Horde, page 34
“Stacking rocks not hard,” said Petunia. “No strong wind to blow them down here. No hard rain to wash them away.”
“Yes, no Human would ever stack rocks like this,” Gilpin grumbled. “It probably means we’re about to get on another boat.”
Gilpin’s words proved to be prophetic as shortly after they passed by the cairn, a stone dock appeared from out of the mist, covered with thousands of generations of moss and lichen. It was so old the stones actually looked more like a natural formation at first, but as they drew closer, Paug could see the steps carved into the stones and the rusted iron loops to which boats would be lashed. They stopped at the base of the dock and looked up the steps. The green growth upon them didn’t appear to have been disturbed by tromping feet, which meant either Flupp Reginald and his crew could levitate, or—
“We did it! We’re first!” Paug pumped his fist in the air in celebration. “Yes!”
Hodak held the Hanrah Hand over the steps as if feeling the air. “It certainly does seem that way.”
Gilpin traced a finger through the plant matter upon the steps. It smeared and came away from the stone easily, as if it had only barely taken root. “Unless we can all fly, they’re going to know we are here,” he said. “Unless there’s another dock?”
Petunia shook her head. “No.”
“Zey do not have to have launched from a dock at all,” said Scufthalansà. “If zey had a boat built already, zey could have left anywhere from the lake’s edge.”
Paug sighed. “You’re not really making me feel better. I thought maybe we won one.”
“Le pauvre Orc.” Scufthalansà smiled at him. “We are still probably first. We made excellent time through ze forest and down ze river.” She patted her bouzouki. “If you like, I will summon ze birds to fly to ze Tower and make sure we are alone in zis valley.”
“Uh, no, that’s all right,” said Paug. “I think we’re alone now.”
“I don’t see any boats attached to this dock.” Gilpin squinted into the mist. “But I can’t see how far out into the lake this goes. This mist is unreal.”
“It is magical, a barrier generated by ze Tower itself.” Scufthalansà gestured to the expansive fog.
“Any boat as old as this dock would be rotted into nothing by now,” Paug said.
“What if it was made of rock?” Milph asked. “Like that one there?”
Everyone looked where Milph was pointing. Paug had to admit the thing which his brother had discovered did look a lot like a boat that had been carved from a single huge boulder. So much algae and pond scum grew upon it that he couldn’t be sure. Nevertheless, he and the others went down to the edge of the dock to look more closely at it. Sure enough, it really was a boat, and it really was made of stone, and it really was floating.
“Nope. Uh uh. No way. I’m out. I’m going back to Wilmasnatch to find an expensive whore with a midget fetish and forget this place ever existed.” Gilpin turned to leave.
Petunia scooped him up as easily as if he was a sleeping chicken. She raised him by his ankle, dangling him upside down in front of her, and lifted until his face was even with hers. “No,” she said, conveying more threat in one simple word than Paug had ever heard in his entire life. It made him want to go find a latrine.
Gilpin turned as white as the surrounding mist. “Oh, all right. My mistake.”
His admission of his error satisfied Petunia sufficiently that she set him down instead of shaking him until his teeth fell out, or drop-kicking him out into the lake. “Boat good enough,” she declared. “Milph, clear it off.”
“How?” asked Milph, watching Gilpin as the Halfling scrambled back to his feet and patted himself all over to make sure all his parts were still attached.
“Like, with your wand, bro,” Hodak said. “Just don’t, you know, melt the boat.”
Milph pulled out his wand. “Don’t worry, I’m real good at this now. I’m a wizard, bro. I’ll just do a little one.” He pointed the wand at the boat and whispered, “Kabob.”
The jet of flame was probably larger than the Orc had intended. Mist evaporated as the jet blasted through it, created a momentary clarity of vision as the flame impacted on the stone vessel. The moisture in the algae and moss flashed into steam that stank of swampwater, followed by crisping into ashes. Satisfied with his handiwork, Milph put his wand away and grinned at the others.
Gilpin held a hand out toward the boat, then scooped a handful of water from the lake and tossed it onto the stone. It hissed and vaporized. He nodded. “Maybe we should wait a minute or two.”
* * *
The mist closed in around them like a chilly wet blanket. It spilled over the sides of the boat to swirl around their ankles, already soaked from the lake water that splashed in every time the boat crested a tiny wavelet. The stone vessel did indeed float, although Paug would have been hard-pressed to explain how. Riding in it was less like sitting on top of the water and more like being in a cauldron with water all around, and if anyone moved too suddenly, it would send all of them plunging toward their doom at the bottom of Maìdenslakh. As it was, Paug was almost afraid to breathe as they slowly paddled out into the depths of the lake.
They had tested the boat’s flotation at the water’s edge with everyone huddled in it. It sank down until it rode with the sides only a few inches over the waterline. Petunia had declared it “Perfectly safe,” which made Paug want to go run screaming for the hills. Nevertheless, he and Milph had joined her in hacking down some trees and reeds to form rudimentary paddles. With that, they set out onto the water.
Almost immediately, the mist surrounded them, insulating them from any sounds of the shore and diffusing the sunlight enough that they couldn’t even see it well enough to steer by it. “How do we know which direction we’re going? No landmarks, no wind, no current.” Hodak squinted into the blank brightness. “How big is this lake, anyway?”
“Big,” Petunia said. “Many days to walk around.”
“So what you’re saying is we could spend days floating around out here until we starve, sink, or die from Milph’s tuber farts?” Gilpin sounded miserable. “Hodak, you should have let me die on the shore.”
“I can’t help it if they make me fart,” said Milph. “I’m sensitive.”
“Yeah, well, the rest of you don’t have a front-row seat like I do.”
“Perhaps I could use my bard powers to summon a raven to guide us to ze Tower,” Scufthalansà said, strumming her bouzouki in her typically discordant fashion.
“Why a raven?” Hodak asked.
“Historically, zey have guided travelers to many destinations.”
Hodak shook his head. “I never heard of such a thing. I’m pretty sure you mean pigeons. You know, like they use to send messages in wartime.”
“Historically, it has been ravens.” Scufthalansà enunciated her syllables more carefully, spitting out her Ss and firing off the consonants like rocks breaking.
“You see any ravens around here?” Hodak waved at the mist. “I don’t see anything but water. Maybe you could summon a fish.”
“I do not summon fishes. I summon all ze flying creatures of ze kingdom.”
“Yeah, we’ve seen how that works,” Gilpin snarled. “You’d have better luck with a pigeon.”
Hodak smiled and patted the Halfling on the head. “Thanks, bro.”
Gilpin slapped the Cleric’s hand away after checking to make sure it wasn’t the one that might make him dissolve into a pile of ash. “I’m not your bro. I’m nobody’s bro. And I’m getting real tired of the short person jokes.”
“I’m just saying zat a raven would solve our problem,” said Scufthalansà.
“I farted again,” Milph said. “Phew. Petunia, is there any room up front by you?”
“No,” said the Barbarian. “Fuck off.”
“Hey, I was just askin’. No need to be a—” Petunia’s paddle whipped out of the water to catch Milph full across the face. He fell backward against Hodak, causing a frightening amount of water to slop over the sides.
“Get off!” Hodak shouted, and lit up the Hanrah Hand.
Milph’s wand appeared in his own hands. “You don’t have to be a jerk either, Inconsequential.”
“I’m soaked, damn your eyes,” Gilpin shouted. “I’m going to stab both of you in the feet. I’ll stab everyone and ride your floating corpses home!”
Scufthalansà drew her knives. “I’ll cut your scalp first, little fool.”
Paug drew the Vorpal Blade of Hrothgar, intending to cut off everyone’s head with it before they all killed each other. As the blade cleared the scabbard, its blue light shone like a beacon, illuminating the mist all around them. Everyone blinked and looked around as if waking from a dream, thoughts of anger and violence forgotten.
“What happened?” Milph asked. He looked at his wand in amazement. “Hodak, bro, I was ready to burn you up.”
“Same here,” said the Cleric, disengaging the power of the Hand.
Gilpin tucked something back into his pack. “I won’t say I’m not still going to kill all of you, but for now I guess you’re all safe.”
Scufthalansà sheathed her knives. “It is ze mist. Or ze Tower. It was affecting us, turning us on one another.”
“Your sword, Paug,” said Hodak. “It’s got more powers than we knew. It’s protecting us, somehow, from the evil magic here.”
“Maybe it could tell us the right way to go, Paug,” said Milph. “You should ask it.”
“What do you mean, ask it?”
“You know, like, talkin’ to it. You say, hey sword, where’s the Cinnabon Tower? And then it, you know, tell you.”
“How’s a sword going to tell me anything, Milph? It can’t talk.”
Nobody said anything.
“Can it?” Paug looked at the Vorpal Blade with suspicion. “Can you talk and all this time you’ve just been letting us bumble around and fall off cliffs and into cold water and smell bad gas and kill each other?”
The sword said nothing, as Paug had expected.
“There, you see? Nothing. Hey sword, where’s the stupid Tower?”
The sword nearly leaped out of his grasp, dragging him across the stone boat and nearly overbalancing it. Hodak jumped across just in time to keep the entire boat from tipping over.
The blade hovered over the water, pointed just past Petunia and to her left. Paug found himself almost draped over her as he struggled to maintain hold of the quivering blade. She looked over her shoulder at him, the piercings in her face sparkling in the blue light from the Blade of Hrothgar. “That way as good as any other.”
With Paug stuck holding onto his sword for dear life, Hodak and Scufthalansà had to pick up the paddling slack. Neither of them was pleased with the required effort, and the only reason they didn’t complain like Gilpin was neither of them had breath to spare for it. As the minutes ticked away, the tug on the Vorpal Blade lessened until Paug wasn’t straining to keep from being bodily pulled from the boat. “I think we might be getting closer,” he said. “Does anybody see anything? My Orc eyes aren’t any good in this mist.”
Scufthalansà squinted into the fog. “I see a shadow. Tall. It may be ze Tower.”
“Paddle faster,” Petunia said. “I do not trust this boat much longer.”
“There’s a lot of water down here,” Gilpin said.
It loomed out of the brightness like a tall ship bearing down upon them. The Cinnabar Tower’s dull red stonework jutted up from a jagged, rocky island like it had thrust its way from the lakebed itself. Centuries of weathering had stained the rocks, making the Tower look like a spear point. It was the tallest construction Paug had ever seen, so lofty that even with the Vorpal Blade burning fog away in the immediate area, mist still enshrouded the Tower’s summit. “Do you think it’s safe to put my sword away now?” he asked the others. “I don’t want us all to be at each others’ throats.” He glanced down at Gilpin. “Or whatever.”
“We’ll just have to, like, be aware of ourselves. Be at peace and harmonious.”
“That’s not natural for some of us,” Gilpin sneered.
“I’m going to try it,” said Paug. “Watch yourselves.”
Petunia said, “Less self watching, more paddling.”
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Chapter Thirty-Two
The Depths of Maidenslakh
They found a stone dock on one side of the island, stained red and crumbling into the lake. Everything had a sharp, metallic odor like the fumes of burnt metal from a forge. Petunia brought the boat alongside the dock’s remains and thus began the careful ballet of disembarking from the stone boat. Every movement made it rock dangerously. True, it rose in the water as Petunia lifted Gilpin out onto the dock and then Scufthalansà, but the fewer people there were within the stone cauldron, the more it swayed and threatened to capsize at any moment. Nobody could tell how deep the water was beside the dock, but Paug had a sneaking suspicion it was deep indeed.
As Hodak climbed up to the crumbling dock, some rotten rock gave way and his foot struck the edge of the stone boat. It tipped and lake water sloshed over the side. Petunia had the presence of mind and terrific strength to leap out of the boat altogether. She cleared the side and landed at the edge of the dock, which gave way beneath her weight. Scufthalansà and Hodak grabbed hold of her to keep her from tumbling back into the water. Unfortunately, the momentum she generated from jumping caused even more water to pour over the sides and pushed the boat away from the dock. Paug and Milph froze, terrified to even breathe as the boat dropped lower and lower into the water until the edge actually sat just below the water line, where only surface tension kept the lake water from pouring over the side and sending both Orcs rushing toward the bottom.
“Paug . . . ” Milph’s whisper barely carried from one side of the boat to the other. “What do we do?”
“I don’t know,” Paug said. He didn’t understand what magic kept the water from flooding into the boat, but every instinct told him not to move faster than a snail’s pace. If he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, he knew the boat would overbalance in that direction and they’d sink like, well, a stone boat. He thought his sword might save them somehow. After all, the Blade of Hrothgar had already pulled him from a sure death by drowning once, so that was a trick it already knew. On the other hand, he was afraid if the sword was halfway smart, it might decide it wasn’t worth saving a drowning warrior for the second time in a week, and let him sink to his death. “Whatever you do, don’t move.”
“I won’t. Hey Paug, are we gonna die?”
“Not today. The others will think of something.”
“Can you see them?” Milph’s back was facing the island but he was between Paug and the others, so Paug could only see parts of the others—elbows, knees, the edge of Petunia’s bearskin cloak, and Scufthalansà’s blonde hair.
“Not real well.”
“Are they thinkin’ of somethin’?”
“I hope so.”
Nothing happened for quite some time. The others appeared to be arguing how best to proceed. The mist was beginning to fill the space between the island and the boat, and Paug knew they would soon drift out of sight completely. He sighed. If he and Milph didn’t drown when the boat finally capsized, they would starve until one of them collapsed from exhaustion, unbalancing the boat and sending both to their watery graves.
“Hey, Paug, if we die . . .”
“We’re not going to die, Milph.”
“Yeah, I know, you already said that. But in case you’re wrong, I just wanted to tell you this has been a real fun trip. Maybe the most fun thing I’ve ever done in my life.” Milph sighed with contentment. “I got to see a bear and everything.”
“Well, I’m glad you came with me, and I’m sorry we’re stuck here like this.”
“That’s okay. If we gotta die, at least we get to go together, the way brothers oughtta.”
Paug’s throat felt funny, like someone had knocked him down and was standing on it. He felt like he couldn’t quite draw a deep breath. He had no idea what that meant, as it was a feeling he’d never experienced before.
Something soft and gray snaked through the air just past Milph’s head. Paug grabbed it before it could strike the edge of the boat, the sudden movement threatening to capsize them. He realized it was the silken rope Gilpin had coiled inside his pack. “Hey!” he whisper-shouted. “Did you guys throw this?”
“Yes!” Hodak called back. “Well, Petunia did, anyway.”
“Brace selves,” Petunia called. “I pull you back here. Keep boat from tipping.”
Paug snorted. “Like that’s something we can control. Don’t pull hard, we’re about a whisker’s thickness away from going in the water.”
“Paug, whatever you do, don’t get in the water,” Hodak called. “I can sense things moving around down there. Real nasty ones, too. Like, with tentacles and stuff.”
Milph’s face fell. “It would have to be tentacles.”
Petunia’s first tug on the rope came unexpectedly and made Paug shift his weight slightly. Water slopped over the side and for a moment he thought they were done for, but then it stabilized. He and Milph had water up to their knees in the bottom of the boat. It was so cold he couldn’t feel his toes. He kept the rope wrapped around his waist to try to absorb any irregular motions. To her credit, Petunia pulled the boat with a slow and steady effort. It must have been incredibly heavy between its stone construction, Orc passengers, and all the extra water in the bilge. Nevertheless, the boat made slow progress back toward the island. Despite the cold, misty air, nervous sweat poured off Paug at such a furious rate he was afraid he might flood the boat all on his own.
The dock drew closer and Paug saw everyone except Gilpin straining to tug them in. The Halfling perched on an outcropping with a second rope looped up and over a stone archway that might have once supported a canopy over the dock. “Hey,” he called when he saw Paug looking at him. “When you guys get close, I’m going to throw this rope to you, and then Petunia’s going to pull you out of there.”
