Free Shadow Games: The Fourth Chronicles of the Black Company: First Book of the South by Glen Cook Page B

have to. I’ve known him since before your dad was whelped. Look at him.
    He’s doing his classic mighty-sorcerer-from-a-faraway-land act. In about twenty
     seconds he’s going to . . . ” A wicked grin spread his mouth around his face. He
     muttered something under his breath.
    One-Eye raised a hand. A ball of light formed within his curled fingers.
    There was a pop like that of a cork coming out of a wine bottle.
    One-Eye held a hand full of swamp bottom. It oozed between his fingers and ran
     down his arm. He lowered his hand and stared in disbelief.
    He let out a shriek and whirled.
    Innocent Goblin was faking a conversation with Murgen. But Murgen was not up to
     the deceit. His shifty eyes gave Goblin away.
    One-Eye puffed up like a toady frog, ready to explode. Then a miracle occurred.
    He invented self-restraint. A nasty little smile pranced across his lips and he
     turned back to the guides.
    That was the second time in my experience that he had controlled himself when
     provoked. But, then, it was one of those rare times when Goblin had initiated
     the process of provocation. I told Otto, “This could get interesting.”
    Otto grunted an affirmative. He was not thrilled.
    Of One-Eye, I asked, “Have you finished telling them you’re the necromancer
     Voice of the North Wind come to ease the pain in their hearts brought on by
     worry about their wealth?” He’d actually tried to sell that once, to a tribe of
     savages coincidentally in possession of an eye-popping cache of emeralds. He
     found out the hard way that primitive does not mean stupid. They were fixing to
     burn him at the stake when Goblin decided to bail him out. Against his better
     judgment, he always insisted afterward.
    “It ain’t like that this time, Croaker. I wouldn’t do it to my own people.”
    One-Eye does not have an ounce of shame. Nor even the sense not to lie to those
     who know him well. Of course he would do it to his own people. He would do it to
     anybody if he thought he could get away with it. And he has so little trouble
     conning himself on that.
    “See that you don’t. We’re too few and too far from safety to let you indulge
     yourself in your usual line of shit.”
    I got enough menace into my voice to make him gulp.
    His tone was markedly different when he resumed gobbling at our prospective
     guides.
    Even so, I decided I would pick up a smatter of the language. Just to keep an
     ear on him. His often misplaced self-confidence has a way of asserting itself at
     the most unpropitious moments.
    Straight for a time, One-Eye negotiated a deal that pleased everyone. We had
     ourselves guides for the passage through the jungle and intermediary
     interpreters for the land that lay beyond.
    Relying on his usual moronic sense of humor, Goblin dubbed them Baldo and
     Wheezer, for reasons that were self-evident To my embarrassment, the names
     stuck. Those two old boys probably deserved better. But then again . . .
    We wended our way belween the shaggy, hump-backed hills the rest of that day,
    and as darkness approached we topped the cleavage between the pair that flanked
     the summit of our passage. From there we could see the sunset, reflecting bloody
     wounds of a broad river, and the rich green of the jungle beyond. Behind us lay
     the tawny humps, and beyond them a hazy sprawl of indigo.
    My mood was reflective, flat, almost down. It seemed we might have reached a
     watershed in more than a geographical sense.
    Much later, unable to sleep for thoughts that questioned what I was doing here
     in an alien land, thoughts that replied that I had nothing else to do and
     nowhere else to go, I left my bedroll and the remaining warmth of our campfire.
    I headed for one of the flanking hills, moved by some vague notion of going up
     where I could get a better view of the stars.
    Wheezer, who had the watch, gave me a gap-toothed leer before spitting a wad of
     brown juice into the coals. I heard him start wheezing before I was