Page 20 of The False Shaman (Claimed by the Red Hand #2)

ARCHIE

It was all an act. I knew it was. I’d orchestrated the whole thing myself.

And yet, when Droko spoke to me like that, all confident and commanding…well, I could hardly stop myself from jumping his bones right then and there. I hurried back to the kitchen to get ready for the chieftain’s arrival with something other than dread filling my belly. It was still a queasy feeling, of course. But now it was tinged with anticipation.

Taruut once told me that a true orc is defined by his honor—though from what I gather, their opinion of right and wrong is pretty fluid. Never mind that Gargle was a backstabbing traitor. That sort of ambition was something all of them could wrap their heads around. But make him seem feeble, and apparently, he’d never recover.

Taruut would’ve been proud of our plan. He had a soft spot for cleverness.

Before he’d died, the old shaman had taught me about more than just orcish stubbornness. He’d schooled me on how to boil mallow to soothe a raw throat, and how to make a plaster of herbs and clay to cover an angry scrape. But instruct me in the art of poisoning? Of course not.

Taruut might’ve been batty…but he was no idiot.

The Deathshade didn’t even exist, as far as I knew. I’d just made it up on the spot. Hopefully something in the larder would serve as a convincing substitute.

I sniffed through the culinary herbs, wishing I could borrow an orcish nose for the task–or even a goblin snout, for that matter. Crespash must have offloaded that horrid spider by now. But where he’d gone was anyone’s guess.

After a few minutes of deliberation, I decided to go with the least pungent of the bunch. A poison that an orc could sniff out a mile away would hardly do its job, after all. I pried several jars from the back of the highest shelf, things covered in cobwebs that hadn’t been opened in years. Some of the contents had petrified into a solid lump. Others were practically dust. I grabbed a handful of each and, one by one, ground them into a fine powder.

I was sneezing my head off by the time I finished. Maybe my fine spray of spittle would lend an extra oomph to my so-called poison. One could only hope.

Now it was just down to making a grub eat my concoction.

I went back to the larder and found a pot of the fattest grubs I could lay my hands on. Wincing, I plucked out a creature to get a closer look at it. The grub was the color of suet, with a translucent, segmented body, a pair of dark spots where eyes would someday develop, and two wriggling nubs for antennae. I thought of the chieftain crushing it between his teeth and my stomach heaved.

I quickly plucked a test grub from the bunch, a feisty thing the size of my thumb. It wriggled in my grasp, and I hastily dropped it into the powder, hoping that it would seize the opportunity to chow down. But instead, it just flopped about and covered itself in a fine coating of herbs. I quietly brushed it into the waste bucket.

What did grubs even eat? I poked around inside the pot and found my answer…and wished I hadn’t. Evidently, they ate each other. Cringing, I plucked out another little cannibal and presented it with the powdered herbs. This time I set it on the edge of the plate…only to watch it roll in and coat itself.

I flicked it into the trash with its buddy.

I’ll try anything once, but there’s plenty of things I’d never imagined myself doing. Bathing in a geyser. Slicing through rock with a dwarvish sword. Kissing a man with tusks. But feeding a bloated white grub with the tip of a tiny spoon was definitely top of the list.

I watched in horrid fascination as its tiny mouthparts coaxed the herbal mixture into its gullet. And once the grub finished its meal, I carefully observed it to see if eating the mixture had any effects. Its movements were sluggish, and its antenna-nubs twitched as if in a trance. If my phony poison was actually toxic to bugs, then all my hard work would be for nothing. Orcs prefer their grubs alive and kicking–or writhing around, if you want to be technical about it–and no doubt serving the chieftain a dead grub would not only be suspicious. It would be an insult.

Did I have enough time to throw together another fake poison? Unlikely. A thrumming sound in a far-off corridor had the distinct pattern of hobnail boots, the very sort worn by Ul-Rott’s guard. Maybe I’d be lucky and the grub would wait a few minutes to actually expire.

As if luck had ever been on my side.

I was scrabbling through the grub pot, searching for a fat enough understudy to take the place of the one I’d just accidentally poisoned for real, when I spied motion out of the corner of my eye.

Fattie had shaken off his stupor and was wriggling desperately around the plate.

The orcish footfalls grew louder. I had just enough time to add a handful of non-poisoned grubs to the dish, and a sprig of watercress for decoration. Hardly a meal fit for a chieftain, I realized, just as the orc reached the doorway.

Kof. All decked out in feathers and white face-paint.

“It’s time, human,” the orc barked at me. “Don’t dawdle.” He turned to go, then paused and added, “For some reason, Taruut always liked you. His spirit won’t want to start without you.”

With that, he scooped up the tray of grubs. But as he did, I noticed something alarming. Fattie now had a dark line of herbs running along the length of its translucent body.

“Wait,” I called out, and Kof narrowed his single eye suspiciously. I cast about in desperation and spotted some rubyseed lingering in the mortar and pestle. “We can’t serve the chieftain just any old grubs, can we?”

The spice was red–really red. Hopefully red enough to cover up a telltale dark line on a very portly grub.

I hastily flung the herb at the plate. Once I dusted it over the top, though, I realized I’d covered my tracks all too well.

The red spice powder made pink, wriggling cherries of my handiwork. Yes, the dark line was covered…but the smell of the subtle toxin I had so painstakingly created was entirely blotted out by the pungent stink of rubyseed.

Damn it—the grub was supposed to look just poisoned enough to arouse suspicion, and now I’d gone and obscured all my hard work!

Kof grabbed the plate. “Hold on,” I insisted, “a splash of wine—”

“Even you know better than to keep the chieftain waiting. Praise Ul-Rott.”

I heaved a heavy sigh, and to Kof’s retreating back, murmured, “Indeed. My ladle is his.”

There hadn’t been much time to prepare, but the honor guard had done an impressive job of turning an abandoned storeroom into a plausible tomb.

At least…I think they had. Kind of hard to tell with all the incense.

The irregular natural chamber was shrouded in a smoky haze, as if the walls were made of fog. The heavy incense burned like thick, cloying perfume and filled the chamber with a dizzying array of smells. Ul-Rott stood in the center, flanked by two enormous guards, their faces obscured by the smoke. The chieftain waved his hand in front of his face to clear away some of the smog so that he could see who had entered.

“Where’s the blasted shaman boy?” he demanded of no one in particular. “Let’s get this over with before I go blind.”

I couldn’t help but compare the impromptu crypt to the makeshift dwarven tomb I’d stumbled into before. They were nothing alike. While the dwarves slept their eternal sleep in a stately, quiet, dignified arrangement, the meditation chamber had been crammed with props. Among the chests and urns and statues, a half dozen wooden biers had been assembled. And on those slabs lay an assemblage of skeletons. Maybe not whole skeletons. I suspected that while there’d been a big selection of bones to choose from, they’d be a mishmash of various orcs and other unfortunates who’d ended up in the bone piles. But the rotting shrouds held them together well enough.

I had no attention to spare for the decorations, though. I was too busy watching my poison plan fall apart. I caught the eye of one of the honor guard and whispered, “Where’s Gorgul?”

“How should I know?” he snapped, and I felt myself wither inside. Without Gorgul, there’d be nothing to show for my oh-so-clever plan but a spicy grub.

Meanwhile, Kof set the plate down directly within Ul-Rott’s reach. The chieftain waved away the proffered food, his attention focused on something else entirely. “What’s that writing scratched into the wall?” he asked Kof. A few members of the honor guard shifted subtly, wondering if they’d gone too far in their set dressing. Ul-Rott squinted. “Curses? Spells? Bah. This witchcraft makes my skin crawl.”

“Who kens the ways of a shaman?” Kof said vaguely, and the chieftain grunted a non-reply.

Then Droko entered the room in full shaman regalia…and everyone went dead silent. No scuffed leather armor today. Instead, he wore a single deer hide slung low on his hips and a cloak with a spray of pheasant tails affixed to the collar. His hair had been freed from his topknot and braided with threads of gold. Most striking of all, though, was the big red-ochre hand print in the center of his chiseled bare chest.

Droko was no shaman. He’d told me so himself. He should have looked preposterous in shamanic adornments. But standing there so tall and proud and strong, he wasn’t silly at all.

He was glorious.

He stepped forward and surveyed the room, his gaze taking in everything: the biers, the incense, the walls veiled in fog. He stood there for a moment owning that smoke-filled room, then gestured for a pair of Taruut’s men to enter. I recognized them as one of the teams who’d carted the old man around in his sedan chair. In tandem, as always, they carried his shrouded form one final time to his resting place.

Droko brought with him a sense of calm assurance. His voice was low but clear when he spoke. “Taruut is here among us tonight,” he said. “His spirit will be honored and remembered.”

Ul-Rott watched him expectantly for a long moment, then narrowed his eyes and said, “That’s it?”

“Now it’s time for you to say a few words.”

“Taruut is dead. He served the clan long…and well.”

And…still, no Gorgul. Droko’s gaze locked with mine and his eyes widened. To the chieftain, he said, “But surely there’s a clever prediction of his that needs retelling—”

“The old man knew exactly what I thought—we didn’t mince words. Let’s face it, these ceremonies are for the living, not the dead. And Taruut was so old, we’ve all had plenty of time to say our goodbyes.” With that blasé pronouncement, Ul-Rott waved aside a fresh cloud of incense and reached for a grub.

I’d been so worried the chieftain would grab the wrong one, I hadn’t even considered he’d manage to do it while the target of our whole deception wasn’t even here!

Ul-Rott plucked a wriggling morsel from the plate and gestured toward Taruut’s bier. “And he’d certainly get a kick out of you being so extravagant with the rubyseed on his behalf.”

Was that Fattie? I thought it was. So many places my cunning plan could fall apart, only to have it go awry because that stupid orc chose this particular moment to make himself scarce—

“Stop!” With the force of a boulder rolling off a cliff, Gorgul plowed into the room, striking the squirming grub from the Chieftain’s hand.

If something like that had happened in the brothel, I can guarantee, most everyone would either be ducking under the table to avoid being hit by a random projectile, or pointing and laughing (if they simply couldn’t resist.) But to these orcs? A swipe at their chieftain was no laughing matter.

Swords and spears whipped out faster than a paying man’s dick eager for a quickie. The chieftain’s men had a clear objective: keep Gorgul away from their leader. The honor guard of the shaman pointed their spears every which way since, irrational or not, Gorgul was one of their own. Kof waded through the pointiness and dragged his lieutenant away from the chieftain before anyone could do us the favor of running him through.

“Stand down,” he barked at his men, then sent Gorgul reeling back with a well-placed shove, demanding, “What’s this all about?”

Gorgul grabbed up Fattie and held him aloft so the light of the biggest brazier fell on its plump, squirming, spice-dusted body. “The grub you almost swallowed is poisoned!”

When Kof swung around and lined me up in the gaze of his single eye, I realized it was possible my plan might work out a bit too well. His grip on his spear tightened. I threw my hands up—would that stop him from running me through?—and said, “Poison? That’s preposterous! It’s covered in rubyseed, nothing more.”

“I heard them spinning out their vile plan,” Gargle insisted. “The new shaman and his pet human, planning to take over the clan. The poison is inside the grub.”

All eyes locked on Fattie. Ul-Rott motioned one of his guards with a simple jerk of his chin, and the soldier pulled a skin from his belt and doused the grub with water. It flopped wetly in Gorgul’s hand…with the dark line just showing through the translucent body.

“See?” Gorgul crowed triumphantly. “Its gullet is filled with—”

“Culinary herbs,” I called out. “What, haven’t you ever had a chicken stuffed with sage? Same thing!”

“Do you take the word of a human ?” Gorgul snarled. “The shaman is clearly under his sway—they reek of each other!”

And then all eyes turned to me—and the pointy ends of all the weapons, too—just as the spasming grub leapt out of Gorgul’s hand and landed with a splat directly between my feet.

Calm as you please, I picked up Fattie—stars above, he was pulsating —and looked Ul-Rott in the eye. “Culinary herbs, chieftain. Nothing more.”

Then I popped the fat, wriggling creature into my mouth.

Let’s just say it’s a good thing I have no gag reflex whatsoever.

The grub had been daunting enough on the plate. Inside my mouth, it felt even bigger, the size of a soft-boiled quail egg. Same consistency too…if boiled eggs could freaking move . And, I realized, as Ul-Rott’s shrewd gaze bore into me, that I’d never get away with swallowing the thing whole.

So…I bit.

It took every scrap of my self-control not to spew all over the row of hobnailed boots that had closed in all around me. As to the taste, I had no idea. Couldn’t get past the texture. And the movement . But one thing was for sure. The herbs I’d fed the grub before I plated him provided a most unwelcome grit.

I swallowed. Convulsively. And swallowed again. And only once I was positive I wouldn’t hurl did I manage to say, “Delicious. An offering fit for a chieftain.”

Ul-Rott waved for one of his trusted men to take up the plate. “You have the best nose—what do you make of this so-called poison?”

Gorgul shoved forward as the guard whuffed over the plate, but a sword leveled at his throat stopped him from interfering. The guard thumped his chest and said, “Nothing here but rubyseed powder, Ul-Rott the Spinecrusher.”

Desperately, Gorgul said, “They fed the poison to a single grub…the one they knew you would take.” Though it was obvious he could tell just how ridiculous he sounded as he said it.

A fact that the chieftain didn’t overlook, either. “The one they just happened to know I would choose. The one the human himself just ate.” He turned to Droko and said, “I’d keep an eye on your man. He’s not in his right mind.”

“The honor guard grieves for their fallen shaman,” Droko said. I hadn’t realized an orc could be diplomatic. “As do we all.”