Kelly McCullough
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Continuing with the Swine Prince Bonus Chapters
🕑 Added 2023-12-15 12:59:01 +0000 UTC#Shagreen#
Their reluctant guide led them down yet another long hall cut from the living rock to a small winding stairway. They took this down a flight and pushed through the door at the first landing. To no one's great surprise it opened into a stone hallway, this one whitewashed and rather drab. Two hundred feet or so later they came abreast of a small unmarked wooden door set into the left side of the corridor.
"Not very impressive for a treasury door," said Truffles.
The underpriest bowed low. "Honored Sir, this is not the door to the treasury. It is the door to the wing in which the treasury, the armory, and the high priest's quarters are located. The door to the treasury proper is even smaller and shabbier. The temple designers felt it would reduce looting. In Azifir's home on earth, the bigger and more impressive the door looks, the smaller and less important the thing it hides. The one that leads into my own cell is inch thick bronze and covered with pictures of the most hideous demons. I can barely open it by myself."
"What's on the other side?" Hal pointed at the door.
"There will be two guards in the room. How you deal with them is your concern. Just, please do not hurt me."
"Let's see," said Hal—thinking aloud, "you step through the door slowly wearing a big happy smile. Once Tasha spots the guards and signals me, I am going to increase the pressure of my sword in your back slightly, like this." He demonstrated what he meant. "That will be your cue to hit the deck. Now, go."
The priest carefully, and with a large smile on his face, opened the door and stepped through. Immediately afterward he dived to the floor, perhaps figuring the worst that could happen would be he would have to tell Hal he thought he'd been signaled and—if he got lucky—all of the nasty unpleasant people with sharp weapons would kill each other and he could claim credit. Sadly—from the priest's point of view—this second scenario did not happen. Instead, at almost the same instant he landed on the floor, a pair of knives went buzzing through the space he had just occupied and buried themselves in the two guards' throats.
The room beyond was as nondescript as the hallway it abutted. The late occupants had been seated at a small trestle table, playing cards.
"Blasphemers!" said the underpriest.
"Huh?" said Hal,
"Gambling is absolutely forbidden to the children of Azifir. It is a cardinal sin, like liquor and jogging."
Tasha smiled sweetly. "Well, I don't think you'll have to worry about these boys doing it again."
The room's contents included—in addition to the dead guards—the table, two chairs, the cards, and a small gong obviously for summoning help in case of emergency. There were two doors. The one they had entered by and an even less imposing one opposite. The room had obviously been designed as nothing more than an entry-way to the treasure wing.
Recognizing that it wouldn't be long before someone found the dead guards they picked up the pace, hurrying through the second door and down the hallway beyond. It ended in a tee. To the right was the passage to the armory and the high priest's quarters, to the left the one their guide said led to the treasury. They followed that to a small and rather spartan sleeping cubicle which housed a small bed, a smaller desk, and a closet with a poorly fitting door that looked like it might fall off its hinges if you breathed on it heavily.
"There it is." The underpriest pointed at the closet.
"There what is?" asked Hal.
"The entrance to the treasury."
"Seriously?" said Tasha. "You've got to be kidding. It's a closet and not even a very good one. Where are the guards and the death traps? Where are the huge unpickable locks?"
"There aren't any, scary lady. There is just that door and another one concealed in the back wall of the closet with a rather simple lock." The priest smiled at Tasha's incredulous look. "You see, it works. Even after I have risked my life to lead you here you have trouble believing it's worth searching the closet. What could be a more perfect way to keep intruders away?"
Hal crossed to the closet but didn't immediately open the door, feeling there had to be a catch. Though he had only been actually out in the broader world for a short he had already come to the conclusion there was always a catch, especially when things looked simple. If the underpriest was to be believed, all he had to do was open the door and then Tasha could pick the lock on the door behind that and they'd be in. He was sure there was more to it than that, but couldn't guess what it was.
"Oh well." With a sigh, Hal pulled the door handle, fully expecting a monster to leap out or a trap to be triggered. But nothing happened.
Well, not quite nothing—the door opened. This exposed a small stone closet with a wooden back panel to which some hooks had been affixed. A little work quickly revealed the panel could be lifted out. The door thus revealed had a lock even Hal could have picked. For Tasha it opened so quickly she might as well have had a key. A short hallway beyond led into a gargantuan chamber. Even from his cramped vantage behind Tasha, Hal could see the gleam of heaped treasure. Tasha started forward, but Hal touched her shoulder.
"Why don't we let our friend here lead the way?" He caught the underpriest by the collar and dragged him into the closet.
"Good idea." She flattened herself against the wall and let Hal and the reluctant underpriest pass.
"Sir, be careful," the priest said as they reached the end of the hall and stepped forward into the broader space. "There may be traps inside this room. I have never actually entered the treasury, only waited in the little bedroom while my superior went to get things."
"Why didn't you mention that before?" Tasha was fingering a knife as she came alongside them.
"I did not know you would take me into the room with you," said the underpriest. "It did not seem so important then." As these words left his lips there came a grating noise followed by a whir and a chunk. Then a bell started pealing.
"You little swine!" Hal whipped the priest around to face him. "I'm going to…" The words died in his throat when he saw the crossbow bolt jutting out from beneath the man's breastbone. He turned the corpse back around and used it as a shield as he stepped further into the room.
The treasure of ages lay in great untidy heaps. Everywhere Hal looked lay piles of gems and precious metals, bolts of fine silks and velvets, careful stacks of gold bars. One rack held weapons so jewel incrusted they looked more like a bizarre breed of coral than devices for killing people. Stacks of rare books stood next to stacks of rare woods or spices. There was even a rack of particularly well made coats.
But mostly there were endless heaps of money. It came in all shapes and sizes; coins of precious metals, coins of base metals, coins of shell and coins of bone, coins of wood and coins of stone, even coins made of some sort of stamped leather. There were also bits of brightly colored paper with numbers on them that Truffles identified as another type of money. There were IOUs and bank notes and drafts against every kind of valuable you could imagine. In short, there was a great bloody lot of wealth piled into a large space that they didn't have time to search thoroughly.
"I think we're about to have a great deal of company." Hal had to raise his voice to be heard over the continued ringing of the bell. "Truffles, if you could find this sword quick like so we can grab it and make like pigs who've seen the door to the slaughterhouse, that would be a fine idea."
"You mean, so you can grab it." Truffles eyes flicked nervously from side to side. "I think I mentioned not wanting to get within a thousand yards of the thing." He swallowed visibly. "And, frankly, in this mess I couldn't tell if I were standing next to it. I'm not moving another inch. Just look for a beat up yellowish leather sheath with a green guard sticking out of it. Oh, and there's probably a big red stone in the pommel and black leather wrapping the hilt."
Hal and Tasha started off to look for the weapon. Bogvar seemed more interested in sticking near the exit. Hal, swearing under his breath at the delay, slid around a heap of miscellaneous coinage and almost tripped over the object of their search. At least he assumed it was the object of their search. Resting in a cradle on top of a velvet covered dais lay the ugliest sheath he'd ever seen.
It was a sweat-stained gold in color, like moldy wheat, and covered from tip to mouth in bas-reliefs of dying swamp life. Sticking out of the ugly sheath was an equally ugly hilt, with a corroded green guard and a big gaudy faux ruby set in the pommel. Hal grabbed the hilt, and pulled the sword partway from its sheath. Sure enough, it was a flat and uninspiring green.
If Danny—the skull who had once been a boy living in a city called Nu Yok—had seen it he could have identified the color more precisely. The blade was the exact shade of avocado found on the matched set of major kitchen appliances in the home of Danny's father and the sheath matched the harvest gold set belonging to his great aunt. Even without that identification, Hal rather mysteriously, and only for a moment, was overcome by the deep-down feeling he never wanted to own anything large and boxy in either color. Looking at Shagreen, Hal knew beyond any question this had to be a mighty weapon indeed. There could be no other possible reason for keeping a blade that ugly in a treasury. He attached the sheath to his belt.
"I've found it," he yelled. "How about we get ourselves out of here before the entire temple guard descends on us?"
Suiting deeds to words, he ran back to the exit. When he proudly swept the sword out of its sheath to get Truffles to verify its identity, the wizard fell over backwards in his efforts to stay away from it. Tasha arrived a moment later. As soon as the near hysterical Truffles had agreed what Hal had found was indeed the sword they were looking for, the three dashed back through the short hallway.
Predictably—where it comes to matters of running away—Bogvar was already in the little bedroom when they got there and calling for them to hurry. They made it all the way to the tee where the hall branched off to the armory before they encountered guards.
Fortunately, there were only two of them and they were armed with a mop, a bucket, and a big sack. This was because when they'd heard the alarm the pair had assumed another underpriest had managed to get himself skewered while trying to get a better look at the treasury. It happened on a surprisingly regular basis and cleanup detail was not popular, but someone had to do it. So they had grabbed the usual kit and headed in. When the guards encountered actual armed intruders, they did what all sensible, and therefore long-lived, guards have done for centuries, they ran like rabbits in the direction of the nearest reinforcements—heading back toward the armory.
This left the path to main body of the temple conveniently open and the adventurers took the turn at a dead run heading for the little guard room. They paused there just long enough to collect themselves a bit, settle their gear, and consult the map Tasha had made their late guide draw. A second series of alarms started about then, so as soon as they had an idea of where they were going they ducked through the door and almost immediately encountered a small unit of heavily armed and armored temple soldiers. By mutual and unspoken agreement among the four members of the little party, running away became the order of the day. This was the one sort of contest in which they, clad in their light desert garb, had a distinct advantage over the temple troops.
What followed was a sort of serial melee as they outran one batch of panting soldiers only to encounter another set just around the next corner. In a momentary lull after a particularly persistent batch of guards had finally collapsed from exhaustion behind them but before they had barreled into the next batch in front, Truffles called for a pause to catch their collective breath.
"Where are all of these people coming from?" Hal panted. "I thought this temple was supposed to be completely cut off from civilization." That thought triggered another question. "Also, where do they find sacrifices when they can't get interlopers? The entrance where we came hadn't been opened in awfully long time."
"Among my people," gasped Bogvar, "there are rumors the worship of Azifir continues to this day. It seems to me we have just proved the truth of the rumors."
"I'd bet," wheezed Truffles, "there's a magical portal somewhere around here connecting the temple with the outside world. This place is bursting at the seams with magic."
"There's probably just a back door," Tasha said, breathing easily. Running-from was, after all, her best event. "I've never met a priest yet who didn't have an escape hatch somewhere."
She was more or less right. The fairly nondescript back door lay concealed at the end of the canyon farthest from where Hal's party had camped. It's purpose however was not primarily one of escape.
In addition to the temple complex there was a huge underground amusement park and religious instruction center. On a fairly regular basis caravans composed of devout Azifir worshipers arrived for weekends of prayer and recreation with the kids. It offered the Azifiri faithful a chance to turn away from the temptations of the secular world for a time so they could contemplate the wonders of Azifir and participate in a structured series of religious events that always concluded with a nice wholesome human sacrifice.
"I still think my theory of a magic portal's more likely," said Truffles, his breathing having slowed from wheezing to something more like staccato puffing. "Otherwise-"
"Debate's over," interrupted Hal. "Looks like it's time to shut up and run away again. Here come some more guards."
A few minutes later only one last hall stood between them and the exit. At the near end stood a dozen very winded temple soldiers. With such a short way to go, the little group of adventurers hit the obstacle like a brick hitting a plate glass window.
Actually, considering the mess they left in their wake, it was more like a sledge hammer hitting a watermelon. It had been years since any of the guards had to do anything much more aggressive than reminding the faithful not to feed the sand sharks, and they were quite unprepared for the nasty and sharp mayhem that party visited upon them. Also, judging by performance or lack thereof, the guards might as well have been supplied by Evil-Temps or some other employment agency long on labor and short on skill.
The party had fought their way to within a few yards of the exit when one of the upper priests finally arrived on the scene. A small man with a tiny head sitting on top of a coathanger-body, he was the Azifiris' chief instructor of magic. Emerging from a secret door between the adventurers and the exit, he immediately began to make a series of slow sinuous gestures in the air, calling out nonsense words in a harsh and evil voice.
The theatrics came to an abrupt halt when Hal brandished Shagreen at him and charged. The priest's face went whiter than an blind cave fish swimming in a lake of bleach and he dived for the floor where he writhed and moaned in terror.
While Hal raced right past the groveling priest, Bogvar had other ideas, and he paused just long enough in passing to implement them by planting a solid boot in the priest's throat. The camel dealer might be a rat but he was a smart rat. He figured his odds of survival went way up if the priest couldn't throw nasty spells at his retreating backside and he wasn't averse to kicking a man when he was down—preferred it in fact. He cheated at dice too. Though, to be fair to Bogvar, it should be noted that Truffles kicked the priest too, and Tasha actually stuck a knife in him. Though that was more out of general principle and a desire to dot the i's and cross the t's than because she felt the others hadn't covered things properly. Doesn't change the thing about the dice, but it's important to keep the record straight even where it comes to crooked people.
A moment later the quartet burst out under the desert stars. It was about midnight, which explained why they hadn't run into any of the Azifiri tourists in their mad dash for the door. All good and devout worshipers of Azifir spent the hour around midnight strangling rodents and praying when on religious retreat. The adventurers threw themselves down the temple stairs and started straight off along the canyon. They hadn't gone far when they found Gnormin waiting astride a saddled horse with the rest of the riding animals in a line behind him.
"Gnormin!" called Tasha, reaching up and kissing him. "How did you know to meet us here?"
Gnormin pointed at Hal and Truffles. "I've been traveling with them for months. When you didn't come back by dark I figured the trouble magnets had struck again."
"Good work," said Hal. "We owe you one, little buddy."
"Never has one so small done so much for such big idiots," Gnormin intoned with a grin. As they mounted, he turned his attention back to Tasha. "Knowing that all hell was bound to break loose shortly, I packed up camp, left the camels on a string by the oasis and went looking for you with the horses. As soon as I saw that place," he pointed at the temple, "I had a pretty good idea of what shape the trouble would take. So I settled down to wait for you all to come screaming out the front door with a horde of guards on your tails. Honestly, it took a fair bit longer than I expected. I was beginning to think I'd have to go in after you."
He might have said more, but just then a huge and multicolored fireball came rocketing out of the temple and blew a gaping hole in the nearby cliff face. Counting that as something of a hint, Hal put heels to horsehide and the others followed suit, tearing off down the canyon as fast as their steeds could carry them.
