Book 3: Sound And Fury

  Chapter 29 House Of The Rising Sun

  In a steam filled garden paradise, surrounded by flowers, foliage and hot churning, perfumed water, Molly bathed for the first time in days… And what a bath it was.

  Soft cloths and brushes lay near to hand in the shower; as nearby, soaps and mysterious potions awaited the bather’s attention. Lost in the pleasure of being clean and unshackled, she forgot for a moment that she was under the watchful eyes of the two warriors.

  Both women had removed their headgear and armored masks of sculpted wood and bronze, revealing young, pretty girls about her own age. Their hard eyed gaze suggested that they were not to be trifled with, certainly not by a naked priestess in a silence collar.

  The magical, dreamlike bath seemed slightly less warm under their eyes. She slipped into the pool, soaking the warmth through her bones for a few glorious minutes, before a soft cough from the warrior in blue broke her reverie.

  With regret she escaped the water’s seductive grasp and draped herself in a simple robe that was both soft and warm. With her hair bound up in a towel she faced her guards, awaiting what would come next.

  “Your robes are being mended and cleaned at the moment.” The girl in blue murmured gently. “I understand that you must feel some trepidation at the moment, but you are safe here… truly safe.”

  “We’re under orders to leave your silence collar on until our officers are present… sorry.” The taller girl took her by the shoulders and guided her gently into the house and into a private room.

  /

  Maya slipped into the common room looking troubled, a half hour after the girls vanished into the bath. “Guys, you all need to chill… Especially you, Wilf.” She said clearly and directly, once the door was firmly closed behind her.

  “We haven’t taken her silence collar off yet, but she’s been tortured… a lot. Like, anywhere covered by clothes… She’s all scars.”

  A pall of silence fell over the room, as the team reevaluated some things. “We’re bringing her in, but guys, stay cool.” The strong, confident ninja the team knew so well reappeared, as Maya took control of her emotions and the team. “Becky is on her way. We’ll do the talking until she gets here, boys.”

  A moment later, the admiral walked a pretty, brown haired blue eyed girl of around seventeen into the dim, comfortable room and led her to a seat on a sofa, between Amy and Maya. She was a little below average height, slim, pale and seemed to have lost much of the terror she had been very poorly concealing all afternoon.

  “We’re still waiting for our officers, so we’ll introduce ourselves. I’m Amy, this is Maya, Rio, Wilf, Benny and Frankie. We’re Adventurers with the guild, contracted to guard you…” She smiled, a firm and carefully measured expression, delivered with precision.

  “We will guard you from harm just as assiduously as we will prevent you from causing harm or escaping. Are we clear on that point?”

  At the girl’s silent nod Amy smiled more fulsomely. “Excellent! We’re team Ragamuffin, of the Ward clan, currently in service to count Liam Kinnis, Forestlord of county Kinnis.” She nodded vigorously at her gathered teammates.

  “As a prisoner of war, you are entitled to certain rights and treatment standards, while in our care… These are our family’s laws, not the count’s. We cannot vouch for how you will be treated outside our care, so stay close to us and do not even think about escape.” Her smile fled, as she continued.

  “Your general did promise to murder every man, woman, child and housepet in this valley. Your cult is not popular in town.”

  A quiet commotion at the door drew everyone’s eyes, as a strange trio came bustling in. A dark skinned, slim young woman entered, accompanied by a short, square, blocky blonde man with pale blue eyes and muscles that bulged and rippled constantly.

  Behind them came a figure that shattered the young priestess’ composure and set her flying at the newcomer.

  The calm, obedient woman took a single glance and went wild, her hands held up in her shackles, presenting raking claws as she lunged for Daisybelle’s face.

  /

  “I know all I need to know about this cult… I wanna know why one of them is hanging out with my kids!” Gary growled at Shai, Tawny and Liam.

  “A perfectly valid request was made, one allowed under law and tradition.” Liam said softly. “Team Ragamuffin is ideally suited for this task, brother.”

  “Allowing the free practice of all faiths is a cornerstone of the law in Wheatford duchy, Gary. Even vile and despicable cults are allowed, so long as they don’t disrupt civic order. That is the law.”

  Shai sat in stoney silence, watching her husband with a calm and relaxed demeanor. When she spoke it was with absolute finality. “I have been updated by Amy on this matter. Becky is on the case… Ye shall not interfere.”

  “But, babe…” He sputtered.

  “No. I am adamant in this, it is no thing for you to meddle in. I shall stir this with a long handled spoon, meself.” She declared, silencing his complaints.

  “If any filthy priest gets grabby with my kids…” He grumbled, as she sank down into a sofa by the fireplace, where Mariah smoldered, mostly asleep.

  “The priestess is a slip of a girl… one we need not fear.” Shai muttered with finality. “Now shush.”

  “Our investigations have borne out what most of our veteran campaigners suspected. This is no proper army, rather it’s a small corps of elites, who have conscripted most of the population of a small city… Lightglen is the name.” Liam said, smoothly getting the meeting back on track.

  “Most of the enslaved people were privately held, until seized for this invasion. Quite a few are the poorest of the locals on the other side, swept up and enslaved by the cult leadership. Likewise, the peasant force is forcibly conscripted from their usual labor. They are an unwilling and fractious group, held together only by their terror of you… And your awful spiders, wasps and bees.” He smiled weakly, as Tawny took over.

  “As you know, almost all of the conscripts are more than willing to return home, if given the opportunity. They find my husband’s domain unwelcoming, I’m afraid.” She smiled and chuckled merrily.

  “The… I hate to say it, but the slave army is the biggest problem, despite your control over them… We simply have no answer to the sudden arrival of twenty thousand people.”

  “Slightly less than nineteen thousand, now. King Ghnash took the… He took some of them away to his domain. You know, the ones who…”

  “Yeah…” Liam answered. “We know.”

  “Yeah. Well, he’s taking care of them, I guess the goblin wives are super experienced with that kind of… thing.” Gary mumbled, feeling like a total heel and unsure why.

  “You, above all people, should know that no one can do everything themselves… No matter how many of you there are, Gary.” Liam declared with a grin that broke the melancholy mood.

  “Let’s go have a smoke in the necropolis… The lavender fields are blooming and your insect friends are having a blast.”

  “Oh, that does sound nice…” Shai enthused, grabbing her husband by the collar, very firmly. “A brisk ride and an early dinner on the plateau, overlooking the valley will be a fine thing. Ye’ll gain a mite of perspective, lad.”

  It was a fine thing. Pedaling up the long, steep trail to the ancient necropolis above the palace took a long, sweaty hour of hard cranking and more than a little cursing, since Gary’s bike engine needed service.

  “I blew a ManaFold array. I need to reforge a ring of purest silver in an iron free environment with tools untainted by base metals…” He shrugged his sagging shoulders and moaned. “That’s a job of work, even before the inscriptions and enchantments.”

  “Twas yer fancy new fangled engine that failed, lad…” Shai let her enchanted ring-motor spin down, as she patted her lad’s sweaty arm. “Ye will lose a mite of pudge from yer tummy this evening, boy of mine!”

  “Well, yours is fancy and newfangled too…” He complained weakly. “Just not as fancy as mine.”

  Seizing an opportunity, Liam pounced, while Shai and Tawny were setting up a picnic dinner on the lawn, near the wildflower meadows.

  “This new engine of yours, tell me about it. You said the mainspring was… Unobtanium alloy? From where is that mined?”

  The Fool couldn’t resist a chance to prattle on about his highly technical, completely opaque crafts and arts, at great length… No matter how hard his audience might try to escape. Brave count Liam leaned into the strike zone and took one for the team, letting a mass of high speed nonsense blast him right in the face.

  /

  “That was an act of unparalleled courage, my lord husband.” Tawny purred in Liam’s ear, when dinner was done and Gary finally shut the hell up about the awful, horrid, disgusting things he had wrought from materials of the vilest kinds.

  “If only you had led him away, so that Shai and I might have been spared listening. You made me listen to his mad tale of forging… He was forging actual shit, Liam.” Her gently scolding tone suggested she would be choosing their game tonight. She gently tugged his earlobe, drawing the young lord in for a kiss of those perfect pink lips. “You will be sleeping in the hayloft tonight, husband.”

  “Her ladyship is tough, but fair.” He answered glibly, with a wicked grin.

  Sleeping in the barn, taking the air…

  Perhaps some sprightly stable lass

  A sweet and comely maiden fair.

  Will wander by lost in the night…

  I’ll swoop her up for my evil delight!”

  “Perhaps she might, at that… Wicked lord Liam.” Tawny replied in her best imitation of a down-country farm-girl’s rolling, common accents.

  The young lord and lady shared a soft giggle, very soft, lest they wake the Fool, who was peacefully unconscious on his wife’s lap, snoring softly.

  Before them, the mesa edge plunged off into the valley, while behind, graves, crypts, cenotaphs, memorials, monuments, obelisks and statues peeked out from a widely spaced forest of living wonders.

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  What had once been a demon’s domain, an undead haunted, vast necropolis of desolate, despoiled graves, now fostered a verdant forest, rippling with life and vibrant colors as night closed in.

  As promised, swarms of sugar-wasps and sun-sting bees zipped from blossom to blossom, feasting on the rich, warm nectar as evening slowly climbed up the mountainside. Deer crept from their nests, peering at the little group of humans without fear, as a porcupine waddled by, his needles swaying in the hypnotic dance of his kind.

  “It’s good to see him sleep so…” Shai muttered softly. “Tis peaceful.”

  /

  With a start, Gary ‘woke’ to find himself still asleep, but mentally awake and standing somewhere unfamiliar. Endless halls and corridors of pillars and ancient stones stretched on, in front, behind and to either side. He stood at an underground crossroads, one lined as far as he could see with shallow niches, each holding a tightly bundled, mummified corpse. They stretched up for uncounted layers, one above the other in their carved stone slots. The vaulted curvature of the roof high above had been tiled in cobalt blue, flecked here and there with gilt to suggest a moonless, starry night sky.

  Time had faded the gleaming gold leaf, while cobwebs and dust coated the tiles, ragged sheets of the tattered, dusty spider stuff waved gently in the nearly still air… or was it air? Silence ruled here, a physical, almost oppressive example that put mere quiet, to shame.

  Gary failed to remain silent, as he walked forward, following the path before him, striding into the dark and ominous tomb with confidence.

  “I don’t play games. Show yourself or begone, spirit.” He called into the shadowed crypt. “You picked the wrong dreams to invade, buddy.”

  “Invade?” A familiar voice asked from all around. “I’ve been here from the start. Waiting inside you; all mortals bear my touch, even something like you.”

  “Sure… Now show yourself before I get pissed and use you to wipe my ass.” Gary growled. “I’m getting sick of non corporeals thinking they can just show up and start goofing on me.”

  “To be fair, this is the first time I’ve contacted you… You’re being quite unreasonable.” The voice rumbled and whispered.

  “Well, you set the mood! What’s up with this endless crypt?! I’m not a stickler for such things but dragging people into tombs is pretty bad form in general.” He complained.

  “You are dreaming this environment, mortal… You fell asleep in an ancient necropolis! Is it any surprise you dreamed of the Eternal Halls?” The being scoffed in a way that felt really, really familiar.

  “Earth? Is that you? The spirit of earth?” He asked weakly, embarrassed and feeling super foolish.

  “Yes, mortal… you finally reach out to me, only to be an absolute prat, when I answer.” He huffed, sounding annoyed. “Usually, mortals expire before I get around to answering their pleas. I’m a little slower to get moving than my brothers and sisters, usually.”

  “Well… sorry… Now I feel like an ass.” Gary mumbled.

  “As you should, but you are young… allowances can be made.” The entity murmured in the sounds of stones and earth settling after an upheaval.

  “I’m not Contracting you, buddy.” The musician muttered, feeling a little used, suddenly. “That’s not what’s going on here. I just needed to do a working of magic that touched your realm.”

  “Bond with… Me?! Oh no…. Impossible, completely impossible. Too, too volatile and chaotic, too much of all the mortal things to ever be compatible with me.” The spirit exclaimed, sounding just a little outraged. “Try in another incarnation… Better luck next time.”

  “Wow… That’s cold. Way to turn that around on me.” He sighed. “So what’s the deal? Just coming by to haunt my dreams?”

  “No… I could have Contracted you, when you were the Fool on The Hill, passive and willing to exist within boundaries… Now you are the Fool entirely. Instead, I have a message from one who is much like me, and another, who cannot approach you at this time.”

  “Ok, two messages… lay it on me.” He answered, bemused by the being’s words and thinking of his early days on this world.

  “Return to your dungeon world. You must go there in the flesh and meet with the one who awaits you there.” The voice fell silent, seeming satisfied that the message was delivered.

  “Uhh, two messages? And I can’t really enter my dungeon world, it’s only half real.” He grumbled into the darkness.

  “The same message, one for the Hermit, one for the Fool… I did not consider how fractured you are… You and the Hermit both must return to your dungeon worlds.” The voice rumbled and grumbled.

  “As for entering a half-real place… It has been done before. The way has been opened. You must follow the path.”

  /

  Gary woke in his wife’s super comfy lap, her strong, warm fingers tangled in his hair as she also dozed, her back leaned against a gravestone older than anyone could ever know. “Mmm, that’s nice, love.”

  “Ahh, yer awake… Let’s head down the mountain, ‘ere full dark overtakes the path.” She sighed, sounding like she wasn’t interested in moving at all.

  /

  Late afternoon sunshine lanced through the front door to Wilf’s place, cutting through the usually dim and cozy atmosphere; much the way a raging fury in iron shackles cut through the distance between Daisybelle and those shredding fingernails.

  With a graceful sway and dip of her hip, Daisybell flipped her attacker in a quick and very skilled display of the proper uses of force, momentum and leverage.

  “I see…” She chuckled. “Angry angry and nub sure why…”

  “She’s still in a silence collar…” Amy offered. “She was calm until she saw you, Daze.”

  The little green girl thought for a moment, still astride the much larger woman, controlling her foe with a firm grip on her earlobe and pinky finger. “Amy, take over here. I will sit over there, out of reach; while we listen to her… It better be a good good story.”

  The tiny green terror deftly passed her captive to Amy’s grip and made her way to a seat behind the bar, out of the way. “Ooh, salted nuts! Score!” She chirped merrily, as she began crunching and snacking.

  Amy firmly seated her captive back on the sofa and stepped back, awaiting another explosion. When none was forthcoming, the admiral carefully unbuckled the girl’s collar.

  “Now, without attacking anyone, tell us your name.” Becky said drily from the other couch.

  “My name is Molly… no family name…” She mumbled, shooting dark glances at the goblin lass in the corner. “I’m an initiate priestess of the Light. They brought me along to minister to the common soldiers and slaves, since I’m slaveborn.”

  “So, your parents were slaves?” Amy asked gently.

  “No, my mother is a slave. My father is her master, an influential and powerful man.” She replied, wrestling her old humiliation down. ‘What matters it, if these infidels know her shame anyway?’ She reflected silently.

  “So why did you attack Daisybelle?” Amy asked firmly. “We should dump you back in the field and find another priest.”

  “None of the others will lower themselves to minister to common soldiers, forget conscripts or slaves.” She said calmly. “They are lords and clerics of rank.”

  “Fine, so why did you attack my friend?” Amy insisted.

  “I didn’t believe the rumors… things overheard from passing guards… But you have one here... You even let it walk among you unchained!” She gasped, pointing at Daisybelle with an accusatory finger. “You infidels…! You barbarians gave the captured pleasure slaves to goblins!”

  “Yes, we did.” Becky answered with steel in her voice. “King Ghnash has taken them to his domain for special treatment. They are in far less peril than you.”

  “Goblins are rapacious animals!” She gasped in horror. “You fed my mother to those cannibalistic monsters!”

  The woman lurched forward, as if to leap at Becky, only to be halted by the high priestess’ wand, the slim tip of the hawthorn rod resting between the girl’s breasts.

  “A simple charm of paralysis… You will be released in a moment.” Becky said calmly, addressing her would-be attacker with a smile.

  “If your mother was among the… survivors taken in by the goblin king, she is alive and unharmed. When I release my spell, if you will tell me your mother’s name, I will have her brought to you tomorrow. Assuming she wishes to see you.”

  She turned to Amy and sighed. “I knew this would be a total garbage fire… Religion is brain poison!”

  “Becky! You’re the high priestess of Knowledge!” Amy barked in disbelief.

  “Critical thinking is a core part of our faith, Amy! Rigid dogma and group-think are anathema to lord Marduk…” She sighed theatrically. “I blame your dad for that. He’s a bad influence on all the gods.”

  “Yeah, he’s nothing but trouble… Good trouble.” The admiral sighed.

  Molly watched and listened, helplessly immobile as they carried on around her. The priestess’ hands were forcibly stilled, petrified in the midst of reaching out to throttle the small woman in robes of bright, autumn colors of smoke, flame and sunset. Pinned like a bug in amber by their unclean witchery, she watched, as they continued their discussion of absolute madness.

  The lunatics that held her fate in their hands blathered on and on, babbling of their own false gods, speaking as if the fantastical fantasies were real people with whom they could interact.

  “Ward, what do you think? Is she under some compulsion or spell?” Amy asked worriedly. “These violent fits are pretty irrational, even if she is completely unskilled.”

  “Amy…” Daisybelle sang from her spot behind the bar, her lilting voice carrying clearly across the crowded room. “You have faced goblin men… You know what they are like. If she believes her mother to have been given to such creatures, she is acting very reasonably.” The little green monster sighed and smiled very coldly.

  “Were it someone precious to me, handed over to goblin men… I would have successfully torn your throat out and danced my dear one’s soul into the next life, clothed only in your gore… Sweetie.”

  The horrid monster hopped over the bar and skipped merrily over to the petrified priestess, eyeing the much taller woman up and down, as if appraising her.

  “She smells human, untainted by demon filth…” The creature remarked.

  “I know you are still awake and can hear me, girly…” Daisybelle spoke calmly and clearly, addressing the immobile woman firmly.

  “Your people are safe under my King Papa’s care, safer than if they were still here in this domain. My papa will die screaming with rage, his spear drenched in blood, before any harm comes to them. That is certain.” She scolded the statue in a plain bathrobe.

  “Now, master your emotions and control your fear. You are a danger to yourself, as you are currently.”

  The woman in robes the color of an autumn forest lit ablaze smiled and touched Molly’s breast with her long, wickedly thorned wand and smiled. “Now behave yourself, young lady, and tell us your tale. Your mother and all the other…” She faltered, her lips twisting around the words. “The pleasure slaves… are safe and will be, so long as they are under the goblin king’s care.”

  Slowly, Molly’s muscles unlocked, relaxing into a weak, trembling, feeble pile of goo, as she slumped back onto her seat on the sofa. She remained completely helpless, but now she was debilitated by pure exhaustion, rather than witchcraft.

  “Now… Molly, was it? Tell us how you came to invade our home with this army of idiots and losers?” Amy asked sweetly, as she passed a cup of tea to the shaking priestess. “Start by telling us about your mother.”

  /

  Numb with shock, fear, horror and confusion, Sally had followed the other pleasure slaves on that chaotic night. She and all the others followed, when directed by the drooling, glazed eyed clerics and nobles on that terrible night. They followed, unknowing until too late that the lords and clerics were under the control of a mysterious wasp monster, a chitinous, flying nightmare; possessed of human form and speech in blasphemous mockery of the Light’s scriptures.

  Believing themselves already doomed to some awful fate, the enslaved followed, as they were joined by a pack of wolf riding goblins, which only confirmed that they were all undone, and in the most awful and horrific way…

  Piteous moans for mercy and the enslaved begging for a clean death went unanswered by the awful monsters who herded them away to an unknown fate, somewhere in the shadow haunted, spider infested woods under the light of two impossible moons.

  Sally remained silent, her daughter’s fate was more of a concern, her sweet Molly had vanished with the lords and clerics, taken by the creatures of the night and no doubt destined for something equally awful.

  Sally couldn’t say how far they walked, or when they emerged from a nightmareish journey through a cave of swirling madness and unseen whispers into a sunlit valley, looking down on a small town by a lake… An impossibly and undeniably different small town, situated by the same lake, beneath the same mountains.

  “Welcome to Goblinhome… domain of king Ghnash, lord of the goblins.” One of the horrible green women sang merrily, from the back of her savage beast. “You are now property of king Ghnash, cupped in his sheltering hands, be at ease, humans.”

  Weeping and piteous cries swelled from the cluster of slaves, as more goblins emerged from the woods, showing their long, sharp teeth in feral smiles.

  “What’s wrong with them?” Barbara-ann asked Lola, who shrugged and looked to Valerie.

  “Humans can’t tell the difference between goblin men and goblin women… I think.” The girl in a red and blue silk uniform replied, adjusting her white, bone buttons and settling her sash at her hips. “Hey, humans… Shut up! No one is going to hurt you.”

  Sally watched in mystified wonder, as a tiny black and gold insect buzzed over to the goblin that did the shouting and proceeded to deliver a silent, finger waggling scolding to the green monster dressed in an elaborate uniform of red white and blue, decorated with bright orange embroidered poppies at her cuffs and breast.

  Unlikely as it seemed, the tiny wasp seemed to be the same being that had led them here, no longer a four foot tall armored warrior wasp, but now a four inch insect.

  The strange creature finished berating the goblin, who looked abashed and embarrassed as the bug buzzed away, back up the path they had come down, leading the still mindlessly drooling nobles, clerics and knights away to some unknown fate.

  “I apologize for speaking so harshly. Lady Kree informs me that you are special guests of the king, not his property.” Valerie said firmly to the mystified slaves. “Now follow us to the city of GoblinHome. Do not stray, there are dangers in these woods for the unguided.”

  What followed became a blur of food, clean clothing, more food and then rest, in clean comfortable cots, under fresh, clean tents in a safe, quiet and secure slave pen. No one came to take any of them away in the night, nor did any cries, or sounds of distress arise…

  The slaves awoke to a soft bell at sunrise… and a bevy of goblin women, bearing a huge cauldron of porridge, baskets of bread and bushels of fruit.

  “Eat, take your ease, rest. The king will come to speak to you at mid-day, humans.” The tallest goblin woman spoke clearly, her voice rang with authority. She wore a long gown of sensible, undyed linen, embellished with embroidered violets and green vines.

  “I am Sabrina the goblin queen, my husband’s daughters will see you fed and taken care of. You shall not be harmed… in any way, my children. I leave you in their care.” With that, she swept away; coolly elegant and self possessed as any human queen.

  When the sun reached its peak, a short, oddly handsome goblin man arrived, strolling casually up to the gate of their pen and letting himself in, while the two goblin girl guards saluted with crisp precision. He was dressed as a human workman, such as might be seen in any town, save for his long nose, pointy ears and green skin.

  The creature hopped up on one of the tables scattered around the mess tent and gave a piercing whistle that drew every eye in the slave pen.

  “Heya, folks…” He announced, sounding for all the world like a real person. “I’m Ghnash, your host… This is going to be super awkward and weird for everyone, so if you will all just chill and go along with the program, everyone will be much happier.”

  He nodded with satisfaction, once he was certain all of the slaves were listening. “All right, first… you are safe here. No one is going to do anything to you… seriously. Second, my daughters will be keeping the peace and making sure everyone is safe. You will be clothed, fed, your wounds and illnesses will be tended. You can trust any of the girls to look out for any of you, at any time.”

  He ran his oddly compelling gaze over the thousand or so people gathered in the wide, fenced in meadow.

  “Finaly… and this is important… whether you are human, beastfolk, or goblin, no one is going to do any violence to anyone or cause any trouble… Violators will answer to Me.”

  With that, the burly little monster jumped down, pulled a long, bone flute from his sleeve and strolled away, playing a sweet melody in the sunshine.

  For three long days and nights, the king was as good as his word, until on the fourth morning, a goblin warrior came to the open gate of the slave pen and called out.

  “Sally, mother of Molly! Step forward!”

  /