A Heartless Task

  Of Muscle and Magic

  By: Jonathan Antony Strickland

  …………………………………………….

  PART 1: A Heartless Task (This is part 1 from “Of Muscle and Magic”, and is free so please enjoy).

  It had been a cold and bitter Friday night but this did not bother the citizens of Galiamank, for them Friday night was the time to get drunk with comrades and forget about the troubles of life. Now however the streets had emptied as night in a few short hours would become dawn. Most of the lights in the city of Galiamank had gone out and only the brothels and pubs stayed open at this late hour. Galiamank was a large city but unlike a lot of the other cities in the Kingdom of Labpreane, was fairly un-remarkable. Except that is for the pubs, these were famous for stocking and providing the widest range of extremely good ales known throughout the Kingdom and people from all around Labpreane would come and visit just to sample the many varied and delicious tastes on offer.

  Inside the "Nine dead Pigs", a pub renowned for three of the strongest and tastiest ales suspected in the whole of the world of Oldabrock, the customers were becoming intoxicated and the tiredness of the late night and the alcohol that cascaded through their blood was beginning to catch up on them. Yawns and sleepy eyelids were appearing all around the bar and the speech that filled the air was starting to take on a drunken slur. Big Polk the barman was an expert at spotting these signs and knew that at this point in the night not much more ale would get drunk and he would very soon call for last orders. Calling for last orders would always get a groan from his customers and sometimes one or two of them might start the odd bit of trouble when asked to leave. Tonight however Polk new there'd be no trouble, not when Calin was about.

  A heavily muscled man walked and on occasion staggered around the pub half drunk but fortunately for some in a rather happy mood. The other men in the bar new this man and even though his company was welcome they new that big Polk paid him to keep order of a kind and should a fight break out the mercenary called Calin would no doubt step in, even if the fight was nothing to do with him and deck anybody who confronted him. Only last week three men, each possessing considerable wealth had been arguing over a beautiful young woman who's father had planned to marry her off onto the one who could prove himself most worthy.

  The three had decided to accompany the girl's father to the Nine Dead Pigs to talk it over and see if an arrangement could be made as to who would take the young girls hand. After an hour of each one pleading his case to the farther he had finally decided on one of the suitors to the other two's annoyance. After a few minutes of arguing fists were flung and soon a two way scrap involving the father and future son-in-law against the other two who had felt it their right to become his future son-in-law was taking place in the middle of the pub. As the four brawled they did not notice Calin who moments before had been laughing and joking with a street whore seeking business suddenly slink over to them with an old wooden stool in his hands that he had picked up from under one of the old oak tables that stood close to the bar. In two quick movements the stool came crashing down on two of the men, upon the second contact the stool had smashed in half in his hands and Calin had thrown the part in his right hand to one side, the wood smashing into glasses of ale from a newly emptied table.

  The other two men, one being the farther and the other being future son-in-law stood and gawked at the two unconscious men they had just a moment before been brawling with. The father of the girl realizing first what had happened burst into laughter and began to thank Calin. Calin, who hadn’t a clue what the fight was about gave the father a funny look before decking him with a right upper-cut which knocked him senseless and sent him sprawling backwards were he crashed to the floor landing heavily on top of the two other unconscious men. The future husband swung a right hand at Calin's head which Calin ducked, then moving in on his opponent, Calin kneed the man in the crotch, then headbutted him and sent him to the land of nod with the other three men.

  Calin had looked down on the four men he had just stoved in. He noticed also the blood and several teeth which were spread across the floor from the violence he had just dished out. His own blood boiled from the combat and he felt anger still within him. Looking around he noticed the other people in the pub where stood around him in a large circle looking, laughing and cheering him for the fight. Calin still held half the stool in his left hand, this he flung up above him into the air and as it began it's decent downwards he nutted it towards a part of the crowd that stood sniggering and whispering to each other. They scrambled out of the way as the half piece of stool sped towards them. Suddenly the room fell silent and all eyes fell on Calin. A large red gash appeared on his forehead and as he stared at the rest of the occupants in the pub, blood began to trickle out from the gash and down over his nose. Calin then clenched both his fists and shouted, "COME ON, COME ON YA DIRTY SCRAGS. ANY ONE ELSE WANT SOME". Un-surprisingly that night nobody took up his challenge and Calin realizing this lost his battle urge and smiled a great grin at the shocked faces in the bar. After half an hour things had reverted back to normal and the cheery drunk voices again filled Polk's bar. The four men, upon regaining consciousness left The Nine Dead Pigs quickly and quietly with heads held low. Calin had spent the rest of the night in good humor and got even more hellishly drunk from the amount of free drinks bought to him by customers who had enjoyed the night’s entertainment that he had provided.

  Only Polk and a few other men knew of the history of Calin. Calin had told them most of his life story throughout the last year and on several drunken nights, the only time he would talk of his past. Polk had managed to piece together most of Calin's life from the brief snippets of slurred speech he would spit out on these occasions. As a boy Polk had learned Calin had been trained as a hunter, roaming the forests and valleys around the small village of Welveing and learning the many different ways to kill animals without damaging there precious hides that he could sell on market days for small amounts of silver. To Calin it had been a poor way to make his living.

  At the age of seventeen he had been drafted into fighting a religious war. A soldier fighting for the priests of Hock, God of the impending law, justice and punisher for one and all, who his servants claimed had waged a Holy war on Kelvnock, who the priests had labeled "Kelvnock the Vile and Impure".

  Kelvnock was an ageing war Lord who had travelled the lands of Oldabrock and on his many legendary and varied travels had accumulated many wives from all around the world. Judged by the priests to be an act of evil, Kelvnock was proclaimed a sinner by the priests and told by the head priest of Hock that if he did not leave his castle and lands within one week, taking his filthy whores with him, then the holy armies of Hock would capture him and break him and his women on Hock's dreaded wheel of sins unbound. It had been Calin's father Geecham who had made him fight for the priests of Hock and Calin proved for the next four and a half years to be an excellent warrior, and when the need arose and the unit in which Calin fought lost it’s captain, Calin took charge. And though many more men where killed he proved to be an excellent leader and captain of a small fighting troop.

  However Calin was never the religious man like his father Geecham was and only continued the fight in the war to please him. After Geecham had died in battle, Calin had changed sides and joined Kelvnock's army. As a young man Calin had admired Kelvnock and marrying many women of different colours, beauty and intelligence appealed greatly to him.

  For over two years he had fought for the armies of Kelvnock, fighting and killing people he had once fought alongside. Even though Kelvnock's army consisted of more experienced fighting men than those of the priests, their number had began to dwindle while those
of the gods Hock rose at a consistent and (for the men of Kelvnock) alarming rate. The dark magic the priests had at their disposal that Hock granted to them also added to the downfall of Kelvnock who always fought in the front line with his men. Kelvnock had died three days before the end of the war. An expert assassin hired by the priests and aided by there dark magic had slipped into the battle worn castle and into the sleeping quarters of Kelvnock. Kelvnock the next day was found dead in bed with his throat slit. Not even three of Kelvnock's wives had heard the assassin as they lay by his side in bed next to him and no sign of the assassin was to be found anywhere, he had escaped into the night long before, back to claim a fortune in gold from the death dealing priests of Hock.

  Three days later Kelvnock's army had surrendered and everybody who had fought in the castle was given a choice. Renounce their evils and become a worshipper of Hock or die at the wheel. Many of the men had fled, Calin being one of these and for the next three years had travelled to many of the ugly and beautiful cities, towns and villages throughout the Kingdom of Labpreane. He had made his living as a mercenary fighting for the right price and only the most evil of causes would he not take on as a job.

  Most of the jobs in truth that Calin had talked of had been boring to him, consisting of guarding or beating some one up who would not pay his taxes. Very few times in his job did the need arise for him to draw blood and take life. On a few occasions though it had and there had been several times on these rare occasions that his own life was at risk. Sometimes the jobs would pit him against warriors or creatures of great skill, strength and cunning, and on one occasion while helping escort a rich merchant across the desert of a thousand dreams and deaths with eleven other warriors, Calin had told a story of how near to death he had once come. The merchant was transporting goods from the Kingdom of Labpreane over to the many cities of the Empire of Velgoramy. The desert of a thousand dreams and deaths separated the Kingdom from the Empire which in a way was fortunate as the two great powers had not always seen eye to eye. In the last two hundred years, three great wars had been recorded between the two.

  The last war had lasted twenty one years and many of the ageing warriors who had survived it say that it was the most bloody throughout the two's history. However peace had lasted between the two for over twenty five years and the goods that can be bought in one of the great lands for next to nothing, can then be sold in the other for a small fortune. The trip across desert though was exceptionally dangerous and half way across they had been attacked by a group of Black Bargels, four foot tall armadillo like creatures but standing erect like men and wielding axes or small shortened spears in there four stumpy arms. Fifteen of these had attacked and towering behind them was there leader, a huge lizard-like thing with green eyes and yellowish-brown scales. It carried a huge barbed spear in its hands and stood over seven foot tall. The creature Calin had later found out was called a Quarog, cold blooded killers that loved the taste of raw flesh and the shine of gold.

  Calin along with the other eleven heavily armoured men of the merchant had engaged the Bargels in hand to hand combat while the Quarog stayed away from the fight and watched hissing out it's commands. The Bargels outnumbered the mercenaries and with there hides of bone proved difficult to kill. Their skill with weapons in hand to hand combat was poor however when compared to that of the mercenaries and throughout the combat only five of the mercenaries were slain, although two more suffered wounds which left them unable to fight.

  The other five men although exhausted by the combat had one more opponent to kill. The Quarog did not give the men time to re-group and instead charged at the nearest one. Calin had dodged just in time as the barbed spear of the beast thrust at him towards his chest, instead of penetrating his heart it took him in the shoulder and he was hurled backwards. The other four men closed on the Quarog before it had time to finish Calin off and eventually they had managed to slay the creature, although one of the four had his stomach ripped open in the process, dyeing a painful and horrible death.

  Afterwards the three men who had survived the battle virtually un-scathed had attended the other three injured men, bandaging and cleaning wounds. Calin had suffered the worst of the three injuries and had to rest for the rest of the trip. The wound, even when it would be healed would leave his left arm lifeless and only magic could restore him back to normal. The money he was paid by the merchant after they had crossed the desert and reached the city called Xthia in the Empire, he had used to pay for a healing spell cast by a priest of Delveiak, greater devil and fifth ruler of the thirteen planes of hell. The spell was expensive and Calin was left with little of the money he had been paid, that said the spell had worked and he was back to being as fit as he ever was.

  Polk liked Calin, even though at times Calin could be more trouble than any drunk when he himself became intoxicated. Polk found Calin's stories fascinating and throughout the last year the two had become good friends.

  For Calin, Polk provided a way of earning money and was also a well of information when it came to other jobs that suited his style of work. Polk would hear long before everybody else of jobs that needed someone to break a few noses or crack the odd rib. Being a landlord in the Nine Dead Pigs had its advantages, information was easy to come by and the job brought in many different characters who would share knowledge of the city and the outside world with Polk.

  Tonight Polk had listened to a travelling man who had recently visited the island of Gelepicko just half a mile from the coast of Scree. The man was something of a bard and felt if the need arose he could sing, dance, juggle and story tell and keep even the gods entertained. Visiting the small island with the one village and its population of around two thousand, consisting mainly of fishermen, woodcutters and housewives, he had felt money could be made from the lack of quality entertainment the people on the island must get. When he had arrived at the one and only village on the island called Pagzuire, named after a legendary pirate who had centuries before used the island to hide his booty, some of which was suspected to be un-discovered and still buried somewhere upon the island. He was surprised by the fear that seemed to hang around the men and women of the village. When he asked to entertain in the taverns he had been refused and told that the time for laughter and merriment was not one that the people of Gelepicko would want in these days of the silent horror.

  When he pressed for more information he was told how twice a week for the past eight weeks a man, women or child would be found at first light dead. The chest of the victim would be ripped open and the heart that had beaten inside that chest gone.

  Nobody had seen the killer; all they knew was that he would tear through the roof of there house and rip out there hearts as they slept. One of the strangest things was that other people in the houses or nearby would sleep through the whole event. There had even been occasions when a wife or husband had been killed and there partner who would be laying asleep besides them would not awake as their loved one was murdered next to them in cold blood. Even the victims corpses when examined the next day would usually have there eyes shut as though they had slept as there hearts were taken from their bodies. Those few that had been found with there eyes open where wide eyed with terror and there faces twisted and contorted in horror.

  After hearing this news and realizing there was no money to be made the bard had paid to take the next sailing boat off the island of Gelepicko, back to the mainland to seek fresh custom. As he waited for a boat in the keyside, a very aged and wizened man approached him wearing light blue robes. The man announced that he was the wizard in the village and offered the bard ten gold crowns if he would spread a message for the next two weeks to as many places he would visit in that time. The bard had found this very reasonable and had agreed to spread the wizard’s message for the price of three weeks wages that was normal for a workingman to make in the Kingdom of Oldabrock.

  The bard then went on to tell Polk the message that later this ni
ght Polk would tell Calin along with the rest of the bards strange story of when he had visited Galiamank. As soon as Calin had heard the tale about the horrific murders and more importantly the message of the wizard wanting warriors to meet him in Cedric's tavern on a Thursday night, the third week of this month, the month of the Drolk. Seven hundred and fifty gold crowns were on offer for up to seven trained fighters. Only the most skilled and bravest warriors in the land were required for the task, the wizard had said the task may prove to be extremely dangerous and death was very possible. Those warriors that survived would share the gold amongst them.

  On hearing this news from Polk, Calin had arranged for the next stage-coach out of Galiamank that would be headed for the sea-side town of Jardbourgh on the coast of Scree. From there a boat could be arranged to take him to the island of Galiamank. Polk told Calin that the bard had left Gelepicko exactly eight days ago; this gave Calin six days to reach the island. The journey he estimated should only take around three days providing no trouble happened while on the road. Bandits or something worse around this part of the Kingdom was rare to encounter but never the less still a possibility.

  Calin spent the rest of the night with Fenretta one of the many prostitutes that worked in the "Red House of Erotic Dreams". Calin liked the company Fenretta provided, as well as her usual service.

  "If I'm going to be gone from Galiamank for a while then I may as well treat myself", he had thought to himself. "Besides if there's hard work to be done in Pagzuire then there will be no time for women".