Critical Failures VI

The Good, the Bad, and the Neutral

By Robert Bevan

Copyright 2018 Robert Bevan

Special Thanks to:

My editor, Joan Reginaldo.

My wife No Young Sook.

My cover designer, No Hyun Jun.

My ARC team.

My fans who like my Facebook page and subscribe to my newsletter.

(Even if the latter only do so to get a FREE copy of Multiple Orc Chasms)

Chapter 1

“What the fuck?” said Cooper. Katherine, Tim, the pegasus, the big-ass beanstalk, they were all gone. They'd just blinked out of existence, leaving behind an untouched expanse of sun-bleached sand. “Where'd all those vines and shit go?”

“Did it just get darker?” asked Chaz.

“Where did those mountains come from?” asked Julian.

Captain Righteous looked at Cooper like he had dicks growing out of his nose. “Do none of you know of the Crescent Shadow?”

Cooper, Julian, Dave, and Chaz gave non-committal shrugs.

“Bits and pieces,” said Stacy. “We've heard about it in passing.”

“You're aware, at least, that it's the island we're currently suspended from?”

“I did know that.”

“It's a retirement community for wealthy and powerful wizards. It periodically blinks to random points above the Fertile Desert.” Captain Righteous squinted at the distant purple mountains. “If I had to guess, I'd say those are the Haunted Highlands, which would put the city of Totino just to the southwest.”

Cooper's mind wandered away from the Captain's geography lesson, distracted by thoughts of delicious pizza rolls. He grabbed the bars on either side of the open part of his cage, then squatted so that his ass was hanging outside.

“What are you doing?” asked Julian. “You're making me very nervous.”

“I've got a big one brewing. I want to see if it's visible from way up here when it splatters on the sand.”

“Didn't you shit, like, eight times on the way to Minswater?” asked Stacy.

“Excuse me. I didn't realize we had daily shit limits.”

“I was just wondering where it all comes from. Have you even eaten anything since then?”

“I don't know,” said Cooper, now getting annoyed that everyone's attention was focused on him trying to take a dump. “Unlike you, I haven't been keeping fucking records of every time someone eats or takes a –” He grunted as his bowels constricted and his cargo bay door opened, releasing his parapoopers over hostile foreign lands. It came out like farty machine gun fire.

Cooper closed his eyes, imagining himself as a ball turret on the underside of a B-17, blasting Nazi shitheads out of the air. He waved his ass from side to side, splattering his payload all over the windshields of imaginary enemy aircraft.

“Get a Luftwiffe of that, Nazi bitches!”

“COOPER!” cried Julian. “The decanter!”

Cooper opened his eyes just in time to catch the Decanter of Endless Water rolling between his legs.

“Shit!” He let go of the bar on his left to catch the decanter, but so much of his weight was outside of the cage that he lost his balance and fell out completely. His right hand slid down the bar and hit the cage floor hard, but he hung on, and even managed to catch the decanter between his knees. He thought he'd finished shitting for the time being, but this little brush with death made him carpet bomb the desert one more time.

“Cooper!” said Stacy. “Are you okay?”

“My hand hurts, and I may have just shat out my large intestine. But I'm hanging in there.” Cooper grabbed the decanter with his left hand, then inserted the neck into his mouth like a big ol' silver dick. Holding it tight with his thick meaty half-orc lips, he pulled himself up one-handed until he could grab the cage floor with his other hand. After a bit of a struggle, he pulled himself back into the cage.

Chaz pressed his face between two of his bars and glared at Cooper. “You need to be more careful!”

Cooper gave him the finger. “Thanks, Mom. I can take care of myself.”

“I don't give a shit about you. That decanter is the only thing keeping us alive if we can't figure out a way to get someone to come and rescue us.”

“Hey, Cooper,” said Dave. “Why don't you hose us down once more, just to reset the clock in case you decide to do anything else really stupid.”

Cooper pressed his back against the bars on the left side of his cage, and his feet on the bars at either corner of the right side. Seeing him do so, everyone else likewise braced themselves.

He unstoppered the decanter, aimed the mouth at Dave, and spoke the incantation. “Geyser!”

A torrent of water gushed out of the decanter, hosing Dave right in his fat bearded face, and launching Cooper's cage backwards, crashing it into Stacy's.

When everyone had had their fill of water, Cooper deactivated the geyser setting, then tipped the decanter above his own open mouth, letting water flow normally.

“Great,” said Stacy. “Like Dave said, the clock is reset. Now what? We can starve to death over three weeks rather than thirst to death over three days. Personally, I think we should do something a little more proactive than wait around hoping to be rescued.”

“Do you have any ideas?” asked Captain Righteous. His pudgy little sidekick looked up hopefully at Stacy.

Stacy frowned. “No.”

Cooper had been thinking about an idea, but he was timid about saying it aloud. It sounded pretty stupid even to him, and he knew that he was already pretty stupid. And even if it worked at all, he wasn't sure if it would work for everyone. Then again, maybe someone else could take the idea and tweak it a little. It would be a shame for everyone to starve to death because he hadn't spoken up.

He cleared his throat. “I've got an idea.”

Chaz rolled his eyes as he wrung water from the bottom of his shiny pink tunic. “Oh, I can't wait to hear this.”

“Step one,” said Cooper. “Chaz eats a dick.”

Julian sighed. “Do you actually have an idea? Or was that just a setup to tell Chaz to eat a dick?”

“I've got kind of an idea. It's a little far-fetched, maybe. But as long as nobody else is coming up with anything.”

“What is it?”

Cooper held up the Decanter of Endless Water. “I could hose down the ground until there's enough vegetation to break our fall.”

Captain Righteous shook his head. “No amount of cabbages and tomatoes would make an appreciable difference from this high up.”

“I think it's a fine idea,” said Chaz. “I'd recommend you give it a shot if we didn't need the water.”

“How about I give your mom a shot?”

Chaz clapped his hands. “Brilliant comeback. Your mom shtick is getting old. That wasn't even an insult.”

“Guys,” said Julian. “None of this is helping. You can bicker with each other once we're not dangling from a floating island.”

Cooper looked down through the bars at the bottom of his cage. “I'm sorry. Chaz is right.”

“It's okay. We really need to –”

“I can do better.” Cooper unstoppered the Decanter of Endless Water, lifted the front of his loincloth, and inserted his dick into the mouth.

“Ugh!” said Stacy.

“Mercy of the gods!” said Captain Righteous.

“We need to drink from that!” said Dave.

Cooper ignored them all, thrusting himself repeatedly into the decanter. “How do you like that, Chaz's mom? Oh? Even better than any of the four dozen top contenders for Chaz's biological father? Thank you very much. It's kind of you to say so.” His balls made a nice splashing sound with every thrust against the water pouring out.

“Cooper,” said Julian. “Please stop that.”

“She's almost finished. She said she's had every kind of dick in the world, from Korean to kangaroo, but she's never had a half-orc dick in her before.”

Chaz gave Cooper the finger. “You're such a fucking asshole.”

“Oh... oh... almost there.” Cooper needed to cut this short because the constant trickle of water on his junk was actually starting to arouse him. “Guess what, Chaz. Mom's a squirter.” He removed the Decanter of Endless Water from his dick and aimed it at Chaz. “Geyser!”

The force of the water sent Cooper's cage swinging, so it required some effort to keep the stream focused on Chaz, who writhed and twisted in a glorious shower of dickwater. “Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck –”

SNAP

Chaz's cage fell. The chain it had hung from, now unburdened, swung wide.

“Chaz!” cried Dave.

“Oh, shit,” said Cooper. He deactivated the decanter, secured it tight against his chest like a football, and let himself fall out of his cage.

“COOPER!” cried Julian and Stacy.

Cooper tumbled through the air at about the same speed as Chaz's cage. He needed to catch up. After lining himself up so that his head was pointed toward the cage, he pointed the decanter toward his feet. “Geyser!”

Much to Cooper's surprise, it worked exactly like he'd hoped it would. It was like a jetpack, except with water instead of fire. That was fortunate, because a fire-based jetpack would be burning his dick off right now.

“Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Fuck no! It's COOPERMAN!”

Chaz had apparently gotten over the dickwater thing, because he pushed himself out of his cage and opened his arms to intercept the rocket-propelled Cooper coming at him.

When they collided, Chaz nearly knocked the decanter loose from Cooper's grip, but Cooper held on as Chaz clung to him like an insecure girlfriend.

“Geyser off,” said Cooper. The water stopped flowing, and they were free falling right alongside Chaz's cage.

“What are you doing?” cried Chaz.

“We have to point it down.” Cooper shifted the decanter so that the mouth was pointed straight at the rapidly approaching desert. “Try to stay balanced.”

Chaz nodded.

“Geyser!”

They weaved and wobbled a bit, but managed to keep from flipping over. Cooper was hoping that this would work like one of those vertical landing jets, slowing their descent to a soft landing, but it felt like they were still falling pretty fucking fast.

Then again, Chaz's cage was falling away from them, so they must have slowed down some. Cooper hoped it would be enough to survive.

Hugging Chaz as tightly as Chaz was hugging him, Cooper wasn't able to look directly below them. He didn't know what kind of vegetation they were about to splatter into. He hoped it wasn't something hard like a giant coconut or pineapple. That would be a bitch.

CRASH

He'd lost sight of the cage. When he finally heard it hit the sand, it sounded just as loud as if it had landed on solid concrete. A trickle of liquid warmth came from Chaz's crotch. He knew it too. They were both so fucking –

SPLAT

Pain. So much pain. Everything hurt. But pain meant that he was alive, right? He opened his eyes.

Holy shit. It was so much worse than he was prepared for. He was in a sea of gore. Dripping blood and flesh everywhere. His brain must have been pumping out dopamine or whatever to ease him through his last few seconds of life. He'd seen this shit on the Discovery Channel.

Chaz groaned. Fuck, he was alive too. The decanter had been a mistake. This was going to be so much worse than a quick splatter on the desert floor.

“My fucking back,” said Chaz, struggling to sit up.

Cooper shoved him back down with his right arm, which was dripping with tendrils of red slimy flesh. “Don't try to get up. Just let yourself go.”

The decanter was lodged in an enormous chunk of flesh, possibly Cooper's ribcage or something, spraying a gushing stream of water horizontally over their heads.

“What is all this?”

“It's us,” said Cooper. It was hard to believe there was so much of them. It was like they were inside an exploded whale.

“I don't think this is us,” said Chaz. He raised his hand into the water spray. When he pulled it back out, it was whole.

“What the fuck?” said Cooper. “The water healed you?”

“No, it didn't heal me. It washed me.” Chaz sat up, grabbed a small chunk of gore, then tasted it.

Cooper cringed. “Dude! Do you even know if that's part of me or you?”

“It's neither. We're inside a giant tomato.”

Chapter 2

“You stupid hillbilly fuck!” Katherine grabbed a squash from a nearby vine and hurled it at Randy. “You fed my brother to your...” She looked at the horse-sized eight-legged eyeless reptilian monstrosity standing next to him, searching for the right word but coming up empty. “... whatever the fuck this thing is?”

“His name is Basil.”

“I don't give a shit what his name is. Cut him open and get my brother out of there.”

“Your brother's gone, Honeytits,” said the dwarf woman dressed in a bean-pod diaper. “I don't care how tough he was. Don't nobody survive that kind of fall, then getting eaten by a basilisk.”

Butterbean growled at her.

“I understand you're upset,” said Randy. “But Denise is right. Killing Basil ain't gonna bring Tim back.”

Katherine wished she still had her vampire powers. She could have so easily beaten the shit out of these dumbass rednecks and torn this deformed dinosaur thing apart from its asshole. Acknowledging that those options were currently off the table, she took a deep breath and tried explaining.

“I understand that Tim didn't survive having his throat slit, falling from a island floating five hundred feet in the air, and getting eaten by...”

“Basil.”

“Thank you,” Katherine said curtly. “Basil. But we are in a fantasy game, and there are ways to bring dead people back to life. I would like to go into the city and find someone who can do that, but I need Tim's body in order to do that.”

Denise grimaced. “Even if it's all chewed up and digested and shit?”

Katherine felt tears welling up. A few minutes ago, she'd had herself convinced that Tim's death was no big deal, that getting him back was just going to be a minor inconvenience. Now the realization that she truly might never see her brother again was rapidly dawning on her.

“I've got to try.”

Randy opened his arms to her. “Come on.”

Katherine supposed there was no point in trying to hide her emotions. She allowed him to embrace her and sobbed against his chest. “I can't... believe... he's gone.”

“I know, darlin'.” Randy hugged her tightly. “He's at peace now.”

That much was true. Tim had been following a figurative downward trajectory long before he entered the literal one which smashed him into the Fertile Desert. Bad luck with women, low self-esteem, terrible businessperson, anxiety, depression, drinking. All that had only gotten worse since they'd gotten themselves stuck in this game. Maybe he was better off now than if he'd continued on as he was going.

“Ol' Basil here might have found some middle ground for you,” said Denise, walking out from behind the massive lizard and carrying a platter-sized cabbage leaf from the bottom with both hands.

“What you got there?” asked Randy.

Denise dropped the cabbage leaf. It thunked down hard on the sand. On top of it was a long, grey turd in a rough figure eight pattern. It was as thick around as Denise's dwarven forearm and smelled like one of Cooper's shits had taken a shit. “I reckon it's Tim.”

Katherine pushed Randy away and glared at Denise. “Is that supposed to be funny?” She stomped toward her, half wishing she had a weapon, but also relishing the thought of pounding this squat banjo-plucking bitch with her bare fists. “Give me one reason I shouldn't kick your fat hairy ass.”

Denise backed away from her. “I'll give you two. First, I'm pregnant.”

Katherine stopped and glanced at Randy for confirmation.

Randy nodded.

“Did you...?”

Randy shook his head.

Katherine turned back to Denise. “How'd you get knocked up so quickly?”

“A scorpion lady injected her fertilized eggs up in my cooter.”

“Oh,” was all Katherine could think to say in response.

“And the other thing is that I wasn't joking. I reckon there's got to be some of your brother in there. I saw folks get fucked up pretty bad when them guys in the flying boat stormed the city with all the dragons, and they went back to perfectly normal when Randy's blasphemy monster hosed them all down with blood.”

Katherine couldn't see how this related to her brother being a lizard turd, but she was willing to listen to a little more. “Go on.”

“They had arms burnt down to bones, missing fingers, hair all burnt away. Then when they came back to life, they looked good as new, like they ain't even been touched. If there's magic in this world that can do that, who knows how much more it could do, given just a little to work with.” Denise looked down at the turd. “I reckon there's got to be at least some of your brother in there. It couldn't hurt to ask.”

Katherine put her Bag of Holding on the ground next to the turd leaf, lifted the top of the rim, then slid the leaf in. When her brother's remains were safely in the bag, she stood up.

“Randy, you've got a little bit of celebrity pull with the temple folks now, right? I need you to come with me.”

Randy shrugged. “I don't know how much pull I got, but I'd be happy to join you.”

Denise twirled some hairs on the side of her short beard. “I wonder if they might be able to sort out my situation as well.”

“Are you talking about an... abortion?” asked Randy.

“Of course not. Don't go bringing politics into this shit. Ain't nobody said nothin' about no abortions. I'm just talking about getting rid of these fucking monster babies growing inside me.”

The town Katherine had flown out from was visible as a shimmering green haze on the eastern horizon, but it would be a long walk. Darius, the pegasus she'd befriended and who'd rescued her and Butterbean from the Crescent Shadow, could fly them there in no time if Katherine stuffed them all in her Bag of Holding.

She opened the bag and was about to open her mouth when she spotted Randy frowning pitifully at the bag as he stroked the big lizard monster's cheek. He'd gone and fallen for the thing. She wanted to reason with him, maybe promise to buy him a less disgusting-looking pet like a puppy or a kitten, that would have eyes and be able to fit easily through the mouth of a Bag of Holding. But when she thought of her own relationship with Butterbean, and the amount of reasoning it would take for someone to convince her to ditch him in the desert, she surmised that convincing Randy would be more trouble than just making the journey on foot.

“Fuck,” said Katherine, then scanned the ground for a suitable parting gift. Spotting a nice ripe cantaloupe, she plucked it from the vine and held it before Darius. “Thank you for your help. You can go home. I have to travel with these people now.”

Darius bit off a quarter of the cantaloupe, swallowed it back, then took another bite. He finished the whole thing in under a minute, then pressed his cheek against Katherine's.

“Thank you again. Maybe we'll see each other again someday.” Katherine wrapped her arms around his neck and stroking his mane.

Darius whinnied quietly. When Katherine let go, he reared up on his hind legs, spread his massive black wings, and started flying back toward Produce City, or whatever the hell that place was called.

Chapter 3

“That idiot!” said Dave, clenching his fists so hard that the leopard fur on his left forearm bristled. “He killed Chaz, he killed himself, and he's essentially killed all of us by taking the water with him.”

Julian peered through the bars at the bottom of his cage, but couldn't make out much. “We don't know they're dead. Cooper wouldn't have jumped if he didn't think he could save Chaz.”

“He is as brave as he is stupid,” said Captain Righteous. “But I must agree with the dwarf. The chances of either of them surviving that fall... I'm sorry for your losses.”

Stacy lay on the floor of her cage, with her head poking out of the open side. “I see something down there. Like a big red splat.”

Julian cringed. “Cooper.”

“Oh,” said Stacy. “I should have been clearer. It doesn't look like the obvious big red splat one might expect to see. It's a brighter red.”

Julian suddenly had an idea. He pulled his serape open. “Ravenus! Wake up!”

Ravenus opened his beak wide and yawned. “Good morning, sir.”

“Cooper and Chaz just fell. I need you to fly to the ground and see if they're all right.”

Ravenus looked down outside the cage, then back up at Julian. “I'm not sure I need to fly all the way down there to assess their situation, sir.”

“Will you please just humor me?”

“Very good, sir.” Ravenus crawled out from Julian's serape and hopped down to the edge of the cage floor.

“And Ravenus,” said Julian.

“Yes?”

“If they're... you know... dead, we're going to try to get them resurrected, so don't eat their eyes.”

“Very good, sir.” Ravenus let himself fall out of the cage, spread his wings, and glided in a downward spiral to the desert below.

Captain Righteous glared at Julian through his cage bars.

“What?” said Julian.

“You've had that bird tucked under your clothes this whole time?”

“Not in a weird way or anything. He likes it in there.”

“It can understand everything you say, and follow commands?”

“Ravenus is my familiar.”

“Then why did you not command it to go seek help, or a lever to raise these cages, or... or anything at all?”

Julian frowned. That was an excellent question with no readily apparent non-stupid answer.

“Honestly, with all we've just been through, it slipped my mind.”

“I can't believe it,” said Dave. “You've killed us all.”

“We don't know that anyone's dead.” Julian was feeling quite a bit of guilt, but he wasn't going to let Dave throw him under the bus. “Besides, you knew I had Ravenus with me. I didn't hear you bringing up any ideas.”

“I've been up here for days!” Dave shook the bars of his cage. “I'm starving and exhausted! I can barely think straight. And I didn't have the easy key to our survival nuzzled against my fucking chest this whole time!”

“Take it easy, Dave,” said Stacy. “These cages are old. If you snap your chain, I'm not jumping down after you.”
Dave looked at the broken length of chain that used to support Chaz's cage, then stopped shaking the bars and started weeping.

“We're going to be okay,” said Julian. “Ravenus must be close enough to see them by now. I'm not sensing any feelings of sadness or sudden hunger from him. So Cooper's idea might have worked. When Ravenus reports back, I'll send him to go look for –”

The sun jumped about two feet to the right. The sky was brighter, the air was warmer, and tall rock formations suddenly appeared on the southern horizon. Julian's Empathic Link with Ravenus was severed.

“– shit.”

“Whoa!” said Stacy. “Are those dragons?”

Julian hadn't noticed them before she mentioned it, preoccupied with worry for Ravenus. But now that he was paying attention, he could see massive flying lizards circling around the rocks.

Captain Righteous laughed. “They only wish. Even from a distance you can see they lack front legs.”

“So they're...” Julian paused in the hope that the captain would fill in the blank. When that failed to happen, he was forced to think of something to finish his sentence. “...amputees?”

Captain Righteous looked at him like he was wondering if that was a serious question. “They're wyverns.”

“What's a wyvern?” asked Stacy.

“A distant cousin to dragons, but dumber than an ogre, and even some of you. They've been hunted to extinction in most parts of the world by trophy hunters who try to pass off their heads as those of true dragons, by certain types of dragons who find their existence distasteful, and by –”

A tiny orange ball of magical energy streaked across the sky from higher up on the Crescent Shadow toward the rocks on the horizon. It struck one of the wyverns and expanded like a second sun before collapsing in on itself again. The wyvern spiraled out of control and crashed into the rocks.

Captain Righteous sighed. “And by the occasional random asshole.”

“They seem to be thriving well enough here,” said Julian. “I mean, aside from that one.”

“Those rocks you see are called Wyvern's Roost. Beyond that is the Southern Sea. Look east and you'll see the wastelands of Meb'Garshur. West is the gnomish kingdom of Kobbleboch.” Captain Righteous squinted, put his arm through the bars, and pointed at something just west of Wyvern Roost. “If you look carefully, you can make out the village of Plonket. The gnomes there have a special relationship with the wyverns of the Roost. They even have a division of Wyvern Riders.”

“It's nice that they care enough to protect endangered wildlife,” said Stacy.

“Nice has nothing to do with it. Wyvern's Roost is the only thing that keeps the orcs of Meb'Garshur from marching into Kobbleboch. The Southern Sea provides plenty enough food, and the gnomes in Plonket actually developed special incubation chambers for the wyverns' eggs to help them reproduce more quickly.”

“Fascinating,” said Dave. “When I'm drinking my own piss in an effort to stave off death for a few more miserable hours, I'll be so glad to have spent what little time I had left learning the history of Knobbycock.”

“Do you suppose there's any chance of us attracting the attention of one of those Wyvern Riders?” asked Stacy.

Captain Righteous shook his head. “Doubtful. Even if any of those wyverns had riders, which they don't appear to, we're too far away for them to spot.”

“That's what I thought.” Stacy sighed and pulled a coil of black rope out of her pack.

“What are you doing?” asked Julian.

“Getting us out of here.”

“How?”

“By being awesome.” She tied one end of the rope to the bottom of a bar next to the open side of the cage. After giving it a couple of good yanks to make sure it was secure, she tossed the rest of the coil out to dangle in the open air.

Dave frowned. “If you had a hundred more ropes, I could see where you were going with this, but –”

“Please shut up, Dave. I'm nervous enough about this as it is.” Stacy climbed out of the cage and lowered herself slowly down the rope.

“I've got to agree with Dave on this one,” said Julian. “Taking fifty feet off your fall isn't going to make a whole lot of difference.”

Stacy, having reached the bottom of the rope, looked up and smiled at him. “Then I'd better not fall.” She kicked both legs forward, then back, then forward, then back, getting into a swinging motion.

Julian finally figured out what she was going for, and it nearly made him throw up.

She was trying to swing far enough to jump over to the observation platform where Mordred had slit Tim's throat. Success would involve a nearly impossible Dexterity check.

“What you're trying to do is preposterous!” said Captain Righteous. “Get back in your cage.”

Stacy swung harder, getting a little more height with each swing. “It looks preposterous, but like I said, I'm awesome.”

Julian glanced nervously up at the chain holding Stacy's cage, then even more nervously down at Stacy. “Your high ability scores make you better than average at things. They don't make you a superhero.”

“If you've got any better ideas, I'm listening.” She had the cage swinging at this point.

“I think not killing yourself is a better idea.”

“I agree,” said an old man's voice from up on the observation platform.

The speaker was a little old gnome in what looked like Ebeneezer Scrooge pajamas, complete with a nightcap. He frowned at the dangling length of chain that used to be holding Chaz's cage.

“What's going on up there?” asked Stacy. “Who is that?”

“Just climb back up the rope, would you?” said Julian. Then he made eye contact with the old gnome. “Are you here to rescue us?”

The gnome shrugged. “I suppose. I heard shouting, and I came down to investigate.” He looked at Katherine's empty cage, then at Cooper's. “I seem to remember hearing more voices.”

“Some of our friends managed to escape already,” said Julian. “At least, we hope.”

“Please, sir,” said Dave. “I've been in here a long time. I haven't eaten or slept. Can we talk about this after you've pulled the cages back up?”

The gnome scratched his beard and nodded slowly, like he had other things on his mind.

“Please!” Dave repeated.

“Yes, of course,” said the gnome, as if suddenly coming out of a trance. “I saw some levers in the room back there.” He nodded back to the opening behind him. “I suppose one of those might do the trick.”

“Awesome. Go give it a try, why don't you?”

Julian shot Dave a warning look. His tone was bordering on disrespectful.

The gnome retreated into the small opening at the rear of the observation platform. A few seconds later, there was a loud click from above. Cooper's cage fell, trailing the entirety of its long chain behind it.

“Shit!” cried Stacy, about halfway back up her rope. “What just happened?”

“Wrong lever,” said Bingam, Captain Righteous's fatter and less competent nephew.

The old gnome emerged back onto the platform. “How was that?”

“Bad!” said Dave. “Really really bad!”

“Oh dear.” The gnome frowned at the empty space where Cooper's cage had been hanging. “Lucky I tested that one first. I think I see how it works now.”

“You think?” said Bingam. “Do you think? Or do you know?”

“One never knows until one tries. The best I can do is make an educated guess based on what I've observed.”

“Can you go find someone else?”

“No!” said Julian. As unsettling as watching that cage fall had been, he reasoned that the levers were designed in such a way that pushing them one way would release the cages, and pushing them the other way would pull the cages back up, and that this wizened old gnome was smart enough to know that. Sending him off to go look for someone more competent was not only extremely insulting to the person who held their lives in his hands, but it would also unnecessarily lengthen the time they all spent dangling in cages of questionably sound structural integrity.

“You're doing a fine job!” said Julian, laying the Diplomacy on thick. “Whatever you did with that first lever, maybe try doing the opposite with a different one.”

“Thank you, elf. I'll take that into consideration.”

Shit. A failed Diplomacy roll. He'd come off as condescending.

The gnome walked back into the control room.

CLICK

The chain which had been holding Chaz's cage slid out from the opening above and plummeted like a snake down to the desert.

Bingam yelped like a puppy whose tail had just been stepped on. “He thinks he sees how it works now!” He glared at Julian. “That crazy old gnome is going to kill us all thanks to you!”

“Oh, I know how it works,” said the gnome, coming back to the platform. “That one was for all your smart talk, young feller.”

That was terrific news. He'd released Chaz's chain on purpose, which meant he knew exactly which lever to pull and which way to pull it.

“We're very sorry!” said Julian. “Our fear got the better of us.”

The gnome nodded, then looked sternly at Bingam.

Captain Righteous glared severely at Bingam. “By the gods, nephew, if you don't apologize this instant, I'll –”

“I'm sorry!” Bingam sobbed and blubbered, shaking his cage. “I'm so-o-o-o-rry!”

Captain Righteous shook his head. “His apology is sincere, friend. He is a weakling and a coward, but deserves not to suffer death for that.”

The gnome nodded. “Very well.” He retreated once more into the control room.

With a series of heart-stopping clicks, the cages began to ascend.

“Ha ha!” cried Dave. “It's working!”

Julian leaned back in his cage, breathing heavily with relief.

Stacy, now back inside her own cage, smiled at him. “I still think I could have made that jump. But I'm glad I didn't have to.”

Julian smiled back. “Me too.”

Chapter 4

“You must really like tomatoes,” said Cooper.

The truth was actually quite the opposite. Chaz detested tomatoes, but he hadn't eaten in days. He'd gorged himself on the bitter pulpy insides of the massive fruit. It was delicious at first, then merely tolerable. When his stomach was full, and his arms looked like he'd just performed a back-alley appendectomy with his bare hands, the sour smell made him want to throw up.

He looked up, focusing on the crescent-shaped island to calm his stomach. When it blinked out of existence, his insides ejected a thick red stream of vomit, indistinguishable from the tomato goop floating on top of the water, which had risen up to Cooper's nipples before he'd deactivated the Decanter of Endless Water.

Cooper frowned at Chaz's tomato puke. “I guess I shouldn't jump to conclusions.”

“Where the fuck is it?”

“Right here, dude.” Cooper pointed at the amoeba-shaped mass of vomit floating between them. A sudden burst of bubbles surfaced in and around the vomit island and the pink water darkened by a few degrees of brown.

“The island, shithead! It's gone!” Chaz ignored the aches and pains from his recent fall and got to his feet. He grabbed a sepal and pulled himself up until he could reach the stem with his other hand. Struggling to find footholds in the goop along the wall, he managed to climb back out of the entry wound he'd created in the top of the tomato when he fell through. When he saw the main stalk of the plant, as wide around as  the trunk of an oak tree, he discovered that the tomato they'd landed in wasn't actually resting on the ground as he'd assumed. But it was too late. The tomato skin was rubbery smooth, and his whole body was slick with tomato innards.

“SHIIIIIIT!” he screamed as he slid down the side. Fortunately, it was only about a ten-foot drop. Unfortunately, he was now coated from head to toe with sand.

“Dude,” Cooper called out from the giant tomato dangling above Chaz's head. “Are you okay?”

Chaz struggled to his feet and spat out some tomato flavored sand. “I will be after a shower. Can you bring that decanter down here?”

“Sure thing.”

If anything could lift Chaz's spirits right now, it would be watching Cooper fall off this tomato and land on his big stupid ass. He watched, waiting for a half-orc head to appear out of the top of the fruit. Instead, a fist punched through the skin near the bottom.

“Oh dear God no.”

The tomato skin ruptured, and Chaz was struck by a gush of tomato juice, vomit, shit, and half-orc.

“Jesus,” said Cooper, picking himself up off Chaz. “That was like... being born.”

“Get the fuck off of me!” cried Chaz. His fists squelched as he punched at Cooper's slimy chest.

“Hey,” said Cooper. “You need to chill the fuck out.” He got to his feet, releasing the flow of soiled water and tomato juice he must have been blocking, and dousing Chaz with more of the rancid liquid.

Son of a –

A glint of silver gave Chaz a split-second warning before the Decanter of Endless Water rode the flow out of the tomato and connected hard with his face.

“And you might have warned me that we were ten feet off the fucking ground, asshole. It's the least you could've done after I just saved your life.”

“You put my life in danger in the first place! Now the island's gone, and we're separated from everyone else. They're going to die with no water, and we'll probably get eaten by dire iguanas or some shit.”

Cooper looked up. “Where'd the island go?”

“How the fuck should I know? It blinks from place to place. Sometimes it only stays for a few minutes, other times it hangs around for hours.”

“Awesome,” said Cooper, obviously disinterested. “Here, give me that decanter. I want to wash this tomato shit off me.”

Chaz was getting sick and tired of being ignored. Now he spotted a bit of leverage, a means to finally get through this asshole's thick skull. He hugged the Decanter of Endless Water close to his chest.

“No,” he said. “You nearly killed me with this. I think I should hold onto it for a while. I'll give it back when I feel you're mature enough to handle the responsibility.”

Cooper looked at him in a way that made him suddenly realize that there was more than one factor determining which of them was in a better position of leverage. When he pounced, Chaz immediately dropped the decanter. But Cooper ignored the decanter and tackled him, pinning him to the ground.

“Is this mature enough for you?” said Cooper, rubbing his balls on Chaz's face. “It feels pretty fucking mature to me. How about this.” A fart rumbled out of Cooper's ass like it was coming from stadium speakers. A searing wind washed over Chaz's face, hotter than anything the desert could hope to produce. It was like a portal to hell, only wetter, smelling of cabbage and sulfur.

“Thank you, Cooper,” said Cooper, wagging his ass back and forth so that his balls slapped Chaz's face like a dank hairy pendulum. “Thank you for jumping out of that goddamn cage to save my worthless life.”

“Thank you!” cried Chaz. “Thank you! Oh God, thank you!”

A loud squawk sent Cooper flying off of Chaz. They both looked up at the deflated tomato. The hole where Cooper had exited looked like an open mouth. Tendrils of tomato guts hung from it like someone kneeling over the toilet at the end of a party. Julian's bird was perched on the stem, staring down at them in a way that Chaz couldn't help but feel was judgmental.

“Are you two quite all right?”

“What did he say?” asked Cooper. “Did he catch that last part in context? Because out of context, it might have looked like we were –”

“Shut up!” snapped Chaz, then looked back up at the bird. “How did you get here? Where's the island?”

The bird sighed. “I can't understand you when you speak like that. I am fluent only in the Elven tongue.”

Chaz remembered. The bird could only understand what he was saying if he spoke with a British accent. That's why Cooper couldn't understand him. He tried to think of something British to say to reacquaint himself with the accent.

“Romeo, O Romeo. Where thee art for you, sweet Romeo?” That was almost certainly wrong.

The bird's talons dug deeper into the tomato stem. “I feel I should warn you, sir, that I'm in a most unpleasant mood.”

“Sorry,” said Chaz. “What are you doing here?”

“My master sent me to see if you two were alive. Then he disappeared. I can no longer sense his presence.”

“The island could be anywhere. We could try to find a wizard to teleport us there, but that will take time and money we don't have, and they'll be dead long before we can hope to rescue them.”

“Please tell me there's another option.”

Chaz frowned. “Not a very good one.”

“What is it?”

“We go back to the Whore's Head Inn.”

The bird ruffled his feathers. “I fail to see how returning to that wretched tavern will help my master escape the flying island.”

“It won't. That option is dependent on them escaping on their own. If Julian escapes, that's probably the first place he'll look for you. But we don't have to decide now. Our first priority should be getting out of this desert.”

Cooper took his fancy new axe off his back, causing Chaz to pay him a bit more attention than he was paying to Ravenus. He held it in front of him, but not in a threatening way. More like he was just suddenly interested in looking at it.

“I don't remember,” he said. “I'll ask Chaz.” He lowered his axe and looked at Chaz. “What's the name of that town Captain Hard-ass said we were near?”

“I think it was called Totino or something.”

Cooper stared at his axe for a moment, then nodded. “Knobby's homeland is only a week's walk from Totino.”

“Who the hell is Knobby?”

“She's –” Cooper paused again, staring at his axe, then grinned. “She says she's the one who will chop your legs off if you call her Knobby again.”

“Ravenus and I were thinking about going back to the Whore's Head Inn,” said Chaz. Trying to appeal to Cooper's simple mind, he added, “Maybe have a few drinks and see if the others turn up.”

After consulting his axe again, Cooper looked up at Chaz. “Knobby thirsts for the blood of those who imprisoned her soul.”

“You're starting to freak me out, man. How about we just head to Totino and take it from there?”

Cooper nodded, turned around, and started a trail of westward leading footprints in the desert sand.

Chapter 5

Dwarves, halflings, humans, half-elves, and some peculiarly bearded elves gave Randy, Denise, and Katherine a wide berth as they walked through the strangely productive orchard growing out of the sand. Some shielded their eyes or their children's eyes. Others simply turned and fled.

“What the hell is wrong with these people?” asked Katherine. “I mean, I know we've got a wolf and a big lizard thing with us, but I've seen a lot scarier stuff than this walking around in the city, and no one bats an eye.”

“It's Basil,” said Randy. “Basilisks can turn people to stone just by looking at them.”

Katherine smashed herself in the face with her Bag of Holding, holding it tightly over her eyes. “Perhaps you should have mentioned that sooner.”

“Basil can't do it now, on account of both his eyes was stabbed out.”

“Awww,” said Katherine, lowering the bag. “That's so gross.”

“I could get used to this,” said Denise, riding on top of Basil. “Y'all go on now! Run like little bitches, you papaya-pickin' pussies!”

When they arrived at the other side of the orchard, they found themselves on the border of a quaint little village. Cute cottages of various colors lined either side of a main avenue, all of their yards overabundant with every color and shape of vegetable imaginable. It was less of a small town, and more of a giant salad. It seemed like a really tranquil place. That is, until six armed elves came charging up the main path between the houses.

They ran sideways in a tight formation, like they were well-practiced in looking ridiculous. Three of them were armed with spears, and the other three were armed with crossbows. All of them wore a small round bucklers on their left forearms with reflective inner surfaces, which they looked back at rather than face the same direction they were running.

“Halt!” said one of the crossbow-wielding elves.

Katherine stepped forward. “Hi. I was just here recently, and I actually talked with one of your –”

“Step away from the basilisk!”

Randy finally understood their goofy running formation. A basilisk's gaze must not turn people to stone if it's reflected in a mirror. These guys were a special unit specifically trained to take down basilisks that wandered into town out of the desert. Now that Randy thought about it, he could see how a creature that turned people to stone with just a glance might be a serious threat to a village. But not Basil.

“Hey guys. You ain't got to worry. Basil's harmless.”

“Are you mad?” asked the leader. “You can't bring a basilisk into a populated area!”

“But he ain't got no eyes. Look.” Randy held his eyelids as wide open as possible with his fingers and stared into Basil's empty eye sockets. “Look at me. Do you see this? I ain't turning into stone. I could do this all day –”

“Enough!”

Randy turned to the leader, who was now facing them. Like the other elves in this village, he wore the strangest style of beard Randy had ever seen. It was just one big tuft jutting out the front of his chin, like he'd gotten stabbed in the face with the back end of a toilet brush.

“What business do you have bringing this creature into Minswater?”

“I couldn't very well leave him out in the desert with no eyes. He'd never survive.”

“This is most irregular.” The soldier stroked his most irregular beard. “I concede the creature's gaze is not a threat, but its very presence is upsetting to the people of this village. I don't –”

“Hey, Jebediah,” Denise called down from atop Basil's back. “If you let us go, there might be something in it for you and your boys.” She pulled aside the leaf she was using as a tunic, revealing side boob that looked like hairy cottage cheese. “How'd you like to dip those beards in honey and paint these big fat titties?”

“Jesus Christ!” Katherine looked up at Denise. “Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you? Where did that even come from?”

The lead soldier cleared his throat. “I'm afraid we cannot allow –”

“Listen,” said Katherine. “We've got no business in this town. We're just trying to pass through.” She pointed at Randy. “He's got this big-ass death lizard, that one's pregnant with scorpion babies for reasons that are becoming clearer every minute, and I'm carrying around a literal bag of shit. The longer you detain us, the more upsetting it will be for the people of this village. I can guarantee you that.”

The leader consulted with his similarly bearded subordinates, then addressed Katherine again. “We shall escort you and your companions out of Minswater. But it is my strong recommendation that you put this poor beast out of its misery.” He sneered up at Denise. “As well as the one it's riding.”

“Hey!” said Denise.

Randy offered the soldiers a slight bow. “Thank you.”

Chapter 6

Stacy climbed back into her cage just before it re-entered the bottom of the island. The chamber it entered looked nothing like the bathroom it had been before. It was just plain, crumbly brown rock. The same went for the larger chamber which the cages released them into. The air smelled earthy and and musty, like an unfinished basement in a long-abandoned house. There were no green and red lights above the doors. Hell, there weren't even doors. Either someone had done some serious remodeling in the past couple of hours, or none of that stuff had been real.

She prodded the floor outside her cage with her foot to make sure it was real. It felt solid enough. Dave fell out of his cage and lay spread-eagle on the floor, grateful to be on solid ground again, even if it was inexplicably suspended several hundred feet in the air.

The distinctly more competent of the two soldiers who were apparently friends with Tim's sister stomped out of his cage like a badass, his fist clenched around the pommel of his sword.

“We must find that red-robed halfling at once! And may the gods still my hand lest I deliver him the King's justice prematurely.”

“If that means what I think it means,” said Julian, stepping out of his cage and joining the others in the larger chamber, “then please don't do that. We need to take him alive.”

“Who is he to you?”

“His name is Mordred. At least, that's what he goes by. He's the one who sent us to this world. And he's the only one who can send us back home.”

The soldier narrowed his eyes at Julian, then Dave, and finally Stacy. “You are all from this other world?”

Stacy and Dave nodded.

“I know it's difficult to believe,” said Julian. “But –”

“Not so difficult. At least, not as difficult as it is to believe that Katherine's brother could be a halfling. And yet she confirmed her claim in a Zone of Truth.”

“You and Katherine were in a Zone of Truth together?” Stacy remembered the Zone of Truth back in that little village on the desert border. She also recalled how sorrowful this guy's eyes had looked when Mordred slit Tim's throat. He wasn't grieving for Tim, but rather for Katherine's loss.

“Yes, in Minswater.”

“How'd that go?”

“It was...” He looked down at his feet. “... uncomfortable.” His face went stern again. “Besides that, you've all consistently expressed a degree of ignorance which I cannot help but feel is genuine.”

“Thanks,” said Dave.

“My name is Righteous Justificus Blademaster. I am a captain in the Kingsguard.” He extended his hand to Stacy.

Stacy accepted his handshake, making sure her grip was at least as tight as his. “That's quite a mouthful. You can call me Stacy.”

“And you may call me Captain Righteous.” The captain appeared impressed with her handshake. “You were not among the others the first time I encountered this group of otherworldy folk.”

“Yeah, I was late to the party.”

“Of course,” said Julian. “We'd be grateful if you could help us find and apprehend Mordred. After he's sent us back to our world, you'd be free to administer whatever justice you see fit.”

Stacy raised her eyebrows. Sure, Mordred had just slit Tim's throat right in front of them all, but Dave and Katherine seemed pretty confident that he could be brought back to life. It seemed kind of cold-blooded for Julian to serve him up on a platter like that, knowing there wouldn't be anyone who'd bother trying to bring him back.

Julian caught her looking at him, and must have read something in her expression. “He's dangerous. He's a threat, not only to us, but to all the people of this world, and maybe ours as well.” He looked at Captain Righteous. “Mordred is the one who set loose that guy with the dragons and the boat who attacked the city.”

“That little halfling?” Captain Righteous scoffed. “That's preposterous.”

“He knows this world inside and out. He grows more and more powerful every day. If we don't stop him right now, we may never be able to.”

Captain Righteous nodded. “My nephew and I shall assist you to the best of our ability.”

“What?” said his pudgy sidekick.

“The Crescent Shadow is not a large landmass. If Mordred is here, we should be able to find him.”

“That's a big if,” said Dave. “If he could teleport here, then he can teleport away. He could be anywhere by now.”

“That's true,” said Julian. “But if he thinks we're all still dangling in open cages, he wouldn't be in any hurry to leave. He might be enjoying a celebratory drink right now in a hot tub full of hookers.”

Stacy smiled at Julian. “Is that what you'd be doing in his place?”

“I'm just saying, if we want to hit him while he's vulnerable, now might be our best chance. It might be our only chance.”

“The Crescent Shadow is outside our jurisdiction,” said Bingam. “Uncle, you know as well as I the reputation these wizards have. If we try to abduct one of theirs on their own island, we'll be lucky if all they do is toss us over the edge.”

“If what the elf says is true, we may be all that stands in the way of a new Dark Age.”

“Listen to yourself, Uncle! What evidence has the elf provided to support his claims? You said yourself that these people are criminals. Reason has abandoned you. It's as though your mind has been corrupted by that half-elf whore. She isn't worth –”

Whatever Bingam was going to finish that sentence with was truncated by a swift punch in the face. Stacy didn't know whether that said more about the captain's feelings for Katherine or for Bingam.

“Apprehending this Mordred is only the beginning of our concerns. We must also figure out a way to smuggle him off this island.”

“And there's the dice,” said Julian. “We still need to find those.”

“What dice?” asked Captain Righteous.

Dave eyed the chamber's exit, no doubt hoping to take this conversation to a restaurant or something. The poor guy hadn't eaten in days. “Mordred must have the dice. Isn't that why Tim stole them?”

“Tim didn't steal them,” said Stacy. “It was Katherine's handsome friend.” The adjective wasn't strictly necessary, but Stacy wanted to see if it got a rise out of Captain Righteous.

He shot her a look of alarm. “Who?”

“The half-drow,” said Dave. “You're splitting hairs. Does anyone here doubt that he lifted the bag at Tim's request?”

Stacy shrugged. “I'm just trying to keep the facts straight, in case there's something we've missed in the details.”

“Has Katherine been consorting with a drow?”

“I don't know how much they've been consorting.” Stacy emphasized the last word with air quotes. “But they've been spending some time together.”

“It doesn't matter,” said Dave. “If Mordred had the dice, he wouldn't have bothered with this cage bullshit. He might not have killed us all outright, but he would have stripped us to our barest defenses so he could toy with us like a cat with a maimed mouse.”

“Enough!” Captain Righteous had his fingertips against his temples, like he was suffering from a major headache. “Can someone please explain to me why you're all so afraid of a single halfling and a bag of dice?”

“He's not really a halfling,” said Julian. “That body is an avatar, albeit for an even less intimidating-looking person. But the dice, those are dangerous. They're probably the most powerful magic things in this world.”

“Magic items,” Dave corrected him. “Actually, a more appropriate term would be artifacts.”

Captain Righteous's gaze locked on Dave. His prominent jaw clenched. Dave had captured his full attention.

“He can use them to manipulate this world's reality,” said Julian. “Whatever he can imagine, he can make happen. He can rule this world like a god.”

“An Old Testament God,” Dave added. “Full of wrath and insecurity and an insatiable desire to be worshiped.”

A seed of thought began to grow in Stacy's mind. A theory. She nurtured it for a moment, testing its plausibility, before saying anything aloud.

“Uncle,” Bingam honked out though his bleeding nose. “Can you see now that they're mad? No artifact is that powerful.”

Captain Righteous stroked his mustache, and the thick stubble growing on his prominent chin. “It does seem rather far-fetched. Surely, if an artifact so powerful existed, this world would have –”

“I know where the dice are!” Stacy blurted out. It was all too clear now. Almost obvious.

Everyone in the room turned to her expectantly.

Dave shrugged. “Well, where are they?”

“They're up Tim's butthole.”

The chamber was silent, at least until Bingam started crying.

“Sorry,” said Stacy. “I probably should have led up to that. Dave got me thinking when he was comparing Mordred to Old Testament God.”

“Thinking about Tim's butthole?” asked Julian.

“Not yet. I was thinking about the wrath and insecurity issues. Swap out a need to be worshiped for a desire to not be thought of as a complete dick, and you've got a pretty solid description of Tim.”

Dave and Julian lowered their heads, not wanting to speak ill of their recently deceased friend, but also not disagreeing.

“But Tim is also very smart, right?” Stacy hoped to assuage their guilt a little by giving them the opportunity to enthusiastically recognize something complimentary about Tim.

As she expected, they both looked up from the floor and nodded.

“Much too smart to show up at a meeting with Mordred with the bag of dice in his hand. He'd want to hide them somewhere safe. And of course there's the added bonus, should Mordred offer terms that Tim found suitable, of being able to live up to his part of the agreement by giving Mordred dice from his ass.”

Stacy paused to catch her breath.

“I don't disagree that Tim is – was – not above that level of pettiness,” said Dave. “So I concede that's a possibility. But I don't understand why you're so convinced it's the only possibility. He could have hidden them under a rock somewhere or something, and used his knowledge of the location as his leverage. Why would he bring the dice to the meeting? Mordred could have simply killed him and taken the dice.”

“Why agree to a meeting at all?” said Stacy. “What could Mordred have possibly offered that Tim would have been gullible enough to believe?”

Julian frowned. “I've been trying to figure that out since this whole mess started. I can't think of anything.”

“Exactly. Powerful as they are, the dice are worthless as a bargaining chip. If Tim were to hand them over, Mordred would have all the power, and no incentive to honor his part of the deal.”

“Is Tim's butthole still somewhere on the horizon of this story?” asked Julian.

“I'm getting to that.” Stacy spread her hands, getting ready for her big reveal. “Tim orchestrated this whole thing. He played us like fiddles!” After waiting a moment for gasps of realization which never came, she explained a bit more. “Julian and I intercepted an encrypted letter about a major deal going down on the Crescent Shadow. How did the rest of you know to come here?”

Dave scratched the back of his neck. “I was at Arby's. An old acquaintance of Professor Goosewaddle claimed he had recently acquired some merchandise.” His eyes met Stacy's. “He was bragging about some big deal going down at the Crescent Shadow.”

Stacy looked at Captain Righteous. “How about you two?”

The captain frowned. “I was attempting to arrest Katherine for breaking into a general store. One thing led to another, and here we are. She never told me why she suspected her brother would be here.”

“I'm willing to bet it had something to do with some bullshit clue that fell into her lap.”

“Actually,” said Julian. “She probably just beat it out of that guy we left tied up with her wolf.”

“Oh, right.” Stacy thought about it for a moment. “That's certainly a possibility. But still, it –”

“We get what you're saying,” said Dave. “We were played like fiddles. But what makes you think that Tim was the fiddler? How do you know it wasn't Mordred?”

Stacy smiled. “Because Mordred was the biggest fiddle of all. Tim set this whole thing up to draw one of the Mordreds out of hiding, so that we could have this opportunity to grab him. He arranged a meeting with Mordred, making a bunch of demands that he'd need to meet in exchange for the dice. When they meet, Tim gives him some bullshit location where he'd hidden the dice, and Mordred sends some minions off to retrieve them. In the meantime, we start showing up. Naturally, Mordred has spies on the island who spot us coming a mile away. He's been anticipating some kind of trap anyway. He thinks he's a couple of steps ahead of Tim, who he has locked in a cell. When Tim's dice information turns out to be bullshit, Mordred knows the whole thing was a setup to lure him out of hiding. He wants to show Tim that his ruse didn't work. Instead of us grabbing Mordred like we were supposed to, Mordred caught us. What Mordred didn't realize, however, is that he was playing right into Tim's hands.”

Julian frowned. “Are you forgetting the part where Tim got murdered?”

“All part of the plan.”

“So he sacrificed himself for us?”

“Aha!” said Stacy, perhaps overplaying it a bit. “That's precisely what he wanted us to think, which is the Timmest part of the whole plan, and how I'm certain, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that...” She looked at Julian expectantly for him to finish the sentence.

“That the dice are up Tim's butthole?”

“Exactly!” Stacy raised her hand for a high five.

Julian flinched like she was about to slap him. “I only guessed that because it's the end of the story that I've been waiting for. I don't actually have any idea what you're talking about.”

Stacy sighed. “Think about it. What happens if we catch Mordred, get Tim resurrected, and he craps out the dice for us.”

Dave's eyes widened. “He's a hero who was willing to sacrifice his life to save us all. He's fucking Jesus.”

Now they were getting somewhere. “And what happens if we let him stay dead? Which, let's be honest, he probably felt was a distinct possibility.”

Dave's jaw dropped open. “We'd be stuck here forever. It would be his final fuck you to the friends who'd given up on him.”

“Would he really sacrifice his life just to give us all the finger?” asked Julian.

Stacy shrugged. “What's easier to believe? That Tim's capable of the ultimate act of love? Or that he's capable of the ultimate act of spite?”

“Holy shit,” said Julian. “The dice really are up Tim's butthole.”

Chapter 7

Like the town Cooper had passed through to get to the desert, Totino's main industry appeared to be produce. Unlike in that other town, however, Totino's citizens seemed to be more focused in what they chose to grow.

For a mile north and south stood rows and rows of giant tomato plants, just like the one he and Chaz had fallen into. Towering stalks stood fifty feet high, supporting fruit ranging in color and size from green beach balls to shiny red minivans.

A network of bamboo pipes poured a constant stream of water on each of the plants and cast a shadow grid on the sand.

“What the hell do they need all these huge-ass tomatoes for?” asked Chaz.

“Giants,” said a half-elf perched atop the biggest, plumpest, reddest tomato in the forest. His hair was a peculiar shade of orange, as if it was once blond, but had become stained over the years with tomato juice. He wore similarly colored hemp overalls and thick red gloves which reflected the sun's light like plastic or patent leather. A hawk perched on his right hand, its talons digging into the glove's sturdy material.

“Go find the others,” he said to the bird. “Bring them here.”

Ravenus landed on a neighboring tomato stem and squawked.

“Don't worry, big fellow,” said the half-elf. “She'll be back with the rest of my group.”

Cooper didn't know if that was meant to be taken as a threat or warning or what. “Listen, dude. We're not here looking for trouble.”

“Then none shall you find.” The half-elf smiled at Cooper. “It's harvest time. This one's ready.” He slapped the skin of the tomato he was crouched on top of. It smacked loud, like the hot nun's ruler against the priest's bare ass in Penance and Penetration IV: Hot Cross Buns. Wrapping his legs around the stem, he shifted from a crouch to a sit. He reached down into the satchel slung over his shoulder, pulled out a normal-sized green apple, and took a big bite.

Chaz ogled him like he was made of tits.

“Sorry,” said the half-elf. “That was rude of me.” He tossed the apple down to Chaz, who devoured it like a horse, not discriminating between the meat of the fruit and the seeds, stem, or core.

Ravenus squawked something at the half-elf, and he responded with something as meaningless to Cooper as the bird's squawk.

“I'm Chaz,” said Chaz through a mouthful of apple. “That's Cooper.” He looked at Cooper and nodded toward the half-elf. “He says his name's Fallon.”

“You do not speak the elven tongue?” Fallon asked Cooper.

“I do not,” said Cooper. “I am one who...” What was the most polite way to put it? “... prefers the company of women.”

Fallon looked at him quizzically, then at Chaz. “So I suppose that makes you Ravenus's master?”

“Ha!” said Cooper. “He's a fucking bard. The bird could kick his ass. Ravenus belongs to my friend Julian. He's up on the flying island thing.”

“Oh my,” said Fallon. “Your friend is a wizard of the Crescent Shadow? I saw it not long ago, and wondered if it had anything to do with your unusual arrival here.”

“He's more of a prisoner there. We were too until we escaped.”

“How exciting. You must tell me more.”

Chaz glared at Cooper. “Or maybe less.”

Now that he thought about it, perhaps telling a complete stranger that they were escaped convicts wasn't the brightest idea in the world.

“You must be starving after an adventure like that,” said Fallon. “I wish I had more to offer. We don't get many travelers coming in from the desert. Perhaps the others will have more when they arrive.”

Chaz swallowed his last bite of apple, having left nothing to waste. “You mentioned something about giants?” It was an obvious attempt to change the subject, but Fallon didn't seem to mind.

“That's correct. We grow these huge tomatoes specifically to trade with a tribe of frost giants to the north.”

“Are these frost giants proportionally as large to us as these tomatoes are to the more standard variety?”

The half-elf laughed. “Gods no! Lest the world would flood every time one of them took a piss. We grow them like this mainly for convenience.”

Cooper squinted at the big ass tomato the half-elf was sitting on. “What's so convenient about a four-ton tomato?”

“It has challenges, for sure. But those very challenges are a blessing on the road. A group of hungry bandits might run out from the forest, snag a few sacks of normal tomatoes, then run back into the trees. They're far less likely to bother a cart hauling one huge tomato like this. They couldn't possibly hope to move the whole thing, and trying to cut it in a hurry only makes a big mess.”

The hawk's return, along with the growing rumble of wooden wheels, meant Fallon's friends had been located and were approaching to harvest this tomato.

The group that arrived was no band of gangly peasant tomato farmers. They looked like a team of commandos, musclebound and wielding spears at least twice as tall as they were. The spears had upward-pointing hooks alongside the tips. Cooper supposed that was for double stabbing power. About a dozen in all, they were made up of humans, half-elves, and two half-orcs. Each of their non-spear hands held a lead rope to guide the beast that accompanied them. It looked like some kind of eight-legged dinosaur in a black leather gimp mask, and was pulling a wide empty cart. Two burly dwarves flanked either side of the cart, wielding weapons that Cooper couldn't quite make out the purpose of. They were like padded shields, but mounted crookedly on poles.

When the two humans leading the group made eye contact with Cooper and Chaz, the procession came to a halt.

Cooper and Chaz looked at each other. Chaz's face seemed to mirror Cooper's thoughts. They were fucked.

Fallon drew a sword from a sheath on his back. It wasn't a particularly intimidating-looking weapon in its own right, but with a dozen club bouncers and a huge lizard monster at his back, he could have pulled out his dick and it would have had the same effect as if he were to pull out a grenade launcher.

Cooper farted long and loud, like a foghorn. Nobody moved. They just stood there, mesmerized and confused, as if unaccustomed to beginning battle this way. While everyone was transfixed on his fart, he formulated a plan in his mind. When it was done, he shared it with Chaz.

“Run!”

He grabbed Chaz by the arm and bolted deeper into the tomato forest. Chaz could only keep Cooper's faster pace for so long before he tripped and fell. Cooper looked back. Their would-be captors were out of sight. But he had his doubts as to whether they'd lost them for good.

Ravenus flapped down and perched on a tomato stem.

“Ask him how far behind us they are.”

Chaz and Ravenus exchanged some gibberish and squawks, then Chaz turned to Cooper.

“He says they haven't moved.”

Cooper nodded. “Fuck. They're letting us wear ourselves out. They're smarter than I thought.”

“Maybe they're not –”

“IN POSITIONS!” The command came from the direction Cooper and Chaz were running toward.

Cooper and Chaz crept forward as quietly as possible. Cooper wasn't the stealthiest person in the world, but the sand helped to soften his footsteps. As they got closer, Cooper might as well have been stomping on crisp autumn leaves for all the difference it made. The men's grunts drowned out whatever noise Cooper's feet could have ever hoped to produce.

It was a similar arrangement of men, cart, strange weaponry, and even stranger masked dinosaur thing, to the one they'd just left.

The men with the long hooked spears stood in a wide circle around a tomato stalk, their spears pointed up at a skinny guy sitting on the branch above a tomato. On the spears' hooks, a circular net made of thick hempen rope was suspended under the tomato. Four dwarves stood underneath, with their padded shields raised up high on their poles.

“Get ready!” said the skinny guy, brandishing a small serrated sword similar to the one Fallon had drawn. “Here it comes!”

He lay flat on the branch, hugging it with one arm and sawing at the stem with the other. When the last of the fibers snapped, the enormous fruit fell into the waiting net. The men grunted as they struggled to lower the tomato down far enough so that the dwarves could bear some of the burden. Together, they hefted the tomato onto the cart.

After a short break to catch their breath, one of the spearmen slapped the dinosaur above its hind-most left leg, and the procession started moving.

“They got distracted by the tomato,” Cooper whispered. “But they'll be hunting us again soon.”

Chaz shook his head like an asshole. “Follow me.”

Cooper followed him deeper into the tomato forest until the stalks gave way to a bustling little town with uniformly strange buildings. They looked like log cabins, but the logs, while familiar-looking, were unlike any tree Cooper could recall. The peaked roofs were made from strips of that same red leather or plastic that Fallon's armband was made of.

Cooper stared at the roof of the nearest building. “What the fuck is that?”

“Tomato skins,” said Fallon, walking out from the forest of tomato stalks behind them. “We grow a number of different varieties of tomato here. The ones we ship off to the frost giants are bred for flavor. The ones you see in front of you, naturally, are bred for construction. The stalks are tougher. The skins are more weather resistant, and the paste mixed with sand makes for a wonderful sealant.”

“Did you follow us here?” asked Chaz.

“Of course I did.” Fallon turned to Cooper. “You shouldn't feel so embarrassed about farting. Everyone does it.”

“I'm sorry,” said Cooper. “We thought you were going to kill us.”

Fallon smiled. “We thought the same. That thing was ripe.”

“Listen,” said Chaz. “Can you tell us how to get back to Cardinia?”

“My, but you are a long way from home.”

“Longer than you know.”

“Why are you in such a hurry to leave? You've only just arrived. Come and join me at The Frothy Tankard. I'll buy you a drink in exchange for your tale.”

Cooper appreciated Fallon's style of getting right down to business, but he found one drink to be kind of a lowball offer.

“Two drinks each, and Chaz will give you some tail.”

“What?” said Chaz. “I don't think that's –”

“Come on, man. You're a bard without an instrument. This is a chance to make yourself useful again... kind of. Take one for the team.”

“I most certainly will not –”

Ravenus squawked something, and then everyone started talking in gibberish again.

We have no time for this. We must make haste to Glittersprinkles Grove. My people have been too long without a leader. I fear for their safety.

“Sorry, guys,” said Cooper. “Nabi's being a buzzkill. She insists on going to a place called Tittywhistle Cove... Or something like that. I may have been off by a syllable.”

“Well, I suppose it's rude to stop at a town and not support the local economy by visiting the local pub,” said Chaz, suddenly interested in being useful. “One drink won't delay us by much.”

Fallon's face turned pale as he gawked at Cooper. “Did you mean Glittersprinkles Grove?”

“That's the one.”

“You'd do well to steer clear of that place, friend.”

“What's wrong?” asked Chaz. “Is that a gay bar or something?”

“Glittersprinkles Grove is no pub.” Fallon's face was dead serious for someone who'd just said the word Glittersprinkles twice in less than a minute. “Best come have that drink, friends. I've a tale you'll want to hear as well.”

Cooper supposed it couldn't hurt to learn something about this place before they went there.

I am from Glittersprinkles Grove. What can you hope to learn from some tomato farmer that I cannot tell you myself?

Nabi made a good point, but there was still the matter of feeding Chaz. They had a long walk ahead of them, and Chaz would need his strength.

Very well. One drink. Hear this fool's story, then we shall be on our way.

The villagers eyed Cooper and Chaz curiously as Fallon led them down Totino's main street, but Cooper sensed no animosity from them. This place had a friendlier vibe than the village they'd entered the desert through. It was amazing how much of a difference a lack of cultists and slave-laborers made.

The last building on the street, which would be the first for anyone entering the village by the conventional way, was by far the most prominent. It boasted a large sign which Cooper couldn't read, but assumed identified it as the Frothy Tankard, the tavern where Fallon had suggested they enjoy a drink together.

Ravenus squawked something as he and Fallon's hawk perched atop the sign.

“Fine,” said Chaz. “But don't go far. We aren't going to be here that long.”

With an excited screech, Ravenus and the hawk flew up over the roof and out of sight.

The inside of the tavern was dimly lit and quiet, with only a few older patrons nursing beers as they stared outside through the windows. Fallon ushered Cooper and Chaz to a booth, the seats of which looked to have been upholstered with the same kind of tomato skin that Fallon's gloves were made of. Clean and shiny as it was, Cooper almost felt bad for smearing his ass all over it.

“Getting an early start then, are we?” said a jovial plump half-elven woman approaching their booth. Her rosy red cheeks made her look like she had a tomato for a head.

“Good day, Evie,” said Fallon. “A round of beers for me and my new friends, if you will.”

Evie set down a bowl of what looked like dehydrated shark teeth. “And where are you fine folks stopping in from?”

“They came in from the desert. Claim to have escaped from the Crescent Shadow.”

“Oh, how exciting!”

“Not so much escaped,” said Chaz. “It was more like we fell off, and –”

“That's not all,” said Fallon. “You'll never guess where they plan to go from here.”

“If they stay with you, they're like to wind up asleep in the desert with their pants 'round their ankles, pecker-deep in tomatoes.”

Fallon glared at her. “That happened one time.” He looked across the table to Chaz and Cooper. “I was really drunk, and coming out of a bad relationship.”

Cooper cleared his throat. “So... How was it? My interest is purely acedemical, you understand.”

“I don't know. I fell asleep before I really got going. The acid burns, though. It took me weeks to recover.”

Cooper and Chaz winced.

“So what'll you have?” asked Evie.

Fallon glanced at Cooper and Chaz, but didn't bother waiting for their input. “Beers for starters.”

“Red or white?”

“White!” said Chaz.

“Dude,” Cooper muttered under his breath. “Take it down a notch, Goebbels.”

Fallon picked up one of the toothy things from the bowl and threw it at Chaz's head. “Where's your sense of adventure? You survive a fall from the Crescent Shadow, but you're afraid to try tomato beer?”

“Oh,” said Cooper. “In that case, I'll have white as well. No offense, man, but that sounds disgusting.”

“How about this?” said Fallon. “I'll buy the first round. If you don't like it, I'll drink all three.”

Cooper nodded. That sounded fair.

“Wait a minute,” said Chaz. “That's not really buying the first round, is it? That's just you buying yourself three beers while we –”

“Three reds, Evie.”

Evie grinned cheerfully. “Coming right up.” She was gone before Chaz had a chance to object.

Chaz picked up the toothy thing that had bounced off his head and landed on the table. “What are these?”

“Tomato seeds,” said Fallon.

“Of course they are.” Chaz tossed it back into the bowl.

“Dried and salted.” Fallon picked one out of the bowl and popped it into his mouth. It crunched like a potato chip. “Try one. They're really good.”

Chaz's stomach grumbled loud enough for the whole table to hear.

“Fine.” He put a seed in his mouth and crunched down on it. His eyes lit up. “These are good. They don't taste like tomatoes at all.”

Cooper grabbed a handful and shoved them in his mouth. They tasted like Sun Chips, but had kind of a papery texture. By the time Cooper swallowed, Chaz had devoured the rest of the bowl.

“Sorry,” he said with a mouthful of seeds. “I was starving.” After he swallowed, he licked his lips. “They sure are salty.”

Fallon grinned. “Makes the beer go down easier.”

“Maybe if you didn't make your beer out of goddamn tomatoes, you wouldn't need extra motivation to drink it.”

“Believe me. You don't want to die before you taste tomato beer.”

“That's true,” said Chaz. “But I'm worried that I might want to die afterward.”

“Then drink up, friend. You're headed to the right place.”

“What's all this talk about dying?” asked Evie as she approached the table again, this time with a tray. She set three large glasses of murky red liquid. It looked like someone had drunk Bloody Marys and thrown them up back into the glasses.

Fallon sneered up at Evie. “If you'd have listened to what I was saying earlier instead of bringing up that incident from three years ago, you'd have known that these two are planning a little expedition into Glittersprinkles Grove.”

Evie gasped, then scowled down at Cooper and Chaz. “Are you out of your fool minds?”

Cooper sipped his beer. It wasn't bad. There was a hint of tomato in it, but the alcohol content more than made up for it. Cooper guessed it to be around ten percent. He ignored the taste and gulped back the rest of the glass.

“The whole forest has been cleared of life,” said Fallon. “Only shadows remain, living in eternal anguish beyond the grave and seeking to drain the life out of any who are bold or stupid enough to –”

A loud cavernous belch erupted from deep within Cooper's stomach. He held up his empty glass.

“Can I get one more of these, and maybe another bowl of seeds?”

It had been a few days since Cooper had last drunk anything, and the tomato beer caught up to him pretty quickly. Outside of the persistent feeling of annoyance in the back of his mind where Nabi was sulking, the evening was a blur. He remembered switching from beer to a stronger tomato-derived liquor at one point, and possibly throwing up on Evie's tits, but that was around where reality and dream started to mingle.

Chapter 8

When they approached Cardinia's western gate, Randy was worried they'd have a repeat of the commotion they'd had at Minswater. But he was pleasantly surprised to find that the Cardinian guards had protocol for dealing with what they referred to as Unusual and Potentially Dangerous Mounts. It was a simple matter of paying five times the standard rate to board a horse, which Randy was happy to do.

“Let's stop at a tavern,” said Denise. “I need somethin' in my belly aside from piss fruit and fuckin' scorpion babies.”

Randy checked with Katherine. She was the one who had the most pressing business to contend with.

“It's cool,” said Katherine. “I'm starving, and Tim's not going anywhere.”

It was between lunch and dinner rushes, so the taverns along the street leading to the Temple of Life weren't very crowded.

“Looks like we got a lot of choices,” said Randy. “What y'all in the mood for?”

Katherine grimaced as she looked up and down the street. “All these places look like they serve stray cat. You guys can choose.”

Denise stopped in front of a shop and looked up at the sign. “This one looks good.”

“The Stinky Pickle?” said Katherine. “That's the last decision I ever put you in charge of making.”

“You're the one who said one place was as good as another.” Denise frowned. “I don't even like pickles, but I got this sudden craving. Must be these little freaks inside me.” She rubbed her belly and looked up at the sign. “Besides, I'm sure the name is ironic.”

When Randy opened the door and stepped inside, it didn't smell ironic. The powerful odor of pickled meats and fermented vegetables wasn't exactly unpleasant, but wow. Randy's sinuses had never felt so clear.

The place was set up like a bar. But instead of liquor bottles on the shelves, there were jars of everything imaginable that could swim in vinegar or brine. Eggs, cucumbers, beets, strips of meat, leafy vegetables, an assortment of animal parts, and things that Randy couldn't identify.

“Greetings!” said a huge man emerging from the back room. He wore a blood-smeared leather apron and had a meat cleaver at the end of his left arm where a hand would normally be. “Welcome to the Stinky Pickle. My name is Grimmond. What can I get for you?”

Randy looked at Katherine. Her eyes said, “We should get the fuck out of here right now.” Randy agreed.

Grimmond wiped his cleaver hand onto his apron, adding a fresh streak of red to an already impressive collection. “You're so quiet. What troubles you? Mayhap a manticore pulled out your tongues?” He gestured to a  particular jar on one of the shelves behind the bar. “I have replacements right here.” He laughed heartily at his own joke. The jar he'd indicated did appear to be full of tongues. Randy hoped they hadn't come from previous customers.

“I need one of those,” said Denise, pointing to a jar of pigs' feet. She kept her finger raised to point out her other selections. “A scoop of that, three of whatever those are, that whole goddamn jar, and a big-ass mug of beer.”

“Very good, Miss.”

“Denise!” said Randy, distracted from his terror. “You're pregnant. You can't drink.”

“The fuck I can't.”

“Congratulations,” said Grimmond. “Might I suggest a mug of Dark Iron Brew? It's popular among women who are expecting. It will help to replenish the iron in your blood.” He winked at Denise. “And it should take the edge off a bit as well.”

Denise nodded. “Sounds good. Give it to me, Chopper.”

Katherine gave Denise a stern glare.

Grimmond laughed. “Fear not, young lady. I've been called worse.” He held up his cleaver. “If not for this, I would never have gotten into this business, and perhaps never have discovered my love and talent for pickling foods at all.”

Randy felt a little less terrified after hearing that. “That's real nice. It's good that you turned a disability into an advantage like that.” He nudged Denise. “We all might learn a little something from that.”

“Aye,” said Grimmond, staring at his disfigurement. “Would you believe that this is the very cleaver which took my hand so many years ago?”

After an awkward moment of silence, Randy, Denise, and Katherine nodded. Randy couldn't think of any reason Grimmond would lie about that, and felt no inclination to ask him to provide evidence.

Grimmond turned to a large jar at the end of the bar. “And that's the head of the man who wielded it.”

Katherine yelped, like she was trying to scream and gasp at the same time. There was indeed a human head staring back at them from inside a jar of pale brown liquid which was barely large enough to contain it. It's eyes were bulged out. The nose was pressed up against the glass, showing off nostrils full of coarse, perfectly preserved hair. The lips were pressed open, displaying the late man's half-rotted teeth. It looked bigger than a human head should. Maybe it was a giant, or maybe it had just bloated over years of being pickled. Randy might have asked, but he had a more immediate question he needed answered.

“You don't... um... serve that, do you?”

Grimmond laughed heartily again. “Of course not!” He sighed. “I just like to have it there to look at.”

“I hear you, man,” said Denise. “If it weren't for all them pussy liberals and their bullshit laws, I'd do the same thing with the heads of my enemies back home.”

“And what will you two be having?” Grimmond asked Katherine and Randy.

“Um...” Katherine frantically scanned the jars, then pointed to one close to her. “Are those eggs?”

“Indeed they are.”

“From chickens?”

“Those are goose eggs, Miss.”

“That's fine. One of those please.”

“I'll have the same,” said Randy.

“Will that be all?”

Randy and Katherine nodded vigorously.

“Anything to drink?”

Randy and Katherine shook their heads just as vigorously. Randy, for one, didn't want anything from this place that he couldn't see where it came from. Heck, he didn't even want that egg he'd just ordered. But he also didn't want to insult this gentleman, lest his head become a pickled decoration on one of these shelves.

“Very well,” said Grimmond. “Please have a seat and I'll return shortly with your food.”

“Oh, one more thing,” said Katherine as he turned toward the kitchen.

“Yes?”

“Could I buy an empty jar here?” She pointed to a medium sized jar of what looked like small pickled onions. “That size should do.”

Grimmond nodded. “Of course.”

He returned in a few minutes with two eggs, a tray full of Denise's mystery foods, a dwarf-worthy mug of dark beer, an empty jar, and a bowl of chopped raw meat, fresh and bloody, which Randy was relieved to see placed on the floor in front of Butterbean.

Grimmond smiled at Katherine. “Your friend looked hungry, too. That's on the house.”

Butterbean went at the meat like he hadn't eaten in a week.

“I guess he is,” said Katherine. “Thank you.”

Randy found his egg surprisingly delicious. It shouldn't have been a surprise, as Grimmond was clearly well-practiced in his art. He also found that he was hungrier than he'd thought. Katherine seemed to have similar revelations. While neither was brave enough to take a chance on any of the other food on display, they ended up ordering and devouring eight more eggs between the two of them.

Denise cleaned her plate, washing it all down with Dark Iron Brew.

“That's some good shit,” said Denise, rubbing her belly.

Grimmond beamed. “Thank you. It's fortified with my wife's own blood.”

Randy and Katherine gasped.

Denise merely raised her eyebrows. “Goddamn, man. What happened? You catch her in bed with an orc or some shit?”

Grimmond's brow furrowed as he stared at Denise. He looked at his cleaver hand, and his eyes lit up with understanding. “Oh dear, you thought...” He burst into yet another fit of hearty laughter. “I could never cause my dear wife harm! I speak of the blood which flows naturally with the cycles of the moon.”

Denise swallowed hard. Her face turned pale. Her eyes turned to Katherine's empty jar.

“Oh shit,” said Katherine. She sprang to her feet and brought the Bag of Holding down quickly over Denise's head.

Denise made no attempt to resist. Grabbing the edge of the table with both hands, her body shuddered once, twice, a third time.

“Is she not well?” asked Grimmond, genuine concern in his voice. “I can assure you all of the food here is prepared with great care. I use only the highest quality ingredients and time-honored pickling techniques.”

“Oh, it's nothing like that,” said Katherine. “She's just got a mild case of... asthma. She'll be fine.”

After Denise's body had calmed down for a few seconds, she tapped the table twice with her left hand, then gave Katherine a thumbs up.

Katherine started to lift the bag, but Denise grabbed her wrist and pulled it back down, then shuddered heavily one more time. Half a minute later, she gave the thumbs up again.

Katherine pulled the bag off. “Feeling better?”

Denise nodded, her eyes glistening and weary. “Much, thank you.” She turned back to the bar. “Can I get a few of them eggs boxed up to go? I got a feelin' I'll be hungry again real soon.”

Grimmond smiled. “As you wish.”

While Grimmond prepared Denise's take-out order, Katherine sat back down and opened her empty jar. She bunched up the mouth of the Bag of Holding and inserted it into the mouth of the jar, leaving enough space for one finger to slip into the bag.

“What kind of creature was that big dinosaur thing we came here with?” she asked Randy.

“He's a basilisk,” said Randy. “That's why I named him Basil.”

“Clever.” Katherine looked back down at the Bag of Holding. “Basilisk shit.”

When it started flowing out of the bag, Katherine jerked her finger away. The shit looked like greyish-brown toothpaste and quickly filled the jar about three-quarters full before it stopped flowing.

Grimmond stopped preparing the eggs, distracted by Katherine filling a jar with shit in his restaurant.

“I hate to be critical,” he said. “But I'm noticing some flaws in your pickling technique. If you'd like to work here as an apprentice, perhaps we can –”

“I'm sorry,” said Katherine. “That was disgusting. I just didn't want to dump a load of animal shit on an altar at the Temple of Life. I thought it would be more presentable this way. Do you have a moist towelette?”

Instead of chopping them all up and stuffing them into jars as Randy expected, Grimmond smiled.

“You're going to the Temple of Life, are you?” He hurriedly finished Denise's to-go box and took a small jar down from a shelf. It was stuffed with what looked like skinny carrots and soggy strips of leather, soaked in a red liquid. “Would you mind seeing that this gets to Brother Mayfair?”

“Sure thing,” said Randy, stepping up to peer into the jar. “What is it?”

“Stirge wings.”

“The fuck is a stirge?” asked Denise.

“Nasty little critters,” said Grimmond. “They'll swarm you, latch onto your skin, and suck every drop of blood out of your body. But their wings are delicious when pickled with sugar, tomato juice, and lionpepper extract. Brother Mayfair adores them.” He slapped his cleaver hand down on the bar. “That reminds me. He'll want a jug of Dark Iron Brew to wash them down.”

Denise groaned. “Who wouldn't?” When Grimmond went into the back to fetch Brother Mayfair's jug of beer, she said to Randy, “We shouldn't have to pay for this. First, he feeds me his own wife's taco sauce, and now he treats us like his personal goddamn couriers. I say we just tell him to jerk off left-handed and get the fuck out of this place.”

“Taco sauce?” said Katherine. “Really?”

“I think we might be able to use this to our favor,” said Randy. “We're like to be better received at the temple if we come bearing gifts, even if they ain't necessarily from us.”

Denise snorted. “Yeah, right. Ain't nothin' butters a guy up like giving him a big ol' jug of cooch hooch.”

Katherine grimaced. “Got any more while you're at it?”

Denise bit her lower lip in thought for a moment, then shrugged. “Vajamba Juice? Bloodweiser?”

“Jesus Christ,” said Katherine. “Are you instinctively this vile? Or do you have, like, a whole list of these you've been waiting for this specific occasion to use?”

“Pabst Red Ribbon? Anheus Her Bush?”

“SHUT UP!”

“Is everyone okay?” asked Grimmond as he returned with a corked gallon jug.

“Everyone's just fine,” said Randy. “And we would be delighted to take these gifts to Brother Mayfair.”

Chapter 9

Captain Righteous led the way up the corridor leading to the rest of the Crescent Shadow. Bingam followed close behind him. Julian and Stacy hung back a little further, but not too far because Julian was carrying a pebble he'd enchanted with a Light spell so that they could all see. Dave took the rear position, not for any strategic advantage, but rather because he was the slowest. He struggled to keep up with the rest of the group. He could see just fine in the dark, but he still felt safer in the sphere of light than outside of it.

“What do you suppose happened to that little old guy who rescued us?” asked Stacy.

“The wizards here have a reputation for being distrustful of outsiders,” said the captain. “He likely couldn't bring himself to leave us there to die, but had no interest in interacting with us beyond that.”

The corridor ended in a spiral stone staircase, which Dave remembered from having walked down it a few days ago. If memory continued to serve, there would be a door at the top of the stairs, on the other side of which would be the dusty old basement of some long-condemned building. When he and Chaz were told they were being led to Tim, it seemed plausible that he might be hiding down here. Coming the other way, Dave reasoned the cages and observation platform were probably relics from a different time, and the values of the Crescent Shadow wizards had since changed. No longer did they find it acceptable or entertaining to watch a prisoner struggle with the choice between jumping to their death or dying of thirst. If Captain Righteous was to be believed, this had less to do with ethics than patience. Nowadays, they probably preferred to just throw prisoners off the edge and be done with it.

The basement was as dusty as Dave remembered it. Captain Righteous headed for the stairs leading up to the ground floor, but stopped when he stepped beyond Julian's light. Something had caught Julian's attention.

“What are you looking at, elf?” said the Captain. “The more time we waste, the lower our chances of catching this Mordred character.”

Julian leaned over a small wooden desk which was conspicuously not covered in dust. A large red leather-bound book lay open on top of it, along with a jar of black ink, a quill pen, and a small stack of papers. The paper on top was half covered in strange writing in a language Dave couldn't understand.

“These are spell scrolls,” Julian whispered, flipping through the papers. “Read Magic.” His eyes glowed with a faint green light as he studied the words on the paper. “This one's a Magic Missile. Or at least it will be once it's finished. The form is a little sloppy, probably written by a first or second level wizard. But it should be functional.”

“So where is he now?” asked Stacy.

“Probably taking a break. Scribing spells is really dull and mentally exhausting work.”

“He's obviously been sent here to guard us,” said Captain Righteous. “This place is too remote to serve as a likely place for a wizard to scribe scrolls, and the Crescent Shadow is no place for inexperienced wizards of first or second level, as you say. We can use this to our advantage.”

Dave didn't like where this was going. He didn't trust Julian's assessment of another spellcaster's work enough to risk fucking with a magic user, especially while they were all on a floating island of magic users known for tossing people off the edge.

“What did you have in mind?” he asked, fearing he already knew the answer.

Stacy smiled. “When he comes back down here, we'll jump him and see what he knows.”

Captain Righteous nodded. “Our thoughts are aligned.”

Before Dave could think of a reasonable argument, the floor above them creaked.

“Elf!” whispered Captain Righteous. “Hide your stone.”

They all backed under the staircase in near pitch black darkness. A small fart squeaked out.

“Ew!” whispered Bingam. “Which one of you did that?” He'd apparently forgotten that dwarves have Darkvision. Even as dark as it was, Dave could clearly see him fanning behind his own ass.

“Shhh!” said Captain Righteous.

When the door at the top of the stairs opened, Dave was surprised that no light flowed in with it. The footsteps on the old wooden stairs sounded heavy and not particularly careful, which probably meant that the person coming down also had Darkvision. Dave hoped the others had come to similar conclusions, because he couldn't communicate his thoughts to them without giving away their presence.

Captain Righteous and Stacy stood ready to pounce. Julian had his hands cupped tightly around his Light stone. Bingam was picking his nose.

A dark-bearded dwarf in a grey robe rounded the banister. He had a roasted turkey leg in one hand and a live toad in the other. He froze when his eyes met Dave's.

“Shit,” said Dave.

“Now!” cried Captain Righteous.

Julian opened his hands, illuminating the room.

“Luminus Obscurum!” said the dwarf through a mouthful of turkey. He tossed his toad at Julian, who reeled back right before Dave went suddenly and completely blind.

“What happened?” said Stacy.

“I can't see anything!” cried Bingam.

“He threw a toad at me,” said Julian. “Who does that?”

“Don't let him escape!” said Captain Righteous. “He's around here somewhere. Is this – Oomph!”

“That was me,” said Stacy. “Sorry about your face. It was just an instinct. I don't like being grabbed.”

Dave heard something skittering up the stairs in a very un-dwarflike manner. He pawed around on the floor until his left hand found something. His heart raced as he felt the still warm scorched flesh around the bone. He nearly wept with joy as he bit into the most delicious turkey meat he'd ever tasted.

His vision came back as suddenly as it had gone.

Julian stood with his bag in one hand. His serape was missing.

“He's a higher level wizard than I thought,” he admitted. “Darkness is a Level 2 spell. It requires the caster to touch the item to be enchanted. He used his familiar to make a touch attack on my serape. He really should be ashamed of the quality of that scroll.”

Captain Righteous frowned at Dave. “I see you did your best to not let him escape.”

“Screw you, man,” said Dave through a mouthful of delicious turkey meat. “I haven't eaten in fucking days!” He tore into the turkey leg again, just to show how unashamed he was.

“Come on!” said Stacy. “He couldn't have gotten far. He's a dwarf. No offense, Dave.”

Chapter 10

Cooper woke up to the sensation of someone trying to hammer a nail, weakly but persistently, into his head. He'd get bored and go away eventually if Cooper didn't give him the satisfaction of reacting. One more hour. That was all he needed. He kept his eyes closed and willed himself to fall back asleep.

His efforts were further thwarted by a series of loud obnoxious squawks and slurping noises.

Hang on a minute. That's not a guy trying to hammer a nail into my head after all. That's...

“Fucking Ravenus!” Cooper said, swiping at the bird but only managing to slap himself in the head.

Ravenus flapped away with an extra loud and obnoxious squawk, then landed on the iron frame of a plain bed.

Chaz was standing at an equally plain wooden table, slurping something out of a bucket.

“Goddamn those guys could drink,” said Cooper. “Where are we?”

Chaz shrugged. “Beats me. Looks like some kind of prison cell.” He slurped again from his bucket. “They make killer soup.”

Cooper stood and joined him at the table. Whatever Chaz was slurping smelled really good. A little sour, a little spicy, a hint of beef and garlic. Some of that smell may have also been coming from the dead raccoon on the floor. Ravenus had already taken its eyes and maybe its riper internal organs from the incision down its belly, but Cooper tried to not let that spoil his appetite.

On the table he found another bucket and a wooden box.

Chaz pulled a lever on a faucet above the table, which puked out chunky red soup, steamy hot, into the empty bucket. He handed it to Cooper. “You've got to try this shit. It's going to change you.”

Cooper gave it a sniff. It smelled even better up close, probably because its scent wasn't mingling so much with that of the dead raccoon. It burned his mouth and throat, due to a combination of temperature, spiciness, and acidity, but he felt compelled to get as much of it into his belly as quickly as possible.

“Holy shit that's good,” said Cooper, filling the bucket again. “Any idea how much there is?”

“Hell if I know,” said Chaz. “This is my third bucket.”

Cooper gulped back a second bucket, then took his time to enjoy the flavor and texture of his third serving.

You've eaten. Now we must hurry to Glittersprinkles Grove.

“We need to get out of here,” said Cooper. “My axe really wants to check out that Glittersprinkles Grove place.”

“Didn't you hear what that guy said about it?”

“I caught bits and pieces,” Cooper lied. Then he figured, what's the point? “Honestly, I don't remember shit about last night. We should've eaten something more than tomato seeds before we started hitting the liquor.”

“He said it was crawling with the undead.”

And that is why I must return. My people need me to help take back their forest.

Cooper frowned. “I don't think she's going to let this go.”

Chaz shrugged. “Lead the way. If you can bust through that steel door, I'll gladly follow you out of here.”

Cooper had busted through a number of doors in his time as a half-orc. This one looked pretty fucking solid. Even with his Barbarian Rage, he didn't think he'd do much but shit on the floor. Considering their other options, his gaze fell down to the box on the table.

“What's that?”

Chaz set down his bucket and let out a small belch. “I don't know. I wanted to wait to open it, just in case it exploded or something. I wanted to be full before I died.”

Cooper nodded thoughtfully. “Good thinking.” He felt a familiar tug in his gut. “That soup's running right through me though. Maybe now's a good time to find out what's in the box.”

“Say no more.” Chaz carefully opened the box's lid. He and Cooper sighed with relief when it didn't explode. The lid came to rest when it was opened a little past upright. Inside the box, a bunch of small steel rods, each about the size of a cigarette, were lined up and stacked on top of each other. The inside of the lid had some writing on it.

“What does it say?” asked Cooper.

“How many triangles can you make? You have one chance. Make no mistakes. The correct answer will open the door. Answer wrong, and you'll be no more.” Chaz looked up at Cooper. “It's a brainteaser.”

Cooper frowned. “Shit.”

Chaz brought the box down to the floor and dumped out the rods. At the bottom of the box were two rows of ten polished stones, each with some mystical symbol carved into it.

“Whoa,” said Cooper. “What do those say?”

Chaz rolled his eyes. “Those are numbers. 0 through 9. We have to place the digits in these two empty slots to give our final answer.” He separated the iron rods into groups of five. “There's thirty in all.”

“Simple,” said Cooper. “A triangle has three sides.”

“Clearly our captors underestimated your mental prowess.”

Cooper took three rods and formed a triangle on the floor. “So what's thirty divided by three? That's got to be, like, at least seven or eight, right?”

“It's ten, stupid. But it's more complicated than that. Don't tell me you've never seen puzzles like this before. Didn't you ever have a hungover substitute teacher in elementary school?” Chaz made a diamond shape on the floor using five rods. “See? Two triangles, back to back, but they're sharing one side, so I only used five rods.”

“Holy shit, dude,” said Cooper. “That's fucking amazing.” He did some math in his head. “So the answer is... eleven?”

“I'm going to need someone else's brain helping here.” Chaz spoke some gibberish at Ravenus, who squawked back in return. They went back and forth like this for a while, until Ravenus flew down from the bedpost and started moving rods around with his talons. When he and Chaz were done, they had formed one big triangle made up of a bunch of smaller ones.

“Shit,” said Cooper. “That's got to be close to fifteen now.”

“There are sixteen individual triangles,” said Chaz. “Seventeen when you count the big one.”

“So is that our final answer?” asked Cooper.

Chaz ran his fingers through his hair. “That seems too easy. I'm sure there's more to it than that.”

Cooper, Chaz, and Ravenus stared at the pattern of rods on the floor for a long time.

“AHA!” Chaz finally cried. “I did it! I found the tricky ones!” He ran his finger over a triangle formed by the four small triangles making up the lower left corner of the larger one. He did the same thing on the lower right corner, and finally the top corner. “Three more. That makes twenty.”

“Whoa,” said Cooper. “It's like one of those Magic Eye posters they sell in the mall.”

Chaz chatted with Ravenus for a bit, then turned to Cooper. “Are we ready to gamble our lives on this, or do you want to see if there are still any we missed?”

“I was ready to gamble our lives on eight. Those last three you pointed out were like fucking sorcery.”

Chaz licked his lips. “Okay then. Here goes.” He removed the third pebble from the first row and the first pebble from the second row, then winced as he placed them in the two answer holes. Once again, the box failed to explode. In fact, nothing at all happened. Truth be told, it was kind of a letdown.

“Did it work?” asked Cooper.

“I don't know. I didn't feel anything or hear anything. I'm pretty sure we didn't die.”

Cooper farted. That soup wasn't going to stay contained much longer.

Chaz looked down at Cooper's ass and frowned. “Or maybe there was no giant tomato. Maybe we died when we hit the desert, and this is my own personal hell. That may be more plausible than the tomato thing, now that I think about it.”

“Fuck you, dude,” said Cooper. “If I had to write a list of people I'd like to share a cell with less than you, I'm not sure I could do it.”

“That's because you're an illiterate fucktard.”

Cooper sighed as he pulled the Decanter of Endless Water out of his bag. “For someone calling someone else a fucktard, you sure seem to have a lot of trouble learning.”

“Oh come on, man. Give me a fucking break, huh? I was just –”

“Geyser.”

Chaz fell backwards as the water punched him in the face. Without Chaz blocking the way, the water hit the cell door, pushing it open.

Ravenus squawked.

“Hmph,” said Cooper. “How about that?” He deactivated the decanter. “Nice going, Chaz. Looks like you solved the riddle after all.”

He crept out into the hall. There was a cell directly across with the door wide open. Peeking his head inside, he found it identical to the cell they'd woken up in, complete with the bed, table, buckets, puzzle box, and soup spout.

Both cells and the hallway were clean and well lit, they served delicious warm soup to their prisoners, and they even had comfortable-looking beds in the cells. If one overlooked the “certain death for getting the wrong answer” aspect of the puzzle, it was nice to offer a chance at freedom. As far as dungeon prisons went, Cooper guessed that this must be one of the nicer ones.

“Hello?” he called down the short hallway.

“This way, big feller!” a husky, yet friendly, voice called back.

Cooper turned back to Chaz, who was still in the cell, nervously holding the open puzzle box with both hands.

“Something doesn't feel right,” said Chaz. “It's like they're toying with us. Why bother locking us up if they're going to feed us and let you keep your axe? They're going out of their way to show us how non-threatened they are by us.”

He had a good point. Cooper looked down the hall again, then walked as quietly as he could back into the cell. He closed the door and sat down on the bed.

“What do you think they're up to?”

Chaz paced back and forth in front of Cooper. “And then they give us this easily solvable puzzle to give us a false sense of confidence, like we've outsmarted them. But the joke will be on us. They're trying to lure us into something, I just know it. I guarantee you as soon as we turn that corner, they'll spring some horrible trap on us.”

“Oh man, that sucks. What do we do?”

“We need to think of a way to outsmart them for real,” said Chaz. “What's the last thing they'd expect us to do?”

Cooper thought hard. Focusing on problem-solving skills must have diverted brainpower which he'd been using to hold his sphincter shut, because his ass erupted in a warm farty gush all over the mattress.

Chaz frowned. “That wasn't really what I had in mind.”

Heavy footsteps approached from outside. “Are you boys okay in there?”

“Shit!” whispered Chaz.

Cooper got to his feet and looked down at the massive red shit stain on the mattress. There were still undigested chunks of tomato in it.

“We should probably hide this.”

“Hide it how? It looks like a giant's used maxi pad!”

“Oh, like you've never shit the bed before. Oldest trick in the world.” Cooper grabbed the mattress with both hands and flipped it up toward the wall. When he pulled the other side out toward him, the soiled side left a pungent reddish-brown streak down the wall. Not that it mattered much anyway, because there was a pretty significant stain on the other side as well. It wasn't a particularly thick mattress, and the force of the blast must have plowed right through it. As long as hiding it wasn't an option, he decided it was at least good for a wipe. He sat down and slid his ass left and right, leaving a thorough coating on what could no longer be called the cleaner side.

“What the hell are you doing?” said Chaz. “Are you deliberately trying to make it worse?”

A small knock sounded on the door. “You're free to come out now.” The door started to open. “We only wanted to make sure – By the gods, what's that smell?”

Cooper and Chaz jumped and stood shoulder to shoulder as the door opened to reveal a burly dwarf in faded brown leather armor.

“Hi, there!” said Chaz.

“That was me,” said Cooper. “I farted.”

The dwarf waved his hand in front of his nose. “Did you ever! Come on. Follow me outside. We'll let this place air out a bit.”

Cooper and Chaz followed close behind, walking side by side in case the dwarf turned around.

“How are you fellers feeling this morning?”

“Better now,” said Cooper.

“The soup was delicious,” said Chaz.

The dwarf led them past the corner where Chaz had been certain something was going to leap out and kill them. “That's an old family recipe. I'll pass the compliment on to the missus.” Opening the front door, he led them out into the fresh morning air. “Whew! That's much better.”

They were in the same village they'd arrived at the previous day. The garden surrounding the building they were now standing in front of had a variety of fruits and vegetables growing, but Cooper could see the giant tomato forest beyond the quaint little buildings.

Chaz held out the puzzle box. “Am I supposed to return this to you?”

The dwarf looked inside the box and frowned. “Your final answer was twenty?”

“Um... yes?”

“And you truly believed your lives were on the line?”

“Are you saying they weren't?”

The dwarf chuckled. “Gods no. We just like to give our guests something to keep their minds occupied while they ride out their intoxication. I came and unlocked the door half an hour before you finally emerged.”

“So, this place...” Cooper looked back through the door they'd just walked out of. “This is a drunk tank?”

“Visitors here are often surprised at the potency of our green tomato beer.” The dwarf smiled. “We like to show folks a good time, but we don't want them to be a danger to themselves or others. We provide what we hope are comfortable accommodations.”

Chaz frowned down at his answer in the puzzle box. “We thought really hard on this. How far off were we?”

“The highest answer anyone has given us so far is twenty-seven.” The dwarf took the box from Chaz. “Yours was the saddest effort I've ever witnessed. I'm almost inclined to think this was a suicide attempt.”

“Thank you,” said Chaz curtly. “I suppose we'll be on our way now.”

“And where might you lads be off to? Perhaps I can offer you guidance.”

Glittersprinkles Grove.

Cooper turned his head back. “I know. I know.” He looked back at the dwarf, who was now eyeing him warily. “We're going to Glittersprinkles Grove.”

“Oh dear. I was half joking about the suicide thing before. I thought it was more polite than implying you were both extremely stupid. But now I wonder if it may be a bit of both.”

Chapter 11

The Temple of Life hardly seemed like part of the city. If not for the backdrop of the white stone city wall, Katherine would have assumed this was an ancient ruin which nature was halfway through reclaiming. Tall white-barked trees served as columns. Their interweaving branches formed trellises between them, from which green leafy vines hung down like curtains. In spite of her most recent run-in with curtains of vine, there was something about these vines which soothed Katherine's mind. She had every confidence that they wouldn't try to seize, strangle, or stab her or anyone she was traveling with.

The path to the entrance of the temple was lined with life-size granite statues of saints, martyrs, and other significant people – as well as other creatures – of the faith; at their feet, each had a brass plaque engraved with their names, deeds, and the dates of their births and deaths.

Many were champions of peace and prosperity. Renford Sweetwater, for instance, an elf who lived from 1,260 to 872 BSR, portrayed here strumming a harp, was credited with uniting the long-feuding Trugwal and Borley clans.

Others served as a reminder that Rasha, the goddess to which the Temple of Life was dedicated, was not someone to fuck with. Stagnor Bloodfroth, also known as Stagnor the Incorruptible, an impossibly tall and muscular human, lived a decidedly shorter life from 215 to 241 AOE. His statue featured wild eyes, a necklace of normal-sized human skulls, and a double-bladed battleaxe, as large as the one Cooper used, in each of his hands. He was granted sainthood posthumously for single-handedly slaughtering all the clerics and acolytes of the Darkwood Catacombs, a feat during which he died three times while achieving. The clerics tried twice to resurrect him as an instrument of evil, but his devotion to Rasha was so strong that he returned to life just as he had been and continued carving his path of carnage.

At the entrance, which was merely two of the tall white trees standing twice as far from each other as the rest of them, Katherine, Randy, Denise, and Butterbean passed through unmolested by vines. The sounds and smells of the city were almost imperceptible from within the temple, replaced with birdsong and burning rosemary incense. Four semi-circular grassy steps of amphitheater led down to an altar made from the polished stump of what looked to be the same type of white tree which formed the perimeter columns, only much much wider. Behind the altar, a golden statue of Rasha herself sat cross-legged, head bowed in meditation, her eight arms spread like rays of the sun.

Visitors of every race were scattered about the grounds, some sitting alone on the amphitheater steps in prayer or meditation, others accompanied by what Katherine assumed were either clerics or employees of the temple, identifiable by their white and gold vestments. The latter seemed to be mostly engaged in either planting seeds or digging up saplings. Both activities seemed to involve the exchange of money.

“What is this place?” asked Denise. “A fucking nursery?”

“It is considered an honor to plant the Seed of Life in Rasha's hallowed ground.”

Katherine, Denise, and Randy jumped at the soft-spoken male voice which came from right behind them. They turned to face it.

“Forgive me,” said the elf in the Temple of Life's uniform vestment. “It was not my intent to startle you. I trained myself to walk silently in my old life, before I discovered Rasha's Light. Alas, old habits die hard. Now, how may I be of service? Planting a Seed of Life requires only a donation of ten gold pieces.”

“How much does it cost to dig up one of them trees?” asked Randy.

The elf's eyes lit up. His pupils might as well have turned into dollar signs. “For a donation of five hundred gold pieces, you may take a Life Tree sapling and enjoy Rasha's presence in the comfort and convenience of your own home.”

“We're not here for gardening,” said Katherine. “I need to speak with Brother Mayfair.”

“Very well.” The elf bowed, then scanned the temple grounds. “Ah, there he is. The portly cleric next to the altar.”

Katherine bowed back. “Thank you.”

“May Rasha's light shine upon you.” The elf backed away, then turned around to find some other saps to shake down for money.

“I could have guessed,” said Denise as they walked down the amphitheater steps toward the altar. “If anyone here could be swayed by hops crotch and chicken wings, it's that fat motherfucker down there.”

“Hi,” said Katherine as cheerily as she could fake when they got within non-shouting distance. “Are you Brother Mayfair?”

“I am.” Brother Mayfair's smile and tone were much warmer and more genuine. “How may I be of service?”

Katherine reached into her Bag of Holding. “Jug of...” All of Denise's horrible euphemisms ran through her head before she thought to say, “...beer.” When she felt the jug in her hand, she pulled it out. “Mr. Grimmond from the Stinky Pickle sends his regards.”

Brother Mayfair licked his lips as he giddily accepted the jug. “Always so kind and generous. One would think I attached a prosthetic head for him!”

“So that cleaver hand he's got,” said Randy. “That was your handiwork?”

“Ha ha!” cried Brother Mayfair, startling Katherine, who hadn't caught the pun until then, and suspected Randy hadn't meant to make one. “Yes, I was the vessel. He said I changed his life forever, that I gave him purpose. But of course, it was all Rasha's doing.”

Randy looked at Katherine and nodded down at the bag. Might as well get this guy as buttered up as possible before they spring a resurrection request on him.

“Jar of wings,” said Katherine, reaching into the bag again. She held out the jar to Brother Mayfair. “He said to give you these as well.”

“Rasha's mercy!” he squealed, placing the jug on the altar and accepting the jar. “Oh thank you!”

“I beg your pardon, your holiness,” said Randy.

“Please, new friend. Call me Waldor.”

Randy smiled. “That's awful nice. You can call me Randy. These are my friends Denise and Katherine. And that's her friend, Butterbean.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you here in the presence of Rasha, new friends.”

“Of course, we ain't come here just to deliver these gifts from Mr. Grimmond,” said Randy. “We was on our way here anyway for some help from Rasha.”

“Would you like to plant a Seed of Life?” Brother Mayfair winked at Katherine and nudged Randy with his elbow. “I'll knock the donation down to eight gold pieces each.”

“It's my brother,” Katherine blurted out. “He recently passed before his time, and I need you to bring him back.”

Brother Mayfair's face turned suddenly serious. “I grieve for your loss. Truly, I do. But it is not for us to choose when our time is come. That is at the discretion of the gods.”

“Don't bullshit me. I know you people can cast spells to bring people back from the dead. I've seen it happen.”

“It is true that the gods will sometimes let us return the spirit to the flesh, but I'm afraid that an attempt would require a sizable donation to the temple, one which common folk as yourselves may not be able to afford.”

“I can get the money.” Katherine held up her bag. “I have a Bag of Holding to offer as collateral. That should count for something.”

Brother Mayfair's eyebrows rose. “A Bag of Holding of that size is rare and valuable indeed.”

“So what's your price?”

“That will depend on a number of factors. How long ago did your brother pass?”

“A couple of days ago.”

Brother Mayfair nodded. “That is good. Then his body should still be relatively well preserved. That will facilitate the process of resurrection.”

“About that,” said Katherine. “There was an incident involving... You know what? It's probably best to just show you.” She reached into the Bag of Holding. “Jar of basilisk shit.” When she felt the jar in her hand, she pulled it out and set it on the altar.

Brother Mayfair frowned at the jar. “I don't suppose I need to ask what substance that is in the jar.”

“A basilisk ate my brother's body before I was able to reach it. I'm sure there's still some of him in here though.”

The look on Brother Mayfair's face drained what little hope she had left. She wondered again why she had any hope in the first place. This was ridiculous. Tim was a lump of shit in a jar. It was over. He was gone.

“I'm sorry,” said Brother Mayfair.

That was it, then. At least Katherine knew for sure.

“The magic required to bring back your brother from such a state is beyond the power the gods would grant me.”

Katherine lowered her head and stroked the back of Butterbean's neck. “I understand.”

“Hang on a second,” said Denise. “Do you mean to say that such a magic don't exist, or that the gods just don't give enough of a shit about you?”

“Denise!” Randy snapped. “Be respectful.”

“All I meant to ask was if it was possible.”

“Through the gods, all things are possible,” said Brother Mayfair. “But what you ask would require the intervention of a cleric much closer to the gods than I. Lady Swansong, our High Cleric, might have the requisite piety, but she is currently away on temple business.”

Katherine didn't want to set herself up for further disappointment, but Randy spoke the question she wouldn't.

“When do you reckon she'll be back?”

“She is curing the diseased north of the borderlands. She may be gone as short as a week or as long as a month.”

“But...” Katherine, against every instinct, allowed herself to hope again. “This Lady Swansong. She could bring my brother back to life?”

Brother Mayfair shrugged. “She might be able to. My own faith is not so strong, but I believe it is strong enough, at least, to see if your brother's spirit is even still connected to this... corporal form.”

“How much?” asked Katherine. She wary of being fleeced, but she needed to know.

“A donation of five hundred gold pieces would suffice.”

Katherine didn't yet have a solid grasp of the exchange rate between dollars and gold pieces, as far as the cost of typical items and services were concerned. But five hundred gold pieces seemed, at a wild guess, like a reasonable amount for finding out whether or not Tim could be brought back from the dead.

“Are you saying it might be possible to bring him back?” Katherine asked.

“I'm not promising anything,” said Brother Mayfair. “It will require the power of the gods to know for sure. Are you willing to offer your Bag of Holding?”

“For what?” asked Denise. “We ain't even talkin' about getting your brother back at this point. Let's hang out here and meet with the Grand Wizard when she comes back.”

“I am a paladin of the New God,” said Randy, the last ditch desperation heavy in his tone. “He would want you to help us.”

Brother Mayfair tapped his finger against his lips as he stared intensely at Randy for an uncomfortably long time. Finally, he lowered his hand. “You speak the truth.”

Randy nodded. “I do.”

Brother Mayfair knelt before Randy. “I will do whatever is within my power to assist you.”

“Please bring back this woman's brother.”

Katherine could tell Randy was uncomfortable exploiting his station. She took his arm and leaned in to whisper, “Thank you.”

“I beg your forgiveness, most Holy Baguette,” said Brother Mayfair, struggling to his feet. “But I have not the power to bring back your friend even if I wanted to. His body is too far gone.”

“You said your superior could do it,” said Randy. “Lady Swansong.”

“This is no small feat you ask,” said Brother Mayfair. “The High Cleric is a busy woman. And the size of the donation such a service would require...” He laughed. “I could not even begin to guess a worth in coin. It would have to be a relic of such extraordinary value such that your Bag of Holding would not even be worthy of polishing it.”

“Just give me a target and point me in a direction,” pleaded Katherine. She looked around the temple, desperately hoping to find something it needed, something it was missing. The massive golden statue was a breathtaking work of art. Its two normal eyes were closed, but there was a rough eye-shaped hole in the forehead which didn't look like it was supposed to be empty. She pointed at it. “What about that?”

Brother Mayfair scowled at her. “Lower your hand at once. One does not point fingers at Rasha.”

“Sorry. I just thought Rasha seemed to be missing something. She's got a hole in her head.”

“You would seek the Eye of Rasha?” Brother Mayfair looked at Katherine sympathetically. “Your brother must truly be special.”

Katherine shrugged. “He is what he is. But he's my brother. Would that be a worthy offering to the temple?”

“I cannot speak for Lady Swansong. But if you were to retrieve the Eye of Rasha, I expect the High Cleric would be very grateful indeed.”

“Well then you should have started with that. Any clue as to where I might find this thing?”

Brother Mayfair shrugged. “I can tell you exactly where to find it. It sits atop the Ice Queen's scepter down in the frozen wasteland of Nazere.”

Katherine nodded. “Consider it done.” She looked down at the jar. “Would it be okay if I left this here? It sounds like we could be in for a bumpy ride, and I'd feel more comfortable if I knew my brother was safe.”

“What you propose is more dangerous than you know, young lady. You would be lucky to survive long enough to be enslaved.” Brother Mayfair sighed. “But I sense there is little I can do to dissuade you.”

“You sense correctly.”

“I've heard tales of Lady Swansong in her youth. She was similarly stubborn and impetuous once she had a goal to focus on, if the stories are to be believed. I think she would forgive me for using temple resources to confirm that your brother's spirit is indeed tethered to this...,” he frowned down at the jar. “...corporeal form before I send you and your companions off to your deaths.”

“That's kind of you,” said Katherine. She half suspected this might be an attempt to dissuade her because he doubted she'd survive a trip south to swipe a stick from some frosty old bitch. He'd wave his hands over the jar and mumble some bullshit incantation, then tell her that there were no spirits tethered to the lump of shit. He'd tell her that she'd done all she could, but her brother was gone for good and she should move on with her life. And of course, she wouldn't believe a word he said.

Brother Mayfair nodded, then took his jug of menstrual brew and jar of wings behind the statue of Rasha. When he returned, he no longer had the jug or jar. Instead he carried a small cylindrical steel container about the size of a tealight candle. He nodded solemnly at Randy.

“May this favor bring our faiths closer together.”

Randy looked surprised at having been addressed and stammered a response. “Yeah.”

Brother Mayfair opened the container, which contained some kind of deep purple oily paste. He closed his eyes and rubbed some of the paste on his eyelids. Then he traced the shape of an eye on his forehead, exactly where the hole in the statue was. When he opened his eyes again, they glowed with a faint purple light, as did the iris in the eye painted on his forehead.

Katherine had to admit, if this was a sham, it was a pretty solid performance.

“There is indeed a spirit tethered to these remains,” said Brother Mayfair.

“I knew it!” Katherine's hope was fully restored. She'd been so braced to resist his bullshit denial, and was thankful to him for being straight with her.

Brother Mayfair's brows drew together in confusion. “I'm sorry, Miss. It would appear you have the wrong remains. The spirit tethered here couldn't possibly be your brother.”

“Because of the race thing?” Katherine laughed. “That's a story I don't have time to go into right now. Believe me, that's him all right.”

Brother Mayfair pulled a square of silk from his sleeve and wiped the magic ointment from his forehead and eyelids. “I must admit, I am most intrigued.”

“I'll tell you what,” said Katherine. “He and I will tell you the story together when these two chucklefucks and I get back from Nazere.”

Chapter 12

The dwarf was gone. It was dark outside now, but the nearly full moon and the flying lanterns from the nearby party provided plenty enough light for Julian's Low Light Vision to see that their quarry had escaped.

This part of the island, while not uninhabited, was clearly not the fashionable district. Seedy taverns, boarded up apartments, and inns advertising rooms by the hour suggested that this was the part of town for folks who wanted to experience the Crescent Shadow lifestyle, but couldn't afford to stay where the real action was.

“He could have ducked into any of these rat-infested dumps,” said Captain Righteous.

“That's a possibility,” said Stacy. “Or he could be seeking out Mordred to tell him of our escape. Mathematically, given the factors I have to work with, our odds of finding Mordred before he does are better if we head for the party.”

“And how good are those odds?” asked Julian.

“Slim to none. But they're better than if we hung around here looking for some hired hand who may already be halfway to him.”

They made their way down dark and quiet side streets, which became better lit and noisier as they got closer to the party. Finally, they emerged onto the main strip. Gaudily costumed bards of a multitude of races and colors filled the air with upbeat music on a bizarre variety of wind, string, and percussion instruments. The partygoers, however, were predominantly humans and elves, with just enough dwarves so that Dave wouldn't look terribly out of place. There was a small spattering of half-elves, halflings, and gnomes. The only half-orcs, full orcs, goblins, and other miscellaneous races Julian spotted were either bouncers, servants, musicians, or other entertainers, but even those positions were more represented by the former races than the latter.

Serving trays glided through the air, weaving through the crowd with an assortment of brightly colored drinks. People grabbed drinks as the trays passed, or placed their empty glasses on them to be carried away.

Three or four-story buildings lined either side of the wide main avenue. On the balconies of each floor, obese old men fondled scantily clad women or, less commonly, vice-versa. The whole scene reminded Julian of Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras, only it smelled less like urine. He hoped Cooper and Ravenus were doing okay.

“We might have a shot here,” said Stacy. “There's a lot of eye candy here, and I don't think Mordred's had a lot of luck with the ladies before, if you know what I mean. It's not too much of a stretch to think we might catch him with his pants down.”

Captain Righteous grimaced at all the chaos and depravity before him. “Not if that dwarf gets to him first.”

Stacy nodded. “I was thinking the same thing. We should split up.”

“No no no!” said Dave. “That's never a good idea!”

“Normally, I would agree with the dwarf,” said Captain Righteous. “But we don't know how much time we have, and we can cover twice as much ground in the same amount of time if we divide into two groups.”

Stacy put her hand firmly on Julian's shoulder. “We'll take this side of the street. You three cover the other side.”

Julian wasn't sure he liked being claimed like a prize pig at a county fair, but he considered the alternatives and decided to keep his thoughts to himself.

“Why do I have to go with them?” asked Dave.

“Because you'll slow us down. The captain already has Bingam to slow him down. You won't be as much of a burden.”

Dave frowned. “This sucks.”

Stacy smiled. “Chin up, Dave. This is a party town. You'll stick out more if you look like you're not having fun.”

Dave, Captain Righteous, and Bingam stepped into the crowd, attempting to sway to the rhythm of the music. They were the textbook definition of awkward white guys.

Stacy grabbed a pink drink from a flying tray, sipped it, then nodded and gulped the rest down. She looked up at the sign on the building to their right. “This place looks promising.”

Julian frowned at the sign. “In what way does LIVE NUDE GNOMES look promising to you?”

“Who knows what kind of freaky shit Mordred is into? And besides, when are you ever going to get another chance to see live nude gnomes?”

Julian had tried to take that attitude toward new experiences while he was stuck in this world, but Stacy seemed to be a whole lot better at it. Bracing himself for what he was about to see, he allowed himself to be dragged into the gnome strip club.

There weren't many people inside, at least compared to the density of people outside. Maybe three dozen in all, including the customers, wait staff, and the two topless gnomish women on the stage, swaying listlessly to soft music from some stringed instrument that Julian couldn't see. They looked like human children who'd been snacking on their parents' hormone supplements.

The vast majority of the customers and staff were also gnomes, the exceptions being a dwarf and a halfling sitting alone at tables in the darkest corners of the establishment, and the two goblin greeters, who hadn't given Julian and Stacy the warmest of greetings when they came in.

The coldness of the goblin greeting and the scowls from a few of the patrons suggested that, while Julian and Stacy weren't explicitly forbidden to be in there, they weren't exactly welcome either.

On the bright side, they were at least a foot and a half taller than everyone else in the place, making it easy to see that Mordred wasn't in there. At least, not the halfling version of him.

“Sorry,” said Stacy. “We were given the wrong address.”

The next place they went into, Wanderlust, was much more accommodating to a wider variety of clientele, and thus much more crowded. It was also about three times bigger.

The human and half-elven dancers on the stage performed feats of acrobatics in addition to merely being nude, and were accompanied by a full band of goblins playing a variety of exotic-looking instruments. Other Wanderlust employees, most of whom were also attractive young human and half-elven women identifiable by the uniform red swimsuits they wore, sat at tables with much older men, drinking their drinks and laughing at their jokes. Bartenders worked tirelessly making drinks and loading them onto trays, which would then either fly between the tables or out the front door.

Stacy grabbed a Windex-blue drink as one of the trays passed by. “I could get used to this place.”

“I don't get how they stay in business,” said Julian. “How can they afford to just give away drinks to everyone?”

Stacy scanned the high ceiling and polished marble columns and arches. “I don't know, but their business model appears to be working.”

A silver tray glided down a nearby red-carpeted staircase, passing between two musclebound half-orcs dressed in shiny plate armor and royal blue capes standing guard at the bottom of the stairs. It was carrying two hollowed-out pineapples with bamboo straws.

Julian looked up the stairs, but they curved to the left, obscuring whatever was up there. “Looks like some kind of VIP lounge,” he whispered to Stacy. “Might be worth checking out.”

The silver tray landed gently on the bar. While the mostly goblin bar staff struggled to mix enough drinks to keep up with the insatiable crowd, their human supervisor casually raised an eyebrow as he took a gold coin from the silver serving tray, then slipped it into his pocket.

“Two more pineapples,” he said to his crew. “And stay steady on the rum. His coin purse is starting to loosen up.”

Two half-elven women in red swimsuits rushed down the stairs, dripping wet.

“I've had it,” said the redhead.

The bartender looked up. “Oh shit.”

“We don't get paid enough to deal with this, Rollin.”

“What happened now?”

“He's a pig!”

“It's Mr. Baxter,” the blonde elaborated. Her voice was calmer and meeker, but no less determined. “The man wearing that strange black gemstone pendant.”

“Those hands of his!” said the redhead, more fired up than before. “Even underwater they feel so... slimy!”

The bartender, Rollin, put down the glass he'd been idly polishing. “Listen ladies. Krysta, Roxie? Is that right?”

The two women nodded.

“I get it. You're new to the High Flyers club. The guys up there pay a lot of money to sit in those tubs, and sometimes you'll get one who's also new to the club, and doesn't yet appreciate the boundaries. He'll learn the ropes eventually. But don't you go throwing your careers away over one bad apple.” He raised an eyebrow. “I heard Mr. Foxglove had very nice things to say about you both.”

The blonde, Roxie, covered her mouth with both hands. “Really?”

“Mr. Foxglove was a gentleman,” said Krysta.

“Most of the clients are,” said Rollin. “You'll see. Give it some time.”

Roxie looked at Krysta, who was folding her arms and biting her lower lip in reluctant consideration.

“Tell you what. I'll send two of the more seasoned girls in to cover for you. You two go in the back room and discuss it between yourselves over a drink.” Rollin turned back to his goblin drink makers. “Wormrot, two Magic Missiles for the ladies.”

Roxie licked her lips and smiled at him.

Krysta gave him a small sneer. “Make it top shelf gin.”

Rollin gave her a broad professionally friendly smile. “You got it.”

Stacy leaned close to Julian. “Who do you know that's terrible with women, has severe entitlement issues, and might be wearing a black gemstone?”

Julian nodded. He'd been thinking the same thing. “Should we talk to the girls?”

“Not in front of the bartender. He's encouraging them to whore themselves out to keep the High Flyers happy. If he hears us asking questions about his top clients, he'll have us kicked out for sure. Let's follow them when they get their drinks.”

The hallway the two women walked down wasn't guarded like the staircase leading up to the second floor, but neither was it trafficked by customers. Julian tried to think of an excuse they could use if anyone asked them what business they had going that way, but was having a hard time coming up with anything plausible.

“Look,” said Stacy, pointing at some tables along the right side wall. “There's Vinny.”

“Who's V-Oof!”

Stacy shoved him into the hallway and silently followed close behind him.

“What are you thinking? That made us look even more suspicious!”

“Relax,” said Stacy. “He wasn't even looking at us. He was buttering up the two girls he's about to serve up to Mordred. Now see if you can figure out which of these rooms our girls are in.”

Feeling like a total creep, Julian pressed his ear to each door along the hallway while Stacy kept an eye out behind him.

The first three rooms were either empty, or whoever was inside was being supernaturally quiet. The doors were thin, and Julian's elf ears would easily be able to pick up the sound of two angry women chatting.

They sounded like they were shouting through bullhorns when he pressed his ear against the fourth door.

“We're worth more than this,” said Krysta.

“But this is the Crescent Shadow. How many girls back home would kill to have this gig? Let's stick it out just a little longer.”

Julian nodded at Stacy.

Stacy waved for him to move aside, and positioned herself to kick the door in.

Rather than move out of the way, Julian pushed the door an inch open with one finger.

Stacy shrugged, then walked through the door.

“Hey,” said Krysta. “This is for Wanderlust employees only.”

Stacy pulled a gold coin out of her pocket. “And this is for shutting the fuck up and listening.” She set the coin down on the table.

Krysta and Roxie looked at the coin, then gave Stacy their undivided attention.

Stacy nodded at Julian. “You're the charmer. Take it away.”

Julian cleared his throat. He'd expected Stacy to do all the talking. “Um... hello.”

“Hi there,” said Roxie.

Krysta narrowed her eyes at him.

“Okay. Well, let's see. We couldn't help but overhear your conversation with the bartender back there. It's these sensitive elven ears of mine. I'm sure you ladies can relate.”

“Not really,” said Krysta. “We haven't had a true elf in our bloodline since our great great grandmother, who was raped by a human over a century ago. Purebloods of either race want nothing to do with our kind. That is, of course, unless it's of a temporary nature.”

“Oh,” said Julian. His Diplomacy skill hadn't prepared him for this. “About the man upstairs. I believe he called himself Mr. Baxter?”

“Yeah, what about him?”

“That black gemstone he was wearing. Did it have numbers etched into the sides?”

Krysta put her drink down. “Yeah, I think it did.”

“We need to see Mr. Baxter right away.”

“The guards won't let you upstairs unless you're a High Flyer.” Krysta looked Julian and Stacy up and down. “You don't look like High Flyers to me.”

Julian shrugged. “We're not.”

“For another gold piece, I'll run upstairs and tell him you're here.”

Julian raised his hands defensively. “No no no. That won't do at all. You see, he won't want to meet us.”

Krysta and Roxie exchanged glances.

“Interesting,” said Krysta.

“In that case,” said Roxie, smiling up at Julian. “For another three gold pieces, we won't run upstairs and tell him you're here.”

Stacy dug into her pocket and glared at Julian. “You really nailed that Diplomacy.” She slapped three more coins down on the table.

“So what are you thinking?” asked Julian. “One of us runs distraction on the guards while the other runs upstairs and swipes the die from Mordred?”

“Wow. Like, every single part of that plan is just the worst.”

“What then?”

“Use your head, Julian,” said Stacy. “Why would we chase down these lovely ladies just to confirm information we already know? They can easily slip past the guards, get right up close to Mr. Baxter, and –”

“I think you may be overestimating how much four gold pieces buys you,” said Krysta. She picked up two of the gold pieces and slid the other two to Roxie. “You've already paid us, and all we've agreed to so far was to shut the fuck up and listen.”

“And you've been doing a fine job of that up til now. Please continue just a little while longer.” Stacy turned back to Julian. “Give me those scrolls you swiped from the basement earlier.”

Julian dug through his bag until he found the scrolls in question. “How did you –”

“I'm awesome.”

Julian handed over the scrolls. “I think I see where you're going with this. But I'm not sure if a Disguise Self spell can make me look like a woman.”

“Sure it can,” said Roxie. “I mean, I've got no personal experience with it, but girls talk. You go into any normal brothel, and it's just a matter of weird things men want to have sex with. Get a few drinks into a wizard on the Crescent Shadow, and it becomes a matter of weird things he wants to have sex as. Experimenting as a woman is really beginner-level stuff. You don't want to know some of the stories I've heard.”

“That's true,” said Julian. “I don't.” He looked at Stacy. “But there's one more problem. It's a Disguise Self spell. That means I can't cast it on you.”

Stacy opened one of the scrolls. “So I'll cast it on myself.”

“This is magical text. You can't read it.”

“It's kinda weird, but it looks pretty straightforward.”

“It's anything but straightforward,” said Julian. “I'm a sorcerer, and even I need to cast a Read Magic spell to comprehend it.”

Stacy spread the scroll out flat on the table, weighing the top corners down with Krysta and Roxie's drinks. She traced her finger from one arcane symbol to another, mumbling to herself and seeming to find patterns where Julian saw none.

“Dum dedum dedum...” Stacy said. “And that goes here, and then you say that.” She winked at Julian. “Piece of cake.”

Julian smiled. “Fine. Let's see what you've got.”

Stacy waved her hand in front of her face as she spoke the incantation. “Disguise Self.”

Much to Julian's surprise, the arcane writing disappeared from the scroll, leaving it completely blank. He looked up and found that there were now two Krystas. Identical red hair. Identical green eyes. Identical pointed ears. They were even wearing the same red swimsuits.

“How the hell did you do that?”

“Hello?” said the Krysta standing behind the real Krysta, but in Stacy's voice. “Awesome.”

Julian shook his head. “That is not an explanation. You're not a wizard. You can't read magic.”

“You don't have to be a wizard to figure out magical writing,” said Roxie. “It's a skill some people have.”

Julian's heart skipped a beat. He gaped at Roxie. “How do you know about skills? Are you from Earth? Do you know what's going on here?”

Roxie leaned back, eyes wide, mildly terrified. “No. I don't understand. Are you asking me how I know what the word skills means?”

“Oh.” Julian relaxed. “You meant it in the more conventional sense of the word. I apologize for startling you.”

“Come on, hurry it up,” said Stacy. “This spell isn't going to last forever.”

Julian unrolled the other scroll, slightly embarrassed to have to use a Read Magic spell to decipher the arcane text. He stared at Roxie, trying not to be creepy about it.

Roxie repositioned herself so he could get a better look, and smiled to show him that she understood why he was staring at her.

“Disguise Self.” He looked down to discover that he'd grown tits. “Wonderful.”

“Yikes,” said Stacy. “You still sound like a dude. Can you try to sound a little more like Roxie?”

Julian cleared his throat. “Hello. My name's Roxie.”

Roxie and two Krystas cringed at his effort.

“You should probably just shut up and let me do the talking,” said Stacy.

Julian forced a smile. “Of course, because you've got such a knack for Diplomacy.”

Stacy stood back to take him in, then sighed. “Stand up straight, and maybe squeeze your boobs together a little more. Keep the attention up there. Here, let me help you.”

There were few situations Julian could think of that would be more emasculating than having a woman help him adjust his tits.

“I guess that's passable,” said Stacy when she'd finished fondling him. She turned to Roxie and Krysta. “Now, what to do about these two?”

“They seem nice enough,” said Julian. “Would you mind waiting here until we finish what we need to do?”

“Sure we will,” said Krysta.

Stacy shook her head. “Bullshit. We're fucking with their livelihoods. As soon as we walk out the door, they'll rat us out so they don't get blamed for whatever we end up doing up there.”

“Really?” Julian asked Roxie.

Roxie shrugged. “She makes a good point.”

“I've got an idea,” said Stacy. She put both her hands on the left side of her waist and wiggled her fingers. Before Julian could ask what she was doing, she began pulling a rope out from her abdomen, like Mary Poppins removing her own small intestine.

“That's disturbing,” said Julian. “But impressive.”

“We're still holding all our stuff,” said Stacy. “It's just disguised by the spell.”

After allowing Krysta and Roxie to gulp down the rest of their drinks, Stacy had them sit back to back, then tied them together.

“Thanks for being good sports about this,” said Julian.

“Come on,” said Stacy. “Let's do this.”

The hallway was clear. Julian struggled to keep Stacy's brisk pace because his balls felt like they were in a vice.

“Don't say anything, but make plenty of eye contact,” said Stacy when they got to the end of the hallway. “You want to keep all eyes above your waist.”

“You're certainly keeping mine there,” said Rollin, rounding the corner and drinking in Julian's tits with his eyes. “Those are just fantastic.”

Not wanting to say Thank you out loud, Julian did the next best thing he could think of. He smiled and wagged his tits back and forth in front of Rollin.

Rollin shifted his gaze to Stacy. “You're just the two ladies I was on my way to find. Did you think about what we discussed earlier?”

“We did,” said Stacy.

“I've got to tell you, you drive a hard bargain. You played Mr. Baxter like a fiddle. He sent those other two girls back and offered to pay triple the standard rate for you two.”

“Oldest trick in the book,” said Stacy. “Playing hard-to-get. Works every time. Right, Roxie?”

Julian grinned nervously and nodded.

“With smarts like that, and tits like those, you'll go far in this business. But you don't want to overplay it.” Rollin walked between them and slapped them both on the ass. “Now get up there and show him what you're worth.”

While Julian was merely feeling awkward and self-aware as he strutted through the tavern with his junk between his legs, Stacy was practically seething with anger.

“I swear to God, the only thing keeping me from beating the shit out of that sleazebag is that I don't want Krysta and Roxie to suffer any repercussions.”

Julian kept smiling and whispered while trying not to move his lips. “Save it for Mordred. Right now, focus on getting past these guards.”

If Julian was giving off any nervous vibes, the guards didn't so much as grunt as he and Stacy passed between them.

“You see?” said Stacy. “We're doing fine. Nothing to be nervous about.”

“So what's our plan for confronting Mordred?”

The second floor was defined by a three-foot-high circular wall, but had no ceiling. Along the perimeter, hot tubs bubbled and glowed with magical light, filling the night air with vividly colored steam. There were a few semi-spherical indentations in the ground where it appeared that the hot tubs hadn't yet been installed. Those already had magical fires burning, as well as leather-padded curved bars which looked like they were there to support the tubs. Julian guessed that meant they'd be installed soon.

Silver trays floated from tub to tub, delivering drinks in pineapples, coconuts, and a couple of other hard-shelled fruits that Julian couldn't identify. Some of the patrons looked refined, chatting quietly with their ladies and occasionally pausing to allow them to laugh, while others tried to grope five or six women at a time, seemingly unaware or unconcerned with who was watching them. Or maybe they were exhibitionists. Either way, many of the ladies had more flexible boundaries than Krysta and Roxie's.

“There's my girls!” shouted a short-bearded, but massively hairy dwarf. His coarse black body hair was so thick it could almost be called fur. He looked like the bastard offspring of Danny DeVito and a bear. And just as the ladies had said, a thick silver chain shone brightly against a backdrop of neck and chest hair. At the center, between his hairy man-tits, a silver dragon claw grasped one of Mordred's magic dice. “You come back to gaze into my crystal balls?”

“Jesus Christ,” murmured Stacy. “The power's really gone to his head.”

Julian smiled at the hairy naked dwarf as he and Stacy sauntered to his hot tub. “So are we just going to jump him and grab the die?”

“We'd need a really quick exit plan to pull that off. Let's see how drunk he is first, and maybe try to get him a little more drunk. We'll jump him as a last resort if our Disguise spells time out before we get anywhere.”

Julian nodded his agreement as they were getting closer to the tub.

He and Stacy stepped into the hot steamy water and sat across from him, on a step halfway down what was essentially a giant glass bowl with a dark-stained wooden ledge around the rim. There were no jets or bulbs. The light and bubbles appeared to be coming from a pile of enchanted glass pebbles at the bottom of the bowl. The bubbles, unfortunately, were not dense enough to obscure Julian's view of Mordred's hard and hairy dwarf dick rising up from his pubes like an ostrich neck.

“So you finally came to your senses,” said Mordred. “Well lucky for you, I'm in a forgiving mood. Still, you might have to be punished.” He wiggled his eyebrows.

Even knowing that Mordred might only be moments away from raping and/or murdering him, Julian couldn't help but feel a little sympathy for the guy. A lifetime of social alienation had snowballed to the point that he was clearly mimicking douchebag stereotypes from terrible movies in lieu of letting people see his real personality. Even here, in a world of his own creation, he didn't feel comfortable being himself.

Mordred leaned back, rested his left hand on what appeared to be some kind of ergonomic bump in the wooden ledge, and grabbed his dick with his right hand. “Now let's get a look at those tits.”

Julian couldn't explain why he felt uncomfortable granting Mordred's demand. He was a guy. He'd been shirtless in public before. His tits were merely an illusion. Hell, if he was honest, he kind of wanted to get a peek at them himself. And yet, he hesitated, instead looking at Stacy to follow her lead.

“You see, Mr. Baxter,” said Stacy. “I think this is what led to our earlier misunderstanding. It's not you, of course. There's nothing we wouldn't do for you. But in front of all these other people.” She ran a finger from Mordred's knee halfway up to his crotch. “A lady doesn't show the goods to just any man.”

Mordred narrowed his eyes and paused in his dick stroking. “When did you start talking like that?”

“Like what?” Stacy, likewise, stopped moving her finger toward his crotch.

“That strange accent, what is that?”

“You don't like it?”

Mordred shrugged. “It's fine. But I want you to know that you can feel free to be yourself around me.”

“That's very thoughtful of you.”

“If privacy is what you want, you should have said something before.”

Julian's heart jumped as the whole hot tub suddenly shifted. He looked over his shoulder, and was surprised to see the building slowly falling away.

“Wha–” said Julian, then caught himself.

“Whoa, Roxie!” said Mordred. “What's with you girls' voices?”

Julian, panicked on two fronts, looked at Stacy again.

“She's come down with a sore throat,” said Stacy.

Mordred grinned at Julian. “Need something to suck on?”

Julian smiled and shook his head politely, relieved to have not blown his cover, but still a little unsettled by being in a glass bowl a hundred feet above a floating island.

“Good,” said Mordred. “I need it to steer.” He pulled his dick to the right, and the tub tilted hard right along with it.

Stacy and Julian reached their arms back to grab the wooden ledge and each other's hands. The way Mordred was looking at them, now that their breasts were thrust forward, that might have been just what he'd had in mind. He jerked his dong to the right, and the tub swerved right. He brought it up straight, and the tub stabilized in the air.

Julian caught himself gawking at Mordred's dick, then checked to see if he noticed. Mordred was staring back at him with one eyebrow cocked.

“Wait till you see what else it can do.”

Stacy scooted around the tub, moving in close to Mordred. She ran her fingers through his belly hair. “What's that you've got around your neck? I've never seen anything like it.”

“Do you like it?” said Mordred, moving his hand from his dick to her leg. “It was very expensive.”

“What do those numbers mean?”

“Those are symbols with which to represent values of quantity or order.”

Julian stifled a laugh at Stacy trying to mask her hostility at having the concept of numbers explained to her.

“Fascinating,” she said with a touch of ice in her tone.

Mordred leaned in closer. “You know what I find fascinating?”

“What's that?”

“Pussy!” his arm shot up her leg like a viper, and he grabbed her crotch.

Unlike a viper, it snapped loudly when she bent it back. At the same time, her other hand produced a dagger from beneath the surface of the water, and drove it down hard into Mordred's other hand.

Mordred howled in pain as the levitating hot tub started to spin, then lurch, then dip sideways.

“You're a real piece of work, Mordred!” said Stacy. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself.”

“Who?”

“Cut the shit. It's me, Stacy.”

“I thought your name was Crystal.”

“It's Krysta! But not really. It's Stacy, the girl you abducted from Earth. Ring any bells?”

“What's Earth?”

“I don't have time for this shit,” said Stacy. “Grab the die, Julian. Don't let him touch it!”

The hot tub tilted hard in Julian's direction. Water was spilling past him onto the crowd on the main street below, which he was terrified to discover he could see by looking over his shoulder. He had more immediate concerns than magic dice right now. He lunged forward and grabbed Mordred's dick.

“Yaaaaaa!” cried Mordred as the hot tub jerked upward, then spun around and shot toward the high tower like a bullet.

“I said the die!” cried Stacy. “What the hell are you doing?” She let go of the dagger pinning Mordred's hand down and grabbed the die herself.

“I'm trying to steer!” Julian yanked Mordred's dick left and right, but the hot tub's twists and turns didn't seem to have any correlation to which way he pulled. Even worse, it was starting to get flaccid. “Don't you go soft on me!”

Mordred looked even more horrified than before. “Are... Are you a man?”

“Dude, I need you to suspend some disbelief right now. I'm a fine-ass woman with my hand on your big manly cock.” Julian slipped his free hand through the shoulder strap of his swimsuit, setting loose his left tit. It was on the small side, but nice and perky. “Come on, man. Focus on the nipple and get your dick back under control or we're all going to die.”

The hot tub looped around the tall tower, then shot straight up another fifty feet, narrowly missing a six-person orgy happening in a properly-controlled flying hot tub, before spinning around five or six times and plummeting back toward the partying crowd below.

“I wasn't actually steering with my dick!” cried Mordred. “That's ridiculous. Who would design a flying hot tub that you steer with your dick? That's just a little trick I like to play for the ladies.”

Julian jerked his hand back from Mordred's dick and covered his boob again. “Then how do you steer?”

Mordred glared at Stacy as she wrestled the silver chain over his head, then nodded at the dagger pinning down his other hand.

“With that.”

Stacy gripped the dagger's handle with both hands, then yanked it free. Mordred yelped in pain and pulled his hand away as purple sparks of magical energy spat out of the hole the dagger had left in the wood.

Fortunately, this seemed to cause the hot tub to finally make up its mind which way it wanted to go. Unfortunately, that route would send them hurtling past the edge of the Crescent Shadow to crash in the Fertile Desert. Wherever they were, Julian couldn't see the lights of a city or village anywhere on the horizon. They were surrounded by miles and miles of nothing.

Stacy jostled Mordred. “Can you fix that?”

“I can't use my hands, you crazy bitch!” Mordred's broken arm was bruised and swelling, and his injured hand was leaking blood into the tub, turning the water pink.

Julian spotted a small grove of oak trees at the edge of the island in the direction of the hot tub's trajectory. He turned to Stacy and was taken aback to see that she looked like Stacy again.

Mordred gasped, but he was staring at Julian. “It's true! You're a... And you grabbed my...”

“Doesn't feel so good, does it?” said Stacy.

The edge of the island was fast approaching. Julian didn't have time to do anything but act. He grabbed Stacy by the arm. Anticipating her reflexive elbow to his face, he ducked under it, pulled her close, then pushed down hard with his feet, launching them away from the hot tub, sending them in a slightly more downward arc toward certain death.

Stacy wrapped her arms and legs around him. “Julian! What are you –”

“Web!” said Julian, pointing with his free hand at the oak trees below them. A sticky white jizz net squirted out of his fingertips, taking hold of the branches of three trees, and catching Stacy and Julian like a couple of unsuspecting flies.

They spent a few moments in silence, suspended fifteen feet in the air upside down in a web of magical splooge. It was a close call, but they were alive.

“You okay?” Julian finally said.

“Yeah.”

“I feel kind of bad about not saving Mordred.”

“Don't worry about it,” said Stacy. “That wasn't Mordred.”

Julian wasn't sure that a person not having an immediate utilitarian purpose to serve was grounds for not worrying about having just let them fall to their death, but he wasn't in the right frame of mind to have this argument with Stacy.

“How do you know?”

“The way he looked at you,” said Stacy. “He was horrified that a dude had grabbed his dick, but he didn't recognize you.”

She was right. Julian stretched his neck to look at her. The silver dragon claw pendant grasped the black die just below the top of her ear.

“Then who was he? And how did he get his hands on one of Mordred's dice?”

Stacy sighed. “Those are both excellent questions. Maybe we should have tried a little harder to rescue him after all.”

Chapter 13

Cooper could sense Nabi's excitement and nervousness grow with each step they took toward Glittersprinkles Grove. She was returning home, but home wasn't going to be the same as when she'd left it. Also, returning as an axe wasn't exactly ideal either.

Cooper had been feeling similarly excited and nervous, but that had less to do with getting closer to Glittersprinkles Grove, and more to do with getting as far away from Totino as possible before that jailer discovered the shit soaked through his mattress and smeared all over his wall. Now that it was mid-afternoon, he figured he was out of the woods, figuratively speaking.

“We could literally be going anywhere else right now,” said Chaz. “And there are definitely other places we should go. And yet we're making a beeline for this place which three people explicitly told us we should stay the fuck away from because your axe wants to go there.”

Cooper continued walking, willing himself not to turn around and geyser Chaz in the face. Doing it too often would only slow them down and make it less effective in the long run.

“Are you listening to me?” Chaz continued. “Does that not sound crazy to you?”

“No, it doesn't. But you're starting to sound a little thirsty.”

“Hose me all you want. That dude said those woods are crawling with shadows.”

Cooper would have preferred a conversation with Ravenus at this point. “All fucking woods have shadows in them!”

“No no no,” said Chaz. “You don't get to play the stupid card on this one. You and I both know he wasn't talking about regular shadows. He was talking about some kind of undead, like ghosts or ghouls or some shit.”

“Dude, nobody's begging you to tag along. If you want to go, here's my blessing.” Cooper stopped, closed his eyes, and concentrated until a fart squeaked out.

“I just might do that, you know. It's in my best interest to stay with you now because safety in numbers and all that. But when you walk into ghoul-infested woods, it'll be time for me to reevaluate my plans. You're armed with a big-ass axe. I'm not armed with shit. Even my lute got smashed when I hit the big tomato.”

Cooper sighed. Chaz had finally done it. He'd worn Cooper down to the point where it was worth trying an explanation. He stopped and turned around.

Chaz flinched, raising his arms in self-defense.

“I picked up this axe on the Barrier Islands off the body of an orc that I killed.”

Chaz lowered his arms slowly. “Do you think I'm trying to take your axe, because that's way off base.”

“I'm just explaining,” said Cooper. “We met in a random remote place under a random and remote set of circumstances. Then we landed in the desert in another random and remote place, under another random and remote set of circumstances, only a few days' walk from Nabi's homeland. I feel like the game brought me here for a reason.”

“The game didn't bring us here,” said Chaz. “You brought us here when you decided to hose me down with dickwater!”

“But you don't find it coincidental that I decided to hose you down with dickwater only a few days' walk from Nabi's homeland?”

“No! Because Knobby is a hunk of steel, and therefore doesn't have a homeland. You're talking to an inanimate object and picking coincidences out of the ether to corroborate your own delusions. It's like A Beautiful Mind if Russell Crowe's character was retarded.”

How did you know about Glittersprinkles Grove or the faefolk who live there?

As if Cooper didn't have enough to deal with right now. “Because you fucking told me about them.”

“I told you about what?” asked Chaz.

Cooper rolled his eyes. “Not you, dipshit.”

No. I meant that you should ask your friend that question.

“Oh.” Cooper thought for a moment. “Could you repeat it?”

Chaz started to speak, but Cooper shut him up with a look.

How did you know about Glittersprinkles Grove or the faefolk who live there?

Cooper nodded. “How did I know about Glittersprinkles Grove or the faefolk who live there?” He put his hands on his hips and raised his eyebrows at Chaz, confident that Nabi had given him a profound argument, even if he was still trying to figure out its relevance for himself.

As if he'd cast a magic spell, the argument served at least to shut Chaz up for a bit.

After a moment of thought, Chaz slowly nodded. “Okay. I believe you.”

“Was that that good of an argument?”

“It had some merit,” said Chaz. “But what really convinced me is the fact that you were able to make an intelligent-sounding argument at all.”

Cooper was pretty sure that was an insult, but he was prepared to let it slide. “Now will you please stop bitching?”

“Just because I believe you doesn't mean I think it's a good idea.”

For fuck's sake. Cooper started to reach for the Decanter of Endless Water.

“Wait,” said Chaz. “Hear me out. I'm still a bard without an instrument, and you're still a low-level barbarian, about to charge into a forest full of ghosts. We've got friends who might be in trouble, or who might be out looking for us. What if we passed the axe – sorry, Nabi – to someone else?”

“She chose me.”

“She chose wrong!”

That might have stung if said by someone Cooper gave a shit about. But coming from Chaz, it was less like a dagger in the heart, and more like a splinter in the ass. The argument was starting to loop around again. It was time to stop the train and see who was getting off.

“Look, dude,” said Cooper. “Nabi has helped me, and I'm going to help her. I'm not going to think any less of you if you choose to go your own way. Hell, I'm not going to think of you at all. But if you choose to come with me, I don't want to hear another fucking word about it.”

A spot of darkness stood out against the pristine blue sky just above the horizon. When it grew large enough to take on a recognizable form, it squawked to announce its arrival. Great. As soon as he gets one to shut up, the other one starts in. It was like they were tag-teaming annoyance.

Ravenus flapped his big goofy wings until he landed on the ground, squawking excitedly.

“He says he found it,” said Chaz. “Glittersprinkles Grove is about a half day's walk from here.”

Cooper nodded. “We'll go on a little further and find a place to spend the night. When I leave tomorrow, you can choose to follow me or not.”

Chapter 14

“I'm very sorry, sir, but we cannot allow a basilisk to board a passenger vessel. There simply isn't enough room. Besides, eyes or no eyes, it's still a ferocious man-eating monster. That would make the other passengers very uncomfortable.”

“But Basil's real friendly once you get to know him,” said Randy. “I'd keep a real close eye on him.”

When they'd first started talking to the deckhand of The Maiden's Voyage, he set of Randy's gaydar, and Randy was picking up strong signals of attraction. He thought he might use that to his advantage, and have better luck with him than he'd had with the previous six deckhands and ships' captains who'd flat out refused him once he brought up Basil. The signals were now beginning to feel more like annoyance than attraction.

Randy didn't want to let Katherine down, but neither did he want to abandon Basil. He had one last card to play. “Would it help if I told you I was a paladin of the New God?”

The deckhand rolled his eyes and sighed. “If I allowed a basilisk aboard this ship, Captain Longfellow would chop both it and me to pieces and chum the water with us. Even if you were the New God himself, I'd rather face his wrath than the captain's. Now please move along, sir.”

His sharp tone stung. Randy lowered his head. “I apologize for wasting your time.”

“Alexei!” shouted a gruff voice from the deck of the ship. “You semen-guzzling shit-for-brains arse fucker. I don't pay you to jerk off dockworkers. Get yer cockworn ass up here and secure the cargo hold.”

The deckhand, Alexei, stood alert. “What about the shipment from Captain Fry?”

“We just received word from the Falcon. It's caught in a storm. Now question me again, lad, and I'll give you a cock slappin' I guarantee you won't enjoy.”

“Yes, sir!” Alexei said as he ran nimbly up the thin plank connecting the ship to the pier.

Randy decided he didn't want to sail with a captain like that anyway and started back down the pier, dreading the look on Katherine's face when he came back empty-handed again.

Halfway to the shore, he heard footsteps running hard and fast on the boards behind him.

“Hey! Wait!” It was Alexei's voice.

Randy turned around. Sure enough, the deckhand was running after him and waving his arms. When he saw Randy had stopped, he slowed to a jog and caught his breath.

“Captain Longfellow wants a word with you.”

“With me?” asked Randy. “Why does he want –” He thought back on all the horrible derogatory remarks the captain had hurled at Alexei. “Well you can tell Captain Longfellow that I don't like his words.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don't like the way he talked to you, those names he called you. It was disrespectful.”

“He talks like that to everyone. It's just the way he is. Have you never been aboard a ship before?”

“I... but...”

“I told him about your basilisk problem. He's intrigued.”

Randy temporarily shelved his thoughts of Captain Longfellow, deeming Katherine's quest more important. “All right, let's go.”

Alexei led Randy back down the pier, then bounded across the plank as sure-footed as a tightrope walker on an eight-lane highway.

Randy paused before stepping onto the plank, wondering why he wasn't terrified. No vertigo or queasiness or nothing. Maybe it was because he knew the fall wouldn't be fatal, but he was sure that wouldn't have mattered before. He just plain didn't like heights, and here he was walking on a foot-wide wooden board fifteen feet above the water. He should have been peeing himself. But strangely enough, he wasn't afraid at all. He actually took some pleasure in the bounce the board put in his step as it bent under his weight.

The Maiden's Voyage wasn't the biggest ship in the harbor, but Randy guessed it could comfortably accommodate fifty passengers, or uncomfortably accommodate a hundred.

“Captain's up there,” said Alexei, nodding to the top of what looked like a small tower standing above the passengers' quarters. A rope and wood ladder hung from the top of the rearmost passengers' quarters, and a narrow staircase rose steeply up and around the structure from which the captain could survey the sea around him in every direction.

“Are you coming?” asked Randy.

“Aye. I vouched for you. Until the captain welcomes you aboard himself, any trouble you cause on this ship puts my balls on the chopping block.”

Randy nodded. “I appreciate that. I ain't here to cause trouble.”

“That remains to be seen. Now up the ladder with you.”

While Randy climbed the ladder with what he thought was adequate climbing skill and speed, Alexei put him to shame. He leaped on top of a barrel, jumped straight up to catch the edge of the roof, then pulled himself up with the effortless grace of an acrobat, and all in plenty of time to offer a hand down to help Randy the rest of the way up.

“I've got it just fine, thank you,” said Randy, pulling himself onto the roof of the passengers' quarters considerably less gracefully. “You gonna cartwheel up the stairs now?”

“Nah, we'll just walk normal like.” Alexei led the way. “I apologize for being short with you earlier. I never thought Captain Longfellow would allow a basilisk aboard his ship. Lucky for you, his regular cargo has been delayed, and he's in a bit of a bind. I still can't believe he's considering this. I've never seen a real basilisk before.”

“It's quite a thing to behold, that's for sure.”

“I've no doubt.” When Alexei reached the top of the stairs, he held his hand out for Randy to remain a couple of steps down, then opened the door. “Permission to enter the Captain's Roost.”

“Get yer cock scabbards in here and close the door behind ye,” said the captain from inside.

Alexei gave a short bow, then stood back and held the door open wider for Randy. “After you.”

The Captain's Roost smelled like salt and old fish. It was about half the length of the ship, and a quarter of the width. Shelves lined the walls, cluttered with dusty exotic trinkets, presumably collected during a lifetime of trading at different ports all around the world. A long table ran down the center of the roost, covered in maps, charts, and dagger marks.

At the far end of the table stood Captain Longfellow himself, proud and tall, his milky grey eyes  peering at Randy from the shadow of his impressive captain's hat. He might have been as young as thirty-five or as old as sixty, depending how how much a life at sea had contributed to the sun-scorched wrinkles on his face and hands and the grey streaks in his grizzled beard.

“Yon cockswallower tells me ye wish to bring a basilisk aboard me ship.”

“First of all, I don't appreciate you calling him that.”

The captain's grizzled beard pointed at Randy as he rubbed under his chin. “He be a basilisk, don't he? What would you prefer me to call him, a bleedin' hedgehog?”

“I mean Alexei. I don't like that word you called him.”

“A cockswallower?” said the captain. “As in one who swallows cock?” He looked at Alexei. “Tell me, lad. Am I mistaken? Or do ye not do a fine job of swallowing cock?”

“It's kind of you to say, sir.”

“Thank the gods. And here I thought I'd lost me salted mind.”

“I'm sorry,” said Randy, feeling slightly confused. “I thought –”

The captain thrust an open hand out at Randy, paralyzing him. “Now did ye come here to lecture me on how to address me crew, or did ye have some matters of business to propose?” He wiggled the tip of his middle finger, and Randy found that he was able to move his mouth.

“I came to propose a matter of business.”

“Very good.” The captain's gaze shifted to something just above and beyond Randy. He nodded. A second later, Randy felt something furry jump onto his head and grab his ears. He suspected it was a monkey. Some monkey-like screams in his ear lent strength to that suspicion.

“Lord Shitflinger knows a fib when he hears one,” said Captain Longfellow. “Tell me no tales, and ye have nothing to fear.”

“I know no fear, for I am strong with the Lord, Jesus Christ.” The words just slipped out of him. He supposed that must account for his sudden lack of acrophobia. “As a beacon of His name, I can neither tell a lie, nor can I attempt to deceive by withholding truths.”

Captain Longfellow thought for a moment, then lowered his hand, releasing Randy from his paralysis. “Aye. That makes things easier.” He snapped his fingers, and Lord Shitflinger ran across the table on his little monkey hands and feet, then leaped onto the captain's shoulder. The captain produced a purple grape from his pocket and held it up for the monkey, who greedily shoved it into his mouth. The captain motioned to Randy. “Have a seat.”

Randy sat down on a stool near the middle of the table. “Thank you.”

The captain took a seat at the head of the table. “Now what in the blazes do ye need to be transporting a living bloody basilisk for?”

“Basil has no eyes. He needs me to look after him. And I need to accompany my friend on a mission she has overseas.”

“Oh, a ladyfriend? And here I'd had you pegged as a knob gobblin' sperm tank.”

“I am a homosexual.”

Captain Longfellow's face wrinkled up like an old man's scrotum. “And what in the Seven Hells does that mean?”

Randy supposed that term might not have been coined here. Rather than stretch out this part of the conversation any more than he had to, he opted to use the term the captain was obviously familiar with. “I'm a knob gobblin' sperm tank.”

“Aye, ye'll find yourself in good company here.” Captain Longfellow flattened out the rolled up sides of a map, spreading it wide across the table. “Now, what be your intended final destination?”

“We're trying to get to a place called Nazere.”

The captain's eyes widened. “Oh, is that all?” He looked up at Alexei. “Do ye hear that, lad? Just a quick trip to Nazere. Won't that be nice?”

Randy frowned at the obvious sarcasm. “I take it there's a problem?”

“Too fuckin' right there's a problem, matey!”

“Well, if you're afraid, I suppose I'll have to take my business elsewhere.” Randy stood up.

The captain leaned back and showed off his collection of gold and silver teeth. “That's a good try, son. Challenge my courage to my face in front of me first mate. I've stabbed men for less.”

Randy glanced back. Alexei was standing conspicuously in front of the doorway, arms crossed with a stoic look on his face. Randy suddenly felt bad for what he'd said, and hoped Alexei wouldn't suffer any repercussions for Randy's rude behavior.

“I apologize, sir. I meant no offense.”

Captain Longfellow stood up and gave Randy a cold hard glare. “Would you call a man craven for refusing to put his meat harpoon in a dire shark's mouth if his friends dared him to do it?”

Randy shook his head. “I would not.”

“And would you call a man brave who would do such a thing?”

“Not brave,” said Randy. “More like insane.”

“More like craven! There's naught to be gained by feeding yer cock to a fish but the fleeting respect of those who would see ye feed yer cock to a fish. So one's only motivation for doing so would be fear. Fear of what those arseholes think of you, the rumors they'll spread about you. A fear so great you'd rather sacrifice yer own willy than face it. Can ye conjure in yer mind a finer example of cowardice than that?”

Randy looked at the floor. “No. I'm sorry. I –”

“Bend over, and I'll show ye where you can stuff yer sorries!” The captain sat down, leaned back, and put his worn leather-booted feet up on the table. “But I'll admit to being intrigued as to what business a so-called paladin of the New God has with the Ice Queen of the Frozen Damned.”

Randy pursed his lips, wondering how deep of shit they were getting themselves into. “That's actually the first time I've heard her referred to as such. But like I said, it's my friend who has business with her. Her brother died, and then Basil, my basilisk, ate him. We brought a pile of Basil's... excrement... to the Temple of Life. The cleric there told us the only way to bring my friend's brother back to life would be to retrieve the missing Eye of Rasha, which the Ice Queen apparently has mounted on her scepter.”

“And you think that you and your merry band of come-garglin' scallywags is going to march right up to the Ice Queen, kick her in the box, and swipe her scepter?”

“That's actually more of a plan than what we've come up with so far.”

“Yer all mad.” Captain Longfellow flipped a gold coin with his thumb and caught it in his palm. “I appreciate a touch of madness. Keeps things interesting. I'll take ye as near as the Callista Island chain, but no nearer than that. Perhaps there ye can find someone daft or desperate enough to take ye the rest of the way.”

Randy grinned, his heart refilled with hope. “Thank you, Captain!”

“So that's three passengers, you say? Plus the basilisk, of course.”

“And a wolf.”

“A wolf?”

“Sorry,” said Randy. “It's my friend's Animal Companion. He's generally pretty quiet. So much so that I forgot all about him until just now.”

“Well this is yer last chance to jog yer memory, lad. Don't be showing up on the dock with six kangaroos and a herd of bloody elephants ye forgot to mention.”

Randy nodded. “That's all. I'm sure of it.”

“I'll trust ye to keep the wolf contained in yer quarters. That won't rattle the crew or other passengers up too much anyway. But the basilisk, that we'll have to keep hidden. We'll set sail in two days' time.” He walked along the table until he came to a pile of long scroll tubes. He removed the paper from one and unrolled it on the table, displaying an older map of Cardinia from a time when it was a little less crowded and developed.

“There's an old storm drain at the bottom of the city wall here,” the captain continued, pointing at a spot on the southern wall near the coast. “The bars are loose. You should be able to remove enough of them to squeeze that big bastard through. Once ye're in  the tunnels, you'll follow this one all the way up here, where ye'll turn right.” There were no tunnels drawn on the map, but the captain traced his grimy finger along a main avenue and stopped at what appeared to be an only slightly smaller street. It looked like it would be obvious enough to find. “Two of me most trusted men will meet ye here and escort ye to the Maiden's Voyage. It'll cost ye two hundred gold pieces. Make sure you bring it with you then. New God or no New God, I'll not be loading a basilisk on me ship on faith alone.”

Chapter 15

Dave, Captain Righteous, and Bingam attracted stares in each place they entered. They looked neither fun-loving nor wizardly, and the stares were making Dave feel even less so on both fronts. He took a drink from a passing tray, then caught Captain Righteous glowering at him like he was boiling his own mother.

“What?”

“I thought you might take this assignment a little more seriously.”

“You need to loosen up, man,” said Dave. “Have you not noticed that we're being gawked at everywhere we go? Mordred will see us coming a mile away.”

Captain Righteous frowned at all the people having fun around him. “We do seem to stand out. Very well. One drink each.” He took two drinks from a tray and glared at Bingam as he passed one to him. “Small sips.”

“Yes, Uncle,” said Bingam, timidly accepting his pink drink.

Whatever family issues Bingam and Righteous had were their business, Dave wouldn't be told how much of this slightly alcoholic Gatorade he was allowed to drink. He was a dwarf, and this stuff would have zero effect on him.

As much as they stood out, they at least had the advantage, or so Dave hoped, of Mordred not knowing that they had escaped from their cages. Mordred, on the other hand, would be at a disadvantage. He was a halfling, which would make it easier for him to hide in most circumstances. But in the current circumstances, he wouldn't know there was anyone he should be hiding from. Plus, halflings were few and far between here, which made those few stand out more, especially if one was looking for them.

“Excuse me,” said Captain Righteous, gripping a purple-robed man with severe black eyebrows by the shoulder. “We're looking for a red-robed halfling.”

“I've seen nothing of the sort,” said the man, annoyed at having been grabbed by the shoulder, but once he gave Captain Righteous a good look up and down, his expression mellowed. “But there are live nude gnomes across the street. I can take you there if you like.”

“That will not be necessary.” Captain Righteous released the man and took more than a little sip from his drink. “Such decadence and debauchery will be the ruin of our society.”

Dave considered saying something about not being so uptight, but he chose instead to just ignore the captain and drink. Scanning the room for another floating drink tray, something caught his gaze and held it. An old man sitting alone at one of the black granite tables outside on the patio.

Black and white forked beard. Why does that seem somehow... Murkwort!

Dave grabbed Captain Righteous's arm.

“Unhand me at once, dwarf!”

Dave glared at him but let go. “Stop calling attention to yourself and look at what I've found.” He turned around.

“What are we looking at?” asked the captain. “The sad old man with the black and white beard?”

“Yes.”

“Is that Mordred?”

“No, but he's the last person known to have been in possession of the magic dice. Katherine's friend lifted them off Frank and must have sold them to Murkwort.”

Captain Righteous raised his eyebrows. “Katherine's friend?”

“Murkwort said he was coming here to make some big score.”

“Why is he alone? Has the transaction perhaps not yet taken place?”

Dave shrugged. “Who knows? He could be waiting for Mordred to show up right now!” He looked around nervously, but didn't spot anyone who jumped out as obviously Mordred.

Captain Righteous stroked his mustache. “Would this Murkwort recognize you?”

“I doubt it. I only met him once, very briefly, and he seems really self-absorbed.”

“We should move in closer,” said the captain, gulping back the rest of his drink. “If this Mordred person and these dice are as powerful as you seem to believe, we should seize this opportunity to keep them apart.” He frowned at Bingam, who was holding a pink drink in each hand.

“I saw you were almost finished, so I got you another one.” Bingam handed a skeptical-looking Captain Righteous one of his drinks.

Dave swigged back the rest of his drink, then swapped an empty glass for a full one. Together, they passed under the large stucco archway to the patio to keep a closer eye on Murkwort and discuss their next course of action.

It was less crowded outside, with most of the wizards preferring to be closer to the music. Dave was relieved to be in more open air with less noise, and he suspected Captain Righteous felt the same way.

Bingam gazed longingly back inside at all the rich and successful young people leading interesting lives full of women, magic, and free booze. This was as close to being a part of that world as he would ever get. At least that's how Dave interpreted his expression. Bingam might have been diligently looking for a halfling in red robes, or another floating drink tray. But Dave got a strong vibe of hopeless inadequacy in Bingam's piggy eyes.

It was the same vibe he'd picked up from Murkwort at Arby's. Murkwort had been so eager to impress Goosewaddle, so thirsty for just a taste of genuine respect. But this place, the Crescent Shadow, wasn't like strolling in on your old college roommate while he's struggling to run his shitty fast food restaurant and showing off some new magical knickknacks you recently picked up. The people here had truly made something of themselves. He'd tried to use just the fact that he was going here to impress Goosewaddle. He might be able to sell some dice here, but he wasn't going to impress anyone. That was their in.

“We need to go talk to him,” said Dave.

Captain Righteous nodded. “Very well. I thought it might come to that. What information are we trying to extract from him?”

“Nothing specific. Whatever he wants to tell us. But remember. Everything he says is amazing.”

Captain Righteous frowned as he eyed the eccentric wizard. “Perhaps you are easily impressed. I have my doubts. Look at his beard. Someone who is genuinely interesting needs not try so hard to call attention to themselves. It reeks of desperation.”

“Yes!” said Dave. “That's what I'm talking about. We need to feed that desperation. Keep him talking and drinking. You get where I'm going with this?”

Bingam nodded enthusiastically and gulped down some of his drink.

“Thoughtless as this plan seems, it is better than more inaction. Lead the way, dwarf.”

Dave thought for a moment until he came up with an icebreaker, then headed to Murkwort's table.

“Excuse me, sir.”

Murkwort, lost in thought, jumped when Dave interrupted him. He furrowed his bushy black and white eyebrows at Dave, then peered up at Captain Righteous and Bingam.

“What's the matter? Am I in some kind of trouble? Have I not as much a right to sit at this table as any other wizard here?”

“Ha ha!” said Dave. “Heck yeah, you do! I just... Are you Murkwort the Magnificent?” He wasn't sure if the 'the Magnificent' part was overplaying it, but he'd committed to the role and it slipped out of his mouth.

“Is that what people are... I mean, yes! Yes, I am!”

The Magnificent thing had paid off. Dave was fairly certain that no one had ever called him that, and the fact that he lapped it up so readily was evidence that either he believed it might be true or, more likely, he'd simply take what recognition he could get.

Dave nudged Captain Righteous. “I told you it was him!”

“Yes, um... You were correct,” said Captain Righteous. “It was wrong of me to doubt you.”

Dave turned back to Murkwort. “My brother saw you perform amazing feats of magic once. He described you to our village. I recognized you by your beard.”

Murkwort stroked the forks of his beard with both hands. “The duality of light and shadow, sun and moon, life and death.”

“Whoa!” Dave nudged Captain Righteous again. “That's so profound!”

“Indeed,” said the captain, not really selling it. “Profound.”

Dave patted around his armor. “I wish I had something for you to sign. Won't the guys at the pub be impressed when I tell them I actually had a conversation with Murkwort the Magnificent!”

Murkwort raised one eyebrow and gave Dave a slight grin and a sideways glance. “Might they be even more impressed if you told them you had a drink with Murkwort the Magnificent?”

“No way,” said Dave. “I couldn't possibly waste your time. I'm just grateful to have –”

“Nonsense! I insist you all sit at my table and have a drink, lest rumor spread that Murkwort the Magnificent is anything but gracious and humble before his admirers.” He thrust a hand out dramatically, causing Bingam to jump and yelp. A serving tray which had been collecting empty glasses on the other side of the patio changed course and flew toward their table. Moving his fingers in a wavelike pattern, he turned his wrist down, then brought it back up. A shiny platinum coin had appeared in his hand.

Bingam clapped excitedly. Dave had to hand it to him, he was really selling the fake enthusiasm. Dave and Captain Righteous joined in the clapping, but neither could bring themselves to match Bingam's effort.

“Special drinks for my special guests,” said Murkwort as he placed the coin on the tray, which zoomed back inside.

Over the next couple of hours, Dave, Captain Righteous, and Bingam listened to Murkwort talk about himself, his opinions on magic, his personal contributions to the Great Library of Cardinia, and how young wizards might as well practice sorcery for all the effort they put into the craft. His ability to talk constantly for such a length of time seemed magical to Dave. He only paused once to shake his head at one of the big lights flying above them as it sailed off the edge of the island, then used that as an example of how young people are ruining everything.

Bingam sucked back drinks as fast as he could, hanging on Murkwort's every word. Captain Righteous continued to nurse his first drink, drumming his fingers against the side of the black granite block he was sitting on. His boredom and impatience were beginning to show. Dave feared he might lose his patience altogether and say or do something to jeopardize the tiny and fleeting advantage they currently had, so he decided to say something less potentially damaging instead.

“Do you have any special magic items?” It may have been the lamest question anyone had ever asked a wizard in the history of this imaginary world, but it was the best Dave could come up with.

“Do I ever!” said Murkwort. He didn't seem at all put off by the lameness of Dave's question. He leaned in and whispered, “Would you like to see some?”

Bingam grinned and nodded.

Captain Righteous snapped out of his bored annoyance. “I would be most intrigued.”

Murkwort stood and offered his right hand to Captain Righteous and his left hand to Bingam. “Join hands, my friends, and I shall show you wonders the likes of which you've never seen.”

“Um, okay,” said Dave as he, Bingam, and Captain Righteous hesitantly held hands with each other and Murkwort. “Are we, like, saying a prayer first?”

Murkwort grinned down at him. “Home.”

The next thing he knew, Dave was in total darkness. He, Captain Righteous, and Bingam, still holding hands, fell on their asses. Their granite chairs had disappeared from under them.

They were in a circular room with wooden floors and stone walls lined with shelves filled with leather-bound tomes. The four windows were open, but it was as dark outside as it was inside. They must have either traveled through time or, more likely, time zones.

“Where are we?” demanded Captain Righteous, hopping up to one knee and reaching out into the empty air in front of him. Bingam stayed on his back, but also groped at the air with his hands and feet. Dave remembered that he was the only one of them who could see in the dark.

“Lights!” said Murkwort. Torches along the walls came alive with a woosh of flame, illuminating the room. “Welcome to my home!”

Dave went to one of the windows and looked outside. They were in something like a tower. Not a tower exactly, as Dave could see the roof just above him and they were only about thirty feet off the ground. More like a three-story cylindrical house designed to look like a tower. It was one of a group of neighboring tower-houses in a city. A little ways away, the familiar uneven spires of the Cardinian royal palace twinkled against the black sky.

“Are we in Cardinia?” he asked Murkwort.

“Indeed, we are.”

Dave didn't have any great love for Cardinia, but he was overwhelmed with relief to be off of that flying island.

“Have you been here before?” asked Murkwort.

“I, um...” Dave panicked, remembering that he was supposed to be some dwarven country bumpkin awestruck by meeting a famous wizard. “I'm from... Hillstown.” Oh my God, I've killed us all.

“Oh yes!” said Murkwort, gliding toward Bingam, who was staring at something on a workbench. It looked like an old mummified hand attached to a chain. “Look at this!”

Dave relaxed, remembering that Murkwort truly didn't give a shit about anybody but Murkwort.

Thrusting his hand forward dramatically, as he'd done with the drink tray, Murkwort telekinetically lifted the hand off the workbench. He pulled it through the air to his open palm, then slipped the chain over his head, letting the corpse hand hang down from his neck.

“This ancient mystical artifact, all that remains of a once powerful elven wizard, grants me the power to move physical objects using only my mind.” To demonstrate, he pointed at a book on a desk across the room. The front cover opened, and the pages began to turn.

Dave was pretty sure that was a Zero-Level wizard spell, but he pretended to be impressed and clapped with what he hoped was an appropriate level of enthusiasm. Captain Righteous followed his lead, but less convincingly.

Bingam frowned thoughtfully. “Isn't that the same spell you used to bring the hand to you?”

Murkwort's big grin at Dave and Captain Righteous's applause faltered. “Well, yes. But to move the book pages, I used the hand rather than a spell.”

“But if you know how to do the spell, then wouldn't it be easier to just do that? Plus, you wouldn't have to wear a dead elf's hand around your neck.”

Murkwort narrowed his eyes at Bingam. “It's not only meant for wizards. Anyone could use this.”

Bingam's eyes lit up. “Ooh! Can I try?”

“No.” Murkwort's tone was curt, and now he was pouting. He'd been insulted in his own home by someone who was meant to be worshiping him.

Dave thought fast. He needed to get Murkwort back to thinking about Murkwort.

“I thought it was amazing. In fact, I'd say that would be pretty hard to top.”

“You'd say wrong!” Murkwort pointed at the desk across the room, and a drawer opened.

Dave hoped that there was more to his performance. It would be difficult to fake excitement over yet another Mage Hand spell. Then out of the drawer rose an object that Dave didn't need to fake excitement over at all. A small leather pouch, about the perfect size to hold marbles, a bottle of Crown Royal whiskey, or some magical dice, meandered through the air to Murkwort's waiting hand.

Murkwort held it up. “What you see before you appears to be an ordinary leather pouch, does it not?”

“Yes!” said Dave. “What's in it?”

“The contents of the pouch are not so impressive as the pouch itself.”

Dave frowned. “Really?”

“A little device of my own inventing,” said Murkwort, dipping two fingers into the mouth of the bag. “Allow me to demonstrate. Does anyone feel a sniffle coming on? Perhaps you could use a handkerchief.” Pinched between his fingertips was a corner of black fabric, which he teased out until there was a full-sized black handkerchief tied off at the opposite corner with – Drum roll, please – a white handkerchief.

Captain Righteous looked like Dave felt, embarrassed to be in the room.

“Wow,” said Dave as Murkwort continued to pull out his continuous chain of black and white handkerchiefs, his arm pulling more exaggeratedly each time, and his face with a more exaggerated look of mock surprise. “I've never seen anything like that.” Since the second grade.

Murkwort was one of those guys who didn't know when to quit. The handkerchiefs were piling up into a mound at his feet, and yet he kept pulling them out. Dave thought that, even if this had been his first time witnessing true magic, he would have grown bored with it already.

“How can such a tiny pouch contain so much within it?” said Murkwort, in case anyone was unclear as to what was supposed to be so amazing.

Captain Righteous knelt next to Dave and pretended to wipe something from his boot. “If I knock him out,” he murmured, “we could tie him with the handkerchiefs and give him a proper interrogation about the dice.”

Dave was afraid he'd been thinking along those lines. “Put a pin in that,” Dave whispered back. “Let me try one more thing.”

He waited for the captain to stand up again, so as to not look like he was acting right after whispering conspiratorially.

Just as he was about to speak, Bingam beat him to it.

“Are you saying that you invented the Bag of Holding?”

NO NO NO!

“It's not a Bag of Holding!” snapped Murkwort. He stopped pulling out handkerchiefs. “Those are much larger. This is a Pouch of Holding.”

“I had a pouch like that once,” Dave blurted out, a desperate attempt to stamp out the fire before it got out of control.

“Did you?” Murkwort crossed his arms and sneered at Dave. “The fat little dwarf who was so impressed by some rudimentary first year wizard school spells claims to have a Pouch of Holding back home in Hillstown?”

“Hey!” said Dave. It wasn't his fault that Murkwort was a shitty performer. There wasn't any need to bring his weight into it. “That's not what I meant. My pouch is ordinary. It's just something I keep my dice in.”

“Dice?” Murkwort's voice sounded suspicious. That hadn't transitioned nearly as smoothly as Dave had hoped it would.

“Yeah. My friends and I get together and play our dice games on the weekend. I don't want to lose them, so I've got a little pouch to put them in. Looks just like that.” The way Murkwort was looking at him, Dave felt like he was wearing a sign that said, “I'M FEEDING YOU BULLSHIT BECAUSE I DON'T RESPECT YOUR INTELLIGENCE.” He really wished Julian was here to do this.

“How nice.” Murkwort went to a tailor's dummy standing between two shelving units. It was wearing a blue cloak with a peacock feather or eyeball pattern around the torso, and what looked like an aviator hat on the iron orb which served as the head. “I have one more invention which I'd like to show you. Would you like to see it?”

“Absolutely!” said Dave, nearly absolutely sure that he didn't want to see it.

Murkwort removed the hat from the dummy, then turned around to face them, once again wearing his performer's face. “For my next demonstration, I'll need a volunteer.”

Bingam's hand shot up. “Me! Me!”

Murkwort scanned the room as if it was an auditorium full of people. “How... about...” he pointed at Dave. “you.”

Fuck.

“I call this a Helm of Honesty,” said Murkwort, dramatically advancing toward Dave with the hat held out in front of him. “It compels the wearer to speak the truth.”

“Is that like a Zone of Truth spell?” asked Bingam. “Because we've –”

“YES!” cried Murkwort. “But it's in a hat! Have you seen it in a hat before? No, you haven't!” He scowled at Dave. “Please remove your helmet.”

Dave looked to Captain Righteous for guidance, but couldn't read anything from his expression. He took off his helmet.

Murkwort shoved the Helm of Honesty down on Dave's head. It fit very snugly.

“Now, what shall we ask him?”

“Oh, I know!” said Bingam. “Ask him if he's ever worn women's clothing before.”

“Yes!” said Dave, horrified that the word slipped out of his mouth involuntarily. “It was at camp. It was a game we were playing. I don't –”

“Let's try something simpler,” said Murkwort. “Where are you from?”

“Gulfport, Mississippi.”

Murkwort frowned. “I've never heard of such a place. Why did you make up such a terrible lie as Hillstown?”

“I didn't have much time to think. It sounded, I don't know, dwarfier.”

“Why did you attempt to deceive me? What is it you truly want?”

“The dice,” said Dave, unable to control himself. “We need them to get back home.”

“I knew it!” Murkwort cried, disgusted and betrayed. “How dare you fill me with liquor and try to take advantage of me like a common harlot! Do you not know why they call me Murkwort the Magnificent?”

Dave pressed his lips together, but the words forced themselves out. “Nobody calls you that. I made it up to massage your fragile ego.”

“Why you impertinent little –” Murkwort caught Captain Righteous making his move and held him paralyzed with a wave of the hand, the captain's arm cocked back to punch Murkwort in the face. “You shall rue the day you insulted Murkwort the MagnYAAAA – Oof!” His concentration had broken, releasing Captain Righteous's fist to continue along its previous trajectory.

Dave looked down and saw Bingam biting Murkwort hard in the calf. Once the old wizard collapsed on top of him, Bingam let go.

When Dave finally got to the end of the handkerchiefs, there were enough of them tied together to practically mummify Murkwort and a chair together.

“Twenty handkerchiefs is a novelty. Fifty is a gag. Anything beyond that is just tedious.”

“Put the hat on his head,” said Captain Righteous. “We shall learn what's become of these dice everyone is in such a tizzy over.”

Dave put the Helm of Truth on Murkwort's head. “Should we try to wake him up, or wait for him to wake up on his own?”

Captain Righteous poked Murkwort in the shoulder. “Are you truly sleeping?”

Murkwort sighed and opened his eyes. “No.”

“Where are the dice?” asked Dave.

“I sold them.”

“Shit! All of them?”

“Yes.”

“To who?”

“Whom.”

“What?”

Murkwort glared at Dave. “To whom?”

“Fuck you!” said Dave. “Who the fuck did you sell the goddamn dice to?”

Murkwort shrugged as much as his handkerchief bindings would allow. “The transactions were anonymous. It's standard practice. Buyers don't want sellers knowing their identity, lest they have a change of heart and seek to retrieve what they've parted with.”

“You honestly have no idea how to get in touch with these people?”

“That's the point of anonymity.”

“But all these anonymous transactions went down on the Crescent Shadow?”

“Yes.”

Dave suddenly remembered something he should have already asked. “Were any of these people halflings?”

“No.”

That was a relief, albeit not a strong one. Dave took a moment to gather his thoughts. What brought Mordred and Tim together if not the dice? Something didn't add up. It was too much to think about right now, but Dave thought that there was still a chance, however slim, that Mordred didn't have the dice, and might not even know that they were floating around freely out there. Furthermore, those wizards who bought them off Murkwort might all still be on the Crescent Shadow. If they left the island, they'd be exponentially more difficult to track down.

Dave looked Murkwort in the eye. “Can you take us back to the Crescent Shadow?”

“Yes.”

Captain Righteous put a hand on Dave's shoulder, then addressed Murkwort. “Are you willing to take us back to the Crescent Shadow?”

Murkwort sneered at him. “No.”

That gave Dave a thought. “If we leave you here, are you going to break free from your bindings and kill us all?”

Murkwort's face contorted as he tried to lie. “N-n-n-n-nnYES! Gods damn this cursed hat!”

“And about how long would that take?”

“Ha!” said Murkwort. “You wouldn't even make it out of the tower.”

“How would you do it?” asked Dave.

“I have a number of spells without somatic components with which I could free myself. Then I would simply incinerate you.”

Dave frowned. “We don't want to have to hurt you. Is there any way we could guarantee our own safety from you without killing you or knocking you out?”

“M-m-m-my spells aren't all memorized,” Murkwort reluctantly spat out. “You could set f-f-f-fire to my tower and b-b-b-burn all of my belongings.”

“Well that settles it,” said Captain Righteous. “I am not comfortable striking a bound prisoner, and certainly not murdering one.”

Murkwort gawked at the captain with terror in his eyes. “You don't mean... you can't mean...”

Captain Righteous nodded. “We have no choice but to burn the place down.”

“Please!” cried Murkwort. “Knock me out!” He craned his neck to give the captain a nice easy target.

“Come on,” said Dave. “If he prefers to be knocked out than have his home burnt down, then surely –”

“The Knights Code is very clear,” said Captain Righteous. “I cannot strike a helpless prisoner. If we untie him first, then –”

Dave shook his head. “No, that's definitely off the table. I'm sure that he's been planning in his head all along what he'd do if he could just free his arms for one second.” He looked at Murkwort. “Right?”

“Shit!” Murkwort cursed at the floor. “Yes.”

Dave had another sudden thought and tried to act on it, but Captain Righteous had clearly anticipated this and caught Dave's fist before it could make contact with Murkwort's face, which was practically begging for it.

He shrugged at Murkwort. “Sorry, man. I tried.”

“No!” cried Murkwort. “All my books! All my research! There must be some other way!”

Captain Righteous was already lighting a candle on Murkwort's reading desk.

“You'd better think of another way right fucking now if you want to save your home,” said Dave.

Murkwort bit his lower lip and groaned as Captain Righteous held a scroll over the candle flame.

“Do you have anything?” asked Dave.

“Yes!” said Murkwort.

“Then why didn't you say something?”

“Because I don't like it.”

“What is it?”

Murkwort writhed in his bindings, willing himself not to speak. “You could take me with you, and I can cast a Contingency spell which will trigger a Fireball spell here in my office should I attempt to deceive you.”

“Hmph,” said Dave. “That's pretty good.” He turned to Captain Righteous. “What do you think?”

The captain nodded and blew out the candle flame. “I can live with that.”

“We should take him to the Whore's Head. They can interrogate him until they're blue in the face, and we might be able to clear Tim's name... at least as far as the dice are concerned. I feel like I owe him that much.”

Captain Righteous stroked his mustache. “Perhaps they will ask him a question with regard to the dice which we didn't think to ask.”

“What's your stake in all this?” Dave asked Captain Righteous. “Why do you care so much about the dice?”

“Because I made a promise to Lady Katherine.”

Chapter 16

Chaz had spent a nearly sleepless night making a list of pros and cons with regard to following Cooper into Glittersprinkles Grove.

Getting the easy cons out of the way first, Cooper was an asshole and he smelled like shit. On the other hand, Chaz didn't know if there was anyone in this world or the one they'd come from whom he'd trust more to look out for him when the shit hit the fan. Sure, it was Cooper's fault that Chaz's chain snapped, mostly anyway. But no one would have given him too much grief about it. He obviously didn't mean to snap the chain. And no one would have faulted Cooper if he hadn't immediately leaped out of his own cage, toward almost certain death, to make a batshit insane attempt at saving him. That had taken balls of a magnitude that Chaz couldn't fathom. Surely, Cooper would show that same courage and disregard for his own safety to protect Chaz from whatever ghosts and ghouls were haunting Glittersprinkles Grove. Plus, he had a pretty badass magical axe.

Then again, rather than count on the fearless support of someone who would give their own life to protect him, it might be safer to spend more time with people who weren't as likely to drag him into situations where both of their lives would be constantly threatened.

Having thought that, Cooper was certainly not a person whom Chaz wanted to abandon right now, particularly after Cooper had so selflessly risked his own life to save Chaz's... even if it was his fault that Chaz's life had been endangered in the first place.

Chaz's thoughts were becoming cyclical, and he wasn't sure he was any closer to a conclusion now than he'd been when he'd started thinking about it. But he was quite certain he was more sleep deprived.

There were people and monsters all over this world who could and would rip Chaz to pieces without a moment's hesitation. At least in Glittersprinkles Grove, he'd have someone looking out for him. Abandoning Cooper now, right after Cooper had saved his life and while he was on a quest of honor, would mark Chaz as a coward to anyone who ever learned of it. Also, if Chaz let Cooper face this challenge alone and the worst should happen, he would have to live with that for the rest of his life. He didn't think he could... It didn't seem... He'd think about it more tomorrow...

*

Chaz woke up to what sounded like an outboard motor and what smelled like burning sulfur. Coughing and opening his eyes, he felt the sting of Cooper's ass, which was hovering over him, trumpeting its morning song.

“What the ever-loving fuck?” cried Chaz. “Honestly, what's wrong with you? What would possess you to squat over another person while he's sleeping and let one rip in his face?”

Cooper shrugged. “I had to fart. It was time to wake up. Two birds, one stone. You should consider yourself lucky. I was about eighty percent sure that was only going to be a fart, but my estimates on that are usually way off.”

“I'm supposed to feel lucky because you failed to shit on my face? That's not luck! That's the default setting. Billions of people go their whole lives neither shitting on other people's faces nor having their own faces shat on by others. When a normal person needs to fart or shit, it doesn't even occur to that person to squat over a sleeping person's face. It's like you're trying to –”

That was it. Cooper was being even more of an asshole than usual to dissuade Chaz from tagging along. Who could blame him for ditching Cooper after he'd just taken a dump on his face. It was the perfect excuse. Cooper was trying to save Chaz's life.

Well fuck that. Cooper had too much moral leverage on him already.

“I've decided to come with you.”

“Fuck,” said Cooper. “Why?”

“You need me. I'm not as useless as you think.” Chaz unsheathed his rapier and swiped at the air. “I can swing a sword, after all.”

“If you roll really well, that might tickle a ghost. You're not useless. You're worse than that. You're a... What's the word? Libel... legality... Lilliputian... Lithuanian...”

“Liability?” said Chaz.

“I think so. Does that mean, like, an extra pain in my ass that I'll need to babysit during an already difficult quest?”

Chaz sighed. “It's closer to that definition than Lithuanian.”

“Okay, cool. Thanks.” Cooper offered Chaz a sad-eyed sympathetic grin. “So... you know... fuck off.”

Chaz had to admit, Cooper was making a very good case for him to leave, but Chaz refused to be outsmarted by someone so stupid.

“No,” said Chaz. “I'm the pain in your ass that's coming with you to Glittersprinkles Grove.”

Cooper shrugged. “Suit yourself. I'm not carrying your dead ass all the way back to Cardinia though.” He started walking through the tall dew-soaked grass in the same direction they'd been traveling the night before.

“Wait!” said Chaz.

“No,” said Cooper.

Chaz shielded his eyes from the harsh midmorning sun and looked around their little clearing. He hadn't unpacked anything, so there wasn't anything to gather. He could have done with a morning piss, but he supposed that could wait. The new day's journey suddenly begun, he ran after Cooper.

“Where's Ravenus?” he asked when he caught up.

“How the fuck should I know? Off killing rats or fucking turkeys, or whatever it is birds do.”

This was going to be an even longer journey if Chaz allowed Cooper to keep talking down to him the whole time. He was determined to prove his value somehow, to put them more on even footing with regard to mutual respect. But first, he really had to pee.

Figuring there wasn't much chance of losing a half-orc in a meadow in the time it took to take a leak, Chaz sheathed his rapier, started to unlace his pants, and turned around.

A massive bird monster, as tall as he was, stood in front of him, staring at him with the cold don't-fuck-with-me expression of an eagle. In fact, all of it looked like an eagle, except for its legs. Though covered with feathers and ending with giant face-shredding talons, they didn't look like bird legs. Proportion-wise to the rest of the creature, they looked more human than birdlike. And something was off about its wings as well. Chaz had never stood face-to-face with an eagle before, but he was pretty sure something was off about its wings.

Leaning slightly sideways, Chaz saw the answer to his confusion. This was no bird. At least, not the back half of it. Golden feathers gave way to golden fur about halfway down its great catlike rear, including the you're-so-fucked hind legs of a lion.

The beast screeched, and Chaz's morning pee issue resolved itself down both pant legs.

Keep it together, Chaz. If it wanted to kill you, it would have attacked already. It's just stupid and curious. Just a big fucking bird with a tiny bird brain. One surprise slice across the throat, and breakfast would be on ol' Chaz this morning.

He grabbed the hilt of his rapier, but the beast grabbed his upper arm. It felt like a bear trap that was on fire.

“Yeaaaaoooooowww!” cried Chaz.

Instead of killing him outright, which Chaz now appreciated that this thing could probably do with very little effort, it began flapping its wings.

“No!” squealed Chaz, not relishing the idea of being suspended a mile in the air by one arm that felt likely on the verge of breaking. “Just kill me. Please!” His arm rose as the beast began to lift off the ground. “No! I don't want to –”

The eagle head jerked sideways as the flat of Cooper's axe smacked into it. Chaz fell to the ground, relieved to still have two arms, even if the top of his right one was a shredded bleeding mess.

“Back off!” said Cooper, turning the axe in his hands. “Don't make me use the blade.”

The creature screeched at him, but flapped up out of his reach.

“Go on. Find something else to eat.” Cooper closed his eyes in concentration, then let out a long, slow-burning fart, filling the air around him like an aura of ass.

The lion-eagle creature gave one last screech as it flew higher, convinced that better food would likely be found elsewhere.

Chaz sat up, unable to bring himself to look at Cooper. He sighed. “Thank you for saving my –”

A deluge of white, bitter-tasting goop landed on Chaz's head.

Cooper laughed harder than Chaz had heard anyone laugh in quite a while.

Chaz spat and wiped shit out of his eyes with his good hand. When he could see, he looked up at the creature as it flew away. “Fuck you! You stupid... whatever the fuck you are!”

“It's a griffon,” said Cooper. “And what the fuck did you expect it to do after you tried to attack it?”

“What was I supposed to do?”

Cooper shrugged. “I don't know. Maybe not attack it?”

“I was supposed to just wait around for it to tear me apart?”

“It would have left you alone if you'd taken the time to talk to it.”

“Excuse me,” said Chaz, standing up. “I didn't think it could speak English.”

“It can't speak the common tongue, but it can understand it.”

“How the hell do you know so much about griffons?”

“I don't know shit about griffons,” said Cooper. “Nabi told me.”

“Your axe?”

“She said it's a gentle creature until it's provoked, but it has a nest full of chicks that need to be fed. They're not too smart, so when it comes to people they sometimes get confused. You made the decision easy when you tried to attack it.” Cooper paused a moment, nodding to himself as he received further telepathic communication from his axe. “She says you've probably doomed all future humans who wander into this territory as well.” He paused again, then grinned. “Yeah, I think he knows that.”

“Knows what?” said Chaz.

“She says you pissed yourself.”

Chaz stomped past Cooper and his axe, rapier drawn, shirt soaked with blood and pants soaked with piss, ready to stab something.

Hearing a sudden avian screech behind him, he dropped his sword, fell to the ground, and curled up in a ball of bard.

“I beg your pardon, sir,” said Ravenus. “I didn't mean to frighten you.”

Chaz uncovered his eyes and found Ravenus sitting on a branch of the tree he'd walked past. “Where the hell have you been? We were just attacked by a griffon, you know.”

“Oh dear. That sounds dreadful. Did you try talking to it? I hear they're very reasonable creatures.”

“Oh, shut up,” said Chaz. “How much further is it to Glittersprinkles Grove?”

“You've still got quite a walk ahead of you. I expect you'll arrive there before nightfall though.”

Chaz got to his feet and started walking again. “Why don't you make yourself useful and keep an eye out for dangerous monsters?”

“I can do that.”

Ravenus flew off and began flying in a wide perimeter around Chaz and Cooper as they continued southwestward on foot. Every so often, he spotted some prey in the tall grass and swooped down like a dive bomber. He killed rats, rabbits, and the occasional squirrel or chipmunk.

Since Ravenus was only interested in eating the eyes, Chaz started going after his kills and picking up the rabbit carcasses.

As morning turned to afternoon, Chaz's arm stopped bleeding, and he was actually feeling pretty good, gripping five dead rabbits by the ears. He felt like a frontiersman, living off the fat of the land. This is how his ancestors had lived, except without a talking bird doing most of the work. All this walking built up quite an appetite, and he couldn't wait to see what roasted wild rabbit tasted like.

It was only when lunchtime came around that it occurred to Chaz that there was nothing around here even remotely flammable. As he grew hungrier, and the rabbit corpses grew heavier in his hand, he thought more and more about tossing them away. The gaping bloody eye sockets were beginning to attract flies. Also, he considered that at some point he might get hungry enough to try to eat one of them raw, and he didn't want to have them around if it came to that. Who knew what kind of worms or E. coli or whatever they might be infested with.

“I'm hungry,” he moaned, not caring what kind of grief Cooper would give him for whining.

“There'll be wood in the forest. We'll roast those rabbits.”

By the time they finally spotted a significant density of trees on the horizon, there was barely enough light to see them. He was so hungry that he was more excited about finding firewood than he was apprehensive about running into ghosts.

As they neared the trees, Chaz thought he could already smell smoke in the evening air, but there was no sign of a fire. Probably just the hunger fucking with his brain. Walking between the sparser, outermost trees, nothing struck him as being especially spooky about these woods.

“I wouldn't go much further in there, if I were you,” said a high-pitched man's voice behind them.

Chaz and Cooper turned around. Some kind of man goat hybrid was standing on its hooved and furry hind legs, sizing them up. He was mostly man from the waist up, except for the curved horns on his head. His beard struck Chaz as goatlike as well, but that might have just been a personal style choice. Chaz had never seen a goat dick, but he now assumed they must be huge. This guy's dick hung down nearly to his fucked up backward goat knees.

“What the fuck are you?” said Cooper. “Satan?”

“I am a satyr. Do my legs not give it away?”

“I'm not interested in what your legs are giving away.”

“What brings you two fine gentlemen to this stretch of wilderness? Are you lost? Might I be of –”

Cooper pulled off his axe and brandished it at the massive-dicked goat man, or satyr as he preferred to be called, who froze like a statue of a confused Satan.

“Whoa!” said Chaz. “What the fuck, man? Put the axe down!”

“Touch those pipes,” said Cooper, his eyes locked on the satyr's, “and you'll be playing them with your asshole.”

“What pipes?” asked Chaz.

“I don't know. It's just what Nabi told me to say.”

“She told you to tell him he'd be playing them with his asshole?”

Cooper shook his head. “I improvised that part. She told me not to let him play his pipes.”

“I beg your pardon,” said the satyr. “Did you say Nabi?”

“Yes.”

“The Fae Queen of Glittersprinkles Grove?”

Cooper pursed his lips. “Maybe.” After a brief pause, he nodded. “I mean, yes.”

“But she has been missing since the Dark Ones invaded our land.”

“Blame it on the Dark Ones. The perfect scapegoat.”

The satyr drew a dagger. “What did you call me, half-breed?”

“What the fuck?”

“I am not a goat.”

“I didn't... That was... Hang on, you're going to get all racially offended right after you blame all your neighborhood's problems on the darkies moving in?”

“The Dark Ones.”

“Whatever. And now you're going to lecture me on nomenclature when you –” Cooper stopped talking and squinted at his axe for a moment, then looked at the satyr. “Lower your dagger, Zanzi, for I have returned.”

The satyr's eyes widened. “Nabi?”

Cooper nodded.

After resheathing his dagger, the satyr knelt before Cooper and took his left hand in both of his. “What have they done to you?” He kissed Cooper's hand.

Cooper jerked his hand free and wiped it on his loincloth. “Dude, what the fuck? It's not me. It's the axe.”

The satyr took the axe and kissed the shaft between the blades. It was more than a polite token of reverence. It was all slobbery, with a lot of lips and tongue.

“Um,” said Chaz. “Would she be comfortable with you doing that if she wasn't an axe?”

“Of course she would,” said the satyr, and resumed molesting the axe with his face.

Cooper yanked his axe away. “She says otherwise, and it's uncomfortable to watch. Now who the fuck are you?”

The satyr got to his hooves. “My name is Zanzifurl Worblestomper.”

“Fuck all that,” said Cooper. “Can we just call you Satan for short?”

Chapter 17

Rather than struggle to break free from Julian's magical webbing, Stacy suggested they let it deteriorate on its own, lowering them to the ground slowly, and use that time to catch their breath and gather their thoughts.

“We've got one die and no Mordreds,” said Stacy, turning her head toward Julian as much as the web would allow. He was upside down relative to her, and his serape's broad surface area had caught a lot more web than she had. “Where do we go from here?”

“Some place where I can wash my hands,” said Julian. “I can still feel dwarf dick in my right palm.”

Stacy laughed, but she'd asked the question for more than something to pass the time with. “And after that?”

“I don't know. Should we bring it back to the Whore's Head?”

“That's the obvious answer. But if Mordred's out there gathering power and armies or whatever he's doing, maybe this little hiccup was a blessing in disguise. Maybe everyone is safer the fewer people there are who know the location of the dice.”

“Is that really our decision to make?” asked Julian.

“Who else's would it be?”

“Shouldn't it be the collective decision of everyone who could potentially be effected by it?”

“You mean like a democracy?”

Julian shrugged. “Sure.”

“That's fine under most circumstances,” said Stacy. “But when the decision is about whether or not to withhold information from a group of people, inviting those people to be part of the decision making process kind of undermines the whole point of making the decision in the first place, doesn't it?”

Julian took a few moments to run that through his mind. “Not necessarily,” he finally said.

“Oh?”

“Let's say we take the die back to the Whore's Head and give them a full report on what happened here. We tell them we have a die, but we propose just what you said, that it might be safer for everyone if the dice were hidden somewhere and only one or two people knew the location.”

Stacy laughed.

“What?” said Julian.

“You've seen that group try to make a decision before, haven't you? They're a mess. And what's more, they don't trust each other. Do you honestly think they'd be able to come to any kind of agreement on who gets to know where the dice are hidden? There will be a bunch of noisy arguing and bickering, and it will only lead to them deciding that, since they can't decide who to trust with the dice, that the dice should stay there at the Whore's Head, which I think you can understand is an extremely unwise decision.”

“It just seems... I don't know... unethical?”

“It's practical. You get a bunch of scared, not-terribly-bright people together, and they'll make decisions undermining their own best interests, knowing that they're doing so, if it means making sure that no individual or faction among them appears to benefit disproportionately. Look at the American south.”

Julian frowned. “You make a good point there.”

“Sometimes people need to be protected from themselves.”

“I just don't know if I'm ready to take on that kind of responsibility.”

The last few tendrils of web holding Stacy up stretched to the point of snapping and released her safely on the ground. She looked up at Julian who, being lighter than her, was still about fifteen feet up.

“I don't know if we're going to have much choice. Do you have any idea how to get off this island?”

Julian shook his head.

Stacy tried to tuck the pendant between her boobs, but the silver dragon claw gripping the die was clunky and uncomfortable. Instead, she took off the whole chain and tucked it into one of her rogue outfit's many hidden interior pockets.

From her bag, she pulled out the rope she'd used on her cage before they were rescued by that random gnome guy.

“Catch!” she said, tossing up the coil of rope to Julian. When he caught it, she gave it a good yank, snapping the web strings still holding him up.

“Shit!” cried Julian.

Stacy dropped the rope and braced herself. The impact was less than she was prepared for. He really was a waif of a man.

“It's been a long day,” said Stacy, putting a still-startled Julian down on his feet. “We should get some sleep.”

Julian looked around at the small grove of trees they were standing in. “Here?”

“Where else? I'm tired.”

“Do you think it's safe?”

“This island is pretty small. The uninhabited part of it is tiny. I don't think it can support a population of bears or lions or dinosaurs or whatever.”

Julian found a cranny of tree roots to sit comfortably in. “Get some sleep, then. We'll figure out tomorrow when it comes.”

Stacy lay down with her head in Julian's lap. “You mind?”

Julian shook his head.

Stacy took his hand and closed her eyes. “Are you thinking about Ravenus?”

“Yeah.”

Of course he was. She could tell he'd been making an effort not to bring up his familiar, but he was never far from his mind.

“Don't worry. I'm sure he's okay. We'll find him.”

Julian gave her hand a squeeze. “Thanks.”

“In the meantime, think about what I said before. All I ask is that you don't tell anyone about the dice until we've made a decision between the two of us.”

“But if I agree to that, and we never make a decision between us, doesn't that amount to the same as if we agree not to tell anyone?”

Stacy smiled to herself. She'd been hoping Julian would be too tired to catch that. “Good night, Julian.” She let herself fall asleep.

Chapter 18

“This must be the storm drain Captain Longfellow was talking about,” said Katherine. She, Butterbean, Randy, and Basil stood before a barred gate at the base of the southern city wall, not far from where it met the sea. The iron bars were coated with rust, and the stone holding them in place was worn smooth from centuries of water running over them, but it still didn't look like an accessible point of entry for anyone who hadn't thought to bring a bulldozer with them. Even if they were able to remove a couple of loose bars, it would be difficult to squeeze Basil through. Fortunately, Katherine had anticipated that the captain, having never seen a basilisk in person before, might have underestimated its size, and had prepared a spell for just such a contingency.

Having a limited number of spells per day, it seemed foolish to waste one to accommodate Randy's pet. The big lizard was also responsible for them having to waste all this time sneaking around storm drains in the middle of the night when they could have much more easily booked passage on a ship without it. But Katherine needed all the help she could get, and she didn't want to force Randy to choose between her and the lizard.

“I've been giving it some thought,” said Denise from up on Basil's back.

Katherine was ahead of her, holding the basilisk's right guide rope. With its head between her and Randy, she was pretty confident that nobody could see her rolling her eyes.

“Maybe I shouldn't go on this quest with you, on account of I'm pregnant 'n all. I gotta do what's right by my unborn children, right?”

“The ones you want to abort?”

“I am still undecided on that particular issue. It's a very personal decision which will take much time, introspection, and alcohol to resolve.”

“I'm sorry,” said Randy. “Until you've decided what you want to do, and then gone and done it, I can't allow you to drink no more alcohol. It ain't fair to them babies.”

“When the fuck did you become my goddamn keeper?”

“When you declared an intent to harm innocent people.”

“They ain't even fuckin' people!”

“We don't know how far along they are in their development,” said Randy. “And the point at which a fertilized egg counts as a person is a matter of –”

“That ain't what I'm talking about!” said Denise. “They ain't people. They're fuckin' scorpion monsters! It ain't your place to tell me I got to carry these freaks to term.”

“And I ain't sayin' you do. All I'm sayin' is that if you choose to have your pregnancy terminated, you do it proper like. Get yourself checked out by a cleric and... I don't know. See how they do that sort of thing here. You had a chance to bring it up back at the temple.”

“I was nervous,” said Denise. “It was called the Temple of Life. How do you bring up killin' babies in a place like that? I don't know how they feel about that sort of thing here. They might have crucified me or burnt me like a steak.”

“At the stake,” said Katherine. Part of her was enjoying listening to Randy and Denise's redneck banter. She'd never considered herself to be a scholarly person, but being immersed in a conversation between these two made her feel like that guy in the wheelchair with the robot voice. “Let me make this simple. I need all the help I can get, and that amounts to you two hillbilly retards.” She looked up at Denise. “You tried to rape my brother, so you owe him this.”

“Wah wah wah, you raped my brother. Don't that never get fuckin' old? I ain't raped shit. That little psycho cut my nuts off. Incidentally, that led to the game turning me into a tubby little bitch, which then led to me being raped and impregnated by a scorpion monster. So I think my rape debt has been paid with interest, thank you very much.”

“Randy,” said Katherine. “Is that true?”

“It weren't rape, exactly,” said Randy. “As far as I could make out, it was consexual.”

“Consensual?”

“That's right. In fact, she seemed really eager.”

“I didn't consent to having fertilized eggs pumped into me! I thought she was a man. That was willful deception, which counts as rape.”

“I don't think she meant to deceive you,” said Randy. “She looked kinda hurt when you said you thought she was a man. And her husband looked pissed.”

The conversation, while morbidly fascinating, was more than Katherine wanted to process right now. She offered another argument in an attempt to end it.

“If you thought she was a man, and you willfully engaged in unprotected sex, then pregnancy was always a risk. Ipso ergo facto, it all amounts to the same thing.” Katherine wasn't sure her Latin was correct, but she was nearly positive that Randy and Denise wouldn't know better.

“Uh uh,” said Denise. “If I fuck a dog, she don't pop out no half-dog babies.” After a moment of uncomfortable lack of response, she continued. “That was just an example. All I meant is that we ain't compatible species. I had no way of suspecting that I would leave that encounter with child.”

“That's not true,” said Katherine. “Compatibility is a lot more lax in this world. Look at me, for instance. I'm half human and half elf. Or take the scorpion people for an even more extreme example. At some point in the past, some sick freak must have squirted his seed on a scorpion, right?”

Denise laughed. “Damn girl. Your logic is stretched tighter than my cooter around a lady scorpion cock.”

Katherine had been gentle so far, but she wasn't about to let this white trash would-be child rapist insult her intelligence.

“Here's a more logical way to think about it. If I hear you bitch about this mission again, or if you make any attempt to fuck it up or escape, I'll extract those eggs from you through your face, and I'll feed what's left of you to this giant fucking lizard. And when he shits you out, I'll feed the shit to some pigs. And when they shit, I'll –”

Basil's stomach rumbled like a cranking car engine that won't turn over, as if he could understand what she was saying. She was almost certain that wasn't the case, but it was excellent timing.

She stroked the side of the beast's face. “Poor baby's getting hungry.” She looked up at Denise. “Any suggestions?”

Denise's expression, as well as her sudden silence, suggested that she understood Katherine wasn't fucking around. That was good. Even Randy remained silent. He'd defend Denise if Katherine tried to murder her, but the fact that he didn't say as much right now meant he'd prefer Denise think he was on the fence about it, and that she'd do well to fall in line and quit her bitching. All that being the case, Basil still needed to eat. He was so big, it would be impossible to carry enough food to sustain him.

Randy tested the storm drain bars until he found one that was loose. It slid straight up, as did the two to the right of it. He looked back at Katherine and Denise, then frowned at Basil.

“Them's the only ones that's loose. Ain't no way Basil can squeeze through that gap.”

Katherine smiled. “I had a feeling this was going to be an issue. Captain Longfellow's going to shit himself when he sees Basil.” She looked up at Denise. “You'd better hop down, Beardy.”

Denise scowled at Katherine, but did as she was told. When Denise was on the ground, Katherine put her hand up high on the beast's side.

“Shrink.”

Basil let out a frightened groan, which grew higher and higher in pitch as he shrank down to half his original size, making him about fifty percent larger than Butterbean. Still pretty big, but just slim enough to squeeze between the immobile bars. Once they were all inside, Randy gently lowered the loose bars back to their original positions.

The smell inside the city's drainage system reminded Katherine of the dumpster behind the Chicken Hut, though it was much fainter. This was obviously built to drain rainwater from the higher elevations of Cardinia, where the palace and several other prominent buildings were located, without flooding the rest of the city. It wasn't meant for dumping refuse, but that didn't stop people from doing just that, which would account for the filthy state of the harbor and for the present but not overpowering smell of garbage in here.

And of course, where there was garbage, there were rats. With no lights inside the tunnel, and only moonlight outside, it was too dark to see further than ten feet in. But Katherine could hear their squeaks echoing off the damp brick walls, and they didn't seem very far off.

“I don't like the sound of that,” said Denise. “Can you turn Basil back to normal size so I can ride up on his back again?”

“Not yet.” Katherine adjusted Butterbean's collar so that the iron ring which attached to his leash was under his chin. Touching the ring, she said, “Light.” The tunnel lit up, and the rat squeaks rose in pitch and frequency. But the rats themselves were still beyond where she could see.

“You think the light will keep them away?” asked Randy.

“I hope not. I think I just thought of a way to kill two birds with one stone.”

“I ain't worried 'bout no fuckin' birds,” said Denise. “Can you think of a way to kill a bunch of goddamn rats?”

Katherine looked down at her. “Aren't you supposed to be a badass barbarian? Are you seriously afraid of a few rats?”

“Rats carry diseases. I'm afraid for my children.”

“That's lovely. Maybe some day you can sit them on your knee and tell them about how, between thoughts of aborting them, you used them to mask your own cowardice.”

“Katherine,” said Randy in a motherly tone. “What was that you was saying about killing two birds with one stone?” In other words, That's enough bickering, you two.

“While Basil is small like this, he should be able to get by on less food than normal, right? A couple of rats might be enough to sustain him.”

Randy grinned. “Why Katherine, that's excellent thinking! I really appreciate you keeping Basil in your thoughts like that.”

Katherine ruffled the fur on the back of Butterbean's neck. “Go get 'em!”

Butterbean growled, barked, then darted forward. The light zoomed down the tunnel like a subway car they'd just missed. It went farther and farther down the tunnel.

“Them rats is farther away than I reckoned they was,” said Randy. “These tunnels must really carry sound well or –”

Butterbean yelped, and it sounded about as far away as it looked.

“Butterbean!” cried Katherine.

The light did an about face and started heading back to them. A cacophony of normal-sounding rats grew louder and less and less normal-sounding.

“Oh shit,” said Katherine.

“What?” Denise took a step back. “What is it?”

Katherine reached into her Bag of Holding. “Scythe.” She pulled out the long-handled weapon and felt a little disturbed at how excited she was to be able to use it. “Dire rats. Sounds like we stirred up a whole nest of them.”

“I don't reckon basilisk food is our biggest concern anymore right now,” said Randy. “Maybe you should bring Basil back up to size so he can defend himself.”

“That's probably a good idea.” She touched Basil's back. “Dispel.”

Basil groaned as he doubled in size, completely blocking out what little light was coming in from outside. Katherine had hoped that the sound might frighten some of the dire rats away, but their angry squeaks and squeals were so loud, she could barely hear Basil at all. From what she could hear, he sounded nervous.

“Don't worry, big guy,” she said, reaching out to soothe his fear. “We'll take care of these –” She felt a hairy leg where she'd been expecting leathery reptilian skin. Without even looking, she grabbed the ankle and gave it a good hard yank downward.

“Fuck!” cried Denise as she fell off Basil's back.

“Get your axe ready to fight.”

Randy drew his sword and stepped forward. “I'll hold them off as best I can. You two will have to handle what slips by me.”

“This tunnel's wide enough for us to fight side-by-side,” said Katherine. “I need more room to use this thing anyway.” Even if this version of the scythe had been designed to be used as a weapon, it would still be more effective outside in a wheat field than it was in a cramped underground tunnel.

“Good call.” Denise stepped back, careful not to back into Basil's mouth. “I'll take the rear.”

“Let's wait until after the fight is over,” said Randy.

As innocuous as that sounded, Katherine sensed there was something off about the way he'd said it. Had Randy just made a buttsex joke? She looked over at him.

Randy was red in the face and trembling from trying not to giggle. This caused Katherine to giggle, which obliterated Randy's dam. As what sounded like a dozen or more giant rats approached to infect, murder, and/or eat them, Katherine and Randy laughed their asses off.

“Real fuckin' mature, guys,” said Denise. “You can both suck my big fat dwarf titties.”

Katherine and Randy stepped aside to let Butterbean run between them, but now that he was among friends, and they could all fight together, he turned around, bared his teeth, and growled.

Four of the huge rats entered the sphere of light simultaneously, rushing at them. Katherine picked a target and brought the point of her scythe down hard, skewering its plump middle just to the right of the spine. It squealed in pain, its disgusting mouth opening wide, showing off its needly teeth and squirming tongue.

Randy stepped up to finish it off, but two of the big rats lunged at him, biting his leg and arm and throwing him off balance. He fell backwards and managed to strike the rat on his arm with the hilt of his sword. It screamed, letting go of his arm and landing on its back between Denise and Butterbean.

Katherine kicked a rat that lunged at her, sending it into a somersault that would have been comical if five more rats hadn't just entered the fray. She jerked hard on her scythe, giving the rat she'd injured a little more to remember her by.

Randy grunted as he drove his sword into the rat that still had a toothy grip on his leg.

Another rat jumped up at Katherine, but she'd seen it coming and anticipated how it would attack her. Just as it leaped, she crouched down and thrust the shaft of her scythe underneath it, using its own inertia to catapult it up, where it bounced off the ceiling and landed behind her.

Denise gave a little yelp, which was in part what Katherine was going for. Tubby little bitch needed to pull her weight.

Having just used the business end of her scythe to launch that last rat, she couldn't bring the blade down on the rat that was moving in on her, the first one she'd stabbed. Instead, she did the next best thing, jabbing it hard in the muzzle with the back end of the shaft. She could feel the crunch of bone upon impact. This poor bastard, while not quite dead yet, was having a really shitty day. It made one last desperate and feeble attempt to bite her with a mouth that barely worked anymore, and she put it out of its misery with two more jabs to the skull.

Randy got back up to one knee, keeping the one rat at bay with his sword, still pierced in its belly. He grabbed another one which was running past him to bite Katherine, by the tail, and yanked it back toward Denise and Butterbean.

“Yaaaah!” cried Denise a second later. “My knee! Motherfucker bit me in the... Fuck this. I'm really angry!”

Rat shrieks from behind Katherine came to an abrupt splattery halt. She readied her scythe to attack one of the three rats coming at her, and stopped just short of bringing it down on Denise as she charged out between Katherine and Randy. She was hardly recognizable with all of her suddenly increased muscle mass. She looked like a giant hairy meatball.

Screaming like a banshee on fire, Denise tore into one rat with her axe, chopping its face in half diagonally while grabbing another rat by the throat with her free hand. She let go of the axe and pinned the live rat on its back, throttling its throat with both hands and slamming its head repeatedly against the floor.

“FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU!” she said as the rat writhed under her even denser than usual body. Its legs and tail flailed frantically at first, then grew more listless with each slam of the head. She was well on her way to killing it when a new rat came from behind and bit her in the ass.

Denise rolled backwards onto the ass rat, pulled its tail to her mouth with both hands, and bit down hard, severing it from the body. The rat screamed, having definitively lost the ass-biting contest, and tried to run away. But Denise grabbed the tail stump and started to rotate, swinging the shrieking rat in a wide circle, spinning faster and faster.

The stunned and nearly-dead rat that she'd been head-slamming against the floor rolled onto its belly, but Randy made short work of it with a merciful stab to the neck.

Denise spun faster and faster until she started to stumble, then released the rat, which hit the wall with a loud smack. Neither of them were done with the other. As the rat righted itself, Denise stumbled after it in a zigzag pattern.

Katherine found it difficult to focus on killing the last few remaining rats because Denise's fight was so much more entertaining.

When Randy drove his sword into the last rat standing, the fight was over for him and Katherine. Denise was still tenderizing her long-dead rat foe's face with her fists, pummeling it again and again, to the point where its head was little more than a furry sack of pulverized brain and shards of skull.

“I think you got him,” said Randy.

Denise punched slower and slower, as if ceasing to punch something was akin to stopping a car merely by taking one's foot off the accelerator.

When she was done, she hung her head and panted. Her body deflated as sweat poured down her face.

“That's... fucking... exhausting,” she said.

Katherine remembered Tim freaking out about dire rats, but in her experience, they hadn't seemed that formidable. Of course, her experiences with them, up to now, had been while she was a badass vampire. And now, she supposed, she was just a general badass... at least considerably more than Tim had been when he first arrived here.

She sighed. The road toward getting him back was proving to be a huge pain in the ass.

Basil gobbled up the two dead rats nearest to him, and Randy was dragging a third one his way by its tail.

“Don't overfeed him,” said Katherine. “We're going to be at sea for a few days, and we don't know how long it's going to be until he'll get another meal.”

Randy frowned. “But that's why I want him to eat as much as he can now, while the gettin's good. It'd be a shame to let all these dead rats go to waste.”

“That's why we're going to keep them.” Katherine smiled at Randy and held open her Bag of Holding. “It's as good as Tupperware for keeping dead bodies fresh.”

“Sweet!” said Randy. He lowered the rat into the open bag and went to get another one.

By the time Randy had completely cleared the floor of rats, Denise had recovered from her post-Barbarian-Rage exhaustion and was breathing normally again.

The air was thick with the metallic scent of blood, still fresh in Katherine's mind as something she'd once craved, but which now turned her stomach. It didn't help that the scents of rat shit, body odor, and garbage were mixed in with it. She needed to start moving before she added the scent of –

“BLAAARRGGGHHHHH!” Denise beat her to the punch, spilling her guts into a puddle of filthy water, rat blood, and God only knew what else.

“You alright, Denise?” asked Randy.

When the last of her puke had splattered against the floor, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Just my mornin' sickness acting up.”

Randy looked around Basil, back toward the entrance of the tunnel. “But it's the middle of the night.”

“Damnit, Randy. They call it mornin' sickness, but it comes when it comes. Or fuck, who knows? Maybe I got some kinda disease when I got bit in the ass by a big-ass fuckin' sewer rat. I just hope my babies ain't affected. Their blood will be on your hands.” She waved her pointed finger back and forth between Randy and Katherine so that they might both be overwhelmed with guilt. Katherine gave her the finger.

Chapter 19

Through a series of increasingly specific questions, Dave and Captain Righteous had gotten Murkwort to produce a way for them to be able to trust him while they all slept for the night. Everyone was exhausted, and even though Murkwort was compelled by his own magic hat to answer their questions honestly, he was as uncooperative as he could be, learning to answer questions more literally, succinctly, and in ways which were as unhelpful as possible while still being truthful. It was a struggle to come up with a line of questioning which led them to a satisfactory solution. The solution itself, however, turned out to be simple. He had a potion he claimed would knock a dire bear out cold. When Captain Righteous finally found and opened the bottle, Dave noted that the dark green liquid inside smelled like an extremely pungent version of NyQuil. The fumes alone were almost enough to knock Dave out.

Dave knew their line of questioning had yielded positive results when he, Captain Righteous, and Bingam woke up the next morning not tied to a rack or covered with leeches. Murkwort remained asleep in his chair still bound by his stupid handkerchiefs, his head hung low as he snored.

“What's the best way to get to the Whore's Head Inn from here?”

Captain Righteous looked out the window. “The Collapsed Sewer District is on the opposite side of the city. Transporting a bound prisoner there on foot would attract attention. My fellow Kingsguard would ask questions I'm not sure I know how to answer.” He sighed. “Bingam and I have been too long away from our duties as it is.”

“I agree,” said Bingam. “We should report back at once.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” cried Dave. “What the hell am I supposed to do with him all by myself? Look at me! I'm a goddamn dwarf!” He had to hit the captain with something he actually gave a shit about. “What about your promise to Lady Katherine?”

Captain Righteous stared pensively out the window, then turned to Dave. “We shall escort you to your inn, but then we must report to our commanders. That is all I can do.”

Dave nodded. “That's good enough.” Now onto the problem of them being stopped on the street and questioned about transporting a man bound to a chair. Even if Captain Righteous outranked whomever was interrogating them, things could get sticky, especially considering that Murkwort hadn't actually committed any crimes. Traveling overland across the city was too risky. Too many things could go wrong. Worst case scenarios played out in Dave's mind. Captain Righteous wasn't exactly a subtle man. If he blabbed about the dice to a superior officer, they might deem it a matter of interest to the Crown and take Murkwort in for questioning themselves. Or even worse, he might be ordered to set Murkwort free.

“What about the sewers?” asked Dave.

Captain Righteous looked at him blankly. “What about them?”

“Couldn't we travel through the sewers?”

“Have I not defiled my uniform enough for your liking?”

“I thought it might be less conspicuous than trying to drag a bound old wizard through the city.”

“I'm only fifty-seven!” said Murkwort.

“Sorry,” said Dave. “I didn't know you were awake.”

“Who could sleep with all of you blathering on like you do? Anyway, what kind of excuse is that? You think it acceptable to insult a man as long as it's behind his back?”

“No, I...” Dave couldn't think of anything to say that wouldn't make him seem like less of a dick.

Captain Righteous frowned. “Are the sewers really the best idea you can think of for traveling to this Whore's Head Inn?”

Dave nodded, and Murkwort said, “Yes.” His not-quite-as-old-as-Dave-had-thought eyes widened. “I mean... No... I thought you were talking to me. Shit!”

“The sewers are a labyrinth,” said the captain. “A group of seasoned explorers could get lost in them for weeks. Why do you think they are our best option for getting to the other side of the city?”

Murkwort fumed, but couldn't keep his lips from moving. “Because I know how to navigate them. Arcane Marks line the sewer walls, providing a clear path for anyone who knows to look for them. It's how young wizards travel in secret before they master Teleportation.” Captain Righteous was about to speak, but Murkwort's lips kept moving in spite of his attempts to hold them still. “And also because I intended to call as much attention to us as possible.” He glared up at Captain Righteous. “Here I am an innocent old man, and you assaulted me in my own home! You are a disgrace to your uniform!”

“You cast a spell on him before he hit you,” said Bingam. “An assault on a Kingsguard is a serious offense indeed.”

“That was self defense! He was in the process of punching me in the face, and I held his arm still. He was only able to follow through because you bit me!”

Bingam shuffled his feet. “That was also after you'd cast the spell.”

“Ha!” cried Murkwort. “I'll have both your cloaks when this is through!”

Dave could see something like regret or deep concern in Captain Righteous's eyes. Maybe Murkwort's threats were sinking in, or maybe he was coming to terms with how close he was getting to ending his career. This could end badly if he didn't intervene.

“Captain Righteous swore an oath to protect His Majesty the king and all his subjects.” Dave was talking out of his ass, but he felt safe assuming something along the lines of what he just said was true. “Those dice you sold could, in the wrong hands, lead to devastation for this city, and for the realm. Maybe even the world.”

“Poppycock!” said Murkwort. “You know nothing of magic. You exaggerate their power.”

“I'll happily wear that hat and repeat myself.”

Murkwort scrutinized Dave. “I believe you. At least, I believe that you believe that what you say is true.” He turned his head toward Captain Righteous. “If you release me, I swear by the gods I shall not take any retaliatory actions against you. Furthermore, I shall voluntarily accompany the dwarf to be interviewed by his colleagues. In return, I expect all of my questions to be answered as well. My curiosity is piqued. I long to know more about these dice.”

Captain Righteous raised his eyebrows hopefully at Dave. “What say you, dwarf?”

Dave shrugged. He was apprehensive about setting a high level wizard free after having punched him in the face, tied him to a chair, and strong-armed him for information. But he was even more apprehensive about passing up what would almost certainly be their one and only opportunity to let bygones be bygones. “He is wearing the hat.”

Captain Righteous exhaled like he'd just jizzed himself, the expression on his face the definition of relief.

Chapter 20

The forest was eerily quiet, as if a Silence spell had been cast on it. No frogs croaked. No bees buzzed. Not a single chirp from bird or cricket. Every acorn that dropped sounded like a hammer in an empty church.

“Is it always this quiet?” asked Cooper as he, Chaz, and Zippypants McGoatcock or whatever the fuck his name was stood among the outermost trees looking deeper in. It didn't smell as earthy as a forest should. Aside from his own contributions, it smelled unsettlingly sterile.

“The Dark Ones have destroyed or driven out all animal life, from wild boar to the lowliest insect. The centaurs, unicorns, and elven druids have all fled to seek new woodlands to call their homes. Even most of the satyrs have gone. Only the bravest, stubbornest, and stupidest remain.”

Cooper snorted. “Which one are you?”

“I suppose that remains to be determined.”

“Who are the Dark Ones?” asked Chaz.

“Not who, but what. For their souls have departed.”

“So they're zombies?”

“Ha!” The satyr took a swig from one of his wineskins. Cooper had assumed it was water, but a trace of the dark liquid ran down his billy goat beard, identifying it as the same wild blackberry wine he'd shared with them the previous night. It was some good shit, to be sure, but not something Cooper would drink at dawn. Dude was hardcore. “The day I witness a centaur fleeing a zombie is the day I put away my pipes for good. The Dark Ones have no bodies either.”

“Then what the fuck is left of them?” asked Cooper.

“Anguish, contempt, and an utter hatred for all life, manifested as shadow.” Zazzyfrazzle's head jerked to the left as he pointed at something in the trees. “There!”

Cooper squinted in the direction he was pointing, but couldn't make out anything unusual. “What are you pointing at? I don't see anything.”

“They're difficult to spot unless they're moving or standing in light. It's too early to enter the wood. The shadows are too thick, allowing the Dark Ones to move about freely and nearly invisible.”

Chaz kept his eyes in the direction the satyr had pointed as he knelt down to pick up an acorn. When he stood back up, he said, “Zanzifurl, let me borrow your pipes.”

The satyr laughed nervously, but didn't look away from where he'd claimed to see an evil dark spirit. “The magic of a satyr's pipes can only be produced by satyrs, and the Dark Ones haven't a mind to be affected by it.”

“I'm a bard,” said Chaz. “I produce magic through music. The instrument doesn't need to be magical.”

“Suit yourself.” The satyr held out his pipes to Chaz. “Perhaps a song will sate its thirst for living souls.”

“You don't need to be a bitch about it.” Chaz took the pipes and blew a few quavering notes.”

“Jesus, dude,” said Cooper. “You're even shit for a bard.”

“I'm getting a feel for the instrument. I've never played one of these before.” A few notes later, it started to sound more like music, familiar music. “I see the light...” He stopped singing as the acorn began to glow in Chaz's hand, and before Cooper could recall exactly what song he'd been playing.

The trees around them glowed brightly as the enchanted acorn banished the shadows.

“Jesus fucking Christ!” said Chaz, dropping the acorn and pipes, and drawing his rapier.

One shadow remained. A vaguely human-shaped faceless absence of light ducked behind one of the thicker trees it had been standing next to. Gaunt almost to the point of skeletal, it raised its hands so that they melded with its head where its eyes should be. A somehow even darker void opened up like a mouth as it let out a silent scream.

Throwing down its fists, it slipped right through the trunk of the tree like it didn't exist, and flew straight at Chaz.

Chaz sliced through it with his rapier, which had about as much stopping power as the tree had. The shadowy creature latched onto Chaz's face with its gaping mouth and gripped the back of his head with both hands. Chaz screamed, dropping to his knees and ineffectually swatting at it.

“Fuck!” said Cooper. He looked back at the satyr, who had hopped back a good ten feet. “What do we –”

Feed me.

Of course. A powerful enough magical weapon could strike an incorporeal creature. Cooper hoped Nabi was up to the task. He took her off his back and swung at the shadowy creature sucking on Chaz's face.

The axe appeared to swing through the creature, but Cooper didn't feel any resistance at all. He'd expected to feel something, even if it was just a patch of slightly denser air. Maybe whatever magical bonus Nabi was packing wasn't enough to affect this type of creature, he scrambled to think of another way to save Chaz. Would pissing on it do anything?

But the shadow monster let go of Chaz's face and whirled toward Cooper.

Finish it!

Cooper supposed he was mistaken. Apparently, Nabi had gotten a piece of this face-sucking shadowy asshole after all.

The creature launched itself at him, arms outstretched and mouth wide open. Having no time to swing, Cooper rolled out of its way, hopped back up to his feet, and brought Nabi down on it from behind. Again, he felt nothing as the axe passed through it, resistance only coming when the blade chopped deep into the earth.

It came at him again before he was able to wrench Nabi free from the ground. He dodged its attack, but instinctively swung a fist at it. While there was no physical resistance, he felt an icy chill in his arm as it passed through the creature's shadowy genital area.

One more hit!

The shadow monster flew for Chaz again, who was on his hands and knees over a puddle of his own vomit. Hardly able to move, he made for a surer thing than Cooper.

“Noooooo,” Chaz groaned as the creature mimicked his pose, hiding itself by sharing the same space he was occupying. Chaz shivered, then began to convulse, and the shadow monster did its best to mimic his motions.

“You cowardly motherfucker.”

“F-f-f-fuck you!” said Chaz, trembling violently on his hands and knees.

“Not you, dumbass.” Cooper could see what game the shadow monster was playing. In order to strike it with Nabi, he'd have to chop through Chaz as well. “If that's how you want to play it.” He held Nabi over his head.

“W-w-w-what are you d-d-d-doing?” cried Chaz.

“Nice try, shithead,” said Cooper. He kicked Chaz hard in the ribs, knocking him a good five feet away and leaving the shadow creature exposed. He brought Nabi down hard, and the creature exploded into a bunch of tiny fragments of shadow which quickly evaporated into the light.

“Are you okay?” Cooper asked Chaz.

“Asshole!” Chaz groaned. “My fucking ribs.”

“Sorry, dude. I didn't have a choice.”

“I know. It just hurts a lot. Calling you an asshole alleviates the pain a little. Thank you for that.”

Cooper snorted. “You're welcome.”

Chaz got up on his hands and knees, then struggled to stand upright. “Did I put on weight? I feel like my bones are made out of lead.”

“You're not heavier,” said the satyr. “You're weaker. The Dark Ones drain your strength when they attack you.”

“Well shit! That was already one of my lowest scores.”

“I'm afraid I do not understand your meaning.”

“I wasn't a strong person to begin with.”

Ziggyfaggles nodded. “In time, your strength will return, provided you avoid further attacks.”

“What happens if I get attacked again?” asked Chaz.

“If they drain you of your strength entirely, you become as they are. Too many of my brethren have turned to shadow, living beyond death in constant anguish.”

“You're kinda bumming me out, man. I get the whole white privilege thing.” said Cooper. He held Nabi up to look at her. “So where do we go from here?”

You must travel deeper into the forest. My pixies will find you.

“What did she say?” asked Chaz.

Cooper frowned. “Nothing too specific. We've just got to keep going deeper into the forest until we get picked up by pixies.”

“That's not a plan. We're going to die and turn into Dark Ones!”

“If that's your biggest fear, you might consider that you're part of the problem.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Chaz bent over and picked up his acorn. “Jesus, it feels like a fishing sinker.”

“We no longer need it,” said the satyr. “The rising sun will keep most of the Dark Ones at bay, and make the hungrier ones easier to spot and avoid.”

That sort of cravenness is why the forest is overrun with them. We must hunt down and destroy them all!

Cooper didn't want to call this guy a cowardly bitch while he was guiding them through the forest, but he felt he should say something about his axe's intentions. “I don't think Nabi intends to do much avoiding.”

“We should hurry if we're to penetrate as deeply into the wood as possible before mid-afternoon.”

“What happens at mid-afternoon?” asked Chaz.

“Half the daylight hours will have been spent. If we've found no safe haven, we'll have to turn around. We don't want to be in this wood after dark.”

Chaz nodded. “That makes sense.” He threw the acorn with what looked like more effort than should be necessary. It landed about eight feet ahead of him. “Damn it.”

“That's amazing,” said Cooper. “It takes a certain degree of innovation to make you suck more than you already did.”

Chaz looked like he wanted to give Cooper the finger, but couldn't be bothered with the effort of lifting his hand.

Chapter 21

Julian lay on his back, gazing up at the sky and willing himself to not think about Ravenus. Cooper may pretend not to like him, but Julian could tell that they'd bonded during their time together at sea, and he knew that Cooper would do everything in his power to look after Ravenus.

So he focused instead on a spider busily building a web between two tree branches. It had already finished laying its anchor strands, and was about a third of the way through laying the connecting sticky strands spiraling out from the center. He remembered having seen a documentary about spiders, in which he learned that the spider is able to produce both sticky and non-sticky strands with which to build their webs.

If human beings had evolved to be able to produce adhesive fibers from their asses, how might modern society look different. Would slavery have been abolished earlier if there was no demand for cotton since every person on earth could shit out as much silk as they could ever want? Would there have even been a slave trade at all? Would obesity be an issue? Or would people be able to convert as much food into silk as they wanted, thus self-regulating their caloric output? Given that spider silk is five times stronger than steel, and a person is so much larger than a spider, would human-produced strands be so much thicker, and subsequently stronger? Would all clothing and building materials be bulletproof? What would that mean for the gun industry? Maybe there wouldn't even be one, because humans would have just been super chill, swinging from tree branches together by their asses, and not have felt the need to build weapons with which to slaughter each other.

“What are you thinking about?” asked Stacy.

“Um... Ravenus.” It was easier that way.

“We should really try to find Dave and Captain Whatshisname.”

They got up, got their things together, and started the short walk back toward the noise.

“I spent a lot of time thinking about what you said last night,” said Julian. “And while I don't like it, I think you're right. We should keep quiet about the dice until we have them all, we've captured all the remaining Mordred avatars, or we find out that Mordred's gotten his hands on one of them.”

“Good.”

“I was just thinking that if something bad were to happen as a result of us keeping our secret, I wouldn't want that to be on my hands.”

“I understand.”

“But now I'm thinking that if something bad were to happen as a result of too many people knowing about the dice, which seems way more likely now that I've given it some thought, I don't want that on my hands either.”

“You don't have to explain yourself to me,” said Stacy. “It was my idea, remember?”

“I know. I'm rationalizing it to myself.”

“Don't overthink it. You're making the decision that's statistically the most probable to be the best for everyone.”

It only took a few minutes to walk back to the outermost dive bars and rent-by-the-hour hotels farthest away from the main party strip. It smelled like Cooper's apartment back on Earth. Younger people sat on the front steps of buildings next to piles of puke, cradling their heads after a night of going at it harder than they should have. Tourists who'd dreamed of the day when they could finally party with the big boys. The gods only knew how much money they'd spent to have this experience,  and they'd likely be going home with barely any memory of it.

“Do you think they spent the night in one of these places?” asked Julian.

“Who knows? I'm kind of surprised they didn't turn up in the woods. Free is free, and I think I'd prefer to sleep on the ground than on any bed I've seen so far in this world.” Stacy glanced left and right down alleys and side streets as they headed toward the main thoroughfare. “Don't focus too hard on them. They're easy enough to spot, as are we. This is a small island, and we're bound to bump into each other eventually. Focus more on spotting another die.”

“What about Mordred?”

Stacy shrugged. “We only know what one of them looks like. If we see him, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. The dice should be much easier to spot, both for us and for Mordred, which makes finding them all the more urgent.”

“What makes you think they'll be so easy to spot?” asked Julian. “They're tiny and valuable. They might be locked away in safes somewhere.”

“They're insanely magical, so much so that none of these wizards knows what to do with them. The only thing they're good for is showing off. That's why the one we've got is mounted on a pendant.”

Reaching the main street, they found a few older wizards staggering from bar to bar, some alone and others stumbling in groups of two or three, singing and holding each other up.

Julian watched one old wizard trip over the threshold as he exited a bar, bend over a railing, vomit out about eight drinks, stand upright again, shake it off, then head back into the bar.

“I don't expect we'll find anything at this time of morning.”

“Maybe not,” said Stacy. “But if we do, they should be a lot easier to subdue. Let's start hitting up bars and see what we can learn.”

“Of course. That always proves educational.”

Julian peered up and down the street. No one place stood out as somewhere a dice-adorned wizard might like to spend his time.

“Where should we start?”

Stacy frowned up at the LIVE NUDE GNOMES sign. “Let's start at one side of the street and work our way to the other.”

“Nothing quite like a proper pub crawl at dawn.”

“That's the spirit. Now what do you think? Right or left?”

After having a look each way, Julian decided that right seemed like the shortest walk.

The last bar they found was called The Lucky Cauldron. The sign included a silhouetted picture of a cauldron with a pair of woman's legs sticking out of it.

“What is that supposed to suggest?” asked Julian. “It's like they're trying to sell being boiled alive as sexy.”

Stacy shrugged. “Maybe it's a wizard kink. Let's check it out.”

When they entered, Julian breathed in the heady aroma of jasmine incense. A young half-elven woman in a form-fitting black dress looked up at them with tired eyes from behind a sleek polished dark cherry bar.

“Good morning,” she said. Her tone was polite, but seemed to want to highlight the morning part of it. “What can I get for you?”

It only now occurred to Julian that all the floating drink trays were gone. Maybe that was a Happy Hour thing or something.

“We're not actually here to drink,” said Stacy. “We're looking for information.”

“Did the sign outside suggest that this is a library?”

Julian frowned. “To be honest, I wasn't sure what the sign was supposed to be suggesting. It was kind of ambiguous. I was actually just mentioning –”

“This is a pub. I deal in drinks. If you don't want a drink, I suggest you go somewhere else. Is that unambiguous enough for you?”

“Three shots of whatever you recommend, please,” said Julian, jumping in before Stacy had a chance to even further lower the ambiguity bar with her feelings over being talked to like that. “You sound like you could use a drink.”

“Sorry. It's been a rough night.” The bartender produced a large glass bottle and three shot glasses from under the bar. The bottle wasn't labeled, and the liquid inside was dark yellow, like unhealthy urine, or honey. Yes. Honey was a good comparison. Why had his mind gone to unhealthy urine first? “You wouldn't believe what some of these rich wizards think that paying for a shot of liquor entitles them to.”

“I'd believe it,” said Stacy, raising her glass once the bartender finished pouring the drinks. “I waited tables in college.” She, Julian, and the bartender clinked glasses and necked back their drinks.

It might have been good liquor, but Julian was no aficionado. All he could say about it was that it burned his throat, and it was a hell of a thing to take down before breakfast.

“Not bad, eh?” said the bartender.

“Yeah,” Julian croaked. “Smooth.”

“Ahhhh,” said Stacy, putting her glass back down hard on the bar. “That's the stuff.”

Before Julian got his voice back to object, the bartender was pouring another round.

“And don't even get me started on the young tourists. They come in here, order the cheapest stonepiss in the place, and act like I'm some kind of damsel that they're going to drag away from this sad life. Do you know how insulting that is? I own this place. I probably make a better living here than most of those idiots ever will. I mean honestly, do you know how much real estate on the Crescent Shadow goes for?”

“No,” said Stacy. “How much?”

“A lot. And I worked my ass off to save up enough money to pay for it. This was a dream I'd had for a long time, and I made it come true. And most days it's great. But then there are some days... Some days I wonder why I ever bothered.”

She and Stacy took their shots, then Stacy looked at Julian, then down at his lonely full shot glass.

“May I ask a question now?” asked Julian.

The bartender said nothing, but continued to stare at him. Stacy, also silent, nodded down to his drink.

Julian sighed. “Fine.” He gulped back the shot and put down the glass. This was not going to be an efficient way of gathering information. “How about now?”

The bartender flashed him a friendly smile. “What knowledge may I bestow upon you?” She refilled the glasses.

Julian took a quick glance to reassure himself that the place was empty, then leaned over the bar to murmur. “We're looking for some men.”

“Go down the alley beside LIVE NUDE GNOMES and take the stairs to the second floor.”

Stacy snort-laughed.

“I probably could have opened more clearly,” said Julian. “I'm not used to drinking hard liquor this early in the morning. We're looking for some specific men, for personal, non-sexual reasons.”

“Do these men have names?”

“Probably.”

The bartender frowned. “What do they look like?”

“I don't know.”

“You're not giving me a lot to work with.”

“One of them is a halfling, wearing red robes. Then again, he might have changed them by now.”

“What about men wearing dice?” asked Stacy.

“Wearing dice?” The bartender shrugged. “I'm not even sure what that means.”

Stacy picked up her glass. “You'd know it if you saw it. Cheers.”

Chapter 22

A half moon peeked through a gap in the swiftly moving clouds. Glints of its reflection far out to sea made the water look much calmer than it sounded sloshing against the hulls of rocking and creaking ships here in the harbor.

In all his years living on the Gulf Coast, Randy had never been on a boat. Like most things, the sea intimidated him. He found it strange that he felt no such feelings of intimidation now, even as they were about to board a much more primitive vessel than anything he would have been likely to board back home. The rickety old boat looked to have been patched together from the remains of shipwrecks.

“He's a bigger bastard than I thought,” said Captain Longfellow when Randy, Katherine and Denise herded Basil nervously along the pier. They were escorted by two of the captain's most trusted crewmen, quiet men who'd only spoken to issue one-word instructions on the way from the storm drain to the ship. Neither of them so much as flinched or showed the slightest trace of disgust no matter how hard Denise came on to them. “We're going to need more planks.”

Randy doubtfully eyed the single plank serving as a bridge between the pier and the ship's deck. If Basil fell in the water, he was a goner for sure. There wouldn't be any way to pull him out before he drowned. Randy wasn't sure that another couple of planks were going to be enough.

“Are you sure we can get him across?”

“Aye! Fear not, lad. I once boarded a dire bear on here, just because another captain said it couldn't be done.” Captain Longfellow frowned. “Whether or not it was worth the damage he done to my ship be a matter of one's opinion.”

The captain's men hauled out three more planks before another problem occurred to Randy. “I'm sorry,” he called out. “Mr. Captain, sir?”

“Aye?”

“Basil's legs are aligned in two rows. I don't see how he's gonna be able to distribute his weight between more than two planks at any one time.”

“Walk him sideways, ye jism-gargling imbecile!”

“You let him talk to you like that?” asked Denise.

Randy shrugged. “He talks like that to everyone, so I'm told.” He looked back up at the captain. “He ain't trained to do that. He won't understand.”

“He'll understand a ramrod up the arse! Ha ha ha!”

Randy couldn't see how that was helpful, or even made any sense at all. “Ain't you got a harness and crane or –”

“I know what to do,” said Katherine. “Keep him calm and don't let him eat me.”

Randy stroked Basil's cheek. “Of course! You can make him small again. Why didn't we think of that in the first place?”

“That's a second level spell. I only get one of those per day. I've got a better idea.”

“What is it?”

“We'll get him to walk sideways.”

“Hey, ye twat-munching tree whore!” said Captain Longfellow.

“What the fuck did you just call me?”

“I told you,” said Randy. “He talks like that to everyone.”

“Don't be taking credit for my ideas when ye mean to board me ship!”

“My idea is a practical means to implement your idea, you peg-dicked monkey fucker!”

The crew all stopped what they were doing, making the night dead silent. Some of them stared at Katherine, while others stared at the captain.

Captain Longfellow peered at Katherine through narrowed eyes. Finally, he pointed at her dramatically. “That one,” he shouted, “rides at no charge!”

The crew roared with laughter and returned to their various tasks.

Katherine placed her palm flat on top of Basil's snout. “Speak.”

Basil groaned.

“That's very impressive,” said Randy. “And while it's a step in the right direction, I don't think –”

“Please shut up,” said Katherine. She stroked the side of Basil's snout as he groaned again. “Oh no, not you.”

They went back and forth, Katherine talking and Basil groaning. It started out innocuous enough, like how one might talk to an animal even though they knew it couldn't understand them. But Randy paid closer attention when Katherine started talking more specific like she was responding to concerns that the basilisk was having.

“I know,” Katherine said sympathetically. “It must be very confusing for you. But the people who did that to you are dead. You killed them.” … “His name is Randy, and he's sworn to look after you. He's a good person.” … “No, I'm his friend.” … “Nothing's wrong with him.” … “No, he's handsome enough, if that's your type.” … Katherine scoffed. “No, I'm most certainly not, not that there's anything wrong with that. But he is.” … “Yes.”

Basil turned his head slightly back toward Randy, then started jiggling as a strange wheezing sound came from deep in his throat like he was coughing or...

Randy scowled at Katherine. “Is he laughing?”

Katherine shrugged. “Give him a break. He's had a rough time lately. Let him have this.”

“Can we get him up on the boat, please?”

“Good idea.” Katherine focused back on Basil. “Do you think you could walk sideways for me? We need to get you on a boat.” … “It's... um... a thing made out of wood, which we use to carry us over water.” … Katherine sighed. “Jesus Christ.” … “No, sorry. It's not you. I wasn't expecting to have to... It's a material we get from cutting down trees.” … “Because you're really heavy, and we need to walk you across four wooden planks, which could break if your weight isn't distributed evenly across all of them. Then you'd fall into the water and drown.” … “That's when you're so engulfed in water that you can't breathe air and you die.” … “Yeah, I guess that would seem pretty amazing if you've spent all your life in the desert.” … “Oh shit.”

Basil groaned louder.

“What's wrong?” said Randy.

“The spell timed out.”

“Can you cast it again?”

“I've got one more, but I kind of wanted to save it for Butterbean. Let's see if he'll walk sideways for us now.”

Randy and Katherine guided Basil forward, lining him up directly in front of the planks. They each took a small step onto the plank behind them and tugged on Basil's scaly hide.

“Come on, big guy,” said Randy. “You can do it. One step at a time.”

“Come on, Basil,” said Katherine. “I'm right here with you.”

Basil's left front foot stepped out sideways, touching down next to Katherine's foot. One at a time, from front to rear, his other three feet followed.

The planks bent further than the one Randy had used to board the ship the first time, and he was almost certain they were going to snap. Hold these planks together, Jesus. He felt strange to have such a certainty that his prayer would actually be received, then he felt guilty for his lack of certainty that his prayers back home had ever been received.

Basil let out a groan which needed no translation. He was scared. Not being able to see was bad enough, but at least he could always rely on the ground being there. The instability of the planks combined with Katherine's introduction to the concept of drowning had the poor creature terrified.

Randy laid his palm flat on Basil's skin. “Take it easy. Ain't nothin' to worry about. You're doing fine.” Randy believed it, and it was true. Basil stopped groaning. He also believed the truth of Randy's word.

Before he knew it, Randy was safely aboard the Maiden's Voyage with Katherine and Basil. When Basil stepped aboard, the whole boat leaned toward the pier, causing two of the planks to fall in the water.

“Shit!” screamed Katherine as she lost her footing and pitched toward the open water.

Captain Longfellow grabbed a rope with one hand and caught Katherine with the other.

“Never been aboard a ship before, have ye?” he said, pulling her in close.

Randy guided Basil to the middle of the deck, and the ship leveled out.

Katherine pushed herself free from the captain's grip. “A little swim wouldn't have killed me.” She gave the air a little sniff. “You could do with a wash yourself.”

Captain Longfellow grinned, showing off teeth made of a variety of precious metals. He walked around Basil's front side, keeping a safe distance.

“That's a fine big beast ye got there.” He turned to Randy. “I suppose it goes without saying that ye'll be responsible for cleaning his shit.”

Randy nodded. “Yes, sir. I understand.”

“And there be no visitation without ye being escorted by either myself or Alexei. If the passengers get wind of this, they'll panic. And the sea is no place for a panic, ye hear?”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir.”

“Bring it this way,” said the captain, surefooted on the gently rocking ship as he proceeded to the rearmost part of the deck. He raised his left hand and twirled his fingers around.

“Aye!” shouted one of the crewmen as he started turning a winch near the rear railing. A series of ropes and pulleys came to life, and a large section of the deck revealed itself as a ramp leading down into the interior of the ship.

Captain Longfellow led the way down into the dark cargo hold. It was stark and strictly utilitarian, with no lights, windows, or any kind of adornments visible in the dim moonlight. When Randy followed, leading Basil, it seemed to occur to the captain how much room Basil was going to take up. He scooted back up the ramp, his back pressed flat against the wall as he and Basil passed each other, only daring to exhale when he was halfway back up the ramp.

“I don't see much in the way of luggage between ye. Please tell me you've got something to feed that thing aside from me crew and passengers.”

“We've got it covered,” said Katherine.

Basil groaned as Randy walked back up the ramp without him. Randy felt bad about leaving him down there in the dark, then felt worse remembering that Basil was already constantly in the dark. Perhaps that should have made Randy feel better, considering that the darkness itself wouldn't contribute to the misery Basil would suffer over the next couple of days, but it didn't.

“Can I give him one now?” Randy asked Katherine. “So he's got something to nibble on while he gets accustomed to his new environment.”

“Sure.” Katherine held open the Bag of Holding. “You can go ahead and do the honors.”

Randy reached in. “Big rat.” He shuddered as he felt the tail in his hand, bony and loose-skinned. But he supposed that, when blindly grabbing a giant dead rat, the tail was the best part he could have hoped for. He pulled out the rat corpse, bracing himself for the foul stench of decomposition, but was pleasantly surprised that the foul stench seemed to be just refuse and rat shit. Katherine must have been right about that bag keeping things fresh. Some day, it might be nice to get one of those bags. But a new one which hadn't had any dead bodies or vomit or anything, and keep a bunch of bread and cold cuts in it.

“That be a nice bag,” said Captain Longfellow, not even attempting to conceal the covetous look in his eyes.

Katherine narrowed her eyes at him. “You keep your hands to yourself, or I'll show you the inside.”

Randy tossed the dead rat down the ramp and felt tears welling up in his eyes. “Close it before I change my mind.”

Captain Longfellow put a hand on Randy's shoulder. “He'll be fine, lad. It may be a little more cramped than what he's used to, but not so much so as the room ye three'll be staying in.”

“What?” said Katherine. “I have to share a room with him?” She looked at Denise. “And that?”

“Aye,” said the captain, “And whoever shows up to fill the fourth bunk in the room.” He led them to the cabins, which were stacked on top of each other like cake tiers, each a little smaller than the one below it, creating a one-foot-wide ledge to navigate sideways on each tier.

Captain Longfellow opened the door of the nearest deck-level cabin. The inside looked like the bathroom of an abandoned gas station, but with cots instead of plumbing, and the graffiti all written in knife marks or blood. “The ones down here are slightly larger than the ones above. But the higher you climb, the more privacy you have, what with fewer folks climbing past yer rooms to go shit-chum the waters.”

He hadn't been kidding when he compared Basil's accommodations to their own. Randy felt a lot less guilty now for making Basil stay in the cargo hold. On either side of an already thinner-than usual doorway, there were two bunks, the upper bunks only about three feet above the lower bunks, and the ceiling about two and a half feet above the upper bunks. It seemed less like a cabin and more like a filing cabinet drawer.

“This is for four people?” said Katherine.

“Aye, and don't forget this little feller.” Captain Longfellow bent over to pet Butterbean, but straightened and raised his hand innocently when the wolf growled at him.

Katherine leaned into the tiny cabin, then immediately pulled back out. “Ugh, it smells like fish and B.O. in there.”

“Perhaps ye be misinformed about what this ship's purpose be. The Maiden's Voyage is not a luxury barge destined for the Isles of Carnal Pleasures.”

“Is that a real place?” asked Denise.

“This is a transport ship for those desperate or foolhardy enough to seek their fortunes on Bharan, and for those who've come to realize their mistake and seek passage back. If you're unhappy with the accommodations, I wish you luck finding more comfortable passage for yerselves and a gods damned basilisk.”

“I'm sorry,” said Katherine. “I didn't mean to –”

“And I suppose I should get this out of the way now. Aboard my ship, ye'll be expected to fish for yer supper. I provide the rods, lines, and hooks, but the aches in yer bellies will be soothed only by what the sea be willing to provide.”

“I ain't complainin' or nothing,” said Randy. “I'm just curious is all. You said it's a big priority to keep folks as calm and docile aboard your ship as possible, right?”

“Aye.”

“Well don't the scarcity of food contribute to panic?”

Captain Longfellow nodded. “I used to think the same until I had a particularly rowdy crowd on a particularly long voyage. They was fighting for the sake of fighting, and it only got worse as the voyage went on. 'Twas all me crew could do to keep them from killing one another.” His eyes glazed over with the unpleasant memory. “And then the storm came. The winds threw us off course, costing us two more weeks 'fore we'd reach our destination.”

“And you didn't have enough food?”

“We had plenty of food. A good sailor expects the unexpected. Storms in the South Sea are not uncommon during the summer months. But two of the passengers had planned their trip so they'd reach Bharan before the full moon. Suffice it to say, that didn't happen.” He widened his eyes at Randy, seemingly for dramatic effect. “And so their curse was revealed.”

Randy gasped. “Were they...” He didn't know why, but he felt he should whisper, “werewolves?”

“Pish no, thank the gods. What a mess that would have been. They were wererats. Just as vile, but not quite so violent. We found them in the morning, bare-ass naked in the food stores, in their hybrid forms and fast asleep. They'd shat all over the place. Every last bit of food was contaminated.”

“What did they have to say for themselves when you woke them up?” asked Katherine.

“Har! Not much, lass. They were swinging by the necks from the yards within an hour. Couldn't even use them for chum. No one wants to risk eating a fish that's possibly been contaminated with lycanthropy.”

“I guess that's when you started fishing?” said Randy.

“Aye, and ye never seen folks get along so well as when they don't know whose line will pull in the next fish.”

Chapter 23

Chaz woke up groggy and confused. What were that continuous rushing sound and those grunting noises? Why did he feel like he was moving? Why was he unable to move? He opened his eyes.

Tree branches rushed upward against a background of pink evening sky. He was on his back, being dragged along the forest floor. Lifting his head, which felt as heavy as a bowling ball, he found that he was bound with twine, like Gulliver. His arms were wrapped firmly to his sides, and his legs were tied together. Lifting his head a bit more, he saw that his feet were also tied to the braided leather harnesses of two black boar which were pulling him on some kind of sled.

He looked back and saw that Cooper and Zanzifurl were likewise tied to bamboo sleds and being dragged through the forest by boar. The boar seemed very purposeful in their task, like they knew exactly where they were going despite having no one to guide them.

Unable to fathom what purpose a boar might have for abducting them, or the means by which a boar, even an unusually intelligent one, would be able to manipulate string with their hooves well enough to tie them to sleds, Chaz suspected the boar weren't working alone.

“Hello?” he called out. “Hey! Is anybody there? What are you –”

He felt something like two fingers poking him in the belly. Two indentations in his shirt matched the feeling, but he couldn't see whatever was making the indentations.

“Cease making all that noise at once!” a voice like a Smurf's scolded him. “Do you want to summon every Dark One in the forest?”

Chaz shook his head. Whatever kind of invisible creature this was standing on his chest, kidnapping him, having boar drag him through the forest, and scolding him for talking, Chaz preferred it immensely to feeling the soul-chilling touch of a Dark One again. Cooper had taken down a few more of them, but one of them managed to touch Chaz again before Cooper could finish it off. He barely had the strength to stand up even if he wasn't tied to a sled. He was curious, however, and risked a whisper.

“Who are you?”

The two indentations on Chaz's shirt disappeared. A couple of seconds later, an orange-haired head materialized above Chaz's face. It was small, like a baby's, but its elf-like features were adult. Then the rest of its body appeared. Yellow gossamer wings and leather armor, painted bright green and pink and adorned with orange wildflowers. Chaz supposed that camouflage wasn't a huge concern for a creature that could turn invisible at will. The small flying man nocked an arrow and narrowed his eyes at Chaz.

“I'm the one who's going to shoot you to sleep again if you don't shut your trap.” He was more intimidating than anyone dressed like that had any business being.

Chaz nodded, and the little flying man flew ahead, landed on the back of the boar, then vanished. With few other viable options, Chaz tried to relax and enjoy the ride.

“The fuck?” said Cooper a few minutes later. “What the... Who... Son of a bitch! Fuck this shit. I'm really angry!”

SNAP

SNAP SNAP

SNAP SNAP SNAP

Chaz heard more cords popping. These little flying fuckers hadn't counted on Barbarian Rage.

Cooper roared as individual pops turned into one big rip. He must have gotten an arm free.

“Halt!” cried another Smurf voice. “The big one's loose!”

The boar-driven caravan came to a halt. Zanzifurl's sled pulled up to Chaz's left side and Cooper's sled, now empty but for some strands of frayed twine, pulled up on his right.

“I told you we should have used more rope on him.”

“We used all we had. More rope for one would have meant less for the other two.”

“Look at the dandy one. One strand would have been enough to bind his hands together.”

Chaz was a little annoyed, wondering whether or not they knew his Strength had been sapped by Dark Ones.

“Fuck you, talking pigs!” cried Cooper as he leaped onto a boar's back and started punching it in the head.

“Cooper!” said Chaz. There wasn't much point in keeping quiet now. “It's not the boar. It's –”

“Where are we?” said Zanzifurl. The sound of squealing pigs and Cooper's barrage of profanity had roused him from his slumber. “It's too dark! We have to get out of here. The Dark Ones!”

TWANG

TWANG TWANG TWANG TWANG TWANG

Similar to how the popping strands of Cooper's bindings had sounded, a series of releasing bowstrings rang out. It was almost musical.

Cooper stood up from the pig he'd been beating, his eyes crossing as his Rage-enhanced muscles deflated. The accompanying fart whisked any hint of music from the air, replacing it with Cooper's signature brand of chemical warfare.

Once he'd collapsed, presumably full of invisible NyQuil-tipped arrows, the Smurf voices groaned from a little higher up and farther away than they had been. Even Zanzifurl's eyes teared up as he scrunched his nose.

“By the gods! How can something so vile be contained within –” Zanzifurl's eyes widened and focused solidly in one direction. “There, in those bushes! I saw one! Children of the Forest, I beg you! Please don't let it take me!”

“I see it,” said one of the Smurf voices. “Spread out. I'll take the target position.”

Chaz spotted the Dark One. It was coming right for him. Being the weakest, he was the likeliest target. He wanted to shout, but he was too terrified to speak.

“Now!” cried the Smurf voice which had called the 'target position'. A second later, the quickly darkening forest flashed alight with five bolts of green lightning, fanning out from a point right behind the Dark One to five points up in the air. The Dark One lit up like a filament bulb, exposing the horrified and anguished face of whomever it used to be for a fraction of a second, then disintegrated into a mist of darkness.

“Put the big one back on the sled,” said a voice that Chaz thought was the same one who had taken the target position, but he couldn't be sure. “Use what you have to keep him from falling off. He should still be asleep long after we reach the glade. We'll bind him more securely then.”

“Everyone, on three!” said another Smurf voice, this one female. “One, two, three!”

Cooper's arms and legs rose from the ground. Then, between at least a dozen grunts and the swarm-like din of furiously flapping wings, his entire body was levitating.

“Gently! Gently!” said the female voice as Cooper floated over the sled. “Very good. Now –”

Cooper let out another fart. This one was long and wet-sounding.

“Agh!” cried at least four of the winged people as Cooper's ass fell down hard. A loud crack came from the sled.

“Nuts and berries!” said the female voice. That was the most adorable swearing Chaz had ever heard. “Now what do we do?”

“What is it you want from us?” asked Chaz.

“I thought I'd made it clear,” said the voice that had told Chaz to shut up, “that I want you to shut up.”

“I'm just saying, if you don't intend to hurt us, I'm sure we'd all prefer to follow you than stay out here with the Dark Ones. If you untie us, we'll happily go wherever you tell us to.”

“Should we trust him?”

“I don't see how we have much of a choice now that the sled is broken.”

“We could leave them here.”

“Hickory Nut, shame on you!”

“I didn't suggest we do that. I was just laying out all the options.”

“They wouldn't survive the night out here.”

“But what if they're agents of the Dark Lord?”

“They don't look like agents of the Dark Lord. If they are, perhaps the Dark Lord is not as powerful as we thought.”

“No satyr would betray his fellow fey.”

“Ha! A satyr would betray his own mother for a cup of wine and a gourd to poke his pecker in.”

“Hey!” said Zanzifurl.

It was getting darker, and Chaz was getting more and more nervous with each flicker of genuine shadow. “Whatever you guys are going to do, can you please go ahead and do it?”

“He's right. Whipperwillow, Honeydrop, and Huckleberry. Tie the two remaining sleds side by side.”

“Yes, Hollywhirl.”

“Dimplethorn, Cinnamon, and Wildflower. Hitch Snuffles and Porkpie together with the other boar.”

“Right away, Hollywhirl.”

As sleds, strings, and pig harnesses began to move around, seemingly of their own accord, a female pixie appeared directly above Chaz's face. She had pink hair and wore yellow and green leather armor. She gave Chaz a stern look and held up a warning finger.

“Don't you make me regret this.”

She turned invisible again, but Chaz could feel the wind from her wings blowing against his face. A moment later, he was able to move his arms. The strings which had been binding them to his sides were now loose.

Sitting up felt like he was wearing a sweater made out of lead. Walking felt like he was wearing cinder blocks on his feet. Those Dark Ones had done a number on him. He didn't know if he'd be able to walk as far as he needed to.

“There's another one!” cried Zanzifurl, pointing at a tree now that his bindings had been loosened. “Hurry! Use your magic lightning again!”

“We just used the last one we had for the day,” said Hollywhirl.

“Then wake up the half-orc! Give him his axe.”

“Absolutely not.”

Chaz finally spotted the Dark One. They were so much more difficult to see with all the natural shadows growing longer and darker as the sun set. Like all the others, it was headed his way. He tried to back away from it, but every step was a struggle.

“Pixie people,” he said, keeping his eyes on the Dark One as it crept toward him. “Please tell me you have another option.”

“Ready!” said one of the pixies from over by the sleds.

“Grab your half-orc friend,” said Hollywhirl. “Get on the sled!”

“I barely have the Strength to move myself. Those things touched me.”

“Nuts and berries!” Hollywhirl sighed. “Everyone help me put the half-orc on the sled.”

There was a quiet din of murmuring as all the disembodied voices gathered around Cooper's unconscious body again.

“His skin is so sticky.”

“I don't want to touch his foot again.”

“The arms aren't much better.”

“He'd better not fart on me again.”

“Everyone grab his arms,” said Zanzifurl. “I'll get his feet!”

With Zanzifurl holding Cooper by the feet and a bunch of invisible pixies holding up his top half, it created the illusion that Zanzifurl was incredibly strong and Cooper was incredibly stiff, and they were performing some kind of impossible feat of acrobatics.

“Gods have mercy!” said Zanzifurl as they hauled Cooper onto the sled. “I might have preferred touching the Dark One.”

Having experienced both, Chaz couldn't even bring himself to joke about it. He gratefully endured his close proximity to Cooper on the sled.

“Hurry!” cried Zanzifurl. “Two more approach! And those are just the ones I can see.”

“Go!” said Hollywhirl, and the boar started running like they'd been shot out of a cannon. Even if his own strength wasn't currently compromised, Chaz had a new appreciation for the power in those short piggy legs. He let himself relax a little as they outran the Dark Ones. Then he jumped when Hollywhirl's head and wings appeared in front of his face. She was flying behind the sled, and pixies could apparently choose what parts of their bodies they wanted to be invisible.

“I don't personally believe you're aligned with the Dark Lord,” she said to Chaz and Zanzifurl.

“This wood is my home,” said Zanzifurl. “I would never betray it.”

Chaz shrugged. “I don't even know who the Dark Lord is.”

“And I believe you both,” said Hollywhirl. “But I cannot allow you to know the way to our Glade of Sanctuary.”

“That's reasonable,” said Chaz. “You don't know us, and you can't be too careful. So what, you want us to put on blindfolds or something?”

“Or something.” The rest of Hollywhirl's body appeared, and she was holding a bow in one hand and an arrow in the other. Quick as the wind, she fired the arrow into Zanzifurl's chest, and he slumped over unconscious. She drew another arrow and smiled sympathetically at Chaz.

“Wait!” said Chaz. “I can just close my –”

It barely felt worse than a mosquito bite, but Chaz's eyelids now felt as heavy as the rest of him. His vision turned fuzzy, then dark, then nothing.

Chapter 24

Dave knocked on the door of the Whore's Head Inn. It budged open an inch. No one was manning the entrance, and it was quiet inside. The smell was familiar, but not as pungent with body odor. His heart quickened as he feared the worst.

“Hello?” he called in.

“The door's open,” Frank grumbled back. “Either come in or fuck off.”

That was slightly reassuring. Dave led Murkwort inside and found Frank, Rhonda, and Tony the Elf slouching at the bar, staring into their drinks. They appeared to be the only ones there. The rest of the common area looked like a restaurant that was either closed for the night or had gone out of business. The stools sat upside-down on top of the tables. A pile of broken glass had been swept into a corner and left there. A dead rat was pinned to the wall with a crossbow bolt. Judging by the state of it, it had been there for a few days.

“I was worried for a second,” said Dave. “I thought the place was abandoned, or Mordred had...” He didn't even want to finish the thought. “Where is everybody?”

Frank let out a shallow laugh. “This is everybody.”

“Where are all the others? I mean the ones who stuck around after you...” There was no respectful way to end that sentence.

“After I lost my shit?” Frank shrugged. “They could be anywhere. They made it a point not to say. We all had a big talk after you left. I'm sorry to tell you that the consensus was that you and the bard guy would most likely fuck things up even worse than they are now, and there was a good possibility that Mordred would get his dice back.”

Dave sighed. “Thank you for that vote of confidence.”

“Rather than being sitting ducks here, we decided that everyone should split off into groups of two or three and go their separate ways. Some had it in their heads that they'd go out and gain some levels until they were powerful enough to stand up to Mordred, that we should have been doing that with the Horsemen before. Others were just tired of having their hopes repeatedly crushed, and went out to try to make some sort of lives for themselves here.”

“What about the three of you?”

“We're the sitting ducks,” said Tony the Elf. “In the off chance that you two idiots managed to pull off some miracle, someone needed to stay behind and wait for you to come back.” He looked Murkwort up and down. “You haven't introduced your friend here. I trust he isn't a super-chill Mordred.”

“This is Murkwort,” said Dave. “He's the one that Katherine's friend sold the dice to.”

Frank perked up. He gawked at Murkwort with wide eyes. “Do you still have them?”

Murkwort cleared his throat. “I'm afraid not. I mounted them on some jewelry and re-sold them to rich wizards on the Crescent Shadow.”

“Gah!” shrieked Frank, shaking his little fists. “Do you have their names? Do you know how to find them?”

As big an asshole as Frank had recently been, Dave felt bad about putting him through this. “They were anonymous transactions.”

Murkwort nodded. “These aren't the sorts of people you want to go back on a deal with anyway. And if I expressed interest in re-obtaining something so magical and mysterious, the price they would demand would be astronomical.”

“I feel it's worth noting, though,” said Dave. “I've thought about it quite a bit since I met Murkwort here, and there's no evidence to suggest that Tim was behind Katherine's friend swiping your dice bag.”

“Evidence?” cried Frank. “He disappeared right after the dice did. How can you be so –” Frank's glare at Dave turned icier. “Wait a minute. You met with him, didn't you?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“I knew it. He sold you some bullshit story about how he had nothing to do with it. He's totally innocent and somebody's trying to set him up.” Frank shook his head. “I know you two go back a ways. But I don't understand, after everything you've seen him say and do here, how you could believe anything that comes out of his mouth.”

“Not his mouth. His throat.” Dave sighed. “I probably should have started with this part. It's been a crazy couple of days.”

“What is it?” asked Rhonda.

“Tim's dead. Mordred slit his throat in front of all of us, then kicked him off the flying island.”

Frank finished the beer he'd been nursing, then set the glass down on the bar. “I'm sorry for your loss. It doesn't prove his innocence though. If anything, his being there at the same time as the dice is further evidence of his guilt as far as I'm concerned.”

“Frank!” Rhonda scolded him.

“Am I wrong?”

Rhonda walked around the bar to refill her own glass. “It doesn't much matter now. Mordred was also on the island at the same time as the dice, and that's a more important matter for us to concentrate our concern on.”

“Murkwort agreed to answer any questions we have about his transactions with the dice if we agree to answer his questions about what they are and where they came from.”

“What's left to ask?” said Tony the Elf. “He's already told us that he doesn't know who he sold them to, and that we've got little to no chance of getting them back. The best we could hope for now is that these rich wizards are powerful enough to keep their new treasures out of Mordred's hands. And that best case scenario still leaves us stranded here for the rest of our lives.”

“How can you say that after everything we've been through?” said Dave. “Look at all the challenges we've overcome simply by not giving up immediately after a problem presents itself. Was this how you played Caverns & Creatures back home? You must have been the shittiest players in the world.”

Anger flashed in Frank, Rhonda, and Tony the Elf's eyes. Dave had challenged their nerd integrity.

Tony the Elf stood up. “Let's start with you then, Idea Man. What's your big idea?”

“My big idea was to bring Murkwort here and try and come up with better ideas together.”

Rhonda heaved a big resigned sigh through her nose, like she was about to say something she didn't want to say.

“Dave's right. Look at us. We just got an opportunity thrown right onto our laps and we didn't even put ten seconds into thinking about how we might leverage it before instinctively concluding that it was another dead end.” She turned to Murkwort. “You've got connections on the island, right?”

Murkwort pursed his lips. “I have a few.”

“Don't be so modest,” said Dave. “They call him Murkwort the Magnificent.”

Rhonda scratched her chin. “A wizard with that kind of influence might be able to convince the people he sold the dice to how dangerous they are in the wrong hands.”

“That's true,” said Frank. “And if Mordred knows about the dice, he'll be hunting them down as well. If we play our cards right, we might be able to catch Mordred in the act of trying to steal one of the dice. And with this guy as our ally,” he gestured to Murkwort. “we stand a chance of swinging the fight in our favor.”

Tony the Elf nodded to himself. “We could actually come out of this with the dice and Mordred.”

Dave felt like he'd just worked a minor miracle. He'd inspired optimism in some of the most defeatist sons of bitches he'd ever met. And although he knew that Frank and Tony the Elf were letting their imaginations run wild with unlikely specific scenarios, he allowed himself to join in their optimism that they might yet have a chance to return to the real world, and that Katherine might be able to have Tim resurrected. One day in the future they might all be sitting around tables in the Chicken Hut, rolling mundane plastic dice, looking back on all this as a wild and fucked-up memory. And Dave would think about this particular moment in time as the turning point at which he had rekindled hope, re-igniting the fire that shed light on the path back home.

He felt confident. He felt heroic even. He felt... some serious fucking pain in his abdomen.

“Ugh,” groaned Dave, doubled over in agony.

“Are you okay?” asked Tony the Elf.

“I don't... know,” said Dave, panting to get the words out. “It... ugh. Maybe my... appendix burst. What does... that... feel like?”

“Preposterous!” said Murkwort. “Appendixes don't just spontaneously burst.”

“That's... interesting... to know.” Dave grabbed Murkwort's arm to keep from falling over.

“You're probably just experiencing gastrointestinal issues. When's the last time you... relieved your bowels?”

Murkwort might have had a point. Dave couldn't remember the last time he'd taken a shit. He hadn't exactly been eating regularly over the past couple of days. Maybe his insides were all fucked up from starvation followed by all those fruity Crescent Shadow cocktails.

“Is there a lavatory in here?” Murkwort asked the others.

“There's an outhouse out back,” said Frank. “Through that door.”

“Come on, then.” Murkwort guided Dave through the Whore's Head Inn from one opening to the other, as if they were enacting a macrocosm of the shit traveling through his own alimentary canal.

By the time they made it through the back door, the pain had spread to the rest of his internal organs, and even out to his knees and elbows.

“What... the fuck... is happening... to me?” Dave wasn't sure if a shit was going to solve his problems, but if that's what it was going to take, it was going to be the biggest shit ever. Fortunately, by the light of the full moon, he was able to see that the scraps of fabric they used for toilet paper were in plentiful supply.

The pain suddenly intensified tenfold. Dave's vision turned red as he felt like he was imploding and exploding at the same time. His bowels did, in fact, evacuate themselves, but it provided no relief. He thought he heard the distant sound of Murkwort screaming as his consciousness slipped away.

Chapter 25

Five bars had produced nothing except a puddle of vomit in the alley between the last two of them. Julian couldn't handle his morning liquor. Stacy wasn't thrilled to be rocking a Saturday night buzz on the mid-morning of whatever the fuck day this was, especially since they weren't getting any information out of it. But what could they do but persevere?

The sign outside the next bar on the strip, the Mortar & Pestle, exuded more of a pharmacy vibe than a place-to-get-shitfaced vibe, but it could also be meant to appeal to wizards looking for an alchemical mix of booze.

“I don't think I can do this again,” said Julian.

“Come on, soldier!” Stacy gently shook him until his eyes focused on hers. “We need your Diplomacy.” She slapped him lightly on the cheek a couple of times.

“It's, like, eight o'clock in the fucking morning. If I see another shot of liquor right now, I'm going to throw up again. That's going to count as a penalty on my...” he let out a long cavernous burp. “...Diplomacy check.”

The smell of that burp, having come from deep down within him, convinced Stacy that he wasn't exaggerating.

“Okay, sit this one out.” There was a courtyard in front of the Mortar & Pestle surrounded by a two-foot-high wall. Stacy considered laying Julian down next to the wall so that he wouldn't be visible from passers by on the street, but her experience in this world so far told her that would all but guarantee they'd be separated. “Can you at least come inside? I'll put you in a booth, and you don't have to drink anything.”

Julian nodded.

It wasn't an ideal compromise. All the bartenders at this time of the morning were young attractive women, no doubt meant to cajole every last copper piece out of the loneliest and drunkest men still managing to stumble from bar to bar. Stacy had been counting on Julian's male charms to likewise assist in cajoling information out of them. Maybe she'd get lucky and this one would be into chicks.

Supporting Julian by his arm over her shoulders, Stacy walked through the entrance of the Mortar & Pestle and immediately spotted two red flags.

The first was the presence of another customer. It was more difficult, and costlier, to keep a bartender chatty when she had to divide her attention between multiple patrons. The well-dressed human man at the end of the bar only glanced her way briefly as she lugged Julian through the door. He looked like a young Richard Gere, and was one of a very exclusive selection of men who could pull off a floppy beret and an ascot.

The second red flag was the lack of enthusiasm in the bartender's greeting. It wasn't like the woman in the first bar who was simply in a rotten mood. The vibe Stacy was picking up from this girl was one of complete indifference. She didn't give a shit that two more customers had just walked in. This was just a job for her, and kind of a shitty one at that. As a disengaged graveyard-shift employee, she was less likely to have the knowledge Stacy was looking for. At least, that was Stacy's assessment of the situation, and she was making a lot of assumptions based on very little evidence. As long as she was here, she might as well find out what she could. She dumped Julian in a booth and took a stool at the bar.

“Howdy.”

The half-elven bartender meandered over with heavy eyes and sighed. “What can I get for you?”

“One of whatever you're having,” said Stacy, trying to send out a vibe that could be misinterpreted as trying to be seductive.

“I'm not having anything.”

Ouch. A swing and a miss. Not only had Stacy failed to establish a friendly repartee, but now she had to actually choose a drink. She didn't want to stick around long enough to finish a beer, and she still felt a little funny about saying the word stonepiss to complete strangers. She scanned the shelves behind the bar until her gaze landed on the oddly-shaped black bottle in front of the other patron, down at the end of the bar. It was made of shiny black glass, wide and round at the bottom, with a long thin neck that rose diagonally and curved over like a scorpion tail. The stinger-shaped stopper lying next to the bottle suggested that the scorpion imagery had been intentional. She remembered the giant scorpion Professor Goosewaddle had conjured up in her boss's office back in Bay St. Louis, her first introduction to the magic of this world. Perhaps fate had led her here to try this drink.

“What's that guy drinking?” she asked, nodding toward the other patron.

“Scorpion's Kiss,” said the man at the end of the bar.

“I'm sorry. I thought I was being more discreet.”

“It's distilled from the venom of scorpionfolk.” The man turned the bottle over and filled his glass. The curved neck made it seem like it would be impossible to pour a shot without spilling half the bottle all over the bar, but he filled the glass to within a hair's breadth of the rim without spilling a single drop. “See if it suits you.”

The glass slid along the bar like they do in the movies, except that this guy hadn't touched it.

Stacy caught the glass, and a couple of drops sloshed over the rim onto her finger.

“Impressive.”

The man smiled. “Thank you.”

Stacy's finger tingled where the booze had sloshed onto it. She brought her hand to her mouth and touched the drops with her tongue, which picked up the tingle more immediately. “Is this stuff okay to drink? You said it's made of venom, right?”

“It's no worse for you than anything in these other bottles. The fatal properties of the venom itself are neutralized in the distillation process, but it provides something of an exhilarating sensation in one's insides.”

“Neat.” Stacy swigged back the shot and brought the glass back down on the bar a little harder than she'd meant to. She caught a flicker of annoyance on the bartender's face.

“What do you think?” asked the man at the end of the bar.

Stacy felt that same tingling sensation all the way down her esophagus, then spreading out along the inner walls of her stomach.

“It's like plum flavored boozy peroxide, except way better than that sounds now that I've said it aloud. Thanks.” She smiled and slid the glass back to him. The drinks must have been affecting her Dexterity. The glass didn't make it halfway before sliding right off the bar and smashing into shards on the floor. “Oops.”

“Unbelievable,” said the bartender, not even trying to mask her contempt.

“I'm sorry,” said Stacy. “I'll clean it up.”

“You've done enough. I've got it.”

Stacy wondered what kind of dire beast crawled up this bitch's ass. She could appreciate that it was not an ideal time of day to be awake and serving liquor to obnoxious drunks like herself, and she understood what a pain in the ass broken glass was to clean up, trying to make sure every tiny fragment was accounted for so that no one would get hurt, but this was just plain bad customer service.

The bartender produced an oddly-shaped copper jug from under the bar. It had a pitcher handle on one side, but instead of a spout on the other side, the entire side was flat. She carried it around to the front and upturned it, pouring out a viscous orange ooze which completely covered the glass shards. Leaving the puddle of goop on the floor, she walked through a door at the rear of the establishment, then emerged a few seconds later with a live grey rat in an iron cage barely large enough to contain it.

“Awww,” said Stacy. “What's his name?”

The bartender rolled her eyes as she lowered the rat cage into the jug by a steel chain. She tipped the jug over on its flat side next to the ooze, which immediately started to move slowly toward it, then into it.

Rat shrieks from inside the jug grew louder and the rattle of iron against copper grew more frantic as more and more of the ooze crept in. The shrieks spiked up in pitch, then both sounds ceased completely.

When the entire mass of ooze was inside the jug, the bartender tilted it back upright. She carried it back behind the bar and set it down in its proper place. She pulled the chain, and it came up with a wet slurpy sound, suspending an empty iron cage.

Stacy was equal parts mesmerized and horrified at the speed with which that ooze was able to liquefy a rat. Remembering what had instigated this spectacle, she looked back down at the floor where she'd dropped the shot glass. There wasn't a glint of broken glass.

“Do either of you need anything before I go bait the rat trap?”

“I could use a new glass,” said the man with the scorpion booze.

The bartender's jaw dropped as she grabbed a new shot glass from under the bar. “I'm so sorry, Darton! Whatever was I thinking?”

“Fret not, Nadia. You had more urgent responsibilities.” Darton raised a brow at Stacy. “Shall I ask for one more glass?”

Nadia's lips tightened as she conspicuously failed to look in Stacy's direction, and Stacy finally recognized the bug up her ass. Nadia wasn't in a rotten mood because of her shitty job. She was being territorial about this Darton guy she was into, and didn't appreciate Stacy and her sizzlin' hot 18 Charisma score moving in on her man.

Was it not enough that Stacy had dragged a guy into the bar with her? She supposed it wasn't. Not if Darton was buying her drinks right under Nadia's nose. That was worse than rejection. That was complete indifference to Nadia's feelings. That is, of course, if he'd even picked up on those feelings in the first place.

Stacy had no interest in getting between this bitchy bartender or her coveted sugar wizard, and she saw a potential opportunity to expedite the results of her Gather Information skill.

“No, I'd better not. I really just came in to ask a question and be on my way.”

“Oh?” said Nadia, suddenly much more attentive and, perhaps not friendlier, but at least less openly hostile. “What would you like to know?”

“I'm looking for some dice.”

“The game parlors are concentrated more on the other side of the strip. Thank you for coming in.”

Nadia was definitely ready to get Stacy out the door, and more than willing to spill her guts to make that happen. Now all Stacy needed to do was refine her question.

“What I meant was, I'm looking for some special dice.”

Nadia looked Stacy up and down. “Listen, Honey. I can see you've got some moxy, and good for you. But if you walk into a game parlor on the Crescent Shadow and try to play with loaded dice, you're not going to walk back out with all your fingers.”

Darton nodded. “Nadia is correct. They take that sort of thing very seriously. You would be well advised to not try to swindle them.”

Stacy's question refinement process needed refinement.

“I'm not trying to swindle anyone, and I'm not interested in any game parlors. Christ, I grew up in Biloxi. I've seen grown men and women shit their pants rather than walk away from a slot machine long enough to go to the bathroom. That's not for me. The dice I'm looking for are more ornamental.” She pulled the dragon claw pendant out of the pocket she'd been keeping it hidden in, all the while keeping a wary eye on Darton, ready to leap over there and break his nose if he tried to cast a spell or anything.

“The one glass will be fine, Nadia,” said Darton without taking his eyes off the die. “Go and see to your rat trap.”

Nadia looked like a puppy that had just been kicked in the gut. “Sure.” Shoulders slumped, she trudged through the back door.

Darton stepped toward her and raised his hand cautiously toward the die, indicating that while he'd like to touch it, he was aware that attempting to do so might result in a broken nose. “May I?”

Stacy shook her head. “Sorry. This is too important. Look, but don't touch.”

Darton peered at the pendant. “The craftsmanship of the silver leaves something to be desired, but the gem itself is exquisite. What kind of stone is that?”

“I don't know.” Stacy wrapped the chain around the pendant and put it back in her pocket. “But there are five more of them floating around out there, and it's very important that I acquire them. They might be mounted on jewelry like this one. Could be a pendant, or maybe a brooch, or... I don't know, a belt buckle?”

“Or on the head of a cane?” asked Darton, pouring himself another shot of Scorpion's Kiss.

“Exactly! Way to think outside the box. Or it might even be on a set of... Hang on a minute. Did you actually see one mounted on the head of a cane?”

“Earlier this very evening, an old colleague of mind, Aleric of Whitewood, was flaunting a newly acquired walking cane with just such a stone mounted at the top.”

“Someone you know,” said Stacy. “A friend of yours?”

“More like a business rival. If you don't mind me asking, how much do you know about these dice, as you refer to them?”

“Not much,” said Stacy. “I just know that I need them to get me and my friends back...” Should she say home or to our home world? Lest she seem like she was having a stroke mid-sentence, she chose one. “...home.”

“Where do you live? Perhaps a simple Teleport spell might work just as well.”

Stacy refrained from sighing. Should have gone with our home world.

“I don't really have time to explain why that's not going to work. The longer the dice are out of my possession, the more difficult they'll be to track down. If you've got any information as to where I can find this Aleric of Whitewood, I'd be very grateful. Otherwise, I'll have to be on my way.”

“Finding him won't be a problem. He's staying at the Starlight. But I'm curious as to how you intend to walk away from him with both that cane and your life. A wizard is wont to be very protective of a prize like that.”

“I'll figure that out when I have to,” said Stacy. “After all, I've managed to get one back already.”

“I admit to being intrigued, and wonder if I might offer guidance, or perhaps some behind-the-scenes assistance.”

If Stacy had learned anything about the Crescent Shadow, she knew that Darton sought more than satisfied curiosity in exchange for risking his neck by helping to steal from a fellow wizard.

“And what would you require from me for your guidance and behind-the-scenes assistance?”

Darton downed his drink. “I'll figure that out when I have to.”

Nadia re-emerged from the back room with a tray full of sparkling champagne flutes which she set on the counter and began hanging upside down on a rack.

“Where are you staying?” Darton asked Stacy.

“We've only just arrived on the island,” Stacy lied. “We haven't sorted out our accommodations yet.”

“I have plenty of room in my suite for both of you. Perhaps we could retire there to continue our conversation.”

Stacy didn't want to kick Nadia in the face while she was down, but she had to take the fastest route toward getting those dice back.

“That sounds wonderful. Thank you.”

The sound of cracking glass came from behind the bar, followed by the sound of glass shattering on the floor. Nadia turned around, exposing her bleeding palm.

Stacy gasped, feeling like a soulless bitch. “Nadia! Are you all right?”

“I'm fine,” said Nadia. “Just a little accident. Occupational hazard. Happens all the time.” She brought the ooze bucket out and poured the orange slime creature on the floor. “Looks like Slimy's lucky day. Can I get anything else for you before I go wash my hands and get another rat?”

“Put this on my tab,” said Darton. He stoppered his scorpion shaped bottle. “And put this back in my private nook when you're done.”

Stacy would have told him which of his private nooks he could put it in, but Nadia made a herculean effort to smile and not cry.

“Of course, Darton. I look forward to your next visit.”

Chapter 26

When an obnoxiously loud bell finally finished clanging, Captain Longfellow's first mate, Alexei, accompanied Katherine, Randy, and Denise to the cargo hold. The curfew bell, Alexei explained, didn't necessarily signify that folks must stay in their cabins for the night. Nature calls when she will and all that. But rather, it signified the beginning of the time during which, if one were to fall overboard, no search and rescue attempts would be made. Whether it was meant to be taken at face value, or there was some underlying threat in there that Katherine didn't understand, it was effective enough such that it was now safe to feed Basil without raising any eyebrows.

“We are to be in and out as quickly as possible,” said Alexei with an almost imperceptible wink at Randy. “These are the captain's orders.” His tone was now more serious. “I shall keep my eyes on the cabins, lest anyone should wander too close. You feed the beast and close the hatch. Are we clear?”

Katherine and Randy nodded while Denise gave him a jerk-off gesture.

Once Alexei showed her how to operate the winch which lowered the ramp to the cargo hold, Denise finally proved useful for something. Katherine held the bag open, but allowed Randy the privilege of reaching into it and pulling out rat corpses. Basil did some groaning and Randy whispered him some encouraging words, but the whole process was over in less than five minutes, leaving the four of them standing awkwardly at the rear of the ship.

At least Katherine felt awkward. She guessed that Randy and Alexei would have liked some alone time, but she was in no hurry to get back to their cabin, especially if it meant that she would be having some alone time with Fragnar, their assigned fourth cabin mate.

Fragnar was a beast of a man. Katherine couldn't tell if he was a half-orc, or just a really meaty and ugly full-blooded human. He had the look of someone who had done a lot of hard time, and for whom life on the outside was even harder. Still, Katherine thought Denise would have had a go at him.

“I'm surprised you decided to join us,” Katherine said to Denise, breaking the silence. “Is Fragnar not your type?” From her observations so far, she'd narrowed 'Denise's type' down to 'anything with a dick'.

Denise rested her bearded chin on her forearms on the ship's railing and sighed. “I ain't his. He said he was put off by my consent.”

Wanting to give Randy and his new friend some privacy, but not yet ready to fall asleep in a cramped room with two rapists, Katherine decided to see if she could squeeze any information from Captain Longfellow. He seemed to have taken a shine to her, but also mindful of his boundaries. And in the event that he wasn't so mindful, she'd have Butterbean there with her.

“I'm going to go for a walk,” she said to no one in particular.

“All right,” said Randy. “Be careful. There's some unsavory lookin' folks on board this ship. You sure you don't want Denise to go with you?”

Katherine smiled at him sympathetically. She only gave so much of a shit about his privacy. “No, that's okay. I've got Butterbean to protect me.”

Randy looked broken-hearted, so Katherine gave it a last-ditch effort.

“Hey Denise. Did you tell Fragnar you're pregnant?”

Denise raised her head and turned around. “No. Do you reckon that would help?”

Katherine shrugged. “If fucked up shit is what turns him on, I reckon poking his dick into a wombful of scorpion babies might be worth running by him.” She mentally crossed Use the word 'reckon' in a sentence off her bucket list. “Just don't come on too strong.”

“I'm one step ahead of you,” said Denise. “I'm gonna tell him that I had second thoughts, on account of I think it might be unhealthy for the babies. That way, he'll think it's rape.”

“Wow. That's a whole new level of fucked up. Good luck with that.”

After Denise had waddled off toward their cabin, Katherine took her leave from Randy and Alexei. When she got to the ladder leading up to the captain's quarters, she held the Bag of Holding open for Butterbean.

“It's just until I get up the ladder. It won't be more than a couple of minutes, I promise.”

Butterbean whimpered a token objection, but walked into the open bag.

On her way up, Katherine kept her mind distracted from the boat's rocking, which was more pronounced the higher she climbed, by thinking about the ethical ramifications of what Denise had proposed. Rape by deception was certainly a reprehensible thing, and she never imagined she'd have to qualify that by adding under most circumstances. But if the victim's only grievance was that he wasn't committing genuine rape when he'd been led to believe he was, was that really such a bad thing?

Having reached the captain's quarters at the top of the ladder, Katherine decided she no longer gave a shit. She knocked on Captain Longfellow's door.

“Who dare be disturbing me slumber at such a late hour?” the captain boomed as his heavy footsteps approached the door.

“It's Katherine. The one with the unusual cargo.”

The door swung open. Captain Longfellow was wearing a dark green silk robe embroidered with purple dragons breathing orange plumes of fire. It was tied loosely around his waist, revealing an impressive collection of scars and tattoos covering his mostly-exposed chest. His heavy eyelids and rum-soaked breath suggested that he was well-started on the night's drinking.

“Do ye mean to say exceptional booty?”

Katherine gave him a warning glare.

“It be a nautical term. How might I be of service?”

“I just needed to get out of my cabin and wondered if you'd be up for some time-killing conversation.”

“Count me honored that such a salty old urchin like meself come to yer mind.” He stood aside, holding the door open. “Do come in.” He poked his head out, presumably to see if Katherine was accompanied by anyone else. “For all the danger and peaks of excitement, a life at sea has long lulls of monotony. Swapping tales with strange folk can keep a land-footed lass like yerself from developing the madness that so many a young – GODS ALMIGHTY!” He'd obviously not expected to see a wolf staring back at him when he turned around.

The stuffy air smelled like a cross between an antique shop, a cigar shop, and a locker room. Shelves along the walls were filled with exotic-looking junk. There were statues of wood and bronze, musical instruments and decorative pieces of weaponry and armor, chalices and skulls of man and beast, even a chalice which appeared to have been crafted from a man's skull.

Katherine took a seat at the table which occupied most of the length of the room. “Sorry about that. I didn't mean to startle you.” She stroked Butterbean's head. “I find that Butterbean keeps men on their most gentlemanly behavior.”

“Aye, I have no doubt.” Captain Longfellow grabbed two dusty shot glasses from a shelf, then took a seat across the table from Katherine and Butterbean and poured brown liquid from a bottle into each. He slid one glass across the table to her, then raised his.

Katherine ignored both the dust and the fact that the captain had obviously been drinking straight from the bottle prior to her arrival. It went down smooth and felt good in her blood.

“Be there anything in particular weighing heavy on yer mind, Lady Katherine?”

“Tell me what you know about the Ice Queen of Nazere.”

Captain Longfellow gave her a half smile as he poured the next round. “This be yer idea of time-killing conversation, does it?”

“Everybody's been making such a big deal out of her. I just want to have some kind of idea what I'm up against.” Katherine raised her glass, initiating the next drink. The captain obliged and they necked their shots back.

“I know naught but rumors of the woman herself. But I've seen firsthand the effects of her wicked sorcery. When I was but a cabin boy on me uncle's ship, The Penetraitor, Nazere was a popular destination for we seafaring folk whose business dealings didn't always align with the laws of the land-folk. Bless me barnacles I wasn't there at the time, but the stories from those who managed to escape say that on the day she arrived, the whole bloody island turned from tropical paradise to frozen wasteland overnight, trapping ships in the harbor and enslaving all those aboard to construct her massive palace of ice.”

“Sounds like a bitch.” Katherine fidgeted with her glass. As appreciative as she was for the captain spilling his guts, she wished he'd start spilling some rum again as well.

“That's not the worst of it. One island in an ocean full of them is no great loss. As much as it saddens me to lose so many fine seaworthy men, a life at sea soon teaches ye that sometimes ye need to cut yer losses rather than let the drowning drag ye down to the depths with them.” His gaze fell to her hand. “Where be me manners?” He filled both their glasses.

“Oh, you don't have to... Thanks.” Katherine gulped back her shot. “You were saying?”

Captain Longfellow poured her another before continuing. “Her curse upon the sea spreads outward from Nazere a few miles more with every passing year. In the next half-century, it's expected that the entire Southeast Passage will be frozen over completely, which would not only cut off trade to the Southern Islands, but would also set her frozen minions loose on the lands of men.”

“Couldn't the king send a swarm of dragons or something to go evaporate her icy ass?”

“No point in it while the trade routes are still open. That be the next king's problem.”

“But what happens when her frozen minions get set loose on the lands of men or whatever? Why not take care of the problem now while they can still contain it?”

“Ye got sperm in yer ears, lass, or did I not speak clearly enough before?” The captain's frustration with the very same question was evident in his tone. Katherine knew better than to take it personally.

She raised her glass. “Next king's problem.”

Captain Longfellow sighed, then clinked his glass against hers. “Aye. Next king's problem.”

Chapter 27

“Where am I?” said Cooper, shielding his eyes against the piercing daylight. “Jesus, what time is it?”

“You have slept just over an hour,” responded a childlike voice that sounded like one of those goddamn wild pigs who'd abducted him, Chaz, and Goatman.

Cooper rubbed some shit out of his eyes while they adjusted to the light. “Don't fuck with me, pig. It was only evening when you worked your sleep magic on me. It's got to be at least late morning now, or early afternoon even. Hang on. Did you... violate me?”

“We are not pigs!”

“I'm sorry, is that like the N-word to your kind? Do you prefer to be called swine or Porcine-American or something?” Now that his eyes had adjusted to the light, he searched the grove to address the pig he was talking to. But the only living creatures he could see were Chaz and Goatman, both still sound asleep. “Where the hell are you?”

A tiny winged person materialized in front of Cooper, hands on her hips, hovering and glaring at him like an angry bee.

“Jesus fucking Christ!”

“Do I look like a pig to you?”

“No,” Cooper admitted. “It was an honest mistake. You sound just like the pigs that abducted me and my two traveling companions.”

“The boar were just pulling the sleds. We were the ones talking to you. We can turn invisible at will.”

Cooper thought about it for a moment. In light of seeing this tiny flying woman hovering in front of his face, her explanation seemed a lot more credible than him being kidnapped by talking pigs.

“Shit. Please apologize to that one pig I beat the shit out of.”

“I'm sure he will understand when I explain to him how incredibly stupid you are.”

“Thanks.” With that weight off his chest, Cooper took in his surroundings. While it was as bright as mid-afternoon in their immediate surroundings, the light didn't come from the sky, but from an orange crystalline structure on the ground, like a frozen campfire. It shined light like Chaz's acorn had, only much more intensely, but the full moon and stars were visible in the night sky. “Where are we?”

“This is the Secret Glade of Glittersprinkles Grove.”

“How fucking secret could this place be all lit up like this? It's got to be visible for miles.”

“We've cast Permanent Image spells all along the perimeter of the glade. To the outside observer, this looks like any other random section of dark forest. Occasionally, a Dark One will wander in by chance, but we make short work of them. Now, tell me what business you have in my wood.”

“I'm not interested in your wood,” said Cooper. “As a matter of fact, I thought you were a woman.” The effeminate flying creature glowered like it might slap him, so he hurried to his point. “We were looking for you. You're pixies, right?”

“Your powers of perception are developing. You can now tell the difference between a pixie and a pig. Congratulations. Now what further trouble do you seek to cause for the Children of the Forest, half-orc?”

“I don't seek shit. I was led here by a friend of yours. Someone by the name of Nabi.”

The impressively convincing pixie transvestite's pink eyebrows furrowed in thought. “Knobby? That doesn't ring any chimes. Is he a gnome?”

“Hollywhirl!” said a second pixie who suddenly appeared, grabbing the first one by the arm. This one also had very effeminate features but was more obviously a dude. He turned to Cooper with a wide-eyed gaze. “Do you mean Nabi?”

“Shit.” Cooper sighed. “Am I still fucking up the pronunciation?”

Hollywhirl pulled his arm free from the other's grasp, and had a tiny arrow aimed at Cooper's face before he even saw him pull out a bow. “What know you of my sister, filthy half-orc? Speak the truth or I'll feed you to the Dark Ones before I destroy you for good.” Dude was pissed, but Cooper found it kind of adorable that he was threatening him with such a tiny arrow.

“Listen, man. I don't want any –”

“SQUAAAWWWWK!” A mass of black feathers launched out from one of the trees at the perimeter of the glade like a particularly obnoxious Dark One with a beak.

Hollywhirl spun around and released his bowstring, interrupting Ravenus's battle-squawk and sending him crash-landing into the grass next to Cooper.

“Nice try, buddy,” said Cooper to the unconscious bird. “It was a solid effort.”

“Search the perimeter,” demanded Hollywhirl to the seemingly empty air. “See if anyone else was following them.”

“It was just him,” said Cooper. “To be honest, I'd forgotten he was with us.”

“We shall soon find out, Mr. Cooper.”

Cooper's heart skipped a beat as he stared in wonder at the effeminate bug-man. “How do you know my name?”

“Are you deaf?” said Hollywhirl. “Your stupid bird just shouted it.”

Cooper looked down at Ravenus, feeling even worse for having forgotten about him. “He speaks the Elven tongue. I can't understand any of the shit he says.”

Hollywhirl's face was a mixture of impatience, frustration, confusion and, as hard as Cooper searched for it, a distinct lack of an Adam's apple.

“Why would you choose for your familiar to speak a language which you cannot understand?”

Cooper snorted. “My familiar? Do I look smart enough to be a fucking wizard to you?”

“No, you do not.”

“And do I look like I have a high enough Charisma score to be a sorcerer?” Cooper let loose the fart that had been brewing from the anxiety of the interrogation to strengthen his point.

Hollywhirl and his visible companion flew a few feet higher.

“I'm not sure I understand what you're talking about,” said Hollywhirl. “But if not your familiar, then whose? The human weakling? The satyr?”

“It's a friend of mine's. We got separated. I'm looking after him until we meet back in Cardinia. Nabi requested we make this detour into a fucking haunted forest. If she's really your sister, then I'm sure you know how stubborn and persuasive she is.”

Cooper was expecting a sleep arrow to the face, which would have suited him fine. But Hollywhirl's hard glare began to soften.

“I sense no ill intent from you, and you genuinely seem too dumb to deceive.”

“Thank you.”

“Where is my sister?”

“She's in my axe.”

Hollywhirl frowned. “I don't understand.”

“I don't either,” said Cooper. “I picked up this badass-looking axe off an orc I killed out on the Barrier Islands. A couple of days later, it started talking to me. Like, in my mind. It said its name is Nabi and started going apeshit on creatures it considered evil. She's fucking exhausting.”

“That does sound like your sister,” said the other pixie, a little judgmentally. “She tends to be a bit zealous.”

Hollywhirl's eyes sparkled a little more than tears alone should account for, like his tear ducts were secreting glitter glue.

“Honeydrop, Wildflower. Fetch the half-orc's axe.”

“Right away, Hollywhirl,” said a voice from the air above Cooper.

A few moments later, Cooper's axe floated sideways and lay on the ground in front of him. He sat extra still, wanting to be absolutely clear that he had no intention of picking it up and swinging it at them.

“Hickory Nut can fell a sparrow in flight from thirty yards away,” said Hollywhirl, gesturing at his visible companion. His tone wasn't hostile, but it wasn't fucking around either. “You are far larger, slower, and nearer. And he's not the only one with an arrow currently pointed at you.”

Cooper glanced around, not seeing anyone, but also not doubting his words. “I understand.”

“Nabi?” Hollywhirl addressed the axe. “Are you in there?” After a moment of no response, even in Cooper's head, Hollywhirl looked sternly at him.

“I think I need to hold her,” said Cooper. “Our bond needs to strengthen or something.” He was kind of talking out of his ass, but he also believed that what he was saying was true in a way that he didn't fully comprehend.

Hickory Nut's expression was skeptical, but Hollywhirl's was hopeful.

“Very well,” said Hollywhirl. “Pick up the axe.” Instead of flying higher as Hickory Nut did, Hollywhirl descended and landed gently on the ground in front of Cooper and the axe. Cooper didn't know if it was meant to convey that he trusted him, or to show off just how unafraid of him he was, like he was daring Cooper to make a wrong move. Maybe he just wanted to show off to his own people who really had the nuts of hickory.

“Hollywhirl?” said Hickory Nut, sounding a little concerned.

“It's okay.” Hollywhirl's gaze never left Cooper's. “He knows he's surrounded.”

Well he sure as shit knows now.

Cooper scooted forward on his ass in order to demonstrate that he was not at all trying to get into an optimal batttle-ready stance. It was due for a wipe anyway. When he reached the axe, he moved his hands very slowly and deliberately toward the upper part of the shaft, near the blades, so as to purposely not have leverage for a swing.

“Nabi?”

You've done well, Cooper. Thank you.

“You're welcome. Your brother is here.”

Hollywhirl's eyes narrowed and his lips pursed, but he remained still and silent.

I don't have a brother.

Cooper kept his circumstances in mind, but glared at Hollywhirl. “You son of a bitch impostor. Who are you?”

Hollywhirl is my sister.

“She had you fooled too, huh?” Cooper cupped his hand around the corner of his mouth, brought the axe blades up close to his face, and whispered, “He asked me what I wanted to do with his wood.”

“I asked you what business you have in my wood, you idiot! That's another word for forest.”

Cooper felt embarrassed that she'd heard him, but relieved because he'd fully intended to rub one out to her later whether she was a dude or not.

“Sorry. Never can tell nowadays.”

“If that axe is really my sister, ask her why she's an axe.”

Cooper listened to Nabi's story in his head, then relayed it, piece-by-piece, to the pixie audience.

“She sensed an evil presence in the wood.” He paused to snort out a giggle and snot bubble. When it was clear that no one else shared his amusement, he continued. “She discovered a dwarf leading a group of goblins and decided to follow them. They went deep into – Hang on, are you fucking with me?”

“What is it?” asked Hollywhirl. “Where did they go?”

“Morning Glory Hole?”

Again, there was a distinct absence of laughter.

“Yes?” Hollywhirl motioned for him to continue.

“That's a real place?” said Cooper. “Morning Glory Hole?”

“It's a cave to the south,” said Hickory Nut.

“And that's the best name you could come up with for it?”

“It's named for all the morning glories which grow around it.”

Cooper frowned. “It doesn't seem a little –”

“Who gives a juniper berry what the cave's name is?” said Hollywhirl. “What happened next?”

After pausing to listen, Cooper continued with Nabi's story. “Though she was invisible, the dwarf had been aware of her presence all along. He cast a Web spell at the cave's entrance, trapping Nabi and rendering her helpless.”

Hollywhirl folded her arms and huffed. “That's just like her to go off on her own without telling anyone and follow evil creatures into a forbidden cave.”

“When they captured her, the goblins held her down.”

Hollywhirl and Hickory Nut's eyes grew wide with worry and anticipation as Cooper developed a sick feeling in his stomach, fearing what information he might shortly have to relay aloud.

“The dwarf grinned down at her, commanded the goblins to turn her over, then...”

He pulled my wings off.

Cooper sighed with relief. “He just pulled her wings off.”

Hollywhirl and Hickory Nut gasped in horror, as did several other pixies who still chose to remain invisible.

“I thought that story was headed in a whole different direction,” said Cooper. “But yeah, I guess that's still pretty bad.”

“Continue with your story, half-orc,” said Hollywhirl, staring daggers at him as if he was the one who'd de-winged her sister.

“The dwarf performed some kind of ritual and trapped her inside the axe. She took some time to adjust to being an axe, and by the time she got control of her senses, she was in some kind of orc stronghold. She held back her power a few times, killing he owners by giving them a disadvantage in combat, until...”

“Until what?” asked Hickory Nut.

Cooper knew this was going to be a hard sell. “Until she met me.”

Hollywhirl narrowed her eyes. “Why? What's so special about you, that Nabi would choose you to wield her?”

You have a good heart, you are loyal to your friends, and you are fun.

Fully aware that it made him sound like kind of a douche, Cooper repeated Nabi's kind words about him.

“I'm not convinced,” said Hickory Nut.

Hollywhirl looked up at him. “But –”

“I know you want to find Nabi. Somehow, this half-orc knows that too. He's telling you exactly what you want to hear and giving himself a hefty dose of flattery as well.”

“I never wanted to hear that my sister's wings were ripped off!”

“The unpleasant details sell the story, the hope that she's still alive. And who better to sell such a story than someone who personally knows otherwise?” Hickory Nut gave Cooper an accusing look, but Cooper was still trying to work out the implications of what he'd just said.

Another female pixie materialized. At least she appeared female. Cooper searched for an Adam's apple.

“There's one way to confirm his story.”

Hollywhirl turned to the new girl. “What's that?”

“We can bring the axe to the Pool of True Sight.”

Hickory Nut rolled his eyes. “I knew it was only a matter of time before someone suggested that. That's a full day's journey, meaning we'll be outside the safety of the glade for an entire night. On evidence provided by this half-orc cretin.”

“Hey, fuck you!” said Cooper.

Tell him the same from me as well.

“Nabi says fuck you too.”

Hickory Nut pointed at Cooper. “There, you see! Nabi would never say that to me.”

Hollywhirl stared wide-eyed at Cooper. “Yes, she would.” She turned to Hickory Nut. “I'm sorry to have to break it to you like this. She's never liked you.” She stood up and looked high in the air. “Children of the Forest, we leave at dawn.”

Chapter 28

Dave woke up on the floor in the cellar of the Whore's Head Inn, which was immediately recognizable by the fact that it contained an enormous wooden dildo, which was the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes. It was right there in his face, pointing at him like he owed it a beej and it was time to pay up.

Pushing himself up off the floor, Dave discovered he was naked. He wondered if his nakedness was in any way related to the proximity of the dildo, and leaned over to give it a sniff. He detected no alarming smell, nor any unusual soreness in his ass, come to think of it. He would assume that his nakedness had nothing to do with the dildo until he remembered or was informed otherwise.

The dildo wasn't the only thing on the floor. The whole cellar was a mess, with weapons strewn all over the floor. Nothing remained of the crates that had held them except broken strips of wood.

The state of the room, the nakedness, his splitting headache, and his complete lack of memory of the previous night's events all led to one conclusion. He, Frank, Rhonda, Tony the Elf, and Murkwort must have gotten completely shitfaced last night. Dave struggled up the stairs on his squat naked legs, whispering a small prayer to whatever gods might be listening that he hadn't fucked Rhonda.

At the top of the stairs he found the thick wooden door scarred with axe and dagger marks, which he was able to recognize easily due to several hand axes and daggers still sticking into the wood. It was also locked from the outside.

“Hello?” Dave called out. “Frank? Rhonda? Are you there?” Suddenly feeling a little panicky, like there might be something more wrong than the possibility of him having fucked Rhonda, he banged on the door with his fist. “Tony the Elf? Murkwort?”

“He doesn't know.” Rhonda's voice was faint on the other side of the door, but it was her all right.

“Hey!” shouted Dave. “I can hear you guys! What's going on? What don't I know?”

“Are you feeling okay, Dave?” Frank called back to him. That was a step in the right direction. They weren't pretending they couldn't hear him.

“I think so. I mean, I'm naked for some reason, my head hurts, and I'm locked in the cellar. But otherwise, I guess I'm doing okay.”

“You don't remember anything about last night?”

“No, but I'm guessing we got pretty trashed.”

After a short pause, Tony the Elf spoke up. “One of us did, in a manner of speaking.”

Dave didn't even want to know how far off the deep end he'd gone. With this group, how far out of line did you have to act to warrant getting locked in the cellar. Shit. Had he tried to force himself on Rhonda?

“Listen, guys. Whatever happened, I'm really sorry. My alcohol tolerance must be out of whack or something. All I've had to eat for the past three days is a turkey leg I picked up off the floor. It's been rough out there.”

There was no response from the other side of the door. Were they on the fence about forgiving him, or at least releasing him? Did they need a bit more of a nudge?

“Like I said, I don't remember what happened last night. But I trust you had a good reason to lock me in here. And whatever I did, I'm truly sorry, and I'll do whatever I can to make it right. I know being drunk doesn't excuse my behavior, but maybe... I don't know. Maybe you could give me a little credit for bringing Murkwort in? I mean, he could be the key to getting us all back home.”

“Dave,” said Frank.

“No, you're right. I'm sorry I brought it up. I regretted saying it as soon as the words came out of my mouth. I can't expect to be forgiven for whatever it is that I've done just because I potentially saved all of our lives.” Did that sound as insincere and passive aggressive to them as it sounded to him? “I'm just saying, maybe we could look past whatever indiscretions I may have committed while intoxicated, and focus on the positive.”

Someone sighed.

“Let him out,” said Frank.

Dave listened as tables were dragged away from the door, then pushed it open a crack. “Can someone give me my pants?”

“You can get them yourself,” said Tony the Elf. “You lost your shit before you lost your shit.”

A little bit of the previous night came back to Dave. He remembered shitting himself. Murkwort was walking him to the outhouse, and... Where was Murkwort now? Why was he so quiet?

“Come on, guys. Can you at least give me, like, a tarp or something?” He wrenched a hand axe free from the door to hide his junk with and pushed the door open a little wider.

Murkwort was sitting on the floor against the wall next to the rear exit. His lifeless eyes were wide open, as was his jaw, showing off his precious metal teeth, as was the gaping hole where his throat used to be. His robes were thick with drying blood.

“What the fuck happened to him?” asked Dave.

“You did,” said Tony the Elf.

This was so much worse than fucking Rhonda. At least definitively worse.

“How could I? He's a high-level wizard, and I'm just... I'm just Dave.”

Frank shook his head. “Not anymore you're not. You're a wererat.”

“What?” said Dave. “That's impossible.” He assumed that Frank had some kind of solid evidence to make that specific an accusation, and tried to think of when or how he might have gotten infected by a wererat, but there was nothing. He shook his head. “Whatever went down last night, you misinterpreted something. I'm not a goddamn wererat.”

“There's nothing to misinterpret,” said Tony the Elf. “We heard a scream out back by the outhouse. When we went to check it out, there was some fucking rat-man monster tearing out Murkwort's throat with its teeth. I grabbed a shovel and clobbered it over the head, knocking it unconscious. It was too late for Murkwort. You were unaccounted for, so instead of killing it, we locked it down in the cellar, just in case.”

Rhonda wiped a tear from her eye. “We were really hoping you'd run away or something.”

Dave sat down at a table. Lycanthropy explained the memory loss and the nakedness. He vaguely remembered a full moon. And a shovel to the head explained his headache well enough. But...

“How could this have happened? Lycanthropy isn't an airborne virus. I haven't been bitten or scratched by anyone. I haven't had sex with anyone. I haven't – Shit.”

“What is it?” asked Frank.

“The turkey leg.”

“The one you picked up off the floor?” asked Rhonda.

Dave nodded. “Someone else had taken a few bites.”

Rhonda and Tony the Elf exchanged a grimace.

“You ate a partially eaten turkey leg you picked up off the floor?” said Rhonda.

“I was starving!” Dave thought back to that dwarf who'd been writing the scrolls and how quickly he'd disappeared. If he'd changed to his dire rat form, he could have easily hidden in the tall grass. Dave pounded the table with his fist. “Fuck. I'm a goddamn wererat.”

Chapter 29

Julian woke up on a massive white pillow in a large luxurious room, at least by the standards of this world. The walls and furniture all gleamed white, and the air smelled like rose petals. He was wearing a white satin robe with nothing underneath it. The huge window gave him no indication as to where he was, as the view was completely obscured by a heavy white mist.

“Shit,” Julian whispered to himself. “Am I in heaven?” If so, shit was probably an inappropriate first reaction.

“Stacy!” he called out. His head felt foggy. He may have still been a little drunk. “Stacy!”

“Look who's finally awake.” Stacy strode into the room in a white satin robe like the one Julian was wearing. She was followed by a man Julian couldn't recall ever having seen before. He was wearing an identical robe. His brown hair was pinned back in a ponytail, and he had a nicely trimmed goatee. Julian supposed he could have been Jesus, and wondered if his own Jewish upbringing was going to cause any complications.

“Hello,” Julian said politely, but with just a pinch of 'Who the hell are you and why are we all within a napkin's difference of being naked in this room together?'.

“Julian,” said Stacy. “This is Darton. Darton, Julian.”

“It's a pleasure to meet you.” Darton stepped forward to offer Julian a handshake, but tripped on the edge of a rug and slammed his shin into the coffee table. “Nnnnnngggggggg!” he said in lieu of swearing. Perhaps he was still drunk as well.

His hand was still extended, so Julian accepted the handshake, but kept his foggy gaze centered on Stacy. “Where are we?”

“I met Darton at that last bar we went to earlier this morning. He invited us to stay in his suite.”

“Sounds like you made the responsible choice.” That came out a little harsher than he'd meant for it to, but the harshness might be justified, depending on her answer to his next question. “Where are our clothes?”

“I had to carry you here,” said Stacy, a hint of annoyance in her voice. “You threw up on me. Darton here was kind enough to send our clothes out to be cleaned.”

It was easy to see how he was currently the dick in the situation, but Julian didn't think it was entirely fair.

“I didn't ask to start doing shots at six in the morning. You were the one who –” A more important thought occurred to him. “Do you have the –” Not knowing who this Darton guy was, Julian didn't know if he should be mentioning the dice in front of him.

Stacy smiled and pulled back the left side of her robe enough to expose the silver chain. “Don't worry. I told him about the dice. He knows a guy who has another one mounted on the head of a walking cane. That's our mark for this evening.”

“Do we have a plan?” asked Julian. “Or am I supposed to just grab his dick and see what happens?”

Darton, still rubbing his shin, looked at Julian quizzically. “Perhaps I was unclear, but I was actually referring to a literal walking cane.”

Julian put his inexplicably hostile feelings toward Darton aside and looked at Stacy. “What do we know about this guy?”

Stacy frowned. “Darton?”

“No. The guy with the cane.” But now that she mentioned it, it might be appropriate to discuss what they knew about Darton as well next time they got a moment alone, since they were sharing all their secrets with him.

“Aleric of Whitewood,” said Darton. “Nothing terribly valuable on the surface. He got his start making scrolls and potions, then moved up to rods and wands. Now he mostly trades in real estate. He makes quite a bit of money, and he likes to show it off. I met him a few days ago over breakfast. He was eating a poached pegasus egg.”

Stacy gasped. “That's terrible.”

“Yes. By all accounts I've heard, they taste atrocious.”

“Then why would he eat one?”

Darton shrugged. “Simply to be seen doing so. They may taste like fermenting garbage, but a pegasus egg demands two thousand gold pieces on the open market. And that's typically for people who intend to hatch it. Eating one is merely a means of saying Look how much I can afford to throw away on breakfast, without actually saying it.”

“What a douche,” said Julian. “And I can't think of anything we could possibly offer him any douchier than a pimp cane.”

A sharp knock on the door made Julian jump.

“You needn't be alarmed,” said Darton. “That will be our clothes.” He turned around, seemingly unaware of the space he occupied, as his right hand swung straight into an expensive-looking vase sitting atop a pedestal on the rear of the plush white sofa. Stacy had to dive, but she managed to catch it, keeping it from smashing to pieces on the floor. She stood up and sighed as Darton walked obliviously to the door.

“That must be what a low Dexterity score looks like,” Julian muttered to Stacy while Darton talked to whoever was at the door.

Stacy placed the vase back on top of the pedestal. “I hope he survives the trip back across the room.”

Having concluded his business with the person out in the hallway, Darton returned to Stacy and Julian with a pile of clean and neatly-folded laundry.

“Damn,” said Stacy, holding up her shiny black leather rogue outfit. “I can't believe I can fit in this.” Now that she mentioned it, it looked like a leather onesie for an adolescent stick figure.

Julian's robes were whiter than they'd ever been. All the blood stains were gone. The multitude of tears, slits, and puncture holes caused by blades, claws, and teeth during his time in this world had all been mended, the stitching almost invisible except upon very close inspection. His serape, which had grown dull with dust and dirt, was now more vibrant and colorful than it had been when he bought it off that guy driving the shit cart.

“An interesting choice of clothing for a wizard,” said Darton when he re-emerged from his bedroom. He'd changed into his own more conventional wizard attire consisting of royal blue robes decorated with embroidered golden bamboo leaves. He was carrying two folded bundles of similar fabric, one of which was forest green and the other maroon. “Wherever did you acquire such an outfit?”

“This is considered very fashionable where we come from.” Julian didn't know why he felt the compulsion to lie to this guy, especially with Stacy right there to call him out on it. But she just shot him a quick curious glance and left it at that.

“The height of fashion it may be wherever you're from,” said Darton. “But here it draws attention, which we don't want on a reconnaissance mission.”

“Reconnaissance mission?” Julian looked at Stacy. “Where are we going?”

Stacy shrugged.

“I had the hotel boy alert me as to Aleric's whereabouts. He's currently having lunch in the restaurant on the top floor of this hotel. Once we all have a clearer idea of who he is and what he's like, we can speak more intelligibly about how we might go about relieving him of his stick.” Darton handed the green bundle of fabric to Stacy, and the maroon one to Julian. “I apologize if these don't meet your high standards of fashion, but they should help you to blend in a little easier.”

Julian wanted to tell him he was going to blend his foot up his ass, but he decided against it after considering that Darton was doing them a favor and that it was a stupid thing to say.

When they were all dressed in Darton's clothes, they went upstairs as separate parties. Julian and Stacy would be a couple, while Darton would be dining alone. He claimed he didn't want to be directly involved in whatever scheme they hatched up, and that he was there only in an advisory capacity. That sounded kind of cowardly to Julian, but Stacy didn't seem surprised by it at all. It must have been part of the deal they'd struck up while he was passed out in the bar.

It was probably for the best that they were dining as separate parties anyway. While they were waiting to be seated, Darton bent over to wipe a smudge off his boot, then slammed his head into the serving tray of a passing waitress when he stood back up. They were both covered from head to toe in exotic fruit juices and surrounded by a corona of shattered glass. For as suave and dapper a man as he seemed to like to present himself, Julian couldn't see Darton as anything but a moronic buffoon.

The hostess clearly thought so as well. Julian caught her shaking her head before she caught him catching her and snapped back into employee mode, flashing him a wide smile.

“Will it just be the two of you?”

“Yes,” Stacy said before Julian had a chance to respond.

“Please follow me.” The hostess grabbed two menus and led them across the dining area. The food smelled amazing, like Thanksgiving dinner in a flower garden.

Julian thought about how remarkably similar restaurants here were to restaurants back home. He wondered if that was because Mordred hadn't been thorough with his historical research when he created this world, or because the restaurant business actually hadn't evolved much in the past millennium.

The hostess led them to a small table with a white satin tablecloth that hung down to the floor. Like the other tables they'd passed, this one came with two intricately folded napkins, a stoppered glass bottle of some kind of brown sauce, and three shakers. Julian assumed, for now, that the dark grey and white contents of two of them were pepper and salt, respectively, and he was curious as to what the granular red contents of the third was.

When they were seated and the hostess left them, they opened their menus.

There wasn't much of a selection. One side of the menu said PORK, and the other side said PHEASANT, with accompanying pictures of a pig and a pheasant under the respective text. Julian didn't think this looked like the sort of restaurant that had much of a barbarian clientele, so he assumed the pictures were there to fill what would otherwise be a lot of empty space.

Pork was a safe choice, but Julian had never tried pheasant. He was actually hoping for something a little more exotic, like griffon or owlbear meat. Or even one of those giant ants. Sure he'd already tried it, but not as prepared in a kitchen by a professional cook. As good as it had been just roasted over a fire, imagine what it might –

“I didn't sleep with him,” said Stacy without lowering her menu.

Shit.

“Who?” said Julian, feeling pressured to respond before taking the time to consider whether or not playing dumb was really the right move here.

“Darton.”

“I don't know how I'm supposed to respond to that.” Julian suddenly grew more indecisive about the pork or pheasant options as he shielded his face with the menu. “I'm sorry to hear that? Congratulations? You'll get him next time, Champ? Why are you even telling me this?”

“You've been scowling at him since we walked out of his bedroom together.”

“I wasn't scowling,” Julian lied. “It's this island. All the hopping around between different time zones. My internal clock is off.” After a moment of silence, Julian peeked over the top of his menu, then jumped when he discovered Stacy staring at him stoically.

What the hell did she want from him? What had he done to get this third-degree business? She was the one who didn't do the act in question, which didn't even actually qualify as an act in question until she brought it up. Maybe he could come at it from a different direction.

“I'll be happy to listen if there's something you'd like to get off your chest.” No, that was terrible. He was making himself sound like he was ready to hear a confession, and maybe hoping to get a glimpse of her tits. Say something else. Say something else. “When you say you didn't sleep, do you mean...” He really needed her to say something, just to shut him up.

“I mean we didn't fuck.”

“Oh.” Julian really wanted another look at that menu.

“We just made out a little. Things got a little feely.”

“I'll just give you two a few more minutes,” said a visibly uncomfortable waitress who neither Julian nor Stacy had seen approaching. She scurried away from their table before Julian could plead with her to stay.

“Listen, Stacy,” said Julian. “This is really none of my business.”

“I'm making it your business,” said Stacy. “We were drunk. We got to talking. One thing led to another. I might have actually gone all the way with him if fate hadn't intervened.”

As long as she was forcing him to talk about it, Julian couldn't be faulted for asking about this particularly curious detail.

“How, exactly, did fate intervene?”

“His, um... weapon went off prematurely.”

That made Julian happier than it should have. He tried not to show it. “Oh,” he said again.

“I want you to know, I'm not telling you this because I feel I owe you an explanation.”

“Of course you don't,” said Julian, somehow feeling like he was the asshole here. “You're a grown woman. You're free to do what you want with whom you want.”

“I also wasn't asking for your permission.”

“And I'm not trying to give it!” Julian calmed himself when he saw their approaching waitress turn around and walk away again. “Maybe it would help if you told me why you're telling me this.”

“We spent the night together in a grove of trees on a flying island below a full moon and a sky full of stars. If you didn't want me then, is it safe to assume you don't want me at all?”

“No, that's not a safe assumption at all.” Julian had sensed that tension between them coming to a crescendo last night. He supposed this conversation had to happen sooner or later. “Back home, I would have been all over you given the slightest hint of an invitation.”

“What's wrong with me now?” asked Stacy. “I'm objectively and quantifiably more attractive now than I was then.”

“It's not you. It's me.” Upon seeing what looked like the desire to stab him in Stacy's narrowed eyes, Julian realized the genericness of what he'd said. “Wait, I didn't mean it like that. I mean in a real, physiological and emotional way. My wiring's all screwed up or something. Do you know that I've only masturbated once since I've been in this world? And even then it was because I hadn't felt the urge to do so for so long that I started to get concerned. It took me over half an hour to get an erection. I'm not –”

Stacy cleared her throat.

Julian sighed. “The waitress is behind me, isn't she?”

“I'm going to leave these here for you.” The waitress placed two tall glasses of orange liquid on the table, then started to retreat.

Julian was ready for her this time. “Excuse me. I believe we're ready to order.”

“Very good, sir.” She flashed him a nervous smile. “And what would you like?”

“The pheasant.”

“I'll have the same,” said Stacy.

“And could you please point me to the nearest restroom?” asked Julian.

The waitress pointed to the back of the restaurant. “It's right over there.”

Julian stood up and excused himself.

Stacy sipped her drink and looked pleasantly surprised. “Try to keep it under half an hour.”

That was unnecessarily hurtful. Julian sulked on the way to the bathroom. He supposed Stacy was right to feel the way she did. He wasn't acting normal. He was fucking this up, and he was going to lose her if he didn't get his shit together.

The bathroom was an interesting design. There was a trough to pee in, like one might find at a stadium, the bottom of which sloped downward from the left side to the right. Julian guessed about eight men could piss side-by-side before the trough leveled off, the top of it covered by three two-inch-thick pieces of wood, each perfectly square, polished, and with a circular hole in the middle. Looking through one of the holes, Julian could see all the way down to the desert floor.

A couple of things occurred to him. This bathroom had no stalls, and this was the only bathroom in the place. Those wooden boards must be for anyone who needed to sit in order to do their business, man or woman, number one or number two. He made a mental note to tell Stacy she might want to hold off until they got back up to the room if she needed to go.

“What are you doing?” said Darton, storming into the bathroom and slipping on someone else's pee. He barely managed to grab on to a notch in the rough stone wall and keep himself from taking a nasty spill on the floor.

'Staring at a toilet seat' was the obvious answer, but Julian thought he could do better. “I was trying to pee, if that's okay with you.”

“I meant this whole time. I've been trying to get your attention from the other side of the restaurant. Have you forgotten why we're here?”

Julian thought for a moment while he peed. Finally, it came back to him.

“Of course I do. We just had some stuff we had to talk about.”

“Oh?” Darton's voice had a hint of concern in it. He was obviously wondering if Stacy had told Julian that he'd jizzed his pants. “What sort of stuff?”

“Stuff stuff.” Julian found it odd that Darton wasn't peeing. “Did you just come in here to watch me pee?”

“No,” said Darton. “I came in here to get you focused. Aleric of Whitewood is dining alone by the window on the northwest side of the restaurant. From where you're sitting, he's directly to the right of the fat palm tree in the center of the floor. If he's in your line of sight, he'll be easy to spot. The cane is actually on his table, head facing outward.”

Julian shook his head. “That's just desperate for attention.” He rinsed his hands in a continuously flowing waterfall on the wall opposite the piss trough, assuming that was the purpose for it being there. There wasn't any soap that he could see, so a thorough rinse would have to do.

“Sad, isn't it?” said Darton. Julian's mind was preoccupied with the lack of hand soap, and he had to mentally backtrack to understand what Darton was referring to.

“Yes. Thanks for the intel. I've got an idea.”

“What is it?”

“Nothing big. I'll run it by Stacy.” Julian walked out before Darton could respond, smugly satisfied knowing that Darton would certainly want a say in what Julian was planning, but wouldn't follow him out of the bathroom and be seen talking to him.

He scanned the dining area as he walked back to his table, casually looking for someone sitting alone with a walking cane on their table. But the fat palm tree in the center of the room, which Julian hadn't even noticed until now, obscured quite a lot. When he turned his attention to his own table, he found Stacy sniffling and wiping away a tear.

“What's wrong?” he asked, quickly sitting down.

“I'm sorry, Julian. You must think I'm such a bitch.”

“No, of course I don't.” Julian shook open a folded napkin and wiped away a tear she'd missed. “I mean, well kinda, but I like that about you.”

Stacy snort-laughed.

“What happened while I was in the bathroom?”

“The waitress overheard us.”

Julian nodded. “Yeah. A couple of times, I think.”

“She's in a relationship with an elf.” Stacy's eyes glistened with tears. “You were right. It's physiological. You guys just don't get aroused that often or that easily. Something to do with your long life spans. If you reproduced at human rates, the world would be overrun with starving elves.”

“That makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint. But is it really something to get so worked up about?”

Stacy snorted again. “No, stupid. I'm not crying because we're not going to be humping around the clock. I'm crying because I feel bad for being so mean to you.”

“Don't even give it another thought,” said Julian. “I was worried about this too. You can't know how relieved I am right now. I mean, given the way I feel about you, I thought there was something wrong with me. Let's focus on getting the rest of those dice, getting Mordred, and getting back home in our proper bodies, and maybe we'll give that humping around the clock thing a go.”

Stacy smiled and gave Julian's hand a squeeze. Tension left the table like an uninvited third –

“Ow!” said Julian. Something had struck him in the temple. Some long dead king stared up at him from the side of a silver coin which had just landed on the table. Julian looked in the direction it had been thrown from.

Darton was glaring at him with a frustrated look on his face.

Julian nodded and pocketed the coin. Now that his issues with Stacy were resolved, at least for the time being, he could once again focus on the somehow less stressful task of trying to steal an artifact from a powerful wizard.

Aleric of Whitewood was easy to spot once Julian made an effort to find him. This was in no small part due to the fact that he was so obviously desperate to be spotted. He sat at his table alone, sipping some steamy beverage from a powder blue porcelain cup, hopefully watching each person who walked by his table. His lips tightened in frustration every time someone passed without sparing a look down at his walking cane, which accounted for most of the people who passed.

“Give me the pendant,” he said to Stacy.

Stacy put her hand over her heart where the pendant hung beneath her robe. “Why?”

“I want to wear it and casually walk by his table. See if it provokes a reaction.”

“That doesn't sound like much of a plan.”

“It's not a plan. It's an attempt to shake things loose, see what happens. Maybe we'll learn something that will contribute to a plan.”

Stacy pulled the silver dragon claw pendant over her head and slid it across the table, but didn't remove her hand. “I don't have to tell you how important this is, right?”

“I think I'm at least as aware of its importance as you are.”

“I don't like the idea of flashing these around in front of so many sets of eyes, any of which could belong to Mordred.”

“That guy's already flashing his around. If Mordred's in this restaurant right now, he's probably already seen it. We've got to gamble on that not being the case in order to better our odds of being able to get one more of those dice out of the public eye for good.”

Stacy smiled appreciatively. “That was some fancy Diplomacy footwork.” She lifted one side of her hand like a clam shell, keeping the pendant shielded from view but available for Julian to take.

Julian took the pendant and slipped the chain over his head. He tucked the dragon claw encased die under Darton's robe, then walked quickly back to the bathroom. He had no excuse to walk from his and Stacy's table to Aleric of Whitewood's table, but using the bathroom as a starting point, he could casually go anywhere in the restaurant without raising any eyebrows.

Or so he assumed. When he left the bathroom, wearing the pendant above the robe, Julian pretended not to notice a few more turned heads and paused conversations than he was comfortable with. Making his way counter-clockwise along the windowed perimeter of the restaurant, he kept Aleric of Whitewood in his peripheral vision while pretending to take more of an interest in the view offered by the windows.

“Hey!” Aleric called out as Julian passed. Julian had set the hook. Now it was just a matter of reeling it in and figuring out how to get it in the boat.

Julian feigned being startled, then stopped and looked down at the portly man at the table. “I'm sorry. Are you talking to me?”

“I am indeed. I couldn't help but notice that curious trinket you wear around your neck.”

“Oh, this old thing?” Julian looked down at his pendant. “I picked this up some time ago in a magical oddities shop. I never did manage to get any functional magic out of it, but I like the dragon claw design.” His gaze dropped down to the cane on Aleric's table. “Oh my. I see your cane has an identically carved stone.”

“Carved? Perhaps. Now that I see an identical one, I wonder if they weren't artificially manufactured. Some apprentice wizard is probably using his master's laboratory to replicate these for a copper piece each, enchanting them with a double-folded illusion spell to give them the appearance of powerful magic, then selling them at ten thousand times the production cost.”

Julian smiled to himself. They were trying to run the same con on each other. Aleric had a better-thought-out story, but lacked the delivery skills to sell it. It was too perfect. Too memorized. Not natural sounding at all.

Julian shrugged. “Live and learn.”

“May I hold yours? I'd like to inspect it, to see if it matches mine upon a closer examination.”

A difficult situation. Julian didn't want to let the die out of his possession, but neither did he want to seem overprotective of it. He searched his mind for a compromise.

“I'll show you mine if you show me yours.” Why the fuck did I just say that?

“Of course,” said Aleric. “Be my guest.” He gestured at his walking cane.

Julian wondered what the consequences would be for just picking up the cane and running like a motherfucker. Almost certainly bad, he imagined. Aleric would have to assume the same would be true for him, and he had the added disadvantages of being seated and having Julian between him and the exit.

Reluctantly, Julian slipped the chain over his head and held it out for Aleric, who was trying his best to appear disinterested as he accepted it. Julian picked up the cane and pretended to examine it, but kept his attention focused on the pendant.

Aleric shut one eye and held the pendant up close to his open one. “Just as I thought. Cheap reproductions. Still, my niece might enjoy it to play with. I can't believe I'm about to say this, but I'll give you ten gold pieces for it.”

Nice one, Aleric. Julian quickly thought up a counter offer.

“I think I'll hang onto it for the time being. Like I said, I like how it looks on me. As a matter of fact, a matching walking cane might be something I'd part with five gold pieces for.”

“The cane itself is nice and sturdy. I'll keep it until I find another that suits me. But thank the gods you refused my offer. I might need to have my head examined. Truth be told, I don't even like my niece that much. Three gold pieces is my final offer.”

It was fascinating, like the exact opposite of a bidding war.

“That's very generous of you,” said Julian. “But I couldn't possibly –”

“Aleric of Whitewood!” said Darton, his arms spread wide as he approached, coming within a centimeter of smacking a passing waitress in the face. “I spotted you from across the room and said to myself, What's my old friend doing here dining all alone?” He sat down at the table, a move which Julian hadn't been so bold as to make uninvited. He leaned in close to peer at the pendant. “Whatever do you have there?” His eyes widened in fake surprise. “Why, it matches your cane!”

“Yes,” said Aleric. “I saw this elf walking by wearing it, and thought it the most curious thing.”

“Indeed it is.” Darton put out his hand. “May I?”

“Of course.” Aleric held the pendant over Darton's open palm without so much as glancing Julian's way for a hint of permission. It was a calculated move, meant to provoke a reaction from Julian giving away how dear the die was to him.

Amateur hour stuff. Even if it was a worthless bauble, as they were both pretending, one doesn't just hand over someone else's shit to a total stranger without permission. Julian could see straight through his motives, and wouldn't give him the satisfaction of a reaction.

“Yeee!” Julian yelped as Aleric dropped the pendant, which seemed to fall right through Darton's hand. Fortunately, Darton caught it by the chain before it hit the floor.

“Are you quite all right?” asked Aleric.

“Yes. That was a hiccup. I hiccup weird.” Clumsy-ass Darton had just blown Julian's facade of coolness. Then again, Julian shouldn't have been so panicked in the first place. It wasn't made of glass, after all. The die was nothing if not durable, meant to be thrown around. Hell, it had survived hitting the sidewalk after falling out the top floor window of the Beauregard Hotel without so much as a scratch.

Darton held up the pendant and examined it, then held it out to Julian. “You want to be careful with a prize like this. You don't want it falling into the wrong hands.” He was about as subtle as an eight-dicked gorilla jerking off at a funeral.

Julian placed Aleric's cane on the table and took the pendant from Darton as calmly as he could.

“Thank you,” he said, trying not to sound too curt. “I think I need to go to the bathroom now.” Why did he say it like that? It sounded like it was in response to what Darton said, which made it even weirder than suddenly announcing that he had to go to the bathroom without emphasizing anything.

But that ship had sailed. He couldn't very well stick around and try to diffuse it. Not going to the bathroom now would only raise the awkwardness even further.

Hoping that Darton at least took the hint, Julian excused himself, tucked the pendant under his robe, and clenched his ass cheeks as he scurried to the bathroom. If he could pull off looking like he was having an IBS attack and immediately needed to take a shit, that might help to explain the whole bathroom thing.

Naturally, when he arrived in the bathroom, a bald half-elf with a white grizzled beard was sitting on one of the square boards taking a dump. If there was anything more awkward than suddenly and ardently announcing his plans to visit the bathroom to a couple of strangers at a restaurant, it was finding said bathroom occupied when he actually had no business to conduct in there.

A series of response options formed in Julian's head like he was a Terminator.

Wait, this isn't the exit.

Oh, I guess it was just a fart.

Did you see a small child come in here?

Fuck you, asshole.

None of those options sounded great, and Julian thought he might be able to squeeze out a little more pee if he really concentrated.

The half-elf's gaze followed Julian to the other side of the trough as he hiked up his robes and aimed his dick.

“Nice weather today.”

Oh my God. Are you fucking serious? Is it acceptable in this world to talk to someone while they're holding their dick? Did this guy not have a newspaper or a spellbook he could be reading? Did he not realize that they were flying over a desert on which the gods themselves had prohibited atmospheric precipitation?

“Sure is.”

The half-elf let out a series of farts, then a small groan. “I don't recommend the pheasant.”

Shit.

“Thanks. I'll keep that in mind.”

“You having trouble?” The half-elf nodded toward Julian's dick.

“Huh? No, I just –”

A middle-aged human woman with striking red hair stumbled into the bathroom. “Make way! This dam's about to burst!” She hiked up her mint green robes, sat down hard on the board all the way to the right, then released an explosion of wet-sounding fart. “Gods' mercy,” she said between pants. “That pheasant.”

The half-elf, only temporarily distracted by the woman shitting two boards down from him, looked back at Julian. “Told you.”

The woman glared at Julian, making him realize that he was still gawking at her.

“This isn't a show.”

“I – I'm sorry!” Julian focused back on his dick, which was still not willing to give up a drop of justification for his being there.

“What's his problem?” the woman asked the half-elf.

“He's having urination troubles. Something wrong with the pipes. Probably been spending too much time in the alley behind LIVE NUDE GNOMES.”

“There's nothing wrong with my pipes!” said Julian. “I just need a little privacy.”

The red-haired woman made a show of averting her eyes. “A thousand pardons, your majesty! Wield not your scepter before us common folk.”

“Oh, come on. It's not like –”

“We'll be out of your way when we've concluded our business here,” said the old half-elf sharply. “When I was younger, the elves would spit upon our kind. I liked to think that times have changed, but I've always been naively optimistic.”

The woman patted the half-elf's knee. “Don't you let this one sour you on elves completely. There are good ones out there. I've plenty of elven friends in the city who'd never look down on their half-breed brethren.”

“I'm not looking down on you!” said Julian, pushing his bladder muscles for all they were worth, which still didn't amount to a goddamn drop.

“Ha!” barked the half-elf. “So he says while literally looking down on me!”

“I'm standing up! You're sitting down! How else am I supposed to look at you?”

The old half-elf pointed a swollen-knuckled finger at Julian. “We may be down right now, but mark my words. One day we'll rise up! See if we don't.”

“Great,” said Julian. “I hope you do.”

The red-haired woman gasped. “Even in the forest, I've never met an elf this rude.”

“What? What did I say?”

“Don't think I didn't catch your little word play there.”

“I didn't –”

“I hope you do.” The woman looked at the half-elf. “As in, I hope you do rise up and get out of the loo, so I can be alone to play with my royal scepter.”

“Of all the –” The half elf glared up at Julian again. “That settles it. I'm staying until you've finished.”

“Me too,” said the woman. “We'll see how long he can hold out.”

“That's fine!” said Julian. “You can stay here all day. I don't even have to –”

“Would you mind telling me what –” Darton stomped into the bathroom with a whirlwind of attitude, then abruptly stopped when he saw the two other occupants of the bathroom shitting side by side. “Oh, I beg your pardon.” He stepped up to the trough next to Julian and began hitching up his robe. “What's the meaning of showing off your...” he glanced at the others, then spoke more quietly. “...thing like that?”

“I'm trying to pee!”

Darton rolled his eyes. “Not that thing. The other thing. In the restaurant.”

“Oh, right. I was trying to get a reaction from Al–” Julian supposed he should be following Darton's lead of giving away as few details as possible to listening ears. “I mean, from your associate. I was doing reconnaissance, just like we talked about.”

“You were calling attention to yourself, and to your... thing.”

“He's been doing that since he came in here,” said the old half-elf.

The red-haired woman harrumphed. “It didn't look all that attention worthy to me, even for an elf.”

Julian ignored them. “I was doing fine.”

“How was that fine?” asked Darton. “He had your thing in his hand! I'm not sure you understand how precious a thing that is.”

“This is getting weird now,” said the half-elf. “I think I'll leave them to it.”

“I had his thing in my hand as well. We were quietly holding each other's things, not calling any attention to ourselves, until you barged in and started gawking at my thing and asking to hold it. That's when people started looking at us.”

“I believe I'll join you,” said the red-haired woman. She and the half-elf reached between their legs and said an incantation, which Julian assumed must have been a Wipe spell, because they let their robes drop down and didn't even wash their hands in the waterfall before exiting the bathroom.

“Did they say they were carrying on like that here in the restaurant?” the half-elf asked once they were out of the bathroom, apparently forgetting that elves have an extremely keen sense of hearing.

“That's the problem with young people today,” said the red-haired woman. “You live such a debaucherous lifestyle long enough, and you need to start stroking each other off in public just to get aroused anymore.”

“Have you ever...”

“Absolutely not! Have you?”

“There's an empty table over there. We could...”

“Let's go.”

“Julian!” said Darton.

Julian focused back on the conversation inside the bathroom. “What?”

“I'm sorry for not trusting your instincts. You did well. We'll discuss what you've learned when we reconvene in my –”

“That's him,” said one of two large men wearing plain grey robes as they burst into the bathroom. They were dressed like wizards, but they had builds more suited to barbarian or fighter classes.

Julian didn't know whether it was him or Darton they were talking about, but he suddenly felt like he might actually have to pee.

“Is your name Darton of Wineridge?” asked the other impressively large wizard.

Julian let out a silent sigh of relief. Sucks for Darton, but Julian had little doubt he was reaping what he'd sown.

Darton hesitated for a second, like he was considering lying about his identity, but then reconsidered. “Yes.”

“We need you to come with us.”

“And who, exactly, are you?”

“I'm Constable Marlowe, and this is Constable Frumm. We're on the Crescent Shadow Council of Justice.”

“May I ask what this is about?”

“You're wanted for questioning in the murder of a Professor Slugbow Von Hottenvalt.”

“Slugbow?” Darton gasped. “Slugbow's dead? And you think that I had something to do with it? That's preposterous! I barely knew the man.”

Constable Frumm sneered. “And that's why you're on a first-name basis.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“You can be, if you like,” said Constable Marlowe. “It's been a while since I've had to use my Tranquility Stick.” He pulled a black steel club crackling with electric purple energy from a sheath on his belt. It looked anything but tranquil.

“That won't be necessary.” Darton turned to Julian, who had hoped to remain known as just a guy taking a piss in the wrong place at the wrong time, and not an associate of a murder suspect. “Julian, you and Stacy can wait in my room. This is a misunderstanding which shouldn't take too long to clear up.”

Not only did Darton acknowledge that he knew them, but he'd said their names as well. Awesome.

The two constables eyed Julian suspiciously, and the pee finally started flowing.

“Come on, then,” said Darton. “Let's get this over with.”

Constable Marlowe led the way out of the bathroom, followed by Darton. Constable Frumm took the rear, his hand on the handle of his Tranquility Stick. Julian imagined he was looking for a reason to use it.

Julian rinsed his hands in the waterfall, then wiped them dry on his robe. No, Darton's robe. He felt a sudden urgency to change back into his own clothes.

He walked briskly out of the bathroom and back to his table,thankful to find Stacy still there.

“Where the hell have you been?” asked Stacy.

“Bathroom.”

“Wow.” She licked pheasant grease off her fingers. “It's been a while. I guess I'd better let it air out a bit before I go in.”

“Did you see Darton?”

Stacy glanced at Darton's unoccupied table. “No. I was starving. You've seriously got to try this pheasant.”

“I'm good for now, thanks.”

“How'd it go with that Aleric guy?”

Julian shrugged. “Not great, not terrible. We both tried to con the other into selling our die.”

“Do you think that's information we can work with?"

“I think we need to cut our losses and get the hell out of here.” He leaned in closer to Stacy and whispered, “Darton was just hauled off as a murder suspect.”

Stacy's eyes went wide as she bit into a side of her bird. “Are you fucking with me?” she asked with a mouth full of pheasant meat.

“No,” said Julian. “And he blabbed our names to the cops, as well as the fact that we're staying in his room.”

“Who got murdered?”

“Nobody we know, thank God. Sluggo Von Hufflepuff or something like that.”

“That can't be right. That sounds like a bullshit name.”

“It is a bullshit name. I said it was something like that. I was afraid I was going to be arrested. It's not like I was taking notes. I knew that guy was bad news.”

Stacy's expression turned more serious as she swallowed her pheasant meat. “Wait a minute. You've still got the die, don't you?”

“Yeah.” Julian pulled his robe back to show the chain.

“Give it here. No offense, but I feel more secure having it where I can feel and make sure it's there.”

“With pleasure.” It was more responsibility than Julian wanted. He slipped the chain over his head and handed over the pendant.

Stacy wore the chain around her neck, tucking the pendant under her borrowed robe. “Any idea on how we might get off this island?”

“First we need to stop in Darton's room.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to get my own clothes back on, and I have it on good authority that you're going to need a bathroom really soon.”

Chapter 30

Katherine watched the predawn light spawning on the eastern horizon. She had a nice view from the captain's quarters, where she and Captain Longfellow had passed out over shots of rum the night before. She was stiff and crampy from sleeping with her face on her arms on a hard wooden table while sitting on a hard wooden chair, but at least she'd slept, which she doubted she'd have been able to do in a cramped cabin full of rapists.

She still hadn't quite gotten her tolerance back up to her pre-vampire levels, so the rum had put her down relatively early. Judging by the lack of wolf bites on him, Captain Longfellow had been a gentleman as he continued drinking alone. With his feet up on the table next to his nearly empty rum bottle and one arm hanging over the back of his chair, he appeared positively comfortable as he snored away the early morning hours.

By the light of a half-melted candle, Katherine prepared her spells for the day. As she focused on the flame, her options became clear in her mind. For her zero level spells, she chose a Purify Food and Water, because some of the sea creatures people were reeling in the previous day had looked kind of nasty, and it could never hurt to have the means to make seawater potable. And she chose three Mending spells because she'd seen a few nets, fishing rods, and miscellaneous other things on the boat that could use a touch of repair. First level spells were also easy to choose. A Magic Fang to assist Butterbean in the event that she needed some extra protection from any ne'er-do-wells aboard the boat, and a Speak With Animals so that she could get in a little talk with him if time allowed.

She spent a little more time reviewing her Level 2 spell options, as they were still new to her. A lot of them had cooler effects than what any of the Level 1 spells could offer. But there were also a couple of duds, such as one spell which would allow her to take the form of a tree for a few hours. There were precious few circumstances where that would be useful, and even then it would be boring as shit.

One spell she considered choosing would temporarily increase her Strength score by four points. She wondered if that would make her as strong as she'd been when she was a vampire. She might wait until she got back on land to try that one out. She'd want to punch something, and all the punchable things around here belonged to Captain Longfellow.

Sorting through the options in her mind a bit more, she discovered one more spell which would mimic another one of her lost vampire powers. Spider Climb, as it was called, would allow her to climb up walls and even crawl along ceilings with ease. She remembered scaling the parking garage of the Beauregard Casino Resort, and how awesome that had felt. Here on a boat she might be able to make use of such a spell to climb the mast or rigging if one of the crewmen needed a hand with something. But if she was being honest with herself, she didn't really give a shit about helping the crewmen. Climbing the masts and riggings just sounded like a lot of fun. How many more times would she get to ride on an old-timey boat like this?

When she finished preparing her spells, it was light enough to see the main deck more clearly throught the dusty windows. She was far from the only one to be getting an early start on the day.

Passengers lined the sides and rear of the boat as it rocked gently on the calm sea. They all had lines in the water. Katherine supposed that she also bore some of the responsibility for pulling in some fish, but it was pretty crowded down there. She'd drop a line when it thinned out a little.

It was still too dark to distinguish anyone at that distance, but Katherine tried to see if she could make out the shapes of Randy, Alexei, Denise, or the man she was trying to trick into raping her. She spotted a couple of maybes, but no one she was certain of.

Finally, the top sliver of golden sun peeked over the glittering liquid horizon. It was magnificent. As far as reasons to be grateful to no longer be a vampire, this came a close second to the ability to get shitfaced.

The Hallmark card perfection of the scene lasted only a moment. When the sun was about a quarter of the way exposed, something else appeared on the horizon right next to it. Something tiny, but jarring and off-putting, like a fly in a bowl of white soup.

Katherine couldn't hear what anyone was saying through the windows and from as high up as she was, but the speck had caused some commotion at the rear of the boat. Some people grabbed their neighbors by the shoulder and pointed at the black speck on the horizon, while others frantically reeled in their lines. The commotion spread like wildfire up both sides of the boat, finally producing a sound that Katherine could hear.

It was like a cross between a church bell and a cowbell. It brought Captain Longfellow out of his deep snore-filled slumber like a cattle prod up the ass.

“What is it? What's happening?”

His little monkey shrieked, jumping up and down on the table and pointing out at the blemish on the horizon. Clever little thing.

“There's something out there,” said Katherine, hoping that everyone was making a huge deal out of nothing, but fearing that wasn't the case. “Maybe a tiny uncharted island? Or a humpback whale?”

Captain Longfellow peered through the window. “That be no whale, Miss Katherine. Lord Shitflinger! Fetch me spyglass!”

Lord Shitflinger! was an interjection which Katherine had been unfamiliar with until now, but she liked the sound of it, and thought she might start using it. As for the captain's other exclamation, how the hell was she supposed to know where the hell his spyglass was, or even what it was?

When the monkey, which had inexplicably launched itself from the table onto a shelf cluttered with junk, returned with a polished cherrywood tube with a glass lens mounted with brass at both ends, much of Katherine's confusion was resolved. But after she parted ways with the people on this boat, she thought she'd probably still use Lord Shitflinger! as an interjection.

Captain Longfellow extended his shitty primitive telescope and squinted through the eyepiece. “Aye, just as I thought. Kastiglian raiders.” He looked Katherine up and down, which worried her due to its distinct lack of perviness. “How well can you handle a sword?” Again, Katherine felt a deep sense of anxiety in the pit of her stomach from the lack of innuendo in his voice.

“I'm better with a scythe.”

“Gods have mercy, some folks should never leave the shore. We'll not be boarded by stalks of wheat!”

“It's a legitimate weapon. I can fight fine.”

“Aye, I have no doubt ye do a fine job keeping wild dogs and pigs away from yer flock of sheep, but when it comes to fighting, the deck of a ship is no place for a farming lass.”

“I am not a goddamn farmer!” said Katherine. “I could kick your jolly rogered ass! You wanna go?” She put up her fists, feeling only a little ridiculous due to all the adrenaline pumping through her.

Captain Longfellow grinned and winked. “Maybe after. Now stay here and don't touch anything.” Before Katherine could tell him to go fuck himself, he was out the door and halfway down the ladder.

Katherine folded her arms. “What an asshole.”

Lord Shitflinger screeched angrily.

“Good. I hope you do tell him. And you can tell him I hope they cut his dick off, too.” She turned away from the monkey and squinted out the window. The approaching boat was now so close, she could identify it as a boat without the aid of a spyglass.

At the front and rear of the Maiden's Voyage, crewmen were distributing rusty short-bladed swords from barrels to all the passengers. Considering how crowded it was on deck now, and how much more so it would be once a boatload of pirates hopped on board, Katherine could see how short blades might be more effective in these circumstances than a scythe, which required a bit of room to properly wield. But that didn't make him any less of a dick for talking down to her like that.

Once the men, and a not unsubstantial number of women, were armed, they were directed to their positions. Many were ordered to stay on the front and rear decks, while others were sent to man the cabin tiers, standing on ladder rungs, holding the ladders with one hand and swords in the other.

Seeing the women being given combat responsibilities further infuriated Katherine. This wasn't some backwards-ass sexist thing. Captain Longfellow had singled her out in particular as being too ill-suited to fight. After fuming about it for a moment, she considered that she might have grown on him during last night's drinking session, and he was simply trying to spare her. If she could accidentally woo Captain Righteous, it wasn't out of the question that this lonely old sea dog might have become smitten with her.

But that theory only made her feel shittier. How was it going to look when the swords stopped clanging and the blood stopped flowing, and she'd spent the whole time watching the carnage from above in the captain's quarters like some prized piece of treasure or... booty.

That wouldn't do at all. She was no man's booty. At least, she refused to be defined as such. Then again, maybe Captain Longfellow had a point. She would be a liability, getting in the way of people who knew far better than her how to fight aboard a ship. He was the captain, after all. And on a ship, one obeys the captain's orders. Katherine tried to make herself believe that this secondary line of reasoning had nothing to do with the sleek and intimidating black boat slicing through the water in a trajectory to put it right alongside the Maiden's Voyage. Black sails jutted out from either side, stretched between long poles, like the pectoral fins of a deformed blowfish.

The Maiden's Voyage had similarly styled sails, which were currently being extended and expanded for what little good it was going to do them, but they weren't nearly as aesthetically thought out as the other boat's sails. They were made of plain brown canvas like one might find stretched over the top of any covered wagon. No dragons, no flames, no threatening slogans or mottoes. Purely utilitarian, like the rest of the boat. Having sailed all of the previous day, Katherine knew what speed the Maiden's Voyage's sails were capable of, and it wasn't anywhere close to the speed the black boat was currently moving. She thought it was a little sad that they were even making the effort.

The black boat was about half the size of the Maiden's Voyage, and it looked to only have about a quarter of the amount of people on board, but those people looked like badasses. Their bodies were covered in muscles, scars, and tattoos. Katherine wanted to count the fact that approximately a third of them were missing limbs as a disadvantage for their side, but she knew in her heart that the fighting skills they'd acquired leading up to those losses, and the recklessness with which they were still prepared to sail into combat, probably counted as more of an advantage, especially considering that most of those who had lost arms had replaced them with sharpened steel prostheses.

In front of the main mast, a machine that resembled a massive crossbow swiveled in the Maiden's Voyage's direction. One of the crewmen attached something to the tip of the similarly massive bolt. She couldn't make out what it was due to the distance and the dirty window, but it looked like some kind of bag. What good would that do? Certainly, it could only serve to dull the projectile's impact.

Once he had secured the thing on the thing, he went around to the back of the swivel-mounted weapon, peered into a scope of some sort, and made some minute adjustments to the weapon's aim. A second later, the projectile was flying straight at Katherine. She dropped to the floor. Before she had time to fully consider that the wall was just as unlikely to protect her as the window was, her thoughts were interrupted by the crash of shattering glass, splintering wood, and the intense heat and blinding light of the other side of the room suddenly engulfed in flames.

Katherine led Butterbean outside. “Stay here!”

Butterbean whimpered as he lay down on the ledge outside the captain's quarters, then she went back inside to see what could be done about the fire.

There must have been some kind of ignite-on-impact paste in the sack that guy had covered the end of the bolt with. It felt strange to refer to it as an bolt now that she could see its size. It was more like a lamp post, its front end at the epicenter of the fire near the steering wheel, having missed the main mast, and the finned back end resting on the captain's table.

Lord Shitflinger was losing his shit, figuratively speaking, shrieking as he jumped up into the shelves lining the walls and flinging all of Captain Longfellow's accumulated junk onto the table, like he was frantically searching for something specific.

“Stay calm!” shouted Captain Longfellow down on the main deck. “That was meant to stir us into a panic, for nothing be more frightening than a fire at sea. But remember that heat rises. If they wanted to burn the ship down, they'd have aimed for us here on the main deck. It's my cargo they seek, so they mean to board us. So fear not the fire, but be ready to fight. Now, all ye pole-stroking sperm-slurping scalawags, I ask ye, is everyone good?”

“Aye, Captain!” the crew members shouted.

“I said, Is everyone good?”

“Aye, Captain!” The passengers joined the crew in responding this time.

“I can't hear ye!”

“AYE, CAPTAIN!” To compare it to a pep rally before a high school football game seemed to undermine the gravity of the situation, but Katherine supposed the same psychological principles applied.

“I still can't hear ye!”

“AYE, CAPTAIN!” They were giving it all they had. Katherine thought that Captain Longfellow might be, for lack of a better phrase, going a bit overboard. Then she had another thought. Was this meant for her? Asking if she, Butterbean, and Lord Shitflinger were okay without actually calling attention to the fact that he had her hiding in the captain's quarters?”

“Ye all got cocksnot in yer lungs? For the last time, I said, Is everyone good?”

“AAAYYYEE, CAAAAPTAAAAIN!!!”

Fearing those poor bastards down there might burst their lungs even before the boat was boarded, Katherine got up on her knees, making her head visible through the broken window. Captain Longfellow was staring right at her. She gave him a thumbs up and a nod. He gave her a wink and a grin.

“Very good, then!” said the captain. “Prepare to fight!”

Passengers and crew alike cheered like there was nothing they wanted more than to fight for their very survival. If nothing else, Captain Longfellow's pep rally had indeed boosted morale. How much effect that would have on the upcoming fight remained to be seen.

Black smoke thickened as more of it flowed out past Katherine, the newly broken window being the only route it had to escape the captain's quarters. The fire was spreading, and Lord Shitflinger still hadn't found whatever the hell it was that he'd been seeking. His search wasn't the most efficient, but it was surprisingly systematic for a monkey. He hopped from the left side of the room to the right, then back again, completely clearing the shelves, getting as close to the fire as he could without burning himself. What the hell was he trying to find? Maybe one of these pieces of junk could help put out the fire. Giving the shelves a cursory scan, she looked for something like a Decanter of Endless Water, but found nothing even remotely similar-looking. If only she could – Well shit, of course she could.

Focusing her mind on Lord Shitflinger, she said “Speak.”

The monkey ceased his frantic emptying of shelves and turned his head to look at Katherine. “What did you say?”

“No time to explain,” said Katherine. “I want to help you.”

Lord Shitflinger glared at her. “Then what are you waiting for? My permission?”

“I need to know what you're looking for so I can help you find it.”

“I'm not looking for anything, stupid half-elf! I'm trying to salvage what I can of Captain Longfellow's treasures.”

Katherine scanned the room. Most of the shelves were obscured by smoke, but she remembered well enough the sort of pirate garage sale shit that was on them. “All of this junk?”

“Junk?” Lord Shitflinger coughed as he picked up a pointed bronze helmet. He seemed to consider throwing it at Katherine, but tossed it down onto the table. “Each piece of what you call junk holds a memory dear to the captain from his many voyages around the world.” He started choking violently, then tossed down some dusty primitive-looking wind instrument. “Who are you *cough* to belittle *cough* what my captain holds dear?”

There was only a finite amount of remorse Katherine would allow herself to feel when being lectured by a monkey, but she conceded he had a point.

“Stay on that side,” she said. “I'll clear this side.” Katherine had a much easier time clearing her side. Instead of picking up one piece of old trash at a time and tossing it down onto the table, she held her Bag of Holding open with her left hand and bulldozed the contents of each shelf into it with her right arm. Once her side was done, she helped Lord Shitflinger clear his side.

After both sides were clear, Katherine told him to put all the shit he'd tossed onto the table into the Bag of Holding in case she couldn't put out or at least contain the fire. The Speak With Animals spell had long since timed out, so she had to pantomime. But Lord Shitflinger, being a clever little monkey, seemed to catch on after watching her make a show of putting items into the bag. When he took over bag-packing duties, Katherine focused on the spreading fire.

She needed water, and they were floating on a literal ocean of it. There must be some obvious solution she wasn't seeing. How could she get water from down there to up here?

The smoke started to fill the room faster as the fire grew. Katherine squatted down until her face was level with the table where Lord Shitflinger was just about finished putting the last of Captain Longfellow's shit in the –

“Bag of Holding!”

She quickly shoved the rest of the junk into the bag while she thought of the best way to get a bunch of water into it. Although it didn't feel like the wisest option in the world, she didn't have time to think of anything better than the obvious. She'd have to go for a swim.

Getting into the water was easy enough, but even if she tethered herself to the boat with a rope, it was going to be a challenge to climb – Oh wait, no it wasn't.

Katherine put her finger to her temple. “Spiderbitch.” She felt a discharge of magic but didn't feel any sudden inclination to fight crime or shit rope. Had it worked?

She placed her hands on the wall and attempted to pull herself up. The change was a little stomach-turning. It felt like the force of gravity had shifted, exclusively for her, toward the wall she was focused on. She could crawl up it as if the whole ship had turned on its side.

“Fucking awesome!”

Unfortunately, gravity was still working normally for the air around her, which was denser with smoke the further she climbed up the wall. Holding her breath and closing her eyes, she made it to the ceiling, and was delighted to find that she could just as effortlessly crawl upside down.

Feeling her way out the window, she climbed out onto the roof of the captain's quarters, where she was able to see and breathe again.

The black boat was now within normal crossbow range, and sailors on both ships were taking random potshots at each other.

Katherine didn't bother with ladders as she climbed down the tiers of the central cabin structure. With everyone concentrated on the left side of the Maiden's Voyage, where the other boat was approaching, she was able to remain unseen as she hopped over the rail on the right side and attached herself to the side of the boat's hull.

Spiderbitch or not, the force of the water could easily sweep her off the boat if she didn't have something sturdy to hold on to. The hull was pretty smooth, and slick with ocean spray. It wouldn't take a whole lot of force to send her out to sea. She considered crawling to the front of the boat, letting the force of the water press her back to the hull, but dismissed that idea almost instantly. She'd only be swept underneath, perhaps getting knocked unconscious in the process. Instead, she headed for the rear of the boat, hoping that she'd be able to grab onto the rudder or something.

Even better, there were two ladders running up the rear. Katherine grabbed a rung tightly with her left hand, and held the Bag of Holding open even more tightly with her teeth and her right hand, letting the movement of the boat force water into it.

A sudden burning pain in her right ass cheek nearly caused her to let go of both the ladder and the bag, but she held on.

“Yeeeoooow!” she cried, freeing the bag from her teeth's grip. She turned around and spotted two sailors on the black boat laughing and pointing down at her. Fucking assholes. One of them wore striped green and white pants and was holding a crossbow, the missing projectile of which was likely sticking out of her ass, and the other had a bushy red beard. Satisfied that the Bag of Holding had a sufficient supply of water and that she'd recognize these two shitheads if she saw them again, she scrambled back to the right side of the boat and up to the main deck.

After double-checking to make sure she was out of anyone's crossbow site, and still out of view to anyone aboard the Maiden's Voyage she grabbed hold of the railing, shut her eyes tight, and plucked the bolt out of her ass.

It was a minor wound, and she'd have a hole in the ass of her jeans with a bloodstain running down from it, but she'd survive.

Ignoring her ass soreness, she continued crawling up the side of the boat until she found Butterbean and Lord Shitflinger on the narrow ledge separating the captain's quarters from the tier below it. The inside was filled with thick black smoke, so much so that Katherine couldn't even see the flames anymore.

She reached into the Bag of Holding for something she could use to break the other windows. If she could get more smoke flowing out, she might not have to work without being able to see or breathe.

“Spyglass,” she said. Of all Captain Longfellow's junk she had scooped into the bag, that was the most clublike item that she could recall.

When she felt it in her hand, she pulled it out and struck a window with it. The window cracked, but didn't shatter. Thankfully, the spyglass did neither. For two hollow wooden tubes, it was a surprisingly sturdy instrument. Rather than swing with her next strike, she attacked the window with the eyepiece of the spyglass, wielding it more like an ice pick than a club. That connected much more solidly, obliterating the window, and allowing another plume of dark smoke to shoot out sideways.

After destroying three more windows on the right side of the captain's quarters, Katherine could finally see the flames. They had spread further along the interior walls but not by much, and they hadn't yet eaten through to the outside. Captain Longfellow might not actually have to completely rebuild his top tier.

As Katherine prepared to douse the fire with the water she'd collected in her Bag of Holding, she considered the issue of delivery. If she just let the water out of the bag, it would dump out at her feet, and the heat was too intense for her to get close enough to the fire to be effective. But she hadn't taken a bolt in the ass to give up now.

Come on, Katherine. Think! She remembered her black friend and his knack for improvisation. What would Tanner do? And lo and behold. There was the answer, right in her hand.

She unscrewed the eyepiece and the lens on the far end and carefully put both into the Bag of Holding, just in case what she was about to do left the spyglass tube still intact. She then bunched the mouth of the bag around the larger of the two spyglass tubes, but left enough room for her to be able to poke in a single finger.

Katherine didn't know a lot about water pressure or magical bags. She didn't know the rate at which the water would flow out, whether or not that depended on the total amount of water being summoned at one time, or exactly how much pressure she'd need to get a good enough propulsion without shooting herself backwards through the wall like Daffy Duck. She'd start with a low amount and test it from there.

Dipping a finger into the bag, she said, “Ten gallons of water.” Then she quickly pulled her finger out and wound the drawstring tight around the bunched-up mouth. Casual vomiting was the best way she could think of to describe how the water gurgled out of the narrow end of the spyglass. She wouldn't be putting out any fires like that.

But thus was the nature of experimentation. From what she'd observed, she guessed she could safely take it up a few notches.

She loosened the drawstring around the mouth of the bag, and re-inserted her finger. “Fifty gallons of water.”

She sensed the coming blast and didn't bother with the drawstring. Instead, she bunched the bag around the end of the spyglass as tightly as she could with both hands.

Water gushed out a little more powerfully, allowing Katherine to move forward and douse some flames, cutting off the ground the fire had been gaining. Shortly after the initial gush started, it slowed down to a weak trickle, and she determined she still hadn't gotten anywhere close to dangerous levels yet.

“One hundred gallons of water!” The water flowed out a little more strongly, and the stream lasted about twice as long, allowing Katherine to drown out a considerable section of the fire. Even the smoke was beginning to thin out. And still, Katherine didn't feel the slightest threat of being propelled backwards.

“Five hundred gallons of water!”

The next thing she knew, Katherine's back slammed against the rear wall of the captain's quarters, and the front windows shattered like she'd hit them with a full magazine from an assault rifle. Thankful to have been spared the injury and embarrassment of flying through the wall, she concentrated her makeshift fire hose on what remained of the fire, drowning it and leaving the captain's quarters charred, smokey, and sopping wet, but ultimately intact. Hell, she'd even managed to spare the windows on the left side of –

CRASH CRASH CRASH CRASH

All of the windows on the left side of the captain's quarters exploded in rapid succession as large steel projectiles burst through them from outside. They thunked on the floor, then receded by the cords they were attached to, catching the window sills with their sharp barbs.

Grappling hooks! The sailors from the other ship were beginning to board the Maiden's Voyage.

As she peered out the window, Katherine tried to remember whether or not she had a dagger to cut the ropes with. It didn't matter. The sailors whom these ropes belonged to had already swung aboard and were clashing their large curved blade swords against the far less flashy version Captain Longfellow had issued to his passengers.

Most of the carnage was concentrated on the rear deck, where the crewmen of the Nightwind – Katherine could now make out the enemy boat's name engraved on the front of its black hull – were ferociously cutting down the Maiden's Voyage's passengers. The swords Captain Longfellow's crew had issued them might as well have been big rubber dicks for all the use they were getting out of them.

Not that Katherine had any room to judge them. Incompetent or not, at least they weren't hiding from the fight. If she were still a vampire, this fight would have already been over, and she would be chumming the waters with these dumb motherfuckers.

Squinting in the sunlight, she reflected that her assessment of that hypothetical fight was incorrect; she would have been in the Bag of Holding, even more useless than she was right now.

Captain Longfellow himself fought like a badass, and his crewmen could hold their own pretty well. Katherine wasn't able to spot Denise, but Randy was proving himself to be a far more competent fighter than Katherine ever imagined he could be. Still, the tide of battle was clearly not going their way.

The deck was painted with blood, occasionally dotted with severed arms and dropped swords. Katherine would have picked up a sword and jumped into the fray, but they slid off the deck almost as soon as they were dropped. She could see Captain Longfellow's objection to her scythe. There simply wasn't enough room to swing it on the crowded deck. She'd just be a nuisance to all those people trying to kill each other. That left her the options of trying to clobber people with a spyglass or trying to pull a Bag of Holding down over their heads, neither of which seemed like a productive enough use of her effort to risk almost certain death for.

While she wondered what kind of effect a sudden barrage of dire rat corpses might have, a horn sounded from Nightwind's deck. It blasted loud over the grunts, screams, and clashing of swords, blowing long and evenly for a full ten seconds. By the time it stopped, so had most of the fighting. The entire crew of Nightwind stood at attention, as did Captain Longfellow and his crewmen. A few passengers who were either unaware of horn-blowing protocols or just trying to get in a cheap shot were quickly subdued with punches in the face from the crews of both ships.

Across the web of ropes which were holding the two boats together, Katherine recognized the horn-blower. The last time she'd seen him and his goofy green and white striped pants, he'd been holding a crossbow rather than a horn. Both of those would be up his ass by the time she was done with him.

The man next to him, dolled up in furs and jewels so as to make sure everyone knew who the captain of that ship was at the very first glance, was too fat to have lived a life at sea. His hair was long and brown, perfectly curled, and absolutely a wig. His face was powdered white and his lips painted red. He was like a caricature of royalty that wanted to be taken seriously.

“Good day, captain of Maiden's Voyage!” said the other captain in a voice he should have been ashamed of.

“Aye,” said Captain Longfellow, his voice filled with resignation. “Good day, captain of Nightwind.”

“I offer you an end to this needless bloodshed. Would you hear my terms?”

Captain Longfellow beheld all the dead and dying on his deck. Many more of those whose blood painted the deck red were under his charge.

“State your demands, Captain.” He spat out the last word, as if he was disgusted by having to recognize such a man as his equal.

Nightwind's aptain smiled and took hold of the rope the horn-blower was offering him. Katherine followed the rope up with her eyes, and found it was hanging from a yard jutting out from the main mast. Neither the rope nor the yard seemed to serve any purpose but to provide an easy swing for someone who wasn't used to swinging from boat to boat.

Even with a pre-constructed junior pirate swinging rope set up, the captain's swing across was anything but graceful. Katherine held her breath when it looked like he was going to fall in the water, but two of his men caught him by the arms and pulled him aboard the Maiden's Voyage.

“Greetings, fellow seamen!” Nightwind's captain announced, prompting a snort from Randy. “You may call me Captain Martinoli. I very much look forward to commanding those of you I find worthy to man my vessels.”

Randy snorted again, then tried to play it off as a sneeze. Katherine thought it a stretch to take anything dirty from Captain Martinoli's last statement, and assumed that Randy was just having a fit of the giggles.

“And those ye don't find worthy?” asked Captain Longfellow.

“Those who are able-bodied will be sent to work in the Kastiglian volcano mines. Those who aren't will be... made use of in other ways.”

Katherine's first interpretation was that he meant to feed those who had lost limbs in the fight to monsters they kept domesticated on their islands. She hoped she was wrong, but Captain Longfellow's sigh suggested her instincts were spot on. She didn't envy the choice he had to make right now. He could save some of them, as far as sending them to spend the rest of their lives as slaves in volcanic mines could be considered “saving”, or he could refuse Captain Martinoli's offer and condemn them all to a quicker death here and now.

“As for my demands,” Captain Martinoli continued, “I expect nothing less than your unconditional surrender, your boat, and whatever cargo you have on board.”

“This is a passenger vessel,” said Captain Longfellow. “We carry no cargo.”

Captain Martinoli shook his head as he sauntered over to the cargo bay. “I had hoped that our relationship would begin on better terms. Honestly, what's the point in lying to me now? I did my research, consulted my little fish. I know the Maiden's Voyage was scheduled to deliver a load of dire tiger hides to Stormwind on your way back from Bharan.”

“Yer little fishes gave ye bad information. The Falcon was caught up in a storm. The delivery's been delayed.” Captain Longfellow's tone was smug. Even if he was forced to surrender his boat, he could at least have the spiteful satisfaction of knowing that Captain Martinoli wouldn't be getting the cargo he'd expected from him.

Captain Martinoli sighed. “Open the cargo door.” Two of his crewmen went to the rear of the ship and started cranking the winches which lowered the cargo door.

Katherine considered that Captain Longfellow may have had another trick up his sleeve. He was looking at Randy now, who knew what was down in the cargo hold and had as good an opportunity as anyone on the ship to give Captain Martinoli a little shove, now that the Nightwind crewman who'd just been next to him was now turning the winch.

Unfortunately, Captain Longfellow and Randy were operating under two very different codes of honor. Katherine appreciated how Captain Longfellow had orchestrated the conversation so that this opportunity presented itself before he formally declared his surrender, but a paladin's code was much less letter-of-the-law than that. Randy wasn't about to sucker-shove an unarmed man into a cargo hold to be eaten by a giant lizard.

“I might have let you continue to captain this ship,” Captain Martinoli continued to Captain Longfellow. “Under my direct command, of course.”

Captain Longfellow's expression grew grim as Randy failed to act on his nods and winks and his fate seemed further sealed. Katherine felt bad for him and for all the crewmen and passengers who would be sold into slavery or fed to monsters. But more importantly, she had shit to take care of, and this fat curly-wigged fuck was delaying her. She lay down flat on top of the Bag of Holding and pointed the spyglass nozzle at Captain Martinoli, who was still droning on.

“But I fear I cannot trust you just yet. You may serve as crewman on Nightwind, working your way up the ranks, and perhaps one day be allowed to serve aboard the Maiden's Voyage as first mate to a captain whose loyalty I needn't ever call into question. If you perform to his satisfaction, then maybe someday –”

“ALL THE WATER!”

If the initial blast of water didn't crack Captain Martinoli's sternum, the spyglass tube certainly did when she lost control of it. Katherine hadn't been sure how much water she had left to work with and wanted to make this shot count. As it turned out, it was a hell of a lot, and it packed quite a bit of force.

Fortunately, the initial blast and spyglass tube were enough to push Captain Martinoli backwards into the cargo hold where his yelp turned into a mixture of screams and chomps, then got suddenly and uncomfortably quiet.

In the following awkward silence, Katherine discovered that Captain Martinoli's death didn't necessarily guarantee that his men would surrender. She found it difficult to believe they'd had any sincere sense of loyalty to a man who'd obviously acquired his position through money alone. The loss of Captain Martinoli did absolutely nothing to shift the balance of power, should they all decide to start fighting again, and any one of Nightwind's crew could progress from a mere deckhand to the commander of a two-ship fleet and rightfully claim he'd earned it.

But which one would it be? Nightwind's men were all sizing up each other rather than paying attention to any of the crew or passengers of the Maiden's Voyage.

“I was first mate,” said the man with the bushy red beard who'd laughed at Katherine when his buddy shot her in the ass. “It stands to reason that I am now the captain of Nightwind.”

“You were a good first mate,” said a shirtless muscular black man with hieroglyphic-looking tattoos covering his bald head and running down his neck and out to his shoulders. “But there is more to captaining a ship than sucking Martinoli's cock.”

Several of Nightwind's men standing near him laughed. Those would no doubt be his faction if things turned ugly.

“I have sailed the longest of any of us,” the large man continued. “It is I who should be captain.”

A man with a bloodied steel pitchfork for a left hand stepped forward. “The crew should decide who they wish to sail under.” After a round of agreeing cheers, he added, “I nominate myself.”

Katherine had a stupid idea and decided to run with it. She got to her feet and put her hands on her hips. “Fuck all that,” she called down, drawing the attention of both ships' crews. “I killed Martinoli. I'm your new goddamn captain.”

The crew laughed, which she'd been expecting. She waited for it to die down, then addressed the deck again.

“You're already bickering among yourselves. You'll kill each other before you unite and agree to sail under one of your own, then there won't be enough of you left to fight the crew of this ship. Sailing under an outsider is the only option most of you have if you want to see another sunrise.”

The opposing Nightwind factions eyed each other. Their choices came down to killing each other or sailing under Captain Kat. She tried to not look too smug.

The large black sailor looked up at her, his face serious. “If you agree to set free those of us who do not wish to sail under you, we shall recognize you as captain of Nightwind and take you as far as the first port you wish to travel to.” He turned around, inviting the rest of the Nightwind crew to agree with the terms he'd just laid out. He was met with a bunch of nods and resigned grunts.

Katherine sought Captain Longfellow in the crowd. He shrugged and nodded. There might be a better deal to be made, but this would do. It would be wise to release those crewmen who wanted to leave and keep only those who would be loyal to her.

She made and held eye contact with the big black guy. “I accept your people's terms.” Shit! “And by that, I mean the crew of Nightwind, of course.”

The sailor eyed her warily. “Of course.”

“Obviously,” said Katherine, despite Randy encouraging her to stop talking by wagging his fingertips in front of his throat. “Because what else would I have mean by that? Let's just get back on the ship, okay?”

As her new crew swung, swam, or climbed across ropes back to Nightwind, Captain Longfellow barked orders for his own crew. Tend to the wounded. Save the dead and severed body parts for chum. Swab the deck. Then he pointed at Katherine. “I'll have a word with ye, Captain, if ye don't mind.” Even though his tone was heavy with sarcasm when he said the word Captain, Katherine liked the way it sounded. While he started climbing the ladder, Katherine beckoned Butterbean and went into the captain's quarters. She wiped water off a chair with her hand, then sat down.

“That was some impressive negotiation ye did down there,” said the captain as he entered through the door and gloomily surveyed the scorched walls and the charred remains of the shelves. “And a fine job ye did putting out this fire.”

“Thank you,” said Katherine, sensing he was about to follow up with a But.

“But,” he followed up, “a captured ship is a captain's prize. I know ye live by land customs, but such are the ways of the sea. Mighty grateful I am for ye saving me ship, me crew, most of me passengers, perhaps even me life. But I cannot allow you to –”

“That's not all I saved.” Katherine placed the Bag of Holding on the table and smirked down at Lord Shitflinger. Reaching inside the bag, she said, “Captain Longfellow's shit.” A pile of old junk spilled out.

“Me treasures!” The captain's face was like a child's who'd just gotten a puppy for Christmas. “I cannot believe it! I thought for sure they were lost in the fire.”

“Lord Shitflinger told me how important all this stuff is to you, so I thought you might appreciate me keeping it safe.” If there was ever an appropriate time and place to call in a favor, this was it. “So what is it you were saying?”

Captain Longfellow paused, looking up from the bronze statuette of a large-breasted naked woman's torso he was admiring. “Now that ye mention it, I can't seem to recall, Captain.” He emphasized Captain again, but this time it was loaded with acknowledgment rather than sarcasm.

Katherine put the Bag of Holding on the floor and held it open for Butterbean. “Come on, Butterbean. Let's go check out our new ship.”

Chapter 31

Hollywhirl delegated tasks and duties to her pixie kin in preparation for the morning's journey. Five would stay behind to look after the secret glade and continue to produce more Light Wards, which kept the Dark Ones at bay or at least easier to spot. It wasn't a perfect solution, as Dimplethorn had explained to Chaz when he'd asked about them. The trees and forest creatures depended on the natural cycles of day and night. Permanent Light would weaken the forest, and so few pixies as they numbered could only hope to patrol a limited area. Still, it was the best idea they could come up with, so for the time being they would continue to make Light Wards.

Dimplethorn had been assigned the task of tending to the animals, which included feeding the boar and healing Ravenus's wing, which had broken when Hollywhirl shot him unconscious in-flight.

“Be still, little bird,” she said in a British accent, cradling Ravenus's head in her lap as he groaned. She held a tiny pixie-sized waterskin that looked like it was made out of a squirrel stomach, over his beak, ready to upend it down his throat as soon as he started to behave himself.

“I don't want to drink it!” squawked Ravenus. “It smells of honey and wildflowers. Absolutely disgusting.”

“It's good for you. It will mend your wing and allow you to fly free again.”

“I'd rather walk!”

“Come on, Ravenus,” said Chaz. “Just drink it. Julian would want you to drink it.” He didn't give a shit about Ravenus or his wing, but he wanted him to shut up.

“Very well then,” Ravenus huffed. “I'll do it for my master's sake.” He made a show of coughing and gagging as Dimplethorn poured the potion down his throat, like he thought he deserved a Purple Heart for getting it down. When it was finished, he let out a loud inarticulate squawk and ruffled his feathers. Then he breathed heavily as he flapped his wings. “My, but that was refreshing.”

Dimplethorn smiled at him. “Didn't I tell you? All better now?”

“I wouldn't object to having my cloaca rubbed.”

“Perhaps another time.” Dimplethorn shoved Ravenus's big bird head off her lap, stood up, and walked over to Chaz. “You dress more colorfully than other humans I've seen.”

Now that she was done with her official duties for the evening, it was apparently time to annoy Chaz with observations about him and questions about life in the city, most of which he didn't feel qualified to answer.

His annoyance had more to do with him being preoccupied with the fact that he still had barely enough Strength to lift his head than it had to do with her genuinely being annoying, and he reminded himself every time he spoke to not be an asshole.

He knew he should have been grateful that she was kind enough to talk to him at all. Most of the other pixies were either shy or distrustful of him and Cooper, and Zanzifurl to a lesser degree. Dimplethorn, either because she was enlightened enough to know that all outsiders weren't dangerous, or because she thought she could easily take him in a fight, chose to remain visible in such close proximity to him. She had pale blue skin, green hair which matched her form-fitting dress made of woven long-bladed grass, and shiny orange wings. If he looked past the facts that she was only two and a half feet tall and part bug, she was a very attractive woman.

And also to Dimplethorn's credit, Chaz didn't find her to be careful about how she answered his questions or selective about what information she was giving him. She could give as well as she received, which would have been great if Chaz could have thought of anything useful to ask her.

“It's what I was wearing when I arrived in the ga–” He still had to stop himself from referring to these people's entire world and existence as a game. “I'm a bard. We tend to seek attention.”

Dimplethorn clapped delightedly. “Oh, that's fascinating!”

Chaz was so accustomed to being ridiculed for his class that he had to replay her response in his head a number of times to determine if she was making fun of him. Against his ego's self-preservation instinct telling him it was a trap, he came to the conclusion that she actually thought it was cool that he was a bard.

Why wouldn't she? Bards were the rock stars of this game. They create magic through the power of rock. The only people he'd spent any significant amount of time with since he'd been here were all gamer nerds who looked down on bards for not being able to kick as much ass in a straight up one-on-one fight against someone of a different class. He should have been out making bank, fucking groupies, and getting the sort of respect he was due.

He shrugged. “It beats working.”

“Can you play me a song?”

“A song?” said a nearby pixie voice. It could have been male, but it was difficult to tell. “Does this one play songs?”

“I play songs,” said Zanzifurl.

“We've heard satyr songs before.” Dimplethorn stood on her root and gestured at Chaz like he was an exhibit. “This one is a bard... from the city.”

“Oh, how exciting!” said a male pixie, which Chaz could only be certain of because he made himself visible, landing next to Dimplethorn and taking a seat on her root.

A female became visible right next to Chaz, nearly causing him to fall backwards off the root he was sitting on. “Play us a city song. Something you'd play to a burly group of ruffians and ne'er-do-wells.” Her knowledge of city life in this game world sounded close to his own.

“I'm sorry,” said Chaz. “I don't have an instrument. My lute was destroyed when I fell out of the sky and landed on a giant tomato.”

Dimplethorn turned to Zanzifurl. “It would give us great pleasure if you would allow the bard to blow your instrument.”

“Holy shit,” said Cooper, materializing at the perimeter of the glade as he walked out of the illusory terrain between two Light Wards. “Did I come back at the wrong time?” He thought for a moment. “Or is it the right time?” He looked at Chaz. “Just so you know, it wouldn't arouse me in the least, but if you're going to blow a goatman, I think I'd want to watch.”

“I am not a goatman!” cried Zanzifurl. He was still sulking about nobody wanting to hear him play his own pipes. To take his pipes away from him and play to an adoring crowd would be kicking him while he was down, especially right after the goatman comment.

“Really, I wish I could play something for you. But I'm much better with string instruments than I am with wind instruments.”

“I've got a wind instrument,” said Cooper. He squatted and let out an impressively long and controlled fart.

The pixie called Hickory Nut appeared above Cooper, then flew even higher. “How is it that you could possibly have anything left to expel after what we just witnessed?”

When a group of pixies had raised their concerns about the smell of Cooper's shits, Hollywhirl had assigned Hickory Nut and two other unfortunate pixies to escort him out of the glade to do his business.

“Please, bard,” said Zanzifurl, holding out his pipes. “Delight us all with a song.”

Chaz thought for a moment on what might have prompted Zanzifurl's sudden change of heart. Then he remembered how shittily he'd performed the previous day. It was good enough to light up an acorn, but it was far from entertaining. This goatman asshole wanted to watch him fail in front of an excited crowd. Then whatever mediocre melody he performed afterward would be all the more appreciated.

“Yes!” said Dimplethorn. “Please play us a song.” Other pixies made themselves visible around her, sitting cross-legged in the grass. Even Hollywhirl watched curiously, her arms crossed as she hovered above them.

Shit.

Chaz accepted the pipes from a smirking Zanzifurl. What a shithead. Why couldn't he have an instrument that didn't require a mouth to play. Chaz wouldn't be able to play and sing at the same time. He tried to think of something with a lot of harmonica in it. Like a Rolling Stone. Could he pull off Dylan? He was one hundred percent sure that he couldn't. At least not for anyone who'd ever heard the song before. He was no Dylan and these wooden satyr pipes were no substitute for a harmonica, and a band full of musicians and other instruments. But maybe, if he rolled well enough, he could pull off a version of the song that would entertain this group of forest-dwelling fey folk who'd never even heard the shit that passed for music in their own world, much less actual real music.

He blew the pipes quietly at first to get a feel for them again. As random sounds gradually morphed into something like the tune that he was going for, he blew louder and more confidently.

Most of the assembled crowd exchanged awkward glances as he played, but Dimplethorn was laser focused on him. She closed her eyes and smiled, like she was trying to meet him halfway, maybe trying to imagine what it might sound like if performed properly with a band and a singer who could remember more than seventy percent of the lyrics.

When he came around to the chorus a second time, the other pixies began to pay more attention, like they were now starting to recognize the structure of the song. As he progressed into the third and fourth verses with bolstered confidence, he felt something like a mixture of two familiar feelings flowing out of him at once. One was the rush that came from a crowd digging his music. The other feeling, the release of magical energy he felt whenever he cast a spell, wasn't really separate from the first. It had always been there, even when he'd played in bars or rocked the shit on karaoke night back home. There was power in music, and he was only beginning to learn how to harness it.

The song ended with a round of applause as thunderous as was possible from two dozen tiny bug people.

Chaz wanted to coolly toss the pipes back to Zanzifurl, but repeatedly lifting them to his mouth had taken a lot out of him. Instead, he waited for the satyr to come and retrieve them.

“I am humbled by your performance,” said Zanzifurl, bowing as he accepted his instrument. “I have never heard music like that before.”

“Thank you.” Chaz was moved by Zanzifurl's words, and thankful that he had opted not to tell him to go fuck himself when he handed back the pipes.

“Be it the will of the gods that we return from tomorrow's journey alive, I would be honored if we could exchange our knowledge of music.”

“That sounds awesome,” said Chaz. “Maybe when I get myself a new lute, we could jam together.”

Zanzifurl's smile faltered. “Of course. We could do that as well.”

“Neither bush nor vine yields fruit without bees to pollinate their flowers,” said Hollywhirl in a peculiar interruption and change of subject. “Until the Dark Lord and his minions are driven from this wood, no one will make jam together.”

“I meant...” Chaz changed his mind and decided to let it go. He was too exhausted to teach English colloquialisms, even if not doing so meant they'd think he had some weird fixation on making liquified fruit. “It's not just the jam. It's the whole ecosystem. The absence of berries throws the whole food chain out of whack.” He thought that had been a good save, but Hollywhirl was staring at him with what felt like contempt for his idiocy.

“Thank you for your performance,” she finally said, though there was little warmth in her tone. “It was both entertaining and thought provoking. Perhaps you would entertain us again sometime, but for now you must rest. We have a long day of travel ahead of us.”

“That sounds fine by me,” said Cooper. “I'm about to rest like a motherfucker.” He collapsed right where he was standing, dead center of the perimeter of Light Wards, which is precisely where Chaz had meant to sleep, having determined it the safest possible place if a Dark One should happen into the glade.

He tried to think of some reason to ask Cooper to sleep somewhere else, but the best he could come up with was You should sleep in a more dangerous place because I don't want to die or have to smell you. That wasn't likely to go over well, so it came down to a choice between sleeping next to Cooper and having to smell him all night, or putting his own life more at risk. That was the kind of decision that put one's logic-forcing into overdrive.

If a Dark One were to enter the glade, it would do so from a random point along the perimeter. If Chaz were sleeping near the perimeter, there would be more points of entry further from him than the perimeter's radius, which would be the distance it would have to travel if Chaz was sleeping at the center, than there would be nearer him. So logically, the safest place he could sleep would be at a random point along the edge.

Does that make sense? That makes sense. Fuck, I'm tired.

Chaz crawled from the stump he'd been sitting on toward the edge of the glade.

“You there! Bard!” said Hollywhirl. “You'll be safer in the center of the glade, next to your friend.”

He looked up in the direction her voice was coming from, but she, along with most of the other pixies, had turned invisible again. “No, you see. A random point on the perimeter... The radius of the glade is shorter... This was easier to articulate in my head. If you consider that –”

“We have limited resources with which to protect you. You're easier to watch over if you're all together. Now you and the satyr should lie down next to the half-orc before you further test my patience.”

Chaz glanced over at Zanzifurl who had also decided to try his luck on the edge of the glade. With resigned sighs, they both shuffled toward Cooper.

“Hickory Nut, Wildflower,” said Hollywhirl. “Retrieve the half-orc's axe.”

Cooper opened his eyes. “Seriously? You let me carry it around all evening. What do you think I'm going to do while I'm sleeping?”

“Believe me, half-orc, when I say I am not frightened of you. But if that is truly my sister, then the way you sleep with her makes me uncomfortable.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You're cuddling it.”

Cooper sat up and pushed the axe a couple of inches away from him. “No, I wasn't.” As the axe floated away from him, he shouted up after it. “You know, this isn't cool, man! It's fine if you want to take the axe away, but don't make me out to be some kind of fucking axe molester. It's not like I was dry-humping it or shoving the handle up my ass.”

“I'm not accusing you of anything,” explained Hollywhirl. “The Children of the Forest do not judge others' sexual habits. We are a sensually enlightened people. In fact, most of us are currently enjoying the acts of love as I speak.”

Chaz felt something warm and wet drip onto the back of his neck as he crawled toward Cooper. He sat up, wiped it off, then looked at his fingers. It looked like glitter glue.

“What the fuck? Is this...” he whispered to himself. He almost had a heart attack when two invisible hands grabbed him by the wrist. Then an invisible tongue licked the substance he sincerely hoped he'd misidentified from his fingers. “Who is that?”

“It tastes like Dandelion,” Dimplethorn whispered back, remaining invisible. “But it could be Huckleberry.”

“Those Dark Ones really took it out of me,” Chaz called out to anyone who was listening. “I'll be there in a second.” He whispered to Dimplethorn. “You know the taste of each of these guys' splooge?”

“I'd like to know the taste of your splooge.”

Chaz's dick was threatening to burst through the front of his shiny golden pants, which disturbed him for all sorts of reasons. They weren't even the same species. What the hell could they even do together? Would his dick fit inside her? If it did, then it would mean that either he had a tiny dick or she had a vag like a subway tunnel. Did she even stop at pixies? If she wanted to fuck him, who's to say she hadn't fucked wolves and bears? He already had one foot in the grave without throwing bear AIDS onto his pile of health issues.

Or maybe she wasn't talking about intercourse. Maybe she just wanted to jerk him off because she was genuinely curious as to what his splooge tasted like. But those tiny hands would make it like getting a handjob from an infant. And where the hell would they do it? Out here in the grass? Cooper would never let him live that down.

“You may have your axe in the morning,” Hollywhirl said to Cooper. “Should we discover that Nabi's spirit dwells within it, and she personally gives her consent for you to lay with her, then you may.”

“I'm not trying to bone your fucking sister!”

Chaz felt Dimplethorn's hands reach under his pants. His elbows went wobbly, causing him to lose balance and plant his face in the moist grass. There was no stopping it now. It was happening.

Just hang on a little longer, man. Don't shoot your load as soon as she touches your –

He shot his load as soon as she touched his dick.

“What you and my sister do is none of my concern,” Hollywhirl continued. “If she chooses to lay with a half-orc, that makes no more difference to me than Dimplethorn's decision to caress the bard's penis to ejaculation.”

Cooper stared wide-eyed at Chaz.

“No!” cried Chaz. “She didn't... I...”

“He's right,” said Dimplethorn, though the sound of her voice right next to him did little to corroborate her denial. “I barely touched it.”

Cooper snorted and gawked at Chaz's crotch. Dimplethorn had taken most of his load when she removed her hand, but he still felt a little sticky, and there was a visible wet spot on the crotch of his pants.

“It's been a while since I've been with anyone, okay?”

“It's saltier than I expected,” Dimplethorn whispered in his ear. “I'm going to save some in a jar.”

As disturbing as that was, Chaz was even more disturbed by the fact that, in the very near future, perhaps ten minutes from now when his post-squirt hormones died down, he would probably be aroused by knowing a tiny winged woman was keeping a sample of his jizz in a jar.

He scrambled the rest of the way to the center of the glade on his weak hands and knees and collapsed face down on the grass, mostly because he was too exhausted to do anything else, but also with the purpose of covering his junk.

“Did you touch her tits?” Cooper said in a lousy attempt at a whisper.

Chaz covered his head with his arms. “Shut up! Let me go to sleep!”

“We're going to sleep now,” Cooper announced to the seemingly empty air above them. “Good night!”

After a few seconds of silence, he non-whispered to Chaz, “I don't want to alarm you, but there's no way I'm getting to sleep now without rubbing one out. I'll turn the other way and try to make it quick, but fair warning, I might get a little gassy.”

Chaz willed himself to fall asleep, which he found surprisingly effective. He faded out to the sound of soft grunting.

Chapter 32

“Come on, guys,” Dave complained. His back ached and his fingers were beginning to blister. “Isn't this deep enough? It's not like this place is going to be crawling with cops and corpse-sniffing dogs. Nobody even knows Murkwort was here.” He was also a little creeped out that he was now in over his head inside the grave he was digging. He was depending on Frank, Rhonda, and Tony the Elf to help him out once he finished, but he couldn't be one hundred percent sure that they weren't just planning to bury him alive. He had fucked everyone over pretty good, and he was a liability. And on top of all that, he suddenly realized, he was whining.

Frank peeked over the edge. “You're the one who told Cooper to go seven feet deep when he buried Mordred, just to be on the safe side.”

“Because it was Cooper. I was intentionally being a dick.” Dave felt a chill run up his spine. He'd been aware, of course, that the avatar of Mordred that Tim had murdered was buried right next to the hole he was digging. They'd chosen that spot because it was out of the way and there wouldn't be a lot of foot traffic or curious eyeballs. A second body now made this area the Whore's Head Inn's official body dump. But now that Frank actually said it aloud, Dave couldn't help but be acutely aware that he was less than a foot away from Mordred's worm-ridden festering corpse.

“If you idiots would stop murdering people on the premises, you wouldn't have this problem.”

“That's not fair! I'm as upset about this as anyone. More so, even. I'm in just as deep of shit as you are now, and I have a disease that turns me into a fucking rat monster!”

“Life isn't fair.”

What an asshole.

“Come on, Frank. I need to see a cleric. There still might be time to reverse this.”

“We can discuss that when there isn't a goddamn dead body in the inn. Now quit your bitching and keep digging.” Frank backed out of sight.

The cool moisture of exposed deep earth provided a little relief from the afternoon sun, but Dave was still a gritty sweaty mess. It would almost be a relief to get buried in here, to lie down and let the dirt cool his exposed skin. The relief wouldn't last long once he wasn't able to breathe, of course.

How much more relieving would it be to bury that little gnome fucker down here though? As he flung a shovelful of dirt out of the hole, Dave fantasized about connecting the business end of the shovel with Frank's head. Then he considered what a fucked up thing that was to fantasize about. Then he reasoned that there wasn't any harm in a little fucked up fantasizing. After all, Dave hadn't killed Murkwort on purpose. He didn't know he was a wererat at the time. But Frank knew that Dave had recently contracted lycanthropy and was denying him the opportunity to get treated. Each hour that passed might be making the treatment that much more difficult, or even impossible. And here he was spending those precious hours digging a fucking hole. This was slave labor.

Dave wondered again, and a little more seriously this time, if they might be planning to bury him alive. The more he thought about it, the more sense it made. This hole wasn't only for Murkwort. He was digging his own grave. When Frank the Fuhrer determined it was deep enough, Tony the Elf and Rhonda would simply toss Murkwort's body down in here with him and start shoveling in dirt.

No. That wasn't how Dave was going to go down. He'd been shit on enough, and he wasn't going to let these three assholes have the final shits. It was time to turn the tables. He would bite all three of them, then throw them in the hole. He would relish their sudden changes of heart about going to see a cleric, and then he'd have a nice long piss on them before he started throwing in handfuls of dirt. But first, he had to figure out a way to get the drop on them, and that meant getting out of this hole. He kept shoveling as he thought, so as not to arouse any suspicion.

If he started digging sideways and diagonally upward, he'd be able to dig himself a ramp that he could climb out of. But he wouldn't be able to do that quickly enough before someone noticed.

He might have a spell that would ease his escape, but the time was an issue there as well. There was no way they would let him sit and pray uninterrupted for an hour to prepare his spells.

Then the obvious answer hit him. He was a wererat. His dwarf/rat hybrid form would likely give him a bonus to his Dexterity, and his changed form might make climbing out of a hole easier. It couldn't hurt. For all their knowledge of digging tunnels and dwelling in underground caverns, dwarf bodies were the worst design possible for climbing out of holes.

How did it work? Did he have to say a trigger phrase like Rat Form? Best to rule out other options first. If anyone heard him say that, and it didn't work, they'd be done with making him suffer the agony and humiliation of digging his own grave and start raining down the dirt on him right then and there.

Deciding to give sheer force of Willpower a shot, he shoveled one more scoop of dirt, then set the shovel down.

He shut his eyes and focused on what the transformation from dwarf to hybrid rat form might feel like. His fingers and toes started to tingle first, then started to hurt. The pain grew excruciating as his bones stretched. He knew he could make the pain stop anytime he wanted, but forced himself to think about how much worse it would feel to breathe in that first lungful of dirt. Choking with no oxygen coming in until he finally succumbed to an agonizing death. He could deal with some stretching bones. It wouldn't last long.

The tingling sensation ran through his hands and feet, then up to his elbows and knees. The knees were the worst, but he willed himself to fight through the pain. He had an easier time when it reached his hips and shoulders. It still hurt a lot, but he was learning how to deal with it better, or so he thought.

When his internal organs started to change and shift themselves around, he wanted to scream, but his face was elongating and he had no control over his lungs. Likewise, his control over his sphincter muscle failed him, and he felt squishy warmth fill the back of his pants.

That was really the point of no return. Being buried alive was one thing, but he couldn't let the final witnesses to his existence know that the last thing he did before his death was to shit himself. At least not at his age.

His armor suddenly felt looser, then he felt like he was being hugged by a crowd of cacti as every pore on his skin forced out coarse grey hairs. Then all the pain stopped at once. The transformation was complete.

Dave held up his hands. His fingertips ended in sharp claws which seemed more effective than a shovel at tearing through this dirt. His forearms were slender and covered with grey fur. Even the leopard fur on his left arm was a shade greyer.

He felt slimmer and more agile, like he'd easily be able to parkour his way out of the hole, but first he'd need to get rid of this armor. Not only was it weighing him down, but it was wrong for his current body style, more of a hindrance than protection.

“Jesus Christ, Dave,” said Frank as Dave frantically worked the buckles on his armor. “Was that a fart? Or did you go full Cooper and – Shit!”

Frank was standing at the side of the hole again, gawking down at Dave. Fortunately, Dave's fingers were much nimbler now, and he'd already gotten his backplate and breastplate unbuckled.

“Rhonda!” cried Frank. “Tony the –”

Dave hurled his breastplate at Frank, striking him in the forehead. There was no going back now. He slipped out of the rest of his armor and tore away the padding and shit-caked undergarments, freeing a tail he suddenly realized he had. After using some of the scraps to wipe his ratperson ass clean, he tossed the shovel out of the hole so that he wouldn't be completely unarmed. Then he leaped at a wall and used his right foot to shove his way up to the opposite side of the hole, where he easily grabbed hold of the edge and pulled himself out.

Frank lay unconscious, bleeding from the forehead. Dave nodded, self-satisfied with such a badass move. He picked up the shovel and thought about what to do with Frank. Squeezing the shovel handle, he thought about how easy it would be to give him a swift and painless death right now. That would be the practical option, especially since Rhonda and Tony the Elf might show up at any moment.

If it were Rhonda or Tony the Elf, he would have gone for the quick death. But he was sure Frank was the mastermind behind the idea to bury him alive. He needed to see Frank suffer.

Dave dropped to his knees next to Frank, licked the bleeding wound on his forehead, then spat in his mouth.

“NO!” cried Tony the Elf, lunging at Dave with a machete.

Dave barely had time to register what was happening. He instinctively raised his right arm to block the attack.

As he fell backwards, he saw that the blade came away a little bloodied, and there was a little bit of blood on his forearm which he could only presume was his own, but there was no actual wound. The strike had smarted a bit at the moment of contact, but it felt fine now, as if Tony the Elf had attacked him with a plastic prop machete.

Then he remembered. Lycanthropes got a pretty steep Damage Reduction from attacks by anything except silver or –

“Magic Missile!” said Rhonda. Two golden bolts of magical energy flew out from her palms and struck Dave on the right side of his chest and on his left shoulder. Those hurt like sons of bitches, and remained hurting. He received no Damage Reduction from magical attacks.

At least the jig was up. No more pretense about it. They were actively trying to murder him now.

“Whoa!” said Tony the Elf, holding up his left hand at Rhonda and his machete-wielding right hand at Dave. “Everybody calm the fuck down.”

Dave smiled to himself. It was pretty rich of Tony the Elf to tell everyone to calm down right after he'd attacked Dave with a fucking machete. Now that he knew that his machete was about as effective as his dick in his hand, he was suddenly the fucking Prince of Peace.

He could probably take them both down right now without breaking a sweat. After all, there were only so many Magic Missile spells Rhonda could have memorized, and Tony the Elf wasn't armed with any weapons that could hurt him. Still, they might overpower him, tie him up, toss him back in the hole and get back to the task of burying him alive. All the Damage Reduction in the world wouldn't save him from suffocation.

Now wasn't the time to fight. Now was the time to escape, let his body heal, and figure out how to get rid of his affliction. Anyway, Frank might have a little surprise in store for them tonight. Hell, it might even work out that Dave could pin Murkwort on Frank if anyone asked.

“Everybody be cool,” Tony the Elf continued, as if he had any control whatsoever of this situation. “Dave, just back away from Frank, and we can all talk this out.”

Dave considered standing there defiantly, challenging Tony the Elf to pull some sort of consequence out of his ass for not obeying. But backing away from Frank, as it turned out, would facilitate Dave's escape. At present, Tony the Elf, Rhonda, and the hole had him kind of surrounded. He could probably jump over the hole with no problem, but falling into it with both of them right there to do a rush burial wasn't a risk he was keen to take. A couple of steps back away from Frank (and Rhonda and Tony the Elf) would give him the path he needed to make a break for it.

Tony the Elf glared at Dave, like he was daring him to bend down and pick up the shovel as he backed away from them.

“Just go away and never come back,” said Tony the Elf. “If we see you here again, we'll be prepared.”

Those were some mighty tough words to essentially convey that they weren't currently prepared. Still, Dave chose not to pick up the shovel. The reward wasn't worth the risk of being tackled and subdued.

When he had a clear path, he bolted away as fast as he could, which was considerably faster than his normal dwarf running speed. The air rushing past his fur-covered face at that speed was exhilarating. That is, until he noticed Cardinian NPCs staring at him. Many cowered away, but some drew weapons and stepped in front of their loved ones.

“Shit,” Dave muttered to himself. Being a wererat was apparently frowned upon in the city. If any Kingsguard happened by right now, he might be murdered or arrested on sight. He had to find somewhere to hide and change back into a dwarf. But even then he'd be naked, which could also lead to him being murdered or arrested on sight. Come to think of it, maybe these people weren't down on him for being a wererat after all. Maybe it was the fact that he was currently naked. He looked down and found that, even in hybrid form his junk was dangling between his legs. His dick was smaller, paler, and more slender than usual, but there was no mistaking it for being anything other than a dick.

He put his hands over it and tried to explain himself, but all that came out of his mouth were horrifyingly shrill shrieks. His tongue, teeth, and the shape of his mouth made normal speech impossible.

“How dare you reveal yourself among the decent people of this city!” said a man wielding a normal-looking shortsword. This did little to clear the issue as to whether they were upset that Dave was a wererat or that he was naked, or which part of a possible combination of the two was the greater offense.

“Get out of here!” cried a half-elven woman. “Go back to the sewers where your kind belongs!” At least she was more straightforward, though Dave was a little surprised at what seemed like kind of a racist thing to say, especially coming from a hybrid of sorts such as herself.

An older human woman thrust her fists down by her side. “Someone fetch the Kingsguard!”

“No!” said the man with the shortsword. “There isn't time. It's better to rid the world of this monster while we have the opportunity. Look there, it's already hurt.”

The young woman next to him pulled on his sleeve. “They can't be harmed with normal weapons!”

“Nonsense. That's just what they want you to believe.” He pulled his arm free and started advancing toward Dave. Slowly at first, then more confidently as others were pressured to join him, lest they look like cowards.

Half a dozen men converged on him armed with swords or daggers, except for one guy who was wielding an iron pipe. Damage Reduction wasn't the same as complete immunity. Getting the shit beat out of him by an angry mob with mundane weapons might be an even slower and more painful way to go than being buried alive.

Dave decided to take the racist half-elf's advice and seek safety in the sewer. He fled toward one of the exposed sewer tunnels, but hesitated when he came upon a pile of dead bodies. They looked like they'd been butchered to death by some deranged axe murderer. Many of them were missing arms and legs. And while there were also a bunch of severed limbs lying around, they didn't appear to match the human bodies that were missing the limbs. The separated limbs were more slender, and covered with fur. Dave wouldn't have known what they belonged to if he didn't currently have a full set of them.

Suddenly the sewer didn't seem like the safe haven for wererats the woman had suggested it was. But the angry mob was still coming for him, and it was a chance he had to take.

Chapter 33

Stacy's insides were still reeling from the pheasant, but she was confident that she'd further fertilized the Fertile Desert as much as she was going to for now. It felt good to be in her own clothes again, especially since the robe she'd borrowed from Darton was now torn into scraps, with about a quarter of it soiled and littering the desert floor. It wasn't her fault he didn't have toilet paper available.

She was folding the remaining scraps and stuffing them into her pockets for later use when a sharp knock on the door startled her.

“Give me a second,” she said. “I'm almost finished.”

“Sorry,” said Julian. “You know I wouldn't normally bother you in the bathroom. I just wanted to make sure you understood the gravity of the situation. We're in the hotel room of a man who just got arrested. The cops, or constables, or whatever they're called here, could be looking for us right now. This room has to be pretty high up on the list of places they'll search for us.”

“I get it. I'll be right out.”

“I know you're not feeling great, but we could find another bathroom. If you could just pinch off what you've –”

Stacy swung the door open, a little disappointed that it missed Julian, who had wisely decided to badger her in the bathroom from slightly to the side of the doorway. But his face looked so embarrassed and remorseful, not to mention kind of goofy now that he was back in that ridiculous serape, that she cut him off before he could apologize any more.

“It's cool. Let's get the hell out of –” Again, she was startled by a knock on the door. Only this time it was more than a mere annoyance, as it was the door leading out to the hallway, and it was clearly not Julian doing the knocking this time.

“They're here!” Julian whispered frantically. “What do we do?”

“Shut up for a second. Let me think.” The seeds of an incredibly stupid idea started to take root in Stacy's head. “Do you have one of those Web spells prepared?”

“I have second level spells available. I could use up one of my – Yes.”

“Follow me into the bedroom and take off your serape.”

“Jesus, Stacy,” said Julian. “Can you turn it off for a few minutes at least? We're in some serious shit!”

Stacy took a deep breath as she dragged Julian by the arm into the bedroom. “I understand that, and I'm trying to get us out of it. I need your serape.” She spoke in a deliberately patient tone, as she realized that she'd kind of walked right into that one. But honestly, how the hell did he imagine the Web spell was supposed to have factored into whatever pre-arrest quickie she'd supposedly had in mind?

“Okay, sorry,” said Julian, taking off his serape. “I'm just kind of freaked out right now, and I'm glad to hear you've got a plan.”

Stacy pulled the duvet off the bed and tossed it aside. “You might not be so glad when you find out what it is.”

“What is it?”

“I'll tell you later. Right now, I need you to stall whoever it is at the door. Use your Diplomacy skill, but maybe try to barricade the door with furniture if you can do so without sounding like you're doing so. I'm going to need a little time.”

“Right.” Julian ran out of the room. “Just a minute! I'll be right there.”

Stacy removed the thin sheets from the bed. Lightweight, durable, and very large. Just what she needed. With the dagger she kept concealed in her boot, she cut the fabric into the shapes she needed, then took them outside to the back balcony and started sawing away at the long bamboo stalks in the garden.

“I'm just lacing up my pantaloons!” said Julian as he tiptoed to the door carrying a single chair.

Stacy considered stripping the leaves off the bamboo stalks to minimize drag and maximize gliding distance. But the leaves might provide more surface area for the Web to cling to, thereby maximizing the odds of this thing working at all, and minimizing the chance of a sooner and more abrupt death. Also factoring into her decision was the time it would take to strip off the leaves. There was only so long Julian could keep up the getting dressed shtick. And depending on the severity of the crimes Darton was allegedly mixed up in, there were only so many fucks the authorities were going to give about whether the alleged accomplices they were hunting down were dressed or not.

After throwing handfuls of loose dirt all over the patio bricks until she was satisfied, Stacy spread Julian's serape flat on the dirt.

“What are you doing?” asked Julian, taking a curious peek at her handiwork. “I just had that cleaned!”

Whoever was at the door knocked again, this time louder and more rapidly.

“Keep stalling!” said Stacy.

Julian went back inside. “I'm coming! You just caught me at the worst possible time. I was in the bath, you see...”

Stacy laid the two large sections of bedsheet fabric perpendicular to Juilan's serape to form an almost unrecognizably thick T shape. Or perhaps a snow angel was a more appropriate description. Then she laid the bamboo framework down along the edges of the white bedsheet wings. It wasn't a masterpiece, but it would have to do.

“Julian!” she said as she lay between the wings, spreading her arms out and gripping the bamboo stalks framing the bottom of them, her legs lying along either side of the serape.

Julian appeared in the patio archway. “What is this? What are you doing?”

“I don't want you to take this the wrong way,” said Stacy. “But I need you to lie on your back so that I can lay my head in your crotch.”

“What?”

“Hurry up! Think of it like you're sitting on my shoulders, except we're lying down.”

“Why are we doing this?”

Stacy sighed. “Is it not completely obvious?”

“No,” said Julian. “It's not in the least little bit obvious.” Still, he followed her instructions and lay on his back scooting toward her until she could lower her head between his legs.

Stacy grabbed Julian's ankles and repositioned them so that they were crossed over her chest.

“Now stretch your arms out as far as you can to your sides and grab hold of those bamboo stalks.

“Okay,” said Julian, grabbing the stalks along what would soon be the front of the wings. “Now what?”

“Now cast your Web spell, silly.”

“On what?”

“On us!” said Stacy. “On this whole thing!”

“Maybe if I had a better idea of what we were trying to accomplish, I could –”

A small clatter of wood caused Stacy to jerk her head up. The room door was open a crack, blocked for now by Julian's meager efforts to barricade it, but that wouldn't last long.

“NOW!” said Stacy, bringing her head back down quickly.

“Oomph!”

Stacy realized she may have come down a bit hard on Julian's testicles. “Sorry. Now please cast the spell.”

Julian shifted his legs and ass around a bit, then said, “Web!”

The light dimmed as Stacy's vision filled with white sticky strands of magical adhesive. Fortunately, she could still make out basic shapes well enough to do what she needed to do.

“Keep your legs tight around me,” she said.

Julian's thighs squeezed her head.

“Did I do it right?” he asked. “I mean with the Web. Is this the effect you had in mind?”

“We'll soon see. Remember to keep your arms spread wide.” Stacy sat up slowly, partly due to the weight of Julian on her shoulders, but mostly to make sure her contraption stayed together.

The loose dirt helped the web peel easily away from the brick patio floor, just as she'd hoped it would.

Standing up proved tricky with both of her legs glued to the serape, but her high Strength and Dexterity scores came through for her.

“Be careful,” said Julian nervously. “I can't see very well, and we're close to the edge of the – Stacy! What the hell are you doing? Are you crazy?”

Stacy waddled to the edge, squatted, then jumped onto the railing. “No, I'm awesome!” She leaned forward.

“FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!” cried Julian as Stacy's head threatened to burst like a watermelon between his legs.

Stacy felt a rush of sensations all at once. There was the head-squeezing of course, the sudden rush of warm desert wind rushing up due to their free fall, the sudden rush of warmth on the back of her neck from –

“Are you peeing on me?” she shouted.

“I'm sorry!”

Stacy realized that the wind was still rushing straight upward, meaning that they hadn't yet leveled out. She also became aware that her arms were being jerked up and down.

“Stop flapping! This is a glider!” She would have liked to be controlling the front of the wings, but she needed her leg strength to work the tail.

Spreading and straightening her legs, Stacy pointed her toes toward the sky, then brought her arms down slightly to dip the backs of the wings.

“Pull your tips up!” she instructed Julian.

“Fuller tit sauce?”

“Tips! Wing tips! Pull them up!” Stacy felt a wobble of almost quasi-stability as Julian followed her orders. It was a tiny wobble, just enough to suggest that there was probably a right way to do this. The fact that they were still in free fall suggested that they hadn't yet discovered it. “Too high! Bring them back down a little!”

After another wobble, they were falling slower. The wind was still rushing straight up, and fast enough that they still probably wouldn't survive hitting the ground at this speed, but it was definitely an improvement.

Stacy tried a number of minute adjustments to the parts of the glider under her control, raising and lowering her arms, pulling up her knees and putting her legs out straight again. While several attempts seemed to worsen their situation, few did them any good.

Not wanting to die without having tried everything she could think of, she tried lowering only her right arm. Something changed, and they finally harnessed some significant air. They were moving forward, kind of. It was more like a wide downward spiral, but it was a hell of a lot better than straight down.

“It's working!” cried Julian. “Stacy, you're a genius!”

That was sweet of him to say. She didn't have the heart to tell them they were still going to die if they hit the ground at this speed.

“Of course,” Julian shouted over the wind, “we're still going to die if we hit the ground at this speed!”

Stacy moved her head left and right, trying to clear some of the Web out of her face. Her vision became clear enough to see that they had a lot less time than she'd thought to find the exact wing tilts they needed. “Julian! We're getting close! You need to try some adjustments! Nothing too big! Tiny movements and see what works!”

“I've got a better idea!”

Don't summon a horse. Don't summon a horse. Don't summon a horse.

“Celestial Giant Bee!”

Stacy had to admit, that was unexpected.

A massive gold-and-platinum-striped honeybee, about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle, appeared just below them, its rapidly flapping wings two silvery blurs flanking its metallic-looking furry body. It took in its surroundings curiously with eyes that looked like giant mirrored sunglasses.

Stacy wanted to ask Julian how the bee was supposed to help them, but the hum of its wings was deafening. That made sense, considering how loud a normal bee's buzz could be from the speed it needed to flap to stay airborne. As big as this thing was, it had to be flapping like a mofo.

One more spiral would have them slamming right into the bee. She could understand how it might be helpful to have a flying creature of that size shoulder some of their weight and slow their descent, but surely Julian must have been taking into account that –

“Shit!” said Julian as the buzzing abruptly stopped and Stacy found herself with a faceful of prickly bee hair. “Sorry! That was poorly thought out.”

Stacy corrected her train of thought. Apparently, Julian hadn't taken into account that the bee's wings would likely get stuck in the web, as that was the exact purpose for which webs had evolved.

The glider went from a spiral to a spin. With the giant bee ass in her face, it was now impossible to tell how fast they were falling. Stacy stretched her legs as wide as the serape and web would allow and adjusted her arms to try and get that spiral back, but she couldn't see anything.

“Julian! I can't see! You need to bring us down!”

“Celestial Giant Bee!” said Julian.

“WHAT THE FUCK?”

Stacy felt another sudden jolt, no doubt meaning that they'd smacked into another giant magical bee. Once that guy gets a solution in his head, he sticks with it no matter what the –

SQPWLISH

She couldn't see. She couldn't breathe. She could barely move. The only evidence she had that she was still alive was all the pain. It was like someone had thrown a wall at her.

No time for pain now. Breathing was the top priority.

With a little bit of effort, she pulled her arms free from the bamboo and scraped the web out of her face, along with whatever foul-tasting liquid was mixed in with it.

Once she'd cleared it from her nose and mouth, rendering her able to breathe again, she cleared it out of her eyes.

It was bee guts. She was writhing in the abdomen of a giant squashed bee. Julian must have summoned that second one figuring that using giant bees to break their fall was better than – Julian!

Stacy sprang to her feet. Julian lay face down inside the crushed abdomen of the other bee. She grabbed him by the shoulders and flipped him over, then wiped the bee guts off his face and checked his pulse. She sighed with relief when she found it. He was alive.

“Julian?”

He groaned as he opened his eyes. “Are we... Did we...” His eyes widened as he looked up at the sky. “Holy shit! We did it! We're alive!”

Stacy looked up. The Crescent Shadow was high above them. And then, in the blink of an eye, it was gone.

“Yeah, we did it alright,” she said. “Of course, now we're stranded in the desert.”

Chapter 34

Those passengers of the Maiden's Voyage who had survived the fight with fewer limbs than they'd started the trip with were understandably upset about it. Randy felt bad leaving people in pain, but he limited his Lay on Hands ability to one Hit Point per injured passenger. Just enough to stop the bleeding and stabilize the recipient. Once that ran out, he helped administer more conventional methods of treatment, such as tourniquets and cauterizing irons, under the supervision of one of the ship's crewmen who had evidently taken some ranks in the Heal skill. They screamed, cried, cursed the gods and Randy, some of them pleading with him to just let them die.

But the crewmen had sustained identical injuries were shockingly laid back about it. It came as no surprise to Randy, of course, that sailors would generally be a heartier breed than most. It's a hard life at sea. But how tough did a person have to be to act so casual at the loss of a limb? This was a life-changing event. No matter what rough experiences they'd had in the past, they'd gotten through them with all of their limbs until now. They were going to face some serious limitations, or at least have to work really hard to overcome them. And yet they laughed and compared the sizes of their bloody stumps. Randy even heard one guy complain that he'd lost a tattoo he really liked.

Was there some kind of nautical peer pressure to act manly no matter what tragedies befell them? Was it the denial stage of grief? Were they simply really that tough?

Nightwind's crew, who had performed more effectively during the battle, at least had the presence of mind to be upset about the limbs they'd lost.

One patient Randy hadn't tended to was Denise. Now that he thought about it, he couldn't recall seeing her during the fight, or at all since the previous evening. He hoped she hadn't been thrown overboard in battle. Glancing over the railing revealed nothing but the choppy waves. Whatever the sea was hiding under them, she wasn't telling.

Denise might have crossed over to Nightwind to help Katherine get established, but Randy wanted to check their cabin first, just to rule it out.

“No!” cried Denise from inside as Randy approached the door. “Stop it! Get off of me! That hurts!”

“Denise!” Randy braced himself against the railing and kicked in the door.

Denise was naked on the floor, punching and kicking at their assigned cabin mate. He was also naked, grunting and sweating, meeting Denise's paltry attempts to defend herself with heavy handed slaps as he tried to force himself on her.

Randy grabbed Denise's assailant by his greasy ponytail and pulled back hard. “You son of a bitch! I'll kill you!”

The rapist shouted in pain as his head jerked back. He hopped to his feet and swung his elbow back, catching Randy in his left cheekbone. It smarted, but Randy kept his grip on the big guy's hair.

Randy hadn't realized how big this guy was, and an admirable collection of scars adorned his naked flesh, suggesting that he had more fighting experience as well. But Randy knew no fear, for he had something even better. The smiting power of Jesus.

“Randy!” said Denise. “Goddammit!”

Randy was ready for the elbow when it flew back at his face again. Ducking under it, he thrust his free hand to his adversary's junk and gripped his balls as tightly as he could. “By the power of Jesus Christ, I smite you!” He shuddered as he felt the big man's testicles squish like grapes in his hand.

“Uuuuuuuuunnnnnnnnggggggggghhhhhhh,” said the rapist.

No time to get squeamish. Randy led him out through the doorway and flipped him over the rail. He hit the water hard and cradled his crushed nuts.

“Hagarf!” Denise stood naked in the doorway, her fists clenched and shaking with anger, but she kept her voice down, like she was worried someone might hear her. “Are you out of your goddamn mind, Randy?”

“What?” said Randy.

“What the fuck was that all about? Could you not see that I was in the middle of something?”

“What?” Randy repeated. He had neither expected nor wanted a display of gratitude during what would presumably be a very traumatic time for Denise, but he certainly wasn't expecting this. “It looked to me like you was in the middle of gettin' raped.”

“I was!” shouted Denise, peeking over the railing. Then she leaned back and spoke in a quieter voice again. “At least that's what he thought.”

“What?” Randy would have liked to vary his responses, but Denise just wasn't making any sense.

“Thank you, mighty paladin!” Denise was shouting again. “You saved me from that despicable evil man! I'm eternally grateful!” She shoved Randy and whispered, “Hurry up and throw him a goddamn rope or something. And you'd better be able to set his balls right again.”

Randy stood confused for a moment, his moral compass spinning wildly. He had felt both justified and righteous by causing harm to his friend's assailant. The big man's intentions were evil, but he had been tricked into acting on them. Randy supposed that in times of doubt, he would do best to err on the side of forgiveness.

Randy found a coil of rope on the deck tied in a wide loop at the end. He guessed it was put there for just this situation. Well, the man overboard situation anyway. Not necessarily the I purposely squeezed a man's balls to jelly and threw him overboard situation. That was way too specific an event to prepare for, after all.

“Praise the gods!” cried Denise, looking over the rail. “That vile man is drowning!” She backed away from the rail and glared at Randy. “Hurry the fuck up, would you?”

“Alright, fine.” Randy had half a mind to throw her in after him. He tossed the loop of rope down to Hagarf but found Denise was right. He did appear to be drowning. His head was dipping below the waves, and he wasn't going for the rope. “Aw man.”

“What?” said Denise. She came back to the rail and gasped. “What the hell are you waitin' for, Randy? A fuckin' invitation? Get in there and save him!”

Randy climbed over the rail and jumped into the water. It was colder than he expected and his boots made swimming difficult. In retrospect, it probably would have been wiser to take them off first. Fortunately, he was close enough to grab hold of the rope in one hand and Hagarf's ponytail in the other. He pulled the big man up until his head was above the water, then looped the rope under his arms.

Randy was about to shout for Denise to pull up the rope, but he noticed that Hagarf was completely unresponsive, and his face was a little bluer than what seemed healthy. He must have taken water into his lungs.

Fearing he might not survive the time it would take to be pulled back on board the ship, Randy decided to administer some amateur CPR there and then. He kept his left hand firmly gripped on the rope to avoid sinking under the waves himself, and used his right hand to pinch Hagarf's nose. He pressed his lips to Hagarf's and tried both blowing and sucking, not sure which, if any, was the appropriate method.

“Hey!” shouted Denise. “The fuck you think you're doing? You people ain't got an ounce of self-control!”

Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation didn't seem to be doing anything, so Randy tried the only other move he could think of. He was pretty sure the Heimlich maneuver was more for people who had a chunk of hot dog wiener blocking their lungs than for drowning victims, and he'd never been trained on how to do it properly, but it wasn't like screwing it up was going to make Hagarf any more dead than if he did nothing at all.

Randy turned Hagarf around and hugged him tight from behind, gripping his greasy ponytail with his teeth to keep his face out of the water. Hoping that he was at least kind of doing it right, he tightened and loosened his arms around Hagarf's abdomen, then repeated the process.

“Jesus Tittyfucking Christ, Randy!” Denise shouted down at him. “Ain't you got no shame at all? That's fuckin' disgusting. And you got the nerve to prance around calling yourself a follower of –”

Finally, Hagarf vomited out what seemed like several gallons of seawater, then started coughing violently. He no doubt felt like complete shit, but he was going to be okay.

Although he was responsible for nearly ending Hagarf's life, Randy felt proud of himself for saving it.

“He's all better now,” Randy called up to Denise. “Pull him up, then throw the rope back down for me.”

“What the hell did you do to him?”

“He was drowning. I gave him the Heimlich maneuver to force the water out of his lungs.”

Denise laughed. “Oh man, I had that all wrong. From up here, it looked like you was buttfuckin' him.”

“Hey, man,” said Randy. “It's kinda cold in here. Would you mind hurrying this up a little?”

Denise nodded. “I'm really angry.”

Hagarf's coughing started to subside. He turned his head back to look at Randy. “You! You crushed my testicles!”

“Sorry 'bout that,” said Randy. “I was just lookin' out for my friend is all.” He nodded up to Denise, who had just transformed into an extremely niche porn category. Her breasts were like water balloons poking out from huge pectoral muscles. Her legs were like the Incredible Hulk's, if he were a lot shorter and played a lot more tennis. Her hoo-ha looked like it could crush a grown man's arm if he could manage to get it through that dark forest of Brillo.

Hargarf looked up as he got lifted out of the water. “What is that? No! Someone help me!”

Without Hargarf and the rope there to hold onto, Randy found himself having more trouble treading water than he felt he should, even taking his boots into account.

“What... What's going... on?” he said, ineffectively slapping at the water. “Why... can't I... swim?” It didn't make any sense. He'd always known how to swim, ever since he was a kid. It had been a few years since he'd last done it, but that wasn't the sort of thing one loses completely due to lack of practice. It wasn't like he was trying to compete in the Olympics. He was only trying to tread water. “Denise!” he shouted, stretching his neck to avoid submerging completely. “Helgbbllggglblbl!” His cry for help came out mostly as bubbles.

Kicking his boots off as quickly as he could, he thought it odd how calm and rational he was being, and how unafraid he was of what he imagined was a horrible way to die.

His boots off, he pointed his feet downward and kicked his legs forward and back while cupping his hands and trying to push himself up through the water. The effort was enough to break the surface, but not by much. Reasoning that Denise was well aware that he was down there, it seemed wiser to suck in as much air as his lungs could hold than to expel air calling for help again.

Randy continued to kick and flap his arms, but though his efforts might have been slowing his descent, they weren't stopping it. He was underwater and sinking deeper.

He looked around, hoping he might see a pretty fish before he died. Then he considered that, since he was in a fantasy world, he might be short-changing himself by hoping for a fish, no matter how pretty it was. What if there were mermaids out here? Wouldn't that be something to see!

But he saw neither fish nor mermaid. Just an endless expanse of blue-green water and the barnacle-dotted hull of the Maiden's Voyage.

Glancing upward to have one last look at the surface, he spotted some strange movement. The waves were jostling the surface too much to make out a clear picture, but it almost looked as though a person was... No, that couldn't be.

Katherine's face broke through the surface, her blonde hair fanning out in the water like a halo. She wasn't swimming, but rather crawling along the side of the ship's hull.

“Katherine?” Randy tried to say, but it came out in a cluster of bubbles.

Katherine reached out to him, saying something in response that might have been, “Take my hand, you dumb fucking redneck!” Or it might have been something nicer. Randy was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. He gave one last flap of his arms, then stretched his left arm toward Katherine's, just managing to hook his fingertips on hers.

She flattened herself against the hull as she pulled in her fingertips, then let go suddenly and made a grab for Randy's wrist. Once she had a firm grip, she pulled him toward her slowly and carefully, as if her strange ability to cling to the hull was compromised by his weight pulling her away from it.

Placing his hand on the waistband of her jeans, she gave him a warning glare, which either mean that he shouldn't try anything funny, or that he shouldn't think that she was trying anything funny.

Randy guessed that Katherine was better able to crawl with both hands free and she was providing something other than her hand for him to hold onto. He nodded and dug his fingers in between her jeans and left butt cheek. Now that he was in there, it felt inappropriate enough so that he could understand her having given him that look.

Once Randy's grip was secure, Katherine started crawling slowly to the surface. Randy was getting close to his breaking point as far as holding his breath was concerned. His lungs wanted filling, and he wasn't going to be able to keep from sucking in for very much longer.

Come on, Randy. Don't give up now. You're almost there.

Katherine stopped climbing when she broke the surface. She reached down and grabbed Randy by his right armpit to pull him up level with her.

Randy sucked in as much salty sea air as his lungs would hold.

“Do you really not know how to swim?” said Katherine.

“I was always a good swimmer.”

“You call that swimming? You looked like you were trying to fight off a swarm of angry bees.”

“I don't know what happened. I just choked, I guess.”

“It's probably a game thing,” said Katherine. “Doesn't matter now. Listen, I'm not going to be able to support your weight out of the water, so we're going to need to – Shit!”

Randy assumed that last word was not how she'd intended to finish that sentence. She was no longer clinging to the boat, and Randy was starting to sink again, now unable even to perform the poor excuse for swimming that he'd been doing before now that his hand was stuck in Katherine's pants. Knowing he was about to go under again, he took a deep breath.

He sank like a rock, dragging Katherine down with him until she finally wrenched his hand free of her pants. It was nice of her to try to save him. He offered her a friendly smile and a wave as he descended. He'd lived as good a life as he knew how. Ever since he'd been in this world, he'd done some good things and made some nice friends. He was at peace with himself, and ready to accept his fate.

Katherine, however, wasn't ready to accept his fate. She swam down toward him, pulled out her Bag of Holding, and gestured for Randy to get in it.

As soon as she brought the bag within his reach, Randy helped Katherine pull the mouth over his head and squeezed his body through. It was dark inside, which was probably for the best, considering all the dead dire rats that were bound to be floating around in there with him. He floated in empty space, not frightened but aware that any moment one of those rat corpses might brush against him. Instead he was hit repeatedly by floating globs of saltwater. In the void, he thought about what the odds were of Katherine finding him at just the right time. To the best of his knowledge, she had already crossed over to her new ship. Had she been given some kind of sign? He was hesitant to even entertain the thought, but was it possible that Jesus might have tipped her off?

His train of thought was derailed by Katherine's firm grasp on his wrist again. The next thing he knew, he'd been ejected from the Bag of Holding and spilled onto the Maiden's Voyage's rear deck.

“Are you okay?” asked Katherine.

Randy nodded. “How did you find me?”

Katherine accepted a blanket from one of Captain Longfellow's crewmen and wrapped it around herself. “With no help from your buddy Denise, that's for sure.” She shivered, which might have been due to a breezy chill after having just gotten out of the water, or might have been due to whatever she'd seen that was making her bring up Denise. “I was looking for you two to see if you wanted to ride on my new ship.”

“That was thoughtful of you. It's lucky you happened by just in time for Denise to tell you where I was.”

Katherine scoffed. “Denise didn't tell me shit. She was all hulked out and naked, manhandling our bunkmate into the cabin. He looked terrified. I think he might have been crying.”

Randy frowned. “If Denise didn't tell you, then how –”

“I happened to glance over the railing, and I saw your hand going underwater.” She took off her blanket and wrapped it around Randy. “Are you saying that Denise knew you were in the water? Did she throw you in there?”

“Of course not!” said Randy. “We're friends. She'd never do that. Her mind ain't quite right when she's in that Barbarian Rage. She was probably just distracted is all.” He thought up another question quick to change the subject. “How is it that you was crawling around on the side of the ship like that?”

“That was a spell. It timed out just after we surfaced. I'll have to keep better track of the spell duration next time. And you need to learn how to swim next time you level up.”

Randy nodded. “I s'pose that ain't a bad idea. So are we set to part ways with Captain Longfellow now that you got your own boat?”

“Not quite,” said Katherine. “He's requested that we make one stop together first.”

Chapter 35

Nabi felt restless in Cooper's hands. He hoped it didn't have anything to do with her sister suggesting that he was trying to bone her.

It's not that at all. Hollywhirl can be a touch overprotective.

Cooper didn't have a lot of thoughts that he didn't blurt out as soon as he had them, but he was uncomfortable with his mind being completely naked for Nabi to read. There weren't many better ways he knew to avoid thinking than idle chatter, so he continued the conversation.

“Then what's wrong?” said Cooper.

Chaz and the satyr glanced his way, saw he was talking to the axe, then continued their perpetual paranoid scan for shadows in the forest.

Cooper nearly fell backwards off the sled when Hollywhirl appeared in front of him, flying backwards at the pace the boar were running.

“Does something ail my sister?”

I thirst for the souls of the wicked, and I've not seen one of those damned Dark Ones all day.

“She's thirsty,” Cooper said to Hollywhirl. Then he addressed the axe again. “I hear you. I could really use a beer, and I haven't seen a bar in this forest either.”

Hollywhirl seemed satisfied with the dullness of their conversation as she flew ahead and vanished.

There will be time enough to dull your wits when I'm free of my prison and the Dark Lord and all his minions have been destroyed.

There will be time enough for you to eat my ass.

I can hear you.

Shit.

“So,” said Cooper, looking around for any stimulus for further meaningless conversation. “What's your favorite kind of tree?”

Oak.

“Oh.” He looked around for another stimulus, but the forest had blown its suggestion load with that first one. “Umm...” Instead of another question to ask, all he got from the effort he was putting into thinking was gas. It came out loud and long, and briefly gave him the sensation of riding a motorcycle.

“The Dark Ones appear to be more timid today,” said Zazzifuck, or whatever the satyr's name was. “Can you really think of no better use of our time than to ask your axe what its favorite tree is?”

“We're being dragged through the forest by pigs. What the fuck do you want us to do, Mr. Productivity? Take up knitting?”

“I just thought we might discuss possible reasons why the Dark Ones are more timid today. Of course it seems like a good thing, and not having to stop and fight one every five minutes is getting us to our destination quicker, but knowing the reason why might provide us with valuable information on how we might better keep from becoming one of them.”

“I have a theory about that,” said Chaz. “We're traveling deeper into the forest right now, aren't we?”

The satyr nodded.

“They're clearing everything out from the point of origin onward. Once every bird, bug, and chipmunk have had their life force sucked out of them, these Dark Ones have nothing left to consume. Their only option is to spread outward. They prefer to stay in the forest for its cover of natural shadows for now, but its only a matter of time before their thirst will push them beyond their comfort zones.”

“That's a good thing, right?” said the satyr. “Being able to see them makes them relatively easy to destroy.”

“That's true for anyone who comes across them and knows what they are, how to kill them, and happens to have magical weapons one them. Anyone else is likely to run away or be turned into one of them.”

The goatman frowned. “That's less good.”

“Without significant opposition, they'll continue to spread until they reach new forests where they can start the process all over again.”

“Glittersprinkles Grove is small and isolated. Most of the other forests around here are much bigger and interconnected. If the Dark Ones reach another forest, they might easily take over the whole continent.”

We can use their desperation against them.

“We can use their desperation against them,” said Cooper.

Chaz and the goatman looked at him doubtfully.

“It was Nabi's idea.”

Their eyes lit up with sudden interest.

“Oh?” said the goatman.

“Let's hear it,” said Chaz.

“First of all, fuck both of you.” Cooper prepared himself for the mentally exhausting task of relaying Nabi's telepathic communication aloud.

As he listened, Nabi seemed to be getting a better grasp of how much information he could relay in a single chunk.

“Construct more Light Wards... A moving wall of light... Force them into tight pockets of shadow along the edge of the forest... Then move in, flush them out into the Wards' light or the sunlit meadows beyond the wood, and destroy them.”

The goatman stroked his billy goat beard thoughtfully. “The idea is not without merit.”

“We are too few in number to carry it out,” said Hollywhirl. “It would sate one axe's lust to cleave the souls of Dark Ones, but we'd never make our way around the entire grove before they are desperate enough to go beyond the edge.”

“It's better than sitting around inside a stationary perimeter of Light Wards and hoping everything will sort itself out,” said Cooper. He pointed to the axe. “Her words.”

“One strategy that is doomed to fail is just as good as another strategy that is doomed to fail.” Hollywhirl became visible and held up a finger, warning Cooper not to argue with her anymore. “We're nearly at the Pool of True Sight. I will continue bickering with my sister once I've confirmed it's her.”

That was just fine with Cooper. From the absence of unsolicited thoughts in his head, it was just fine with Nabi as well.

A few minutes later, the boar slowed to a stop next to a group of four trees. That alone wouldn't have been noteworthy, considering they were in a forest. But these four trees were distinguishable by virtue of being fat ancient-looking oaks with branches that sloped all the way down to the ground. And while the other trees were dispersed randomly throughout the forest, these four oaks stood as corners of a perfect square. Their roots mingled and twisted around each other, forming the sides of the square and trapping a pool of stagnant black water inside them. The branches likewise mingled together as if they were all part of the same supertree.

Now that he thought about it, this seemed like something he should have noticed from further away. He hadn't been staying hyper-aware of his surroundings, but this was kind of an unusual thing to jump out at him like that.

“Is this the place?” said Cooper. “Or we just taking a pee break? I kinda need to take a dump.” A conclusive response wasn't really necessary. As long as they were stopped, he would take his dump. He walked over to the nearest low-hanging branch and grabbed a hold of it at the height which best facilitated his ability to squat.

He was a little uncomfortable with the knowledge that so many invisible people were hovering around, any of whom might be watching him take a shit. He had to remind himself that he wasn't a young Asian woman on the internet, so the likelihood of anyone wanting to watch him defecate was remote at best.

“You are a stranger to my wood,” said a nearby scrawny tree which had just turned into an elf. He wore a simple wool cloak the same shade of grey as the bark of the tree he'd just been. He stared at Cooper expectantly with his bright green eyes.

“I'd like to keep it that way,” said Cooper. “I'm kind of in the middle of something. Could you maybe go away, or at least turn around?”

“I demand to know what business you and your traveling companions have here.”

“Dude. If you could give me just a little bit of privacy, I can do my business, and you can study it as hard as you like.”

“Barnabus,” said Hollywhirl, becoming visible between Cooper and the elf who was intensely watching him try to take a dump. “These people are with us.”

“Jesus Christ, guys. Would it kill you to take this conversation like fifty feet over that way?”

This is Barnabus. He is the guardian of the Pool of True Sight. I feared the Dark Ones might have taken him. I am much relieved to see that he appears to be unharmed.

Cooper had gotten used to shitting in Nabi's presence. But now that she was suddenly reminding him that she was part of a larger audience, he wished that she would step away as well.

“We seek vision from the Pool of True Sight,” said Hollywhirl. “The half-orc claims that his axe houses the spirit of my sister, Nabi.”

Barnabus folded his hands and bowed to Hollywhirl, then to Cooper. “You are welcome to use the Pool of True Sight. But be warned that the Dark Lord's influence has corrupted it. As he draws power from the roots of the Sacred Trees, the pool's ability to show Truth is compromised.”

Hollywhirl turned to Cooper. “We must take your axe.”

“I wish you would.”

Cooper felt the axe being unstrapped and lifted from his back, then he saw it float toward the black pool between the four fat oak trees, accompanied by Hollywhirl and Barnabus. Realizing he might not get any more privacy than he had right now, he concentrated on emptying his bowels but was still unable to get his mind and body to comply. In the back of his mind, he knew that while the pixies had bigger fish to fry than watching him take a shit, they were also into some freaky shit. He wouldn't put it past that one who wanted to jerk Chaz off to be hanging back to pleasure herself to the sight of him soil the soil.

When the axe was lowered into the pool, a holographic image appeared above it which opened Cooper's sphincter muscle like the valve on a pressure washer. He lost about ten pounds in two seconds.

The figure was pixie-like but wingless. That much was accounted for by Nabi's claims, but the image, while familiar, was a far cry from the image of Nabi that Cooper had once seen in his dreams.

Her skin was wrinkled, not so much like an old woman, but more like a younger woman who'd lived an extremely hard life. Her eyes were sunken and deep creases in her face highlighted sagging jowls. It seemed like every vein in her body was visible, dark grey against her translucent papery skin.

Some of the congregated pixies gasped. Others wept.

“Nabi!” cried Hollywhirl as she became visible. She reached out to touch Nabi's cheek, but her hand went through the image. “Sister, what's happened to you?”

“I warned you,” said Barnabus. “The pool is corrupted. This image does not show the full Truth of your sister.”

Nabi's image gaped at her sister's shocked expression. “Is it really that bad?”

Hollywhirl wiped a tear away and nodded. Then she turned to Barnabus. “But it's really her, isn't it? Nabi's spirit truly resides in this axe?”

“So it appears.”

“How can we get her out?”

Barnabus raised his arms in a shrug. “This is beyond my knowledge of magic.” He turned to the image of Nabi. “Who did this to you?”

“I don't know for sure, but I suspect very strongly that it was the Dark Lord who saps the life out of this wood.”

Cooper took a couple of steps back, hoping that he was far enough away to not transmit his thought that she was sapping the life out of his wood.

“There is one person who can tell us how to release you from this instrument of destruction,” Hollywhirl said to Nabi.

Nabi raised her eyebrows, making her face look even more gaunt and grotesque than before. “Who is that?”

“The same person who put you in there.”

“You don't mean...”

“We must enter Morning Glory Hole.”

Cooper snorted. Everyone who was visible turned to give him a stern glare.

“Sorry,” he said. “Seasonal allergies.”

“No,” said Nabi. “It's too dangerous. You'll only end up the same as me, or even worse. Cooper and I must go alone.”

“Wait, what?” said Cooper.

“I don't want to lose you again, sister,” said Hollywhirl. “The Fae Folk need a leader, and I am unfit for such a position.”

“Poppycock. I have seen you in action. You're a little rough around the edges, but the other pixies respect you. That reminds me. The half-orc, Cooper, and I entrust one another with our lives. He has been nothing less than a perfect gentleman, and I give my consent to lay with him as he sleeps.”

Cooper farted in vindication. “I told you.”

“Please, Nabi. Let us join you. There is safety in numbers. You've already been in the hole. You know the goblins' traps, so we can avoid them.”

“How will all of you avoid a cave full of Webs? Cooper is strong and dense, and I am currently an axe. We have little to fear from Webs. Our job is to rid this wood of the Dark Lord and return my spirit to its proper body. Your job is to make sure I have a home to return to.”

Hollywhirl hung her head in resignation. “Very well, sister. I –”

Something that looked like a beanbag flew into the space between the four trees and exploded into a white cloud of what looked like flour. Two more explosions followed, one below the first one and another above it. The pixies which had chosen to remain invisible now resembled ghostly white apparitions. They also appeared drunk. The powder had apparently blinded them, causing them to fly into the tree trunks, branches, and each other.

“What is this?” demanded Nabi. “What's happening?”

Barnabus pointed to a cluster of bushes about twenty yards behind Cooper. “Goblins!” He spoke some additional words that Cooper didn't understand, and the bushes seized five screaming goblins in their prickly branches.

“They followed us!” cried one of the white drunk-looking pixies hovering aimlessly between the four trees. “They must have seen the – Oomph!” He and two other pixies were caught in a flying net. It  had been launched by a group of goblins on one side of the trees using a mounted contraption that looked like an eight-barreled crossbow. A group on the other side of the trees stood by a similar contraption which was still loaded. They took aim and fired, netting four more pixies out of the air.

Each group intercepted the other's catch and secured the netting.

A dozen more crossbows released simultaneously, most from shooters who were still managing to remain concealed. A few of them who had obviously rolled poorly on their Hide checks, were easy to spot, crouched behind trees, rocks, and bushes.

Barnabus dropped like a sack of pin cushions.

“Snuffles! Porkpie!” said the pixie who sounded like the one who'd jerked off Chaz the previous night. Dingletits or something. “Hurry! Run!”

The boar ran from their loosened straps, but a net shot out at Dingletits, who had managed to avoid getting covered in flour, making the net look like a sentient blob made out of ropes.

“Cooper!” cried Nabi. “Take me! Take me now!”

As if he didn't have enough shit to deal with right now, she was also going to dump on him the added pressure of finding a way to let her down gently.

“I cherish our friendship too much. I don't want to ruin what we have.”

The holographic image of Nabi glared at him. “Take me out of the water and use me to fight the goblins, you fat stupid fuck.”

“Oh, right.” Cooper shrugged off a couple of crossbow bolts as he ran to the Pool of True Sight, appreciating that Nabi was picking up some colloquialisms from him.

The water was pitch black, with zero visibility. He was going to have to feel for the axe. He reached over the oak roots which formed a side of the pool and felt around under the water. It was warm and slimy, slick with an oily film on top. Fortunately, it wasn't very deep.

The bite of another bolt in his ass, and the thuds of two more hitting the tree right next to him told Cooper that his time was running out.

“Get in the pool!” said Nabi.

He jumped over the roots to take cover in the pool.

Finally, he found the axe's handle. He pulled it out of the water, causing Nabi's image to disappear.

Hurry! It's up to us now. We must save them!

Wonderful. She was back inside his head.

The scene didn't look promising. Barnabus was a goner. Chaz and Zagnuts were both down. All of the pixies which had been covered in white powder were captured, and possibly some others as well. A couple of goblins had fallen, but more remained than what Cooper thought he could reasonably handle between only himself and Nabi. Then again, reason was never his strong suit.

He stood tall and raised Nabi high. “I'M REALLY –”

Somewhere between half a dozen and eight dozen bolts tore into Cooper's chest, arms, legs, gut, and ass. The last two things he felt were a splash and a fart which may or may not have been just a fart.

Chapter 36

If Dave could count himself lucky about anything in his current state, it would be that his Base Movement Speed seemed to be doubled in rat form. It was bad enough to suddenly discover he was both a murderer and a monster, then to have the townsfolk try to lynch him for merely existing, not to mention having to trudge aimlessly through a sewer to get away from them. At least he was eventually able to outrun them.

But now that he thought about it, the sewer wasn't as bad as he remembered from his previous experiences trudging through it. It was funny how viable a traveling option sewers were in this world. Dave had been in some tight situations back in the real world, but had never once even entertained the idea of crawling down a manhole and fleeing danger through his neighbors' liquid shit.

Maybe he should have. At least the sewers back home could be counted on to be relatively free of monsters. Dave was scared, and telling himself that he was the monster people feared did little to help. They didn't fear him. Not like someone fears a prizefighter or a bear. He was no badass. They feared his disease. Lycanthropy was the leprosy or AIDS of this world. They feared becoming what he was.

Well fuck them. He didn't have leprosy or AIDS. What he had wasn't going to kill him, after all. His disease was actually a blessing when you got right down to it. Sure, he might lose control of himself a couple of times a month, but that could be mitigated. All the rest of the time, he had new powers. He could shapeshift. He was a lot tougher to kill. He could finally move at a reasonable speed. This was way better than merely not AIDS, in fact. This was fucking awesome.

And as long as he was looking on the bright side of things, the smell down here wasn't so much offensive as it was... acquired. Being in rat form to better stay out of sight from any predators or pitchfork-wielding redneck townsfolk, he had his nose right down there at shit level. It wasn't necessarily a scent he'd try to bottle and sell, but it had an earthy quality that wasn't entirely unpleasant, like a strong cheese or one's own fart.

Dave slowed his pace, then stopped walking altogether. His pursuers had stopped pursuing him a while ago. As a matter of fact, he wasn't sure if they'd even set foot in the sewer proper. They probably got justifiably freaked out by the pile of chopped up bodies lying just outside of it.

Unfortunately, his dwarven Darkvision didn't work in rat form. He must have had Low-Light Vision as a rat, as he'd been able to see where he was going this far with next to no light, but now that he was getting closer to actual total darkness, he couldn't see five feet in front of him.

That seemed unreasonable. Didn't dire rats live in sewers after all? How did they survive down here without being able to see? How was he going to survive? Blindness aside, what the hell was he going to do in the sewer? He couldn't live down here. There was nothing to eat, and there was someone, or something, apparently hunting down and slaughtering wererats.

He just needed to wait a few minutes, make sure the mob had dispersed, then think of somewhere safe to go. The Whore's Head was certainly off the table for now. He could go to a temple and beg them to cure him, but he wasn't sure that he wanted to be cured. Perhaps a blacksmith? He could explain his situation, and pay a couple of gold pieces to be locked in a strong steel cage while he wasn't in control of himself. Or hell, maybe just another place with a cellar. The Whore's Head Inn had a cellar. The Pissbucket Tavern had a cellar. Dave wasn't the first person in the world to contract lycanthropy. Surely it was a common enough issue that there was standard established protocol (beyond lynch mobs) to accommodate people like Dave who chose to make the best out of their situations and voluntarily have themselves locked up overnight during the full moon. It was probably a bustling industry.

It was just a matter of figuring out a way to ask people without freaking them out.

Do you know of any temporary lycanthrope housing facilities? I'm asking for a friend.

That probably wasn't going to cut it, especially if he was naked. His clothing issue would need to be addressed before he worked on his pitch. Some of the dead bodies outside had clothes on. Most of it was torn to shreds, but it might be a solid starting point. If he was able to scrape something together which would allow him to walk the streets without calling too much attention to himself while he searched for better options, he could find a tarp or an old blanket or something and pass for an ordinary vagrant. Then again, rooting through a pile of corpses and stripping their clothes off would make for a whole new level of awkwardness if anyone caught him doing it.

Maybe there was something down here he could use. He couldn't think of what, exactly, he might find in a sewer that he'd want to wear outside, but people dumped all manner of garbage down here. Literally anything that covered his junk would suffice. It was worth a peek anyway, just for the offhand chance that it might obviate the corpse-stripping option.

Bracing himself for the pain, he focused on morphing back into a dwarf. It got easier to bear each time he changed forms. The exception this time came not from the changing itself, but from the overpowering stench of shit, or rather his reaction to it.

Vomit exploded out of Dave's mouth, and a little through his nose. Tears welled up in his eyes and rolled down his cheeks. The smell hadn't changed at all. How did he possibly think this was okay just a moment ago? Then it occurred to him. He was a rat. Rats are accustomed to living in shit.

He wiped the tears out of his eyes, took a few deep breaths, then threw up again. He'd been in a lot of low places in life, but this might be rock bottom. He sobbed softly and wiped his eyes again, resolved to not turn back into a rat before he made use of his Darkvision.

Four dire rats, two wererats in hybrid form, and a naked half-orc with a dong hanging down almost to his knees were staring back at him.

“JESUS CHRIST!” Dave immediately covered his junk with both hands.

“Get him,” said the impressively endowed half-orc.

The others charged at Dave. He reverted back into his rat form, not because he fancied his chances of being able to escape, but more so that he wouldn't have to suffer revulsion at the stench of shit on top of whatever they were going to do to him. And if he was being totally honest, also because the half-orc's giant dong was making him feel a little inadequate.

Chapter 37

Stacy claimed to recall having seen mountains on the northern horizon before she hurled them both off the Crescent Shadow. And now that he thought about it, Julian seemed to recall having seen them too. Of course, that could have very well been the powers of suggestion and wishful thinking playing tricks on his memory. But with nothing else to go on, and a seemingly endless expanse in every direction, north was the direction he guided the magical horse they were riding.

“I suppose it's possible I was mistaken,” said Stacy about an hour into the ride when the horizon continued to offer nothing but more sand.

Julian suspected she was right about having been mistaken, but that didn't make much difference at this point. “We've already committed time and miles to this direction. We might as well stick with it.” In the haste of their departure from the Crescent Shadow, they hadn't prepared for a trek through the desert. They had no water and no food except what meager fruit they could conjure up by peeing on the sand, and that wasn't going to last long. They had a couple of days tops, and Julian's limited number of Mount spells meant that they'd be doing more walking than riding.

“Maybe we'll be able to see something useful at night.” Stacy spoke cheerfully, but it sounded forced to Julian. The fact that she felt the need to boost his morale was kind of demoralizing. “Who knows? The glow of city lights, a fireworks show, a wizard battle, a fire-breathing –”

“Look!” Julian pointed ahead at a speck on the horizon. It wasn't civilization, a shimmering oasis, or a Dairy Queen, any of which he would have been beyond grateful for. It probably wasn't anything that would help their situation in the least. But it was something besides sand, and that was enough to justify a bit of excitement.

As they rode closer, the object on the horizon appeared to be some kind of creature.

Stacy rested her chin on Julian's shoulder. “Is that a centaur?”

“I don't think so,” said Julian. “The lower half doesn't look very horse-like.” The legs were shorter than a horse's. More like a lion maybe. The torso was definitely humanoid though.

“It's kind of weird how it isn't moving at all.”

It was completely motionless, sitting on its hind legs and facing east with its arms folded across its chest and a stern expression on its human-like face. Another strange feature was that it was charcoal grey from head to whatever passed for toe. That hadn't seemed so strange from a distance, because Julian thought it was silhouetted. But now they were close enough to make out color and texture, both of which suggested it was made out of stone.

“It's a statue,” said Stacy as Julian cautiously slowed his horse.

Julian was no art expert, but this thing looked to be extremely well-crafted. In fact, the sculptor might have gone a bit overboard with the unrealistically perfect abdominal muscles leading down into the feline half. It was just as it had appeared from a distance. A statue of something like a centaur, but with the lower half of a lion instead of a horse.

“Is that even a real creature?” asked Julian.

Stacy hopped down off the horse and approached the statue. “It's beautiful.”

Julian followed her gaze to its abs. “It's an adequate piece of sculpting.” He told himself it was silly to feel jealous of a statue. Especially a statue of a monster. But even putting that aside, he couldn't help but take issue with the sculptor's decision to include a belt around the creature's waist with a scabbarded dagger. Either go for the gusto and put a weapon in its hand for an action pose, or don't include the weapon at all.

“Why would someone abandon such a magnificent work of art out here in the desert?” Stacy's gushing did little to help Julian get a grip on his irrational feelings.

“Maybe it fell off the Crescent Shadow. It could have been a gaudy decoration outside of a casino or something.”

Stacy shook her head. “There's no way it would have survived the fall in such good condition. Look at how detailed it is.” She leaned in to inspect it more closely. “Look at the hair. Some of it looks to have been carved into individual follicles.”

Julian had a sudden revelation. “I know what this is!” He walked wide around the statue, appreciating the detail in the lion fur, the back muscles of the human-like torso, and the finely detailed hair which hung down past the shoulders. “Holy shit!”

“What is it?” asked Stacy, sounding a little concerned. “What did you figure out?”

“This is no statue. I mean, it is. But those individual hair follicles weren't chiseled. They were real.”

“I don't quite follow you.”

“This game borrows a lot from ancient mythologies. Think Medusa.”

Stacy smiled. “I think you've got your mythologies mixed up. Medusa wasn't a lion person. She was the lady with the snakes for hair.”

“That's right,” said Julian. “And what happened to people who looked at her.”

“They turned to –” Stacy gasped and gawked up at the statue. “No fucking way!”

Julian came around to meet her at the front. “What else could it be? It's just like you said. That's way too finely detailed to have been the work of even a master sculptor.”

Stacy scanned the horizon in every direction. “Does that mean Medusa is roaming around here in the desert?”

“Not necessarily. She's just the first thing that came to mind. I'm sure there are other kinds of creatures in this game that can turn people to stone. In fact, it's probably safe to rule out Medusa.”

“Why's that?”

“Look at his posture, all proud and confident. Not a worry in the world. Medusa was supposed to be horrifying to look at. He should be more like this.” Julian made his best horrified face while raising his arms to shield his eyes and stood completely still for a second.

“Maybe she was wearing a hood or a mask or something and caught him off guard.” Stacy pulled her own hood over her head, keeping her face hidden in its shadow, and sashayed toward Julian. “Hey there, big boy. What's a fine-looking lion man monster thing like you doing all alone out here in the desert?” She suddenly pulled back her hood, exposing her face, and hissed at him.

Julian jumped, then shrugged. “I suppose that it could have gone down like that.” He looked back up at the poor bastard's petrified face. Something was off about it, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what. “Was it smirking like that just a moment ago?”

Stacy eyed the statue's face. “I.. I don't know. It seems like I would have –”

“Good afternoon, travelers,” said the statue.

“WHA!” cried Stacy, her right fist flying toward its face.

The creature, obviously not a statue, caught Stacy by the wrist with one hand and gently placed the other over her fist. It's skin, fur, and hair changed right before their eyes. The stone color and texture gave way to yellow fur, dark bronze skin, and hair as black as ink.

He looked into Stacy's eyes as he brought her hand to his lips to kiss it. “The desert is home to many dangerous beasts, but every so often one may find a flower of immeasurable beauty.”

Laying it on kind of thick there, buddy. I don't know what kind of woman you think a hamfisted line like that works on, but Stacy –

“Well ain't you a charmer.” said Stacy, pulling her hand back, but not quite out of the lion man monster thing's grip. “What's your name?”

“I am Strovgar. And who might I have the pleasure of addressing?”

“My name is Stacy. This is my friend, Ju–”

“StaCEE!” said Strovgar. “The angels weep at such a beautiful sound!”

Stacy waved. “Oh stop.”

“You have traveled far, and are weary. Stay with me for a time, so that we may enjoy the pleasure of each other's company.”

“Sorry,” said Julian. “We'd love to, but we got lost, and we're not sufficiently equipped to be traveling in the desert. We can't afford to waste any more –”

“Oh come on, Julian.” Stacy looked at him and tilted her head. “One more hour isn't going to make that big a difference.”

“One more hour?”

“Tell your sister she needn't worry,” Strovgar said to Stacy. “For you are not far from the village of Tamar.”

“Hey!” said Julian. “I'm not her sister. I'm a man.”

Strovgar spared Julian a brief glance up and down. “A thousand apologies, Julia.”

“Julian.”

“I was fooled by your delicate body and pretty dress.”

“These are sorcerer robes.” Julian hoped that stressing the word sorcerer might be perceived as a warning, but hearing himself say it aloud made him feel like a huge dork. Change the subject. “And what are you, exactly? I'm not familiar with your... um... species.”

“I am a lamia.”

“Oh,” said Julian. “Cool.”

“And this... man...” Strovgar glanced Julian up and down again as if to concede that Julian barely passed the technical definition of the word, then turned his attention back to Stacy. “He is your lover?”

Stacy shrugged. “We're taking it kind of slow.”

“He does not meet your womanly needs, yes?”

“That's one way of saying it.”

“Stacy!” said Julian.

“It's nothing to be ashamed of, Julian. We'll get there.”

“That's not the point. We don't know this guy. You don't have to go blurting out our private sexual issues to a complete stranger.”

“Forgive me for intruding,” said Strovgar. “But it is I who blurted out your issues. They are no secret to me, you see.”

“Why? Are you telepathic or something?”

Strovgar laughed. “Alas, I am not. But I have traveled far and wide, and have known many elves. You have no hunger for the carnal pleasures, and you have a penis like a little girl.” He rolled over onto his side, planting his elbow in the sand and propping up his head with his hand. He raised his left hind leg, exposing his junk. His penis looked like Julian's forearm and his smooth scrotum looked like it was holding two baking potatoes.

“Whoa!” Julian shielded his eyes. “That's not really approp–”

“It would give me immense pleasure,” Strovgar said to Stacy, “if you would rub my genitals until I ejaculate.”

Julian gasped. The nerve of this mother–

Stacy licked her lips. “That sounds like a good time.”

“WHAT?” Was she really that starved for sex? Was she some kind of nympho?

Strovgar turned and locked eyes with Julian. “Then your friend can lap up my seed like a dog.”

A wave of relief washed over Julian. He'd been thinking of himself as a third wheel. It was thoughtful of Strovgar to include him in his – Wait, no. Something is wrong here. Did he just ask me to...

Julian stepped forward and pulled Stacy back by the shoulders just before her hands took hold of Strovgar's slowly erecting dong. For his effort, he got a harsh glare and an even harsher elbow in the gut.

“This jealousy thing is getting out of control,” she said as Julian fell on his ass in the sand, trying to start breathing again. “I'm a grown woman, and I can make my own choices. You had your chance and you blew it.”

“No,” wheezed Julian when he had enough breath. “He's got you... under a... spell.”

Stacy shook her head. “You're pathetic.” She headed back to Strovgar, whose penis was now fully erect. It was as red, pointed at the end, and covered in backward-facing barbs.

Strovgar shrugged and grinned at Julian. “How does the saying go? Appreciate what battles you win, for you cannot win them all.”

Julian wasn't sure if he was saying that Julian shouldn't feel too bad about the fact that Stacy was about to jerk him off, or that he wasn't harboring any hard feelings about Julian not wanting to lap up his seed like a dog.

“Please, Stacy. Listen to me. He's inside your head. He was in mine too. You don't want to –”

“YEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOW!” howled Strovgar. It sent a chill up Julian's spine, for there was only one thing that could cause a creature to make that sound.

Julian looked from Strovgar's horror-stricken face to his impressively large nutsack and found that, sure enough, Stacy was pulling her dagger out of the latter. He cringed and pressed his legs tightly together.

Strovgar rolled over, winced as he got to his feet, and reached for his dagger. All his hand met was an empty sheath.

Stacy, on the other hand, was now armed with two daggers. Julian recognized one as the dagger she kept in her boot. Its straight thin blade dripped with testicle blood. The other dagger was a little on the flamboyant side for a rogue. Its larger curved blade was just about the same size and shape as Strovgar's sheath.

“Julian!” she said, flicking the smaller dagger down into the sand at his feet. Now that she had blown her cover with the Sneak Attack, there wasn't much point in being roguish. Between the two of them, she was the stronger fighter and therefore better-suited to wield the bigger blade.

Julian picked up the dagger, careful not to let any of the blood touch his fingers.

“You will pay for your deception, human whore!” said Strovgar.

Stacy balked at him. “You literally just used magic to make me jerk you off, and I'm the deceptive whore?”

Strovgar narrowed his eyes and grinned. “Your defiance only makes me crave you more. My wound shall heal, but once I've finished having my pleasure with you, I shall leave you with pain that will never go away.”

Julian shivered, thinking about those barbs on its dick.

“You better go away,” said Stacy. “Or I'll finish what I started.”

“Save your meaningless threats for the little elf bitch.”

Julian threw up his hands. “What the fuck, man?”

“Come on over here and see how meaningless my threats are,” said Stacy. “I'll be doing a favor to every woman who crosses your path.”

Strovgar gave her a slight bow. “Very well. If it is a fight your heart desires, a fight it shall have.”

“Come on, man,” said Julian. “She's letting you off easy. We've got weapons, you don't. Just go away and nobody has to get hurt.”

“You needn't be afraid, little girl. It would still give me pleasure for you to watch, so I shall only cripple you.” As if being a rapist wasn't bad enough, he was being a real prick about the whole thing.

Julian shrugged. “Have it your way, asshole. Bring it o– Oh shit.”

Seven more Strovgars appeared, all standing side by side whichever one of them was the original Strovgar, mimicking his movements precisely. It was like Riverdance, except with lion-man rape-monsters bleeding from the nuts.

All eight Strovgars pounced simultaneously at Stacy, blurring and changing positions. Stacy blocked their human-like arms, but one of their fore-paws raked its claws across her belly, tearing through her clothes and into her skin.

She sliced Strovgar's dagger down hard on one of him, revealing the extra seven to be mere illusions as it winked out of existence.

“Stacy!” said Julian. “Are you okay?”

Stacy backed up and readied herself for another attack. “I'm fine. He fights like a kitten.”

Strovgar let out an inarticulate roar as he and his six remaining backup dancers lunged at Stacy again. Julian wondered if what Stacy said had pissed him off because it was emasculating, or because it was racist.

She rolled under him as he leaped at her and was back on her feet before he turned around. She glared at Julian. “Go around the other side and start stabbing away the fake ones. Keep him between us, and I'll get my Sneak Attack bonuses.”

Julian was impressed. Stacy was really getting a handle on the nuts and bolts of the game a lot faster than he had. It must have had something to do with her high Intelligence score.

“Stop flapping your lips, walking cock-sleeve,” said seven Strovgars. “Your nonsensical words make my ears hurt.”

“You know what?” said Julian once he got into position on the other side of him. He waited briefly for a What? that didn't come. Strovgar didn't even turn around or acknowledge him. Nevertheless, Julian answered the question. “FUCK YOU!” He held Stacy's dagger high and ran at one of the Strovgars, hoping it was an illusory one.

It wasn't. Julian caught a rear paw in the gut that threw him back. He didn't think he was injured, but he also failed to get in a stab.

Stacy, on the other hand, hacked the shit out of one of the illusory Strovgars. If that had been the real one, he would have been in some serious shit. Instead, there was just one fewer image.

Strovgar seethed with rage as he continued to swipe at Stacy and she continued to duck, weave, and jump out of the way. She looked pretty pleased with herself until one of his fists connected with her face.

“Ha!” said Strovgar.

Stacy wiped a drop of blood from under her nose, then looked at her finger. “You son of a  –”

“YAAAAAA!” said Julian, annoyed that he was still being ignored and wishing he had a better battle cry. He brought down Stacy's dagger hard on lion ass and was shocked when his hand failed to swipe right through it.

“Ooow!” said Strovgar, finally turning to acknowledge Julian. “You loathsome pest! Can you not see that the adults are fighting?” He reared up on his hind legs to bring his front claws down on Julian, and Stacy took the opportunity to leap onto his back.

Unfortunately, Stacy leaped onto the wrong back, eliminating one more illusion and falling face-first into the sand.

Strogvar's claws tore down both sides of Julian's serape, tearing great gashes into it. It was painful and would definitely leave some red marks on his chest. He might have even lost a couple of Hit Points from the attack. But he wasn't scooping his intestines up off the ground like he'd expected.

“You're right,” Julian called past Strovgar to Stacy. “He really does fight like a kitten.”

Five Strovgars snarled and took a wild swipe at Julian's head. He ducked it easily and jabbed away one more illusion.

Strovgar's four remaining faces grimaced and groaned as Stacy stood up with Strovgar's blade, dripping with Strovgar's blood which had, judging by his expression, come once again from Strovgar's balls.

“Just kill him already,” said Julian. “You don't need to keep attacking his junk.”

Four Strovgars backed away from Julian and Stacy, tears welling up in their eyes. Tiny plants sprouted out of the sand where his testicle blood dripped.

“May the gods damn you both to the Abyss!”

Julian was taken aback. “Are you... crying?”

Strovgar and his three illusory Strovgar's made a sound between a roar and a wail as they turned and fled.

“Hey!” Stacy called out after him. “You forgot your dagger!” She held it up by the blade, not so queasy about the nut blood as Julian had been, and hurled it at the fleeing Strovgars. It went right through one, which vanished. The three remaining Strovgar's shrieked and continued running, not even bothering to stop and pick up his dagger.

“He's not getting away that easy,” said Stacy. She hopped on Julian's horse and whipped the reins. “Ya!” The horse obediently bolted after the Strovgars.

“Just let him go!” Julian called out after her. “He's not worth it!”

If Stacy heard him, she wasn't swayed. As the horse ran at full gallop, she leaned over, plucked Strovar's dagger out of the sand, then sat upright again. Julian had to admit, that was pretty impressive.

Julian wouldn't shed any tears over Strovgar's death. Strovgar was a creep, for sure, and the world would probably be a better place without him. But he didn't like watching Stacy chase down an unarmed person and slaughter them while they were fleeing. Besides, however vile Strovgar's intentions may have been, he hadn't succeeded with them, and he had certainly come away from the encounter worse off than Julian and Stacy combined.

Under ideal circumstances, Strovgar might have been about just as fast as a horse, but his gait betrayed the pain in his nuts, and Stacy was quickly catching up to him.

She leaned right, holding the curved dagger blade out as far as her arm could stretch, like she was going to do a drive-by knifing.

Three Strovgars looked back at her. “Please!” they cried. “Mercy of the gods! Spare me!”

Stacy rode even harder until she was almost right on top of him, pulled her arm back to swing, then tumbled ass-over-face into the sand when the horse disappeared out from under her.

“Coward!” she called out after Strovgar, hopping to her feet and kicking sand in his direction.

Julian started walking northward again, giving Stacy some time to chill and Strovgar some time to keep fleeing before he summoned another horse. Whether her desire to murder him was justified or not, Julian was down to his last Level 1 spell for the day, and wanted to get as much distance out of it as possible.

“He said there's a village not far from here,” said Stacy when she finally caught up with Julian.

Julian didn't know whether she had sufficiently chilled in that very small amount of time, or whether she was intentionally bringing up a different subject because she didn't want to talk about it. Either was fine with him.

“Do you think he was telling the truth?”

Stacy shrugged. “I can't see anything he'd have to gain by us believing that. And he had to have come from somewhere.”

Julian scanned ahead. “I don't see any signs of... well, anything.”

“We're bound to find it if we keep riding north. Conjure up another one of those horses.”

“Okay,” said Julian. “But this is my last one, so we can't afford to go running off on other errands.” He felt he was putting it Diplomatically enough.

“I'm cool now. I gave him more than enough to remember me by. Hopefully, he'll think twice before trying his tricks on someone else.”

That was good enough for Julian. He pointed at the ground. “Horse!” Their transportation for the next couple of hours was taken care of.

They rode for an hour or more, until the sun began to set on the featureless desert horizon. Julian peered ahead, squinting to make his eyes focus on the furthest point that they were capable of, but it didn't look any different to anything else he could see for – As if they'd just stepped through a dimensional rift, they were galloping through a cabbage patch. Dwarven farming folk were leaping out of their way as Julian's horse trampled their produce. There was a charming waterwheel ahead and to the left of them, and a wooden footbridge across a –

“SHIT!” cried Julian, pulling the reins too late as the horse ran off the edge of the ravine. His heart barely had time to stop beating before he realized the danger wasn't quite as great as it had first appeared.

Five feet down, they hit water. They hadn't even fallen off the horse's back. The magical beast of burden, even now, was diligently horse-paddling its way across the river.

“Where are we?” said Stacy. “Did we just teleport?”

“I don't think so. The air feels the same. We might have just stepped through a –”

“Gator!” cried Stacy.

“I was going to say facade or illusion, but if that's what people say down south, then –”

Julian felt himself being grabbed by both upper arms and yanked to the left, Stacy's weight pulling him off the horse and into the water.

He took a moment to orientate himself and found Stacy swimming underwater beside him. She pointed in the direction they'd just come from. Julian turned and saw his horse's brown legs paddling wildly. Then a massive set of reptilian jaws clamped down on its back and belly. The water turned blurry red, then the jaws snapped shut as the horse, its Hit Points drained to zero, winked out of existence.

“Dammit!” Julian said in a burst of bubbles.

Feeling a tug on his serape, he suddenly appreciated that he and Stacy were in a river with a giant hungry alligator which had just been cheated out of a meal.

He swam in the other direction, but couldn't help but look back. The gator's massive snout poked through the murky pink cloud of dissipating horse blood. It was swimming right for him. There was no way he could out-swim that thing. He'd had a good run, but this was it. He was going to –

Stacy grabbed his wrist tightly and pulled him upward faster than any human being had any business swimming.

Julian looked forward again and saw that Stacy had grabbed hold of one of the buckets on the water wheel. Julian grabbed the next bucket, and Stacy let go of his arm. As he was lifted out of the water, he gratefully took in a great breath of air and realized that he had a very short time to think about what action he might take before the wheel dumped him right back into the river, and into the jaws of a just-as-hungry but more-pissed-off giant alligator.

“Jump!” said Stacy.

Julian turned just in time to see her leaping from the top of the wheel onto the footbridge. Near as it was, it wasn't so near that he had any prayer of making the same jump. Then again, there was always the chance he could roll a Natural 20.

“Shiiiiiit!” he cried as he pushed himself away from the top of the wheel.

Nope. Not even close. His timing was off, he hadn't accounted for the added weight of his wet clothes, he hadn't allotted any Skill Points to Jump. He was fucked.

He made a desperate grab for the edge of the bridge, but he was going to miss it by a mile. Then an upside down Stacy filled his field of vision. She grabbed both of Julian's wrists. And there he was, suspended in the air by his arms.

He looked up. Stacy was hanging upside down from the bridge with her legs locked on its railing. That was some quick thinking on her part, and an incredible feat of Strength and Dexterity.

Looking down, he found that the giant alligator hadn't yet given up the hunt. Julian pulled his feet up just in time to avoid its snapping jaws.

“Stacy! Help!”

Stacy grunted, and Julian felt himself ascend. Other hands grabbed his wrists and pulled him up onto the relative safety of the bridge.

He and Stacy lay on the bridge for a moment to catch their breaths. Julian sincerely hoped that the four friendly-looking dwarves who were staring down at them had no intentions to rape or murder them. They needed a bit of a break from that.

A small round of applause broke out from the dwarven farmers watching from either side of the bridge. Julian assumed that was mostly for Stacy's acrobatics show.

“Good evening,” said a plump male dwarf in brown overalls. “You gave us quite a scare. We thought for sure you were going to feed Old Edna for the night.”

“Old Edna?” said Julian. “Is that what you call the giant alligator?”

“Crocodile,” the dwarf corrected him. He smiled warmly and offered Julian a hand while a couple of other dwarves helped Stacy up. “My name is Orgol. I'd like to welcome you to our little village, Tamar.”

Chapter 38

It was just as well that Katherine's first voyage as captain was accompanying another ship. Being co-owner of the Chicken Hut had taught her little about leadership and absolutely nothing about sailing. It also didn't help that her entire crew was composed of people who had just been trying to murder her, and several of them probably resented her usurping what they felt was their rightful position. If they got a few minutes of privacy to chat amongst themselves, they might each make some concessions, come to an agreement, and regroup for a good old-fashioned mutiny, which Katherine, aided only by Butterbean and Randy, would have a difficult time putting down.

Fortunately, enough of them had died or been wounded beyond the ability to work that the ones who were able to work had their hands too full tending to the shorthanded ship to start up any conspiracies. But in case any of them decided to get chatty, Katherine sent Randy to mingle among them. Ostensibly, his assignment was to give a helping hand where it was needed, but she actually wanted a set of ears that were loyal to her floating around to stop that sort of talk before it started. She just needed to stay in control for however long it took to get to whatever mystery island Captain Longfellow insisted they visit before heading to Bharan.

“Do you know where we are headed?” asked one of the new crewmen. It was the big bald black guy, one of the three who were sizing each other up for the position Katherine had pulled right out from under all of them.

Katherine glanced down to make sure Butterbean was still standing next to her, then told herself it's not because this guy is black.

She shook her head. “We're just following the other ship.”

“Pardon me, Captain.” There was a hint of contempt in his voice. “I do not ask because I do not know where we are headed. I ask because I do know where we are headed, and I thought you should know as well.”

That sounded reasonable, if not a little foreboding. It couldn't hurt to start learning her way around. “Spill your guts, then. Where are we headed?”

He lifted his massive dark-brown arm, covered from shoulder to wrist in even darker tattoos, and pointed out past the ship's bow. “Do you see how the horizon is blurred over there?”

Katherine peered in the direction he was pointing. There did appear to be some kind of dark grey fog obscuring the line between the greenish-blue water and the cloudless sky, but it didn't seem alarmingly unusual to her.

“Yeah, I see it. What about it?”

“Those are the Shoals of Mist.” He was looking at her like she should be impressed by that.

“Awesome.”

The big man frowned. “The Shoals of Mist must be avoided at all costs. And yet we sail straight for them.”

“Why?” asked Katherine. “What's so bad about them? Are there cannibals?”

“There may be once the shoals tear open our hulls. We'll have no food, no means of escape, and no hope of getting rescued. When the food stores have been consumed, and then the animals,” he glanced down at Butterbean, then raised his eyes back to Katherine. “with what else will we nourish ourselves but one another?”

Katherine couldn't help but feel some subtext in his words and the way he spoke them. I'm almost looking forward to the shipwreck which will lead to all our deaths, because at least I'll get to eat the bitch who stole my boat before I die.

“Thank you for the information.” Katherine pretended to not notice any subtext. If he wanted to threaten her, then he could grow a sack and say what he had to say. Captain Longfellow had warned her that some of the crew might be apprehensive about where they were going, and that she should reassure them that they'd all be fine as long as they followed close behind the Maiden's Voyage. “If you do as you're told, we'll nourish ourselves just fine.” She spoke loudly enough for other crew members to hear as well, both to reassure them and so that they might witness their new captain handling her shit when it came to implied insubordination. “Stay on their tail. Do you understand?”

The crewman narrowed his eyes, looking left and right to see who else may have overheard.

Katherine kept her eyes squarely focused on him.

Finally, he gave her a slight bow. “Very good, Captain.”

She wasn't smug about her little victory. Now that she had made her point, she wanted him to know that while she may not be heeding this particular warning, she valued his insight.

“What's your name?”

“I am Attal.”

“Thank you, Attal. This boat is smaller than the Maiden's Voyage. Anything that they can pass through should prove no problem for us. But maybe keep an anchor ready to drop so we don't ram them if they should happen to hit a snag.”

Attal nodded. “Very good, Captain.” That time, although she was listening for it, Katherine didn't pick up any contempt in his voice.

It wasn't like she had any great reason to have unwavering faith in Captain Longfellow. He was good for a laugh and a drink before turning in for the night, but he was no bumbling dandy like Captain Martinoli. Captain Longfellow clearly enjoyed the respect and admiration of his men, and he had perhaps more reason than any of Nightwind's crewmen to think Katherine had swiped his rightfully captured ship out from under his nose. Had she accidentally insulted him in front of his whole crew? The more she thought about it now, she reasoned that he could be leading her into a trap.

On the other hand, Captain Longfellow seemed like a straightforward sort, and more likely to call someone out to their face than to lead them into some kind of spooky mist trap. Judging from the little time she'd spent in his company, that didn't seem like his style.

Katherine asked Attal to instruct the guys working the sails to stay far enough behind the Maiden's Voyage so that they would have time to drop anchor if the need arose. As slow as it was traveling once they entered the mist, that precaution still had them practically right on top of each other. That was just as well, because Captain Longfellow had some things to shout at them.

“Stay close enough to see us!” he bellowed to them through the fog. “Keep ready at the rudder and follow us exactly!”

Attal delegated responsibilities to the crewmen that Katherine felt bad for not understanding. She hadn't earned this position any more than Captain Martinoli had. They'd acquired it through two different means of fraud.

On the other hand, Katherine didn't really give a shit about being a ship's captain. This was simply a means to get her to that ice woman's island, grab the magic gem of whatever, and get back to the mainland so she could get Tim resurrected. When all that was done, she might thank one of the men who had gone above and beyond the call of duty by handing over the reins and naming him captain.

The fog got so thick that the Maiden's Voyage was completely obscured. They wouldn't have been able to continue following if not for a brightly lit lantern hanging from a hooked pole off the back deck.

“Perhaps I was mistaken,” said Attal about an hour into their excruciatingly slow journey of seemingly random sharp turns.

“Why?” asked Katherine. “Are we almost there?”

“I know not where there is. To the best of my knowledge, no ship has ever sailed this far into the Shoals of Mist. It is known only as a place for ships to die and sailors to go mad... and then also eventually die.”

As more hours passed, Katherine's eyes and mind grew weary from the strain of trying to keep up with that lantern. Every time a particularly dense puff of fog blew by, completely obscuring it for a second, she worried that they might fall far enough behind that they wouldn't be able to see it again. She realized that she was putting blind faith in Captain Longfellow after all. He could cripple them any time he wanted simply by extinguishing the light in that lamp, leaving them stranded and helpless.

Even as they followed the Maiden's Voyage to the best of their ability, she still felt scrapes and bumps as Nightwind's hull connected with underwater obstacles, hard enough to feel, but not quite hard enough to break through. But perhaps even more worrying were the non-stationary things that occasionally scraped against or bumped into Nightwind's hull.

Finally, the path straightened out and the bumps and scrapes became less frequent.

“Lower your anchor!” Captain Longfellow called through the fog.

“Shit!” said Katherine as the back of the Maiden's Voyage became visible again. “Boat! Ahoy! Steer!” She sighed with relief when Nightwind veered left just in time to avoid a collision, then felt embarrassed about the orders she'd shouted.

When the two ships were anchored alongside one another, Captain Longfellow instructed Katherine to count up the number of Nightwind's crewmen who were missing limbs, then choose three men to accompany her to the island.

Randy was an easy enough choice. She also picked Denise, just so she could keep an eye on her and keep her from causing any trouble on the boat in Katherine's absence. She considered that Attal was the strongest contender to lead a possible mutiny, and that it would be good to keep him away from the crew, but where would they go? Whatever means Captain Longfellow had at his disposal to navigate his way through the Shoals of Mist, he was keeping that knowledge to himself. In the end, she chose Attal as the final member of Nightwind's envoy because he was the only one of them who she knew by name, and because she liked to think he was starting to warm up to her.

Once Attal had counted up the ship's maimed, Katherine, Butterbean, and the rest of her landing party climbed into Nightwind's single rowboat, and the crew lowered hem into the fog-obscured water.

“It's not far now,” said Captain Longfellow as he and his landing party were lowered into the water. “Just follow the sound of me voice.”

Randy and Attal took oar duty, quickly finding their rhythm and following the sound of Captain Longfellow belting out some song it sounded like he was making up on the spot about pirates, dicks, buttsex, and semen. If there was any subtextual meaning, it was lost on Katherine.

Fortunately, Captain Longfellow wasn't wrong about almost being there. He'd only finished the third stanza of his song, which involved shoving things aside from his penis into other men's buttholes, when the fronts of their rowboats crunched against sand.

Captain Longfellow stopped singing. “How feels the land beneath yer feet, Captain?”

Unable to see him, Katherine could only assume that he was talking to her. She stepped out of the rowboat in order to be able to give a more honest reply. She had to admit, it felt good. After a few days at sea, there was something nice about standing on something that wasn't swaying.

“Wow. I don't remember it feeling so... solid.”

“Ha!” barked Captain Longfellow. “Some captain you be!”

“Where are we?” asked Attal. “What island is this?”

Captain Longfellow pulled the stopper out from a bottle of something and took a long greedy swig, then belched. “Be damned if I know what it's called. 'Tis home to the strangest manner of folk ye ever set eyes on.”

“Cannibals?” asked Katherine.

“By the gods, I hope not. There's not that many of them to begin with.”

Something that sounded like a heavy wooden crate thunked down in the sand not far from Katherine.

“What's that?” asked Katherine.

“A gift for the natives,” said Captain Longfellow. “Everyone grab a handle.”

Katherine knelt next to the box and felt around until she found a metallic handle on the side. Everyone lifted at once, and she suddenly felt like a pallbearer.

“Is it a dead body?”

“It is not, in fact,” said Captain Longfellow, his tone suggesting that he was a little put off by having to answer that question.

“You have a strange fixation with cannibalism,” Attal observed. “Did someone try to eat you when you were a child?”

Katherine rolled her eyes, well aware that no one could see her. “No. It's just that... nevermind.”

They walked for hours, nearly blind in the thick fog. Katherine could barely make out the people around her. The casket-like box they were all carrying was the only thing that kept them from wandering away from each other and getting lost. The gods only knew how Captain Longfellow was navigating.

A couple of hours later, Katherine's legs ached something fierce. She had hoped at the beginning of the trek that they were climbing to the top of a small hill and would soon enjoy a leisurely stroll down the other side, but it gradually became evident that the whole trip was going to be uphill. They were climbing a mountain.

They took a couple of breaks to rest their legs and sip a drink, but nobody was too keen to hang around long. The novelty of the fog had worn off pretty quickly, and being blind sucked.

Finally, when blindness started to seem preferable to the burn in her thigh muscles, the fog started to thin out. Katherine could see the people around her more clearly. She could see Butterbean, and even make out the shapes of scrawny leafless trees on either side of the path. Hell, she could even see the path now. It wasn't much of a sight, just hard packed dirt with the occasional fog-choked weed struggling to survive, but it was still nice to be able to see.

A few minutes later, her vision was completely restored. She hadn't realized just how blind she'd been until now that she could tell it was night. It made sense, considering how long they'd been walking, but it was kind of amazing that the fog was dense enough to block out her ability to tell day from night. A big fat full moon illuminated the swirling blanket of fog that covered everything for miles around.

“It's like we're on top of a cloud.”

Captain Longfellow stopped the procession and motioned for them to set down the crate. He smiled at her. “Take a look behind ye.”

Katherine turned around. “Holy shit!”

A massive stone head was carved into the side of the mountain, some combination of man and cat, vomiting out fog from its wide open mouth.

“The fuck is that?” asked Denise.

Captain Longfellow's crewmen smiled knowingly, no doubt remembering the first time they saw this.

The captain himself simply shrugged. “Be damned if I know. I've not dared try to venture inside. It be the source of the fog which keeps this place cut off from the rest of the world.” He winked. “Except, of course, for those who know how to find it.”

“How did you acquire this knowledge?” asked Attal.

“By keeping me mouth closed and me ears open.”

Attal nodded, understanding and accepting that Captain Longfellow wasn't going to give up his secrets. “The Sombali people. Are they real?”

Captain Longfellow grinned wide, showing off his impressive collection of precious metal teeth. “See for yerself.” He turned to face forward and howled out some call that sounded like a wolf in heat.

Katherine and Butterbean exchanged a glance.

After a moment of silent anticipation, something rustled in the bushes ahead. A tiny hairy man, naked but for a thick coating of dry orange mud, emerged onto the path. He wasn't like Tim. He was the other kind of midget in the game, like Frank. A gnome.

“Wongfallow!” the gnome exclaimed happily, his arms wide open in a friendly greeting.

“Wongfallow! Wongfallow!” other gnomes called out from the wilderness, then ran out onto the path. Men, women, and children, all covered in cracked dry mud, and not a one of them wearing a strip of clothing. The children reminded Katherine of Cabbage Patch Kids, but somehow managed to be both even uglier and more adorable.

Captain Longfellow spread his arms out wide, mimicking the gesture all the gnomes were making. His crewmen quickly followed his example. After a brief exchange of glances, Katherine, Randy, Denise, and Attal did likewise.

A few of the gnomes took a tentative step toward them, but stopped when Butterbean growled.

“Stay calm, Butterbean,” said Katherine. “They're friendly.” She raised a brow at Captain Longfellow. “They are friendly, right?”

“Ha!” said Captain Longfellow. “Ye don't yet know the meaning of the word.”

Katherine wasn't sure what he meant by that, but he didn't seem afraid, so she assumed they must be friendly.

Captain Longfellow turned to address the gnomes. “Olla!”

Wide grins spread across all their faces. “Olla!” They swarmed the visitors, placing their hands all over the visitors' bodies. While it certainly wouldn't fly back home, and would likely be deemed inappropriate in most parts of this world as well, to the best of Katherine's knowledge, it didn't have a sexual vibe to it. It was more like they were just curious, appreciating the texture of these giant strangers' exotic clothes.

“The fuck is going on here?” asked Denise.

Randy looked positively horrified. “This is making me very uncomfortable.”

Denise scoffed. “I'd think this was like heaven for you. Buncha kids grabbin' at your pecker. It's probably hard as a rock right now.”

“That ain't a nice thing to say.” Randy scowled at Denise. “I told you I ain't like that.”

Katherine couldn't help but glance down at Randy's crotch. There was no noticeable bulge.

They chattered excitedly in some gibberish language that Katherine didn't understand. But after listening for a moment, it wasn't complete gibberish. She could actually pick out a few words.

Are they speaking... Spanish?

Katherine remembered the greeting Captain Longfellow and the gnomes had shouted at one another. They weren't saying Olla! Well, Captain Longfellow might have been. It was clear that he didn't understand their language and had simply learned to mimic one sound that got them all riled up. But the gnomes were saying Hola!

She leaned toward Randy and Denise. “Do either of you speak Spanish?”

Denise glared up at her. “Do I look like a fuckin' beaner to you?”

“No. You look like a fucking asshole. Randy?”

Randy shook his head. “Just a few words from high school.”

Katherine tried to call back her own memories of high school Spanish. She cleared her throat. “Yo tengo...” She strained her brain, trying to think of a noun, any noun. “papas fritas?”

The gnomes stared up at her in silent awe, as did Captain Longfellow and his crewmen.

“Papas fritas!” cried one of the gnomes. Then they all crowded in on her, excitedly talking a mile a minute, but the only words Katherine could understand were papas fritas.

“You can speak their language?” asked Captain Longfellow.

Katherine shrugged. “Not really. I just said pretty much all I know.”

“What did ye say to them?”

“I told them I have French fries.”

“What are French fries?”

“Fried potato sticks.”

Captain Longfellow scrutinized her. “Where did ye get fried potato sticks?”

“I didn't,” said Katherine. “Like I said, those are the only words I remember.”

“Ye be a mysterious one indeed, Captain.”

Katherine noticed that there was no sign of mockery in his voice when he called her Captain. She should probably keep working this mysterious foreigner angle. It was getting her some respect.

“Let me try one,” said Randy. “Dónde está...” He bit his lower lip in thoughtful concentration, then his eyes lit up. “el baño!” he finished triumphantly.

The gnomes all stared up at him perplexedly, then one of them pointed to a tree on the side of the path.

Randy frowned. “I suppose that makes sense.”

“What did you say?” asked Captain Longfellow.

“I asked him where the bathroom is. Foreign languages weren't really my strong suit.”

Neither is your native language, Katherine refrained from saying. Randy regularly took enough abuse from Denise, and she didn't feel the need to pile any more on him.

“Be there nothing else ye can say to them?” said Captain Longfellow.

Katherine bit her lower lip. “If we really put our minds together, we might be able to say I have a bathroom and ask them where the French fries are.”

Captain Longfellow sighed. “Not terribly useful.” He looked down at the naked gnomes. “Gestan.”

The gnome who had first greeted them nodded. “Gestan.”

Katherine tried to think of what the word gestan might have meant in English, but she couldn't come up with anything. Judging by the look on Randy's face, he was trying to think the same thing, and coming up with just as much for his effort.

The gnomes disengaged and started walking further up the path.

“Let's go,” said Captain Longfellow, bending down to grab the box handle nearest him. Everyone else followed suit, grabbing their own handles. They lifted the box and followed the crowd of what Katherine desperately tried to keep from thinking of as Mexican Ewoks.

About thirty more minutes passed before the ground leveled out. They were high enough above the fog to give Katherine a tiny hint of vertigo. She knew in her head that a fall from where she stood would continue through the fog for a much longer distance, but she force-deluded herself to imagine the fog as a soft, pillow-like surface.

Thankfully, the gnomes led them away from the edge, and into the island's interior. It was less of a jungle wilderness than Katherine had expected, and more like a well-cultivated orchard. There were oranges, lemons, grapefruits, and other citrus varieties that she didn't recognize. Scurvy was certainly not high on the list of these people's problems.

Beyond the orchards were vegetable gardens, sectioned off in squares with paths running grid-like among them. Now that the trees weren't obscuring her view, the moonlight was enough for her to make out the curve of the tree line on either side. She guessed that in the light of day she would see that they composed a full outer ring, and that the vegetable gardens formed a similarly concentric ring.

After they passed the gardens, they walked through a series of pens which housed pigs, chickens, and some strange-looking reptilian livestock that Katherine didn't recognize and hoped she wouldn't be asked to eat.

The next ring was a thick bamboo forest, with some stalks growing as tall as twenty feet. Given the utilitarian nature of the outer rings, Katherine assumed that the Sombali people needed to take advantage of every square inch of land they had. She was surprised that they let bamboo grow wild like this. Of course it was useful for making the animal pens, but there was only so much of the stuff they needed for that. Even if they made their shelters with it, they couldn't possibly need this much of it.

The adorably ugly children ran ahead, disappearing into the bamboo and shouting excitedly.

When the bamboo cleared, Katherine saw the justification for them growing so goddamn much of it. Their entire village was made of the stuff. An outer perimeter of tiny houses gave way to a second ring of houses which were just as tiny, but raised a level higher on thick stalks. These weren't simple huts either. There was complexity and beauty in their split-level design.

“This is incredible,” said Katherine. “I wasn't expecting this level of... sophistication.” She realized her praise might be mistaken for condescension and felt bad for voicing her assumptions aloud.

“Hmph,” said Denise. “So they built a couple of shacks out of sticks. Big deal. Look at them, running around naked as the day they was born. Ain't nothing but a bunch of spearchuckin' savages.”

Katherine allowed herself to feel relatively better about her assumptions.

“Ye'll find no spears here, dwarf. The Sombali be completely peaceful. Since nobody knows how to find them, or that they even exist, they have no enemies. And I aim to keep it that way.”

“Well la-di-fuckin'-da. What the fuck are we even doing here? What's in this box that we had to lug it up a goddamn mountain to give it to a bunch of filthy peacenik fuckin' hippie midgets?”

Captain Longfellow stopped the procession, lowered the box, and lifted the lid. “Hardtack and dried beef.”

The children, as well as some of the more shameless young adults, swarmed them again. But this time they didn't get all gropey and grabassy. They were interested in the same hard tasteless biscuits and chewy strips of beef that the captain had been rationing out.

They passed it around excitedly, but no one took so much as a single bite of it.

Denise glared up at Captain Longfellow. “If you had all this food aboard the boat this whole time, then why was you being so stingy with it?”

“It wasn't for us.” Captain Longfellow gazed admirably at the gnomes. “It be for them. It was all I had on me the first time I met them. They thought it was the greatest thing in the world. For all they produce on the island, you'll notice there be no wheat nor cattle.”

“You'll notice I don't give a fuck,” said Denise. “Why did we come so far out of our way to deliver snacks?”

“The Sombali be a very religious people. From what I've been able to understand, they worship the god whose face be carved into the side of this very mountain, who puts out the fog which keeps them safe from the dangers of the outside world.”

Denise sighed. “Maybe I ain't makin' myself clear. I don't give a shriveled up dog turd about their shitty island or their fog-puking god. What's in this for us?”

The crowd of gnomes quieted. Those behind Captain Longfellow stepped to the left or right, leaving a clear aisle running between them. In the doorway of the hut at the end of the aisle stood a wild-haired gnome, older than any of the others by at least a couple of decades. His body was coated with the same dry orange mud as the rest of the gnomes, but his face was covered with blue mud.
“Wongfallow!” he said, spreading his arms wide and grinning. His teeth were silver and triangular, the top ones and bottom ones fitting together precisely like the teeth of a bear trap.

Captain Longfellow returned the gesture. “Gestan!”

Three or four of the older children ran up to the old gnome, apparently named Gestan, took a knee, and held up offerings of hardtack and beef jerky.

Gestan accepted a bit of beef from one of the children, then waddled past them toward Captain Longfellow.

Katherine caught one of Longfellow's crewmen eyeing her with some weird smile on his face. He looked away as soon as she spotted him. She thought he was just checking her out until she noticed two more of Longfellow's men giving Randy, Attal, and Denise the same look. It was conceivable that they might be checking out Randy and Attal, if that's what they were into, but Denise? Nobody was into that.

Katherine made a mental note to keep aware of her surroundings in case these guys were up to something, but turned her attention back to Captain Longfellow and Gestan.

The old gnome stopped before the captain and held his right hand forward. Captain Longfellow got down on one knee, bowed his head, took Gestan's hand in both of his and gave it a gentle kiss on the wrist. Then he offered his own right hand to Gestan, who took it in both of his, opened his mouth wide, then bit down hard on Captain Longfellow's thumb.

“Jesus Christ!” shouted Katherine, paralyzed with horror at the sight of Captain Longfellow's blood flowing out of the mad old gnome's metal grin.

“Captain!” cried Randy.

Attal remained silent, but his eyes betrayed his terror.

“You was right, Katherine,” said Denise. “They're a bunch of goddamn cannibals!”

Katherine and Randy rushed forward, but two of Longfellow's men blocked their way. Were they in on this? Had they set their own captain up? Was this an unnecessarily complicated mutiny?

Taking a second to reassess the situation, Katherine noticed that while Captain Longfellow was grimacing in pain, he wasn't making any move to defend himself or free his hand. She'd seen him fight on the rear deck of the Maiden's Voyage. He could hold his own against the biggest sword-wielding badasses on the sea. Surely he could defend himself against one old gnome armed with nothing but a set of metal dentures.

With a groan and a crunch, Gestan's teeth clamped together, and he pulled his head clear of Captain Longfellow's thumbless right hand. He tilted his head back, his face completely slathered in the captain's fresh blood, then spit the thumb high into the air. When it landed on the ground with a soft thud, the crowd of gnomes cheered. Much to Katherine's surprise, Captain Longfellow's men cheered right along with them.

“What the ever-loving fuck is going on here?” asked Denise. Katherine had to admit that she was wondering the same thing.

Gestan regarded Captain Longfellow, who remained kneeling but looked like he might fall over any second, then turned back toward the house he'd emerged from and shouted a few words.

Another blue-faced gnome ran out of the house with a fist-sized hermit crab shell spewing white vapor, not unlike the fog which blanketed the island and surrounding shoals. He ran past Gestan and offered Captain Longfellow the shell.

Maintaining as much grace as he was capable of, Captain Longfellow accepted the shell, gave the blue-faced gnome a slight bow, then guzzled back whatever was in it. Dark purple liquid ran down his cheeks and chin as he greedily gulped down as much as he could take.

Gestan's assistant stood close by the captain, holding his hands below the shell is if he expected him to drop it. Captain Longfellow didn't disappoint, dropping the shell right into his hands and collapsing to the ground, writhing in pain.

Katherine didn't know what to do. She hated to just stand around while the situation kept going from bad to worse, but this all appeared to be part of some sort of ritual which Captain Longfellow was knowingly and voluntarily taking part in.

“Is he... okay?” She felt stupid for asking the question, as he was clearly not.

Nobody bothered responding. Those in the know simply stared like watching a man die an agonizing death right before their eyes was the most natural thing in the world. Katherine, Randy, Attall, and Denise simply stared in horror and morbid curiosity.

Finally, the captain stopped groaning and squirming. Katherine hoped that at least his spirit was at rest.

“Sons of sea whores,” he said between gasps. “That never gets any easier.” He slowly rose on his left arm and wobbly legs, keeping his maimed right hand tucked under his blood-smeared shirt. When he finally got steady on his feet, he raised his right hand, showing off an inexplicably healthy thumb. “Olla!”

“Hola!” the gnomes shouted in return. The children thought that was hysterical, laughing until tears streamed down the sides of their faces.

Katherine stared at the ground. This was no illusion or sleight of hand trickery. There was still a savagely-removed human thumb lying on the ground in front of Gestan. There was still Captain Longfellow's blood smeared all over the crazy old gnome's face.

Captain Longfellow held his re-thumbed hand down to the apprentice, who returned the shell to him. He turned to Denise, holding up the shell.

“This, dwarf, be what's in it for us.”

Chapter 39

The noise had subsided, but the damage was already done. Ravenus was awake from his nap and couldn't get back to sleep. After a long deep yawn, he wondered why the sled wasn't moving. Had they reached their destination? Maybe they were taking a break to eat. He was starving. Those shadow monsters had wiped out or driven away every animal in the forest. There were no rotting deer carcasses, no maggot-riddled squirrel corpses, not so much as a grub. He wasn't sure how much more of Chaz and Cooper's food he could stomach before he lost control and gobbled up one of the boars' eyes. The only reason he hadn't done so already was because that would only prolong the time they had to spend apart from Julian. Still, there was only so much temptation a bird could withstand.

He grumpily squirmed his way out of Chaz's bag, and his heart nearly stopped when he discovered what caused all the noise that had woken him up. Chaz lay still on the ground next to the sled with three arrows sticking out of his back. His mouth and eyes were wide open, the latter looking delicious. Ravenus felt his gizzard grinding as he considered the ramifications of eating just one eye. If Chaz was dead, he didn't really need his eyes. But if he was alive, removing his eye might do him in. Ravenus was no doctor, but Chaz looked pretty dead to him.

No! Stop!

He ruffled his feathers, shook the thought out of his head, and took in the rest of the scene.

Cooper lay face down at the edge of some pool with more arrows sticking out of him than Ravenus could be bothered to count. The satyr and some elf Ravenus hadn't ever seen before were in similar condition.

The pixies were conspicuously absent. Ravenus supposed they could merely be invisible, but it seemed unlikely that they wouldn't be responding to their traveling companions' current predicament. Ravenus gasped. Had they been behind it? Those butterfly-winged freaks! He should have known better than to trust them. Still, it was odd that they'd leave behind their sled and... BOAR!

If the boar had been shot, the question of whether or not to eat their eyes posed less of an ethical conundrum than the question of whether or not to eat Julian's friends' eyes. He checked the front of the sled and found that the boar were missing.

“Shit.”

This was silly. Why should Ravenus starve himself to preserve a couple of dead bodies? It wasn't as if they were going to remain in pristine condition out here in the wilderness in the time it would take for him to find Julian and lead him back here. He decided to give Cooper, Chaz, and the other mammals a little while to show some sign of being alive before he confirmed them dead. An hour seemed fair. In the meantime, he needed something to distract himself from thinking about eating their eyes.

There were a couple of bags on the sled. Ravenus didn't hold out much hope that they would contain anything decent to eat, but it wouldn't hurt to take a peek.

The buckle holding the bag closed proved too complicated for him to unfasten with his talon, but the strap it was connected to was easy enough to shred. When he finished tearing the strap, he lifted the top flap of the bag with his beak.

The lack of aged raw meat couldn't really be considered a disappointment because he hadn't expected to find any. All he did find was a few of those little fluid pouches like the one that the pixie woman had forced him to drink from. It hadn't been as bad as he thought it would be, but neither was it what he wanted to fill his belly with.

Then a thought occurred to him. If he could pour one of these down Chaz or Cooper's throat, he'd be able to definitively tell whether or not they were genuinely dead.

The question of which person to test first was easy enough to answer. Ravenus would never be able to flip Cooper's massive body over. Chaz was already on his back with his mouth wide open. The real challenge was figuring out how to feed him the liquid.

He knew from his experience with the bag's buckle that he didn't have any hope of opening these containers as they were meant to be opened. He'd have to tear them apart with his talons. Doing that while balancing on Chaz's face might prove tricky though.

Suddenly, he knew what he had to do. He'd been spending so much time in the company of mammals that the most obvious and natural solution nearly flew right over his head.

He tore into the bags until the green fluid inside them started leaking out. He lapped up as much as he could, but most of it soaked into the bag's fabric. After five containers' worth, he guessed that he'd probably drunk enough to fill one of them. That would have to do. He couldn't stomach much more of the stuff.

After flapping his wings to land gently on the ground, Ravenus hopped over to Chaz. He leaned in and placed his beak inside Chaz's mouth. It smelled bad enough to make him thankful he wasn't poking his face inside Cooper's mouth.

Summoning up the fatherly instincts within him, he started heaving. He heaved until he felt the sweet liquid coming back up his throat. It was a paler, more opaque shade of green coming back up. When his belly was even emptier than it had been before he'd drunk the liquid, he stood back.

Chaz still wasn't stirring. Ravenus started salivating, but his conscience nagged at him to try just one last thing before savoring that delicious sticky-sweet burst of ocular fluid.

The contents of Ravenus's stomach were pooled in Chaz's still-open mouth. He had to figure out some way to force him to swallow. He hopped up on Chaz's chin, leaned over, turned his head, and clamped his beak down on Chaz's nose to close his nostrils. Then he let his feet drop off Chaz's chin and pulled them up to force Chaz's mouth closed. It was not the most comfortable position he'd ever experienced, and he didn't think he could maintain it for more than a few –

Chaz's face started convulsing, and Ravenus struggled to maintain his hold until he finally heard a gulp.

“AWAAAWA!” said Chaz, or something to that effect. “Bwahama wawa bwa bwa haya!”

Ravenus let go of Chaz's face and flapped to the ground. “I cannot understand what you're saying.”

“I said,” Chaz continued, speaking properly now. “What the fuck are you doing on my face?” He looked down at the arrows sticking out of him and groaned. Then he licked his lips and grimaced. “And what's this taste in my mouth?”

“There were medicinal liquids on the sled,” said Ravenus. “I had to administer them the only way I knew how.”

“Oh my God. Did you drink them, and then shit in my mouth?”

“You're not far off.”

“Don't tell me that.”

“I drank as much of the liquid as I could, then regurgitated it into your mouth.”

“You puked in my mouth?” Chaz seemed rather upset about it.

“I may try your method next time. Regurgitation was a bit rough on my throat.”

“Jesus Christ, just let me die next time.” Chaz sat up and winced as he plucked the arrows out of his chest. He took in the scene around him. “Holy shit. It was a total massacre. Is anyone else alive?”

Ravenus lifted his wings, mimicking the gesture Julian sometimes made when he didn't know the answer to a question. “I honestly didn't think you were alive. I was just double-checking before I ate your eyes.”

“You stay away from my eyes, you twisted fuck.” Chaz got to his feet, stumbled toward Cooper, then placed two fingers on his throat. After a moment, he nodded. “He's got a pulse, but it's weak. How many more of those healing potions are there?”

“None in the bag I opened.”

“Shit,” said Chaz, plucking arrows out of Cooper's back.

“There may be some in the other bags.”

Chaz paused in his arrow plucking to glare at Ravenus. “Well, would you mind checking?”

“It's difficult for me to work the buckles.”

“Are you good for anything but squawking in people's ears and eating their eyes?” When he finished plucking the arrows and rolling Cooper onto his back, he walked over to meet Ravenus at the wagon, groaning down at his blood-soaked clothes. His jaw dropped when he looked in the bag. “Jesus, Ravenus! There were five potions in here. These could have brought Cooper and I back to full health if you hadn't spilled them everywhere.”

“Perhaps you haven't noticed,” said Ravenus, getting a trifle annoyed at Chaz's continuous berating and lack of gratitude. “I don't have hands.”

Chaz checked the other bags, then shook his head. “Nothing but grains, seeds, and tiny camping equipment. I guess Cooper's fucked.”

Ravenus thought for a moment. He came up with one idea that was probably too stupid to bother with, but it was better than any of the zero ideas Chaz was coming up with.

“The bag is still soaked with the liquid. Perhaps we could force him to eat it?”

Chaz pursed his lips and looked down at the bag. “You might be on to something.” He picked up the bag, turned it inside-out, and sucked hard on a wet spot. “I think it's working. I feel a little better.”

“Save it for Cooper. He's a lot more likely to help you stay alive than the other way 'round.” Ravenus allowed himself to feel a twinge of satisfaction watching Chaz come to terms with that as he stopped sucking on the bag.

When they'd returned to Cooper, Chaz covered his fingers with the end of his sleeve and pulled Cooper's jaw open. What looked like a pint of bloody drool flowed out the corner of his mouth.

“Now what?” asked Chaz.

“I could tear the bag into smaller pieces,” offered Ravenus.

Chaz licked his lips. “I've got a better idea. We'll juice it.”

“I'm afraid I don't quite follow you.”

Chaz crumpled the bag as small as he could, then stuffed it in Cooper's open mouth. A low groan and some snot bubbles came from Cooper's nostrils.

Ravenus perched on Cooper's chest, watching curiously as Chaz cupped his hands together and dunked them in the black water. When he pulled them out, the water in his hands was murky grey. Chaz gave it a sniff and frowned.

“What does it smell like?” asked Ravenus.

“Rotten eggs and spoiled milk. The old man said the pool had been corrupted or something. I don't know if that's what the smell is from, or if Cooper shat in it. Either way, it's better than bird vomit, and it's all we've got to work with.” He let the water trickle down on the crumpled bag in Cooper's mouth, then repeated the process three more times. He looked at Ravenus. “Here goes nothing.” He placed one hand beneath Cooper's chin, and the other on the top of Cooper's head, then pushed his arms together, squeezing Cooper's jaw as closed as he could.

Cooper started to gurgle, then choke. His eyes opened.

Chaz smiled wide. “Cooper! You're –”

Cooper's fist hit Chaz's face hard. Chaz fell into the murky black water. Ravenus hopped off Cooper's chest and flew up to a branch on a nearby tree.

“Wabwabwa?” said Cooper after he took the bag out of his mouth. “Bargar snargargblar!”

“Gwaflabla!” Chaz shouted back, rubbing his face as he picked himself up out of the water. “Nga nga jawagwag!”

“Snurg?” Cooper looked at the bag in his hand, then quickly shoved it back in his mouth, sucking as hard as he could. As he gulped down his own saliva, soiled water, and presumably some trace amounts of the medicinal liquid, arrows began to drop out of his body, and his wounds closed up. He sucked and sucked until he caught Chaz staring longingly at him. He took the bag out of his mouth and held it out to Chaz. “Frugnuck?”

Chaz grimaced and shook his head. “Wibbajibba tumtum.”

Ravenus couldn't fathom why anyone would choose to pass such a dreadful language down to future generations. What was the point of communication if it sounded like that?

Cooper tore pieces off the bag and ate them while Chaz checked the other bodies for signs of life.

“Zanzifurl and the old guy are dead,” Chaz said to Ravenus. Then he said what Ravenus assumed to be the same thing to Cooper.

Cooper took the news harder than Ravenus had expected him to. “Bwargfnarb!” he said again and again, obviously upset as he paced back and forth, staring at the ground.

“I hadn't realized he cared so much for these people he hardly knew,” said Ravenus. “I wonder if he'd be that upset at the news of my passing.”

Chaz let out a hollow laugh. “He's not upset about them. His axe is missing.”

That made things a little less awkward.

“In that case, would anyone object to me eating the deceased's eyes?”

Chapter 40

“The mountains keep us hidden in the east, north, and west,” said Orgol. He sipped the sweet milky-white, slightly alcoholic drink from his wooden bowl, then set it down. “But we've created a permanent illusory border, as well as a moat, along the southern edge of our village to protect us from wanderers in the Fertile Desert. There are dangerous creatures in the desert, and those who are not understanding of our simple way of life.”

Stacy washed down a mouthful of some kind of bland meat with the same beverage, which Orgol's ruddy-faced wife, Grella, had poured for them all. “Not to mention rapists.”

“Oh dear.” Grella frowned sympathetically. “Did you meet a lamia?”

“Yes, I think so.” Stacy thought she remembered that being the type of creature Strovgar had referred to himself as. She found it odd that Grella had immediately jumped to that conclusion though. Were all lamias rapists? She supposed that being born with innate powers of magical seduction might cause a significant number of men to lean that way, but she wasn't comfortable with the racial profiling.

“Did he... violate you?” asked Grella.

“No. I...” Stacy caught Julian watching intently. “I mean we sent him on his way with a lesson in manners.” Relishing the memory of having so savagely defended herself and Julian against a creature that powerful, she shoved a spoonful of mashed potatoes and peas in her mouth. The dwarves of Tamar prided themselves on the simplicity of their culture, and that simplicity was certainly represented in their food. It was probably the least exciting food she'd eaten since arriving in this world. But it was also one of the closest experiences to normalcy, and she appreciated that.

Grella ladled out a second serving of potato onto Julian's nearly empty dish.

Julian covered his mouth for a nigh-imperceptible belch. “Please, ma'am. You've already been too generous. You really shouldn't have gone to all this trouble, especially when you're not even eating.”

“We've supped for the day, lad,” said Orgol. He lifted his cup and smiled. “But there's always room enough for a bit more to drink.”

“We really appreciate your hospitality. But honestly, I'm stuffed.”

“Look at you,” said Grella, poking him in the ribs with a wooden spoon. “All skin and bones. There's no substance to you. How do you expect to court a fine young woman such as this without some meat on your bones? She's like to break you in half!”

Orgol laughed. “I'm surprised the lamia didn't have a go at him as well.”

Stacy and Julian glanced at each other, but remained silent. Stacy tried to find a way to steer the conversation away from them having nearly gotten raped. The eight hefty children waddling around the kitchen seemed like a good place to start.

“You have a lovely family.”

Grella beamed. “Why thank you! They are a handful, but we thank the gods for the blessings they have bestowed upon us.” She grabbed the oldest one by the cheek as he waddled by, chasing his slightly younger sister. “Rorrick here fancies the new girl in the village.”

“Mother!” said Rorrick, trying to pull his cheek away.

“There's no shame in that,” said Orgol. “You'd do your family proud. She's a fine-looking young miss, and I've no doubt she'll make a devoted wife. Once she's been properly educated, of course.”

That was a strange caveat, but Stacy supposed that it was good that they valued providing women with an education in their simple culture.

Grella winked at Stacy. “Three times we've caught him sneaking off in the night to go see her.”

“Mother!”

“It's perfectly natural to be curious. Your father visited me on many more than three nights before we were wedbound.”

“True,” said Orgol. “But I was never caught.”

Grella gave Rorrick a stern look. “Just you remember to keep your hands to yourself.” She pointed at the ceiling. “The gods are watching.”

Rorrick sighed. “Yes, mother.”

Grella's expression turned sour as she sniffed the air. “Gorki soiled his nappy. Run along and change it.” She let go of Rorrick's cheek, and he waddled away looking relieved to get out of there, even if it was to change a diaper full of shit.

Grella shooed the other kids out of the kitchen as well, poured everyone another round of the milky-white beverage, as well as a bowl for herself, then took her seat at the table and gulped it back. When she placed the bowl back down on the table, Stacy couldn't help but notice that some of the drink had dribbled down her beard. On one hand, she felt like she should discreetly let her know about it, so as to allow her to wipe it away. But on the other hand, it seemed wrong to ever point out a lady's facial hair.

“By the gods, woman,” said Orgol. “You look as though you've been sneaking off to have shameful relations with the lamias.”

“Father!”

Stacy cringed. Hearing a woman refer to her husband as father was way worse than seeing the drink in her beard, or even Orgol's insinuation as to what it resembled.

“You've got sweetmilk in your beard.” Orgol wiped his own beard to demonstrate where she should wipe. He winked at Stacy. “I can't be helped if that's what it looks like.”

Stacy wished they'd both stop winking at her. It was getting weird now.

Grella wiped her beard. “You needn't say aloud every thought that enters your filthy mind. We can't have our guests thinking we're ungodly savages. Any more talk like that, and we'll be drinking without you.”

“It's really okay,” said Julian. “I can assure you, some of our friends have much filthier minds than your husband.” He finished his cup of sweetmilk, and Grella rose from her chair to refill it.

“Be that as it may, it's rude to speak that way in front of strange folk. One can't just assume that everyone they meet is comfortable with that kind of talk.”

“Or as much talk,” Orgol snapped back, “regardless of the kind.” He opened a door on the hutch behind his chair and pulled out a dark brown glass bottle. “It's getting late. Time to break out the good stuff.” He grinned and winked at Stacy again.

Stacy wasn't any less creeped out by the wink, but some stronger booze than this sweetmilk wouldn't go unappreciated. This stuff was so weak they were even letting the younger kids drink it.

Following their hosts' lead, Stacy and Julian drank what sweetmilk was left in their bowls, into which Orgol then poured about two shots' worth of the brown liquid.

Grella raised her cup. “Thank the gods for blessing us with the gift of these travelers.”

“Oh, that's too much,” said Stacy. She and Julian raised their own cups and touched them against Grella and Orgol's.

“Thank you so much,” said Julian. “It's been an honor to be guests in your home.”

Orgol sniffed his drink and smiled. “Drink up, lad. This'll put some hair on your stones.”

More out of curiosity than to follow her host's lead, Stacy gave her drink a sniff. She reeled back, her eyes tearing up. The stuff smelled like turpentine.

Orgol laughed at her, gulped back his drink, then clenched his fist as he exhaled. “Ah, that's nice.”

“We don't drink to excess,” Grella explained. “For the gods frown upon such behavior. But it's not every day we have he privilege of hosting strangers to our village. A single cup is appropriate for such an occasion.”

Stacy didn't require any explanation. After the day she'd had, she was ready to suck back that whole bottle, in spite of how the liquid inside it smelled. But she didn't want to disrespect their customs. The single cup would have to do. She could get her drink on properly when she and Julian made their way to a slightly more cosmopolitan town.

“Speak for yourself, woman,” said Orgol. “I believe I may have another cup.”

“Not before taking our guests to their quarters, you won't.” She smiled apologetically at Stacy and Julian, presumably for her husband's boorish behavior.

Stacy wondered where these quarters could possibly be. The house wasn't that big. She was pretty sure she could see most of the inside from where she was sitting. No matter. That question would be answered soon enough.

She held her breath as she, Julian, and Grella necked back the contents of their own cups. It barely tasted like anything. It just burned going down. She could feel the shape of her whole esophagus and where it spread out to the top of her stomach.

“Goddamn, that's strong!” she said, slamming down her cup on the table. Then she remembered where she was and who she was talking to. “Excuse me. I just wasn't expecting... I think you're right. One cup might be enough.”

Grella looked at her sternly. “Indeed. We'll need to cleanse that filthy mouth, Father.”

Stacy didn't know if it was an effect of how suddenly the booze was hitting her, but the situation seemed to have just turned a lot darker.

“I'm sorry.” Her words were coming out slurred. “I don't usually talk like...”

“We can throw the mouth to the pigs,” said Orgol. “I want to taste that meaty thigh.”

What the fuck?

Stacy looked down at her legs. “Are my thighs meaty?”

Come on, Stacy. Get a grip. Something fucked up is going on here. Stay in control of your –

CLUNK

Stacy turned to Julian, whose head had just hit the table. “Julian?” She stood up, knocking her chair over behind her. She tried to focus on Orgol, but there were at least six of him weaving in and out like Strovgar's illusion spell. But this wasn't the same, because there were at least six of everything. It was the booze. There was something more than booze in that bottle.

“What... the fuck... is going on?” she said, stumbling back and tripping over her chair.

The Orgols frowned sympathetically at her. “It's easier if you just let it run its course, Miss Stacy.”

“Fuck that, and fuck you two weirdos! You think I'm afraid of you? I fought off a llama today!”

“Lamia,” Orgol corrected her.

“Whatever!”

“Oh don't bother arguing with it, Father,” said Grella. “Just let the potion do its work, then bring it and the other one to the kennels.”

Stacy swayed on her feet. She wanted to attack one of them, but she knew she'd fall flat on her face if she dared take a step. “Who are you calling it, you hairy-faced bitch?” She felt bad about attacking her physical appearance, especially since dwarven women didn't seem bothered about having hairy faces, but continuing to talk was all that was keeping Stacy's body from succumbing to sleep. She looked in the doorway and saw eight or nine swaying images of their oldest child, Rorrick, holding the baby and staring back at her. “What the fuck are you looking at?” It occurred to her that she might be mistaken about their intentions. Maybe it was a misunderstanding brought on by getting so suddenly shitfaced, and she was currently making an ass out of herself. No, they definitely said something about feeding her mouth to pigs and eating her thighs. There wasn't more than one way to interpret that. She did her best to focus back on Rorrick. “I'll fuck your mother!” No, that wasn't what she'd wanted to say. “I mean, fuck y–” The rest of it came out in a huge yawn. “I'll motherfuck your fuck.”

No. That's definitely wrong.

“Go mind your brothers and sisters,” Grella instructed Rorrick. Then she turned to Orgol. “Can you believe the filth this beast is capable of? And in front of our children!”

Stacy was going down, and she knew it. She held up both middle fingers at Grella. “Fuck you, lady. And fuck your children.”

As her vision faded into complete darkness, Stacy considered that that last bit might have been a bit harsh. Fuck it. At least she'd managed a coherent sentence. At least she thought she had.

Yeah. I really stuck it to –

She barely felt herself hit the floor.

Chapter 41

The trip back down the mountain was a lot more easygoing than the trip up it had been. Of course it's easier going downhill than up, but the box was a lot lighter as well. Those Regeneration potions the Sombali Chief Shaman had cooked up ain't weighed near as much as all that dried beef and stale bread had done. Randy would have been happy to carry the box by himself if everyone else in the group didn't need to hold onto it to get through the fog.

Under Captain Longfellow's guidance, they made it back to the ships, then out of the Shoals of Mist. No one questioned the captain on how he managed to navigate his way through, and he didn't volunteer any such information. He was a fair man, and took only as many of the Sombali people's potions as he needed in exchange for the goods he'd brought them. Less scrupulous folk might have taken them for all they could, and committed additional atrocities upon the people. Taking that into consideration, Randy could understand the captain's reluctance to reveal his navigational secrets.

Now that they had sailed successfully back out of the fog, and them who'd lost arms and legs had now grown them back, everybody was in pretty good spirits.

“Maybe now's a good time to let them know where we're going next,” said Katherine, who'd just sneaked up from behind.

Randy scanned Nightwind's rear deck, taking in all the happy sailors admiring their new limbs like freshly opened Christmas presents. “I reckon it's good a time as any.”

Katherine took his arm with both hands just above the elbow. He was just a little creeped out. When he looked her way, she was looking back at him with big puppy dog eyes.

“Would you mind?”

Aw shit. This was awkward. His high Charisma score had gotten the better of her. She'd been through so much. He didn't want to throw rejection in her face right after she lost her brother, especially when it could be argued that he was partly to blame, on account of it was his basilisk who'd eaten him. On the other hand, he didn't want to toy with her affections by leading her on.

“You realize I'm of a different... persuasion, right?”

Katherine's brow furrowed, and she shoved his arm away like it was covered in roaches. “Jesus, Randy! I mean, would you mind telling the crew that we're setting a course for Nazere?”

Randy sighed and wiped the sweat off his forehead.

Katherine continued to glare at him. “You don't have to look so relieved.”

“I'm sorry. It ain't you. It's...” He judged by her raised eyebrows it was best not to finish that sentence. “Why I gotta tell them?”

“Because they're more likely to listen to you than they are to me.”

“But you're their captain.”

“And you're my... um... press secretary.”

This was news to Randy. “Since when?”

“Since now. Listen, Randy. You're a natural leader. Remember you had those twelve apos–”

“Please don't bring that up,” said Randy. “It makes me uncomfortable. Anyway, those guys believed in me because they saw me perform fantastic miracles. Now I'm just the same as any ol' low-level paladin.”

“You're also very handsome.”

Their boundaries had been set, and he knew she was just using flattery to get him to do what she wanted, but he also knew that she was objectively correct as he was in his current form, and accepted the compliment as gracefully as he knew how. “Thank you for saying so.”

“And rumor has it that a lot of these guys are –”

“Stop right there,” said Randy. He shook his head at her.  “So there it is. You think they'll listen to me because they're all a bunch of queers?”

Katherine shrugged uncomfortably. “Well...”

“They ain't jingling one another's bells on account of them being gay. It's a lonely life at sea, and oftentimes people will just take what they can get. And from what I've seen, folks is a lot less uptight in this world about sexuality in general than they is back home.”

“Yeah, but –”

“It ain't like the captain put an ad out for Queers Only. I reckon the ratio here is the same as anywhere, meaning most of them would likely be more persuaded by a woman.”

“This is still a heavily patriarchal society,” said Katherine. “Just because they might prefer to bone me doesn't mean they're more likely to listen to me telling them to sail to a dangerous place.”

Randy knew Katherine wanted to shove this responsibility on him, and had expected her to keep pushing the gay thing. Her last argument took him by surprise. She actually had a pretty good point there. If he wasn't personally invested in their mission, he probably wouldn't be too keen to follow her orders. Not because she was a woman so much, but because she clearly had less experience at sea and poorer judgment than even the late Captain Martinoli.

“Fine. I'll do it.”

Katherine gave him an encouraging punch in the arm. “Attaboy! Shiver those timbers, me hearty. Ahoy and avast!”

Randy nodded. Katherine had been wise to delegate this responsibility to someone else. In fact, it would probably be for the best if she never addressed her crew directly.

He climbed up to the swivel mounted ballista, as that's where he had the best view of the most people. It was unloaded, and he kept his hands clear of it to make sure he didn't come off as threatening at all.

“Excuse me!” he called out to the crew. He got a couple of glances, but didn't hold them for long. “Crew of Nightwind, may I please have your attention?” That didn't get him anywhere. He sighed, then tried again. “AHOY AND AVAST!”

The crew quieted and stared up at him.

“Thank you,” said Randy. “I ain't meant to culturally appropriate your way of life or nothin' by that.”

“I don't know what you're talking about,” said one of the burliest-looking half-elves Randy had seen in this world.

“Yeah, Randy,” said Denise. “What the fuck are you on about now?”

“I just needed your attention is all.”

Denise grinned. “You gonna dance for us?” The rest of the crew laughed. Some of them looked hopeful.

Randy shook his head. “No, it ain't nothin' like that. I have a few announcements to make.”

“Don't nobody want to hear whose nuts you been suckin' on.” said Denise. She took a swig from a bottle the men were passing around.

“That ain't the nature of what I mean to announce. Also, you shouldn't be drinking.” Before Denise could respond, Randy quickly moved to the announcements. “First, our captain, Miss Katherine, has named me her new press secretary.”

“What's a press secretary?” asked the burly half-elf.

Randy remembered that 'the press' probably wasn't a thing in this world. He wasn't sure, but the actual printing press probably hadn't even been invented here yet.

“That means I speak on her behalf.”

“Why?” The half-elf nodded toward Katherine. “She's right there.”

“She's, um... shy.” It was as good an answer as any. Well, that probably wasn't true at all, but he'd already said it. Moving along. “Second, I think we can all agree that a show of gratitude to Captain Longfellow of the Maiden's Voyage is in order.”

The response to that was mixed. On one hand, he'd given them back their limbs. But on the other hand, he and his crew had taken their limbs to begin with. But he got a few claps from those who were grateful to once again have two hands to clap with. Captain Longfellow, who was listening from his own ship's rear deck, bowed gracefully.

“It's with a heavy heart,” Randy continued, realizing he might be laying it on a little thick, “that I inform you that Nightwind and the Maiden's Voyage will shortly be parting ways.” He paused to allow his crew to express any emotions they might have, but no one seemed to care. That made sense enough, considering how the relationship between the two ships began. “As soon as we transfer our basilisk from his ship to ours, Captain Longfellow shall continue south to Bharan, and we on Nightwind shall set sail for the island of Nazere.”

“Nazere?” cried Attal.

“Basilisk?” said a bronze-skinned human, stroking a forearm that was considerably cleaner than the rest of his body. No doubt one of the men who'd benefited from a Regeneration potion. “Is that what ate Captain Martinoli? Why would you have a basilisk aboard your ship?”

“They're mad!” shouted another sailor.

“I'll swim back to the Shoals of Mist before I sail for Nazere!” said yet another. “What good is it to have two working hands if they're only going to be used for slave labor in the mithril mines?”

“Come on, guys!” said Katherine. “You promised you'd sail with me to the next port.”

Attal frowned at her. “We had no idea you were insane when we made that agreement. What business have you in Nazere?”

“I have to steal the gem from the Ice Queen's staff to save –” The end of her sentence was drowned out in laughter. Even Attal laughed, and he didn't seem the sort that was easily amused.

“You, a little girl too shy to address the crew of her own ship, wish to steal from the Ice Queen.”

She looked to Captain Longfellow. He wasn't laughing, but he shrugged as if to say, “Don't say I didn't warn ye.”

Katherine turned back to her crew with a determined look on her face. “I need that gem to save my brother.”

“Then your brother is damned,” said Attal. “And you will be captured and imprisoned. The Ice Queen will drain your soul until it is all gone.”

“So she's, like, a vampire?” asked Randy.

“Even worse. A vampire will take your life and turn you into one of its kind, but at least you will continue to know who you are. The Ice Queen is very much alive. She is patient and sinister. Her methods will slowly drive you mad until you forget your true selves and think of yourselves as only tools for her greater glorification.”

“So she's more like a cult leader then?” asked Katherine.

Attal nodded. “Some men escaped the island in the early years of her reign, before the ice spread too wide. They were picked up by passing ships and returned to families that barely recognized them. None were the same men as when they were captured. Many struggled with a desire to return and beg the Ice Queen to let them spend the rest of their lives in the mines.”

Katherine looked pleadingly at Randy, her new press secretary.

There wasn't much he could think of to persuade them. Tim wasn't their problem. But he'd give it his best shot. He turned to Attal. “Did you ever meet any of these people?”

Attal shook his head. “This was before my time. It is common knowledge among sailors.”

“If there's one thing I know about cult leaders, they know how to spread the kinds of rumors that keep normal folks at bay while they gather the strength of their loyal followers. It's possible these people you heard about was completely made up, and it's also possible that they were her most loyal followers, sent out to spread fear of the island.”

Some of the sailors seemed to be considering the theories that Randy was pulling out of his ass.

“A third possibility,” said Attal, “is that the stories are true, and I have no interest in finding out firsthand.” He turned to Katherine. “Whatever ails your brother, you have my condolences. But he is not my concern.”

As much as Randy hated to admit it, Attal was right. He stood close to Katherine and whispered. “It ain't right to force these men to come with us if they don't want to go.”

After a long moment of silence, she sighed, then addressed her crew. “Won't any of you come with us?”

The sailors grumbled to themselves and looked down at the deck.

“Most of us have families as well,” said the burly half-elf.

“You've got at least five yourself in various ports,” said the man next to him. The rest of the crew laughed.

The half-elf shrugged. “Those are the ones I know of. The point is, we can't go throwing our lives away for your brother. We all have people who depend on us as well.”

They'd made as good an effort as they could have hoped for, but Katherine hung her head in defeat. After taking a deep breath, she raised it again. “I can't afford to waste anymore time, and it doesn't look like I'd be able to find a crew who's willing to join me at any port. If Captain Longfellow will have you, those who wish to sail to Bharan are free to board his ship.” She looked at Captain Longfellow, biting her lower lip, like she was hoping he'd refuse them.

Captain Longfellow nodded. “Sorry, Captain. It be not my place to condemn these men to join ye on this fool's errand.”

The crew formed a line on either side of the rear deck, giving Basil plenty of room in the middle. Two-by-two, they climbed from Nightwind to the Maiden's Voyage.

“And where the fuck do you think you're going?” Katherine's tone was as sharp as any of the crewmen's scimitars.

Randy followed her gaze and spotted Denise in one of the lines.

Denise tried to pretend she didn't realize she was the one being addressed, but everyone was staring at her now.

“What? I don't give no more of a shit about your brother than any of the rest of these people.”

That was probably the wrong thing to say, especially considering –

“That was obvious when you tried to rape him,” said Katherine.

The sailors all exchanged awkward looks, like they didn't want to suddenly be privy to whatever messed-up drama Katherine, her brother, and this dwarf woman had going on.

“Jesus Christ, woman,” said Denise. “How many times you gonna play the You tried to rape my brother card? The rest of these folks done tried to kill you. I don't see you givin' them no shit about owing you nothin' for it.”

“And where were you when all that was going on?” said Katherine. “Hiding in your cabin, forcing some poor giant man to rape you.”

The murmurs grew louder.

“Did I hear that right?”

“I don't understand.”

“What does that even mean?”

Hagarf dropped to his knees on the rear deck of the Maiden's Voyage and started sobbing. “It's true! It's all true! It was horrible. She wouldn't let me stop, even when she was vomiting.”

Randy could tell by the looks on their faces that, in all the time they'd spent at sea and in less-than-reputable port towns, this was the most twisted and depraved sexual encounter many of these men had ever born witness to. He imagined it was difficult to tell such tales as to make a pirate uncomfortable, but Denise had an effect on people.

“To be fair,” said Randy, trying to mitigate some of the repulsion, “she was vomiting on account of she's pregnant with scorpionfolk.” As soon as he said it aloud, he realized it might have the opposite effect of what he'd been going for.

“Goddammit, Randy!” said Denise as the men closest to her inched toward Basil. “Don't nobody want to put their dick where it might get pinched by a fuckin' scorpion monster baby!”

“I'm sorry! I was only trying to help is all.”

“Ye good folk seem to have many an unresolved issue between ye,” said Captain Longfellow. “Mayhap it be for the best that ye continue on yer journey together.” To the captain's credit, that was as polite a way to say I don't want that freak aboard my ship as Randy could imagine.

“Aw, shit.” Denise glared at Randy as he stepped out of the line.

Nightwind's crewmen began changing ships more quickly and efficiently. When the last of them climbed aboard the Maiden's Voyage, and they began untying the ropes holding the two ships together, a thought suddenly occurred to Randy.

“Wait!” he cried.

Captain Longfellow let out an impatient sigh. “What be the problem now?”

“Don't none of us know nothin' about sailing. Could one of you maybe give us a quick rundown on how all this stuff works before you go?”

Chapter 42

Cooper had already done as thorough a search for Nabi as could be done, but he kept searching anyway. Anything to keep his eyes and attention away from Julian's fucked-up bird pulling out the satyr's eyeballs. He felt bad for the poor goaty bastard, but starving Ravenus wasn't going to bring him back.

“What kind of goblins were those?” said Chaz. “Aren't goblins supposed to be dagger-fodder for Level 1 parties? They came in like a goddamn Navy SEAL team.”

Even Chaz's whining was preferable to Ravenus's slurping, so Cooper went to the bother of talking to him.

“There's no rule that says goblins can't level up.”

“Do you think they're working for the Dark Lord?”

Cooper shrugged. “They're probably just working for themselves.”

“No way. Nobody wanders around with net shooters and explosive powder bags unless they have a very specific reason for doing so. They were hunting pixies to take in alive.” Chaz scratched the back of his neck. “But for what purpose?”

“Maybe they wanted someone to jerk them off,” Cooper proposed.

Chaz glared at him. “I didn't ask for that. She just reached down in there and went for it.”

Giving Chaz shit about getting a handjob from a pixie should have been more fun, but Cooper just wasn't feeling it. He plucked a goblin arrow out of a nearby tree and considered how he might go about rescuing Nabi.

“Those sons of bitches!” said Chaz. Now that Ravenus had moved on to the old man, Chaz was rooting around in the satyr's belongings. He shook his head at Cooper. “Those scavenging assholes took Zanzifurl's pipes.”

That seemed a little judgmental on his part. “Don't you know that because you were looking to do exactly the same thing?”

“That's different,” said Chaz. “I'm a bard. My powers come from music. For any of them, it's just a toy or souvenir. I don't know what class they are, but they certainly didn't look like bards to me.”

“The way they snuck up on us like that, I'd guess rogues. But damn if they weren't effective. I've always viewed rogues as slightly less useless than bards and monks.”

Chaz tossed the satyr's bag away and stood up. “So,” he said in a tone suggesting that he was going to follow it with something delicate. “I guess we're going to head back to the Whore's Head now?”

“Fuck no,” said Cooper. “I've got to get Nabi back.”

“Come on, man! We're in the middle of a haunted forest. I've had most of my Strength drained out of me by fucking ghosts, we're not at full Hit Points, there's an elite team of goblin assassins out here, all of our allies are either dead or captured, and we don't have any fucking weapons!”

“Here's a weapon for you,” said Cooper. He turned his ass toward Chaz and farted.

Chaz nodded. “That's fucking wonderful. I feel so much better about following your lead now.”

“If Crybaby Bitch was a character class, you'd be a god by now.”

“I'm tired of being in constant danger. I want to sit down and relax without worrying about getting shot or having my soul drained. I want a cold beer and a warm meal. Do you realize the only time I've eaten in the past twenty-four hours is when Ravenus threw up in my mouth?”

“What the fuck, dude? Are you exclusively attracted to creatures with wings?”

“What?” said Chaz. “How do you make something erotic out of what I just said?”

Cooper raised his hands defensively. “Hey, man. I was just trying not to judge.”

“I don't want to talk about this anymore. Do you have any idea how to go about getting your stupid axe back beyond just walking up to the goblins who tried to murder us and getting shot properly dead before you can ask them to please give it back?”

“You're giving these guys too much credit,” said Cooper. “Yeah, they're kind of badass when they've got time to plan and prepare, and take their enemies by surprise in a coordinated effort. But get one alone and unprepared, and he'll most likely be just as shitty as you.”

Chaz sighed. “Thanks.”

“I figure we can grab one of them while he's out taking a shit.” A bonus thought occurred to Cooper. “Then we can also take his weapon.”

“Absolutely brilliant,” said Chaz. Cooper couldn't be sure, but he thought it sounded sarcastic. “And how do you propose we go about finding the goblins?”

Cooper scanned the ground around him. There were leaves and dirt and roots and sticks, but he didn't see anything that looked like footprints. “Do you have any tracking skills or feats?”

“I don't think so. Is that something you have to declare that you're trying to do?”

“Fuck if I know, but I guess it's worth a shot.” Cooper stared at the ground more intensely. “Track!”

“Do you feel any trackier?” asked Chaz.

Cooper shook his head. “Maybe you should try it.”

Chaz rolled his eyes and stared at the ground. “Track. Find footprints. I track thee. Look for signs of –”

“Jesus, dude. Knock it off. You sound like a fucking retard.”

“I was just doing what you told me to do.”

“And I'm borderline retarded. So shut the fuck up and check this out.” Cooper pointed to a thin rut in the dirt.

Chaz squatted and peered at the ground where Cooper was pointing. “What am I supposed to be looking at?”

Cooper got closer and pointed directly at the rut. “See this little groove in the dirt?”

“Yeah, so?”

“It's Nabi.”

“Bullshit. That could be anything. Hell, it could have been from the sled for all we know.”

“I'm telling you, it's –”

“Think about it,” said Chaz. “Who carries an axe with the blade dragging on the ground behind them?”

Cooper grinned. “Nobody!”

Chaz narrowed his eyes at Cooper. “I asked a question, the correct answer to which should prove your theory to be as stupid as it is. You answered the question correctly, and yet you have a look of triumph on your face. Why do I feel like I'm missing something?”

“That's how I know it's Nabi. She gets inside the head of whoever's holding her. She can be very persuasive when she wants to be.”

Chaz's face turned pale. “Shit, I think you might be right.”

“Seriously?” Those weren't words Cooper was used to hearing.

“I was thinking about it earlier. These goblins seem like they're pretty good at what they do, but it was kind of sloppy to not confirm that we were dead. But if their leader picked up your axe, it could have told him something like... I don't know...”

“They're dead enough,” suggested Cooper, remembering Nabi's voice in his head. “You got what you came for. There's no time to waste. Wow, this axe is heavy for a goblin rogue. You should probably drag it behind you.”

“Shit,” said Chaz. “Now we owe her.”

The trail wasn't always easy to follow, and they moved slowly. In places where the ground was thick with dead leaves, finding the groove in the dirt was next to impossible. Each time Cooper picked the trail back up, it was less defined, and he was less certain that his whole axe-dragging theory wasn't complete horseshit. When they got to a deep bend in a wide creek, Cooper couldn't find anything he could even force himself to pretend was a trail on the other side.

“We did our best,” Chaz finally said, sitting on a tree root with his bare feet in the cool running water.

“I'm doing my best. You're sitting on your ass.”

“You might have been right about the axe thing. But if those goblins are rogues, they probably take certain precautions against being followed. Following a stream for a while is a classic trail-killing strategy. If that's the way they travel, maybe Nabi couldn't persuade them out of it.”

If that was true, picking up the trail was going to be really difficult. On dry ground, they at least had the guidance of a general direction to search in. The goblins could have gone either upstream or down, and for any distance, before coming out on the other side. Cooper had a brilliant idea.

“Tell Ravenus to go look for them!”

Chaz sighed. “I was wondering when you were going to suggest that.”

Cooper could understand Chaz being a cowardly piece of shit, not volunteering that suggestion when it first occurred to him. It was the sigh that set him off. It wasn't bad enough that he was deliberately sabotaging Cooper's mission. He also had to rub Cooper's low Intelligence in his face on top of it.

Cooper stomped through the water toward Chaz. “Come here, motherfucker! I'll rub my ass in your face!”

“What? No!” Chaz scrambled to his feet, but he wouldn't be hard to catch with no shoes, barely any Strength, and a naturally lower Base Movement Speed.

“You're going to look back fondly on the taste of bird puke when I'm done with you.”

“Stop!” cried Chaz, his back up against the tree and his hands held up defensively. “I only meant that I'd considered that already, and it would only get Ravenus killed and alert the goblins to our presence.”

Cooper stopped. “That sounds like bullshit, but I don't actually want your face in my ass, so I'm willing to listen.”

Chaz sighed again, but this one was clearly relief. “Think about it. There aren't any birds left in this forest. A big black raven flying around is going to look delicious and conspicuous, and I think we can both agree that those goblins are pretty good shots.”

He had a point. Cooper grunted and scratched his balls.

“The more I think about it, the more I agree with you,” Chaz continued. “I'd rather get killed properly with arrows than have the rest of my life drained out by those ghost things, which is exactly what would happen if we tried to leave this forest without you wielding that axe. The best thing we can do right now is –”

TWANG

“Son of a bitch!” Chaz suddenly had an arrow sticking out from his chest, up near the shoulder. He looked up. “It's an ambush. They're in the trees!” He jumped into the pool at the bend in the stream and submerged himself underwater.

Cooper was so distracted by Chaz's peculiar and seemingly ineffective survival instincts that he was startled when a goblin shrieked from above, then fell out of a tree, landing right on top of Chaz, clouding the water red from the gaping hole in its chest. Chaz's scream that bubbled to the surface suggested that the goblin had landed specifically on his new arrow wound.

A second goblin dangled right above Cooper's head, hanging onto Nabi's handle with both hands. Nabi's blade, dripping with blood, was hooked over the branch the dangling goblin had presumably just fallen off of. Nabi had to weigh at least a quarter of what the goblin did, which would make it difficult to wield effectively, especially when he was using both hands while up in a tree.

Cooper grabbed the goblin tight around the ankle and gave a good hard yank.

“Gwaaaa!” cried the goblin, but he held stubbornly onto Nabi's shaft.

“Dude, you're not going to win this.” Cooper pulled down hard on the goblin's leg again, but he wouldn't let go. “I'm really angry!”

“What the fuck is going on?” Chaz's voice barely registered as Cooper was overcome with his Barbarian Rage.  “How did you –”

The branch proved less determined than the goblin, cracking about a foot away from the trunk and knocking Chaz back into the water.

Cooper grabbed Nabi by the shaft above the goblin's hands, then shouted as he pounded the goblin's head with his fist. “MY AXE, LET GO, FUCK YOU!”

The goblin let go of the axe about the same time Chaz re-emerged from the water.

“Cooper!” cried Chaz. “Stop! We should take one alive.”

A satisfying jet of bubbles flowed out of Cooper's ass as the Rage within him calmed.

A third goblin jumped down from a tree branch on the other side of the stream and ran away from them as fast as his legs would take him.

He'll warn the others. Stop him!

It was nice to have Nabi back, but not so much to have her barking orders at him when he was fatigued from coming out of his Barbarian Rage.

As if placed there by the god of irony, two goblin bows, as well as an assortment of loose arrows, were floating in the water in front of Cooper and Chaz. They looked at each other, shrugged, and grabbed one of each.

Two arrows in the back were enough to bring the fleeing goblin down.

“We should use bows more often,” said Chaz.

Cooper laid the goblin he'd beaten either to death or merely unconscious on the bank of the stream. “I don't know. It feels kind of lazy, like stabbing with a remote control.”

“I'm absolutely fine with that.” Chaz scooped together all the arrows floating on the surface of the pool and relieved the certainly dead goblin of his quiver, as well as a small dagger.

“Feel any better now that we're armed?” asked Cooper, not minding if it sounded a bit like gloating.

Chaz nodded. “A little.” He grimaced as he plucked the arrow out of his chest, then exhaled. “A little more now.” He examined the tip. It was coated with his blood, but he deemed it still usable and stuffed it into his quiver with the others.

I've learned much from Grelnik.

“Who the fuck is Grelnik?” asked Cooper.

Chaz shrugged. “I don't know anyone named Grel–”

“Dude. Shut the fuck up. Can't you see I'm talking to someone?”

Grelnick is the goblin who took me. He was the leader of the band who attacked you. The Dark Lord has promised them enchanted weapons in exchange for their protection while he gathers his power.

“So he's, like, what? Working out?”

The expression on Chaz's face asked what the fuck Cooper was talking about.

He resides deep within Morning Glory Hole, collecting –

Cooper snorted.

Is something the matter?

“Sorry. It's probably best that I share this information with Chaz.”

Nabi agreed, and transmitted her thoughts slowly enough for Cooper to relay them aloud.

“He resides deep within Morning Glory Hole.”

Chaz snorted.

“Dude, grow the fuck up.” Cooper listened, then continued. “He's collecting part of the life force from every living thing that the Dark Ones drain.”

“Whoa,” said Chaz. “It's like a Ponzi scheme with souls.”

“The power is delivered back to the Dark Lord through the interconnected roots of the trees.” Cooper raised Nabi. “We've got to chop down the forest!”

No!

Cooper lowered Nabi. “My bad,” he said to Chaz. “Scratch that last part. I was getting ahead of her.”

Chaz rolled his eyes. “So what are we supposed to do?”

Cooper listened and relayed. “Due to their magical nature, pixies make good candidates for trapping inside magical weapons. Nabi's friends will suffer the same fate she has if we don't rescue them before the Dark Lord finishes gathering his power and awakens.”

Chaz bit his lower lip. “I'm curious about one thing. What the hell happened here? Why were these three goblins hanging back? How did they know we were coming?”

“Because she told Grelnik we were following her.” Cooper thought about what he'd just said. “Wait, what?”

I hoped it was true, but I couldn't be sure. I needed to exploit Grelnik's suspicions of Nezblat anyway. He suspected Nezblat of making advances on his mate. I... fanned those flames a bit.

“That's some cold shit, Nabi,” said Cooper. “I like the way you roll.”

If the worst had happened, and you had not returned to me, my only option would have been to continue sowing discord among the goblins and hoping they murdered each other.

“What are you talking about?” asked Chaz.

Cooper relayed Nabi's scheming in his own words.

“Oh,” said Chaz. He laughed weakly. “Well I hope she doesn't pull the same move with us.”

“Nabi says not to worry. Grelnik has a weak mind.”

“Phew, what a relief.” Chaz didn't look relieved at all. “Perhaps we should get moving again. Get all that brute force and homicidal aggression nearer to the goblins.”

“What should we do with Grelnik?” asked Cooper.

“It sounds like Nabi pretty much grilled him for all the info he's good for. I say we just kill him.”

If he's alive, you should bind him and take him with you. The Dark Lord has cast Wards of Protection on his goblin servants. The Dark Ones won't come within thirty feet of one while they live.

“Sweet,” said Cooper.

Chaz looked hopeful. “What is it?”

“The goblins all have words of protection or some shit. It keeps the Dark Ones away so long as they're alive. See if you can find a pulse on – Goddammit, Ravenus!” Turning back to Grelnik, Cooper found Ravenus slurping back the optic nerve of his second eye.

“No!” cried Chaz. He dived at Grelnik and shooed Ravenus away. He felt frantically for a pulse, then tried a few chest compressions, but soon gave up. Grelnik was gone. He shouted incomprehensibly at Ravenus, like Charlie Brown's teacher.

Ravenus squawked something back at him.

Chaz sighed. “He says we should keep him better informed. At any rate, we should be sure to take one of those goblins alive so that we can get out of here after this is done.”

Yes. Keep as many goblins alive as you can. As much as I thirst for their blood, their Wards of Protection will be useful in flushing the Dark Ones out of hiding where they can be more easily dispatched.

“We'll do our best,” said Cooper. He turned to Chaz. “Try to keep from killing the goblins if you can. Nabi wants to keep them.”

“That's kind of fucked up,” said Chaz. “But you know what? I'm beyond giving a shit at this point. Where's this Glory Hole place?”

Cooper listened to Nabi's instructions, then relayed them to Chaz. “It's about half a day's walk from here. She says the goblins are heavily encumbered with equipment and prisoners, and they're paranoid about being followed, so they're taking a roundabout way of getting there. If we make a beeline for it, we might beat them there.”

“Awesome,” said Chaz. “And what then?”

“I don't fucking know. Put our dicks in it or something.” Cooper paused for a moment to listen to Nabi. “Wait, no. Apparently, we're not supposed to do that.”

“Oh no?” said Chaz. “I can't believe the solution to our problem is something other than putting our dicks in it.”

“I didn't name the fucking place.” Cooper listened a bit more. “Nabi says we might be able to find a place to hide and ambush the goblins. That will probably make more sense once we actually see what this place looks like.”

Chapter 43

Julian hated waking up not knowing where he was. He hated waking up in general now that it wasn't natural for him to be asleep in the first place, and the fact that he was sleeping probably meant some bad shit had gone down.

He was surrounded by complete darkness, and his memory was foggy. There was the lamia, and a giant crocodile, and a quaint village full of dwarves. It was like some hazy messed up fairy tale. A surge of sudden hope ran through him, and he reached up for his ears.

Shit.

They were still freakishly long. He was still an elf, and the past few months of his life had not, in fact, been some booze-induced fever dream.

“Stacy?” he whispered into the darkness.

A reassuring snore came from nearby. That was her all right. Best to let her get her rest. He remembered Orgol and Grella's hospitality, and that bottle that Orgol had taken out of the hutch, but he only scarcely remembered drinking the stuff. That must have been what did him in. Stacy must have kept going, and then they carried him to the guest bedroom, which must be down in the cellar.

While he appreciated the hospitality, they might do well to invest in some mats or something for next time they have guests. This cold rough stone floor wasn't very comfortable at all.

While he had the wee hours of the morning to himself, it was a good time to prepare his spells for the day. Julian needed to get back to the Whore's Head Inn as quickly as possible in order to see if Ravenus had made it there, and he had no idea how far from Cardinia they were, so he filled all of his first-level slots with Mount spells. Web had served him well, and he didn't feel like thinking too hard about choosing anything else, so he filled his Level Two spell spots with that. He put the most thought into his Zero-Level spells, dividing his slots between Mage Hand, Detect Magic, and for his current circumstances, Light.

When he came out of his trance, he heard heavy fast-paced breathing. He was about to whisper to Stacy again, but she snored again, and it came from an entirely different direction that they strange breathing.

Maybe he'd been wrong about what had happened last night after he passed out. He was suddenly a lot more curious as to where he currently was, and who he was currently with. He felt around on the ground until he found a chipped piece of stone large enough to enchant. Before he could talk himself out of doing so, for there was no guarantee that seeing his surroundings would better his situation, he blurted out, “Light!”

Vertical steel bars reflected the stone's light. Julian and Stacy were in a five-foot by ten-foot cell. Stacy was on the other side of their cell, curled up asleep in the corner. In the cell across from theirs, a young malnourished-looking dwarf girl was also asleep. In the aisle between the two rows of cells, a young dwarf boy who Julian recognized as Orgol and Grella's son, Rorrick, had his pants around his ankles and his dick in his hand, furiously jacking it off while staring at Stacy. It was a lot to take in all at once, especially when there was only a split-second before everything went all to hell.

“Huh! Wuh! Hoo!” said Rorrick, stepping back suddenly and tripping backwards over his pants. He landed hard on his back with his dick still in his hand.

The dwarf girl opened her eyes, saw Rorrick lying almost face-to-face with her on the other side of the bars, and screamed.

Stacy yawned like a lion as she sat up. “What's going on in – Oh my god!”

Rorrick removed his hand from his dick, and frantically fiddled with a gold ring on his chubby dwarf finger until he finally slipped it off. When he slipped it back on again, he disappeared.

Julian's heart skipped a beat. He patted his pocket, felt something small, hard, and round, and sighed with relief. But the thing in his pocket didn't seem to have a hole in it. In a panic, he reached in and pulled out a silver coin. It was the coin that Darton had thrown at him in the restaurant.

“Hey!” said Julian, looking at the space where Rorrick had just been. “That's my ring!” He listened for sounds of Rorrick getting up and fleeing the scene, but all he heard was more panting. Was he still trying to finish the job? Julian remembered being a teenager. He likely wouldn't ever have gotten himself into these sorts of circumstances, but once in them he'd probably have done the same thing. He pointed at the panting noise. “Web!”

The pinpoint accuracy hadn't really been necessary. Web was a pretty wide-reaching spell.

“By the gods!” said the unnaturally skinny dwarf girl. “Please tell me that was a Web spell.”

Julian cringed at what she must have assumed the alternative to be. “Don't worry! It was!”

“Excuse me,” said Stacy. “Can someone please tell me what's going on here?”

“Well, I don't know why we're locked in cells,” said Julian. “But our hosts' son, Rorrick, stole my ring for his sneaking-out-of-the-house wanking sessions.”

Stacy shook her head. “That poor girl.”

Julian cleared his throat. “Actually, when I caught him, he was looking at you.”

“Please,” pleaded Rorrick, still invisible and, judging by the rhythm of moving web, still jacking it. “Don't tell Mother I was pleasuring myself to the cattle.” Rorrick had clearly not taken many ranks in Diplomacy.

“Who the fuck are you calling cattle, runt?” Stacy's glare lessened in intensity as she turned to Julian. “Oh yeah, that reminds me. We're in cages because this is a village of cannibals.”

“What?” Julian thought back to the night before. “So last night, that meat we were eating. Was it...”

“You were probably eating goat,” said the dwarf girl as she groped in the webs through the bars of her cell. “They don't get enough visitors to feed their own demand, and they don't see you as real people.” She caught a hold of part of Rorrick, as evidenced by his yelp, then slammed it repeatedly on the hard stone floor until he stopped making noise and the webs near where Julian guessed his crotch was stopped moving. She then reached down that way and picked up talking where she'd left off. “You're lower than a dwarf in their eyes, but higher than what they refer to as the baser animals. In other words, you're quality meat, fit for a dwarf.”

Rorrick appeared, unconscious or dead with his head bleeding on the floor and his dick in his hand. Julian was impressed with his dedication to complete the task.

The dwarf girl was holding his ring.

Stacy's eyes went wide. She frantically patted her pockets, then hung her head and kicked the cell bars. She didn't need to say it. They'd taken the die.

“I'm sorry,” said Julian to the dwarf girl. “We haven't been properly introduced. I'm Julian. This is Stacy. And you are...”

“My name is Magra. I wandered away from my tribe, got lost in the mountains, and stumbled into this village. Do you have any food?”

“Sorry,” said Stacy. “We didn't have time to prepare before we started traveling. They don't feed you in here?”

“They've offered me human, halfling, and half-elf. They say it's a rite of passage, so I may be deemed fit to be a member of the village. I've refused so far. If I hold out for one more week, they say they'll feed me to Old Edna. I guess she's their leader or something?”

“Actually, she's a dire crocodile they keep in a moat on the southern border of the village,” said Julian. “Could we maybe talk about all this later? We've got one of theirs lying here, perhaps dead, with his dick in his hand. If we don't figure out a way to get out of her, we'll all be fed to Old Edna.”

“I've got an idea,” said Stacy. “Magra, put on that ring.”

Julian felt a reminder was in order. “That's my ring!”

“Shut up, Julian.”

“I want it back later.”

Magra slipped on the ring and disappeared. A second later, something clunked against the bars of her cell.

Stacy rolled her eyes. “It makes you invisible, dear. Not incorporeal.”

“Then what good is it?” said Magra.

“Next time someone comes in here, we'll say that Rorrick was... pleasuring himself... to you, and you just went totally apeshit on him.”

“Totally apeshit?”

“That's right. Then you grabbed something from his pocket and used it to pick the lock and escaped. When they open the cell door, you jump them for real.”

Julian nodded. “Impressive. We're literally spelling out exactly how we're going to escape in order to trick them into helping us do it.”

“There's just one problem,” said Magra.

Julian and Stacy looked at her, or at least in her general direction.

“What's that?” asked Stacy.

“Why are they going to open the cell door?”

Julian frowned. That was a good point.

“Rifle through his pockets,” said Stacy. “Maybe you can find something that will look like a clue they'd want to investigate, or –”

A door creaked from above, letting some natural light in from the stairwell outside the kennels.

Julian turned to Stacy.

She shrugged. “Just go with the plan we've got.”

“What's this? Why's it so bright down here?” It was Orgol's voice. The door above closed, blocking out the early morning light in the stairwell.

Julian thought it might have been a good idea to cover his enchanted chip of stone, but it was too late now. He heard Orgol's heavy erratic footsteps on the stairs, but only saw a strange shimmer when Orgol should have been emerging into the room.

“Mercy of the gods!” The barely visible shimmering figure swatted at the decaying strands of webbing between the cells. “What is all of this – Rorrick!”

It was Diplomacy time. Julian cleared his throat. “Sir, we're very sorry for your –”

“Shut up, elf!” shouted Orgol, becoming partly visible as he lowered the hood of Stacy's Cloak of Elvenkind. “What happened here?”

That was unnecessarily confusing. Was Julian supposed to shut up or answer the question.

“I'll tell you what happened,” Stacy snapped at him. “He came down here and pulled his little dwarf sausage out at the young woman you had locked in there. Then she beat the shit out of him, grabbed his keys, and let herself out.”

“Shut your lying whore mouth, human. Rorrick doesn't have the keys.” He pulled a key ring off his belt to show her. “Only I –” His hand punched between the cell bars like it had a mind of its own, and the rest of him followed.

Magra was flickering back into visibility, both of her hands gripped firmly on Orgol's wrist. She could have gone for the keys, but she clearly wanted more than just to escape. When Orgol's face slammed into the bars, she bit down hard on his forearm.

Orgol screamed as his blood first trickled, then flowed down Magra's chin and puddled on the floor. The keys dropped by her feet, but she only bit down more ferociously. Finally, she tore away a horrifically large chunk of skin and muscle, then spat out what wasn't still dangling from his arm.

“There, I've tried it,” she said, her mouth dripping with blood. She spat out as much as she could. “I'm afraid it's still not to my liking.”

Orgol moaned, dropped to his knees, and pissed himself.

Stacy sighed. “I wouldn't mind if at least some of my cloak wasn't soaked with liquid Orgol.”

Julian had what he deemed more pressing concerns. “If he keeps moaning like that, someone might hear him.”

Despite her current physical state, Magra pushed and pulled Orgol's arm, repeatedly slamming his head into the bars until he stopped moaning, or moving, or probably breathing. Julian couldn't blame her. He had no idea how he'd handle prolonged starvation, and hoped he'd never have to find out, but damn she was intense.

When she was satisfied that Orgol's voluntary noises would be quieter than the noise of his head repeatedly banging against the steel bars of her cell, or perhaps when it just ceased being enjoyable for her, Magra let him collapse onto the floor. She picked up the key ring and unlocked her cell door. Then she gave Julian a good hard look in the eye. It was unsettling not only because her face was still dripping with fresh murder blood, but also because Julian, until now, had taken for granted that she was going to spring them from their cell as well.

“I need to keep this ring,” she said.

“Fuckin' A!” Julian blurted out. It's not what he normally would have went with, but he was so overwhelmed with relief about her stipulation that it just came out. “I mean, of course. I wouldn't dream of taking it back from you after what you've been through.”

She spent a second, which felt like a month, thinking it over further, then tossed the keyring to him.

Julian gratefully unlocked the door to their cell and pocketed the keys. It wasn't much, but any effort he could put forth to make it more difficult to lock people in cages to be eaten was worth putting forth.

Careful to step around blood and pee, Stacy relieved Orgol of her Cloak of Elvenkind, then patted him down. “Fuck,” she said. “The die isn't on him.”

“It must be back at the house.” Julian turned to Magra, who had apparently turned invisible again. “Magra, would it be okay if we borrowed that ring just one more time before –”

The door at the top of the stairs creaked open.

“Shit!” whispered Stacy. “Somebody else is coming. What do we do?”

Julian looked around frantically trying to think of a plan in the five seconds it would take for someone to descend the stairs. “You and I hide on either side of the doorway. Magra can just hang out here. As soon as they step through, we all jump them.”

Stacy nodded. “Good plan.”

Magra made no indication that she understood the plan. But as plans go, it was a pretty simple one, and Julian was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Julian and Stacy waited in their positions for five seconds, then ten, then fifteen. Around twenty seconds in, Julian found it odd that he couldn't even hear footsteps.

“Magra?” said Stacy, not bothering to keep her voice down.

Julian glared at her and pressed his finger against his lips.

“She's not here. The door opening wasn't someone coming in. It was Magra leaving. She ditched us.”

“Ah, well.” Julian had made peace with losing his ring. With all Magra had been through, he would have let her keep it even if she wasn't holding the threat of letting a bunch of dwarves eat him over his head. “Good for her. I hope she finds her fam–”

A faint scream came from outside, then cut off.

“Did you hear that?” asked Julian.

Stacy nodded. “Sounds like Grella.” She pulled up her hood and turned almost invisible, then blurred past Julian and through the doorway.

Julian followed her up the stairs wishing he wasn't the only clearly visible escaped convict running around this village. But it was still early, and he couldn't think of much to do in a village of cannibalistic dwarves that would necessitate getting out of bed before the sun had properly risen.

Fortunately, it was only a short sprint across the grass from the root cellar prison to the house, and he didn't see anyone wandering around outside.

The back door was open, and Julian walked in on a grisly scene in the kitchen. Grella lay dead on the floor with a hatchet still lodged in her skull and a still-expanding pool of blood spilling under it.

Stacy pulled down her hood and became visible.

“Did you...” Julian dared not finish.

Stacy shook her head and pointed to sticky red footprints leading toward the open front door. “Looks like Magra had one last errand to run before she got the hell out of Dodge.”

“Mumma?” called one of the younger dwarflings from the other room. “I had a bad dream. I heard someone screaming.”

“You take care of this,” said Stacy. “I'll look for the die.”

“What? How do I... Shit!” Julian jumped into the doorway just in time to block the tiny dwarf girl from entering the kitchen. He smiled down at her nervously. “Hello.”

“You're not Mumma.”

“That's true.” Come on, Diplomacy. You can do better than that.

“Where's Mumma.”

“She's, um...”

“Shit!” said Stacy from another room.

Julian sighed. “That's right. Mumma's taking a shit. Now run along back to bed.”

The little girl frowned. “But I'm thirsty.”

“Stay right here.” Julian glanced back behind him. The pitcher of sweetmilk was still on the table, along with a nearly empty bottle of that NyQuil-like liquor they'd used to knock out him and Stacy. He grabbed the one bowl remaining on the table, presumably the one Orgol had been drinking from, as it still had some residual brown liquid in it. Hopefully it would be enough to put this kid down until noon.

After filling the bowl with sweetmilk, he handed it down to the little girl. She gulped it back, then returned it to him.

“Okay,” said Julian. “Back to bed now.”

“But I need to tinkle.”

“I told you, Mumma is in there right now. She could be a while. Can't you hold it until you wake up later.”

The girl crossed her legs and squirmed. “No!”

“Whoa, kid. Keep your voice down. You don't want to wake everyone up.” Julian thought for a moment, then realized the answer was right there in his hand. He gulped back the pint's worth of sweetmilk that was left in the pitcher, then handed it down to her. “Here. Tinkle in this.”

She took the pitcher with both hands, looked doubtfully into it, then decided it would have to do and retreated back into her room.

Julian sighed.

“I found it!” said Stacy, right behind him, nearly causing him to have a mid-sigh heart attack. “Ready to go?”

“What about this?” Julian gestured at the dead body on the floor.

Stacy looked down. “Good idea.” She grabbed the hatchet by the handle and yanked it out of Grella's head. “Can't hurt to have one more weapon. At least we know it works, right?”

“Jesus, Stacy! I meant what about the body on the floor, and all of this blood? What's going to happen when the kids wake up and see their dead mother?”

“I don't know. Maybe they'll grow up to be murderers or cannibals or something. Oh, wait. I forgot. They were already headed down that road anyway.”

“Come on. We can't just –”

“There's a lot we can't do, Julian. We can't bring her back to life. We can't clean this mess up and bury the body before the village wakes up. And we can't afford to waste any more time before they send a hunting party after us who know their way around these mountains a hell of a lot better than we do. We need to get as long a head start as we can before –”

“Grella!” said an older woman's voice from outside. “I brought you some of those fried human finger fillets you're always going on –”

The kindly neighbor stopped in the doorway and dropped her tray of fried human finger snacks. She looked up from Grella's dead body to the bloody hatchet in Stacy's hand.

Stacy quickly hid the hatchet behind her back. “This isn't what it looks like.”

The old woman ran away, as much as an old dwarf woman can be said to run, screaming, “Help! Help! The beasts have mauled Grella!”

“Mauled?” said Stacy. “Like I'm a bear or something? How racist do you have to be to not even credit me with murder?”

Julian wished he'd prepared a Sleep spell to buy them some more time, but he had to make do with what he had. “Horse!” After he and Stacy climbed on, he slapped the reins and guided the horse out of the village and into the rocky mountain wilderness beyond it. The rising sun was peeking up from between two peaks at his two o'clock. They were traveling east and slightly north, the route they'd take if they wanted to go back to Cardinia. He didn't know if that was what Stacy wanted to do, but they could discuss the matter once they weren't being hunted by a mob of angry dwarves.

Chapter 44

Katherine sat on Nightwind's rear deck, staring at the line she had in the water. It was more like rope than the modern fishing line she was used to, easy to see even in the early morning darkness. Fish back in the day must have been dumb as shit.

She didn't care if she caught anything or not. She was mainly interested in trying to estimate the ship's speed by seeing how quickly the line cut through the water. The sea was calm and there was barely a breeze. It didn't feel like they were moving at all. At Randy's request, her former crewmen had pointed her ship in the right direction and rigged the sails for her. They told her that if nobody touched anything, the ice sheet around Nazere should be wide enough for them to run into it.

That was good enough for her. She didn't hold any grudges for them not wanting to go on what they saw as a suicide mission. And why wouldn't they? They'd all grown up on these wild sailor tales. For Katherine's part, she was putting her faith in the propaganda theory that Randy had pulled out of his ass at a moment's notice. She took comfort in that he seemed to be genuinely unafraid of what may lie ahead for them all. If he was hiding his fear, he was doing a much better job of that than he was with hiding his sorrow at parting ways with Alexei, Captain Longfellow's first mate.

“Kinda chilly out here, ain't it?” said Randy.

Speak of the devil.

Katherine's Grim Reaper cloak and Captain Martinoli's brandy were keeping her warm enough, but she noticed that she could see her breath. “It'll warm up once the sun comes up.”

Randy took a seat on the other side of the rear deck. “Catch anything?”

Katherine shook her head. “I'm not even sure if there's still bait on the hook.”

“Somethin' on your mind?”

“I'm just thinking about Tim, about why I'm doing all this.”

“Why?” said Randy. “It's because you love your brother, of course. He's lucky to have a sister like you.”

Katherine shrugged. “I guess that's part of it, but I think a bigger part is that it's something to do.”

“You mean like Minesweeper?”

“Yeah, actually. Kind of like that.” Katherine gulped back a swig of brandy from the bottle, then offered it to Randy, who declined. “You know how, back in your normal life, you'd get up every day and go to a job, then you go wind down at a bar, or go home and watch TV, maybe sometime along the line you get married and have some kids, and eventually you die?”

“I suppose so.” Randy sounded doubtful.

“Well maybe it's a little different for registered sex offenders. Maybe you beat off to Sesame Street, then microwave a burrito for breakfast or whatever.”

Randy looked slightly annoyed. “I don't know how many times I got to –”

“My point is, we had a routine. No matter how miserable we were about having to do it, we knew when we got up what we were going to do each day. Right?”

“Sure.”

“I don't have that here. I feel like, if I didn't have this stupid quest to keep me occupied, I'd be going nuts. It's like the job, the kids, the bars, all of that shit is gone, and I'm just waiting for the eventually you die part.”

“Ain't a whole lot for me back home,” said Randy.

“That's my point. I've got nothing going for me back home either. I'm the co-owner of a shitty fast food chicken restaurant with my brother. But at least I know what I'm supposed to do every day. Even if it's a lousy direction, it's a direction. Here, it's like I'm just adrift at sea.” Katherine took a moment to take in her surroundings. “I'm literally adrift at sea. I'm living in a goddamn metaphor.”

“You'll find your way. Once we get Tim back, I reckon you'll still have plenty to do takin' care of him. He seems to have taken a harder downward turn as of late, and he'll need your support to climb out of the hole he's dug for himself.”

“Who the fuck am I to help anyone climb out of a hole? I'm down there in that hole with him.”

“You don't give yourself enough credit,” said Randy. “You're a talented and clever young lady. Look how much you've accomplished in only the past couple of days. You need to get to an island, and the next thing you know, you're the captain of your own ship.”

“Which I don't even know how to sail.”

“You'll pick that up in time. What I'm saying is, you got a knack for gettin' shit done, girl.” Randy's words and smile felt sincere. They warmed her even more deeply than the cloak or brandy had managed to.

“That's really sweet of you, Randy,” said Katherine. She hadn't really noticed until now, but he really was a handsome guy, which was odd because he also looked pretty much the same as he had back in the real world. It was as though the game used some kind of Instagram giving-a-shit-about-yourself filter to show his greatest potential. She smiled back at him. “It's too bad you're gay.”

“Huh?”

“Oh wow, that came out so wrong. I didn't mean it's bad that you're gay. It's good that you're gay. I love that you're gay.” Stop saying 'you're gay'. “I just meant, here we are on a boat. Sky full of stars. You're single, I'm single. You're good looking, I'm –”

CRUNCH

“Wha?” She was jolted off the back of the ship.

SPLASH

“Fuck!” she cried in a burst of bubbles. The water was freezing.

She willed herself to avoid going into shock. She didn't know how fast the boat was moving, and Randy couldn't swim. She had to get to the ladder before he ignored that fact and jumped in to rescue her.

Having reorientated herself to the best of her ability, she started swimming hard in the direction she guessed the boat was. Two strokes in, she slammed her head straight into it.

She used the last of her breath in another burst of bubbly swearing, then climbed up the ladder at the rear of the ship.

Butterbean looked down at her and barked helplessly.

“Are you okay?” said Randy, getting to his feet as Katherine climbed back onto the deck. At least Butterbean was smart enough to know it would have only made the problem worse to jump in after her. It appeared the only thing that had stopped Randy from doing so was that he'd fallen backwards.

“No, I'm not f-f-f-fucking okay. I'm f-f-f-freezing.” Her sopping wet clothes in the chill of the breeze felt colder than being in the water had. “I need to get out of these clothes.” She looked around for alternatives to straight up being naked. Her gaze fell on the Bag of Holding. “I need to go inside the bag and see if there's anything in there for me to wear. Give me a minute, then reach inside the bag and say Katherine. Can you do that?”

Randy nodded confidently. “Sure I can.”

“If you fuck this up, I'm going to suffocate and die.”

“I got it,” said Randy. “I put my hand in the bag and say Katherine. I seen y'all use the bag before.”

It was a simple enough task, but Randy was nothing if not a simple man.

Another breeze nudged her decision along.

“Okay, here goes.” She pulled the bag down over her head and found herself floating in the all too familiar void. How many times had she vowed to herself that she'd never get in this bag again? Ah well, at least it wasn't as cold in here as it was out– “What the fuck?”

She'd expected to see giant rat corpses floating around. With her mind focused on being cold as fuck, that's the only thing she could remember being in the bag. But there was something wrong with the corpses. They all appeared mummified, their skin clinging tightly to the bones.

Were they decomposing? Was her meat-preserving-properties-of-a-Bag-of-Holding theory debunked?

Katherine hadn't seen a whole lot of decomposing bodies in her lifetime, but these didn't line up exactly with her mental image of what that was supposed to look like. There were no gaping holes full of squirming maggots, no discoloration, no foul odor, at least no more fouler than before. As one rat corpse floated by near enough for her to examine it, it's skin didn't appear to be damaged at all. It was shriveled up like a –

“Holy shit!” Having had an epiphany, Katherine hurriedly began taking off all of her wet clothes. With each garment shed, she felt better and better, until she could finally laugh at how Randy was going to react when he –

A hand grabbed her left tit and squeezed hard.

“What the fuck?” she said, stark naked with the chill of the deck biting her ass and Randy's hand on her tit.

“Shit!” cried Randy, putting his hands up like a dozen state troopers had just drawn guns on him. “I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to – Hang on, why ain't you got no clothes on?”

Katherine rubbed the soreness out of her tit. “Would you mind turning around?”

“Of course.” Randy did a quick about face.

“What the fuck is going on?” said Denise, coming out from the cabin. “It's cold as fuck and I was just jolted out of my sleep by some kind of – Well hello there, Sugartits. You best be careful. You're like to poke someone's eyes out with them nip-nips.”

“Denise!” said Randy. “Have a little decency and turn around.”

Denise raised a brow at Randy. “And what the fuck happened to you, Homo Erectus? You go one day without a cock in the ass, and now you're battin' for the home team?”

In under a minute, Katherine had heard as much of Denise as she wanted to for the day. “Turn the fuck around and shut your hairy-ass face or I'll grab you by your fat red neck and throw you overboard.”

Denise frowned. “It ain't right to judge folks based on stereotypes.” She turned around. “So what's goin' on here anyway? Y'all skinnydippin' or something?”

“Just keep facing that way.” Katherine reached into the Bag of Holding. “All the water.”

A gush of cold seawater fell out of the bag and onto her feet. She willed away the chill running up her legs and back, and hoped her new theory was right.

“My clothes,” she said, her hand still in the bag. She could feel right away that they were bone-ass dry. “It worked! I'm so fucking awesome!”

Randy turned to her. “What did you – Oh, you're still naked.” He turned away quickly.

Katherine hurriedly pulled her clothes back on, relishing the warmth of her own retained body heat, especially when she finally wrapped herself in that thick black cloak.

“Okay, I'm decent now.”

“So what the fuck was that all about?” asked Denise.

“As it turns out, a Bag of Holding can also be used as a clothes dryer.” She thought about the rats. “Or a horrible way to kill a person.”

“I know exactly what you're talking about,” said Randy. “My cousin Ronnie got stuck in the dryer once when we was kids. His mamma turned it on and let it run a full minute to teach him a lesson about how dangerous it is.”

Katherine gawked for a moment at Randy's latest demonstration of how fucked up his upbringing was, then reined in her thoughts again. “That's not what I'm talking about at all.”

Randy frowned. “Yeah, now that I think about it, those particular dangers wouldn't necessarily apply to being inside a bag.”

“So what's the big revelation?” asked Denise.

Katherine grinned. “Right. So when I was floating around inside the Bag of Holding, I noticed that all the dead rats were shriveled up like furry prunes.”

Denise grimaced. “That sounds like an old man's nutsack.”

Randy had a more concerned expression on his face. “What happened to them?”

“I asked myself the exact same question,” said Katherine. “And then it hit me.”

“A dead rat?” asked Randy.

“No, the answer to my question. When everyone was fighting on the Maiden's Voyage, I blasted Captain Martinoli with water from the Bag of Holding.” After pausing for whatever dumb hillbilly comments they might want to interrupt her with, she continued. “I explicitly said all the water. Along with the seawater I'd collected, the bag ejected all the moisture in the rats' bodies.”

Randy offered an unconvincing grin. “Well that's... gross.”

“How much water you reckon that bag can hold?” asked Denise, holding onto the railing with both hands and looking toward the front of the ship.

Katherine appreciated hearing something from her that wasn't completely vile. “I don't know, a lot. Why?”

“Because unless it can swallow up the whole goddamn ocean, your clothes is about to be wet again.”

Katherine leaned over the railing and looked past Denise. “Shit!” They'd run into a sheet of ice, and it had torn a hole in the hull.

“On the bright side,” said Randy, “this is what we been lookin' for, ain't it?”

“Some bright side. Once we get the Eye of Rasha, how the fuck are we supposed to get back to the mainland?” She sighed in frustration. “I swear, I'm the worst captain in the history of –”

A cry like a yeti caught in a bear trap broke her train of thought.

Denise peered into the icy darkness. “The fuck was that? Sounds like it's right on top of us.”

The beast cried out again, sending a chill up Katherine's spine that had nothing to do with the cold.

“No!” said Randy. “Right below us! It's Basil!” He and Katherine ran to the winch that lowered the cargo hatch and turned it together as fast as they could.

The damage to the boat was worse than Katherine had first suspected. Water was gushing in, and poor Basil was up to his fat leathery neck in it. He cried out again. If Katherine had to guess, she'd say this cry sounded more like relief than the first two had.

Randy stepped carefully down the ramp into the water and guided the massive beast back up onto the deck.

Katherine noticed that the water was deeper at the rear of the ship than it was at the front, which seemed odd considering that's where the hole was. Even as she watched, the water began to crystallize around the top of the breach. And while it was still flowing in at a much faster rate than they could ever hope to bail it out, it seemed to have slowed down a bit.

“Hey!” called Denise from up near the front of the ship. “Y'all come check this shit out!”

Katherine glanced up at Randy, who also seemed doubtful as to whether or not he wanted to check out whatever it was Denise wanted to show them. She forced herself to remember that Denise was pregnant, and that no matter how satisfying it might feel at first, she would probably ultimately come to regret throwing the bitch overboard.

Seeing how low the rear of the ship had sunk in the water at this point, there wouldn't be any point in wasting the effort to throw anyone overboard anyway. She had to hold onto the railing to help herself climb her way up the incline to the front of the ship. When she got there, she saw that throwing Denise overboard would be pointless for a reason other than the one which had just occurred to her. Denise was already overboard.

“Look at me!” said Denise, standing on solid ice. “I'm walkin' on water, just like Jesus!”

She'd obviously climbed down the anchor chain, which was hanging from the front of the boat. The anchor itself didn't appear to have chipped the ice it lay on.

“This doesn't make any sense,” said Katherine. “It's chilly out here, but it doesn't feel nearly cold enough to freeze water.”

“'Specially seawater,” said Randy, still down at the rear of the ship with Basil. “On account of it bein' so salty.”

Katherine gave him a thumbs up for saying something smart, then wondered if that might have come off as patronizing. But Randy beamed at the gesture.

“Ain't no sense to be made of it,” said Denise. “We're at a semi-tropical latitude. Water don't freeze naturally 'round here, salty or otherwise. This is obviously magical ice.”

Katherine resisted the urge to tell her to go fuck herself. “Go on.”

“Jesus, woman. Don't you get it? The cold air ain't makin' the water freeze. It's all the goddamn ice that's makin' the air cold.”

“Oh.” While what Denise was saying sounded reasonable, Katherine still had to suppress the urge to tell her to go fuck herself.

“Hang on a sec,” said Randy. He peeked down into the cargo hold. When he pulled his head back out, his face looked hopeful. “It looks like the hole's froze over and plugged itself up with ice. The ship might not sink after all.”

Katherine supposed that was sort of a silver lining. But a ship stuck in ice wasn't going to do her any more good than a ship stuck at the bottom of the ocean, as far as getting back to the mainland went. She'd have to cross that bridge when she came to it. Right now she had to focus on getting to the island proper and getting that stupid gem from that stupid ice bitch. Getting Basil down onto the ice was going to be a challenge.

“Hey Randy,” she said as persuasively as she could. “How do you feel about leaving Basil here while the three of us go to the island?”

Randy frowned. “I don't know for sure that the ice is gonna keep this ship afloat. And I'd hate to leave him out here alone. He might get scared.”

“Oh, come on,” said Katherine, trying to sound confident. “The ship's not going anywhere. We can leave him a couple of dehydrated rats to chew on. He'll never know we were gone.” Dim as he was, she could tell he wasn't buying it. She could smell her own bullshit as she spoke the words. “Look, I just don't see how we're going to get him down there on the ice. He can't climb down the anchor chain, and he's too big to put in the Bag of Holding.”

Randy smiled. “We just got to get creative is all. We solved harder problems than this before.”

“Y'all keep flapping your gums for another hour,” said Denise from down on the ice. “I reckon the problem will just solve itself.”

Katherine turned on her with a severe glare. “Listen, Fuckhead. I've had about enough of your shit. We're trying to come up with a solution to a problem, so if you've got nothing to contribute, I'd appreciate you shutting the fuck up.”

Denise put her hands on her hips. “And I just gave you a solution, Miss Potty Mouth. Give it an hour or so, and the problem will solve itself.” She sounded suspiciously unlike a sarcastic bitch.

“What are you talking about?”

“Take a look.” Denise gestured to where the front of the boat met the ice. “It's still expanding, slowly but surely. At the rate it's going, I reckon the whole ship will be engulfed in ice in about an hour's time. When the ice reaches the rear of the ship, that fat-ass freak of nature can just step over the railing.”

As the sun continued to rise, the ice continued to engulf the ship as Denise had predicted it would. When Katherine and Randy successfully guided Basil and Butterbean off the rear deck and onto the unnaturally solid ice, Katherine rewarded Denise's ingenuity by not punching her in her smug hairy face.

Across what looked like miles of solid ice, Katherine saw a small bump on the horizon. She and Randy hoisted Denise onto Basil's back, and they started the long cold walk to the island of Nazere.

Chapter 45

Chaz could sense they were headed in the right direction by the increasing gloominess of their surroundings. Perhaps right direction wasn't quite the correct way to put it. He was still torn between helping the pixies and just getting the hell out of this forest. He sensed, rather, that they were heading in their intended direction.

Purple vines clung weakly to the trunks of dying trees, their wilted black petals falling like volcanic ash. The further they traveled, the more abundantly this ominous strain of flora dominated the terrain.

“This place is creeping me out,” he said, barely above a whisper. “What kind of flowers are these?”

Cooper continued walking without responding, and Chaz assumed he was ignoring him, but after a moment passed, he spoke up.

“Nabi says they're called morning glories. When they're healthy, they're a beautiful shade of blue. The Dark Lord is sapping the life out of the forest. The nearer we get to him, the more evident his influence becomes.”

Chaz plucked a black petal and rubbed it between his fingers. It produced a dark blue smudge. “Well we must be getting pretty close, because his influence is evident as fuck.”

“You need to hurry!” squawked an avian voice flying in from behind them.

“Jesus, Ravenus,” said Chaz. As much practice as he now had speaking in a phony British accent, it never felt any less douchey. “You can't sneak up on people like that. You about gave me a heart attack.”

Ravenus flew to a branch and spoke to Chaz as he passed under it. “The goblins aren't far behind you. You'd do well to hide yourselves.”

“Will you tell that bird to shut the fuck up?” said Cooper.

“He says the goblins are right behind us.”

“All the more reason for him to shut the fuck up. He sounds like a goddamn car alarm.”

“Ask Nabi what we're supposed to do now.”

Cooper walked in silence for a moment, then relayed Nabi's thoughts. “It all boils down to, if we let them get in their defensive positions, we're fucked.”

Chaz nodded eagerly. “Yes, that makes sense. What else.”

“They'll shoot us both dead before we ever get near them, and they'll make sure they finish the job this time.”

“I understand that,” said Chaz. “All of that was implied by we're fucked. So... at the risk of repeating myself, what are we supposed to do?”

After another pause, Cooper said, “Not let them get in their defensive positions.”

“Oh, that's very helpful. Thank you, General MacArthur.” It became evident to Chaz that he was going to have to take some initiative in developing a strategy. “What have we got to work with? I have a goblin bow, and just marginally enough Strength to fire it. You have a magical axe and Barbarian Rage. To best leverage our assets, we should find a spot they're certain to pass through, where I can hide up in a tree and you can hide at the base of it.”

“It's nice how you leverage your ass set up a tree and leave me down here to fight off a dozen goblins by myself.”

“I'm your air support, firing arrows from above. You're the tank. These are our respective roles and, unless you can think of anything better, the best chance I see of us taking these assholes out.”

“What about my idea of grabbing them one at a time while they're taking a shit?”

Chaz didn't want to tell him directly how shitty a plan that was, but their time was running out. Fortunately, while he was trying to think of a more roundabout way of saying the same thing, Cooper spoke up again.

“Nabi likes your plan better,” he said glumly. “Some friend.”

“Don't take it like that,” said Chaz, seeing an opportunity to win Cooper over a little, which couldn't hurt when he was depending on Cooper to keep him alive. “She only wants what's best for you. Rather than spare your feelings, she made a decision against your objectively shitty plan.” Shit. Wasn't I just trying to avoid saying that exact thing?

“Fuck your mother.”

Chaz didn't feel any more comforted about Cooper's desire to keep him alive.

“I'm just saying that she cares about you. She wants to make sure you have the best possible chance of getting out of this alive, and she's willing to tell you things you don't want to hear in order to make sure that happens. Isn't that what true friendship is all about?”

Cooper shrugged, which was better than a punch in the face. “I guess so. That's kind of what happened between me and Tim one time. I told him some shit I thought he didn't want to hear, but I thought he needed to.”

Chaz let out a silent sigh of relief. They were getting somewhere, perhaps even... bonding? “Good for you. How did that work out?”

“He fell way off the deep end, slit Mordred's throat, and then wound up getting himself murdered. So, not well.”

“Oh,” said Chaz. “I'm sorry. I assumed you were referring to a time further back in your relationship.”

“You know, your plan is pretty shitty too. I mean, where the fuck am I supposed to hide at the base of a fucking tree?”

Chaz considered the trees and determined that Cooper had made a good point. Some were thicker than others, but none were even close to thick enough for a big-ass half-orc barbarian to reliably hide behind. The plan was heavily dependent on the element of surprise. If the goblins got a chance to organize from any appreciable distance, Cooper would be shot down before he could get a swing in.

So absorbed was he in trying to think up a solution to this problem that he tripped over the obvious solution and fell face-first into more of it.

He rolled onto his back and grinned up at Cooper. “Vines!”

“Really fucking observant of you. I'm sure glad you're on my side.”

“No, I mean the ground is literally covered in vines!”

Cooper furrowed his brow, then his eyes widened. “Do you have an Entangle spell?”

“No. And I can't cast any spells right now anyway without an instrument.”

“Then who gives a shit about the vines?”

“You can hide under them. We'll rip a bunch of vines out of the ground and cover you with them at the base of a tree. You'll look like a small hill or mound.”

After silently consulting his axe, Cooper sighed. “Nabi thinks it could work.”

In the couple of days since the shadow monsters had drained his Strength, Chaz felt like he'd regained some of it. Standing upright no longer felt like a workout, and his arms didn't feel like they were made out of lead when he lifted them. But uprooting these morning glory vines was really a chore. After freeing one from its hold in the rich earth, he wiped the sweat from his brow and checked on Cooper, who had ripped out enough vines to cover ten of himself.

“They're coming!” Ravenus whispered urgently, flapping down to land on a branch near Chaz's head.

“Yeah, we know. You already –” Chaz shut up when he heard the terrible randomly blown notes of someone who obviously didn't have a whole lot of practice playing satyr pipes. “Holy shit, they're coming!” He looked for a suitable tree in the path of where the music was coming from.

Finally, a spot of luck. The perfect tree stood out like a gift from the gods. It had a low branch leading to a slightly higher one, then to an even higher branch with enough leaves and morning glory vines to provide a decent amount of cover. From that position, Chaz thought he might be able to fire off three or four arrows before the goblins discovered where he was shooting from. That would be more than enough time for the fight to have been pretty well decided.

“There,” he said to Cooper, pointing at his selected tree. “Hurry up. They're practically here.”

Cooper dropped his massive pile of vines on the ground next to the tree. He laid Nabi down on the opposite side to where the terrible music was coming from, then picked up the vines and dumped them on the axe. Finally, he crawled under the vine pile to join Nabi.

Chaz stood back and tried to imagine seeing this as a natural scene. He couldn't do it. It was obviously a pile of vines someone had deliberately put at the base of a tree. It would definitely arouse suspicion. He smoothed down the sides of the pile, pulling some of the vines around to the front of the tree. Standing back a second time, he felt a lot better about how it looked. It wouldn't pass a close inspection, but by the time the goblins got close enough to make that distinction, it would be too late.

The music was getting closer. Chaz hurried back to the tree and jumped up to catch the lowest branch. There, hanging like a dumbass with death marching toward him, he discovered the fatal flaw in his plan. He'd regained some of his Strength back, but nowhere close to all of it. Certainly not enough to do a pull-up. Hell, in this body, he wasn't sure if he could do a pull-up at full Strength. He glanced down at the mound of vines by his dangling feet and considered asking Cooper to give him a boost. But Cooper couldn't be trusted to properly hide himself alone.

Shit. Shit. Shit. Think. Think. Think. No, there's no time. Fuck it.

Chaz let go of the branch, dropped to a lying position on the ground, and slithered into the vine pile.

“Dude,” said Cooper. “What the fuck? You're supposed to be up in the tree.”

Chaz readied his goblin bow and laid a few arrows from the quiver on the ground next to him. “I'm too weak to climb.” He sniffed the air. There was something in it more pungent than vegetation or earth, like a dead skunk, or... “Did you fart?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus, dude.” Chaz's eyes were watering. “How can you stand that?”

“Fuck you. I wasn't expecting company.”

“Could you stop moving around so much? You're making it –”

“Hey!” cried Ravenus as loud as he possibly could.

What the hell was he thinking? Did he not understand what their situation was? Chaz wanted to tell him to shut up, but there were limits on how far he'd stick his neck out for a bird.

“Hey you! Goblins! I'm up here in the tree!”

The amateur pipe music stopped playing, and the goblins began chattering among themselves. Chaz couldn't understand the goblin tongue, but he thought he had a pretty good idea of what they were probably saying.

“Did you hear that?”

“It sounds like a bird.”

“How could that be? The Dark Ones cleared this place out.”

“It could have flown in from somewhere else.”

“Who cares? It sounds like a big fucker. Let's shoot it.”

“Dibs on a leg!”

“Fuck off. You ate both legs last time. You'll be lucky to get the neck.”

“Do you know what I like? Cornish hens.”

“Oh yes, those are lovely.”

Chaz was making up random shit at this point. He had no idea what the goblins were going on about and why it was taking them so long to act. He was worried that they might have spotted him and Cooper, then felt relieved when he heard bowstrings twanging but didn't feel arrows boring holes in his face.

“Shit!” cried Ravenus.

The goblins shouted short imperatives at each other. They were circling in.

“You missed me!” Ravenus taunted them, but his tone was less cocky than his words. He was purposely trying to draw them in closer. “Any time you gentlemen are ready.”

“That's our cue,” whispered Chaz. “Let me get one shot off before you start roiding out and tearing shit up.” He grabbed an arrow and brushed some vine out of his face to find a target.

The first goblin he saw didn't have his bow out. He had something in his hands, but Chaz couldn't make out exactly what it was. With the odds against them as much as they already were, he sought to maximize whatever opportunities he could. An already armed goblin would make a better target. Success would mean two less arrows being fired back at them rather than only the one from the goblin who was currently unprepared.

He brushed away a little more vine to improve his view and spotted a goblin aiming his bow high toward the upper branches of the tree. Perfect. Then a movement in his periphery drew his attention back to the unarmed goblin. It brought whatever was in its hand to its mouth, then started playing familiarly terrible music.

“That son of a –” Chaz said before he could stop himself.

The goblin's eyes locked with his, and it blew a sharp loud note which was even more off key than its usual performance.

Their cover blown, Chaz didn't bother with trying to be sneaky while nocking his arrow.

“Now, Cooper!” he cried and released his bowstring. The goblin, who had dropped Zanzifurl's pipes and was frantically grabbing for his own bow, caught Chaz's arrow in the gut. His groan of agony was more pleasing to the ear than any note he'd blown on those pipes.

“I'm really angry!” said Cooper, rising out of the vine pile amid confused goblin shrieks and cries. Cooper in his Barbarian Rage looked terrifying enough without any additional accoutrement, but the creepy black vines hanging from his body must have had the goblins shitting themselves. He looked like some kind of swamp revenant, returned from the dead to exact revenge upon those who had slain him. He ran at the goblin Chaz had shot and grabbed it by the neck, he and Nabi both apparently trying to resist the urge to just chop it in half. If it was still alive at this point, the two arrows it intercepted as they were on their way to Cooper surely did it in. No longer having any use for it, Cooper threw the dead goblin at one of its companions, but hit the tree it was taking cover behind instead.

Arrows were flying past Cooper from multiple directions, but only three managed to hit him. Chaz couldn't see where all of the arrows were coming from. Having been caught unaware and unprepared, the goblins weren't fighting as an organized unit. They were more concerned about individual survival than they were about their blitzkrieg battle tactics. If Cooper and Chaz could keep the chaos going, they would have a fighting chance.

He spotted one goblin who was still scrambling to find cover. An arrow in its ass didn't kill it, but it got its attention.

The twang of bowstrings seemed to be lessening, but it was difficult to make out such specific sounds over the din of Cooper's Rage-induced fit of swearing and goblin screams cut short by crunches and splatters.

Chaz sought another target and spotted a goblin peeking up from behind their pile of equipment. He took aim, then –

“Yaaaa!” he cried at a sudden searing pain in his lower back. Chaz had been shot enough times now to know the feel of an arrow, but it never got any easier. Pulling them out was hard enough when they were in easy-to-reach places. The pain would be that much worse trying to grab it at such an awkward angle. He forced himself to think of all the filthy little goblin hands that had touched the arrow. They probably wiped their asses with those hands, and they almost certainly didn't wash with soap afterward. That was just the motivation he needed to reach around back, grit his teeth, and give the arrow a nice hard yank. He sighed. Fuck, that hurt.

THWUNK! THWUNK! Two more arrow shafts wobbled in the trunk of the tree right next to his head. Why were they shooting at him? Wasn't Cooper still a more threatening – Shit, Cooper! Was he...

“Fuck you! And you! And you!” Cooper's voice conveyed the exertion of axe chops. Evidently, he was still alive.

Chaz crawled around the tree for cover and saw that, while Cooper had about a dozen arrows poking out of him, he was still up and fighting. The goblins who were shooting at Chaz must have been doing so because he was an easier target for them to aim for without moving from their hiding places.

Cooper was doing as good a job as could be expected, but he wouldn't be able to hold out much longer. Chaz needed to help more effectively if they were going to get out of this alive.

“Chaz!” cried a tiny high-pitched female voice.

“Dimplethorn?” Chaz looked in the direction he thought the voice had come from, over by the goblin's equipment.

Of course! The goblins had brought the goddamn cavalry with them! Inside the little rickshaw they'd been hauling their supplies in, Chaz spotted a moving blob of net peeking over the edge.

“Shut up!” said the goblin who was hiding behind the rickshaw. He swatted down on the net, eliciting a cry of pain from several of the trapped pixies and igniting a spark of fury in Chaz. He couldn't tolerate seeing someone hit such a delicate and beautiful creature, and he told himself that it had nothing to do with her having given him a handjob.

“You goblin piece of shit!” he cried as he started running clumsily at the cart. His Strength not yet fully replenished, his legs weren't quite ready for a sprint. He must have looked like a drunken asshole, because the goblin he was running at actually laughed as he nocked the arrow that might very well end Chaz's life.

But while his Strength may still be suffering, his Charisma and Dexterity scores were doing fine. He took advantage of them by using the Bluff and Tumble skills to feign moving left, then rolled to the right and picked up Zanzifurl's pipes.

The feigning left worked well enough, causing the goblin to fire in the wrong direction. The roll, on the other hand, turned out to be more of just a run-of-the-mill falling to the ground, grabbing the pipes, and standing back up. Not a whole lot of panache, but it got the job done. By the time the goblin had another arrow ready, Chaz was on top of it, tackling it with a similar grace he'd demonstrated with his Tumble attempt.

Even though he was twice its size, Chaz guessed that they were about equally matched in Strength. The goblin might have actually been one or two points stronger than him. If he lost his current advantage, he would be highly unlikely to regain it, so he sought to maintain it the best way he could think of, by throttling the goblin's throat with both hands and repeatedly slamming its disproportionately large head against the ground. He considered what Nabi had requested about trying to keep some of the goblins alive, but this felt like a kill-or-be-killed situation, and he was going to put everything he had into not ending this fight on the be-killed side.

The goblin's yellow neck skin felt dry and leathery, like an old woman's tit. Its tiny red eyes bulged as it tried to scream, but only squeaked out a weak groan. Chaz squeezed harder until even that was cut off. He started to tire, and he wondered how long it actually took to strangle someone to death. It normally went a lot faster in movies.

Finally, after enough time had passed such that the act of murder was actually getting boring, the goblin stopped resisting. Its arms went limp and fell to its sides. Chaz slammed its head against the ground a few more times to make sure.

When he was satisfied that his goblin adversary was sufficiently dead, he peeked over the cart for any impending attacks. Cooper and Nabi didn't appear to care too much about keeping goblin survivors. They were employing all of the restraint of someone bingeing on a Party Size bag of Doritos on cheat day. Goblin body parts were strewn around the forest floor. Dripping bits of gore hung from branches like Christmas tree tinsel. Some poor bastard's intestines were dragging behind Cooper's right foot like a strand of toilet paper as he chased some other poor bastard whose intestines were about to meet a similar fate.

“Chaz!” said Dimplethorn. “Let us out of here!”

Chaz examined the net. Individual ropes looped around a cord running around the rim, like a drawstring bag. The drawstring cord ran through a hole in the side of the cart, down to a hook on the bottom where it was tied off. This was obviously a precautionary measure to avoid allowing captured prisoners to release themselves.

As soon as he untied the cord, the opening of the net expanded quickly, then the whole structure collapsed as if it had been a living net monster that suffered a sudden and fatal heart attack. The next thing Chaz knew, about a dozen stray arrows rose from the ground and hovered in the air, pointing one way and then another, looking for a target. Unfortunately for them, it appeared that Cooper and Nabi had deprived them of their opportunity for vengeance.

Cooper's Barbarian Rage finally tapped out, flowing out of his ass in a long extended fart as he leaned against a tree, sweating profusely. He looked like shit, bleeding from a multitude of arrow wounds. Chaz hadn't bothered to count, but Cooper might have had more arrows in him now than he'd had in the Pool of True Sight. He couldn't possibly have more than a couple of Hit Points left.

The group of floating arrows moved simultaneously away from Cooper's fart cloud, drawing his attention.

“What the fuck?”

Some movement in the bushes from the other direction caught Chaz's eye. Two more goblins stood and took aim at Cooper's back.

“Cooper!” cried Chaz.

“What?” Cooper snapped back, annoyed.

THWANG! THWANG!

The first arrow lodged in Cooper's right ass cheek, but the second one went in one side of his neck and out the other. Cooper's eyes widened and glazed over as arterial blood gushed out of his neck.

“THERE!” cried Dimplethorn. All the arrows swarmed at the two goblins who hadn't noticed them until now.

One of the goblins said something that Chaz could only assume translated to, “Holy fucking shit!”, and started running away while the other one fired an arrow harmlessly through the swarm of arrows descending on them.

The flock of angry pixies hacked at the goblin who'd fired the arrow like it was the Ides of March. They splattered so much goblin blood on each other that Chaz could make out some of their forms. Their bloodlust not quite sated, they flew after the goblin who wisely, albeit lately, decided to run.

“Try to take that one alive!” Chaz yelled after them as he ran to Cooper.

He was no doctor, but Cooper looked as dead as any of the goblins whose entrails were currently decorating the forest. After snapping the fletching off the back of the arrow in Cooper's neck, he pulled the shaft out through the other side, causing blood to flow out more quickly.

Shit! I made it worse. Come on, Chaz. We were so close. Think of something.

“Come on, Cooper.” Chaz wiped unexpected tears from his eyes. “Don't you die on me, you crazy fuck.”

“Is he okay?” asked Ravenus, hopping to Cooper's head and giving it a poke with his beak.

“Does he look fucking okay to you?”

“He looks dead to me. Mind you, that's an amateur opinion. I thought you both were dead only yesterday.”

Knowing he was going to regret it, he asked, “What should I do? And I swear to god if you say anything about eating his fucking eyes, I'll roast you over a fire.”

“You needn't be rude,” said Ravenus. “I've seen you use magic before. Have you any spells which might be useful under these circumstances? The fat one with the hair growing out of his face sometimes uses magic to heal wounds.”

“Dave? He's a cleric. I'm a bard.”

“A bird?”

“No, dipshit. You're a fucking bird. I'm a bard.”

“What's a bard?”

“I sing and play musical instruments and shit.”

Ravenus cocked his head to the side, blinking up at Chaz. “That doesn't seem like a particularly useful skill set.”

“It makes magic happen. You saw me make an acorn glow. I can also use it to charm people, or put them to sleep, or... Actually, I don't even know what else I can do with it. I can't remember the last time I checked my spells. Keep an eye on him for a second and try to not let him die.”

“And just how am I supposed to...”

Chaz ignored Ravenus's bitching as he sat in as comfortable a position as he could manage, closed his eyes, and brought Zanzifurl's pipes to his lips. He blew a soft melody and focused on that, tuning out everything else in an effort to clear his mind.

In the clarity of his meditation, he was able to observe the power of his music. He couldn't see or hear it exactly. It was as if he could feel it on some super-conscious level, and understand how he might manipulate notes and lyrics to produce real and tangible effects.

One such effect he was surprised to discover was the ability to Cure Moderate Wounds. He was so excited at having discovered it that he nearly lost it. Forcing himself to calm down, he concentrated on understanding how the spell worked until he felt it become part of him.

He opened his eyes and looked at Ravenus. “I know what to do.”

Like any of the spells he'd come to understand, Cure Moderate Wounds simply required an appropriate song. The only one that came to mind off the top of his head was Marvin Gaye's Sexual Healing, but he didn't feel comfortable singing that while touching Cooper. Touching, unfortunately, was a necessary part of casting the spell. It was also kind of a logistical problem, as Chaz needed both hands to play the pipes properly. At least that issue was easily enough solved. Chaz removed his shoe and placed the sole of his bare foot on Cooper's face.

Ravenus eyed him curiously. “I feel it would be remiss of me to not suggest that what you're doing right now might not be very helpful.”

“Shut up. I'm trying to think of a song.” Chaz blew a few notes into the pipes and figured he'd start the lyrics simply and see where it went from there. “Cure Moderate Wounds,” he sang, then tried to think of something that rhymed with wounds. “Hear my moderate tunes.”

Cooper coughed weakly, and Chaz could see that blood was no longer flowing from the hole in his neck.

Holy shit, it's actually working!

Not wanting to lose his momentum, he quickly thought up some more words for the song.

“If ever you're harpooned...” Now he needed something good to bring it home full circle. “Cure Moderate Wounds.”

“What the fuck are you singing?” said Cooper. “And why is your foot in my face?” He still looked like shit. The song could obviously use a little refining. But at least he was unquestionably alive.

Chaz removed his foot from Cooper's face and put his shoe back on. “I just saved your life. I can cast Cure Moderate Wounds now.”

Cooper winced as he sat up. “Hang on. Did you just level up by watching me kill all those goblins?”

“No,” said Chaz indignantly. “I actually killed one of them myself. And I assisted on two others. As for the spell, I don't know how long I've been able to cast it. I keep forgetting to update myself when I level up.”

“Dude, you're already useless enough as a bard. Not using what few powers you have, it's like you're training for the Uselessness Olympics.”

“You know what? I'm getting a little tired of being –”

“WHAAAAAAA!” cried a goblin inexplicably flying toward them like a short, big-headed, terrified Superman. Its cry stopped abruptly when its flight turned into an eight-foot free-fall and it landed hard on the ground in front of Chaz and Cooper.

“Alive, just as you requested,” said Dimplethorn. “Please let us know if you change your mind.”

The goblin sat up. Its eyes were dark and puffy. It was bleeding from both nostrils, and a few of its teeth appeared to be freshly missing. Dimplethorn and the others may have spared the poor creature's life, but not without beating the shit out of it first. Chaz could scarcely believe that those same tiny hands which had so delicately caressed his dick were capable of this kind of ferocity.

“Hey, Shitbag,” said Cooper. “Do you speak English?”

The goblin's eyes darted back and forth like he was considering making another run for it, but focused on Cooper when he picked up Nabi.

“W-w-w-what is English?”

Cooper shook his head. “Fuck this smart-ass motherfucker. Pixie friends, beat the shit out of him some more.”

“Wait!” said Chaz, holding his hands up toward where he guessed the pixies might be hovering. He looked at the goblin. “Do you speak the Common Tongue?”

The goblin squinted at him, then turned to Cooper. “We now converse in the Common Tongue, yet your companion asks if I speak it. Is he...” it tapped a finger against its temple “simple of mind?”

“You mean, like, retarded? Yeah, something like that. He's a bard.”

“Hey!” said Chaz. “Fuck both of you guys. I was just... Never mind. You've got a lot to answer for, buddy. Let's start with why did you and your companions try to kill us?”

The goblin looked genuinely shocked. “You attacked us! We were merely defending ourselves.”

“Don't get cute with me, Fuckface.”

“How dare you!” The little shit was now more angry than scared. “You murder my friends, hold me here against my will, and now you call me this... Fuck Face? My name is Gwlaarkb'harac!”

Chaz and Cooper looked at each other, then back at Gwlaa... then back at the goblin.

“I'm sorry,” said Chaz. “I'm never going to be able to pronounce that.”

Cooper nodded. “If it's all the same to you, I'm just going to stick with Fuckface.”

Chaz didn't want to get too sidetracked with what to call Fuckface. He wanted to get back to his interrogation.

“I'm not talking about this time. I'm talking about the first time, a few hours ago, when you jumped us at the Pool of True Sight, killed the satyr and the old druid guy, and kidnapped our pixie friends.”

Fuckface's expression changed to surprised. “That was you? My apologies. I thought we killed all of you.”

“You came pretty fucking close!” Chaz pointed to Ravenus. “We'd both be dead by now if this bird hadn't thrown up in my mouth.”

Fuckface cringed. “I don't even want to know how that –”

“Why did you attack us?”

“It wasn't you we were after. We needed the pixies. The Dark Lord promised to craft special magical weapons for us, imbued with their spirits, much like your friend's axe.”

“Who is this Dark Lord guy anyway?” asked Chaz.

Fuckface shrugged. “Some dwarf we tried to ambush in the woods a couple of months ago. He was all alone, and looked like an easy target, but he was much more powerful than he appeared. He spared our lives in exchange for our services. Then he paid us well, fed us good food and quality wine, and equipped us with armor and weapons far superior to what we're accustomed to fighting with.”

“What's his name?” asked Cooper. “It's not Dave, is it?”

“He never told us his name. He insisted we call him Dark Lord. We all thought it sounded stupid and laughed about it behind his back, but...” Fuckface gestured around at the creepy forest almost entirely sapped of fauna. “He appears to be living up to the title.”

Chaz didn't like this sound of this at all. “And where might we find this Dark Lord?”

Fuckface nodded in the direction they'd been headed in. “There's a cave just over that way.”

“Morning Glory Hole. We've heard of it.”

Fuckface hung his big head guiltily. “We were meant to be guarding it, but we thought that since the forest was mostly cleared out, except for your group, we'd go on a pixie hunt and have them ready for when our master awakens.”

“When is he due to awaken?”

“When he's drained all the life from the forest.”

“That could be any minute now.”

Fuckface shrugged. “Could be.”

Chaz turned to Cooper. “Then we need to get the fuck out of here, right? We could just carry Fuckface like a football and use him to get past the Dark Ones and out of the forest.”

Cooper stared blankly at Chaz for a moment because Nabi apparently had some opinions on Chaz's suggestion.

“Did you forget what we came here for?” he finally asked.

“I've never been very clear on that, actually.”

“Neither have I.” Cooper stared at his axe. “So, what did we come here for?” He nodded while Nabi explained, then addressed Chaz. “We have to confront the Dark Lord, stop him from draining all the life out of the forest, and then either force him to rejoin Nabi's proper body and spirit or kill him.”

That sounded like a pretty tall order for a weakling, a moron, a goblin, a sentient axe, and a bird. They were like The Breakfast Club, except perhaps even less qualified for the task that lay ahead of them.

“I love every part of that plan,” said Dimplethorn. “Let us go forth and fist the Dark Lord's ass!”

Chaz and Cooper exchanged an uncomfortable glance.

Dimplethorn's colloquialisms needed some work, but Chaz felt a little better knowing his invisible flying friends would be tagging along. Judging by Fuckface's fucked face, they could be savage little monsters when they were pissed off about something.

“Nabi says it's too dangerous,” said Cooper.

“What?” cried Chaz.

“You need to return to the glade and continue expanding the Light Ward perimeter. Start moving it toward the edge of the forest.”

“Cooper!” Chaz realized he was pleading with the wrong person and grabbed Cooper's axe with both hands. “Nabi, please! We need your friends to help us. We got our ass handed to us by a gang of goblins for Christ's sake. You can't expect us to go in there and take on the guy who beat those same goblins into submission, and who's only gotten more powerful since then.”

“Don't worry,” Dimplethorn whispered in his ear. “I believe in Nabi, and I believe in you.”

Chaz let go of Nabi, turned to his left, and whispered back to the empty air. “I don't even believe in me.”

“When you return, I'll have a surprise waiting for you.” Dimplethorn kissed Chaz on the cheek, then flew away. The others flew off with her, their well-wishes and words of encouragement fading in the breeze as they flew back to their glade.

Chaz sighed. “If she wanted to give me one more handjob, I wish she would have done it before we marched to our deaths.”

“That wouldn't incentivize you,” said Fuckface. “I've been learning some new things by observing how the Dark Lord motivates us to do his bidding. I feel that, under the right set of circumstances, I might be able to take on a leadership role of my own some day.”

“I'm not the smartest guy in the world,” said Cooper. “But I expect there's more to leadership than jerking off your employees.”

Fuckface scowled at Cooper. “I never said he –”

“Guess what,” said Chaz. “You just got your first leadership position. You're going to lead us into Morning Glory Hole.”

Chapter 46

“I think we should return to the Whore's Head,” said Julian.

Stacy smiled to herself. She'd known this was coming, and wondered how long he'd been mustering up the courage to bring it up. “I agree.”

“Really?” Julian tried to turn around to look at her, but soon discovered that he wasn't an owl. He faced forward again to guide his horse over the rocky terrain.

“I'm sure Ravenus is there waiting for you.”

“I certainly hope so, but there's also the matter of –”

“We need to bring the die there,” said Stacy. “I was wrong to want to keep it hidden from everyone else. What if we hadn't survived that fall in the desert? What if we'd gotten eaten by dwarven cannibals? We'd be dead, and everyone else would be that much more likely to be stuck here forever. I get it. I'm not the big badass I thought I was.”

“That's not true,” said Julian. “You're every bit that big badass. But there are always going to be circumstances beyond our control. I think we'll both rest easier knowing that the die is as safe as can be, and not solely our responsibility anymore.”

Stacy heard the babble of running water nearby and thought it would be a good time to give her bad-ass a rest. “I think we're far enough away from the dwarves that we can stop for a quick pee break. How about you?”

“That sounds just fine to me. I've been holding it in for a while. There wasn't a really opportune time to go before we left the village.”

Stacy hopped down off the back of the horse and rubbed the soreness out of her butt cheeks. She led the way through some half-dead-looking bushes and found a little stream running down the gradual slope. She wondered if this stream fed into the considerably larger one which formed the southern border of the village they'd just left.

“I'll go behind this rock. You go over there.”

Julian nodded, then eyed the water. “Just give me a heads-up if you're going to pee in the stream. I'll probably want to take a drink.” His thoughtful expression suggested that he was considering the awkward phrasing of what he'd just said. “And I'd prefer there not be pee in it.”

“Okay, that's what I figured you meant.”

“Doesn't hurt to clarify.”

“Of course.”

Stacy had no real desire to pee in the stream, and squatted as far from it as she could to avoid it being an issue. The pee had other plans, though. She watched as one line darkened the otherwise dry stone in a meandering course toward the flowing water. If it reached the stream, it would only be a couple of drops' worth. Comparatively speaking in terms of parts per million, there was likely to be more animal pee in there from farther up the mountain. Did this tiny trickle warrant the awkwardness of warning Julian about it? If the tables were turned, would she want him to tell her? She sighed. Yeah, probably.

“Hey, Julian. There might be just a wee bit of... well, wee, in the –”

Terrified horse screams relieved her of the obligation of finishing her sentence.

“Cassidy!” cried Julian, running out from behind his rock while hastily pulling his pants up under his serape. Stacy wasn't as well-hidden as she'd thought she was, but he didn't even glance her way as he ran toward the horse she hadn't realized had a name.

Stacy pulled up her own pants and readied her bloody hatchet while she jogged up to meet Julian.

Cassidy reared up on her hind legs, trying to throw off the skinny young dwarf woman who had one arm firmly locked around her neck and a slim-bladed dagger stuck deep in her throat.

“Magra!” said Julian. “What are you doing to my horse?”

“So... hungry...” she responded, holding on for her life while trying to end the horse's. Again and again, she plunged the stiletto blade into the wild-eyed horse's throat.

“That's not going to do you any good! As soon as it dies, it's just going to – dammit!”

Magra picked herself up after what looked like a painful fall. She was bleeding from her nose and from a rough abrasion on the side of her face. Her expression was more bewildered than pained, though, as she looked up at Stacy and Julian.

“What happened?”

“It wasn't a real horse,” Julian explained. “Or maybe it was. I'm not really sure how it works. I summoned it with magic. When you kill it, it disappears.”

Magra licked off as much horse blood from the dagger's blade as she could, then suppressed a gag as she swallowed it down. She took a step back and pointed the dagger at Julian.

“You tricked me!”

“What?” said Julian. “What motive could I possibly have to trick you into stabbing my horse to death?”

She narrowed her eyes and nodded, like she was putting the pieces of the puzzle together. “Just like the Tamarian dwarves, you seek to drive me mad until I give in to your demands.” She looked at her hand wielding the dagger, then back at Julian. “That's it. You want the ring back, don't you? That's why you followed me.”

“We didn't follow you. We just –”

“Well you can forget it! The ring belongs to me now.” Her wary gaze darting back and forth between Stacy and Julian, she slipped the Ring of Invisibility off and back on, then vanished.

“Hey now,” said Stacy, raising her hands as non-threateningly as is possible to do while holding a bloody hatchet. “We've all had a rough morning, but we're all on the same side, right? Let's not do anything we'll regret.”

“You should have thought about that before you decided to double-cross me.”

Julian, hands also raised in the air, whirled around to face Magra's voice, which was now coming from the opposite side of him. “I don't want the ring, I swear! Just leave us alone!”

Hoping that Julian had Magra's full attention, Stacy pulled her hood up over her head and dropped as silently as she could into a prone position. She knew she wasn't exactly invisible, but she should at least be more difficult to spot as she blended into the rocky ground. She focused her eyes and ears where she thought Magra was most likely standing, looking and listening for some clue to pinpoint her exact location. A crunch of rock, a tiny puff of dust disturbed by a heavy footfall, anything.

“Excuse me, ladies,” said Julian. “I'm not comfortable being the only one visible here. There's still time for everyone to calm down and talk this out.”

Stacy wished Julian would shut up. As long as he talked, Magra would have a much easier time moving without being heard, widening the statistically probable area of where she might be.

When it finally happened, it wasn't Magra's feet that gave her position away, but rather her head.

The dry withered tip of a tree branch bent back and snapped off. Stacy sprung like a cobra and lunged at the empty air beneath the tree, letting go of her hatchet. She was confident that she could disarm and subdue a starving dwarf girl without resorting to lethal violence.

Magra was kind enough to help her out by trying to stab her, flickering into view just in time for Stacy to dodge the attack, grab her dagger arm by the wrist, and punch her in the face.

The dagger fell out of Magra's hand, and she dropped to her knees, sobbing as blood flowed freely out of her nose.

Stacy kicked the dagger toward Julian. “I'm sorry it had to come to that, but you were losing your shit.”

“Please,” Magra said between sobs. She slipped the Ring of Invisibility off her finger. “Take the ring. But please leave me the dagger. I need it to hunt, and to defend myself if the Tamarians catch up to me.” She tossed the ring to Julian, who caught it with his left hand, then picked up her dagger with his right.

Stacy looked down at Magra, attempting to look intimidating, if not necessarily threatening. “We need to get to Cardinia. Can you point us in the right direction?”

Magra nodded and pointed at a gap between two large boulders. “Go that way. Half a day's walk will take you to a road heading east and west. You'll want to turn east.” She looked pleadingly at Julian, her mustache glistening with blood and snot.

Julian walked up to her. Holding the dagger by the blade, he offered her the pommel.

“Thank you,” she said, accepting the dagger with both hands. “I'm sorry for everything I –” Her teary eyes focused on the ring Julian had slipped onto the blade before handing it to her. She looked up at him. “Is this...” She choked back a sob.

“I'm a man of my word,” said Julian. “And I appreciate everything you've done for us.” He pointed at the ground next to her. “Horse.”

Magra gazed at the horse with hunger in her eyes.

Julian gave her a warning look. “You already know what will happen if you try to eat it. But I thought that maybe you could ride it and try to find your people or, I don't know, maybe chase down a goat to eat or something. It will only be around for a few hours, so try to use your time wisely.”

“Thank you,” Magra said again.

Julian shrugged. “I wish there was more I could do.” He pointed at the ground between himself and Stacy. “Horse.”

“As long as you're in such a generous mood, do you mind if I take the reins this time?” asked Stacy. “My bottom's still a little tender from that last ride.” She appreciated Julian's desire to help this girl in need, but thought he might be going a little overboard in giving so much of their available resources to someone who'd been on the fence about murdering them just a few minutes ago. At least he hadn't invited her to tag along with them.

Julian gestured up at the saddle. “Be my guest.”

Stacy climbed up onto the horse and positioned herself as comfortably as she could in the saddle. Julian climbed on behind her.

“Good luck, Magra,” said Stacy. “I hope you find your family.” She guided the horse in the direction Magra had pointed them in.

“Wait!” said Magra.

Don't ask to come with us. Don't ask to come with us. Don't ask to come with us.

Stacy smiled. “Yes?”

“Don't go that way.” Magra pointed about thirty degrees to the right of where she'd previously indicated they should travel. “The road back to Cardinia is that way.”

“Then what's over there?” asked Stacy, pointing back at the gap she'd been about to lead the horse through.

Magra shrugged. “I don't know. I saw some cave troll tracks. I thought they might kill you.”

Not knowing what to say in response to that, Stacy corrected the horse's direction and slapped the reins.

“What a sweet girl,” she said when she judged they were out of earshot. “I'm so glad we helped her out.”

Chapter 47

“I'm f-f-f-freezing my f-f-f-fuckin' tits off out here,” said Denise. “Can't this thing move any faster?”

“Basil ain't used to this kind of terrain,” Randy explained. The soles of his bare feet stung on the ice. Poor Basil must have been feeling that four times over.

Katherine pulled her big black robe more tightly around her. “Get your fat lazy ass down off Basil and walk. That'll warm you up.”

“In case you ain't noticed, I'm with child. What if my knees go all post partum? You ever think of that? Maybe instead of bein' a selfish whore, you could do me the kindness of lending me that warm-looking robe you got on.”

“Maybe you can go fuck yourself.” Katherine pulled down her hood and made the action of wiping sweat off her brow, though Randy hadn't seen any on there. She was most likely just messing with Denise. “Phew, that feels better. It sure can get stuffy in here.”

“Oh, that's real nice. Just rub it in, why don't – The fuck?”

Randy peered ahead but didn't see anything out of the ordinary, or at least any more out of the ordinary than what had already been established. He glanced up at Denise to get a hint at what she might be referring to.

“Oh my God, I can't believe it!” said Katherine, sounding inexplicably happy while staring at what seemed to be absolutely nothing.

Then he saw the first flake. Then another. Then another. Within a few minutes, they were trudging through a blizzard.

The further they traveled on the ice sheet toward Nazere, the more effectively the ice chilled what should have been warm tropical air. Randy was no fan of cold weather to begin with, but he sensed something unnatural about this coldness that bothered him much more. It felt like evil, and the feeling grew stronger as the air got colder.

“I reckon we're gettin' close to something bad,” said Randy. “Something ain't right about this place.”

Denise threw a snowball at him with snow he'd scraped off Basil's back. “No f-f-f-fuckin' sh-sh-sh-sher, Sh-Sh-Sh-Shitlock!”

Randy felt his heart quicken. What he was feeling wasn't fear, which it probably should have been. It was more like rage. He was getting pissed off about something, and it wasn't that Denise had just thrown a snowball at him.

“I've never seen this much snow in my life,” said Katherine. She followed Denise's lead and scooped up some snow, then packed it into a ball. She turned to Denise, arm cocked back and ready to launch, then her jaw dropped as she stared into the heavily falling snow. “What the fuck is that?”

Two small whirlwinds sucked snowflakes into their swirls as they swayed and meandered toward them like a couple of drunken sailors on shore leave.

Randy drew his sword. He didn't understand why, but he was overwhelmed with the urge to destroy them.

“Take it easy, Randy,” said Katherine. “You can't cut air with a sword.”

“Aw, shit!” cried Denise. “There's three more comin' from the other side. This place has some fucked up weather.”

Katherine took a step back to squint past Basil, then nodded at Randy. “She's right.”

“They ain't weather,” said Randy. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he was sure of it. “Them's some kind of creatures, and they're coming for us.”

“They do seem to be moving deliberately this way,” Katherine admitted. She threw the snowball she'd intended for Denise at the nearest approaching whirlwind. The whirlwind stopped advancing, and the snowball went round and round inside it, spiraling upward in the funnel, then launched out of the top at an impressive speed, hitting Katherine square in the face, dropping her on her ass.

Randy cringed, because that looked crazy painful.

“You son of a bitch!” Katherine honked as she staggered back to her feet. She sounded like her nose might have been broken, and her right eye was shut. She reached into her Bag of Holding. “Scythe!” When she pulled out her weapon, it became obvious that she'd been going for a Grim Reaper ensemble. It would have been more convincing if she didn't currently sound like an angry duck.

The other whirlwinds halted their advance, but Randy couldn't bring himself to believe it had anything to do with their perceived threat of him and Katherine.

A smaller funnel of swirling wind and snow branched out from the whirlwind at Randy's ten o'clock, like it was sprouting an arm. The arm, in turn, sprouted fingers at the end, four of which curled inward, leaving one pointing toward the island. A mouth-like gap opened in the front of it.

“Go.” Its voice sounded like an echo of someone else speaking from the other end of a tunnel.

Katherine brandished her scythe at it. “We're not going anywhere, motherfucker!” She sounded ridiculous.

In spite of not knowing what kind of creatures these things were, or if they were vulnerable to attacks by swords, Randy's every instinct was to charge up and start hacking at them. He had absolutely no fear, which was refreshing in a way after having spent the bulk of his life in a perpetual state of fear. But he also recognized that fear was a valuable self-preservation instinct, and that his life wasn't the only one currently on the line. He took a small sidestep toward Katherine and whispered out the corner of his mouth, “Then what are we gonna do?”

Her good eye fiery with rage and indignation, Katherine hesitated for a moment, then finally said, “Fine. We'll go. But not because you said so. We were going that way anyway.”

“That's right!” said Randy in a show of solidarity.

Denise sighed. “Y'all sure put them in their place.”

As they continued to walk, two whirlwinds flanked them on either side. The largest of them led the way, clearing a path through the snow and spraying it out through its top like the smokestack of an old-timey steam engine. If he hadn't known in his heart that they were evil at their core, and leading him and his friends to an even greater evil, he would have thought the gestures to be exceedingly hospitable.

With all the snow flying around, both from the heavy snowfall and from the mini-tornado clearing the path in front of them, visibility was extremely limited. Randy's first indication that they'd reached the island proper was the grit of sand raining down on him. Their guide was doing such a thorough job with the snow that it was carving a small trench into the beach as well.

Katherine spat a few times. “Hey, would you mind easing up on the sand? That could get in someone's eyes.”

The sandstorm didn't last long anyway, soon replaced by falling shards of ice being stripped off long-dead but well-preserved vegetation and vomited up into the air.

“Ow!” said Denise. “That stings, you fuckin'... living fart!”

The whirlwinds ignored her, continuing as they were, all of them shooting ice shards into the air. Katherine was protected enough with her thick cloak, and while Randy didn't particularly enjoy the sensation of ice raining down on his skin, he wouldn't give these evil creatures the satisfaction of a complaint.

After about twenty minutes of being pelted with ice, they'd made their way out of the vegetation and the snowstorm seemed to be letting up. The sun had just set, but there was still enough light in the sky for Randy to make out the shapes of buildings, or in many cases the collapsed remains of buildings, on either side of the path they were walking along.

“This must be what's left of the once-thriving port town Attal was telling me about,” said Katherine. “What's the point of ruling over this? It looks like shit.”

“That looks a little nicer,” said Denise. She was gawking straight ahead, and slightly upward.

When Randy turned to follow her gaze, a gust of wind swept enough snow out of his field of vision to unveil the magnificent entrance to a massive structure which appeared to have been build entirely from blocks of solid ice.

Two of the whirlwinds broke formation to mingle with two carved-ice statues of large deer which stood on either side of the entrance, facing each other so their great antlers came just shy of touching to form an archway for visitors to pass under. They swept the collected snow from the statues, revealing the ice from which they were made to be much purer and clearer than that which made up the bricks of the wall behind them. As the whirlwinds swirled their way up the antlers, Randy had the feeling that the artist's purpose was to show off just how intricate and delicate he or she could make them.

Once the maintenance was finished, the two whirlwinds took their flanking positions again, and the procession moved inside the building.

Inside was no warmer, but there was no wind. Also, it was nice to be able to see clearly again, especially since the place was so beautifully decorated. Everything was made of ice. Chairs, tables, display cases to show off tiny ice sculptures of people, animals, and an assortment of fantasy creatures, all of it. Even the braziers along the walls, despite clearly being big bowls of fire, were made of ice. Not one of them appeared warped or melted in the slightest, nor did the murals behind them, pictures formed in negative space from ice shaved perhaps a millimeter deep into the walls. Rather than melt them, the flickering flames only enhanced their beauty.

The lead whirlwind, still visible but a little more difficult to see without all the snow, sand, ice and random debris swirling around inside it, ascended a staircase which curved around the right side of the room. The other four escorts moved in closer from behind, a clear suggestion that they should follow.

The stairs were textured with decorative patterns of shallow ridges, and Randy was surprised to discover that they weren't slippery at all. He considered that the ridge patterns might have been put there more for practical reasons than style.

Basil groaned when they started up the stairs. He'd likely never experienced this steep an incline in the desert, and new experiences are scary enough when all of one's sensory organs are in working order. Randy and Katherine stroked him on the sides of his neck, reassuring him that it was safe and encouraging him to keep moving. Basil took small, tentative steps, and the ascent was slow-going.

Smaller braziers lit their way up the staircase, resting on ledges carved into the walls. Randy put his hand near the first one to see if the fire was real or not. It was very real, and he continued to put his hand near them as he ascended.

“Hey,” Denise whispered. “You know what this place reminds me of?”

Randy looked back at her, expecting an inappropriate comment about buttholes rather than any useful insight, but he was willing to take that chance. “What's that?”

“That movie about the ice queen.”

Katherine looked hopeful. “Mordred modeled some places in this world on pop culture. Could you be any more specific?”

“I can't remember what it's called. Frizzles or some shit.”

Katherine shrugged. “Maybe it came out after I got sent here.”

“Maybe.” Denise turned to Randy. “You know the one I'm talking about, right?”

“I don't recall.”

“The one about the fuckin' ice princess, what's her name. It had that song everybody was playin' all the goddamn time. Something like, Let me go! Let me gooooo!”

“Are you sure this was a song from a movie?” asked Katherine. “Or are you getting it mixed up with the memory of some kid you were trying to fuck in your squad car?”

“Jesus Christ, will you just let it – Oh wait, that's how the song went.”

“I didn't really get out much,” said Randy. “And I ain't into princess movies quite so much as you.”

Denise huffed. “You know what? Fuck both of you. Here I am trying to be helpful, and I just get shit on from both sides.”

“Alright, fine,” said Katherine. “If this island is based on Frizzles, what can you tell us about the ice princess?”

“She was born a freak of nature. At least, that's how her parents, the king and queen, thought the rest of society would see her, so they locked her in a room and told her to try to stop being such a freak.”

That sounded a lot like Randy's life growing up. “I might have to see this movie if we ever get back.”

Denise rolled her eyes. “Fuckin' queer.”

“You haven't given us much to work with,” said Katherine. “What does any of that have to do with any of this?”

“Her parents died at sea, and she became queen. Then she lost her shit, froze everything, and ran off to live by herself in a palace made of ice.”

Katherine nodded. “Okay, now we're getting somewhere. So how did it end?”

“That's the part that I think might be relevant.” Denise leaned down to whisper. “They melted her frozen heart with love.”

Randy scratched the back of his neck thoughtfully, trying to think of how they might apply that information to their current situation. “So, what you're sayin' is...”

“I know it ain't gonna be easy, Randy, on account of you bein' a faggot 'n all, no offense. But you're gonna need to fuck the evil out of her.”

Randy didn't know what to say. He was conflicted on so many levels. Again, his paladin instincts weren't equipped to answer these kinds of ethical questions. Was it worse to let himself and his friends suffer the wrath of an evil ice queen, or to whore himself out to her in the questionably valid hope that the power of his righteous dong will somehow make her see the error of her ways and repent? Also, did his own sexuality factor into that at all? Would refusing on the grounds that he was gay be selfish or heterophobic of him? These all felt like stupid questions. He turned to Katherine to ask a simpler one.

“What do you think?”

Katherine shrugged. “It certainly feels like a fucked up Hail Mary play, but if Mordred was a fan of this Frizzles movie, maybe there's some merit in it. Only you can decide if you want to go that route or not. If it were me, I guess it would depend.”

“On what?”

“I don't know. What he looked like. Um... his sense of humor?”

“Seriously?” said Denise. “His fuckin' sense of humor?”

“No, not really. I just couldn't think of anything else off the top of my head and I didn't want to sound shallow.”

“Listen, y'all,” Randy whispered urgently as they got close to the top of the stairs. “I'll do what I can, but I can't guarantee that I'll be able to seduce this woman, or that I'll be able to perform to a standard that will change her fundamental beliefs. That's an awful lot to ask really, when you think about it.”

The lead whirlwind passed through the arch at the top of the staircase. Randy disengaged with Basil to follow it.

On the far side of a vast, mostly empty room, a pale, blue-gowned woman sat on a throne of solid ice which looked like it was designed for someone three times as large as she was. In her left hand she held a golden scepter. Its head looked like the sun, with pointed rays radiating out from it. Mounted in the center, eclipsing the sun, was a pale blue stone pulsating with soft light. The Eye of Rasha.

The whirlwind approached her but stopped about ten feet from her.

The woman pointed at the floor to the right of her throne, and the whirlwind moved in next to her, squatting down so that it looked less like a funnel cloud and more like a doughnut made out of wind.

She opened her mouth and made sounds like wind going through a tunnel, to which the whirlwind responded in kind. Their conversation went back and forth like that, like they were speaking an entire language made up of variations of a single vowel.

“Come forward,” she finally demanded of Randy. “My air elemental tells me there are three of you, and some sort of creature?”

Randy sheathed his sword. “That is correct, ma'am.” He sensed strong evil in her, and wanted nothing more than to charge forth and run his sword through her cold wicked heart, but until such time as that became the prudent course of action, he would be polite.

“And yet I see only one. Where are the others?”

Randy glanced back at the empty archway, then turned back to whom he presumed to be the ice queen. “Basil's havin' kind of a rough time getting up the stairs. They'll be along shortly.”

“My name is Elisa Stormbringer, Ice Queen of the Frozen Damned. And to whom do I have the pleasure of – WHAT?” She turned away and shielded her face with her sleeve. After a few seconds, she began to laugh. “It was a good try, I'll give you that,” she continued without lowering her arm. “Many attempts have been made on my life, but perhaps none so bold, brazen, and preposterous as this. I applaud your creativity. It was almost stupid enough to work.”

“I beg your pardon, Miss Elisa,” said Randy. “But I honestly have no idea what you're talking about or what's going on with your arm right now. As a paladin, I'm honor bound to do what I can to kill you, but I must balance that against my duty to protect my friends and do right by them. To that end, I am prepared to offer you the best night of sexual congress that I can provide in exchange for the gem at the top of your scepter and my friends' freedom.”

“Real smooth, Randy,” said Denise. “I know my panties is all sloppy after hearin' that.”

“I feel like two unrelated conversations are taking place,” said the Ice Queen, still hiding behind her arm. “You're blathering about some ill-conceived plot to seduce me, while I'm speaking of the basilisk you escorted into my throne room with which you hope to turn me to stone.”

Randy sighed with the resolution of a big misunderstanding. He, Denise, and Katherine let out brief uncomfortable laughs.

“You ain't got to worry about Basil. He ain't got no eyes.”

The Ice Queen spoke briefly to her air elemental servant in the strange wind language they shared, then lowered her arm.

“It would appear that you are even more stupid than I gave you credit for. What do you three fools hope to accomplish by invading my island with a crippled basilisk? All you've done is point out a weakness in my defenses which I can now remedy.”

“We ain't much for planning. Basil's just here on account of I didn't feel right leaving him out there alone in the ship.”

“It looks strong enough. I suppose we can use it in the mines. If it doesn't work out, we can always eat it.”

Randy got the distinct impression that neither his offer nor the combined threat of himself, Katherine, Denise, and Basil were being taken seriously. “Now you wait just a –”

“Do any of you have ideas on what kind of work detail you might be best suited for? Do you have any special skills or talents?”

Randy thought about it. “I can heal wounds pretty good.”

“I can split logs,” volunteered Denise.

“Hey, idiots,” said Katherine. “She's talking about slave labor. We didn't come here to apply for jobs.”

The Ice Queen shook her head at Denise. “No, you'll definitely be used for breeding. We have too few dwarves working in the mines.”

Denise's face shook with anger. “I am getting mighty fuckin' sick and tired of folks thinking they can just use me like some kind of fuckin' incubator.”

That caught the Ice Queen's attention. “Is that a frequent occurrence for you?”

“Too fuckin' right it is! I got eight scorpion people babies crawling around inside me right now because some half-bug bitch thought it was okay to just dump a load of fertilized eggs up my cooter. I'd invite you to ask how well that turned out for her, but you can't on account of she's fuckin' dead.”

The Ice Queen turned to Randy. “Dimwitted human who is compelled to speak the truth, is the dwarf truly pregnant with scorpionfolk?”

“She is, and you can call me Randy.”

“When they mature, they'll each be able to do the work of six strong men.”

“The fuck they will!” cried Denise. “Them's my kids you're talkin' about. You so much as lay a finger on one of those freaks, and I'll chop your tits off and sew them together to make a two-nippled ball for them to play with.”

Katherine cringed. “Did that idea occur to you as it was coming out of your mouth, or is this something you've given thought to in the past?”

“I must ponder this,” said the Ice Queen, leaning back in her throne. “What have I done to so please the gods?”

That struck a nerve with Randy. He could take her abuse all day long, but throwing blasphemy on top of it was going too far. And realistically, they weren't going to get a better chance than this anyway. It was four of his group, counting Basil, against two of hers, counting the air elemental. If they didn't act now, while the odds of their success honestly seemed pretty decent, they might as well have not bothered to come.

He drew his sword. “I know one god you ain't pleased!” He ran at her. “In Jesus Christ's name, I smite –”

A blue ray shot out of the scepter she casually pointed at him, and he found himself frozen solid in a cocoon of ice. Having been running at the time, he wasn't in a balanced position, and he fell forward onto his face. Unfortunately, the fall wasn't hard enough to break the ice, but it was plenty hard enough to hurt.

The Ice Queen spoke to her air elemental servant, the language even stranger when filtered through a layer of ice. When they were done, Randy's frozen open eyes could make out Katherine and Basil being led out of the throne room. Shortly after that, he felt himself sliding on the icy floor behind them.

Chapter 48

“And what's in it for me?” said Fuckface, looking smugger than Cooper thought his current situation warranted.

“The fuck are you talking about?”

“You're asking me to betray the Dark Lord, who has promised me an enchanted weapon for my services. It only makes sense that you'd have to offer me something better in exchange for my betrayal.”

“Listen here, you little shitbag,” said Chaz. “You don't seem to understand how negotiation works. In order for –”

Cooper raised his hand to silence Chaz. “I think I know a way to explain this better. Give me that bag of snacks you took from the pixie sled.”

Chaz handed over the pickle bucket-sized burlap sack.

“You want any?” asked Cooper, offering the open bag back to Chaz.

“Not right now.”

Cooper turned to Fuckface. “You?”

Fuckface shrugged, then reached into the sack and pulled out a handful of nuts and raisins.

“Ravenus?” said Cooper, holding the bag up toward the tree branch Ravenus was perched on. Ravenus squawked back incomprehensibly.

When everyone had taken as much as they wanted, Cooper tilted his head back and upended the bag, pouring the entirety of its contents into his mouth.

“What the fuck, man!” cried Chaz.

Cooper regretted going for it all in one mouthful. Chewing that many raisins and nuts at once was exhausting. He could feel sticky drool running down his chin. And now fucking Chaz wanted to engage him in conversation.

“I acku iffu wassum,” he responded.

“What?”

Cooper got his chewing a little more under control. “I asked you if you want some.”

“And I said not right now.”

“Then what the fuck are you bitching at me for?”

“That's all we've got to eat. We were supposed to ration that until we made it out of here.”

Cooper swallowed, and was relieved to not be chewing. “You gave me an idea. I needed the bag.” He turned the empty snack sack inside-out, slipped it over his hand and forearm like a big thumbless mitten, then reached under his loincloth and dug as deep into his ass crack as he could without tearing the bag.

“You learned how to wipe?” said Chaz. “Congratulations. Did you just level up?”

“Wiping is just phase one.” When Cooper felt he'd adequately soiled the inside of the bag, he pulled his hand out of his ass and stood straight.

“You said something about me having inspired this brilliant idea of yours?”

“Yeah,” said Cooper, pulling the bottom of the bag out through the rim so that his ass residue was properly on the inside. He smirked down at Fuckface, who'd been staring curiously at him while he wiped his ass, but who now seemed to be one step ahead of Chaz with regard to knowing what Cooper had in mind.

“Nooo–”

Cooper pulled the bag down quickly over Fuckface's head and pulled the drawstring tight so the mouth of the bag bunched around his neck. He grinned at Chaz. “You called him shitbag, remember?”

“It wasn't a bad idea,” said Chaz. “But I don't know if it was worth using up the last of our food.”

Fuckface was screaming and crying and clawing at Cooper's arm until Cooper gave him a quick little warning jab in the face.

“Knock that shit off,” he said. “Nod if you can understand me.”

Fuckface nodded.

“We need you to take us to the Dark Lord.”

Fuckface nodded.

“In exchange, we're prepared to offer you the opportunity to never have to wear this bag on your head again.”

Fuckface nodded.

“What you're experiencing right now is about a Category 2. When all those raisins kick in, we might be looking at a Category 9 or 10. You're really not going to want the bag on your head after that. I'm not sure you'd survive it. Do you understand?”

Fuckface nodded.

“It's going to be textured with little chunks of nuts as well.”

The bag bulged out in front as Fuckface threw up. Nut-textured vomit dribbled out the tightened mouth of the bag and ran down his neck and chest.

“And then there's that. The point that I'm trying to drive home here is that it's not going to be pleasant. Do you feel I've driven that point home well enough?”

Fuckface nodded.

Cooper let go of the drawstring, and Fuckface's collected puke gushed down his chest and pooled at his feet. “Shall we proceed?”

Fuckface wiped vomit off his chin with one arm and tears from his eyes with the other, then nodded.

“On second thought,” said Chaz, “I think this might be worth possibly starving to death.” His eyes went wide. “I just realized who Fuckface reminds me of. This is just like those Lord of the Rings movies, when Frodo and Sam got followed around by that little gremlin guy. What was his name? Snuggles?”

Cooper's memory of the character's name was blocked by Chaz having asked the question. He was willing to bet a testicle that it wasn't Snuggles, though.

“We're the two unlikely heroes,” Chaz continued. “On a dangerous quest, beating the odds and barely clinging onto our lives, about to be led into a dark and evil place by a little gremlin who'd much rather see us both dead. Fuckface is our Snuggles!”

“Whatever, dude,” said Cooper. “I'm still calling him Fuckface.”

We're nearly on top of Morning Glory Hole. My blades thirst for the blood of the Dark Lord, and you speak this inane nonsense.

“Shit, sorry.” Cooper turned to Chaz. “Nabi's getting impatient. You ready to check out the Dark Lord's Glory Hole or whatever?”

Chaz sighed. “Absolutely not. But as it looks like I don't have much choice, I'm ready to have this whole ordeal behind me.”

“Alright, Fuckface. Lead the way.”

It only took about ten more minutes of walking before the trees were absolutely covered in dead or dying morning glory vines. It was probably very pretty when the plants were healthy.

Indeed, this is one of my favorite places in the forest. I would often while away hours at a time, lost in my thoughts and the sweet smell of the flowers.

“It kind of smells like old pee right now.”

The forest is dying, all of its life being absorbed into the Dark Lord. If we don't end his life now, who knows how much devastation he'll be capable of rendering? Not just in Glittersprinkles Grove, but in the world outside it as well. Those who thirst for this kind of power are seldom content to reign over chipmunks and birds.

“We're here, aren't we? You don't have to keep selling me on the idea.”

When the trees cleared, the titular hole was clearly visible at the center of the glade. Purple vines radiated out from it, giving it the appearance of a puckered sphincter.

Chaz grabbed Fuckface by the shoulder and spun him around so that they were facing each other. “What are we going to find down there? If we run into any unexpected surprises, I'm going to force feed Cooper chili and cabbage every day for a month. I swear to God the only breaths of fresh air you'll get for the rest of your miserable life will be while his ass is spraying explosive diarrhea into that bag.”

My, but that was explicit.

“Intimidate is a Charisma-based skill,” Cooper explained.

Fuckface glanced at the bag tucked into Cooper's loincloth, terror in his eyes. “There's nothing down there bu the Dark Lord and the Green Mother.”

“Hang on,” said Chaz. “Hold the fucking phone. Who the hell is the Green Mother? And why is this the first we're hearing about her?”

Fuckface pointed at something past them. “That's the Green Mother.”

“Oh, shit!” Cooper raised Nabi, ready for action, as he spun around to look in the indicated direction. He didn't see anything that looked like anyone's mother. “Where? Is she behind that fucked-up tree?”

“She is the tree,” said Fuckface. “The Dark Lord draws his power through her roots.”

“What the fuck kind of tree is that anyway?” Its wide green trunk seemed to be made up of smaller trunks all twisted together, not unlike Julian's beanstalk in the Fertile Desert. The leaves were waxy and dark green on one side, and light on the other, like magnolias except that they were perfectly circular.

Only five are known to exist in the world. They bear neither fruit nor seed. As a group, they have no name like oak or elm. In the forests in which they grow, they each have their own names. This one we call the Green Mother. Her roots spread throughout the entire forest, nurturing the other trees.

Cooper scanned the clearing. “The other trees look kind of shitty. Has Green Mother been having some late nights with Meth Daddy?”

“What are you talking about?” said Chaz.

Cooper shushed him and listened for Nabi's response.

The flow of life can be reversed. The Dark Lord is taking advantage of the connection the Green Mother has with the rest of the forest. The Dark Ones feed his share of the animal lives they drain into the trees, where the corrupted energy flows back to him through the Green Mother's roots. But he also drains life from the trees themselves.

Morning Glory Hole was created long ago by an evil druid who sought to do exactly what the Dark Lord is doing. It is the entrance to a tunnel leading directly to some of the Green Mother's exposed roots.

“If she was exposing herself, why didn't anybody fill her hole?”

Chaz and Fuckface glanced uncomfortably at each other.

The druid was unable to endure the excruciating pain of the Green Mother's roots inside him. He was defeated, the evil was banished from the forest, and the raw magic released by the Green Mother's roots brought forth these beautiful morning glories. Such evil is all but unheard of in Glittersprinkles Grove.

“Sure,” said Cooper. “It's like one of those nice neighborhoods where you feel like it's okay to leave your door unlocked until you wake up one morning to find a hobo whacking off into your refrigerator.”

“Hey,” said Chaz. “What the hell are you even talking about now? Did you get any information about the hole?”

“I think Fuckface is telling the truth. It's just a tunnel that leads to that weird-ass tree over there. Not a whole lot of room for traps and ambushes and shit.”

“Maybe we should send him down first just to be sure.” Chaz turned quickly to Fuckface, like he was trying to catch some panicked expression.

Fuckface remained calm. “If you like.”

“Let's get on with it,” said Cooper. “I've got a storm brewing inside me, and I need to know whether or not I'm going to wipe with this bag.”

Chaz was still staring narrow-eyed at Fuckface. “On the other hand, maybe he's so eager to go first because he knows where all the traps are, and how to avoid springing them. Or maybe he intends to run ahead and wake up the Dark Lord.”

“Fuck it,” said Cooper. “I'll go first.” He grabbed a fistful of morning glory vines and started to lower himself into Morning Glory Hole. Had they been healthier, they might have supported his weight. But the vines were far more weakened than he'd suspected, snapping like undercooked noodles and dropping Cooper hard on his ass.

“Cooper!” cried Chaz. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. It wasn't a long fall, and the ground is pretty soft. Send Fuckface down here.” He tried to mask the panic in his voice, suddenly having realized that he'd left Fuckface up there alone with Chaz who, at his best would probably struggle to fight off a goblin. If Fuckface took this opportunity to attack Chaz or run away, Cooper didn't know if he'd be able to climb out of this hole in time to make a difference.

Whether Fuckface picked up on any of that or not remained unclear. If he had considered making a break for it, the threat of the shitbag looming over him was one he was taking very seriously. The vines held his meager weight as he climbed down to join Cooper.

Chaz's failure to lower himself down gently seemed to have more to do with his lack of Strength rather than the vines'. He entered Morning Glory Hole with as much grace and dignity as Cooper had. When he got to his feet, he blew a few shaky notes into the satyr's pipes.

“I see the light.”

The pipes began to glow, illuminating the tunnel ahead of them and annoying Fuckface, who squinted and turned away from them.

Ravenus squawked down at them from the edge of the hole.

“What the fuck does he want?” asked Cooper.

“He wants to know whether he should join us or stay here and act as a lookout.”

“Tell him to stay up there. We're trying to kill a dude in his sleep. He's noisy as fuck.”

The tunnel was wide enough for the three of them to walk abreast, remarkably unremarkable for something of such significance. It was just that, a tunnel. A hole dug through not-very-solid-looking earth. Cooper suspected the only thing keeping the loose soil up top from caving in and burying them all alive was a network of morning glory roots, and in their current state, those weren't something he wanted to put a lot of faith in.

“Let's get moving,” he said, stooping to enter the tunnel and thinking even less of the evil druid who'd commissioned its construction. Would it have killed him to make it just a little taller?

At least it wasn't a long walk, or so Cooper thought. It felt a lot longer in a creepy dark tunnel that might collapse on them at any second than it had appeared from outside.

“Are we descending?” asked Chaz after a few minutes.

“Slightly,” said Fuckface. “The Green Mother's roots run deep.” He caught up to Cooper and pointed ahead. “We're nearly there now. Those old twisted roots sticking out of the side walls there. Those mark the threshold beyond which even we, his faithful servants, were sworn never to cross before he – Stop!”

Cooper and Chaz froze like statues.

“What is it?” said Chaz. “You better not be getting any ideas about turning on us. Do you need another whiff of the shitbag?”

Fuckface leaned in and squinted at something that Cooper couldn't see. “Bring the light closer. Look here.” He ran his finger along some invisible line until Cooper finally saw a razor-thin glint reflected in the magical pipelight, maybe half the breadth of a strand of spider silk. It ran diagonally from the top of the left wall of the tunnel to the bottom of the right wall.

“What is that?” asked Chaz.

“A trap.” Fuckface took the pipes from Chaz and examined the ceiling on the other side of the thread, then squinted back at the ceiling over the side they were standing on. “It's rigged to collapse on us if we walk through it.”

Chaz snatched his pipes back. “I thought you said there weren't any traps down here.”

“I didn't know there were. I never would have seen this one if the light hadn't reflected off it.” Fuckface scowled. “This trap wasn't meant for you. It was meant for us. Goblins can see in the dark. There would never be a reason for us to bring a light down here. He was hoping we would disobey him.”

“I don't know why you're acting all surprised,” said Cooper. “If you start working for someone who calls himself the Dark Lord and whose mission in life is to grow powerful by killing everything and absorbing their souls, you ought to expect him to be kind of an asshole.”

“It just stings a little, knowing it was there the whole time we were being loyal. At least until now, but this doesn't count. I've been coerced. I'm acting under duress.”

“We did our best,” said Chaz. “I guess now we turn around and go back to the Whore's Head?”

“As far as I can tell, there's only the one strand. We can crawl under it.”

“It doesn't bother you that we're standing under tons and tons of earth which is all being supported by a strand that could be broken by a butterfly fart?”

“I didn't ask to come down here,” said Fuckface. “This was your idea.”

Once again, Cooper resolved the issue by taking rash and irresponsible action. Unable to make out the strand now that the light wasn't shining right up against it, he squeezed as close to the bottom left corner of the tunnel as he could manage and marine crawled his way through until his toes were beyond the gnarled roots which marked the beginning of the forbidden zone.

“There,” he said after he sat up. “If I can make it through there, you two skinny bitches surely can.”

Fuckface crawled through confidently, followed by Chaz, who inched through at a snail's pace until Cooper grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him the rest of the way.

Chaz and Fuckface took the lead from there, Chaz shining the light directly ahead, and Fuckface keeping a wary eye out for traps. It was excruciatingly slow, and Cooper's back was beginning to ache from not being able to stand up straight.

“Come on, guys. Let's move this shit along. Getting buried alive is starting to seem like the better option.”

“Hush!” whispered Fuckface. “The Dark Lord slumbers just ahead.”

“Okay.” Cooper spoke as quietly as he could. “So the plan is for me to just walk up to this dude and give him a good solid death chop in his sleep?”

Fuckface looked up at Chaz.

“Oh, you're talking to me?”

“I can't imagine my input would be relevant,” said Fuckface.

Chaz gave Cooper a thumbs-up. “Yeah, good plan.”

Cooper hadn't been talking to either of them.

Yes. Swing true, Cooper. I want to feel the crack of his sternum and the last beat of his evil heart.

“It feels rude. Can't I at least wake him up first?”

Fuckface stared up at him with wide, terrified eyes. “That would be unwise. He has no doubt gained tremendous power by now. If you give him even the slightest chance to wield it, this will end badly for all of us.”

“Also,” said Chaz. “Waking people up is rude. So if you wake him up, and then kill him, that's two rude things.”

Cooper nodded. “You make a good point.”

“Hey, what's that?” Chaz held the pipes up to shine light on something else glistening in the dirt ahead.

Fuckface gasped. “Nothing! I mean, it's another trap. Stay away from it.”

“That's no trap. It's – Oh, shit.” Chaz turned around to face Cooper. “Cooper, don't –”

It was too late. At first glance, Cooper thought he was looking at two shards of a broken stained glass window. Then the realization hit him. Judging by the silent rage practically vibrating inside him, Nabi also recognized her own torn wings discarded in the dirt.

Hearing her tell her story before hadn't had quite the same impact as seeing pieces of his friend lying here on the ground. Cooper could now better understand Nabi's bloodlust. He was almost looking forward to cutting down the Dark Lord and even had to restrain himself from taking a swing at Fuckface here and now.

“Should we bury them?” he asked aloud to distract himself from Nabi's murderous thoughts. “Or maybe take them with us?”

Do with them what you will. They are no longer part of me.

“We'll leave them here then. Let's keep moving.”

Finally, they made it to the chamber. Cooper was relieved, in spite of the horrific scene in front of him, that the ceiling opened up a bit and he could stand up straight.

The Dark Lord, as advertised, was a dwarf. What Cooper hadn't been expecting was for him to be naked, suspended by the Green Mother's roots, arms spread wide like a fat naked Jesus.

The roots, as green as her trunk and branches, snaked around his arms, legs, neck, and torso, their tips buried in his every orifice. They were in his ears, nose, and mouth. Smaller roots slipped between his eyeballs and eyelids. He even had a thick root up his asshole and a thin one going into his pee hole.

Cooper, Chaz, and Fuckface cringed, all of them staring at the pee hole root.

“Killing him will be an act of mercy,” said Chaz. “I can understand how that first guy didn't make it. It must be excruciating. What kind of power is worth having to endure this? And who the hell is this dude who can just sleep through it?”

End him now, Cooper. Let him absorb not another ounce of life from the forest.

“Fine.” The thought of chopping the shit out of a guy with an axe while he was sleeping didn't sit quite right with Cooper, but he understood that any alternative course of action would put countless more lives at risk. He wiped the sweat from his palms onto his loincloth, then got a firm grip on Nabi's shaft with both hands. She was more than willing to take the lead on this one, so Cooper let his mind drift, almost to the point that he wasn't able to stop himself from cutting Chaz in half when he jumped in the way.

“STOP!” Chaz shielded his face with his forearms, vastly overestimating their effectiveness against Nabi's blade.

“Dude!” said Cooper, wresting his Will back from Nabi. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Could you not see that I was swinging a goddamn axe?”

“I know. I'm sorry. I just had a thought.”

“It was almost your last one, dumbass.”

Chaz took a few deep breaths. “I think I might know who the Dark Lord is.”

Cooper groaned as his intestines expanded and constricted inside him. The raisins were catching up to him.

“Are you suggesting he's someone other than this dude with the vine in his dickhole?”

“No, of course not.”

“Awesome. You've cracked the case. Nice work, Matlock. Now will you get the fuck out of the way so I can kill him?”

“Who do we know who is able to put their minds in complete and total vegetative stasis? Who could get penetrated in every conceivable bodily orifice at the same time and not even feel it?”

Cooper lowered Nabi and looked past Chaz at the naked elf suspended by tree roots. “The Dark Lord is Dave's mom?”

Chaz gave him a stern glare.

“Oh, come on. You totally set me up for that.”

“I was talking about Mordred. This could be one of his avatars, completely impervious to pain while another one is active. Fuckface said that they tried to ambush this guy a couple of months ago, right? Vague as that is, it fits in with a possible timeline of being shortly after Mordred looted the Horsemen's villa. He goes off on a killing spree with his new badass weapons. He quickly gains enough levels so that it's not even a contest when he gets ambushed by a bunch of goblins.” He gestured to Fuckface. “He has the knowledge of this place, a nigh-insatiable thirst for power, and is in a unique position to be able to endure the pain of having roots crawl up into his dick.”

“Wait,” said Cooper. “How does Nabi fit into this?”

“Mordred and his little minions catch a curious pixie. He's got a bunch of new magical toys he's eager to play with, so he uses his magical whatever to put Nabi inside his axe. The goblins were impressed.” He looked down at Fuckface. “Weren't you?”

Fuckface nodded. “Very much so.”

“Whoa.” Cooper was impressed with how accurate Chaz's story seemed to be. Then again, Fuckface might just be agreeing to fuck with them. “So how did Nabi go from being created here to being in –”

“Wait!” said Chaz, holding his palms up at Cooper. He turned to Fuckface again. “Mordred knew he was going to be chilling here for a while, and none of the goblins could effectively wield a weapon that large. So he decided to gift it to one of his other selves, the one who was currently most active. He sent a small envoy of goblins to...” He pointed at Fuckface.

“Meb'Garshur.”

“Damn,” said Cooper. “I was being sarcastic before, but you really Matlocked the shit out of that.”

Chaz frowned at Mordred like he wished he was wrong about him. “We have to take him back alive.”

“What?” cried Fuckface.

What? Are you mad? You don't understand what kind of power he's gained, what he's now capable of.

“We don't have a choice,” said Cooper. “This guy's our ticket back home, and he's kind of an endangered species now.”

“Besides,” said Chaz. “The fewer Mordreds there are in the world, the more powerful the remaining ones will become, since they don't have to split their awake time quite as much. Hopefully there aren't too many more of these gain-levels-while-you-sleep kinds of places in the world.”

You saw what he did to me with your own eyes, Cooper. Give me my vengeance!

“I really feel like a dick about this, but Chaz is right. We need him.”

Cooper felt Nabi trying to take full control of him. He fought back, using every bit of Will he had in him.

“I'm... sorry... Nabi. This is... too... important.”

I didn't come all this way to let this monster roam free.

“My... other friends are... counting on me.”

There's no other about it. If you let this vile creature live, knowing what he's done to me, you are no friend of mine. Make your decision.

“I... I...”

“Cooper,” said Chaz. “Are you okay?”

“I...” Cooper felt Nabi abandon his mind, and about a metric ton of shit abandon his ass. He breathed heavily while Chaz and Fuckface did their best to breathe as little as possible. “I'm okay now.”

“Glad to hear it,” Chaz croaked.

“You two get to work pulling the roots out of his junk.” Cooper narrowed his eyes threateningly at Fuckface. “I'm going to wipe my ass.”

The inside of the bag was thoroughly saturated by the time Cooper was done. He almost felt premature pity for Fuckface, but wasn't sure how much betrayal it would take for him to actually go through with putting the shitbag over his head.

Chaz gently pulled the roots from Mordred's nostrils, which came out with a wet slurping sound, dripping with snot and a little blood. They were really up in there, a good twelve inches at least.

Everyone jumped when Mordred took in a deep breath through his nose. He didn't wake up, but he was now breathing normally.

“The roots must have been oxygenating his lungs directly,” said Chaz.

Cooper thought that sounded like bullshit. “How can roots do that?”

“I don't know. I'm not a fucking magical botanist. I just know that he's clearly alive, despite not having been able to breathe normally until just now.”

Realizing that he didn't actually give a shit, Cooper got to work helping Chaz pull roots off of and out of Mordred. The thin ones were easy enough, but the thicker ones were much tougher. Their bright green color was as deceptive as the way they wrapped around parts of Mordred's body. They weren't flexible like vines. This was proper hardened wood.

“There's no way we're going to get him out of this without breaking some of these roots,” said Chaz. “So you might as well save us some time and use the axe.”

Cooper frowned at the thickest of the roots, wrapped around Mordred's torso. “It's the Green Mother.” He held Nabi in front of his face. “Is it bad to chop the Green Mother's roots?”

After a moment, Chaz rolled his hand impatiently. “Well?”

“Well shit,” said Cooper. “She's not talking to me.”

“Is she... gone?”

“No, she's still in there. She's just acting all pissy because I won't kill Mordred.” He wagged a finger at the axe. “Well I'll tell you something. I don't give a fuck about your Green Mother. If you've got any objections to me chopping at her roots, you'd better speak up.”

Nabi remained stubbornly silent.

Cooper held up the axe threateningly at the tree roots. “I'll do it!”

Nabi said nothing.

“I'm going to count to three.”

Nabi continued to say nothng.

“One! Two!”

Silence.

“Two and a half!”

It was getting embarrassing now. Cooper had to make good on his threat, but wasn't yet ready to go whole hog on the big roots. He swung gently down on a root about the breadth of the power cord on a kitchen appliance.

The ground didn't shake. The tunnel didn't cave in. The severed root didn't shoot out a stream of blood. And as far as Cooper could make out, the tree wasn't screaming in agony. In fact, the root healed itself right there while Cooper was staring at it. The clean sever was gone, replaced by a pointed root tip. He looked at Chaz.

Chaz shrugged.

“Is everything cool?” asked Cooper. “If so, don't say anything.” He knew she was in there because he felt a surge of anger and annoyance in his mind that wasn't coming from him. “Alright, let's get this fat fuck out of here.”

Cooper hacked away at the roots holding up Mordred. Some were in difficult-to-reach places without risking a piece of Mordred in the chop, but he managed. The whole process took somewhere between half an hour and forty-five minutes. When it was done, Mordred was still asleep, wrapped in hardened roots with his arms spread out crucifixion style, but he was free of the Green Mother.

“It's going to be a real bitch dragging him all the way back to the Whore's Head like this,” said Cooper as he pulled Mordred away, lest the Green Mother try to fuse any of her roots back together.

Chaz grabbed Mordred's other arm and helped pull. “One step at a time. First we need to get him up to the surface, then we can talk about how to get him back to Cardinia.”

Fuckface, who was stronger than he looked, held up Mordred's feet so that they weren't dragging on the ground. “I have done as you asked. When we climb out of Morning Glory Hole, will you release me?”

“Not quite yet,” said Chaz. “We still need your Ward of Protection to get us out of the forest without getting jumped by those shadow monsters.”

“It's really not our call anyway,” said Cooper. “We need to hand him over to the pixies and let them decide his fate.” He hoped to feel some tingle of forgiveness from Nabi, but he didn't feel anything at all.

Fuckface made his best attempt at sad puppy dog eyes, but he looked more like Yoda taking a dump. “But I helped you! You can't hand me to the pixies. Look at what they've already done to me. They'll kill me for sure!”

“As if we give a fuck!” said Chaz. “You've tried to kill us twice now. You tried to shove their souls into weapons. You pulled out Nabi's wings. Don't start bitching to us about how life isn't fair.”

Cooper felt happy for Chaz, who finally had someone he could look down on.

Fuckface scowled at Chaz. “What right have you to judge me? Have you led a life of complete innocence?”

Chaz laughed. “Dude, you do not get to play the cast-the-first-stone card here. That's not how this works. You're not the Jesus in this situation. We don't owe you shit. The choice you have to make is whether or not you're going to spend what little time you have left between now and then with that bag on your head.”

“Your hearts are full of treachery! We had an understanding, and you –” A clicking sound came from above them. His eyes widened. “Oh sh–”

He was interrupted again, this time by the tunnel caving in on them all.

Unable to see, move, or breathe, Cooper now remembered that they should have been looking out for that thin strand that they'd crawled under on their way in.

“Nabi,” he whispered. “I'm sorry.”

I'm sorry too, Cooper. I know you want to help your friends. That's what I've always loved about you. I was just really angry, and I –

“That's it!” said Cooper. “Thanks, Nabi.” He was so happy that she was talking to him again that he found it difficult to become enraged. Focusing, he spoke the words, “I'm... really... angry.”

His bulging body packed the dirt around him even more tightly. He was now truly stuck, unable to even wiggle a finger, much less dig himself out of however many hundreds of pounds of dirt he and the others were buried under. After all they'd just accomplished, this felt like a really shitty way to go.

He thought he might have a little more wiggle room if he came out of his rage and shrank back down to normal size. Unlikely to do any good as it seemed, he was about to try when suddenly the dirt started lifting away on its own.

He furiously breathed in massive lungfuls of air as the dirt around him continued to rise. He could hear the others breathing greedily as well. Chaz, Fuckface... Mordred!

Cooper looked up. Mordred was levitating about a foot off the ground. His arms were still spread wide apart but no longer because of the roots, which had fallen from him. He wiggled his fingers, producing swirls and wavy ripples in the dirt he held suspended in the air with his mind. He grinned at the magnificence of his newly-acquired powers, until his glowing red gaze fell to Cooper.

“You!” he said, removing any doubt of his true identity.

“FUCK YOU!” said Cooper as he punched Mordred in the dick.

His concentration broken, Mordred fell hard on the ground, cradling his dick with both hands.

Chaz and Fuckface shrieked as the dirt rained back down on them.

Mordred had dispersed the dirt enough so that when it fell back down, Cooper's head was still above the surface.

He came out of his rage and took in the soothing aroma of his own fart as his body shrank back down to normal size. He had some room to move now, and knew he didn't have much time before Chaz and Fuckface suffocated to death, Mordred reemerged from the dirt, or both. He'd have to choose between subduing Mordred or rescuing Chaz and Fuckface.

Use the Decanter of Endless Water.

“I'm glad you're talking to me again, but I've got more important shit to deal with than needing a shower.”

Set it on the ground, point it at your friend, and use the geyser setting.

“Like the dickwater thing from before? I know it was hilarious then, but it seems unnecessarily cruel, considering he's already buried alive.”

It wasn't that funny. Please, Cooper. Trust me.

“Fine,” Cooper grumbled as he dug the Decanter of Endless Water out of his bag. “Everyone's a fucking critic.”

The ground behind him, where Mordred was buried, was beginning to ripple as the first pieces of dirt began to rise. This time the effect was concentrated strictly on the space just above Mordred. He was going to let the rest of them stay buried. What a dick.

Cooper set the Decanter of Endless Water on the ground and aimed it in the direction he thought Chaz was buried in. “Geyser!” By the time he climbed out of his own Rage-Cooper sized hole, he could already see that the power and volume of water gushing out of the decanter was liquefying the dirt covering Chaz and Fuckface. This might actually work. It had better, because Cooper had a dick to punch right now.

You got lucky last time, catching him by surprise. He'll be anticipating another punch to the genitals.

“Well if you've got any better ideas, lay down your cards. I don't have all day to come up with a complicated plan.”

No one expects the shitbag.

Cooper's baser instincts told him that a punch to the dick was still the way to go, but the shtbag idea had merit. Besides, he owed Nabi some vengeance. The shitbag was as close to death as vengeance came, and arguably even more satisfying for the avenger.

As more dirt rose, Cooper walked around to the other side of Mordred's hole and readied the bag. Sweet baby Jesus, was it ripe.

Mordred's left hand burst out of his hole and the flying dirt started to swirl around it. The dirt-tornado grew darker and darker as more dirt lifted from his hole and became part of it. His head and right hand were unburied at the same time, the former taking in another deep breath, and the lattter holding what appeared to be a miniature time-delayed fireball. He was going to unbury them, chuck in a fireball, and bury them again before it exploded. Kind of an awesome way to go, but not today.

When he caught his breath, Mordred laughed as he exhumed his lower body and began to rise. “How very appropriate that the first people to fall under my new powers should be the very people who – ”

As soon as Mordred's head broke surface level, Cooper brought the shitbag down hard on it. The fireball fizzled out like a burning marshmallow dunked in a toilet. The sudden lack of tornado sent dirt flying in every direction. Mordred started to fall, but Cooper caught him forklift-style under the pits, then sat him down and held his arms behind his back.

“What is – NO! Please, no! Please! Plaaaauuuuurrrgggghhhhh!”

Runny green vomit gushed down Mordred's front, leaving little chunks in his hairy dwarf tits. Finally, his body went limp.

Chaz and Fuckface gulped in as much air as their lungs could hold as they crawled out of the soupy mud created by the still gushing Decanter of Endless Water.

Chaz flopped down on the ground like a slimy living turd. “Cooper, you're okay. What happened.”

“I had to shitbag Mordred. The DC on his Concentration check is too high for him to cast any spells, so he tapped out and abandoned this body.”

“That was good thinking, but I don't know how long we can depend on that. We should gag him and tie his hands together to further limit his spellcasting ability. And we need to get him back to the Whore's Head pronto. The sooner this responsibility is out of our hands, the better.”

Cooper wholeheartedly agreed. He picked up the Decanter of Endless Water, deactivated it, and put it in his bag. “So how are we going to get him there? He's heavy as shit. It'll take us weeks to carry him there, months maybe. I don't even know where the fuck we are.”

Chaz wiped mud from his face. “Maybe the pixies would loan us a boar sled?”

Cooper shook his head. “Nabi and I are still kinda on shaky ground. I'm not really in a position to be asking favors right now.”

Take him to the Glade, and my friends will provide you with the requested transportation.

“Oh, never mind,” said Cooper. “She's cool with it. Thanks, Nabi.” He frowned down at the fat naked dwarf at his feet. “Even getting him that far is going to be a bitch.”

Chaz sat up. “I've got an idea. Cooper, ask Nabi if any of the other pixies speak Elven.”

“Nabi, do any –”

I can read your thoughts. Most of my friends are fluent in the Elven tongue.

“Yes.”

“Thank the gods,” said Chaz.

Cooper glared at him. “What the hell, dude? Do you need help writing a fucking sonnet or something? We've got more immediate shit to deal with right now.”

Chaz laughed. “Why drag him all the way back to the Glade, when we can get the pixies to bring the sled to us? Come on. Let's go find Ravenus.”

Chapter 49

The air elementals led Katherine, Denise, Butterbean, and Basil into a large empty room, possibly a ballroom which the Ice Queen hadn't bothered to make furniture for yet. Katherine was eager to swipe the scepter and put this whole ordeal behind her as quickly as possible, but the effortlessness with which the Ice Queen had incapacitated poor Randy gave her pause.

“Aaaaaaaaaah” was the only sound Randy was able to make with his mouth frozen open as he slid past them and hit the wall opposite the entrance. Unfortunately, his icy encasement failed to shatter.

They weren't completely screwed just yet; they still had all their belongings, and the entrance didn't have a door. All they needed was to either break Randy out of the ice or stuff him in the Bag of Holding, somehow distract or defeat the air elementals guarding the entrance, and make a break for it before the Ice Queen –

“Make yourselves at home,” said the Ice Queen, now standing in the doorway.

Shit.

She pointed her scepter at the two corners of the far wall, and a two-foot cube of ice rose out of the icy floor in each corner. “Please, have a seat.”

“I'll stand, thanks,” said Katherine in a useless display of defiance. It proved even more useless when the air elementals swarmed back into the room and got all up in her face. “Fine, I'll sit.” She led Butterbean to the left corner and sat on the big ice cube.

Denise took a seat on the cube in the opposite corner. Randy lay frozen between them. Poor Basil had no idea what was going on. He walked face first into the right wall and groaned.

The Ice Queen raised her scepter in her left hand and spread the fingers on her right hand wide at the ceiling. The Eye of Rasha glowed bright blue as icicles grew long and thin all the way to the floor, forming the bars of four cells. Three of them running the width of the entire back wall, separating Katherine and Butterbean from Randy, and Randy from Denise. Denise's cell was larger, running down half the length of the right wall. Basil's took up the other half.

Katherine really wanted to talk some trash, but she held her tongue. The sooner that frosty bitch left, the sooner she and Denise could break these weak-ass icicle bars.

“Search them,” said the Ice Queen. “Relieve them of all their belongings but the clothes on their backs.”

The air elementals moved in fast. Katherine flailed her arms while Butterbean barked and growled. The whirlwind engulfed her. It flowed in and out of her cloak, against her bare skin underneath.

“Hey!” said Katherine. “That is not cool.”

“You like what you feel, big boy?” Denise was clearly having a better time with her frisking. “Get on up in there. Gimme some of that windy wang.”

Even worse than getting molested by a tornado, Katherine saw her Bag of Holding swirling around her, along with most of her hope of getting an upper hand in the situation.

The elemental disengaged and passed between the cell bars with her bag. Denise's axe, bag, and dignity were likewise flowing between the bars of her cell.

The Ice Queen snapped her fingers, shattering Randy's icy encasement, then sent in an elemental to clean up the fragments and steal all his shit. He was shivering too hard to put up any resistance.

“That's my bag!” said Katherine. She immediately regretted it when the Ice Queen smiled at her. Katherine was showing weakness, and she was eating it up.

“Not anymore. A Bag of Holding will come in handy for my mining operation, but I'm much more curious about you. They say you can learn a lot about a woman by examining what she carries on her person.”

Katherine thought of all the emaciated rat carcasses. The Ice Queen was about to learn some fucked-up shit about her.

There were so many things she wanted to shout as the Ice Queen started walking away. She considered pleading, reasoning, bargaining, or lashing out with some choice profanity-laden insults, but she knew nothing she said would change her situation, and Katherine didn't want to give her anymore satisfaction than she already had.

Once the Ice Queen was gone, Katherine tried to be optimistic. She'd known she was in over her head from the get-go. She'd met harder challenges than this along the way. Like Randy said, she'd become captain of her own goddamn boat when all she'd needed was a ride. Now all that stood between her and the Eye of Rasha were a couple of icicles, each of them only a couple of inches thick at the bottom. She didn't need a black belt in Kung Fu to break through this piss poor effort to contain her.

She waved to get Randy's attention. He was still shivering on the floor, but he slid himself closer to the bars between her cage and his.

“We're going to bust through these bars and jump her while her guard is down,” she whispered. “Wait for my count, then we'll all hit a bar at the same time to minimize the noise. Pass it on to Denise.”

Randy rubbed warmth into his arms as he hobbled to the other side of his cell, where he relayed Katherine's plan.

Denise nodded as he listened, then looked at Katherine and gave her a more resolute nod and a thumbs-up.

Katherine and Randy readied themselves for a kick, while Denise got on her knees and cocked her arm back for a punch.

When everyone was in position, Katherine counted down silently with her fingers. 3... 2... 1... Attack!

She was glad she was wearing thick boots, because she really laid into one of the bars, and it didn't give so much as a nanometer. The Eye of Rasha put out some powerful magic indeed. This was no ordinary ice. It was strong as fuck.

“Son of a motherfucker!” cried Denise, cradling her hurt hand.

“Are you okay?” asked Randy. “You might want to put some ice on that.”

Denise glared at him with her lower lip poking out. “Real fuckin' funny, Randy! You ought to take that show on the road.”

“I'm sorry. I ain't meant it like that. My brain's still thawing out, I think.”

Think. That's what Katherine needed to do right now. She'd been locked in her share of cells during her time in this world, and she'd always managed to figure out a way to escape. She sat down, closed her eyes, and imagined her mind as a freshly erased whiteboard ready to be filled with fresh ideas.

She wasn't a vampire anymore, so turning into a cloud of mist was off the table.

There was no door, so there wasn't any point in thinking up ways to fiddle with a lock.

Her Bag of Holding was gone, so she couldn't get Randy to bag her up, shove her between the bars and –

“What happened to your cloak?” asked Randy, throwing a brick wall in front of Katherine's train of thought.

“What?” she snapped back.

“I'm sorry. Just makin' small talk is all. It looks like you got a hole in your cloak.”

Katherine looked down at her cloak flattened out on the floor. There was a perfectly square hole in the fabric. Recognition hit her like a time delay bomb.

“My hole!” She had completely forgotten about the Portable Hole she'd confiscated from the pervy dwarf who'd been using it to watch her take a bath.

“The fuck you guys talkin' bout over there?” asked Denise.

“Randy discovered my hole!”

Denise shrugged. “First time for everything, I s'pose. Congratulations to you both, but I ain't given up on bustin' out of here just yet. I'm working on an idea.”

“What is it?” asked Randy.

“You just stay focused on her hole. I gotta take a dump.”

The first phase of Denise's plan didn't sound very promising to Katherine. She peeled the Portable Hole from her cloak and flattened it against one of the icicle bars. When she removed her hand, it fluttered to the floor. She tried again, but got the same result. She tried the other side, but it wouldn't adhere to the ice.

“Shit,” she said aloud.

“What's wrong?” asked Randy. “What's that thing you got?”

“It's a Portable Hole. The air elementals missed it when they were looting us. I thought I could get through the bars with it, but it's not working.”

“Come here,” said Denise. “Come on, you fat scaly son of a bitch. It's snack time.” She was on her hands and knees beckoning through the bars between her cell and Basil's. In front of her, on Basil's side of the bars, sat something small and brown.

“What's wrong with you, Denise?” asked Randy.

“Keep your big girl panties on. This ain't what it looks like. Just you watch.”

“Don't you tell me that! You're trying to feed Basil a turd. Basil, you stay away from that!”

Basil moved in for a sniff, but seemed to assess Denise's offering just as Randy had. He groaned and turned away.

“Hey!” said Denise. “You get back here and eat that!”

Katherine shook her head. “You might have better luck if you hold it out to him.”

Denise thought for a moment. “That could... But no. He'd bite my whole goddamn arm... Oh, hardy harr har. You're as much of a hoot as ol' Randy here.”

“There ain't no reason for this,” said Randy. “I always tried to be as understanding as I could with you, in spite of a lot of bad things you done, but this is where I draw the line, Denise. This ain't nothin' but cruelty for the sake of cruelty. If you feed that turd to Basil, you and I is done for good.”

“Dammit, Randy. I'm tellin' you, this ain't – Oh shit!” Denise backed away from the bars and made an unconvincing attempt at looking casual as footsteps approached from outside the room.

Katherine slapped the Portable Hole back on the bottom of her cloak, toward the rear so that the square hole would be less visible.

The Ice Queen stepped back into the room. This time, instead of her usual air elemental companions, she was accompanied by a filthy, sweaty, wild-eyed dwarf wearing torn and threadbare overalls with nothing underneath. He looked like someone out of the Gulfport Walmart.

She smirked at Katherine. “I trust you've tried to break the bars a few times by now?”

Katherine responded only with as steely a glare as she could muster.

“My magic is far too powerful. I would have told you before, but I like to give my new recruits an opportunity to learn that for themselves, work it out of their system if you will.”

Her steely glare accomplishing nothing but making her eyes tired, Katherine sighed and gave into curiosity.

“Who's your friend?”

“Loyalty is rewarded in Nazere. Gabrok here has worked tirelessly in the mithril mines for over a decade and trained hundreds of new recruits. But however expertly a non-dwarf is trained, they'll never match a dwarf in terms of efficiency and productivity. Sadly, dwarves tend to dislike sea travel, and too precious few end up here. Once the she-dwarf gives birth to her scorpionfolk babies, Gabrok will put dwarf babies inside her. But until that time, I shall reward his loyalty and service by allowing him to copulate with her strictly for pleasure.”

Randy pressed his face between two of the icy bars. “That's goin' too far, lady. I can't allow you to –”

“Shut up, Randy,” said Denise. She leered at the filthy drooling dwarf who was gawking at her. “Hey there, big feller.” She winked and squeezed her tits together. “You like what you see?”

Gabrok nodded enthusiastically and drooled some more.

Katherine had been in some low places in life, and at times struggled with self-esteem issues. She'd done some things she was now ashamed to recall. But even at her lowest, she never came close to reaching the depths of desperation that Denise was proudly showcasing right now.

“Step away from the bars, dwarf,” said the Ice Queen.

Denise wagged her ass back and forth as she walked, glancing back lustily at Gabrok. A waddle-sashay is a tricky combination to pull off, and she was light years away from doing so. Or maybe she wasn't. Gabrok was pitching a pretty solid tent. Maybe a decade of loneliness and slave labor were aphrodisiac enough to make Denise, who had only a few minutes before taken a dump on the floor and handled one of the turds with her own bare hands, seem something other than completely and utterly repulsive.

When Denise was at the far corner of her cell, bent over with her hands against the wall and her ass thrust out invitingly, the Ice Queen pointed her scepter at the section of Denise's cell between Randy's and Basil's. Two of the icicle bars liquefied and were reabsorbed into the ceiling.

Gabrok waddled in, grunting and with a maddened hungry gleam in his eyes. Once he was in Denise's cell, the icicles lowered to the floor again.

“Come on, Denise,” pleaded Randy. “You don't have to do this. You're better than this.”

Not that she wanted to witness what was about to happen, but Katherine thought Randy might be giving Denise a little too much credit.

Denise grinned at Randy while Gabrok fondled her ass. “Just you watch, Randy. You're about to witness the beauty of love between a man and a woman the way that God intended it.”

Katherine steadied herself against her cell bars and concentrated on not throwing up. She'd toughened up some during her time in this world, but she wasn't sure she could handle this.

“Please,” she pleaded with the Ice Queen, not even caring about giving her the satisfaction of watching her beg. “This is too cruel, even for you. Can't you bring them somewhere else? I don't want to watch this.”

The Ice Queen cringed, then turned away from the two dwarves engaged in something that involved a lot of moaning and slurping.

“I'll do you this much, but ask no more of me.” She swept her scepter from Katherine's cell to Randy's. The icicles between their cells remained as they were, but the ones on the outside thickened until they formed solid walls. They weren't exactly opaque, but the outside now resembled the TV screen when Katherine and Tim used to try to watch HBO when they were kids and didn't have premium cable. They dampened the sound a little as well, which was nice. A small window was left open facing the entrance to the room, presumably so that Katherine and Randy could breathe. Also a thoughtful gesture.

“Thank you,” said Katherine humbly. I'm choosing my battles and laying the groundwork for what may turn out to be a long-game strategy. I am NOT succumbing to Stockholm Syndrome.

“I shall return in ten minutes, Gabrok,” said the Ice Queen. “I expect that will be plenty of time for you to satisfy your...” The uninterrupted slurping and grunting noises suggested Gabrok wasn't even listening to her. “Ten minutes,” she repeated flatly, then hurried from the room.

Katherine and Randy stared at the floor, purposely not making eye contact. Katherine feared she may never be able to become sexually aroused again as the sounds of dwarven lovemaking continued.

“Give it to me, Gabby!” cried Denise. “Oh yeah! Don't hold back! Oh! Oh! OH! Wait, stop.”

Gabrok let out a warning grunt.

“No, it ain't like that, Gabby. I just want that fat dwarf dong in my mouth.”

Gabrok grunted more understandingly.

“Oh man. Just look at them big hairy stones of yours. I bet you shoot a load like a jizz-breathin' dragon.”

By the quickening rhythm of Gabrok's breathing, Katherine suspected Denise had about ten seconds before she found out whether or not his load would live up to her expectations.

“I'm almost sorry I got to do this,” said Denise.

Gabrok's panting suddenly turned into a howl. It didn't sound erotic to Katherine, but neither had any of the sounds they'd been making this whole time.

“I'm really angry!”

The grunts and slaps and thuds that followed were almost certainly fighting. They had to be. At least that's what Katherine told herself.

“Denise?” said Randy. “You alright? Did he touch you in a way that you didn't –”

“Waaaaaaaaaaaaa!” croaked Gabrok.

Through her small window, Katherine could see the two naked dwarves. Denise was all hulked out, pressing Gabrok against the cell bars and strangling him in a choke hold. Gabrok's erect penis pointed right at Basil, who was sniffing and turning his head to face it.

“Hey, Denise,” said Katherine. “I don't know if this is one of your weird sexual fetishes or whatever, but Basil's about to bite your new friend's dick off.”

“NO!” shouted Denise. She grabbed Gabrok by the matted, bug-riddled hair on the back of his head and slammed his face into the cell bars until he stopped resisting. She dragged her unconscious lover away from the bars and out of Katherine's field of view just in time to deny Basil a dwarven sausage.

Randy sat on the floor and looked up at the small window in his cell. “Whatever he did to you in there is your business. But I just want you to know I'm here in case you need to talk about it.”

“Jesus, Randy. Would you shut the fuck up?” Denise had come out of her rage. “And you! Get your dumb reptilian ass away from them bars. I offered you a snack before.”

Either Basil understood what Denise had said to him or, more likely, he didn't want to be near the turd Denise had left for him. He moseyed on his eight legs to the other side of his cell.

Denise dragged her unconscious conjugal visitor back into view, then reached through the bars to retrieve her turd, which she put in Gabrok's mouth.

Reacting to whatever facial expressions Katherine was unconsciously making, Randy stood up and looked out his window. “I understand you been through a traumatic experience. But is that really necessary? I reckon he's a prisoner here just like the rest of us.”

“Whether he is or he ain't he drools like a motherfucker, and I need to wash this thing off.” Denise closed Gabrok's mouth, squeezed his cheeks in and out, and moved his head back and forth.

Katherine thought she was going to be sick. She wanted to be sick. That would be the normal thing to do in this situation. She was watching a fat naked bearded woman slosh a turd around in the mouth of a fat naked bearded man. The fact that she wasn't puking her guts out right now suggested that this sort of thing was becoming her new normal.

When Denise took the turd out of Gabrok's mouth, Katherine was surprised to see that it had remained rigidly solid, and seemed to be a shade lighter than it was before.

Denise grabbed a scrap of Gabrok's clothes, wrapped it around the turd, and rubbed it together between her hands. When she unwrapped it, it was white. Or white-ish, at least. It would take some serious scrubbing to get all the poo off whatever this thing was that Denise had pulled out of her ass.

She put the hastily cleansed item in Gabrok's left hand, closed his pudgy sausage fingers around it, then shoved his arm through the cell bars.

“Come on back here, Basil,” she said. “I'm sorry. Here's a tastier treat for you.”

Katherine couldn't find the words to express what she was feeling. Considering all the fucked-up shit Denise seemed to be into, she couldn't think of what Gabrok could have possibly done to her in the short time they were out of sight that warranted feeding his arm to a hungry basilisk.

Basil turned back toward Denise.

“That's right, big feller,” said Denise. “Come n' get it. Fat juicy dwarf arm, fresh as can be.”

“Basil, no!” said Randy, slapping the icy wall of his cell. “Please, Denise. Don't do this.”

Denise looked up and winked. “Y'all probably don't want to watch this.”

Katherine didn't know what Denise was going through right now. Maybe whatever Gabrok had done to her really did warrant losing an arm. There was a lot Katherine could judge Denise for, but she wasn't ready to pass judgment on this until she knew the facts.

“Hey, Denise? I know we're not best pals or anything. But if you want to tell me what he did to you, woman to woman, I –”

“He rode me like a fuckin' rodeo bull. It was amazing. I'm sorry I had to cut it short, to be honest. But Basil's got to eat, and I figure it was either my arm or Gabby's. That ain't no choice at all really, when you get down to it.”

Katherine and Randy exchanged a confused look. Since when did Denise give a shit about Basil's well-being? Something didn't add up, unless...

“You twisted sadistic piece of fuck!” Katherine didn't care that what she'd said didn't make any sense. “You really enjoy watching people suffer, don't you?”

Denise shrugged. “Occasionally, but I reckon I'm gonna look the other way for this one. I highly recommend you do the same.”

Basil sniffed Gabrok's hand and licked his big scaly lizard lips.

Much to Katherine's surprise, Denise actually turned around, purposely facing away from him.

Suddenly, things clicked into place, and Katherine knew what was at the core of Denise's turd.

“You're a real asshole, you know that?” she said. “You couldn't have given us a clue about what you were doing?”

Denise laughed. “I warned you not to look, didn't I?”

“Basil!” cried Randy, still staring through his window and slapping the wall. “Don't you eat that! Back off. We'll feed you soon enough, I promise!”

“Randy,” said Katherine, approaching the icicles between her cell and his. She crouched down to look at him where the bars weren't as thick. “Come here.”

Randy reluctantly turned away from the window and came over to crouch down in front of her. “What is it?”

Katherine put her hands through the bars and covered his ears. “Don't look. Don't listen. Stay here with me. Everything is going to be okay.”

Her hands might have helped dampen the crunch of Gabrok's arm bones, but she could see in Randy's panicked eyes that it did sweet fuck all to muffle the sound of Gabrok's screams. Having your arm ripped off by a giant lizard must be a hell of a thing to wake up to. Katherine held Randy's head firm between her hands. He grabbed her forearms but didn't try to wrest her hands away. He just needed something to hold on to.

After a few slurps, smacks, and crunches, Katherine heard the gulp she'd been waiting for. Then Basil let out a long moan. It started soft, then gradually became loud enough to drown out Gabrok's screaming.

Randy tried to pull his head away, but Katherine held it steady.

She smiled at him. “Not yet.”

“Why is you smilin'?” asked Randy. “What the heck is wrong with everybody? Has the whole world gone –”

“What is all this noise?” cried the Ice Queen from outside the room.

Katherine gave Randy a reassuring wink and whispered, “Wait for it.”

The Ice Queen gasped. She was right outside the door. “Gabrok! What did this wretched pig of a woman do to –” Her voice was abruptly replaced with a sound like cracking ice.

“Speak,” Katherine whispered to herself. Then she called out, “Basil, can you hear me?” Randy was now staring at her like she'd gone completely off the rails, which was a good sign that the spell was working.

“I have eyes again,” said Basil. His voice was deep and slow. “I'm hungry.”

“I know,” said Katherine. “I'm going to get you some more rat. But first we have to get out of here. I need you to close your eyes. Can you do that for me?”

“I use those for see. Long time have no eyes. Can't see. Not fun.”

“Your eyes turn people to stone.”

“I'm cold.”

“Basil! I need you to focus. Can you close your –”

“This place no good.”

The sound of crashing ice echoed in the room.

Two questions occurred to Katherine simultaneously. Had the Ice Queen's curse been broken? Had Denise considered that before feeding Basil the Potion of Regeneration?

The first question was easy enough to answer. Katherine let go of Randy's head with her right hand and gripped one of the icicle bars at its thinnest point. It was slippery and wet to the touch. She gave it a good hard yank, and a chunk of it snapped off in her hand.

Randy gasped. “Wha... What happened?”

Time would be running out on Katherine's Speak With Animals spell. She could explain what still needed explaining after she got as much as she could out of Basil.

“Can you break the other ice walls?”

“What's that weird sound you keep making?” asked Randy. “You almost sound like...” The confusion on his face loosened up like an unknotted string of Christmas lights. “Basil?”

“Yaya?” said Basil. Katherine guessed that Yaya was the name Basil had given to Randy. The next sound she heard was his normal reptilian groan. The spell had timed out.

“Keep talking, Randy,” said Katherine. “But don't look at him. Denise grew his eyes back. See if you can get him to break down these ice walls.”

“Basil! It's me, Randy! Come on over here, buddy.”

Katherine could see the rough form of the basilisk through the translucent ice wall well enough to make out that his head was near Randy's window, so she could take a safe peek through her own.

Just as she'd suspected, the Ice Queen was now a statue, her arms raised too late to cover her face, which betrayed the last feelings she would ever have. A cocktail of anger, confusion, and terror.

The only part of her that wasn't gray stone was the gem at the end of her scepter, which still glowed dull and blue, its own magic too powerful to be affected by simple basilisk eye magic.

Basil groaned loudly as he reared up on his four hind legs and lay into Randy's ice wall with his four forelegs. The wall was sturdy, but that was a hell of a lot of lizard. It only took a few pushes and stomps before Basil smashed through the wall.

Katherine dropped to her knees, wrapped her arm around Butterbean, and covered both of their eyes.

“Fuuuuuuuuck!” said Denise from outside the cell room. Basil must have broken the bars of her cell as well as his own. Was she deserting them? “It's slippery as shit 'round here now. Randy, wrap these over Basil's eyes and tie 'em off at the bottom.”

“Ow,” said Randy as whatever Denise had thrown hit him. His eyes would also be closed. “Is this what it feels like? Denise, where did you get these?”

“I found them in another room. The Ice Queen had all Katherine's shit from the Bag of Holding spread out on a table. Looks like she's profiling a serial killer or something.”

“That is such an invasion of my privacy,” said Katherine. “And it's not like it paints an accurate picture of who I am. It's not like I collect dehydrated giant rat corpses as a hobby. Most of the stuff in there is –”

A distant crash and a closer series of loud cracks brought Katherine's attention back to more immediate concerns.

“Hey, remember how big and impressive this ice palace looked when we saw it from outside?”

“Yeah,” said Denise. A hint of worry in her voice suggested she had some idea of where Katherine was going with this.

“The Ice Queen's magic is gone. We're inside a giant structure of regular-ass ice that's melting in the heat of the tropical sun. All of it is going to come crashing down on our heads at any moment. We need to get out of here. Now.”

“How's that blindfold comin' along, Randy?”

“Al...most...there... Got it! Sorry, Basil. This is only temporary until we can figure something else out. Y'all can open your eyes now.”

Katherine opened her eyes and saw what looked like her own legs and ass straddling Basil's face. “My jeans?” She frowned at Denise. “Do you know how hard those are to come by around here?”

Randy tried to turn Basil around, but the melting floor was crazy slippery now. Basil's eight legs were slipping out from under him in every direction.

Katherine wrapped her hand around the Ice Queen's scepter and gave it a yank. The elaborate design was no doubt better suited to metal than stone and snapped off easily.

“You guys figure out how to get him going,” she said to Denise and Randy as she admired the glowing gem atop the broken scepter. “I'm going to go grab the rest of our shit.”

Denise pointed out the door to the hallway leading right. “Second doorway on the left.”

Katherine and Butterbean slipped and slid out the doorway, bouncing from wall to wall as they made their way to the second doorway on the left.

As promised, there was all of her shit laid out on a large ice table. Like most of the furniture in this place, and much of the place itself, it appeared to have been designed with invulnerability in mind. The massive slab of ice making up the top looked really heavy for the relatively delicate legs holding it up.

Katherine only needed it to hold together long enough for her to collect her belongings and get out of there. Spreading her arms out wide to keep her balance, she shuffled carefully toward the table an inch at a time until she reached the Bag of Holding. The Eye of Rasha was indeed a beautiful thing to behold, but she felt great relief shoving it into the bag and out of her sight.

Prioritizing items by proximity rather than usefulness, she scooped as much into the bag as she could reach, including a permanently enchanted Light stone, two dead dire rats, and some clothes. Her next priority was her scythe on the far end of the table. She shuffled sideways until it was within reach, guided it handle-first into the bag, then started loading up the shit nearest it.

“Okay, Butterbean,” she said when she'd finished shoving everything she could reach into her bag. “We probably shouldn't press our luck anymore than we – Butterbean, NO!”

Butterbean whined at her, no doubt wondering why he was being reprimanded for simply taking a piss.

It was too late. With the structural integrity of the table leg compromised by hot and steamy wolf piss, the corner of the massive ice slab crashed down hard on the floor. Fortunately, Katherine was able to get her toes out of the way by the time the other three legs buckled and shattered.

Just when she thought she could afford a sigh of relief, she saw and heard the expanding crack in the floor caused by that first table corner dropping. A sudden realization occurred to her. They were on the second floor.

“I'm really angry!” Denise called from down the hall.

Shit!

A crazed roided-out barbarian was the last thing this situation needed. Every square inch of ice making up these walls was keeping the entire palace from crashing down on them. They needed to move as calmly and delicately as they could toward the exit, praying that they made it out before –

CRAAAAAAAACK!

The break in the floor splintered out like bolts of lightning, the gap near the fallen table widening so much that Katherine could see the foyer below them. She grabbed Butterbean and rolled onto the table slab. If they were going through the floor, she wanted to be sure they weren't crushed under it. Three seconds later, after a deafening crash, she and Butterbean were sitting a good fifteen feet below where they had just been. The table slab fell unevenly, absorbing some of the impact as each of its corners hit the floor beneath them. Except for a cold, wet, and sore ass, Katherine assessed that she and Butterbean were no worse for the wear.

Katherine looked up and saw that the rooms on the other side of the hallway hadn't yet collapsed. She tried to figure out which one of the doorways was the entrance to their cell room. The question was answered when Basil crashed sideways into the doorway.

“One more time,” said Randy from further inside. “We just need to aim a little straighter, and keep his head pointed at the –”

CRAAAAAAAACK!

The floor had suffered all of their hillbilly antics it could stand. It spiderwebbed with cracks, then shattered into a bazillion sparkling fragments and dumping Randy, Denise, Basil, Gabrok's one-armed and probably dead body, and the gray stone likeness of the former Ice Queen of the Damned onto the ground floor. The brittle stone smashed hard on the floor, exploding into a cloud of dust and collapsing into a pile of semi-recognizable chunks.

“Is everybody okay?” asked Randy.

Basil groaned, but didn't appear to be harmed.

Denise, now out of her Barbarian Rage, stood up and rubbed her ass. “Goddamn, that hurt. I feel like I just got jumped by a pack of Randys.

As if to remind them of the danger they were still in, a microwave-sized block of ice crashed through the ceiling about fifty feet away and sent cracks radiating out on the floor.

Katherine looked around. Water was dripping and flowing from cracks and holes in the ceiling and down the walls.

“We've got to get out of here. The whole palace is going to come down any second.”

She squinted through the falling debris. The grand entrance was only about fifty yards away, which would have been an easy sprint if the floor weren't so slippery.

“How we gonna get Basil out?” asked Randy. “He's used to walkin' on sand. He can barely stand up on all this ice.”

Given more time, Katherine was sure she could have come up with a less terrible and disrespectful solution to their problem than the one lying at her feet, but time wasn't currently a luxury she had.

She picked up the Ice Queen's head and looked her in her cold stone eyes. “I'm really sorry about this.” She hurled the head as hard as she could toward the entrance. It landed about halfway and smashed into dust.

“I don't reckon she's gonna get any more deader,” said Denise.

Katherine picked up the most throwable chunks of stone she could find and threw them so they formed a path of gritty stone dust footholds that they could push off from.

Digging her feet in hard on the dust of the initial impact, Katherine grabbed Basil by the tail and started pulling. The big bastard actually moved.

Randy and Denise took the hint and followed her example. They weren't moving as fast as Katherine wanted as more and larger chunks of ice came crashing down around them more frequently, but they were moving.

As they got into a rhythm, they picked up a little speed. By the time they reached the halfway point, Katherine thought they might be able to slide the rest of the way out with one final push off the Ice Queen's powdered head.

She was wrong. They only managed to slide another ten yards before coming to a stop with nothing around them but smooth flat slipperiness.

“Welp,” said Denise. “We done the best we could. Thanks for breakin' us out, Basil. You done good.”

Randy gawped at the suggestion. “I can't just leave him here to die. Not when we're so close.”

“I'm sorry, Randy,” said Katherine. “I don't think we have a –”

“MY QUEEN!” cried a gruff voice from behind them. “You killed my queen!”

Katherine rolled her eyes. Like she didn't have enough shit to deal with right now. She turned back and was surprised to see Gabrok staggering toward them. He was pale and leaving a crimson trail of blood in his wake as it continued to drip from the gaping hole in his shoulder where his arm used to be attached. Even more surprising was the fact that he still had enough blood in his body to maintain his erection.

“Goddamn!” said Denise. “That's some kind of dedication. Was you a virgin before today?”

Gabrok glared and pointed at Denise. “You are to be my bride. The Ice Queen promised you to me!”

“That's not how relationships work,” said Randy. “Denise ain't the Ice Queen's property to give away. You can't just lay claim to a woman and expect –”

“Holy shit, a yeti!” Denise pointed past Randy.

Katherine, Randy, and Butterbean whirled around. The southern wall of the grand foyer was conspicuously lacking in yetis. When they turned back to face Denise, they found her pulling Katherine's jeans back down over Basil's right eye. Gabrok was now an angry one-armed statue.

“Sorry 'bout that, Gabby. I kinda hoped we could finish what we started.” She wrapped her hand around Gabrok's stone dick and snapped it off. “Come to think of it, maybe we can.” She grinned up at Katherine and Randy as if holding the petrified dick of a dwarf she'd just murdered was the most natural thing in the world. “I found some more stone.”

Randy's paladin code might have caused a problem if Denise hadn't pulled the yeti trick, but he didn't make any objections to making use of Gabrok's body now that the deed had been done. They made it the rest of the way out of the collapsing palace on the dead dwarf's smashed and gritty remains.

Katherine was surprised she could actually feel the sun's warmth. She thought this might be a neat place to visit in a month or two once all the ice was gone and the indigenous vegetation had a chance to reclaim the island.

The natural terrain provided more traction, and they didn't have any trouble moving again until they arrived at the ice sheet beyond the beach. Fortunately, the beach had more than enough sand to make a path back to the boat, and Katherine had a Bag of Holding to carry it in.

They got their rhythm going again, and it wasn't long before Katherine began to feel uncomfortably warm under her thick cloak.

“The hell we s'posed to do once we get to the ship?” asked Denise, waddling alongside Basil to keep him facing the right direction.

“I've got a spell I think I can fix the ship with,” said Katherine. “But we need to get there before the ice that's holding it up melts.”

“That's all well and good. But I wonder if it might be wiser to stay on the island, where we might be able to find food and shelter, than it is to make for a broken ship don't none of us know how to sail.”

Katherine had come to this island with a specific purpose. She'd die trying to swim back to Cardinia before she spent the rest of her life stranded on an island with Randy and Denise. But fortunately, she didn't have to tell them that.

“Don't even worry about it. I know how to sail now.”

“Since when?” said Randy.

“I don't know. After the Ice Queen turned to stone, I just sort of figured it out.” Katherine scanned the shimmering horizon and found the dark spot she'd been looking for. “There it is!” She allowed herself a sigh of relief. With the tropical heat and the warm seawater eating away at the ice, she wasn't sure they were going to make it in time.

“The fuck you mean you know how to sail now?” said Denise. “It ain't like one of them Soduki puzzles where the right answer can just pop into your head. Sailing is a skill set learned over a period of time through hands-on –”

CRAAAAAAAACK!

“Oh shit.”

Katherine stopped dead in her tracks. The crack in the ice wasn't visible through the slushy top layer, but she'd felt the ice shift below her feet when she heard the ice break. They had passed the point where the ice remained thick enough to hold them up safely, and that point would be moving faster and faster back toward the island as the ice continued to melt.

Even worse, the cracking sound wasn't isolated to where they were standing. Katherine could hear it off in the distance, coming from the direction where her ship was now sinking into the water again.

“You guys stay here,” she said to Randy and Denise. “I've got to go save the ship. Whatever you do, don't m–”

CRAAAAAAAACK!

“WRAAAAAAHHHHHH!” Basil groaned as the ice gave out from under him.

Randy dropped to his knees on the edge of the fractured ice sheet, desperately trying to grab hold of Basil's thick scaly skin.

“Don't worry, buddy. I ain't gonna let go. You hang in there. Randy's here.”

Katherine tried to think up another miracle she could pull out of her ass, but poor Basil was just too big for her to make use of her Portable Hole or Bag of Holding. She couldn't waste anymore time thinking about it, or they'd lose both Basil and the ship.

“I'm sorry, Randy.” She looked at Denise. “Don't let Randy die too.”

Denise nodded solemnly, then grabbed Randy in a choke hold.

“Basil!” Randy croaked through his squeezed trachea as Denise pulled him back away from the edge.

“YAAAYAAA!” groaned Basil just before his head disappeared under the water.

Katherine turned and ran for Nightwind. The sinking ship was certainly a factor in her haste, but so was the fact that she didn't want to be seen with tears running down her cheeks for this moron and his pet lizard.

Butterbean ran alongside her, and she shuddered to think about the same thing happening to him.

Poor Randy. But really, there was nothing I could have done.

Every footfall brought forth bigger and bigger splashes of watery slush, and Katherine knew that it wasn't going to be long before one of her feet went straight through the ice. She wasn't going to make it to the boat on foot, so she took off her cloak, shoved it into the Bag of Holding, and braced herself for another cold swim.

“Stay, Butterbean!” she said as she ran.

Butterbean moaned an objection.

“I'll be right back. I promise.” She felt bad for having to take a harsh tone with him, but she needed him to know it wasn't up for debate. “Now STAY!”

Butterbean moaned again, but it grew distant as she kept running and he obediently stayed put.

Nightwind was in some serious trouble. The rear end was only a couple of inches above the water. If it went under, there wouldn't be anything she could do.

With the slush getting thicker and thicker, Katherine thought swimming might be the faster option. Rather than wait and be surprised, she decided to take the guesswork out of when she was going to crash through the ice. She took a deep breath, jumped as high as she could, and came down hard on her heels.

She crashed through with ease. The water was chilly, but not quite as much as she'd expected. The tropical warmth was quickly reclaiming its rightful territory, and Nightwind was probably only hanging on by less ice than it took to chill a can of beer.

She swam to the front of the ship where the ice had broken through the hull. For all the weakness of the ice around it, the chunk still sticking though the basketball-sized hole was too solid to break off. She needed some air, and she needed to stall for time.

After punching through the surface, she poked her head through the weak ice and sucked in as much semi-refrigerated air as her lungs could take in. The ice was too weak to walk on. Her Spider Climb spell would have come in really handy right now if she hadn't needed a different second level spell to fix the boat.

She held her breath and went back underwater, punching through the ice again when she reached the rear of the ship. There wasn't enough rear for her to have to climb over. It was level with the sea, and Katherine feared she might be too late. There was only one way to find out. She pulled herself aboard, swam underwater to the deck, and opened the Bag of Holding.

Water swirled into the bag, but Katherine wasn't able to tell if she was bailing out the ship, or merely pulling in more water from outside. She remained there holding the bag open until her lungs screamed for oxygen. Then, just when she was about to break off and swim up for air, her head surfaced above the water.

She'd done it. At least, sort of. The ship's rear was now a good three inches above sea level. Some outside water was still sloshing in, and there was still a big hole in the front, but it was definitely an improvement.

She held the Bag of Holding over the side. “All the water.” The bag vomited all the water it had taken back into the sea where it belonged.

Repeating the process a few more times yielded less and less results, until Katherine saw that the ship was actually starting to sink again. The ice which had been half-assedly plugging the hole in the hull must have either snapped free or melted away. It was time to fix the ship.

Katherine cranked open the cargo door just enough so that she could slip down into the hold, then reached into the Bag of Holding. “Light stone.”

She held the stone before her as she entered the cargo hold and swam to the front of the ship. The ice was gone, and water was flowing freely into the breach. Katherine dropped the bag and the stone, placed her hands on the damaged wood, and hoped that being underwater wouldn't affect her spellcasting abilities.

“Warp Wood,” she bubbled out with the last of her breath.

The wood surrounding the hole thickened and twisted against her hands. Under normal circumstances, this would be a spell one would use to sink a ship rather than keep it from sinking. And while it didn't completely repair the hole, it did appear to have significantly reduced the size of it. Nightwind was still in extreme danger of sinking, but Katherine hoped that the Bag of Holding could outpace the leak until she was able to prepare another spell. It was time to find out.

She swam down to the bottom of the ship, grabbed the bag, then pushed herself up toward the cargo door.

A few bagfuls of water over the side later, she was winning the fight again.

“Hey!” Denise's voice was barely audible above the balmy tropical breeze, creaking wood, and sloshing water.

Katherine trudged through the knee-high water to dump the bag over the right side so she could try and see where they were. Denise and Randy had caught up to Butterbean. Katherine waved at them.

“You fix the boat or what?”

“Kind of!” she shouted back. “Stay there! I'll come and get you!”

She filled and emptied the bag three more times before she felt she'd bought enough time to bag up her traveling companions and return to the ship before it sank. When she was as satisfied as she thought she was likely to be, she dived overboard and swam as hard as she could toward them.

“Get in the bag,” she said when she reached the swiftly melting ice island they were all huddled on. She flopped the Bag of Holding down at Randy's feet.

“You all go ahead,” said Randy glumly. “I failed Basil. I watched him drown while he was screamin' for me to save him. I deserve to join him.”

“Listen, Randy,” said Katherine. “I'm sorry for your loss. I really am. But my arms and legs are fucking exhausted right now. There will be time enough to mourn once we're on solid ground, and we're not going to make it that far without your help. So please cut the drama and get in the goddamn bag.”

Denise didn't wait for a response from Randy. She picked up the bag and pulled it down hard over his head, then held it open for Butterbean, who was more than ready to jump inside. Finally, she pulled the bag down over her own head. Katherine grabbed it and swam back to Nightwind. The thought of those two hillbilly fuckwits taking over bailing duty while she got some rest was the motivation that got her back on board.

After Katherine pulled them out of the bag, she demonstrated her water bailing method while they caught their breath. Once she was satisfied that they could take over without her supervision, she retired to her captain's quarters, sipped a bit of Captain Martinoli's spiced rum, and let herself drift off to sleep.

Chapter 50

The sled ride back to the Glade was one of the most terrifying and uncomfortable rides Chaz had ever been on. He knew Fuckface would kill him if he thought he could get away with it. The only thing keeping Mordred from killing all of them was the shitbag over his head. Ironically, though, it was Cooper who'd come closest to killing him when Nabi had been willing to chop straight through him to put an end to the Dark Lord.

Also, the sled hadn't been built to seat four, so it was kind of cramped. And the stench of Cooper's raisin shit wasn't at all confined to the shitbag.

It was a long slow ride, and Chaz was able to watch the sun set behind him and rise ahead of him before they finally arrived.

The Glade was busier than it had been the last time they'd visited. There were now dozens of pixies working and cavorting in the rays of sunlight that poked through the forest canopy. Chaz supposed they might have been there before and had chosen to remain invisible and silent, but that seemed unlikely.

When the boar pulled up, everyone stopped what they were doing and approached cautiously, some of them turning invisible. It occurred to Chaz that all the pixies they'd met so far fell inside a young adult age bracket, and he'd wrongly assumed that's just what pixies look like no matter how old they get. But while most of the pixies assembled in front of them looked like they might get carded for beer, there were a few elderly folks as well as some young children among them. The former appeared almost as youthful as the pixies he'd been traveling with, but the bold and vibrant colors of their hair had faded to grey. The latter were so tiny, they could fit in his cupped hand.

Nabi's sister, Hollywhirl, fluttered down to the front of the crowd, trying to look pleased to see them, but her eyes kept twitching toward Fuckface.

“You have succeeded. New buds grow on the tree branches. Thanks to you, we shall enjoy a second spring, and it is safe enough for the children and elders to fly outside again.” Her smile faltered as she glanced between Fuckface and Mordred. “I see there are more of you now than there were when we first met. To whom do we have the honor of welcoming to our Glade?”

“You've met Fuckface,” said Chaz, gratefully stepping away from the sled. “As long as you keep him alive, his Ward of Protection will help you ferret out and destroy the rest of the Dark Ones.”

“And the other one?”

“This is... Mordred.” Technically not a lie.

“And Mordred is...”

“My uncle,” said Cooper. It was Chaz's fault. He should have spoken before Cooper had a chance to.

Hollywhirl narrowed her eyes at Cooper. “You, a half-orc, ran into your dwarven uncle wandering around in a lifeless forest, then proceeded to bind his hands with rope?”

Cooper farted nervously. “He was abusive. He used to get drunk and touch me in bad places.”

Hollywhirl flew closer, sniffed the air, and backed away. “Is that a bag of shit on his head?”

Chaz was tempted to let Cooper keep talking and see how deep a hole he could dig himself into. But he wanted to get to the Whore's Head and unload the responsibility for Mordred off his shoulders as soon as possible.

“That's the one you refer to as the Dark Lord.”

The whole crowd gasped, which was weird considering a good three-quarters of them had turned invisible by this point.

“And you brought him here?” cried Hollywhirl. “You were supposed to slay the Dark Lord, not bring him into our Glade!” She glared at Cooper. “Where is my sister? She wouldn't have stood for this.”

Cooper held up his axe non-threateningly. “She's still in here. And for what it's worth, she was very much opposed to this.”

“The Dark Lord took Nabi's wings. Nothing would have stopped her from reaping her vengeance.”

“We need Mordred alive. Nabi wasn't happy about it, but she put my needs and the needs of my friends before her own thirst for vengeance.”

Hollywhirl circled Cooper, scrutinizing him. “I believe you, both because my sister can be very foolish and because I have personally witnessed your pathetic attempts at lying.”

“Thank you.”

“Do you realize how much power the Dark Lord has consumed?”

Cooper nodded. “A substantial amount.”

“And you seek to contain that power with a bit of twine and a bag of shit?”

“It seemed a lot less stupid before you put it that way.”

Hollywhirl turned to the assembled pixies. “Bind this dwarf properly and get to work on some anti-magic wards.” When several of them flew away to follow her orders, she turned to Chaz.  “Dimplethorn had more faith in your safe return than most of us. She's been waiting to give you a token of our appreciation.”

Cooper snorted.

It was awkward enough without Hollywhirl announcing it in front of everyone. Was it supposed to happen here? With everyone watching? Chaz didn't want to be rude, but getting jerked off by a pixie in front of Cooper and a crowd of spectators was where he drew the line.

“Hey, listen. About that. I don't mean to sound unappreciative of the offer, but I –”

“There you are!” said Dimplethorn, flying hurriedly into view. She smiled at Chaz. “Sorry I'm so late. I was making some last minute preparations for the surprise I promised you. Please follow me.”

That sounded more promising. She was going away from the crowd, and they weren't following her. Chaz wasn't half as bothered about everyone knowing what they were up to, so long as they weren't actually watching it happen. She would have rubbed his dick raw before he could have shot a load under that kind of pressure.

Dimplethorn led him to a particularly wide elm tree at the edge of the glade. It was still a little too close to the crowd for his liking, but if they went on the other side of it, he could probably block them out mentally long enough to squirt.

But she didn't go on the other side of it. Instead, she flew up to the branches and started tugging random ones. Just when he was about to ask her what she was doing, the ground opened up at his feet. Roots and stones formed steps leading down into a secret tunnel beneath the Glade.

Dimplethorn flew inside, then turned to him with a seductive smile. “Watch your step.”

Now this was some first-class privacy. Chaz followed her down the curved staircase, careful not to slip on the mossy stones. He was exhausted from the long sled ride, but he had most of his Strength back now, and he was confident he could give her a load that she could truly remember him by.

He unlaced his pants and started stroking life into his dick. There was no point in making her work from ground zero. While he didn't want to seem overzealous, getting an erection going would be an act of courtesy, and a compliment as well. As his dick got hard in his hand, he wondered what kind of preparations she had made. Scented candles? Lube? Booze? He hoped it was booze.

After they reached the bottom of the stairs, Dimplethorn led him down a corridor much better-constructed than Morning Glory Hole had been. The support arches keeping the ground from caving in on them were made of living wood. Some of them were actually sprouting leaves. Luminescent fungus growing on of the walls illuminated their way.

“This is where we hid the elders and spritelets from the Dark Ones,” she explained.

“Oh?” said Chaz, feigning interest but wishing she would talk about something other than old people and children. He stared at her tiny pixie ass as it bobbed and weaved ahead of him. He was going to plaster her to the fucking wall with jizz.

Whoa. Calm down there. We don't want to squirt too early again. One time is a fluke. Twice is a pattern.

Chaz stroked more gently. It took skill and focus to maintain an erection without escalating toward ejaculation. In game terms, he imagined it would involve a combination of Dexterity and Willpower. The very act of imagining it in game terms was part of the process of de-escalation. His mind was still focused on his dick, which kept it at attention, but thoughts of numbers and statistics and dice and a table full of nerds were almost as much of a counterbalance to his arousal as the room full of children that Dimplethorn led him into.

“Surprise!” said Dimplethorn, turning around to face him. “We've been working on this ever since – Oh dear.”

A dozen pixie children and half as many elders gawked as Chaz frantically tried to pull his pants back up over his stiff and aching junk while at the same time jumping out of the doorway. He failed spectacularly in both endeavors, tripping over his own feet and falling hard to the earthy ground.

He rolled out of his audience's view, pulled his pant up properly, and started lacing over the tent he was now pitching.

The children in the room were laughing their tiny asses off.

“What the fuck was that?” said Chaz. “I thought you were going to... you know... like you did before.”

“Not in front of a bunch of spritelets and elders!”

“How was I supposed to know they were down here?”

“I told you they were. But I supposed you were distracted.” Dimplethorn huffed. Her face was flushed. She peeked back into the room and cleared her throat until the kids stopped laughing. “Would you mind giving us a little time alone?”

Chaz sat against the wall and covered his face as the pixies filed out of the room and headed down the corridor toward the surface. Some of the elderly ones were voicing their opinions on what just happened.

“Shameful.”

“Typical human.”

“Were we supposed to be impressed? Proportionally speaking, it wasn't anything special.”

When the voices got far enough away, Chaz chanced a peek.

“They're gone now,” said Dimplethorn. Her voice was heavy with the distraction of knowing she was going to have to face those people again.

Chaz crawled hurriedly into the room. “I'm really sorry about that. You have to believe I didn't know there were –”

“Of course I believe you.” Dimplethorn smiled at him. “I've believed in you since I first met you. You are the hero I have –” She glared at something giggling invisibly behind her, then reached into a small pouch on her belt and hurled a handful of glitter at the seemingly empty space.

Some of the glitter fell to the ground, but most of it stayed suspended in the air, taking the form of the heads, torsos, and arms of two pixie children. They let go of the laughter they'd been trying hard to suppress as they flitted out into the corridor.

The awkwardness of the situation was only a little less comfortable than Chaz's aching balls, angry at being denied the release they were promised. Right now, he wanted nothing more than to go find a private place to deliver on that promise, then get as far away from this forest as possible. Dimplethorn was a sweet girl, but Chaz knew that there was a threshold for how badly he could fuck up in a relationship and still have a chance at repairing the damage. And he knew that he'd crossed well over that threshold the moment he jerked off in front of a bunch of children and old people. It was time to cut this one loose, get the hell out, and never look back.

“You've been more generous to me than I deserve,” he said. “I really can't accept anything more.”

Dimplethorn's face turned angry. “I told those children a story of the hero who would deliver them from the Dark Lord's power. They've worked very hard over the past couple of days to decorate this for you. Toss it on a fire for all I care once you leave this wood, but you will leave here with it.”

Chaz was beginning to suspect that the surprise Dimplethorn had in mind was not, in fact, another handjob. He followed her teary gaze to the paint-splattered table at the center of the room which all the children had been gathered around when he first entered.

Atop the table sat some kind of oddly-shaped leather box, covered in colorful hand-painted illustrations of what the children obviously expected his confrontation with the Dark Lord to have looked like. There wasn't a single depiction of a naked dwarf with a bag of shit over his head, but there were a bunch of pictures of a kick-ass bard blasting the shit out of some black demon beast with energy beams and lightning bolts which emanated from a variety of musical instruments.

“Are these... me?”

Dimplethorn wiped a tear away and nodded.

None of these kids had ever seen Chaz, but the similarities were enough to tell that Dimplethorn had given them some rough guidelines to work with. An instrument of choice was clearly not one of those guidelines, however, as Chaz was depicted kicking the Dark Lord's ass with horns and pipes and harps and lutes and... Finally, he recognized the strange box for what it was.

“It's a lute case,” he said appreciatively.

“You said your last lute broke. I thought this might help you take better care of your new one.”

“That's very thoughtful of you. When I acquire a new lute, I shall keep it safe in here.”

Dimplethorn rolled her eyes. “Open the box, stupid.”

Chaz undid the clasp holding the case shut, then opened the lid. While the case was hastily finger-painted by a bunch of kids, the instrument itself was an exquisitely tasteful mix of art and nature. Like the support arches keeping this bunker from caving in on them, the lute appeared to be made of living wood.

Inspecting it more closely as he carefully lifted it out of its case, Chaz saw that even the strings gleaned with the green sheen of living wood. They were pleasantly firm and responsive as he strummed, filling the room with strong, pure notes.

He looked up at Dimplethorn. “How does a thing like this exist?”

“Many of our elders are skilled craftsmen, and feyfolk are very fond of music. They applied their knowledge and scaled up their efforts to account for your size. Then the elder druids enchanted the lute as I requested. None of them believed in you as I did, and I had to consume much elder seed to have this made.”

“Oh wow,” said Chaz. “You shouldn't have done that. Honestly, you really shouldn't have.”

Dimplethorn frowned. “Yes. Elder seed is most bitter.” Then her eyes lit up as she flew closer to him. “But I think you'll find it was worth it. There is magic in the lute. For every ten minutes you play, you can work a Suggestion spell into the music.”

“Useful. I can see how that would be worth gulping down gallons of expired pixie jizz.”

“I'm so happy you like it!”

Chaz placed the lute back into its case. As delighted as Dimplethorn seemed to have gone to such lengths to have this gift made for him, he felt bad about accepting it. But he knew that not accepting it would mean that she'd blown a bunch of geriatrics for nothing.

“Thank you,” he said as non-awkwardly as he could. “I'll always cherish this.”

“You'll play us a song before you leave, won't you?”

Chaz closed the case, picked it up, and backed toward the doorway. “Of course. I'm just going to need a few minutes alone to get a feel for the strings.”

Dimplethorn smiled. “I'll see you on the surface.”

Chaz nodded, then hurried back up the tunnel and into the woods in search of a private place where he could empty his balls.

Chapter 51

The monotonous task of bailing out a ship with cracks in the hull proved therapeutic for Randy. He didn't blame Katherine for Basil's death. As much as he'd wanted to right after the fact, he couldn't even bring himself to take the blame. He could have done things differently. He could have left Basil on that island, and he might have done that and stayed there with him if things hadn't been happening so fast. But he knew that whatever mistakes he'd made were just that, mistakes. He'd done his best to take care of Basil, but his best hadn't been good enough. As he picked up the Bag of Holding, which Denise had tossed down to him from the deck, Randy prayed that Basil was in a better place.

“I reckon we can take a break,” Denise called down to him. “Now that we know we can bail it faster than it can fill up, we might as well let some water accumulate.”

“You go ahead,” said Randy, happy to have the work to occupy his mind. “I'm gonna keep going.”

“We been at this all night, Randy. And all the while that lazy tree-huggin' bitch and her wolf have been sleeping. You ever notice this whole trip seems to be about her? She puts our lives at risk to save her good-for-nothing brother. She runs off and leaves Basil for dead to save her precious boat. Dumb bitch is gonna get us all killed, mark my words. She's spent a couple of days on a boat, same as us, and thinks she knows everything there is to know about sailing now? That sound right to you?”

“Maybe she's a quick learner.”

“Don't nobody learn nothin' that quick.” Denise leaned in, poked her head down into the cargo hold, and spoke in a low voice. “I tell you what, Randy. When a week passes with no sign of land, and the hunger really starts to set in, I reckon she's the first to go.”

Randy was going to voice his objection, but Katherine spoke up before he could get a word out.

“Good morning.”

Denise jerked her head up and slammed it hard against the cargo door. “Son of a... Fuck!”

“Sorry,” said Katherine. “I didn't mean to interrupt. What were you guys talking about?”

“Um...” Denise rubbed the back of her head as she pulled out from the cargo hold. “Gilligan's Island. Like, what if they never made it to the island, and they was all just stranded out on that boat? Which one should they eat first? I chose Mary Ann. Stupid bitch has it coming if you ask me.”

That was a decent attempt at a save, depending on how much Katherine had heard before making herself known.

Katherine cranked the cargo door open wider until she could see Randy. Randy was shocked to see how light it was outside. Had they really worked the whole night through?

“Who did you choose?” Katherine asked Randy.

“I ain't given it much thought, to be honest. Maybe Gilligan?”

Katherine sat on the deck, letting her feet dangle down into the cargo hold. “That's interesting. Why Gilligan?”

Randy shrugged. “This whole line of thinking is pretty gross. I ain't got nothin' against Gilligan, and I don't want nobody to eat nobody. But if I had to choose, he seems like the most ethical choice.”

“More than the Howells? They've lived the longest and most privileged lives.”

“That ain't no reason to eat them,” said Randy. “I reckon that whatever happened that got them all lost, it was most likely Gilligan's fault. And he'll probably keep on screwing things up, as he tends to do. The longer he stays alive, the more people will eventually have to be eaten.”

Katherine nodded. “I can see some logic in that. It's odd that neither of you chose the Skipper. The rest of the gang could survive for weeks on his fat ass.”

“That's crazy,” said Denise. “He's the only one who knows how to navigate the goddamn boat.”

“Hmm... You make a good point. It seems then that the rest of the crew would do well to shut the fuck up and do what the Skipper tells them to do, so that everyone can get back to land as safely and quickly as possible.”

Randy wasn't certain, but he felt there may have been some subtext in that.

“I might change mine to Ginger,” said Denise. “She thinks she's such hot shit. See how hot she looks with them titties chewed off.”

Katherine sighed. “Okay then. That's enough of that. I've collected a few scraps of wood I think I can seal the rest of the breach with, but I won't be able to hold them in place from the inside while all that water's gushing through. I need you two to lower me down on a rope so that I can plug the cracks from the outside.”

That seemed unnecessarily risky to Randy. “Why don't you just use that spell you done when you was climbin' all over the side of the boat before?”

“I'll use it if you two somehow manage to fuck up the task of holding a rope, but I'd rather keep it in case I need it later.”

“Good idea.” Randy waded toward the cargo door, his exhaustion now catching up to him. Half the water he was wading through might have been his own sweat. He was actually looking forward to getting out on the deck and letting the sun dry his clothes.

Katherine tossed a loop of thick rope down to him. “You're going to be the anchor. Put this around you and keep your eye on the breach from inside.”

So much for drying off in the sun. Randy held the loop open and stepped into it like a pair of pants. He pulled the loop up to his waist and slid the knot toward him until it was snug. He looked up at Katherine. “That's a nice knot.”

“I know, right? I swear I didn't know how to tie that yesterday.” She secured herself in the loop on the other end of the rope, then handed the middle coil to Denise. “You're the relay. You keep me held steady and pass messages back between me and Randy.”

“I know what a fuckin' relay is. Let's get this thing done.”

While he waited for either a relayed message from Denise or something to happen from Katherine's end on the other side of the hull, Randy opened the Bag of Holding and drained out as much water as he could so that the breach was visible. Water sprayed in through the thin cracks. The pressure was so great that the water was painful to touch. Randy agreed with Katherine's assessment that it would have been impossible to plug the holes from inside.

After a few minutes of watching the water spray in, the spray patterns changed. Randy could hear a faint banging sound from outside. Katherine was trying to hammer in ill-fitting pieces of wood to close the gaps. It wasn't working. No less water was getting in the boat, it was just coming in at different angles.

Randy was disheartened by Katherine's effort, and a little bit embarrassed for her. She'd seemed so confident in her ability to fix the problem, but this was a Kindergarten-level solution. He supposed it was good that she hadn't wasted that spell at least.

But now they were back to being stranded at sea. If it really did come down to having to eat each other, Randy thought he might simply take his own life. Sure, suicide was generally considered a sin, but if it was done to keep other people from having to choose which person they was going to kill and eat first, then he figured Jesus would understand.

After all, he'd given his life so that we all might –

“The heck?”

The water stopped gushing in as suddenly as if someone had turned off a faucet. The breach was completely sealed. Those pieces of wood Katherine had forced in had warped somehow, expanding to fit the gaps exactly.

“Hey Randy!” Denise shouted from up on the deck. “She wants to know if it worked!”

“Yes!” cried Randy. “I don't know how, but she did it! He started pulling the rope. “Reel her in. This one's a keeper!”

Katherine boarded her ship once more and ordered Denise down into the cargo hold to help Randy sweep the rest of the water into the Bag of Holding. She complied with zero fuss.

“I am none too pleased at the way she thinks she can boss us around like this.” Denise voiced her opinions extra low and repeatedly glanced up at the cargo door to make sure Katherine wasn't peeking in on them. “So she fixed a hole in a boat. Big fuckin' deal. That don't give her the right to treat us like slaves, makin' us do all the work while she struts around on the deck like some kind of Panamanian drug runner's wife. You given any more thought to what I asked you about before? About when the hunger sets in?”

Randy shrugged. “Y'all both made good enough points, but I reckon I'm gonna stick with Gilligan.”

Denise's eyes went wide with terror. She glanced back at the cargo door. When she turned back to Randy, her eyes had their usual look of annoyance again.

“Goddammit, Randy. I'm talking about us. Who knows how long we're gonna have to wait out her before another ship passes by to rescue us? There's only so long we'll be able to survive on them shriveled up rat corpses. Sooner or later, we're gonna have to make a hard decision, if you catch my meaning. When the time comes, I got to know if you're gonna have my – Whooo!” Denise fell on her ass into a puddle as the ship jerked forward.

Randy managed to keep his balance and steady himself. “Are we... moving?” He splashed some puddles as he ran toward the cargo ramp. When he got to the deck, he found all the sails open and full of wind. He looked over the railing to see water rushing toward the rear of the ship. They were really moving. Katherine actually seemed to know how to sail.

“Katherine?” Randy called out when he couldn't find her.

“Uh heee!” Katherine's voice was coming from above, but it sounded like she was gagged.

Randy looked up and found her hanging upside down with her legs twisted up in the rigging. She had the end of a rope in her mouth, the other end of which was attached to a small black triangular sail.

“You all right?”

Katherine finished fiddling with whatever she was fiddling with, then took the rope out of her mouth to tie it to the whatever. She smiled down at Randy. “Not too shabby, huh?”

“Well I'll be a motherfucker,” said Denise, joining Randy on deck. She frowned up at Katherine. “How the fuck did you learn how to sail in a goddamn ice prison?”

Katherine crawled halfway down the mainmast like a squirrel, then hopped down the rest of the way, landing confidently on her feet. “I must have leveled up. The way I understand it, you get more abilities and skills when your character reaches a higher level. I must have gotten the Sailing skill or something.”

“And just what in the hell did you do to reach a higher level?”

“I don't know. Maybe we got a bunch of Experience Points for killing the Ice Queen. She was kind of a badass.”

“I killed the Ice Queen,” said Denise. “Y'all ain't done shit.”

Katherine shrugged. “I guess the game decided it was a team effort.”

“Bullshit! It was my idea to feed that potion to Basil. And it was me who carried it up my asshole that whole time.”

“I meant to ask you about that.” Katherine cocked her head sideways and narrowed her eyes at Denise. “That demonstrated a lot more foresight than I believe you're capable of.”

“Thank you.”

“Why did you have that potion up your ass?”

“I –”

“And don't even bother trying to tell me it was part of your plan to take down the Ice Queen all along.”

Denise scowled as she mentally revised her answer.

Katherine's expression grew more impatient. “Tell me the truth, or you'll spend the rest of this trip in the cargo hold.”

Denise sighed. “Fine. I swiped it from them cannibals on the foggy island. I thought I might be able to use it if we ever got back to Earth. Maybe I could grow my nuts back, you know?”

“That's a perfectly valid reason,” said Katherine. “I'm honestly really impressed that you thought of it. Why would you feel compelled to lie about that?”

Denise shrugged. “I don't know. I guess I just ain't comfortable talkin' bout my missin' nuts in front of a lady and a faggot.” She looked up at Randy as if shocked by her own words. “I'm sorry, queer.”

Randy wasn't sure how that was supposed to be any better, considering the context, but she sounded sincere enough.

“I'll keep an eye on the horizon,” said Katherine. “You two get some rest. You've earned it.”

Randy and Denise stretched out on the benches that ran along the walls at the ship's rear and took in some sun.

“Hey Denise?” said Randy.

“Yeah?”

“What happened at the end of that Frizzles movie? I mean with the townsfolk and all that. Did they ever come to accept her?”

“Oh yeah, right away. It was like they never gave a shit about her ice powers in the first place. She made it snow in the summer, and everyone thought she was the fuckin' tits.”

“Then why did the king and queen lock her in a room?”

Denise shrugged. “Shitty parenting, I reckon. She would have been way less fucked-up if they'd died a lot earlier.”

It was sad to think about, but she might have been right. Then again, it was possible that Denise wasn't giving the most faithful a synopsis of the story. Randy decided to reserve his judgment on that until he was able to see the movie for himself.

“Hey Denise?”

“Jesus Christ, Randy. I'm trying to get some fuckin' sleep.”

“I appreciate you using up that potion to save our lives. I know how much you miss having testicles.”

“It ain't nothing to get all weepy over. There's more potions where that came from.”

That was true. When they figured out a way to get back home and in their proper bodies, Randy and Denise could take another trip with Captain Longfellow. Randy could say a proper goodbye to Alexei, and Denise could get another one of those potions. Randy drifted off to sleep with renewed hope that someday, somehow, everything was going to be all right.

Chapter 52

“I never thought I'd be this happy to get back to this city,” said Julian as he and Stacy rode through the northern gate of Cardinia and into the crowded, bustling streets. “It's kind of scary how much this place is starting to feel like home.”

“I'm just happy to be out of those goddamn mountains.” Stacy scanned up and down the main street hoping to see a food vendor. They'd managed to scrounge enough to keep themselves alive, but she longed for some properly prepared food. It didn't have to be gourmet. Hell, it didn't even have to be good. Some of Goosewaddle's Arby's would even go down nicely right now. She could tear into that shit.

“Do you think Magra intentionally sent us down the wrong path?” asked Julian.

“Nah. I think she's just genuinely terrible with directions. Getting lost was how she got captured by those Tamarian freaks in the first place, remember?”

“There sure were a lot of trolls in those mountains.”

“Lucky for us they're pretty stupid and they've really got a taste for horsemeat.”

Julian frowned down at the horse he was riding. “I feel really bad about that.”

Stacy gave him a friendly punch on the arm. “You did what you had to do. They're in a better place now.”

“Sometimes I think that when I die I'll have to answer for all of these horses whose lives were cut short prematurely because of me.”

“You think God's a brony?”

Julian gasped. His eyes widened.

“Jesus, Julian,” said Stacy. “Relax. That wasn't a serious suggestion. I'm not even sure if I believe that God exists... or bronies for that matter.”

“No, it's not that!”

Stacy had seen that look on his face one time before. “Is it Ravenus?”

Julian nodded. “He must have made it back to the Whore's Head.” The excitement faded from his eyes and voice. “Now that I know he's okay, I feel bad for not having been more concerned about Cooper and... Shit, what's that other guy's name?”

“The bard? I don't remember. Wasn't it something like Steve?”

“Yeah, I think it was Steve. Do you think it's possible that they could have survived that fall?”

Stacy shrugged. “Anything's possible. We survived.”

“We survived because you built a hang glider with bamboo, bedsheets, and your extremely high Intelligence score. They didn't have any of those things.”

“Cooper's tough as shit, though. Physics is kind of wonky in this world. Maybe he had enough Hit Points to survive the fall.” Stacy frowned. “That being the case, I wouldn't hold out much hope for Steve.” Her growling stomach reminded her that there was probably food at the Whore's Head. “No point in all this speculation. Let's go and find out.”

They guided their horses as fast as safety and courtesy on the busy Cardinian streets would allow, which wasn't very fast at all. They probably could have made better time walking.

The Whore's Head Inn was barely in view when Stacy spotted Ravenus diving down at them like a black feathery Tomahawk missile.

“JUUUULIAAAAAN!”

Stacy wiped a tear away from her right eye. The reunion was as touching as a man hugging a bird could be.

“I didn't think I'd ever see you again,” said Julian. “You wouldn't believe what we've been through since we got separated.”

“Ha!” squawked Ravenus. “You think you've been through some strange and unpleasant circumstances. Just wait until I tell you about our little adventure.”

“Our? Does that mean that Cooper and Steve are alive?”

“Steve, sir?”

“Holy fucking shit!” said Cooper, stepping out the Whore's Head entrance.

Stacy screamed and clapped her hands. “Cooper!” She ran up to give him a big hug, then slowed down once the smell hit her and raised her hand for a high-five. When she got a few feet closer, she settled for a wave. “Hey!” Then she waved at Steve, who'd just come out to join Cooper. “Hey, Steve!”

Steve frowned. “It's Chaz.”

“Oh, that's right. Sorry.”

“I'm glad you guys made it back,” said Cooper. “I thought you might still be on the Crescent Shadow. I was about to start heading back that way to look for you.”

“I think we would have been long dead by now if we were still in those cages,” said Julian. “But thanks for the thought.”

Cooper and Chaz stood aside to let them inside. There weren't as many people around as there were last time Stacy had been in there. The ones she knew by name, Frank, Rhonda, and Tony the Elf, nodded at her and Julian over their drinks. Stacy hadn't been expecting a ticker tape parade, but she was once again disappointed at the amount of enthusiasm her arrival provoked from these people.

“I knew you'd gotten out of the cages,” said Cooper. “I figured if Dave could get out, the rest of you surely could.”

Stacy stopped thinking about food for a second. “Dave? What do you know about Dave?”

Cooper pointed his thumb back toward the group at the bar. “Frank said Dave was here about a week ago.”

“A week?” said Julian. “How could Dave have gotten here before we did? Dave never gets anywhere first.”

“Dave has undergone some changes recently,” said Frank. His tone suggested he was even less excited about Dave's arrival than he was about theirs. “I don't expect he'll be returning here anytime soon.”

Julian put his hand over Ravenus, who was tucked into his serape. “What are you talking about? What happened to Dave?”

“He's a wererat. He arrived here with some old wizard, lost control of himself under the full moon, and ripped the poor old bastard's throat out.”

Stacy gasped. This was all sounding too familiar. The last time she'd come here, she'd arrived with Julian, who had recently reunited with Ravenus. She'd been greeted coldly by people who'd witnessed one of their own commit a murder. Were the similarities even more specific?

“The old wizard he killed. Was it a Mordred?”

Frank shrugged. “I don't think so. At least, that's not how he introduced himself.” He glanced at Rhonda and Tony the Elf, who shrugged and nodded in response. “But speaking of Mordred, we may have captured another one.”

“We brought him back,” said Cooper. “It's totally him.”

“Are you serious?” said Julian. “Did he identify himself?”

Frank swallowed back some beer, still not looking nearly as enthusiastic as he should with that kind of news. “He seems like the real deal. But there's no point in getting all worked up about it. Until we have one of those dice, he's just a liability in a coma tied to a chair in the cellar with a bag of shit over his head.”

Stacy and Julian looked at each other. Stacy was curious about the bag of shit thing, but felt it could wait until after she revealed her own bit of news. She pulled the chain out of her pocket and let the die hang below her hand.

“Cheer up, Frank. We didn't come back empty-handed either.”

She could practically read the thoughts going through his head by the changing expressions on his face.

What the fuck do I care about some souvenir trash piece of jewelry.

Then again, I'm curious if it has any magical properties.

Holy fucking shit! Is that one of the dice?

The last stage was punctuated with a spray of beer from Frank's mouth.

“I can't believe it,” said Rhonda. “Where did you... How did you...?”

Stacy brushed her fingernails on the front of her tight leather top as she approached the bar. “A little bit of detective work, a little bit of asskicking, and a pinch of seduction.”

Julian cleared his throat. “I seem to recall there being some teamwork involved.”

Tony the Elf reached out tentatively for the die.

“Please,” said Stacy, thrusting the chain into his hand. “You don't know how thrilled I am to hand off the responsibility. And now that we've got Mordred, we should be all good to go, right?”

Frank shrugged. “We thought that once before. It proved a little more complicated than that, as you may recall.”

“I have Suggestion,” said Chaz.

After a tense moment of silence, Frank spoke up. “Yes? We're listening.”

Chaz rolled his eyes. “No, I meant I have the spell Suggestion. Remember I mentioned it before? One of the pixies gave me a magic lute which casts the spell. I think I can coerce Mordred into saying our names while we force him to hold the die.”

Frank nodded. “Very good. That just might do the trick. Now, how do we go about waking the fat son of a bitch up?”

“I have a suggestion,” said Chaz.

Everyone glanced away from him like they were embarrassed for him.

“Dude,” said Cooper. “I know you don't get to feel useful very often, but –”

Chaz stopped him with a middle finger, which he then displayed to everyone else until he had their attention again. “I meant an actual suggestion on how we might wake Mordred up.”

“That, um...” Tony the Elf cleared his throat. “free-spirited dwarf woman who arrived with Randy beat the shit out of the last Mordred we captured, but didn't get so much as a whimper out of him.”

“Pain isn't going to do the job. That's why Mordred was able to let the Green Mother penetrate him.”

Rhonda cringed. “Maybe you can skip this part?”

Chaz turned to Cooper. “Do you remember what caused Mordred to wake up?”

Cooper shrugged. “I figured he had some kind of Contingency spell set up to wake him if somebody was trying to pull the Green Mother's... um... appendages out of his... um... orifices.”

He seemed to be trying to choose his words carefully, but the images forming in Stacy's head were almost certainly worse than whatever the reality had been.

“Wrong,” said Chaz. “If that was the case, he would have woken up as soon as you started chopping at the wood pumping life force up his ass.”

Frank and Tony the Elf winced.

Frank pushed his beer glass to the side. “Seriously, is this leading to a conclusion of some sort?”

“You said Mordred didn't wake up when Denise beat the shit out of him. Do you know if she tried suffocating him?”

“No,” said Frank. “And I'm going to have to stop you there. We're not proud of how we handled things before, looking the other way while Denise tortured a guy in our cellar.”

“Maybe suffocation was too strong a word. I'm just talking about pinching his nose and lips closed for a minute to see if that forces him awake. When he woke up in the forest, it was right after the tunnel caved in on us.”

Frank, Rhonda, and Tony the Elf looked at each other and nodded their consent.

“Fritz,” said Tony the Elf to someone in the small crowd which had gathered around them. “See if you can pry the die loose from the dragon claw.”

“Not a problem,” said the elf who enthusiastically accepted the task assigned to him.

“Be careful with it.” Tony the Elf seemed uncharacteristically giddy. Even Frank had a spark of hope in his eyes.

Rhonda watched Fritz walk back to his table with the die, then stared down into her nearly empty beer glass. “We might still have a problem.”

“Shit,” said Frank, like he knew it was too early to start getting his hopes up. “What is it?”

“What if we need the same die that brought us here to get us back? We've only got one of the dice. Does that mean only one-sixth of us get to go home?”

“It's better than nothing,” said Stacy. “If that's the case, those of us who get left behind can start an expedition to go find the other dice. Sure, it'll take a little legwork, but it's not impossible. It's certainly no reason to not celebrate a small victory while we've got one.”

“That's right,” said Julian. “And it's also nothing to get all gloomy about until we know if that's the case or not. Let's work with what we've got, then go from there.”

“Got it!” cried Fritz, holding up the die, now unmounted from the pendant.

Frank gulped down the rest of his beer. “Fuck it. Let's do this. Somebody go downstairs and drag that tubby piece of shit up here.”

A solid-looking dwarf pointed at Cooper. “You, let's go.”

Cooper followed him down into the cellar. When he moved out of the way, Stacy noticed Chaz scribbling something on a piece of paper.

“What's wrong?” She asked Julian, whose face was showing less excitement than the current median excitement level at the Whore's Head Inn.

“You know I can't go back yet.” Julian stroked the feathers on Ravenus's back.

Stacy genuinely felt sorry for him having to make a choice between keeping his bird friend and returning to his real life, but also a little frustrated that it was actually a choice at all.

“Yet? What's your plan? Are you going to hang out here until Ravenus dies of natural causes? That could be decades. And in the meantime, who knows how much of your real life you'll have let waste away? I don't want to sound callous, but you need to say goodbye.”

Julian was staring at her like he had something to say the whole time but was waiting to let her finish speaking her mind.

“Ravenus. I need to speak with Stacy alone for a minute. Would you mind waiting outside?”

“Of course, sir.” Ravenus hopped onto his forearm, then launched himself into the air and flapped out the still open front door.

“I'm not going to tell you that saying goodbye to Ravenus isn't going to be difficult. But I can't leave here without the people I arrived with. What about Dave and Katherine? For all we know, she could have even had Tim resurrected. And then there's Randy... and Denise, I guess.”

Stacy nodded. “You're a good friend, Julian. I'll stay back and help you gather everyone together. But...” She really didn't like how vulnerable what she was about to say made her feel. “Will you promise me that you'll come back after we get everyone? I've been doing some thinking, and it's going to be tough trying to form a serious relationship with a man who hasn't had this experience. There would always be this part of my life that I'd either have to keep to myself, or sound like a crazy person for talking about.” Now that she'd actually spoken it out loud, it sounded less vulnerable and more heartlessly pragmatic. “And there's also the fact that I really like you, of course.”

Julian smiled, but there was sadness in his eyes. “The Horsemen had no memory of their time here. I'm probably not even going to remember having met you.”

Stacy's chest tightened. She didn't want to forget her time here, and she certainly didn't want to forget Julian.

“At least I won't have to worry about that sounding like a crazy person thing.”

Julian shrugged. “You were still normal you when you saw me and Goosewaddle trash your boss's office with a horse and a giant scorpion. You'll probably still remember that.”

“Shit, that's right. How am I going to explain that?”

“Or your sudden disappearance just after the fact. I bet you're a person of interest.”

A few short moments ago, Stacy's biggest concern was how she was going to reconnect with Julian back in the real world. That seemed frivolous now that she was looking at being unemployed and wanted by the police.

Before she could think up anything to respond with, the crowd at the cellar door parted to let the strong-looking dwarf through. He held the back of a sturdy wooden chair as he backed carefully up the stairs. Sitting in the chair was another dwarf, this one naked but for the ropes that tied him securely to the chair, glowing crystals on hempen twine tied to his wrists, ankles, and around his neck, and a splotchy brown cotton bag covering his head. The facial expressions on the crowd which was now backing further away suggested that the aforementioned bag of shit was not a metaphor for something else.

When Cooper, who was carrying the bottom of the chair, reached the top of the staircase, he and the dwarf brought the prisoner to the middle of the room and set him down. Cooper placed his hand on the bag.

“Ready?”

Frank nodded eagerly, rolling the magical die between his palms.

Cooper lifted the bag, revealing the horrified face of a dwarf who had seen better days. He was asleep, but his parting expression, still frozen in place, suggested it had been an emergency evacuation. His bushy beard, mustache, eyebrows, and hair were all caked in a dried brown substance which Stacy doubted very much was mud.

“Would you mind doing the honors?” Frank asked Cooper. “I mean, since you're right there already.”

Cooper scowled at him. “Fine.” He pinched the captive dwarf's nose with one hand and pressed the other hand firmly over his mouth.

Stacy counted in heartbeats. She didn't make it to ten before the dwarf's terrified eyes popped wide open.

Cooper let go of the dwarf's face and backed away.

“How do you live with yourself?” cried the dwarf. “I'll be doing you a mercy when I destroy you!” He struggled with his ropes, seeming to only now realize that he was tied to a chair. He scanned the room, sneering at everyone. “You're all the same fools I sent here. I thought a taste of reality might toughen you up, make you respect the game more. But all you've done is cower here in your little tavern, wishing to go back to your dreary ordinary lives and squandering this opportunity for greatness that I've given you.”

“Holy shit,” said Frank. He was breathing hard and fast. “It really is you. You twisted son of a bitch. We've got you.”

“You've got nothing.” Mordred nodded toward Cooper. “This idiot saw me move tons of earth with my new powers. Do you honestly think you can contain me with simple ropes?” He closed his eyes, turned up his palms, and began chanting.

Most of the Whore's Head gang started backing toward the door, but Cooper moved behind Mordred and held the bag of shit ready to bring down on his head.

Mordred opened his panicky eyes. “What's wrong? What happened?”

Cooper grinned and lowered the bag. “Those pixies didn't fuck around. I told them the shitbag was keeping you under control, but they insisted on putting a bunch of anti-magic crystals on you.”

“If I have to abandon this body, my others will only grow stronger faster, and when I come for you I promise my vengeance will not be swift.”

“You can't really abandon it now. We know how to wake you up.” Cooper rubbed his stomach. “Your threats are fucking with my insides though. I only wiped with the bag before. Next time I think I might just fill it up.”

Mordred's sneer disappeared. He was not taking Cooper's threats lightly.

“What do you want from me?”

Stacy looked at Frank. He seemed as impressed as she was that Mordred was finally compliant.

“You know what we want,” said Frank. “We want to go home.” He turned to Chaz. “Let's see what you've got.”

Chaz nodded and pulled out his lute. It appeared to be made of still-living tree branches, but it sounded surprisingly musical when he began to strum the strings.

“We found you underground

with tree roots up your keister.

I suggest you make no sound

until I tell you, Mister.”

Mordred's eyes said “What the fuck?” and though his mouth tried to do the same, no sound came out.

“Ha!” said Chaz, obviously very proud of himself. “What do you think of that?”

Everyone shifted uncomfortably.

“That last rhyme was a little on the weak side,” Frank finally said.

Chaz's shoulders dropped. “I had literally five minutes to come up with something. It worked, didn't it?”

“Oh, sure. As far as that's concerned, it was fantastic. I thought you were looking for honest critique on its artistic merit.” Frank held up the die for everyone to see. “Who wants to go first?”

“I nominate you, Frank,” said Tony the Elf. “We've had our differences in the past, but you've carried us through some hard times. I think you've earned the honor.”

Frank shook his head. “I know many of you are in a hurry, but I wouldn't mind taking a few minutes to say goodbye to this place. Stacy, why don't you go first? You brought the die back.”

“That's nice of you, Frank. But Julian and I are going to go round up the folks we came here with.”

Frank nodded. “Yes. We should get some folks on that as well. But we need to make sure this is going to work before we do that. Doesn't anyone want to go first?”

“I'll go,” said Fritz, the elf who'd unmounted the die.

Cooper turned to Chaz. “Let me know if you need help finding a word that rhymes with Fritz. I've got one in mind.”

Everyone laughed. It was as happy as Stacy had seen this place since the Horsemen disappeared.

Chaz smiled. “Thank you, but I think I've got something.”

Mordred squirmed and struggled and tried to scream as Cooper forced his fingers open and Frank put the die in his palm.

Cooper closed Mordred's fingers around the die, then nodded up at Chaz. “Rock and roll, dude.”

Chaz cleared his throat and strummed his lute.

“I've but one life to live,

as everybody has.

I hope you can forgive.

Mordred, please say Chaz.”

“What?” said Fritz.

“You dick!” said Cooper.

“Chaz!” said Mordred, then gasped.

Chaz closed his eyes tightly and squatted like a paratrooper about to touch ground. He neither disappeared nor turned into a different person. After a long silent moment of nothing, he slowly opened his eyes to find everyone glaring at him.

“Shit.”

He would have time to answer for his dick move later. For now, everyone was speculating on why it hadn't worked.

“Maybe that wasn't his die,” said Rhonda, referring back to her theory from a few minutes ago.

“Maybe the anti-magic crystals are interfering,” said Julian.

“Maybe it doesn't work if he's coerced,” said Tony the Elf. His face suddenly went pale as he locked eyes with Mordred.

Half a second later, Mordred's eyes lit up with realization. He smiled wide. “Mordr– OW!”

Stacy kicked Mordred's hand, sending the die flying upward. It hit the ceiling, bounced off a wall, then shattered into a million black crystalline shards on the floor.

For a moment, the only sound in the room was the memory echo of shattering die. Then Mordred started laughing.

“I hope you didn't pay too much for that cheap glass replica.”

Every other eye in the room turned to Stacy and Julian.

“That was no replica,” said Stacy. “That was the real deal.”

“That's strange,” said Mordred in a way that was inviting a kick to the face. “They didn't break when I threw them from the top floor of the Beauregard.” He sneered, slowly moving his narrow-eyed gaze from Stacy to Frank. “I'm curious, though, as to how and why you managed to procure a phony die. Could it be that you've misplaced the originals somehow?”

“Of course not,” Frank lied.

Mordred shrugged as much as his restraints would allow. “Then perhaps we should try again.” He opened his hand. “I'm ready when you are, Frank.”

Frank made a weak effort to mask his frustration. “Cooper, bag him.”

For what little satisfaction it was worth, that wiped the smug look from Mordred's face.

“No! No! N–” He dared not open his mouth to speak once the bag came down, instead continuing his protest exclusively with the letter M. He squirmed and bucked, but the ropes held firm. Finally, he went limp.

Frank glared up at Stacy and Julian. “What the hell was that?”

“Watch the tone, Frank,” said Stacy. “We've been out there in the field, risking our lives, while you've been sitting on your ass here in the Whore's Head.”

“Don't you tell me to watch my tone. We're back to square one, and now Mordred knows we don't have the dice!”

A long loud exhalation came from the bag of shit on Mordred's head.

“Actually,” he said in a nasally voice as he held up his head and both middle fingers. “I didn't know for sure until just now. So thanks for that.” His hands and head went limp again.

“SHIT!” said Frank. “Bring him back down to the cellar!”

Cooper and the dwarf picked up Mordred's chair and started back down the stairs. Frank hurriedly closed the door behind them.

“There's got to be some kind of logical explanation for this.” Stacy thought hard, but couldn't come up with anything that made sense. She turned to Julian. “We never let the die out of our sight, right?”

Julian shook his head as he nervously fiddled with something in his pocket.

“We've got to get out of here,” said Chaz.

“We're all well aware of your feelings on the matter,” said Frank. “We'll deal with you once we figure out our next move.”

“I know I'm not the most popular guy in the room right now, but you need to listen to me. That particular Mordred is insanely powerful. You can ask Cooper when he gets back. I don't have a lot of faith in those ropes and crystals keeping him contained for very much longer. And I've got a hunch that the other Mordreds will want to get this one back. We need to keep him moving and unaware of where he is at any given time.”

Stacy resisted her natural instinct to punch Chaz in the face. “He's right. The collective Mordred knows where we are by now. He also knows that the dice are up for grabs. If we play our cards right, we might be able to use this to our advantage.”

“How's that?” asked Rhonda skeptically.

“Much like myself, Mordred's biggest weakness is hubris. We can use that to feed him false information and lure his other avatars into traps.”

Frank shook his head. “I fucked up. He's not going to bother with us now that he knows we don't have the dice. There's no point in it. He knows we aren't going to kill the only Mordred we've got captive. That's our only leverage. He'll just let him stay in a vegetative state indefinitely while he seeks out the other dice. And he's almost certainly got more resources on hand to find them before we can.”

Stacy moved in closer to Frank and whispered. “He doesn't necessarily know that the dice were dumped on the Crescent Shadow. We could still get a head start. And we might be able to point the other Mordreds in the wrong direction.”

Frank nodded solemnly. “What about the Whore's Head Inn?”

“We'll have to torch it.” Stacy felt bad about having to lay this on Frank, especially since she felt partially responsible for having lost the magical die. “We don't want to risk other people coming here to hang out when Mordred shows up to unleash his wrath.” She shrugged. “Maybe we can leave a clue as to where we've gone or something.”

Frank looked up at her with despair in his eyes. “The Whore's Head Inn has been our symbol of hope since we arrived here. If people show up here and find it burned to the ground again...”

“Let it go, Frank,” said Tony the Elf. “If a Mordred gets his hands on a real die, he'll be able to send himself back home and re-establish himself as master of this world. He won't fuck around with us again. He knows that we now know that we're a threat to him. He might not kill us outright, but he'll damn sure put some thought into how he can subjugate us and limit our opportunities to strike back. Or, more likely, he'll not want to take that chance and just kill us outright. Stacy's right. We need to get out of here. We need to be proactive and find those dice before he does.”

Chapter 53

Hungry as she was, Katherine opted not to stop in at the Stinky Pickle on her way to the Temple of Life. She didn't know exactly how powerful the Eye of Rasha was, but it seemed like a pretty big deal. Maybe it might try to fuck with her mind like that ring in those movies about the midgets. Maybe it was emitting some kind of magical signal that would attract thieves to come try to steal it from her. These weren't chances she wanted to take. The sooner she got this transaction over with, the better.  And besides, Tim would probably be hungry after being resurrected. It was enough to ask the High Cleric to transform him back into his proper midget form from a lizard turd. Asking to bring him back with a full stomach would be pushing it.

“That temple ain't goin' nowhere,” said Denise. “And it ain't right to go in there empty-handed.”

“I'm bringing them the Eye of Rasha. I think that should suffice.”

“Aw, come on. I got all these fuckin' freaks to feed, and we ain't had a proper meal in I don't know how long.”

“I think Butterbean and I can make it on our own from here. If you two want to hang out and eat, that's fine with me. I don't know how long resurrections generally take. If it's instantaneous, Tim and I will come back and join you here. If it's a lengthy process, you can bring me a couple of those pickled goose eggs when you're done eating.”

Randy frowned. “I ain't all that hungry, to be honest.” Poor guy was still thinking about Basil. Katherine felt a little guilty that they were on their way to bring back Tim when Randy didn't have that option with his recently deceased loved one.

“And I ain't never seen a pile of shit turn into a person before,” said Denise. “I reckon that'll be a sight to behold.”

As they continued to the temple, Katherine's stomach grumbled with a combination of hunger and nervousness. There was still a lot of uncertainty. Those people who died in the fire at the Whore's Head came back normal enough, as did all the people who got turned into zombies when the flying boat attacked the city. Hell, even Katherine felt like her old self after getting unvamped.

But those were all cases of simply reuniting a lost soul with its host body, or so she theorized. Tim would have to be reconstructed from scratch. And his soul, wherever it was, had been away from his body for quite some time. She'd essentially just brought these guys a sample of his DNA. Were they merely going to clone him? That would be awful. Not only would she be responsible for incubating and raising some test tube embryo, but it wouldn't even be Tim. It would just be an exact genetic match of his fantasy body. Even worse, it would be a constant reminder that the real Tim, her brother, was really and truly dead.

And even if they were able to grow an adult version of Tim's body and put his own soul back in it, would the time it had spent in the afterlife change him? Was she about to rip him out of some eternal paradise? She supposed it was more likely that she'd be rescuing him from eternal suffering in Hell. But even then, would his mind be all fucked up from being tortured and burned? Or would he become some kind of pain in the ass Born Again? All of these questions were making her second-guess her decision to bring him back at all. She stopped at the vine-curtained entrance of the Temple of Life. Randy and Denise looked at her as if they were awaiting further instructions.

No, Katherine. That's just the resurrection jitters. It probably happens to everyone in this situation. Tim will be fine. You've come all this way. You can't turn back now. You can't tell Randy that Basil died for nothing.

“May I help you?” asked a heavyset bald woman with tired eyes and a tone that didn't suggest a desire to be helpful as soon as they stepped through the open front gate.

Katherine didn't want anything from this woman except for her to get the fuck out of her way. “I'm looking for Brother Mayfair.”

“Brother Mayfair is in meditation with the High Cleric.”

“Awesome. We need to see him too.”

“Her,” the woman corrected. “Meditation is not to be disturbed. You'll have to come back another time.”

“And who the fuck are you, Cue Ball?”

“My name is Shelda Moonfist. Acolyte in training here at the Temple of Life. My duties include seeing that the High Cleric is not disturbed during her meditation.”

“We been through a heck of a time, ma'am,” said Randy, stepping forward. “If we could just –”

“Stay where you are!” Shelda struck some kind of karate pose, threatening Randy with two fists and a raised foot. “Take another step, and I shall unleash my Flurry of Blows upon you.”

“I hate to break it to you, lady,” said Denise. “But I reckon you're barkin' up the wrong tree.”

Katherine put her hand on Randy's shoulder and pulled him back gently. “Let's all calm down. Nobody is going to blow anybody. I have something for the High Cleric. It's something she'll want as soon as possible.”

Shelda lowered her foot and hands. “You may entrust it with me, and I shall see that it gets delivered to the High Cleric once her meditation is complete.”

“I'm sorry, but fuck that. This isn't a basket of cookies. I've got the Eye of Rasha, and I'll not be entrusting it to anyone but the High Cleric herself, and only then on the terms I made with Brother Mayfair.”

Shelda scowled at Katherine. “Take your foul tongue and blasphemy elsewhere. You are not welcome on this sacred ground.”

It was time to pull out the big guns. Katherine reached into the Bag of Holding. “Ice Queen's scepter.” When she pulled the stone chunk of scepter out of the bag, she could see the glowing blue gem reflected in Shelda's astonished eyes. “I guess you can tell the High Cleric that she can find us at the Stinky Pickle when she gets a free moment.”

“Right on!” said Denise as Katherine put the scepter back into the Bag of Holding and turned to leave the Temple of Life.

“Wait!”

Katherine smiled to herself, then turned around. “Yes?”

“Shit,” said Denise.

Shelda bowed deeply. “I beg your forgiveness, holy messenger of Rasha.”

“Take it down a notch, Mrs. Clean. I'm not –”

“I shall take you directly to the High Cleric at once.”

On second thought, maybe riding this whole holy messenger of Rasha thing was the way to go.

Katherine performed a grand but ambiguous gesture with her right hand. “You are forgiven. Rasha is pleased with your service. Now go forth and... um... lead the way.”

Shelda led them to the altar in front of the giant statue of Rasha, where she'd talked to Brother Mayfair before. A radiant silver-haired elf woman in gold-trimmed white robes sat cross-legged three feet above the ground. Five subordinate clerics, dressed in nicer robes than the humble potato sack Shelda was wearing, but not quite so fancy as the elf woman's, likewise hovered in a sitting position around her, all facing toward her with their heads bowed deeply. Katherine recognized one of them as Brother Mayfair.

“High Cleric!” Shelda called out.

The elf woman's eyelids opened wide, revealing only bright blue light where eyeballs conventionally reside. She was quick enough to lower her feet and land gracefully in a standing position. Her underlings, whom she'd apparently been suspending in the air as well, weren't as quick. They cried out as they landed on their asses.

“Wha!”

“Oomph!”

“Ugh!”

“Hoo!”

“Harder!”

The others all turned to the olive-skinned half-elf whose cry was the most unusual and specific. The light from the High Cleric's eyes dimmed as she narrowed her eyes.

“Sister Kalia?”

“Challenge me harder, Rasha,” Sister Kalia continued hurriedly with her head bowed, “that I may serve you better.”

“Nice save,” Denise muttered.

The High Cleric's narrow-eyed gaze whipped toward them, specifically toward Shelda. “For what purpose do you disturb my meditation?”

Shelda took a knee and bowed. “Please forgive me, High Cleric. These people arrived, and I –”

“You give them a warm bowl of porridge and a blessing, then send them on their way. Who trained this one?”

“That was me, High Cleric,” said Sister Kalia.

In spite of the High Cleric's eyes being spheres of magical energy, Katherine thought she detected a roll.

“Of course it was. Take her to the Dias of Shame, strip off her clothes, and strike your open palm against her naked flesh until she walks again in Rasha's Light.”

Shelda and Sister Kalia locked eyes briefly, each of them biting their lower lip. Katherine suspected this might be less of a punishment than the High Cleric intended, and might actually be an activity these two practiced regularly in their down time.

“Excuse me,” said Katherine. “But we're not homeless.”

“Well...” said Randy.

“Okay, I guess technically that's not true. But we're not here to beg for food.”

“I don't know,” said Denise. “Some of that warm porridge would go down real nice right about now.”

“Would you two shut the fuck up for a second?” Katherine waved at Brother Mayfair. “Do you remember us?”

“How could I forget?” He gave the High Cleric a small, embarrassed smile. “This is the young woman who delivered us the jar full of basilisk excrement.”

“Lovely.” The High Cleric looked Katherine up and down and sniffed the air. “She appears to have brought more with her.”

“Listen, lady,” said Katherine. “I've had to put up with a lot of shit over the past couple of weeks, so maybe dial back the bitch?” She turned to Brother Mayfair, who was visibly shocked. “I got the thing you asked for. Do we still have a deal?”

“Th-th-the thing?”

Katherine nodded up at the statue of Rasha, more specifically at the empty socket in the middle of its forehead.

Brother Mayfair turned to the statue, then back to Katherine. “Impossible.”

The High Cleric raised her eyebrows. “Brother Mayfair?”

“I told her that you would resurrect her brother.”

“Did you?”

“On the condition that she returned here with the Eye of Rasha.”

The other four not-quite-as-high clerics gasped.

The High Cleric seemed less impressed. “You brought us a jar of shit last time you visited. Your gifting skills are much improved.”

“That jar of shit is my brother,” said Katherine. She thrust her hand into the Bag of Holding. “Ice Queen's scepter!” When she pulled it out, the High Cleric stumbled backward and shielded her eyes.

“The Eye!” she cried, her voice trembling with fear. She looked at Katherine with normal blue eyes like a scared child. “Please, you understand not the awesomeness of the power you wield.”

“I don't want to wield it,” said Katherine. “I want to cash it in. Can you magic that shit jar back into my brother or can't you?”

The High Cleric seemed confused and distrustful, but she nodded. “If the Eye of Rasha is returned to its rightful place, it is within my granted powers to do as you ask.”

“Okie dokie,” said Katherine, a little weirded out by how much of a thing the High Cleric was making of this. “Here you go.” She held out the scepter to the High Cleric, who backed away further.

“Careful! The one you call the Ice Queen was one of us before she was driven mad with lust for the Eye's power. Anyone who touches the Eye will suffer the same fate.”

“Lucky I didn't touch it then.” Katherine glared at Brother Mayfair. “That would have been nice to know going in.”

Brother Mayfair bowed. “My apologies. Our meeting was brief, and I expected you to either give up, become enslaved, or die long before that knowledge would have benefited you.”

“Whatever,” said Katherine. “What the hell do you want me to do with this thing?”

The High Cleric pointed a trembling hand at the altar. “Place it on the altar. We shall handle it from there.”

Katherine did as she was told a little more carelessly than she should have. She was growing impatient. The brittle stone of the scepter shattered against the much firmer stone of the altar, leaving the Eye of Rasha free and exposed.

The High Cleric breathed out a sigh of relief, as if Katherine was a child who'd just set down an assault rifle she thought was a toy. She whispered a quick incantation, pointed at the glowing blue stone, then raised it telekinetically into place on the statue. All three stones glowed a bit brighter, then dimmed back to their normal glow.

“Yay,” said Katherine, underwhelmed at the payoff for all that effort. “So can we get this resurrection thing rolling now?”

“The High Cleric of the Temple of Life is true to her word.” She gave Brother Mayfair a small sideways glare. “Or to the word of those who would assume to speak for her.” She smiled at Katherine. “I don't believe you appreciate the gravity of the service you have performed here. While it's true under normal circumstances that resurrection is a substantial favor to ask of a goddess, your brother's life is worth so much less than what you've done here today.”

Katherine sighed. “Sounds like you knew him.”

The High Cleric turned to Shelda. “I apologize to you. You were right to disturb my meditation, and I was wrong to speak to you as I did.”

“It's nothing, High Cleric. Please don't give it another thought.” Shelda's gaze flicked toward Sister Kalia.

“Shall I still strike my open palm against her bare buttocks?” asked Sister Kalia.

The High Cleric shook her head. “I see no reason for that now. She has done no wrong.”

“I have other sins for which I might be punished,” said Shelda, kind of grasping at straws now. “And the junior monks have been long without a reminder of Rasha's Justice.” She gave Katherine a simpering smile. “I am inspired by this woman's bravery and would be honored to suffer on the Dais of Shame.”

Brother Mayfair and the two other male clerics slouched to allow their robes to hang more loosely over their growing erections.

“Very well,” said the High Cleric, waving Shelda and Sister Kalia away. “I have more urgent matters to attend to.”

The two young women ran off giddily to get their kink on in front of an audience.

The High Cleric strode gracefully to the altar and brushed away the remains of the Ice Queen's scepter. “Brother Mayfair. Fetch the jar of...” She looked at Katherine.

“Tim,” said Katherine.

“Yes,” said the High Cleric. “And the other components necessary to complete the spell. You can find a list in the Sacred Texts.”

Brother Mayfair bowed. “Right away, High Cleric.”

While he was away, the High Cleric produced an assortment of magical knickknacks and doo-dads from inside the altar and placed them on top. She lit candles at each corner, then crushed herbs and stirred them into an oil which smelled strongly like a mixture of Pine-Sol and Raid. While she sprinkled the mixture on the altar, Katherine voiced her concerns about the spell.

“Is my brother going to be... different in any way?”

“We all cope with trauma in our own way. Judging by the state of his remains, I would guess he did not part from this life peacefully.”

Katherine shook her head. “There was a fair amount of trauma involved.”

“He will retain the memory of everything that happened until his spirit slipped away from his body. It's up to you, the people who care about him, to help guide him on the path toward inner peace.”

“Sure,” said Katherine. “I'll be all over that. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't ripping his soul out of Heaven, or whatever your religion's equivalent is. Valhalla? Nirvana? Soundgarden?”

The High Cleric looked at her curiously. “Do you speak of the celestial planes?”

“Um... yes.” That sounded good enough to Katherine.

“Fear not. If your brother is so noble or useful to the gods, they shall simply deny my request.”

“I don't foresee that being an issue.”

Brother Mayfair huffed and panted as he jogged back to the altar hugging the jar and a few other ritual things. He looked like he's spent less time following the path toward inner peace and spiritual enlightenment, and more time following the path toward the refrigerator.

He stopped to kneel before the altar, then approached and placed the jar on top. Still panting, he said, “Rasha's... will... be done.”

Tim was looking pretty grim inside the jar. The basilisk shit had dried out, shrinking down to about a third of the mass it had been, and had grown some kind of white mold or fungus. When the High Cleric removed the lid from the jar, it was as if Rasha herself had lowered her great godly ass from on high to smite them all with a Taco Bell fart.

“Goddamn!” said Denise. “Your brother's fuckin' ripe.”

Even the High Cleric, who should have been a paragon of professionalism, seemed to be fighting to not puke her guts out.

Katherine wanted to tell them all to grow the fuck up. It's not like none of them had never smelled shit before. But she remained silent, preferring to breathe as little as was necessary to remain alive.

The High Cleric turned the jar over and dumped the small pile of basilisk shit into the bowl where she'd mixed the oil and crushed herbs. When she put her hands in and started kneading, Katherine was now the one who had to concentrate to keep herself from vomiting.

“What's this?” asked the High Cleric, pulling a shit-covered something out from the mixture.

Brother Mayfair squinted at it. “A bone, perhaps?”

“I think not. It feels metallic.” She set it aside and continued kneading. “I need flour.”

Katherine thought she might have misheard, but Brother Mayfair poured fine white powder from one of the other jars he'd returned with. She hoped that Tim wasn't going to come back as a Gingerbread Man.

When the kneading was done and the air was a little clearer, the High Cleric lifted the mixture out of the bowl. It appeared to have a consistency similar to Play-Doh. That made more sense when she actually started sculpting it. She squeezed a round blob out at the top, forming a crude head, then four longer and thinner appendages from what remained. Artistically, it was less effort than a six-year-old would have put into making a clay person, but that appeared to be good enough for Rasha. She laid the figure down on the center of the altar.

Brother Mayfair pinched three sparkling stones from a small silk pouch and placed them delicately on the altar. They appeared to be two diamonds and a large ruby. Katherine hadn't realized how expensive this was going to be. She felt cheap for not having stopped at the Stinky Pickle on the way here.

The High Cleric pushed the two diamonds into the shit figure's head where eyes would be. The ruby she pushed into its chest, then pinched the opening shut.

Denise picked up a twig from the ground and broke a piece off. “You can use this if you want to give him a wiener.” Though she sounded sincere, the High Cleric ignored her and Randy giggled. To be fair to Randy, the proportions of the stick Denise had offered compared to the figure on the altar would have given Tim a dick longer than his arms.

The High Cleric put the metal thing she'd found in the basilisk shit into the mixing bowl, then placed the bowl on the ground next to the altar and spoke the word, “Water” in a British accent. Crystal clear water poured out of thin air about a foot above the bowl, then got a little murkier when it mixed with the residual oil, flour, and basilisk shit. It got murkier still when she knelt by the bowl and began scrubbing her hands in it.

“Is this part of the spell?” asked Katherine.

The High Cleric stopped scrubbing and glared up at her. “I'd prefer to proceed with clean hands, if that's quite all right with you.”

Thinking back on how she began, she could see how she might have accidentally come off as an impatient bitch.

“I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Here.” Katherine knelt on the opposite side of the bowl and dipped a finger in. “Purify.”

The water instantly turned as clear as it had been when the High Cleric magicked it into existence, and she looked shocked to discover that she was now scrubbing perfectly clean hands.

She stood up, staring at her hands. “I can't believe I've never thought to do that before.” She pulled the mystery item out of the bowl. It appeared to be some sort of clasp, decorated with an image of a face, or rather halves of two different faces joined together.

“What is that?” asked Katherine.

“It looks like a hair clip,” said the High Cleric. “Did it not belong to your brother?”

“Not that I'm aware of.”

She held it out to Katherine. “It was in your jar. It's yours if you want it.”

Katherine didn't currently give a shit about accessorizing right now. But in the interest of keeping things moving, she accepted the clip and put it in her pocket. “Thanks.”

The High Cleric covered the shit figure in a white linen cloth, then spread her arms wide. The candles all ignited at once, and her eyes went back to being orbs of bright blue light.

Katherine stepped back to where Randy and Denise had just been, but discovered that they had also taken a step back.

The sky darkened as the High Cleric spoke an incantation in a language that Katherine didn't understand. Heavy raindrops fell on the altar, sporadically at first, then more consistently. Several times they hit the candle flames directly, producing a sizzling sound but failing to extinguish the flames. The white linen cloth took the shape of the figure underneath it as it became saturated with water. Then it moved.

It was a nearly imperceptible wiggle at first, and Katherine thought she might have imagined it, but there was no such doubt about the arm jerk that followed.

The figure grew slowly beyond the cloth, its texture transforming from shit-clay to more substantial flesh. The diamonds sank deeper into forming sockets. Other cavities opened below them, which would become nostrils and a mouth. The arms and legs sprouted fingers and toes, and became more smooth and slender. In fact, they looked to be a little too slender for a halfling. But who was she to tell a goddess she was fucking up her resurrection? The arms and legs would sort themselves out.

But when the figure on the table continued to grow bigger than Tim was supposed to be, and didn't show any signs of slowing down, Katherine couldn't keep her mouth shut anymore.

“Hey, can you shut this off? He's getting too big! He's supposed to be a halfling!”

“No, he isn't,” said Brother Mayfair.

The High Cleric looked confusedly at Katherine. “I thought you said this was your brother.”

Brother Mayfair responded before Katherine could finish rolling her eyes. “I brought this up when she arrived last time, and she seemed to be aware of certain irregularities of her claim.”

“Yes!” said Katherine. “The fact that my brother is a halfling was the irregularity I was referring to! What else did you think...” Unless he was coming back as Tim Tim. Between this and teleporting, she might have discovered a back door to get things back to normal without having to deal with Mordred or his stupid dice. She stared into Brother Mayfair's eyes. “Is he... human?”

Brother Mayfair looked even more confused than before. “No, of course not! Do you honestly have no idea who we're currently resurrecting?”

Now that he mentioned it, she wasn't sure that she did.

Katherine bit her lower lip for a moment, staring at the slender humanoid creature growing organs and bones under translucent gray skin on the altar, then looked back up at Brother Mayfair. “You're sure you got the right jar, right?”

“How many of these do you think I have?”

Something didn't add up. What was with the hair clip? Could Brother Mayfair have swapped Tim's remains out for someone he wanted to bring back? Katherine stalked up to the altar and got in his face. “I don't know. But if the person on that altar turns out to be your dead wife or a hooker you accidentally killed or some shit, we're going to have –”

“Hey!” said Randy excitedly as he approached the altar. “I think I know this guy.” He pulled the cloth down to cover the person's developing genitalia. “I saw him at the Whore's Head Inn that night when Tim killed Mordred.”

Katherine had to admit, now that his features were starting to get more defined, he did look vaguely familiar. When his skin became opaque and darkened, and white hair sprouted out the top of his head, it finally clicked.

“Tanner?”

Tanner sat bolt upright, opened his eyes wide, and sucked in as much air as his lungs could take in. His terrified gaze jumped between everyone standing around him like he was a chicken which had just woken up in a den of foxes. Finally, he locked eyes with Katherine. He looked no less terrified, but a little more confused.

“Katherine? Where am I? What happened?” His eyes rolled up and he collapsed. Randy caught his head just in time to keep him from bonking it on the hard stone altar.

“He must rest,” said the High Cleric. “His body needs time to adjust.”

Katherine didn't want to seem ungrateful for what the High Cleric had done for her, but this wasn't something she could shrug off like getting fries when she'd ordered onion rings.

“I'm sorry, High Cleric. But this isn't my brother.”

Brother Mayfair looked annoyed. “I tried to tell you that when we first met. You're the one who insisted he was your brother.”

Katherine turned to Randy. “You're sure Basil ate Tim? You saw him, right?”

“I only caught the last part of it. I saw a little hand, so I knew he ate somebody. But I didn't know it was Tim until you flew down on that pegasus and told me he just fell off that island.”

Was it possible that Tanner could have been down there in the desert as well? No, that was ridiculous. He wasn't anywhere around there.

Katherine mustered up the nerve to give the High Cleric of Rasha a stern look. “There's been a mistake.”

The High Cleric smiled. “The gods do not make mistakes. Such is the nature of divinity.” She turned to Denise. “Come forward, little dwarf. Rasha wishes to reward you as well.”

Denise put her hand to her chest. “Me?” Her shocked expression morphed into smugness as she nodded. “It's about time someone showed me some proper respect.” She waddled up to the High Cleric.

“You are with child, are you not?” the High Cleric asked rhetorically.

Denise's eyes lit up. “Is that somethin' you and Rasha can take care of, if you catch my meaning?”

“Your children are not well.”

“Ain't that a goddamn shame?” Denise shrugged, clapped her hands, then rubbed them together. “Well then I reckon it's best not to make them suffer any longer. If you'll kindly help me up onto the altar here, I'll spread my legs and you can whip out your Coat Hanger of Mercy or whatever and get this fuckin' nightmare over with.”

The High Cleric took a knee in front of Denise. “Be still, for you have nothing to fear.” She reached her right hand up under Denise's skirt.

“Goddamn, woman. You just gonna go up in there and pull them out with your bare hands? That's fuckin' hardcore. You got anything I can bite down on? Maybe a stick or a broom handle or something?”

“Fear not, for you will feel no pain. Perhaps just a mild tingling sensation.”

Denise tilted her head back and closed her eyes. “Oh yeah, mama. You got me tinglin' alright. I could get used to –” Her eyes suddenly went wide as golf balls. “HOLY FUCKIN' SHIT!”

“Denise!” cried Randy. “Are you –”

“It is finished.” The High Cleric removed her arm, glistening and dripping up to the elbow. Thankfully, Brother Mayfair was quick to wrap a cloth around it.

“Oh. My. God.” Denise panted as she steadied herself against the altar. “That was fuckin' amazing. I want to go out and get knocked up again right now just so I can get another magical abortion.”

The High Cleric removed her hand and stood. “Your children are now healthy. Rasha's Mercy will keep both you and them safe from harm until they leave your womb.”

Denise's jaw dropped. “The fuck are you talkin' about? That ain't what I wanted! I need these fuckin' monsters out of my body!”

The High Cleric glared at Denise, then at Katherine. “Recipients of gifts from the gods generally show more gratitude.” She turned to Randy. “Perhaps the paladin can set an example for you both.”

Randy looked up like the teacher had asked him to answer a question when he hadn't been paying attention. “Rasha's got somethin' for me too?”

“She does not.”

“Oh,” said Randy, looking unsure as to how he was supposed to set an example with his reaction to that. He cleared his throat. “I am okay with that. Rasha's will be –”

“Your gift comes from the New God,” the High Cleric said, smiling warmly at him. “He says you have served him well, and you have proven yourself worthy of a mount.”

“Like a horse?” Randy frowned. “That's real thoughtful, but I don't reckon I'm ready for that kind of responsibility. I failed the last animal I tried to take care of.”

“You are free to dismiss your mount at any time,” said the High Cleric. “It will await your summons from the Celestial Plane in which it resides. Once per day, you may call its name, and it will appear before you ready to serve.”

“What's its name?”

The High Cleric gave him a curious frown. “The New God said you would know.”

“Basil!” said Denise.

Katherine had half a mind to deck her for making such an insensitive joke, but Denise wasn't smiling. Her eyes were wide, focusing on something behind Katherine and Randy.

“Yaaaa Yaaaaaa!”

Katherine and Randy turned around. Basil, or at least a shining silver version of him, stared at them with large, glowing white eyes which fortunately didn't turn them all into stone.

“Basil!” cried Randy joyfully. “You're... okay? Alive?” He scratched his chin. “What are you, exactly?”

“A paladin's mount is no normal animal,” the High Cleric explained. “It is a heavenly beast, selected by a god or goddess for a paladin when he or she deems their servant worthy of the honor. Your love for this creature earned it a place in the heavens, and your devotion to the New God moved him so much that he saw fit to reunite you.”

While everyone else was checking out the new and improved Basil, Katherine held back to reflect on the Tanner thing. She believed Randy's account of what he saw, but it didn't add up with what she was seeing now. Tanner would hopefully be able to fill in some of the gaps when he woke back up, but if his remains were the shit in the jar, then where the hell was Tim?

“Thank you, High Cleric,” she said as sincerely as she could fake. She waved up at the sky. “And thank you, gods.” She nudged Randy. “Help me bag up Tanner. We've got to get back to the Whore's Head.”

Chapter 54

“Maybe Darton swiped it from you,” suggested Julian as he and Stacy drank beer and digested their dinner. He could tell she was still trying to figure out what had happened to the die. “You mentioned that things got a little feely between you and him in his hotel room, if I recall your phrasing correctly.”

Stacy smirked at him. “They didn't get that feely, but it's cute that you're still bothered about it.”

Julian's heartbeat began to quicken. He was onto something. He knew there was a reason beyond petty jealousy he'd gotten a bad vibe from Darton.

“How feely would he really have to get?” he asked Stacy. “Katherine's black elf friend swiped the dice bag from Frank without sexually assaulting him. With a high enough Dexterity score –” Julian remembered Darton barely being able to walk without falling over. He sighed. “Never mind.” Still, it nagged at him. It was the only explanation that even came close to making sense.

“Darton's high on my list of suspects,” said Stacy. “For all we know, those guys who came in and arrested him could have been friends of his, or people he hired to get him away from us after the job was done. But there are a couple of problems with that theory.”

“Which are?”

“Motive, for one. Sure, he must have guessed that the dice were valuable, but you don't go to that kind of effort for something you don't know anything about.”

That sounded like weak reasoning to Julian.

“You might, if the thing is valuable enough. We don't know how much those rich wizards are willing to pay for that kind of bling.”

“I'm pretty sure he didn't swap it out while I was sleeping. Not only would that have been extremely difficult to do without risking a very awkward moment followed by a knee to the nuts, but when would he have had time to get a replica made? We were with him the whole time.”

“He could have sneaked out for a couple of hours. We were on an island of powerful wizards. For the right price, I'm sure it's easy enough to get a guy to conjure up a replica of whatever you want.”

“Why go to all that bother? It would have been half as risky to just swipe the pendant while I was sleeping and make a run for it.”

“That's a good point.” Julian felt like he was on the right path in spite of the number of times it kept seeming to lead to dead ends. Another theory occurred to Julian that would fill in some of the gaps. “What if he was working for Mordred?” He gasped. “What if he was Mordred?”

Stacy shook her head and started counting off on her fingers. “One, Darton didn't come looking for us. We walked into the bar he was already drinking at. Two, Mordred didn't know the dice were missing until just now. Three, even if he did know, he wouldn't have known what kind of jewelry they were mounted in. And four, that still wouldn't explain why he would go to the trouble of making a replica.”

“Wow. You really have put a lot of thought into this.”

Stacy nodded. “And I'm smart as shit.”

Julian rubbed his temples. “So let's step back a bit. If the swap didn't happen while you were sleeping, it had to have happened at the restaurant, right?”

“That seems like the most likely place.”

“This lunch thing was completely orchestrated by Darton.”

“We're just going around in circles now, Julian,” said Stacy. “I know you want it to be Darton. And frankly, you're starting to get kind of weirdly obsessive about him. The more I think back on it, the more I see him as kind of a loser, stumbling directionless through life like he stumbled through his hotel room. He tried to pass himself off as suave and successful, but I could see a certain sad desperation in his eyes. And I had a similar feeling when he kissed me. It felt like –”

“Stop!”

“Sorry. I shouldn't have mentioned –”

“Seriously,” said Julian. “Shut up for a second. I think I've got something.” His mind was thinking about things that made him uncomfortable, but he couldn't afford to shut down those thoughts. He didn't have all the pieces of the puzzle yet, but there was one glaring problem that he could bring to the surface right now. He reached into his pocket, grabbed the silver coin Darton had thrown at him in the restaurant, and slapped it down on the bar.

Stacy frowned down at it. “Is that a tip?”

“Darton threw this at my head from halfway across the restaurant.”

“Please tell me that's not what's fueling your vindictive obsession. I was really hoping that had more to do with me.”

Julian smiled in spite of where the evidence was leading. “He threw this across the room with pinpoint accuracy. That would require a pretty high Dexterity score, wouldn't you think?”

Stacy took a moment to think. “So you're suggesting the whole clumsy thing was just an act? To what end?”

“He didn't swap pendants with you. He swapped them with me.” Julian pounded his fist on the bar. “It was out of my sight for less than a second.”

“What are you talking about, Julian?”

“When I took the pendant to Aleric of Whitewood's table, he asked if he could hold it. I allowed him to on the condition that he let me hold his cane. That son of a bitch was in on it. He passed it to Darton, who came over to join us, and Darton dropped it below the table. It was meant to look clumsy, but it was a Sleight of Hand trick. Those smug bastards told me I had a cheap reproduction while they were actually handing me a cheap reproduction.”

Stacy sighed. “And a few minutes after that, Darton got arrested.”

“It gets worse.”

“How could it?”

“Who do we know with a high Dexterity, who would jizz his pants at being able to give you a sad and desperate kiss, and who has the brains and motive to fake his own death?”

Stacy gasped. “Oh no.”

The front door burst open with some sort of groaning howl that sounded like Chewbacca with a cold.

A giant silver dinosaur head with glowing white eyes continued its terrifying cry.

“SHIT!” cried Tony the Elf. “It's Mordred! He's come for us!” He grabbed a bow from under the bar like he'd been waiting for this opportunity for quite some time, nocked an arrow, then fired it into the magical creature's neck.

“Dismiss!” said a familiar voice from beyond the door. The silver dinosaur vanished like one of Julian's horses. Then Randy walked in, followed by Katherine.

Katherine took a knee and reached into her Bag of Holding. She pulled out Butterbean, her black half-elf friend who was naked, and Denise. They all lay on the floor gasping for air.

“Katherine,” said Julian. She looked kind of pissed off, so he was hesitant to bring up such a touchy subject, but he had to know. “Did you have any luck getting Tim brought back to life?”

“No. In fact, I've got a shitload of questions. I'm not even sure Tim is dead.”

Julian and Stacy glanced at each other.

Julian took a deep breath. “We've got a working theory on that.”

Chapter 55

Sitting in a steel cage in the sewer for multiple days was surprisingly exhausting. Dave guessed that was mostly due to him going apeshit in rat-monster form. He didn't have any memory of that time, but he was pretty sure he didn't spend it sleeping. One minute, he'd be having convulsions as his body started to change, and the next thing he knew he was sore and out of breath. Rat Dave was clearly not as chill in his confinement as Dwarf Dave.

Aside from the fact that they were keeping him locked in a cage in a sewer, his captors didn't seem particularly cruel. They didn't beat him or torture him for information, and they kept him fed with some kind of gray sludge that tasted like spoiled yogurt textured with minced assholes. Now that he thought about it, he might have had too low a bar for how he defined non-cruelty.

“He's in here,” said one of the female wererats from just outside the secret door hidden in the wall. She was the one Dave was starting to develop a Stockholm Syndrome crush on. “I don't know what you want with him. I know our numbers are down since that crazed half-orc slaughtered so many of us, but this one strikes me as one of the least interesting or special people I've ever interacted with.”

Ouch.

“I would like to speak with him alone,” said a voice that sounded both familiar and peculiarly unfamiliar at once. It reminded Dave of a high school theater student trying to mimic an old man's voice in a play.

Dave stood and picked some dried bits of vomit out of his beard in a weak effort to make himself as presentable as possible. These were going to be the first words anyone had spoken to him in days, and it might be an interview that would determine whether he was going to be assimilated into the group or murdered.

Come on, Dave. You can be interesting. Or at least you can fake it.

An old gnome slipped inside the room. Whether it was his grim expression or the way the flickering torchlight accentuated the creases on his face, something about this little gnome creeped Dave out more than any of his larger companions.

“Howdy!” Dave blurted out with a big stupid grin and an exaggerated wave of his hand. That may have been the worst Diplomacy fail in the history of the game.

The gnome stopped in his tracks with a perplexed look on his face. “And howdy to you as well.”

Dave stopped being creeped out and embarrassed when it dawned on him who this guy was. “I know you!”

“Do you now?” said the gnome.

“You were the guy who freed us from those cages on the Crescent Shadow.”

The gnome put up his hands, palms facing forward. “Guilty as charged.”

“I never got a chance to thank you. Things got kind of hectic after that.”

“And how is it that, hundreds of miles away, I come to find you in a cage once again?”

Dave sighed. “It's a long story.”

The old gnome smiled. “I'm keen to hear it, if you don't have any other plans.”

“I ate a contaminated turkey leg and contracted lycanthropy. Some people I thought were my friends turned on me, and I made a run for it. Then these guys caught me and locked me in here. Now that I say it aloud, I guess it isn't a very long story after all.”

“Friendship can be a fickle institution. I put more value in relationships rooted in common problems and shared goals.”

“That sounds practical, I guess.”

“That's why I think you'll make a good partner in a little project I'm working on.”

Dave didn't like the sound of this at all. It felt like he was being hustled, like his freedom was going to depend on him agreeing to join this guy in some kind of time-share scheme.

“What kind of common problems and shared goals do we have?”

“I'm a wererat, just like you,” said the gnome. “I suppose that counts as a common problem, but it's a manageable one, and I've grown to enjoy some of its benefits. I'm more concerned with the goals we share.”

“What do you know about my goals?”

“I know a lot about you, Dave.”

“How do you know my name?”

“I know you've had a secret crush on Stephanie Whitmore since the third grade. I know you left Rob Ryder's party without telling anyone because you clogged up his toilet and made it overflow your shitwater all over the bathroom floor.” The gnome smiled. “And I know it was you who spilled root beer on Cooper's Xbox.”

Dave had officially reached his threshold of being creeped out. He pressed his back against the wall and hugged his knees. “How do you know that?”

The gnome shrugged. “Because I was sitting right next to you, dumbass.” He reached behind his head and felt around for something in his hair. When he pulled his hand away, his appearance changed suddenly, like the naked people at the end of Michael Jackson's Black or White video.

“Tim?” Dave could barely croak out the word. “I thought... We all saw you... How?”

Tim held up the clip he'd pulled out of his hair when he looked like a gnome. It had a design like a face made out of the halves of two different faces joined together. “This is hands down one of the coolest magic items in the game.”

That was an easy explanation to comprehend, but it begged another question.

“If Mordred didn't kill you, then who did he kill?”

“Jesus Christ, Dave. Mordred didn't kill anybody. I was Mordred.”

Dave took a moment to realign the thoughts in his head. Unless he was mistaken, that just made things worse. “Then you slit someone's throat and kicked them off the platform?”

“Correct.”

Another terrible thought occurred to Dave. “Was he Mordred?”

“No,” said Tim, like he was annoyed at having been asked. “I admit I fucked up when I killed that other Mordred. That was impulsive, and I regret having done it.”

“So who did you kill?”

“That NPC douchebag who was hanging out with Katherine. That reminds me, what happened to her? I noticed she wasn't in her cage when I went down to rescue you.”

“She caught a ride down on a Pegasus.”

Tim nodded. “Sweet.”

“She was going after your dead body to get you brought back to life.”

“Yikes,” said Tim. “That could be awkward. We'll have to get the ball rolling on those shared goals we talked about.” He opened his shirt, exposing his dark coarse chest hair, and the silver chain running through it down either side of his neck. At the end was a silver dragon claw grasping a black twenty-sided die. “What do you say, Dave? You want to help me make this right?”

The End

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