“Oh,” said Goron realising Torbin was dead, “Better than the rot.” The response elicited a cheer from the remaining guards, and Torbin was quickly forgotten.
“I dare you, Borne, to trick the black.” Tricking the black meant the risk-taker leaped out the window and, as the black sea was about to claim another victim, the adventurer turned in mid-air, grabbed the window ledge, and pulled himself up. It was a trick Borne was built for, wiry and short with cat-like agility. He’d performed it numerous times before and even in states of greater drunkenness.
“Right.” Borne drained his tankard, stretched his back with a dry crack, and took a runup. He didn’t want to jump too far but enough to clear the ledge. He pulled it off and, midway through his leap, he twisted and reached out. His fingers clasped the ledge, its brick surface blackened with the strange mould that came with the miasma from the forest. The ledge crumbled in Borne’s hands. He stared at the handfuls of rubble and blinked a couple of times before the reality of what happened set in. By then he was already halfway through his long journey down the cliffside. That left him enough time for a surprised yelp before he was dashed on the rocks and swallowed by the black sea.
The three faces that peered out the window at the rocks far below witnessed all of Borne’s body fluids depart from him in a split second. “The rot won’t get him either,” Goron said.
The guards cheered.
“It did in a way, though,” Jasin said scraping at the mould coating the windowsill.
“Right, Androw, battle axe catch.” Thud.
“It might be time to stop playing that game,” Jasin said. Looking around the room at the carnage, Goron was inclined to agree. “Unless you want me to dare you to do something very naughty.” She led him to the table, pushed him back onto it, and ran her finger from Goron’s throat to his belly button. His britches began to swell.
“What would that dare be?” Goron asked.
“I dare you to last longer than last time.” Jasin tugged down his britches and expertly went to work.
Goron tried to fill his head with horrible memories. The plum-sized boil he lanced on the back of one of his men last week. Jasin climbed on top. Her breasts dangled in front of his eyes, and the heat of her sex pressed against him. Goron groaned and clenched his fists. It wasn’t working—his chamber pot, his mother wrapped in muslin, being thrown from the castle into the sea.
“Goron!” a voice screeched. Anwen stood in the middle of the hall shaking with rage.
That did it. Goron’s libido jumped out the window and dashed itself on the rocks below.
Packmaster Caroc squatted down in the water reeds on the bank of the river Grayl and watched the two boys approach, fishing rods and tackle boxes slung over their shoulders. It was telling they would risk leaving the castle to catch the bitter-tasting, translucent, bulbous-eyed fish that lived in the murky water. Food in the castle was in short supply.
Caroc wasn’t the only one observing the boys. Six toadoks hid in a copse of trees to his right. The forest dwellers were loathsome creatures with the bodies and heads of toads and the spindly legs of malnourished children with rickets. They’d obviously heard the rumours Wichsault was in its death throes and journeyed from their village in the west to see if they were true. They wouldn’t be disappointed. The battlements were largely unmanned, sections of the castle crumbled from the dark rot, and the scarcity of lights flickering on the walls during the night advertised how few inhabitants remained.
Caroc should have dealt with the small group. A year ago he would have—he was a ranger—it was his duty. But he was afraid. He’d spent his time over the last week skulking in the flatlands around the castle, not daring to go near the deserted village of Mournburn with its chomite infestation, or the brooding Forest of Tadblack teeming with equally murderous inhabitants. And now, to top off his heroics, he was cowering from enemies outside the castle gates.
If the boys continued on their path to the river, it would take them past the toadoks. It was daylight, and he couldn’t hope to warn the children without being spotted. He’d have to fight if he wanted to help them.
He looked down at the arrow he gripped in his right hand. It was trembling. So too was the reflection of a young man with shoulder-length, blond hair, a long face with an aquiline nose, and emerald green eyes. He’d been told he looked like an elf even though nobody in the castle had ever seen an elf.
He sneered. The face of the last ranger of Wichsault, the packmaster, sneered back at him. The face belonged to a coward. The thought hurt him and, for a moment, his eyes flashed in anger. Memories surged up of the man he wanted to be, brave, a protector, and a bane to all the creatures that threatened Wichsault. As quickly as the fire in his eyes came to life, it dimmed and went out, as if drenched by the river he saw them reflected in. He was Caroc the coward again, hidden in the reeds and shaking at the thought of fighting a few toadoks.
A movement to his right caught his attention. He pulled up his tattered, earth-brown hood to cover his blond hair and turned
