As the beast swallowed its tidbit and begged for more, Khleeg, too, swallowed. Golgren hesitated. It would not be the first time a ruler of his people had fed a failure to one of its pets. But Golgren let Khleeg fret for a moment then stepped away from the beast. Khleeg breathed a sigh of relief.
“The summer soon gives way to the autumn, Khleeg! All must be in readiness for the glorious occasion! Is it so?”
“The Jaka Hwunar, it readies!” blurted the officer. “The guards, they ready! The slaves, they busy making fine clothes for the grand lord! They carve great faces of him and paint glorious battles he won!” That brought to mind a subject Khleeg wanted to ask about, diplomatically. “Grand Lord, is it true … that the elves, they go … they go free when the crowning is done?”
Golgren’s expression grew veiled. “This none concerns Khleeg! Khleeg should be concerned about the crowning, yes?”
Again, the officer swallowed, glancing at the meredrake. “Yes, Grand Lord! No one will break the walls of warriors! Golgren will be grand khan, lord chieftain of all Kern and Blode!”
“Golthuu,” corrected his lord. “We should both remember that from now on. When I rule, the ogre lands will be renamed Golthuu, in my honor. No more Kern. No more Blode.”
“Golthuu. Yes, Grand Lord. Golthuu.”
“Go! All must be in readiness! You will do it, yes, Khleeg?”
The heavy ogre struck his breastplate. “I swear!”
At that moment, Wargroch entered. The younger warrior repeated Khleeg’s breast-beating gesture then announced, “Grand Lord, you wished to practice. Practice is ready.”
“Good!” To the departing Khleeg, Golgren growled, “There must be no delay.”
The senior officer nodded hurriedly before vanishing from the chamber. A moment later, the grand lord and Wargroch also left. The two marched noisily through the palace, down to the ground level, and through several halls. Soon enough, they came to an inner doorway where two hulking guards stood at attention. One quickly opened the door for Golgren.
The unrelenting light of day rushed over the grand lord. He stepped out into what was almost a miniature version of the floor of the Jaka Hwunar. High walls upon which had long ago been carved an idyllic garden scene-replete with dancing beasts and beautiful High Ogres watching while one of their own played a lyre-surrounded a stone and sand floor. Other than the door through which Golgren had entered-a door immediately sealed from inside the palace by the guards-there was only one other way in, an arched entrance four times as wide as the door and blocked by a toothed, metal gate that could be raised or lowered.
The burning sun illuminated well the many old crimson stains on the walls. Suspected by Golgren to have originally been a true garden, the area was a kind of brutal playing field; long ago it had been designated as such for the amusement of the ruler during the days when the High Ogres’ decline into debauchery and sadism had been in full throttle. There, instead of the onetime garden of peace and music, prisoners fought other prisoners or beasts, or simply fought to survive some insidious torture.
There the grand lord enjoyed a daily practice regimen. With only one hand to use in fighting, he had to keep his reflexes sharp and his mind sharper. Six burly warriors stood watch over the small arena, but they were not there to act as his opponents. Instead, the metal gate squealed open, and two surly figures trod inside. They were low-class prisoners, their crimes varying, but both with tempers more ferocious than most of their kind. Each outweighed Golgren by half again as much, and one was nearly a foot taller than the next largest fighter present.
Both were chained but stood quietly under the watchful eyes of two guards; a third undid their bonds. The two prisoners rubbed their wrists and gazed wearily around at their captors.
“Jaduum!” called Wargroch. “Hysta idor-”
Golgren gestured for silence. “Common. Always speak Common. All must learn it, know it.” To the two criminals, he asked, “You know Common?”
The one on the left nodded warily. The second cocked his shaggy head then finally let out a raspy, “Yes.”
Golgren beamed with pleasure. The odds were that their understanding of Common was minimal at best, but that would do. “They have been told?”
Wargroch grunted. “Their freedom if the grand lord is beaten or dead.”
“F’han,” murmured the larger of the prisoners, his blood-shot eyes glinting.
Golgren smiled at him. “Give weapons. Leave fight.”
The guards looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Grand Lord,” Wargroch protested. “Better I should remain-”
“My command. Obey.”
With a shrug of surrender, Wargroch indicated that the captives should be duly armed. A guard handed one of them a long sword and the other a chipped but very serviceable axe with the marking of a Solamnic Kingfisher etched into its face. Golgren made a mental note to have such weapons secreted in the palace while the knight was still his guest. It would not do to remind the human of past hostile encounters between ogres and humans.
The captives wore only kilts and, in one case, not even sandals. The two had obviously led rough lives even in comparison to most of their kind. Partly for that reason, Golgren expected a good fight out of them. The grand lord wore a kilt of much finer make and sandals equally new. Atop he wore a light brown tunic that enabled him to hide what he hung around his neck.
The grand lord patted his tunic once to let his adversaries see that he hid no breastplate or other protection beneath the thin garment. The first prisoner grinned wide, revealing several gaps in his yellowed teeth; the other’s eyes narrowed maliciously.
Golgren held up the stump of his arm and Wargroch attached to it a variation of the claw device that the ogre leader used in his battle against rebellious ogre chieftains. There were four claws, banded tightly together. They were also shorter but sharper, and the base was better designed to grip his stump by a series of leather straps rather than the hooks that sometimes ripped his flesh. The new false appendage had been finished that very morning, and Golgren was eager to try it out.
The prisoners shuffled uneasily at the sight of Golgren’s arm stump and false claws, but after a moment, both giants recovered their confidence. For Golgren to use the steel talons, he would still have to come well within arm’s reach.
In addition to the sword and axe, the prisoners each also received a dagger. The first slipped his into his kilt, while the second gripped the small blade for more immediate use. As for the grand lord, he had hidden away his ancient dagger, replacing it with a serviceable, wooden-handled one designed for more mundane purposes.
At Golgren’s signal, Wargroch and the guards retreated through the arched entrance. The criminals were wise enough not to attack Golgren immediately, waiting until the others were well and truly gone and they were alone with the grand lord.
The gate shut again. Golgren raised his talons. “Begin!”
The pair came lumbering at him. With his longer strides, the taller ogre reached the grand lord first. His axe immediately angled toward Golgren’s skull, but the half-breed had amazing reflexes. By the time the blade crossed where his head should have been, Golgren was far to the left, taking on his other foe.
His jab to the sword-wielder’s waist drew a flash of blood, albeit not enough to slow the prisoner. Baring his teeth, the shorter criminal performed a lunge whose sloppiness nearly enabled him to fumble past Golgren’s defenses. The grand lord parried the blow just inches from his throat, then had to turn and contend with the return of his axe-wielding adversary.
Fortunately, the pair didn’t think to coordinate their attacks. They fought for position over each other as much as they fought the grand lord. The taller one elbowed aside his partner, eager to kill the grand lord first. A warrior who slew Golgren in battle would gain not only freedom, but an enviable reputation.