Don Bassingthwaite - The Killing Song

There was no answer, of course, but the old collar of rune-carved black stones that had once belonged to Adolan slid around his neck with a reassuring weight.

And then turned shockingly cold.

Geth sat up straight, rocking the boat and nearly dropping his paddle. Kneeling in the center of the boat, Ekhaas grabbed for the sides and cursed. “Khaavolaar! What are you doing?” The hobgoblin twisted around to glare at him with amber eyes, a scowl on her flattened face. “Are you trying to turn us over?”

“Adolan’s collar-” Geth grunted and reached up to touch the stones. The collar was an artifact of the Gatekeepers. It had shielded him from the mental powers of Dah’mir and the hideous mind flayers in service to the Master of Silence and given him warning of danger. If it had grown cold …

To his surprise, the stones were once again warm under his fingers.

“Well?” asked Ekhaas. Her voice was both smooth and coarse at the same time, like cedar smoke, and when she wasn’t feeling patient, it could carry a vicious sting.

Geth let his hand fall. “Nothing,” he said, and wondered if it had been his imagination.

The hunting call of a marsh cat rose and fell in the twilight, and this time it was Orshok, in the boat’s bow, who sat up. The young orc tucked his paddle under one arm-Geth swore and plunged his paddle back into water to try and hold their position against the current-and raised folded hands to his wide mouth, letting out a trill of birdsong. The hunting cat answered and Orshok’s eyes went wide beneath his heavy brow.

“Ring of Siberys!” he exclaimed and snatched up his paddle again. “Geth, steer us for that leaning tree up ahead.”

Geth didn’t need further directions. Along the riverbank, a bulky figure had risen beside the tree Orshok had indicated. As they drew closer, Geth recognized the figure with surprise. It was Krepis, another orc of the Fat Tusk tribe and Batul’s elder student. He looked much the same as he had the last time Geth had seen him-big even for an orc, wearing a necklace of crocodile teeth and carrying a heavy spear-except for the long red stripes that had been painted above and below each eye. They gave him an angry look, as if he was staring in perpetual, wide-eyed rage.

Beneath the paint, however, he looked pleased to see them, though he glanced at Ekhaas with some mistrust. He stepped down into the shallows as the boat glided up, and grasped the side near Orshok, holding the boat easily against the pull of the river. Orshok asked something in the guttural tones of Orc, probably trying to find out what Krepis was doing there, Geth guessed. Krepis answered in the same language. Ekhaas’s tufted, wolf-like ears stood up as she listened. Orc, Geth knew, was just one of half a dozen languages that she spoke, but Orshok and Krepis might have been speaking gibberish for all that he could understand them.

At least for all that he could understand them on his own. He stretched a hand down and let it rest on the hilt of the ancient Dhakaani sword that was lashed to his pack in the bottom of the boat. He’d carried the sword out of the ghostly fortress of Jhegesh Dol and with it had wounded Dah’mir. Only recently, in the caves beneath Taruuzh Kraat, had he discovered that it was even more than it seemed. Its name was Wrath -Aaram in Goblin-and it was a sword of Dhakaani heroes, forged by the same legendary Dhakaani daashor who had created the binding stones. As if the visit to those caves and the tomb of its creator had roused the sword from long slumber, he’d found that it also had powers previously hidden. In Taruuzh Kraat, he’d learned that holding the sword allowed him to understand Goblin and the vile speech spoken by creatures of Khyber. Experimentation in their travels had revealed that Wrath let him understand other languages known to the hobgoblins of the lost Empire of Dhakaan-including Orc.

The instant his fingers closed around Wrath’s hilt, Krepis’s words were clear in his ears. “-waiting here for three days. Batul had a vision that you would come.”

“But why here?” Orshok asked. He looked vaguely troubled. “Why not at Fat Tusk?”

Krepis grunted. “Because we’re not gathering at Fat Tusk. There’s a lesser river just past here. Turn up it and go until you reach a sandbank. I’ll meet you there.” He looked at Geth, gave him a hideous smile, and switched out of Orc to greet him. “See you good, Geth!” he said with a thick accent. “You bring big fights with you!”

Geth straightened up and let go of Wrath. “Good to see you too, Krepis.”

The orc heaved against the boat and sent them sliding back into the open river, then climbed back up onto the bank and disappeared into the undergrowth. Orshok slid his paddle into the water once more and looked over his shoulder. “Were you listening?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Ekhaas.

“Yes,” said Geth, putting his paddle into the water and pressing against the current. Now that he was looking for it, he could see the smaller river Krepis had told them to follow. “But I didn’t hear everything. Who’s gathering and what are those stripes on Krepis’s face?”

“They’re horde marks,” Orshok answered, his voice tight. “They mean that he’s taken an oath of war.”

They found the sandbank and Krepis. Geth was startled to see that they were far from the first to land there. More than a dozen boats-some small like theirs, others larger-were beached on the sand and still more had been dragged higher up the riverbank. Orshok started to ask Krepis about the boats, but the other orc just shook his head and said, “Come.”

They followed him along a well-worn trail, the meager packs that had seen them across Droaam and the Shadow Marches on their backs. Geth carried his great gauntlet in a bundle as there seemed little point in donning the armored sleeve in the company of friends, but he made a point of buckling on Wrath so he could reach the sword easily if he needed its abilities.

Away from the river, the ground made a slow rise, becoming slightly drier and a little firmer underfoot. The area was thick with bushy ferns, their leaves half-furled against the night, and shaded by a few trees with smooth bark and gnarled branches. Geth spotted a sentry reclining among the branches of one, tracking them with a stout bow until Krepis raised a hand and made a sign in greeting. The sentry relaxed and waved them ahead.

The shifter heard the camp before he saw it, a dull roar of activity familiar from any number of campaigns during the Last War. The rising path reached a crest and the camp spread out before them, filling a vast depression in the landscape with tents and huts and cookfires and the forms of hundreds of orcs. Krepis spread his arms wide. “The horde of Angry Eyes!” he said with pride. “Come. We find Batul.”

He led them down the interior slope of the depression and into the camp. In spite of its size, Geth realized, the depression wasn’t actually very deep-three long strides carried him from the top of the slope to its bottom. The ground within the depression was noticeably drier than that outside it, even though it clearly sat somewhat lower. Among the tents and huts, he could also make out the shapes of tall standing stones. He recognized them as markers erected by ancient Gatekeepers. “What is this place?” he asked Orshok.

“The Sharvat Vvaraak,” said young druid. “The Mirror of Vvaraak, the dragon who taught the first Gatekeepers. It’s been a sacred gathering place for thousands of years.”

Ekhaas kicked at the dirt. “This doesn’t look like a mirror to me.”

“Legend says that if you dig down, you’ll find a sheet of glass covering the Sharvat from side to side.”

Geth saw Ekhaas’s eyes light up. The hobgoblin was a duur’kala , or dirge-singer. Even through their short acquaintance, he’d discovered that one sure way of getting her attention was to mention a story or legend she hadn’t heard before. “I don’t think this is a good time to start digging,” he told her.