Black Bones Of The White Hypaethral, Appearing In Swords And Larceny from Baen Books
Baen Books is dropping a new anthology centering on fantasy thieves and heists on September 5th. Contributors include:
Christopher Ruocchio
Wen Spencer
A. Lee Martinez
Jim Zub
John C. Hocking
James Enge
Tim Akers
Mark Finn
Bill Willingham
Adrian Simmons
Tracy S. Morris
Stephen Aryan
David Afsharirad
Among the lineup is my offering, Black Bones Of The White Hypaethral, which is the second published adventure of my recurring sword and sorcery character, Mogarth The Muttwhelp, who first appeared in an anthology called Blackguards a number of years ago and was reprinted in Skelos #3.
Mogarth (that’s him on the cover) is a half-ork and veteran of The Black Army, the confederacy of orkish tribes who united under the great chieftain Odius Khan to support The Witch Queen in her bid to conquer the lands of Wayphar. The thing is, Mogarth slew Odius Khan (he had his reasons), the Black Army failed to arrive to support The Witch Queen, and she fell in the ultimate battle to the forces of “good.”
Now Mogarth and his goblin partner Redshat roam Wayphar, just another pair of dispossessed soldiers, unwelcome and unwanted in the post-war kingdoms of the victorious elves, dwarves, and humans.
In this adventure, Mogarth and Redshat hire on as bearers and guides for a pompous and shifty elvish treasure hunter, seeking an ancient magical relic in a remote jungle temple…
Here is an excerpt –
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They secured the animals and approached the portico of the White Hypaethral.
As soon as they stepped from the bright sun into it the shadow cast by the temple, the goblin shivered visibly.
“Cold,” he hissed.
It was noticeably cooler. But was the goblin’s reaction due to its hidden nature? Bullocius knew from experience that the fey reacted strangely to magic in this world.
“What’s holding it together?” Mogarth asked.
In truth, Bullocius had no idea what held the temple of bones together. There was no apparent mortar, and up close, he noticed the entire structure had a tendency to sway slightly. What if it was nothing but a great precariously balanced rick that would topple on their heads if they weren’t careful? There was a disconcerting click and clack now and then as they moved closer. Was it the slight breeze of the steppes rendering elements of the construction into bone chimes, or evidence that the temple was not entirely deserted? What if Madflesher had left some horrific monstrosity to guard his ancient sanctuary?
“I don’t know,” Bullocius admitted aloud. “Old magic, maybe. Or evil prayers. Be cautious. Watch where you step.”
“Brilliant,” Mogarth muttered.
“Bones, Boss,” observed the goblin.
Mogarth stepped under the pediment, which was formed from the stubby skeletons of numerous halflings arranged in a macabre dance or circus act, each clasping the others’ ankles until at the center peak, two held hands. The floor inside was black flagstones. It was the only feature of the construction that wasn’t bone.
Inside the confines of the temple, Bullocious took note of the arrangement of the various skeletons, in case the cultists had trapped the place. In doing so, he observed that many served no structural purpose, but were posed in specific manners, as the friezes and reliefs decorating, say, a church of Feyllinyos or Llawyndrynon might. What scenes they depicted he couldn’t be sure of; blasphemous rites in service to the Black Dragon perhaps, or the history of Plutonius’ cult.
The goblin was less than wary. He scrambled past Bullocius and curiously gripped one of the leg bones protruding from a column.
Mogarth rapped him lightly on the top of the head.
The goblin hissed and jumped back, glaring at his partner.
“Don’t touch nothing, ‘Shat,” Mogarth advised. “You wanna bring the whole place down on us?”
Redshat uttered something so uniquely foul it took Bullocius a moment to comprehend the meaning. By that time Mogarth had already yanked the goblin up by the nape of his neck and deposited him on his own broad shoulders.
“Just stick close.”
They carefully made their way toward the back of the temple.
They passed down a central aisle between rows of white tables that appeared to be carved from the massive bones of some unidentifiable mega-creatures; perhaps the mandibles of whales, or elder dragons. Bullocius noticed each bone table was slightly slanted and fitted with an iron drain. Further, the stone floor was crisscrossed by a series of rough-hewn hollow bone sluices that seemed to lead to a central drain. Blood shed on the sacrificial tables had apparently been collected and drained into a subterranean reservoir, or perhaps simply disposed of in a rudimentary sewer. He shuddered to think what purpose collecting that much blood could have served. He had heard that the Madfleshers drew some unfathomable power from the stuff.
Mogarth wrinkled his nose as they reached the entrance to the enclosed naos, the heart of the temple. Ordered stacks upon stacks of bodies, such as in a catacomb, formed the walls. A single, open black doorway loomed, framed by the long necked skeletons of two young wyverns, the bone wings outstretched in ornamental splendor, the snouts touching in an eternal kiss.
The goblin bared his ebony teeth.
“Cold, Boss. Very cold inside.”
“See anything?” Mogarth asked.
Of course, a goblin’s eyes, developed for navigating underground warrens, would be invaluable here. So would a fey’s.
The goblin hopped down and crept cautiously up to the doorway. Laying its hands on the frame, it leaned in as far as it dared on the long nailed tips of its bare toes, and peered.
Bullocius held his breath and the balanced handle of the tuck in his baldric, expecting something within to jerk the goblin off its feet and pull it into the shadow at any moment.
The goblin returned to its heels and looked over its shoulder, an expression of disappointment on its face. It shrugged and rubbed its bare upper arms with its overlarge hands.
“Just more bones, Boss,” it said, and its breath puffed out in a visible cloud. “Black bones.”
Black bones! The Black Skull…thought Bullocius, and crouched to light his hooded lantern.
“Sound like what you’re looking for?” said Mogarth.
“Yes it does,” said Bullocius, rising and shining the light at the door.
“Well you got the light. Lead the way.”
Bullocius expected to feel the muttwhelp’s cleaver bite into his neck as soon as he passed through the door.
He held the lantern out to the goblin.
“I’ll need my hands free,” he said, by way of explanation.
Redshat looked back at Mogarth. The muttwhelp nodded. Grumbling, the goblin took the unwieldy thing, which was nearly its height, and hefted it, waddling through the doorway.
Mogarth and Bullocius followed, shoulder to shoulder.
The interior of the inner sanctum walls were arranged with rows upon rows of miniature skeletons cavorting in deliberate designs, again, depicting strange scenes Bullocius didn’t care to dwell on overly. These were the tiny remains of thousands of pixies or other diminutive fey.
The room had a central altar, which seemed to be of the same makeup as the flagstones, but covered in runes and supported by four kneeling skeletons clutching bone sconces, the baskets blackened by long gone fires.
But it was the figure at the back of the naos looming over the altar that commanded his attention. It was an effigy, nine feet tall, hunched over in the low ceilinged chamber; a long-boned black skeleton draped in a tattered black shroud, knotted many times over in some ritualistic manner, its arms outstretched over the altar, the drooping hands supported from behind by skeletons set into the wall, as if they were enraptured devotees elevating their object of worship.
Bullocius realized the black skeleton was not bone at all, but some kind of polished, carved agate. Peering out from under the hood of the shroud was a skull of the same shining stone.
This was an idol of a Death Saint; an unknown high priest of The Madflesher Cult. Perhaps it was the transmogrified bones of the old Madflesher himself. It didn’t matter. What did matter was the ancient and verified curse laid upon it. It was written that to take The Black Skull from its place was to invite a calamitous death. So Bullocius had read in The Laospel of Plutonius, the canon he had stolen from a Madflesher enclave in Rentellevaire’s Temple District for the coded map to the temple ingeniously folded into its pages.
He had also read that there was a secret name that rendered the Skull’s curse harmless. Whether it was the true name of the Madflesher, the author of the Laospel, or the caster of the curse, or the identity of the insane temple builder….who could say? He knew the name from his reading, and Boquila of The Many Forms did not.
Redshat hopped on the altar and set the lantern down on the carved stone. He peered up at the black effigy, snuffling his ridiculous beak of a nose.
“Careful, ‘Shat,” Mogarth said.
Bullocius picked up the lantern and shined it on The Black Skull, taking the opportunity to slip his thin bladed tuck from its soft sheath, noiselessly. He hid it low, the flat of the straight blade pressed behind his back in the shadows.
“Go on. Take it, goblin,” he urged.
Mogarth looked at him suspiciously, lip curling over one of his stout tusks.
“Take it yourself. You’re the expert.”
Fine, thought Bullocius. The hard way it is...
Preoder is up now….
