‘The question is,’ said Grim, navigating his way down the hillside, ‘what do we do about it?’
Wedding Crashers
The next day, in the privacy of their room in the basement of Fell Towers, Og-Grim-Dog went back and forth over their options.
‘There’s no doubt in my mind,’ said Grim, ‘that Lilith intends to remove, almost certainly kill, the Dark Lord. She and her friend Samael made that clear enough. Why exactly, we can be less sure. What we also don’t know is what that all means for us.’
‘I believe,’ said Og, ‘this all boils down to our objectives here. Are we loyal followers of the Dark Lord? Or are we just in it for our food and lodging? In which case, what’s to stop us siding with Lilith, if it looks like she’s going to be on the winning side?’
A silence fell.
‘Dog?’ Grim pressed.
‘What?’
‘Come on now,’ said Og. ‘It’s time to be honest with each other. You’ve been the one most in favour of our place here. To keep our place, we’ve had to do things I regret. We’ve murdered and kidnapped: hurt people we had no personal quarrel with. We’ve lost our friend Assata over it. What have we become? Unthinking beasts? Dogs that do their master’s bidding in exchange for the scraps from his table?’
Dog snarled at that.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Og. ‘That was a poor choice of words.’
Dog took a breath. ‘No. You are right. I am just a mean dog, who only cares about where his next meal is coming from. But I know you are more than that, Og. I am sorry. This has gone far enough now. I’ve no loyalty to the Dark Lord or to Lilith. Both captivated me for a while, I’ll admit. I thought I’d found somewhere to belong. We don’t belong here. But if you’re asking me what we should do now, I haven’t got a clue.’
‘You’re not just a mean dog,’ Og told him. ‘We’re all better than what we’ve become. But we still have some decisions to make. Do we warn the Dark Lord? Do we just escape alone in the night? Do we leave Princess Borte in her cell, or do we take moral responsibility for our part in putting her there?’
That was a lot to think about, and Grim felt as unable to fully answer Og’s questions as his brothers. But he could see a first step, at least.
‘I think we should tell Gurin what we know,’ he said.
‘I don’t give two craps about the Dark Lord,’ Gurin admitted once Og-Grim-Dog had filled him in on what they had observed. ‘It’s what you learned about the Bureau that interests me. Director Barclay,’ he said the name with obvious distaste, ‘the man behind the debasement of the adventuring life, is actually working for Lilith. Do you understand? The Bureau has been corrupted, its members sent here to eliminate the Dark Lord on her orders.’
Grim nodded. With all the revelations they had learned, he hadn’t quite pieced together what it told them about the Bureau.
‘I don’t think it’s just the Bureau, either.’
‘What do you mean, Og?’ Grim asked.
‘Do you recall when we went dungeoneering in Wight’s Hollow?’ Og asked them.
‘That disgrace of a place?’ asked Gurin. ‘Why are you reminding us of that?’
‘There was a branch of Discount Dungeon Supplies there. I remember Assata suggesting that they were corrupting that place, in a fashion. Changing it into a tourist destination: not a real dungeon at all. Ever since, I’ve noticed how many branches of DDS there are around Gal’azu. When we returned here from Kuthenia, a DDS warehouse had appeared. It’s replaced the Dark Lord’s own weapons manufactory. A strange decision, if you ask me—making him dependent on others to keep his army supplied. And who was behind it?’
‘Lilith,’ Grim answered his brother. ‘So she and this Samael she spoke to, what if they control DDS and the Bureau? It seems that Samael now has a measure of control over the Kuthenians, too, since he is leading an army this way. And now Lilith wants to remove the Dark Lord—’
‘—and take over Fell Towers,’ Dog finished for him.
‘By The Maker’s Mighty Beard,’ said Gurin. ‘There’ll be no institution left in Gal’azu that they don’t control. A hidden nexus controlling all the weapons and armies in the land—even the heroes who might have stood up to them.’
‘And the food,’ Og added.
‘Eh? What do you mean?’ Gurin demanded.
‘Sheev’s,’ Og said simply.
‘No!’ said Dog. ‘Don’t tell me that Sheev’s is now the enemy. This is going too far.’
‘And for all we are learning,’ said Grim, ‘we still have to decide what we are going to do about it.’
‘And quickly,’ said Og. ‘Because a Kuthenian army will be here in two days’ time.’
It was the night before the day before the wedding. Og-Grim-Dog was in the basement room they had begun to call home, though recent events meant they no longer used that word. Still, some things hadn’t changed. Their job, as it had been for the last few weeks, was to keep an eye on the princess of the Kuthenian Empire. If anything, they were taking that duty more seriously than ever.
They took turns staying awake through the night while the other two slept. So it was, that when an unusual noise of clanking metal came from the basement—a noise which Grim would probably have slept through on previous nights—he woke his brothers and got to his feet.
Og-Grim-Dog took the time to light a lantern and then exited their room. The basement was especially dark at night-time, and as Og held the light in front of them, Grim was able to navigate towards Borte’s cell.
As he neared, he saw a pale blue light that looked like it was hovering in the air, at about the same height as Og’s lantern.
It wasn’t until the bars of the prison cell came into view that he realised the light was held in the palm of a human wizard. It bathed Borte’s cell in a gentle light, revealing an open door. Inside, a halfling was in the process of leading the princess out of her prison. They stopped, caught in the act, when they saw Grim approach. Movement next to the wizard caught his eye next, and an elf appeared at the mage’s side. The bow she held was drawn and aimed their way. Finally, a voice from the darkness made him turn in the opposite direction to the prison cell. Here, Og’s light identified a sword-wielding barbarian.
‘We don’t want to turn on you, Og-Grim-Dog,’ said the voice. ‘But if you try to intervene, we won’t hesitate.’
The barbarian frowned slightly at the response.
Three ogre smiles appeared.
‘Praise be to Lord Vyana and His Horde of Winged Hyenas,’ said Dog. ‘We’re glad you’re here.’
The Yellow Wedding
The wedding breakfast was held in the Old Refectory. Tables full of menials occupied most of the space, while other menials acted as servers. They had already begun to circulate with the food, and the smell of fried bacon and hot syrup hung temptingly in the air.
No-one from Princess Borte’s family was at the top table. Indeed, Princess Borte was not there herself, since in this part of Gal’azu it was considered bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the ceremony. Instead, joining the Dark Lord and Lilith, was the groom’s mother, and various aunts, uncles and cousins.