Tinkermage (Book 2)
Read Tinkermage (Book 2) Online
Authors: Kenny Soward
Tinkermage
GnomeSaga II
Kenny Soward
Copyright © 2014. All rights reserved. This electronic book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Edits by J.M. Martin
Copy Edits by Amanda Shore
Cover Art by Arman Akopian
Cover Design by Shawn T. King
Map by Todd A. Gamble
Worldwide Rights
Created in the United States of America
Published by Ragnarok Publications |
www.ragnarokpub.com
Editor-In-Chief: Tim Marquitz | Creative Director: J.M. Martin
Tinkermage
Book Two of the GnomeSaga
For Mark, Joe, Mike, David and Kay
Nikselpik Nur had always been plagued by bad dreams—heart-pounding, rough-and-tumble excursions through the darkest regions of his mind, like wallowing in dank sewers beneath clean thoroughfares paved with strong ideals. His dreams were likely the cause of his paranoia and his ready willingness to make light even in the dourest situation.
But there was truth to what lurked within those sordid recesses. His past, of course. Real, dangerous, unforgiving. Endured.
Lived
. Unlike most other civilized gnomes whose dreams were mere reflections of simpler worries—job security, academic prowess, wedding plans—Nikselpik’s dreams were more akin to possessive entities with agendas of their own, Hells-bent on grinding him down to a quivering nub of sanity.
That was on any normal day, when waking up was the only thing that saved him. But now, not even that was possible, thanks to the injuries he’d sustained in the wizard’s duel with First Wizard (“First Bastard” more like) Raulnock—his mind registered only vague flashes of magick and fire—and his
addiction
: the bugs… oh, the bugs.
There were other times during his recovery where he caught glimpses of things happening around him, moments when he would open his eyes and recognize a friend or a lover or his sister. Never mind their names.
Perhaps he’d find his way home soon, but for now, Nikselpik was trapped in this immutable darkness, and he clung to his sanity like a child to his favorite stuffed toy.
Futtering Hells
.
And the worst part was that these memories, these dreams, were all jumbled together in spite of his best efforts to put them in their rightful places in his history. Like oil on the fingers when trying to button buttons, the connections were hard to make. Damn near impossible in all this gloom.
Survive. Proceed.
Nikselpik stood up and wiped filth from his eyes. It stunk in there. Like shit and worse. Like the waters in a stagnant harbor filled with the worst kinds of detritus washed up around the moorings: dead fish, piss, and whatever garbage had been thrown from ship decks that day. It was quiet but for the drippings. The
drip, drip, drip
that threatened to drive him insane if he stayed there too long.
“Gods, I hate my mind,” he mumbled, pulling more stuff
from his straggly hair and pitching it into the slowly running morass of sludge nearby. Boots soaked all the way through to his feet. Nikselpik waited for a chill to pass before taking stock of his situation. A tunnel—more specifically, a sewer tunnel—stretched ahead and behind. The same muck that ran down the center trough dripped down the walls. A seedy, green light filtered down from above, egging on his growing headache.
Everything vivid. Everything as real as waking. Nikselpik’s hands shook. His forearms itched through his grime-soaked bandages. He instinctively went for the canister on his belt to fetch out a bug. Only there was no canister.
“Of course not.”
He stepped out of the muck and onto a stone walkway, crept along the incline for no other reason than
up
seemed better than
down
. Perhaps up there,
way
up there, he’d find his way through to a clean, natural light. Wakefulness. A reprieve. If he was lucky, the waiting arms of someone he loved.
But he’d not count on it. Never had. His life of an adventurer and dungeon crawler had reaped many rewards but very few friends; facing terrors alone was something he’d grown used to a long time ago.
For long hours, he navigated the dark passages of his mind, chambers ripe with groveling horrors and the ghosts of those left behind. Most of them were easily avoided except for those who could talk… those who could whisper.
“You left us to rot,”
they said, or, “
You’ll pay, Nik. Oh, you’ll pay…”
or,
“How does it feel, Nik, to be a victim of your own folly?”
Nikselpik shuddered against their chill words, put his shoulders down, his eyes to the floor, and moved ahead… always up, up, up.
He stopped to rest in one chamber, a particularly stinky one. He said, “Ah, what’s this? Shit soup spiced with rotten fish. My favorite.” But in truth, he wanted to cry. The corpse of a young woman leaned against the wall. Her hair was the color of a fresh orange, matted and dirty, but still that outrageous shade she’d always worn, a contrast to her sunken cheeks and hollowed eye sockets.
“Jezz. Damn it. I should have known you’d be here. Will you curse me too?”
The wormy, white lips remained still, the rot-darkened teeth too. The truth was, he missed Jezz. She was one of the few mercenaries, a student, really, that he could call friend. And he’d betrayed her…
But then he remembered. She’d forgiven him. Yes, that was the truth. In some deep cavern at the feet of a mighty machine, her ghost had smiled upon him, touched him, and forgiven.
Nikselpik leaned against the wall and rubbed his temples. “Thank you, Jezz.”
And then he noticed the thing in the corner of the chamber that hung suspended in a web of muck, the spindly-legged thing with the single black eye and gaudy, twin pincers.
“What are you doing here…?” Nikselpik stepped in front of Jezz as if to protect her, lifted the red rubies he miraculously held, one in each hand, gazed longingly at their perfect facets, and then looked at the
thing
again. “You have no right to the Satin Seals,” he told it, accused it. “You weren’t even there—”
It scuttled forward, sliding off the slimy web, and pressed itself down as if to leap, its distended belly squelching in the muck. Nikselpik shoved the stones into an inner pocket and backed away, dove to the side as the thing lunged for him with an ear-piercing squeal.
Nikselpik found himself in a side tunnel and slipped and slid his way to a lower level, turned left, and ran as fast as he could until the thing’s chattering faded. He found himself in another dark pipe, leaning against the wall to catch his breath. But he knew better than to stop.
And they won’t let me go up. They won’t let me leave.
Whispers followed him as he worked his way over to a parallel tunnel and began ascending once more. It wouldn’t be easy, but he’d not be herded like some domestic cow. He hobbled on, turning his feet at odd angles as the incline grew steeper to keep from falling on his face and sliding all the way back down to the bottom.
He grunted and slapped his hand against the wall to guide himself, dragging his fingernails through layers of slime. Finally, he reached another chamber, level and true, and he stood up straight and stretched his lower back. A grimace forced its way past his lips.
“Let’s see what you have for me then, eh?” And then he stepped inside. “A goblet of Perry’s Maze would be nice. Surely, there’s
something
good up here in the old noggin. Can’t be all doom and gloom…”
A shadow slid through the far green haze, followed by a blossom of cold air that cut through him so fast it set his teeth chattering. A snake’s tail rattled. Something hissed words, incantations. Old swamp magick. Close, so very close.
Nikselpik shut his eyes and gulped. He knew this one. The Dread Witch, Beyrthiz. He’d fought her in the Giyipcias Swamp for an ancient pair of thaumaturgic elven eyes that gave the holder far vision. But the far vision wouldn’t help him now.
“Beyrthiz. Surely, you’ve forgotten our little row by now. It was such a long time ago.” He drew a long blade from the folds of his robe. “Let’s be friends.”
He was met with silence. No, wait, what was that slithering in the muck? And was that a caught breath and whispered words? The words of a vicious spell? Or perhaps she was preparing one of her poisoned arrows, smiling all the while…
Nikselpik rankled in agitation. He stepped forward, shaking his fist. “I won them fair and square, you conceited worm. If you want to test me again, then come.”
He searched for his wellspring, but it was not there. Luckily, his knife
was,
whatever good it would do him. Yet his normal bravado wavered, his stomach edgy with fear. His arms raged beneath the bandages, skin twitching and crawling.
He stood on the precipice and held his ground.
A hiss caressed his ears. Suddenly, she was there, gliding from the gloom on her slithery torso.
“Have you seen far with my eyes, little one? The eyes you stole?”
A clawed hand encroached from the gloom into a paltry swath of light. Needle fingers of black chitin spread like the pointed leaves of an exotic, poisonous plant.
Nikselpik whipped the blade back and forth as he stepped backwards…
“
Return THEM!”
The whisper exploded, wrapping around him like a snake’s coil. The hand shot forth, five points of death headed for his heart.
Nikselpik stabbed wildly, slipped, and fell hard on his arse at the edge of the trough. In a blink, he was sliding down the slick mess, his feet up in the air and his head plowing through six inches of liquid filth before he was dumped onto a flat landing.
He grunted and rolled over on his stomach, got his hands beneath him and pushed himself to his knees. He looked up the slope expecting the witch to follow, but nothing came, thank whatever gods existed in the world of dreams.
With a groan, he stood. “Why do I have to be so exhausted and broke down in my own futtering dream?” But he knew exactly why. It was the bugs—or rather, the lack thereof—which had sickened his body and drained his wellspring. He craved just one little critter, one teensy beetle to bond with, to share the intimacy of the alchemical reaction, to fill the hole where his self-confidence should have been.
But Nikselpik would never have another bug again, not if he wanted to live. And he didn’t need to swear an oath to be sure. He was stubborn to a fault, prideful too, once he set his mind to something.
Just need to get out of here. Need to find… a moment of peace.
Nikselpik turned and gasped. A vast lake lay spread before him, its waters the color of pitch, the surface as still a dead man’s breath, devouring the murky light from above.
Is this the peace I seek?
There was indeed a calm fortitude about the place. Why, then, did he feel uneasy? Why were the hairs on the back of his neck rising and goosebumps blossoming across his shoulders?
And the itch, the futtering
ITCH!
He rubbed his arms together, but they only infuriated the sensation, now a blaze of wrath beneath the bandages. He wanted to tear off the dressings and rake his fingernails across his skin until the fever stopped, and if he flayed himself in the process, it would still be a relief.
A stench rose from the waters, different from the tunnel seepage, rancid like a ten-day-old corpse, a sweet, festering ichor that nearly knocked him down. His head swam with dizziness. His hands began to shake. No, this was nothing he’d ever experienced before, the ageless stench of what could only be a dark and terrible god.
His pessimistic side saw the humor in it. After all, he’d always craved power. Well, here it was. He should be dancing a jig at his newfound friend. But, in truth, he’d always been a futtering fool, more lucky than skilled. Never half as talented as he’d like to believe. So how could something so dreadful have taken up residence here in his simple mind?
And then he knew.
He’d smelled it before during the battle with the amorph collective mind and the witch. He’d seen the
thing
in the lake. This lake. This
thing
.
Oh no…
It rose from the murky brine, a massive column of twisting shadow, shedding tons of brackish water as it towered over him. Dripping, its blind eyes gazed down on him with an indifferent hunger. Cold hatred rolled off the beast and over him. He was nothing to it, a tiny morsel to be sucked, meat off bone, before it devoured all of Sullenor.
Nikselpik opened his mouth to scream, but the awful terror had taken his voice.