Bone lord 2, p.12
Bone Lord 2, page 12
“Think about washing yourself and brushing your teeth once in a while,” I said. “Don’t worry about losing your warrior powers. I’ll use my, uh, death magic so that you don’t lose your powers.”
Drok let out a booming laugh. “You try make Drok bath, eh? But Drok not stupid! Drok know you try to trick him, because you want Drok to lose his powers. Then, it be easier for you to make Drok go away. No, no, no. Drok no bath or brush teeth! Drok need be strong, very strong!” He lifted his arms and flexed, and I saw muscles appear on top of muscles.
For the moment, it seemed, we’d just have to put up with Drok’s stench. I’d conjure up some other means to wash the stink off him. Perhaps I’d change our route, do some river crossings. Yeah, lots of river crossings. A stink like Drok’s, though, might take something like an ocean crossing to dispel.
“You can keep your stench,” I said. “But you’ll make up for it with this.” I removed a golden coin from my pouch and infused it with my power before I handed it to him.
Drok placed it in his mouth and bit on it. “Gold real?”
I nodded. “Put it somewhere on your body, where you won’t lose it. Whenever you kill someone, their soul will be mine.”
He slipped it in the rear of his kilt and grinned. “Coin safe.”
Rami leaned over to me and whispered, “Where did he put it?”
“Probably between his clenched ass cheeks,” I whispered back before I turned to Drok again. “I know you barbarians eat like horses, so you’re responsible for finding your own food.”
“Drok good hunter. Drok find a lot of food. Drok go hunt right now!”
He ambled over to a dead soldier, picked up a battle-axe lying beside the corpse, and snatched a spear still in its grip. In his meaty paws, both weapons looked like mere toys. Grinning like a buffoon, he traipsed off into the woods. I had no idea how a loud, lumbering oaf like him would manage to catch anything except a cold, but if he was fine with feeding himself, then there was no harm in having him join us. I also needed him to show me the way to his wise woman eventually.
Now that the fight was over, Grave Oath was full to the brim with fresh souls. The tree on the black plane was calling out to me. I suspected that now, with this fresh cache of souls, I’d be able to give myself a new ability and take yet another step in the direction of becoming a full deity.
Chapter Twelve
Before I sent my spirit to the other world, I needed to consider what ability I now needed. It seemed that I did have some sort of conscious control over which ones I could gain. I’d seen as much when I gave Cranton the ability to produce enchanted coins. What power would help me overcome Rollar? What ability would allow me to fight against the hordes Uncle Rodrick commanded?
“I never imagined that I would fight in the style of a knight of Prand,” Rami interrupted my thoughts. “But I have to admit, it was enjoyable.”
“I’m glad you like it. I spent my entire childhood training for combat like that. I’m glad it didn’t all go to waste.”
“If only I had some gray powder,” Rami mused. “It could have been useful in a situation such as this.”
“Gray powder? Don’t tell me that that’s some sort of herb or potion you Yengish enjoy. I don’t want to deal with another Cranton.” I smiled at her.
She laughed. “Gray powder is a substance our Yengish alchemists developed for the art of war. It is a powder… and it is gray—”
“You don’t say.”
Rami paused at my interruption and pouted with mock anger for a second before laughing and continuing. “When flame or even a spark touches this gray powder, it explodes. And when I say explode, I mean boom!” She threw her hands into the air for emphasis.
“Is it magic?”
“I don’t believe so. We enjarta create bombs with the gray powder by filling a segment of bamboo with it. Then, we use a fuse to delay the explosion long enough for us to throw it. It’s useful for dealing with close-packed enemy troops. One of these bombs can kill many of them at once.”
“Interesting. Do you know how to make the powder?”
“I don’t, unfortunately. It’s a secret known only by the most elite Yengish alchemists, a secret that is heavily guarded.”
“You didn’t bring any with you from Yeng?”
“The powder degrades quickly. It loses its explosive ability mere days after its manufacture.”
I sure as hell could use something like that, but it didn’t seem that it would be possible to bring such a substance from Yeng. It would become inert long before it crossed the ocean that separated the country from Prand. Such a substance would definitely help in my dreams of having the world’s mightiest undead army, but it was a consideration for later.
For now, I’d been given an idea. A memory from my childhood popped into my mind. An old story about a powerful necromancer who was able to make corpses explode. Well, I’d been a necromancer, and now, I was the ultimate necromancer, the God of Death, so surely some sort of corpse explosion spell would be well within the scope of possibility for me.
Abruptly, I swept Rami up in my arms and planted a huge kiss on her lips. She gasped. Then, her lips parted and her eager tongue darted into my mouth. I almost forgot why I’d kissed her, lost in the searing passion for a moment, slipping my fingers through her silky black hair and clamping my free hand on her firm round ass as our tongues danced.
I let go of her and smiled. “Let’s resume this later. I have to go on a little journey.”
Before I could close my eyes, I caught sight of Elyse staring at me. She blushed a little before she looked away. I’d probably have to speak with her about Rami at some point, but now wasn’t the time.
I shut my eyes and extended my soul outward with a flick of my will. This time, it was a lot easier to get to the black plane. As I approached the huge gray tree, I saw the little sapling that represented Cranton’s powers. It was looking healthy and strong, something I took as a sign that my First Priest was sticking to his word and staying off the greenfoil.
Returning my attention to my tree, I noticed that some of the mist surrounding one of the branches was thinning. To perform the now-familiar ritual, I stabbed Grave Oath into the trunk, and once again felt the souls pulsing out of it into the tree. As my dagger emptied and the tree filled, the fog around the lowest of the cloud-covered branches dissipated.
Hanging from it like an ethereal fruit bunch was a glowing image of an exploding corpse. Bone shards and meat and viscera and blood were spraying everywhere, pushed outward by a fireball explosion. The fire, however, was no ordinary blaze. The flames were the same yellow-green tone as Fang’s eyes.
Eager to obtain this new skill, I clambered up the tree and snatched it from the branch. A jolt ripped through my body, and destructive energy crackled in my fingertips. I gritted my teeth at the near-overwhelming pain, and it soon subsided, giving way before the excitement of testing this new power.
In a flash, I was back in my body, in the clearing among dozens of corpses.
Rami smiled at me. “You have returned. Much faster this time.”
“I’m getting better,” I said.
“Ugh,” Elyse said as she staggered into the clearing. “Thank the Lord of Light that foul-smelling brute is gone. Did you see him eat that soldier’s brains? And the foul reek of him!”
I had to suppress an amused smile. “Well, he’s gone for now. But Drok is going to be joining our party.”
Elyse stared at me for a few moments as if I’d just told her that her mother was a cave troll and that the sky was about to collapse on our heads and kill us all.
“He has some part to play in my fate,” I explained. “He was sent to find me, and the wise woman of his tribe dreamed about me and the Blood God. The Auras are dropping some pretty hefty hints at my feet. I’d be a fool to ignore them.”
“By the Lord,” she murmured, “my poor nose. I thought the zombies were bad. Now, I have to deal with yet another rancorous odor.”
“I figure we’ll force him to wash at some point.”
“Thank you.” She sighed. “Now, are you going to raise these skeletons and continue with our journey? I suppose you’ll have to send these ones away, to join the others on foot.”
“Actually, I won’t be raising all of these corpses as skeletons. I’ve gained a new ability.” I smiled at the corpses as the image of detonating them appeared in my mind. “‘Always test your weapons before you need them in battle,’ is what my father used to say.”
“Oh? Is it more undead?” Elyse seemed genuinely interested, a much different attitude than when we’d first met.
“Watch this,” I said.
I didn’t know how powerful the explosion was going to be, so I aimed at a soldier’s corpse that was at the far end of the clearing, with nobody near it. Energy in my fingertips appeared and grew rapidly, as if I’d dipped my fingers into boiling oil, but the heat wasn’t painful. It felt as if an invisible thread had appeared, stretching from my fingertips to the corpse. In my mind’s eye, the corpse appeared like a vat full of highly flammable oil, waiting for a spark, hungering for a lick of flame to set it ablaze.
There was only one thing left to do now: transfer the energy.
I grunted, and the fiery heat barely contained in my fingertips released at once. It zipped along the invisible thread with the speed of a loosed crossbow bolt. When it struck the corpse, the ground shook with the immense power of the blast. A boom like a clap of thunder resounded through the clearing, and a great fireball of yellow-green flames billowed outward from the corpse as it exploded. An acrid, black cloud mushroomed from the corpse, and sharp shards of bone pitched in all directions, riddling the nearby trees and the other corpses in the vicinity with bone-shrapnel.
When the smoke cloud cleared, there was nothing left of the corpse except for a crater in the ground, large enough for a cave troll to hide in.
“By the Lord of Light,” Elyse murmured, her jaw slack. “That was… impressive.”
“You’re right about that!” I said, an ear-to-ear grin spread across my face. “You can start calling me the God of Thunder from now on.”
“That was no mere substitute for gray powder,” Rami said. “To produce so large an explosion with the Yengish substance would require immense quantities.”
Isu emerged from the trees, looking suitably impressed. “Ah, the corpse explosion spell. That was one of my favorites. Use it wisely, Vance. And be careful how and when you use it, too.”
I raised an eyebrow. Was this another occasion where Isu was willing to actually provide me with advice rather than snark?
“Why do you say that?” I asked, unsure of her motives.
“Don’t you notice anything about how you’re feeling now?”
“I feel great. I could blow up corpses all day!”
“You could… but you’d be dead by the time night fell.”
“What? But I feel—”
Now that the initial euphoria was wearing off, a sensation of weariness was coming over me, as if I’d just fought a grueling battle against a powerful opponent.
Isu studied my face and smiled knowingly. “I told you. The more powerful your magic is, the greater the cost. You’re not yet powerful enough to throw spells around with abandon. More souls… more followers.”
Drok came ambling back into the clearing with a dead deer slung over his shoulder. He paused and looked at the smoking crater in the ground.
“Hmm, that look like nice hole for sleep,” he observed.
Isu wrinkled her nose. “I see you’ve obtained yet another follower,” she muttered to me.
“Horned woman!” yelled Drok, his blue eyes sparkling with delight. “I can touch horns?”
In an instant, Isu’s dagger was in her right hand. “If you even think of touching me, you filthy half-wit,” she snarled, “you’ll lose a hand, or worse.”
“You probably shouldn’t touch her horns, Drok,” I said. “Or any other part of her, for that matter.”
“Don’t even breathe in my direction,” Isu hissed. “Keep him away from me, Vance, or I won’t be held responsible for my actions.”
“Relax,” I said. “He’ll behave. Won’t you, Drok?”
“Drok be good,” he rumbled reluctantly. “Drok no touch no one. Drok no breathe on no one.”
“Good,” I said. “Now that’s all settled, let’s enjoy some roasted venison, courtesy of our new friend, Drok. After that, we move on. We have more soldiers to kill, a map to find, a ruined temple to explore, a goddess to resurrect, and a lordship to take back.”
“Also go to Drok’s home,” he said. “See wise woman.”
“Yeah, that as well.”
Chapter Thirteen
Everyone with me was mounted, with the exception of Talon the harpy, of course. Even Drok was riding. He’d taken a horse from the bandits. The poor beast was utterly exhausted and looked like its back was about to break. The barbarian needed something a lot more powerful than a mere horse to lug his bulk around. Perhaps I could kill a bear and raise it as a zombie? That sort of creature would be able to handle his weight. Or, even better, a cave troll, if we could find one. We weren’t near any mountains though, so that was out of the question for the moment.
Not long after we set off, we found a razed hamlet, along with the corpses of loggers and their wives. It was a similar scene to the one I’d witnessed in the village, dead men and women lying everywhere, having been cut down while trying to flee. At least there were no children this time. All the dead had been stripped of any valuables. It seemed pretty consistent with how Rollar’s thugs operated.
Not wanting to defile the dead, I didn’t raise any of the corpses. After Elyse uttered a brief prayer, we continued riding.
Atop Fang, I crested a small rise in the woods. When I looked over the top, I spotted more corpses hanging from the limbs of a large, sprawling oak tree. They’d all been hanged, that much was clear. The Sunburst symbol of the Lord of Light’s army showed on their tabards. But these weren’t members of the church’s military. At least, they weren’t current members. They were Rollar’s troops.
Elyse rode up to me and gasped. “What on earth happened here?”
“By Xayon,” Rami murmured as her horse stopped beside me.
“Who do you think did this?” Elyse asked.
Isu scowled up at the tree. “Someone with poor taste in execution methods.”
“Let’s have a look at the bodies,” I suggested. “We might find some clues.”
We approached the tree, and I cut down a corpse. It dropped to the ground, and its head burst in a spray of foul-smelling viscera. The soldier was still wearing his armor and still had his sword sheathed on his hip, as well as a dagger tucked into his belt. His coin purse was bulging with copper and silver, and a few items of women’s jewelry. His hands were tied behind his back.
I cut down another, and it was the same story: his weapons were still on him, and his purse was full of stolen gold and women’s jewelry. They must have raided more than just the corpses we’d come across earlier because the items were too expensive for mere loggers.
Was this mass execution a product of revenge? Had some of their victims pursued them?
No, that didn’t make sense.
I looked at the women. “Whoever did this wasn’t interested in their gold or valuables, or their weapons. Nothing has been taken from them. And I don’t think they got into an argument over the loot.”
Elyse frowned. “Why do you say that? It seems the most likely explanation.”
“They would have fought each other with their weapons, and the losers would have had their purses emptied.”
“It seems to have been a matter of justice,” Rami remarked.
“But what kind of authorities patrol these vast woods?” Elyse asked. “There’s very little out here but for the occasional logging camp.”
“There are hunters,” I answered, “but in remote places like this, they’d be working alone, or in pairs or groups of three at the most. They wouldn’t have taken on a dozen soldiers like this. And if this was done by hunters, the corpses would be riddled with arrows, and they’d have taken the gold off the soldiers.”
“Soldiers,” Drok grunted. He had dismounted and was wandering around, staring intently at the ground. “Many soldiers. More soldiers than soldiers in tree.”
I hopped off Fang, sucked in a lungful of fresh air, and held my breath when I was within a few yards of Drok. His reek was still taking some getting used to.
“See,” he said, dropping onto his hands and knees and pointing at the carpet of leaves. “This show many soldiers walk here.”
I saw that the leaves had been disturbed in a particular pattern. I also knew that northern barbarians, who spent much of their lives wandering through various areas of wilderness, were expert trackers and woodsmen.
“And here,” he continued, scrambling over to another place where the leaves had been disturbed, “these soldiers, dead soldiers, they come from this way. Other soldiers come from that way.” He crawled across the ground for another couple of yards. “And here, many soldiers leave this way.”
I trusted his recounting of events, and it made sense that a group of soldiers had done this. The only ones who were this far north were Rollar and his troops. Had Rollar’s men executed their comrades? Had these corpses in the tree been deserters? That seemed the most likely explanation.
I returned to the women. “Drok’s discovered that a large group of soldiers came here, stopped, then turned and marched off in that direction. So, it seems that these dead pricks were executed by soldiers.”
“Then Rami was right,” Elyse said. “It was a matter of justice.”
“Yes,” I said, “It’s a pity. I’ve been itching to try out my new corpse explosion spell in combat.”
I looked up at the tree and considered lighting it up with a series of explosions. A smile touched my lips as I imagined what it would look like, but I held off for now. I didn’t want to waste my energy needlessly.
