The Sellsword (16 page)

“Watch myself,” muttered Vanderjack, turning away.

After sorting through their rucksacks, pouches, and pockets, Theodenes and Gredchen set off for Willik. Vanderjack found a place against a banyan, with a bedroll for support, and drew Lifecleaver from its scabbard. He laid the weapon across his knees and watched as the Sword Chorus appeared around him.

“Wise of you to remain here,” said the Philosopher.

“You’ll need some agaric, the root of the summer-foster plant, and some weak tarbean tea,” said the Apothecary.

“What for?” Vanderjack asked, making a face. “Scouring out the inside of a cast-iron pot?”

“A simple healing salve,” said the Hunter.

“Any mercenary should know that,” said the Cavalier.

“Not this one,” said Vanderjack. “Besides, I have you lot around to remind me.”

“I think that’s the root of your problems,” said the Cook, stepping forward. Etharion somehow looked less spectral and indistinct than the other seven ghosts. He appeared much as he had in life, although as a ghost he was bleached of all color and partly transparent.

“Hmm?” Vanderjack rose and began poking about in the edges of the jungle clearing for the herbs and ingredients the Apothecary was directing him to find.

“Look how much trouble you were getting in when the Sword Chorus wasn’t here to help you.”

The sellsword turned back to the Cook’s ghost. “I’m always in trouble. It has nothing to do with you and your ghostly friends.”

The Cook shrugged. “Have you ever thought about whether you’re becoming too dependent on them?”

“It may be dependence, but it could just be good advice,” countered the Aristocrat.

“Indeed. Advice taken well is a boon,” said the Conjuror.

“But nobody should be this reliant—” began the Cook, but mysterious looks from the other ghosts cut him off.

Vanderjack shook his head and looked over at the dragonne. It was looking back at him. After a second or two, the sellsword realized that Star’s eyes were following the movement of the ghosts as well.

“That dragonne can see you all!” he said. “Did you know that?”

“They have a heritage of magic and heightened awareness,” said the Conjurer.

The Cook turned and beckoned toward the dragonne. It got up from its scaly haunches and stalked over, stopping a few feet from where the Balladeer floated.

“He’s right. It can see us,” the Cook said warily.

“I can hear you too,” said the dragonne in an accented Ergothian dialect.

The other ghosts seemed unsurprised. The Cook, on the other hand, seemed to be fascinated. “Hmm, that’s an unrecorded quality of dragonnes,” he said. “We knew they hailed from the Dragon Isles, and were once the guardians of the good dragon eggs….” His voice trailed off.

“Mind what you say, Etharion,” said the Aristocrat.

“How do you come to know of my kind?” asked the dragonne, clearly talking to the Cook.

Vanderjack looked between the ghost and the beast and said, “That’s a good question. Etharion, when did you turn into a librarian?”

The Cook shook his head. “Uh, just something I picked up from my years in mercenary camps.”

“Right. All those years cooking.” Vanderjack lifted an eyebrow.

“Yes. Cooking.”

“Anything other than cookies?”

“Another time,” advised the Cavalier sternly.

Etharion looked somewhat apologetic and drifted away from Vanderjack to join the other ghosts.

“Star’s not your real name, I take it?” Vanderjack asked the dragonne with what he hoped was a tone of polite inquiry. “Theo can’t be
that
cursed.”

“The gnome likes the name, and so I honor the memory of his companion and bear it with pride,” Star said.

“Whatever he told you about that, don’t believe all of it,” Vanderjack said, once again selecting herbs from the undergrowth. “These ones?”

“Yes,” the Apothecary said. “Not the ones to the left; those will poison you.”

“Oh. Nice of you to mention it,” he said, tossing the poison aside and stuffing the tonic herbs into his fist. He returned to the banyan tree. The dragonne moved closer and seated himself in the clearing, watching him.

“Perhaps you should tell me about my predecessor,” said Star. “Why is Theodenes upset with you?”

Vanderjack, with the Apothecary’s continued guidance, crushed the herbs together, set up a small traveling sellsword’s stove, and started a pot of tarbean tea brewing. “That’s quite a story, long in the past, and I really don’t think too much about the past. That was during the war.”

“I was in the war,” the dragonne said with enthusiasm. “I joined with the good dragons.”

“Really? I have to admit never seeing one of your kind before.”

“Many of us resemble lions. One or two of us are cougars.”

Vanderjack stirred the herbs into the tea, watching it thicken. “Hmm. Well, like I said, you’re the first I’ve seen. Has all this been happening here in Nordmaar?”

“In various places.”

“Like here in Nordmaar?”

The dragonne growled, but the sellsword shrugged, feigning indifference to Star’s apparent annoyance. “Yes,” the dragonne said finally. “Here in Nordmaar.”

Vanderjack grinned. “How’s that working out for you?”

“As you can tell, it isn’t.”

“Mmm. Well, you’re welcome to come along with us for a while. I’m being paid to rescue a beautiful girl for that ugly woman’s employer, a nobleman who for some reason hasn’t been kicked out of a dragonarmy-occupied region.”

“She isn’t ugly,” said Star.

“Are you serious? I don’t know about you and your magical eyes, Star, but I don’t think I’ve seen a person more likely to crack a mirror if she looked at it.”

“As you like.”

“I know what I see.”

The tea seemed to have thickened completely. The Apothecary directed Vanderjack to soak a bandage in the salve. He wrapped his chest in the bandages, wincing as his ribs ached. He also hoped the Apothecary wasn’t setting him up for yet another stinking poultice that put him to sleep or threw his nerves off. With the other ghosts quiet and the Apothecary’s advice done, the sellsword set aside Lifecleaver and started another
pot of tarbean tea.

“I have been asked to remain with you, at least for part of your journey,” said Star.

Vanderjack grunted, raising an eyebrow. “What do you mean, you’ve been asked to remain with us?”

“That is my purpose for the moment.”

“Who asked you?”

Star’s tigerlike features formed a curious expression of shame or discomfort. “It isn’t important. There are powers involved in the outcome of events here in Nordmaar that wish to see you succeed.”

“Ho! Wait a minute,” Vanderjack said accusingly. “What powers? And since when has this been about anything more than a rescue mission for some noble’s daughter?”

Star shifted his wings and settled them against his flanks. “That is all I will say.”

“‘That is all I will say,’” Vanderjack echoed mockingly. “It better be because I’ve had enough of your mysterious blather.”

There was an awkward silence for about ten minutes. Vanderjack lay back against the overgrown roots of the banyan, muttering, “Powers. Powers wish for me to succeed. Hah!” Star sat there in the clearing, watching the trees, ignoring the sellsword. Finally, Vanderjack broke the silence and said, “So you can see the ghosts.”

Star looked up, his massive chin resting between his forepaws. “Yes.”

“The others can’t. You realize that, right?”

Star shook his head negatively.

“Nobody else does. It’s just me. The Sword Chorus is pretty much a secret. If you could keep that secret, at least until it no longer matters, I’d appreciate it.”

“The Cook is right, isn’t he? You
are
dependent on them.”

Vanderjack pointed at the dragonne. “That’s enough of that!”

Vanderjack closed his eyes and leaned back again. This is a sign of just how far things have come, he thought. I’m talking about my feelings with a big scaly flying tiger. Vanderjack resolved to stop talking about his feelings in the future, whether the other individual in the conversation was a dragonne or not. People would start thinking he was crazy.

If they didn’t already.

Theodenes and Gredchen walked the quiet, early-morning streets of Willik, wondering where all the people had gone.

Willik was supposed to be a fairly prosperous town, founded by a small cabal of spice merchants who felt that its central location would help them make a fortune selling spices all around Ansalon. That was in the first century after the Cataclysm, when the world was in disarray. Nordmaar had risen from the ocean floor, transforming itself from a small archipelago of islands to a single region of tropical jungle, grasslands, and swamp. It was the ideal sort of climate for spices, and the natives were more than happy to help the merchants with their business.

With the invasion of the dragonarmies, Willik and other merchant-driven settlements in the region experienced a sharp decline, as might be expected. However, the canny highlords and highmasters found a way to make use of the already-established trade routes. Red Highlord Phair Caron made sure her officers, including
Rivven Cairn kept the steel and goods flowing in and out of Nordmaar, Kern, and the other territories she conquered. Even after Phair Caron’s death in Silvanesti, her orders were upheld, and under Rivven Cairn the spice business had flourished.

It was, therefore, a surprise to Theo and Gredchen that Willik seemed barely occupied. They saw one or two people, peering out of windows; there was no shortage of houses or shop fronts or trade buildings. The merchants’ hall was standing where it was most appropriate, in the center of the town, and tools and belongings were strewn about. But it was as if the residents themselves had simply vanished, without taking anything with them, and leaving behind only a handful of citizens to maintain an illusion of daily life.

“This doesn’t seem right,” Gredchen said in a low voice. “I was told there were many ogres here.”

“I see ogre-sized implements,” Theodenes said. “These houses along this row here have even been renovated in the past few months to incorporate individuals of a larger size.”

“So there were ogres here recently. And where there are ogres, there are slaves, and occasionally goblins and hobgoblins. I don’t see any. Maybe we should ask one of those people down there.”

In front of the spice merchants’ hall was a low area, probably originally meant as a gathering place with built-in seating. About a dozen humans, male and female, sat watching the large brick building expectantly. There was no sign of life within the hall, but the people seemed content to just wait patiently as Theo and Gredchen approached. All along one side of the area, mounds of fresh dirt were piled up. What the dirt was doing there or where it had come from was unclear.

Gredchen tapped one of the nearest people on the shoulder. “Excuse me.”

The woman turned around slowly, lifting her head toward Gredchen. Gredchen gasped and took a step back. The woman’s eyes were black—no white or colored iris, just empty black orbs. Others nearby seemed to notice the two outsiders as they also turned to look. All had the same black stare.

“By the gods, look at them,” Gredchen said, moving a little closer to Theo. The gnome had his polearm at the ready, currently configured as an axe at the end with a vicious-looking barb behind it. He boldly flourished the weapon before him.

“Fascinating,” said Theo. “Some kind of enchantment, perhaps. No doubt the work of the ogre shaman.”

Neither of them were very experienced with the supernatural, not even Theo, who had let that side of his broad underpinning of scholarly research subside in his lifelong pursuit of weaponsmithing. As they watched, the woman whom Gredchen had touched rose from her bench and stood to face the new arrivals.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Gredchen whispered to Theo. “Are they ogre slaves? Are they dangerous?”

As if in answer, the closest woman’s face twisted into a hideous, snarling mask. She no longer looked human. The other townsfolk curled their fingers into clawlike shapes, hunched themselves over, and leaped up onto the benches. As Gredchen and Theo backed away, the first woman opened her mouth, and her tongue extended out, long and barbed and monstrous.

“It would seem they are very dangerous indeed!” said Theo, pulling the polearm back for a swing. “In fact, I would wager that they intend our immediate harm.”

The woman-creature sprang, propelled by strength that her slight frame gave no impression of having, hissing like an angry snake. Her fingernails were chipped and broken but long, and once Gredchen had a better look at them, she saw that dirt, or worse, was heavily crusted underneath them. The other black-eyed strangers leaped through the air and landed close by Theo and Gredchen, bent over, some on all fours.

Theo let the closest one have it. He took a step forward to give himself additional leverage and swung the axe head of his polearm straight at the torso of the fiend. It crouched low, barely evading the swing, then jumped right for Theo. The gnome was able to bring the polearm around and up just in time to knock the creature to one side. He let out a grunt and prepared to defend himself against another, a female, edging forward.