Disenchanted (8 page)

“Prince Boric!” called a voice from the house. It was Padmos. “How much longer?”

Boric gritted his teeth but didn’t reply. Hadn’t he warned those two about breaking character? If they spooked the ogre, he’d have to travel to the next town — assuming they didn’t cause the ogre to alter his pattern — and do this all over again. Meanwhile, Boric’s idiot brothers were undoubtedly scheming against him back at Kra’al Brobdingdon, trying to figure out how they were going to cheat him out of his spoils if he defeated the ogre. He needed to get this over with and get back home as quickly as possible.

“Prince Boric!” called Padmos again. “I don’t think this is working!”

“Quiet, you moron!” hissed Daman, momentarily ceasing his wailing.

“I think he’s left us,” said Padmos. “Left us alone to be ripped apart by an ogre. Figures!”

“Waaaaahhhhh!” cried Daman, doing his best to drown out Padmos’s mutterings.

“Stop that!” growled Padmos. “You sound like an imbecile. Is this how you want to die, mewling like a baby?”

“Waaaaahhhhh!” cried Daman in response.

“Fool!” hissed Padmos.

Boric’s hand went to the pommel of his sword as he imagined smacking Padmos on the back of the head with the flat of his blade. But no sooner had he touched the pommel than he jerked his hand away as if he’d been stung. “What in the…” he mouthed to himself. Brakslaagt seemed to be vibrating in its scabbard, as if it had been struck by a hammer. He peered at the pommel in the dim light, but his breath caught in his throat as his attention was seized by something moving underneath him. A hulking figure lurked directly underneath the bough on which Boric perched, barely visible in the moonlight. The ogre!

Even bent over, with its massive hands nearly dragging on the ground, the creature had to be a good nine feet tall. Forget about climbing trees; the ogre could easily reach up and grab Boric by the ankle without even straightening its torso. Idiot! thought Boric. I’m a sitting duck. It was only dumb luck that the ogre hadn’t yet spotted him. A slight shift in the gentle night breeze, or a quick glance upward, and the ogre would have him. Boric didn’t have a chance.

The giant beast reached its leathery hand out to the trunk of the tree, seeming to be taking stock of its situation. Its head craned back, cavernous nostrils sniffing the night air. Boric thought he saw the creature’s brow furl in perplexity. It smells me, he thought. It just can’t pinpoint my location. Boric considered drawing his sword, but he didn’t dare move. The smallest sound would be like a claxon to the ogre.

“Boric!” called Padmos again. The ogre’s head crooked to hear the sound.

“Waaaaahhhhh!” cried Daman. The ogre’s limbs twitched with excitement at the wail. It seemed to instantly forget about Boric and lumbered toward the open window. For a moment, Boric lost sight of the creature in the shadows. There was a terrified screech followed by a bellowing roar. The bait had worked.

Boric swung down from the bough, landing in a crouch at the foot of the oak tree, and then sprinted toward the house. His hand brushed the pommel of Brakslaagt again, and he noted that it was still vibrating, but less intensely. Had it been reacting to the danger posed by the ogre?

Padmos screamed again. Ahead of Boric, the hulking figure of the ogre bent over next to the window, fishing around inside the house with its right arm.

“Pull the rope!” cried Boric. The ogre turned its massive head to face Boric, its arm still nearly shoulder-deep in the house. Boric heard muffled shouts from inside the house.

“Pull it!” cried Boric again. The ogre’s face contorted in anger at Boric. Still fixated on the “baby” in the house, it clearly resented this intrusion. It bared a mouthful of crooked yellow teeth and pulled its arm from the house. It advanced toward Boric, but suddenly stopped short as its right arm jerked to a halt behind it: a loop of thick rope was wrapped around its wrist. The other end of the rope disappeared inside the house.

“We got him!” hollered Daman from inside the house. “We did it!”

Boric swallowed hard. He wanted to believe that it really was that easy, but he knew that he had underestimated the size of the ogre. What if…?

As if in response to his half-formed question, the ogre planted its feet wide on the ground, leaning away from the house, and then thrust its arm forward. Miraculously, the rope didn’t break, but what did happen was arguably worse. Boric had secured the other end of the rope to what remained of the stone chimney that ran down the center of the house, and as Boric stared in awe, a sizeable chunk of the chimney exploded from the house as if the wall was made of paper, revealing two terrified men cowering inside. The fragment of stone and masonry sailed over the ogre’s right shoulder toward Boric, who barely managed to dive out of the way. The chimney struck a sapling behind Boric, reducing it to splinters. Boric had to admit that as much as he disliked the elves, they made some damn strong rope. The cord was barely half an inch thick, but it was stronger than steel.

The ogre grinned at Boric. Boric smiled weakly back at the ogre.

Ogres are stupid, thought Boric. I can outsmart him. But another part of his brain retorted, Of course you can. Why, look how well you’re doing so far!

The fact was, Boric knew, ogres
were
stupid, at least in most capacities. You wouldn’t want to rely on an ogre to recount the Seven Ages of the Old Realm or remind you which of the wines of Swarnholme went best with lobster. But there was one thing that ogres were very smart about, and that was smashing things. For all their other intellectual failings, ogres were precocious smashers. An ogre might never have figured out how to create an incredibly effective weapon by securing a rope to a five-hundred-pound chunk of stone, but by Grovlik, an ogre knew what to do with such a thing when it was presented to him.

And that’s why the ogre smiled.

Boric got to his feet and brushed the dust off his tunic, glaring defiantly at the ogre. If he was going to die, he was going to die like a man.

The ogre wrapped the silvery elven cord around his wrist several times and pulled. The chimney lifted off the ground and soared into the air, whirling in a great arc over the creature’s head. Boric gulped. As big as the ogre was, it was even stronger than its size indicated. It whirled the chimney faster and faster, seeming to relish its power over Boric. It had already demolished the only tree nearby; there was no cover within reach. Boric stood on the balls of his feet with his sword drawn, shifting his weight back and forth as he waited for the ogre to release the chimney.

The ogre brought the chimney around one last time and then stepped forward to send the massive chunk of stone hurtling toward Boric. Boric dove under the projectile, sliding face forward on the dirt toward the ogre. The chimney missed him by inches, thudding to the ground where he had been standing less than a second before. Boric sprang to his feet and stabbed at the ogre’s groin, but the ogre took a step back and swatted at Boric’s head with its left hand. Even this absentminded blow was enough to knock Boric off his feet. His shoulder slammed into the ground and he rolled into a defensive crouch, raising his Brakslaagt before him.

“Shit,” muttered Boric, wiping blood from his chin. The ogre’s arms were too damn long. There was no way to get past those oak-tree limbs to strike anything vital. He was going to have to do this the hard way. The ogre took a step toward him. Boric turned and ran.

Behind him, he heard the ogre laughing its horrible, shrieking ogre-laugh, like a pack of wolves in a hailstorm. Fine, thought Boric, as he put distance between him and the ogre. Have your laugh. We’ll see who’s laughing when —

He was distracted by a jolt running up his arm as Brakslaagt nearly vibrated out of his hand, and he lost his footing on the uneven ground. As he fell, gravel pelted his neck, and he felt a rushing of air. A shadow passed over him. Lying prone on the ground, he craned his neck to see the ogre’s improvised flail retreating into the sky. The massive hunk of stone had missed him by an inch, at most. By Greymaul’s mace, the ogre was fast. If it weren’t for Brakslaagt’s warning…

Boric got to his feet and continued running. In a few seconds, he reached the tree where he had perched earlier. He slid Brakslaagt into its scabbard and leapt for a bough just over his head, hoisting himself onto it. Behind him, the ogre chortled with anticipation. Boric turned to see the chimney hurtling away from him. The ogre grinned, knowing that there was no escape for Boric. He swung the chimney around again and again, until it was just a blur in the night sky. But Boric wasn’t watching the chimney. He was watching the ogre’s feet for the telltale shift of weight that signaled…
there!

Boric swung from the bough, landing just on the other side of the tree from the ogre. The ogre’s tiny, smashing-optimized brain outdid itself in making a minute change in trajectory to adjust for his target’s new location but failed to accurately assess the ramifications of another obstacle in its path. Boric flattened himself on the ground and the chimney sailed over his head, but rather than soaring back toward the ogre, it arced sharply around the tree, wrapping the rope tightly around the trunk. The ogre, furious with the tree for trying to steal his new toy, roared with anger and leaned backward, pulling with all his might against the tree’s grip. As curious as he was to see which would give first — the tree, the ogre, or the elven rope — Boric didn’t wait to find out. While the ogre was still gripped with arboreal fury, Boric sprang forward, lifted Brakslaagt over his head, and brought it down with both arms, slicing the ogre’s hand clean off.

Its burden suddenly relieved, the ogre catapulted backward, tumbling crazily, massive limbs flailing, its right wrist spurting great fountains of greenish-yellow ogre blood, finally coming to a stop as it crashed into the ruined house. What was left of the roof crashed down on top of it, and the ogre lay there for a moment, covered in plaster and burned lumber, its gigantic feet twitching spastically.

Boric didn’t dare give the creature a second’s respite. He ran toward it, but even as he did so, the monster sat up and began to crawl out of the rubble. It tried to reach out toward Boric with its missing hand, great sluices of ogre blood pumping forth from its wrist. Boric lost his footing in a pool of the slimy stuff, stumbling and sliding uncontrollably toward the monster, finally slamming awkwardly into the mass of tangled hair covering its groin. He nearly lost consciousness from the stench. It smelled like a sulfur mine filled with rotting fish.

Boric retained just enough presence of mind to be aware of the ogre’s other hand moving toward his throat. Boric swung wildly with Brakslaagt, hoping to buy a moment to regain his footing. To his surprise, the blade sliced through the monster’s wrist, severing its remaining hand. The ogre, apparently coming to grips with the fact that it had lost two important appendages, howled with rage and wrapped its handless arms around Boric’s body in an attempt to crush him in a bear hug. Still off balance, Boric didn’t have time to react except to suck in a great gulp of putrid air and tuck his arms into his sides. The ogre squeezed Boric tightly and Boric pushed back, trying to keep the creature from crushing his ribcage. Hot ogre blood poured from the two stumps and over Boric’s body, making him feel as if he were being encased in wax.

There was nothing to do now but wait and hope that the ogre passed out from blood loss before Boric died from asphyxiation. Boric had once held his breath for four minutes in the icy water of the River Ytrisk, having lost a bet between his two older brothers, but this was different: Boric was already out of breath from the melee, and the foul air burned his throat and lungs. He was on the verge of losing consciousness, and when he did, his muscles would slacken and the ogre would crush his ribs like twigs. He knew he couldn’t last much longer, and the ogre, despite its copious blood loss, showed no sign of weakening. In the distance, just before his eyes closed, Boric thought he saw the silvery silhouette of a wyndbahr approaching, its massive wings fluttering in the moonlight.

Then suddenly the monster’s grip slackened. Boric filled his lungs with air and pushed the ogre’s arms away. He tumbled to the ground and skittered away from the unconscious creature. Brakslaagt, still clutched in his right hand, was at rest: the danger had passed. The Ogre of Chathain was dead.

Getting shakily to his feet, covered with slimy, smelly ogre blood, Boric saw a blade protruding from the monster’s chest. Behind the prone creature stood Daman the blacksmith. He had skewered the ogre with Boric’s sword. Padmos stood next to him, smiling grimly.

“Thanks,” said Boric.

“Don’t mention it,” said the blacksmith. “Now, about the three gold coin you owe each of us…”

“One gold,” said Boric.

“Fairly certain it was three,” said Daman.

“Two,” offered Boric.

“Deal,” said the blacksmith.

Exhausted, the three men made their way back to town.

NINE

It was a sign of how disconcerting his whole predicament was that it wasn’t until the dim gray light of predawn began to gather over the Kalvan Mountains that it occurred to Boric he had no idea who was now King of Ytrisk.

Boric had no sons, and in any case his father had established that it was the king’s prerogative to select his own successor. Understandably paranoid, Boric had developed a habit of altering his selection every few weeks, entrusting various advisors with different versions of his last will and testament, each supplanting the previous version. This made it virtually impossible for anyone to guess who the rightful successor was and correspondingly reduced the incentive for anyone to assassinate Boric. The plan had been so successful — right up to his actual assassination — that Boric himself could not say with any certainty who he had picked to be his heir. One of his nephews, he thought. Or maybe that cousin with the clubfoot. He wracked his brain, but couldn’t remember whom he had settled on most recently.

Had whoever it was somehow figured out that he was the heir and plotted to have Boric killed? (For there could hardly be any doubt that someone had bribed Captain Randor to stab him; the gold coins in his purse could only have come from someone who had wanted Boric dead.) It seemed unlikely that the heir could have found out about his selection, and even if he had, how could he be certain that Boric’s choice wouldn’t change between the hatching of the plot and its execution? No, whoever had bribed Randor had been waiting for that opportunity for some time. But who would want Boric dead regardless of his successor?