A Sea of Skulls (Arts of Dark and Light Book 2)

by Vox Day

  “Cursed if I know.”

  Fortunately, it wasn’t hard to find Nekheru’s camp. They weren’t the only warleaders being summoned to kiss the crown. Lugbol found himself following a pair of Hagahornu heavy cavalry kors who weren’t any taller than he was, but whose arms looked to be very nearly the size of his head.

  “Looks like we won’t be doing no hit-and-runs this time,” he observed. “Them boys are for straight-up banging heads.”

  Ghurash nodded, and somehow, although Lugbol wouldn’t have thought it possible, his expression grew even more sour.

  Ten massive Hagahornu mountain orcs stood outside the rude barrier of uprooted trees that marked the limits of Nekheru’s turf, five on either side of an opening barely big enough for the pair of boar riders to pass through. Lugbol was not a small orc, but these mountain orcs looked as if they had more than a splash of troll’s blood in them as most were a full head taller than him and several had a faint bluish cast to their skin. They eyed the two smaller orcs contemptuously, and Lugbol rubbed his new brand to remind himself that for all their size, he had the favor of the Great Orc.

  One of the guards had what looked like a galvebel’s tattoo on his exposed chest, and he tilted his head as he studied first Ghurash, then Lugbol. His lower left tusk was broken off and capped with a false iron tusk.

  “This some kind’o joke?” he demanded of Lugbol in his thick-tongued northeastern accent. “Half-gobbo like you can’t be no Gor-Gor-damned graborgh!”

  Lugbol spit at the bigger orc’s feet. “Who you calling half-gob, kobber?”

  The galvebel’s yellow eyes narrowed, but with suspicion rather than anger. Lugbol exhaled slowly, glad to see that the mountain orc was inclined to think before he split any skulls in his massive, club-like hands.

  “You either stupid or you somebody.”

  Lugbol spit again and wrinkled his lip in a contemptuous sneer. “If I’m stupid, then why am I standing here staring at your shriveled vank, squaggie?”

  The big orc guffawed, setting off his subordinates, who pointed at Lugbol and slapped each other on the shoulder, no doubt picturing what would happen if Lugbol tried to mount their officer. Lugbol forced a hard smile and let them have their fun. He knew the galvebel had already backed down.

  “Yeah, you somebody. The king told me to look for a pissant what was a sharp bastard. He be you, yeah?”

  “Yeah, he be me,” Lugbol confirmed. “I ain’t no graborgh, though. The Great Orc just made me grun-kor.”

  “No szhar?” The big orc sounded impressed. He pointed to some of his kors. “You four, come with me. We bringing these little kors to Nekheru; we got orders. You five, you got the gate until I come back!”

  “Galvebel!” The remaining guards saluted while the four ordered to escort them fell in on either side of him and Ghurash. He practically had to jog to keep up with the long strides of the Hagahornu, but the galvebel clearly wasn’t trying to walk fast because he was chatting cheerfully down at Lugbol as he strode through the milling ranks of Nekheru’s forces.

  “We ain’t been here long, but the food sucks something fierce. All the wood is green and you can’t cook a bloody pot without a proper flame, so everything ends up half-raw and tasting like the damn bitter smoke. We thought when we was coming down out of the mountains that we’d be eating dwarves for breakfast and elves for dinner, but all we get is roots and bark and maybe a bit of gobbo in the stew. And now they saying we going after men?”

  “Man ain’t bad,” Ghurash commented. The galvebel glanced at him skeptically.

  “When you be eating men? I ain’t never had none meself.”

  “We was in the Man lands,” Lugbol explained. “We just came back three, four days ago. Got our voreghs handed to us, but not before we sacked and burned maybe twenty, thirty of their villages.”

  “Yeah? You must have got your taste of Man then. What’s it like?”

  “More tender than gobbo, less stringy. Less froggy, if you know what I mean.”

  “Damn!” The galvebel nodded eagerly. “I hope we get on the march soon, I could go for some o’ that!”

  Lugbol nodded. The purposeful pace at which the bigger orc had set them was drawing attention to them now as they made their way towards wherever the king was, and Lugbol was, despite himself, impressed by what he was seeing. The Hagahorn’ugh were not cowardly kor-come-latelies, they were big, they wore armored breastplates and spaulders and vambraces cast in the iron mined from their mountains, and they looked proper hard. They might not be as numerous as the Ommog’ugh, nor as ruthlessly disciplined as elite Zoth Ommoghu units like the Red Claw Slayers, but they were no slouches. Seeing them up close, it was easy to understand why the Great Orc was wary of his newly-come ally. They weren’t no ghash’ugh.

  And they were certainly nothing like the rowdy, slipshod gungiyar’ugh that Zlatagh had led to disaster the previous moon.

  That could be either good or bad. Nekheru would need hard kors if he was going to beat the iron demons and the terrible steel riders of the Szavon’agh. On the other hand, if they weren’t of a mind to listen to Lugbol, he and Ghurash were liable to find themselves torn limb from limb and stuffed in the iron Hagahorn cookpots no matter how highly the Great Orc valued him. Once the two armies split up and the Hagahorn’ugh marched on the Man lands, there would be nothing that Azzakhar, or the brand he’d personally applied, could do to protect them from the big mountain orcs.

  “Is Nekheru the kral of all Hagahorn?” he asked the galvebel.

  “Ain’t nobody ever been the kral of all Hagahorn, except of course the Troll Kral. Nah, he’s just the clan chief of the Drangahanu, and they’s the biggest sept, so all the mountain tribes that matter pays him hubble. They’s some that don’t, but mostly smaller tribes up north, real vicious bastards that’s half-troll, half-goat. He just calls hisself kral so’s the Great Orc and t’other southies give him his props.”

  The clan chief of the Drangahanu, Lugbol saw, was standing on a wide, shallow hill of sorts, surrounded by circles of grun-kors, galvebels, and assorted kors sporting inkings that indicated dozens of different tribes. He didn’t look tall, but he had the powerful shoulders and bulging forearms of a boar rider, and a square, pugnacious face marked by two comically stubby lower tusks. The sides of his head were shaved, and his white-streaked mane was tied back into a boar’s tail. He was listening, with a skeptical expression on his face, to a big orc with yellowish skin who was energetically waving his hands as he spoke.

  The kors surrounding Nekheru gave way reluctantly, but they gave way nevertheless as the galvebel and his men pushed through the crowd. Conscious of the many curious eyes on him, Lugbol stared fixedly ahead and stuck his chest out. Only a few of the kors here would grasp the significance of his still-raw brand, but word would spread soon enough that he was, as the galvebel said, somebody.

  Nekheru waved the yellow orc to silence as the galvebel saluted. “Felseg Kral, this is the little Goghu what you wanted.”

  The kral nodded and waved off the galvebel. The big yellow orc started to say something, but Nekheru shot him a warning glance, and he had the sense to clap his trap and back away. When the kral returned his attention to Lugbol, Lugbol saw that they were much of a height, although the older orc was considerably heavier and more muscular. He had a paunch and his squat legs were bandy with years of sitting on boar’s back, but despite his age, his eyes were still keen with intelligence.

  “You’re to be Azzakhar’s leash on me?” he asked, raising one skeptical eyebrow. “Who the faszh are you, kor?”

  “Grun-kor Lugbol of the Gog Black Fist Infantry, Felseg Kral. And my galvebel, Ghurash.”

  “And why the faszh do I need a faszhek grun-kor from anyafaszhek Gog, Grun-kor Lugbol, especially a grun-kor with one faszhek arm?”

  Well, at least Nekheru wasn’t threatening to rape him with it, Lugbol told himself. “Because the kral is marching west into the Manlands, Felseg Kral. And because not one moon past, the bloody
Szavon’ugh fed twenty-five thousand kors under Zlatagh Maneater their own anyafaszhek vanks. My Black Fist Infantry was the only gungiyar to fight, to stay together through the night, and return to the army afterwards, Felseg Kral.”

  “You think yez some kind of bad-arse kor, Grun-kor?”

  “No, Felseg Kral. I just try to look before I stick my vank in it.”

  Nekheru barked with laughter. “Then yez one kor in a thousand, Grun-kor Lugbol. So Azzakhar ain’t looking to throw my kors into the grinder?”

  “I wouldn’t know, Felseg Kral. I seen him once, when he give me this.” Lugbol pointed to his arm.

  “With the fire,” the kral said approvingly. His bulging arms were marked with nothing more than tattoos and scars, but then, Lugbol hadn’t seen a single Hagahornu zabit sporting a brand. It didn’t seem the northerners were inclined to burn themselves; after taking the fire himself, Lugbol very strongly felt that the Hagahornu had the right of it. “So what did the looking learn you?”

  “They can fight. We thought we was safe because we was in the trees, so their cavalry couldn’t smash us and their foot couldn’t catch us. We bled them, we burned their villages and we killed their kwee and their kin, but somehow they got behind us and squagged us good. All the gobbos and half the kors who live is probably still running.”

  “Orcs.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Orcs,” the kral repeated. He gestured around him. “They wasn’t no kors. These be kors, Grun-kor. Kors like you.”

  “Right,” Lugbol said as if he meant it. He didn’t know what else to say. And what was he going to do, argue with the orc?

  The kral chuckled. “I’d half a mind to send your head back to Azzakhar before, but now I see he didn’t mean nothing by it, I think it’ll serve me better on yez shoulders. I’m naming you Hadvezer. You’ll command the scouts and the skirmishers.”

  “Felseg Kral!” Lugbol blurted, half in shock, half in protest. In normal circumstances, a hadvezer was a warleader of more than one clan. In the present situation, it meant that the kral was putting Lugbol on his command staff, and making him senior to every graborgh, grun-kor, and shugaba in the cursed army!

  “Do I keep my kors?”

  “How many you got?”

  “Roundabout five szazad’ugh, Felseg Kral.”

  The kral tapped his chin reflectively. “Yeah, Hadvezer Lugbol, you can keep them. Probably best to keep a few Gogh’ugh around in case some thickskull gets it in his head to think he don’t have to take yez orders.”

  “Thank you, Felseg Kral.” Lugbol knew very well that the kral had probably just saved his life. No matter what he was called, he was going to need all the muscle he could get to keep the Hagahorn’ugh kors in line. Fortunately, the same thought appeared to strike the kral.

  “Oi, listen up, all you sqwaaks and squaggies! This here’s Lugbol, of the Black Fist! He’s small, he’s Goghu, but for all that I’m telling you he’s the new Hadvezer for the light infantry! He’s a right proper kor, he’s fought Man before, and if he’s yez commander, you’ll damn well do what he say or I’ll have yez skin flayed and made into a vest for him to wear! You got that, kors?”

  “Oi, Felseg Kral!” the Hagahorn’ugh shouted, with no reluctance that Lugbol could see. But it wasn’t enough for Kral Nekheru.

  “You got that, kors?” he shouted back.

  “Oi, Felseg Kral!” they roared, much louder the second time. Nekheru nodded and turned back to Lugbol.

  “Can’t say you won’t run into nobody who’ll give you trouble, what with being Goghu and all. If they do, pull rank on ’em; I’ll back you up.” The kral snorted, his eyes distant. “Some of the big ’uns need to be kicked in the bollocks once or twice to fall in line. Come back tonight at sunset; you’ll be meeting your alulzabit’ugh at the talakhoza.”

  “How many kors will I have?”

  “Counting the sqwaaks, maybe fifteen ezer, four o’ them farkhut’agh.”

  Lugbol nodded. Fifteen thousand, four thousand being goblin cavalry. He was being given command of an army bigger than any he’d ever imagined could possibly exist before being summoned by the Great Orc the previous autumn. It reminded him of when his anya had first told him tales of Mulguth the Mighty, the terrible Goblinsbane, who commanded more kors than any orc could count. And yet, that was ten ezers less than Zlatagh had commanded, Zlatagh Piss-taker, whose body now lay rotting in the Korokhurmagh along with thousands of other orcs and gobbos.

  “I’ll be your eyes, Felseg Kral!” He saluted, and the kral saluted back. When he turned around to face the crowd of bigger, more powerful orcs staring at him again, he no longer felt the weight of their collective gaze. He was grun-kor of the Black Fist infantry, and damned if they weren’t the best in the cursed Hagahorn’ugh army.

  He didn’t wait for an escort. He simply plowed straight ahead, with Khorpaghu falling in behind him, and all the Hagahornu kors parted before him as if he was an anyafaszhek troll. The big galvebel was back at the makeshift gate with his orcs. He must have heard the kral’s announcement, as he raised his fist swiftly and his fellow guards followed suit. Lugbol grinned and raised his fist in response; it felt pretty damned good.

  Once they were clear of the kral’s camp, Korpaghu finally opened his mouth. “You really want to go back into the Korokhurmagh?”

  “They’re not going to fight us there. Not when the real infantry are with us. The mandokki will wait for us out in the open once they know we have to come to them.”

  “If you say,” the galvebel said. He sounded dubious.

  He was disappointed to discover upon their return that Tadezha was already gone. His kors reported that a pair of the Great Orc’s guards appeared not long after Lugbol’s departure to collect her. He was just about to order an assembly when behind him, he heard a familiar voice calling his name.

  He turned around to see a most unwelcome sight. It was Snaghak, the bastard orc he’d hoped was rotting deep in the forest with Zlatagh. No such luck, it seemed.

  “What in the name of Ordogh’s bunghole is yez ugly face doing here, Snaggletooth?”

  Snaghak held up one finger to his left nostril and blew. A long string of green-yellow snot flew out and landed very near Lugbol’s left foot. It was a damned good shot, Lugbol was reluctantly forced to admit. “I heard the Black Fist was taking in all sorts o’ kors.”

  “Don’t want you, Snaggletooth.”

  “Didn’t think you did, Grun-kor.” He jerked a thumb at a hulking orc behind him who looked vaguely familiar to Lugbol. “See, I was just talking to Unbak here, and he don’t much like how yez calling the shots around here.”

  “That so?”

  The big orc blinked slowly. He wasn’t a mountain orc, and compared to the Hagahorn’ugh kors he looked almost underfed, but even so, he was clearly capable of tearing Lugbol limb-from-limb.

  “Yeah,” Unbak said. “Yeah, you punk-arse, me say.”

  Right. Lugbol glanced to both sides. There were far too many of his orcs paying witness to let the challenge pass, and while he was loath to kill one of his own kors, there was no way he could hope to beat down Unbak, especially not with an injured arm. Well, Snaghak left him little choice. He gestured to a kor he saw wearing a crossbow slung across his back.

  “You, yeah you, point that at the big one there.”

  The kor hesitated for a moment, then shrugged, wound the crank, slipped in a bolt and aimed it at the big orc’s unarmored chest.

  Unbak blinked stupidly, a perplexed expression gradually making its way across his broad green face. Snaghak, on the other hand, exploded with rage, just as Lugbol had hoped.

  “I knowed you was tricksy, but I never knowed you was yellow, you bloody ghash!” The former shugaba was nearly frothing at the mouth in his fury. “You may be grun-kor, but you think one single kor in the gungiyar is going to follow you anywheres if you have yez kors kill’im instead of fighting the challenge, you stinking coward?”

  Lugbol merely s
miled. The Law of the Orc was less an iron-clad set of rules than time-honored traditions violated with impunity by those with the power to do so, and bent as far as possible by those without it, but there was one law that was always kept by every orc, in every clan and every tribe. And that was, in times of war—defined as when the gungiyar’ugh were gathered and the hadvezer named—no challenges were permitted to the warleader on pain of death.

  “You would be right, if yez big friend there had challenged me when I was just a grun-kor, Snaghak. But I ain’t no grun-kor no more. I’m hadvezer.”

  “Murdu!” Snaghak snarled. “You ain’t no hadvezer!”

  “Go ask the kral of the Hagahorn if you don’t believe me.”

  Ghurash stepped forward, twirling a spiked club he had somehow acquired without Lugbol noticing. A circle of kors had begun to gather now, sensing the prospects for some afternoon entertainment.

  “Best watch your filthy faszhek mouth,” the normally taciturn galvebel said loudly. “I was there. He’s grun-kor of the Black Foot, but now he’s hadvezer for the whole bloody light infantry too.”

  Triumphant whoops and blood-curdling howls erupted from the orcs who heard him, prompting even more to rush out of their tents and inquire as to the cause. Lugbol looked around and saw nearly one hundred of his kors had already gathered around; even some passing heavy infantry had heard the commotion and were standing on the outskirts of the mob.

  “You want me to pincushion this big faszhan, Hadvezer?” the orc with the crossbow asked with a smirk. Unbak, already pale, promptly wet himself, sparking shrieks and screams of mocking laughter.

  “That depends on our friend Snaggletooth here,” Lugbol said, staring down the former shugaba. “If he’ll take me on, right here, right now, I’ll let the piss-legger live.”

  “Fight, fight, fight!” The watching orcs began to chant. Snaghak’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.

  “Yez just trying to trick me.”

  “No trick. What, yez gonna yellow out now?”

  “Yez gonna say I challenged you, then hide behind yez damn hadvezerek to kill me, yeah?”