Kevin Wright's Blog: SaberPunk - Posts Tagged "fantasy"

Greetings all.

This is the first entry of my new blog, SaberPunk. Awesome name, I know … or maybe I just think it’s awesome and really I’m trying too hard for it to sound cool.

Anyways, I chose the name mainly because I like it as a play on the science fiction genre ‘cyberpunk,’ of which I am a fan (particularly of William Gibson) but with the word ‘saber’ in it, to cleverly denote a more fantasy-centric feel. My wheelhouse for reads, fictionwise(I enjoy history as well) is mainly confined to the realms of fantasy, sci-fi, and horror (though I also enjoy detective fiction).

Who are my favorite sci fi and fantasy authors? In no particular order: Joe Abercrombie, China Mieville, Neil Gaiman, M. John Harrison, H.P. Lovecraft, Patrick LeClerc, Lloyd Alexander, Robert E. Howard(Conan! Though I prefer Solomon Kane to the mighty-thewed barbarian), J.R.R Tolkien, of course (except for Tom Bombadil whom, I believe — probably along with anyone else who’s ever read it — would be gleefully edited out of ‘Lord of the Rings’ were it published in this day and age), and again, of course, George R.R. Martin.

And exactly why should you care about SaberPunk and me and who my favorite authors are? Really you shouldn’t. I’m not very important. Not even slightly.

Moving on, my plan for SaberPunk is to offer reviews, opinions, or just discuss works and authors within these particular genres. I’m hoping to work my way through both classics that many fans of these genres(myself included) may have missed or overlooked or forgotten and some new works that aren’t quite so mainstream(mainly indie authors). Maybe you’ll find a new favorite author. Maybe I will. Maybe you’ll begin to hate me. Maybe I’ll begin to hate myself. Who knows?

The first work I’d like to highlight is ‘Elric of Melnibone’ written by the sci fi and fantasy legend Michael Moorcock and published by DAW Books in 1972.

I was first introduced to ‘Elric of Melnibone’ in the early 1980’s when I started playing Dungeons and Dragons, the role-playing game that made young men across the world virtually irresistible to women. Thumbing through ‘Deities and Demigods’ (the greatest — in my opinion — work of TSR, the publisher of AD&D and Dungeons and Dragons) was always one of my favorite literary pastimes(I’ll highlight ‘Deities and Demigods’ in a later post because it is so very awesome).

The first thing a 1980’s nerd(I used to be wicked smart) such as myself would notice about Elric in ‘Deities and Demigods’ is that, despite being the marquee entry in his respective area of Melnibonean Mythos, Elric is not tough. Not even in the least. For a guy who memorized the stats of all the gods and goddesses and heroes in ‘Deities and Demigods’ and pontificated regularly on who would win if Thor fought Zeus in a no holds barred contest of fisticuffs and thunderbolts(It’s too close to call, but my money would be on Thor because he’s Thor), and who was the toughest god(It’s Hastur the Unspeakable pg.45), Elric was far and away one of the most disappointing and pathetic entries in the entire book. His strength and constitution are 6 and 3 normally, which means that the 1980’s version of myself, a ten-year-old lad, could have probably taken him a fair fight. Not the stuff of legend, except for the fact that he looks like the cracked-out albino version of the lead singer of virtually any eighties hair band, which might be considered awesome by some.

So, when I was about ten or so, I became so enthralled with the Elric Mythos that I never went out and searched for him in book stores or the library. I have no excuse(It was probably that strength of 6 thing and I didn’t want to read about a guy I could best at arm wrestling). Fast forward thirty or so years to last month when my friend handed ‘Elric of Melnibone’ to me because he thought I’d like it.

He was right.

‘Elric of Melnibone’ is the first full length high-fantasy novel featuring Elric. It’s about 170 pages long, and it’s good. It’s not the greatest fantasy I’ve read, but I can see how Moorcock was looking to turn the world of fantasy, at the time, on its head. It seems to me(I was not born until 1976 and have neither researched nor confirmed and cannot corroborate that the following statements I’m making are even slightly true)that much of the fantasy of the day was centered around powerful warriors whose martial prowess more often than not carried the day(See: Conan, Kull, Aragorn, Boromir, Prince Gwydion, Solomon Kane, etc…).

Enter Elric, the desiccated husk of an albino emperor of a fallen empire, who is only able to function due to the imbibement of various magical potions he brews. Essentially, he’s a fantasy version of Walter White that’s become addicted to and requires his own homebrew of methamphetamine to function. If he doesn’t have his drugs, he just kind of sits around. Maybe he does poetry or something.

Also, unlike the beefier heroes such as Conan, who pretty much do what they want without hesitation or regret, Elric feels. He regrets. He does possess a conscience. He’s just not ruled by it, or even swayed by it, not even a little. In fact, after he pontificates on the evil he’s about to commit, he usually commits it. Within the first thirty pages of the book, he stands by approvingly as a woman and child are tortured to death … under his own orders. Then he pretty much high fives the torturer for doing such a darn good job. Elric makes Jaime Lannister’s murderously incestual decision making prowess in ‘Game of Throne’s’ seem trite by comparison. In fact, it seems like Elric’d be more comfortable sitting next to Emperor Palpatine and zapping the crap out of whiny Jedi knights than being the protagonist in a series of high fantasy novels and rescuing damsels in distress(Fear not, the said damsel in distress is the love of his life, but she also happens to be his cousin, so it’s still rather icky).

‘Elric of Melnibone’ is dark and it’s horrible and it’s good. And even if you don’t dig it, it’s a super short read. So read it.

Rock on.

Kevin Wright
Revelations: http://amzn.to/1rbza7Q
GrimNoir http://amzn.to/1GaFsYw
Lords of Asyum http://amzn.to/242AqeO

SaberPunk #2
“The Colour Out of Space” by H.P. Lovecraft

Greetings all,

SaberPunk’s second installment highlights my personal experience with “The Colour Out of Space,” a story written by H.P. Lovecraft and published by the magazine “Amazing Stories” in 1927. Lovecraft has been somewhat famous for decades for his many Cthulhu Mythos stories and lately for having been a racist weirdo.

The thing that stands out to me about the title of this fantastic story is that it is incredibly lame. I dislike it so much that, back in the day, even after I had read a great many of Lovecraft’s stories, and considered myself a fan, I was still so put off by it that I just could not bring myself to give it a chance. And it’s only about 20 pages long. So why didn’t I just take a stab at it?

Here’s why:

Crack open most any book nowadays and run a finger from top to bottom along the right or left hand side of the text and you’re likely to see a lot of empty white space. Dialogue. Short paragraphs. One sentence paragraphs. Breaks. Those empty spaces provide some breathing room. They provide hope. You can fly through those pages.

Now open almost any work by Lovecraft and you’re likely to see a giant block of lead-heavy text. This text is so dense that you can use it to cover and protect your naughty bits while getting an x-ray.

What’s my point? My point is that you can’t breeze through it while sitting on a noisy subway or munching snacks in a cafeteria or at home with your daughter running around the house threatening your son with “The Punching Game.” To read any of Lovecraft’s works, you need the perfect storm of quiet, of solitude, of the time to read, and all while still possessing the will and energy and focus to invest yourself wholly in it.

And need I say, those perfect storms, for me, are rare.

Oftentimes, even when I found myself happily within this most rare of alignments, I didn’t want to risk wasting my limited time on something new, and especially on a story whose title filled me with a sense of such overwhelming apathy. So instead of giving it a go, I’d just read one of the stories I already loved. “The Rats in the Walls.” “The Call of Cthulhu.” “The Whisperer in Darkness.” “The Shadow over Innsmouth.” All awesome titles. All awesome stories. With no risk involved.

So, how did I actually get around to reading “The Colour Out of Space” that first time? As with many wonderful things in my life, I have comic books and my older brother to thank for it.

Knowing I’m a Lovecraft fan, my brother(who is a comic book aficionado) used to buy me any comic that came down the pipeline that was even remotely related to Lovecraft. And there were a lot of them. Some were good, some were awesome, like all the ones illustrated by Richard Corben, and some were pretty terrible. Any way, they were always short, easy to read, and I never seemed to pay my brother for them, so it was never a big investment for me in time, effort, or money.

So naturally, one of those Lovecraft comics my brother bought for me had “The Colour Out of Space” in it. So I hazarded a peek. It was short, about ten pages, so I took a stab at it, and I blew through it. Which made me want to read the full story. Which I finally did.

So “Colour Out of Space” was written during the pulp era heyday of horror and science fiction. Lovecraft had allegedly grown tired of lame aliens and anthropomorphic aliens and bug-headed aliens and just plain shitty-old aliens. So he set out to write a truly “alien” alien. And that’s what “The Colour Out of Space” is about, a truly “alien” alien. The alien, the backwoods New England setting, the characters with creepy biblical names and the horrors that beset them are all perfectly done. This is Lovecraft’s best work, in my humble opinion, and I’ve read on the internet that it was his favorite as well, so it must be true.

So, my advice? Go to the horror section of your local library or ask your weird friend to borrow his or her worn copy of one of Lovecraft’s anthologies. There’s about a thousand of them. Make sure “The Colour Out of Space” is in it. Then make sure the edges of the pages of the copy you’re borrowing are yellowed and the cover dented. The spine should be broken in. For some reason I cannot adequately explain, it just doesn’t seem right to read Lovecraft on an ebook reader, but you do what you have to.

Now find a proper place to read. Quiet is a must. Alone, too, unless that special someone is also reading. It’s dark outside, and inside you sit beside a window, with bugs outside buzzing and crawling up the rusted screen. Maybe a single harsh lightbulb dangling from a wire above is your light source. It sways in the intermittent breeze that blows on your face. If a dog is barking somewhere off in the distance, so much the better. Now crack open “The Colour Out of Space” and invest the time and the effort. Ignore your family for an hour. You won’t be sorry.

Rock on.

Kevin Wright’s works:
Revelations http://amzn.to/1rbza7Q
GrimNoir http://amzn.to/1GaFsYw
Lords of Asyum http://amzn.to/242AqeO
Kevin Wright Author Facebook page: http://bit.ly/1nZem3j

I had some concerns when I began reading Ren Warom’s Escapology. But I’ll get to that. For now, just know that I’m a fan of William Gibson’s Neuromancer. A big fan. It’s my favorite sci-fi novel, in fact. William Gibson’s writing moves. It’s sleek and stylish and you may not know where it’s going or even where you are when you get there, but you definitely feel the wind blowing back your hair while it’s happening. Ren Warom has a similar style which is the style of excellence incarnate. Warom’s writing style wasn’t my concern, however, it was merely its foreshadowing.

In the interest of avoiding spoilers with either work, let me just say that my concerns pertained to the many and profound similarities between the two, culminating in Escapology’s first chapter appearance of a character by the name of Mim who is dead-nuts identical to Molly from Neuromancer. Dead-nuts…

As I said, I had concerns.

Before Mim’s nail-in-the-coffin appearance, there was always this echo of Neuromancer pervading the prose in many forms: in the main character(Shock Pao), in the setting(the Gung), in the opening sequence(hangover), in the drugs(pervasive), and in the writing style(excellence incarnate). However, holding my concerns at bay and on the strength of Warom’s writing, I continued reading, and I didn’t stop because, as it turns out, my concerns were unfounded.

As I said, I’m a fan of Neuromancer. Warom is, too, she has to be, and that first chapter of Escapology is Warom’s tip of the cap to Gibson’s Neuromancer. She’s acknowledging Neuromancer for the masterpiece it is before striking off on her own drug-induced cyberpunk thriller. It’s a madcap dash through a futuristic techno-junglescape where everyone and anyone is a predator. The rub is that there’s always a bigger, badder, nastier predator waiting just around the next corner. And it’s hungry and you’re delicious.

—Kevin Wright

Sometimes when reviewing a book, I tend to get lost in minutiae and overthink things. What did the book mean? Was it good? How was it good? Or was it bad? Did it meet or fall short of my expectations? In reviewing ‘Kings of the Wyld,’ I’m using a much simpler system: speed of the read.

I burned through ‘Kings of the Wyld.’ And it’s a fair chunk of words, just shy of five hundred pages. To give some perspective, I read it in on a family vacation that did not allow much time for anything other than walking, going on rides, growling at my children, and passing out with sore feet. Amongst all that, I managed to read it in four days, squeezing in reading sessions each night while my wife and kids did the smart thing and passed out, readying for tomorrow. So I read it pretty fast. Considering.

I find that there are books I enjoy while reading them but never really feel the need to get back to. I just sort of drift along through them and enjoy as I read. ‘Kings of the Wyld’ was not like that. I was looking forward to getting back to it, looking forward to burning through another chunk. To me, that’s the hallmark of a good book. You can analyze it, dissect it, do whatever you want to it, but if you want to get back to reading it when you’re not, you know you’ve found it. So… Read ‘Kings of the Wyld.”

‘Kings of the Wyld’ is a high-fantasy novel that follows the exploits of a band of past-their-prime mercenaries come together for one last job. A fairly simple plot but done well, extremely well. In fact, everything about ‘Kings of the Wyld’ is done extremely well.

And as I said, it moves. There isn’t a dull spot in the whole novel, and where there could have been lulls there were generous doses of humor to lubricate it along. All the characters pull their weight with the funny business, from the sarcastic internal monologue of Clay Cooper, the pov character, to the antics of easily the craziest character, the wizard, Moog. Even the psychopathic killing machine Ganelon manages a few lines that’ll make you chuckle. I didn’t find myself laughing out loud while reading it, like some of the reviewers I’ve read, but I chuckled, and I was also in a two-bed hotel room with sleeping kids whom I didn’t want to wake on pain of death.

Humor is a big part of the book, but it’s not all. The action scenes are top notch. From skirmishes to massive warfare, the scenes are all entertaining and over the top awesome.

And I apologize for going a little emo here, but there are truly some heartfelt moments in the novel and not always where you’d expect it. My favorite moment in the entire book concerns the relationship between a pair of brothers, Dane and Gregor. Sounds pretty run of the mill, but it’s not even close.

So ‘Kings of the Wyld’ is a funny fantasy novel, but it’s not just that. It’s way more. Read it and check it out for yourself. You’ll be glad you did.

Kevin Wright, author of ‘Lords of Asylum’
http://amzn.to/242AqeO

Chapter 1. The Quest

Acolyte Spew waddled across the muck floor of the hovel, a bone stiletto jutting tooth-like from her fist. “Forever don’t always take so long as you think it might, boy,” her croaking voice sawed the sweltering air like a bog owl’s screech, “sometimes it takes but a moment.”

“Blow it out your arse, hag.” Malving’s vision began to clear. To focus. Where was he? His hovel. The floor. His hands were bound! “RRRrrrrg… What the Craw do you want?”

The croaker crept forward with amphibian coolness, her round red croaker eyes blazing.

“Let me go!” Like some half-drowned kitten, he batted at her stiletto.

“After I just finished tying you up?” Spew hopped closer, the slap of her belly against the ground splashing slime and brown putridity alike. “Pretty-pretty pink.” She draped her slim fingers on his forehead. Petted him. Left four snail trails glimmering. “So soft. So smooth.” Her eyes narrowed. “I could cut out your heart and wear it beating round my neck as a pendant, boy,” she loomed over him, eclipsing the light, “or … I can not.”

“Huh?” Malving grunted. “What?” What in hell was she saying? If he could just slip free. Just his hands. One hand. Almost… He was bigger. Stronger. He’d beaten stupid croakers raw before. His face burned crimson as he struggled. “Cannot what?”

“Can … pause … not.” Spew articulated the stiletto like a teacher’s pointer.

“What!?” Malving spat. Come on.

“Cretin!” Spew raised her stiletto overhead.

“I know you are but what am I!” Malving barked.

“I’ll shut you up for good!” Two-handed, Spew stabbed down.

Malving jack-knifed a squirm.

Snap! Spew missed wide, breaking her stiletto blade off at the hilt. “Damn you!”

Malving wriggled further back through the muck. The blade had landed behind him. Somewhere. He had to get it.

Laughter filled the hovel.

Spew whipped around. Her glare choked the laughter dead.

Malving’s newfound hope plummeted through him like Swamp Rat stew. The fat croaker hag wasn’t alone. He squinted past her. Into the dark corner of the hovel. A shadow gallery of silhouettes stood lined up against the far wall. Watching. Snickering. Five of them. Elbowing each other. Whispering.

Yes… Now he remembered. Villains. Blackguards. Weirdos. All of them. Spew had come to his sty. To buy a pig, she’d claimed. And when he’d gone out back? All six had jumped him.

Malving squirmed closer to the blade. She hadn’t noticed it. Almost…

“Ahem…” Spew adjusted her purple wig. “As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted,” she cast the gallery a fell glare, “I can, or conversely, I can not cut out your worthless heart. It depends solely upon you and your attitude. Forthwith.”

“Wartback,” Malving hissed.

“Tsk. Tsk.” Shaking her head, Spew withdrew a fish club from within her bag.

“I’m just a kid,” Malving pleaded at Spew. At the five. But his fingertips touched the blade! “You gonna just stand there and let her gut me?”

An uncomfortable silence blanketed the room.

“Well, that was the plan,” one finally admitted.

“Ridiculous,” another scoffed, “can’t gut anyone with a fish club.”

“You bunch of sissies!” Malving seized the blade! “Took six of you to kidnap one kid.”

“Is he questioning our villainhood?” One was obviously taken aback.

“It was five, really,” another confided behind a hand. “Spew barely helped.”

Behind his back, Malving sawed feverishly at his bindings.

“A worm on a hook you are, boy.” Spew polished the fish club on her robe sleeve. “And the nether-gator’s come cruising.”

“GET BACK!” The bindings split off his hands, and Malving surged to his feet, stiletto blade forth. “I’ll cut you!”

Feet pounded across the mud floor as the shadow gallery trampled one another fighting for the exit.

Malving smirked as he watched them fighting at the door. He turned to Spew, “Just you and me now, hag” and tore after her—

“!@#STOP#@!” Spew’s command reverberated through space and time, sundering reality in waves of purple energy. A cavernous echo whipped swirls of indigo energies devil dusting away.

Magic. Black Magic.

A hair’s breadth from stabbing Spew, Malving stood quivering still as a statue, teeth gritted, sweating, whimpering, arcane forces slithering on him, in him, through him.

“Pathetic.” Taxed ragged, gasping, Spew wiped her mouth.

Malving sneered, the only thing he could do.

“You’re nothing but a fodder, boy.” Spew plucked the bone blade from Malving’s inert hand, turned to the shadow gallery, all five of them jammed in the doorway. “Grab him. The Ribspreader wants him.” Her grin oozed evil. “A new project.”

Chapter 2. The Chosen One

A maelstrom of screaming demon skulls tore through the chamber. Eldritch energies and arcane forces sparked like lightning, bouncing off the ceiling, rattling the skeletons and iron masks spiked to the walls. Within the safety of the pentagram etched into the floor, before the Altar of Woe, the two Wrackolytes stood yet untouched, protected by an invisible shield-barrier.

“Do you see her?” Abzgorn the Ribspreader hissed.

“By Sanctos…” Lorgex the Eyes growled. “I’ve harnessed the demon, but… ” His old bones creaked as he straightened from gazing into the empty sockets of his seer-skull.. “Spew cannot hide from me. Not from the Eyes.” He wiped smears of sweat down either side of his leather slicks then started patting down his pockets. “Damn.” He looked to his torture slab across the room.

“What in the Craw—?” Abzgorn asked. “Stop!”
Through the invisible barrier Lorgex suddenly leaped, arcane winds searing his skin, his lungs. Ducking, dodging, screaming, he skidded to a halt at his slab. “Where?” Across it he searched, scattering a thousand haphazard trinkets and paraphernalia in the process. “They’re here. They must be!”

“Hurry, you old fool,” Abzgorn watched on in growing irritation. “The ice you tread was rotten already.” He adjusted his hold on the Elder Sign, held quivering above him, generating the shield-barrier. “Grimnir’s teeth.” He winced as arcane an eldritch horror slammed the barrier.

“Curse you!” Lorgex swept his arm across his slab, a hailstorm of sharp instruments clattering onto the floor.

“The High Wrackolyte has already considered castrating your appointment as Wrackolyte,” Abzgorn roared. Cracks began to fissure through the barrier. “Fail me now, and I shall will it done!”

“I need more goblin eyes—” Lorgex looked under his slab.

“The barrier is failing!”

“They’re here—”

“Curse your eyes!”

“I left them right here!” Lorgex sweat coursed down his liver-spotted egg of a head. Airborne ethereal demon-skulls buzzed past him, snapping with sharp, pointy teeth. “I know it.” He snatched up his torture bag, looked under it, cursed, then dove back into it, rifling through with reckless abandon. Metal forks flew, spike-spirals, chisels and other horrible blood-crusted instruments all over his shoulder. “Aaaarch!” He upended his bag, flung it against the wall and started slamming his puny fists against the slab.

“Damn you, Spew!”

“I-In m-my b-bag!” The Elder sign in Abzgorn’s hands vibrated so badly his teeth chattered. A demon-head broke through the barrier, biting onto his leg. “Arrgh!” He kicked, flinging it off. “The b-bottom left—”

Lorgex was there in an instant, elbow deep in the bag, rifling through it, ducking demons, yelping at the burn of hellfire gales. “Aha!” Lorgex yanked a jar free. Orc eyes stared out numbly from within. He deflated. “The demon won’t like these…”

“Do it!” Abzgorn roared. “Give it something! Or I’ll see Spew made Madam and you—” that thought went unfinished as spurting balefire drove him to one knee.

“She’ll be no Madam!” Lorgex ducked another skull, dove across a slab and hurled himself back into the pentagram. Blood streamed from a myriad of cuts and bites to his head, his face, his arms. “No damned wart-back croaker’ll be a full Wrackolyte.” He latched onto the Elder Sign alongside Abzgorn. “Not while I still live and breathe!” As one … they rose.

“Enough. Forget her quest—”

Lorgex’s blue eyes beamed ravenous in the polychromatic swirls. “You know the object of her quest?”

“Go!”

Lorgex obeyed, abandoning Abzgorn and the Elder Sign for the Altar, the seer skull perched atop it. Abzgorn screamed in pain. Lorgex drew the jar from his slicks and smashed them on the altar. Snatching two rolling orbs and took up the skull. “Yeouch!” It snapped at his fingers. “Please — what quest?”

Abzgorn withered beneath the falling barrier. “I… Rrrrrg… cannot say…”

“But you must!” Lorgex begged, kneeling, contorting now beneath the collapsing barrier. “You must tell me. I must know—”

“Harness it!” Abzgorn cried. “Do it now, or we’re doomed.”

Leaning his head back, holding the skull above him, staring into its bulging eyes, Lorgex squeezed his thumbs into the eye sockets. The aqueous-humors squirted, pouring down his arms, first a trickle then raining down onto his face, his own eyes. The seer skull moaned luridly. Its jaw slackened hanging now open. Sated.

Abzgorn collapsed to the ground, dropping the Elder sign rolling across the floor. Cold silence filled the room. The demon-heads were gone, the arcane energies harnessed.
Dark words Lorgex muttered then, the language of pain and jealousy and rage, the tongue of fear and hate. Of the Woebringer. The clear juices upon him began to hiss, steaming, sizzling as though Lorgex were aflame. The white steam swirled around him, entering him through his mouth, his nose, his ears, his eyes. The crypt shook, a cacophony of vibration, tools dancing across the torture tables. Lorgex shuddered in ecstasy as he SAW…

“I can see her, Abzgorn. Her shade. She walks— No, she rides,” Lorgex whispered. “Yes… Yes… She rides in the company of others. Five.” Lorgex stared deep into the eye sockets. “Yes… Yes, I see you, Spew. What is it you’re doing? Where is it you’re going? No. Coming. You are coming here, yes, but what are your words? What are you saying? What task has the High Wrackolyte set you?”

“There is no one else with her?” Spent, broken, exhausted, Abzgorn lifted his hooded head from the stone floor. Barely.

“No. I see nothing — wait. There is more.” Lorgex’s face peeled back in a rictus of ecstasy. “She rides atop a child — a pilloried child?” Lorgex muttered. “Who is he?”

“She brings him here?” Abzgorn asked in awe. “Now?”

“Who is this child?” Lorgex turned. “I must know! You shall have whatever you want of me! Name it.” He blinked, seeming to lose his balance for an instant, legs wobbling, but regained it by clutching onto the Altar. “Is he a sacrifice?”

“I-I cannot say,” Abzgorn gasped.

“Tell me!” Murder in his eyes, Lorgex stood above him, the seer skull raised for a killing blow.

“The child is the one sent to usher in a new age of darkness.” Abzgorn cringed. “Blood of the Ancients reborn anew, he shall lead Grimnir’s hordes forth from the Craw. He shall destroy and defile all that is Shagra’lor! Spew brings the Chosen One! The Chosen One of Grimnir!”

“What? No. It cannot be.” Lorgex clutched his chest. “It must be me! It should be me! It shall be ME!”

Chapter 3. Mugger’s Folly

“Come back and fight!” Acolyte Spew tore her whip round in snapping circles above her head. CRACK! “Come back!”

Atop the marsh-oak pillory fastened about Malving’s neck and hands, Spew clutched on like some tree-frog goddess. And upon that altar of pillory wood and flesh she was wrath incarnate. And before her wrath they fled, a stumbling mass of arms and legs, bone weapons and rattling armor, stinking bodies scrambling madly for escape— Regrettably for Spew, the ‘they’ were four out of the five mercenary guards she had hired on implied-retainer. And the only reason she had not fled before them was the simple fact that for her mount she had chosen a stooped thirteen-year-old pig boy who was muzzled, pilloried, and dead-tired from the fifty-pound croaker attached to his head.

Spew glanced to her left. Only Izula still stood by her, and only because she was extremely stupid. The giant sword she wielded trembled between her grotesquely knuckled fists. Her huge croaker pupils had constricted to pinpricks of black on yellow. And she was drooling. Copiously.

“A pity.” Lorgex the Eyes smirked as the greater portion of Spew’s entourage fled down the back alleys of Cesstern.

“That’s Acolyte Spew, you shriveled abortion.” Spew feverishly tore about for some sort of escape.

“Give me the Chosen One, and you can go free,” Lorgex crossed his skinny arms.

“The wha—?” Spew raised a non-existent eyebrow.

“Relinquish him not and my chitterling horde shall chew the very flesh from your bones,” Lorgex sneered. “It is said croakers are something of a delicacy in chitterling cuisine.” He smiled so wide that for a moment Spew thought the drum-tight skin over his emaciated face might rip free of the skull so prominent beneath.

“Eat-eat, chew-chew, froggy-froggy,” the chitterlings chattered. They stood waist high all about Lorgex. A ragged pack of them. Stooped, giant man-rats they were, with all of the charm of sewer rats coupled incestuously with the morals and opposable thumbs of men. Like paired gravestones, huge slanted chisel teeth jutted from beneath dripping whiskered muzzles.

“He’s mine.” Spew blustered herself up. She had to get the hell out of here. There were too many foes — one was generally too many. “Be gone, Lorgex, or Izula, here — hey, stop drooling.” She nudged her with her whip handle. “Ahem, Izula will give you and your rats something to chew on!” So long as that something was Izula and not Spew.
“Attaaaaaack!” Spew screeched.

In response, Izula huffed hard and slow then started foaming at the mouth, which was, possibly, an improvement over the drooling? Either way, it would still take the chitterlings a few precious moments to eat her. Then the boy. Of course, by then Spew could be — staring down the long crooked alleyway she calculated her torpid land speed — not very far. She was built for many things: power, torture, seduction. Alas, speed was not on that list. Then her eyes lit upon it — the heaped garbage pile from the Swamp Rat Tavern. The back door lay buried somewhere beneath that glacial midden-heap. Somewhere…

“Very well, Spew, you had your chance.” Lorgex raised both of his twizzled arms. “Take them, chitterlings! Bite them! Gnash them! Sharpen your teeth on their marrow!”

A wave of red eyes and chipped teeth and damp hairy limbs broke over Izula and surged round Malving’s legs. Spew struggled amidst the tide to hold on as Malving screamed in muzzled terror, turned to flee but was knocked from his shackled feet, slamming pillory first to the ground.

“Gimpy! Do not gnaw the man-child!” Lorgex ran forward. “NO! Gimpy. Bad Gimpy!”

Spew’s whip flew from her hand as she smacked down hard, bouncing twice and rolling hard like a wad of snot. Into the Swamp Rat’s midden heap she slammed, an avalanche of filth and animal bones cascading down, engulfing her immediately as dozens of clawed rat feet stomped towards her. Sniffles and snuffles and teeth gnashed through the trash all around her, searching.

“Bring him to me, Gimpy!” Lorgex screamed. “No! No bites—”

As Spew scrambled free of her tomb, a huge chitterling soared through the air, tackling her. Its bulk pressed her deep into the midden heap. Suffocating. Claws digging in. Slavering, its whiskered rat muzzle pressed toward her face, teeth bared to the black gums. Snap! A roar suddenly exploded up the alleyway. Piercing squeals instantly followed flying rat carcass.

Spew’s chitterling sprayed black breath as it hissed down to gnaw into her—“!@#STOP#@!” — spat Spew dead to rights into the chitterling’s face. Her voice fissured the air.

The chitterling froze. It blinked. Twitched.

Spew weaseled and clawed, sputtering from beneath the frozen rat-thing, scrambling towards the Swamp Rat’s back door. She hopped onto the door handle and pulled with all her might, but the door would not budge. “By Grimnir’s black name, open this door!” She pounded away to no avail. She turned and the huge chitterling was moving again, at her feet. But something was different.

It lay twitching…

It lay dying.

It lay dead.

It’d been cut in half below its stomach. Black tentacles of gore and innard trailed it like some doomed comet’s tale. A yellow wind oozed down the alley, and in the distance, Spew could hear the flesh-peddlers’ hawkings from the Sickamore Slave Market.

“Izula…” Spew whispered.

In the alley, nothing moved.

Flies buzzed.

Lorgex was gone. So too Malving.

No matter. Spew yet lived.

She adjusted her purple wig and tiara. Brushed herself off.
Clutched her torture bag.
She found Izula amidst the circle: the circle of limbs, of torsos, of rat heads flung about as though some sort of great razorback tornado god had inhaled them all in one great gout, chewed them up, then vomited them all forth. Impossible to tell how many.

Gashes and flaps of hanging green skin covered Izula’s body. Blood eeked out. Her long, bone saw-sword lay across her chest, clutched red in her monstrous hammer fists. Her eyeballs lolled back beneath barely cracked lids.

Spew reached forward, tentatively, closing Izula’s eyes then touched the hilt of the blade with a delicate wet finger. Fine craftsmanship, really. The work of a master bone-smith. It would fetch a good price at market. Her armor, too. And, perhaps Izula had some other goodies as well. Oooh. She rifled Izula’s corpse.

“Crrrrrrrrrrrrrrroooooooooak…” Izula croaked meekly.

“Hop toward the dark.” Spew dug into a coin purse.

“Crrrrrrrrroak…”

Spew upended the coin purse. It was full of teeth. Spew hadn’t paid her yet. And that meant she still owed her the implied-retainer. And a debt owed and left unpaid was possibly the one thing Spew could not swallow. Bad business. Word would get out. No more meat-shields to work for her. Protect her. Die for, and more importantly instead of, her. And Izula had proved rather useful in that function, despite the overwhelming drooling problem. Spew looked around in awe, counting chitterling heads. Five… Six… Eight… Nine!

All by herself.

“Croooooak…” Izula coughed up a dribble of pink foam.

Yes, Izula was useful, but more importantly, she was very stupid. And very stupid meant she was probably very loyal as well. And very loyal people were generally very willing to do stupid things for other people. And Spew was habitually asking people to do stupid things for her.

“Grimnir’s grimy ball-sacks…” She pushed back her indigo sleeves. Scraping a handful of dirt from the muddy streets, she packed it into a ball and shoved it into her mouth. And she chewed. And she grimaced. And she swallowed. It went down like a wire-haired cat. Hocking deep from within the bowels of her black soul, she tore open Izula’s cavernous maw, and spat the black earth bile in. She closed Izula’s mouth, her shattered skull shifting and scraping like a bag full of pottery shards beneath Spew’s hands.
Leaning in close then, Spew whispered, “!@#LIVE#@!”

And live she did.

Part 4. A Vintage worthy of Spew

“Grim-damned Luzgar…” Spew growled. Luzgar, the Swamp Rat Tavern’s owner, had not only low-balled Spew on her chitterling-stew offer but had also charged her a delivery fee to drag the carcasses into his bar which had left Spew with but two copper plogs scraping sadly in her bag. And two would make nary a dent in her debt to Abzgorn.

Lorgex would take the bounty.

The credit.

The coin.

“And Grim-damned Lorgex.” Spew glanced up at the Obsidian Gates, a warped giant’s skull, its open mouth the Black Temple’s entrance. A long night of alms collections lay before her. Best get earning to recoup the losses, maybe pay Abzgorn the Ribspreader back a trifle, promise the rest, hope he didn’t kill her in her sleep. Or her awake. And better sooner rather than later. She took her post at the gates, mentally preparing herself to accost anyone who ventured near.

“Halt!” a challenge rang out. “Who goes there?”

“Shut your gob-holes,” Spew croaked. There were two guards guarding the Obsidian Gates, she knew, though she could see neither. “It’s me. Again.” There were always two guards, and they were always hiding. “Imbeciles…”

“It is our sacred duty,” said the second guard solemnly, possibly hidden behind a potted angler plant.

“We have to ask for verification, Acolyte Spew,” whined the first guard, who might have actually been the potted angler plant. “You shan’t grow cross. As it stands — ooh — someone approaches — Shhhhh! Hide. Don’t tell him we’re here. Please!”

“Hail, Grimnir,” Spew said to a figure as it stumbled drunkenly — it had to be drunk or it would never wander near the Black Temple — from the dark and into the temple wall, passing out nearly within the teeth of the Obsidian Gates. Spew hopped tentatively toward it. “Give to the Temple of Grimnir, or I’ll curse your loins flaccid!”

The goblin twitched once or twice. Then it burped and farted. Simutaneously.

“Shhhh. Don’t move,” whispered the second guard. “He’s right at your feet.”

“Did he see us?”

“I don’t think so. Spew, did he see us?”

“Did she do that to him? He looks fairly flaccid.”

“Pathetic.” Spew commenced one of the more common and less savory tasks of the Alms Acolyte: rifling through the pockets and orifices of drunk and indigent goblins. The problem wasn’t not knowing what she’d find. It was knowing exactly what she’d find. Spew began tossing teeth, hairballs, pig ears, and other such dregs and grossery over her shoulder.

“Find anything?” the first guard hissed on bated breath.

“A half-drank flask of Gat’s Green-spume.” Spew held up a bone flask and shook it a bit. “Hmmm. Fetch a plog. Maybe.”

“How old?” the second guard drooled audibly.

“Eh?” Spew sniffed it, ventured a swig. Swallowed. Shuddered. “Two days.”

“Ooh. Vintage,” the first guard groaned. “Might we sample it?”

“Nads on a zombie, you two are.” Spew took another swig of the sour red. They called it Gat’s Green-Spume for its color on its way out which was not uncommonly instantaneous and exceptionally explosive. “Worst. Guards. Ever.”

“Alas,” whispered the second guard, “we’re miscast as guards. If it weren’t for the gossip we garner, I don’t know how we’d get on.”

“Ooh, gossip, yessss,” the first guard whispered. “Anything juicy we might glean from your recent travels and travails? Scuttlebutt as of late centers upon Wrackolyte Lorgex the Eyes and you. Back alley fisticuffs. Kidnappings. And intrigue.”

“Oh, do tell.”

“Have you two seen Lorgex?” Spew looked up sharp.

“Not more than an hour ago,” the second guard whispered. “He came through with a pilloried boy in tow. Who was he? A fugitive?”

“Probably just a sacrifice, right?” the potted angler plant broke in. “A good sacrifice, though, yes? A blood tithe, maybe? Or a stranglee? Is he the son of a king? Yes? No…?”

“The son of a king?” Spew rasped, incredulous. “He’s naught but a pig boy.”

“Heh? Then why’d Lorgex bring him directly to the High Wrackolyte? Please, oh please, tell us. We can keep a secret. He’s the seventh son of a seventh son, yes?”

“Lorgex did look rather pleased with himself for someone his advanced age.” The angler plant nodded emphatically. “Ooh! Acolyte Spew, forgive me. The High Wrackolyte requested your presence as soon as you got in. Said she has some business to work out between you and Lorgex. In the lower crypt.”

The torture crypt! Spew gulped. Business with the High Wrackolyte Diathama Sneering typically involved the asystematic removal of one’s vertebrae from whatever orifice lay anatomically furthest away. She clasped her torture bag under arm, pivoted on heel and commenced marching directly toward Westleaf. It’d only take her about a year or two to get there…

“She said that he’d be scrying for you,” said the first guard. “Lorgex, that is. And she’d expect you directly.”

Spew froze, one foot poised mid-step. Lorgex! Damn his scrying eyes! Damn, damn, damn. Could she run? No. Hide? No. There was no escaping the Eyes. No evading them. Not for long. She’d best go. Take her prescribed dose of medicine. Hemlock most likely. Or perhaps the High Wrackolyte was excessively drunk and would somehow see fit to lay mercy on her. Or maybe she’d just kill her once and not torment her eternally through resection-resurrection.

Crestfallen, Spew moped back in through the Obsidian Gates, wishing Izula had been conscious enough to accompany her. She might have been useful. Spew could have dressed her up in a purple wig and robe and pawned her off as herself.

Part 5. The Blind

“Good boy, Gimpy, good boy.” Lorgex tussled the sweaty fur behind Gimpy’s third ear and stood proud as a papa over his newborn babe, personified in this instance either by a four-foot-tall mutant rat with a severe leprosy problem or an adolescent boy who lay shackled, muzzled, and pilloried on the ground.

“Alms Acolyte Spew, you may enter.” The High Wrackolyte Diathama Sneering. Beautiful in a demanding way. A cold, stern, sadistic, horribly demanding way that bespoke of an evil not only that came natural to her, but was also worked on, honed, trained relentlessly in conjunction with endless hours of mechaniacal machines specifically designed to heighten and intensify one’s own innate cruelty. “Abzgorn. The door, please.”

“As my lady wishes.” Abzgorn’s hooded head bowed low before he drew upon a great onyx chain. The door shuddered as it opened sidewise and up like the maw of some great insect about to take a bite, the black rune-hardened steel screeching in protest.
Spew inched through, careful not to impale herself upon one of the many barbs or hooks. The gallery of skeletons and eyeless steel masks adorning the walls watched her.

Lorgex stifled a guffaw, and Gimpy immediately started thrashing his naked tail. “Bitebite, froggy frog,” Gimpy growled low in his throat. Good. Spew would bear witness to his accolades. Or perhaps the granting of a slave? Perhaps even multiple slaves! Or, dare he dream, a promotion? No, no. That was too much to hope for. But then, he glanced down at the boy, was this not the Chosen One? What award commensurate to the bearer of such a prize? Mayhap the High Wrackolyte would deign to let him caress her? Just once… Lorgex dabbed at the pink foam congealing at the corners of his maw.

In any instance, it would break Spew, crush her spirit to know he had won. Stolen her thunder. For her to see him raised while she — Ha! — she would be condemned to a life of alms collection, an indentured pauper forever spelunking through goblin trousers for subsistence.

“And so this is the reason thou saw fit to disturb me within my private chambers?” The High Wrackolyte’s voice cut the ether like an obsidian knife. “And during the very zenith of the hedonistic hours?” Pebbles upon the crypt floor vibrated as she spoke. “A pig boy…?”

Lorgex’s smile died right there. Wilting. Wasted. Withered.

“Explain thyself,” the High Wrackolyte demanded.

“I … ahem. The b-boy, my Lady, is q-quite special. I assure you.” Lorgex dabbed at his suddenly dewy forehead and glanced at Abzgorn for affirmation. The torture crypt was suddenly unseasonably warm. He tried to swallow but couldn’t. He glanced at the door, gaping wide open, then at Spew, whose face was now a shivering rictus of barely suppressed impish glee, then back at Abzgorn who raised a bored eyebrow.

“Hastily, decrepit one.” The nail of the High Wrackolyte’s forefinger gouged a curl of mahogany from the arm of her throne. “Explain thyself. Thy answers are not etched upon the Ribspreader’s succulent flesh or I would know them intimately already. Is that not so, Abzgorn?”

“It is, my Lady.”

“The boy,” Lorgex blurted, “he is the Chosen One of Grimnir. The one who shall marshal forth Grimnir’s horde—”

“Every babe festering in the Craw knows the story of the Chosen One.” The High Wrackolyte chopped him silent with a hand. “I see a pig boy. A pig boy and nothing more…” Her voice rang through the crypt. “Abzgorn, my lust-muffin, perhaps mine eyes hath deceived me? What is it thou sees?”

Lorgex’s stomach nearly dropped out his backside. It all rested on Abzgorn now. Lorgex stared at him, pleading with bloodshot eyes, begging silently for mercy, understanding, salvation, from the Black Temple’s head torturer.

“Your assessment appears correct, my lady,” Abzgorn said with the finality of a headsman’s axe falling.

“Gulp…” It would be a death sentence. And not a good one. His bald head reeled. His gaze fell to Spew who, grinning, surreptitiously drew a thumb across her neck.

“And Acolyte Spew,” the High Wrackolyte turned, “what doth thou see?”

“Ahem, my lady, I see a palsied old relic fit only to finger-dig plogs wrist-deep from the tightest of goblin arses.” Spew adjusted her bone tiara. “Lying on the floor next to him, I see an overgrown rat and a pig boy.”

“Your tiara, Acolyte Spew, I simply adore it.” The High Wrackolyte’s lip twitched a smile at the corners for the briefest of moments and was then cold hateful alabaster once more.

“My lady.” Spew curtsied low.

“M-my Lady, I was told that the b-boy was the Chosen One,” Lorgex pleaded, the last vestiges of his dignity fleeing into a girlish whine. “It was said—”

“Said by whom?” the High Wrackolyte’s voice cracked like thunder. Chunks of ceiling rained down. All in the crypt ducked except the High Wrackolyte herself. She merely stood, pursing her lips, eldritch energies emanating in dark tendrils from her voluptuous form. “Said by WHOM!?”

The very floor quaked—

“By Abzgorn the Ribspreader, my Lady!” Lorgex pointed with one hand, covering his head with the other. “He told me, my Lady. Him!” He stared at Abzgorn. Accusing. “Do you deny it?”

“I deny nothing.” Abzgorn shrugged. “Nothing more than an entertaining jest, my Lady. Lorgex had come unprepared to torture times too numerous to count. And his skills? The Eyes?” He shook his head. “The Palsied Hand might be a more apt name. Or the Tepid Constitution. At any length, my patience with him met its end. Long ago. And the dotard obviously thought my ridiculous story true.”
Lorgex’s acid glare at Spew confirmed Abzgorn’s assessment.

“Whose dark eye watches over Acolyte Spew, I must wonder?” Abzgorn started forward. “I’ll have my boy, then, Lorgex.”

“No, thou shan’t.” The High Wrackolyte picked Malving up and broke the pillory from his neck with a Word. “I have spoken with him this past hour while we waited for Acolyte Spew. He proves a vile, wretched young thing. Evil courses through his very bones. It was through your own machinations that you lost him, Abzgorn. The Temple shall appropriate him. Raise him. Thou shall need abscond with another human for your delvings.”

“As my lady wishes.” Abzgorn bowed.
Lorgex started edging his way toward the door…

“A thought just occurred to me, my Lady.” Abzgorn nonchalantly pulled on the door chain — the doors fell like two axes, screeching shut together, slamming just before Lorgex could escape. Whimpering, he clawed haplessly at the seam between the twin mandible slabs of black iron. “Mayhap Lorgex might fill that position?” Abzgorn offered. “He has proven inadequate at all else. It is doubtful, but might he not in pieces prove the use that as a whole he could not?”

Lorgex oozed down the wall, expanding puddle-like across the cold stone floor…

“Abzgorn, you naughty scamp.” The High Wrackolyte waggled a scolding finger. “Thou knows it is most unseemly to dissect fellow Wrackolytes.” She shook her head in droll mirth, “I could never allow such an abhoration to occur … in normal circumstances, of course … why, only under the most dire of transgressions would I even entertain it … a transgression most difficult at best to incur … a transgression whose level has admittedly been met by Lorgex’s brash intrusion to my chambers … which hath forced me to consider and now reconsider … and, finally, yes, to acquiesce to thy most reasonable request. Thou may have him to whatever be your design, Ribspreader. May you achieve in his death, what he failed to achieve in his life.” Darkness spewed in writhing tendrils from her mouth as she spoke, “%!@#LORGEX, LAY UPON THE SLAB#@!%”

“Eeeeeeeee—” Lorgex’s screech stifled as the High Wrackolyte’s clarion power-call took hold, seizing him. Herky-jerky, golem-like, Lorgex jittered, fighting fruitlessly, and stutter-shuffled his way zombiefied to the torture slab. He flopped his frail body down — SLAP! — upon its cool smooth expanse.

“Acolyte Spew, restrain him,” commanded the High Wrackolyte.

“As my lady wishes.” Spew waddled to the slab, clomb up, and plopped her torture bag down at Lorgex’s head. She ran her slimy fingers through his sparse wisps of hair. “There, there, sweet Lorgex. Hush…”

Fifteen various straps she drew, fastened, then cinched down across Lorgex’s torso. His head. His neck. Finally, his arms and legs.

“Spew! No! Have mercy!” Lorgex’s limbs were his once more, and he strained against his bonds. “Please. I’ll do anything.”

“Acolyte Spew,” the High Wrackolyte said, “it seems a position in the Wrackolation of the Craven Lord shall soon open. Imminently. Dost thou wish to fulfill that position and become a full Wrackolyte? Or dost thou wish to maintain thy present station at the Obsidian Gate accosting drunken thugs?”

“I accept the appointment, my Lady,” Acolyte Spew said without missing a beat. “I shall serve none other than He. I shall live for He, shall kill for He, shall die for He, shall rise for He. I shall crawl back up through the earth in death and shall die once again for He.”

“Excellent,” the High Wrackolyte beamed. “As of now, I rename thee, Madam Spew, the Misery Whip.”

“Please, Madam—” Lorgex hissed. “Save me. Ask a boon of her. It is ritual. She shan’t refuse you on your naming day. Please, I’d owe you my body. My life. My very soul.”

“And what use could any prove?” Madam Spew sneered.

“PLEASE!”

“Heh. Perhaps,” Madam Spew considered. “Ahem, my lady, might I spare Lorgex the Eyes?”

The High Wrackolyte fixed Madam Spew with a numbing glare. “Do what thou will with him, Madam, so long as Abzgorn the Ribspreader agrees,” the High Wrackolyte said. “Lorgex and all of his innards are his property now. Though I might rethink thy appointment should thy first act as Wrackolyte be one of mercy.”

Madam Spew nodded, then, expectantly, looked to Abzgorn.

Lorgex strained his eyes to see.

Abzgorn studied Madam Spew intently. “What is it you intend?”

“I wish simply to rename him,” Madam Spew said.

“And to let him live?” Abzgorn asked.

“Yes.” Madam Spew looked down. “Would those terms be agreeable, Lorgex?”

“Yes! Those terms — I would be grateful, M-Madam Spew,” Lorgex blurted. “Eternally. A chorus of demons shall sing your praises, echoing within the cavern of my soul!”

“And I accept the debt I will incur for your loss, Ribspreader,” Madam Spew said, “in addition to that of the absconded boy.”

“No matter.” Abzgorn dismissed it with a hand. “They are nothing to me. Uninspired specimens at best.” He raised an eyebrow. “But … what is it you intend to rename the Eyes?”

“I intend to give him back his old position as Alms Acolyte.” Madam Spew petted Lorgex.

“W-What?!” Lorgex gagged on rage. “No!”

“You would grant him two acts of kindness?” Abzgorn glanced down at the struggling Lorgex as though he were a bug he might consider pulling the legs off of. “You would grant him life, and some modicum of status? However slight an alms collector’s might be? Think wisely.” Abzgorn studied Madam Spew. “They will call you soft. Such a white mark might follow you all your days. It might prove the end of you.” Abzgorn looked down at Lorgex. “Is he worth it? He was a failure at even this one position suited to cripples and dotards.” Abzgorn raised a finger. “And alms collecting is a repositioning, Madam, not a renaming.”

“Release me, she-demon!” Lorgex railed.

“I am aware of all of those things, Ribspreader.” Madam Spew reached into her torture bag. “I understand that those with physical ailments are more adept at chiseling alms from the weak of heart and loose of pocket.” She pulled out a padlock.

“What?! What do you intend?!” Lorgex screamed, trying to see.

“Perhaps his physical ailments at present are inadequate to the task?” Madam Spew offered. “Perhaps he needs aid. Grimnir’s aid. My aid. Perhaps … a modification to the Eyes?”

She placed the lock down next to Lorgex then reached for an iron mask on the wall.

“What is it?!” Lorgex struggled. “Release me, Spew! I don’t want your help — you stunted wartback! Fly-eater. We had a deal!”

“It’s Madam Spew,” Madam Spew unstrapped just his head and neck, “and our deal is I get to rename you.”

Lorgex craned his head up, biting at her fingers with broken teeth.

“Tsk… Tsk… Lorgex the Eyes. Hmmm…?” From within the claustrophobic confines of her torture bag she retrieved a jar full of goblin eyes. “What ever shall we rename you?”

“YOU!” Lorgex’s eyes bulged near to bursting on seeing the jar.

“Were you looking for these?” She set the jar down and took up the eyeless iron mask.
“Why!? Why?”

“For Matilda,” Madam Spew slid the pitted eyeless mask over his bald head and locked it with the padlock, whispering softly into his earhole, “Lorgex the Blind.”

The End.

Chapter 1. A Bargain on Champions

THE TWO COMBATANTS circled each another amidst the raucous Swamp Rat Tavern crowd.

“FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!” the crowd tossed chairs and tables and goblins out of the way to form a circle.

“I piss on first-blood duels.” Madam Spew hopped atop a table. “Just ain’t proper. So, whoever survives gets the job!”

The crowd roared its approval.

Really, though, Madam Spew could only afford to hire one thug. And only one from the bottom of the barrel, which just so happened to be exactly where the Swamp Rat Tavern was situated.

“Two grunts on the Mullet!”

“I got one on the Tricorn!”

The first combatant was a straw-headed youngster wearing a tricorn hat, a rapier jutting from his quivering fist.

“A most unmanly weapon!” shouted his opponent, a tall mulleted man with a dashing patchwork cape cast across his shoulder. Within each fist, he wielded a bone steak knife.

“Kill him!” Madam Spew spat nut fragments as she screamed, entranced by the intoxicating promise of impending barbarity. Gimpy, her new chitterling pet, gnashed his rat teeth from the bottom of the bar stool.

“Stab him, mullet man!”

“FILLET HIM!”

The Mullet acted first, hurling a knife end over end at young Tricorne who tripped, serendipitously avoiding the flying blade.
“Ahhhhhhh!” cried a goblin in the crowd, clutching the knife buried in his skull.
Tricorn recovered wide-eyed, breathless, and lunged forward. Awkwardly. At best. The Mullet lurched aside as the rapier stabbed harmlessly past and into the crowd—

“Ahhhhhh!” screamed the same goblin.

“A fair thrust, boy!” The Mullet tore his cape from his neck and whipped it around his forearm. “But no man is Donvannos’s equal!” He slashed wildly, missing, recovered, and slashed again, missing even more. “Have at thee!”

Tricorn circled silently, eyes tearing up bloodshot in near panic, jabbing noncommittally here and there, using the rapier’s superior length, where his skill was obviously deficient, to his advantage. He spasmed forward suddenly, slamming his rapier to the hilt through the mulleted Donvannos — but wait — NO! Donvannos had deftly dodged the thrust and ensnared the rapier within his wrapped cloak which he whipped into Tricorn’s face.

The rapier clattered to the floor!

The crowd roared.

“Yield!” Donvannos bellowed.

Limbs locked together, they devolved to hand fighting, slapping at each other as they danced for supremacy. Donvannos was the bigger of the two, and he muscled Tricorn awkwardly to and fro, punching him in the kidney and spine until he tripped and both collapsed in a lanky heap. Donvannos landed on top. He pressed the point of his steak knife into Tricorn’s throat, a dot of red growing. “Yield!”

Tricorn still struggled.

“Enough, boy. Donvannos may kill by necessity, but he does no murder!”

“WHAT—!? BOOO!” roared the crowd, Madam Spew spearheading the jeer.

Tricorn’s eyes bulged from his skull, unaware even that Donvannos was talking.

“Cease this!” Madam Spew appeared suddenly amongst the legs of the bristling mob. An idea had metastasized in her warped brain. “You, Tricorn, are the vanquished! You, Donvannos, are the victor. Yet,” she raised her hands to either side, “I see no need for death this day!”

“WHAT—?!”

“KILL HIM, YOU PANSY!”

Whimpering, Tricorn closed his glistening eyes.

“There, there,” Madam Spew managed as she edged closer, disgusted but also impressed somehow by Tricorn’s complete and total lack of manliness. “There…” she added for good measure. “Ahem. How could I hire but one warrior, when two have so proven their mettle.” Madam Spew managed to croak it out without choking into laughter. But here it was: the victor hadn’t killed the loser, thus breaking the rules of the duel. So… She could shave his fee! And the loser, the very embodiment of the word, she could chisel down his fee to a quarter plog. She glanced at Tricorn’s puddle of saffron desperation growing beneath him. Possibly a eighth.

“Up, my boon comrade.” Donvannos grasped Tricorn by the forearm and yanked him up. “T’is time we met our generous employer.” He dusted off Tricorn’s shoulder then turned and bowed low. “Madam.”

“I believe this is yours.” Madam Spew handed Tricorn his rapier. “And this, I believe is yours,” she said as she stepped over and yanked Donvannos’s steak knife from the stupefied goblin’s head. He fainted. Possibly.

“Uh,” Donvannos winced, “perhaps someone should see to that fellow?”

Unsurprisingly, there were no takers. Except for Gimpy.

Madam Spew took a seat that the bar and ordered some swill.

“Uh, that chitterling…” Tricorn pointed surreptitiously with one finger.

“Ahem, what exactly shall be the nature of our work?” Donvannos nodded thanks to the bartender and took a sip of swill. He shuddered.

Madam Spew shoved a fistful of nuts into her maw and commenced chewing and speaking and spitting nut fragments as she did so. “The purpose of our quest is confidential. Know only that we’re trudging west to Festerfern Gorse come nightfall. And you are both to be my personal meat shields—ah, bodyguards.”

“Uh, Madam,” Tricorn whispered, “your rat-thingy-guy. He’s, uh, gnawing on that goblin’s head.”

“Yes well,” Madam Spew nodded her head in approval, “he’ll do that.”