Ratastrophe Catastrophe Read online

  The Ratastrophe Catastrophe

  The Illmoor Chronicles

  David Lee Stone

  For my mother,

  Barbara Ann Stone

  Contents

  SELECTED DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  EPILOGUE

  Preview: The Yowler Foul-Up

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  SELECTED DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  (ye cast of characters)

  BARROWBIRD: a distant relative of the forest hornbill

  BURNIE: Troglodyte councilor

  CADRICK, TACITURN: Trade Minister

  FINLAYZZON, GODRICK: Owner of Finlayzzon’s inn

  FIREBRAND, CHAS: Owner of the Rotting Ferret tavern

  FORESTALL, TAMBOR: Council Chairman, ex-sorcerer

  FRANKLIN, VICTOR: Assassin

  GOLDEAXE, GORDO: Dwarf mercenary

  GREEN, MIFKINDLE: Assassin

  GRIM, BERNARD: Ratcatcher

  MARSHALL, PEGRAND: Manservant to the Duke of Dullitch

  MICK: Mite

  MODESET, VANDRE: Duke of Dullitch

  PHELT, CEDRIC: Militiaman

  PIDDLETON, TOMMY: A lame boy

  QUARRY: Lord Chancellor of Dullitch

  QUICKSTINT, JIMMY: Thief/herald; Tambor’s grandson

  SANDS, QUARIS: Home Secretary and member of the council

  SIDDLE, MALCOLM: Ratcatcher’s apprentice

  SOAK, ROCHUS: Seer

  STUMP: Adventurer

  TEETHGRIT, GROAN: Barbarian mercenary

  VICIOUS: Fox terrier

  WUSTAPHA, PIER: Charmer

  WUSTAPHA, MRS.: Farmer’s wife; mother of Diek

  WUSTAPHA, PIER: Farmer; father of Diek

  PROLOGUE

  DURING THE TRI-AGE (CIVILIZATION’S third attempt at getting things right) there grew, on the swollen lip of the continent of Illmoor, a city quite unlike any in recorded history.

  The rulers of Dullitch were imbecilic, and their incompetence gave rise to such diverse crimes as fraud and murder. Among the nobles, one vile family after another struggled for power, submitting their sons as prospective lords in order to strengthen their stake in the city. On the tenth day of every tenth year, a new duke was chosen, each invariably more corrupt and untrustworthy than the last—“A snake to lead snakes,” it was said. Under such leadership, which allowed a vile assortment of assassins and pickpockets to thrive and squirm beneath it, the city quickly earned a grim reputation. It became despised by many and generally avoided by travelers through the Gleaming Mountains, by which it was sheltered, like the treasure hoard of a particularly insecure dragon.

  And what a horde Dullitch contained: humans, trolls, ogres, sprites, elves, pixies, dwarves, gnomes, giants, and greenskins. Remarkably, considering the sheer diversity of races, a lasting peace endured.

  Still, a large, weather-beaten plaque swung back and forth on tired hinges above the city gates, proudly welcoming all and sundry to visit Dullitch. Though a local saying warned, “You haven’t lived until you’ve visited Dullitch and, after that, you won’t want to….”

  The continent of Illmoor is riddled with magic. Not the empty, inept magic practiced by men who believe themselves to be members of the Ancient (now defunct) Order of Sorcerers. This is the original, undiluted magic from which the continent itself was constructed: a powerful and volatile force that has leaked out through the ages, rising up from the graves of long-dead warlocks.

  Two types of magic coexist: light and dark.

  Light magic finds its place in the air, giving rise to galloping unicorns, love charms, and fairy groves before it evaporates into the ether. It is a gentle and harmonious force, a force at one with nature. Though much sought after by amateur “sorcerers,” it proves practically impossible to harness; and those who do spend long hours in pursuit of mastering it are often said to be deranged.

  Dark magic, on the other hand, seeks immediately to earth itself in the land it was once used to forge. Arising from the long-dead souls of great and terrible enchanters, it is an angry magic, an untamed source, a parasite yearning for a host.

  And hosts are rare.

  Trees suffice, for their roots go deep, but this is no way for dark magic to travel; when it lodges itself in trees, the results are straightforward, rather boring, and nobody gets hurt. No, what dark magic truly requires is susceptible minds. These are a delicacy and, although seldom encountered, are always relished. But dark magic is a reckless lodger; it cares little for the minds it invades.

  A particularly powerful charge of dark magic appeared during the reign of Duke Modeset. Though it would affect the lives of several very different people, it arrived almost entirely unnoticed. In fact, only two pairs of eyes in the whole of Illmoor observed its passage.

  These belonged to the mercenaries, Groan and Gordo, although their part in the story would not become apparent for some time. Long before they had the notion to set their steeds southward, the magic had found its mind.

  A searing wave of energy infiltrated a land of fields and forests, seeking the warmth of a weak mind, homing in, until…

  ONE

  WHOOSH…

  Diek Wustapha dropped his flute. The leather-bound book that had been resting on his lap tumbled to the floor and lay open, its pages flapping in the breeze.

  “What is it, lad?”

  The boy turned and looked up at his father, his smile was apprehensive. “I thought I heard something, Dad.”

  “That’ll be the cattle cart,” said his father, quietly grateful that his son had stopped playing; Diek’s musical ability suggested possible employment in the torture trade.

  Mr. Wustapha looked out over a broad expanse of west-country farmland, his brow creased. A few cows in the field opposite had wandered over to the gate and were mooching idly about.

  “No, it was more like a feeling than a sound. I thought I felt something.”

  “Well, that’ll be your dinner,” his father continued, reflecting on years of terror at the dinner table. Mrs. Wustapha was one of a long line of cooks on her mother’s side of the family. He hoped fervently she would be the last. “You know something, boy, when I first met your ma, she used to make puddings the like of which would turn your stomach inside out for days on end.”

  “Yes, Dad. So you’ve told me. Repeatedly.”

  “Fair enough. You’re reading again, I see?”

  Diek nodded, sliding his flute under a rock with the heel of his boot. He snatched up the book. “It’s called Ancient Royal Fables.”

  “Good lad,” said his father, patting the boy affectionately on the shoulder. “Have you got to the bit where Huud the Wise tells Prince Kellogg to go round up the sheep?”

  “No, Dad.”

  Diek looked up. His father was waiting patiently, a grin spreading across his broad face.

  “I’ll go and round the sheep up now, Dad,” he said,
with a knowing smile.

  Diek got to his feet and set off toward the north field. His father watched him go.

  Diek wasn’t a bad lad, he thought, at least, not in the conventional sense. He just dawdled from time to time, lacked direction. Perhaps he should take his brother’s advice and send Diek to Legrash for the summer, let him experience a bit of the real world. What harm could it do?

  He stroked his chin thoughtfully, wondering exactly how much trouble a young boy could get into in a town like Legrash. A boy like Diek. Probably best not to speculate. He whistled a merry tune and headed off to see how his son was getting on with the sheep.

  The magic sank into Diek’s mind like a stone plunging down a deep well. There it lay low, biding its time with patience born of millennia lingering in deep caverns, lurking in dormant hollows.

  When the magic decided to surface, it did so with such reptilian guile that no human eye could detect the change. Diek Wustapha, however, was cursed with the ownership of a barrowbird with particularly keen sight.

  The barrowbird is a curious creature indeed. One of the High Art’s darker throwbacks, it was rumored to have once been an ordinary scrawny relative of the forest hornbill. Legend holds that on the few occasions throughout history when the gods decided to visit Illmoor, they did so by inhabiting the minds of barrowbirds. On one such occasion, it is said that one particularly spiteful god decided to leave something behind: the curse known as Vocalis Truthilium, commonly translated as “I speak as I find.”

  And the barrowbird did just that. In fact, it gave a new and terrible meaning to the phrase. No personal comment was beyond it. Despised as a species, its put-downs included such harsh observations as “You’ll never get a girlfriend unless you actually cut that ear off,” and the oft heard “If I had a figure like yours, love, I’d stay indoors for the duration.”

  Now Diek’s own barrowbird was treating him to a baleful stare. “There’s somethin’ amiss with your right eyeball,” it chirped. “’S glowin’ like an ember, ain’t it?”

  “Is it?”

  Diek blinked and raised a hand to his head. He’d been propped against one corner of the pigpen all morning, watching the truffle hogs misbehaving. “Maybe I’m coming down with something,” he said, beginning to wander off around the side of the pen. “I do feel a bit odd.”

  He reached for his flute and brought the instrument to his lips, but was interrupted before he was able to muster a tune.

  “Could be fouleye,” the barrowbird squawked. “You hear of a lot of folk dyin’ from that.”

  “Dying? It’s fatal?”

  “Right as mustard. You ask anyone: ‘How’s your daughter, Milly?’ ‘Fouleye took her.’ ‘How’s your aunty Ethel?’ ‘Down with fouleye.’ One minute you can be runnin’ around in a field, the next you’re a goner. That’s usually the females, mind. I never heard of a male taken with it yet.”

  “Okay, okay. It’s probably not that, then.”

  Diek produced a single, shrill note from the flute, then stowed it away in his tunic. He didn’t feel much like playing today; his heart really wasn’t in it.

  He sighed and closed his eyes tight, then tentatively opened them again. “Has it gone?” he asked.

  “Has it, heck!” said the barrowbird. “Now they’re both alight! Well, stone me. You’re not standin’ on a lightnin’ rod or somethin’, are ya?”

  Diek took a step back, then looked around. “I’m not standing on anything,” he said. “Besides, you noticed it when I was over there.”

  The barrowbird put its head on one side. “Then, if I were you, I’d go and see the apothecary or, come to that, the village witch.”

  “I need to do my chores. Besides, why would I want to see a witch?”

  “Well, first there’s the eye thing, and then maybe you could find out why you’re suddenly such a magnet for the pigs.”

  “Huh?”

  Turning about on his heels, Diek noticed for the first time that all twelve of his father’s hogs had followed him along the length of the pen and were now squatting in a group just beyond the fence. Curious. Usually, they ignored him completely, unless he had scraps. “Th-that’s odd.”

  “Odd ain’t the word, boy. ’F y’ask me, you’re up the creek without a shovel.”

  “I think that’s supposed to be a ‘paddle,’ and I feel fine, thank you. Now, I’m going to see to the milking…alone.

  The barrowbird hopped onto a nearby tree branch, and watched Diek skulk toward the milking shed. “Somethin’ amiss,” it muttered. “Somethin’ amiss, right enough.”

  The milk was curdled. Rather, it hadn’t been curdled when Diek had first picked up the bucket, but it was definitely curdled now.

  Diek tipped the bucket, shaking his head as a series of fat, creamy blobs plopped onto the bench below. Odd. He took a step back, turned on his heels and stopped dead. All the cows were staring at him, their tails swishing in the shadows of the milking shed. There was definitely something wrong; they usually took no notice of him whatsoever.

  Maybe it was time to see an apothecary….

  Diek’s visit to the apothecary wasn’t entirely successful. The man, like most of the villagers, largely ignored everything Diek had to say, before supplying him with a strange potion that looked and tasted like seven-year-old jam. He was to take it three times a day, as instructed, or alternatively, whenever he “felt a bit odd.” The old man certainly hadn’t given him any useful advice, and quickly changed the subject when his flowers wilted as Diek got up to leave. On reflection, Diek had practically been thrown out of the shop, in the end.

  Diek had always been a loner, but now he took to spending whole days in the fields by himself. He had decided to give the barrowbird to his father as a birthday present; its insults and depressing forecasts of hideous eye disorders had become unbearably tiresome. Also, it had started crowing about Diek’s increasingly resonant voice and made a pointed comment that, every time he played a note on the flute, the neighbor’s grimalkin came tearing across the Midden Field as though the hounds of hell were after it. He had seen that wretched cat a lot lately.

  Weeks passed and, as the magic took root inside Diek’s mind, it began to surface in a peculiar fashion, giving the boy an almost magnetic personality. His foolish absentmindedness became thoughtful contemplation; his inane and idiotic comments were replaced by clever and insightful witticisms. In short, people of Little Irksome began to notice Diek Wustapha.

  They would spend a few moments talking with him, then trail after him in large groups, like sheep after a shepherd. This was all much to Diek’s astonishment; he’d never had a lot of time for people before. Now they praised him and appreciated his music (unlike his father, who only tolerated the odd tune every evening after tea). These people wanted more. They would wait quite patiently all day, just on the off chance of a tune. It wasn’t that his music was particularly melodic, as Diek would have been the first to admit. On the whole, it tended to comprise a few strangled notes huddling together in mournful misery.

  Then, one afternoon, everything changed.

  Diek had been playing for Butcha, the baker’s niece, when suddenly the music came alive. He didn’t even notice it happening; it was simply there at his lips, awaiting release. To the girl’s mesmerized delight, he produced tune after tune, melody after melody, song after song. These delicate pieces floated into the air, twisting and turning in the breeze, and were carried for miles over the hills and dales. Slowly, one by one, the villagers of Little Irksome stopped what they were doing and craned their necks to listen. Then they put down their tools and washboards, snatched up their hats, and fastened their walking shoes. The cobbled lanes of the village were suddenly alive with curious people irrevocably drawn to the sound.

  By midafternoon, the entire population of the village stood grouped around an oak tree in the Midden Field, listening to Diek Wustapha weave his tunes. And play he did. From that day forth, he knew that nothing in his life would ever be the same ag
ain.

  So did his parents.

  In practically no time at all, Diek’s talents had become many, from snake charming to hypnotizing mice. Visitors arrived from a few of the neighboring villages to watch his skills and hear his music. Deep inside his subconscious the magic was throbbing, turning, gaining momentum. And he carried his flute wherever he went.

  He’d taken to playing long, drawn-out melodies too, whimsical at first, and then, as the days drifted by, progressively stronger. Melodies could be more than mere tunes, he discovered. Melodies could be almost magical.

  Diek found himself reflecting on things like the reception of spiritual messages, the existence of telepathic sheep and, more important, his part in the larger scheme of things.

  “Everybody’s got a place in the big picture, lad,” his father would say. “It’s just a matter of finding out where you fit in.”

  Diek wondered where he would fit in, and found himself gazing longingly toward Dullitch, capital city of Illmoor, with its gleaming spires and megalithic monuments.

  TWO

  IT WAS SUMMER IN Dullitch, the air was clean and sobering, and the streets were filled with the combined odors of freshly baked bread and exotic spices. In the marketplace, throngs of hungry patrons lined up for the early bargains, and a few rogue mongrels gathered for free pastry offcuts at the baker’s serving hatch.

  It was the annual Clairvoyants’ Awareness Weekend and a fete was being held in tribute to Ouija Mastook, the oldest (and most incontinent) medium on record. The guest of honor was due to arrive at midday and no one knew what to expect. The bandstand was currently being reinforced to withstand the weight of Mastook’s entourage of nursing staff.

  Usually, the ceremony consisted of a rambling speech, three (extraordinarily loud) cheers, and several rounds of celebratory drinks. Invariably, it would conclude with a séance in which somebody’s aunt Margaret turned up to let them know that her valuables were hidden in the attic.

  Atop the Church of Urgumflux the Wormridden, two members of the dreaded Yowler cult were taking turns peering through a spyglass at the proceedings below.