Chapter 11: Bartan, Soldier

He repressed a shudder, watching his footing as they clumped down the winding stair. He was near the head of the column. Orcs ahead, Orcs behind, Orcs to either side. The rancid, musky smell of them clogged his nostrils, caught at the lump of fear in his throat. Kargh's muttered curses drifted back between a pair of Orcs, falling silent as orange light washed about them.

The walls fell away. The steps wound down around a central pillar into a circular room. Pairs of broad double doors opened in at two places, each guarded by what looked like a couple of particularly large and hairy Orcs. It was only as he reached the bottom of the stair and approached one portal that he realized that they were huge!

Brutish faces leered down at them, dented helms almost brushing the high ceiling. The portal they flanked looked tiny, though he knew that any three of this party could pass through it side by side without brushing against one another.

"Faw gworsh!" The Orc leader's words sounded as though they might be some debased tribal dialect. "Gworsh Ka. Gamoog, nakh gworsh. Kwah Gorrick."

"Gahh mooog. Gah worrush." The words slurred from between jagged fangs, in a voice so deep it almost lost itself among the echoes. The Ogre stepped aside, eyeing them warily. Or hungrily, Bartan thought to himself. The paired doors swung open to the Orc leader's tug, revealing a broad corridor lighted by torches in wall holders.

They stopped where the hallway made a right turn, and Gorrick kicked the wall on his left. He was answered by a startled yelp and a spate of Orcish.

"It's me, Gorrick." Bartan had a good ear for languages, and by now could follow Orcish fairly well. A lot of it seemed to be made up of words from the Common tongue, twisted and slurred. "Open up, Griggo. Or I have gizzard for supper."

"Where Foggip?" the unseen voice whined. "Him say, open for him."

"Foggip dead. You be dead, you not open door!" Gorrick glared as though he'd bore a hole through the hidden panel with the force of his anger, but he couldn't repress a fearful glance back at the room of the Ogres. "Now! Open door, or I feed Griggo to cave monsters. In chunks. Live chunks!"

A section of wall fell away with a rattle of chains. Griggo was a scrawny little Orc in greasy leathers, armed only with a notched short sword of tarnished bronze. He cringed back against the wall to let them pass, securing the door after them.

They ignored a door in the left wall, and it stayed closed. A door in the end wall of the passage revealed a further stretch of hallway that went a short distance before turning left. Before they reached the turn, Gorrick stopped at a door in the right hand wall.

"Griggo! Come! Open door."

He stood well back as the smaller Orc pushed the door open, then followed warily into a room that was set up as a rough barracks.

"Sleep where you want." Gorrick gestured widely, mouth half open in a gap toothed grin. "Plenty room now. But not shit here. Go out in hall, let cave monsters clean up."

He seemed to have picked Bartan as the leader of the group. Not about to argue with the burly Orc, he waved toward a partly empty corner. The few Orcs already there, clad in leather rather than metal, gave them plenty of room. All but one, that is.

"Come on, move it!" Bartan snarled.

"Huh?"

"Go! Over there!" He pointed toward the other end of the room where some of the other Orcs were watching.

"No! Not go! This Dalbur place."

A few inches shorter than Bartan, the Orc stood flat footed, a gnarled club dangling from his fist. In one easy move, Bartan plucked away the club. Spinning the Orc around, he used the small end of the club, jabbing Dalbur in the buttocks. The Orc stumbled forward, tripping over another Orc's outstretched leg, and crashed to the floor. Bartan tossed the club after him, ignoring the other Orcs' guffaws.

"You handled that well." Darrick spoke in a low voice. "We don't want to start anything yet, but be on guard."

"Don't worry," Kargh snarled. "We can handle these bastards."

"I thought Orcs could smell out Humans," Elm whispered.

"Not in this stink." Kletta wrinkled her nose. "We'll be all right as long as we stay well away from them."

The room quieted as the Orcs settled down. A few of them huddled together under a torch that burned feebly, throwing knucklebones for copper pieces. The others stretched out on the stone floor, pulling tattered cloaks over themselves.

"Now what?" Darrick sat with his back to the wall, and Bartan knelt to whisper in his ear. "We can't stay here."

"Wait until more of them sleep. Then we'll slip away. You probably didn't spot it, but there's a secret door back down the hall. If we're lucky, it could lead to another stair."

"Hey, you! Bard'n. C'mere," Gorrick commanded.

Bartan obeyed. Gorrick sat at his ease in the far corner of the room, conferring with a couple of his underlings.

"What you want?" Not hostile, but not whining.

"Talk. Where you from? How long you here?"

"Us woods Orcs. From big swamp hole."

"Near Shurr'd?"

"Some near. Us just come here."

"Yah! That good. You in Gorrick tribe now. Do what Gorrick say. This Gorrick den. All right you go out, but stay close. Bad things out there. Eat one, two Orc. Stay away if see more."

"Where food?" Bartan growled, shielding his face from the light with a fold of his cloak.

"Food come. Food, drink. Plenty for all."

Bartan retreated, finding his knees strangely weak. The Orc leader's attention had been centered on the bone he was chewing, or he'd have surely seen that it was no Orc he was dealing with. Bartan breathed a silent prayer of thanks for Tarr's paints, then slouched back to their corner and reported what had been said.

"Watch what you eat and drink," Darrick repeated the warning he'd given earlier. "Water should be all right, and fresh meat if it comes from outside. Don't touch the ale or wine, or any kind of fungus."

The torches burned down, adding their resinous stench to the foul air. They couldn't be too far below the surface here, the stairs hadn't been that long. Yet Bartan felt as though he had the weight of a mountain on his back. Once or twice an Orc stirred, stumbling sleepily out into the hall and returning. Then the door shook to a mighty blow. He sprang to his feet, sword in hand, surrounded by his companions, but the Orcs only glanced up, unafraid.

"Food!" Gorrick shouted happily. "Griggo! Open door for Glomp!"

The scrawny Orc scuttled to the door just ahead of a hearty kick, and yanked it open. He cringed back out of the way as an Ogre squeezed through the opening, one hand dragging a sack made from the mangy hide of some colossal beast. Under the Ogre's other arm, a battered keg dripped alarmingly.

"Foo ood. Glomp bring foo ood," the creature rumbled. "Where Fo oggip?"

"Dead!" Gorrick snarled. "Me chief now!"

"De ead? How de ead?" Glomp lowered the keg to the floor, let go of the sack of food. This creature might not be terribly quick on the uptake, Bartan guessed, but it wasn't as stupid as some of the Orcs in this room, either.

"Monsters gottum. Us kill monsters. Now us eat."

"Nooo Ee eat. Tell Daahrk One!"

"Tell later. Glomp go away. Us eat now."

The Ogre ducked out through the door, its helmet scraping the top of the opening even with its knees bent. As soon as the door closed, the Orcs swarmed around the food, tearing the sack open with clawed fingers. A scaly haunch of some unknown beast was quickly torn into bloody chunks, and slabs of pallid fungus were snapped up avidly. Snarls and curses subsided as fanged maws were stuffed with food. Each Orc crouched by itself, ready to fight off anyone who came near.

Bartan, Kargh and Furdick backed away clutching lumps of evil smelling fungus, and pretended to eat. As soon as the Orcs were done feeding, they gave up the pretense and ate from their own packs.

"We'll dump this fungus out in the hall," Darrick muttered. "We'd better move out soon. This Dark One just might decide to check up on Gorrick."

"Think that Ogre'll pass the word to him?" Bartan asked. "He looked pretty dumb."

"Not dumb enough to suit me. We can't take too many chances in this place."

With food enough for a whole Orc band divided among half their original number, the Orcs were soon snoring lustily. Even Gorrick nodded where he sat, then jerked awake as his helmet slipped from his head and clattered to the floor.

"Huh? Whuzzat?" He fumbled for his helmet and jammed it back onto his head, then got to his feet. Stumbling over prone bodies, he set his back against the door and slid to a sitting position. Soon his snores mingled with those of the rest of his band.

"Klond's Basalt Balls!" Kargh snarled. "How're we gonna get past him?"

For answer, Elm slid his dagger from its sheath, fingering its sharp edge.

"No," Darrick shook his head. "You'd have to come at him from the front. He just might let out a yell. A spell would be better, but I hate to waste one we might need later. Kletta, you're the best one at moving quietly. You and I'll check the walls for a secret panel."

"And if we don't find one?" Kletta glanced back over her shoulder before moving off.

"Then we try Elm's way, and fight our way out if we have to."

Creeping silently among sleeping bodies, they examined the walls foot by foot. Around them, snores rose and fell, building to a thunderous peak as several Orcs breathed in unison, then smoothing out to a steady rumble. For a moment, Bartan was reminded of all the soldiers' barracks he had ever slept in over the years, all over Orris Kayn. The sounds, even the smells were much the same, though this time he was surrounded by deadly enemies. One missed step, and the room could, no, would erupt. In that kind of a fight, there was no telling who might survive.

He heard nothing over the rising and falling snores, but he could almost feel Darrick's tension ease as a stone moved under his hands. With the faintest of scraping noises a section of wall was replaced by darkness. The skin of his back crawling, expecting attack at any instant, he followed as Kargh and Anji led the way. The panel closed behind them.

Darkness!

A faint scratching. A spark of light. It wavered, then grew as Elm's deft fingers coaxed a torch to life. This room was about the same size as the one they'd left, but empty. Doors opened out to left and right, but the floor and piles of debris were evenly covered by a layer of dust. Nothing had come this way for some time, if appearances could be trusted.

"Well?" Kargh stood spraddle legged, looking first to one side and then to the other. "Which way? Or do we flip a coin?"

"We can hope to come at the secret panel from that way." Darrick nodded to their left. "Might as well try that door first."

"Smells foul." Elm knelt by the door, wrinkling his nose. "Might be something moving in there, but I can't be sure."

The door was hinged to swing toward them, but was blocked by a shattered length of timber that had fallen against it. Bartan wrenched it away, and the door swung open, thrust wide by a tide of horrors!

"Yaa haa! Corr Lannth!" His sword flailing with deadly effect, Bartan was forced back from the door. Somewhere Baysil and Darrick were chanting, holding their Holy Symbols on high, and suddenly the pressure lessened as some of the horrors he faced went to dust.

Anji chopped at an attacker. It fell back, but not before its claws raked her leg. She stiffened and fell, dropping her sword. Bartan ripped at two of the things, but no blood flowed from their gaping wounds. They would not die, but they could be smashed and crippled.

Kargh and Furdick ranged themselves at his side, dealing death, if indeed these things lived. Kargh's sword dripped orange flame, then guttered out as he crumpled under rending claws and fangs. The creature shuddered as missiles from Burdock's wand crashed home, then slid limply to the floor.

Beating one aside with his shield, Bartan split another's skull. Reaching claws raked his armor, but failed to catch. Shadows danced as Kletta and Tarr flailed at mewling creatures with their torches, skipping away from clumsy attacks. The room was a chaos of weapons and lurching bodies as two more of the Company fell beneath poisoned claws and fangs.

Pain! Bartan fell back as claws ripped at his throat. Before the thing could follow up its attack, Burdock was there with his deadly wand. He staggered, but kept his feet. A thing came at him, screeching and waving stumps of wrists. A last blow from his sword and the room was still.

"Klond's Basalt Balls!" He borrowed Kargh's favorite curse. "What are these creatures? And what of our friends?"

He knelt at Anji's side, but she was already stirring. Kargh, Furdick and Darrick were alive, but still paralyzed by whatever poison these things carried.

"Kargh's coming to," Elm reported, and Furdick was next to recover. The last to wake was Darrick, but then he'd been the last to fall.

"Don't you know what they are?" Elm asked in mock surprise. "I thought that you knew about all the different creatures that ever lived."

"I'm not sure that these things could properly be called living," Darrick answered from where he sat half propped against a wall. "Undead, called back to a semblance of the living by unclean magics. Devouring any true life they encounter. Neither dead nor alive, time would have no meaning for them."

"You think they guarded treasure?" Kargh peered at the open door, a gleam of avarice in his deep set eyes.

"That may be, but wait until our wounds are bandaged."

This was quickly enough done, and healing spells repaired the worst of the damage done by the monsters. Bartan would have held back, but Kargh pushed eagerly through the doorway.

"Here's something!"

The Dwarf tugged at the lid of a massive stone crypt. The carved slab crashed to the floor, shattering with a resounding crash.

"Nothing in here but old bones, and..." His words choked off as the bones moved. Up from the coffin rose a human skeleton in full armor, the rusty metal hanging about the bleached bones by virtue of crumbling leather straps. Bartan deflected a swing of the ancient sword, and Kargh's blade only rang harmlessly against the corroded shield. Baysil limped forward, his mace swinging in a deadly arc, and the skeleton backed off a couple of steps.

"Begone! Back to the evil that raised you up!"

Darrick's voice rang out clear and strong, as though a sudden ray of sunlight pierced the gloom. The skeleton reeled back like a warrior taking a mortal wound, and crumpled. The ancient bones fell to powder, released from whatever enchantment had bound them, and suddenly weapons and armor were only piles of rust.

Kargh was reaching into the coffin before the echoes of its fall had died away, searching for whatever he might find. His clutching hand came up with only a couple of scraps of parchment, and he stood peering down at them doubtfully.

"We'll take those!" Burdock deftly plucked them from his hand, giving one of them to Tarr. "They're not for the likes of you to fool with."

"What? Give them back!"

"They'll do you no good. Ah, there's more here."

Kargh looked down, distracted, then made a grab for what Burdock had spied. He lifted up a leather sack whose rotting sides spilled a torrent of coins.

"Gold! Bright, shining gold!" Kargh clutched at them, letting torrents of yellow metal run through his fingers.

"Divide it up, and keep moving," Darrick snapped. "We've more important things to do than to squabble over a few paltry bits of metal."

Kargh glared, but at least he shut up. Bartan watched as the pile of coins was roughly divided, each of them taking a hundred or so of the golden tokens. If they ever got out of here with their lives they'd be well off, though not perhaps truly rich. They'd have tales to tell around the campfire, to boot. If they got out of here.

A door on their left led only to an empty room. The room beyond that was also empty, and had only the one door.

"Back the way we came," Darrick ordered. His voice was calm, but Bartan glimpsed the strain he was under. Though it might only have been a trick of the light as flickering torches accented the lines of his face.

Anji slung a short spear across her back. He'd noticed her pick it up after the fight with the skeleton, wondering why she bothered with it. Still, the head was of good metal, the shaft short enough not to get in her way.

Nothing stirred as they back tracked. The skeleton was only a vague pile of dust, adding a minuscule bit to the gray that veiled the stone flagging. In the next room the undead lay in tangled piles, no longer a menace.

"Hold it!" Kargh growled a warning as something moved among the unclean bodies. A strand of silvery twine stretched down from an air vent, and a hairy body the size of a dog scuttled toward them on eight hairy legs.

"Missiles!" Anji's bolt glanced off, but Kargh's quarrel and his own arrow sank deep. Fanged jaws gaped soundlessly as the spider tried to attack, but its wounds were mortal. Gray slime leaked out and the circlet of jetty eyes lost their luster. Its legs twitched, scrabbling at the hard stone, but that was all.

"Try the other door."

Elm nodded assent to Darrick's command, removing his iron cap to hear better. A moment of silence, then he shrugged. "Don't hear anything, and I can't tell if what I smell is from what's already here."

Kargh pushed at the door. It yielded slowly, squashily.

"Klond's frolicking fleas!" He swore his disgust. "A whole room full of shit!"

"Rotten fungus!" Bartan sneezed at the stench that seemed to roll forth in an almost visible torrent. "How're we going to get past that?"

"There's a door in the far wall." Anji's voice was muffled as she peered through the gloom. "It's only ten feet or so. We can wade through it. It's only up to our knees."

"To your knees, maybe!" Kargh snarled. "To the Nine Hells with it! I can make it if the rest of you can."

Slipping and sliding, they waded through the muck. Even in the light of the torches the stuff gave off a sickly glow that fooled the eye, making it hard for Bartan to keep his balance. Sure, the others would help him if he fell, but he'd still wind up covered with glop from head to foot.

"Oh, shit!" Kletta slipped to one knee, grabbing at Elm as she struggled to her feet. "Hey, I found something!"

She fished it out of the muck, dabbing at it with a corner of her cloak to reveal a gleaming shield. Scraping off the worst of the filth, she slung it from her pack. The room was narrow, only ten feet across, but the far door was offset to the right. By the time Baysil entered behind them, Kargh had reached the other door. It opened easily, held only by a simple latch.

"Oh oh," he whispered. "We've got troubles."

"Let me see." Tarr slithered through the muck to where she could peer through the narrow opening as he held it barely ajar. "Oh. Bugbears. I think I can handle them. It's worth a try, anyway. There are too many of them for us to fight if we don't have to."

Bugbears. Creatures much like Orcs, Bartan remembered. Like, but unlike. A different breed entirely. Wide fanged mouths and bulging eyes, with a flat nose that was almost lost in the middle of their faces. Fierce fighters, hard to kill, but not too bright. Large, pointed ears that twitched and turned at every sound. Hairy bodies clothed only in random scraps of armor.

Kargh pushed the door open far enough for Tarr to step through. In one upraised hand she held her ceremonial silver dagger by the blade. As the Bugbears jerked around to face her, she chanted a short phrase in some unknown tongue.

The leader of the band, a hairy monster with a huge spiked club, roared a command that silenced his fellows. Bowing his head nervously, he licked his lips with a pointed orange tongue.

"How I serve?" The words were Orcish, but slurred and distorted.

"We are called to serve the Dark One. You will let us pass."

"Us let pass. Go to Dark One."

She stood proudly erect as Kargh led the rest of the Company to a door that opened inward across the room to their right. When they were safely past she turned to follow, then hesitated.