The Sceptre of Samnos

Dermakarak Part 5

Shale's group consisted of Jherek and two of the other trogs whose names were Hamlode and Bluin. It also contained Connery, Shaun, Matthew, Diana, and the three alumni who, in Shale's mind, added up to one good wizard. Rogil took the other four trogs, the two trog clerics and the other two mercenaries. It was midday when they started out again, and Shale confidently expected to have the entire village cleared out by nightfall.

Shale's group passed the spot where they'd fought their first battle, and they placed the four dead trogs in Redeye's crypt until they could be given a proper funeral service. Shale searched the bodies of the buglins, as he had searched the bodies in the guard room, but found no sign of the Proof of Mantellor, or anything else of value except a few coins that he slipped into his pouches. Diana looked shocked at this blatant robbery of the dead, and the three wizards were thankful that she hadn't seen them searching Mikos's body, but she made no comment, and when Shale had finished she said a few prayers over the buglins' bodies before moving on.

They had no further trouble for some time after that. They moved slowly, thoroughly checking every room they came to, making sure that no new tunnels had been dug down which enemies might be hiding. Buglins weren't the world's greatest tunellers, preferring to inhabit places dug and then abandoned by other races, but they could manage it when they really wanted or needed to. One of their favourite tricks was the pit trap with lots of sharp spikes in the bottom, covered over with a loose framework of sticks and cloths and with dust and rubble scattered over it to disguise it. They did occasionally come across the occasional pile of dust and rubble, but they always turned out to be nothing more than the results of minor roof falls.

Soon, they began to arrive at the residential areas of the village. Each home consisted of half a dozen rooms carved out of the living rock. They were all entered by means of a single door in the corridor, a well crafted stone door that swung easily on its hinges, and which had the names of its former occupants carved on it in an elaborate cursive script. Only a few were locked, the majority either having been left unlocked when the villagers left, or having been forced open by the shologs. Every room was almost completely empty, except for the occasional stone tables or chairs, some of which still had some of the original cloth covering and woolen padding on them. Some of the niches in the walls still had bottles of glowfluid standing in them, and still glowed when a drop of activating fluid was put in, much to the amazement and delight of Shale and the others. He took a few down, and gave one each to Lirenna, Jerry and the humans, just in case they got separated.

Twice they came across more intersections, once where the tunnel street branched in two, and again where another street crossed their own. Each time, they sent someone down the new tunnel to make sure it still ended in a dead end, as it had when the villagers had left. "They were dug when it was still thought that this place might turn into a large town," explained Shale. "They wanted to leave ways to expand between the rooms lining the streets. Who knows, maybe one day we'll need them."

As they reached the far end of the village, they came to the places where the buglins had been living. The rooms were decorated with stolen ornaments, animal skins and skulls, and the floors were covered with more animal skins, rough woven rugs, and half eaten animal bones. The few areas of bare rock had been carved into surprisingly sophisticated images of buglins doing all the things that they loved doing most. Chasing and killing their enemies, mainly trogs and nomes, engaging in contests of strength and fighting ability and feasting on stolen food. Despite themselves, even the trogs had to admire the quality of the carvings. Nasty little things they might be, but they had no little artistic talent.

The sleeping cots were made of thick soft blankets and feather pillows, and looked quite comfy. They counted them as they went, to get some idea of how many enemies they were up against, and were shocked when, after searching only three homes, the total had already passed thirty. If all the old trog homes were occupied, there would well be hundreds of them! They also came across dozens of larger cots, probably used by the shologs, and about twenty others that had to belong to the goblins. A cold fear came over them all. What had they gotten themselves into?