Horde, page 31
Paug scratched his chin. “I don’t think they’re hunting.”
“They must be huntin’. They’re bringin’ back food.”
“That might not be all they’re doing.”
Milph snorted. “Well, of course that’s what they’re doin’. Why would they call it huntin’ if they were, you know, havin’ Pleasures of the Flesh together?”
Paug blinked. “Do you think that’s what they’re doing?”
Milph grinned. “Thinkin’ ain’t really my strong suit, bro.”
Regardless, Hodak seemed a little more stressed than normal. The laid-back attitude he’d affected since becoming a Hanrahite Cleric had transformed to a short temper exacerbated by Gilpin’s constant needling. It got to the point where Paug offered to go a couple rounds of arguing with swords with him just so he could work out his issues.
On the other hand, Scufthalansà seemed more cheerful than ever. She hummed to herself as she walked, often strumming her bouzouki. Paug saw the change in her behavior and wondered if regular bouts of Pleasures of the Flesh made women better companions and men worse. He was beginning to think he should reconsider his interest in finding an Elven wife. He didn’t need to be moping around all miserable every day like Hodak was.
The rolling hills grew taller and cold, burbling streams rolled along their bases. Occasionally one would drop into a sudden box canyon to vanish dozens or hundreds of feet below. It was into one of these canyons they descended, Petunia leading them down a narrow path that was invisible from the canyon’s summit. Split logs had been laid across the path to form natural barriers to erosion. Likewise, they lined the inside edge to guide water away from the path surface and into carefully-designed gutters.
“This is a good path,” said Gilpin. “Better plumbing on it than Elves have.”
“We are not all Barbarians,” said Scufthalansà, who had been more private about her bodily functions than most Elves. “It is all in ze upbringing.”
“Not all Barbarians,” Petunia said with a solemn expression. “I am much more cultured than many. They are . . . Barbaric.”
They descended the terraced path to find it continued along the side of the river, marked by regular cairns of stones piled as high as Petunia’s head.
“Why so tall?” Gilpin looked up at one.
“Winter. Sometimes that much snow.”
Gilpin shook his head. “Nature.”
The river beside them bounced and clattered over boulders, filling the air with chilly spray and making conversation at volumes less than a shout impossible. Petunia led the party along the path worn bare by many generations of the Barbarian people, using her spear as a walking stick. Scufthalansà and Hodak followed her, not exactly hand-in-hand, but not exactly far enough apart to suggest there wasn’t something going on there. Scufthalansà’s bouzouki bounced across her back and she carried her bow in hand. Paug tried not to watch the play of her behind parts as she walked but his eyes constantly strayed toward them, to the point that Milph had to keep him from stumbling more than once. Gilpin scampered along behind them, his inexhaustible Halfling energy tempered by his nonstop litany of complaints about being outside and shouldn’t happen to a decent Halfling.
Milph and Paug brought up the rear, which was an odd position for Paug since he felt he was more or less in charge of the motley crew. He mentioned as much to Milph and his brother put it all into perspective in his unique, moronic fashion. “Back home, captains always led from the rear of the regiments. Don’t you remember them tellin’ us in regimen? If the captain leads from the front, he’s the first one to get a spear up his nose, and then where would we be?”
“So you’re saying they’re the regiment?” Paug wrinkled his brow. “That doesn’t seem right. A regiment is part of the Horde, and that’s a gigantic army. They’re supposed to die on the spears and arrows of our enemies.”
Milph beamed. “Yeah, ain’t it great?”
“No, that’s not us. We’re not going to just stand around and order others to their deaths. That’s why we left the Horde. I didn’t want any part of that lifestyle.”
“I don’t understand,” Milph said. “But that ain’t anything unusual.”
“We’re not slaves to the Horde. Not now. We’re the heroes of this tale.”
“You mean . . . you mean we’re the good guys?” Milph gasped in astonishment. “But we’re Orcs.” He pointed. “We do stuff like that.”
Paug looked where his brother pointed, and saw several skulls mounted upon spears jammed into the ground. Strips of leathery flesh dangled off them, while their gaping mouths hung open to allow the spears to penetrate them. Despite their location near the river, they appeared to have dried out instead of rotted.
“Is this . . . your village?” Scufthalansà’s voice was barely a whisper.
“Home.” Petunia sounded as subdued as Paug had heard her since the first time they’d met. “Came back to this before. Changed nothing.”
The only sound in the remains of the village was the burble of the nearby river and their footsteps scraping on the ground. It looked like it had held several permanent structures as well as maybe a dozen tents when it was whole. Now, only a few poles and posts remained, charred and blackened from the attackers’ flames. Charred skeletons scattered about the ground provided the only evidence people had lived within the village before its burning. Being an Orc, Paug wasn’t particularly moved by destruction. In fact, he found it to be a refreshing change of pace. They were trained in regimen to loot, plunder, and pillage, and burning was standard procedure following an Orcish victory.
Defeating the small village wouldn’t have taken a lot of soldiers, Paug thought. Even with it populated with a bunch of warriors like Petunia, a regiment or two of Orcs would have taken it down handily. Something about the remains of the dead struck him as unusual, and he stopped to look at a couple of them.
“Ow, dang it!” Milph hopped up and down, holding one foot. “I stepped on a stupid spear point.”
Paug realized that was what had been bothering him. All the burnt victims had the equally-burnt remains of weapons beside them, but they didn’t appear to have been used. Indeed, none of the victims appeared to have been aligned for combat. It was as if they’d been armed but not expecting trouble, and had been cut down where they stood.
“This stinks,” said Gilpin. “And I don’t just mean of old fires, either. These people got blindsided. How fast did this village burn?”
“Fast,” Petunia said. “I was not gone even half day.”
“I can only think of one thing that burns so fast.” Gilpin looked over toward where Milph sat on a stone, picking at the cut on his foot. Paug likewise looked toward his brother, as did Hodak, Scufthalansà, and Petunia, who took a single, heavy step toward him. Paug’s hackles raised and he put his hand on his sword, just in case.
“Not raiders after all,” Petunia said through clenched teeth. “Magic.”
Milph noticed everyone looking at him. “I’m okay, I just stepped on somethin’ sharp.” He paused. “Do I have a booger or somethin’?”
“Petunia, it can’t have been him. We’ve never been here before. We didn’t even know where here is.” Paug reached out to touch her arm. It was quivering with barely-repressed rage.
“Could be fire wand though,” the Barbarian said. “I break it.”
Milph gasped, eyes wide. “My wand? You can’t break my wand! I stole it fair and square while that old man was poopin’!”
“Barbarian . . .” said Scufthalansà. “It is bad to break magic wands. It often releases all ze power stored up in zem at one moment. I have seen how powerful ze wand is in ze hands of an inexperienced magic-user. Imagine what it would do should it be shattered.”
“Petunia, you can’t blame the wand. It’s just a weapon. Someone has to point it and use it,” said Hodak.
Petunia’s eyes narrowed. “Blue wizard. I kill him.” She turned to leave.
Paug stepped in front of her, wondering if he was consigning himself to being run through. “You have to stay with us, Petunia.”
“Why?”
“Because we know where Fankwipf Bluehat is going. He’s going to the Cinnabar Tower with that fucker Flupp Reginald,” said Gilpin.
“We have to get there first,” said Paug. “So we can set a trap for them. Then you can kill him.”
Petunia looked down at Paug. “You wiser than you think, Paug. Is good plan. I stay with you.” She looked back at the remains of the villagers on the poles. “But first, we take those down. They deserve better.”
“Do we have time?” Paug asked.
“We make time.”
Scufthalansà cleared her throat. “You will need a Cleric to oversee ze proper treatment of ze immortal remains. I shall go hunt for our dinner. Perhaps ze Halfling would like to join me?”
Gilpin missed a step and nearly went sprawling. “Uh, sure. Whatever you want, Princess.” He shot a glance at Hodak, who looked strangely relieved at not being selected for hunting duty.
Paug shook his head, wondering if his time would ever come.
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Chapter Twenty-Eight
Down the Dhum River
While Gilpin and Scufthalansà were hunting—whenever Hodak said it, he made an odd gesture with his fingers that Paug figured was some sort of magical air glyph thing—Petunia combed the coast of the river.
Paug and Hodak watched her search. “Do you really think it was Fankwipf Bluehat who burned her village?” Paug asked the Cleric.
“I think she thinks it was, bro,” said Hodak. “Regardless of what actually might have happened. For all we know, it could have been those raiders she already killed. Or even another wizard altogether with a fire wand or fire spells or something.”
“Are there a lot of them? Wizards, I mean.”
“No.”
Petunia crowed with success from the riverbank. “I have found boat.”
What she called a boat looked to Paug more like a bundle of logs tied together by braided rope. He blinked as she dragged it onto the river shore beside where it had been tied and proceeded to stomp logs that had come loose from the ropes back into place. “Hey, uh, maybe we should walk.”
She didn’t look at him. “No. Faster this way. Get blue wizard faster.”
Paug watched her wrestle and bully the pieces of the boat back into a configuration of which she approved. “Is it, uh, safe?”
Petunia kicked at the side of one log, skewing another out of place with the impact. “Plenty safe, yes. Watch where you step. All fine.” She wrestled the loose log back into place. Then she dragged the boat back out into the river, pulled a pair of poles from alongside one of the logs, and jammed them down through gaps between the logs into the mud below to act as anchors. “When Elf and Halfling done fucking, we go.”
“Petunia? I don’t mean to be all smarty butt on you, but I think you mean huntin’. They’re huntin’.” Milph beamed. “Maybe you got a different word for it in Bar . . . Barbarish.”
“Hunting,” Petunia repeated. “Yes. Surely.” She snorted in a mixture of disbelief and amusement. “We leave when they return. From hunting.”
“I don’t think she thinks they’re huntin’,” Milph whispered to Paug.
Paug shoved him away. “Thinking isn’t your strong suit.”
Sure enough, Elf and Halfling returned awhile later, bearing a brace of pheasants tied to a stick. Gilpin’s face seemed frozen in a perpetual look of mild perplexment, while Scufthalansà hummed to herself as she prepared the birds for roasting over the coals. Petunia took one of them from her and walked away, crunching upon it raw. While the Elf rubbed seasoning over the freshly-plucked carcasses, Gilpin withdrew a tiny flask from his backpack and drained it dry.
“Rough day hunting?” Paug stood over the Halfling and looked down at him in bemusement.
Gilpin groaned. “It’s like climbing a mountain, Paug. I don’t know how you people do it.” He sighed. “I wish it was further into the winter. I could really use some ice.”
“Ice? For what?”
“Don’t worry about it.” For the first time, Gilpin noticed Petunia and her raft. “That’s not another damn boat, is it?”
“Anything can be a boat, bro.” Hodak smiled as he passed by with an armful of wood for the cooking fire. “Long as it floats.”
Gilpin laid back with his arm over his eyes. “Thank you for that wisdom, O Cleric. I can die fulfilled now.”
“Do you need healing?” Hodak held up his Hand, its glow plainly visible against the cloudy sky.
“You are not bringing that thing anywhere near Little Gilpin.”
“I thought all of you was Little Gilpin.” Milph giggled at his own joke.
Petunia paced back and forth while the others ate the roasted birds, clearly anxious to be underway even with the lateness of the day. Occasionally when she felt she’d paced enough, she’d stand off to one side and clear her throat repeatedly until someone looked in her direction, at which point she would first glare at them and then shoot a significant glance toward her raft.
Paug blew on his fingers, which he’d burned on the pheasant. “Petunia, wouldn’t it be better to camp here and leave in the morning? I’m not real keen on being on an unknown river at night. There could be anything out there.”
“Undead,” said Hodak.
“Bandits,” added Scufthalansà.
“Bears.” Milph crammed the last of his portion into his mouth and looked longingly at Gilpin’s.
“We should not stay here,” the Barbarian said, in as restrained a voice as Paug thought she could probably manage. “This place cursed now. Spirits of my people not resting.”
“So, like, how can we put them to rest?” Hodak finished the last of his pheasant and tossed the bones into the fire. “I mean besides the obvious bit about you killing the Blue Wizard. We all get that already. Is there a ritual we can perform to put your people to rest?”
“No.” Petunia folded her arms. “Leaving. Now.”
“But—”
“No.” The frostiness in her tone suggested Petunia’s patience with the Cleric was nearly exhausted.
Paug figured he’d better intervene before the Barbarian ran Hodak through, ending the resurgence of Hanrahism in the world and putting the party at much greater risk of dying unexpectedly. “Well, I’m in favor of leaving tonight. Get some miles under our belts before we sleep.”
The others looked at him in astonishment. “Uh, what?” Gilpin picked a couple internal organs from his pheasant and threw them into the fire, much to Milph’s dismay. “You just said we should stay.”
Paug cleared his throat. “I said it might be better to stay, but that’s before she told us there are restless spirits here. You really want to sleep in a burned-out village full of restless spirits? The last bunch of restless spirits nearly killed us all in the Hidden Grove, in case you forgot.”
Milph raised his hand. “I didn’t forget.”
Paug fixed a gimlet eye on his brother. “Milph, I think we should go. What do you think?”
“Oh, you’re right, Paug. You’re pretty much always right. I still forget my trousers sometimes, and you never do.”
“That’s three in favor of leaving tonight. One more and we hit the water,” said Paug. “Hodak?”
The Cleric shrugged. “I’m pretty sure I can banish any aggressive spirits, bro, but I don’t think they’re interested in us. We’re just, like, passing through.”
Gilpin looked at the remains of his pheasant, pointedly ignoring Milph’s repeated throat-clearing and less-than-subtle pointing at his mouth, before tossing the leftovers into the fire. “That raft doesn’t look particularly safe. I’m not so sure we wouldn’t be better off just going on foot. At least we’re not going to drown. The rest of you can wade across a river and not even get your junk wet, but I can drown in what you call shallows.”
Paug grimaced at everyone’s unwillingness to commit. He turned his attention to Scufthalansà, the Elven princess who was the spitting image of her mother modeled in the pages of The Wicked Garden. Would she support him. She smiled back at him. “I will be pleased to go where you do, Monsieur Orc.”
Paug felt like a huge weight had lifted from him. He looked at the others. “Gather your things. We take to the water.”
* * *
Cold mist rose off the river as they poled the raft downstream in the darkness. The water was icy and occasionally splashed through the cracks between the logs or over the edges. Paug and Milph didn’t mind it so much, as cold and wet was part of the world in which they’d grown up, in the halls under the mountains. Likewise, Petunia didn’t seem bothered by wet feet as she steadily pushed the boat along with her pole. Gilpin complained quite a bit more at first, but Petunia threatened to use him as fishing bait, and he settled in after that. He and Scufthalansà and Hodak huddled together for warmth, making themselves a misshapen dark mass in the center of the raft.
“Are we there yet?” Milph asked with a yawn. “I’m kinda sleepy.”
“No,” Petunia said.
“How long a journey downstream is it to the Lake of Madness?” Paug asked.
“Two days.” Petunia’s pole splashed as she moved it through the water. “Mostly easy.”
“What’s m-m-mostly?” Gilpin’s teeth were chattering from the cold.
“Rough water before Maìdenslakh. Should not ride raft through it. We will die.”
Hodak’s smile was barely visible in the muted glow of his hand, which he’d wrapped to keep it from acting like a beacon in the darkness. “That’s a comforting thought on a cold night, bro.”
The mist thickened as they floated on down the river. Dark shadows rose on either side as the river wound its way down into a canyon. “We stop soon,” Petunia declared. “River grows too dangerous to travel at night.”
Paug stared out into the foggy darkness, trying to see further downstream. He couldn’t tell how fast they were moving, but he had noticed Petunia was no longer pushing the raft along. Instead, she used her pole to steer them around approaching rocks, letting the current do the hard work of moving the raft. It spun around slowly, sometimes with Paug and Milph at the leading edge and sometimes Petunia.
