Yet, if he could never be rid of the nightmares, there still might be something he could do about the cursed suit he wore. Fauztin had been a sorcerer of some reputation, but even the Vizjerei had admitted that there weremany practitioners more skilled, more knowledgeable, than he.
Norrec would just have to find one of them.
He looked east, then west. To the east he saw nothing but tall and menacing mountains, whereas the west seemed a bit more gentle in scope. True, Norrec knew he might be working under false assumptions, but his best hope, he decided, had to be the latter direction.
The cold wind and moisture already chilling him to the bone, the weary veteran started off on his tremendous trek. It might be that he would die of exposure before he even made it out of the mountains, but some part of him suspected that such would not be so. Bartuc's armor had not seized him simply to let him die in the middle of the wilderness. No, it likely had some other notion in mind, one that would make itself known with time.
Norrec did not look forward to that revelation at all.
The sun vanished into an overcast sky, turning the weather even colder. A wetness also hung in the air. Breathing heavily, Norrec pushed on despite everything. As of yet he had not so much as seen a glimpse to hint that he traveled the right direction. For all the weary veteran knew, he had headed in the exact opposite of where he should have gone. Some mountain kingdom could have been just past the next peak to the east.
Thoughts like that, however frustrating, managed to keep Norrec from completely going mad. Each time he let his thoughts wander, they ever returned to the tomb and the horror of which he had been a part. Fauztin's and Sadun's faces haunted him and every now and then Norrec imagined he saw the pair condemning him from this shadow or that.
But they were dead and, unlike the bloody warlord,they would stay so. Only Norrec's guilt continued to condemn him.
Around midday, he began to stumble. It finally occurred to him that he had neither eaten nor drunk since waking and the day before he had last supped early. Unless he planned to fall over soon and die, Norrec had to find sustenance of some sort.
But how? He had no weapon, no trap. Water he could find simply by scooping up some of the snow topping the nearby rocks, but actual food looked to be hard to come by.
Deciding he could at least assuage his thirst, Norrec walked over to a small outcropping where the coolness of the shadows had kept a small bit of snow and ice still unmelted. He scooped up what he could and greedily sucked on it, not caring at all about the bits of dust and grass that came with it.
In moments, his head seemed to clear a bit. Spitting out a few fragments of dirt, Norrec pondered what to do next. Not once had he seen any wild animal other than a bird. Without a bow or slingshot, he had no chance to bring down one of the creatures. Yet, he needed food-
His left hand suddenly moved without any regard as to his wishes. The fingers separated and bent inward, almost as if now Norrec clutched an invisible sphere. The gauntleted hand then turned until the palm faced the landscape just before the stunned fighter.
From his lips burst a single word, "Jezrat!"
The ground a few feet ahead buckled. Norrec at first thought that a tremor had struck the area, but only a small crevice, perhaps six feet by three, actually formed. The rest of his surroundings did not so much as shiver in the slightest.
His nose wrinkled as noxious fumes arose from the minute but apparently deep fissure. The air burned where yellow tendrils of smoke spread.
"Iskari! Woyut!" The new words came out of his own mouth with great ferocity.
From within the fissure came a horrid, chattering sound. Norrec sought to back up, but his feet would not move. The chattering increased, now a babble of highpitched, animalistic sounds.
Norrec barely stifled a gasp as a grotesque tusked face thrust itself somewhat unwillingly into the overcast day. A pair of jagged, curved horns rose from the top of the scaly head. Round, yellow orbs with blazing red pupils shied away from the sky, finally focusing with clear bitterness on the human. The creature's squat, porcine nose twitched as if smelling something terrible-something that the fighter realized likely was him.
Twin sets of three-digited talons seized hold of the sides of the fissure as the horrific beast pushed itself up to the surface. Squat, oversized feet with curved nails planted themselves on the ground. Norrec stared down at a thing surely out of the underworld, a vaguely humanoid, hunchbacked denizen of the depths who, while barely reaching his waist, revealed surprising muscle under skin both scaled and furred.
And then a second of the creatures joined the first… he immediately followed by a third, a fourth, a fifth…
The frightful pack ceased growing in numbers after the sixth, a half a dozen more than Norrec certainly desired. The demonic imps chattered in their incomprehensible language, obviously upset with being here and very clear upon whom they blamed this entire situation. A few opened toothy maws and hissed at Norrec, while others simply scowled.
"Gester! Iskari!" The strange words once more startled him, but their effect on the monstrous pack proved even more astonishing. All signs of defiance faded abruptly as the imps groveled before him, some fairly burying themselves in the ground to prove how lowly they were.
"Dovru Sesti! Dovru Sesti!"
Whatever the phrase meant, it sent the horned brutes scurrying in outright panic. Squealing and chattering, they headed off in different directions as if their very lives depended upon it.
Norrec exhaled. Each time unknown words sprang from his lips, it felt as if his heart stopped. The language sounded akin to that used by Fauztin and other Vizjerei with whom the veteran had made acquaintance over the years, but it also sounded harsher, darker, than anything Norrec's murdered friend had ever spouted, even in the worst of battles.
He had no time to think any more on the subject, for suddenly chattering arose in the distance. Norrec peered to the south, saw two of the monstrosities loping back- the bloody, torn remains of a goat dragging behind them.
He had been hungry and now the suit provided him with its idea of sustenance.
Norrec blanched at the sight of the carcass. He had, of course, often slaughtered animals for food, but the imps had taken some delight in capturing and slaying the unfortunate goat. The head had nearly been ripped from the body and the legs dangled as if all broken. A portion of the goat's flank had been torn away, the blood flowing from that massive wound leaving a stream of crimson behind.
The grotesque creatures dropped the animal in front of Norrec, then backed away. Even as they did so, a third member of their pack returned, this one carrying a small, bloody carcass with vague similarities to a rabbit.
Eyeing the grisly offerings, the wary veteran looked for anything he himself might still consider edible. Exceptional hunters the tusked beasts might be, but their handling left much to be desired.
The other three imps returned within moments, each bearing their own prizes. One, a tattered-looking lizard,Norrec immediately dismissed. The others, a pair of rabbits, he finally chose in preference to what had been first given to him.
As he reached for them, his left hand again rebelled. The gauntlet passed over the rabbits and as it did, incredible heat threatened to sear Norrec's fingers.
"Damn you!" He managed to stumble back a step. The heat faded quickly again, but his hand still throbbed from the near burning. From where they gathered, the imps chattered, this time sounding quite amused at his discomfort. However, a quick and furious glance silenced them.