Chapter 106 - Punch line

“Slow down,” I said. Even though Taquoho wasn’t even speaking fast. My head swam.

“Haut Voclai Behen Mira Do turned on us once we reached the desert and intends to turn the King of the Ifrit against Tribe Apollo,” said Taquoho. “He plans to tell them you have taken our kin captive.”

I looked at Luther, who nodded and explained further between gasping breaths. “They smashed up all the ceramics, then tried to have the Paladins kill me, but they refused. So they tried to do it themselves, and that’s when I took Taquoho and fled.”

Sourtooth growled. “Honorless curs. Bent words from twisting tongues of flame.

“And you made it here on foot?”

Luther groaned. “Little more than stumps, now!” he complained. I eyed the perfectly-functioning feet at the ends of his legs and raised an eyebrow, feeling my sympathy diminish. Luther quickly realized his mistake.

“Your pardon, o’ king! It has been a trial, these last days. We have been hunted and nipped and bitten and harried every step of the way.”

I looked to Taquoho.

“There were minor vermin—threatening to a goblin’s ankles, perhaps. But we were fortunate to escape my kin.”

I sighed. “I’m just glad he got you both out safe. Thanks, Luther.” I straightened. “Still. This is a huge problem. The King of the Ifrit thinks we reneged on our deal and kidnapped half of the Ifrit who came to the village.” I rubbed my hand over my face. “I guess that means we can’t expect any more help and material from the Ifrit until we get the truth sorted out. Well, if it’s not one crisis, it’s another. At least food is settled for the moment. We have your friend Girmaks to thank for that,” I said.

“Please elaborate, o’ king,” said Taquoho.

“Well, once we got onto the badlands, we found out there’s this orc hunting festival going on. Girmaks got us into it so that we could get hunting rights for the tribe. So, we joined up, hunted with the orcs for a bit, and long story short, we’ve got attack helicopters and tanks now and we’ve got to help them kill this magic-eating monster.”

“I am familiar with the concept of the Stampede, King Apollo,” said Taquoho. “As well as the devouring sky-devil. But who is this Girmaks you reference?”

I waved my hand. “Right, familiar brevity. Giral mal ksch. The union you said had taken a shine to the buggies.” I looked back at the trike. “Normally he’s hanging out at the motor-pool. I’m actually going to ask if you could borrow his coaxial vessel since he’s in an engine most of the time, anyway.”

Beside me, Sourtooth stiffened. Lura tilted her head.

“King Apollo,” said Taquoho, carefully, “The union I referred you to was named Odo Fortu Val. I know of no union called Giral Mal Ksch, or Girmaks, as you have named him. Those words are not of the Ifrit.”

Sourtooth stalked off, muttering to himself. Lura held her hands over her mouth.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

I furrowed my eyes. “That’s impossible.” I looked at Lura. “You spoke with him.”

The Dawn’s Light chieftess tilted her head back and howled with laughter. “I spoke with him, yes, little brother. But he gave not his name—for I’d have known it. Giral Mal Ksch is an old orc phrase, you see,” she gazed after Sourtooth and slapped her thigh, laughing. “One favored by an elder orc of the Flock. Last laughter be mine, it means.”

“I… what?” I stammered. “Are you sure?”

Lura straightened. “Quite sure, little brother. They were the words he spoke as I threw him down the gullet of the whistler. I suppose the last laugh is his in having, after all, no? I’m sure a great jest indeed, was binding we three together: to see me kill the beast and yet receive credit not at all. To see you press me to aid, and to see Sourtooth stirred out of his cups. A fool, I’ve been—for thinking myself so clever. Devil of an old orc. I've lessons yet to learn, tis sure.”

She chuckled to herself and made her way back into the camp after Sourtooth as if it were the funniest joke she’d ever heard. I looked between Taquoho, Armstrong, Luther, and Chuck for a time, before Taquoho’s voice broke the silence.

“No Ifrit would ever impersonate an orc grandfather spirit,” he said. Then hesitated. “Perhaps the reverse is not also true…” he trailed off.

“Got ‘is revenge on the beastie wot ate him, though,” said Armstrong. He grinned. “That’s my kind of sneaky! I like orcs.”

“Hold on, now,” I said, raising my hands. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. Luther, what do you…?”

I glanced over. Somehow the noblin had already managed to produce paper and a charcoal nub, and was hunched over the floor of the desert, filling in squares.

I sighed. I guess it was histry now. The annals of Tribe Apollo—Stampede hunters and great artificers, and the apparent butts of a dead orc’s joke. But we’d be going to bed with full bellies and the immediate future of the tribe secure from the worry of food scarcity.

So it wasn’t Girmaks having the last laugh. And if he had impersonated an Ifrit once, I had no doubt he was still somewhere in the motorpool, laughing it up and planning his next prank. The orcs loved speed almost as much as the wranglers did—and there was plenty of it to be had on the hardpack and dusty badland plains. An orc ghost that could apparently work an engine as well as any Ifrit would certainly find use in tribe Apollo.

I helped Luther up and onto one of the buggies, and we headed back to the orc camp/party. We’d killed the whistler. This was a night for the Flock, who it seemed would be with us for the foreseeable future, just like our contingent of Ifrit. At least until we took out this sky devil.

I held Taquoho’s vessel up to the engine block, and his pale flame slid from one vessel to the other.

“You have made improvements, I can see.”

“Prototype, test, iterate,” I said, climbing to the controls and kicking the trike into gear. “Ever forward. Ad Luna. You should see the choppers.”

“I’m sure I shall,” said Taquoho. But there was an edge of bitterness in his voice.

I pursed my lips. “I’m sorry about what happened with haughty-von-haughty. We may not be able to manage the desert yet, but I will get you home, Taquoho. I promise it.”

“I believe you, King Apollo. But if the king’s mind has been poisoned against you…”

“There is that,” I said. I clicked my tongue. “So how would we convince him?”

“Defeating the null-devil would certainly lend credence. But I fear it is beyond even you.”

I glanced back at the engine block. “I would think calling a desert-dwelling beast a devil would be crude and reductive, for you, Taquoho. What did this thing do that was so bad?”

“It introduced the concept of mortality to the Ifrit. It did so by devouring the natural magics of our essence and starving our ancestors of all their wellsprings save one. It is the reason the City of Brass has walls.”

The hair on my neck stood up on end. “Good thing there’s only one.”

“Hundreds fell from the stars in a time that reshaped the world, thousands of years before the Great Spirit would whisper its first words. It is the last of its kind here. It has hunted and devoured all of its kin.”

“Lovely.”

So. On the to-do list: Conquer the sky for the orcs so they didn’t hunt us down, kill an un-killable magic-devouring super-predator, free the City of Brass from its millennia-old oppressor before they sent their paladins to assassinate us for another Ifrit’s lies, and, oh yeah, land on the moon.

Neil Armstrong never had to deal with this crap.