Treasures of Fantasy - Margaret Weis [84]
“Ah, yes, quite right, Commander,” said Acronis. “Thank you.”
Skylan at first feared they had caught him eavesdropping, but then he saw them both looking at something on the other side of the garden. Sighting the newcomer, Skylan understood why the two had abruptly ended their discussion.
An ogre was walking toward them. The ogre had a tattoo on his arm like Skylan’s.
Like all his kind, the ogre was immensely tall, standing head and shoulders over Skylan, which meant that he towered over the Southlanders. The ogre was in excellent physical condition; unusual for ogres, who disliked strenuous exertion of any kind and tended to run to flab. This ogre wore the customary ogre garb: leather breeches, held in place by a wide leather belt, stuffed into leather boots laced over massive calves. His well-muscled and hairy chest was bare, crisscrossed by a leather harness that, under normal circumstances, would have held the ogre’s weapons. In this instance, the harness was empty.
And, as with all ogres, the hulking body was topped by a bald head and a face that was soft and round and guileless as that of a human babe. His cheeks were plump, his mouth small, his eyes bright. Aware that their faces tended to inspire laughter, not fear, ogres made themselves look more ferocious by painting their heads, a practice that also denoted the ogre’s rank and place in society.
This ogre’s head was painted white with a black stripe running from the neck to the chin and another black stripe crossing the nose and cheeks. Skylan thought back to the time not long ago (though it seemed a hundred lifetimes) when the ogres had entered his village to tell them the gods of the Vindrasi were dead. Skylan had seen only two ogres with faces painted like this and they were the ogre commanders, known as godlords.
Skylan was consumed with curiosity, wondering what an ogre godlord was doing in Oran and how he had come to be a slave. That the godlord was a slave was obvious, not just from the tattoo on his arm, but by the way Acronis and Zahakis treated him. They waited for the ogre to come to them, instead of going to meet him, and even when he was standing next to them, they finished their conversation (which had turned to something inconsequential) before acknowledging the ogre’s presence.
The ogre stood patiently, looking about. Skylan had once considered ogres to be stupid brutes, lazy and dull-witted. He had learned to his sorrow that ogres were crafty, cunning, and intelligent. Heavy of girth and large-boned with broad shoulders and big bellies, ogres were of a naturally sedentary nature, which other races often mistook for laziness. They were not particularly skilled with weapons, having no need to be. They counted on their weight to overpower smaller foes.
Skylan recalled with painful clarity the hard-hitting ogre warriors smashing into the front lines of his shield wall. The wall had disintegrated, men crushed to bloody bits.
As he was thinking this, the ogre suddenly saw Skylan. He stared fixedly at him, plainly taking Skylan’s measure, eyeing him up and down. The ogres and the Vindrasi were ancient foes. Skylan scowled and stood straighter, making himself taller, and thrust out his chest and crossed his arms. He met the ogre’s gaze and looked him up and down.
The ogre chuckled, amused. Skylan burned with resentment. Zahakis and Acronis looked back at him, then the three began to discuss Skylan as though he was deaf. They spoke of him as a “hothead” and “youth.” Then Zahakis said, “He has some skill with a sword.”
“Some skill!” Skylan cried, blazing. “Give me a sword and we’ll see how much skill I have!”
Acronis gave a commanding gesture, and Skylan’s guard gripped him by the arm and led him around the hedge, down a path that ran beneath a trellis covered with grapevine. Skylan walked proudly, keeping his gaze fixed defiantly on the ogre.
“This is the leader of the Para Dix team. His name is Keeper of the Fire,” said Zahakis, performing introductions. “He will be your trainer for the game. Keeper, this is Skylan Ivorson.”
The ogre