[Part Two]
Leza was roughly shoved onto the stool, her
arms firmly bound behind her back. She barely
had time to whip her tail out as they thrust
her on the flimsy piece of wood. Despite the
impending danger she felt a sharp wave of
self-conscious regret about her weight. She
was physically fit for the most part, and
for tauren there were few things culturally
that would say she had to be lighter. Perhaps
she had been spending too much time amongst
the other races.
The blindfold over her eyes was ripped off
violently. The sudden flood of light that
hit her eyes caused her to blink furiously
and wince. At first it was hard to see anything
around, but then things began to take shape,
her eyes began to adjust, and the sight of
figures could be seen moving in the light.
She was now outside. And what seemed like
flooding light at first was the pale light
of a full moon filling the night sky with
its radiance. Her mind went almost immediately
to the training Pazo had given her. She glanced
from side to side very quickly. Five on the
left and two on the right. All orcs. Weapons
were Horde military, circa second war. A mix
of axes and jagged blades that showed the
very violence that the demon enthralled masses
of the horde chose to wield during that time.
Weapons that required extra wrath behind each
swing in order to make the attack in any way
damaging, but when the hit would come it would
make sure whatever it hit knew it before it
died.
And of course, there was Or’gok. He
was sitting directly in front of her on a
stool similar to the one they had her on.
Though the orcs around her were all green
skinned but painted with a deep red and wore
armor of frontline soldiers, Or’gok’s
skin was a bright red. He sat there, eyes
flaming with a low red glow. His jagged face
cut in several places, a brutal scar sliced
down the right side of his face, the eye clouded
over long ago from the damage. Two pale white
tusks protruded from his lower lip, one of
which was shattered, the other pierced with
a shard of metal. His stance was that of a
horde general, possibly one of the most frightening
things ever to face directly. The horde ruled
by those who were strongest in those days,
and Or’gok had the look of someone who
got to his position by standing on the corpses
of his challengers.
“Well,” came the guttural voice
of the orc. His tone was very alien. The very
sound of the voice seemed like a deep echo.
“We have one of the mighty Stonehoof
clan with us today I see. Enjoy the view?”
He rose one of his lanky arms and waved it
in the direction of the landscape around them.
Taking a moment to break his gaze, Leza turned
her head slowly, trying to take in the surrounding
environment as much as possible.
They sat in the crumbled citadel that was
once Durnhold Keep. Stone rubble and shattered
landscape spread out before her. They seemed
to be on a rooftop of one of the remaining
stone structures, a sharp man made precipice
on every side of the structure. The strong
peak of Alterac rose up in the distance, glinting
from the light of the full moon.
There was no easy way down from their position.
Certainly not with her hands bound and her
totems confiscated.
“To think this once used to be a proud
human structure, one that stood fast and defeated
even our best assaults during the great war.
And yet, that rat child Thrall was able to
escape from within using the powers of his
precious spirits.” The general chuckled
a rough guttural chuckle. “This filth
that is the keep is the very example of why
the humans and their allies must burn.”
“Is this the pithy banter portion of
the interrogation?” Leza chided.
“Ha!” The general slapped his
armored knee. His outfit was crafted from
shards of what appeared to be thorium wrapped
in wolfskins. “What spunk! A true Stonehoof!
Defiant to the very last. But this is no interrogation
my dear. For now I only request the pleasure
of your company until your dear brother arrives.”
There was that sinking feeling again in her
stomach. She felt this way when she first
learned that Or’gok was alive. She got
it again when she had told that stupid Frostwolf
Legion how to find him. She had not expected
to walk right into a trap.
“Well,” Leza continued, “If
I’m here for a while then how bout you
share with me how you ambushed us?”
Or’gok smiled grimly at Leza and leaned
forward ever so slightly. “A little
birdy told me.”
“Mr. Sneed!” the sudden shout
from Pazo, even outside and possibly down
the street, was enough to make Zooti jolt
awake, the silk sheets that had covered his
naked form tossed aside in the movement. “Most
with of the down!”
Groggily, Zooti glanced around to see that
Mr. Sneed was perched on the third floor veranda,
staring at him with calm intent.
“Wrack, Zooti get moving, wrack!”
The parrot chirped.
A muffled sigh came from the direction of
the bed. Glancing over at the slender figure
of Sprillig fast asleep with a grin on her
green goblin face made him have a brief pang
of regret about leaving now. But he knew from
experience that this was the best time to
leave. The only time to leave.
There were aspects about Goblin trade princesses
that he couldn’t get enough of, but
then the flip side was that he could get way
too much of the other aspects. The eventual
discovery by the prominent father for example.
Zooti grabbed his robes and tossed them on
as quickly and quietly as he could. If Pazo
woke him up from the street below he was bound
to have alerted other people that something
was going on.
He tied off his belt and slapped his bag
of spell goodies at his side, then rushed
over to the balcony and looked down. Though
the room he was leaving was ornately and richly
decorated and clean, the rest of Ratchet,
from the outside at least, looked like a smelly
dump of a fisherman’s warf.
“Oh, holas Zooti! Most greet with greats!”
Pazo yelled up once he saw that Zooti was
in view.
“Pazo, shhhh,” he shouted down
to the Tauren. Even though it was the third
floor the head of Pazo was only a few feet
below Zooti’s feet. Goblin architecture
never included Tauren in the equation.
With a swift move Zooti pulled a small light
feather out of his pouch of goodies and lunged
over the edge of the balcony. The ground ripped
closer and closer to him as he fell.
“Fluffy foccacio!” he called
out just before hitting the ground. The feather
burned away and magical energy flowed over
the tiny gnome, and suddenly the decent was
slowed to nearly a stop as energies caught
all of the air around him like a parachute.
He lightly glided to the ground next to the
big Tauren.
“Hee hee, Zooti featherboy!”
Pazo chuckled and looked back up towards Mr.
Sneed, who was gliding himself down to Pazo’s
shoulder.
“Lets get out of here before you wake
any more of the neighborhood,” the little
gnome muttered as he gathered himself and
began strolling down the street. “Where
are the others?”
“Pub of nappy,” his tauren companion
replied with a grimace. “Need boatman
for sea and all captains make with drinkies
at there.”
Zooti nodded and the two continued down the
filth covered streets of Ratchet.
Hukari sniffed cautiously at the pint in
front of him. He was not really sure that
it had been brewed so much as hurled into
existence. He half fancied something was swimming
in the dark fluid.
“Ya gonna be starin at ya drink all
day ya feeblemon?” Golomojo chuckled
from his nearby stool as he downed another
pint. The two trolls looked completely out
of place at the goblin tavern. The tiny tables
were built to accommodate people of goblin
size, and the trolls were very lanky creatures,
looking very comical as they straddled the
two stools.
The rest of the pub went about its daily
business hardly noticing the two oddities.
Various humans, elves, dwarves, goblins and
other assorted creatures seldom allowed in
Horde lands were enjoying their breakfast
or drinks as much as they could.
Hukari glanced around and noticed the bruisers
standing off to the side. Goblin enforcers.
For their size, they were impressively well
trained and could pack a punch. Ratchet claimed
neutrality, and violently so, dispatching
bruisers to wherever they might be needed.
“So,” Golomojo said at length,
looking to his arch nemesis. “’Ow
ya wan do this mon? Good voodoo, bad voodoo?
Hustle an’ bustle?”
Hukari glanced around the bar and leaned
in toward Golomojo. “Ah be tinkin’
we do dah’ big announcement ting. Speak
up an’ see what ‘appin.”
And with that the troll hopped up on the
table, cupped his hands to his mouth, and
gave a shout. “Eh der all yaz. Ah an
mah friends be needin’ passage tah Estan
Kingdams. No questions asked. Who intahested?”
A roar of laughter broke out from the denizens
of the bar.
“BUR!” came a shout from a nearby
human clad in paladin garb. From somewhere
in the crowd a banana went wizzing by and
nearly hit Hukari in the face.
Reluctantly, the troll sat back at the table
with a sigh.
“Ya mojo weak mon,” Golomojo
chuckled.
And then all of the light coming from the
adobe door entrance was blotted out with the
massive figure of Pazo. Everyone turned to
watch the tauren as he stepped into the bar.
Tauren seldom strayed from Horde lands, and
Pazo was clad in enough armor that one would
think he were going to war. He even had on
a pair of golden arches on his shoulders more
commonly worn by paladins as a symbol of strength
and wisdom.
To this, the paladin who did sit at the bar
shuffled uneasily, as he wore the same shoulderpads,
though his fit versus the ones that Pazo had
found extra straps to tie on to his own shoulders.
“Pazo with travel to Kingdoms of East,”
the tauren shouted, demanding the attention
of the bar with his projecting. “Need
captain with balls. Any captain with balls?”
An awkward silence descended upon the bar.
Some people shifted in their seats, others
looked as intently as possible at their food
or beverage.
Pazo snorted and walked over to the table
with the trolls at it. “Captains no
with balls.” He reached to the table
next to them, and with a swipe of his tail
cleared off the small plates of food the two
dwarves sitting at that table were enjoying,
and pulled the table over next to Hukari and
Golomojo. With a huff he sat down on the table,
it being about the right size to be a chair
for the tauren.
Zooti pattered up behind him, horribly out
of breath from trying to keep up with the
tauren. “Pazo, you have all the tact
of an Ogre who had his ball taken away. Before
you go making bigger asses out of yourselves
than you need to, I do have a contact here
that Tehd referred. I had Mr. Sneed go find
him and deliver a message for him to meet
us here in an hour or so.”
“What do you want with my brother?”
Leza asked at length. Obviously the general
wasn’t going to kill her so she figured
it was a good time to get at least some information.
“Oh my dear,” the general spoke
with great reservation. “Your brother
has a debt to pay. He failed in his mission
and our master cannot have that.”
“Your master?”
The general leaned forward, putting his tainted
breath and damaged eye right up next to her
face. “You are unworthy to speak his
name child, but know that your brother long
ago made a pact that must be paid.”
The sound of a head getting slammed into the
bar made all of them turn to see the commotion.
Rukra stood there, drink in one hand, the
head of a squirming dwarf in the other pressed
against the bar.
“Okay lassy!” the dwarf bellowed.
“Ahm’ sorreh! Ya ain’t got
a tiny weenee green behindee.” Rukra
released the dwarf, he stumbled to the ground
and scuttled off. She turned to join the rest
of the group.
“Small person, big jerk,” she
commented as she pulled up a stool at the
very crowded table. “Me need better
bar.”
Zooti grumbled to himself. All too often
when he was out with these four he felt like
the only one that could speak with in a complete
and grammatically correct sentence.
A melody began to sound through the bar.
The plucking of strings on a mandolin with
masterful skill tugged at their ears and drew
their eyes to the other side of the pub.
And there, with both feet up on a table,
was the pasty white figure of a blood elf,
gently playing the strings of his mandolin.
Everyone in the bar stared at the elf, enamored
of the tunes that flowed from the gem-encrusted
instrument in his hands.
His face was fair, though worn by the sea,
and his hair flowed down in a graceful manor
that appeared to listen more to appearance
then to gravity. He wore a bright red swashbuckler
shirt, revealing far more of his muscle bound
chest then one would think prudent. A mighty
captains hat with a massive feather sticking
out of it crowned his head and he looked at
the gathering of misbegotten smugglers with
a humerous look in his eye.
Despite all attempts to resist, many of the
people in the tavern found themselves looking
long fully at this elf and lightly chanting
“Esteben…”
Even Pazo and Hukari looked and let the name
flow off of their lips, “Esteben…”
Zooti looked at the people in the tavern
and at the elf and began to chuckle. “Clever
elf.” He spoke and then with a flick
of his wrist and a blink of one eye he let
a counterspell fly across the room and hit
the mandolin full in the body. The instrument
fell silent and everyone in the bar shook
their heads with a bit of confusion and went
back to their daily routine.
The elf stood up and strolled over to the
table that the gathered party rested at. He
looked at each of them in turn, his eyes hovering
ever too long on Rukra, whose gaze was locked
on the elf, unable to look away.
“I am Capitan Esteben,” he began
with a very southern accent. “You are
the persons that Tehd spoke of?”
Zooti stood up and met the elf’s gaze.
“We are. I’m Zooti and these are
my minions.” Grumbles broke out from
everyone but Rukra at the table. “We
understand you have a ship and might be willing
to let us buy passage?”
The elf turned and gazed into the eyes of
Rukra. “But of course. Mi compadres,
I would be more than happy to offer such transport
to such a… ravishing… group.”
Hukari began to reach for something at his
side. Zooti, seeing this, snapped his fingers
to get Esteben to turn back to him. “How
much?”
“Well, the seas have not become safer
in the años of late. But I would perhaps
be willing to, say, transport you all for
the low fee of fifty gold a piece.”
“Five gold a piece and we work out
a contract for keg smuggling distribution
that Tehd said you were interested in.”
“You drive a hard bargain, mi amigo,”
the elf smiled at the gnome, raising a single
eyebrow. “So be it. In advance.”
Zooti nodded. “When do we leave?”
“We sail with the tide gnomito,”
he grinned and turned, shooting one last glance
at Rukra as he glided more than walked out
of the bar.
Rukra shook her head as if she were just
now waking up. “What happen?”
she asked, confused.
“Arcana,” Golomojo spat. “Dah
captain be usin’ powerword machismo.”
He turned on Zooti. “Ah still be ‘tinkin
ah should eat ya fah playin wit dat arcane
mon!”
Zooti shrugged. Golomojo’s wrath against
arcanists was nothing new.
From the outside the bar, a young gnomish
woman with bright pink pigtails watched the
exchange with the elf. Her hearing was greatly
improved by the eye of kilrogg spell she has
used. After listening for a short while she
turned to the large gaseous blue figure next
to her.
“Time to go tell Gelluk,” she
whispered to the voidwalker. The demon hissed
in acknowledgement.
[Part Four], [Top]
