They retreated into darker alleys opposite the tavern.
“FIRE!”
Raw-throated screaming started.
The tavern emptied a crowd into the winding street.
Shouts filled the air, Men and a few elven-kind and dwarves calling for water, buckets, billhooks, and sand. Invisible in the firelight, the brothers slipped past them into the echoing, empty tavern, sprinting upstairs to their room.
“Let’s move it!”
Will ripped his dress over his head. His short, stocky frame glowed in the light from the burning buildings. Fingers fumbling, he pulled on shirt, trunk-hose, fine mail-shirt, and doublet. He buckled on his sword, checked the placement of throwing-daggers and poison needles, and ran over to join Ned, who was throwing every piece of gear from dark lanterns to heavy-duty crossbows into the brass-bound chests.
“Lower ’em down from the back window with the rope,” Ned said. “We’ll go out and round the tavern—”
Will darted across the room and laid the palm of his small hand on the door. He frowned, opened the door a crack, and looked into roaring flames. All the tavern’s stairs blazed.
Burning thatch floats.
“We’ll jump down after,” he corrected, shutting the door and coughing. “It’s only one floor.”
“One floor in a Man-building!”
“If you’d rather roast, Ned—!”
Grinning at the expression on his brother’s face, Will opened the back window and hefted the first chest up onto the sill. Braced, he lowered it by the rope, then lowered the second chest and scrambled up onto the windowsill. He took careful aim and jumped.
“Arrhhh! You little turd!”
In a tangle of knees and elbows, Will got himself together and found the innyard empty except for the Man he’d landed on. The fat human ostler, still sprawling, opened his mouth to yell again, and Will hit him on the temple with the hilt of his dagger. The Man fell backward.
Ned Brandiman’s feet hit square on the Man’s chest, cushioning his jump also. The Man choked, lips turning blue. The halfling pulled the last pink ribbons from his hair and shook out the braids. He chuckled.
“Fast work, Will.”
“No problem, Ned.”
A Man’s voice bawled, “Oi! You two!”
Will spun round and ran towards the burly Man in working clothes at the yard entrance.
“Help! Sir, help us! The tavern’s on fire, we were only saved by the heroism of this Man—and I think he’s injured; please, help!”
The stranger, a brawling-looking redheaded Man, loped across the innyard and knelt down by the ostler. While he prodded the recumbent form, Will took a swift look around. No sign of Ned, but the stable doors were open…
Will palmed a knife as he came up behind the redheaded Man, and sliced neatly through the jugular vein with the Man facing away from him, so that the gout of blood sprayed across the unconscious ostler. He stared thoughtfully up at the tavern. Smoke coiled out between the eaves. He bent and put the red knife in the ostler’s hand.
“Will! Here!”
Straining to lead a sweating pony, Ned Brandiman staggered out of the stables. Will grabbed a couple of empty boxes and, climbing on them, fixed the brass-bound chests either side of the saddle, and finally leaped up behind Ned as his brother flailed a horse-crop nearly as tall as himself, cracking it against the pony’s flanks.
The hot wind from the fire flew in his face, and Will grinned widely. The poor quarter’s houses and low dives flashed by, lost in the dung kicked up by the pony’s hooves. He shook Ned’s small but muscular shoulder.
“Slow down!”
His brother heaved on the reins. The pony reluctantly fell into a walk. Ned soothed it until the flattened ears relaxed, and Will sat straight-backed in the saddle as they paced with dignity through the merchants’ quarter and the night that here was quiet, towards the sleepy guards on Ruxminster’s city gate.
The orc encampment steamed gently in the sunshine.
Barashkukor, leaning scabby elbows on the parapet of the Nin-Edin fort, gazed down from the mountainside at a wilderness that only the vultures could love. He tilted his dented helm back on his head. “So what do you get if you cut the legs off a warrior?”
Marukka gave a baritone chuckle, waving her jagged sword in the air for emphasis. “A low-down bum!”
Barashkukor groaned, but quietly in case she should hear him. The young female orc towered over him by a twenty inches.
“And what,” she pursued, “do you get if you cut the arms off a low-down bum?”
Barashkukor leaned his poleaxe up against the stone parapet, abandoning all pretence of sentry-duty. He scratched at the scabs on his scaly chest and pulled his scruffy brigandine open—the metal plates sewn into the jacket poked through the worn lining, pinching his tough hide. The hot air sang with emptiness, and the mountain fort glowed like an oven.
“What do you get if you cut the arms off a low-down bum?” he repeated.
“An ’armless low-down bum!”
Barashkukor giggled sycophantically. The female orc planted her bow-legs wide, fists on her hips, and bellowed. Her bright orange hair, caught up into a horse-tail on top of her skull, shook wildly. The rusty mail and plate-armour in which she clad herself jingled, as did the knives and maces hanging from her wide leather belt. Her vast breasts strained the buckles of her brigandine.
“And what—”
Barashkukor sidled along the parapet towards the steps. The rest of the orc band sprawled in the bailey, in the noon heat, around the cooking-pit. Only a few roofless buildings and the outer defences remained of this fort. Barashkukor found it rather homely.
Marukka’s sword-point slammed against the wall an inch in front of his face. He halted and assumed an expression of extreme attentiveness.
“—what do you get,” she demanded, “if you cut the head off an ’armless, low-down bum?”
He considered it in proportion to the nearness of her jagged weapon. “Ya got me. What do you get?”
“A headless chicken.”
Barashkukor said incredulously, “A headless chicken?”
“Well—would you stand and fight, with no arms and legs?”
Marukka slapped her bulging green thigh. Her jaw dropped, and she wheezed. Tears leaked out of the corners of her beetle-browed eyes.
“That’s good! Isn’t that good? I made that one up myself!”
Barashkukor showed all his fangs and tusks in a grin. “Real good, Marukka. You slay ’em.”
“Sure do.” She stroked the sword complacently and tucked it back under her belt. “Shouldn’t be surprised if I was good enough to be paid. Stinkin’ Men get paid for jokes. I seen that once. I was in a city, once, you know—”
I know, Barashkukor thought. “How about a game of Orcball?” he suggested hastily.
“Good idea! Aww… We ain’t got a ball.” Marukka sniffed. She stomped down the steps into the bailey. “’Ere! Whose idea was it to cook the dinner?”
The largest orc, who was (it need hardly be said) the band’s leader, pointed silently at one of the smaller orcs. Marukka advanced, drawing her sword. The small orc backed away.
“I didn’t! It wasn’t my idea! I wasn’t even here—urp!”
Marukka’s jagged blade whistled through the air. There was a whup! and something relatively round bounced and landed at Barashkukor’s feet, still blinking. The orc-band scrambled to their feet with enthusiasm.
“We got a ball,” Marukka announced. “Let’s play!”