Another Day, Another Dungeon

by Greg Costikyan

  A smallish lizardman bounded up and zeroed in on Timaeus, the most prosperous looking of the group. He tugged on the wizard's robe. "Welcome to cavernth, honored thir," the lizard said, hopping rapidly to keep up. "Need hotel? Know all good rethtauranth. Act ath guide? Thee many hithtoric thights? Rent thithter? Hourly rateth."

  "Get lost," Nick said menacingly. The lizardman hopped away from him a little.

  "No, no," said Timaeus. "None of us is familiar with the depths of Cytorax Caverns. An experienced native guide could prove invaluable." "Yeth! Yeth!" said the lizardman, hopping closer. "Lenny knowth all about cavernth! Lenny show you! Lenny take you to good treasure, yeth! Lenny ith good guide! Reathonable rateth!"

  "This is a mistake," Sidney said.

  "What do you mean?" said Timaeus a little huffily.

  "Just look at the little reptile," said Sidney. "Give him the opportunity, and he'd sell you as quickly as his sister."

  Lenny looked at her with wounded eyes. "Not true! Not true!" he whined. "Lenny honetht lithard! Honetht!"

  "Really," said Timaeus, "I hadn't expected racial slurs from you, Miss Stollitt. Given trust and support, I'm sure this young creature— "Yeth!" said Lenny. "Trutht Lenny! Lenny find treasure! Big treasure!" "Look," said Nick to Timaeus, "forget it. It's a dumb idea. Okay?" Timaeus bristled. "Nonsense. None of us is familiar with Cytorax. We need a guide. I'm sure this fellow will do us proud." He patted the lizardman on the head; Lenny looked back adoringly.

  "Twenty thilver pennies per hour?" Lenny said.

  Timaeus cleared his throat. "Sidney, please take care of the details, if you will." He wandered across the street to look at one of the stalls. Sidney gritted her teeth. She glared at the lizardman. "Two pennies an hour, you little bastard," she said, fighting to keep control of her voice. "And not a penny more."

  The lizard looked disappointed that he wasn't bargaining with Timaeus. "Three," he said. "And one perthent of any treasure."

  "Two and a half—and no part of any treasure, you reptile. And if you abandon us down there, I'll hunt you down and kill you—and your sister, too. Got me?"

  Lenny looked at her with wounded eyes. "Lenny not do that," he said sadly. "Lenny good guide. Lenny help. Need three pennieth. Thtandard rate."

  Sidney sighed. "Three pennies," she said. Lenny bounced up and down in joy. He bounded off after Timaeus.

  "Thir! Thir! Not shop here. Lenny show you better thtore. Duty free itemth. Good pritheth."

  "What are we getting into?" said Nick.

  Kraki grunted and picked up the handles of the wheelbarrow. "Don't vorry," he said. "If lizard con us, I tvist head off." He strode off down the street.

  "That's very reassuring," said Garni doubtfully. He hoisted his gear and followed.

  Sidney shook her head and sighed.

  Nick patted her on the bottom. "Don't worry, kiddo," he said. She glared at him. "And why the hell not?" she muttered.

  III

  The passageway, Garni thought, had obviously been a mine shaft at one time. He raised his lantern and studied the beams that held up the roof; they looked several centuries old. He doubted they were entirely sound.

  Up ahead, Lenny had stopped at a thick wooden door. Light seeped out around its edges. "Thththth!" Lenny said, putting one finger to his crocodilian snout. The others joined him.

  "Okay," said Garni in a low voice. "Everybody ready?" The others readied their weapons. Timaeus nodded.

  Garni threw himself against the door. It slammed open. He stumbled into the room beyond, waving his battle-axe and shouting a battle cry. Swords swiped through the air above Garni's head. Two trolls stood inside the room, one on either side of the door. They'd been prepared for intruders—but obviously expected someone taller than the dwarf. Unable to stop himself under the weight of his pack, Garni staggered all the way across the room to fetch up against one wall. One troll turned to charge the dwarf, while the other kept a wary eye on the door.

  Kraki stood blocking the doorway, studying Garni's axe work. "Well?" said Sidney, prodding him from behind.

  "Hah?" Kraki said. "Oh! Ve kill things now?" "Yes, you idiot!"

  "Hokay, hokay," said the barbarian huffily, drawing his sword. "You don't have to get upset." He hurled himself into the room. "YAH HA!" he exclaimed, plunging his sword into one troll's torso, whipping it out, and hacking off the head of the other.

  Both trolls fell.

  Kraki flexed his muscles heroically, looking pleased. He posed with one foot atop a trollish body. Garni lowered his battle-axe to the ground and stood panting, leaning on its haft.

  The troll under Kraki's foot reached up and ripped open the barbarian's calf. It rolled for its sword. Kraki, astounded, stood with one foot in the air, bleeding from his leg wound. "Vhat going on?" he complained.

  "Shut up and fight," panted Garni. The troll stood up clutching its sword. Snarling, Kraki ran to it and hacked off both its arms, then both its legs for good measure.

  The limbs began to inch across the floor toward the glaring, limbless torso. Garni fumbled with an arm, trying to keep it away. The other limbs began to heal back in place.

  "Vatch out!" shouted Kraki. Behind Garni's back, the other troll, blindly fumbling across the floor, had found its head. Kraki charged across the room and kicked the head out of the troll's hands. The head bit him on the foot.

  "Ouch!" said Kraki. "I kill you now." He stabbed at the head gingerly, trying to avoid his foot. He hopped on his free leg. The head gnawed on his toes.

  "Those things can regenerate," said Sidney worriedly from the doorway. She tossed a dagger at one trollish arm, trying to keep it from getting back to its torso.

  "Quite so," said Timaeus.

  "How can we kill them?" asked Nick, peering intently at the trolls, his face ferretlike in the torchlight.

  "If I recall my natural philosophy," Timaeus said, "only fire or acid will do."

  "Great," said Nick. "I'm all out of Greek fire, I'm afraid. How . . . ?" "Leave it to me," said Timaeus, as Kraki hopped around the room stabbing at the head on his foot. "Stand back." Timaeus cleared his throat, held his pipe, and gestured, speaking Words of mystic power. A ball of flame appeared in his hand; he hurled it into the room.

  The ball exploded.

  There was a blinding flash.

  There was a tremendous, thundering boom.

  Flame splashed out of the room, billowing up and down the corridor for dozens of yards.

  Sidney, Nick, and Lenny were hurled down the corridor like straws in a wind.

  The caverns shook with the boom. Dust and pebbles fell from the corridor roof. Beams creaked and shuddered.

  Father Thwaite fell out of the wheelbarrow. "Where am I?" he said faintly.

  "Well," said Timaeus happily. "That certainly did the trick."

  The magician was completely untouched by the explosion and breathed the thick smoke without discomfort. By touch, he found Garni's lantern, which the blast had snuffed, and relit it.

  The room was devastated.

  The rug on the floor was burnt to a cinder. The wooden table at the back of the room was burning merrily. The trolls were charred and motionless. Garni was unconscious on the floor, his clothing smoking. Kraki's skin was covered with soot. He stood with an idiot grin on his face, one leg in the air with a charred trollish head on the raised foot. As Timaeus watched, the barbarian's eyes turned up into his head, and he tumbled to the floor. The floor shook.

  "Oh," Timaeus said. "I say."

  Nick stumbled into the room, supporting himself against one wall. His hair was singed. "I think I've seen the spell before," he said hoarsely. "Fireball, wasn't it?" He coughed and waved the smoke away from his face.

  "Er . . . yes."

  "What's the diameter of a fireball?" "Ah . . . thirty feet or so."

  "Hmm." Nick eyeballed the room. "I'd say this room is about ten by ten."

  "Er . . . Yes," said Timaeus. "Given the volume of the spell, a certain amount of splashback was to
be expected."

  A green snout peered around the edge of the door. Lenny looked in hesitantly.

  "A certain amount?" Nick said incredulously. "You're an educated man. You figure it out. The spell's volume of effect is ten times as big as this room."

  "Ah . . ."

  "We're lucky to be alive! Have you looked at the corridor? I just hope the support beams hold long enough for us to get out."

  Timaeus was turning pink.

  Sidney pulled herself into the room. She moved gingerly, as if unconvinced that she was still alive. "Nifty spell," she said sarcastically. "Real neat."

  "Look . . ." said Timaeus.

  Thwaite staggered into the room. The cleric looked haggard, hung-over, and queasy. He stopped and peered around. He noticed the charred corpses, the unconscious bodies, and the gore that had splashed everywhere. Thwaite looked even queasier. He staggered back out of the room. There was a retching sound from the hall.

  Timaeus sighed. "Look," he said softly, "I'll be more careful next time. Fire doesn't much affect me, you see, and sometimes I forget what it can do to others. I'll try to give you some warning. Is that acceptable?"

  Nick and Sidney looked at each other. "It's your expedition," said Nick. "You twit," said Sidney.

  Timaeus bristled. "Madam, I've given you my apology—" "Don't call me madam," snarled Sidney.

  Thwaite staggered back into the room. He fetched up against a wall. "Hello," he asked the wall, "do I know you?"

  "As a matter of fact— said Timaeus.

  Sidney sighed. "It's Sidney, Father," she said. "And this is Magister d'Asperge, the leader of the expedition I was telling you about." She glared at Timaeus.

  "Hmm?" the cleric said, studying the wall. "I vaguely recall . . ." "The expedition into the Caverns of Cytorax," Timaeus said. Thwaite shuddered. "Which you joined by signing the papers of enlistment in my office not forty-eight hours ago."

  "The Caverns of Cytorax?" Thwaite said in horror. "What in Dion's name did I do that for?"

  "You must have been drunk," said Timaeus dryly.

  Thwaite cleared his throat. His head was pounding. "A state I much prefer to my current one," he said. Glancing around the room, Thwaite noticed Garni's sprawled body. Blisters were beginning to form on the dwarf's face. "Oh dear," Thwaite said. "Hmm." He pushed off the wall, staggered over to the dwarf, and dropped to the floor. Timaeus made an abortive gesture to catch the priest, then realized Thwaite had merely fallen to his knees.

  Thwaite studied the dwarf. He held a wrist, thumped Garni's chest, and felt the dwarf's forehead. Thwaite closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment.

  "Yes," he said faintly. From within his robes, he produced a silver aspergillum and a stick of incense. He leaned over and lit the incense at the burning table, then wafted the stick over the dwarf's body, murmuring a prayer. He stood the stick on the floor and sprinkled the body with water from the aspergillum, praying as he did.

  Under the cleric's ministrations, Garni's blisters began visibly to recede. Perhaps, Timaeus thought, the cleric would be of some assistance after all. He scratched an ear and surveyed the blasted room and his injured companions with embarrassment. "Idiot," he muttered to himself.

  The room was carved from the rock; sedimentary banding along the walls plunged at an odd angle toward the floor. The table, no longer burning, stood at the rear of the room. Underneath the table lay a trunk, bound with leather. Straw ticking lay in a clump against one wall.

  Garni was still too weak to rise, but that didn't stop him from directing the search. "Righto," he said. "Nick, lad, search the bodies. Sidney, take a look at the chest. If you would be so kind, Magister d'Asperge, do you think you could examine the table? Father? The straw . . . ? Thank you."

  Kraki propped himself up against the wall, put both hands behind his head, and grinned, watching the others work. Thwaite had bound up the barbarian's leg, but his injuries excused him from the labor, at least for now.

  Nick went over the body of the man the trolls had killed. "A purse," he said. He poured its contents into his hand. "Four shillings and—um-eight pence ha'penny." Lenny came over and stared at the silver avidly. Nick poured it back and fixed the purse to his belt. "A dagger—a cheap one."

  "Pockets?" asked Garni. "Are the clothes worth anything?" "They're sliced up," Nick said, "and kind of bloody." "Never mind. Slit open the belt."

  "Hey, what do you know! A gold sovereign, sewn into the leather." Garni grinned into his beard.

  Timaeus yanked open the table's only drawer. A cockroach crawled out. "Zounds," he said, and jumped back. He pointed at the cockroach and started muttering a spell. Before he could complete it, the roach had disappeared into a crack. Timaeus stopped muttering; smoke curled from his finger as the aborted spell dissipated. He shook his finger painfully and cursed under his breath, then reached into the drawer. "Empty," he reported, "save for this paper." He pulled it out. "It appears to be a note of some kind. Written in—I believe it is orcish script."

  "Lenny read! Lenny read!" said the lizardman, bounding up and down. Timaeus handed it to him. Lenny puzzled over it. "Heat oil in heavy thkillet," he read slowly. "Fry one pound thalted manthflesh—"

  "Yoiks," said Timaeus in disgust. "A recipe."

  "If you would, Magister d'Asperge," said Garni, "the rest of the table." "What rest? There's only the one draw."

  Garni sighed. "Anything behind the drawer?" "Hmm?" Timaeus pulled it out. "No."

  "Does the drawer have a false bottom?" "Ah . . . no."

  "Does the top of the table lift off?" "No."

  "Flip it over. That's right. Now, pry out the table legs." "Is this necessary?"

  "Professionalism, Magister! We must be thorough! Does the leg sound hollow?"

  "No." "Test it."

  "Eh? What do you mean?"

  "I've known magic wands to be disguised as table legs," Garni said. "Ye gods . . . All right." Timaeus pointed the table leg at a wall, and said "Klaathu . . . Proujansky . . . Moshalu!"

  Nothing happened. "The other legs."

  With mounting impatience, Timaeus tried the other three legs. Nothing. "Knock all over the tabletop."

  "I say, this is a bit thick."

  "Wouldn't you feel like an idiot if we passed up a treasure just because we weren't thorough?" said Garni.

  "I suppose, but—"

  "Professionalism, my dear Magister! Professionalism! Knock, my good man!"

  "Non omnia possumus omnes, " Timaeus muttered—but he knocked on the tabletop. It sounded like solid, slightly scorched oak.

  "All right, hand me the legs." Timaeus did so. Garni took out his boot knife and started whittling.

  "What the devil are you doing?"

  Garni shrugged. "There might be secret compartments . . . items glued into the wood . . . anything. You never know."

  Timaeus rolled his eyes and reached for his pipe. He started tamping it with pipeweed.

  "Ah . . ." said Father Thwaite. "Yes, good cleric?" said Garni.

  "Ah, this straw seems to be matted together with . . ." "Yes?"

  "Well, from the stench, I would venture to guess that it's . . . troll urine."

  "Indeed. Well, persevere, Father! Persevere!" "Yes," said Thwaite faintly.

  "Nick, lad?" said Garni. He'd reduced one table leg to shavings and was working on the second.

  "Yes, Garni?" Nick said, grinning. "The troll bodies."

  "What about them? They don't have any clothing . . ." "You never know what might be in the stomachs." Nick lost his grin. "Stomachs?"

  "Yes. Trolls are not very bright, you know. They've been known to swallow the most extraordinary things."

  Grimacing, Nick moved toward one of the trolls, dagger in hand. Timaeus had finished tamping his pipe. He brought one finger toward the bowl . . .

  There was an explosion. Everyone dived for cover.

  Flames raged around Timaeus's head for a moment, then dissipated in smoke.

  Unscathed, Timaeus puffed c
ontentedly on his pipe. He looked around the room and noticed that everyone was hugging the floor. "Oh, really," he said. "Can't a man smoke in peace?" He puffed some more.

  "How are you doing with the trunk, Sidney?" Garni asked.

  "Just a minute," Sidney said. She pressed an ear to the steamer trunk and tapped over it with a finger. She drew back, stood up, and took off her pack. She took an ear trumpet out of the pack and tapped over the chest again, listening with the trumpet.

  Then, she brought out a Y-shaped silver wand and, holding the forked end of the wand in both hands, moved it over the chest and down all four sides. The wand remained stable.

  She stepped back and looked at the chest, thinking for a moment. Then she took a coil of rope from her pack. She looped it around the chest and moved as far across the room as she could. She gave the rope a tug. The chest moved slightly. Nothing else happened. She yanked harder. The chest moved a little farther.

  She coiled the rope and looked at the chest thoughtfully. "Yust open it," said Kraki.

  She glanced at him. "It could be trapped." "Bah," said Kraki.

  "Everyone out of the room," said Sidney.

  "This is silliness," said Kraki. "Ve are vasting time."

  Nick stumbled out of the room, green trollish ichor dripping from his sleeves. He looked rather greenish himself. The others followed him, Kraki last and reluctantly.

  Sidney dragged the heavy oak tabletop up to the chest. She tipped it up along its long edge and crouched behind it. She laid a metal rod, several feet in length, over the tabletop. The rod had a claw at the end; carefully, she used it to pry open the chest lid.

  The lid opened. Nothing else happened.

  Sidney peered over the tabletop and into the chest. She probed the interior with the rod.

  Nothing happened.

  She stood up and let the tabletop fall with a bang.

  Everyone rushed into the room. "Are you all right?" Nick asked. "Sure," she said, peering in the chest.

  Lenny bounded up and down. "Lenny lead you to good treasure! Magic! Thilver! Jewelth!"

  "Two bags of pemmican," she said, "and a jar of—" she sniffed, and took a swig "—rather flat ginger beer."

  Lenny stopped bounding up and down.