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  Rats, Magic, and Thieves:

  Skull of Oghren

  Tuomas Vainio

  Skull of Oghren. Copyright © 2015 Tuomas Vainio.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without a written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Please contact the author at [email protected].

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue:

  Chapter 1:

  Chapter 2:

  Chapter 3:

  Chapter 4:

  Chapter 5:

  Chapter 6:

  Chapter 7:

  Chapter 8:

  Chapter 9:

  Chapter 10:

  Chapter 11:

  Chapter 12:

  Chapter 13:

  Chapter 14:

  Epilogue:

  Prologue:

  There is a city that never stops growing as one generation after another continues to lay the next layer of bricks over the foundations of old. These bricks continue to pile ever higher as such is the way of the city, the very rules of its life within its boundaries. From chimneys to towers and pillars, they all compete to reach ever higher and to finally pierce the sky above.

  Under all those constructions aspiring to be as thin and sharp as daggers, a multitude of flags and ropes wave and dance with the smallest changes of the wind. Further down pieces of cloth ranging from nobles' coats to peasants' undergarments provide their flickering shade from the scorching midday Sun, and on the streets themselves; you can never hide from the sounds of the city. The sounds of human life itself; the cries of merchants, the tattling of wives, and underneath it all the steady rhythm of thousand boots stomping against the battered bricks and stones of the streets.

  Travellers who come to the city often become stunned by how life itself seems to breath out onto the streets, how the city stands as a glimmering monument of human endeavour, brilliance, and persistence. A city of happy long lives and plentiful opportunities.

  Yet their impression remains nothing but a façade. The city has been built of bricks, and bricks rarely are anything but burnt blocks of clay or misshaped rocks. Those bricks come as brittle as they are heavy. Therefore, there will always be that regrettable day when a single brick can no longer bear the weight resting on its back. A day of grief and sorrow as the families and friendships are torn and broken along with the very streets of the city.

  But the people of the city have grown hardy over the hundreds of centuries. They know how all people are bound to die and disappear from memories on one day sooner or later, but they also know how the city will always remain after them. Thus regardless of the sorrow and grief the ever shifting city might bring; the people that remain will continue to lay the next layer of bricks over the ruins of old. And as the local saying goes: 'What tumbled down can be put up again, what tumbled down only reshaped the streets below, what tumbled down only gave chance to birth something new.'

  And of course as the city keeps changing, the travellers and merchants who come to visit are often shocked to hear how their maps are no longer up to date. But how could those maps ever remain accurate? The city itself is almost like a thick and murky red and grey soup slowly bubbling inside a half-buried cauldron of a mountain that has spilled towards the sea. The bubbles on the surface will grow and burst on their own within the ancient walls. Therefore the best anyone could hope is for the local cartographer's guild to remain up to date with the recent collapses and reconstructions. After all, it is what they get paid for by the ruling Council of Magisters.

  Chapter 1:

  Where this story begins is nearly at the edge of the city itself. Near the jagged mountain and wall that separates the city from the valley surrounding it. At an edge of a city block that has almost imploded on itself. The vestiges of the residents of old still linger as the painted doors and glass windows still present a pretty frame to a ruined painting. Thus it stands almost no different from the nearby collection of homes and stores. Yet it is the tiny gaps between buildings that reveal the truth of collapsed walls through sightings of piles of rubble and broken bricks.

  Yet this ruined block of former homes and business is not entirely sealed off, a single narrow passage remains to lead into the former courtyard surrounded by tall walls that stand erect out nothing but their stubbornness to tumble over. It is a dead end, and it is where one particular young boy has been driven to. A boy little over seven summers old. Franticly, he tries to see where and how to climb up as well as a place to hide as the sound of the heavy boots grow ever louder behind him. The sound of those steel heels hitting against the bricks and stones, the clinking of the chain mails under their red cloaks and tunics.

  He is just a boy. His heart is beating too hard, he cannot think straight enough to act, and the heavy purses he has stolen weigh him further down into the dirty puddle of brick dust and rain water. He is but a rat caught in an unwitting trap.

  The boy musters his courage to turn around and face his pursuers, their gold embroidered red cloaks, their pointy and shiny halberds, their tall hats held firm under their chins, and most of all; those well groomed moustaches under their big noses and red cheeks dyed in the colour of near exhaustion.

  It may have seemed like a comic sight for those eight armed and big men to chase after one little boy who somehow managed to linger roughly two steps ahead of them, but now the chase is over. They and the boy knew it in their very bones. They are to reclaim the stolen goods and to throw the thieving boy into the salt mines under the foot of the city. The law was clear and just in that regard; 'If one breaks the laws by means of theft, one's fate is the lick of salt until all debts are paid.' It mattered not whether the thief's visage was that of a street rat or that of a highest lord within the walls of the city, all thefts were paid in salt dug underneath.

  The guards take their moment to catch their breaths. They are confident, they start to grin and laugh at the little thieving rat they have caught in its own unwitting trap. But under their puff of confidence, they still recall clearly all the tricks the boy had pulled to shake them off his tail. All the things he threw, and all the problems he caused on the way from ladies' honour to turned over cabbage carts. Thus these eight big men slowly spread around him and the puddle he stands on, all while the boy can only watch them do so. And honestly, what could a little boy do while standing in the middle of a dirty puddle? Throw those bags of coins into the air and try to flee? The guardsmen know better by now, and they would only make him pick up and wipe each and every coin clean once properly chained.

  'Just surrender kid. You got nowhere left to run.' The booming voice roars against the crooked stubborn walls of the inner yard.

  The boy swallows, loudly. He is not much to look at, pale skinned and one eyed, with nothing but dirty ragged clothes under a makeshift patched cloak along his eye patch, and of course those bags and pouches of gold held against his tiny chest. The boy just stares back unflinchingly. He lets some of the bags fall down as he raises his hand to casts aside the eye patch, thus revealing an empty hole surrounded by scarred claw marks.

  The guards around him burst into hearty laughter. 'Is supposed to scare us? Whatever took your eye is coming to get us?' The eight men are almost flexing their own muscles out of confidence.

  The boy shuts his eye, before shouting back with his timid young voice: 'I ain't got nowhere to run, but ye do!'

  The laughter of the eight guards falls silent as a teal dot
begins to faintly glow inside the boy's empty eye socket. A dot that begins to grow brighter, to burn with an eerie glow of fox fire. And then along the ruined walls that surround them, pairs of such glowing dots begin to pop up from the crack on the walls, over the piles of rubble, and even beyond. Those eerie lights surround them like the hungry eyes of a thousand rats. The guards legs turn shaky as their ears become filled with the sounds of growing squeaks and tiny claws scratching against the rugged surfaces of the bricks.

  Over two thousand eyes stare directly at the eight guardsmen, and these guardsmen only have their halberds to rely on. Weapons enchanted to be sharp and durable enough to cut through brick walls if the need be. Each of them has spent at least a decade to master their weapon to earn the right wear their red cloaks. Yet the unspoken question inside their minds is that what good is a halberd against a swarm of over a thousand rats? Their hearts are touched with the icy grip of fear. They recall the stories told to them as children by the fires and bed sides. They know of the fury of Rat-Kings, of the bloody bones they leave behind of those who dare cross with them on their territory. Their faces have turned pale and their mighty moustaches have nearly fallen off with the rattle of their jaws.

  The boy shouts out again before them: 'Run ye fools, run fer yer life.' The eight men need no further encouragement, they turn around and dash out of the heart of the ruins. They dare not to look back, their cloaks wave behind them as they vanish back to surrounding streets.

  A hat and two halberds linger in their wake along the narrow passage leading to the streets. The boy sighs in relief. The glow in his eye socket fades away, and with it, so does the shadowy figures of rats on the walls. The boy's arms lack the strength to hold the weight of the bags and pouches of gold, and so he too soon after falls into the dirty pond of rain water.

  The sages say that all humans are born with a touch of magic within their hearts, and just as it is with one's height; it takes time for that touch to reach its full potential. If the heart is not given its time to grow, that touch of magic could turn into hungry beasts that simply devours one from within.

  A shape begins to move inside a nearby ruined building. The shape stretching its arms upwards and clumsily waddles onwards until it finds a crack on the wall to look through. The large brown eye is barely noticeable from the outside as it scours the inner yard. It blinks once as it notices the boy's body on the puddle of water, and several times more after the eye focuses on the open pouches and bags of gold. This shape hidden within the darkness of the ruins grumbles in the most dissatisfied manner before retreating from the lone crack on the wall.

  The creature turns around and huddles onwards without the need of guidance from the lone beam of light illuminating the pitch-black darkness of the abandoned home. The creature's sharp nails scratch against the bricks until he has found the right spot. The wall against the narrow passage. The beastly humanoid slams its hands against the walls, and exerts his strength with a bellowing groan.

  The wall before him creaks as the bricks slowly tear loose from the plaster that ties them together. The whole wall comes tumbling down, and piles into the narrow passage. The humanoid rat basks in the faint glimmer of the Sun. His whiskers shake off the dust, and he steps clear off the debris and heads towards the inner yard. The were-rat’s massive tail whips backwards, and slams against a support pillar not far from where he burst through, and the whole building comes crashing down onto the narrow passage sealing it off for good from the street.

  On the other side of the passage, another humanoid sized rat carefully pushes open the crooked wooden window shutters and peaks out to see what has transpired. This rat first gazes down, right, and finally left towards the newly sealed path. This were-rat shakes it's head before jumping down from the second floor window. Naturally, the bricks around the small window do not withstand rat's mass and those tumble down with her as well.

  The two humanoid rats gaze upon each other silently. The first of the were-rats wears the merchant guild's yellow tunic with puffy tattered sleeves, the vest above it is orange and decorated with black embroidery, and the trousers the were-rat wears are nothing but stained brown leather. The second wears a brown and rather moth eaten monk's robe, and her head is shaved bald of its natural fur.

  Even with their hunched backs; the pair of giant rats could easily stand as tall as any adult man. With the thickness of their large shoulders and the length of their long and flexible tails, they are quite the menacing sight. They could easily dwarf any man daring to stand stand in front of them, they could almost tear them apart like twigs. But regardless of their beastly vermin shape, the Monk still lingers as the slightly more feminine of the two, slightly leaner, and somehow gentler to the eye than the Merchant.

  'Squeak, squeak. What a foolish boy. It would have been cheaper to get you out of the salt mines.' The Merchant rat leaps to the boy, and grabs the boy's hair with its clawed fingers almost faster than the eye can follow. He pulls the boy out of the dirty puddle, and dangles the limp and unconscious body in front of him. 'You ruined a meeting place -- squeak, squeak -- I ought to just bite. Deliver your just punishment right here and now.'

  'Oi.' The Monk grabs the Merchant's snout, thus stopping the Merchant's front teeth from scraping the boy's arm. 'It seems the boy got greedy, as usual, we both knew this of him. So how about we count the gold before you sink your fangs to him. Let us see if it is enough to get us a new place for our meetings and hidings.'

  'You always have that soft spot for little runts.'

  'I have a soft spot for what they are worth hairless, nothing more, nothing less.'

  The Merchant casts away the boy and begins to pick up the half opened pouches of gold from the dirty water. He is not happy to rummage his clawed fingers through the wet brick dust to pick up each and every piece of gold, before handing those onwards to the Monk. But the gold's worth is well beyond his minor discomfort, and when the deed is finally done, he wipes his fingers clean against his trouser sleeve. 'Well, how much is it?' He demands to know.

  The rat in the guise of a monk pours the coins from her hand into her larger donation pouch. She bounces it few times, and then shifts the heavy pouch from hand to hand. If there is one thing all members of the clergy know, it is the weight of gold. 'What do you know. The boy did us solid. Even with all things considered; I think he has earned his little bag of food on top.' She licks her own whiskers. 'And to think how you almost turned him into one of us, the sages say; never bite the hand that feeds.' She chuckles as she slings the gold to her back.

  Although his reply is another squeak, it is not a whimper of a little rat but rather closer a growl of an angry beast. Yet, there is no reason for the Merchant to drawn blood, nor is there a reason linger there to just argue on the loosing side. Both of them start to look at the brick walls of the inner yard. How they could best climb upwards and reach to the other side.

  Their early climb is stopped, grinded to a halt, the exact moment a head of a small grey rat pokes over the ruined walls above them. The tiny eyes of that old rat stare at both of them. The rat's tiny mouth opens to reveal a line of yellow old teeth: 'Pick up the boy too. Or I will make sure that all three of you will wait for reinforcements, with magisters, to arrive. It probably won't take too long now, twenty minutes, maybe little more.'

  The Merchant's face is twisted by anger. His whiskers shake aggressively as the words become spit out of his mouth: 'You are not a rat king.'

  'Nay, but I am old, and you are no fool.'

  The Monk simply shakes her head. 'Just pick up the boy with your tail, and let us get away before there is more trouble for us. Heck, it saves us the trouble of getting him out of the salt mines later.'

  Grudgingly the rat Merchant has his tail spin around the boy's waist. He squeezes hard, but not hard enough to cause harm beyond short-lived pain for the boy. He then follows the Monk's climb upwards. Although the ruined inner wall stands still and firm enough under their clawed hands and feet, both of
them feel how loose those bricks could become under their sharp claws. As the old mortar crumbles, once here and there some of the bricks fall loose and tumble down. Yet those two humanoid rats continue their near effortless climb towards the top unhinged, completely confident in the strength of their vermin like bodies.

  Both of them momentarily pause to enjoy the view and the cooling touch of a fresh wind on their dark brown fur. The city is all around them, it almost sprawls before them. The tiled roofs bounce and wave as if those were frozen waves, the chimneys stand crooked and black at the top, the towers rise ever higher and the Sun makes the stained glass windows sparkle in all the colours of the rainbow. And of course, the almost howling wind has not forgotten the flags of the guilds, those donning the grand towers of the magisters in the heart of the city, nor all the flags of somewhat more individual importance; those of laundry left to dry. The wind pulls and throws around the ropes, making them occasionally snap and crack.

  The Monk finds pleasure in the rare sight, but her merchant companion much less so. Their shared affliction forces them to seek the shade of shadows, to be cast away from the sunlight and the lives they once had or could have lived.

  The Merchant grinds his teeth as he gazes towards the limp body of the boy, how to boy hangs on nothing but the strength of his tail. Jealousy is a dangerous thing, but today is not the day when he lets go. Not while the old grey rat continues to stare at him on his shoulder. He finds himself amused, his limbs and tail posses strength that could have made a short work of the eight guards even with their silver bladed halberds. Yet he knows too well how that tiny old rat could simply flare its fangs and slit his throat without leaving him much to say afterwards.

  But as enchanting as the view is, they all realise how they cannot stay idly standing there for too long. Their big hulking bodies are bound to stick out as eyesores. The constant flapping and waving of the ropes and clothes can only mask them for so long. The ire of a mere alert crossbowman or a magister becomes a price too costly. Thus they begin to climb down along the other side, into the darkness of the broken floors and stairs. They crawl towards their exit: the path leading away from the ruined buildings of the surface. A road to safety.