The Troll's Trove Ch. 40

Chapter 40 - Damn Gods

Brynis woke to a loud pop. Shadows danced upon the wall. The greasy smell of fat and meat roasting filled the air.

She sat up. She clutched her stomach and fell back to her blankets. Fire burned through her abdomen. She pressed against the floor and levered herself up again. A groan escaped her lips.

Eric looked up from where he was cooking. As he did a glob of bear blubber rolled into the fire. Flames reached up to scorch Eric. He snatched his hand back. "Smarta's bite! Damn—" He clutched the abused hand. "—want some?"

Brynis rubbed her neck. Her face contorted as she stretched her elbow. "No, not yet." She untangled herself from her blankets, stomped into her boots and struggled up the stair.

She winced. The sun hit Brynis's eyes like a lance exploding upon impact. White on white everywhere. The poorly skinned and butchered remains of the bear were the only color in the world anywhere. She walked some distance from the blemish.

I want a bath. Her clothes were as stiff as she was. Bryn smelled of blood, sweat and campfire. She scooped a handful of snow and scrubbed her face.

When Brynis returned to the abandoned cellar Donnar had his map out. "I don't think anyone's left Bendle's yet. No tracks. We've got a head start."

Brynis looked down over his shoulder. "Unless they've gone around the horn." Her voice was flat. She pointed at a mountain upon which they'd rested. "They could be making for the old road."

"Tor's ballocks, your right! We've got to go."

"Don't cuss."

"I thought we were going back," Eric said.

Both Brynis and Donnar stared at him. "Really?"

"I—" He looked between the two of them. "—we promised. Bendle, I mean."

"And he promised us a safe place to stay." Donnar folded up his map and shoved it in his pack. "He didn't really deliver, did he?"

"What-what about the monster?"

Brynis shouldered her own pack. "Look, you can go back. You can both go back for all I care. I've—" got a man to kill. A man chasing a Princess. A Princess he claimed was headed to Gejsern.

"You're not going alone. Besides," Donnar said to Eric, "there's no monster and if there is, Bryn will protect us."

Bryn started. Donnar's eye sparkled when it caught her's. Something welled up inside her and the boiling poison in her soul abated a little. A slight smile cracked her chapped lips. She grabbed a sizzling strip of bear from the flames and climbed the stairs. "You commin'?"

Donnar overtook to her three leagues later just as she crested the pass. Eric joined them as they descended into a blanket of fog below. Underfoot, green replaced white. Mud gouged from the slope with each tread. The humid, slightly foul air grew heavy like the panting of a sweltering dog.

The slope bottomed out and the fog lifted. Broken buildings littered the landscape before them. Great grey, white and brown basins of hot water and boiling mud seemed to grow from the ground just downslope of the ruin. The fabled Gejsern bathhouses perched amongst them dripping with so much mud the building appeared as an effigy warning away all visitors.

For the first time Donnar looked lost. "Where is it? I mean-I didn't expect the town to still be standing. The horn could be anywhere."

Brynis' heart began to hammer. Her hand tightened upon the hilt of her Pa's sword. Her eyes jumped from darkened doorway to toppled building to empty window. There were a hundred buildings for that scar-faced bastard to hide in if he intended to ambush the Princess.

Why here? Was Ada really coming here?

Eric rubbed his burnt hand. His gaze darted from shadow to shadow. "Maybe we should go back."

Brynis' voice bled poison. "I'm not going back."

Donnar eyed her. "We'll have to search them one-by-one."

"The horn is in there." Brynis pointed to the mud covered bathhouse. A constant stream of dark vapor boiled from its vacant windows and doors.

"Re—" Eric's voice cracked. "—eally?"

"What makes you say that?" Donnar gazed upon the building more calmly.

"Only place big enough for a troll."

"Okay," Donnar said. "Makes sense. Let's go." He started for the dripping muddy slopes that led to the hotsprings.

"Uh, why not that way?" Eric whined. He pointed at the wide road leading into the ruins. "There's bound to be a trail or something to the bathhouse."

Donnar continued on his chosen route. "If something's really waiting for us where d' y' think it'd wait?"

Eric shied away from the road. "I thought you said—"

"Do you really want to risk it?"

Eric slunk after Donnar.

Brynis' hand screwed down on the hilt of her Pa's seax until her fingers were banded so tight her knuckles threatened to pop. Her eyes attempted to bore through the buildings lining the village street. Donnar's words made sense but she wasn't here for the horn, not any longer, she was here to break the one-eyed demon that had broken her. She took a step towards the town.

"Bryn!" Donnar said from the wall of mud leading up to the hotsprings. "You commin'?"

The fire in her breast momentarily guttered. Her personal demon could wait. She turned to follow the boys. Still, her feet dragged.

They climbed the muddy slopes leading to the hot-springs. Nine steps out of ten Brynis sank to her shins in the mud. Her feet cooked. Vapor burned. Her eyes teared and her throat grew raw from breathing the abandoned henhouse stench.

"I-I can't," Eric said. His flesh was as ashen as the chalky mud streaking his face. He stared into the narrow gap in the wall of the bathhouse. The hole had once been a door but was now choked with the slimy mud that dripped down the face of the entire structure.

Bryn dropped to her hands and knees and crawled half way in. "It's dark. Really dark."

Donnar dropped his pack in the mud and fished out a torch. "Atra's kiss, Eric, Bryn's more man than you are." He lit the implement. The flame sputtered in the heavy sulfurous air. "Here, Bryn." He passed the brand to Brynis. She crawled in further.

The torch beat back the darkness but not the fog. Brynis couldn't see from one wall to the other. A pace within the building, Brynis could stand. Three paces in the muddy floor gave way to sweating stone. The air was so thick she panted. Water tracked down her flesh in rivulets.

Donnar crawled in behind her. Eric came on his heels.

"Oh gods, gods, damn, gods." Eric's voice quaked.

"Damn gods, damn gods." The first words uttered beyond the mud portal echoed back at the three. They stood, anchored to the spot. The last damnation faded into the depths and the drip, plink of water replaced the unholy litany.

Brynis bit her lip and edged forward. The boys hovered at her shoulders.

Pillars rose out of the gloom like ghostly sentinels. They passed a stone still pool. The water within reflected blackness and drank their torchlight. A hall opened before them.

Brynis tripped. She pitched up against the wall. Eric whimpered.

"Deer," Donnar said his voice shaky. He pointed at an antlered skull some paces from the femur Bryn had stumbled over. More bones littered the path which opened upon a trash strewn hall.

The mists thinned and climbed for the ceiling high above them. Bryn motioned with her head down the new path. They edged past another pool and their boots left muddy swirls in the shallow sheen that crept across the floor.

Beyond the next arch Brynis stopped and lifted the torch high. Matted furs and tattered canvas made a rough bed in one corner. Charcoal filled a pit as big as a bathing pool. Armor and weapons, brown-red with rust, were on haphazard display against one wall. More were simply piled in a corner.

"The horn." Eric's voice was hushed.

The silver highlighted, ivory instrument was yellow with age and black with tarnish. Scrimshaw nymphs danced about the bell.

Donnar reached up and released the instrument from the wall. "We have it." His slouch straightened. His chest expanded. An eager light lit his eyes. "We've got the horn." He laughed. "We've got the horn!"