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Authors: Gary Gygax

Tags: #Science Fiction, #General, #Fantasy, #Fiction

Gary Gygax - Dangerous Journeys 1 - Anubis Murders (10 page)

BOOK: Gary Gygax - Dangerous Journeys 1 - Anubis Murders
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She was a little puzzled and very disappointed that the wizard-priest hadn't seen fit to take her into his confidence. Just where was Setne going? And for what purpose? He'd be in danger, Rachelle was sure of that. He
should
have taken her along on his foray. And such a strange note. . . . Bother this soiree, anyway!

"What troubles you, dear Lady Rachelle?" Al-driss asked solicitously.

She turned and smiled at him. Rachelle hoped the expression wasn't too thin. "It is nothing, Sir Bard, nothing. Quite the contrary, for Magister Inhetep has been kind enough to give me the night free from duties!" She laughed a little to emphasize her pleasure at the prospect.

"This way then, please, Your Ladyship. It is a fine evening despite the chill of winter. Our coach awaits." Moments later, the carriage was rolling away from the inn, its four matched horses heading for the palatial castle at a fast trot.

The gilded coach's departure was observed by a lone figure shrouded in the shadows of a nearby lane. When the carriage had passed from his sight, the man turned back and disappeared up the near alley. A flickering lantern revealed his face for a split second. It was a hard and ruthless visage whose scars and battering nevertheless could not hide his Phonecian heritage. The fellow was no taller than average, but his wide shoulders and big hands indicated that he had known much labor and hardship. Mercenary? Perhaps. Seaman? Certainly, if the rolling gait was considered. Cutthroat? Who else but one of that sort would roam the unlit byways of Camelough?

"Whiskey!" he demanded from the barkeep. The strange man had followed lane, gangway, alley, and passage to get to the tavern. It was far distant from the royal seat of Lyonnesse, and the most infamous of the many low dives in the city's slum district, Scathach. Foreigners, thugs, thieves, and all manner of riffraff lived and died without ever leaving Scathach's few square miles. But likewise, many of those in the district came from distant parts, other kingdoms.

The barman hardly noticed the stranger. Many came into the place. Most were no better looking than the Phonecian, and some were worse. "Whiskey," the sallow-faced barkeep said, as he slammed down the earthenware pot containing about three ounces of raw liquor. "That'll be ta spurs, killey," he growled to the scar-faced man.

The Phonecian produced a fat disc of silver from somewhere, so that the coin seemed to appear magickally beneath the barman's fingers.

"The change o' thet drake is yers," he informed the proprietor, "if ya kin tell me suthin'," the Phonecian growled back in near-perfect Lyon-nese gutter dialect.

The barkeep was suspicious. Those twenty-three spurs—the difference between the two bronze coins he'd demanded and the silver drake the stranger had slipped him—could mean trouble. On the other hand, the sum was about all he made on a typical night. He eyed the scar-faced man. "What air ya askin'?"

The fellow with the battered countenance tossed off the whiskey in a single gulp. "Aaah . . ." he said slowly. "Anither, an' one fer yersel', killey," the Phonecian added. As he spoke, he made another of the silver drakes appear on the bar. "I'm seekin' atter Eastern curs, so ta spake."

The barman gaped at the second coin. "Noon i' these parts 'ave stray mongrels," he replied non-committally. "Jest what's special so's ta recognize an Eastern one?"

The scarred face broke into an evil grin. "Come on now, killey. Big, black ears, and from the place where all the gods 'ave animal 'eds," he chuckled softly.

"Well ..." the barman responded slowly, glancing around furtively. It was early yet, at least two hours before midnight, the time most regulars came along Rushlight Lane and the Two Cups Tavern. The pair of silver coins gleamed in the barkeep's sight. The foreigner seemed all right. . . . "If you were to go over to Shoddyway an' around ta the Duke's Cellar, I'd wager on seein' summat that's o' interest to you," he told the Phonecian as he scooped up the two drakes. They barely clinked as he asked hopefully, " 'Ave anither whiskey?"

The stranger nodded, but this time he conjured forth only a big copper piece. The tot of liquor was splashed into the heavy cup. He waited for it to be filled as full as before, and the barman grudgingly obliged. "Me thanks," the scar-faced stranger grated. " 'Tis a quiet place— too quiet, so's I'll be rollin' on."

"It'll be right lively 'ere in an 'our, killey," the barkeep said, turning to fetch the jug containing his best whiskey from the shelf behind the bar. He'd give the Phonecian a free round—prime the pump, so to speak. Then perhaps the man would start to produce hard silver again. "This one's on the hou—" but he cut his statement short, because the scar-faced foreigner was gone.

The man's broad shoulders and his scarred face were quite sufficient to discourage would-be assailants, and even kept whining beggars at bay. One look told these street rogues that the Phonecian had a ready weapon, quick hand, and hard heart. Rushlight Lane wandered left and right in shallow curves, south from Roundabout Gardens all the way to Dray Street near the southern wall of the city. About two-thirds of the distance along the crooked lane, the edge of the Scathach cloth and garment district shouldered the byway. Shoddyway was wider and straighter than Rushlight Lane, but if anything it was more dangerous, because more of the denizens of Scathach gathered along its length after night fell.

When a young tart stopped him near Vixen Court, a gaggle of her older professional sisters looked on and laughed snidely. "She'll be scam-perin' back right smart soon now," one slattern remarked, having seen the man's hard eyes. "Lookit 'at!" another hissed. Not one of the five or six whores could believe it. The inexperienced little doxy had actually scored! The broad-backed tough was handing her coins, and without further ado the saucy trollop had slipped her arm through his and was wiggling on down the street.

"You'll be sarry!" one of the older ones jeered after her. Another cried, " 'E'll beat yer arse!" but the calls were ignored.

"Damme!" the leader of the group muttered as the couple disappeared around a corner. "I swears I saw gold when that barstid 'anded over payment!"

Her friend was derisive. "Naw, deary. All's ya seen was some new brass, an' 'ats the troof."

She was wrong.

"I don't care where we're goin', lovie," the little strumpet said. "At your pay, we can go wherever and do whatever ya likes! But jest where are we 'eaded for?"

"So ya likes a little gold drachma, do ya," the Phonecian said, phrasing it as a statement, not a question. He saw the tart's thin hand go to her breast, fingering the coin she'd placed inside her blouse. The drachma was a smaller coin than the golden drake of Lyonnesse, about half its weight and value. It was nonetheless a handsome sum, for it equalled no fewer than five hundred of the common coins of everyday existence, bronze spurs. She noticed his glance, hastily removed her hand from the cheap cloth, and nodded. "Good," he said. "You an' I are goin' to pay a visit to a temple—a special kind o' one."

"Whatcha mean?" the girl asked suspiciously. There were some very strange places in Cam-elough's seamy sections.

"Don't get yer arse in an uproar now, cutie." There was a trace of humor in his voice. "All's I 'spect is that ye'll be takin' me to the place where they 'onors jackals, so's ta speak."

She looked relieved and bored at once. "Sure, dearie. I bin ta that temple, as ya calls it—it were back in summer when it were first begin." She shrugged and looked at him. "Ain't nuffin' goin' on there. Lotta talkin'—jus bullshit promises about makin' us per folk rich and alia while takin' coins as contributions. What say we goes ta 'Attie's Paradise instead. They gots all kinds—"

"Later," he growled. "First ya takes me to see the place wi' the animal-headed statues."

"Ya bin there already?" The man assured her that he'd only heard about the funny-looking idols, so the tart led on. "It's below the dive called the Duke's Cellar," she explained. "We'll go inta the back way, they'll pass us through, an' then it's down the stairs inta the Ratshold."

"Whazzat?!" the Phonecian demanded.

"The Ratshold?" She made it sound like "Ratz-awld." "Come on, lovie, ya knows! The subcellars an' tunnels an' drains an' all that lot belows the 'ole city 'ere. Alls ya killeys knows 'bout that. Where'll else ya 'ide out?"

With a pat on her skinny bottom for reassurance, the scar-faced man said, "It's news to me, cutie. I ain't familiar with yer Ratshold 'cause this ere's the first time I bin ta Camelough."

"Nawrr . . . !" The little whore shook her head in wonderment at his lack of sophistication. As she steered him through a narrow gangway leading to the back of the Duke's Cellar, she wondered if this was a mark to be rolled. Too tough, she decided, but because of his inexperience, she figured he might be good for more coin—maybe even another gold drachma. She was smiling at him as they went into an alcove-like back entry, then along an even narrower and darker corridor. The Phonecian listened as the girl identified herself, told the guard that she'd brought a wealthy stranger along to pay his respect to the "liberator," and they were passed through a heavy drapery of old cloth. They stood before a worn staircase of stone. The brown illumination from a pair of old candle lanthorns flickered along the steps, which wound down about twenty feet, perhaps more, where the second light pulsed dimly below at the stairway's curve.

Muted voices were discernable from down the steps. They were accompanied by reed pipes, some form of brass strings, and a gong. There was another thick hanging to pass through, then the couple stepped into a vaulted basement, a subcellar of ancient construction whose stones and crude bricks might have been mortared in place centuries, even a millennium ago. Sputtering oil lamps of the sort used in Phonecian cities, or Egypt for that matter, barely illuminated the huge, echoing space. The eerie light was made stranger still by the room's adornment. Just as instructed, the whore had brought him to the temple of animal-headed idols. The enormous statue of an ass-headed man with a muscular body clearly represented the chief deity of this secret underground temple. It had glass eyes of ruby-red hue and held strange objects in its plaster hands—a loop-handled dagger in the right, a long rod with spiked top in the left.

" 'At's the so-called god they say's the big 'un," the girl whispered confidentially to the broad-shouldered foreigner. " 'Is name's Set."

"Know the names 'o them others?" the Phone-cian inquired sotto voce.

She shook her head. "The killeys 'ere claimin' ta be priests an' all are always tellin' us about this un and that, but how's a girl to remember all them stoopid foreign names?"

They moved to the center of the back area now, well away from the entry but not quite to the rows of benches. The tart had hissed that those seats were reserved for those who were believers—chumps who actually forked over coin and paid homage to these weird gods from far off. "Them's Egyptian idols," the man told her. She didn't respond, except to shrug. He listened intently to the voices murmuring in the background, quickly identifying a chanted prayer to Set. It came from the ranks of idols flanking the central one. Some low-level magick was in use, whether to convey the sound from actual devotees elsewhere or to create it through enchantment. The same was true of the accompanying instruments. Despite the dim illumination and the heavy smoke from incense smouldering in pots near the altar, the scar-faced man was able to identify the other statues. To Set's right were Anubis the jackal-headed, the hippo-goddess Tuart, and four strange, chimerical figures. Crocodile-headed Sebek was near Set's left, along with five other unknown depictions of entities. Each bore a perverted
ankh-
dagger and some form of seep-ter or rod. The form of each idol was typical of those of modern Egyptian make.

A trio of women in cowled robes suddenly appeared in the front of the underground temple, filing out from behind the ass-headed statue of Set. Two shook sistrums as one came forth and swung a thurible before the idol. The fumes washed around the statue of the evil deity, rising slowly in the heavy air of the subceller. Then a priest-like figure robed in red and wearing a mask in the shape of a jackal's head stepped forth.

"Set is Master!"
the masked cleric boomed.

"The Red One is Mighty," came the intoned response from the cluster of worshippers seated on the benches. The cleric began anointing the statue with some unguent as another dozen of the faithful—more dregs of Scathach—entered and took seats.

"All will serve Set, even as these great ones of AEgypt do,"
the mock-priest called from within his metal mask. Again the assembly responded. A litany of praises and claims followed, until the man finally stepped forward, raising his voice even louder.

"You are lowly now, but when Set rules this land called Lyonnesse you will be as nobles!"
He paused as the congregation made noises of agreement.
"Through his son and servant, Anubis, the great Set will grant this to you and me.
As
a jackal, Anubis steals through the night; as a wolf, the son of Set slays all those who oppress you, who deny us all our right to the luxuries and wealth they horde for themselves!"

The roar of the crowd echoed through the vaulted basement. There were now at least fifty gathered, and more were streaming down into the temple.

'I 'adn't 'erd 'ere was so
many
buyin' this rubbish!" The girl said in disbelief.

BOOK: Gary Gygax - Dangerous Journeys 1 - Anubis Murders
11.42Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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