The Darkslayer: Chaos at the Castle (Book 6) (39 page)

“Huh,” Tuuth said,
walking away, “I think I liked you better when you talked more.”

Venir kept shoveling, glancing around from time to time.

Watch. Listen. Learn.

The remnants of the Brigand Army
and the renegades from other orders were fewer than one hundred, including Flaggon and Tuuth. But the underlings were a different story. Venir had never seen so many different colored eyes before. He hadn’t realized there were so many underlings in the world. He’d managed to count over a thousand of them one day, but the next day when he woke there’d been almost two thousand. They weren’t all coming in through the gates either. Instead, squads of them came from inside the Outpost walls, out of a building that was once the Royal Headquarters.

And Venir knew there was no way
that building could hold them all. Dread filled him.

Have they taken over the entire world?

Digging, he tried to make sense of what was happening, but he could barely think.

Brool.

His war-axe entered his mind. It seemed his days of devastation were over. What
a fool he’d been, to remove the armament and leave it behind. And for what? His pride!

Am I a fool
?

He couldn’t shake the feeling
he’d seen Brool and the rest of the armament for the last time. He’d do anything to be reunited with it again.

Curse me
for a buffoon
.

He slung more muck over his shoulder. One shovelful. Two. Fifty. A hundred. Two hundred.

Steam rose from the muck. The big flies and mosquitos swarmed.

A tall man walked over with a jug of water. It was Flaggon.

“You seem to attract the rottenest things.” He fanned the bugs away. “Here, drink.”

Venir took a swallow and made an ugly face.

“What did you put in that?” Venir tried to hand it back.

“Keep drinking, Stranger
, and make it quick. That’s vinegar added to it. You need it.”

Venir eyed him.

“I thought you’d win the bet if I died today.”

“Ah
.” Flaggon’s brows lifted. “Tuuth told you about that, did he? Well, the truth is, Tuuth doesn’t know what’s going on. I already have plenty of wine, and there’s no such thing as money here. We barter a little with the underlings.” He winked. “But Tuuth’s not very good at bartering. Besides, now that you’ve survived this long, I hate to see you die. Ye’ve defied the odds, ya have.” He scratched his head. “And something’s to be said for that.”

Venir took another drink, finishing it off
, and tossed Flaggon the canteen.

“How long
do you think they’ll keep you around?”

Flaggon
shrugged. “I don’t have any choice in the matter. No more than you. But I’ll tell you this: the underlings are running the show on Bish now. They aren’t going to kill everyone, but they will be killing everyone who opposes them. And I figure I’m better off with ‘em than against ‘em.”

Venir scowled. “You make me sick.”

“Ha!” Walking away, Flaggon waved at him. “I see they haven’t broken your spirit yet, Stranger. See you tomorrow. Dead or alive. I’ve a bottle of underling port to crack.”

Digging and simmering, Venir filled the
other hole, crawled over the ridge between the pits, and stepped in it. Rolling his shoulder, he realized no one, not man or underling, even noticed. Instead, they all went about their business. A digging corpse, he was already forgotten.

They were
Chittering back and forth with one another, even smiling, some of them.

Could it be true? Had the underlings taken over?
He even saw one playing an instrument, similar to a lute. But the thing that disturbed him most was―he was getting used to it. Their smell. Their gray faces and their faint fur-like pelts.

Another hour passed
, then two.

“Dig
, Arsehole Bastard. Dig!”

It was the underling
commander.

Venir ventured a look at him.

His bulging arms were crossed over his barrel chest. A razor-edged sword hung by his side.

“On your knees, Arsehole Bastard,” the underling said. “You are now a servant of the underlings.”

It felt like all the eyes of the fort were on him.
Those of both underling and man. Dying of thirst, tongue swollen, Venir kept shoveling.

“Orc,” the
commander said, “is this man deaf? I told him to bow, not to shovel. Make him bow, Orc. Make him bow!”

“On your knees, Stranger
,” Tuuth said.

Venir kept shoveling.

“He looks like he can’t hear.” The commander slid a sharp dagger from his belt. “So he doesn’t need those ears.” He extended it towards Tuuth.

Hesitating, Tuuth said
, “You want me to cut them off?”

“
No, I want you to carve him a new arsehole, Stupid Orc.”

Tuuth snatched the blade
. “Fine then. Stranger, get out of that puddle.”

“No!”
The underling pointed. “You get in the puddle, Orc. What’s the difference? You always smell like dung.”

The
surrounding underlings chittered in agreement.

“Last
chance to bow down, Stranger,” Tuuth warned, an angry look growing in his eyes. “If I step in the mire, I’m going to do more than cut your ears off. I’ll cut your tongue out as well.”

Venir glared at them
. “What are you waiting for?” He slung a shovel full of muck on the both of them.

Ruby eyes flashing, the underling let out a hiss.

Tuuth roared, jumping in, splashing muck all over.

“You couldn’t keep your mouth shut, could you
?”

Crack!

Venir’s head rocked back, falling into the sludge.

The underling
s and men let out cheers.

“That’ll shut him up, Tuuth!”

“Bust him again, good!”

“Make him eat that slat he’s diggin’!”

Even the underlings chittered words of encouragement.

“He’ll not
talk after that punch!”

His legs felt like anvils, his arms like sandbags, but Venir got up
and raised his hands on his busted wrists, squeezing them into fists. Dripping in muck, he eyed Tuuth.

“Fight or die.”

Tuuth walloped him in the belly.

He sagged to his knees.

“He’s bowing now, ain’t he!” a brigand said.

Venir rose again.

“Cut his ears off, Orc!” The underling commander said as two other underlings wiped the muck from his armor. “I want them for a necklace. I might have you add some fingers and toes as well.” He spat and wiped his mouth. “I want the tongue too.”

Tuuth grabbed
Venir by the hair, yanked him up to his feet, and put him in a head lock.

Struggling, Venir’s face was be
et red, but a ten-year-old boy would have fared better. His strength, what little he had left, was not enough.

Venir grinded his teeth and tried to pulled away.

“You!” Tuuth ordered to one of the brigands. “Get in here and grab his feet.”

“Slat on me,” the heavyset man said, stepping in and rolling up his sleeves
. “Just make it quick, will you? It smells worse than an ogre’s outhouse.”

“Try not to scream, Stranger,” Tuuth growled in his ear.

Slice!

His ear dropped into the mu
ck.

“Did you hear that, Arsehole Bastard
?” the underling commander said.

Every eye from the underling camp was watching now. From the tower
s, the catwalks, sitting on the parapets. If you were within eye shot, you could see.

Fight, blast you! Fight!

Venir’s struggles were in vain.

Slice!

His last ear fell in front of his eyes, floating atop the grime.

“Good, Orc
, good,” the underling rubbed his chin. “And I like your idea. Cut his tongue out as well. No more talk, Human. Instead, you will scream so we can’t hear.”

“You two, get in here,” Tuuth ordered.

One man rolled his eyes; the other one groaned.

“Get in there, i
diots,” Flaggon said, shoving them forward.

The
y sloshed through the muck, one holding his nose.

“Get his arms,” Tuuth said,
and then looked down on Venir. “Any last words, Stranger?”

“You’re all orc, Tuuth. And it smelled better before you got here.”

Ptui!

A gob of spit hit Tuuth square in the eye.

Tuuth rose his dagger high.

“Just the tongue Orc! Do not kill him!”

THROOM!

Everyone in the fort flinched, eyes searching the southern gate.

THROOM!

All the men
murmured.

The underlings chittered, scrambling to
their stations.

The wooden portcullis crack
ed and buckled.

THROOM!

The alarm was sounded, high pitched.

“Move it
, men,” Flaggon ordered. “Tuuth, leave him. He’s not going anywhere.”

“Not until I have his tongue first.” He rested the knife on Venir’s chin. “Hold him.”

CHAPTER 54

S
hackled to a stake with mystic purple bands, gagged, arms behind his back, Boon sighed.

The fight is over.

All his life he’d been in control. Dominant. A powerful force. Even when the giants had custody of him, as powerful as they were, he’d had a say in his destiny. But now, his say had run out.

Surrounding him, in an underling camp in the Outland, were more of the fiends than he cared to count. Thousands
, and they were still arriving. He’d never seen such a large force. He hadn’t even imagined one so large.

Nearby, a brood of underling magi watched over him. The
ir light blue and green eyes in study.

He wondered why they kept him alive.

“Water,” he said, licking his lips.

They said nothing to him, chittering to themselves from time to time and inspecting his robes. The only stitch he had left
on him was a pair of cut-off trousers. Even his sandals were gone. The suns gave a nice red layer to his back.

He tried to stand, but his knees wouldn’t bend.

He never thought he’d ever ask an underling for anything, but he asked again, “Water.”

Nothing. But it would come. It had come yesterday and the day before. A humpback urchling had fed him some food that was horrible but digestible.
And so it had been. Day in. Day out. Hour after hour.

“I always imagined I’d die battling you fiends. Never a prisoner. Now look at me. An underling
’s beggar.” Again he sighed. “I can’t even insult you.”

After d
ozing off, for how long he didn’t know, he was rustled. Two underling warriors picked him up, leading him on trembling legs through the camp. The black grey smoke burned his eyes. He closed them until they stopped. An underling chittered at him with an angry tone. He knew what it meant.

Open your eyes, Human.

He knew what to expect. He didn’t mean to open them, but he did.

They led him to the edge of camp
, where a graveyard of the living and the dead waited.

Trains of people
―men, women and children―fell under the lash and spade. They screamed, cried and wailed. Mercy was asked, but none was given. They dug graves. And were buried in them by their own.

A tear fell onto Boon’s wispy white bea
rd.

One under
ling pointed. The other one laughed.

It gnawed at his gut.

“To take such pleasure in it is sick.”

They led him through the graveyard
until his legs failed.

H
ow could this happen?
The armament must be gone.
Or the underlings must have it.

CHAPTER 55

As quick as he might be, Melegal was no fighter. He was a thief. A cutpurse. Shadow. Survivor. Rat. The swords in his hands were heavier than those he was accustomed to, his blades, the Sisters.

“Just get
in a quick jab between the ribs, Detective,” Creed said. “You have it in you.”

Tonio and Jarla stood nearby
, surrounded by underlings with long spears, leaving Melegal in the center of the arena, all alone.