from THE UNDERGOD
FARCHRIST TALES - BOOK THREE
Speculative Fiction
Approximately 69,000 words
Copyright © Eric Lanke, 1991. All rights reserved.
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We called the game “kick-the-can,” and I’m sure children have
played and will continue to play it for years under that name or under some
other simplified nomenclature. I was “it,” and I had just counted up to the
mandatory fifty, when I saw the horse-drawn wagon come crawling down the
street. The man who drove it was still young, but obviously an adult, and he
wore red clothes and a black beard. Behind him, the wagon absolutely tottered
with piles of books and boxes, loosely held together with a piece of tarpaulin.
The man stopped the cart right beside me, in front of a house that had been
vacant for months and whose yard my friends and I had been using as a
playground of sorts. He asked me for some help in unloading his wagon. Without
much thought I agreed, figuring his books and boxes might be more interesting
than another round of kick-the-can. He asked me my name and I said Gil. I asked
him his and he said Roy. When the work was finished, and I had seen dozens of
things that made my eyes swim with fascination, the man took me aside and
pressed a small silver pentacle medallion into my palm.
+
+ +
Brisbane did his best to make out
Ternosh’s vague form as they walked down the dark tunnel. Every once and a
while, he would unconsciously slow down and Vrak would give him an angry shove
from behind. In that way, at least, it seemed like old times.
“As I said before,” Ternosh said
as he led the way into the ork tunnels, “I pretend to neither understand nor
agree with the information I have received from my Demosk, but I do not for a
moment doubt its veracity, nor will I shirk my obvious responsibility in the
matter.”
Brisbane noticed how talkative
Ternosh was being. He decided to try and take advantage of it. “Just what
exactly did your Demosk tell you this time?”
Ternosh turned down a side passage
and Brisbane quickly followed him, eager to hear anything the ork might say.
Ternosh was silent for a moment before he answered.
“I might as well tell you, I
suppose. I’m going to have to tell you quite a bit I’d really rather not tell
you before this is all over.” Ternosh continued his fast pace down the tunnels
and into the earth as he spoke loudly enough for Brisbane to hear. “My Demosk
again asserted the bane of He-Who-Watches was in your blood and he also
revealed something about his intentions in granting you such a responsibility.
I was told even if given the chance, you would not flee from the settlement
because you had a job of sorts to do here. I admit I do not know what this job
is. I was also told you were to be treated like any other Grum, or
Grumak-in-training. This I will do even though I do not know what will possibly
result from it.”
Ternosh continued to lead the way
through the countless tunnels and corridors. Brisbane was not sure if he was being
taken to the same chamber he had been to before, but he did not think so. His
eyes were beginning to adjust to the darkness and occasionally they would pass
near a room or through a corridor that was lit by torchlight.
“Other than that,” Ternosh went
on, “I really am not yet sure what He-Who-Watches, Or Gruumsh One-Eye as I am
now allowed to refer to him as in your presence, has in store for you. I do
know I will continue to ask my Demosk for information, but that can often be
slow going. Whatever reason Gruumsh has for this situation, it must be unusual
and very important for him to go to these extreme measures.”
Shortly the small party arrived at
a small chamber that seemed to be a laboratory of sorts. It was lit by torches
and contained workbenches covered with books, glassware filled with liquids,
and jars filled with solid ingredients. A single ork stood at one of the
workbenches, dressed in red robes like the ones worn by Ternosh, except his had
white stripes running down the sleeves and wide white streaks in the folds that
fell beneath the waist. The ork seemed busy at working with the liquids and
glassware. When he turned to meet the group entering the chamber, Brisbane
noticed he had two red eyes.
Ternosh turned to face Brisbane
and saw Vrak standing there behind the human. He raised his voice in several
curt orders and Vrak quickly turned and fled from the chamber.
“I’m afraid Vrak has not yet
accepted the fact that you are no longer a prisoner. It is a problem you are
likely to have with the majority of us. I will do as I am told, but I cannot
force anyone to treat you cordially. Wister?”
Ternosh addressed the ork in the
red and white robes and he stopped his work to come over by the pair at the
doorway.
“Brisbane,” Ternosh said, “this is
Wister, a Grum like you. I have already discussed your new position with him
and, as I am needed elsewhere at the moment, he will have to continue with your
indoctrination into our ways.”
Brisbane looked at Wister and
nodded his head. “Hello.”
Wister said nothing and turned his
red eyes away from Brisbane.
“By the way,” Ternosh cut in. “My
name is Ternosh.”
“I know,” Brisbane said, trying
not to feel insulted by Wister’s rudeness.
“You know?” Ternosh said, his brow
wrinkling. “How would you know that?”
Brisbane did not want to go into
what had happened between Smurch and himself. “I heard your Demosk call you
Grumak Ternosh. I knew Grumak was your title, so I figured Ternosh was your
name.”
Ternosh seemed puzzled. “You can
speak our language? That of the grugan?”
“No,” Brisbane said honestly. “The
Demosk was speaking the common tongue.”
“You heard your own language?”
“Yes,” Brisbane said.
“Fascinating,” Ternosh said. “This
is something I will have to look into.” He snapped out of his puzzlement. “Oh
well, no matter, I must be off. I will leave you in Wister’s capable hands.”
Ternosh turned to leave but before
he had gone a full step he stopped and turned back. “Oh, Brisbane. Now that you
are a member of the klatru, our upper class, you have the right to retain a
personal servant. Shall I assign you one or do what want someone in particular?”
“What do you mean?” Brisbane
asked.
“Well,” Ternosh said, “if you
wanted to pick Vrak or someone else in the party that captured you, they would
have no choice in the matter. They would be forced to serve you.”
Brisbane thought about it. “No,” he
said. “I’m not going to make any friends that way.”
Ternosh nodded and then focused
his attention on the side of Brisbane’s neck. The Grumak reached out and tore
off the healing patch he had placed there. Brisbane’s hand went up to his neck
and he could feel no trace of a scab or scar.
“So,” Ternosh said. “I’ll just
assign you someone.”
“No, wait a minute,” Brisbane
said. “Smurch. I would like Smurch to be my personal servant.”
Ternosh looked at him oddly but he
eventually nodded his head. “Fine. I’ll have him sent down. Now, I really am
leaving. Brisbane, Wister, I’ll see you both at dinner.”
Ternosh spun and this time he did
leave the chamber. Brisbane watched him go and when he turned back to the
chamber he saw Wister had returned to his workbench. The ork was mixing liquids
together in exact amounts.
Brisbane slowly went over to
Wister’s work table. It was cluttered with an array of various-sized bottles,
but a small work area had been cleared in front of Wister. The ork had a large
book open before him and a large vessel in which he was mixing small amounts of
the different liquids. Brisbane heard a squeak and amidst all the bottles he
saw a small wire cage holding a large black rat. The rat’s body filled the
entire cage and left no room for the animal to move around.
“What are you doing?” Brisbane
asked.
Wister said nothing. When he had
mixed his ingredients to the proper amount, he picked up what appeared to be a
small arrowhead on a stick and began to dunk the barb into the mixture he had
created. The potion was syrupy and it clung to the arrowhead like glue. When
Wister had the point coated with the substance, he brought the small weapon to
bear on the rat’s cage. The ork quickly struck the arrow in between two of the
bars and into the hide of the rodent.
Brisbane stepped up next to
Wister. “What are you doing?”
Wister put out an arm to keep
Brisbane away from the rat. The ork kept his eyes on the animal in the cage and
Brisbane could do nothing else but watch.
The rat, which had squeaked loudly
when the arrow had pierced it, was now silent and stood on shaky feet with its
beady black eyes wide open. The wound in its side was not great, and it
appeared the sticky potion had actually stopped some of the bleeding, but the
rat did not look well. Its whole body was quivering now with rapid muscle
spasms and in a short period of time it fell over and stopped moving
altogether.
“Is it dead?” Brisbane asked.
Wister still said nothing.
Completely ignoring Brisbane, he picked up a quill pen and began to make notes
in the book that lay open before him. The script he wrote in was both strange
and somewhat familiar to Brisbane.
Poison, Brisbane thought. It must
be some kind of poison. Killed that rat quick and easy. Is that what this
Wister is doing here? Developing different kinds of poison?
Brisbane decided to try one more
time. “Is that some kind of poison?”
To Wister, it must have been like
Brisbane was not even there. For a moment, Brisbane considered Wister might in
fact be deaf, but he quickly dismissed the idea. Ternosh would have told him
that, he thought, and besides, Wister had not only not spoken to him, the ork
had paid him no attention whatsoever.
To the hells with him, Brisbane thought. If that’s the way he wants to be—fine.
Brisbane could play that game, too. He stepped away from Wister and began to
move around the chamber, looking at the other work tables and the things on
them. They were all similar to Wister’s table and Brisbane quickly lost
interest in them because nothing was being worked on at them. He wasn’t about
to go wandering around in the dark tunnels, so it seemed he would have to sit
and wait for something to happen. Brisbane squatted down against one of the
walls and did just that.
He began to turn the situation
over in his mind. He did feel more in control than he had in his cage, but he
was in no way near to having control
over it. There were still a lot of things that were up in the air, things he
didn’t understand, and things of which he wasn’t sure.
What exactly had the Demosk told
Ternosh about him? The Grumak had acted like he was coming clean with Brisbane,
but Brisbane doubted Ternosh would actually tell him everything he knew.
Brisbane could not forget the countless faces that had passed by his cage
earlier that day. Whatever was going on, as Ternosh had said, it was not a
normal situation. Traditions were going to be suspended, policies changed, and
feelings hurt. He was going to have to tread very lightly if he wanted to make
any progress.
Brisbane was playing along with
this charade just long enough for him to get Angelika back. He knew that on the
surface, but he still did not fully understand the deep down importance of such
an action. To him it was a rational decision, he figured as long as he still had
his life, he had a chance to steal back his sword from the orks. The thought
that in his quest for Angelika he might very well lose the life Ternosh had
granted him had never occurred to him, nor did the thought that the decision to
stay might not have really been his.
Thoughts of Angelika made Brisbane
realize he was now in the same caves in which he had seen Vrak take his sword
and he may, in fact, be close enough to her to re-establish contact. He didn’t
seem to have anything else to do—Wister was still working at his table,
oblivious to Brisbane—so he closed his eyes and opened his mind, reaching out
in all directions for her.
And ever so quietly, behind all
his brain’s activity, underneath even the currents that beat his heart and
digested his food, Brisbane could hear that soft, seductive voice he had longed
for so much.
Brisbane? Is that you?
Brisbane’s heart raced. Angelika! Yes, it’s me. Where are you?
I am nearby, young Brisbane. I am glad you have found me.
Where are you? I’ll come and get you right now.
No. Remember what I have told you. We have the chance to do great
good in this den of evil. Be patient and be strong. Vengeance shall be ours.
Angelika. I’ve missed you so.
As I have missed you, young Brisbane. Never before have I been wielded
by someone with such potential. Our conquests will be written in the Book of
Time. Together we will destroy terrible evil. I yearn for our next battle.
Angelika’s words left Brisbane a
little empty. No, Angelika. I need you.
I’ve missed you. I’ve missed your voice in my head.
Be patient and be strong. In your hands, I shall draw evil blood
again.
Angelika?
Her voice was gone. Brisbane felt
unusually uneasy. Normally, a little discussion with Angelika would have
supported him, given him a boost of confidence to continue facing the odds in
such an unfriendly situation. But this time, her voice left him feeling just
the opposite. He felt a little bit more alone in his strife, a little less
confident, and a little less able to deal with the mess his life had become. It
was a feeling he tried not to dwell on. He tried to reassure himself, forcing
himself to be nurtured by Angelika’s words, and tried to forget he had never
had to force himself before.
There was a noise at the entrance
of the chamber, someone clearing their throat in order to draw attention to
themselves. Brisbane opened his eyes to see Smurch standing there, dressed in
his plain gray clothing. Brisbane quickly got to his feet and went over to his
friend. Wister took no notice of them.
“Jack,” Brisbane said in a low
voice. “It’s good to see you again.”
Brisbane extended his arm for a
handshake but Smurch ignored it. Instead, the half-ork bowed respectfully.
“I am honored,” Smurch said to the
floor, “that you have chosen me, Grum Brisbane. I pledge myself and my service
to you until such time as you deem it unnecessary.” He slowly straightened back
up.
Brisbane tried not to blush. He
looked over at Wister and spoke in an even lower voice. “Is there somewhere we
can go for some privacy?”
Smurch answered in monotone. “I
can show you to your chamber, if that’s what you mean.”
Brisbane turned back to his
servant and nodded. “Let’s go.”
Smurch did not move. “Grum
Wister,” he said to the ork in the red and white robes. “Do you have any
further need of Grum Brisbane?”
Wister did not turn around. He
continued his work, mixing different liquids together to make strange potions.
Brisbane heard the ork speak for the first time.
“No.”
“Then I shall take him to his
chamber,” Smurch said.
The half-ork turned and left the
room. Brisbane quickly followed him. They walked down many of the twisting
tunnels and Brisbane made a mental note that sometime soon he was going to have
to learn the layout of these caverns. He couldn’t very well have Smurch take
him everywhere he wanted to go. Brisbane tried to memorize the way from the
work chamber to his personal one, but there were so many twists and turns he
would not have bet on his ability to find his way back.
Finally, they came to a small
corridor branching off one of the main tunnels. It went back about twenty feet
and ended in a portal with a dark curtain hanging in it. Next to the portal, in
a wall bracket, was a burning torch and under the torch, carved into the wall,
was a large cubbyhole, about big enough for a man to lie down in. The floor of
the cubbyhole was blanketed with thick animal furs.
Smurch stopped and pulled aside
the dark curtain. Brisbane could see a roughly square chamber about twenty feet
across. In the center of the room was a low table, and on the table was what
appeared to be an oil lantern. A crude bed sat against one wall, a well-worn
mattress laying on a wooden rack to keep it off the floor and heaped with old
blankets and furs. The room appeared to be otherwise empty.
“This is it,” Smurch said as he
went in and set about to lighting the lantern.
Brisbane stepped in and let the
curtain swing shut behind him. “A bit frugal, isn’t it, Jack?”
Smurch was getting a warm glow
from the lantern. “Only the Grumak and the Sumak have finer accommodations,
Grum Brisbane.”
“Jack,” Brisbane said. “You don’t
have to be so formal with me.”
Smurch stood up and looked at
Brisbane. “Are you not my master? Have you changed your mind? Are you going to
choose another to be your servant?”
“No, dammit, I’m not going to
choose another. I chose you because I wanted someone I could talk to.”
“I will obey your every command,”
Smurch said.
“That’s not what I mean and you know
it.”
Smurch made a face as if he was
trying to think. “Grum Brisbane, I must treat you with due respect in the
presence of others. If I do not, you will become a laughing-stock among the
klatru. They will think you are unable to control your own servant.”
Brisbane nodded. “Okay, fine. But
we’re alone now. I want you to drop this ‘Grum Brisbane’ horseshit. My name is
Gil.”
“Is this an order?”
“If it has to be,” Brisbane said.
“If that is the only way I can get you to treat me as an equal.”
Smurch’s eyes went wide. “Grum
Brisbane, we can never be equals.”
Brisbane shook his head in
frustration. “Then how about friends?”
Smurch did not say anything, but
the look on his face was not promising. Brisbane’s stomach suddenly rumbled
loud enough for Smurch to hear it.
“Dinner is less than an hour
away,” the half-ork said. “If you do not wish to wait until then, I can send
for some food to be brought here.”
Brisbane shook his head. In a
strange way, he had almost become accustomed to his hunger.
Almost.
“I guess I can wait,” he said.
“What else is there to do?”
Smurch looked shocked. “You may do
whatever you wish. You are Grum Brisbane.”
Brisbane was really getting sick
of that. “What would you suggest I do with my time?” he snapped.
Smurch sniffed the air. “Well,”
the half-ork said slowly. “No disrespect intended, but it would not be proper
for you to show up in the banquet chamber smelling the way you do. As a member
of the klatru, it is now your privilege and duty to bathe regularly.”
Brisbane lifted his arm and took a
whiff. “I am a little ripe,” he said after his eyes stopped watering. “It’s
been quite a while since I’ve had a bath.”
Smurch nodded. “Shall I take you
to the bath chamber?”
“This place sure does seem to have
a lot of chambers.”
Smurch said nothing to that.
“Yes,” Brisbane sighed. “Please
do.”
Smurch extinguished the lantern
and then led Brisbane out of his personal chamber. They turned down the main
corridor and began to make their way to one of its ends. Small tunnels branched
off the corridor at regular intervals, all of them ending in torchlight and a
dark curtain. Brisbane could only assume these were more living quarters for
other members of the klatru.
When they reached the end of the
corridor, Smurch led Brisbane into another lit chamber. High up on one of the
walls, a spout of clear water tumbled out a rough crack in the stone and fell
to gather in a large pool that dominated the floor of the room. Next to the
pool, freakish and out of place in the rough stone cavern, was a small wooden
towel rack, like you would expect to find in someone’s home, stuffed with
towels and cakes of soap on a small shelf.
Brisbane looked at all the water
before him and had to decide whether he was going to drink it or bathe in it. Both, he decided liberally. I’ll drink from the spout and bathe in the
pool.
Smurch was at his elbow. “Would
you like me to bathe you, Grum Brisbane?”
“No,” Brisbane said, laughing
inwardly at the idea. “There are still some things I prefer to do myself.”
“I understand,” Smurch said. “With
your permission, I will go and procure some clean garments for you to wear.”
Brisbane nodded. “That will be
fine, Jack. Thank you.”
Smurch stiffened. “I will be back
shortly,” he said. “Enjoy your bath, Grum Brisbane.”
“Gil,” Brisbane corrected him, but
the half-ork had already turned to leave the chamber.
Brisbane began to remove his
clothing. He was still wearing his tanned leather pants and the blue tunic his
mother had made for him, but they were filthy, caked with mud and waste. Wash them, he thought. I’ll wash them, too. Smurch was going to
bring him new clothes, but he still did not want to get rid of his old ones. He
could still remember his mother’s hands as she had stitched the tunic together
and had put the gold needlework around the collar. Brisbane put the tunic and
the trousers carefully by the side of the pool and removed the tattered remains
of his underclothing.
When he was naked, he found some
stone steps leading down into the pool and he slowly immersed himself in the
water. It was warm and only about waist deep, but Brisbane dunked himself down
all the way, and he stayed under for as long as he could hold his breath. He
felt good under the water like that, better than he had in a long time. His
body was buoyed in the water and it felt like he had left the confines of the
earth and was floating in some thick soup that existed between the stars. His
eyes were closed so he could see nothing and the only sound he heard was the
muffled rumble of water falling into the pool.
When his breath ran out on him,
Brisbane resurfaced. He moved over to the rack to get some soap and he began to
wash himself. He soaped up and then moved over to the waterfall to rinse off.
He turned his face up into the spray and let the water cascade down around him.
He took a drink and, although the water was warm, it was clean and refreshing.
Brisbane surveyed his own body as
he washed it. The effects of his injuries were diminishing—the swelling on his
face had gone down considerably and his abdomen was only a little tender to the
touch. This pleased him, the fact that he was healing, but there was something
else that disturbed him. His eyes saw a body that was much thinner than the one
he had known before. His muscles were noticeably, perhaps only to him, smaller
and there seemed to be less fat padding them. He looked hardened, more angular,
and different. It was as if he was slowly changing into something else and
these were the first steps in the metamorphosis.
Brisbane tried not to think about
it. He was a member of the klatru now and, along with bathing, he was sure to
get all the food he could ask for. Smurch had said dinner was less than an hour
away. Brisbane would then see to putting some meat back on his bones.
He continued his bath, washing out
his hair and his clothes when he had removed the grime from his skin. He felt
refreshed and invigorated when Smurch returned with his new clothes, red and
white robes like the ones Wister had worn. Brisbane felt ready to eat an entire
horse at dinner.
Smurch offered to towel dry Grum
Brisbane.
Brisbane refused him.