Bk3, Ch15 : Brun's Rebellion Begins

Book III

Chapter Fifteen

BRUN’S REBELLION BEGINS

After they split up, Brun followed Rung’j’u north through the streets. On the east side of Goblintown, there was no fear of being caught or executed by guards.

But there were other dangers.

“Just stay close,” instructed the tailor’s apprentice. “And careful who you stare at.”

Unlike the west side of Goblintown, which mostly had shops and services for the humans in the main city, the east side was truly for goblins. The shops were shorter, the doors were small, and Brun’s height alone made him stand out.

Potions and powders (kept in little glass boxes) were what caught Brun’s eye most. Every third shop or so sold potions, just potions.

Brun felt the cowl, matting to his hair, smothering his nose and mouth. He kept trying to pull it off his lips, to make it easier to breathe, but the cowl was too small for his head. It was tight, and made ever tighter by the pressing storm.

To his great relief, Rung’j’u led them toward a great trio of warehouses, with the word “CHANDLER COURT” in three languages : Ne’jum’esh, Goblin, and an almost scrubbed out Orcish.

The door to the warehouse was almost closed, cracked just enough to let a body through.

Rung’j’u slipped in first, then Brun, though Brun was too big for the opening. He tried to push the door open.

It was too heavy, and didn’t budge.

But if he didn’t budge it, he couldn’t get in, so Brun braced himself, put one forearm against the wall, and used the other arm to push the door again.

His muscles strained. The door was made of wood, twenty strides high, and a dozen more wide.

“Don’t do that!” said Rung’j’u, seeing Brun straining. “I’ll get help. Just hold on ; I’ll go get…”

Brun let out a groan. He couldn’t do it.

He stopped, and his groan became the softest sob he’d ever sobbed.

Rung’j’u was about to speak again, when Brun let out a roar.

A genuine roar.

All the rage that had been building up, ever since… Since…

He didn’t even know when.
His whole life, maybe.
The cage in Old Gudd’rj.
Seeing Ush’ga become one of the Emperor’s wives.
Seeing Na’la for the first time.
Losing Na’la. Getting knocked out, as she was dragged away, to be—

“NNNNGGGGGG—!”

His eyes went red.
He felt the fury that only the sun could feel, and it filled him.
As he roared, he pushed, and his voice echoed into every mind.

The door moved slowly at first.

Then, all of a sudden, the force of Brun’s arms and his legs and his body and his will threw the enormous door of the warehouse wide open.

He stood there, panting, silhouetted by the rain.

Both inside and outside the warehouse, the goblins and humans and elves all watched, stunned. When Brun looked around, he noticed that most of the people he thought looked the most human wore cowls, just like his, cowls just like what Tha’seng had given him. They truly did look human to him.

Still riding the high of his fury, Brun peeled the cowl off his face, and took it off.

“Quite a show,” said a man who worked in the Chandler’s Court. He wiped his hands with a dry towel. “I’d give you my thanks, but now we have to move it back, or else all our wares are gonna get ruined. You ever think that maybe that door was shut for a reason, big man?”

Brun nodded. Of course, he thought. “Sorry,” he said. “I was… I was just trying to get in ; I didn’t… I didn’t mean to—”

“No orcs allowed today,” said the warehouse-keeper. He stopped wiping his hands, and crossed his arms. Though he was a particularly short goblin, the gesture was genuinely intimidating for reasons Brun couldn’t quite place. “Sorry.”

Brun pursed his lips. “Understood.”

Head bowed, Brun began to walk away.

“Ner’u!” hissed the tailor’s apprentice. “Master Tha’seng sent him! He wants him to—”

“I don’t care what he wants,” interrupted the warehouse-keeper. “Hey! Don’t leave yet! You need to put our door back! Then you leave.”

Brun stopped walking.

It was just too much.

He fell to his knees, on the muddy, uncobbled street, and buried his face in his palms.

People murmured and watched. A crowd was gathering. Some goblins even left. With an orc in chains, it would be far less likely that goblins would get harmed or taken this night. The thought was not a rare one, and many of the onlookers left to fetch the Lich’s guard.

“Oh, get up!” barked the goblin.

He went to Brun, and grabbed him by the armpit to lift him up.

Brun yanked away, keeping his face in his hands.

The goblin didn’t get up. He went again.

This time, the fury came back into Brun, and he let the goblin pull him. Then, as he rose to his feet, he used his other hand to grip the goblin by the throat. He raised the goblin into the air with one hand.

Feet dangled, the warehouse-keeper strangled for a moment.

Brun’s eyes were red. But then, he saw the expression, and heard the murmers of enragement all around him. Brun’s expression turned to sorrow, then the glow was gone from him.

He set the goblin down, and let him go.

Choking and coughing, the warehouse-keeper named Ner’u stumbled backward. All around Brun, goblins were shouting, and yelling, and brandishing weapons at him— shards of glass, sewing scissors, clubs and knives and tiny tridents.

Brun’s eyes were fixed on the goblin, whose visage was furious and fearful, and embarrassed at being so easily bested.

Brun took out his sword, and a quiet came over the crowd. Not a quiet of watchfulness, but a quiet of readiness. Readiness to swarm. Readiness to kill.

But Brun knelt, and put the sword out, and bowed. Bowed low. Bowed deep. Bowed like he had bowed, so many times before, to Emperor Ba’ku’ra.

“My life is yours,” said Brun. “Do with it as you will. The violence I have done you cannot be repaid.”

The goblin stared at the sword, and the crowds quiet broke.

“Kill him!” yelled one watcher.

“Yeah, kill him!”

The warehouse-keeper reached for the sword.

“Kill the orc!”

The goblin’s hand hesitated, as the crowd grew more and more restless, more and more rowdy. But eventually, he took the hilt of the sword and picked it up.

The sword was heavier than he first thought, so the goblin had to hold it with both hands. His finger’s interlaced around the hilt, and he studied the blade.

It was an unremarkable weapon. Simple steel. Well-carved fuller. The hilt was wrapped in leather, and the crossguard had not decoration to speak of. The pommel was as simple as one could come, just a tapered block of iron.

But it was balanced.
The feel of the weapon was exceptional, even in a goblin’s hands.
The goblin’s gaze dropped to Brun, whose head was still bowed.
The crowd quieted, sensing the decision to come.

“You are a brute,” he said.

“I am that, Sir,” Brun confessed.

“Sometimes,” interjected Rung’j’u, in a plead for Brun’s life, “it is good to be a brute. Or to have a brute, at least.”

The crowd began to hurl insults at the tailor’s apprentice, whose face paled.

“And your name, brute?” demanded Ner’u.

“Brun, my Lord.”

Some of the shouts quieted, for among the crowd were many seers. The goblins of old had come from the Zhuk Desert, long long ago, a thousand or more years before. Some of them had blood that remembered the taste of Dust.

And at the sound of his name, the temperature of the crowd changed.

“Brun of Gudd’rj,” said Brun. “Knight of New Je’gu’ra.”

Ner’u gaped at Brun, then at the sword in his hands.

“B… Brun?” he said. “King Brun?”

The goblin clapped on Brun’s shoulder, making Brun look up.

The goblin’s once harsh face was now smiling, joyful, brimming with hope.

“You are!” he said. Then he looked out at the crowd. “The King has come! The King has finally come! Get up, get up!”

He hurried Brun up to his feet, and put the sword back in his hands. Then, he gestured at Brun, to all that watched in the storm.

“The night now approaches! The night of all hopes!”

As confused as he was, Brun was glad he was on the other side of the crowd’s favour. The peoples’ joy was as rowdy as their wrath.

A few voices whispered of soldiers coming, and Ner’u was swift to action.

“Shur’u!” he said, calling the names of his workers. “Bae’ru! Grab Khazh’mj, and get that door shut!”

His workers obeyed, and many in the crowd helped. It took about twenty goblins to get the door shut, slowly, slowly, steady… Then, as before, there was only a crack for the rain to get in.

Ner’u led Brun into the warehouse, and Rung’j’u followed.

“There’s a misunderstanding,” said Brun. “I’m… not a king. I’m the son of a farmer ; I’ve never—”

“Tha’seng sent you?” Ner’u interrupted.

“He did,” answered the tailor’s apprentice, trying to keep up and stay relevant in the conversation. “Said he’s going to need a job ; thought maybe the blacksmith might b—”

“Your sword,” said Ner’u. “Can you use it?”

Brun nodded. “A little.”

Ner’u let out a manic laugh. “Yes, I thought so! Yes! A little, oh that’s good. How we’ve waited! And the night is finally upon us! Finally…”

“Waited for what?” Brun said.

“For you!” Ner’u said.

Within the warehouse was an entire market. This was what the Chandler’s Court was : a collection of vendors (mostly goblin, some elven) who sold food, trinkets, devices, potions, powders, promise charms…

Pestles and stoves, oils and herbs…

Bug parts and body parts and bloods of all types.

There was an instrument shop, that had wood flutes and porcelain smoking pipes…

One stand was just wooden weapons, but on each of the bows or staves or spears were carved runes in Old Goblin and New Goblin and Orcish.

There was a shop that just sold fishing rods, boxes, tackle, and bait.

The cloak shops here were not nearly as fine as Tha’seng’s shop, but the variety of items was impossible to take in. Colours and textures and insignias abounded. The cloaks looked neon against the dull grayness of everything else in Ne’jum. Brun realized that they were still bright because they were dry, here, inside of the warehouse.

No wonder they’d been so mad about the door.

“Where are you taking me?” said Brun.

“Right here!”

Ner’u hurried Brun into a shop that just said…

CANDLES
WAXES
SOAPS
EFFIGIES

“Quickly, quickly!” said Ner’u, eyes scanning the entrance. “They’re coming! Wait in here!”

He shut the curtain behind Brun, and Brun and Rung’j’u found themselves suddenly alone in the (very closed) candle shop.

Then, Ner’u poked his head back in, almost as an afterthought, and hissed with a huge smile…

“Brun’s Rebellion has finally begun!”

Then he closed the curtain again, and was gone.

Brun stood in the silent shop, barely able to see the tailor’s apprentice.

Unable to speak, Rung’j’u paced nervously, and Brun took a seat, and waited for it all to click into place.

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Link to Orcish-English Dictionary

Wanna hear the music of NALA SAGA?

FANTASY GIFT SHOP

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