The fighting had not taken very long to resolve itself into a Brizaki defeat. With Thimenians it rarely did, for their eagerness to get into battle was only slightly stronger than their eagerness to join their ancestors in their Sky Father’s halls. They did not hold back, nor did they retreat or surrender. Win or lose, battles with the reavers tended to be over in minutes.
A few minutes later Jahaksi smiled to himself as the gigantic eagle burst from the hold, Lanae clinging wet and naked to its back. She had escaped the Thimenians. It was good.
“They’ll probably want to camp by this ruined pier to divide up their spoils.” Jhumar observed shortly. “We’d best be gone when they come ashore.”
“But where?” Tarthaga asked.
“Back into the woods. Where else?” Jhumar replied.
“Yes.” Jahaksi agreed. “Back down the hidden roads. At least until we can find another boat. Jhumar, see if you can find the horses again.”
Chapter 38: Northcraven Sound, points east
When the city watch captured Dejon Blaise in the act of stealing silver from the tinker’s house and sent him to the magister, the evidence had been clear and overwhelming. He had been caught literally red-handed, for he’d cut himself on the sharp edge of a knife while rifling drawers in the tinker’s kitchen, and the blood on his palm, the blood in the drawer and the silver spoons in his pocket had rendered his confession unnecessary. He’d been glad at the time, for the lack of the need of a confession had meant the lack of the need of torture, and he’d avoided the disappointed questioner’s pins for a moment.
The magister had announced the penalty for that burglary, five years in the Blackhill, and Dejon had hung his head and sighed. He’d sighed and barely heard the judge add, almost as an afterthought, “and the fourth finger of the left hand, by flensing.”
The finger was what you paid when you didn’t have money for a fine or the court’s fee, and of course, if Dejon had had the money, he wouldn’t have needed to burglarize the tinker’s house. Dejon had not known what flensing was.
When applied to the punitive removal of a digit, flensing meant they took it in parts, the questioner explained with relish. “No quick chop for you, mate. Flensing means I puts a little iron ring on your pinky, see? Then I takes off the nail; then I takes off the skin; then I takes off the meat, and then we get the chop. By then you’ll be beggin’ me for it.”
The explanation alone had filled Dejon with horror. The process had taken half an hour, and no matter how he screamed or thrashed or wept, the patient questioner had gone about his business with no more than a slight smile on his face. The instrument employed was nothing more than a sharpened meat knife. Twice Dejon had passed out, and twice they had revived him with a foul ichor rubbed beneath his nose. The process was a part of the punishment, the jailers explained. The questioner called it a lesson in consequences.
For years, the memory of that half an hour in the dungeon beneath Mazlit’s keep had awakened Dejon in a cold sweat in the middle of the night, and it was months before he could even look at a meat knife without feeling queasy. That had been horrible. It was the worst pain he had ever imagined he could feel.
Until now.
After they drowned him in the hold of the Kalgareth, what remained of Dejon’s soul had expected to go straightaway to the Abyss of Darkness. There he imagined the worst of the stories told by the priests in the House of Light would be his lot, and eternal damnation, regret and all of that.
Instead, he had been flensed. From the soles of his feet to the crown of his head, every inch of him, inside and out, had been slowly and excruciatingly flensed, and although he was blind now, he could see the million tiny knives slowly devouring him. This abyss was worse than he had imagined. The priest had been a horrible optimist. He screamed silently in endless torment as his flesh was knifed and his blood poured forth, to be replaced with a burning ichor that filled his veins with a fine suffering that was so complete as to be almost exquisite.
After a lifetime of suffering, all of Dejon Blaise was flensed away, leaving an empty vessel to be filled with purpose and a terrible lust. His body was healed, but the healing too was terrible. For another lifetime, he itched and burned ceaselessly, writhing and soundlessly weeping with the horrible helplessness of being unable to scratch or find relief. A thick sap filled his veins, emanating from the black tree he was now a part of, and that was now a part of him.
He tasted his blood in the water through his skin, now covered in fine tendrils like the root of a weed, and it was good. He soaked in the briny water in the cold, dark hold, and he felt the desire for blood. His thoughts, such as remained to him, turned to murder.
He no longer hated. He no longer loved. Instead, he needed.
His need was the force that held him to the world.
Soon, he knew, he would fulfill that need.
His name and his soul and his memories were gone, and only need remained. He would soon go forth and fulfill that need, let the world would run red with blood. He would drink it all.
He was a seeker.
The voice of Anrealla Bishota welcomed him to his new world.
Chapter 39: North of the Wraith Pit, Muharl Ogre Country
Skullbuster sat at his campfire and glowered into the flames. Two fornicating days they’d waited for the pigsucking Gutcrusher to come back from the Wraith Pit, and his followers were losing patience. “He’s not coming.” He growled into the fire.
“He’s coming.” Fleshripper replied wearily. It was an argument they’d already had once. “The sheepdiddler went this way, that’s what the Hounds say, and this is the only way back from the Black Mountain.” He was sitting on the stump of a tree, glaring angrily at the warning tree. Fleshripper had wanted to go on, to follow the Crusher and put an end to him, but neither Skullbuster’s nine nor the Hounds would go past the grim marker in the trail. He wanted Gutcrusher dead and he wanted that blacksteel mace, and his lust for it made him whine in frustration.
“The Hounds also say them as go this way don’t usually come back.” Skullbuster replied, idly scratching himself. “Look around you. Look at all the dead ogre bones.” He spat in the direction of a grinning skull. “This is a bad place. A mean place. Gutcrusher’s dead and I’m hungry. I don’t want to waste no more fornicating time here.”
One of the Hounds, a skinny bastard named Longrunner, or Briarwalker or Thornracer or some such stupid Hound name decided to join the conversation. “If he comes out of there, we will pick up his scent.” He declared. “Hounds will get him.”
This might be true, thought Fleshripper, but if the Hounds got him they would get his mace, too. Fleshripper didn’t just want Gutcrusher dead, although that was the main thing, but he wanted to piss on his corpse and steal his most prized possession. He wanted the Crusher dead and he wanted to be the one who killed him.
Oddly, he couldn’t remember exactly why he hated Gutcrusher so much. He couldn’t remember which casual insult had made him decide to betray the Crusher and his band, not that he thought about it much. He only knew that the long miles spent chasing him had gotten his blood up, and the longer Gutcrusher eluded him, the stronger his hate grew. It wasn’t that Gutcrusher had treated him with particular unfairness, it was the frustration he felt at not having caught him that galled.
Every time they had thought they had them, Crusher’s boyos had been just a hair faster, just a bit trickier, and even with the Hounds helping in the hunt, Gutcrusher had gotten clean away. It was like him that he didn’t see any connection between the hundred weight of loot from Gutcrusher’s camp he was hauling and his slowness in pursuit. Now the Hounds’ blood had cooled and they had grown bored with the chase.
Soon even Skullbuster’s nine would decide Gutcrusher wasn’t worth the trouble of hunting, or that he was dead already, and they would start back for their home territory. If he heard another ogre bitching about how witchy these woods were, he’d …
Well, he didn’t rightly know what he’
d do. Something, though. He’d definitely do something. “Bear’s Piss!” He shouted at nothing in particular.
Wearing thick soled boots shod in steel and half-plate armor, Gutcrusher made no attempt at stealth as he strode like a conqueror through the blasted lands that surrounded the Wraith Pit. Behind him came Balls, Wolf and One-eye, each laden with enough weapons and armor to outfit a hand of ogres. Gutcrusher’s own bag was full of jewelry, gold and weapons. He carried it slung over his shoulder and it clanked and rattled cheerfully under his right hand. He carried his mace in his left hand, with a round shield hung on that arm as well. If he’d known how to whistle, he would have done so for the incredible luck that he felt in his heart. As it was, he was reduced to cursing, like so many of his kind. They were cheerful expletives, uttered for the sheer joy of living. Gutcrusher the Ogre King surveyed his domain as if his kingdom were already won.
Balls had no shield, but he wore a thick helmet and half-plate and thick boots. His success appeared to have taken years of weariness from him, and he walked like an ogre in his prime, happily waiting to see what kind of new disaster Gutcrusher would lead him into, and out of again.
Wolf and One-eye carried shields, bags of loot and wore scabbarded swords at their waists. Wolf occasionally glanced at Gutcrusher with something like wonder. He scarcely understood the impulse that had led him to take a knee before this new ogre king, and he’d be skinned before he would ever do it again, but he did not take it back, not even in his pitiless ogre heart. The Crusher’s luck was uncanny, witchy even. He understood now what Balls had always known. There was something different about Gutcrusher, maybe he truly carried the Black God’s favor.
One-eye was hungry, and his thoughts didn’t go much beyond that.
Each of these ogres carried on their backs enough plunder to make them chiefs in their own right, and every ogre in the Muharl Territory would soon know of it and want to try to take it or join them. The wealth they carried was unthinkable, for in the land of the Muharl the possession of just a single piece of such weaponry or armor was the makings of a chieftain. What they carried was but a token of the hoard of plunder still inside the Black Mountain, and guarded by their pet witch, who had stayed behind.
“Come back when you have the rest of the bands behind you.” She had commanded. “I will be here waiting.”
The witchy road that had inexorably led Gutcrusher and his band to the Black Mountain had relented in its eldritch properties, so that now it led them out again in a fairly straightforward manner. They made camp on a ridge overlooking the road, with a clear view for miles. Now that they had conquered and been inside of it, the mountain no longer seemed threatening. When they awoke the morning was unusually clear, and far to the west they could just barely see the snowcapped peak of an enormous mountain glistening in the morning sunlight. Had they known it, they were looking at Mount Ossith, the colossal mountain that marked the boundary between the Muharl Ogre Country and the land of the Fargi Ogres. Such nuances of geography escaped them, however. When One-eye commented that it looked like a big ass mountain, Wolf cheerfully told him to piss off.
The ogres had slept in their armor, not because it was particularly comfortable, but because it was gear of such surpassing excellence they could not imagine ever taking it off. They were a bit stiff upon waking, but after their morning piss and without further ceremony they started up the path again. They took long and optimistic steps, and walked in single file. Gutcrusher was in the lead, followed by Balls, Wolf and One-eye bringing up the rear, which had become their standard marching order.
Ridgerunner, a heavy-limbed and pot-bellied Hound, saw them marching from a distance. He had not seen them before and only knew to be on the lookout for four ogres, so he gave a howl and picked up his stone hammer. In minutes five other hounds had joined in the howling, indicating that they, too, had seen the four. They began closing in on the road from both sides.
Skullbuster looked up from his place at the campfire and grinned. “Dumb fornicators are coming back.” He observed cheerfully, grabbing his great two-handed hammer. Maybe this trip wasn’t going to be all wasted after all.
Fleshripper leaped to his feet eagerly. He felt his luck on him. Had Gutcrusher come back even an hour later, Skullbuster and his nine would have been gone, and the Hounds too, probably. Fleshripper would have had to join Skullbuster, and he would have been the low man in the band, having failed to deliver Gutcrusher to his rival. As it was, the Ripper was already getting sideways looks from the others in Skullbuster’s band. Nobody liked a side switcher, although they were each of them ready enough to jump ship if circumstances demanded it.
Now he could redeem himself. With Gutcrusher put down and the blacksteel mace in the Ripper’s fist, none would dare challenge his position in the band, and eventually Skullbuster’s nine would become Fleshripper’s eight.
He’d seen the way Gutcrusher fought, always falling back on Balls for help, and together with Skullbuster he had planned for it. With Skullbuster to handle the oldster, it would be just him and the Crusher, and he knew he was just as strong as Gutcrusher and faster. The plan would also give him the first chance at the blacksteel mace. He grabbed his stone hammer and growled eagerly.
Gutcrusher heard the Hound howl and he laughed out loud. “Fornicating Hounds.” He said to the others. Wolf laughed, too. Armored and armed as they were, Gutcrusher’s little band of four feared nothing. “I’m going to kill me some Hounds today.” He watched with grim amusement as the Hounds began to appear, running half-hidden in the sparse forest beside them, carrying their spears as if they were things to fear and howling like wolves.
“Tell your suckbuddies Gutcrusher is here!” He yelled at them. “Go on, run and do as you are told.”
“We’ll run you down, Goatdiddler!” Yelled one of the Hounds in reply.
“We aren’t running anywhere, Hound. Come and get us, you dogrobber.” Wolf replied.
The Hounds appeared confused. Their usual tactic was to course alongside their quarry, waving spears and shouting until the quarry began to run. Then they would run alongside, throwing their spears or striking their enemies until they tripped or fell, to be jumped upon by the entire pack. But Gutcrusher just kept walking, allowing the Hounds to close in on both sides like an escort as he approached the camp of Skullbuster’s nine.
The Hounds all had names that reflected this tactic, such as Ridgerunner or Backchaser, and they seemed baffled by enemies that didn’t run or seem particularly afraid of their howling.
One particularly bold Hound, Duneleaper by name, decided he would start Gutcrusher’s band to running. Holding his spear in two hands, he charged the back of the line, running toward One-eye and screaming. One-eye stopped walking, dropped his bag of loot, drew his sword and set his shield. In an instant Wolf was beside him, having done the same, and a second later Balls and Gutcrusher had come in on the flanks. Luckily they were in a small clearing, and there was room to maneuver. Confused at facing the impromptu shield wall, Duneleaper attempted to veer aside at the last second, but Balls leaped out and sliced him on the thigh with his blacksteel spear.
Duneleaper screamed and fell to his knees as the poison from the lethal weapon began turning his leg black.
“That’s one of you fornicators!” Gutcrusher roared. “Come on and get it!”
The Hounds stopped attempting to get Gutcrusher to run, and instead formed a circle surrounding the four, spears facing inward. Their blood was up now.
Gutcrusher and his companions stopped walking also, forming a box with one ogre facing in each direction. Gutcrusher laughed. “Come on, you filthy puppies. Go and get Skullbuster like I said. You don’t have the guts for this.”
“We’ll kill you for that!” Shouted one Hound, pointing his stone spear at Duneleaper, who was whimpering as he died.
“Hah!” Gutcrusher laughed. “What for? He killed himself. Jumped on a spear, the dumb fornicator. Now get this straight, you sniveling sons of pigs, I am Gu
tcrusher. I’ve claimed the Kingship. You come after me, you die. You join me, you maybe get to live. If you don’t join me, I’m going to hunt you down like the dogs you are and hang your bones from the trees.”
“Fancy armor don’t make you nobody’s King.” Came a new voice, and Skullbuster walked into view, Fleshripper right behind him. Strung out in a line behind them came nine more ogres, full-blooded Muharl giants with their blood up. “Where’d you get the swag, Gutcrusher?”
“It don’t matter.” Gutcrusher growled in reply. “I got it and lots more.” He kicked one of the bags on the ground and a fortune in weapons and gold spilled onto the ground. “But you don’t need to even think about it, Skullbuster. In a few minutes you’re going to be dead, and that son of a shitbeetle next to you.” He nodded toward Fleshripper.
Skullbuster laughed back. “I’m going to knock you right out of that armor, Gutcrusher. I’m gonna take all that swag and your head, too. You finally stuck your stupid neck out too far.”
“All you gotta do is come and take it, dogspawn. What’s the matter? You turned into a talker instead of a fighter?” This was among the worst insults that could be hurled at an ogre, and Gutcrusher knew that Skullbuster could only respond to it in one way and retain the respect of his boyos.
War of the Misread Augury: Book One of the Black Griffin Rising Trilogy Page 39