Clash of Heroes: Nath Dragon meets The Darkslayer (3 page)

CHAPTER 5

Bish

A small wooden barge glided over the dark and stagnant waters. There was little to see in the tunnel. It was pitch black aside from the glow of a small lantern that lit up the front end of the craft with a faded illumination. Below, in the waters, glowing minnows darted underneath the craft, feeding on the algae on the bottom before darting away again. A lone figure sat on the back of the craft. Black robes covered his small body. His violet eyes, like gemstones, smoldered.

“A meeting,” he grumbled. “Nothing I detest more than a meeting with my fellow underlings.” He let out an aggravated chitter. “And with those two, no less. I’ve been cursed only to be cursed over and over again.”

In front of him sat a chest made from wood, strapped and hinged in iron. He ran his fingers over the cool metal. From this, perhaps, he could give his masters what they sought and then be gone. He didn’t care to fool with his kind much anymore. No, he had other interests. Experiments. He enjoyed toying with the world above far more than the world below. Not that he didn’t find comfort in the caves, but he just didn’t find much comfort among the underlings. And his fellow underlings didn’t find too much comfort with him. He was odd like that. A loner.

“Oh well, I suppose I might as well make the most of the journey.” He shifted on his bench and reached down with his furry grey hand into a small open crate nestled between the planks behind him. His nimble fingers grabbed a bottle by its neck, and with his sharp teeth he pulled the cork out of the bottle, only to spit it into the crate and take a long drink.

“Ah. There’s nothing quite like a fine bottle of underling port.” He guzzled down another drink. “And how it eases the senses, yet doesn't dull them too much.” He thought of who he was about to face and shrugged. “On second thought, I don’t think I could dull them enough.”

Without looking, the underling rummaged through the crate and took out a jar big enough to fill both hands. Small insects crawled within. He removed the cap and ate several crunchy bugs one by one, washing them down with port. Satisfied, he replaced the lid, dropped the jar in the crate, finished off the bottle, and with a tap of his chest, let out a long but somewhat polite burp.

Bwurp!

Picking his catlike teeth with his long black pinky fingernail, he said, “That makes things a little better.”

Traveling the Current waters that spanned like black veins beneath the surface of the world of Bish, he meditated on his upcoming meeting. Rubbing the light-grey, rat-like fur on top of his hands, he said to himself, “Don’t worry. Know full well that it will be far worse than the last time. It always is.”

***

The small barge banked itself on the soft sands of the inner-world beach. With a groan, the underling shuffled to its end and hopped onto the dry land. With a wave of his fingers and a mystic glow in his eyes, the chest lifted up and out of the barge and followed him onto the land. Head down and shoulders slumped, he trudged away from the comfort of the lantern and into one of many tunnels that seemed waiting to devour him.

“Here we go. No fear. No fear.”

He entered the mouth of the nearest cave with the chest gliding behind him inches above the ground. It was pitch black, but the path was far from confusing. This was his home, after all. The Underland. Darkness was a comforting blanket for him and all of his kind, but there was still a peculiarity about it. He was no longer welcome here. He had been banished.

Rubbing his palms together, he stopped at the last bend.

Be arrogant or be humble, they’re never pleased either way. Oh, I’ll just let them do the talking
.

He emerged into a cave created from carved stone.

The soft bluish underlight illuminated the edges of the walls. Two more underlings, dressed similar to him, sat at the back of the room in large, ornate, high-backed pewter chairs. Four massive mangy dogs bigger than him lay at their feet. The underlings didn’t speak. The one's silver eyes and the other's golden eyes burned right into him.

Oh great. It’s both of them. Why must they always be together? They’re insufferable with each other.

He swallowed the lump in his throat, approached, bowed, and took a knee. His voice almost cracked when he said, “Lords Catten and Verbard, I am here, as you requested.”

Silence followed.

Minute after agonizing minute, he remained on one knee until he trembled. His brow beaded in sweat. His body ached.

The four cave dogs walked over and sniffed him. One growled in his ear and licked its hairy lips before sauntering back again and lying down.

It was miserable. It always was miserable here.

Catten, the golden-eyed one, spoke. “Oran, must you grovel all the time? Get up!”

Oran rose on his aching legs, fought the urge to shake the numbness out, and said with his eyes down, “As you command.”

“Oh, come now, Oran. You know you are most welcome among us,” Catten continued.

No, not true. Never true. Last time, you let the urchlings scourge me.

“Yes,” Verbard said with a silvery smile, “please, tell us how you have been.”

“How I have been?”

“No, how I have been,” Verbard said with sarcasm.

“You are most excellent as always.”

“Don’t be a suck-up, Oran!” Verbard formed a fist and punched forward.

An unseen force knocked Oran off his feet onto his chest.

Gasping for breath, he crawled forward on his hands and knees, croaking out the word, “Apologies.”

“I hate apologies,” Catten said with an evil flicker in his eye. “They imply failure.”

“Yes,” Verbard agreed. “Oran is a failure, and we know what happens to failures around here, don’t we?”

Without even looking, Oran could feel Catten nodding.

The underling master then said, “Yes, we turn one's apologies into successes by tormenting them night in and night out until they get things right.”

CHAPTER 6

Oran’s violet-sapphire eyes turned red. He bounced to his feet and said in a fit of rage, “Oh, will you two stop! Have I not faced all of your whimsies? Done your vile deeds? And yet you continue treating me like one of the demented urchlings! I am here on your request. I didn’t have to come, but I did.” He rolled up his sleeves, and his fingertips glowed with yellow light. “Either kill me or do business with me. What will it be?”

“Well now, it seems Oran the Outcast has a spine in his back after all,” Verbard said. His eyes turned into storms of silver. “But no underling dares talk to me like that.” He cocked back his elbow and let loose the first jolt of lightning from his hand.

The bolt slammed into a citrine shield of energy that Oran had summoned at the last second. His sandaled feet scooted backward through the sand.

If I die, I die. So be it then. At least I’ll never have to listen to these two again.

“Enough, Brother, enough,” said Catten, the voice of reason, to Verbard. “Oran is our ally, not our enemy. And he is right. We did summon him here, did we not?”

Tiny streams of lightning danced on Verbard's fingertips and winked out. Nodding, he said, “We’ll see.”

Huffing for breath, Oran wiped the sweat dripping down his cheek with his sleeve. He turned to the chest and flipped open the lid.

Catten and Verbard, robes dragging over the ground, floated over. The lithe underlings were already taller than him, but hovering over the ground made them seem like giants. Flanking him, they peered into the chest.

Oran cleared his throat and spoke. “Here it is.”

Catten tilted his head. “Here what is?”

“Yes, I thought you’d brought us the corpse of our enemy.” Without a crease in his inquisitive face, Verbard frowned. “Instead, you bring this? A chest with an urn in it? Do tell me it is filled with the ashes of our enemy.”

“You summoned me here to help you catch him,” Oran objected. He reached inside the chest and removed the urn from its packing. It was bigger than his head and heavy. With a grunt, he teetered over and set it down on the ground.

Fool of a cleric! I suppose I could have lifted it with a spell, but I’ll need my energy.

He cleared his throat again. “This will help you catch him.”

“Are you jesting?” Catten's eyes were slits. “You catch the enemy, not us. We have better things to do. That is why we summoned you, fool!”

The two underling lords glared at the urn with suspicion. It was crude but majestic in its own way. Its arcane markings were vibrant, deep and spacy.

“I don’t know this thing,” Verbard remarked. “Where did you get it?”

“As things in the world of men go: one of the Royals with sorcerous ways was betrayed. Cut down. I bartered for it in a trade.”

Catten and Verbard hissed and chittered. Anger filled their eyes. “You are a fool to dally with the humans above. That is why you were banished. A trickster. Deceiver. Traitor, they call you. Dabbling with our sworn enemy.”

“They are easily duped,” Oran argued back. “So steeped in greed, they even kill one another. I serve our cause, the underling cause, not my own. Our leadership is too blind to see that. Making an example out of me.” He spat on the ground. “Pah! I am Oran. Every castle, every cave knows that.”

“Knew that,” Verbard corrected. He stared down at Oran. “But they know our names now, don’t they? Don’t make me finish you, Oran. I will, you know.”

With effort, Oran kept his anger in check. “I can’t operate this object without your help.”

“Surely you jest. You come for our help?” Catten said.

Oran reached back into the chest and withdrew an ancient scroll. It was a dusky brown parchment, fastened with leather cords and wider than his very shoulders. “This is power from a millennium ago, maybe longer. I can read it, but I cannot summon the power of the urn at the same time. I need someone to harness my words, turn them to energy, and ignite the urn.”

“And then what?”

“Then, as it says, it will summon a monster to do anything we want.”

“All of this trouble on account of one lone slayer,” Verbard said. “This butcher should have been dispatched already.”

“This butcher slays us in our own night. Our blood feeds the soil above. It makes men’s spirits fertile. I dare not face this menace of slaughter alone. I’ll need help.”

Catten and Verbard drifted away and conferred, leaving Oran alone in his thoughts.

Such a waste of my precious time this is, but whatever I can do to get them out of my business, I will. As the humans would say, 'Slat, let’s get this over with.'

The brothers returned.

Lord Catten spoke for both. “You read. I’ll channel. Verbard will ignite.” He extended his hand and took the scroll from Oran. As he unrolled the parchment, his brows lifted. He showed a row of straight pin-needle teeth to his brother. “Let’s pluck this thorn, cast it in the fire, and go home.”

CHAPTER 7

Nath crashed hard into the ground. His head was pounding. Limbs shaken, he forced himself up into a sitting position. He was in a cave, he knew that much. It was dimly lit by a faint blue light, and the walls were slick and wet. Rubbing his neck, he tried to remember what he'd been doing before. As he searched his memories, he was seized by panic. He didn’t recall anything. Not a single moment from before, just nothing.

A rustle caught his ear. He twisted around.

Three ugly, hairy humanoids were there in robes, one standing and two floating a foot above the ground. They had bright eyes. Nothing at all was familiar about them. They spoke a strange chitter, none of which made any sense.

A growl caught his ears.

Four huge dogs, mangy beasts and ugly, snuck toward him with their heads low. Their jaws slavered with drool that dripped from teeth that looked like they could chew stone. The beasts surrounded him, closed in, and snorted.

“Easy,” Nath said, holding out his hand.

A glint of metal caught his eye. A sword, grand and exquisite. It seemed familiar, but it was too far away.

On instinct, he locked eyes with the biggest of the four dogs. He knew them for what they were and could name the normal objects that he’d seen, but aside from that, he had no memories whatsoever. No idea who he was or how he got here. “Easy,” he repeated.

The dogs' mostly white eyes narrowed. All together they pounced.

Nath balled up.

Wet snouts probed his body, sniffed. Rough tongues licked him.

***

With his head cocked to one side, Verbard said, “What is this? They lick him like a pup?”

“Bizarre,” Catten replied. “Oran, what sort of demon is this? No doubt, he is a hideous beast, but he’s taken command of our dogs. Is that a smile on his lips? Pah! You have summoned no monster but a human.”

Breathless, Oran argued, “That is no human.” His breathing was ragged. The spell had taken quite a toll on him. He could barely stand. It didn’t help that the monster he'd worked so hard to get and paid so much for in trade looked like a man with a mane of wild red hair. And the cave dogs bathed him like an old friend. Quickly, Oran’s master plan had become a disaster. “Cave dogs have quirky natures. You know that. No, look at this thing. Look at those arms. They are scaled. And those claws could tear through a Vicious!”

“You fool!” Catten yelled. “This creature you have summoned shows glee. Name me any demon that shows such an expression. Where did you summon this man from, one of the Royal brothels?”

Oran was speechless. The … thing he’d summoned was a far cry from anything he could ever imagine. At first, he fought to find something to say, and then instead, he watched the man rise to his feet.

The … thing was a towering figure. Human perfection. Strong chinned, his chiseled frame was covered in powerful supine muscle. He wore well-crafted breastplate armor, breeches, and nothing else. The red-haired stranger scratched a dog behind the ears with his yellow claws. In every way, the summoned being was as graceful and fluid as a cat. And unlike Catten's cold, metallic golden eyes, this being's eyes were as captivating, warm, and golden as the dreaded sunrise.

“Just send it back,” Catten said.

“You know that's not possible.” Oran's violet-sapphire eyes were fixed on the marvelous being. Surely this was the answer to his call. The very presence of the man, thing, or demon he had summoned dominated the room. With tongues hanging out of their mouths, Verbard and Catten's protective cave dogs looked like playful pups. “We have not even communicated with it.”

Catten and Verbard's metallic eyes found his and prodded him on.

Oran approached the creature inside the charred circle that still smoked. “What is your name, demon?”

The scaled stranger tilted his head and lifted a brow.

Oran asked again, this time in Common, “What is your name?”

The demon creature shrugged his shoulders. Pushing through the dogs, he made his way over to the great sword and bent over to pick it up.

The sword slid across the cave floor and stopped at Lord Catten’s floating feet. The blade was every bit as long as them standing.

The demon gave them a curious look.

“Well,” Catten said, “Not only is this pet of yours hideous, but it’s also stupid. We can’t have it playing with sharp objects, now can we?”

“I’d say not.” Verbard’s feet touched the ground. His silver eyes studied the sword. His fingers rubbed his chin. “This is a fascinating blade. Are those dragon heads on the pommels? That is not of Bish. If only I had a soldier big enough to wield it.” He reached down and touched the hilt.

Zzzt!

Verbard jerked his hand away and screamed. “Argh!”

Oran backed away.

Verbard looked furious.

Heh, they always find a way to make things worse. He had it coming.

“It seems it is a demon after all.” Catten chuckled. “The blade is possessed. Either that, or it’s an excellent judge of character.”

“This is a farce! I’m ending it.” Lightning flashed in Verbard's silver eyes and erupted from his fingers. Streams of fiery light blasted the demon full in the chest and knocked him off his feet. He stopped at the edge of the cave, unmoving. Verbard dusted off his hands and turned to Oran. “It’s time to turn your banishment into a funeral.”