RE: [13th Age] The Eyes of the Stone Thief
The Assassin
The waiting was tedious. Boring even. Hugh sighed a quiet sigh. He definitely was not happy with where this assignment had ended up. His first attempt was cut violently short and now they were here. Hugh looked around from his vantage point in the branches of a powerful oak tree. The ominous sounds of the woods and the buzzing of insects were all around him. The rotten vermin in the camp below were anything but quiet. Hugh passionately hated Orcs.
The great island of Omen, in the very centre of the midland sea, was anything but tedious. Monsters, beasts, giant spiders and worse, this was not a place for a slummer like Hugh. He’d take the oversized rats of Shadow Port over the stingers in this place any day. Swiftly and quietly, Hugh squashed a bug the size of his thumb against the tree right before the parasite could land on Hugh’s big nose.
Now, it looked like the tedious waiting would fast be over as excitement was washing over the camp below. The orcs down there were preparing to fight. One of the lieutenants had challenged the captain and the two were banging their iron bracer against their axes to signal the start of the ritual combat.
That’s what happens in a desolate place like this. The men get restless and it would be hard for a leader to keep them in check if they’re this scared. They’ll want to go back home to what they know. Murdering innocent farm kids in their case. Hugh gritted his teeth and silently swore he would singlehandedly murder every last orc here if they wouldn’t kill each other first.
The lieutenant had quite a few followers, but would be no match for the Captain in single combat. At least, Hugh hoped the younger orc would not be up to the task, as the captain was Hugh’s mark. He would not claim the prize if he would not be the one making the kill. But the captain was wielding Festerwound, a legendary giant axe gifted to him by the Orc Lord himself. He would not be losing that honour. Not until Hugh would slit his throat.
Then, everything happened at once. A great rumbling and slithering noise came from the camp below as the Orcs were screaming. War cries at first, then screams of pain and fear as the warcamp was shaking and trembling on the shifting grounds. Trees small and great were falling, tents were collapsing and the lieutenant’s men were now in open mutiny against their captain as they were hacking their great axes into those still loyal to the leader.
The entire camp was now falling into the ground, collapsing in on itself as the very forest floor closed in around them and was about to swallow all the orcs like a great maw.
Hugh assessed his chances, deemed them far too low. Regardless, he leapt into a falling tree a few yards over and silently hopped a few branches down. The old assassin muttered a few words for his Prince, like a prayer of sorts, and swung from a low branch and behind the skull adorned banner of the Bloodreavers. Unseen, Hugh sprang past the orc captain wielding that red and silver axe, plunged his knife in the back of the captain’s neck. Cursing his luck as he lost grip of his favourite blade he jumped back into a falling tree, leaping from branch to branch until he was well away from the weirdly sinking area.
Later, when reporting the successful hit to the guildmaster, Hugh did not expect the man to believe everything Hugh had witnessed. “A living dungeon eating an orcish warcamp? That sounds unlikely.” The guildmaster would say. Hugh knew damn well what he saw but decided not to share all the details. Still later, spending his new coin in the Scurvy Mermaid in Shadow Port on an expensive Santa Cora Red, a cloaked man with a broad smile unexpectedly grabbed the seat next to him, leaned over knowingly and whispered. “I have a new job for you, Hugh.”
"I think I'll have seconds.."
-Chronomangor; Eater of Time. ∞
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