Sailing Ether Tides

Book 2: Dirt Diver’s Dance

Blessings Of The Light Ch: 6

Daisybelle and her pack slipped up to an overhanging ledge and peered down on the narrow, jagged cleft in the mountainside and grumbled softly. There was a voidmaw down in that chasm, right where her quarry had disappeared.

“Crud… cruddy, crud! He’s gonna be super double mad!” The slim, tiny goblin slipped back from the edge, mounted Petunia and rode away as fast as she could, with Nightshade and Jasmine following close behind. Winter was threatening to close in on the peaks early… she hadn’t been a long time tracking those fools down, just a week; but the cold was starting to bite and these mountain peaks were inhospitable to warmth loving, lowland gobbs.

They ran through the sparse pine forests on the heights, gazing longingly down on the lush valley floor and its warm, clinging mists. It would be a long run to a place where she could descend into the valley and begin her journey home.

On a long, craggy road as night gave way to awful morning, the last thing she expected was to hear his majestie’s flute, drifting up from a deliciously shaded, sheltering overhang near the road.

She vaulted from her mount and admonished them to wait on the road as she ducked through the thicket of thorny bushes and jagged stones that surrounded his majestie’s campsite. Dressed in a dark, hooded cloak, he sat looking into his little campfire as he played one of her favorites. The one that inspired her name.

‘Daisybelle’ rangout crisp and clear, cutting the fading night like a blade, unlike the warm, soft sound her papa’s flute usually had…

In any case, she leapt out of the dark with a joyous cry of welcome and delight.

“Papa! What are you doing here?!”

#

“We haven’t seen a sign of that troll. The goblins have been solitary or in small, disorganized groups, since their master fled.” Dannyl reported at lunch with the count and the visiting dignitaries.

“They’re under control, but we need to find out where the little shits are coming from.”

“In that case, if any of our illustrious visitors wish to return home, I can spare enough warriors to assure your safe travel.” Liam announced with satisfaction. He turned his eyes to Becky, seated at the end of the table.

“Any information on the troll from our… other methods?”

“Nope. wherever it’s hiding it must be deep and dark, cause they haven’t found it. I can tell you, if it comes within twenty miles we’ll know…” She grinned sheepishly at the gathered nobles.

“We’ll probably know way, way farther out than that; my calculations suggest that it must have either hidden itself with an obscura charm of great power, or escaped this plane entirely.”

“Witchcraft?” Duke Abed asked sourly, drawing a disappointed glare from his wife.

“Yes, your grace, witchcraft indeed. With a piece of the creature’s body, my brother and sister would be able to find it under almost any circumstance.” She answered calmly.

“Our family arts are reliable and effective, your grace.”

“Yes, excellent!” Julius agreed with everyone, to cut the tension. “I do enjoy a good old fashioned hexing in the afternoon!”

He grinned at the entire table and nodded as if to confirm something to himself. “In that case, I will see about my return journey. With goblins about, my people need their silly gadfly duke back.”

Gabbie almost sobbed at the news, but nodded her head silently, like a big empress. “We should return as well… you must visit us and see the empire!” She cheered a moment later. “Think of the scandal, the pure naughtiness of it! Barbarians sleeping in the very imperial palace…” She shuddered in glee as her gathered ‘barbarian’ friends smiled awkwardly.

“Yes, we’ll be sure to do that…” Grace answered with her usual suave… grace.

“I have a team out there finishing the road repairs now, your return journey should be much less harrowing.” Liam offered. “We’ll send a squad of Ducklings along to help, they’ve proven very reliable.”

There was a soft clatter, as a big lad in light armor in the count’s colors stood up just a little straighter and gave off an aura of intense satisfaction from behind his obscuring visor.

“Yes, very steady indeed.” The countess agreed, smiling at the huge, young captain of the countess’ Ducklings.

#

It was cold on the mountains, super cold… He’d stayed up all night feeding his fire under the rocky overhang just to keep from freezing. Now he was cold, hungry, exhausted and wishing he’d made warmer clothes. Or more clothes, he was wearing everything and still shivering. He played his flute all through the night, just to keep his fingers moving and to stay awake.

Now, the blessed light of the sun was warming the air at last, as full dawn shed its glory over the mountain passes and crags.

He smiled at the lyrics to this one, sweetening his tone a little in pleasure.

There is a flower within my heart…

Daisy, Daisy…

Planted one day by a glancing dart…

Planted by Daisy Bell…

“Papa! What are you doing here?!” Was the only warning he had, before someone plopped into his lap and hugged him around the neck.

He sat there in shock for a moment, with a slim, green skinned, smiling, goblin girl inside his cloak.

#

Daisy realized her fatal mistake far too late, when she looked up, expecting to see her father’s big brown eyes and shaggy black hair. It was her papa, undoubtedly; taller, much larger, much younger and so strange looking, but behind the blue-gray eyes and neatly shorn sandy blonde hair it was him… and he was playing her song on his strange, shiny flute.

The strange, wide eyed boy just kept playing, staring at her in a strange mixture of emotions that made little sense. His features were too alien for her to read his face, so she slipped from his lap politely, bowed in apology and began to dance to his music, picking it up at the chorus.

Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do,

I'm half crazy all for the love of you!

It won't be a stylish marriage,

I can't afford a carriage;

But you'll look sweet upon the seat,

Of a bicycle built for two!

“You… know that song?” He asked in a strange, rhythmic, rumbling accent. His voice was so much deeper than papa’s despite his youth…

He was tall, so tall, and incredibly muscular, even wider and thicker than papa and as solid as the stones of the mountain itself, judging from his lap and the embrace she’d stolen.

His short cropped hair and big light eyes shook her, as his words sank into her befuddled mind.

“Of course… It’s my song! I’m Daisybelle.” She piped up at him.

#

One moment he’d been miserable and cold, desperately waiting for dawn and the warmth of the sun. then without warning, he’d had an armful of someone warm, so soft, so slim and light… and so green. Green eyes, big round green eyes, round green apple cheeks, blushing pink, and perfect pink lips with only a faint greenish cast and a short cascade of dark green hair that was almost black…

All he could think to do was keep playing, it had to be delirium from the cold… that was a thing, surely.

If it was a hallucination he needed to keep playing, only a few more minutes and sunrise would banish the cold… When she slipped gracefully from his lap, bowed elegantly and began to dance and sing one of his secret songs he decided he’d gone mad.

There was no way that after a full day on the road alone, cold, hungry, thirsty and desperate, that this dancing dream was real.

She could barely meet his eyes while he was seated on a boulder, shivering and hunched over… the girl was barely four feet tall, and so slim, almost skinny, with a waist so narrow he could almost wrap his hands around her middle… that thought made him blush and almost faint.

Her snug jacket and pants revealed a plump rounded bottom and very bouncy boobs that threatened to jiggle free of her wide, plunging neckline as she danced.

And the way she danced, barefoot, wild and free, all around his little campfire; her sweet, high, almost childlike voice ringing out clearly in the dawn, singing lyrics even he didn’t really understand but had known for his whole short life underground.

She smiled, showing sharp, white teeth that were just a bit more pointy than he expected and bowed again when the song ended.

“My papa says that an apology is best best when delivered in dance… strange boy.” She sang in her high, musical accent. “I gave my name, tradesies is fairly played!”

She chittered at him and straightened her strange, snug coat with rows of bone buttons and bone shoulder plaques that were definitely decorative, rather than armor. Her cuffs were embroidered with strands of blackberry brambles, picked out in bright colored thread that gradually vanished at the elbows of her strange, marvelous garment. The whole ensemble had the look of a uniform, signifying… something.

His practiced tailor’s eye noticed where her uniform had been snugged, adjusted, taken up and in, to fit her so perfectly, by a very skilled artisan.

“I’m sorry…” He rumbled softly. “You startled me… for a moment I thought… “I’m Gandree…” He thought for a moment about giving no clan name or lying, but compromised instead. It felt right, somehow it fit, considering his unique facility with Wards and inscriptions… “I’m Gandree Ward, pleased to meet you, Daisy Bell.”

“Nope, Daisy’s my mom, Bell’s her sister, I’m Daisybell!” She chirped merrily, her little bare feet still sketching as dance by his dying fire. “You’ve got two names! That’s weird… Won’t your family run out of names? What’s a Gandree? Can my doggies come into camp? It’s still cold-cold out!”

The young dwarf couldn’t keep up with her rapid fire questions and nodded at some point, which she decided was ‘doggie approval’.

Gandree’s hand sought his axe at his belt when three huge, shaggy shapes emerged from the woods at some silent command. Three massive wolfhounds prowled into the camp, sniffing around suspiciously, nosing at his unused bed of branches.

He’d have burned the green boughs, but they smoked too terribly and threw balls of flaming pitch around as they slowly smoldered without heat.

Gandree felt a strange sense of disapproval and mild disgust coming from the creatures as they nosed around his camp.

“Petunia says those are pitchpine boughs, if you sleep on those, you’ll get all sticky and gross…” Daisybell giggle at him, while her dance continued. “Are you done playing? Cause I’m not done dancing, Gandree; the boy with two names, who talks like a person.”

“Just Gandree… please… And, forgive me… you can speak to these creatures?” He asked, marveling at the big warm, shaggy hounds.

“They’re my familiars…” Her voice got even higher pitched as she leapt into the pack of mutts snuggling and mauling them fiercely. “Good doggies!”

“Fascinating…” he murmured, as bits and pieces began to fall into place. The angle of a tail, a subtle shifting of weight and a snuffle in an ear… it all had meaning, and was there to be ‘heard’, if he just opened his… something that wasn’t his ears, eyes or nose. Just like that he could hear the ‘conversation’ that was silently happening all around him.

“This guy’s dense…” Nightshade grumbled, as he stalked around the perimeter of the camp. “No food, either. Can we eat him?”

Petunia took a sniff of the strange male’s butt and agreed. “He’s clean, no parasites… not even fleas or worms.” She liked his hand gently and panted, the boy seemed nervous suddenly, for some reason…

“He smells scared all the sudden… is something near?”

“Nope.” the big black dog rumbled from the edge of the overhang. “All good.”

“Wait… he couldn’t possibly…” Jasmine sniffed the breeze and glanced at Petunia, who was shoving her head under the boy’s hand hoping for an ear rub that was not materializing. The boy still seemed frightened and very uncomfortable…

“Petunia, if he doesn’t start rubbing your ears, you should bite him.” She complained. “Give him like, five heartbeats.”

He immediately began with the fingerstuff, doing his job as a primate. Jasmine sniffed with satisfaction and growled in response.

“This guy can hear us, boss.”

“Really?” The strangely cute girl giggled and bounced on her toes, in honest and gleeful joy.

“Aren’t you glad I didn’t let you eat him up?” She demanded of the big black dog.

Jasmine sighed at her mistress and nudged her with a wide, wolfy forehead. “You did no such thing, boss… The eating option is still available.”

“You’ll do no such thingiee!” The girl squealed imperiously. “I forbid you to hurts him… I’m bringing him home home, to king papa!”

She stamped her foot and that was final. Her bright green eyes landed back on Gandree who was still rubbing the big wolfhound’s ear for all he was worth.

“Why’d you pretend stupid, beast talker? That was sneaky sneaky!” She huffed as she prowled over, looking him up and down appraisingly. “King papa will know what to do about you…”

“I can’t just… Your friends wanted to eat me!” He complained, but he kept up with the fingies…

“Nightshade only suggested that… as an option.” Jasmine offered helpfully. “I’d rather not eat talking meat… that seems very… uncivilized.”

“He’s good at finger stuff tooo…” Petunia moaned under his hands.

“That settles it!” Daisybelle chirped. “We head home home to see king papa and Gandree Lotsanames comes withsies!”

“Why should I trust you…” He asked weakly.

“I told you, I’m Daisybelle…” She answered with a confused look in her eye. When he just sat there looking dumb and playing with her mutt’s ear, she pointed at the lushly flowering and fruiting blackberry vines, painstakingly and realistically embroidered on her coat cuffs.

“Daisybelle…”

When he still looked confused she sighed elaborately and bowed again, with a put upon look on her little face. “King papa Ghnash is my papa… I’m princess Daisybelle, warg knight of the goblin king.”

#

Krulguth smelled warg… and goblin girl… and something else, like man, but not. Like the bearded stoneskins, but not, something different, and the same… either way, meat was meat and he was so hungry. He stalked the trail cautiously; on these barren heights a shift in the wind could turn predator into prey in a moment. He’d learned what fear was, again… after forgetting all about it when he’d become troll Krulguth, leaving his cowardly goblin self far behind.

Since he’d eaten that crawling inchy-pinchy that had been so determined to eat him, he’d left fear behind, save the fear of fire.

Fire burned, fire seared, fire left him not whole and lesser… It still burned, the flaming demon’s brand. He remembered fear now; and wanted to make these fresh meats feel it, instead.

#

“We still need a healer or medic and a journeyman supervisor…” Perry grumbled in Rio’s cottage above the lakeshore, overlooking Wilf’s house.

“I’m a qualified lay healer…” Lindsey mumbled quietly. “I never learned the sacred spells and couldn’t use them if I had… but I’m still a trained and certified field medic.”

She blushed and hung her head to hide her face, thinking of her lost Contract, so swiftly forgotten.

Harry grinned like the cat that just figured out how to get into the creamery. He clapped a gentle hand down on the slender girl’s shoulder and sighed with pure happiness. “That means, if we can find a supervisor, we’re all good…”

“But who?” Barry asked, as he scooted over and sat closer to Lindsey. Harry met his eyes significantly and made an exaggerated yawn in silent pantomime… twice. “Do you need a nap, bro?”

“No… Ok, maybe. You’re exhausting.” He sighed.

Lindsey sighed as well, and followed it up with an exaggerated yawn of her own, that somehow became a mighty stretch, which ended with her slender arms wrapped around the wide, muscular shoulders of Barry, who had no clue what just happened.

“We’ll workshop that… you two rest, you look… tired still.” Harry offered, as he chivvied his two brothers out of the little pink stucco house. “...and someone should check your bandage.” He called,as the door closed, leaving the pair alone, again. After a few precious minutes just sitting there, Lindsey pulled herself away from him and sighed just a little.

“Your brother is right, we should check and re-dress your wound and put you to bed… you lost more blood than you let on, I think. You seem pale.”

Like all the Ward houses, near the front door, back door and kitchen there were prominently marked cabinets, emblazoned with the serpent wound staff of the healer’s and pharmacists arts.

Each one was fully stocked with a cornucopia of precious and rare things, beside all the usual utter mundanities, like bandages and the bent metal clips used to secure them; sewing kits with clean sharp needles beside vials of astringent and cleaning solutions.

Among the treasures were packets of fresh Violet Salve, bearing the maker’s mark of the Ginger Dreadnought… the finest available.

Beside those were waxed paper boxes of the apricot flavored, chewy nuggets that Adventurers and cavalry swore by for both people and horses.

When eaten after vigorous activity, they aided recovery in a number of subtle ways. The humble, rather tasty treats prevented cramps after exertions or battle, encouraged users to drink more water, increased blood pressure and improved blood flow overall.

Other, stranger things she left alone, taking only what she would need for the job at hand.

“Uhh. it’s on my upper thigh… like… really upper thigh…” Barry mumbled, when he saw where this was going.

“We just discussed this. As team medic, officially… drop your pants and lay back.” Her grin of delight undercut her professional credentials, but no one was there to hear Barry’s complaints.

Even with that stupid grin plastered all over her beautiful, sweet face, she was brisk and professional as she dressed the wound. It was a long, ragged gash near his crotch, perilously close to some things she was certain were still working just fine.

More concerning, it had come very close to the major artery and only good fortune had prevented a deadly dangerous injury. She briskly and gently cleaned the injury and dressed it with a fresh bandage… that had to go around some very ticklish places, while he was forced to lay there and blush ferociously.

#

“Sorry, boys… I must follow my duke’s commands.” Sir Kermal answered gently. “I’d be proud to have you, but I’m headed to Port Erasmus.. and I doubt you parents want you hunting slavers around the south Shallow Sea.”

“No, probably not…” Harry mumbled. “We’re gonna have to sign up for street patrols and gobb hunting at the guild hall…”

“Don’t feel down kid…” Kermal sighed while ruffling the huge lad’s hair. That only worked ‘cause he was sitting down. “Most bands start out with minor monster hunts and local irritants. Saving a farmer’s sheep from a wallowbear or goblin band isn’t glamorous, but it’s honest work.”

He patted the disconsolate giant on the shoulder. “There’s monsters aplenty out there, and more dungeons than most people think.”

Kermal watched the kids head off, three big, young lads marching along in light armor, headed for the Adventure guild, just angrily hoping a goblin would stumble in their path on the way.

#

“Clear the room, on pain of death!” The High Deacon’s voice roared out, scattering the human faithful before him and sending them scrambling for the doors.

Once only the blessed remained, the richly robed man seated on the highest throne in the cathedral spoke:

“Read that again. That is not correct.” Grand Pontiff Luminar the seventeenth gasped.

“Omar of the hundred eyes has been defeated?” The scribe read his message again, extending his eyestalks on pseudopods, in case his vessel’s flesh eyes were deceiving him. “Yes, it says defeated… by this necropolis lord and his army of crypt dregs and wights. Blessing of the light be upon your holiness…”

“Impossible… He was in a fresh vessel, he should have been…” He gasped as his own decrepit vessel wheezed and lurched around him. “I’ll need a new one soon too. Fetch me the Fleshsculptor… She will have insights into this undead pest.”

He sagged back, disgusted by the weakness of his decaying human mount. All these years, feeding his disgusting mortal appetites and guiding him to the heights of power, now he was failing just when true success was in reach.

Pontiff Luxor on the sealed world, behind the void gate, was simply gone. She had been thriving for so long, anchoring his own rise in this world. Now his sister was gone, seeming to have been snatched from the eternal ether, as if she had tasted mortal death…

That impossibility alone was terrifying, now a few short mortal years later, this unknown, nameless, undead haunt had appeared… and begun snuffing out his lesser servitors… permanently. So far as he could discern, none of their lights remained in the eternal ether…

In the interminable ‘time’ it took for his servant to arrive, Lumos contemplated impossibility. It had been rumored among the dwellers outside, that some new thing had appeared, done things that were impossible and then been snuffed out…

He sniffed his vessel’s nostrils in disgust. The idea that an immortal could be ‘slain’ was ridiculous and beyond the mere impossible. Luxor still existed out there… somewhere beyond his reach…

#

“Blessings of the light be upon you, Grand Pontiff… I await your desires.” Fleshsculptor moaned eagerly through her several, sewn together living human faces. Her preference was for young females… or very young males, but those were so in demand she’d been making due with older stock for a while.

This was a golden opportunity to acquire some new living humans to work with. Hopefully a brace of young ones that were old enough to feel terror and horror properly and last a bit longer.

“I desire your insights into mortality and the nature of mortal undeath…” He clattered his mount’s bony fingers on the gilt arm of his throne, bejeweled rings chiming softly on his skeletal, blue veined hand. “We have a new problem, one that is proving resistant to my clerics’ mortal sorceries and has even engulfed a few of my lesser servants… somehow.”

“The new lich thing and its necropolis of shadows? I have already begun investigating… and have received an interesting thing or two.” She wrung several of her hands together in glee, as one of her servants brought a finely wrought trunk forward from a nearby transept. The undead hulk shambled forward bearing the heavy box in its gray green arms with ease.

“Zombie ogre…” She said with some pride. “Very good for carrying things. I put a living human brain in there to keep it moving… I’ll be needing more of those…” She murmured greedily from her weeping, tear stained faces.

When the box landed with a soft thud, Fleshsculptor slithered over on her serpent tail of braided human muscles, wrapped in a patchwork sheath of human skin, all sewn together with intricate care.

She opened the chest and drew out a garment of some kind, decorated with many, many human eyes, peering out from the cloak of fine, soft, human leather. Each eye looked about and moved, blinking and staring in horror at the world around it with silent dread.

“This is Omar of the hundred eyes…” She announced quietly. “The mortal, undead tormented construct of Omar’s remaining consciousness and Will.”

Luxor sat back and chuckled a soft, wheezing laugh. “Impossible.” Was all he said.

“The wight that did this left him no mouth to speak, no muscles nor bones, no motive force or spark of Agency…He is a mortal, undead magical tool now, one that will be destroyed eventually, even if just by rotting away under the weight of time.” Fleshsculptor whispered in sublime delight.

“Mighty Omar, the all seeing is now a simple work of mortal craft… and a masterpiece of revenge. He remains conscious, aware and utterly impotent, completely subjugated to the Will of the wearer and unable to touch this world.” She giggled again, with true pleasure in the awful, laughing chorus.

“He suffers as only mortals can and will be no more, once this construct is no more… Genius, and impossible.”

She dropped the once mighty demon to the floor carelessly and dug in her box again. This time she produced a strangely shaped object of bones, skin and sinew, strung on a framework of metal and wood. A face stared out in mute horror and agony from the round body of the thing.

“Mortals call this a ‘banjo’.” She dared instruct the Pontiff in his throne room, her faces shining with happiness as she strummed a discordant note from the instrument.

“What care I, for mortal music?” Lumos demanded, tiring of these mad games.

“This is Knisinns, the stolen face, your missing first assassin. He too has been… remade into a prison for his… now mortal essence. These are the bones and sinew, and this is the face of his immortal spirit, made flesh and crafted with devious arts and some magic I fail to recognize… But it is a work of a mortal’s hands… that is certain.”

Her glee was so great she began to ooze bodily fluids from several of her orifices onto the waxed marble floor.

“I simply must meet this artisan, and flay his secrets from his soul...”

#