Martin Scott - Thraxas at the races

Makri hates them more fiercely than anyone. Despite this she refuses to acknowledge that Human civilisation is more advanced. She claims that contrary to what is believed in the west, Orcs do have music, literature and even a theatre of sorts, with extended performances of various religious rituals. If this is true, it’s completely unknown to us, apart from the savage martial tunes they play when advancing into battle and the weird, shrieking pipe music they play from the backs of their dragons. Orcs can breed and control dragons, Humans can’t. They’re dark-skinned and wear their hair long, a style favoured by only the lower classes in Turai, and they dress in shaggy, tasselled black clothes. They’re fond of silver jewellery. They make good weapons. They hate all Humans. And they can fight. So can I, which is fortunate as I’m not carrying any spells. I whip out my sword and my dagger and sink into my fighting stance.

The three Orcs are in the garb of young warriors, with black helmets and tunics and weapons at their hips. But they haven’t attacked us yet. Strange. Orcs and Humans are implacable enemies. We waste no time when we meet. We just kill each other. I wonder if it might be worth asking them what they’re doing here.

I don’t get the chance. Makri’s hatred of Orcs doesn’t allow for conversation. With a decisive movement she rides one of them down and leaps off her horse to confront the others. Her axe and her sword are in her hands as she hits the ground and the first Orc’s head flies from his shoulders before he has time to move. The second tries to draw his sword but Makri guts him and he slumps dead to the ground. I’m not the sort of man to let my companion fight on her own but I don’t have the chance to join in. As the third Orc climbs to his feet Makri whips out a throwing star from her bag and tosses it with deadly accuracy right into his throat.

It’s all over in seconds. Three dead Orcs lie sprawled at our feet. Seven years in the Orc gladiator pits, five of them as Supreme Champion, make a woman hard to beat.

Makri stalks around suspiciously, peering through the rain and sniffing the air for other Orcs.

There don’t seem to be any more. There shouldn’t have been any here in the first place. The Orcish nations are far away to the east. They don’t wander around at will in the Human Lands. Any movement by a force of Orcs across the Wastelands that separate us would be detected by Human Sorcerers who scan continuously for just this sort of thing.

I wonder what they were doing here. There was something odd about their behaviour. We mount up and hurry on. A long white wall surrounds Mursius’s villa. A heavy iron gate guards the front, behind which sits a bored-looking member of the Securitus Guild. I tell him my name and he nods as if expecting me. He opens the gate, and we ride in. When I tell him about the Orcs he looks at me with utter disbelief. I assure him it’s true.

“Three warrior Orcs. Just up the hill. We dispatched them. You’d better have the local militia scour the area in case there’s more.”

Realising that I’m serious, he hurries away to raise the alarm while Makri and myself head towards the house. The villa’s extensive gardens are partially submerged after the weeks of rain. Two servants take our mounts off to the stables.

The experience with the Orcs hasn’t put me off my mission. I have a living to earn. My instructions from Mursius are to talk to his wife and find out what she did with the works of art she sold. He didn’t require me to be subtle about it, and I’m not planning to be. Just a few quick questions, find out where the loot is, then recover it.

My plan for a few quick questions goes wrong right away when a well-spoken young woman informs me that Sarija, Mursius’s wife, can’t see anybody just now.

I wave this away.

“Mursius sent me.”

“I know,” she replies. “But you can’t see her.”

“Why not?”

“She’s unconscious from dwa.”

I stare at the young woman in surprise. One might have expected something more subtle.

She shrugs. “It’s the truth. I’m only paid to look after her, not tell lies.”

I get the strong impression that she’s had more than enough of taking care of Sarija.

“If you want to wait she’ll probably recover in a few hours. You can dry yourself in the guest rooms. I’ll have a servant bring you some refreshment.”

The young woman’s name is Carilis. She is pretty, in a bland sort of way. She speaks with the cultured voice of Turai’s elite and is rather expensively dressed in one of these long white gowns they charge a fortune for in the market. She was obviously disconcerted by Makri’s appearance. I wonder why she’s playing nursemaid to a Senator’s wife.

Shortly afterwards I’m drying myself in front of a fire as Makri roots around in the extensive window boxes decorating the large bay window. There’s a tray of food in front of us and a flagon of wine on the table. We wait for a while, which is okay with me. I charge by the hour and if a few of these hours involve sitting around eating and drinking I’m not going to complain. I’ve just begun to feel comfortable when the door opens and a woman walks in. She is as white as a ghost and just about as healthy-looking.

“I’m Sarija,” she says. “And it’s time for you to get the hell out of my house.”

She picks up the flagon of wine. For a second I think she’s about to throw it at me—Senators’ wives are notoriously bad-tempered—but instead she puts it to her lips and pours a healthy slug down her throat. She coughs violently, throws up on a very expensive-looking rug then keels over unconscious.

We stare at her body, prostrate on the floor in a pool of wine, vomit and broken glass.

“I’ll never really fit in with polite society,” says Makri.

I shake my head. “Senators’ wives. They get worse every year.”

I think about helping her up but I’m not really in the mood. I stride out into the corridor and holler for someone to come and help. Round the corner marches an Army Captain with eight armed men at his back. That’s more help than I was really expecting. They’re accompanied by the gatekeeper.

“He’s the one.”

The Captain wears a red tunic covered by a silver breastplate. He’s extremely wet and doesn’t look friendly.

“What’s the idea of sending me on a fool’s errand looking for Orcs?” he demands.

I explain to him that it was not a fool’s errand. The Orcs were there and Makri killed them.

“Makri?”

I lead him into the room. When confronted by a Senator’s wife lying stretched out on the floor and a young woman in a chainmail bikini with an axe slung over her shoulder, the Captain becomes even more agitated.

“What the hell is going on here?” he demands.

“Just looking,” says Makri, and shifts around rather furtively.

“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “They haven’t come about the plants.”

The Captain strides over to Sarija. I’m thinking that we might have some awkward explaining to do but fortunately at that moment Carilis appears. The Captain seems to know her and makes no comment as she attends to the Senator’s wife. He turns back to me.

“Well?”

“We’re down here on business at the request of Senator Mursius. And we met some Orcs. Didn’t you find the bodies?”

He didn’t. Nor did he find any trace of a fight. Not even a footprint.

“The rain must have washed it all away.”

“Very convenient. And would the rain also wash their aura away?”

“No, it wouldn’t.”

“Well, we went there with a Sorcerer. A very important local man. He wasn’t at all pleased to have the Army dragging him outdoors on a day like this. He was just settling down with a glass of wine and a new book of spells. But we told him it was important. A sudden appearance of Orcs.” The Captain fixes me with a grim stare. “The Sorcerer couldn’t find any sign of them. Not the slightest trace of an Orc’s aura. So what have you got to say about that?”