The Black Talon Read online

  For the coming of the grand lord—an arrival announced in advance by riders from the column some days before—the crowds were tremendous indeed. They were dressed as few outsiders had ever witnessed the race; in robes and other garments mostly refashioned from elven finery, the highest of the caste looked nearly as magnificent as the finely dressed leader whom they greeted with cheers. Many even had crudely brushed and cleaned their hair, and more than a few had filed down their tusks in the manner of the grand lord. To most humans, dwarves, or elves, the scene might have been amusing—brutal beasts playing at civilized behavior—but others would have looked upon the spectacle with wonder, awe … and worry.

  “Iskar’ai!” the legions of onlookers shouted. “Iskar’ai!” The ogre word for victory was precious, used only on rare occasions and celebrated for its meaning. Victory was another word for power, and power was the means of domination and rule.

  Horns blared from the walls and from the roofs of buildings, where kilted, breastplated sentries announced the approach of the Grand Lord Golgren to the crowds ahead. In the column warriors beat on leather drums in rhythm with the marching of the soldiers. More than four thousand fighters were following Golgren, which was not even his entire army. In the past year, a hundred chieftains and lesser khans had added their oaths of fealty to those already in his service. He had large forces scattered outside the city and all around his realm.

  In the distance, several high towers loomed. They, too, had been repaired—completely, it appeared—but even then figures dangling from ropes were altering the vast reliefs carved outside the upper levels. Golgren revealed nothing of his inner thoughts, but his eyes flickered at the sight.

  Those towers—and much of the initial work on the capital’s reconstruction—had been instigated not by Golgren, but rather by the Titans. Before he had first set foot in Garantha, before he had taken the name Golgren, the city had begun its resurrection under the guidance of the Titans. It was the Titans who initially inspired the people to restore the towers, and they had had their own symbols and images carved on them. Both the grand khan and his counterpart in Blöde had bowed to the Titans. The latter, Donnag, had willingly taken part in their dark rituals, eventually becoming one of the Titans himself.

  The entire city had bowed to the Titans. But that time, like the era of the High Ogres, was past, Golgren reflected. He was master. The grand khan was a miserable toady who knew that he survived only at the whim of his former minion. Golgren did not give him much thought. But Donnag, believing in Titan superiority, had challenged the rise of the upstart Golgren—challenged and lost. His fate—his sentence—was an example to all the Titans; no one dared cross the grand lord.

  But still Golgren knew that the Titans existed to undermine him. They would do so again and again.

  Surrounded by jubilant crowds, the procession moved through the city. Ogres appreciated strength, and Golgren represented a strength that seemed destined to rise and rise. He had brought a pride to the race, and he had done it, for the most part, with cunning and the strength of arms. The people respected and feared him differently than they did the Titans. For all his mixed blood, Golgren knew that they accepted him as one of themselves—unlike his sorcerous rivals, who were regarded as aloof, apart. That did not mean that the ogre masses would not turn on Golgren if at some point he revealed weaknesses. That was life among ogres—harsh choices and mercurial loyalties.

  The banner of the severed hand fluttered on buildings throughout Garantha. Golgren’s image also appeared here and there—more and more, over time—as reliefs carved into the walls of buildings more recently built and clearly the fine work of artisans who were not ogres. Indeed, as the grand lord neared the palace, he caught a glimpse of two ragged figures at work on a ten-foot-high reproduction of his profile. The image was more refined than the actuality, but Golgren did not mind.

  The two hollow-eyed sculptors were toiling as though their lives depended upon it, which they did. Like Idaria, they were elves, and the niceties of their existence depended upon their value to the grand lord. Though they looked worked to death, they lived better than many of their fellows. That was because their talent was useful to Golgren. He wanted his face plastered all over the ogre lands; that pair was one of many helping to spread his reputation and legend among his kind.

  The guard standing watch over the sculptors noted Golgren’s gaze upon them and immediately began whipping the elves to work harder. Golgren frowned and signaled one of his officers.

  “He whips too hard. They must survive in order to do my work.”

  The other ogre nodded and went off to warn the guard of his overzealousness.

  “Thank you,” Idaria murmured.

  Gazing straight ahead without acknowledging her, Golgren shrugged. He had not done it out of any mercy or sympathy for her people.

  Ogres continued to throng the streets, many of them banging clubs and the ends of spears on the stone path. Golgren slowed to give his people one last clear look at their leader before he entered through the gates. Although he was no longer visible to the populace, their cheering and shouting did not diminish, for the grand lord was trailed by impressive ranks of armored warriors, themselves followed by the vanquished, the defeated remnants of the ogre horde bent low from exhaustion, whippings, and their heavy chains. Their fates would make them envy the elf slaves.

  After the vanquished would march more of his legions, so many that he would astonish the onlookers with the minimal losses his army had suffered. Golgren had not been hesitant about borrowing fighting methods from both the Uruv Suurt and the Solamnics when it came to training and preparing his warriors. That their training was a rough blend of those two formidable foes was intentional. Too many generations had passed in which the ogres had been slaughtered by superior disciplined and trained forces. He would not let that happen again.

  A harsh memory from his early days flashed through his mind, causing the grand lord to jerk on the reins of his horse. Images of bloody ogre corpses, of a burning village, overwhelmed him suddenly. As his mount came to an abrupt halt, he sensed the others’ curiosity at his unexpected behavior. But no one uttered any sound; none expected any explanation from him. They merely waited until Golgren prodded the horse with his heels, urging the animal on and pretending nothing had happened. Wise enough to steer clear of their master’s ill moods, Khleeg and the other officers had also briefly halted, and they followed suit, resuming the procession, like obedient hounds.

  Only Idaria betrayed any hint of interest. Her glittering eyes narrowed briefly as she stared at the grand lord’s back, but just as quickly she resumed her downward, subservient gaze.

  Zharang had been the grand khan for only a brief time when he had seen the value of the short half-breed who had come into his court offering his services. Since the mantle of rule for an ogre khan rarely exceeded a handful of years, Zharang had been crafty enough to realize that Golgren had obvious ambitions and that they could profit him in the short term. His new grand lord would help to eliminate potential threats and rivals then die when his master saw fit.

  But that was not what happened. The assassins Zharang had ultimately recruited to kill Golgren had instead embraced his cause, and when they deserted him, so did many of his other most powerful supporters. As the squat grand khan munched on some scorched goat, his bloodshot eyes observed the nearly one hundred guests seated on the cushions in the chamber. It was very likely that, even right then, more than one of his guests was spying for the half-breed and others were spying on the spies to make certain they remained loyal to Golgren.

  Even his own guards could no longer be trusted. As grease dribbled down onto Zharang’s already-soiled emerald and gold robes, he awaited the inevitable entrance of the thorn in his side.

  A moment later, the thick mastark curtains that separated the feasting room from the entrance chamber swung aside. A hirsute, hefty figure whom the grand khan recognized as the one called Khleeg was the first to barge into th
e room. The chained musicians, all from Silvanost, ceased playing their silver horns and golden lyres. Several of the guests—all dressed in colorful pillaged elven finery that had been resewn to fit their larger, bulkier—if not corpulent bodies—paused to gaze in expectation at the new arrival. Zharang ignored the lack of respect shown by Khleeg’s abrupt entrance as he was forced to ignore so much else. Khleeg wore the emblem of the severed hand on his upper chest. His loyalty was clear.

  “Ka i’Urkarun Dracon iZharangi!” growled Khleeg, giving a cursory bow. The other revelers grew silent, some surreptitiously eyeing the grand khan of Kern, who was clearly irritated but struggling to keep a blank, bored expression. “Ka i’Urkarun Dracon iZharangi!” The newcomer repeated.

  At first Zharang—or The Great Dragon That Is Zharang, as his name-title translated to in the Common that his rebellious lackey so admired—did not acknowledge the ceremonial greeting. Instead, he took up a long clay pipe and inhaled from it more of the scent of the Grmyn flower. The flower was a popular pastime among those of his inner circle, and a thick, purple-tinged cloud already floated over the assembled guests, hindering the efforts of the torches in the walls to keep the chamber properly lit.

  The heady smell sent renewed confidence through the grand khan. He finally nodded at Khleeg.

  Eyes narrowed, the officer turned toward the curtains at the back and, in a manner most unlike an ogre, snapped to attention, as Zharang had heard human warriors often liked to do. Zharang had hardly ever seen one of his own race look so erect or foolish in military posture, he thought bitterly.

  In a wrought-iron cage high off to one side, a fearsome dark-red avian picking at the finger bones of a hand squawked as the curtains flew aside again. The huge bird stretched its wings and snapped with its sharp beak through the bars. At the same time, Zharang found himself unconsciously straightening. Golgren strode into the chamber, his sweeping bow accenting that aspect of his lineage that was rumored to be elf. He grinned widely at the grease- and wine-splattered spectators, some of whom shifted as much as they could to avoid his scrutiny.

  “Welcome, Grand Lord,” Zharang uttered, showing that he, too, knew enough Common to get along at official occasions. In truth, the heavyset ogre had struggled to learn what little he could speak, but felt obliged, as those who knew the foreign language might be using it to speak ill of him behind his back.

  “Your greeting is most gracious,” returned Golgren, his words flowing with the ease of a mighty river. Then the grand lord paused without adding the many other titles of the seated figure, as tradition warranted. That was a clear insult to accepted ritual, which Golgren compounded by continuing with words that emphasized his own greatness. “The enemies are broken, their swords and clubs shattered! I bring two for later display and, as a gift to my khan, this wonder!”

  He snapped his fingers, and an ogre behind Khleeg brought forth a bagged bundle. Despite himself, Zharang leaned forward in curiosity.

  Golgren pointed at the low table upon which square plates full of seasoned goat, amalok, and snake, along with goblets of wine, had been set for the grand khan and his guests. Acting on instinct, many of the latter quickly pushed away from the table.

  The armored ogre poured the contents of the bag on the oak table. It bounced once, its vibration spilling several nearby goblets, then rolled along the length of the table toward Zharang. As it did, Golgren’s “wonder” rattled wooden dishes and splattered food in all directions—food and still-congealing blood.

  The head of the chieftain Trang rolled to a stop with its bulging eyes staring straight up at the grand khan. In its cage, the black-orbed raptor squawked eagerly, hoping for a tidbit.

  Zharang took another quick inhalation of the Grmyn flower then nodded his approval to Golgren. “Good. Good,” he responded, his skill with Common faltering. “Corruun i’fhani.”

  “A splendid dead he makes, yes.” The grand lord snapped his fingers again. “And even more splendid is this.”

  Two more guards entered; in their grip was a surly figure. The ogre chieftain Guln glared at his hated captors.

  “Ja i f’tuuni!” he defiantly rasped at Golgren. “Ja i f’tuuni!”

  Golgren ignored the insult, instead gesturing for Guln to be brought forward, to Zharang. Having dreamed of that moment, the grand khan grinned wickedly and rose. He extended his hand behind him and was presented with a long, sharp sword cast of steel that Golgren himself had gifted to him after a previous victory over the black-armored humans called Nerakans.

  Ogre tradition demanded that a triumphant chieftain bring a powerful foe back home as a present to his lord. The grand khan would acknowledge the chieftain’s victory and loyalty with a ceremonial execution of the prisoner as celebrants watched.

  Despite his jaded, rotund appearance, Zharang swung the sword back and forth experimentally in a manner that showed his skill as a warrior had not faded entirely. Indeed, he had enjoyed practicing with his sword since that defeat of the Nerakans. His display of prowess earned grunts of approval and banging of fists on tables from his guests, and even Golgren nodded appreciatively.

  Guln was shoved to his knees. Even though he was well aware of his doom, the chieftain did not reveal despair or fear. To do so would leave his spirit wandering in shame and also mark his clan for a generation.

  Gripping the sword firmly, the grand khan took up a position to the side of the prisoner and near Golgren. The guards stepped away, but they kept their weapons ready should Guln attempt something reckless at the very last moment.

  Golgren, his own sword sheathed, watched the events unfold. A hint of amused anticipation touched his countenance.

  Zharang, his face twisting into an expression of dark pleasure, raised the once-Nerakan blade high. With a grunt, he brought the sword down heavily—and at the last moment shifted its angle so as to aim its sharp edge toward Golgren.

  Thus Zharang had dreamed and plotted for weeks, certain of his opportunity. Golgren’s triumphs would prove his own undoing.

  But the shorter ogre’s throat was no longer where it had been, where it was supposed to be, in the grand khan’s scheme. Zharang encountered only empty air. Momentum sent him whirling in a circle, so hard had he thrown himself into the attack.

  And when he next caught sight of the grand lord, it was to see the one-handed figure with his own weapon at the ready and grinning as only an ogre could. All hints of elf lineage had vanished from his bestial face, utterly.

  Rattled but now committed, Zharang attacked again with ferocity. Still holding the sword with both hands, he beat repeatedly at Golgren’s defenses. The grand lord was pushed back.

  No one interfered, not even Golgren’s guards. Everyone edged away, some gaping. The day had been long in coming, and all were well aware that the loser would die and the winner would own their loyalty—or they, too, would die. There were not even any wagers, as was usual when fights broke out. Not one square copper coin was tossed in the room, for to bet on the outcome of that spectacle was to take chances with one’s own future.

  The two ogres were zigzagging around the great chamber, others scattering from their path. Zharang had an advantage that few other ogres could claim against Golgren; for a long time, he had been observing the grand lord, carefully studying his fighting moves and noting those that the upstart favored. Zharang believed he knew and could parry the best of them.

  Despite being momentarily harried, Golgren continued to smile as though amused and unconcerned. That served only to infuriate Zharang, who advanced and swung his sword all the harder.

  Twice, Golgren nearly lost his grip. Zharang continued to pursue him around the chamber, even forcing his smaller opponent against the cage inhabited by the savage, red-crested bird. The vicious avian creature snapped at Golgren’s cheek, drawing blood. A favored pet of the grand khan, much of its diet came from the severed fingers of those who had lost favor with Zharang.

  Its master grinned devilishly, showing that, while his tusks had b
een filed down, Zharang had teeth sharpened to points. He was able and eager to bite through bone.

  Suddenly, Golgren reached around and grabbed the iron-wrought cage and threw it down to the ground. Crashing on the marble floor, the cage broke open and the angry bird escaped. The added pandemonium briefly distracted Zharang, enabling Golgren to rush under his guard. The grand lord’s weapon swept across his khan’s chest, cutting a minor but bloody swathe, the initial red ribbon spreading over much of Zharang’s ruined robe.

  His little wound only energized Zharang, who countered with several bone-shaking strikes. One at last managed to do what seemed inevitable. Golgren’s sword went flying out of his sole hand.

  No sooner had the grand khan started to crow at his inevitable triumph than Golgren hurled himself at the other ogre, sending both of them crashing atop a small table. Something sharp raked across Zharang’s wrists, causing them to momentarily spasm. The grand khan’s fingers twitched open, and his sword hilt slipped away. He reached for it, but a heavy force slammed into his windpipe. Belatedly, Zharang realized that it was his adversary’s arm, the one lacking a hand.

  “F’han, iZharangi,” mocked Golgren quietly in his ear. “F’han.” The shorter ogre held something before Zharang’s eyes: a small dagger drenched in blood—the grand khan’s blood.

  The wounded Zharang spit forcefully in Golgren’s face then pushed away from his foe. However, it was too easy; the grand khan realized that his enemy had willingly separated himself.

  When the grand khan tried to rise, a heavy foot kicked him back down among the spoiled meats and table shards. Try as he might, Zharang could not seem to struggle up again. His hands and wrists felt numb, and the numbness was quickly spreading along his arms. His breathing became labored.

  He heard something metal scrape on the marble floor, and a moment later there it was: his own magnificent sword, clutched in Golgren’s hand. Despite the weight of the blade, the other ogre handled it with ease and with obvious relish.