Grunts (8 page)

“Sergeant Major!”

He intercepted Company Sergeant Major Ashnak as the big orc left the Officers Mess. Ashnak surveyed Barashkukor, and hastily moved his boots out of the way.

“What it is, Corporal?”

“Sir, you said we’d be leaving this position, sir, and that must mean we’re going to fight, and—” Barashkukor heaved in a breath of hot, foetid air. “And you said I could have a
real
gun, sir; please sir, can I, sir? Now, sir?”

Company Sergeant Major Ashnak examined his talons. “Certainly, Corporal, certainly. In fact, I think we might even issue you an M79. Follow me.”

Barashkukor trotted across the compound beside the large orc, towards the ruined stone building marked out as the armoury. He passed a smoking crater in the earth. A scorched size three pair of combat boots occupied the hole, and the explosively dismembered corpse of an orc. Ashnak strode over a second crater, and spat his cigar into a third. Barashkukor narrowly avoided the fourth crater, where a larger pair of scorched boots rocked gently.

“I see Squad Three’s mine detector is still on the blink,” Ashnak ordered. “Here we are, Corporal. Try this.”

Barashkukor reached up to the armoury issuing-window and grabbed the gun Ashnak offered. He leaned over backwards to counteract the apparent weight and staggered, finding it unexpectedly light.

“The M79 forty-millimetre grenade-launcher,” Company Sergeant Ashnak announced.

Barashkukor strained to grasp the fore-end and stock of the blunderbuss-like weapon, which seemed twice as long as he was tall. He flipped the catch, broke the gun, dropped the positively enormous shell that Ashnak handed him into it, and closed it down. He tucked the stock into his shoulder, muzzle waving wildly as his helmet slipped down over his eyes, and grabbed for the trigger.

“Testing the weapon now, sa—”

FOOM!

The sun shone painfully into his eyes. Barashkukor rubbed a hand across his face and brought it away bloody. Stone dust covered his combat trousers, where he sprawled on his back amongst the rubble of the armoury wall. There was a warm, wet patch at his crotch. His helmet was gone. The M79 grenade-launcher had landed several yards away. Every bone in his body ached, his ears rang, and his nose bled.

“I should watch the recoil on that one…” CSM Ashnak strode away, grinning, and pointed to a scattered orc body on the far side of the compound, the bits still smoking from the grenade impact. “Get that taken over to the cookhouse. Then get your squad on parade, Corporal, I’ve got an announcement to make.
Now
, marine!”

By the time the ringing concussion had died out of his
ears the marine company was drawn up in serried ranks, filling the compound to capacity. Barashkukor snapped his squad to attention, saluting, as Zarkingu walked down the ranks.

“Mmm—yes—hmm?” The sergeant (Magic-Disposal and Administration) lifted her snout out from a sheaf of papers. Her tilted eyes glittered in the sun, and a slight froth trickled down her small porcine jaws. One of her ears twitched arhythmically. “Corporal, your squad needs a colour designation. Call yourself Red Squad, or Blue Squad, or…”

“Yes sir, ma’am!” Barashkukor slammed a salute. “Please, ma’am, permission to designate this squad Black Squad?”

“No!” The female orc glared. She rattled the sheaf of papers under Barashkukor’s pointed nose. “We already have fifteen Black Squads, twelve Dark Squads, four Raven Squads, three Midnight Squads, one Sable Squad, one Ebony Squad, and,” she consulted a sheet of paper, “one Pink Squad. Hmm. Yes. Well…We’re all a little worried about Pink Squad…”

Shaking her head, she moved on past Barashkukor. He watched out of the corners of his long eyes as she halted in front of Marukka’s all-female squad with their black unit-tattoos, whose helmets had “BADGURLZ” stencilled on their camouflage-covers.

The sun beat down on Nin-Edin. The homely stench of ordure and decaying flesh rose up from the compound, comforting Barashkukor. He unobtrusively straightened his cleaned webbing and eased the strap of the M79 grenade-launcher where it cut into his horny shoulder.

“Officer on deck!”

Barashkukor came to attention and slapped his hand against the butt of the M79. The big female Agaku, Shazgurim, paced along the ranks of orcs, grinning nastily. She gave a lazy half-salute.

“At ease, orcs. Sergeant Zarkingu will now read you
this
week’s promotion list. Zarkingu…”

The smaller female orc marched up to the skull-standard pole, snapped an about-turn, and faced the orc company. Her thin, piercing voice echoed in the noon heat.

“Now listen up! The entrails have been consulted, according to the usual procedure, and the results of the promotion-auspices are as follows. MFC Kusaritku is promoted to
corporal. MFC Marukka is promoted to corporal. MFCs Azarluhi, Tukurash, and Ekurzida are made sergeants. Corporal Barashkukor is promoted to first lieutenant.”

Barashkukor drew himself up proudly, ignoring the jealous mutters in the ranks. He grinned his fiercest grin.

The small female orc, eyes gleaming, continued: “Sergeants Imhullu, Shazgurim, and myself are promoted to the rank of captain. CSM Ashnak is promoted to major, in command of this company. That is all.”

A voice behind Barashkukor muttered, “Arse-licker!”

“You!” Barashkukor snarled. “After parade. The whip: fifty strokes!”

“Company, tenHUT!”

Three hundred combat boots hit the packed earth in unison. Barashkukor, facing eyes-front, caught sight of Major Ashnak in his peripheral vision. The big orc walked slowly between the ranks, Sergeant Imhullu behind him, stopping to exchange a word or two here and there.

Noon beat down on ranks of orc grunts, on web-belts hung with grenades, on rocket-launchers, assault rifles, antitank weapons, and machineguns. Orc-fangs glinted; squad insignia painted on hunched shoulders shone. Variously coloured combat fatigue trousers blazed back the light, cleaned and pressed after hard training. Boots shone.

“A good turnout, sergeant.” Ashnak walked from the rank behind Barashkukor, Imhullu at his side. “Very good; I’m impressed. Stand the orcs at ease now.”

“Squaaaads, standat—
ease
!”

Again, three hundred boots hit the earth together. Barashkukor clasped his hands behind his back, wondering just where a first lieutenant’s insignia should be tattooed.

Ashnak strode to where several ammunition cases had been assembled in a dais, and stepped up onto them. His black-and-white urban camouflage stood out against the blue sky.

“Right, you orcs, listen up!”

The Agaku had a machinegun and bandoleers slung across his back, and a Desert Eagle automatic pistol in the holster on his web-belt. His broken fangs had been capped with silver and polished, and a major’s insignia was painted on his muscular, sloping shoulders. Grenades hung from his belt. He wore a battered urban forage cap.

“You’ve trained hard.” Ashnak surveyed the ranks.
Barashkukor straightened his aching shoulders as the big orc’s gaze swept over him.

“And now your training’s over.” The Agaku grinned. “I’m proud of you. You’re marines! You’re hot! You are
fucking
hot marines!”

Shrieks and cheers split the air. Barashkukor shook his grenade-launcher in the air, taking two hands to do it. The big Agaku held up a hand for silence. He got it.

“Your training’s completed, and you’re ready for your first big mission. Your officers will brief you fully in a moment, but I want to say this. We know now that the date for the Final Battle has been set.”

The breath left Barashkukor’s chest as if he had been hit. Fear and adrenaline sparked through his veins, firing him with a fierce joy, and he growled in his throat.

“The Horde of Darkness will march on the night of Samhain. But
before
that, and to ensure its success,
you
are first going to perform your mission.”

The company stood quiet now. No noise in the noon of Nin-Edin but the vultures wheeling about the mountain fort and crying. Barashkukor swallowed with a suddenly dry mouth.

“And succeed in it. I know you can do it—I’m proud of every one of you mean motherfuckers! You’re trained marines now.” Ashnak straightened, one taloned hand resting on his pistol. “Trained and armed. Captain Zarkingu will be instructing you personally later, but I will say this now. These guns are not sorcerous weapons. They are
not
magical. And therefore—therefore the magic of the Light has no defence against them.”

The interior of the Great Hall of Sarderis’s city keep shone white in the afternoon sun. Will Brandiman, comfortably replete, advanced towards the dais at the end of the Hall and bowed. Ned, walking beside him, looked wide-eyed and wondering at the company of elves, dwarves, and Men crowding around the dais, and at the female Man sitting on it in the high-backed chair.

“Will and Ned Brandiman.” Will bowed again. “Halfling brothers, my Lady. Very much at your service.”

He tugged his new silver-embroidered black doublet as if he were straightening it, taking advantage of the movement to check with nimble fingers the position of secret poisoned needles. His short-sword and throwing knives he had handed in at the gate-house, keeping the mail-shirt on pretence of personal danger.

Ned bowed, cloddishly, still gazing up wide-eyed. Will trod on his brother’s foot as a warning not to overdo it, unwilling to use the Thieves’ Guild finger-talk where it might be recognised and read.

“You two it was who found the family butchered? How is that so?”

The female Man on the dais leaned forward in her chair. The light from the whitewashed walls shone from her plate-armour and the dazzling surcoat with the golden Sun embroidered on it. As her face came into the light, Will used every effort to keep from flinching.

Her hair shone yellow as any female Man’s, cropped short over pointed grey-white ears. The greyish white of her skin continued across her face, becoming blotched with dark grey and black patches over her jaw and down her neck to where the gorget covered her skin. One misshapen tooth pushed up a corner of her wide, thin-lipped mouth. Thick hairs protruded from her flat nostrils, and her eyes—tilted so that
they slanted up from the outer corners towards the bridge of her nose—glinted green.

“Fear me not.” Her soft voice slurred a little, and a drop of saliva ran from under her lip where her tooth lifted it. She wiped her mouth with a gloved hand. “Fear not, halfling. I am called The Named. I wear another’s ugliness of soul upon my body—as he wears the beauty of my virtue, unearned, on his face. But that shall change, also, when we face each other in the final confrontation. For now, believe my heart serves the Light, and speak your answer. You it was who discovered the bodies?”

Will Brandiman spread his hands helplessly. “My Lady, the very sight was…horrific. These were good people of the town with whom we took lodging, and I greatly fear that was their downfall.”

The Named said sharply, “How so?”

“It must be that we were followed, Lady, on our way to you, and whoever sought our lives found those good people, and so…” Will swallowed. “We were about our own business that night, not returning until the morning, when we found their bodies.”

A slender elf in green stepped forward from the crowd. “Some creature of darkness was responsible, Lady. The child’s body had been cooked and partially eaten. It is an infallible sign of the orc-filth. None but orcs could be capable of such wickedness.”

“And the writing? Can orcs write?”

The elf bowed her head. “For that, I know not.”

Ned Brandiman, at Will’s elbow, said, “Our lodging was paid two weeks in advance at the shop. If the Dark has human spies in the city, I suppose they must have found that out and sent for…other creatures to attack us. Perhaps it was spies of the Dark who wrote—but I can’t read, Lady. Brother Will told me what filth they wrote.”

“I did.” Will patted his brother’s arm. With his hand firmly on Ned’s arm he took the opportunity to finger:

—
I said act impressed, not half-witted
.

Will added, “Lady, there is much that you should know. I fear your brother seeks our life.”

The stunningly ugly face shifted into something that might have been a sad smile. “Say on, little one.”

“It is to our shame,” Will launched into his story, “that we
were, in part and as it seems, employed by your brother the nameless…”

He wielded ignorance and innocence in a complex web, his eyes on The Named’s misshapen face, leaving it to Ned to scan the assembly for armed Men, hostile dwarven-kind, and elvish mages.

“…I grew to know something of these orcs. Orcs have no love of magic, Lady—unless it’s the sort that requires much torture and sacrifice and has short and easily pronounced incantations. But their magic-sniffer could tell an absence of magic truly. And so we fled for our lives, concluding that if they should escape, your brother’s orcish army now has weapons that are not magical but are infinitely greater than sword or bow. And these he will put at the disposal of the Dark Lord.”

He paused.