Paul Kidd - Descent into the Depths of the Earth

“Polk, shut up.”

“See? Now I knew you were going to say that. That’santicipation, son! That’s what you have to learn.” Polk sighed sorrowfully andcontemplated the sad state of the world. “Guess I still have to train you. Guessthe fault’s all mine. I see errors, son, and I’m too forgiving, too quiet! Ijust let ’em slide. I don’t comment-too polite, that’s always been my failing.Never say an unkind word. Try to let fellers figure things out for themselves. A doctrine of non-interference, son! That’s my way. I’m too quiet!”

Jerking back and forth to try and break his ropes, Jus breathed heavily, his eyes bloodshot with an utterly volcanic rage.

“Polk, enough.”

“Well, that’s nice of you to say, son. I see what you’regetting at. The way I teach you is good enough for normal folks, but you’re justa bit slow on the uptake, thick as a plank…” Polk gave a concerned shake ofhis head. “Ain’t your fault, son! All great heroes have a few failings.It’s just up to people like me to make allowances. It’s my own mistake. I didn’ttake you properly in hand. ‘Let the young feller learn from his own mistakes’, Isaid. ‘Experience is the best teacher’, I said.” The teamster gave a tragicsigh. “I should have been more forthright, guided you better. Now we’re justgonna be fed to a demonic demigod, and that’s that.”

His hands tied behind his back, Jus flexed his fingers with the need to crush and rend.

“What?”

“Fed to demons, son. These drow are agents of evil. Stands toreason they have demonic overlords. Stands to reason overlords have to be fed.”Clucking his tongue, Polk leaned around the pillar to look back at the Justicar. “Son, that’s what I mean. You ain’t got a logical mind.”

They both sat roped back to back, tied to a huge, solid stalagmite. Bruised, cut, and gouged, the Justicar was still smothered with blood. Savage and dangerous, the Justicar watched events in the lich’s cavernswith predatory interest.

They were tied beside a slave caravan. A line of dispirited bugbears, goblins, and troglodytes-apparently failed tribe members-were chainedin a line beside a reeking pack lizard. Drow merchants and guards lounged nearby, breathing perfumes, drinking wines, and idling away their time. The merchant leader walked languidly behind his men, seeming utterly unconcerned. Jus took stock of each drow, the position of their weapons, and the location of intervening cover.

The lich’s cave, a dark cavern opening from which hundreds ofsoft voices were murmuring, stood only thirty feet away to the north. Beyond that, the main cavern was relatively empty. Four bugbears stood guard at the southern entrance-the one through which Escalla would come when she started herrescue. The rest of the cave sloped away eastward where it became warrens for the mutually hostile tribes of bugbears and troglodytes. The two species were ferociously antagonistic. Raw terror kept the stupid creatures in line-terrorand a greed for the rewards brought by service to the drow.

There were signs that another previous caravan had left only hours before. Tracks and less wholesome spoor betrayed that Sour Patch’s lostpopulation had been brought here and then moved on. Conceivably this second, smaller slave train was heading in the same direction.

A hooting noise began to grow and swell. Around the cavern, colors shifted as troglodytes dropped their protective coloring. The chameleons emerged from their guard posts on the walls and leaped clumsily to the floor, expanding throat pouches to give off deep, ear-splitting booms.

A huge troglodyte chieftain paced out from the warren caves. Twenty warriors came with him-all huge lizards draped with belts made from badlyflayed goblin skins, some with the wet red skulls of victims still hanging in their hands. They dragged prisoners along with them-six gnolls and a hobgoblin,all gouged, bleeding, and nearly dead.

Scores of angry bugbears flowed out from the other warren caves, following the troglodytes. Surly and snarling with jealousy, they eyed the bleeding prisoners. Leaving the slave caravan, the drow merchants walked over to meet the troglodyte leader and began talking in a braying, barking tongue.

Troglodytes offered their captives to the drow, pointing at the slave caravan. The prisoners were clearly too badly injured to march to the caravan’s destination. The drow used gestures to reject the goods. Roaring inanger, the troglodyte chieftain turned and bellowed to his followers, who instantly gripped the captives and tore the creatures apart with their bare hands. Screams echoed through the tunnels, and the troglodytes closed in like piranha to feed on screaming, shrieking flesh.

Polk shrank back against his stalagmite in horror as he watched the captives being eaten alive. “Ah, son? Have you an escape plan ofyour own? Because mine still needs a little bit of work.”

“Polk, quiet.” The Justicar tensed, leaning forward togaze at the southern tunnel entrance. “Do what I damned well tell you the momentit starts.”

Polk blinked and looked around at the Justicar. “It?”

Lurching up the southern passageway came a large pack lizard-a big thing covered in mildewed scales and occasional fungus growths. Thecreature was led by a solitary drow-a thin, somewhat tall creature armed with aheavy crossbow and with an unusually long sword slung over its back. Watching the drow come closer to their cave, four bugbears at the cavern entrance came to their feet.

As the solitary drow trader approached, a bugbear halted him with an upraised hand and spoke in its guttural, snarling tongue. The drow looked at the floor stiffly and gave a grunt, shrugging his shoulders. The bugbear nodded as if in agreement, then presented its hand toward the drow, palm upward.

The drow hesitated, looked confused, and then put a platinum coin into the bugbear’s hand. The gigantic goblinoid blinked at the coin, lookedpleased, pocketed the trinket, then presented its hand once again.

The creature jiggled its hand and snarled out a few words, then pointed to the drow’s cloak pin. Alarmed, the drow began to pat its pocketsin confusion. It turned to face the pack lizard, careful not to touch the thing, since it was only a flimsy illusion spell case over a floating, misshapen string of shapes tied up in an old tarpaulin. Pretending to search its own robes, the drow hissed a whisper into empty air.

“Why does it want to look at my cloak pin?”

“Cloak pin?” Invisible and sitting astride the floatingcanvas sausage, Escalla felt a flash of inspiration. “Oh! I think he wants youridentification!”

“Identification?” Transformed into drow shape by one ofEscalla’s spells, Private Henry quailed. “I don’t have any identification!”

“Lessee… we found some weird stuff.” Escalla rememberedthe gold hairpin filched from the drow sorceress who had turned into a manta ray. The faerie extracted the pin and slipped it into Henry’s hands. “There yougo! Give this a try.”

His ashen pallor making his black skin gray, Henry turned and placed the golden pin in the hands of the bugbear. The huge goblinoid took one look at the spider symbol upon the pin and instantly fell to its knees. Its companions clumsily followed suit, holding their bloodstained clubs against their chests in salute. Henry accepted the pin back from the guard, raised his hand in a vague attempt at benediction, then towed his rather awkward pack lizard past the guard-post and into the caves.

“There we are-simple!” Escalla, utterly invisible andtherefore not sweating in fear, waved to drow guards and merchants. “You see Jusover there?”

Carefully ignoring the pack lizard and Henry, Jus sat tied to a stalagmite near the lich’s cave. Polk had been tied to the opposite side ofthe same stone pillar, and the little man’s mouth was moving as he showered anunwanted soliloquy on empty air. Pulling his long, stark white locks from his face, the dark elf that was Private Henry peered over at his friends.