The Lore Anthology: Lore of the Underlings: Episodes 1 - 5 Read Free Page B

certainly.”
    “Isn’t the other your cousin Yoz?”
    “Shhh! Do not speak that name. He was a leaver. Long gone.”
    “Forgive me, Ixit. I didn’t know ! Just how long ago?”
    “A score of seasons or so I’d say. Five years after the Treasuror’s fall.”
    “T hen we shall not see him again…”
    “Shut up all of you! Silly fools. Open your eyes. These are strangers.”
    “What?!”
    “Oh my!”
    “But…”
    “Mother Mayly may be right. She knows her beans from stones.”
    “Though if that’s so, then what’s to do?”
    “And how, who?”
    “Who knows?! But someone should do something soon.”
    “Or the Guard will have us in a stew…”
    “Boiled to hell with your cousin’s bones and a cabbage head or two like you.”
    “Then this is it.”
    “Yes, surely so.”
    “The time is here.”
    “Here we go.”
    “But where are my manners…”
    “Please, be my guest…”
    “No, after you…”
    “Oh, I insist…”
    “Hold on. Could it be? What luck!”
    “Here comes Bylo Hamyx. Look!”
    “Good for him!”
    “Bless the Finder!”
    “Get them, Bylo!”
    “We’re right behind you!”
     
    A fleshy bald man had shoved his way clear and into the middle of things. He staggered, out of breath and blood-flushed, the red of a rash or a snarl hog in rut. Sweat streamed off the big lumpy dome on his head as drops of it dripped from a furrowed brow to wet his huffing, puffy face.
    “Where is it?” he growled, yellowed eye whites wide, flashing this way then that. “Where is it?”
    Someone called from the crowd, “Bylo! What do you seek?”
    He paid no heed and lurched ahead to search the circle of souls before him. “Weeds, all of you. Weeds to pluck from this blood-fed field.” He cast his glare across the lot of them, face to face to face. The tall ones. The fruit of Hurx. He spit on the ground. He spat at their feet.
    “Weeds to pluck and boil…” He paused then suddenly raised a quaking hand that flexed an index finger gnarled and encrusted in a bark of scab and sallow pus. He pulled the foul finger to straighten it out then used it to stab at the air.
    “You!” he roared, baring a row of broken black teeth. “You are the thief!” Again he jabbed a pointy nail and jerked himself that way, lumbering over a lonely wildflower of gold. “Now for your crimes you shall pay.”
    Jixy backed away and looked for a gap to slip through the wall of watchers. But there was no escape from the ring of lights and lives that surrounded her. She cut behind John Cap and the boys and broke for the circle’s empty center. Bylo the Finder followed.
    “Useless scrub! Soiled seed!”
    “Quickly girl,” guided the tall young woman of gilded tresses. “Come here.” Her bright green eyes sparkled like precious jewelstones in the flickering torch light. “Stand at my side.”
    Jixy ran to her as if they had known each other forever. As if they were blood.
    “Surrender the sneak!” hissed the steaming Hamyx. “It belongs to me.”
    The woman raised an open palm against Bylo’s boarish charge. He halted and slid on the soft sweetgrass, landing hard on his hefty buttocks. “Oof!” Before he could pick himself up again, her two companions arrived as reinforcements. Morio planted himself on Jixy’s other side, John Cap three steps behind watching their backs.
    The woman lowered her hand. “No harm shall come to this child.” Jixy gazed up at her with a look of wonder.
    Bylo shook with anger, flinging droplets of stinking sweat all about him. “So this is the smelly cheese you sell? Well, as you wish. But know that the Guard have a garden of thorns ready for robbers of the Keep and those who harbor them.” He laughed bitterly and spit again, just short of the woman and girl.
    “Oh I’m glad that’s settled!” chirped Morio, pulling out the boven sack of foods that Jixy had left on the ground. “Let’s all celebrate with a snack. I must say that I am full of hunger after such a long