“Maybe this will help,” he said. “As I remember, it made me feel better when I was . . . you know.”
“Sick?” Raine’s teeth chattered. “You can say it. It’s only a word.”
“Aye, but I prefer not to. It’s not an easy thing for a Finlar to admit.” Mauric hunkered down next to her, his blue eyes shadowed with worry. “When Gertie returns, she’ll soon set you to rights. In the meantime, what else can I do?”
There was a ripple of panic in his deep voice. Poor Mauric. He was genuinely out of his element and rattled.
“Put me out of my misery?” she said, only half joking.
“And leave me to ride that giant alone? Not a chance. Misery loves company. Which reminds me . . .”
Rising, Mauric stalked over to the sleeping titan and kicked him in the shin.
“Ow.” Tiny sat up, rubbing his leg. “Whud you do that fer?”
“The girl’s not well.” Mauric pointed to the heavy, gray clouds sulking over the mountains. “And it looks like snow. Scout around and find shelter for us—a cave would do nicely.”
“She be sick?” Tiny’s mouth trembled. “It be my fault, don’t it?” His face crumpled. “Aw, the poor little thing.”
“Tro, are you crying?”
Tiny wiped his eyes on the edge of his kilt. “You think jes ’cause I be big I don’t has feelings? Well, you be wrong. Giants be sensitive, don’t you know.”
“I’d give you a hanky, but I’m fresh out of vests.”
“You would?” Tiny’s huge eyes widened. “And you being the Rowan’s nephew and all?”
“You know about that, do you? Who’s been yapping?”
“Gertie tole me.” The giant’s chin quivered. “Thankee fer the offer of the hanky. That be right kindly of you, warrior.”
“I’m a regular sweetheart. Ask anybody. Ask Gertie. Oh, wait, you can’t because she’s not here.” Mauric picked up a rock and threw it. “Do you suppose it would bruise your tender feelings too terribly to look for that cave now?”
“Reckon not.” Tiny lumbered to his feet and indicated a clump of peaks in the distance. “If you needs me, I be over there.”
The giant’s outline shimmered. With a single disjointed step, he left the rocky gorge and reappeared a mile away on the side of the next mountain. Another step and he disappeared altogether.
Mauric returned to Raine. “How are you doing?”
Raine’s teeth rattled. “F-freezing.”
“The giant has gone to find us a place to spend the night.” Mauric shifted his weight and looked down at her, his expression anxious. “Maybe a little watered wine will do the trick.”
A shudder racked her body. “No. God, no.”
“You’re right, of course. Stupid of me to ask. Wine would only make it worse.” He gave an anemic tuft of grass a vicious kick. “Damn Gertie and Bree for leaving. Horses I know. Fighting I know, but I’m no healer.”
Raine gazed at him through bleary eyes. She was sick, but Mauric was the one coming undone.
“Maybe I’ll try a little watered wine after all,” she said, taking pity on him.
His face brightened. “You will? Good, good.” He reached for the leather pack and stiffened. “Uh-oh. Here’s trouble.”
He didn’t sound worried, Raine noticed. He sounded eager. Had the wizards returned? She followed the direction of Mauric’s gaze and gasped. Three ugly shapes had entered the little valley. Squat and muscular with greenish-gray, leathery skin, the creatures shambled toward them. Their long arms trailed the ground and the spiked clubs they carried in their clawed hands dug ruts in the rocky soil. Drooling mouths hung open, exposing jagged teeth. Ragged holes in their skulls served as ears. Their dull, black eyes were unevenly placed, giving them the lopsided look of a melted troll. Filthy skins hung from their waists, makeshift coverings that made Tiny’s hide clothes seem couture. Raine took a closer look and shuddered. The skins looked human.
She made a grab for Mauric’s arm. “W-what are those things?”
“Goggins. Magog made them.” Mauric picked her up off the boulder and settled her in his arms as if she weighed nothing. “These hills are swarming with them—one reason I didn’t want you wandering off. They keep the Shads in, and the rest of us out. These particular grotties are called ograks. They’re stupid, mean, and always on the lookout for their next meal.”
The largest of the ograks, an ugly brute with a wide scar down the middle of his face, lurched closer with a hideous growl.
“Are they dangerous?” she asked in rising alarm.
“One ograk is easy. Two, merely annoying. But three?” Mauric grinned. “Three should be diverting.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Raine demanded. “Surely you’re not thinking of—”
She was interrupted by a reptilian hiss.
“There be three of us and one of you, man-thing.” Scar Face slammed his cudgel into the ground. “We be hungry. Give us the she-thing and maybe we lets you go.”
The smallest ograk bared his teeth, exposing a set of broken choppers. “I says we keeps ’em both.”
“Shut yer gob.” Scar Face swung his club at Snaggle Tooth. “Nobody asked you.”
Snaggle Tooth yelped and ducked.
“I knows her.” The third ograk peered at Raine. He was a squatty creature with a black patch over one eye. “She be the she-thing on them coins.”
Scar Face scowled. “What coins?”
“The ones we got off them Shads.”
“Lummox,” Scar Face said with a growl. “That be Hara, Magog’s High Priestess. This scrawny morsel o’ meat ain’t Hara.”
“Maybe not, but they favors,” Black Patch insisted stubbornly. “Cast yer peepers at ’er again. You’ll see.”
With an effort, Scar Face focused his mismatched eyes on Raine. The ograk shifted his flat feet with a grunt of surprise. “You be right. She do favor Hara a bit.”
“What of it?” Snaggle Tooth edged closer. “She be sumpin to munch on.”
Scar Face swung at him again. This time the club connected. “I said shut it, you.”
Snaggle Tooth grabbed his arm and howled in pain.
Black Patch turned on Scar Face with a snarl. “Leave ’im alone, Skrell. Yer allus pickin’ on Krog.”
Skrell hissed in fury and leapt at Black Patch. The ograks rolled to the ground, clawing and biting one another. Snaggle Tooth danced around them. With a howl of frustration, he flung himself into the fight. The noise was deafening.
“Excellent.” Mauric’s deep voice hummed with satisfaction. “Ograks are nothing if not predictable.” Turning, he strode over to a tall pine and tossed Raine onto the lowest branch.
She swayed and grabbed the trunk of the tree for support. “What are you doing?”
“Something I’m good at, by Tro.” Mauric showed his teeth. “If they kill me, throw yourself out of the tree and hope you break your neck. You don’t want to be alive when they start to eat you.”
“What? That’s a horrible thing to say. Don’t you—”
Mauric drew his sword and trotted toward the ograks.
“Mauric, get back here. Mauric? Mauric.”
Of all the jackass, lame brained, macho, asinine . . . Fuming, Raine wedged herself between two branches and waited.
Skrell got on top of Black Patch and punched him in the nose. “Stupid lump, if you be right, the she-thing be valuable.”
Snaggle Tooth wheezed and got to his feet. He’d lost another tooth, and his face was bloodied from the scuffle. “I don’t cares what you says, Skrell. I wants to eat now.”
Skrell punched Black Patch again for good measure and huffed to his feet. “Always thinking wiv yer stomach, Krog. We takes her to Glonoff and gets much meat. Then we stuffs ourselves until we bloat.”
Mauric swaggered up to them. “Fr
om the smell of your filthy carcasses, I’d say you’d moved past bloat and gone straight to rot.”
The ograks gaped at him.
“Hello?” Mauric waved his sword at them. “Have the squirrels made a nest between your ears? I said you stink.”
The goggins forgot their quarrel and charged Mauric. He stood his ground, balancing on the balls of his feet. Raine held her breath, horrified at his stupidity, but unable to look away. The big idiot was going to get himself killed. Then what was she supposed to do?
To her relief, Mauric threw himself forward at the last second and rolled between the stampeding ograks. He rose to his feet in a fluid motion and slashed the back of Snaggle Tooth’s thighs. The ograk bawled and went to his knees. Mauric’s blade flashed again. A ludicrous expression of surprise crossed the goggin’s deformed face. With a meaty thud, Snaggle Tooth’s body toppled to the ground and his misshapen head rolled away.
Skrell and Black Patch skidded to a halt, staring at their dead companion in brutish incomprehension.
“One gut bag down, two to go,” Mauric sang.
The ograks howled and renewed the attack. Mauric drew a knife from his boot and threw it. The weapon spun end over end and sank deep into Black Patch’s good eye. The goggin stiffened. Black blood spurted from the wound, and the ograk crumpled to the ground.
“Two down, one to go.” The warrior tossed his sword from hand to hand, taunting Skrell. “Your turn, Pus Mug. Come and get it.”
Under different circumstances, the panicked look on the remaining ograk’s face might have been comical. Skrell dropped his club and sprinted for the distant tree line. As he neared the shelter of the woods, the air in front of him shimmered, and a large, sandaled foot appeared. The ograk disappeared beneath it.
Tiny Bart materialized. With a loud pop and a wet squishing sound, the giant crushed the ograk beneath his shoe like a bug. He stomped over to a rock and scraped the gog goo off the bottom of his sandal.
“No fair,” Mauric said, frowning. “That was my ograk.”
“Were it, now? ‘Pears to me he be getting away.”
“I was giving him a head start.”
Raine stared at the jellied remains of the ograk. The bloodied pulp resembled so much road kill. Mauric’s and Tiny’s voices sounded tinny and far away over the roaring in her ears.
“Thought you said the lass be peaked,” Tiny said. “What she be doing climbing a tree?”
“She didn’t climb,” Mauric said. “I put her there.”
“So’s you could have yer sport with them goggins?”
“Aye.”
“And a fine job you made of it, too. Shame on me fer spoiling yer fun.”
“No harm done.”
“Hmm.” Tiny cut his eyes at Raine, then back at Mauric. “Me mam allus says what goes up be a-coming down. You ever hears that one?”
“Sure. That’s an old chestnut. What’s it got to do with anything?”
“Nothing, ’cepting the lass be about to fall.”
“What?” Mauric whirled to face Raine.
“Sharp as a whistle, me mam.” Tiny beamed. “Best hurry if you wants to catch her.”
“Hold on, Raine. I’m coming.” Sword in hand, Mauric broke into a run.
The blood dripping from his weapon was black and viscous, like the mush Tiny had cleaned off his sandal. Raine’s head felt curiously light, as if it might detach and float away. Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts. The childhood jingle played inside her head. Mauric was closer now, she observed through a fog. A few more strides and he would reach her.
Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts. Great green gobs of—
The rocky ground rippled and swelled, rising to meet her.
“Tro,” she heard Mauric say as she toppled out of the tree.
Chapter 8
Fever Dreams
By the time they reached the cave in the mountains Tiny had found, it was snowing. A bitter wind blew through the pass, flinging bits of sleet and grit into their faces. Snow devils whirled around them and danced among the black rocks.
“There it be,” Tiny said, pointing.
From his perch on the giant’s shoulder, Mauric squinted at the opening in the rock. It didn’t look promising, little more than a crack in the side of the mountain.
“How far back does it go?” he asked.
“Dunno. I stuck my arm in and wiggled it about a bit. Plenty o’ room for the two of you, thas’ for sure.”
“Is it empty? I don’t fancy bedding down with a nest of ograks or waking up with a hungry borg standing over me.”
Magog’s ferocious three-headed bears roamed these mountains. Mauric had never encountered a borg, and he wasn’t anxious to make the acquaintance. Borgs were teeth at one end and poisonous, spiny barbs at the other.
“I puts my pie hole up to the opening and hallooed. If there be anything in there, they be terrible sound sleepers.”
A moan drew Mauric’s attention to the unconscious girl in his lap. Raine’s skin was pallid, the color of two-day old porridge. She was obviously unwell; lines of pain and exhaustion etched the corners of her eyes. Hard to believe this gaunt, sickly creature was Hara’s twin. He studied Raine’s drawn features, searching for the likeness that had been so readily apparent to the goggins. All humans must look alike to an ograk, he decided, because he didn’t see the resemblance. True, the profile was similar—the same straight nose and stubborn jaw, but, whereas Hara’s face had been soft and round, with full, pouting lips, Raine’s face was gaunt and angular.
Hara . . . Mauric recalled Magog’s bride with a twinge of regret. Now there was a ripe, inviting lass with a body a man could lose himself in. Her twin, by contrast, was a bag of bones, slight-hipped, flat-chested, and white as a tucker. Raine’s hair was different, too—dull, lank curls. Hara’s tresses, he remembered with a sigh, had swished about her hips in a fall of ebon silk.
Raine shivered and Mauric touched her forehead with the back of his fingers. Her skin was hot and dry, and the pulse at her throat fluttered like a captured bird. Tro, what had Gertie and Bree been thinking to leave him with a sick woman, and a virtual stranger at that?
He adored Gertie, he truly did. The cantankerous old fur ball was a trusted family friend, a confidant and mentor. Why, his fondest childhood memories were of summers spent in the troll’s cabin in the Far Hold, the northern mountains of Finlara. Gertie had taught him to hunt and track, to climb, wrestle, and swim. She’d schooled him in the art of whistling and the proper way to smoke a pipe. She’d given him his first drink. From her, he’d learned Trolk and the history of Tandara before the Maiming. When he was old enough, she’d taught him the art of swearing—the old gal had a mouth that would make a sailor blush.
In truth, there wasn’t much he wouldn’t do for Gertie, but, by the gods, this inched perilously close to the limit. Like any hale, healthy Finlar, Mauric was terrified of sick people. Add to that the fact that this particular invalid was Hara’s twin and the possible Wielder of the Eye, and you had a recipe for indigestion. What if he did something wrong?
What if he broke her? Damn wizards.
“Warrior?”
“I heard you.” Mauric shrugged aside his ill humor. “Take the girl while I go inside and have a look.”
He handed Raine to Tiny and shimmied off the giant and onto the rocky trail.
“Here.” Tiny handed Mauric a cloth torch. “Fer light.”
“Thanks,” Mauric said. The torch, no bigger than a candle in the giant’s hand, was longer than Mauric’s arm.
The track they were on was narrow, scarcely wider than an ox cart. Cautiously, Mauric peered into the crevice in the cliff face. Watery light spilled into the entrance and faded to black.
He didn’t much care for caves. The thick, suffocating dark and the sense of stone pressing down on hi
m made it hard to breathe. He particularly disliked unexplored caves. Anything could be in there, watching and waiting.
Taking a deep breath, he eased inside and listened, skin and nerves prickling with unease. Nothing stirred. Heartened, he removed tinder and flint from a pouch on his belt, ignited the torch, and held it aloft. The cave was small and dry. Black sand glittered on the floor and icicles of rock hung from the ceiling. Best of all, there wasn’t a goggin in sight.
Still, he couldn’t be too careful. Drawing his sword, Mauric searched the space from end to end. The cave was unoccupied. Satisfied, he trudged back to the entrance.
Tiny poked his head in the opening, blocking the faint light. “Do it be passable?”
“Aye, for us, but what about you? You’ll never fit.”
“Don’t fash yerself about Ole Tiny. I be fine as feathers. Frost giants loves the cold, don’t you know.” The giant stuck his enormous hand inside the cave. “You’ll be wanting this.”
He unfurled his fingers. Raine lay on the giant’s palm. Her limp, slight form reminded Mauric of one of his younger sister’s cloth dolls. He took her from Tiny and stepped back.
The giant withdrew his hand and stuck his face in the opening. “Be there anything else you needs? I mos’ likely won’t be back afore morning.”
Mauric opened his mouth to say no, and thought better of it. He was used to fending for himself, but he had the girl to think of now. The cave provided protection from the stinging wind and snow, true, but it was cold as a frost giant’s balls—an observation he kept to himself, in the interest of Finlar-giant relations.
“We’ll need firewood and my packs,” he told the giant.
Tiny tossed the saddlebags inside. “I be back in two shakes of a lamb’s tail,” he said, and left.
Moving deeper inside the cave, Mauric made a pallet on the sand for Raine and covered her with a blanket from the saddlebags. A tremendous crash from the trail outside made him jump.
“Here go yer firewood,” Tiny boomed, shoving a dead birch through the narrow opening of the cave.
Hurrying to the entrance, Mauric looked outside in time to see Tiny dump two more trees on the rocky path.
A Meddle of Wizards Page 6