“We call ’em corpse worms where I come from,” said Mama Hog. “Just one of ’em gets in a half-dead, and pretty soon he’s so full of worms he’ll bust wide open. We don’t have no vampire troubles in Pot Lockney, boy,” she said.
I grunted. Mama Hog stopped, half-through the door. “Them Trolls left you something else,” she said. “When you get your legs back come and see. Took two Trolls to haul it across town. Took me two hours to wipe off the mess.”
I didn’t need to go look. I had seen past Mama when she’d barged in-the Haverlock’s fancy ironwood desk sat in my office.
It’s a fine big desk. I keep Mister Smith’s talking rock in the top right-hand drawer and a keg of Keshian ale in the big cabinet to the left.
And when people ask me how much the desk cost, I just smile and tell them a dear old friend left it to me when he passed away.
It isn’t the truth, exactly, but it’ll do.
