The Limbs of the Dead (A Wielders Novel Book 3) Read online

  “Like we saw Missus Warbler’s cat Tidger going there a few days ago.”

  “And then the next day it attacked her. We heard about it at school.”

  “She’s kicked Mister Warbler out of the house as well. We heard about that too.”

  “Mister Warbler’s living in a cardboard box now. Old Stinky Pants Warbler everyone calls him.”

  Not wanting to hear any more information about Old Stinky Pants Warbler, Skulks thanked the two children, giving them a couple of Slivers each, not caring if the information proved to be useless. He’d seen Pumper taking a drink at the river last night, so it was something worth checking into. Ignoring further urine stains and wind-blown papers, Skulks proceeded to the Ten Dams River. At this point, the city was closer to the sea than were the Downriver Docks, but the docks were close by. Skulks could see the larger sea-faring ships tied up to the huge stone jetties where they were berthed. If he concentrated, Skulks even fancied he could see Dockmaster Grumps making her way up a boarding plank as she did her inspections.

  Where he stood, there was only a rough wooden jetty suitable for smaller vessels. The Tradis Brewery was here - the large, square building butting up close to the river. Skulks breathed in deeply, allowing the warm smell of brewing to waft through his nose and over his tongue.

  “Ale,” he found himself whispering as he peered over the edge of the jetty into the water. This close to shore the river was shallow, but became rapidly deeper as the banks fell away steeply. Leaning over further, Skulks saw that the jetty had been constructed over a small beach. He made his way to the end of the jetty and slithered nimbly down the river bank, using one of the jetty’s uprights to swing himself onto the beach, thereby avoiding damp penetration in his steel toe-caps.

  The beach was small and deserted. It was only a few feet wide and fifty or so feet long. The jetty overhead ensured it wouldn’t get much sun, even on a nice day. Not that anyone would really want to build sand castles or sunbathe on it, with flotsam lapping upon the shore and an extensive collection of rotting sticks, papers and a rusted metal chain which looked like it had come from a ship. Further along the bank, Skulks watched a dog greedily drinking from the river, so assumed the water was sufficiently fresh to quench thirst, rather than kill through over-consumption of salt. He trudged the length of the beach, not through any hope of discovery, simply because he was reminiscing on happy times past where he had walked along much grander beaches elsewhere, without a care in the world.

  It was fortunate that he decided to proceed, wrinkling his nose against the smell of rotting fish, for he noticed something that shouldn’t have been where it was. In the gloom at the far end of the jetty was something black in colour, slumped up against the riverbank. As he came closer, he saw that whatever it was continued into the river. Standing next to it, he shuddered slightly in disgust. It was a large mound of black flesh, which could be described as little more than a shapeless lump. Skulks drew a dagger-sword and prodded experimentally at it. There was no movement, so he pushed the dagger harder until it slid into the mound. Still it failed to move, so Skulks rightly assumed it to be dead.

  Investigating further, he saw that it had tentacles - perhaps ten of them in number and many feet in length. Most of them were submerged in the water, though Skulks noticed that the tip of one appeared to have been severed at some point, though the wound would surely not have been enough to kill a creature of this size. He walked to the edge of the water and saw that the body was a good thirty feet long and tapered. One of the tentacles ended here, just on the beach and Skulks kicked it with his foot, finding that it ended in something that looked like an eye. He stooped over and saw that the eye had been skewered, as if by something sharp, such as a dagger-sword.

  Standing upright, Skulks scratched his head in bemusement, forced into thinking the unavoidable: this was the same demon-beast which had tried to snatch him from the deck of the Hardened’s Reach while on his recent voyage to Rhult. Yet here it was, slumped unnoticed upon a tiny beach in the city itself. Further unavoidable thinking followed, suggesting that this demon could be leaking poisons into the river and corrupting the creatures that drank from it, driving them insane.

  “Surely my dagger to its eye could not have killed it?” he asked himself, looking for reassurance. If Skulks’ strike had killed this large creature, then that would mean that he was responsible, albeit indirectly, for the attacks by crazed animals in the city.

  “Poor Pumper,” he thought to himself. “I’m sorry, boy.”

  There was to be no let-up in Skulks’ dismay. As he watched, a deep, wooden bucket was lowered over the side of the jetty on a rope. It plunged into the water near the dead demon, before it was hauled up again at a much slower pace. Skulks dashed back along the beach and scrambled up the bank onto the jetty, just in time to see a man hauling the bucket of water in the direction of the brewery. Skulks caught up and tapped him on the shoulder.

  “What are you doing with that water?” he asked.

  The gentleman in question, being a crotchety bugger, looked over at Skulks. “What does it look like I’m doing?” he asked, setting the bucket down.

  “I don’t know,” said Skulks in puzzlement. “That is why I asked.”

  The fellow was thickset, with a broad face and grey stubble that seemed to reach impossibly far up towards his hair line. He looked at Skulks as if he were looking at someone of incredible stupidity. “I’m going to wash my arse in it,” the man said, voice dripping with sarcasm.

  “Perhaps you’ll need a second bucket,” said Skulks before his brain could intervene.

  “Perhaps you should piss off,” said the chap quite rudely.

  Descending rapidly to his level, Skulks looked at the man again, infuriated by this interference with his investigation. “Perhaps I didn’t make myself clear,” he said. “If you don’t tell me where you’re taking this water, I shall punch you upon the nose!”

  In saying this, Skulks escalated the situation beyond that which the other man had hoped. Having no desire to engage in fisticuffs over a bucket of water, the man flicked a thumb in the direction of the brewery. “It’s going there,” he said.

  “And what happens to it when it gets there?”

  The man huffed and puffed, still angry. “It goes in the ale, stupid!”

  Skulks looked at him in horror. “What do you mean, it goes in the ale?” he demanded harshly.

  “You’ll need to speak to the boss about that.” The man shrugged and picked up the bucket again. Skulks grabbed his wrist and pulled the bucket from his grasp. He whirled it around once and cast it eighty yards out into the river.

  “Hey!” said the man, indignant that his bucket should be treated with such contempt. He found himself picked bodily off the ground by the lapels of his jacket. Skulks shook him a little.

  “Where’s the boss?” he asked.

  “In there,” said the fellow, pointing to a side door in the brewery. “First office on the right. Now let me down, you oaf.”

  Skulks did indeed let him down, by dropping him onto the jetty. He felt the man’s eyes burning into his back as they followed Skulks’ path to the indicated door. It wasn’t locked, though this would have caused little delay. Inside, the air was warm and smelled of fermenting yeast - a smell which Skulks would have savoured on another day. He followed a short corridor and barged into the first room on the right. Inside was a short, wiry man with his feet on a desk as he flicked through that day’s edition of the Hardened Times.

  “Don’t you knock?” he asked indignantly through his groomed beard and moustache. “And who are you besides?”

  “I work for the Chamber Council,” said Skulks. “In the Foods and Beverages Inspection Department.”

  “Well you’ll find nothing to concern you here,” said the man airily, standing up. He was wearing trousers that were too tight for him. “My brewery uses only the finest ingredients, locally sourced. We make limited batches of the finest ales, each one a masterp
iece hand-brewed for the palates of our more discerning clientele.”

  “And would these finest ingredients include water drawn from the river nearby?” asked Skulks.

  “They would,” said the man. “Our artisan ales are each unique in their own fashion. We are currently producing a limited run of Ten Dams Pride, with a bucket of the river’s own water in every vat. The early batches have sold out.”

  “Are you aware that river water is not permitted in food products sold within the city?” asked Skulks gravely.

  “We use less than one percent river water per vat, which falls within the allowed levels of pollutants,” said the brewery’s owner. “Though ‘pollutant’ is such a pejorative term I find.”

  “Come with me,” Skulks told him, beckoning towards the exit.

  “Where are we going? I’m a busy man,” said the owner, following nonetheless.

  Skulks took him outside and to the end of the jetty. When the man started spluttering that he had things to do, he found himself held by the arm and was dragged along slightly less willingly, but spluttering slightly more.

  “Please desist in your dragging of me! I am beginning to doubt that you really do work for the Foods and Beverages Inspection Department!” Skulks slung the gentleman over his shoulder and clambered down to the small beach.

  “This is kidnap! I shall report you to the authorities!” the brewery owner protested. “I am well-connected!”

  When Skulks put him back on his feet in front of the demon-beast’s carcass, the man gulped.

  “What’s that thing?” he asked.

  “That thing is a demon! And you’ve been putting its juices into every cup of Ten Dams Pride and turning the unfortunate quaffers thereof into walking dead-men!”

  “Oh,” said the man as this news sunk in. He looked around, worried. Skulks could see that he had something else he wanted to say, but was rather wishing he didn’t have to. After a pause, he spoke that which was on his mind.

  “We’ve only sold four barrels of it so far. It was such a success we sold another forty last week. Thirty of them are awaiting delivery, but another ten left on a cart just half an hour ago. They usually stop at the Trammelled Sausage first.”

  With these words, Skulks was gone. He dashed along the beach, up the slope and off into the city.

  Four

  Skulks knew where the Trammelled Sausage was, because he rarely forgot a tavern. He ran there so fast that he made it in under five minutes, slowing down as he reached the door. There was no sign of a horse and cart and he’d not passed one on the way.

  “That man’s got a thirst,” someone chortled as Skulks barged inside.

  “Here, we’re not open yet,” called the bar keep as he cleaned an ale mug. It was one of the two men who had served Skulks the previous evening. “Oh, it’s you Bertram,” said he, for Skulks had introduced himself as Bertram Snaggletooth, an itinerant toe-nail reader. He’d read at least half a dozen toe-nails including the bar keep’s. In line with Skulks’ usual nonsense, everything he’d said was completely made up.

  “Do you see that scuff there?” he’d asked one young lady of her big toe-nail. “It means you’re going to marry a rich merchant with seven ships and a love of poached eggs.”

  “Eeh, but I don’t like poached eggs,” she had replied in dismay, forgetting the part about the rich merchant.

  “If you do not grow to love them, your husband will drift away, eventually falling for your best friend.” Such was the balderdash spoken by Skulks, repeated in a different form for each toe-nail presented to him.

  Today the mantle of toe-nail reader was discarded. “Have you just taken delivery of a barrel of Ten Dams Pride?” Skulks asked.

  “Indeed we have. Fancy a quick one before lunch, do you? I’ve not fixed the hose up yet.”

  “No thanks,” said Skulks. “Is it in the cellar?”

  “That’s where we normally keep ‘em,” said the bar keep, whereupon Bertram Snaggletooth left the tavern without further ado.

  Minutes later, the bar keep didn’t hear any sounds from his cellar, for there were none loud enough to reach his ears. There was however a Wielder in there, who had let himself into the cellar through the street-side locked hatch at the back of the tavern. The barrel of Ten Dams Pride took little finding, being adjacent to the cellar steps and stamped with ‘Tradis Speciality Brews’ on top. Taking care to mask the noise, Skulks snapped the tap away from the barrel and watched as the contents gushed out, glopping down the drain hole.

  Having nullified the first barrel of demon-polluted ale, Skulks left the cellar onto the street and poked his head back around the tavern door. “Where does the delivery cart go next?” he asked innocently.

  The bar keep had long ago learned that if he was asked something without having a clue why, it was best if he just answered the question. People usually went away if he did that and truth be told he didn’t especially care to find out the story behind everything he was asked. “The next stop is The Reluctant Tasher. Just up the street and along Chunter Avenue.”

  “Much obliged,” said Bertram Snaggletooth, vanishing from the doorway.

  Along the street sped Skulks, turning left into Chunter Avenue. After a hundred yards, he saw a cart wobbling along the street in an ungainly fashion, loaded with barrels.

  “Excuse me!” shouted Skulks after it, to no avail. The rattling of wheel upon pavement drowned out all but the loudest of sounds. Not that he had much to worry about, as the cart did not travel at speed - the horses were old and the driver no younger. When Skulks caught up with the cart and signalled for the driver to stop he found that the years had not mellowed the old man driving it.

  “Piss off, I’ve got ale to deliver,” was this fellow’s opening gambit as he steadfastly refused to slow the cart.

  “Sir, you must stop at once, there is a problem with the barrels!”

  “These barrels are fine. I’ve been driving this horse and cart for forty years now and I know there’s no problem with my barrels. Once more, I invite you to piss off before I stick my boot onto your arse and my fist into your eye!” This was shouted over the clattering of wheels and Skulks thought it most peculiar that the man was so certain of his pugilistic abilities, given how short, scrawny and decrepit he was.

  Having had his fill of unwarranted rudeness for today, Skulks hollered back at the man, “Your barrels are infested with Cootfly worms!” This got his attention. Everyone employed in the transport of fermented products knew that Cootfly larvae were particularly voracious in their consumption of wooden ale-barrels. There was even a chance they could drop from the barrels and onto the precious delivery cart, rendering it useless within a matter of weeks. The man reluctantly drew his cart to a halt.

  “Who are you?” asked the driver, furrowing his already furrowed brow and masticating with his gums in a quite off-putting fashion.

  “I work for the brewery,” said Skulks, doing his best to look concerned. “And they’ve discovered Cootfly worms in all their barrels just this very morning! Their insurances are in order, but contract workers are not covered.”

  “So you mean that if these Cootflies get into my cart, I’m on my own?”

  “Precisely! We need to get these barrels back to the brewery as quickly as possible!”

  The old man thought about it for less than a moment. “There’s no way I’m taking a load of Cootfly barrels back to the brewery. If you work for them, you get rid of them. Get them off my cart now!”

  “Sir, I shall relieve you of these barrels forthwith!” replied Skulks, climbing up onto the back of the cart. The barrels all contained Ten Dams Pride and were secured beneath a rope net, which Skulks pulled aside. As he lifted one of the barrels over his head, ready to throw it against the nearest wall, the old man piped up.

  “Hey, why’re you doing that?”

  “The insurance policy only pays out in the event of the product being damaged,” replied Skulks, hurling the barrel firmly against the wall. Ale bar
rels were sturdily built in order to withstand rough treatment, but Skulks had sufficient strength to ensure the impact smashed it open. The old codger looked dismayed as he watched several gallons of ale spill out onto the street. The first barrel was closely followed by three more, leaving the street awash with pale brown liquid, which passers-by did their best to avoid, though a few stood around to watch.

  One of the passers-by was a shabby old tramp, known locally as Bloot. “I use ter be a rich man, but I bloot all on ale,” he would say, eventually earning himself his name. For once, this was a tale of a wealthy man’s fall from grace which had large elements of truth to it and fifteen years after his financial ruin, Bloot still retained a great fondness for that which had brought his downfall. Seeing the barrels of ale being shattered against a wall, he fell to his knees. This was not to implore the heavens to prevent the injustice, but to push his face into where the ale ran deepest. He took in deep, choking swigs of Ten Dams Pride, mixed with dust, dirt and traces of animal faeces.

  Caught off-guard by the man’s desperation, Skulks grabbed Bloot by the back of his ragged jacket and hauled his face from the ale. “Sir, you should desist! This ale is polluted!”

  “I don’t care!” cried Bloot, kicking and thrashing as he struggled to free himself. “I want it!”

  In a rush of mercy, Skulks clonked the man on the back of the neck with sufficient force to render him unconscious and laid the booze-addled body on the pavement away from the ale. He jumped back up onto the cart and completed his task, breaking the remaining barrels of ale and standing guard as their contents flowed to the centre of the street and into a drain hole. Resisting the urge to steal the eight Slivers from the curmudgeonly old cart driver’s underpants, Skulks slung the comatose Bloot over his shoulder and went on his way.

  Twenty minutes later, there was a knock on the door of Dockmaster Doris Grumps’ office. She had scarce the time to say “Come in” before the door was open and Skulks had entered. He tipped Bloot into one corner.