Chapter Forty-Eight: Crucible

Tom had Sere wait while he told Val his discovery. They were perched on adjacent branches of the same tree, and after their whispered conversation, he instructed Sere to continue on. The little birds would be able to see more than they would, and they wouldn’t be able to get much closer to the camp without being seen, anyway.

Tom paid close attention to the images Sere sent him. She spotted another pair of sentries, these two seemingly arguing over something. It looked like their disagreement was on the brink of devolving into a fight.

Remembering back to the days of his capture, that seemed pretty normal as far as orc group dynamics went. They were a fractious and volatile lot. The entire time the orcs had held them captive, they had bickered incessantly. The only thing that had kept blood from being spilled was the presence of the massive Idealist orc leader.

Tom used the second pair of sentries to orient Sere towards the camp. Several sparrows hopped and flitted between branches in small bursts, slowly working their way forward.

He was aware of Val watching him intently as he focused on the images from his familiar. He tried his best to ignore her. He sent patience and caution flowing down the bond, though he felt it unlikely any of the orcs would notice the birds, and even if they did, they were one among millions that lived in the Deep. They were slightly oddly coloured, but there were plenty of oddities around. He was confident that brightly coloured sparrows would attract no attention at all.

They crept ever further forward, and Tom began to get other impressions from Sere. The birds didn’t seem to have much of a sense of smell, but they recognised smoke drifting from up ahead. They noted uneven windcurrents, low levels of turbulence in the air too.

The trees began to thin. The hulking shapes of the Nails became clearer through the widening gaps in the foliage. They suddenly crested a small ridge, and there they found the camp.

It was set in a shallow depression, the ground sloping off slowly and slightly from the top of the shallow ridge where the sentries were arranged, until it bottomed out in the middle of the camp and, in the distance, began the gradual climb to the foothills at the base of the mountains.

The trees had been cleared for a thousand yards or more, and as far to either side, as well. Tom could make out the ragged stumps dotted everywhere, all different sizes, like lily pads in a pond.

The entire space was filled with orcs. Teeming with them.

Tom tried to get some sort of rough estimate of their numbers and quickly realised it was useless. There were tens of thousands, easily.

As he watched through the eyes of birds, they swarmed, and fought. Cooked huge slabs of meat on spits and rutted like animals in the open next to them. He saw casual murder, and squalid birth treated with the same indifference.

Hunting parties brought continual streams of carcasses to the perimeter, where vicious fights immediately erupted over the fresh meat. Orcs died in the melees, and their bodies were fought over too. It was chaos.

Tom was horrified. Terror boiled in him. He was repulsed. Bile threatened his throat. Groups of orcs this large were always referred to as an infection, an infestation, and he could see why.

They had poisoned this place, dug into it and subverted the natural, recurring, sustainable processes and took. They consumed. They had drained the order and balance, and left rot and turmoil. It was a travesty.

Tom felt his breath hitch in his chest, his heart pumping, and he forced himself back to calm. There was more to see. Much more.

Great plumes of smoke rose from near the centre of the camp. There, huge, crude structures had been erected, and dark gouts of smog belched from rude chimneys. Several other large buildings sat nearby, in the true centre, and one area was ringed by a palisade made from sharpened logs.

This was all wrong. Orcs didn’t build, they broke. They didn’t create, they destroyed. They were scavengers, beasts whose greatest achievements were to tear down the works of better races and defile them, turning any haphazard scraps of armour, any of their weapons, even bent or broken, against their creators.

And yet, here, the orcs were doing something.

If they had manifested Ideals, then they had to reevaluate what they knew of orcs. If they were suddenly building things, even in such a crude facsimile of true creation, then the danger they posed had grown exponentially.

It spoke of planning, beyond the pure animal ferocity they usually acted with. And it did not bode well for Wayrest.

Tom had to know more. He pushed Sere to flight, and several birds flickered from the treeline and over the camp.

Their tiny shapes danced through tendrils of oppressive smoke. They skimmed through air buoyed by the rank breath of countless savage thousands of orcs.

A bird’s eye view of the press, the screaming, braying, hateful violence condensed below, was something Tom was utterly certain he would never be able to forget.

They lived in squalor. Aside from those few buildings he now flew towards, there was nothing else to note. No tents. No lean-tos. No bedding. The orcs grew and died, fought and lived, with as close to nothing of a buffer between them and a beast as made no difference.

They clustered, like hideous knots in a writhing muscle. They shifted, suddenly flowing one way or the next, spurting, like blood from a neck wound. Groups sundered, split, like a leg breaking, and rent apart, tugging, like a limb being pulled apart at the joint. They surged, seeming almost to push upwards when the press inwards became too great, like a bone seeking air through skin.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

It was nauseating.

Sere approached the centre, and the buildings became clearer through the pall. They were low to the ground, and he saw that the bottom halves of the walls were earthen, with logs forming the upper walls.

The roofs were made of logs too, crisscrossed and roughly thatched, but large sections sat open to vent the foulness from within to the sky. Sere circled around one, and another, but couldn’t see anything inside of either. The smoke was too thick.

The press of orcs slackened around them, though, he noticed. He was also struck by the size of those that remained close to them. They were big. Everyone of them seemed to be among the largest, the healthiest, and the most ferocious from among the orcs.

A pair of particularly large specimens stood at the only doorway into each of the structures, glaring balefully at any who came too near. Tom didn’t see anyone or anything leave either building.

He sent Sere onwards. There was no way for him to see what was happening inside. He directed her towards the other large buildings, these with just thin dribbles of smoke leaking from small holes in their roofs.

There was a cluster of three buildings, one smaller than the others, though clearly the most important. As before, only the largest and most ferocious orcs gathered around these structures.

Outside the door of the smallest of the three, stood a group of positively monstrous orcs. All of them carried well-made equipment, eclectic in variety and clearly scavenged. None of the larger orcs nearby dared to even get close to the guards standing at the door. They watched their lesser brethren with disinterest.

Sere landed on the roof. Tom needed to see whatever was in there. It was clearly the centre of the entire camp.

The roof, roughly strewn with branches for thatching, had plenty of holes large enough for a sparrow to hop through. And hop Sere did.

One sparrow popped through gaps, nudged aside leaves, wriggled at points, and was soon far enough through that they could see inside the building.

Tom was shocked. It took a moment for him to believe what he was seeing. The building, while not tidy or clean, was at least approaching it. There were only ten orcs inside, each of them singularly enormous. Four were female, more lithe than their male counterparts, but also more deadly looking. Not that the giant males looked much less so.

They were talking, alternately squatting on their haunches or standing idly, listening to the largest among them talk.

The male was …big. A titan. A head taller again than even the orcs guarding the door. The monster must have been approaching ten feet tall. It had long, black hair, worked into a queue which fell down to its waist. It sat on a simple bench, the only furniture in the building, from the looks of it, and from there it looked down upon its fellows.

Intensity radiated from it, from every line of its savage face, to every bulge of its corded muscle. Power surrounded it like an almost palpable force, pushing outwards, pressuring. Tom felt like it was getting harder to breathe, even just seeing the scene via Sere.

Tom pulled his wisp over, not knowing whether it could translate things he heard via Sere. The leader spoke, and its voice was a boulder dragged through a cave.

We need more! his wisp translated. We must be faster!

We go as fast as their weakness allows, Great Smith, one of his subordinates snarled in reply.

The leader released a great exhale, its massive chest falling.

We need more, I say! Capture them! Drag them here! We must be faster!

Filthy dogs! We could push them harder were they not so weak! And these are the vermin that sought our extinction? Pathetic!

Coldness sluiced over Tom. He recognised the orc speaking. It was the leader of the party that had captured him and hunted him. He could see the twisted scar on its shoulder from where he had stabbed it in their fight. The brute seemed even bigger than last he saw it. Had it not even been fully grown?

DO NOT KILL THE HUMANS! the orc leader raged. The subordinates shrank away from his anger. Clearly none of them wanted to test his patience. The leader did not restrain his anger, but much of it suddenly abated, restrained.

We need them. We need more Idealists, still. We are close - close! But not ready yet. Have we taken any more captives?

The ones who prowl this forest are wily. We lose as many as we take trying to capture them. They are no lambs like those they sent in force, another said.

The orc leader reclined slightly. Its tiny eyes narrowed in thought.

They could have stamped us out, then. But they retreated. I still wonder why… he pawed at his chin with fingers like prison bars.

No matter. It was weakness for them to retreat. We will burn their city to the ground as soon as we have enough Idealists.

The other orcs let out a collective, hair-raising growl of anticipation.

We need more captives. Every Idealist we take is hundreds more we can forge. We are close. Go. Find them. I don’t care how. Bring. Me. Idealists.

The gathered orcs slowly made for the exit, moving with unconscious, predatory grace. Tom reeled at the implication. This supposed Great Smith was somehow turning humans into orcs? Or using them to make Idealist orcs?

The blood rushed from him, and he felt pale and dizzy. He was aware of Val’s hand on his shoulder, her concerned, whispered questions, but he absently waved her off. He had to confirm this. This changed everything.

The little bird worked its way back out of the roof. The last image it sent Tom before leaving was the Smith sitting on his bench, clearly deep in thought. Tom burned it into his mind’s eye.

When Wayrest readied for war, the Watch would be loosed. This Great Smith was still only one orc. An assassin’s blade would do as well for it as any king.

There was only one structure left in the camp to inspect. Tom sent Sere towards it, though he already knew with sickening certainty what it would contain.

The ringed palisade wall came closer. He had time to note the huge amount of guards, all seemingly the same size and quality of the ones guarding the Smith, positioned all the way around the wall, and then Sere was over it. Within its wooden bounds sat almost fifty humans.

They were miserable. Every single one looked one step away from a skeleton. They were starved, living in filth. Huddled together for the meagre company their fellows presented. Tom seethed with rage and pity and fear.

That could easily have been him.

They all looked whole, though. Some had bruises, or other injuries, but none appeared to be in any imminent danger of death. Just severely mistreated.

Tom supposed whatever foul industry they were being used as fuel for required them to be, if not healthy, then at least alive.

He was not sure how much longer they had, though. The Smith mentioned they were close, several times. Would they keep their human captives, then? Were they that valuable? Or would they toss them away once they had a bigger harvest to reap?

Tom recalled Sere, urging the little birds to speed.

They had news for Wayrest, and it wasn’t good.