Death’s Usher: Quarry of Slaves, Foundry of Souls

Read Part One here

Read Part Two here

Read Part Three here

Read Part Four here

“DID YOU REALLY have to do that, Ibnar?”

“Of course. According to the Law, I provided for your needs while teaching a con man a lesson.”

“By bullying him into giving us all his poison vials! How are you any better than a robber?”

“A robber would have beaten him and left him for dead. I let him go.”

I sigh and shake my head. Blight peeks out of my pocket and gives Ibnar a few angry squeaks.

*Blight no like bad guy. Reeks of sweat and hair oil. Blight wants to bite him but will hold back.*

I give my new furry friend a few scratches behind the ears. He sinks back down and curls up.

“Shall we continue onward, or will we stand by the side of the road forever?”

We walk on. I ball my hands into fists at my sides. My fingernails draw stinging ichor from my palms. I wish I could reach Ibnar, earn his respect so he wouldn’t treat me like this. He couldn’t see the spirits in the graveyard. To him, I wasn’t fighting anything. I was only making a gigantic racket. Maybe if I learn how to throw my dagger like he does his kukris? That might be a start. The thing is, I’m too chicken to ask him. I don’t want to make him any madder than he already is.

Nothing much happens during the next couple of days. We keep our eyes straight ahead and our thoughts to ourselves. I don’t get the chance to try my new lute. We eat, camp, and sleep. Blight watches over us, since an undead rat doesn’t need to do any of these things. No one attacks us at night. Nor are we waylaid by any more bandits during the day. I keep waiting for someone to ambush us, but who? More Inquisitors? I haven’t seen any on patrol so far south. It makes me wonder if this road has been outlawed. It does lead to the sages’ city, and their knowledge has also been outlawed. Damn the Exarch! You can’t take a step without breaking one of his 500 rules!

Speaking of which, we reach the labor camps a day early. When you’re not wasting time talking or singing, you pick up your pace. What else is there to do? The closer we get to Codiza’s largest quarry, the more my heart pounds. My breathing comes in shallow gasps. A jolt of fear makes my brain feel hot and tingly. I’m so thankful I don’t sweat like a normal human.

Down below, from so deep in the quarry that I almost can’t hear it, come the ringing of voices and sledgehammers. The convicts are singing despite the heat and the work. I breathe faster.

“Calm down, Lyli,” Ibnar says, using my alias. “I’ll have to tie your hands behind your back again. Otherwise, those in charge will wonder why I’m letting a prisoner walk freely. And, for Void’s sake, don’t let anyone see the vermin in your pocket.” Begrudgingly, I agree and submit to the binding. We approach the outskirts of the camp. Several Inquisitors and a foreman are already waiting. My heart stops. The foreman is a bona fide ogre in leather armor, carrying a sledgehammer that must weigh a hundredweight. He could tear the Inquisitor beside him in half if he wanted to.

“Halt!” The smaller man, who isn’t small at all, raises his hand. “State your name and status.”

“Inquisitor Ibnar, Tenth Rank.”

I almost fall over in a dead faint. Could the only person above him be the Exarch himself?

The guard frowns. “You can’t be that high. If so, you’d wear black plate armor. Yours is plain.”

“A disguise for the road. Wearing ordinary gear means I’m not drawing attention to myself.”

“Aye. However, I must see your sigil to confirm your rank. Raise your right hand to the square.”

When Ibnar obeys, his colleague drops to one knee and bows his head. “At your service, sir.”

So that’s what my dark bodyguard has been hiding, which raises several questions. The lesser Inquisitor asks them: “From where have you come? Who is this captive behind you? Why have you not informed us of your arrival? If we would have known, we would’ve prepared a banquet.”

“I don’t need one. I come from Milham’s Ford, and this is Lyli. She’s been convicted of whoring.”

“For how many offenses, and what’s a Justicar doing escorting a common prostitute here?”

“One. However, she’s been remanded to a higher court. It has come to light that Lyli has seduced several of her clients with magic. So say my peers, but they’ve no hard proof. If I take her to an ecclesiastical tribunal, they’ll unmask her witchery. She might merit a long sentence. Even death.”

To my surprise, the lower-ranked Inquisitor looks me straight in the eye. “Is this true, girl? Speak.”

I lower my head and murmur, “Every word, sir.”

“LOUDER!”

“Every word! Upon my soul, I swear I’m no sorceress. The church court will find me innocent.”

“No one is truly innocent. We are all guilty under the Law, yet some of us are guiltier than others. Justicar Ibnar? You and this low-life may pass. I expect to see her back here in a week, in chains. Meanwhile, I have something of grave importance to discuss with you, away from prying eyes and keen ears. Come. Foreman Gruk? Guard this girl with your life until we return.”

The bald, snaggle-toothed ogre grunts and glares. When his two superiors are gone, he lumbers up to me. “What you got? Gold? Shiny rings? Healing drinks? Give all, or me smash your head.”

“My hands are tied behind my back. Sir. If you’ll unbind me, I’ll empty my pockets right now.”

Foreman Gruk unties the rope around my wrists with fingers the size of elk sausages. His touch is surprisingly nimble. He unfastens the purse from my belt and counts my fifteen sovereigns: all I have in the world, plus the five from Ibnar. “Lotta gold.” He puts it back in my purse and lets it dangle from his huge hand, shakes it so the coins rattle, then spies my lute. “What in da Hells?”

“It makes music. You know what music is?” Gruk nods. “Would you like me to perform?”

“You bard? Right, right. You sing song, but you better be good. Or me smash your head.”

I take a deep breath. What song would please him? Perhaps “Take Down the Troll.” Then again, trolls get along well with ogres. Offending Foreman Gruk could cost me my life. I think of several other ditties about war and bloodshed when inspiration hits like a lightning bolt. “The Warlord’s Cradle” is one of Codiza’s most famous tunes. It’s a macabre twist on a lullaby, based on a true story about a man raised as a warrior from the moment he was born. Instead of crooning about safe sleep and sweet dreams, his mother sang of all the things he’d do in the future: swing swords, bash shields, rush foes, slit throats, and cut every enemy down. He would show no mercy; he would give no quarter. As the title suggests, he grew up to be a nefarious warlord. He ruled his fiefdom with an iron fist. Before every battle, he’d enter a trance and remember his mother’s voice, smooth yet insistent, gentle yet unbending. The only one to defeat him was – guess what? – an ogre. The ogre did to him exactly what he had done to everyone he had ever fought.

By the time I finish “The Warlord’s Cradle,” Foreman Gruk is lying on the ground, fast asleep.

My coin satchel lies by his side. If I approach him in order to take it, I might wake him up.

“Blight? Hey, Blight?” My rodent friend peeks out again. “See my purse? Go get it.”

He squeaks. *What’s the magic word?*

“Pretty please with a slice of cheese?”

Blight crawls out of my pocket, down my leg, and over to my second-most-prized possession. He takes the drawstrings of my coin purse in his teeth and drags it over to me with strength belying his size. Even though the gold inside jingles, it doesn’t wake the ogre in the slightest. He’s snoring so hard that the ground is shaking beneath both of us. Ibnar and his fellow Inquisitor return, stare at Gruk, then stare at me. Why are my hands untied? What am I doing with a blood-red lute?

I tell the truth. “Foreman Gruk wanted to hear a song. He unbound me so I could play one.”

“And you put him to sleep?” asks the other Inquisitor. “You’d better explain yourself fast.”

“It’s a new instrument. I wanted to break it in. As for him, why not let sleeping ogres lie?”

“Because he’s the foreman of this quarry. I need him back at work. Gruk? GRUK!” At the sound of his name, the hulking brute snorts in recognition, then rolls over and slumbers on his stomach.

“He’s exhausted,” says Ibnar. “Lyli is in my custody. She won’t escape, so let us move on.”

“Bind her again. Then you may. I beg a thousand pardons for questioning you, Justicar.”

“Hmph. I should report and demote you for insubordination, but that would take too much time. Who knows what dark and dreadful powers Lyli could unleash if I don’t take her away now?”

“Go. Go!” The other Inquisitor waves his hand like he’s swatting a swarm of mosquitoes away.

No one needs to tell us twice. Once we’re clear of the camp, I snarl at Ibnar: “Now I’m a witch?”

“I apologize for the accusation. I had to think of a plausible reason why I wasn’t dropping you off to do time for selling yourself. I had to think of a worse crime, one beyond my subordinate’s ken and pay grade. The ecclesiastical tribunal I mentioned happens to be in Sudansa, of all places.”

“We’re heading straight from the butcher’s hook into the lion’s mouth? Wonderful.”

“What would you have said? How would you have avoided a warranted stint at hard labor?”

“I would have said I was innocent, and you were taking me to a higher court to prove it.”

“Our appellate court is in Vobod. The so-called City of Freedom lies all the way to the west, several weeks from where we are right now. Sudansa’s much closer. Yes, now my inferior knows where we’re going. No, he won’t hunt us unless we fail to return in a week – or unless we give him the slip and find sanctuary in the sages’ city. The big-brains have been known to offer it to weary travelers for a high price. Here’s what we do: we pretend to be just that. We inform no one of our mission to find someone who knows magic. On the sly, we listen to rumors about mages who’ve gone into hiding, and we track one down. We offer them their life in exchange for their service.”

“More intimidation. Can’t we promise gold or rare items to them instead if they travel with us?”

“Aye. It may not be enough. The best way to ensure someone’s loyalty is through fear.”

“So you say. I say that appealing to their expertise and academic curiosity will get us further.”

“With a big-brain, that might work. Breaching the Hendecahedron is the chance of a lifetime.”

I clear my throat. “I don’t mean to pry – all right, I do mean to pry – but what did you talk about with that other Inquisitor? He said it was of grave importance. That means I need to hear it.”

“Yes, you do.” I blink. Ibnar just agreed with me on something crucial. Progress!

“Inquisitor Oswald informed me that I absolutely must be in Exarchion three days before the next full moon. The Exarch has something planned. What that is, I know not, but Oswald said that disobedience or a failure to obey means death. Ordinarily, this matter is for Inquisitors’ ears alone, but Oswald risked his station to tell me that whatever the Exarch means to do will affect all of Codiza. That means you too. As soon as we conclude our business in Sudansa, we head east.”

“Did he say anything else? Anything about the bandits we fought, and the one we left behind?”

“As a matter of fact, he did. He mentioned the headless dwarf, and how whoever had decapitated her made such a clean kill that it had to have been a professional job. Naturally, he was right. He had no reason to suspect me. The other two thieves with her, the elves, reported to the quarry. They spoke of a monster disguised as a man, a vicious killer who pretended to serve the light. Of course, I told Oswald that if you lived as an assassin, you often died by the hand of another one.”

“And Oswald believed you?”

“Why wouldn’t he? I never lie unless I must for self-preservation. He swore me to secrecy on all fronts. He also said, ‘Tell the witch I hope she burns long and painfully, for ‘tis what she merits.’”

“Thank you, Ibnar. That’s reassuring.”

“You asked if Oswald mentioned anything else. I’m reporting the answers. As I said before, we’ll elude him in Sudansa. What’s he going to do? Abandon his post at the quarry and risk public execution to pursue a Justicar and HIS rightful quarry? No. He’ll stay where he’s supposed to, and we’ll move right along like we’re supposed to. If he hires spies, we’ll slay or evade them all.”

“What if we don’t recognize them? What if he’s already alerted his other friends about us?”

“He wouldn’t dare. He saw my brand. He knows the stakes of trying to take us down. Have a little faith in something besides the Scales and ‘eternal balance.’ Have a little faith in your protector. He’ll get you to Sudansa much safer and sounder than you would have been on your own.”

“But that’s so far – I mean, will we make it in time? We might need to rent horses or a wagon.”

“Do you know how to ride a horse?”

“Nay. Steeds are for rich kith. I’ve never been rich, even plying my second trade.”

“Then a wagon it is. Who knows? We could travel with that peddler I shook down – er, corrected.”

“I think he’d high-tail it straight to Vobod if he ever saw us again. A lowly bard and a Justicar: what a pair! What was the sigil you had to show Inquisitor Oswald to confirm your rank?”

Ibnar holds up his right hand. The letter “I” has been burnt into his thick, callused palm.

“I for Ibnar?” I shudder at the thought of a branding iron searing my own delicate skin.

“A good guess, but no. Back when the first paladins fought their first battles, ‘Justicar’ was spelled ‘Iusticar.’ There were no J’s as we know them today. Tradition dies hard. We Inquisitors are thralls to it.” He shrugs his shoulders in a grand harrumph. “Did it hurt? Like the hells. Did I resent having my identity buried in my title? Also yes, but I put duty first. You’re lucky to be traveling with an Inquisitor who’s spurned his vows. I’m living proof that betrayal isn’t always bad.”

I almost congratulate him on the irony a lack of self-awareness brings, but I don’t. Instead, I ask him what he was doing in Milham’s Ford in the first place. A Justicar in a backwater village? With one of his characteristic smirks, he says, “I asked for the post. I wanted an assignment where I could conduct my covert activities undetected. City graveyards are well-guarded. Yours is not. As for murdering kith, I also wished to hide until I could strike again. I’d carried out eight contract kills, and my equals in Exarchion were getting suspicious. If I exiled myself to a place so out of the way that it’s not worth putting on a map, I could let the fallout from my assassinations blow over. When I return to the capital, I plan to use my rank as the way in to the Hendecahedron. A regular Inquisitor doesn’t have the authority to go inside, but the only one higher than me is the Exarch.”

“You’re absolutely horrid, but I need you. I can’t reach the portals to the afterlife without you.”

“Glad to be of service, little fanged one. As long as we work together, we should reach our goals.”

We settle into an uneasy truce in the next few days. Even Blight calms down from wanting to bite Ibnar. Keeping a steady pace, we reach the bridge connecting this near-deserted road to Sudansa.

“Toll’s four gold apiece,” says the bridgekeeper, a regular guard in chainmail instead of plate.

“Four gold? Highway robbery, especially for an Inquisitor. A Justicar. One gold each. That’s it.”

“You’re no Justicar. You’re in plain plate, not black.” Ibnar shows his right hand. “Sorry, sir.”

The bridgekeeper lets us pass, pocketing the gold so fast it might as well have been two hot coals. We cross over the River of Eleven Houses, formerly the River of Twelve Houses. It’s running clean and clear. I want to fill up our canteens, but Ibnar says we shouldn’t waste time clambering down the steep banks. A vision of him lying face down in the mud makes me giggle, but I stop once I see the scowl on his face. Once again, he’s saved us trouble by being exactly who he claims to be.

That doesn’t mean I trust or agree with him.

On the other side of the bridge, the wind suddenly changes. The air becomes thick and metallic, sharp with the odors of molten iron mixed with fire. Blight peeks out of my pocket, sniffs around, and shivers. *Blight scared. What are those bad smells? Not like nature at all. Like liquid death.*

“There must be a smelting plant near,” I mumble. “I’ve never been this far south, so I don’t know.”

“Yet you suspect correctly,” replies Ibnar. “But what’s this giant sign? It has a picture of a – tablet?”

“Tablet? Those have to do with reading. Reading often has to do with magic. We must be getting close to Sudansa. I can smell metal and fire, but Blight? He says it smells like liquid death.”

“Now you’re talking to the rat?”

“He talks to me.” I take a breath. “I mean, not out loud. Inside my mind. Out loud, he squeaks.”

“You really are a lunatic. Either that or the world’s greatest druid. They talk to animals too.”

I’ve never met a druid, just like I’ve never done much of anything outside my hometown, so I take Ibnar at his word. We tread carefully, letting our lungs fill with smoke and cinders the closer we come to an odd building. It looks like a foundry, and it glows like a foundry, but something’s wrong.

I hear screams.

Screams like no other, like swallowing liquid iron, like being torn limb from limb. Screams of pain and damnation, of fear and hopelessness, of lives lost too early. Screams of unexpected torment.

“We have to see what’s going on in there,” I say, tugging Ibnar’s arm and pointing to the foundry.

“Why? It’s only a metalworks. Let’s leave the laborers to their business and return to ours.”

“Come on, Ibnar. I saw you staring at that sign like a hungry bear stares at a deer. You can’t leave anything alone if it even looks like something illegal. Who knows? We might find contraband, and that might lead us to the mages in Sudansa. Besides, you’re my protector. You know how to fight.”

“That I do. Let’s compromise. Ten minutes in the foundry. If we find nothing, we leave.”

“Deal.”

The screams become mind-rending shrieks. I cling to sanity by clinging to Blight, stroking his fur and helping him calm down. What in Codiza could be causing so many kith so much agony?

We approach the door, flanked by two men in leather armor. Ordinary gear, ordinary guards.

“Halt,” one of them says. “This is private property. Identify yourselves or move along. Now.”

“I’m Justicar Ibnar,” my bodyguard says, pulling rank. The guards stiffen but don’t move. “I’m here to inspect this plant by order of the Exarch himself.” He holds up his right hand. “Let us enter.”

“Of course you can,” says the guard on the left, inspecting Ibnar’s sigil, “but who’s the girl?”

“My research assistant. She has proven invaluable. I’m not going in without her. That’s final.”

“Hmm,” says the guard on the right. “I’ve never seen a female technologist before, but go on in.”

The left guard pulls the foundry door open. I blink my watery eyes against the onslaught of heat and more cinders. The glow would blind anyone else, but my eyes adjust. Creatures of the night can see anything in the dark. What I behold makes me hold my breath for twenty seconds.

Kith in cages. All sorts of kith in all sorts of cages, even ogres and trolls. All in chains, and all naked. Peculiar tattoos – at least, that’s what I think they are – cover every inch of their bodies, even the tops of their shaved heads. The men grab their cage bars and howl for all they’re worth, like animals trapped in a black-market zoo. I’ve heard about such things in tavern rumors, but this is far worse. The women sob and stretch out their hands like beggars, not daring to breach the bars. Blight is right: it smells like liquid death in here. Like molten iron mixed with molten corpses.

“Great Scales, what is this place?”

A dwarven foreman in goggles approaches us. He glowers at me, then at Ibnar, folding his arms across his chest. “You two are trespassing. This is a rune foundry. Turn around while you can.”

“A what?” Ibnar sneers. “What kind of foundry keeps naked, tattooed kith in cages? Answer me. I am a Justicar, and I can place you under arrest. I should, but I’ll give you a chance to explain.”

“A rune,” says the dwarf with an equally disdainful sneer, “is an item of arcane technology. Magic mixed with natural materials. We don’t deal in potions and powders here, nor in spells. We traffic in powerful metal items imbued with the raw power of the sinful souls these wretches don’t need. Can you imagine? No more torches; we’ll have rune-powered streetlights. No more reeking outhouses; runes will pump the waste away if you piss and shit into special cisterns. No more fireplaces or candles; runelight will shine in every room in every home. Mechanomagical gadgets may be blasphemous novelties, but think of the potential! They’ll save us from this dark age.”

I can’t help the words that fall out of my mouth: “Or usher in a new one! You’re smelting souls!”

“For a good cause. A higher purpose. Besides, no one will miss these kith. They’re all lawbreakers of some sort. I’ve trapped thieves and murderers here, counterfeiters and kidnappers, whores and the panderers who exploit them. See that troll over there? He was once employed as a night watchman, but he slew his bosses over gold. His greed-green self will make quite the agricultural rune. The soul of that Justicar? A blinding beacon on a lighthouse. And yours…yours, girl! It’s silver. I’ve never seen such a marvel in all my life. Bound to a rune of divination, it will embody justice. No guilty kith will ever escape the brilliance of your spirit, and all courts will truly fulfill the Law!”

The dwarf signals for two ogres and two elves to flank him. Five against two. What great odds.

“Come with me, both of you,” the dwarf says. “Otherwise, you’ll die with your purpose unserved.”

Again, I can’t help the words that fall out of my mouth: “I’d rather fight.”

Credit: Tenet