All around me, Brakith was slowly waking up as the sun blazed its golden rays over the landscape from beyond the distant western peaks; birds were singing in the trees, yawning guards on the battlements were extinguishing their burning torches, and merchants were setting up their stalls in the town square hundreds of feet below me. The people and horses looked like tiny miniatures from this height.
Colorful flags fluttered in the crisp morning breeze, but the largest flag, and the one that flew above all the others, mounted on the top of the highest turret in the castle, was a black flag, with the emblem of a bright yellow-green skull painted on it. It was my flag, with my personal sigil: the flag of the God of Death.
From the armory at the western end of the town square below came the sound of hammering; Brakith’s finest armorer would be putting the finishing touches to the suit of plate armor I’d commissioned.
I preferred wearing my lightweight assassin’s armor, of course; speed and mobility and the ability to move with complete stealth were extremely valuable to me, but now, as a lord, I did require a full suit of plate armor, if only for use on ceremonial occasions.
Even though it wasn’t my style, I’d been trained as a knight from the time I was a boy, and while I preferred to fight like an assassin, I hadn’t forgotten any of my knightly skills. Who knew, I might be finding myself in a situation in which I’d need to charge into battle on my giant undead lizard, Fang, with the complete protection that only full plate armor can provide. Why not have a suit around for just such an occasion? It wasn’t that I couldn’t afford it.
I couldn’t wait to see it; the old armorer had been perfecting his craft for decades and was now one of the most sought-out professionals in all of Prand. He had a waiting list that extended into the years ahead. Lords from all over the continent had commissioned suits of armor of various kinds. But because he’d known me as a boy and had always liked me, he’d bumped my order to the front of the line. It was supposed to be ready later today.
Ah yes, it was promising to be a good day, a damn good day indeed. Birdsong and the cheerful shouts of vendors and townsfolk in the market square below filled my ears. My eyes were free to feast on the exquisite nude form of Elyse as she slept. The kitchen chimney nearby brought the delectable scent of eggs and bacon frying in the pan. Then another smell entered my nostrils.
Did I say “entered”? I meant assaulted.
The stench was beyond potent and had left nauseating far behind. It was like a pile of troll diarrhea that’s been sitting in the summer sun for three days, mixed with week-old puke and month-old piss. Mixed with the farts of a room full of beggars infected with stomach-rot plague. Yeah, like that, along with maybe a bucket of night soil that someone left on top of an oven on a hot day.
The stink was like that but worse. And I knew exactly where—or, rather, who—it was coming from. I sighed and shook my head and glanced down to a balcony three floors below me. There stood Drok, my northern barbarian friend, yawning and stretching. The morning breeze had changed direction and was carrying his reek all the way from down there up to me. Maybe today wasn’t going to be such a great day after all, I thought, grimacing and wrinkling my nose.
Drok let out a thunderous belch, then lifted his leg and ripped an equally loud fart—the stink of which I hoped wouldn’t be carried on the breeze up to me like his body odor had been—and then lifted up his kilt, whipped out his cock, and streamed piss over the balcony. The yellow liquid arced through the air and hurtled down into the market square below, almost hitting a potato farmer dragging his cart along the cobbled streets. The potato farmer cursed and darted out of the way, then yelled and shook his fist at the barbarian, who mistook the man’s gesticulating for a morning greeting, and waved at him with his free hand, beaming out an idiot’s grin while continuing to spray the square below with his piss.
“Hey, Drok!” I yelled down at him. “How many times do I have to tell you not to piss off the balcony?!”
He finished peeing and covered his nether regions with his kilt again, then turned and looked up at me, still smiling stupidly.
“Drok no like make toilet inside house!” he said. “Make toilet inside house is dirty!”
I groaned and shook my head; the irony of this statement—coming from someone like Drok, possibly the smelliest and filthiest man or creature in all of Prand—was staggering. Maybe one of these days, I could train him to use the privy. I opened my mouth, intending to give him a lecture on the virtues of indoor plumbing—which the castle was fitted out with, famously, and it was an installation of the latest and most sophisticated variety—but I decided against it and shut my mouth again. Sometimes, you achieved more by yelling at a brick wall than by attempting to talk sense into a berserker like Drok. I turned around, intending to head back to bed for a while—not for sleep, which I didn’t need, but in the hope that Elyse would wake up and be ready for some morning fun of the adult variety.
“I have dream last night, Vance!” Drok bellowed up at me from his balcony before I could head back inside. “Important dream!”
That made
