CHAPTER SIXTEEN - “GRUUL!”

2 Seleszeni 10.076 Z.C., Afternoon

  Slinking through the shrubbery, Mav returned to where he’d left Raf and Bron. Around him, the underbrush rustled with animal life. Birds and bats called overhead in the thick canopy, and mysterious hoots goaded him from the shadows. The ambient sounds of the rubblebelt confused and alarmed his ears, more accustomed to tuning out the hawkers and smelters of Precinct Six.

  “It’s me,” he announced, pushing through a screen of bushes covering the small clearing they’d stopped at. Rafiel and Bron met him with daggers drawn anyways. Registering Mav, Raf turned back to scraping a butterscotch-colored lichen into a vial, held aloft in a tentacle.

  “How do I know it’s really you?” Bron examined, eying Mav with suspicion and holding his nose high.

  Mav snorted. “Bron, they’re Gruul, not Dimir.”

  Still, Bron hesitated another long moment before stepping forward, tapping on Mav’s shoulders and chest to check for an illusion.

  “What? I’m just making sure,” he defended, breaking eye contact after the legionnaire threw him a threatening glare. Bron jumped back and sheathed his dagger.

  Raf cleared his throat and pondered, “So…”

  Mav shot Bron another accusatory look before crouching down and brushing clear a patch of dirt. Rafiel protested under his breath, muttering about ground cover, keystone species and ecosystems.

  “They’re Slitz alright. Mostly viashino, but a few humans and others. They’ve set up camp in a derelict courtyard, occupying a few of the remaining buildings,” he began, inscribing the layout of the crumbling plaza in the dirt.

  “The main structure at the rear of the courtyard, this here, is our best bet for finding the target. On the first floor, attached to the structure, they’ve got pens of rubblebeasts, which we could release as a diversion. These here are the other occupied buildings, and scouts are posted here, here, here, and here.” Mav outlined his rough map as he spoke, adding a small key to interpret the Legion scout’s marks he denoted on the map. Lilla’s precise directions made finding the camp simple enough. Getting in seemed easy too. Getting out though - that worried him.

  “Hey, do you think that was the real Rocman yesterday?” Bron’s non sequitur stunned Mav.

  “What kind of stupid question is that?” he asked, taking on Uncle Brutus’ tone while filtering the worst of the vulgarity. Mav stared at Bron, his face impassive.

  “What? It’s just a question,” Bron whispered with a half-hearted chirp, adjusting his boot.

  “If your highness is done daydreaming, maybe we can get back to work?” Mav menaced, his tone cold. Bron frowned.

  “Jeez, sorry, I didn’t realize you rocjocks disliked Rocman so much,” he muttered, a small smile creeping across his face.

  “That’s not what I’m talking about. In case you forgot, we have a mission here,” Mav corrected, pointing back to the map. “Now as I was saying, I spotted several humans and elves among them. If we disguise ourselves a bit and act cool as Gruul, getting in should be easy enough,” Mav continued.

  Rafiel studied the map, the vial in his tentacles already replaced by a small journal and charcoal pencil. He had sketched a copy of the map as Bron and Mav spoke, and pointed to a dotted route hugging the perimeter and heading to the back of the main building Mav indicated before.

  “Entering here?” he asked, cocking his head with an inquisitive glance. Mav nodded, impressed. The hybrid drew out the exact route he planned to suggest. Bron looked at both maps and shrugged.

  “Looks good to me too. So, how does one act ‘cool as Gruul?’” Bron asked, miming out accompanying air quotes. Wait, was he doing an impression of me?

  Mav ignored the taunt, drawing his boot knife and unhooking the canteen from his belt. He scraped together several piles of colored dirt and clay, one brown, one reddish, and one with a lot of moss. He wiped off his hand on his pants and opened his canteen, pouring water onto each pile and mixing them into paste.

  Bron winced when Mav wiped his hand on his clothes and shifted, crossing his legs when Mav added water to the piles.

  “What are you gonna do with that?” he asked with disdain. “Paint your face?”

  Raising an eyebrow, Mav straightened and stripped off his shirt, painting Gruul war symbols onto his face, chest, and arms with the improvised pigments.

  Bron grimaced, but followed suit. Rafiel tugged at the loose sleeve covering most of his hybridized arm.

  “What about me?” he posited. Mav studied Raf, from his pointed ears to his rugged hiking boots, before placing a mud-covered hand squarely over the elf’s face. Rafiel spluttered, shoving Mav’s hand away and struggling not to wipe the drying mud from his cheeks. Bron smirked.

  “Actually, it looks pretty good,” he praised after a sensible chuckle, scooping up some leaves and sprinkling them in Raf’s hair before pulling his hood up over his ears. “Perfect.”

  The trio set off, slinking around the Gruul camp and moving through the underbrush, quieter than the breeze. They needed to circle around to the opposite side of the camp before sneaking closer through the widest gap between sentries. Despite a close encounter with one of the viashino patrols when he scouted ahead earlier, Mav remained optimistic about their chances. So long as they found the weird, the POD didn’t explode, and they got out, this mission would be a success.

  After about five minutes of stealth, they made it through to the sheltered side of the improvised barn. Through the walls, hooves stamped and animals cried. Mav always heard tales of the nomadic Gruul bonding with wild monsters, and didn’t know before now they held beasts in captivity like the Selesnya. He guessed these wild rubblebeasts resented being caged, even by fellow denizens of the broken reclamation zones.

  They paused to regroup against the wall before advancing around to the front of the barn where the threshold stood open, any hinges or doors long since destroyed.

  “So what’s the plan now?” Bron sneered, his expression revealing a readiness to shoot down the first grand plan or a clever diversion he heard.

  Mav grinned. “We put these to the test,” he announced, tapping the Gruul rune painted on Bron’s pasty white arm. Slouching, Mav then copied the asymmetric, lazy gait he observed in the rest of the Slitz, and started toward the corner of the building.

  “Azor’s ass, you’re serious?” Bron exclaimed. Raf shushed him before checking his blinds and following Mav’s lead. Bron did the same, continuing to mutter under his breath.

  Mav’s heart pounded in his chest, defying his confident swagger as they rounded the corner and came into sight of the Gruul war band camped in the courtyard. His hands itched for his longbow, or even a pair of daggers. Instead, as they strolled past the anarchs, he donned the cold, familiar gaze he used when passing beggars empty-pocketed. Forcing himself to loosen up, his eyes darted around, spotting sentries posted at various points. No alarms raised at the apparent sight of three ‘hunters’ returning to camp.

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  They walked across the courtyard, and into the large building. From afar, Mav saw a few attached animal pens, and some of the Gruul warriors led beasts in from their paddocks. At first the creatures resisted, but they moved with renewed vigor when a viashino brandished a long and crude staff. A Gruul pain stick, he guessed, not unlike its Rakdos cousin, the excruciator. Lilla told him plenty about how the Gruul used those terrible devices.

  Now inside, he pressed his eyes closed to adjust to the darkness faster, and opened them after a few agonizing moments of blindness. The Gruul kept a lot of cages here, and more than beasts of burden alone. Several large maaka prowled in one enclosure, the huge predator cats licking their lips as they appraised the newcomers.

  To their fortune, the Gruul assigned no sentry to guard the barn. Mav imagined the tongue-lashing and court-martial any aerie attendant would suffer if they allowed intruders to release the skyknights’ rocs from their stables. Mav pointed Bron and Raf to the largest pack animals’ pens and they hurried over to open the gates.

  Exhaling and taking a cautious step, Mav turned to the maaka. These six-eyed natural hunters, twice his size, were known for their ferocity. As much as he didn’t want to risk fighting one himself, the cats would make an excellent diversion while their team searched for the weird.

  “Good kitties,” he murmured, examining the lock on their pen. Good thing Grubby couldn’t see this.

  “Are you insane?” Bron hissed as Mav raised the hilt of a dagger to smash the rusted latch. From the look on his face, Raf agreed with Bron’s assessment. The maaka’s drooling lips sided with Mav.

  “You got a better plan?” the legionnaire retorted. Bron opened his mouth, paused, and closed it again.

  “Not dying?” he tried weakly. Raf’s face hardened with resolve.

  “Do it,” he whispered, standing ready at the gate to his pen. If they timed this right, the maaka would attack the beasts instead, inciting them to stampede.

  “Fine,” Bron sputtered. He finished prying open the loose latch on his gate and stood at the ready.

  Mav brought the hilt of his knife down, shattering the corroded latch. The waiting maaka pounced forward and slammed against the door, a blur of claws, teeth, and fur. Mav hung onto the cage door and used the bars as a shield, letting the maaka force the metal grate open. Bron and Raf opened the other pens and took cover in a similar fashion, and the makeshift stable erupted into chaos.

  Animals spilled out into the courtyard, then came frenzied shouts of panic. Running in lockstep, the three rushed for the large staircase to the upper level of the building. At the top of the stairs, they arrived in a large open bunkhall, filled with Gruul anarchs.

  “What go on down there?” a flummoxed cyclops asked Bron, peering out a broken window.

  “The animals, they’re escaping!” Bron shouted, forgetting to school his accent. “Quick, we need everyone downstairs!” His unconvincing call echoed through the chamber, loud enough for all the warriors to hear. Still, they grabbed their weapons and rushed downstairs in a furor. One viashino lingered behind the rest, sniffing in Bron’s direction, a suspicious look on his scaled reptilian face.

  “Where are you hairballsss going?” he checked, tongue flicking out to sniff the air, pupils narrowed to slits.

  “Boss said get help, so we get help,” Mav stepped in and grunted, affecting his best Gruul voice. The clever lizardfolk hissed and shook his head.

  “Be quick, and get back to work, humansss,” he spat before following the other anarchs down the staircase. They heard the ruckus continue outside, shrieks of wild beasts and the clatter of crumbling rubble intermingled with the feral cries and howls of the Gruul and maaka.

  Once the viashino left, Mav signaled for the others to follow him to the door on the far side of the chamber. Their distraction wouldn’t last long. Bron tested the handle and shook his head, frowning. “Locked,” he mouthed.

  On a hunch, Mav set his shoulder to the door, wiggled the knob and pushed. The door opened. Just like home.

  Inside a large man, perhaps half-giant, with a full mug of … something in his meaty hand swung around to face them.

  “Hey, wha’ you lot doin’ in ‘ere?” he blinked, stale alcohol drifting on his breath as he swept crumbs and spiders from a messy beard. This looked like the treasure hoard, the man all alone in here. The quartermaster? Mav wondered.

  He and Raf exchanged a look while Bron scrambled for an excuse, distracting the sentry with a shiny trinket pulled from his belt pouch. The two fighters grabbed the closest heavy items they could find and stepped behind the half-giant, slamming the makeshift cudgels onto his head in unison. Already drunk and drowsy, the large man went down with no protest.

  “Find the weird,” Mav ordered, kneeling next to the man to check the severity of the head wound. Satisfied the man would live, he rolled him onto his side, and joined the search. Plunder filled the room from wall to wall, much of it junk to anyone except as trophies to the Gruul, and most of it soiled or broken by now.

  In a stack near the door, Rafiel found the weird’s cylindrical POD and signaled Mav. The initiate opened his pack and, with Raf’s assistance, secured the cumbersome tube inside before hoisting it across his back.

  “Grab anything else of value and let’s go,” Mav told the others. Drawing his daggers, he returned to the door and stood watch. Bron and Raf threw a few things into their packs, then readied their weapons as well.

  “Plan?” Bron cued, trepidation in his green eyes.

  Mav presented as bold a front he could, pushing aside his own misgivings. “Run, stay together and fight our way out if we have to,” Mav whispered. And angels, a little divine favor would go a long way right now.

  They hurried downstairs and found the Gruul already rounded up many of the escaped animals. The city dwellers attempted to stroll out of camp as coolly as they arrived. They reached the outer edge of the courtyard when a shrill reptilian whistle rang out behind them.

  “Thosssse hairballssssss are fakessss, get them!”

  “Run,” Mav shouted, and they did. By the angel’s grace, they evaded the roving patrols searching for the missing maaka, hounded by a group of viashino pursuers all the way back to the city walls.

  Relieved to return to safety, Bron ran to the gates, jumping and waving his arms in the air.

  “Gruul! Gruul!” he shouted, panting. Atop the walls, the Boros guards drew bows. They fired a warning shot at Bron’s feet, causing him to yelp in alarm.

  “Aye, and you’d best not come any closer,” one of them called down, and horror filled the young noble’s pale face.

  “Wait!” Mav called, dropping his longbow and saluting. Thankful for his Legion conditioning and life on the streets, he didn’t need to catch his breath like Bron. “We’re undercover, not Gruul. Soldier Viktorr, Sunhome Garrison,” he called up. The guards atop the wall conferred with each other for a moment.

  “You got proof of that, sonny?” the first called down again.

  Mav gritted his teeth and forced himself to smile. He knew he might catch trouble for being an initiate claiming to be an undercover soldier, but hopefully they would overlook his audacity.

  “Sure do. Hold your fire,” he requested as he lowered one hand to his belt pouch to retrieve his ID papers. The gates opened and a legionnaire stepped out, checking the papers. They cleared Mav and the others to reenter the city after a cursory glance at the Legion insignia on his papers.

  Once within the safety of the gates, Raf shook the remaining leaves out of his hood and hair. Bron pulled his shirt back on and tried to wipe the dirt off his face, but only succeeded in smearing it. Mav grimaced.

  “You’re getting dirt and sweat all over your shirt,” he remarked, and Bron shrugged, blasé.

  “So?”

  Mav shook his head; didn’t Bron give him a disgusted look for wiping his hand on his pants before? Then again, Bron probably never washed his own clothes in his life. “Never mind.”

  Mav led the way back to the Blistercoils. He didn’t see any smoke rising from the massive network of mana generators in the waning light of the setting sun.

  “Looks like we made it back before the … thing overheated,” Mav started, trying and failing to remember the name of the regulator. Raf scrutinized him out of the corner of his eye, but Mav ignored the glance. “Let’s get the POD to the lab before it explodes,” he remarked, taking care not to jostle his pack.

  When they returned, Aethrin arched a fine elfin brow at their mud-smeared attire, but said nothing. He accepted the weird back with reserved thanks, suppressing clinical joy at the safe return of his specimen. Impressed by not only their speed, but also their discrete actions and unused Izzet charm, Aethrin paid them a handsome bonus in gold zinos. In addition, he provided each a red enchanted gem the size of an arrowhead, which when broken summoned a bound elemental for a short time.

  “Cool!” Bron commented, studying the gemstone and turning it over in his hands. Beside him, Rafiel produced a magnifying lens from his field kit and inspected his gem in the light of a nearby mizzium tube. Aethrin sniffed.

  “What kind of elemental will it summon?” Mav asked. Aethrin took an extra moment to size Mav up with a disapproving stare, from his muddy boots to his untamed mane, and the bare, painted chest between. He and Aunt Melo would get along well.

  “It’s red,” Aethrin pointed out.

  Mav nodded. “Yes.” So?

  “Fire, obviously!” Aethrin shouted. “Now out with the lot of you, I have work to do!”