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  “The leader, Mister Tanith, was a were-bitten ogre,” the little runt glowered. “If you had bothered to thoroughly peruse your contract, you would have known this before coming in here and embarrassing yourself this evening.”

  Ven stopped pacing, his eyes gaping as he stared at the little bumpy green lump with big hairy ears decked out in a badly pressed suit behind the desk in front of him. Then he collapsed into the chair opposite the Handler, his tail pushing through the hole in the back of the seat. He closed his eyes and massaged them with the balls of his taloned hands.

  'Ogre.' Not 'Orc.' 'Ogre' as in, three meters on the small side, weighing in at close to a ton, granite slabs for biceps, voraciously carnivorous. With the strength, speed, and savagery of a wolf on top of it all. That kind of ogre.

  That… that is one cold hell of a mistake to make.

  Had he been drinking more than usual the night he’d perused the contract? Had he just not been paying attention? ‘Orc’ and ‘ogre’ were fairly similar in Gloobeec, but not enough that it should have tripped him up. He wasn’t a master of the spoken language, but he could read it with almost no effort.

  Or maybe… maybe he just hadn’t wanted to know. Maybe some part of him hoped he’d be caught unaware. Unprepared.

  Maybe I’m just tired. Of everything. Ven cut that thought off at the knees. It led to some dark places.

  “Okay… okay,” he said. This was supposed to be an easy job. All the anger, the insults to his pride and reputation, suddenly washed away in the tide of this unforeseen, inexcusable error. He’d been so sure, so confident in his own skill. So… cocky. “Let me… let me just take the four hundred,” he said, abest-mindedly switching to Elvish Common. “I'll… I'll stick around the village for a few more days… see if I can’t get this bastard out in the open. Same trick's not going to work twice, he'll be looking for that. And he's already found a new hole to lay low in, that's a guarantee. But maybe… maybe if I can find him...” he looked up at the goblin Handler, his expression helpless. “Maybe I can kill him before, you know, he kills me.”

  “That would be the most amenable course of action,” the goblin nodded, his manner once again genial. If Ven’s lapse in etiquette had bothered him, he gave no sign. He closed the fat book in front of him with a clunk, flipped its latch closed with a nimble clawed finger, slid from his chair, and stood. Without the aid of his seat, the goblin was roughly half as tall as the ornate desk from which he conducted his business. “Hold a moment, please. I'll be back shortly with your earnings.” He turned and hurried to an impossibly small door on the back wall, and disappeared behind it.

  Ven was left alone with his thoughts. Most of which involved an insane, overpowered ogre-wolf gutting, dismembering, and otherwise rending him apart. If it had been in the cave, if it had just been where it was supposed to be…. Even an ogre would have been weakened during that kind of assault. He could have taken it. He could have handled the whole crew; he’d been in worse scrapes and gotten away.

  He’d have talked less, at least.

  Ven sighed and weighed his options.There was no way the mine-lighter trick worked again; the were-ogre would know its pack had been hunted, and would have burned their previous safe house and gone to ground already. Even an animal knew when its shelter was no longer safe, and Shifters were at least smarter than animals. Not by much, sure, but smart enough. And there was no way Ven could hunt for him during the day, when the brute would be unable to change. Not with his own light-sensitive condition.

  Maybe, maybe I can catch him off guard with… something… ogres are pretty obtuse, all things considered. Single-minded. There's got to be an angle. There's always an angle.

  And to think, he'd figured this one was going to be boring. Maybe his Handler was right. Maybe he was coasting. Maybe he was getting slow. Or at least complacent.

  Ven shook off his silent reverie as the tiny door clicked shut and a leather purse clinked upon the desk. He grabbed at it with an unenthusiastic talon as his Handler scurried back up to his perch. “Is there anything else I can do for you?” the goblin asked.

  “No, less you have some kind of explosive in rabbit hole of yours,” Ven replied once more in Gloobeec.

  “Even if I do, I'm afraid it isn't in your price range. Good luck to you as always, Mr. Tanith,” he smiled with slick, file-pointed teeth. “I do hope to see you again tomorrow night.” He then returned his attention to the notebook on his desk.

  “It Ven,” the gargoyle grumbled as he stood. He turned and found a craggy gray troll standing behind the chair he'd just vacated. He jumped out of reflex, startled. So that's what that smell was, he thought wildly. Was starting to wonder if I'd forgotten to shower. More likely, he’d just been too wrapped up in his own misery to notice it.

  Ven himself was an impressive meter-and-change in stature; the troll towered over him nonetheless. Its muscled shoulders pulled its hunched frame into such a position that Ven was more or less looking it in the eye. Its face was hard and sharp and appeared to be composed entirely of right angles. It might have been carved from the side of a mountain.

  “'Sup,” it said, its voice gravel. A thin shower of dust fell from its grinding jaws. Ven’s reply was an annoyed grunt.

  “Ms. Pumice will show you out,” the goblin said, without looking up.

  “How long, uh,” Ven chunked a thumb at the troll. “How long has… she… been stand there?”

  The goblin sighed. “Ms. Pumice slipped in around the time you said I was composed of goat feces.” His eyes finally left the parchment he'd been studying, searched Ven's face for a moment. “I pay her quite a bit of money to not take kindly to people insulting me. As I said, she'll be showing you the door.” A stony hand, forceful but not entirely ungentle, gripped Ven's shoulder. He knew, if the troll applied even a fraction more of its strength, his collarbone would snap clean; he was being shown mercy. Ven nodded to his handler, put his talons up, and turned to walk out the door, his pace calm and deliberate. The hand never left his shoulder, but the pressure didn't increase either.

  As Ven was leaving, the goblin called out, “I'm surprised you didn't smell the woman, Mr. Tanith. Don't your species and hers share an ancestry?”

  “Oh I did. And that's a common misconception,” Ven said as he was escorted away. He didn't bother to translate this time.

  Chapter 3

  The rain Ven had smelled the night before broke while he was in his Handler's offices. It dumped great sheets of cool, clean rain onto the thatch huts and cobblestone buildings that made up the gnomes’ village, and Ven was soaked through before he'd made it ten paces past the awning that hung over the exit. Heaving a sigh, Ven drifted through the downpour to the tavern nearest the inn where he'd rented a room. After all, he couldn't get much wetter, so why rush it? Not like there was a monster somewhere in the darkness that might be looking for his head.

  Gnomish hamlets like Grok's Hollow relied heavily on merchants and farming traders for income, so it hadn't been difficult for him to find a bar where the waitstaff served larger clientele while balancing on stilts. Ven was determined to, needed to have the drink he'd promised himself, and damn the consequences. The inn--which was called Tall Boys, if Ven was getting the hang of Gnomish--was a bit of a hole: dark from a dearth of torches and oil lamps, damp from the weather, and reeking of stale grey mold. But the beer smelled good, and the dark and damp had never bothered him. Ven liked damp. Damp wasn't something they knew about back in the Blessing.

  He folded himself up into a booth near the back and threw the barmaid a gold coin to leave the pitcher as she walked by. The fact that the tavern was underlit wasn't an issue either; gargoyles as a species had excellent night vision, and Ven's was better than most. Nor did the clatter of bar traffic disturb him; his anger at himself, his situation, his life, blocked it out. In between shivers from his damp robes and gulps of the lukewarm, foamy brew, the buzz of late night diners and other patrons just looking for a good time, he a scribbled into
the journal he kept stuffed in the hidden pocket of his carryall.

  Goblins. No one knew how they had gotten so good with money after they'd been emancipated from trollish slavery, but somehow, their guild had taken over every banking system in the Known Lands. They were sharp little bastards, cunning, with a head for even the most complex equations and what appeared to be a bottomless pit of gold to fund security in the form of their former persecutors. Nowadays, if you wanted a private loan, government assistance, or in Ven's case, a paycheck, you had to approach whatever representative the guild had established in the area. The goblins back in Gedeva had more or less raised him, true. But still! They could be such little shits! It was enough to make his blood boil.

  Oh, yeah. And let's not forget the fact that on top of everything else, I thoroughly botched a major contract this evening.

  It should have been easy. Werewolves were not an uncommon thing on the moors anymore, and Ven had skirmished with a pack or two in his time with the Elves. Most Shifters had migrated from the Dead Lands in the east, looking for fatter, slower prey. The Elves had allowed the migration (for reasons they'd kept even from him) but they had imposed strict hunting and feeding licenses on all clans who had applied for residency. Most of the clans had complied, which had surprised Ven; less surprising were the offshoots of rebel killers who resented the restrictions. The six outlaws from Ven’s contract had broken away from Cracktooth Clan over a month ago. They’d began terrorizing gnomish farming hamlets shortly thereafter. It wasn't hard to see why the Shifters had targeted gnomes; they were less than half a meter at their tallest, and tended toward the round side in their bellies. Gnomes on the whole were known for their fine dining and exotic crafts, not warfare.

  Still, “poor skills with weaponry” was not an attribute known to carry a death sentence; not in what was, ostensibly, a civilized society. After being brushed aside by the Elven magistrate of Ay'ladii, the residents of Grok’s Hollow had pooled together enough funds to file a bounty contract with the Guild for the wolves' capture or termination. Which was where Ven came in.

  He'd been in Ay'ladii for a couple of months, dicking around the northern coast, drinking and trying to figure out what to do with his life. He took the odd job to keep booze and occasionally food on his stomach, and had been trying to shy away from anything eye-catching. For now, he just wanted to keep his head down and his beak clean. He'd even considered taking a ferry out to the Gyness Isles; the Guild had representation there, and the Elves hadn't been able to sink their weird, perfect teeth into its ruling body quite yet. But what would he do then? Ven didn't know, so he hadn't bothered.

  When his Handler had asked if he'd be interested in this bond, he'd said sure. Pack killers were bullies, butchers with no code of honor and no sense of style. Not mention, booze wasn’t free, even if it was cheap.

  The Gnomes who hired him had been incredibly supportive, offering him food and shelter along with the bond itself. It was above and beyond what someone in his profession was usually afforded.

  But now....

  As far as he could see, he had two options: if he took the four hundred and walked, Ven would lose face with the Guild, not to mention the rest of the bounty and the respect of the Gnomes ( though he was pretty sure he could live with that last one). But facing down a were-ogre on his own without proper equipment or a considered plan would also cost him face. Not to mention heart, liver, kidneys, spleen....

  I could go back to the dwarves, maybe? Four hundred gold pieces bought a decent amount of friends. And even if a rejiggered Mine Lighter was out of the question, surely they had something else stashed away. Ven was good with technology, he could figure something out. Assuming he survived the night, he could.

  But that was the rub, wasn't it? He had to survive tonight. And that sure as cold hell wasn't going to happen if he hung out in a bar all night.

  He should have knocked back the rest of his pitcher and left. He should have gone back to his room, grabbed his equipment, and gone to ground while he made a new plan. But something, some unknown force, held him to his seat. Something… anticipated him? Was that the word?

  Ven scratched a sudden itch around his right ear canal and shook his head, which was starting to pound. The last thing he needed right now was a headache. Can't afford another distraction on top of everything else.

  Which, because fate has a dry sense of humor, was the exact moment he caught a movement near his table out of the corner of his eye. He glanced at his pitcher, muttered, “I'm doing fine, thanks,” and returned to his writing. It wasn't constructive for his current situation, he knew that, but it helped with his anger. And if he was just going to sit here, being anticipated (or whatever), he may as well occupy himself.

  Then he realized someone was sitting in his booth, across the table from him. That wasn't anything new. Any number of potential clients who didn't understand that his job came with an avalanche of paperwork would slide onto whatever furniture happened to be handy and talk him up like he was some kind of clandestine assassin, which he wasn't. At least, not as far as anyone around here knows. Irritated, he looked up. Then he looked up some more.

  A giant occupied the other end of his booth. It was clothed in a simple woolen tunic, completely smooth skinned except for a pair of scars that criss crossed over an empty, creamy white left eye. The right one was appraising Ven with deep and weighted care. It steepled its stubby square fingers on the table in front of it. A satchel, handmade from the skin of something dark and scaly, was strapped over one shoulder.

  Ven swallowed. “Help you?” he mumbled. Giants usually meant trouble. He hoped if he spoke quietly and used simple sentences, this one would just move on.

  After another moment of study, it pointed a thick, meaty digit at him. “Rahvin, right?” it asked. Its voice was soft, surprising for someone of its size, and deep. If a clear mountain valley could speak, Ven thought, it would have a voice like that. He also realized he couldn't smell it, which startled him almost as much as the question. It didn't just not smell like a giant, it didn't smell like anything. Like there was a hole in the space where it was sitting, a colorless empty void. He saw too that its hands were scrubbed clean; giants were laborers, their hands always covered in the filth of the land. The skin was dry, but no dirt lined the creases, and his nails were trimmed. Who the cold hell was this guy? And why the cold hell was he sitting at Ven's table? And most importantly, how the cold hell did he know enough about Gargoyle Castes to ask that kind of question?

  “Uh,” Ven said after a moment. “Tanith, actually.”

  “Ah,” the giant said, his face breaking into a toothy smile. “I see. I'm a little surprised, I admit. I was under the impression a Tanith wasn't allowed to read or write.”

  “My father's Rahvin allowed me to study with his hatchlings while my father worked,” Ven said. “It was an honor,” he continued, in a voice that sounded as though that part had been learned by rote. Then he looked up again, his face a portrait of shock. “Wait, are you singing Lath'shian?” Ven's native tongue was a language of notes that weren't spoken so much as harmonized. It was a language he hadn't heard in a couple of decades, at least, and never from anything that wasn't another gargoyle.

  The giant grinned again. “I am,” he said. “I thought you might enjoy using your own language, Tanith…?”

  “Ven.” He blinked. “Tanith Ven.” He was struck with another realization: he'd never met a giant who could string together more than five words without hitting something. “And you have me at a disadvantage.”

  “Oh? Oh, I apologize,” the giant grumbled, its every manner polite. “X'on Doth, Mister Ven. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.” He lifted a beefy hand from the table. Ven gave it a wary eye.

  “I don't think so,” he said finally. “No, no no no. You don't get to sit there and act like you didn't just throw ten kinds of weird my way. How in the cold hell do you know StoneLyric? How do you know about Gargoyle Caste systems? Why haven't you tr
ied to crush my skull yet? Did you know you have no scent? Like, at all?”

  X'on lowered his hand, his face showing no trace of insult. “Last question to first, then,” he said. “One, I had no idea, though I'm sure your kind's vaunted senses are among the few who would deduce that. Two, as I'm sure you're aware, 'Tanith', not every member of their species conforms to the stereotypes placed upon them.”

  “Its 'Ven',” he interrupted absently.

  “I know,” X'on replied. “I was illustrating a point.”

  For a moment, Ven's face was a blank stare; then he had the good grace to look embarrassed. “Ah,” was all he could manage. Followed shortly by: “Please continue.”

  If X'on was offended, it once again didn't show. “Three, as to my knowledge of Gargoyle castes. I am a… student of cultures, if you will. Cultures and histories. Gargoyles… the Beings of Light and Stone, as you prefer to be called… are among the most fascinating race of creatures I've ever studied. Never before have I encountered a more rigid social structure, and I've studied the ways of the Old Elves. I've lived a long time, and it’s truly amazing to see how much things… creatures, politics, society… change. And more often, how much they resemble that which came before.”

  Ven cocked an eyebrow ridge. “Long time? I thought giants didn't live much past the half century mark.”

  “Half-giant,” X'on said. “Never really fit in with my kind.” His grin was conspiratorial. “For example,” he patted the satchel at his waist, “I can read. And use polysyllables.”

  Ven smiled back. He wasn't sure why, but he was starting to like this strange, strange being who seemed to have come from the aether just to chat him up. X’on’s actions, his words, everything about him was smooth, methodical. On anyone else, Ven would have thought such a combination dangerous, or at least disingenuous. With X'on, though, it felt more like a dignified grace.