by Max Anthony
“Are you sitting in then Jodhpur?” one of them asked.
“Areet, I’ll join yers, but give me a round or two to see what rules yer using.” It so happened that Skulks was familiar with many of the two-hundred and twenty-three variations of bones played across Ko-Chak, Rhult and the Treads Archipelago. It took three casts before he saw they were playing High Domes common rules. He produced a small quantity of his own Slivers and shimmied his legs under the table to await the next round, determined not to alienate his new found drinking and gambling friends by winning all of their coin.
After a couple of rounds which Skulks permitted himself to lose, he asked:
“I thought yers were all on strike.”
“We are,” said woodman Natter.
“Well where do yers get all yer Slivers from then?” Skulks thought it an innocent enough question.
The whole group seemed to pause as if it was coming to a collective decision.
“There is technically a strike,” said one.
“Yeah. Technically,” said another, as if enormously pleased at the word.
Skulks looked puzzled. “So if yers are technically on strike, how comes yer all got so much coin?”
Woodman Natter responded. “How it is, is that we do a bit of chopping….on the side. But not for Hardened.”
Another man continued. “We chop a few trees down at night. Sell a bit of wood. All hush-hush. We get paid in Hardened Slivers. A man’s still gotta make a living, even when he’s on strike!”
The conversation paused as Skulks rolled a natural Demon’s Fork on his next cast, netting him the twelve Slivers in play and a further ten in the kitty.
“Do yers have room for another man in yer hush-hush tree chopping?” he asked. “I told me mam and gran I’d bring them some coin back to pay for some nice things for them.”
A few men nodded; it was good that a man thought to look after his family.
“I dunno,” said one. “It’s the foremen that picks the teams. Everyone gets a go and everyone gets paid, but some people get more goes than others. Depends how much they like you I guess.”
Skulks looked like he was considering this information as he cast the bones upon the table, intentionally missing an obvious Three Swords winner as he cast a second time, coming up without a strong roll.
“What exactly are yers on strike for then? Shouldn’t yers just be chopping trees and getting yer Slivers fer a fair day’s work?”
This question caused some consternation. Skulks could tell this for there were a number of furrowed brows and some puzzled harrumphing.
“It’s the foremen,” said one.
“Yeah,” said another helpfully.
“They told us Hardened’s paying the High Domes woodmen another eight Slivers a day over what we get.”
Skulks knew that Hardened had a quantity of luxury soft Butterwood brought downriver from High Domes, but he couldn’t for the life of him imagine that the High Domes woodmen were in the direct employ of Hardened.
The woodmen were starting to get into flow now:
“It’s not right!”
“And they said we couldn’t stand for that! It’s immoral is what they said!”
There was more nodding around the table at this.
“How’s a man to feed his family on eight Slivers a day less than what a High Domes woodman earns? Me old man’s got a gammy leg and he can hardly afford to eat on what I send back, what with the costs of everything going up.”
Skulks shook his head at the criminal injustice of it all, whilst wondering how the man could fail to spot that his own actions were contributing directly to his father’s struggles. This same man was also enthusiastically placing large wagers on the throw of bones.
“Aye,” spoke woodman Natter. “The foremen have looked after us, they have. Made sure we kept our provisions from Hardened while Foreman Y’Prout twists the arms of them bastards in the Chamber Council to get us what we deserve!”
Skulks didn’t know who Foreman Y’Prout was. There’d been space for three foremen in their hut; the name wasn’t local to Hardened, but he couldn’t off the top of his head think where it was from.
“Does yer hush-hush tree chopping pay yer an extra eight Slivers a day?” he asked.
“Oh aye it does, and more! Black market wood, you see. Pays top Sliver it does. For them that get the night work, that is.”
“Anyways, I reckon it won’t be long till they crack and pay us our dues!”
Skulks would, under different circumstances, have encouraged further outpourings, but he’d begun to feel that these were simple men who were being manipulated and it wasn’t likely for their own benefit.
The conversation tailed off at that and the men focused on their game of bones. Skulks made certain he only won a little of their money - enough to keep himself interested, but not enough to upset anyone. After a time, the men drifted off, heading back to their cabins or, presumably, to get ready for a night shift of illicit tree chopping.
As the camp gradually quietened down for the night, Skulks remained alert. He was watching and listening most carefully to hear the sounds of the night shift setting off into the forest. Sure enough, after another hour or so, he heard the clanging and banging of a group of men untrained in the art of silence attempting to make their way stealthily out of the camp. He didn’t know why they were attempting to remain unseen and unheard – perhaps they thought Hardened had spies out looking for them, or it could have simply been to let their fellow woodmen get some sleep.
Skulks followed. A forest at night was perfect conditions for him and even the light of the two moons in the sky wasn’t enough to make him visible. He looked up. Chartus, the largest of the moons was waxing gibbous, just as Tradis was becoming a waning crescent overlapping the first. The third moon, Ploster, was not yet visible. Skulks knew that in some lands this particular conjunction was considered a bad omen. He wasn’t superstitious, but took note and reminded himself to take extra care tonight.
It was easy to keep pace with the woodmen as they clattered their way through the forest. There was a work party of about twenty men, dressed in their usual work clothes, carrying the standard array of axes, belts and straps required for the felling of trees. Foreman Trowel was leading them, walking silently at the front of the group and holding a lamp aloft. Skulks kept pace thirty yards off to their left as they wended their way deeper into the trees.
It didn’t take long until they reached their destination, about half a mile from the edge of the forest where the camp was set up, and near to the Ten Dams River. Here there was sign that work had taken place, with a large clearing already made, tree stumps freshly chopped over the last few weeks. Skulks estimated that the woodmen’s night time activities must have started not long after the strike had begun.
“Right, men,” spoke Foreman Trowel in a loud voice. There was no need to maintain a pretence of quiet this far from the camp. “We need two dozen lengths of hardwood. They need to be shaved and shaped; they’ll be paying us well.”
The woodmen were generally simple folk, but they knew their trees and didn’t need any further guidance than they’d been given. They split into what Skulks assumed were pre-defined teams and headed off to find the most suitable trees. Watching unseen, Skulks saw that the men required little in the way of motivation. They knew they were going to get well paid and the more lengths of shaped hardwood they could finish, the more Slivers would go into their pockets. These were men starved of a regular wage.
The wait was a long one. Skulks thought that the only thing less interesting than chopping trees was watching other people chopping trees. The steady thunking noises of axe blade on wood became progressively more irritating. Though Skulks was not especially susceptible to boredom or excessive introspection, he was more a man of the city than a man of the forest. He would have preferred to have been seated in a good, nay any, tavern to being here watching twenty men industriously chopping and trimming tree trunks.
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nbsp; Eventually though, his patience was rewarded. Foreman Trowel raised his hands and blew three times on a whistle he carried on a cord around his neck. The men stopped immediately, stretching and flexing to stimulate tired muscles. There were exactly twenty-four lengths of shaved and shaped hardwood lying about the clearing.
The woodmen seemed to know what was required of them. Thick leather straps were slung under the lengths of wood and, without much relish for the wood was back-breakingly heavy, they were hoisted up to knee height, five men per side. Their night’s work wasn’t over yet, for they grunted and struggled as they walked their loads out of the clearing and towards the river, along a wide, straight path which appeared to have been recently hacked out of the undergrowth.
Skulks tracked them, listening to suppressed curses and heavy breathing as the first two trunks made their laborious way to the Ten Dams River. A long jetty had been built, running parallel to the river. Skulks already suspected what would be there and confidently bet both of his testicles that a barge would be moored in waiting. His balls were secure for now, as a cargo barge was lurking silently at the jetty. It was not illuminated, but four figures could be seen on the river bank, dimly lit by the moons overhead. Skulks crouched behind a tree a stone’s throw away and watched.
Foreman Trowel motioned the men to stop a modest distance from the jetty and walked confidently forward, raising a hand in greeting. Though Trowel spoke quietly, Skulks was a Wielder and could hear a Timid Tree Warbler belch from fifty yards away if it was quiet and he knew at which cardinal point the bird was to be found. He was thusly able to hear much of the conversation that transpired.
“Trowel,” greeted one of the four, a short, slightly dumpy man clothed in dark robes.
“Y’Prout,” spoke Trowel. “We’ve got a full quota tonight.”
“Splendid. Our mutual friend will be very pleased at your progress.” There was a slight sibilant quality to his voice and an accent that eluded Skulks for the moment. “Another three weeks and we should be done if you can meet quota every night. Offer the men another five Slivers per night to keep them keen.”
“Agreed. They’re practically fighting amongst themselves to be chosen already. It’s keeping them in line.”
“What are their numbers like?”
“Half a dozen have drifted off over the last few days, but we’re holding them together for now. What about the bargemen?”
“They continue to be full of righteous anger at the injustice of their situation.” Y’Prout chuckled at this. “We’ll have no problems there.” Then he paused. “Did you know we’re being watched?”
Before Foreman Trowel had the opportunity to reply, Y’Prout raised one hand in a gesture, as if casting something into the air in front of him. Skulks felt invisible bands clamp themselves tightly about his arms and legs, forbidding their movement. A strong metallic smell imposed itself upon his nostrils and there was a high-pitched whining in the air, though not a loud one.
“Over there! I’ve netted him - he won’t get away,” said Y’Prout, hardly raising his voice, but pointing to the exact spot where Skulks was hiding. The three figures accompanying Y’Prout, who’d remained silent throughout the exchange moved as one towards Skulks’ hiding place, spreading themselves out in order to approach from three sides.
“An adept!” thought Skulks, already working at the spell which had been cast upon him. Had he been a normal man, he would now have been on his side on the floor with his limbs no longer under his command, awaiting what would doubtless be the painful ministrations of his captors. Luckily for Skulks, he was not an especially normal man and was able to force his unwilling body into slow footsteps deeper into the forest while he struggled to shrug off the unnatural shackles placed upon his person, which made him feel as though he was carrying a sack of cow dung upon his back.
In his hobbled state, it wasn’t long before the first of the three figures who’d been sent to ensure his capture reached him, approaching more silently than Skulks had expected. This figure wasted no time in delivering a sharp blow to the Wielder’s temple using a short wooden cosh, expecting it to crumple the shadowy target who was moving at a surprising pace for someone afflicted by an adept’s binding magic. The surprise of Skulks’ foe was further compounded when a heel connected firmly with his solar plexus, causing him an intense discomfort in the affected area and dropping him onto his buttocks.
With his head ringing from the strike it had received, Skulks continued deeper into the forest. He was a master at all things mechanical, but also had some sway over the magical, particularly where it pertained to the arts of binding and locking. There was many a wizard who had fallen asleep happily, confident that their precious baubles were safe beneath countless layers of magical trickery, yet who had woken the following day to find themselves significantly poorer, if not destitute. Ten Hands had made it his mission to pry from Skulks his methods for the undoing of magics, but thus far Skulks had not confided his secrets.
Moving more freely now, Skulks continued to pluck away the strands of Y’Prout’s magic, even as he turned to face those who had been sent to enact his return to the jetty. It was fortunate that he had not delayed a moment longer, for two were nearly upon him. The third had partaken of a most rapid recovery from the unexpected kick and was only a short distance behind. Skulks sized them up, even as they returned the favour. They were two women, and one man, the latter whom had received a foot in the gut. Their clothing was normal at first glance, but Skulks noted that it was light in weight and arrayed so as not to present any form of encumbrance. They were all lean and walked with a balance and silence that immediately identified them to the trained eye as dangerous foes. Not the sort of opponent one would expect to find amongst the bargemen, where shoulders and biceps were prized, along with the capacity to drink twelve mugs of ale without going for a piss or falling overboard.
The closest one threw a small knife at Skulks’ throat, the movement smooth and fluid. Skulks knew it was a knife for he saw it whisper past him as he turned sideways to avoid it, its trajectory informing him that they now intended to kill him, rather than subdue him for later questioning. The second of his three foes pulled forth two short swords, the blades thin, almost dagger-like. Darkness was no impediment to Skulks’ eyes and he saw the fine workmanship of the swords, with ornate yet functional cross-guards.
Skulks pulled his own daggers from his boots, just as another throwing knife sped through the air towards him and through the space his head had just vacated as he crouched. Skulks’ daggers looked like nothing out of the ordinary, being perhaps slightly longer than a normal dagger; almost a short-sword. The hilts and cross-guards appeared to be cheap iron or steel and the blades themselves looked peculiarly dull. In fact, these seemingly ordinary dagger-swords had each taken five years to create and had cost Skulks so much money that he’d had to steal from practically every rich man in Crimson where they had been made, to pay for them. That was over three hundred years ago and even today there were wanted posters out for his arrest in that city. Much of the cost had been given over to Ten Hands and the Warp and the Weft, who had taken the blacksmith-forged blades and woven in their own spells to ensure that they remained sharp and unbroken, no matter what impact they suffered, as well as absorbing light rather than reflecting it so as not to betray Skulks. The blades had other powers too, but imparted no finesse to the arm of their holder.
Still feeling slightly sluggish, for Y’Prout’s spell had proven to be one of reasonable potency, Skulks faced the group before him. The man and one of the women tried to flank him, both holding the same short-swords, while the second woman stayed back, with the clear intention of trying to skewer Skulks with a throwing blade. Their faces were grim and they made no sound – they were clearly a trained team.
Skulks continued to back further into the forest, trying to put some distance between himself and the jetty. He didn’t particularly want twenty eager woodmen crashing in his direction trying to earn the
mselves a fifty Sliver bounty for his capture. Fortunately, the woods were dense and though he could hear noises from the jetty area, he supposed that Y’Prout and Trowel had no desire to alert other river traffic by creating a disturbance. The densely-packed trees also made it easier for Skulks to stop his opponents dictating the fight.
After a couple of minutes’ cat-and-mouse, with Skulks managing to keep a tree or a swordsman between himself and the dagger-thrower, the woman holding swords darted towards his right, closing the few feet between them with astounding speed. With perfect coordination, the man attacked from the left as the second woman threw a knife and reached for a second. “They must have practised this endlessly,” thought Skulks.
He swatted the knife out of the air with his left-hand dagger-sword and stepped forward to meet the attacking woman with his right-hand blade. Her swords flashed, the first looking to engage Skulks’ dagger as the second was thrust towards his stomach. As Skulks had thought, she was an expert swordsman, not overcommitting herself in an attempt to rush the kill. Nevertheless, he struck aside her first blade with a great and unexpected force given how little room his arm had to accelerate, whilst he turned his torso to the side so that her thrust met with nothing but thin air.
At the same time, the man had attempted to stab Skulks from the other side, using a thrusting motion as the shortest and quickest path to the target. This man held his second blade on guard. They were skilled and cautious, none of them underestimating Skulks.
Skulks didn’t even need to look in order to flick aside this second attack, having already predicted the man’s attack from his movement. With the thrust knocked to one side, the Wielder feinted a stab to distract the man’s sword from its guard and at the same time directed a sideways kick with unerring accuracy into the man’s balls, connecting with such power that he was almost lifted from his feet. It was to his credit that he was able to resist the need to double over forwards, instead hurling himself backwards. Skulks was impressed by the man’s training and fortitude, but not so impressed that he failed to note another knife arcing its way keenly towards his own chest, thrown by the same arm as the others, yet with the same result as Skulks once more batted it aside with a dagger-sword.