A War of Stones: Book One of the Traveler Knight

by Howard Norfolk

  “Tell me who all of you are,” Kulith said, as he advanced and stood over the man. He pointed over at the others against the wall. “Tell me who this male and female are, and I will spare you pain.” The man didn’t seem to hear him, and so Kulith bent down, picked him up and flipped him over so that he was now facing him. He watched for a response. The man’s eyes showed that he was delirious, in a haze of sickness and pain.

  “This one has gone all rotten,” he said. He reached down and grabbed one of the damaged feet where it had turned from red to black. Finally the man cried out, and the other humans lying in the bones against the wall looked startled and aware now of something that did not have to do with their own individual plights. Kulith had been absently touching the sword all the time, to adjust the scabbard from it striking across the floor.

  Now the painful snaps of energy returned and formed into a current, like a rush of agonizing fire up one arm, across through his chest, and down into the other where it flowed out through his fingers. The man gasped and tried to turn and sit up, as the energy seemed to burn into him and break apart the black clots of blood and flesh, to align the bones, and erase the red lines going up under the skin. His health and sanity returned to some degree, and so did his pain.

  He howled out and thrashed, and the trolls and goblins either laughed or got quiet, depending on how they interpreted what was happening. Kulith made a contact of understanding with the sword, or with something else, and realized that the man’s feet would never heal. It had been too long since the injury, so that if left as he was the poison and sickness would just return and kill him. Kulith dropped the man’s foot, jumped back and drew out the blade.

  As the man lay panting on the floor, Kulith lifted the gold hilted sword up and brought it down on one ankle, cutting through it and searing the wound. He walked around and used his own foot to pin the man and then he cut off the other. The man shrieked and passed out when he brought the Tuvier Blade back against the stumps left and let it completely burn and seal up the wounds.

  The goblins and trolls all roared out their approval and slammed their plates and cups down upon the tables. He had burned a foot earlier, and now he had just taken two off. There were perhaps a few thoughtful, more piercing looks, those individuals trying to figure out just what and why he had done it. Kulith felt vulnerable, as so he snarled and lifted his arms up to make a show, to try and convince the others it had been done strictly in malice. He pointed with the sizzling blade over at the rest of the captives.

  “Move him away and bring the priest here next,” he told the buggers. Two of the goblins snatched at the man in black and drug him across the floor, dropping him so that he caught himself on top of the other man’s black, bloody feet. Kulith hunched down with the blade in his hand and threatened his face with its tip.

  “Tell me who all of you are,” Kulith said. “Tell me who the female is and I will spare your pain.” That was all to this routine that was needed. He waited for the man to wet himself and beg for mercy.

  “Tell him. Tell him who we are!” The girl by the wall yelled out at the man in black, and he looked back at her and jerked in fear, as if he was more afraid of that then of Kulith. Incensed at having his threat forgotten, Kulith picked him up and by a foot and lifted him up, hanging him there upside down.

  The goblins were hooting now, and a thyr was barking as he stood up on a bench in the back. It was very hot and Kulith’s blood was up from all the noise and confusion. He took the blade and with the point cut along the priest’s midsection, splitting the black material but seeing that the blade had refused to cut him. Kulith swore and tossed him back down onto the floor.

  “Bring the girl over to me,” he said. “Let’s hear the all of what she has to say.”

  The goblins grabbed at her and the two soldiers they had taken captive now hopped up to contest it, and there was a brief fight, with the goblins bludgeoned them back down, and stabbing one of them in the upper arm. Kulith turned and looked over at Hovus Black Smile. The great troll lifted his cup up and they nodded to each other. Hovus drank and then opened his mouth in a grin to show his rotten, trademark smile.

  Kulith snatched the girl by one of her legs and hoisted her up into the air like he had done to the priest, but she was not complacent and wiggled and shrieked. She was skinny, long, and mostly made up of bones. Kulith also saw her as unattractively weak, with her hair the color of mud. He shook her a little more to terrify her, but not enough to break her.

  “Tell me who you are!” Kulith commanded her.

  “I am the Countess of Rydol!” she shouted back. The noise in the keep’s hall cut off as her claim focused all their attention.

  “Countess!” Hovus Black Smile said, whistling out. Several of the other buggers sitting on the benches repeated him, louder. There were only ten or so counts in all of Gece, and they were right under the Grand Prince in influence, wealth and power. This windfall had come upon them suddenly, and now seemed a bit dangerous. The counts had access to all kinds of soldiers, from the many towns and villages that lay in their individual counties. They could also if in favor draw on the standing companies that formed the Grand Prince’s army. Instead of a West Lands noble with a couple dozen soldiers and a castle or town, the eye of Gece had now turned fully to look upon them.

  “We have found what we needed,” Ovodag said, pushing aside the smaller goblins as he came into the hall and looked across at the girl. Kulith lowered her down to the floor and let her go. She squealed and pushed herself away from the stinking, blackened feet. Kulith wondered how long his brother had stood there watching, and what he was going to do now.

  Ovodag went past the buggers at the tables and bent down to look at her. Kulith saw quickly that his half brother also disliked her thinness and mud colored hair. She was a collection of the things they detested about stone men: physically weak, relying on others to keep them safe and inbred to a state of polished dullness. She was just like a twig ready to break, Kulith thought.

  “Are these men her slaves?” Ovodag asked Kulith, as he gestured back over at the beaten men laying the trash.

  “Close enough for her purpose,” he replied. “They were guarding her when they were all caught.” It appeared that the soldier who had been stabbed while resisting the girl’s treatment was now dead and two buggers were commenting on the incident as they searched the body for loot. Ovodag looked at the other prisoners, pausing longer to llok at the one who had just lost his feet to the Tuvier Blade.

  “Send the two healthy ones back down the hill to one of the castles,” he ordered. He gestured over at the man without any feet. “That one is not worth keeping, but then he isn’t going to run away on us either.” Some of the goblins chuckled. “And the horde won’t be able to stand having that priest around for long. Both of them showing up at Krolo together and telling the same story will probably be believed.” Ovodag pointed over at Kulith and fixed him with his finger.

  “Take care of the countess,” he said, “since you aren’t out fighting with us right now.” Another troll threw down a pair of manacles with a length of chain attached, and then tossed the brass key over to Kulith. Kulith glowered across at them and kicked the manacles with his foot, then turned and sat back down on his chair. He found the brass cup and held it in one hand, the sword in the other before him, and took a sip of wine.

  Ovodag and the other trolls who had just shouldered in traded looks, growled, and started leaving, talking about him quietly as they went out. Kulith assumed they would go find another ripe human settlement to make trouble with. He pointed over with the cup at the priest and the soldier. Since it was his idea, he was expected to now move it forward.

  “Take them down to the outskirts of Krolo and let them go. I promise to reward the ones who do this with meat and a gold coin upon their return.” He stood back up and sheathed the sword, then set the cup aside next to the cooling remains of the badger. He jumped forward and seized the countess by the back of her neck
and hair, and waited out the resulting long scream. He took the shackles up and put them on her, the other buggers all watching them fight. Then he lifted her back up to her feet and held here there for them to look at.

  “We will keep this countess and ransom her,” he said. “If we are moved against, we will kill her.” He looked over at the priest and the soldier. “Take that message back with you to the lords of the West Lands and to your far-away little prince.” The goblins drew lots for the job he had offered, and then forced the two other men to take the crippled man out and down to the dungeon they had created to hold the other slaves and hostages.

  “Give them some water and some bread,” Kulith ordered. “Without it they will never make it down to the castle, and this will all have been a waste of time.”

  He gave the girl’s chain a shake and said to her, “Don’t be stupid, or I will eat you.” He looked over at one of the other goblins. “Get her some water.” He pulled her over to his chair, put some of the corn and potatoes into a bowl, and then he held it out to her. “Eat this or I will let one of the little buggers in here ride you around the hall like a horse.”

  Hovus Black Smile had watched the exchange between the brothers, watched Ovodag leave, watched Kulith give his commands, and now he came over to stand by Kulith, who was smugly watching the dirty countess sit on the floor and eat bugger food.

  “What are you doing with that sword?” he asked Kulith, as he picked up the pair of black feet and flung them over into the bones and trash against the wall. There was an old agreement among the trolls that they would not use magic. Kulith was breaking this rule now, perhaps not in a serious, alarming way since the sword had not belonged to one of the thrings, but he was still in violation of one of their most fundamental taboos. Hovus was testing his own suspicion and worry for them all.

  Kulith didn’t think anyone could now connect the sword directly with the death of Sarik and the Prayer. The great damage made on the hill and his survival of the event seemed to vindicate him. But the sword only had to be observed to know that it was enchanted. His continued use of the sword was being noticed now, and Kulith knew its magic had probably affected him in little ways. The sword had put its own thoughts and feelings into his head and changed his actions in little ways, several times.

  “I understand it,” Kulith just said to Hovus, as his explanation.

  “You will eventually fall under its wheel and be run over by it,” Hovus Black Smile told him. That was a phrase used sometimes to mean that a bugger’s own scheming and stupidity would eventually get them killed.

  “Stupid sword,” Kulith remarked. “It is not a holy blade. You cannot make a thing that kills and have it be holy. It is a weapon of anger. Who are you angry at?”

  “Whoever I need to be,” Hovus replied. “Right now, I am starting to get angry at you.”

  “Well, you should save it up for a little while,” Kulith said. He flexed his hand and moved it farther away from the grip of the sword. “For example, this sword is angry at all of us. It is angry at the little buggers, at the trolls, at the dog faces and the ones who don’t even show their heads. All the time it is angry and vengeful. It is angry at the Dimm. But most of all it is angry at the thrings. If we have to fight with them, won’t all our hatreds come in handy?”

  Hovus picked up the chain that ran to the countess’ shackles and gave it a shake. She didn’t scream, but she did squeal and cower back away in fear from the great monster.

  “Watch this girl,” Hovus told Kulith, and dropped her chain. “Do not do anything else with that sword and keep your mouth shut.” He stalked out of the hall, and several of the other trolls also picked up their gear and went with him.

  Kulith looked about through the smoky hall, noting that some of the goblins and other trolls had been listening. Well, what he had said was a general sentiment, always on the bugger’s minds. It hadn’t done him any damage. It was the kind of thing a clan or war chief was bound to say at some point.

  He took a big drink of water out of the bucket the goblins had brought him. He put it down next to the girl for her use and sat back in the chair, one of his hands going up and absently scratching at the shock of black hair that partially covered his head. He needed to figure out where that casket of gold and silver coins had gotten to, or find another. He would have to get some goblins to watch and care for the girl, because he knew he wouldn’t always be able to do so. And he needed them to diligently watch each other, or they would collude and destroy her, like the rat-faced fiends that they were.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE SHORE OF THE DIMM

  It had taken ten days, but they had all walked the long way back over the Priwak, arriving at the area known as the Shore, on the shore of the Dimm. Kulith had picked ten goblins out of several different bands to watch the girl and bought a lame archer taken on the walls of Fugoe Castle to act as a personal servant, be an alarm, and as a go between. Ovodag sent one of his trolls around to check on her every few hours, and for the time being the buggers were all well fed and content in knowing that they could use their great plunder to soon buy whatever they wanted when they reached the town of Doom Wall on North Stone.

  The stony hills of the barrens gave way in a series of rocky down slopes dotted here and there with trees, built up terraces of fields and pointy towered goblin warrens, all watered and concealed at times by the whit mists rising up from Lake Aven. The vague, shimmering outline of North Stone peeked at them like a great lazy eye rimmed by thick white lashes on the flat, gray face that was the surface of the Dimm. There were hundreds of little buggers bunched up behind him on the slope in mass, with their band and clan totems in front of them, their pockets full of coins and little bits of loot they wanted to spend. And that was just the ones that Kulith could see, as he looked back and forth along the line of the slope that he stood on.

  They would buy drink, food, and access to females, if however fleetingly, for as long as it lasted. A few had made enough to live on for a couple of years, but it was never enough to last. Kulith wondered for the first time if Doom Wall could hold them all and get them what they wanted. The raids they had made after Sarik’s death had been unprecedented, and it could be argued that they had been the first ones to successfully sack the West Lands.

  The goblins warriors lifted up their long horns to blow them again, as others started banging on drums. Each formation was soon shouting a different chant or song, which they could do all day if left to it. Kulith had seen whole bands of goblins get slaughtered because they couldn’t find a door set into a wall, but they could keep a passable rhythm if they all worked at it together.

  He turned back and looked at the buggers that were standing with him there. They were speculative, arrogant, waiting, watching constantly the three large formations of thrings and goblins that stood below on the slope, blocking their way to the large warrens, and to the bridges and causeways that connected the Shore to North Stone. The girl they had taken as a hostage stood in back with the lame archer, wearing a torn dress and her chains, though those were probably not necessary this far away from the West Lands.

  The leaders of the different bands had gone forward down the hillside without Kulith’s counsel to arrange for the host’s return. They were anxious with winter nearing to get home and secure more food before their traveling stores ran out. The Dimm was always full of fish, birds and frogs, and there were several types of plants that were harvested. There was never a scarcity of food on the Dimm, and there was also tump available, the intoxicating liquor that the goblins drank.

  “What terms?” Kulith wondered aloud, as he and the other buggers looked back and forth at each other. There were always constant threats that the thrings or goblins would cut off the food carts going out to the horde, or that the barrens settlements would not receive their frontier allowances. That would make for a very hard winter.

  The massed, dark herds of stinking rat and pig faces had now brought their chants and horn calls up to
a high point and then slowly went quiet across the slope. The leaders were returning from below, making their way up one of the many back and forth paths that rose from the shore of the lake. Kulith thought that they would split apart and go right into their bands, but they did not. As he watched they started to pass them by, causing a great deal of consternation in those ranks. They came instead up to where he was standing with his goblins, his trolls, and the great ransom.

  He saw with anger that Rat Ears had returned with them, which he had considered might happen. This meant that they had talked with one of the greater thrings, or with whoever represented that thring. It might be Rat Ears himself he thought, but that position seemed too elevated and complicated for the creature. It could repeat what was happening and said here though, and report it back to someone else. Ovodag and the others stopped before them and formed a rough line.

  “You have been summoned before one of the great thrings,” Ovodag said to Kulith. “You are to bring the ransom with you. He wants to see her for himself.”

  “Half the horde is still out in the Priwak,” Kulith said to him. “If we give her the girl now, which I think is going to be asked, they will not get the same bargain that we make here.”

  “Maybe theirs will be better?” one of the goblin chiefs considered openly to the rest. Kulith looked around at the files and lines of goblins waiting on the slope, watching what was going on. They didn’t care at all about the ones they had left camped around Fugoe Castle. All they were only interested in now was getting down to the lake shore and out onto the Stones.

  “You said he?” Kulith asked Ovodag.

  “It’s the Vagrim and some of his bunch,” Ovodag said. “He says he took control of the Stone Pile after Sarik was destroyed, though Vous Vox has been left there still as its keeper, and does as he will. The lich is too valuable to them for his hundreds of years of magic lore and the history he knows.”