Bad to the Throne, page 8
part #15 of The Good Guys Series
“Bigger Tom here,” the leader said, completely unfazed, “has the highest strength score you’ll have seen. And if you don’t comply, he will ruin you.”
“No shit,” I said. “What’s the score, Bigger Tom?”
He grinned. “Seventy-five.”
“Well, hot damn, that’s high.”
“And he can put that strength to use,” the leader said.
“Seems like he could probably do better than acting as the muscle for you.”
The leader frowned. He glanced back at Bigger Tom, and then back at me.
“He does what he wants.”
“And he wants to be ordered about by an idiot?”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, strength doesn’t dictate everything,” I said. “That’s really only part of the equation, from a fighting perspective.”
“You want to see what he can do?” the leader asked.
“I mean, I admit to being curious.”
“You won’t like it.”
“Might be my kink.”
“Your what?”
“Let’s ignore that I said that and just move on. I’m going to go now, because it’s getting late, and I’d like to get home and find some pants that aren’t blessed by the pope.”
That only got confused stares.
“You know, holey.”
Didn’t fix anything.
“Grab him,” the leader said.
Bigger Tom, still smiling, happy at being given free rein to use his powers, I supposed, lunged for me.
As I expected, Bigger Tom had definitely put all his attribute points in one place.
He was slow.
All I had to do was step to the side, and Bigger Tom closed his meaty, hamhock-hands around air.
He reached for me again. And again, I stepped out of the way.
One more time. He lunged, and I grabbed the leader and shoved him right into Bigger Tom. Being that Bigger Tom had a very low agility score (likely), he stumbled over the leader, and both men tumbled to the ground.
“See?” I said. “Only part of the equation.”
Bigger Tom got off the ground and glared at me. At least, that’s what it seemed like he was doing beneath the mask. Kind of hard to get the full picture of his facial expression with so much of it hidden.
“Stand still,” he barked.
“Where’s the fun in that?” I asked. “But, okay, I guess.”
He lunged, and I think he assumed I was going to move, because he missed.
Then he quickly corrected and got a hand on my arm.
“Now you learn why you pay up,” the leader said, brushing the road dirt off his formerly black clothes. “Hurt him.”
Bigger Tom squeezed my arm and started to twist it.
It likely would have hurt a lot. In fact, the squeezing wasn’t comfortable at all.
But between unbreakable bones and having quite a bit more strength than the lad, I just stood there, taking it.
“Not bad,” I said.
Bigger Tom looked confused, going so far as to take his hand off my arm and stare at the spot he’d been gripping.
I picked Bigger Tom up while he wasn’t paying attention and chucked him over the bridge and into the river. Just as fast, I snapped a jab at the leader, popping him in the nose. And then I kicked him. He stumbled back, hit the railing, and then went over.
“Anyone else wanna play?” I asked.
“Hey!” Bigger Tom shouted, hurrying back up the bank and back to the road. “You can’t do that — I wasn’t ready.”
“You want to be ready this time?”
“You can’t do that when I’m ready.”
He swung a fist at me, and it was so fucking telegraphed that I swung back at him, slamming my fist into his as hard as I could.
There was a fantastic crack, and it’s fair to say that Bigger Tom was lost in the interchange. His hand basically pulped before his forearm bones snapped, leaving the lower portion of his arm little more than jelly in a skin sack. Really fucking appetizing.
One of the men in the group stepped away and vomited over the railing of the bridge.
“What the fuck?” the leader bellowed up.
“Bigger Tom needs a healer,” I said, waving my fingers at the group to show that I was still perfectly fine. Which was only slightly a show. The hit hurt like hell, but since I was already out of combat, the soft tissue damage had healed.
Bigger Tom sat down on the ground in shock, unable to process his ruined arm.
“Probably a good one,” I continued. “Not sure if there’s one nearby, but, you know, good luck with that. Hope you put a few points in constitution!”
I sauntered away, heading north toward Romainmont.
26
The stroll north was pleasant, especially once I took my boots off, dumped the water out, and let my feet dry out. It took a little over an hour to walk, which made me think the bandits were probably from Romainmont. I wasn’t sure I wanted to dig into that further, though. Unless, of course, they tried to mess with us when we left. In that case, I’d be forced to kill them all. Or you know, kill one in a very bad way and let the rest run for it.
Maybe losing their primary source of muscle might make the group disband for a bit. Maybe even permanently.
By the time I got into town, people were up and about, doing their day-to-day things — herding cows to market, hawking wares, and, in the case of one person, hauling a wagon of manure around.
I walked to the inn, went inside, and headed straight for the innkeep.
He saw me and wrinkled his nose, trying to hide his disgust but failing.
“Good morning,” I said. “You think I could get a bath?”
“I would suggest it,” the innkeep replied.
“Where might I find that bath?”
“In the back. I can add the charge to your room, if you would prefer.”
“You know, I would prefer that.”
“I can send a girl to draw the bath for you now, or—”
“Perfect. I’m going to grab some clothes, to um, you know.”
“Would you like those laundered?”
“You think there’s someone here who can save these?” I asked, gesturing at the rags I wore. They were probably being held together by the gore still on them.
“Perhaps not, no. But we could probably burn them for you.”
“Probably for the best.”
Ten minutes later, I was in a small room that was mostly taken up by a deep soaking tub. A nice young woman had drawn the bath, and then stood there for a moment. I had to disrobe in front of her, which I did quickly before hopping into the hot water. Which stung a little. She picked my clothes and started to walk off.
“Do you think you could bring me a pair of pliers?” I asked.
“Pliers?”
“Yeah, I got something stuck in my leg, and I need to get it out.”
“I can, um — I suppose I can do that.”
She gave me a strange look, which I figured I deserved, and then left.
I leaned back in the hot water and luxuriated.
“I could get used to this,” I said to no one.
“I bet,” came a familiar voice, but one I hadn’t heard in a while.
I looked around the small room, but in the dim light, I couldn’t see anyone. Switching quickly to tremor sense, I spotted a heartbeat tucked into the corner. I cupped my hands together and shot a jet of water out.
“Hey!” came the reply as Amber, the kitsune girl ranger, stumbled into the light.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, about to get out of the bath before I remembered that I was naked, and sunk lower.
“Someone had to come with Fritz to help you out.”
“Yeah, but–”
“Skeld can’t come, right?”
“Right, but Ragnar?”
“Regrowing.”
“Regrowing?”
“Yep.”
“Regrowing what?”
“Couple of bits, if I remember correctly.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t exactly know. It’s more based on rumor and speculation. Similar story with Bear. She’s not conscious that much these days. I think maybe Skeld wanted to keep her close because, you know…”
“Sort of.”
“Tarryn is on the north wall, working with the construction teams to finish it, and Skeld thought pulling him off would only delay the project more. Darius said the superweasels would revolt if he left. Lee’s workshop is infested with gremlins, which means the rest of Mountainhome is dealing with them as well. Lord–”
“Gremlins?”
“They’re everywhere and they’re awful. Northwoods wanted to come, but then didn’t want to ride Fritz that far. Baltu was exhausted, so he couldn’t come back. Nice horses by the way — Darius told me to tell you that he’ll get them settled and keep them away from Northwoods. Who is drooling over them, but, you know, Darius thinks he can keep Northwoods away. Which I just said.”
“You did.”
“Maybe I figured that there were enough rangers right now. And maybe I wanted to see the capital, what a proper city might be like, as well as the rest of the Empire. And when would I have another chance? Plus, I always wanted more time flying on Fritz, and so I volunteered, and here I am. I can help you until we get back.”
“Help me how?”
“I dunno — whatever Ragnar and Bear did.”
“Do you have invisibility spells?”
“No. But I can hide pretty well.”
“Can I throw you?”
“If you need, I guess.”
“Well, welcome aboard.”
“Thank you. I have pliers for you?”
She held up a pair of pliers that, while both dirty and somewhat rusty, were still a damn sight cleaner than most of the tools I’d used for self-surgery back home.
“Ah, right, I need to pull some teeth out.”
“Whose teeth?”
“Wurm teeth.”
“Wyrm teeth? What kind of wyrm? Forest? I bet they’re out here–”
“Nadelzahnwurms.”
“Oh, wurms.”
“You’d think they could find some names that didn’t rhyme. Or sound exactly the same — whatever.”
Amber just shrugged and then demonstrated the pinch-pinch thing with the pliers.
“Where are the teeth?” she asked.
“You’re going to do it?”
“You were going to do it to yourself?”
“Yeah, but–”
“Where are they?”
“All over.”
“Let’s go then.”
I tried to get out of the bath and maintain modesty, but she just gave me a look.
“You do realize I worked in a brothel, right?” she asked. “I’ve seen it all.”
“Have you seen me naked?”
“I think so.”
“Well, I–”
“For a man who seems to love bathing in gore, blood, and all sorts of other horrible things, you’ve got weird hangups.”
“Fair,” I said, and I turned so she could look at my ass. “First one is there.”
I pointed to my right buttock.
I braced for immense pain.
“Gahh!” I shouted.
“Next!”
It was no longer a pleasant bathing experience.
27
By the time all the teeth were out, I was aching and Amber had collected an impressive collection of needle-like teeth in a wide variety of sizes.
She left me to get dressed, although I was still bleeding in a few places. It turned out that there was some bonus venom in the wurm teeth that made clotting difficult. That meant I inadvertently got blood on my pants. Again. It was just the way I was destined to look. So I had that going for me.
At breakfast, I introduced everyone to Amber, which was a little awkward because no one really knew how to act around her. It was a bit like bringing a supermodel into a frat house. The women all glared at the poor kitsune girl and the men all leered. Except Philippe. He was his usual self, somewhere between affable and idiot. Affiot?
I explained what I’d seen and got an extensive tongue lashing from Albrecht for foolishly putting myself in a position of danger. He also, unsurprisingly, didn’t think it was a good idea to go back. But I wasn’t about to leave the nest in place.
“You didn’t see it,” I said. “It’s bad.”
“Of course it’s bad,” Albrecht countered. “It’s a nadelzahnwurm nest. You think people want ‘em to pop up? That’s why it’s on the list of things to be cleared by the Empire, instead of being left to idiots like you who will wind up making the problem worse.”
“How would I make it worse?”
“By falling in and being devoured.”
“Well, I didn’t.”
“Only by luck.”
“Maybe, but I’m fine.”
“You’re going to run out of luck at the wrong time, your grace, and we will all pay the price.”
“Well, maybe that’ll be after Valamir gives you your next assignment.”
“A man can hope.”
“Besides,” I said, “I have a plan to handle things that don’t include going anywhere near that stupid nest.”
“Care to explain?”
“Let me tell you about a thing called air power.”
“You’re going to drop something on the nest from Fritz.”
“Um, yeah. So I take it you know some things about air power?”
“Yes, your grace.”
“Well, that’s what I’m going to do — I’m going to go get on Fritz, and I’m going to drop things on the nest until there isn’t a nest to speak of. Any problems with the plan?”
“None, your grace. I am going back to bed. Let me know when you are done. Or, underlings, let me know when he’s died and we can go back to Glaton without dealing with him anymore.”
“Always a pleasure, Albrecht.”
“For one of us, perhaps.”
At which point, he left the table.
28
I bought all the lamp oil that the little general store had, which amounted to four large barrels and three smaller ones. Then I got the cooking oil they had, which was mostly in solid form, like lard and tallow. Then I rounded up all the high-proof alcohol in town, which wiped out a fair portion of my current gold supply. I actually wound up trading a few sapphires for the more industrial oil the smithy had on hand, which I felt a little weird about because the gems were practically worthless to me, and I had to pretend they were of great value.
By the end of my shopping spree, I figured I had a good amount of flammable shit to firebomb the nest with. I loaded everything into my bag of holding, and Amber and I went out into the woods. She used a whistle to call Fritz down, and I explained the plan to Fritz.
“There’s this nest of wurm things,” I said. He immediately squawked at me and used his head to gesture over to the east. “You know where it is?”
He nodded.
“We’re going to firebomb it.”
He bobbed his head up and down, which I took to mean he was moderately excited by the task. Amber and I hopped onto Fritz’s back and we took off.
It was nice to fly again. Not that I disliked walking. I’d grown to enjoy the act of moving through the world on my own power. It was something I’d detested back in the old world, when I thought going anywhere not via motorcycle was a sign my world was ending. But there was something so magical about flight that I loved every moment I got to experience it. Especially in a place where it was so foreign.
Fritz seemed to recognize some of the inherent issues that came with bombing via throwing things from the back of a bird, so he didn’t go up as high as normal, choosing, instead, to fly just above the treetops, about two hundred or so feet up.
Minutes later, the nest was below us, and Fritz banked hard to give us a good view.
The nadelzahnwurms had been mighty busy since I’d been gone. It didn’t look like I’d done any damage. The surface of the nest was covered in whitish-mucus-web, and it was a mess of activity. The whole thing seemed to writhe. I felt a full-body shiver pass through me and Amber made an awful noise. I wasn’t sure if she’d thrown up or just dry heaved.
“Go around again,” I shouted at Fritz. “We’ll drop some barrels when you bank!”
I got a squawk in response, and he flapped his huge wings to get us some speed.
While he did that, I reached into my bag of tricks and pulled out a barrel of lamp oil.
As we came through on the second pass, Fritz did half a barrel roll to keep us perpendicular to the ground.
I managed to get two barrels out.
The first hit at the start of the nest, and the next crashed into the middle.
The nadelzahnwurms did not like that. They started to swarm, but they also didn’t seem to understand what was happening, because why would they expect things to fall out of the sky on them?
Back and forth we went, dropping barrels. Lots of barrels. Ragnar hadn’t used all the barrels he’d prepped for the last firebombing, so we were more than ready. I counted forty-two barrels of various oils and flammable liquids. And it looked like most every part of the nest had been liberally doused.
Now for the hardest part — getting a lit flame down there.
I reached into the bag and thought about a lit torch. Had to be worth a shot, right?
Sure enough, I felt one in my hand. No idea when I’d put it in the bag, but I was grateful I had.
Minor problem though: flying is windy. So as soon as I pulled it from the bag, it blew out.
If I had one, there might be another.
“I got another one!” I shouted, pulling out the lit torch that immediately became a stick.
“I got it,” I heard Amber yell.
I looked back as she got a small bow out and strung it, which was impressive to watch while on birdback. Then she shot an arrow.
I was a little confused, but the arrow flared halfway to the nest, and hit while still lit.
