The Dreaddrac Onslaught (Book 4) (6 page)

At the audience hall, in front of the assembled ogres, the wraith released the orc shell that crumpled to the floor. He seized a particularly powerful ogre for his body, and in that form, he marched up the aisle to confront the commanders. He took King Calamidese throne and looked out over the assembled ogres, who quickly hushed and stood at attention before their new master. General Tarquak’s ogre eyes were milky white looking across the assembled host. He saw the nervous twitching his gaze caused among the silent officers.

“Let me make this clear,” General Tarquak said, pausing to sneer. “You ogres will regain control of that ragtag army or I’ll use my own methods to regain control.” He paused again and scanned the crowd. “You’ve two days. After that, any orc found away from his unit will to have his left ear sawed off…slowly.”

There was sudden muffled chatter among the agitated ogres.

“Any orc I find away from his unit after three days will cease to exist, is that clear? Any unit found short by ten percent of its personnel will have its commander removed to the dungeon here in Sekcmet and that means you.”

“But general,” an ogre said from the back of the hall.

Before the commander could finish his protest, wizard-fire shot from the throne and the ogre was no more than a stream of rising smoke and ash.

“Clearly, that commander was incapable of following orders,” Tarquak said. He looked around the hall to see if there were further protests but the hall was silent. “You’re dismissed.”

*

Word of the general’s disasters, and his treachery at his last battle where he sold out his own army, spread rapidly among the commanders leaving Sekcmet Palace. The ogres disliked and mistrusted Tarquak intensely.

“That warped general, he likes torture and watching pain. He don’t care what happens to us,” one ogre mumbled. “I heard he done run off, leaving his whole army at his last battle, where he led them into a trap. There was only three what got out of there alive.”

The next night, Tarquak had an ogre tortured for no apparent reason. Word spread; it jolted the ogre commanders into line, but they were afraid to let the orcs know for fear of a general mutiny. The ogres surrounding the wraith bowed deeply in acquiescence and withdrew from the general’s command post as quickly as possible.

*

“General!” his adjutant yelled, rushing into his headquarters just after the ogres left. “General, there’s an army coming from the east. They’ll be here by mid-day tomorrow.”

“Excellent, we’ll give these natives something to think about,” the general replied. He didn’t look up or seem surprised.

“What orders do you have, General?”

“Round up two hundred citizens immediately,” the general said. “Tie them securely and stand them, spaced evenly, on the eastern wall at sunrise. Have an orc stand between each pair.”

“Will that be all, General? Shall I send new orders to the ogre commanders?”

“Call them back.”

The ogres returned soon after leaving the palace. Tarquak was at hand to address them. “There’s an army approaching Sengenwhapolis from the east. You will get control of the city’s orcs immediately. They must be prepared to defend the walls by sunrise. You’re to threaten the orcs with death if they fail to return to their units at once.”

The ogres complied and by dawn, when the general returned to his resting place in the palace dungeons, he’d issued orders for the troops dispositions. Two hundred confused citizens were forced up on the battlements of the city’s eastern wall.

* * *

Atop his white stallion, King Calamidese VII marched at the head of his army to lay siege to his capital. After resting several hours that night in the woods on the slopes above the city, the army began their decent from the hills to surround Sengenwhapolis at daybreak.

“It’s a good feeling we have, marching to retake our capital and being the central rallying point for the army,” King Calamidese told his adjutant.

As the king approached Sengenwhapolis, he saw hundreds of his subjects tied up and standing like spikes atop the city walls. To the king’s dismay, the orcs standing between each pair of hostages were orderly and confident. I’d hoped to catch the city in chaos before a new commander could exert control over it, he thought. I’ll give them the opportunity to leave without bloodshed.

“Surrender the city and you may go north in peace,” the king’s messenger said, from an agitated horse before the city’s great eastern gate. Calamidese watched from his command post above the city. His horse, like the messengers, stamped the ground and snorted.

“You’z like flies buzzing round a buffalo,” said the ogre in charge of the gate’s defenses. He stood atop the portal’s tower, the height of twenty men above the messenger. “These here granite walls won’t fall to your threats. You best run away before we opens the gate and stamps you out.”

“Is that your final word?” the messenger asked. “What does your commander say about that? King Calamidese wants to know who’s in charge of his capital.”

“Tell your Calamidese, General Tarquak commands this city now,” the ogre said, puffing out his chest. “The Lord of Dreaddrac is king here.”

The messenger turned his horse and galloped back to King Calamidese with the bad news.

*

“We hadn’t expected the defenders to surrender the city at the outset, but we had hoped to retake the city before a new commander could take control and organize the resistance,” Calamidese told his generals, gathered in his command tent. The wind whipping at the fabric reflected the general tension. “General Tarquak would have to be a wraith since it’s common knowledge he was killed, running away from his last battle. He’ll be desperate to keep his soul back on earth. He won’t surrender or shy from battle. Deploy the troops around the city walls.”

The commanders fidgeted with their helmets but said nothing.

“Have the carpenters build siege machinery, and send men through the forest to cut trees for catapults and battering rams.”

While the commanders were implementing the king’s orders, Calamidese rode through the camps, rallying the troops. In the evening, just at sunset, the king rode to the gatehouse himself and called for General Tarquak. Ominous dark charcoal clouds gathered over the city in stark contrast to the purple and orange sunset.

Having arisen from his rest, the general was coming onto the walls to observe what had transpired during the day. He wanted to be certain his orders had been followed. Calamidese watched the posturing ogre shell of General Tarquak make his way to the gatehouse to confront him.

“We are King Calamidese VII and we demand you surrender our city immediately. Why are you holding those people, bound like animals, on the city walls in the heat all day?”

“They’re your citizens, Calamidese,” the general said with a grin on the ogre’s face. The scar that passed through his lips distorted the sinister grin. “Do you want them back?”

“Free them at once or suffer the same fate, when we recapture the city.”

The general raised his arm as a prearranged signal to his orcs on the walls. To King Calamidese horror, the orcs began to shove every other bound hostage off the walls, each orc pushing the terrified captive on his left. General Tarquak broke out in deep laughter. The sight of one hundred bound hostages falling to their deaths on the rocks below clearly excited the general, as it horrified King Calamidese. Even the king’s horse stamped his hooves and moved back.

“If you’re not gone by morning, the other half of your devoted subjects will join those citizens,” Tarquak said. He pointed down at the bodies among the rocks. “Each day you remain here, another two hundred of your precious citizens will be thrown from the walls.” A mean, twisted look on the ogre’s face then foul teeth showed through a triumphant grin.

King Calamidese turned and rode back to his camp. I’m not prepared for this development, he thought. I can’t waste my subjects like that but I can’t allow the general to control the kingdom either.

* * *

Moaning constantly, Earwig apparently felt and heard nothing but her black, blue, and yellow-green body throbbing with pain. She was a bloated mass of pulsating flesh with swollen hands and feet protruding from her lumpy-potato body. Dreg poured water on her to keep her cool, but he dared not even move her out of the sunlight where her misshapen body roasted. It took her a week for the swelling to subside enough for her to sit up. The black and blue turned a sickly yellow-green where thousands of lumps denoted stings on her toad like hide. Her outer skin peeled away from venom and sunburn, but she lived.

Anyone else would’ve died from all them stings or sun poison, Dreg thought. I expects her messed up body just eat up all that poison, being as she lives on poisonous mushrooms. Still, death would’ve looked better on her than the way she is now.

About the time Earwig was able to sit up; a noble couple from Konnotan rode by and saw Dreg talking to someone. The couple stopped to see if the people needed assistance.

Miss Irkin won’t like to see these people, Dreg thought.

“Young man,” the nobleman asked, “do you need help?”

Earwig turned to the question’s source. The lord and lady were visibly shocked by Earwig’s appearance. They jerked their horses away apparently fearing contagion. The lady delicately put her handkerchief over her face. “Is it living?”

Earwig cringed. “Don’t tell them who I am.”

I don’t understand her. Her swollen lips can’t form words, Dreg thought. She must want me to introduce her. “This is Miss Irkin, Grand Duchess of Konnotan, the king’s aunt,” Dreg said, puffing up with pride.

As a former gravedigger, he didn’t have a lot of social interaction and didn’t know the witch’s reputation. The nobles gasped. They didn’t return the introduction, but galloped down the road with all the speed they could coax out of their equally terrified horses. 

*

“They’ll tell everyone about my condition!” Earwig screamed. I want to kill you Dreg, she thought. The simpleton can’t get anything right.

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Dreg mumbled. He smiled at her.

The simpleton has no clue what damage he’s done, she thought. Her claws dug into her palms. I need to kill him. Since I first took on this dimwit, my life has been a sequence of near-death experiences. In my present state, I can’t even move my fingers enough to cast a spell turning the fool into a frog before he does more harm. I’ll have to wait until he nurses me back to health to make him wish he’d never been born.

Two more days passed and Earwig stood up, hunched over, permanently. The witch hobbled about the camp babbling. It’s time to start north to Dreaddrac again. It’s Dreg or me; we can’t both continue to live, she decided. The fool’s more ill-fated than I am. One of us will be killed if I continue to travel with the lout. I’ll have to eliminate the halfwit. “Dreg, we must get back on the road in the morning.”

“I’ll pack the cart before daybreak, Miss Earwig.”

The fool can’t even use my real name anymore. I’m tired of protesting. Earwig winced but said nothing.

Next morning the two painfully mounted the cart, and set off up the road going north again. They seldom talked. Only the groaning of the strained cart’s wood speckled the silence.

Dreg’s quiet for a welcomed change, Earwig thought. The last ten days must’ve worn out the idiot’s vocal cords. His incessant chattering has hounded my ears to near deafness.

Zendor moved along at a pace that would have been considered enthusiastic if going to his own funeral.

“Zendor’s really spirited today,” Earwig commented sarcastically, as she looked back. “I think I can see the spot we left from this morning.”

Dreg looked back, but he couldn’t see it. “Where?” He continued to look back over his shoulder.

Earwig rolled her eyes, but said nothing. She looked ahead and saw what she’d hoped to find.

“Stop, stop there beside that graveyard,” she demanded. “I hate to stop the nag, being as he might make it another ten feet if he continues on until dark, but I need to rest.” The bloated witch, the daft helper, and the wormy looking horse set up camp beside the graveyard, just as Earwig had insisted.

“What’s for dinner?” Earwig questioned, having regained her appetite. She took a deep breath and stretched her flabby, sagging arms.

“I think we camped downwind of the graveyard,” Dreg said. He coughed and his face pinched with each breath. “Your toes and fingers are they all right?” he asked. He looked down at the campfire.

“Of course they are,” Earwig replied, jerking her head and gaping at him. “Why do you ask?”

“Something dug up a grave nearby,” Dreg said. He poked the fire with a stick. “The rotting stink is making me sick.” He looked up at Earwig. “You seem to like it.”

I rightly suspected a ghoul inhabits the thicket beyond the cemetery. I hope it will postpone its already delayed meal and eat Dreg. She felt a sinister smile bloom on her face.

“Thinking good thoughts, Miss Earwig?”

“Oh no, it’s nothing at all. Just some meat caught in my teeth.” Earwig stuck a claw in her blackened fang stubble. “Now Dreg I insist you sleep closest to the woods to protect me in the night.”

She bedded down under the cart and away from her companion, where she pretended to sleep that night. Where’s the ghoul? Why doesn’t he show himself?