Skarsnik by Guy Haley

Author:Guy Haley [Haley, Guy]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fantasy
ISBN: 9780857878205
Publisher: BL Publishing
Published: 2013-06-03T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

In Truth, a Brave Little Goblin

I was woken some hours later, sore and chilled. My stomach felt a little better. My muscles were stiff and protested vigorously as I was hauled to my feet and dragged away from the prison-caves. I was a young man then, and fit from my life on the road. Had I been older or frailer, I have no doubt that I would have perished from my travels and my incarceration, Skarsnik’s interest in me or not.

The cave of prisoners was empty as I was taken through it. Goblintown was awake and full of bustle. This was fortunate for me as Skarsnik’s bodyguards were forced to kick their way through the crowds, and so had less time to mishandle me, although I drew a deal of unwanted attention from the goblins who crammed the streets.

Skarsnik’s dais was full once again of his cronies and supplicants. He was breaking his fast as I was brought before him. He looked up from his meat with a wide smile of acknowledgement.

‘Wotcha,’ he said.

‘Good morning, my lord,’ I replied and bowed, which broadened his smile.

‘You ’ad sumfink to eat? No? Get him sumfink ta eat!’ he bellowed, and cuffed a random goblin flunky hard around the head. ‘Humie food too! Don’t want ’im dying on me.’

‘Might I also ask for a pot to relieve myself in?’

This made him laugh so hard his belly wobbled. A pot was procured, although there was no privacy to go with it.

Hunger compelled me to eat the stew given me. I had managed to this point to avoid it, but the smell of it, as nauseating as it was, causes stabbing knives of need to trouble my stomach. I devoured it, along with the spongy bread-like mushrooms I was given. I still shudder to think what the stew might have contained. There was another bottle of the wine brought me. The wine washed the taste of the meat, and the thought of what that flavour might betoken, from my mouth and my mind.

‘You ready den?’ said Skarsnik. He wiped his hands and his mouth on a cloth held by a servant, a rich piece of embroidery treated as a soil rag. He was alone in these minimal ablutions, as I saw no other goblin clean itself while there.

I nodded that I was. Trying not to let the shaking of my hand show, I poured myself a full goblet of wine and took up my pen.

‘Now,’ said the green potentate. ‘Where was I? Ah yes… Makiki and his crew, that was it…’

Wolf legs eat miles as readily as wolf mouths devour flesh. Drear moors and steep valleys filled with miserable forest dropped away, and the hills became gentler as they rode down from the skirts of the Worlds Edge Mountains. Runtgit was aware of little of this on his way from his mountain home. His eyes were seared by the light of the Evil Sun, and the grey grasses that whisked past his pointed nose were a confusing blur.

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