Fortress Al-Mir

Zharja stared around what was to be her new home with middling curiosity. Smooth walls. Smooth floors. It wasn’t natural. That didn’t necessarily mean it was bad, just that it meant someone had built it. The same could be said of the mines, though they felt more naturalistic with the exposed raw stone and dirt.

There wasn’t much to it. At least not in the small section the gorgon had been given. Although it was smaller than the mines, most of the others didn’t mind. Between the large room filled with nothing but chickens and small piglets that they were free to eat whenever the mood struck and the strange magic that granted them each personalized dwellings, most of the others were lazing about, enjoying the coma that came with filled stomachs.

In truth, Zharja found it hard to leave her new dwelling as well. What had once been a plain room with oddly-patterned fabric coating the floor had turned into the perfect spot to lounge about. There was a large stone, warmed by a bright glowing stone overhead, that was perfect to coil up on top. If she got too warm, the stone sat right next to a large, marshy pool, deep enough that she could entirely submerge herself, hiding from the world above. In the two days she had been at this fortress, Zharja had taken to coiling her upper half against the rock while letting her tail dangle into the water.

It was… soothing.

She could understand the others wanting to rest. Those mines, while safe, hadn’t provided plentiful food or warm, sun-baked rocks to rest against.

Today, however, Zharja had dragged herself away from her rock to further explore the corridors of her new home.

The fortress was made up of long corridors, often with several doors on either side. The corridors would occasionally split, leading to a branch of more corridors with their own doors. Most were empty. Boring. Good hiding places if she needed them but nothing worth exploring.

There was one problem with this place.

It was too… samey. In a proper cavern or even the mines, there were ways to tell where she was. Markings on the wall, odd outcroppings of rocks or stalactites overhead in the more natural caverns. Here, there were stone brick corridors and stone tiled floors. Each corridor was the same as the last.

Zharja didn’t want to admit it, but she had no idea which way to go to get back to her rock.

Tongue darting from between her lips, Zharja tasted the air, identifying a number of different scents. In a split second, her mind categorized each and every one. She dismissed the scent of leather, cloth, metal, wood, and other inanimates. None were important. It was just the scent of the building around her and the items within. They couldn’t hurt her.

It was the other scents that had her tail twitching with nervous tension.

Sweat, muscle, meat. There were orcs here. The strange creature with a smell she couldn’t quite place had told her that. The taste they left in the air was similar to humans except more… volatile. Aggressive. She could taste the aggression mixed in with their sweat. Their fear as well. Shortly after the new human returned, the taste of the orcs changed. The anger had spiked and the fear permeated the air.

The strange creature warned the gorgon against interacting with the orcs, at least for a while.

That was fine with Zharja. She had no intentions of interacting with anyone if she could help it.

Moving down the corridors, Zharja found herself drawn to a room of heat that smelled strongly of metal and sweat. The corridors of the fortress weren’t exactly cold—warmer than the mines—but if she were in charge of the place, the lights that heated her rock would be lining every corridor.

Turning a corner, she approached the warmest door in the new hall. It, like all other doors in this place, swung open for her as soon as she approached.

A truly massive hearth, lit with bright orange coals, dominated the entire back wall of the room. Large bellows pumped up and down on their own, attached by chains. A rack of metal ingots lined another wall while flowing water ran through troughs on the opposite side of the room. In between, several anvils sat out on the floor.

An orc stood at one of the anvils, raising a hammer and bringing it down on a bit of metal. Sparks erupted into the air with every strike.

At her appearance, the orc paused. He looked over to Zharja and immediately froze.

Zharja stared back. So much for not disturbing the orcs of this fortress.

She didn’t know why the elders of the den had chosen to abandon one human for another. She supposed it was better that Arkk wasn’t deceiving them as Savren had done. Although she thought the den would be better off on its own—at least, she had thought that before growing to like her rock and the plentiful food—still, she had no intentions of causing trouble. Savren had never seen fit to punish her for any transgressions. She didn’t want to give their new leader cause.

“I am not going to turn you to sstone,” Zharja said, hoping this orc wouldn’t panic and call down Arkk on them. She deliberately glanced away, looking down at the item he had been hammering out.

A gauntlet? Made for humans—or something else with five fingers.

The orc jolted, staring contest broken. Clearing his throat, he reached into the pouch on his apron and pulled out a ragged, blackened cloth. Wiping it over his face might have mopped up some of the orc’s sweat but it only served to smear around the soot.

“Heard there were gorgon around,” he grumbled, still staring at her. “You need something or just scaring people for no good reason.”

Not willing to admit that she had gotten lost, Zharja slowly moved about the room, examining the racks of half-finished weapons on the walls, bits of armor pieces, and the odd components that looked like they were made for larger contraptions. “You are a craftssman?”

“I volunteered for the forge. Better than marching or fighting,” the orc said, wiping his face once again. It had little effect. “Think I’m actually getting good at it these days.”

“What are you working on?”

He held up the vambrace he had been working on. “Arkk wants all fighters fully armored and ready for battle. Don’t know why. Orcs have tough skin. Cover the vitals. Cover the arms to block blows. Take everything else and bare the scars with pride.”

“I ssee. What battle approachess?”

“Hopefully nothing,” the orc said, relaxing enough to pick up his hammer once again. “Got some humans breathing down our necks,” he said, slamming his hammer down. “But he’s got a plan for dealing with them without a big fight. This is just in case.” A few sparks jumped up as he hammered again. “You wanting armor? Never made anything for a snake before. Might be interesting.”

“I have tough sscales,” Zharja said, echoing his statement. “Clothess and armor would get in the way,” she said, slithering around as a demonstration.

“Maybe down there, but your head? Chest? You got vitals in there?”

“I… don’t know.”

“Where is your heart? Your stomach? Your lungs?”

Zharja blinked. How would she know? She had never seen inside herself.

Perhaps one of the elders would know.

“Well, probably doesn’t matter much right now,” the orc said, slamming his hammer down again. “Too busy with this work. Perhaps later.”

“Perhapss.” Zharja moved closer to the door. “I sshall leave you to your work.”

The orc didn’t respond, his focus returned to his hammering before the doors closed behind Zharja.

Zharja remained outside for a short moment before slithering down the hall in the same direction she had come from. If this was the orc section of the fortress, she didn’t want to meet any others. The first had been pleasant enough. There was no guarantee that any others would be the same.

A despondent, lithe grace hit Zharja’s tongue as she explored the corridors. Elves, it had to be. There weren’t as many elves as there were orcs. One of them smelled more like a human than an elf but the other two… Death lingered in the air around them. Perhaps that was why all three smelled distraught.

She did not head toward the scent. Meeting with the orc had been enough interaction for the day.

Other scents hit her as she tasted the air once again. Not far from the sad elves, she could taste more humans. Again, not very many compared to the orcs. If she hadn’t already met the leaders of this place, she would have thought the orcs were in charge.

One room smelled of books and Savren. Zharja moved right past without a second glance. Although she had been warned against interacting with the orcs, she didn’t care much about them one way or the other. That indifference did not extend to Savren. His… betrayal stung. Zharja wasn’t sure that she would be able to stop herself from turning him to stone if he stepped in front of her.

Beyond the room of books, Zharja came across a room that smelled of cut trees. A thick layer of wood dust coated the floor outside the door. She paused in it, feeling it under her scales. It was an interesting sensation. Like dirt but smoother. It soaked up the little moisture on her scales. Not an unpleasant feeling.

Zharja’s delay cost her. The door swung open of its own accord.

“—lesson time with Zu—Ah!”

A tiny human stepped out, bumping right into Zharja.

Zharja looked down, waiting with mild resignation for the tiny human to start screaming. Instead, the girl just stared up with wide eyes. A quick taste of the air detected a slight sensation of fear, but nothing close to what she expected.

“You are so pretty.”

Zharja blinked.

“Hale! Get away!”

Looking up from the tiny human, Zharja saw an older man further back in the workshop. There was the fear. Despite that fear, the old man still rushed forward, grabbed the small human around the waist, and pulled her back.

“Get off me,” the human grumbled. “Arkk wouldn’t let something run around that would hurt me.”

“You don’t know that,” the older human said, not taking his eyes off Zharja. Which, when dealing with a gorgon, was one of the more foolish things to do.

It was a good thing that Zharja wasn’t about to stone them.

Zharja looked away from the two, about to continue without another word. An extra taste hit the air before she could move. It just appeared out of nowhere.

Arkk stood between her and the door to the workshop. “Is there a problem? Zharja, right?”

“I wass exploring,” Zharja said, keeping her hissing as neutral as she could manage. “The tiny human bumped into me.”

The small human stiffened, dark hair on either side of her head twitching as she straightened her back. “It was my fault. I wasn’t watching where I was going. And then this old man went and panicked,” she said with a glare over her shoulder. “The snake lady didn’t do anything bad.”

“Snake lady?”

“Of course! Look at how pretty she is.”

Zharja looked down at her iridescent black scales. They weren’t gleaming much at the moment. She would have said that she looked fairly dull. “I will be sshedding ssoon. My sscales will regain their lusster after.”

“Can I see?” the tiny human asked, stepping closer again now that the old man had let her go.

Zharja stared down for a long moment before twitching her head. Realizing that the human wouldn’t recognize her motions, she affected a shrug. “Perhapss I sshall return then.”

The little human flashed a grin before immediately trying to look more mature, like the older humans. “Thank you,” she said, bowing her head.

A long moment of quiet fell on the strange group before Arkk finally spoke. “Well, if there are no problems—”

“Wait,” Zharja said.

“Yes?”

Zharja glanced back to the other two humans before motioning with two fingers further down the corridor. She wasn’t sure how far humans could hear but did know that everyone said they had bad hearing. A few body lengths away, she stopped. Looking at Arkk, she hesitated.

“What’s wrong? If Hale is bothering you—”

“No… No. Jusst. Which way to my rock?”

Hawkwood sat at his desk, staring down at the latest report from the Duke.

The Kingdom of Chernlock was made up of four states. Chernlock itself, the seat of the kingdom, occupied the largest portion of the continent to the south. Most of it was a desert but several underground rivers allowed civilization to thrive, especially when combined with the fertile swaths of land all along the Chernlock River. To its east, the Principality of Lockloch was a fairly small territory but contained valuable mineral deposits and the largest lake on the continent, providing fresh water to the entire region. North of Lockloch, the Principality of Vaales dominated much of the northeastern edge of the continent and possessed a large navy.

The Duchy of Mystakeen, north of Chernlock and west of Vaales, was a forested and mountainous territory. It didn’t have too many special features. Just mounts, trees, and adequate farmland. The only thing that made it notable was that it was the only one of the kingdom’s territories that bordered another nation.

The Duchy maintained a strong military. It had to. The Evestani Sultanate wasn’t always the most friendly of neighbors. It was part of the reason why White Company was exclusively contracted to the Duke. Reserve forces—or, more likely, fodder—while the rest of the nation prepared in the event of an invasion.

In the last hundred days, the peace seemed to be wearing thin. If the Duke’s spymaster was to be believed, Evestani was marshaling its forces. The spymaster didn’t know why they were suddenly building up their army—if they did, they hadn’t seen fit to inform Hawkwood about it—but that didn’t change what was likely to happen.

“Thirty years since the last war ended,” Hawkwood mumbled, taking a drink from his teacup. “Fifty years since the last war began. How long will this one last?”

“Not long if they put you in charge, Sir.”

Lowering the spymaster’s report, Hawkwood looked up. His adjutant, Neil, stepped through the door, holding a few more papers in his hands.

“Doubt I’ll be doing much. Throwing away good men while the proper armies make sure their swords are polished.” He let out a long sigh. “More word from the spymaster?” he asked, nodding toward his adjutant’s papers.

“Not quite. You asked me to keep informed of Company Al-Mir’s activities.”

Welcoming the distraction, Hawkwood hurriedly waved Neil further into the room. “And what has Arkk been up to since he fought off that horde of monsters at Darkwood?”

“It seems some inquisitors took interest in his activities after that. Reports say they cleared out the remainder of the monsters at Darkwood and now they’re poking around some Cursed Forest south of Smilesville Burg.”

Smilesville… Hawkwood turned around in his chair, facing the large map of the territory. It took him a few moments to find it. “Not far from Langleey. Wasn’t that where Arkk said he was from? He seemed like a good sort. Wonder what they’re doing.”

“It might have something to do with what he did after.”

“After? Wasn’t he wounded?”

“Back on his feet, according to this. Arkk and a single associate—a demihuman of undetermined type—showed themselves at Silver City one week ago.”

Hawkwood clapped a hand to his forehead, rubbing at his hair. “The gorgon job. I told him not to take it. Two people aren’t enough to assault a den of gorgon. Was he there for other matters?”

“No. He marched through the town with several dead chickens slung over his shoulders.”

“Poison? Gorgons would have smelled it.”

“Not sure. All we know is that he entered the mines alone, according to witnesses.”

Hawkwood closed his eyes, letting out a long sigh. “Shame.”

“He walked out about two hours after, helping several formerly petrified humans back to the village. Claimed he dealt with the gorgon and that they wouldn’t be back.”

“Excuse me?”

“Silver City’s baron, Geno, tried to throw a feast. Arkk just left. Didn’t even take the reward they were offering. They sent a few volunteers into the mines and couldn’t find any trace of the gorgon.”

“I… Good thing I wasn’t taking a drink of my tea. I might have made a mess.”

“It gets better.”

Hawkwood raised an eyebrow. “He did something else?”

“Did you hear what happened to Hope’s Rest Village?”

“Terrible business,” Hawkwood said with a nod of his head. “Some kind of stasis spell over the entire village.”

“Well, two days ago, Arkk found a ritual circle hidden behind a wall in the catacombs beneath the village church. Destroying the ritual circle woke up the villagers. The village is lost—without anyone to tend to the crops, pretty much everything died. Our illustrious duke wanted to send tax collectors out upon the news reaching him—”

“Bastard.”

“—but was convinced not to by one of his advisors. The elf, I gather.”

“Good thing someone in his manor has some sense to them. I don’t suppose she convinced him to send some of his taxed goods as support?”

Adjutant Neil shook his head slowly. “Not sure what is going to happen to the village yet. I’d put coin down on them splitting apart to nearby villages that will take them in.”

“At least the people survived. They can always return to their homes in the spring and try to get their village going.”

Neil didn’t say anything. He merely set down the papers he had been looking over while delivering his report, allowing Hawkwood to read them at his leisure.

“Sounds like Arkk did some good. More than good. Estimates were six to ten gorgon? Would have lost half our company clearing them out. And he recovered the petrified miners then casually went…” Hawkwood trailed off, looking back to his map. He found the mountains where Silver City was nestled then dragged his eyes across the Duchy to Hope, not too far from Cliff. The distance between the two wasn’t insignificant. A single rider could travel much faster than a group, but to make it across Mystakeen in a week?

“Huh.”

“Something wrong?” Neil asked.

“No, no. Just thinking,” Hawkwood said with a shake of his head. “Arkk did very well for himself. Glad I had the opportunity to help guide him along, even if it seems like he ignored my advice about the gorgon. Any chance we can lean on the inquisitors and get them to back off?”

“I could ask around.”

“Do it. See if you can figure out what they’re after and maybe get them to back off. Saving two villages? Doesn’t deserve to be hounded like that.”

“Understood, Sir.” Neil ducked his head, bowing out of the room.

“Before you go,” Hawkwood said, frowning down at his empty teacup. “See if you can’t get some more Evestani tea imported. And quickly.” His eyes drifted over to the spymaster’s report. “Might not have much of a chance in the near future.”