Crypt of the Moaning Diamond

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Sanval fell behind the Siegebreakers. Though relieved to see Ivy back with them, he also felt a familiar frustration. Why could he not have said anything sensible or even interesting when he helped her out of the hole? Instead, he had just babbled the usual Procampur phrases-completely impersonal, if courteous. He watched Ivy walk ahead of him, her head bent to catch some remark of Kid's. Since the first day he had seen her, striding through the dust of the camp, he had thought that she walked through the world as if she had no cares. No, he corrected himself, not quite that. Rather, she walked as if the world did not own her. Laws, traditions, even the gods themselves, seemed to be unable to constrain that cocky stride and the intelligent, mocking gleam in her eyes. And, Sanval was honest enough to admit to himself, he envied that freedom more than anything else.

Of course, Ivy was nothing like the perfumed ladies of Procampur, the silver-tile court intriguers who whispered secrets behind feather fans, or the red-roof girls who swayed their hips as they sashayed down the street. If there were a contest for the most grubby mercenary, Ivy would probably win. Once, when he had been very young, too young for tutors, he had eluded his nurse and gone out to the stableyard. It had been raining, and the yard was a wonderful, slippery mess of mud, perfect for sliding. Sanval still remembered the pain in his ear as his nurse dragged him upright and held him dangling before her, dripping mud upon her clean white apron. "You are the muckiest kid," she had scolded, slipping into the blue-roof dialect of her sailor father at that moment. "Dirtiest boy that I have ever seen!" Mucky was, he felt, a rather apt description of Ivy. Except, and again he had to be honest with himself as he tried to be with others, her collecting of dirt was that same friendly, joyful, defiant roll in the mud that he had enjoyed so much that day. She did it deliberately, he felt, just to tweak the more proper nose of those Procampur officers who were foolish enough to sneer at her as she swaggered up the hill to the Thultyrl's tent.

Those officers-and he had a couple of satisfying duels scheduled with the most discourteous-did not know how very beautiful and courageous and clever Ivy was. She was much finer than any noble lady born under the silver roofs.

Sanval sighed, remembering how Ivy had looked two nights ago. She had just come from the canvas bathhouse used by the mercenaries and was joking with the others as Gunderal braided Ivy's hair. As he stood there, outside of that circle of warmth and laughter, she turned and looked directly at him. "Hey, Sanval, how do you like me clean?" she yelled. "Come and join us. We're more fun than anyone sitting up on the top of that hill." He almost did it-sat down, had a drink, and shared a joke. But the message from the Thultyrl had been urgent, and he needed to return with an answer immediately. So he had said something polite-stupid and dull, but polite-and gone away again. He had never regretted any action so much.

Now he still had a duty to the Thultyrl. He could not let Archlis succeed in his plans. If he could keep Archlis from returning to Fottergrim, it would give Procampur's army an enormous advantage, perhaps even greater than toppling the western wall. Sanval was convinced Archlis would eventually return to Tsurlagol. He knew that Ivy thought she could safely follow Archlis, but she was wrong. As soon as Fottergrim's troops saw her, they would turn against her and her friends. Even her clever tongue would not be able to talk them out of a quick execution, unless Sanval could come up with a way to keep her safe from Archlis and Fottergrim.

Without intending to, Sanval dropped back until he was walking in step with the two bugbears trailing the group. The larger one growled at him and pointed at his armor.

"Your breastplate is very fine," said the big bugbear in Common. The creature wore no metal armor at all, just well-worn leather over his torn breeches and a few clanking chains looped over his shoulders. "A little small for me. But I could wear it. I can trade for it. I have good things, some of Hackermic's things. Poor Hackermic, poor Hackermic." The bugbear sighed deeply, a rumble in the center of his chest.

Sanval nodded, not to agree but to show his interest in the conversation. The creature seemed surprisingly friendly and he thought he could turn that to his advantage.

"Or I could hit you on the head," the bugbear continued more cheerfully, "if you do not give me the breastplate."

Sanval raised one eyebrow but kept silent.

The other smaller bugbear growled some incomprehensible words.

"His name is Norimgic, and I am Osteroric," said Osteroric, gesturing at his companion. "And he says that Archlis does not want you hit on the head. Not yet. I am not afraid of the magelord's anger, not like this one."

Norimgic snarled, showing off his big yellow fangs. "You are afraid of Archlis," said Osteroric to Norimgic, apparently not too impressed by the display. "Or you would have eaten him when he made us leave Lorie behind. Lorie was Norimgic's friend, his particular female friend. But something ate her," he explained to Sanval.

"Where was Lorie eaten?" asked Sanval, although he thought he knew.

"When we first came into these tunnels, something that we could not see bit off her head and an arm. It was very sad," said Osteroric, "because she was Norimgic's first love. This is the problem of being with a fighting female-they get killed so often. Of course, all our females fight. Which means that we males are often heartbroken. Our lives are tragic."

Sanval had never contemplated the romantic disasters of bugbears and decided after a few moments of reflection that he would rather not learn more. Still, he could understand the problem presented by fighting females and offered his own observations, made over the last few turbulent days of his life. "Fighting females," he said, keeping his voice down and hoping Ivy would not overhear him, "can be a very plague upon the heart, making dreams troubled and honorable thoughts difficult."

"You are poet, like us." Osteroric thumped Sanval on the shoulder, a friendly thump not much more staggering that the recent pats that he had received from Zuzzara. "We three brothers (Norimgic is my younger brother, and poor Hackermic was my elder) are all poets. That is why we left our tribe to roam the world. Because in our pack, they did not like poets. Especially after Hackermic broke the chief's jaw when he criticized Hackermic's five-lined verses with the clever triple and double rhymes. The chief thought we should only make verses in the old forms, and Hackermic should not recite his type of verses, especially before his elders," explained Osteroric. "Also, the chief did not approve of Norimgic's poetry-it is all love songs, because he wants to attract the females. Myself, I make the war chant, the kind that makes bugbears bang their heads with clubs or other bugbears. You know, the kind of chant that rouses the blood."

"It sounds very exciting," Sanval said.

"A good thump-thump beat is necessary," Osteroric said. "But Norimgic's songs move the blood as well. With passion of a different sort."

Norimgic, who must have understood the Common tongue even if he did not speak it, coughed to clear his throat and then broke into a long, drawn-out caterwaul that caused Archlis to glance over his shoulder. The magelord fingered one of the charms on his cloak, and Norimgic shut his mouth with a snap.

"That man has no appreciation for the songs of adoration." Osteroric sighed. "That song begins 'love is a nightmare, a thousand sword cuts can never sting so much; a hard heart makes for hard times.' In Fottergrim's camp, they often call for Norimgic to sing another someone-betrayed-someone love song."

Sanval was now positive that he wanted to know nothing more about the love lives of bugbears, but, always polite, he replied, "I regret that I do not speak any of the dialects that Norimgic uses for his love songs and thus cannot not fully appreciate his poetry." Like most gentlemen of Procampur, Sanval's tutor had tried to drum a little literature into his head between training in the sword and horseback riding. "I remember something from my lessons about a fashionable form of poetry, very popular with courting gentlemen and ladies, that consisted of one eight-line verse and an answering six-line verse."

Osteroric said that sounded fascinating although he continued to argue in favor of Hackermic's style of a five-line verse using rhythms created by two short syllables followed by one long one.

Now that friendly conversation had been established, Sanval began to consider how he might be able to sway the bugbears to his side. With great courtesy, he turned down Osteroric's offer of a bent knife for his breastplate, pointing out that his armor had been most excellently made by the best smiths in Procampur. Such armor had not only the natural strengths of the steel plate to keep its owner safe, but also came with certain standard magical protections against arrows laid into it. Such protection was hard to come by, especially underground, and Sanval would prefer to wear it himself-or so he told Osteroric.

"You can keep the chain mail," said Osteroric. "It is too small for me."

"Still, I would not trade my armor for something of lesser value," said Sanval, in as reasonable a tone as possible, because Osteroric was at least a head taller than him and bulging with muscles clearly visible under his furry skin. Remembering one former tutor's advice to know one's enemy, he added, "Why would so powerful a being as yourself need more armor?"

"You will see," said Osteroric with a shiver. Norimgic gave a snarl that almost ended with a whimper. The big bugbear patted his brother on the arm. Norimgic began to chide Osteroric in a series of snarls and growls.

"He thinks that I am too friendly to humans," translated Osteroric. "Blind trust in the honor of soft-skinned bipeds is what got us here in the first place, he says. By that he means that we should never have listened to Archlis when he promised to fill our bellies with more meat than we had ever tasted. Still, it was better than what Fottergrim offered us. He threatened to take off our heads and stuff them down our throats if we lost Archlis in the ruins one more time."

They turned another corner. Twitching at each footstep, Osteroric slowed his pace. Beneath his helmet, his fuzzy ears were tilted flat back against his skull. Before them, a small round chamber revealed numerous entrances to other tunnels, radiating out from the chamber like spokes on a wheel. Around the arched and empty doorways, hundreds of symbols had been carved: some were elaborately detailed, and others hastily scratched. In the light of his torch, Sanval could pick out one small sentence scratched in Common. "Here I fought, and here I die. Remember…" but the name was obliterated by another symbol written over it, in another style. It was as if every treasure hunter and adventurer who had dared the ruins of Tsurlagol had passed through this point and been compelled to try to leave some record of their passage.

"Better plug your ears," Osteroric growled. Wondering what would worry a bugbear that much, Sanval felt the ground beneath his feet begin to shake. Suddenly a terrible sound, like some giant millstone grinding through his brain, echoed through the chamber.

Archlis handed his Ankh to Osteroric, and Sanval observed Ivy watch the transfer with hungry eyes. She looked ready to lunge for the Ankh, but Gunderal plucked her sleeve and whispered in her ear. Ivy glanced up to meet Sanval's gaze. She shook her head just slightly. Warning him off? Wanting him to look away? Disapproving of his presence? Once again, he wished that he had the same unspoken communication with her that she made seem so effortless with her friends. Once or twice, he thought he knew what she wanted-if she had been from Procampur, it would have been easy for him to separate the sincere words from the formal courtesy. Not that Ivy cared all that much about courtesy, considering some of her more outrageous statements in front of such people as the Thultyrl.

"Do not step through the arch," the magelord commanded them.

Making several complicated passes with his hands, Archlis muttered and spat his way through a series of phrases in an ancient tongue. Both Gunderal and Kid winced as the recitation continued, as if the words themselves were scratching across their skin. Archlis finally pulled another charm from his cloak and ground it between his hands, reducing it to dust. He sprinkled the glittering powder in the air. Something shimmered in the air before them.

"Watch," Archlis instructed them, pointing at the empty chamber beyond the invisible barrier. A trio of huge beasts, light brown and dapple-striped in darker brown, shambled into the room. Hairless and hideous, they resembled nothing that Sanval had ever seen before. Two came through arches leading from different tunnels. The third clawed its way through a hole that opened up in the floor. The monsters jostled for space in the tiny chamber, clambering over each other. Their heads turned to the left and right, blindly questing for the source of the noise that had lured them out there just before Archlis had raised his spell.

"They have no eyes," whispered Gunderal.

"But look at the size of their raggedy ears," replied her sister.

"I'm noticing the size of those great long claws, myself," said Mumchance, putting his hand on Wiggles's head and pushing the little dog deeper into his pocket, as if that would protect her from the beasts. "And do you see all that ugly muscle in the tails? Must hit like a battering ram."

"What are they?" asked Ivy, not taking her eyes off the beasts circling in frustration before them. Blind as they were, the great monsters obviously knew that there was prey close.

"Destrachans," said Archlis. "Watch closely."

One of the creatures lifted its round muzzle to the ceiling. Although they could hear nothing on their side of the invisible wall created by Archlis, a deep vibration shook the ground. The other two beasts also lifted their round, toothless mouths, looking much like a malevolent pack of reptilian hounds howling at the moon. The stone of the ceiling changed almost immediately, melting into a cascade of sand that splattered across the destrachans. Balancing up on their powerful tails, first one and then the next of the beasts used their giant claws to pull themselves into the hole created in the ceiling.

Sanval watched Ivy as the last of the creatures disappeared into the hole in the ceiling, a final flick of its big brown tail sending down a small avalanche of pebbles and sand. Ivy chewed on one gloved knuckle-the most obvious sign of nerves that Sanval had seen her display.

"What did you call them?" she asked Archlis, as the magelord retrieved his Ankh from Osteroric.

"Destrachans. They are rare but not entirely unknown in such ruins as these. They probably trailed into the underground passages following a migration of kobolds, a favorite food of the beasts."

"So they are meat-eaters," stated Ivy. "I did notice that they have no teeth."

"That does not matter. They break their food down with waves of sound or pull it apart with those claws. They especially like intelligent food that they can play with before they devour it."

"If you consider kobolds intelligent." Zuzzara snorted, but Gunderal shushed her.

"Why not just hit them with one of those fire spells that you keep threatening us with?"

"Their cries can shatter metal," admitted Archlis, "and dissolve stone. Also, they seem to have incredibly tough hides."

"So you tried fire on them?"

"Not this group. But I have encountered this breed before. They are the bane of deep ruins."

"And you think they will destroy your Ankh before you have time to destroy them." Ivy was back to making statements, as if she were ticking off some mental list of disasters.

"It is a possibility that I would prefer not to consider," Archlis explained. "The problem with destrachans is that they are sensitive to the slightest sound. Any noise near their lair brings them out hunting."

Osteroric whispered to Sanval that was how he lost poor Hackermic, who caught the edge of the destrachan's scream. "His armor became a cloud of… what would you call it," he asked Norimgic. The bugbear's companion rolled his eyes and hissed back. "A cloud of scintillating dust," continued Osteroric. "I told you that Norimgic is a great poet. He is very good with words, even if he will not talk to humans. As for Hackermic, what the creatures did next to him was truly awful."

Ivy's discussion with Archlis was growing louder, which caused Osteroric and Norimgic to back farther away. Norimgic grunted something at Osteroric. "If she pitches her voice any higher," said Osteroric, "she will bring the shrieking beasties back. She is a very formidable female, says Norimgic."

"He is right," said Sanval, watching Ivy cock her head forward so she was standing almost nose to nose with Archlis, her gaze locked with the magelord's. It was a deliberate tactic, he realized-one that she had used to equal effect in the camp on the officers in the Thultyrl's Forty and that camel she had punched out of her tent. If she could get Archlis to back down even one step, she would be on top of him in a flash. But Archlis was more resolute than a Procampur officer or a dromedary. He did not budge.

"You must lure the destrachans away from their lair," Archlis said. "I am running out of bugbears, and they do not make good decoys. They are too slow and too easily caught."

"Poor Hackermic." Osteroric sighed.

"Why not just use that fancy spell of yours? Why not just sneak around them?" Ivy demanded.

"That fancy spell, as you call it, ends as soon as we pass through the barrier," Archlis said, waving a hand at the sparkles of light still shimmering in the air.

Gunderal gave a little sniff and whispered to her sister, "And he doesn't have any more charms like the one he just crushed. Have you noticed all his spells use other objects-no magic coming just from him."

Archlis frowned but ignored the sisters. "We are still far from where I need to be, yet the sounds that we just made drew the destrachans immediately."

"They are what forced you back the first time, not Fottergrim's hobgoblins," guessed Ivy.

"I retreated a strategic distance to consider my options," Archlis said in dignified tones, looking down his long nose at Ivy.

"Ran like a hare," said Mumchance to Kid, not trying to be quiet. Archlis ignored him too.

"Why us?" Ivy pressed the point.

"I have no more silence charms," Archlis admitted in a disgruntled tone.

Gunderal poked her sister in the ribs. Zuzzara patted her on the head in acknowledgment of her cleverness. Swatting her sister's hands away, Gunderal pushed her topknot straight and fluffed up her side curls.

"So I need a distraction-something to lure the destrachans away from this tunnel," said Archlis to Ivy. "You seem more intelligent than those hopeless hobgoblins or my bugbears. Destrachans like to play with their food. If you make the chase interesting, you can lead them a long way from here."

"Which helps you and doesn't help us. I fight for who pays me. Not for who is sure to get me killed. Same for all of us. Offer me something better than what he has." To Sanval's surprise, she pointed straight at him. He knew red-roof mercenaries sold their loyalty to the highest bidder, but still he had not expected so blatant an offering of betrayal from Ivy.

"If you can get the destrachans away from their lair and destroy them while I retrieve my treasure, then I will lead you out of the ruins," promised Archlis. "Which is more than that gentleman can do." Not seeing too much enthusiasm on their faces, the magelord added, "And a reasonable fee. Gems or gold. Whichever you wish. But only if I retrieve my treasure."

Ivy pointed out that the odds of their success were not great, but she did not question whether Archlis would keep his promise. Sanval wondered at her ability to trust the skinny magelord's word. Perhaps Ivy had lied to him earlier, and she or one of the other Siegebreakers did have some magic concealed about her person that would protect her friends and defeat the creatures. After all, everyone knew that red-roof adventurers had all sorts of fantastic abilities, and maybe she was just intending to run away from the magelord as soon as she and the other Siegebreakers were out of sight.

But Archlis could not succeed in his mission and return to the walls of Tsurlagol. Sanval knew that it was his duty to stop Archlis, even if it took him away from Ivy. Besides being the right thing to do, it might also be the best way to help Ivy and her friends. If he fought Archlis, the rest could escape. He just had to pick the right time for his ambush.

"So," said Sanval to Osteroric. "You might have something worth trading for."

Osteroric bent closer to Sanval to listen to his whispered instructions. The bugbear pushed back his battered helmet and scratched his fuzzy head. He puckered his lips and blew out a long and stinking breath. "Hsssh," whistled Osteroric. "This could be big trouble for me. Bigger trouble for you. I wonder what Hackermic would have done… He was even smarter than Norimgic."

"Does that matter?" asked Sanval, loosening the straps on his breastplate.

"Not really," agreed Osteroric. "Hackermic is dead. We are not."

"Then we trade," said Sanval.

"Then we trade," said Osteroric. "But I think that you will end up the same as poor Hackermic."