direction. It’s no secret that all our knowledge of orcs is based on idle fantasy and legend. Not many of the authors of scholarly works on the race of the Firstborn have actually seen any Firstborn in the flesh. And so in my mind (especially after my brief encounter with orcs in the cabbage field and in certain waking dreams), the Firstborn were cruel, coarse, unrefined creatures, and all in all …
All in all, their personalities were so much like elves’ that sometimes I was absolutely amazed. But then, what was so very astonishing? They were close relatives, the darkness take them! The only difference was that the orcs couldn’t bear even the smell of outsiders and thought all other races were greatly inferior to themselves.
I personally had been expecting them to keep us on starvation rations, give us a thrashing every day, stick red-hot needles under our fingernails, and commit other similar atrocities. But that wasn’t the way things were at all—no one had any intention of touching us (a couple of pokes from Fagred didn’t really count), they fed us remarkably well, and our food was exactly the same as what they ate, although we didn’t get us any more wine.
The weather improved, the wind carried the clouds away to the south, toward the Mountains of the Dwarves, and once again the sky had that astounding autumn blueness that harmonized so well with the yellow leaves of the trees. And it got a bit warmer, too. It was probably the last, or perhaps second-to-last, more or less warm week in the year.
Ravens arrived for Shokren twice, but we could only guess at what was in the messages that were delivered. Glo-Glo spent all day huddled up under his old patched cloak, replying sarcastically to our questions or making meaningless remarks about my conversations with Mis. The old shaman’s main occupation was mumbling to himself. Either the old goblin had gone completely gaga, or he was preparing some kind of spell, despite the mittens. The second assumption was probably the right one, since Glo-Glo shut up the moment any of the orcs appeared, and when Shokren’s face hove into sight on the horizon, the old shaman pretended to be asleep.
At first Mis wasn’t much inclined to make heart-to-heart conversation, but after a while the man from the Borderland proved to be a fine conversation partner. The warrior’s wound was gradually closing up and the orcs paid him absolutely unheard-of attention by giving him a clean rag and some kind of ointment to help it heal. Glo-Glo stuck his nose in the ointment, seemed satisfied with the result, and advised Mis to change the bandage as often as possible, then he went back to playing his whispering games.
On the fifth day Olag came over with Fagred, who was smiling and had a coil of rope in his hands. The unpleasant thought immediately sprang to mind that someone was going to get eliminated.
“Get up, moth!” Olag told me.
As you’ve probably already guessed, this suggestion distressed me so much that I stayed sitting on the ground.
“Where are you taking him?” the goblin interceded for me.
“None of your business, greenie!” Fagred growled.
“Get up, moth! Shokren doesn’t like to be kept waiting! Or do I have to get you up?” Olag asked.
Sensibly accepting the fact that Shokren was not the gallows, I got up, and Fagred immediately put a noose round my neck and wound the other end of the rope round his hand. I was led off to the shaman on this improvised lead.
Shokren was talking to Bagard about something, but when he saw they’d already brought me, he cut the conversation short.
There are times when I really regret not knowing orcish.
Fagred tugged on the rope, almost breaking my neck, and dragged me off after Shokren. Olag walked alongside and gave me an occasional push in the back. They led me along just like a sheep to the market fair! Naturally, I didn’t wax indignant, because being stubborn was a very good way to get a poke in the teeth from Fagred.
They brought me to the edge of the forest, and Shokren sat down on the ground and fixed his thoughtful gaze on me. Of course, no one suggested that Harold could sit, so I had to stand there with that stupid lead round my neck and act like a bored idiot. The shaman seemed a bit upset that his hard-stare treatment hadn’t produced the desired result. He frowned and said, “I need to clarify a few details of the way you appeared in our forest and find out how you managed to get the Horn. Will you answer me, or shall I tell Fagred to hang you up for a little while?”
“I’ll answer,” I blurted out hastily.
“I’ll answer, sa’ruum,” I repeated obediently.
“Good. If I sense that you’re lying to me, Fagred will hang you up.”
I squinted at the huge orc’s happy face. The bastard was just dreaming of Shokren catching me out in a lie.
Then the questions came thick and fast. Naturally, despite the orc’s threats, I had no intention of blabbing about the Commission. Four days of idleness had been quite enough time to invent a plausible cover story, go over all the moves, and modify a couple of them, so that in the end not even my inestimable acquaintance, the head of the Order of Valiostr, Artsivus, could have told the truth from the lies, let alone some orc shaman. And so Shokren and my two guards were treated to the heartrending story of an old and very rich count who commissioned this thief to get a Horn I had never heard of for his collection.
I was given heaps of gold, helped to get to Hrad Spein, and after that it was in the hands of the gods. I took the Horn, collected the emeralds along the way, and then somehow found myself in Zagraba. How had I got there? I had no idea at all, not a clue. Some sort of magic, tricks of the darkness. How had I got hold of the Key? That was very simple, Mr. Sa’ruum, sir. It was already in that count’s collection, the elves must have sold it to him.
At that Olag snorted loudly, letting the entire forest know what he thought of the idea of elves selling their own relics to men, but Shokren told the warrior to be quiet and started asking me his endless questions again. How had I got to Hrad Spein? With what kind of group? Were there any elves in the group? Sure, if I told you there were elves, you’d mark me down as one of the elves’ cronies.
“There weren’t any elves,” I blurted out, and immediately regretted it.
Fagred’s face suddenly had a really, really pleased expression.
“That’s a lie,” Shokren answered me in a bleak voice. “In the city of Chu you and your monkey friends killed some of our warriors. Fagred was the only one who managed to get away. Hang him up!”
“You killed my brother! He was wounded!” Fagred yelled, and tugged on the rope so hard that I fell to my knees, scrabbling at the tightening noose.
What a shame we didn’t finish you off, too! I thought. Darkness, what a stupid way to get caught out! Talking to the shaman was as hard as talking to Vukhdjaaz. I had to improvise again.
“There were elves! There were!” I squealed as I saw Olag throwing the rope over a branch of the nearest tree. “Only they weren’t real elves.”
Shokren held his hand up to tell the warriors to delay the torture for a moment.
“What nonsense is this, little monkey! What do you mean, not real elves?”
What was that I used to say? If you tell a lie, make it a really big one!
“They were bastards!”
“We know without you that all elves are bastards!” Fagred said, and he tugged on the rope again.
“No! I mean their fathers were men, and their mothers were elfesses!”
The more incredible a falsehood is, the more like the truth it sounds. I didn’t know if what I’d just made up was even possible (I hadn’t heard of anything of the sort anywhere), but the orcs swallowed the bait—hook, line, and sinker. The Firstborn didn’t have a very high opinion of elves in any case, and when they heard something like that, they believed it was true straightaway. I think Olag cursed, and the very sight of Fagred was frightening, but absurd at the same time: I thought he was going to be sick. Shokren rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“I knew they were sadists, but to do … that … with monkeys…” Olag didn’t even bother to say it in orcish.
“All right, bring it back. I have a few more questions for it,” Shokren snapped.
Realizing that the hanging was postponed for the time being, I cheered up a bit. The “few questions” went on
