With its prey's only guard dispensed, the man-thing lunged forward. Its head, a bearlike face twisted into a brutal snarl, was squashed between its shoulders to make a rounded lump above oversized shoulders. Before Pinch could dodge, the thing flung its limbs around him, pinioning one arm to his side. Rip went the back of his fine doublet as thick claws cut through it like paper. The nails pierced his back, burning between the muscled knots of his shoulder blades. The creature drove them in hard, pressing him close into its greasy chest. It smelled of sheep fat, grubs, night soil, and salt, and he could taste the same crushed up against his lips.
The skewed perceptions, the over-pure sensation of it, vainly tried to fill his mind and drive down the sear of pain as it worked its claws deeper into his flesh.
He distinctly heard the ragged course of his breath, the helpless scrape of his feet against the flagstones, and the creak of his ribs. He tried to twist himself free, but this was a futile play at resistance. The beast had struck too quickly and was too strong for him to resist.
Still, in the writhing, he managed to get a little leverage with his dagger hand. He couldn't jab the blade in, the way it should be, but was able to make a clumsy slash along its side. There was little hope of seriously wounding the creature. All the rogue wanted was a deep gash, one that would hit nerves and spill blood, distract the thing and give him a measure of satisfied revenge.
The knife cut as if through thick leather, and Pinch was rewarded with a furious squeal. Seizing the chance, he kicked out and twisted to break himself free. The hope was a cheat, like trying to win against a cole who's cut the dice to his advantage.
The squeal transformed into a snarl and, in one effortless sweep, the beast raked its claws out of Pinch's back to sink into his shoulders. Heaving up, the creature cleared the thief's feet from the floor and slammed him against the stone wall so hard his head cracked on the rock.
The world, a gloom already, darkened to a single tunnel. Somehow Pinch kept his dagger, though he could do little more than wave it around in weak blindness.
The creature slammed him against the wall again, its yellow fangs bared in brutal joy. And again. A fourth, a fifth, and more times until Pinch lost all count. With each crash a little more of the volition drained from his muscles until he flopped like a helpless doll in the monster's grasp. The world was all blackness, save for the tiniest point of the real world-the candle he'd dropped, still guttering on the ground.
The bashing stopped. Pinch could barely loll his head up. The rogue still hovered over the ground in the beast's bloody grasp.
'Whot your naim?' The basso words rumbled through the hall.
I'm hallucinating, the thief was certain. He forced his pain-dazzled eyes to focus. The creature was watching him, its flattened head cocked owl-like as it waited.
'Name!' the beast bellowed in badly slurred trade tongue. It rattled him a little more just for emphasis.
Pinch understood.
'P-Janol,' he croaked. He almost used the name of his old, Elturel life, but a spark held him back. He was in Ankhapur, and here he was Janol. Gods knew who or what this beast might report to.
'Ja-nol?' the creature snarled, trying to wrap its fangs around the shape of the word.
Pinch nodded.
All of a sudden he dropped to the floor, the creature's cushing grasp released. It was so unexpected that Pinch, normally of catlike footing, tumbled into an angular pile of clothes, blood, and pain.
'You-Janol?' it asked a third time, with less ferocity than before. It could have been almost apologetic in its tone, if it reasoned at all like normal beings. The rogue doubted that, given its behavior so far.
'I'm Janol… royal ward of Ankhapur.' Between each word was a wince and the struggling determination to get back to his feet. 'Kill me… and the royal guard will… scour this place with fire and sword.' It took a lot of effort for Pinch to stand and say all that, although it wasn't hard to give the lie a little conviction.
The beast stood and said nothing, its face puckered up in concentration. This finally gave Pinch a chance to study it clearly. It was bowlegged, broad, and reminded Pinch of Iron-Biter in that, except for the fact that where he could look down on the dwarf, this thing was a full head taller than him. He'd seen such beasts before, though during the brute's battering that recognition was not uppermost in his mind. There was cold solace in knowing just what was killing you.
Now that it wasn't trying to smash his skull against the wall, there was some chance and gain in that recognition. Naming the thing, though, added more to the mystery than solving the problem.
It was a quaggoth, an albino beast of the far underground realms. They were virtually unknown on the surface. The only reason Pinch knew of them was his youth here in Ankhapur. Manferic had raised a few, like slavish dogs, as his special lackeys. They were hunters and jailers, one of old Manferic's 'special' punishments.
'You not Janol. Janol boy.' Amazement that the thing knew him once was increased by urgency as the thing reached down to continue its beating.
'I've grown,' he blurted hastily.
He tried to duck beneath the sweeping arms, but the monster was quicker than its speech. With the thief in its grip, the quaggoth slowly and deliberately squeezed. The wind crushed out of him in a last series of choking words. 'I… am… Janol,' he gasped in vain.
The beast snarled and crushed harder. Pinch heard a crack from within his chest and the sharp burn of a broken rib, but there was no air left in him to scream. The dim tunnel of light was quickly becoming even more dim.
'Ikrit-stop!'
The pressure ceased. The pain did not.
'Is he Janol?' It was a woman's voice, quavering and weak but unmistakably female.
'He say, lady.'
'And you?'
'Me, lady, say he not Janol.'
'Put him down.'
Pinch tumbled to the floor. This time he made no move to get to his feet. He gasped for air like a landed fish, and each heave brought a new lance of pain that drove out all the wind he had regained.
'You want look, lady?' From his hands and knees, Pinch looked up to see the beast addressing something or someone in the darkness.
'… Yes.' There was a pained hesitancy in the framing of her simple answer.
The beast stooped to seize Pinch and present him like a prisoner before the dock. The rogue tried to crawl away, but all he did was trigger a paroxysm of choking that ended with a mouthful of coughed-up blood.
'No-wait.' Her words shook, as though they were a dam to her fears and uncertainties. 'You say he's not Janol?'
'No, lady. Not Janol.'
There was a drawing of breath from the darkness, a drawing of resolve. 'Let me see him.'
The quaggoth bowed slightly to the darkness and stepped aside. Pinch, suspecting that his life might hang on this display, wiped the blood from his chin and lips and struggled to stand upright. He peered into the gloom of the tunnel, but even with his thief-trained eyes, he could not make out the slightest shadow of his examiner.
At last a sigh, pained and disappointed, floated from the darkness. 'It's too long. Who can tell?… Let him go, Ikrit. Take him out.'
'Who are-' Pinch's question was forestalled by a spasm from his chest, the broken bone protesting even the rise and fall of words. There were so many questions inside him, all strangled by the lancing pain inside.
'Who am I?' The echo was a confused musing of his words. 'I'm… one who loved unwisely.'
Riddles! Every answer led to more riddles. If he hadn't felt so lousy, Pinch would have cursed the voice in the darkness. He forced himself to frame one last question.
'What am I-' he paused to force back the pain, '- Janol, to you?' The effort left him collapsed against the wall.
Footsteps crept closer from the darkness. The quaggoth took a protective step to intercede between Pinch and its charge. There was covert tenderness in its move, uncharacteristic for its race. 'Janol is-' Suddenly the whispers halted in a gagging retch, like a drunken man. When it stopped, the woman tried again. 'Janol is… hope,' she said weakly, although it was certain those were not the words she wished to use.
Pinch gave up. He hadn't the strength to ask any more questions, and the lady, be she human, sprite, or
