R. Salvatore - The Ancient

Unaware of the changing mood, the trolls began herding the prisoners away from the gorge. Bransen and the rest started away, but Ancient Badden called a command for them to wait. As they all, troll and prisoner alike, turned to regard the man, he again took up his conversation with the troll who had delivered the sword. That creature whirled about and pointed in the direction of the prisoners, in the general area of Bransen.

Ancient Badden calmly walked over and spoke not to Bransen but to Vaughna at his side. “I am told you wielded this blade in the fight,” he said.

Vaughna glanced nervously at Brother Jond and Bransen. “I did,” she said, not knowing what else to say.

Badden motioned, and the trolls dragged her forward. “This blade,” Ancient Badden announced, “has the scent of the blood of a Samhaist elder on it.” His glower fell squarely over Vaughna. “This blade killed a friend of mine.”

Vaughna seemed to shrink at the remark. She turned her head as if to look back at her friends for support. Bransen tried to call out that the sword was his, but the Stork was unable to make his cry any more than an undecipherable keen.

“I only acquired it recently,” Vaughna stammered, seeming to shrink next to the Ancient one. “I never met a Samhaist elder.”

“You have now,” Ancient Badden replied. Without warning he stabbed the sword into Vaughna’s belly. Her eyes registered shock briefly before she doubled over, howling and holding her spilling guts, and sank to one knee. Her companions recoiled in disbelief.

Ancient Badden motioned to the trolls, then to Olconna and to another group, followed by a nod of his chin toward Vaughna. His well-trained charges knew what to do. As one group moved to lift Olconna to his feet and shove him back to the others, a second group fell over Vaughna, dragging her forward trailing blood and bile.

She fought as well as she could which wasn’t much, given her condition and the odds. The gutsy woman did manage to squirm about to regard Olconna as he was dragged the other way. “Every moment precious,” she gasped to him, despite the pain, despite her imminent demise.

One troll ran to retrieve a rope, looped over a pulley at the end of a beam that was hanging out over the chasm. Bransen and the others watched in horror as the trolls tied the rope about Vaughna’s ankle and dragged her to the edge of the chasm and left her there as Ancient Badden strolled over, sword still in hand.

The trolls around the prisoners began herding them again, but Badden stopped them. “Let them watch,” he said with a wicked edge to his voice.

Hot with horror and revulsion, Bransen fell within himself. He fought to find his Jhesta Tu edge to cry out that it was his sword. The second the sound escaped his lips something smashed hard into the side of his head, dropping him to the ground. He looked up in surprise to see that it was Brother Jond’s fist and not that of a troll.

“Do not insult her sacrifice,” the monk whispered harshly.

It took the dazed Bransen a few moments to reorient himself. He looked back at Ancient Badden and the chasm where Vaughna hung upside down by one leg, trying to curl up, to grab her bleeding stomach. Bransen’s heart sank, every fiber in his body tense with disbelief and shock. Brother Jond pulled the transfixed Bransen back to his feet.

Ancient Badden stood on the ledge before Vaughna, his arms upraised. He began a chant, calling forth the power of the “great worm of the ice.”

“What is he doing?” the thoroughly shaken Olconna asked, or started to, for before he finished, a thundering, rumbling roar shook the ice beneath their feet.

Hanging over the chasm, Vaughna looked down, and her face drained of all color, despite being upside down. She began sputtering and tried to swing herself toward the edge while the trolls began to turn a crank, lowering her from sight. From somewhere below a great beast roared again with obvious excitement. Vaughna began to scream beneath the lip of the chasm, beyond sight. The trolls kept turning the crank, easing the woman a long, long way down. More screams, more roars, and then suddenly it went very quiet.

Suddenly the rope jerked so forcefully that the heavy beam bent and seemed as if it would break. It held, and the trolls began hauling up the rope-no need for the crank anymore.

“Justice is done,” Ancient Badden pronounced, turning about to the gathering, a supreme and contented smile on his old face. He motioned to the trolls to begin herding the remaining prisoners away.

Suddenly another squeal from the chasm turned the stunned prisoners about yet again, this time to see the end of the rope. Vaughna’s leg dangled from it, the flesh of her mid-thigh ripped and shredded where some nightmarish monster had swallowed the rest of her.

“By Abelle,” Brother Jond muttered fervently, head bowed.

The Anvil over Their Heads

They’re wanting ye to use yer long legs and wade out for better fishing,” Mcwigik explained to Cormack.

The man sat on a large rock on the northeastern side of the powries’ nearly barren island, staring at the misty waters.

“We’re not going to kill ye,” Mcwigik assured him, handing him a weighted net. “Not unless ye do something asking us to kill ye.”

“I do appreciate the rescue, and your generosity in allowing me to live.”

Mcwigik shrugged. “I’m thinking that the bosses are wanting Prag’s son to get old enough to see if the boy can win his dead father’s cap back.”

“The bosses? Aren’t you one of the bosses?”

“Yeah, but I’m wanting to keep ye alive just because.”

“Just because.”

“Yeah.”

Despite his troubling situation Cormack managed a little grin at that cryptic admission from the rough powrie. He had grown somewhat fond of the dwarf.

“Ye don’t give us any reason to kill ye, and we won’t kill ye,” Mcwigik reiterated. “Now go get us some fish.” The dwarf hocked and spat on the rocks and turned and started away.

“And what happens when you go to battle?” Cormack asked, stopping the dwarf in his tracks. Hands on hips, Mcwigik slowly turned about. “When the powries row out to do battle with the monks or the Alpinadorans, what am I to do?”

“Ye’re a long way from getting us to let you go along,” Mcwigik replied, completely missing the point.

Cormack gave a little laugh. “I could never go to such a fight, and you know it well.”

“Yach, but ye fought them barbarians all the time.”

“Not by my choice,” said Cormack. “Never by my choice. Not against them and not against you powries.”

Mcwigik hocked another large ball of spit, this time landing it near Cormack’s feet. “I’m knowing ye better than to think ye’re afraid of a fight,” he said.

“There is no point to the fighting!”

“No? How about the trolls, then? Would ye-”

Cormack cut in. “I’ll help you kill all the trolls you can find.”

Mcwigik smiled approvingly. “Yeah, we seen what was left of yer boat. Durndest boat any of us e’er seen. Might be a big part of why th’others’re letting ye stay.”

“But I cannot stay,” said Cormack.

“Up for a long swim, are ye?”

“I cannot remain here for long, anyway,” the fallen monk went on, ignoring the sarcasm. “This is no place for me.”

“Ye wanting us to put ye back with the monks?” asked Mcwigik. “Aye, might that we can, but that ye’ll have to earn. So go get the fish, and keep getting the fish-”

“I can never go back there,” Cormack interrupted. “They would not have me, and I would not have them. They set me adrift, thinking they had left me for dead, but somehow I didn’t die.”