Rattick had not pushed his luck. After killing the boy, he had left the Wizard’s presence as quickly as possible. Sure, there was the question of payment owed, but Rattick knew as well as anyone that dead men collect no tolls or tithes. Best to stay alive, for there was no profit in death. The Orcs carried Boltac’s sack high above their heads, fighting over it as they raced to the Great Hall. Rattick followed in the shadows, waiting for his chance to grab something of value before he escaped from the madness of the Wizard’s lair. Why were rich people always so dangerously out of touch with reality? Rattick wondered.

The Great Hall was ambitiously named yet modestly furnished. A large cavern off the main passage, it was a darker analog of a refectory at a traditional boy’s school. Large wooden tables with benches had once been lined up here. Now half of them were pushed into a jumble at the far end of the room. A mock fireplace carved into the living rock was full to overflowing with bits of discarded bone and gristle. Here and there, a wolf nosed through the scraps. Even to Rattick, this jumbled room looked like the end of a civilization.

Concealed by his cloak, he climbed the rough chamber wall and shimmied down a thick iron chain to a long unused chandelier. There he took up his perch and watched and waited.

The Orcs cleared a space in the center of the room where they fought over the bag. Claws darted in here and there, trying to snatch the contents. The room quickly filled to capacity with the brutish creatures. The noise of their disputations was deafening. The smell of so many of them, packed so close was debilitating. Rattick began to wonder if the chandelier had been a terrible idea. But he remained still and silent. There was nothing else to do.

Soon the bag was upended, and the contents spilled all over the floor. For such a tiny, plain bag, it was shocking to see how much it contained. Among the miscellany–the occasional weapon, rations of food, bits of apparel–came sack after sack of coin. They poured from the opening, landing on the floor with solid, seductive clinks of loot. What would they do with the gold? Rattick wondered. He decided to wait until they were tired of fighting amongst themselves. Then he would swoop down and collect as many of those sacks as he could.

Rattick’s dreams of avarice were shattered as he watched Orcs claw the leather bags apart and cram the gold pieces in their mouths. They clawed and fought and ate until all of Boltac’s gold–of which there was a substantial fortune–had disappeared into their monstrous gullets. Rattick sighed and felt an emotion that was very much like grief. Ah well, the dungeon had been good while it lasted, he thought. He’d wait for the creatures to disband then he would sneak out like the thief he was.

But the Orcs did not leave. Their squabbles gradually died down until, bloated on coin, they fell asleep under, on, and around the tables. Rattick cursed his luck and shifted his cramping legs. How much longer would he be stuck up here? He waited until the strange snores of the Orcs below wafted up to his ears. Then he uncoiled himself from his perch and climbed back down.

He snuck through the sated and sedate creatures as quietly as he could. When one near the door snorted heavily and rolled over, Rattick swore he could hear coins rattling in his belly. A plan suggested itself to Rattick. And, with Rattick, where there was a plan, there was almost always a sharp knife involved. He drew his cruel blade from the sheath on his thigh and considered how he might do this quietly. With an ordinary person, he would just cram a hand over the mouth and slide the dagger down into the neck. This would sever an artery deep inside the torso so that the person would bleed to death internally in a matter of seconds. It was very clean and very professional. Rattick prided himself on his knowledge of this assassin’s technique.

But with an Orc, this presented a number of problems. Not least of which: how do you cover a mouth that has tusks? And he had seen how brutishly powerful these things were. He doubted that they would die quietly. How could he hope to hold this one down? He hunkered in a nearby shadow and considered his prey. As he did, out of habit, he drew a whetstone from a pouch on his belt, spit on it, and began to sharpen the already razor-sharp knife. There was gold enough here. He just needed to figure out how to cut off a piece for himself.

When he heard a noise from outside, he replaced the knife and sharpening stone and then hid his hands under his robe. As the clawsteps drew closer, he closed his eyes so that the whites of them might not give him away when whoever it was entered. This was an old and important trick of Rattick’s. Hiding was a fine art, relying as much upon psychology as camouflage. The only time people looked carefully at a room was when they first walked in. Once they believed they knew who and what was there, it became very difficult for them to see anything new. It wasn’t so much hiding in plain sight as hiding in someone else’s self-enforced blind spot.

He heard another Orc enter the room. There was a shuffling and a scraping of claws. But there was no sharp intake of breath. No sudden movements. Rattick remained unseen. Then the Orc spoke, but in the human tongue.

“It is safe, they are all asleep,” said a voice both alien and familiar to Rattick. He opened his eyes and saw Samga, the Wizard’s clever Orc. And entering the room behind him… BOLTAC! In spite of his own general and considerable sneakitude, Rattick jumped at the sight of Boltac and struggled to stifle a curse.

“Well, somebody had a party,” said Boltac. “Did they eat everything?”

“Most likely just the metals.”

“Good, ‘cause there’s a couple of things it would be nice to have,” Boltac said as he searched the wreckage of the room. After a few moments, he held up a half-chewed, heavy wool mitten. “I suppose the other one is too much to ask for. See if you can find a wand, or the sack.”

Samga held up a shredded mass of fabric that had once been a Magic sack. “You mean this?”

“Ah, crap,” said Boltac. He took the burlap from Samga and examined it carefully. The torn shred contained nothing. Boltac turned it over and then over again. As he folded and unfolded it, something fell out onto the floor. It was a small, lacquered box. “Enh. Well, it’s better than nuttin’,” said Boltac as he tucked the box inside his tunic. “Well, if that’s all we got, it looks like we’ll be doing this the hard way, unless…” Boltac looked around the room at the sleeping Orcs and their bloated bellies. “You know, Samga, there was a lot of gold in that sack of mine. An awful lot. Did they eat all of it?”

“They kept eating until there was nothing left to eat,” Samga said with a shrug.

“En-henh. Not sophisticated and restrained like you.”

“As you say,” Samga said, surveying his kin with sadness. “All of your gold is gone. Such a shame.”

“It’s not gone,” said Boltac, “It’s in your friends’ stomachs, here. Important distinction.”

Samga did not understand much of anything humans said. The gold was eaten. And that other word, he had never heard it before, “Please, what does this word ‘friend’ mean.”

“Ya kiddin’ me, right?” said Boltac.

Samga gave him a flat Orc-ish look that admitted of no humor.

“Okay. You, Samga, you’re my friend. You are helping me, ergo, you are my friend,” said Boltac.

“But I am just hurting The Master,” said Samga.

“Yeah, it’s a trade. You help me by getting me out. I help you by hurting The Master, and we both benefit. Trade makes friends, Samga.”

“But you cannot be friends with such as I. I am beneath you.”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous. Beneath me? I mean, ya short, there’s no way around that. But I know good people. You, Samga, you are good people. Uh, Orcle? Whatever, c’mon. I still got a lady to rescue.”

Then Boltac noticed his Magic-detecting wand, trapped under a sleeping Orc’s leg. “Hey, uh, Samga, could you…” He pointed at the wand. “Probably better you than me if this thing wakes up.”

Samga lifted the leg and retrieved the Magic-detecting wand. It, too, had been gnawed on but had fared better than the bag and mittens. Boltac used what remained of his tunic to wipe the saliva from it.

“Okay, this will do, now let’s get outta here.” They returned to the door. Rattick thought that Boltac looked right through him–right into his eyes–but Boltac’s eye was drawn to something on the right side of the door.

“Hey,” Boltac said, “The sacred Lantern of Lamptopolis.”

“Lamptopolis?” asked Samga.

“Eh, never mind. It’s a long story. The damn thing doesn’t really work that well for me, but, as I always say, you can never have too much light or too much water.” Boltac reached down and grabbed the lamp by its handle. As he held it up, it blazed forth with a clear, brilliant light that filled the room as if the sun had been harnessed and dragged into the bowels of the earth.

Samga hissed and averted his eyes. Rattick covered his eyes to protect his night vision, but otherwise stayed absolutely motionless. For an instant, he was completely exposed, but there was nothing to be done.

“Holy crap!” Boltac said, and dropped the lamp with a clatter. Its light gradually faded away. Rubbing residual spots of brilliance from his eyes, Boltac stood over the lamp, confused. “I don’t understand. I mean, I’m not–”

“We must go!” said Samga.

Boltac looked up and realized that the Orcs, awakened by the commotion, had begun to stir. He grabbed the remnants of Themistre’s Bag of Holding and wrapped them around the lamp handle. This time, when he picked up the lamp, it did not light. He flipped a loose end of the burlap over the lamp’s motto. “Burns with the Flame of a True Heart,” Boltac muttered. “En-henh.”

One of the lethargic Orcs saw them go. The creature cried, “Hork!” but it was a half-hearted protest at best. The gold, heavy in its belly, made it difficult to rise.

Rattick slipped out of the shadows. How had Boltac survived his fall into the bottomless pit? And where was he headed now? Rattick sensed chaos. And where chaos rode, there were always plenty of spoils for the taking. He followed the Merchant and his unlikely guide.