Mark Anthony - Tower of Doom

Other creatures lurched into the circle of light. A legless elf woman with arms ending in crablike pincers slithered on a slime-covered pad like a gigantic slug. A green-skinned halfling with hissing snakes for arms peered with gigantic frog eyes. A man with hundreds of insect legs sprouting from his body wriggled on the floor like a huge centipede. There were dozens of the creatures. A few seemed strong and powerful like Ghurr. Most moved clumsily, as if in constant agony. Some were little more than shapeless heaps of quivering flesh. Ghurr uncoiled his sinuous tentacle- arm and jerked back the hood of Wort's cloak. Hisses and growls came from all around.

"This is no Broken One!" a creature shrieked.

"He is an Overling!" screeched another in revulsion.

The elf woman clicked her pincers. "We must kill him, Ghurr. You know the Overlings fear us. If he tells the other humans about us, they will seek us out and destroy us!"

"No!" Wort cried out, his bulging eyes almost as wide as the froglike orbs of the halfling. "I won't tell anyone about you. Don't you see? I know what it is liked to be loathed by others. I am a monster, too."

Ghurr's growling laughter echoed eerily. "You? A monster? No, Overling." With his tentacle he pointed to the centipede-man. "This is monstrous." He turned to the legless elf. "And this." His tentacle coiled sadly, almost lovingly around a bubbling pile of flesh. Wort could make out two eyeballs swimming in the shapeless mass, gazing up at Ghurr in adoration. "And especially this," Ghurr said with sorrow and rage. "Look carefully, Overling. These are real monsters. Any one of us would trade his body for yours in a moment."

Wort shook his head, gasping for words. "How… how…?"

"How did we become this way?" Ghurr paced a slow circle around Wort, his talons scraping against the stone floor. "We are the Broken Ones. But we were not always like this. Once we were whole and beautiful-elves and dwarfs, humans and halflings. Then we were captured by the Nightmage."

"The Nightmage?" Wort gulped.

"Yes. Three centuries ago he dwelt in this keep, a wizard more powerful than any this land has ever seen. He forged many objects of power." He pointed to the glowing silver candle. "That is one of them. There are hundreds of such enchanted artifacts lost throughout the keep. The Nightmage conducted experiments as well-magical experiments involving living beings and animals." Ghurr gestured to the others and himself. "We are the failed results of those experiments. And I tell you, there were many more failures than successes. The Nightmage kept us alive to study us. Finally we rose up against him."

"I tore his throat out myself!" the elf woman said hatefully, her crab-claws snapping.

Ghurr went on. "We thought his death would release us. We were wrong. The magic that transmuted our bodies kept us alive, as it does even now. We retreated beneath the keep, to dwell here in the darkness. But if the Overlings learned of our existence, they would not tolerate us." His cold tentacle brushed Wort's cheek. "So we must kill you."

Wort shook his head, stunned by Ghurr's dark tale. "Please," he gasped. "Please, I won't tell anyone "

Ghurr's eyes glowed murderously. "I know," he whispered. His tentacled arm coiled around Wort's throat and began to tighten. Wort's hands scrabbled uselessly against the slimy tentacle. Bright sparks flared in his brain as he fought vainly for breath. So this is how my life ends, he thought giddily, at the hands of another monster. The tentacle squeezed tighter.

Suddenly green light exploded from above. Ghurr jerked his head up as the other Broken Ones cried out. The tentacle slipped from Wort's neck. He slumped weakly to the floor, gasping. In the emerald incandescence he could see that they were in the center of a huge cavern. A score of misshapen forms lurched and shambled across the cave-more Broken Ones.

"It is Clan Krillek!" the elf woman shouted. "They are attacking!"

"Clan… Krillek?" Wort choked in confusion.

"Not all the Broken Ones follow me," Ghurr snarled. "Some serve Borr, and these ones follow Krill. They have come to try to steal our territory from us. But they will not find it so easily done." His eyes flashed hotly. "I will deal with you when we are done with the Krillek, Overling."

Ghurr pushed Wort aside and lunged toward the advancing Krillek. The rest of Clan Ghurran hobbled, slithered, and crawled after him. With shrieks of hatred, the two clans of monsters clashed. Ghurr's tentacle wrapped around a lizard-scaled woman and squeezed until his opponent snapped in two. Blood spurted in a gory fountain. The elf woman's pincers closed on a beetle-man's insectile arm and sliced it cleanly off. Yellow ichor oozed from the stump as the beetle-man waved it in agony. One of the Krilleks, a dwarf with a boar's head, skewered the centipede- man on his long tusks. Suddenly the dwarf screamed. The shapeless blob of flesh with the staring eyes had landed on the back of his neck. From the center of the blob, a tube like a mosquito's mouth plunged into the dwarf's skull and began to suck out his brains. And that was only the beginning.

Somehow, Wort managed to tear his gaze away from the grisly melee. Then he spotted something. Nearby was another opening in the wall of the cavern. He did not hesitate. Grabbing the silver candle, he lunged. Without stopping to see if any of the creatures pursued him, he raced down the narrow passage as fast as his bowed legs allowed. Snarls of rage and squeals of agony echoed after him. Leaving the Broken Ones to their bloody struggle for dominion of the underdark, he raced on.

It was morning when Wort finally stumbled out of a filthy storm drain into the courtyard of the keep. He breathed the cold air in relief. For a time he had feared he would never find his way out of the labyrinth below. Then the now-familiar voice began to whisper in his mind, telling him where to turn and which passages to take. He had encountered no more of the Broken Ones. Though they had meant to kill him, Wort found he almost pitied the creatures. He was like them. He dwelt alone, hiding his monstrous appearance. Soon, he vowed, he would never have to hide again. He moved stealthily toward the bell tower.

When Wort stepped into his high chamber, he instantly knew something was awry. Crouching warily, he gazed about the dingy room. Nothing seemed out of place. It was the pigeons that gave it away. They fluttered about in agitation, calling out querulously in their sweet, stupid voices.

"What is it, my friends?" he whispered, moving slowly into the room. "What has happened?"

He heard a squeak in the floorboards above. There was someone up in the belfry. His belfry!

Murder glinted in his bulbous eyes. How dare someone trespass upon his private demesne? Casting off his cloak, he sprang onto the wooden ladder and scrambled nimbly upward like a malformed ape. He burst through the trapdoor and crouched on the floor of the belfry, long arms before him, ready to grapple the intruder and snap his spine like a willow sapling. What he saw plunged a cold spike into his heart.

"I wouldn't touch that if I were you," he said grimly.

Before him, an expression of shock etched across her pale visage, the violet-eyed angel-woman froze, in the act of reaching for the rope that hung from the cursed bell.

"I–I'm sorry," she gasped, snatching her hand back. "I only wanted to hear the sound of the bell."

"Believe my words," he croaked, taking a step toward her. "You would not wish to hear the voice of that bell. Any other bell, perhaps. But not that one."

She nodded, unconsciously backing away from him. Wort noticed this with satisfaction. Perhaps she was afraid of him after all. As well she should be.

"Why have you come here?" he asked accusingly.

The woman visibly steeled her shoulders, lifting her chin high. "I wanted to speak to you after you frightened that mob away in the village, but I didn't know how to find you. Then I heard folk talking of someone who lived in the bell tower of Nartok Keep. They said it was a… "