The Graveyard of Khoram Khor – being the Fifth of the Tales of the Dark Guild
Pie Chart Aug 2008
“Mock not the Vulture God! That way madness lies, for sharp are the beaks, and keen are the eyes, of the vultures of Khoram Khor.” M’aladic tribal saying.
“A good thief should be able to raid anything” Khalia said, “even the graveyard of Khoram Khor”. It was said slightly too loudly, but then she was bragging for the benefit of the visitors. All the regulars understood that, because its one of the tricks of the trade, our trade. There were quite a few visitors present that evening, and amongst them several who were clearly not the sort of people who would normally enter a place like the Black Griffon. Some of them were being noticeably careful not to recognise, or be recognised, by anyone else present, which told its own story. The fact is that if you need a thief’s services in Keldstadt then a visit to the Black Griffon is a good way to make contact. Not that anyone would be likely to make a direct approach in the common room – that sort of blatancy would be firmly rebuffed – but it does give would-be patrons a chance to size up the possible operators. And vice versa.
“’Even’ the graveyard of Khoram Khor? Why the ‘even’?” Jolinda asked, picking up the cue line. “Most graveyards I’ve ever come across are pretty simple. You need a bit of care of course, in case there are guards, particularly if there is anything worth having inside, or they are the last resting places of the rich or famous. But most graveyard guards are pretty low grade people; I mean, any halfway decent guard isn’t going to be allowed to go to waste by being made to sit in a graveyard all night long, now are they?”
“You forget that in some cases those guards are neither human nor living” Drek remarked in the deep rumble that passes for his speaking voice. “Nearly got caught like that myself once. Got into a graveyard in Muskul. No problem. Lovely easy job. There was a guard at the gate – old boy sitting beside a brazier snoring his head off. I watched him for an hour, and I could probably have walked in right past him without any problem. However, I was being cautious, and decided to go in over the wall just in case. Easy climb with plenty of hand and foot holds. Inside there were several big family tombs, some big enough to be miniature mausoleums, and one of them was my target. Cracked the gate lock easily, slipped in, found the right coffin, had that open, and got the thing I had been sent in to recover – not telling you what it was, secrecy being pat of the deal on that one. Anyway, fastened and resealed the coffin and put it back, got out, secured the gate lock, and froze. Not twenty feet away from me there was a ghoul. Nasty looking bit of work. I turned for the wall, and spotted another waiting for me in the shadows, and another a few yards from it. Started to move carefully then, and they moved with me. Next thing I knew they’d edged me round so the only way out was the main gate. So I ran for it. Beat them to the gate, and went over the wall beside it. I knew they’d follow, and had a bright idea. Crept up on the old guard, lifted his keys, and unlocked the gate. Ruddy great screech from the hinges as it opened. The old boy woke up then, so I grabbed him quick before he could make a fuss, pitched him into the graveyard, and pulled the gate closed behind him. Locked it and handed him the keys through the bars. He was paying so much attention to me that he never saw the ghoul that caught him, and while they were having their dinner I high-tailed it down the road. Bit close for comfort though”.
We all laughed then – Drek’s colourful tales are notorious, if sometimes too fantastic to be believed in their entirety. But as someone remarked, there’s a grain of truth in every tale, and more than one thief has gone to an apparently easy job in a graveyard, and not come back.
“Anyway, Khalia, you still haven’t explained the “even” bit in your statement” she was reminded.
“That? Because Khoram Khor’s graveyard has an evil reputation amongst thieves in the Eastlands. Some even say that a demon lives there. The truth is probably more mundane – they worship the Animal-headed Gods there, and more than one Eastern Master Thief suspects that our kind are being decoyed there as sacrifices to the Vulture God. Whatever the truth, the Eastern Guild discourages people from going there. A bit wet of them I’d say – any decent thief ought to be able to get in and out of a graveyard, even if it does take a bit more care than usual.”
There was a dark-cloaked figure sitting in a corner by the kitchen door, with his hood pulled up to hide most of his face. Hiding your face isn’t common, and we allow it, knowing that there are many reasons why patrons of the Black Griffon may wish to keep their identities concealed. Now he joined in the conversation from the depths of his hood. “That is not quite true. The Eastern Guilds allow anyone to attempt a theft. It is far from easy, and an unpleasant death awaits those who fail, but it is a useful way to settle arguments about who is the better person at their job without the need to resort to unnecessary violence. Still, it’s rarely more often that once a year that someone goes there.”
“And who, may I ask, are you?” Khalia demanded.
“Me? My name is my own to know. Let it suffice that I am one who has been to Khoram Khor, and I know that of which I speak.”
“Really? So what’s so special about this graveyard then stranger?” Khalia asked, her voice awash with scarcely veiled contempt.
“Yeah. And for that matter what is so special about this place Khoram Khor, and where in this world is it?” another asked, picking up on Khalia’s mood.
He took a slow look round, and briefly I saw the flash of eyes deep within the hood. “Khoram Khor lies in the foothills of the Samarra Erg, a day’s ride beyond where the fertile flood plain of the Derro ends and the rocks of the mountains start. It is dry; dry and bakingly hot by day; but at night when the sun falls then often a frost forms. Rain comes but rarely, for rare it is that a cloud appears in that sky; and woe betide the person who is lost in those hills, for the sun will blister the skin from their bodies, and dry them out to the consistency of leather, and many a lost stranger has been found as no more than a dried out and withered corpse. Yet many more of those who become lost are never found, for the vultures find them first.
“The vultures! Ah, the vultures Khoram Khor! The great vultures of the Erg, whose beaks are so sharp that they can cut the hide of a horse, whose necks are so strong that they can tear human flesh like paper, whose eyes can spot a fallen animal many miles away. The vultures quickly find the weak and dying and, flocking in, will rapidly strip a corpse, and sometimes the weak but still living as well, leaving only bare bones amongst the sun-bleached rocks.
“But what is Khoram Khor you ask? A town in the hills? Yes, but more than that. Khoram Khor has wealth beyond the dreams of most men. On the surface it appears only a typical town of the hot hills, a collection of one and two storey flat roofed homes clustered round the Market, the Caravanserai, and the Temple of the Animal Gods. But below the town, in the ground around, are precious stones; and in the hills beyond gold and silver be found. Much is worked and sent away, but plenty remains, and even the poorest in the town can manage to sacrifice a gold coin and a cut gem to accompany their loved ones on their final journey, while the rich and powerful go into the next world adorned with rings and necklaces, bracelets and chains. That is why the thieves come, come to defy the people and the Gods alike; and that is why there are defences round the Burial Ground to trap even the cleverest thief. And for those who are trapped there is only one way out, and that way is death; the slow, living death of the Vulture God!”
He raised his head and looked round again slowly. “Believe me when I say that only a fool would go to rob the graveyard at Khoram Khor. A desperate fool, or someone anxious to prove their worth against another. The two things are sometimes the same.” Again he looked round, and once more I saw the flash of his eye beneath the folds of his hood. He made a sweeping gesture that took in the whole room. “Thieves though some of you here may aspire to be, even skilled ones perhaps, still I have only one word for you. Do not try to raid Khoram Khor – only the best, the very best in the Ten Kingdoms, stand any chance of succeeding. You, here, would all fail.” His tone was flat and dead, a clear warning if ever I heard one, and any wise person would heed his words. And yet the trouble is they were exactly the sort of words to fire up the hot-headed, for I read into his words an implicit challenge to our prowess, and so did others in the group.
Anyway, there was soon a lively discussion going which drew most people’s attention, and during it the cloaked speaker quietly left the room. No one, bar me, seemed to see him go, and I only just noticed it because I was expecting him to go, and keeping an eye out in consequence. But I might still have missed him had the ring on my right middle finger not vibrated very slightly as it does in the presence of cloaking magic. I looked up as he passed me; his cloak swung open slightly, and I saw a pendant there, a dark silver pendant with an unmistakeable bird shape. I remained blank, not following him with my eyes, because I didn’t want to give away the fact that I could see him. Magic tricks like my ring are generally better if produced unexpectedly, and that implies keeping them secret. It was a few minutes later that the others noticed his absence, and that was only because they wanted to ask him some questions. Then I heard Drek say something about “… oh well, no doubt you’ll find out on the ground when you’re at Khoram Khor. I’ll be interested to hear all about it when you get back, though I admit I’d not want to go there,” and Khalia replied very clearly “yes, I will. And I’ll bring you some other little souvenir back as well just to prove I’ve done what I said I would.” She had continued bragging and Drek, who later admitted he’d been leading her on, had manoeuvred her into a verbal corner, and pounced the moment she had opened her mouth just a bit too far. She had left herself with only two choices; either announce that she was going to raid the graveyard, or loose considerable face; and the latter concept has never been an option Khalia.
Now I have known Khalia very well indeed for a lot of her career – she is somewhat younger than I am - and we taught in the same Junior’s tutor group for the Guild at one point. I wouldn’t call her a friend – friends are people you can trust – but we have helped each other out from time to time. I know how her mind works, and it was therefore no surprise when she sought me out a couple of days later. “Well” she said, “what about it – are you game?”
I guessed what was coming next, but decided the best ploy was to pretend otherwise. “What about what?” I asked
She forced a pained expression. “Going to Khoram Khor of course. What else?”
“What else?! I can think of a lot of else’s, and the answer to that particular one is no. Very firmly, no.”
She looked a little disappointed. “Oh well. And I thought you might be interested in joining in on that sort of job. Why ever not?”
“Why not? Because it’s a long and inconvenient way away; because there’s no specific Mark; because you’re going on spec with no guarantee that there will be any profit out of it; because it’s far too damn dangerous; and because I’ve got another little matter outstanding which I’ll be leaving on sometime in the next couple of days.” I’ll admit that the last of those was almost a lie, but it was one I had prepared against just this possibility, and it was a good one because she had no way of checking. That’s the advantage of being not just a Thief, but registered as a Mercenary as well; and as I well knew, Khalia had no way to check the Merc’s Guild registers to see if I was booked out on a job. And of course, an existing booked job is sacrosanct. She knew that as well as anyone, but she was still willing to try it on.
“Oh. Can’t your other job wait? This would be very good for both of us you know.”
I decided to draw her out by sounding puzzled. “Good for us? How so?”
She pulled her chair a bit closer than I like and her voice sank to a theatrically dramatic whisper. “Look, I’ll be honest with you, and I don’t want this spread about please. It’s the Guildmaster. You know old Fennris can’t last much longer without a challenge, and he knows that. Rumour is that he’s only avoided a challenge so far by promising one or two other “interested parties” that he’ll stand down anyway after Harvest. Now, who’s in the running? I make it five of us – you, me, Grennet, Silvanus, and Zurg.”
“And Drek” I said, interrupting her flow.
“And Drek, though even you would admit he’s probably only an outside chance. Now, Zurg won’t get it – the Guild isn’t ready for a female Zanusha half-breed yet. And if I’m brutally honest you probably won’t either, because you’ve upset a few of the seniors over the years, and you are still an outsider. Given the right boost I can beat Grennet and Silvanus, and if you help me to get that boost I’ll make sure you get a senior Guild post – Training Master perhaps. I know you’d like that, you’ve often said you’d like to train people. Now if we do Khoram Khor “just for fun” we will come back with the reputation for being the greatest thieves in Keldstadt, and that would be just the boost we needed!”
“And one or the other of us, or both of us, could also come back dead, or rather could fail to come back because we were dead. That’s not such a good option really.”
“Yes, and so we make sure neither of ends up dead. I watch your back and you watch mine, and with two of us it ought to be easier to keep out of trouble. But actually” she went on in a semi joking tone, “it might still work even if one of us did get unlucky. Look, say I got killed and you not only did Khoram Khor, but you also got my body back, ideally at no cost to the Guild of course, then think what that would do for your reputation! The Guild would be mad not to take you as the next Guildmaster. And vice versa, of course. You do see don’t you?!
I think it was the word “mad” that set alarm bells ringing, and got me thinking. There was certainly something close to a mad glint deep in her eyes, and I just wondered if perhaps she might just already be planning to cast me in the role of “rescued dead partner”, might possibly even be prepared to assist me into role. Still speculating I looked up at her. “Khalia, you heard that hooded man in the Griffon the other night. His warning was quite clear. Without a definite mark, and a lot of backup, Khoram Khor would indeed be madness!”
“That wasn’t a warning, it was a challenge” she pouted.
I sighed. “Well, it might have been either or both. But you yourself said that the Eastern Guilds suspect Thieves are being set up as sacrifices to the Vulture God, …”
She broke in with an impatient “Oh come on, we’re far too far away for that. Anyway, admit it, you’re scared!”
“No” I said evenly, “I’m not scared, just naturally cautious, and hoping to have a long and comfortable retirement one day. And also, I’m afraid I already have a prior engagement that I’m taking up.”
“Really? How interesting. And how convenient! Now I happen to have checked and there’s nothing in the Guild Register about you being unavailable ….”
“Which guild’s register did you check?” I asked quietly, “the Silent Guild one, or the one at the Mercenary’s Hall?”
There was no answer to that – she had forgotten that rather unusually I was a member of another Guild, and it suited my convenience to maintain the belief that I was a Registered Mercenary. I knew Khalia wouldn’t be able to check the Hall Register. The Mercs’ Guild is by no means as formal as the Silent Guild, but its doings are still not open to inspection by non-members, and in general it doesn’t like the Thieves.
“Bollocks, you’re just scared” Khalia repeated, “and that’s why you’ll never be Guildmistress. I, however, intend to be. I’ve got all the equipment I need, and I can do it myself if I have to, and I’ll get all the glory. I’ve offered, and you’ve turned it down. You’ll regret doing so when I get back!”
“If you get back,” I said quietly. “You know, you’re getting reckless, and depending too much on your equipment. You’re beginning to remind me of Phoenix, and you wouldn’t want to end up like her.”
“I couldn’t” she said, “I certainly don’t have her equipment! My tits are far too small for that!” and then we both had to have a laugh because Khalia, while not flat chested, is certainly not in Phoenix’s league.
Then I got serious again. “I’ll tell you what, why don’t you either get a Junior to go with you, or if you specifically want me then delay your departure until I’m back.”
“Not a Junior; this isn’t the sort of trip for that – I need someone I can rely on…” (yes, I thought, you wouldn’t want to take a Junior; too dangerous for you, and not enough credit if you succeed. I might have taken one to bring them on, but then I work in a different way to Khalia) “….so how long will you be gone?”
“Don’t know” I said casually, “at least 10 days, but anything up to 6 weeks; probably the lower end, but you never can tell…”
“Six weeks! I’m not sure I’ve got that much time to wait!” and with that she flounced off. Well, the next thing I did was to go round to the Silent Guild and register myself as booked for a trip with Khalia starting from when I got back, but with an estimate of 6 weeks. Thus far the plan was working well. I had demonstrated my willingness to put myself under obligation to Khalia, but now she had revealed why she wanted to go to Khoram Khor I knew perfectly well that she wouldn’t wait. The equation in her mind was simple – 13 to 15 days each way, plus a couple of days to do the job on site, plus a six week wait for me equalled at least10 weeks. In that time the succession for the Guildmaster might well have been sealed.
Having said I had a prior engagement was a good excuse, and it was almost true. I don’t like lying – it’s too easy to get caught out later or, worse, to run into someone with a Truthstone, and get caught out right there and then. I prefer to massage the truth, and the truth was I did have a prior engagement, but it wasn’t time critical and I’d been holding it in reserve as an excuse for a few weeks. That accepted, I needed to leave soon, certainly before Khalia had a chance to start rumours that I had chickened out of a Guild job. But before I left I went down to see Phoenix. She’d also been a serious potential challenger for the Guildmaster’s job, and she’d acted as my mentor at one point. In consequence I liked to keep her abreast of what was afoot in the Guild, though the chances that she ever heard a word of it were pretty slim.
Phoenix was not built in the classic thief’s mould, rather she was every man’s dream of the buxom barmaid, the sort of jolly, busty young woman with long blonde hair who for a few coins could probably be charmed into bed. It was a façade of course, though she wasn’t adverse to a tumble in the hay with customers, colleagues, or marks. She was a master thief who could turn her hand to most aspects of the trade, but her speciality was getting a Mark, ideally a married one, into bed. Somewhere she had discovered an all but tasteless slow-acting narcotic drug. She would carefully rub scented oil into her nipples to seal the skin, and then rub on the narcotic. As she said, she’d never yet met a man who would refuse to suck a woman’s nipples when asked to do so, and she used to boast that the trick was to stop them doing it too soon because, as she put it “I don’t want them dropping off before they’ve given me a really good seeing-to first”. As soon as she noticed the drug was starting to take effect she would pretend something was affecting her, and “fall asleep” in the mark’s arms before he dropped off. However, once the Mark was out she would rise, steal what she could, hide it, and then force the door or window so it looked as though it had been done from outside. Then she’d take a little pellet of the same narcotic, get back into bed with them, and happily go to sleep in their arms. Of course the Mark would wake up first (and if he didn’t she’d play-act being out cold and wait for the row to start0. The Mark would remember she had dropped off first, and was still out when he woke, so clearly she couldn’t be involved. It would be a mystery how they had both been drugged, and even if her clothes were searched just in case nothing would be found except her little leather purse containing a few pennies and groats. Once she was “properly awake” she would complain bitterly about the fact that the thieves had robbed her as well, swearing blind that there had been a couple of silver coins in her purse, and generally making a nuisance of herself until she was thrown out. That, she told me, was a key point; a guilty person would go as soon as possible – staying to complain just made it the more unlikely that she was involved.
“OK, I can see all that” I asked her once, “but how do you get the takings out?”
“In my purse” she replied, and handed it to me. It was a very ordinary little purse, but when I looked closely I noticed that it had a lining stitched into it.
“Below the lining?” I ventured.
She nodded. “Below the lining there’s a bag of holding, which lets me bring tools in and take things out. Just have to re-stitch it in place before I go to sleep. Nice little idea, eh! Got it years ago from a wizard I knew as a reward for, er, “services rendered”. Marvellous bit of kit!”
It was one of her favourite MOs, but she used it a bit too often. Evidently word got round, and one day it went wrong. Badly wrong. She got the Mark nicely asleep without any problems, and started checking to see what he’d got that might be worth having. There was this curious little carved wooden box which, as the Guild later discovered, had an attraction spell on it, and not surprisingly it drew her attention. She leant forward, flicked it open, and looked straight into an “eye of the Gorgon”, a trap jewel that can only safely be looked at by its owner. It was the last thing she ever saw. The Guild got her back of course, and without paying too much. The Mark did threaten to have her broken up for rubble, but he was persuaded out of that course. So now she stands in the Guild museum completely naked, her feet apart, leaning forward with her big breasts dangling down. One hand rests on a table and the other is reaching out for a small wooden box. I’m sure she realised at the last instant what was happening, because her face is frozen in a permanent look of shock, with her mouth is open in the “Oh!” position. The Guild probably could have sought out a Great Mage to come and turn her back, but it was a long time before one of suitable standing visited, and by then we had got used to having her as she is. All the apprentices get to go down and see her early on in their time as a warning against overconfidence, and against using the same technique too often.
Anyway, I digress. I rode out on my bay pony Falcon two mornings later, carefully pretending not to see Khalia watching me as I said my farewells to Drek. I had more than half an idea she would have me tailed, so I departed through the West gates, and took a long swing round through the villages, zigzagging a bit, and doubling back twice until I was certain I wasn’t being followed. That alone made me suspicious, but as I didn’t have any more time to spare I made my way round to the South Highway and pushed on. Sometime about mid morning I got the uneasy feeling that I was now being followed, and by dint of using cover and stopping to observe I quickly managed to identify a distant mounted figure. I had no idea who it might be at that stage, but I was determined to find out, and quickly. My first instinct, which I’d certainly have used if I was further away from the City was to get to cover, and wait for him to come in range of my crossbow, and ask questions only after I had fired. However, since it was likely to be someone I knew I rejected that, and decided to go for a more gentle approach.
Beyond Halton-in-the-Vale the road develops into a series of switchbacks over ridges, with deep dips between. I waited until I was out of sight in the last dip before the little village of Ganner. In the bottom of the dip I reined in, dismounted, and dug out some tools. If you know what you are doing it is quite an easy task to strip a shoe of a horse, even a newly refitted one, and I knew exactly what I was doing. I rode up the ridge into Ganner going as slowly as I dared and dismounted again in the Smith’s yard demanding a new shoe. Of course, if I’d given him the old shoe he would have been quicker, but as I wanted to waste time here I left it in my pack. Fortunately I was going to have to wait while he finished off a big draft horse before he could get to me, so I made a couple of quick changes to my clothing, and positioned myself and Falcon so that I could observe the road without it being too obvious who I was, nor that I was watching, and settled down to wait.
I’ve always been in the habit of checking over my kit when I get the chance, and I did so now. Falcon’s brow band had a bronze medallion riveted onto it, nothing valuable, just a curio, but recognisable as mine, and as I looked now I noticed the faintest marks on one edge of the metal and a minute scratch on the leather beside it. I had to look twice to realise they were there, and if we hadn’t been in bright sunlight I would have missed them, just as I must have done when I tacked him up in the stable that morning. That roused my suspicions, and as I examined it more closely I realised that something had been carefully forced in behind the medallion. I reached for a set of picks, and after a bit of juggling managed to slip out what at first sight looked like a brass farthing. A closer look, however, told me that this was no coin, but a Tracker talisman, a device that would allow someone to follow me at an undetectable distance. At that moment the sound of a horse approaching alerted me to the fact that my follower was about to appear, and I looked up with interest, wondering who I might see. I was expecting one of the more senior members of the Guild, so when young Gillett rode into view it was all I could do to avoid bursting out laughing.
Gillett is a good lad, but he is only 14, and still doing his basic apprenticeship. He is willing, he tries his best, and when he gets a bit older and more experienced he’ll make a fine Journeyman Thief. But at this time he was still learning to be anything more than a good city street rogue. His natural habitat, so to speak, is a crowded market place where he blends in with the general hubbub and confusion. Out here he stood out like a sore thumb, the more so since it was quite clear from his sagging, uncomfortable looking posture that he and ponies didn’t get on. I expected him to turn in, but he looked neither left nor right and disappeared from view. I waited, expecting the Tracker to bring him back, but either he wasn’t paying it any attention, or he was being far more subtle that I thought. This however served mainly to deepen the mystery. Gillett, good lad though he was, was precisely the wrong sort to be out on this quest, and certainly wasn’t the sort of lad likely to be being given a Tracker to use. I mulled this over while the Farrier shod Falcon, and an idea began to form in my mind.
My suspicions were further confirmed when I reached the far end of the village, and saw that Gillett had gone on down the road, so I turned hunter myself, and followed him for half an hour using the little woods, and the dips and folds in the ground as cover. He was obviously trying to push on, and that suggested that he had no idea that he had over-run me. At last he reached the top of the hill above the Karath valley where the road runs straight and clear down to the river. From there he had an open view over 3 miles of the road, and I saw him rein in and observe. It didn’t take long for the realisation to set in that I was nowhere ahead, and that he had lost me. I saw his shoulders go down, and with a bit of a struggle he got the pony turned round and started back towards Ganner. At that point I picked a suitable clump of trees, tethered Falcon under cover, and wormed forward with my crossbow until I fund a perfect concealed firing point close to the road. Soon Gillett clopped into view. I let him get to about thirty paces from me before I fired, aiming well over his head. His sudden jerk as the quarrel smashed into the tree he was just passing was enough to panic the pony, which shied in a most satisfactory manner, dumping its rider firmly on the ground. As I stepped out onto the road, crossbow in one hand and drawn sword in the other, Gillett was struggling to his knees.
I smiled. “Good morning Gillett. Were you, by any chance, looking for me……?”
He flushed and stammered an inaudible reply of some sort, so I frowned. “I’ll take that as a ‘yes’ then. Now I wonder why a young street rogue like you would be following me all round the countryside? And on a pony as well! I must say you look thoroughly uncomfortable mounted – take my advice and stick to walking in future!” I smiled, though frankly I didn’t feel like smiling. “Now, let me guess: you’re here because Khalia sent you? Yes? Because she wants to know what I’m up to and where I’m going I suppose?” He shook his head and looked puzzled. “No? What then?”
“Khalia said it was to develop my skills. Said I was too much of a town boy and needed to get experience in the country. She said she had arranged it with you as a training trip, and you’d try to shake me off if you spotted me, so I was to avoid being seen if I could. Told me I had to try to follow you for three days at least….”
I sighed and sheathed my sword. “I think, young Gillett, that you have been mislead, and dangerously so. What we’ll do now is catch your pony, and then we’ll carry on to the Ferry Inn at Bell’s Ford where we can get something to eat and drink, and have a chance to discuss things properly.”
It didn’t take long - the pony hadn’t bolted - and half an hour later we rode into the inn’s stable yard. Once the animals had been looked after we wandered into the bar, and I ordered beer, bread, cheese, and ham. I’d been going to challenge him about the Tracker, but decided not to. If my suspicions were correct I would have to dump it, and the Guild wouldn’t be pleased if such a valuable item were to go missing. I had to officially not know about it.
“Now then” I said once the food had arrived, “how were you supposed to follow me without being seen?”
“Use my eyes, and stay out of sight” he said. “How else could I have done it?”
From the way he spoke I was certain that he didn’t know about the Tracker, so I changed tack a bit. “So, who else is in the hunt for me?” He gave me a blank, puzzled look. “I see. So as far as you know you are out on your own then? Well, well, you may be right, but I wouldn’t bet on it. There is an old competition between Khalia and me, and she’s playing pretty fast and loose this time. So what I think is this: Khalia wants to know what I’m doing, and knows I’ll expect something. You’ve been sent out as a sacrifice, with the intention that I spot you quite quickly, and send you packing. Hopefully that’ll put me off my guard, and I’ll not notice another person following me at a much longer distance. Old, old trick that. Trouble is, this could easily have cost you your life. Back in town you tend not to kill people following you because bodies are difficult to get rid of. Out here it’s different; out here folk just ambush people following them, and dump the bodies in the bushes. By the time they are found there’s no way anyone will be able to connect the killer and the victim. Khalia knows that, and knows quite well that I’d be quite likely to try to kill a follower. But then, as I said, in her eyes I think you’re disposable really!”
Well, we talked for a while, and the upshot was that when I finally sent him on his way he was deeply suspicious of Khalia and her works and ways. I told him he owed me a favour, and I wanted him to take his time going back. I dispatched him with instructions to go in a big circle off to the north, and spend the night at the Boar at Welling, and then go on to Helvestall, before returning to town three or four days thence. I supplied him with enough silver to get a good meal and a comfortable bed each night. Before we left, however, I spotted that there was a Mendatic trader’s caravan in the yard, and as they are great leatherworkers I went over and haggled for a new tooled red leather bridle for Falcon, which cost a bit more than I wanted to pay, but allowed me to dump the old bridle with the Trader, nominally in part exchange. I brought the new one back in triumph, telling Gillett how much I’d wanted such an item, and he had to admit it was nice. His lack of reaction finally confirmed my belief that he knew nothing of the Tracker.
We parted at the ferry at the Six Birches, and he watched me cross the river and ride off down the Ollershaw road. Once I knew I was beyond his view I turned and rode cross country to the other road, and waited for the Mendatic trader to pass, tracking his caravan for a day south. That night as they lay up at an inn I managed to get in amongst them and quietly abstract one of their short bows, and a couple of their very characteristic arrows. Then I faded out into the darkness to watch and wait. Nothing happened that night, and the next day I again followed at a distance until the road ran into deep forest country. There I lay in wait.
There were a few other travellers on the road, but none of them of any significance until early evening, when who should pass quietly by but Silvanus! He’s not one I trusted, and was very much an outsider for the Guildmastership. And then it crossed my mind that he had always been a bit of a follower of Khalia. Recalling her conversation to me about going to Khoram Khor I was left wondering what inducement he had been offered to get him to come after me? Providing evidence might discredit me, and thereby remove me as a threat to his ambitions? Probably; and probably also an offer like, for example, the Training Master’s post when she was Guildmistress. But there might well be another issue. Silvanus was a good thief, but he had ambitions to be an assassin. I knew he’d killed more than once on his own behalf, and a couple of times with the Guild’s tacit support when it had suited their purposes for someone to vanish. Yes, there might well be another reason why Khalia had sent him after me! It was clearly time Silvanus and I had a reckoning. Grinning unpleasantly I turned hunter. ….
Other than that, however, my trip passed without incident, and I carried out the job I’d been holding up on for some time – a simple ‘visit’ to a yeoman farmer who had ‘forgotten’ to pay his debts when he’d been helped to inherit a farm, and who had been thoroughly nasty to the Guild official sent to remind him he needed to pay. A tedious little task, and with no real challenge – he’d been left alone long enough to have become complacent, and evidently he didn’t trust his servants since he didn’t let them sleep in the main house. Just cutting his throat while he was asleep would have been child’s play, but the guild wanted me to leave a more permanent message to others. So rather than killing him I merely subdued him, and while he was “out” tied and gagged him. Then I waited for him to come round, and when he did I gelded and blinded him. Simple? Yes, at least until a complication in the form of his daughter walked into the room. I don’t do collateral killings if I don’t have to, but the girl was armed and inclined to be noisy, and if I’d merely subdued her and left she could have identified me. So I dropped her, bound her, and took her with me. Some two hours into the deep woods I stopped, slit her throat, and bled her out. I couldn’t manage all of her of course, but I took most of a leg, her rump, and a few of the more delicate parts, wrapped them in her clothing, and left the remains for the wolves to find.
That little task completed I cut cross country, and spent a thoroughly enjoyable and happy six-day away from all the pressures of the city, staying with an old friend to whose daughter I am an honorary Godmother. It was some years since my friend’s pregnancy had forced her out of active duty, but that wasn’t really her fault; she had got caught on a job, which was perhaps careless, and was sentenced to death. While waiting for sentence to be carried out she seduced the gaoler, and that led to a final chance to escape, which she duly did, taking with her the gaoler’s sex organs, which she then had preserved so her child would know who its father was. But I digress. As I said, she had been off active duty for some years, and so welcomed the chance to get some fresh human meat into her diet again. We roasted the leg, and grilled the rump, and sautéed the other parts with wild asparagus and wild mushrooms, and dined like royalty in consequence!
This peaceful time was disturbed by the arrival of a carrier pigeon with a message, and based on that information I timed my return to the city for the seventeenth day. I immediately left word for Khalia that I was back and would be ready to go off with her within 24 hours, and who should be more shocked and angry than I when I discovered that she had left two days earlier without me, and done so despite having reserving my services! Interestingly she had taken Sasha, another street urchin, though recently promoted to Junior status at Khalia’s behest. Despite the street origin she was an old enemy of the hapless Gillett, which also made me wonder. Anyhow, she’d gone with Khalia instead of me, and rumour said that neither was totally happy about it. Publicly, neither was I, and still complaining about the way I had been treated I announced that I would follow on because I knew her destination, and believed they would both be in severe danger without my skills. A day later I was gone. But what no one else knew, though Drek may have suspected, was that prior to my departure I sent off a couple of messages of my own. And I didn’t use pigeons, but a rather older, more certain, and much faster system know to only a few of us.
I moved fast, using routes that Khalia wouldn’t know, and managing to call in a couple of relief ponies en route. That kept my speed up, whereas I was fairly certain that Sasha’s presence would serve to drag hers down. I was right, and a couple of days before we reached Khoram Khor I had closed to only a day behind the two of them, and that was the distance I intended to keep.
I found Sasha a few miles short of Khoram Khor, and if she hadn’t been in such danger I’d have laughed at her, she looked so dismal. She was sat on a rock by the roadside stark naked and filthy, with a fresh bird-shaped brand mark on her forehead, and she made no attempt to get out of sight as I approached. In fact, she didn’t appear to see me until I was so close I could speak to her. “Hello Sasha” I said, “is that the new working dress for Juniors I heard about?”
She registered me then, and made a feeble attempt to hide her womanhood, so I laughed and asked “What on earth are you doing out here, what happened to your pony and your clobber, and where’s Khalia?”, though I was nearly sure I knew - the brand mark told me much.
She looked at me slowly, and I recognised the signs of incipient heat exhaustion, physical exhaustion, and sunburn, so I took her over to a nearby shepherd’s hut amidst the rocks, got her under cover, and poured a lot of water with some salt into her. Then I anointed the brand mark with cream, and dressed it, while she ate some of my bread, dried fruit, and travel cheese. When she had eaten I gave her an old shirt of mine, and a pair of spare britches, and sat down to eat myself. “Well?” I asked after a while, “are you going to tell me about it? From the start please.”
She took a deep breath. “I didn’t really want to come with her, I really didn’t. But I owed her, so I had to. I hated the ride, every minute of it. I’ve rubbed sore everywhere…” (“I know, I saw” I remarked) “…but she was being so cross with everybody, especially after Gillett returned, and told her about you changing your bridle and things. That made her really furious, and she insisted that she needed to leave at once, and someone had to come with her. The Guildmaster chose me.
“The journey was a nightmare. I’m not good on a horse, and she kept saying what a drag on her I was, and how I’d need to make serious amends when she became Guildmistress. We got here yesterday after a short ride from that last village, whatever its name was, and we booked into an inn, and she decided we should go for a walk and spy out the Graveyard before dark….” Sasha looked at me somewhat wild eyed, shook her head as if to get rid of a bad memory, and then after a few moments went on. “Weird area. It isn’t a proper graveyard like at home, it’s a sort of baking hot dustbowl amidst the rocks, all boulders and paths winding through it, and several cave-like openings in the rock walls. And there are these sort of strange raised circular stone platforms, some of which have got doors in the base. I couldn’t see any graves there, but Khalia said she guessed the poor people were buried in the caves, and she suspected the platforms with the doors were some sort of family mausoleums for wealthier folk.” She blinked, and then went on. “And was it ever spooky! I mean, there didn’t seem to be anyone about, but I had that feeling we was being watched all the time. Anyhow, she decided it would be easy to slip in at night, and wander round. She said she’d have a look herself later when it was dark, and work out if she could do the job at once, of if I’d have to come with her the next night. So we went back to the inn and had supper, and I went to bed, and that was the last I saw of her.
“Sometime round dawn there was a bit of fuss, but it died away quickly, and then about mid morning there was a lot more noise, and before I could do anything my room was full of folk, and they dragged me out into the street and up to a sort of courthouse place. There was one of their chiefs or someone there, and he questioned me about what was going on. Told me they’d caught Khalia in the graveyard, and were going to do something really nasty to her, and wanted to know what my role was. So I told them that as far as I knew my lady had gone off on some task of her own, and I was just to remain at the inn and make sure the horses were OK. He said I was a thief and a liar, and he didn’t believe me, but that since I hadn’t actually done anything, the Vulture God could judge me himself, and that I was to leave town at once and I’d die horribly if I ever tried to return. Then the men stripped me, and they branded me, and chased me out of the town like I was, hitting me with these long sticks as I ran. And I didn’t know what to do, so I just kept going, but the heat got to me…..” and with that she burst into tears.
I recognised that she was in a pretty poor state, not far off delirium, and that he guard was pretty well down, so I started asking more pointed questions, like whose bright idea was it had been to put the Tracker in my bridle. Turned out, as I thought, that it was Khalia’s; but Sasha had been the one who had to purloin it from the Guild Quartermaster and fit it behind Falcon’s brow band. Then I asked her why Khalia had picked Gillett.
“She didn’t” she replied, “I did.”?
“Oh! Can I ask why you dislike him so much?”
“Because he’s a little Tarek bastard!” she spat.
“Ah” I said, “and you’re a Harrad. That’s clear then.” And it was. Sasha’s never been near the Harrad homelands in her life, but the old hatreds linger on wherever the two tribes meet.” I looked at her again, and saw just how much that last burst of passion had taken out of her. Clearly she wasn’t going to be fit to travel for a day or two, much less take part in an operation to rescue a colleague, and in any case there were reasons why I didn’t want her with me. So I left her where she was with food and water, and instructions not to go out or let anyone in. I also placed a token by the door which anyone local would see, recognise, and stay well away from. And with that done I rode off to seek Khalia.
She was inside the graveyard, chained by her wrists to the wall of a holding cell built under one of the burial towers. When I was escorted into the chamber she was slumped on the floor, and only the tension in the chains was keeping her from falling over onto her side. Like Sasha she was naked, and big livid bruises were coming up all over her face and body, so evidently she had been “questioned” by the guards. At first she seemed to be unaware of my presence, but then the gaoler threw a bucket of water over her, and she came round somewhat. I saw she was trying to lick up the water running down from her hair, so I guessed this was her first water for some time.
“Khalia!” I said, “it’s me. They said they’d got a prisoner, and I knew it had to be you! What happened?”
She half opened one bruised eye and focussing seemed to be an effort. At last she said “How did you get here?”
I chuckled. “You didn’t wait for me, but I followed anyway. I told them at the Guild Hall that you’d probably need to be rescued, and I knew the area better than you. Looks like I was right. Sasha said you’d gone off at night on your own……”
“Sasha’s safe?” she asked, “she got away?”
“In a manner of speaking” I said, and told her what I knew. I could see her mind working – with Sasha safe she’d look even more of a fool, unless of course she could shift the blame ….. “Kill her for me” she whispered. “I’d do it if I could, but I can’t. Kill the bitch for me. Please?” She tried to give one of her winning little girl smiles, but her face was so bruised she just seemed to leer. “The bitch must have betrayed me, she must have. I wouldn’t have been caught so easily otherwise….”
“Tell me?”
She gathered herself. “We got here and booked into the inn. No problem that – lots of strange people passing through, so we just mixed in. I suppose that’s because it’s a religious centre. Then we went out and walked round to the edge of the graveyard. There were others doing the same.” She paused briefly, and then went on “Have you seen it? Oh yes, of course you have. Well once I’d looked at the entrance gateway I decided to go elsewhere, and we got to a vantage point above one side, where there’s a low cliff down into the hollow. I could see people pottering about in the area, so obviously folk did go about there, and I reckoned that if I could bypass the gate I could move about un-noticed. So later I left Sasha at the inn, and came round the side in the dark, and worked back to near my earlier vantage point, and allowed the dawn to come up. Soon as it was near first light I started to move down, and then hid. Within half an hour several other people appeared, and once there were several out and about I surfaced. And then all of a sudden there were guards in the distance, and I knew something was up, and went to ground. They came straight towards me, and though I was hidden, very well hidden, they had me within seconds. I tried to make a break, but they used some sort of drugged dart, and when I went down they dragged me in here, and interrogated me. And one of them said they’d been waiting for me, and laughed. So you see, I was betrayed, and that’s why you’ve got to kill the bitch – we can’t have a traitor in the Guild!”
I looked at her for a few seconds, and then I laughed. “Oh Khalia, you really don’t understand what is going on do you? And you of all people trying to get upset about folk betraying each other! Oh dear! Well, to use a local proverb, the snake shouldn’t tell the scorpion that it runs too near to the ground; and you, my dear, are a snake of the nastiest kind.”
She looked at me with astonishment, and tried to feign anger. “What do you mean?”
“What about young Gillett, sent out to follow me on a lie, and very likely to be killed had you not underestimated my ability. And Silvanus? What did you offer him as a bribe to kill me? No, don’t try to deny it, he and I had words… “ Actually this was a lie, but Khalia’s shocked “what did he say?” reaction confirmed what I’d guessed, and I smiled.
“What, when he realised that you’d sent him to his death? He cursed your name as he died, but then he died believing that you had set him up to be killed by me to remove him as a rival on your way to the leadership of the Guild. Of course when his body is found there’ll be a Mendatic trader’s arrow in his back – it was that which killed him – and Gillett’s probably told the world he saw me exchange my harness with a Mendatic trader. I just wonder when the Guild finds out there’s a Tracker missing if they’ll jump to the conclusion that it was hidden in my harness…” and I smiled again. “Which brings me to the subject of Phoenix. I’ve often wondered who betrayed her, but I think we know, don’t we? Yes? Now that alone would be enough to have turned me against you, even if you hadn’t come here to desecrate and despoil the home and the Faith of the Vulture Headed God. I couldn’t let you get away with that, now could I?”
“Why?” she whispered, “you worship the Gods of The Delph. I know you do.”
“I do. But I’ve also been a member of the Vulture Cult for may years, like many who trained in the Dark Guild’s eastern chapters.”
“The Dark Guild? What’s that got to do with …Oh!”
“The light dawns at last?” I said. “Dear little ignorant Khalia has suddenly realised that the Keldstadt Thieves Guild, of which she hoped to be the Mistress, has, like most other large Thieves Guilds, got it’s own resident Dark Guild member, and arrangement mutually beneficial to both Guilds! And unknowingly you sent out that amateur assassin Silvanus to bring down a Senior Journeyman Assassin of the Dark Guild! How delicious!” I leant forward and tweaked one of her nipples. “And you wonder how did you got caught? I’ll tell you. You moved in daylight, and the vultures spotted you. There is always at least one circling high above the graveyard, even in the greyest light of dawn and dusk, and their eyesight is sharper than yours or mine. And yes, the guards did know you were coming, because you were betrayed. But not by Sasha, but by me. And as an Acolyte of the Third Feather I will shortly have great pleasure in presenting you to the God as my personal sacrifice! But don’t worry, I’ll make sure that some of your bones return to Keldstadt to take their place in the Guild museum,” and with that I left her.
Came the noontime, and as the sun reached its peak, Khalia was brought out of the cool, dark prison, and forced up the steps onto the circular top of the burial platform. There she was stretched out and secured by light chains, arms and legs pulled wide, her body positioned to face the sun. Cloaked and hooded I stood between her spread feet, raised my hands, and chanted the blessing to the Vulture Headed God. Even before I’d finished there was a flapping, and the first of the great grey vultures of the Erg came to rest on the parapet wall. I looked down at her body spread invitingly before me, and for a fleeting moment regretted that all her delicious meat was to go to the birds. “Well, Khalia, the time has come for you to move on, so I’ll say farewell” I said, “you may scream to your hearts content. And you will, believe me!”
She screwed up her eyes against the sun’s glare. “I can’t see you” she whimpered, “the sun’s too bright….”
There was another great flapping as she spoke, and two more birds dropped onto the wall. “I wouldn’t worry about it” I said, “but I’ll shield you eyes for you”, and with that I fixed over her face and neck the cage that stops the birds killing their victim too quickly. Yet another vulture dropped in onto the wall, and another, and before I’d finished the first one to arrive had hopped down onto the roof and waddled a couple of wary steps towards her. I stood. “I’ll be nearby to watch” I said, “though no doubt they’ll hear your screams in the town”, and with that I joined the two resident Vulture Priests on the seat at the head of the stairs.
A second vulture flopped off the wall, and a third, as yet more of the great yellow-legged birds drifted in on the light breeze. The leader of the flock edged forward, and forward again. Still more came into land on the wall, and a few of the braver souls fluttered down onto the flat roof, slowly waddling closer to the moaning woman. The leading bird opened its curved yellow beak, and snapped it shut with a sharp “clack”, and the others took it up till the rooftop reverberated to the sound. Now the lead bird was in range. Cautiously it leant forward, the bald head bent down as it selected its choice of meal. It struck! Skin and underlying tissue were sliced apart, and Khalia screamed as her left nipple, indeed most of the top of her left breast, was ripped away, tossed up, and gulped down. We watched the bulge slide down the bare skin of the vulture’s throat, and then it leant forward again. This time it was not alone. Other birds had edged close. One struck at her exposed leg, tearing open the calf muscle as though it were butter. Another carved into her thigh, leaving a bleeding sword-wound of a gash in the firm flesh. And then the entire flock descended, and the carnage began. I watched her breasts ripped off in pieces, her belly torn open, her arms and legs sliced apart. She gave a particularly agonised shout as one old cock bird tore into her pussy, gulping the lips, and returning for more. A bloodstained head lifted from her belly with a beak full of entrails, and soon there was a merry squabble going as the birds fought for bits of her guts all across the roof. Her ribs were bare now, and I saw a beak starting to pry between them; about that time they got the protective cage off her head, the sharp beaks went for her eyes and tongue, and her screams turned to bubbling gurgles. In agony the traitor passed on, and the God and I were satisfied.
I returned to the hut the next day clutching a small lidded box. Inside it were Khalia’s skull, pelvis, and several of her larger bones, all stripped bare, and all showing the deep scars where the vultures’ beaks had gouged into the bone. “Well, I’ve got her, or as much as I could manage” I said as I brought Sasha outside to show her the remains. “The rest of her is being scattered in white splashes all over the Erg in a 25 mile radius of Khoram Khor. And now” I added, reaching for my killing knife, “I think you can usefully join her.” She shrieked once, very briefly.
“And did she taste good?” Guildmaster Fennris asked.
I nodded. “What of her I ate. The majority of her carcase I put out for the vultures, and as you see I saved her skull and a few bones as well.”
He nodded. We were standing in the Guild museum front of a new display cabinet in which the two women’s remains were tastefully arranged, along with some local Khoram Khor rocks, sand, and a bit of scrub. A sign above the display said, simply, “Beware the Graveyard of Khoram Khor”, and then went on to outline the story of the two foolish thieves who tried to raid beyond their skills, and ignored the warnings not to. My part in the story was limited to a simple statement that I had rescued those remains that I could find.
“So, the whole business went off rather well in the end” Fennris went on. “Phoenix was the first, though I’d rather she hadn’t gone…” (he slapped her bare rump gently) “… and even Silvanus appears to have come to a sad end at the hands of a Mendatic caravan guard. Did I tell you that Grennet had been injured while you were away? No? Fall from a roof I believe. He’ll live, but he’s not going to be about much – broken back I’m told – so he’ll probably become a Guild Pensioner, though we might need a new Guild Quartermaster since I’m promoting Bulthus despite his inability to stop things like Trackers being stolen…” He eyed me suspiciously at that point, and I smiled back, so he snorted, and went on “under the circumstances I’ve also decided to stand down, and the Guild Council have ratified my decision that Drek should take on the role with immediate effect …..”
I turned and gave my lover a big hug and kiss.
Later on that night I lay naked and sweaty beside the big, hard man I loved. He put his arm round me. “One day, when you’re ready, I’d like you to retire” he rumbled, “at least from the Dark Guild work. I’d like us to have a child sometime.”
I thought about it. “If you insist” I told him, “but not yet, not for a long time. But there’s plenty of young Guild Orphans in need of a father if you’re in a hurry to be a Dad, and don’t mind adopting.”
He kissed me. "Possibly” he said, “I’ll think about it. But in the meantime even if you’re not going to be pregnant I can’t see any harm in practising how we’ll do it when you are ready ……” His hands moved with surprising gentleness, one to my breast, the other between my thighs.
“No, a bit more practise can’t hurt, can it?” I sighed, and arched my back, and miles away beyond the Erg I knew that the Vulture God was smiling, and would bless me when the time came.
Last edited on Mon Aug 4th, 2008 10:58 pm by Pie Chart
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