Travellers' Rest

The story you are about to read features James Enge’s wondrous character, Morlock Ambrosius. Morlock is a swordsman, an exile, a hunchback, a drunk, and a wizard, though he himself would use the term “Maker” and say he is a master of the two arts, Seeing and Making. He is a modern descendant of the sword and sorcery adventurer that was birthed in the pages of
Weird Tales
magazine, and Enge himself has been favorably compared to Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, David Eddings, Steven Brust, and, interestingly, Raymond Chandler. His tales of Morlock the Maker have appeared in
Black Gate
magazine, in the anthology
Swords & Dark Magic
, and elsewhere, and Morlock features in the novels
Blood of Ambrose
,
This Crooked Way
, and
The Wolf Age
. Speaking of the novel
The Wolf Age
,
Locus
magazine wrote, “One of Enge’s great virtues as a writer is weirdness—he’s not afraid to do the unexpected, and his imagination is formidable. But there’s an underlying emotional power here, too. The author excels at depicting the bonds of friendship, the pain of betrayal, and the tragedy of well-laid plans going awry, and that emotional payload is what makes this novel into more than just an entertaining adventure story about a guy with a magical sword who fights monsters.” Which is not to say that there isn’t a magic sword, because there is, and where Morlock goes, rest assured there are always plenty of monsters. This story, “Travellers’ Rest,” is no exception. Chronologically, it takes place some years before the events of the novels. If you are new to Morlock, it should make a fine introduction to Enge’s creation, and if you are not, you will be pleased to see the return of at least one old friend. Either way, we hope that you enjoy it.

Sincerely,

Lou Anders, Editorial Director

Pyr, an Imprint of Prometheus Books

The awkwardly made maker and his dwarvish apprentice were passing through trackless green fields peppered with large, slow-moving shell-backed beasts. Ahead, scattered around the junction of two roads that met in the shadow of the nearby hills, were some ragged brick buildings. The town, if that’s what it was, looked worn, weather-bitten, barely populated.

The apprentice—a gray-faced, brown-bearded, dark-eyed dwarf named Wyrth—said, “Master Morlock, let’s go on to the next town.”

“No.”

“Morlock, those beetles are taller than I am. Imagine what the bedbugs are like! Next town, please.”

“I believe these are cattle. Note the udder on that one.”

“I have better things to do than look at the private parts of cows! Um. If that’s an udder, there’s another one sprouting from the beast’s other side. Are you sure they’re cows?”

“No. They seem to be chewing cuds, though. If you can bring yourself to look.”

“You may practice your wit on me as you like, Master Morlock. It needs the practice, as God Sustainer knows. I still vote for the next town.”

Since voting had nothing to do with the matter, Morlock proceeded with his loping irregular stride toward the buildings clustered at the town’s center. His lack of reply was all the reply necessary: Wyrth was free to continue to the next town if he liked, but Morlock was stopping here.

“For the conversation, probably,” Wyrth speculated at Morlock’s crooked shoulders and followed him into town.

Two roads met at the town’s center, where there was a fairly large hostel several stories high. But the facade was in poor repair, and the road running westward to the sea was ill tended and untravelled, carpeted with brown weeds. The road running north toward the hills was in a slightly different condition: the weeds carpeting it were more of a reddish gray.

“Next town,” Wyrth muttered rebelliously, but followed Morlock through the broad open door of the hostelry into the shadows within.

One of those shadows was snoring behind a counter. Morlock rapped a knuckle on the counter and the shadow jumped like a startled rabbit and, rubbing its eyes, said in a professionally suave voice, “Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Your pardon! Welcome to Travellers’ Rest at Boulostreion! What can we do to assuage the weariness of the long roads you have travelled to reach us?”

“Couple rooms,” Morlock said. “Lunch.”

“Lunch. Yes. Lunch. Let’s see. Right now it’s about—”

“Noon.”

“Noon. Not really? I’ve slept the morning away. I hope my good wife and daughters have not done the same. I mean—daughter. Never mind. One moment while I check. Before I go, may I ask how long you’ll be staying with us?”

Morlock opened his hands and shrugged. When the hosteller realized that was all the response he was going to get, he shrugged himself and hurried off.

“If there is cooking going on in this establishment,” Wyrth remarked, “then I’m one of those cow-beetles back there. I didn’t even see a thread of smoke from the chimneys as we approached.”

“They don’t see as many travellers as they once did; that’s clear,” Morlock replied.

“Maybe travellers know something that we don’t and tend to travel a little further down the road? To the next town perhaps?”

Morlock travelled a little further into the hostelry, where there were many tables and benches set up in a roomy (if somewhat dim) dining hall. The benches, tables, and floor were all scrupulously clean, as far as Wyrth could tell. He was about to comment on it when Morlock gestured at something moving in the shadows nearby. It was some sort of insect fringed with dozens of feathery tendrils; it spun endlessly across the shadowy floor.

“Does it eat the dust?” Morlock wondered. “Or just pick it up to deposit elsewhere?”

“What else does it eat besides dust?” Wyrth countered. “How will you feel when you find one crawling up your thigh in the middle of the night? The thing’s bigger than a sausage tray!”

Morlock hung his sword belt over a nearby chair, then unshouldered his backpack and took a cold-light from it. He tapped the crystalline cylinder and set it on one end of the table, giving light to the room.

Wyrth grumbled a little but eventually slid off his own pack and engaged Morlock in conversation on various topics: the weather; the state of politics in the imperial capital when they’d left it; the likelihood that the cows they’d seen were actually blood-drinkers, like bovine mosquitoes; the amount of blood it would take to satisfy such ravening beasts; and so on.

Morlock had little to say about any of it except, “They won’t be interested in my blood.” This was perfectly true: Morlock’s blood tended to set things on fire, and few parasites made the mistake of putting the bite on him—none made it twice. The same was not true of Wyrth’s blood at all, and reflections on this topic led him to fall into an unusually gloomy silence.

Meanwhile the hosteller returned to his counter and, not finding Morlock and Wyrth, cried out in vexation and something like despair.

“Mine host!” Wyrth said. “We’re over here.”

“Ah!” The hosteller leapt eagerly toward them into the circle of light cast by Morlock’s cold-light. He was followed by a shorter, thinner, paler, female echo of himself. “Ah, gentlemen—may I know your names?”

“No,” said Morlock.

“Oh!” said the hosteller. His plump reddish-brown face looked baffled.

Wyrth was annoyed at his master. The man had his reasons for not giving his name every time he was asked, especially south of the Dholich Kund, but you’d think that by now he’d have figured out some more diplomatic way of answering.

“Canyon keep you, you surly old bastard,” Wyrth muttered at Morlock. “Mine host, this gentleman here is a secretive fellow, but he’s not dangerous when well fed and kept away from poisonous or predatory insects. I just mention that in passing, in case there are any around here. I’m his apprentice in the many arts of making, God Avenger pity me for it. My name is Wyrth, and I don’t give three chunks of chaos who knows it.”

The hosteller was relieved to meet someone of his own talkative turn of mind. “Well! Gentlemen, I am Sunlar; this is my house. Here is my younger daughter—I mean my daughter, Raelio; she will see to your comforts, within reason, of course.”

Wyrth assumed this meant that the girl was not on the menu. That was fine with Wyrth: he himself never dated outside his species, and Morlock’s vices did not include preying on children. “Despite appearances, we’re reasonable people,” Wyrth said to the hosteller, hoping he could make himself understood without any disgusting particularities.

“Excellent, excellent,” said Sunlar. “Well, I’ll leave you with Raelio. I have to go help my—I have to help with the—Some matters await my tending.” He bounced off toward the back of the house.

The child watched him go, amusement and affection gently lighting her dark-eyed weary face.

“He’s awful excited,” she remarked.

“We’re the first guests in a while, I suppose?” Wyrth said.

“I wasn’t supposed to say. If I did, I’d have to count back a month or two. And they snuck out without paying, the scasp-chewing branticules. Still, it was nice to have someone in the house for a while. How long are you staying?”

“A while,” Morlock said. “What’s to eat?”

“I couldn’t exactly say. I was supposed to tell you that the house special was the best thing I’d ever eaten, but I can’t exactly say that because I don’t know what it is and I don’t want to lie.”