If someone stands in your path to glory, crush him. If someone holds you back from achieving your goals, crush him. If someone peppers his speech with too many “ers” or “ums,” crush him.
—THE WARLORD’S PATH TO POWER: AN ANCIENT TOME OF DARIAN WISDOM
The Warlord of Dar closed the door to his guest suite: a posh room carpeted with pilfered animal-skin rugs and furnished with sophisticated armchairs and armoires that Rauber had stolen over the years. He turned to address the Darian soldiers he had gathered there. First in line was Madu, the Keeper of the Snake. Tall and lithe, Madu wore a tattered kilt and a loose vest that hung open to reveal scores of serpent tattoos covering his skin.
Beside the snake handler stood a stocky bodyguard named Jezek, who was clad from collar to boots in spike-studded armor. And next to him was Redshirt, a thick-necked barbarian with a penchant for licking the edge of his ax.
The final member of Rundark’s cabal was Wrathgar, the dungeon master. A walking mass of muscle, Wrathgar was larger than the Warlord himself (larger than all Gustav’s brothers, too—in case you’re keeping score). A red-and-black mask covered the top half of his face, while below it, a freakishly long mustache hung down to his chest like a pair of face-ponytails. Tied to each end of his mustache was an unidentified bone: the remnant of a lion’s claw, perhaps, or a human finger, or maybe just a chicken leg (it’s not like anybody was going to ask).
Lord Rundark had discovered Wrathgar years earlier. The Warlord had been leading a platoon of barbarian soldiers to raid and ransack the Darian village of Hocksnath, but when he arrived, he saw that the town had already been reduced to a blackened field of burning timbers and smoking rubble. Standing in the center of all that debris was Wrathgar. As the Warlord approached the masked behemoth, Wrathgar simply said, “The people of Hocksnath didn’t like my facial hair.” To which Rundark responded by offering the man a job. Wrathgar had been Rundark’s secret weapon ever since.
“Tell us what you need, Lord Rundark,” Wrathgar said. When he spoke, it sounded like his mouth was full of broken glass (which it often was—he liked to chew on bottles in between meals).
“As we have discussed,” the Warlord said, “Rauberia will soon be ours. And once we have transformed this most perfect of all geographical bases into New Dar, the rest of the nations of the world will be waiting for us to skewer them like so many kingdom kabobs. But the boy remains an issue.”
Fig. 27
Rundark’s HENCHMEN
“So we take him out now?” Wrathgar asked.
“No, I cannot eliminate the Bandit King until I understand the core mystery that surrounds him,” Rundark said. “I cannot comprehend his popularity among his men. Nor his notoriety among the people of these nearby kingdoms. Rauber is a floundering mess of a criminal. He is sloppy, stubborn, and, from what I can tell, he doesn’t have the stomach for true evil. In short, he is a child.”
“Have you all been on the roof?” Madu, the snake handler asked. “He’s got a little golf course up there. Where you have to hit the ball between the legs of an elephant that squirts water at you. I don’t get it.”
“His dungeon disgusts me,” Wrathgar bellowed. “To see the things he calls ‘torture devices’—a funnel to drip saliva into one’s ear, a machine to stretch a prisoner’s undergarments—it is pitiful.” He picked up an armchair, bit it in half, and spat the pieces onto the floor.
“I understand you are all frustrated, but you will need to tolerate the boy’s insufficiently villainous behavior a while longer,” Lord Rundark said. “As powerful as the five of us are, I doubt we can hold back a rebellion of three hundred bandits. We need to win Rauber’s men over to our side first.”
“We need bards,” Redshirt suggested. “Rauber’s got so many of those songs about him. That’s why he’s so infamous. People hear those bard songs, and they either want to join Rauber or flee from him. I’ve been saying for years that Dar should have a bard.”
Rundark grabbed Redshirt by his red shirt and hurled him out through the fourth-story window. More eel food.
“Bards are good for nothing more than brainless entertainment,” Rundark said to his remaining henchmen. “It is not men wielding tiny guitars who tell the world what they should fear; it is men of true power like myself. We have been schooling Rauber’s men in the ways of Dar; eventually they will realize what true villainy looks like.
“It is to this end that I have gathered you four . . . er, three here today. We must begin working on Rauber’s bandits, sowing the seeds of discord among them. Pay extra attention to the swordsman, Vero. If we can turn him, others will follow.”
There was a quick knock, and Falco—the bald, sharp-toothed sentry—opened the door and slipped in, looking agitated.
“What is it, Falco?” Rundark asked.
Falco got down and walked on his knees and made a goofy face.
“Rauber is coming?” Rundark said.
Falco nodded.
Seconds later there was another knock at the door—a loud banging this time. Falco opened it to reveal Deeb Rauber, picking his nose.
“Yes?” Rundark intoned.
“I’m hosting a circus tomorrow—four o’clock,” Rauber announced. “It’s gonna be sweet. Clowns, dancing bears, cat jugglers—I think they’ve even got a monkey that throws darts at a pig.”
Jezek stepped up to the doorway. “I’m supposed to be teaching your men spear technique tomorrow afternoon,” he said.
“It can wait, Spike,” Rauber returned. “Did you hear what I said? Cat jugglers!”
“What does that even mean?” Jezek asked with disdain. “Is it men who juggle cats or cats that juggle other stuff?”
“Like it matters?” Rauber retorted.
“Fall back, Jezek,” Rundark said. He stepped up to Rauber. “My men and I will not be attending this circus,” he added with barely disguised disdain.
“No way, man” Rauber said. “You can’t skip it. I mean, you’d totally regret it if you did.”
The Warlord let out a long, slow breath. “If it means so much to you, I will try to stop by at some point.”
“And chance missing the best part?” Rauber said. “No, you’re gonna be sitting right next to me in my private viewing box. Best seats in the house. Especially for the finale. It’s gonna be awesome.”
Rundark eyed the boy in silence for several seconds. Then his mouth curled into something resembling a grin. “You win,” he said in his friendliest voice (which was still pretty scary). “I will be there at four on the dot.”
“Excellent,” said Rauber. “You’re not gonna regret this. Circuses rule.” And he left, whistling loudly and very much off-key.
As soon as the Bandit King was out the door, Rundark’s men began grumbling. “A circus?” Jezek asked skeptically.
“Rauber was unnaturally insistent that I not only attend, but that I sit in a specific seat,” Rundark said. “The boy thinks himself my equal, my rival even. It was only a matter of time before he tried to eliminate me. And he’s making his move now. He plans to assassinate me at the end of this . . . circus.” He spat the word. “I will let him try,” Rundark continued. “And after he has failed in front of everyone, I won’t have to worry about winning over his men. I will do so right then and there—by killing the boy.”