpressed. “Rely on luck, and hope for the best?”
Tales From Thac Page 19