Realms of the Underdark - J. Robert King [86]
Geppo wore a dark, muddy tunic of rough fabric, under which a darker outfit showed at the collar. Wykar guessed that leather or hide armor lay beneath. A finely tooled black belt bearing many small pockets and pouches was pulled tight at his thin waist. It looked like a drow's belt, but it was unlikely the derro had taken it from the bodies of their former masters. The Underdark held the remains of many failed plans and dreams, and one could get anything if one knew where to look.
After a long moment, Geppo's gaze dropped. He resumed scraping the edge of his long knife across the scar-crossed back of his right hand. "Late," he grunted, his voice as rough as a broken rock.
Wykar saw the butt of a weapon lying within reach of Geppo's left hand, almost hidden by the curled edge of a glowfan fungus. The bent gnome stepped closer, his movements relaxed and slow. The weapon looked like a crossbow, a little two-shot repeater type favored by the drow-a lucky find. When he was ten feet from Geppo, Wykar crouched on the balls of his boots and rested his elbows on his thighs, letting his thick hands dangle. "Long walk home," he replied.
Geppo snorted faintly, as if he recognized the lie. He lifted the knife blade, eyed its bright edge, then carefully slid it home in a crude sheath strapped to his belt. His thin arms then rested on his knees, hands limp. After a short glance around Wykar, he nodded. "Alone," he rasped approvingly.
"Alone," agreed Wykar. He detected no heat-glow but Geppo's, heard no sound but Geppo's breathing, smelled nothing other than the earthy scent of the glowing fungus and a sour, unwashed body odor that had to be the derro's. Didn't they ever bathe? It must be easy for Underdark predators to track them; little wonder most derro were so insanely paranoid.
Geppo nodded and seemed to relax. He reached over and gently broke a piece from a nearby glowfan. He popped the luminescent tidbit into his mouth and chewed.
Wykar saw disease-blackened teeth through the forest of filthy whiskers. The gnome swallowed and covered up his disgust. He never touched glowing fungus, much less ate it; many species of it were poisonous. Geppo seemed to enjoy fungus of any sort, though. The drow had fed him nothing else.
Wykar let it go. He inhaled slowly as he looked the derro over. "I was surprised to see you here," he said at last. "I didn't know if you would make it very far after…"
The derro smiled with the look of a wicked boy who is proud of something. "S'prise you, s'prise Geppo," he said. "You run much, walk much? You strong, hey. Geppo… mmm, no. Not strong." He held out his thin arms and turned them over, shaking his head and frowning in disapproval. "Not strong, hey? Sick much, sick much." He dropped his arms and shrugged, then leaned forward and stared into Wykar's cool gray eyes, a smirk on his ravaged face. "Hey," he whispered, his white eyes narrow. "Geppo sick much but"-his voice dropped further, as if telling a little secret-"laughing ones sick more now, hey?"
He pulled back before Wykar could reply. "Laughing ones sick more," he repeated with a quick nod. "Sick more than Geppo." The derro thumped his chest with a bony fist when he spoke his name.
Wykar's cheek twitched as he nodded in response, remembering. "Very sick," he said softly. He shivered, though he was not cold in the slightest.
Geppo's smirk faded. After a moment, he nodded and made a gesture of dismissal. "Laughing ones no laughing, all good. You say, see me here, then you run. You here now." He stopped, waiting.
The deep gnome looked into the derro's white eyes. This could work, he thought. He's still the same, or looks it. If he's the same old Geppo, this could really work.
Wykar swallowed. He sensed that he should speak only the truth at this point. Being caught in an important lie would lead straight to serious trouble, especially with a derro-even this one.
"When we… escaped, we left some unfinished business behind us," he said, making no pretense of talking down to the derro. Despite the derro's pidgin-talk, Geppo was