22
It was late afternoon when Fletcher awoke, the light from the sun filtering through the upper windows of the tavern. Ignatius purred softly on Fletcher’s chest, his tail twitching as he dreamed. He had deliberately moved from his customary position around Fletcher’s neck to deny Athena such a prime location. The Gryphowl had seemed annoyed by the little imp’s antics, and Fletcher had wisely chosen to infuse her to avoid a confrontation.
Beside them, Othello snored loudly, his mouth open, nostrils flaring with every breath. Peering through the shutters and seeing the sun high in the sky, Fletcher gave Othello a gentle kick. The dwarf snorted awake and groaned, pulling the covers over his face.
‘Looks like staying up all night to plot our route has meant we’ve wasted most of the day sleeping,’ Fletcher complained, looking through the window. ‘I told you we should have gone to bed.’
‘Well, we’ve done all the leg work now,’ Othello said, though he didn’t sound convinced. ‘We can spend the day shopping. Don’t you want to enjoy a day of freedom? You’ve been at it nonstop since you came out of that cell.’
Fletcher stretched and began to put on his boots, allowing Ignatius to slide off on to the floor. The imp remained on his back, legs akimbo, refusing to be roused despite a mental prod from his master.
‘Trust me, there’s nothing I would like more,’ Fletcher replied, ‘but last night Jeffrey suggested we go to the front lines, meet the soldiers. I’ve never been there – I want to see what it’s like, what they’re like.’
‘Are you sure?’ Othello asked, his apprehension obvious.
‘Yeah.’ Fletcher tiptoed past Jeffrey, who was still sleeping on the sofa across the room. ‘We’re about to go behind enemy lines and we don’t even know what our own soldiers look like. I’m going to see if the girls are awake.’
He left their bedroom and knocked gently on the adjacent door. There was no answer, so he knocked a little harder. As he raised his fist to knock a third time, there was a bang as something heavy was thrown against the door, then a voice rang out.
‘Bugger off !’ Cress shouted.
Fletcher grinned and retreated from the door.
‘Looks like it’s just us three,’ he said, prodding Jeffrey awake.
It was a long carriage ride to the front lines, so much so that the first orange tinge of dusk was already staining the sky when the driver knocked on the ceiling to let them know they had arrived. The journey had been a sombre affair, the realisation of the task the three would undertake the next day sinking in. Fletcher had even infused Ignatius halfway through their trip, as the demon had caught their despondency and his mournful growls did little to lighten the mood.
‘Come on,’ Fletcher said, leaping out as the other two looked at the carriage doors with trepidation. ‘Let’s explore.’
The carriage had stopped at the top of a low hill, allowing him a view of the front line, which stretched for miles on either side of him. It constituted a single, wide trench that came up to a man’s shoulders, with a wooden step built along the inside for the soldiers to stand on and aim their weapons over the top. Wooden bunkers with cannons emplaced within broke the line up at intervals, and Fletcher could hear the dull echoes of cannon-fire – an orc raid in the distance.
A few hundred yards away, beyond the trench, the green fronds of the jungle could be seen, with the ground between a barren wasteland, churned to mud after years of cannon-fire and pitched battles.
Fletcher had never seen the jungle before, and was fascinated by the intensity of colour and the thickness of the foliage, shrouding all but the edge of the jungle from view. Even as he peered closer, his stomach twisted. Soon he would be far beyond this border, cut off from the safety of Hominum’s lands.
Behind the trenches on their side, red-uniformed soldiers milled aimlessly, walking among a mess of campfires and large tents, smoking, eating and drinking. Somewhere, a violin creaked out a mournful tune, then an angry bellow cut it short, the musician’s efforts unappreciated.
‘Great, Fletcher,’ Othello grumbled, standing beside him. ‘This looks like a fun place. Well worth the four-hour journey.’
‘Give it a chance,’ Jeffrey said, eyeing the largest tent, from where shouts and laughter could be heard. ‘Let’s see what’s happening in there and have one drink, at least. We can sleep in the carriage on the way home.’
‘Agreed,’ Fletcher said, watching as a man was hurled from the entrance by two guards, landing in the mud with a spatter. Another staggered out behind him and retched violently, then collapsed on top of the steaming puddle he had left behind.
‘Although, let’s not stay too long,’ he added, then turned to the driver of the carriage. ‘Wait here for us and you’ll have a fare for your journey back.’
‘Right you are, sir,’ the driver replied with a wink.
They trudged down, trying not to get too much mud on their brand new moccasins. As they walked by, some soldiers stood up straighter, tugging their forelocks or saluting. Jeffrey’s walk turned into a swagger; the new uniforms they wore were clearly expensive, and identified them as officers of some sort. Even the two guards stepped smartly aside to allow them to pass, and soon they were within the confines of the tent.
It was devilishly hot within, the air steaming with the stench of unwashed bodies, pungent smoke and spilled beer. The place was full of men, swigging on tankards and puffing on cheroots, leaving a pall of smog to hang above their heads.
There was a bar to the right, which Jeffrey swiftly gravitated towards, joining a queue of men to secure a drink. Meanwhile, Fletcher and Othello saw a group crowded around what appeared to be a walled pit in the centre of the room. As they moved in to investigate, a gap-toothed man with a shaven head approached them, holding a grubby stack of papers in his hands.
‘Place your bets, lads. Odds are five to one on all four of ’em. Pick blue, red, green or yellow, ’tis all the same. Last one standing gets to live.’
They ignored him, pushing their way to the front of the crowd, with Othello just tall enough to peer over the lip and see what lay below.
A large crate sat in the centre of a bloodied sandpit, twitching and rustling with movement from within. Around it, four smaller crates were lined up against the pit’s edge, each around the size of a small keg of beer and corresponding to the colours the bookie had named. All of them were connected to a rope that ran through a ring embedded in the awning above the pit, ready to lift them and release what was within. Animal bones were scattered among the sand like cheroots in an ashtray, while the ribcage of an animal, perhaps a large dog, lay mouldering in the corner.
All around, men were jeering, some spitting and hurling abuse at the unknown inhabitants of the four crates.
‘Last chance for bets – anyone, anyone?’ the gap-toothed man called out, but there were no takers. He leaped on to the barrier beside Fletcher and as the eyes of the crowd turned to him, Fletcher realised he was the organiser of the event.
‘Release the gremlins,’ he bellowed.
Slowly, the boxes were lifted, and out of the hinged flaps at the bottom fell scrawny, grey-skinned creatures, barely taller than a toddler and clad in ragged loincloths. They had long noses and ears, bulging eyes and nimble, pianist fingers that scrabbled at the boxes in their attempts to stay within. Each was daubed with a splash of paint across their backs, just as their containers had been.
Strangely, one stood out to Fletcher. While the others cringed and scampered into the corners, the blue gremlin stood proudly, triangular ears flattening along his back, eyes swivelling around, flicking from the large box in the centre to the crowd above. For a moment the gremlin’s eyes focused on Fletcher, then it snatched up a broken thighbone from the ground, one end sharp and jagged, the other a thick double-club of bone.
‘Looks like we have a fighter! Blue’s got a bit of spunk in him.’ The gap-toothed man laughed uproariously, slapping Fletcher’s back as if he were in on the joke. Then his voice turned ugly and he gave Fletcher a sadistic sneer.
‘They’re usually the first to go.’
Jeffrey pushed his way between the two of them, much to Fletcher’s relief. He handed a drink to both Othello and Fletcher, his eyes already glazed over with inebriation. Fletcher took one look at the foul-smelling liquid within his tankard and quietly handed it to the gap-toothed man, before Jeffrey could see.
The man winked with thanks and then, after a swig that spilled most of the drink down his shirt, roared, ‘Unleash the rats!’
The largest crate was raised, and out came a mass of seething, wriggling bodies, a grotesque mix of tails, incisors and black, matted fur. There must have been a hundred of them, and wherever they scampered, they left little claw prints of blood.
The man threw his arm around Fletcher’s shoulders, the drink buying his goodwill. ‘We don’t feed ’em for a while – gets ’em ravenous,’ the man croaked with a conspiratorial nudge. ‘Takes a while for ’em to resort to cannibalism, the sweet spot’s three days. Looks like these ones started a little early.’
His breath stank, fetid in Fletcher’s nostrils. He turned away in disgust, and his eyes fell on to the pit once more, unable to drag them away from the spectacle.
The rats had sensed movement now, though many were still extricating themselves from the pile. Blue, thighbone in hand, was chittering to his compatriots, giving them orders in a strange language, or so it seemed. But if he was, they ignored his pleas, instead hiding their heads between their legs, while one clawed at the pit’s dirt walls, trying to find purchase in the crumbling material.
The first rat leaped for Blue, but he batted it away with a desperate flail. Again, he called to his friends, to no avail. Now two rats leaped, and he had no choice but to dive aside with a frantic roll.
The green gremlin fell, surrounded by a squeaking swarm of red-eyed rats. Blue cried out in alarm, but the sound was nothing compared to the screams and gurgles of pain as the teeth gnashed at the emaciated creature beneath them.
More of the vermin found their footing and Blue shuffled away, until his back touched the festering ribcage, pieces of fur still hanging from the bones, rotting tendons holding the structure together. The yellow gremlin was next to go, disappearing under a mass of black rats, its pitiful screams hollow in Fletcher’s ears.
Of the others, only the red one remained, having somehow managed to scramble halfway up the pit. It hung there, suspended, unable to climb any further. Beneath it, the rats squealed and leaped, teeth snapping below the gremlin’s kicking ankles. In the corner, Blue slipped beneath the ribcage, then pushed the sharp end of his bone through the gap and began stabbing at any rat that came within reach.
Fletcher watched in horror as a man leaned out and prodded the red gremlin, which fell screaming into the baying pack. There were yells of anger from some of the men, but they were only complaining because they had bets on it. Like a pack of piranhas, the rats stripped the tiny corpse until it was nothing more than a skeleton.
‘Blue wins!’ the gap-toothed man cried, greeted by a cheer from the men who watched. ‘Now, who wants to bet on how long he will last? I’ve got two to one it’s a minute!’
There was a surge of men, silver sovereigns held high as they rushed to take his bet.
‘I thought the winner got to live,’ Fletcher growled.
‘The show’s never been this good before,’ the man whispered out of the side of his mouth. ‘I ain’t gonna let it go to waste.’
‘I feel sick,’ Jeffrey mumbled, gripping Fletcher’s arm. ‘I don’t think this beer agreed with me. Take me outside, please.’
Below, Blue valiantly struggled on, a rat squealing as it was hit in the eye, another battering the ribcage beside it.
‘Let’s go,’ Fletcher said, shoving his way through the crowd. The tent was suddenly too small, too hot. He needed to breathe again.
They burst through the entrance and Jeffrey staggered away, dragging Othello and Fletcher behind him. He began to vomit, and Othello rubbed his back, turning his head away in disgust. The darkness of night had fallen, the last vestiges of sun sinking behind the horizon.
‘I took one sip of that stuff and poured it away,’ Othello said. ‘Like piss, fresh from the horse. Though drinking’s no more than a coward’s way to courage anyway.’
Courage. That was what Fletcher had just seen, from a little gremlin, fighting against insurmountable odds. As he pictured the struggling creature, his heart filled with resolve. He set his jaw and began to pace back to the tent.
‘Fletcher, wait,’ Jeffrey mumbled, spittle dripping from his mouth.
But Fletcher was already through the doors and barging through the crowd. He vaulted over the pit’s parapet with a single leap, then blasted the rats aside with kinetic energy, sending their heavy bodies thudding into the earthen walls.
He summoned Ignatius with a pulse of mana and the demon came out fighting, slashing back and forth with his claws. A wave of flame from his mouth sent a dozen rats to their deaths, but the scent of cooking flesh was too much for the others – the remaining rats fell upon their burned compatriots with squeals of joy.
Blue was locked chest to chest with a monstrous rat that had wriggled inside the ribcage, stabbing it repeatedly in the side with his bone. Fletcher drew his khopesh and neatly spitted the rodent, using the sword and body to lift the cage away. Then, as the cries of excitement began to die, he sheathed his sword and gathered the little gremlin into his arms. Blue’s skinny chest heaved in and out with exhaustion.
The crowd stared down at Fletcher in shock, then the gap-toothed man yelled.
‘What the hell are y—’
But he never finished his sentence, for the world flipped upside down and an explosion tore through the tent, shrapnel ripping through the crowd of drunken men like a scythe through wheat.
Deep in the pit, the flare passed above Fletcher and Ignatius in a wave of roiling fire. His ears sang with pain from the thunderclap of sound and he was thrown to the ground by a shockwave that rippled through the earth.
Then he was clawing his way out of the pit and over the screaming bodies of injured soldiers, Blue still clutched protectively to his chest. He felt a hand grasp his ankle and he kicked it away, stretching and pulling forward like a drowning man heading for shore. Ignatius tugged at his sleeve, guiding him through the smoke. Then Othello’s strong hands dragged him out and over the mud, until they collapsed together at the base of the hill. The dwarf’s relieved face peered down at him.
‘You’re alive,’ he breathed. ‘It’s a damn miracle.’
Fletcher stared at the carnage behind him. Frantic sergeants barked orders as soldiers dragged the wounded from the blackened, bloodstained ground and on to hastily prepared stretchers, made from spears and knotted jackets.
‘This is no miracle,’ Fletcher choked, for the air was thick with smoke, smaller fires spreading among the wreckage. Ignatius chittered fearfully and scampered on to Fletcher’s shoulder, nuzzling his neck for comfort.
‘We need to help them,’ Jeffrey gasped, stumbling towards the ruined tent, but Fletcher grasped him by the collar and tugged him back.
‘Othello, you shouldn’t be seen here,’ Fletcher said urgently, as angry voices mingled with the sounds of dying men. ‘An explosion … a dwarf nearby.’
Othello’s eyes widened in horror, then he was tugging Jeffrey up the hill with Fletcher, though the boy fought them every step of the way, demanding to be allowed to help the fallen soldiers.
It was not long before they reached the carriage, which by some miracle was still waiting for them.
‘What the hell happened?’ the carriage driver asked, his eyes widening as he took in the gremlin cradled in Fletcher’s arm.
Fletcher shoved a fistful of coins from his purse into the driver’s hands as Othello manhandled Jeffrey through the carriage doors.
‘Take us back to Corcillum,’ Fletcher growled. ‘And quickly.’