‘Did you find the location of the leather sack?’ I asked.
‘It was disposed of – thrown down one of the rubbish chutes.’
‘Are you sure?’ I asked. How could something considered to be so important by the pointy-toothed purra have been discarded as worthless? I wondered.
‘Yes, the sack was opened and found to contain a severed head in such an advanced state of decomposition that it was dumped very quickly.’
‘Give me the location of the chute!’ I demanded. No doubt the rotting head it contained was an exceedingly loathsome, stinking abomination, but the purra considered it to be the most important of her possessions. Once I explained the impossibility of getting hold of the rest, it might be enough to satisfy her. Retrieving it should not prove difficult.
‘District Boktar North, Level Thirteen, chute 179,’ Hom replied.
‘I will go there immediately. Have one of your selves meet me there and take me directly to the sack.’
It did not take me long to reach chute 179, which was working at full capacity. From above, it had the appearance of a huge concave half-cylinder with an oval hole at its centre. From the pipes overhanging it, all types of refuse were being disgorged into the gaping mouth of the stinking chute: mostly bones, slime, offal and excrement.
The white skoya was covered in yellow-brown slime with clots of green, and I was glad that I did not have to climb down into the chute itself: there was a system of ladders provided for the maintenance workers. Their job, in addition to attending to the pipes and keeping the flow fast and free, was to descend into the area directly beneath the chute and use spades and carts to spread out the refuse. Otherwise the growing mound beneath would eventually block the flow.
I negotiated the series of ladders. Looking down, I could see just one solitary Kobalos pushing a laden cart as he walked away from the flow from the chute. The presence of a haizda mage down here might be reported so I didn’t want to be noticed. There might be up to a dozen Kobalos employed at each chute, but each had to move his load some distance away: if I was lucky, no one would see me. Thus I decided to conserve my magic and dispense with the cloaking spell.
Hom was waiting obediently at the foot of the ladder, his thin rat-tail twitching energetically. Without waiting to be told, he immediately scampered away and I followed, trudging through the muck and getting my boots dirty. It wasn’t long before we reached our objective. Finding it was easy; the problem was that someone had got there first. There were two figures in the distance, and one was holding the sack. They were engaged in conversation, and at first they did not notice my approach.
But when I was within about twenty paces of them, the one with the sack spun round to face me.
To my astonishment, I saw that it was a purra, but not one from Valkarky – she was a stranger. Unlike the one with pointed teeth, she wore a skirt that came down to her ankles, with a dirty fox-fur jacket buttoned at the neck. She was barefoot, with slime squelching up between her toes, and her face was twisted with hatred.
I wondered if they were accomplices of Grimalkin – other human witches. If so, might they have similar magical powers and fighting abilities?
‘Drop the sack and go!’ I commanded. ‘You have no business in our city, but you may keep your lives.’
The other purra was some distance behind the first and I couldn’t see her clearly, but I heard her cackle with laughter at my words.
The nearer purra threw the sack to one side, drew a knife and began to stride towards me, a purposeful expression on her face. She began to mutter under her breath, and I realized that she was indeed a human witch and was trying to use magic against me. Within seconds her appearance changed dramatically. Her tongue protruded about an arm’s length from her mouth; it was forked like that of a snake. Next her face twisted into something bestial: large fangs grew down over her bottom lip, almost reaching her chin, and her hair became a nest of writhing snakes.
I was not sure what the purpose of the transformation was. Perhaps it was intended to distract me in some way. There was no doubt in my mind that the witch had become marginally uglier than before, but it did not affect my concentration in the slightest.
I stepped backwards, focused my mind, and before the knife came within range of my body, I drew my sabre and struck her head clean from her shoulders. She collapsed in a heap, blood spurting from the stump of her neck. I kicked the head away and prepared to face the second witch.
This one approached me slowly. She was cackling again as if she found the whole business highly amusing. ‘I can keep my life, can I?’ she crowed. ‘And what life would that be?’
For a moment I did not understand her meaning, but she was closer now, less than ten paces away, and I could smell loam, rot and dead flesh. The matted hair was crusted with dried mud and I could see maggots wriggling within it. Then something writhed and slowly emerged from her left ear. It was a fat, grey earthworm.
I focused my hearing on her and concentrated. She was wheezing slightly but not breathing in any natural way, and there was no heartbeat. It could mean only one thing.
She was correct: she had no life. She was already dead.
She attacked, running directly towards me, hands outstretched, claws ready to rend my flesh.
I am fast but the dead witch was faster. Her sudden attack took me by surprise, and the claws of her right hand missed my eye by a whisker.
Her left hand didn’t miss, though. It clamped hard upon my own left wrist. I tried to pull it free but the grip tightened. Never had I encountered such strength. I punched her in the face with my free hand but she didn’t even flinch. Her fingers were like a tightening metal band cutting through flesh to squeeze the bone. My numbed hand released the sabre and it fell into the slime.
I WAS A mage who had studied the occult for many years.
However, I had no experience at all of entities that could function in bodies that were essentially dead. In that moment I realized how big a place the world was and how much I had yet to learn. We Kobalos have a history of fighting humans, but we believe them to be far more numerous than us. It is perhaps fortunate that they are divided into many conflicting kingdoms, but we have little knowledge of any who use magic in those more distant places. Thus I knew nothing of human witches and their powers. How, I wondered, could I kill something that was already dead?
I drew a dagger with my free hand and plunged it into the witch’s throat. It had no effect, and again her claws lunged towards my face. I spun away, still gripped by the witch, our bodies stretched taut.