The Orcish Horde 3 — “The” Grak, Himself

Posted by Scourge on February 18, 2010

The last thing Harlon wanted to do was talk to Lady Ansul again, but if this flamboyant orc-minder was staying at her boarding house, he really had no choice. He’d put up with almost anything if the price was right. For all the moaning about keeping the missus in the manner to which she had become accustomed, Harlon wanted to be kept in the manner to which he had become accustomed as well.

Lady Ansul opened the door a few minutes after he knocked. In fact, he was raising his hand to knock again when she swung it open. She fixed him with a deadpan glare.

“Captain Harlon,” she stated in a tone that made him remember a particularly bad cart crash two winters ago when Barend had been covered with two inches of ice.

“I am here to see…” His voice trailed off when he suddenly became aware that he did not know the man’s name. The wheels started spinning quickly and ground to a halt when he came across the only memory he did have of their identities.. “Grak.”

He was pleased that Lady Ansul’s eyebrows twitched upward a hair’s breadth. He had surprised her. He stifled a smile. “I will see if he is available. You may wait in the garden.”

He couldn’t help but glance about the garden in hopes of seeing Celiaria back there, bent elegantly over the frog pond or kneeling in supplication before a magnificent flower. He was disappointed, but did not have to wait long for Grak to show up, trailed, thankfully, by the oddball. They strode up to Harlon and the man smiled.

“Ah!” he exclaimed, spreading his arms wide and sending his gold-threaded cloak into paroxysms of fluttery-ness when the wind swept across its folds. “The good captain who so helped restore order in the streets the other day.”

Harlon stepped back as the man swept past Grak and approached him with his arms outstretched, wondering if he would try to hug him. Instead, the man stopped at a respectable distance and grinned wider. “I suspect you really wanted to see me instead of Grak, didn’t you?”

“Yes, but I didn’t know your name.”

The little man stuck out his hand and Harlon shook it. “Torm Grapillia, at your service. And this…” He motioned over his shoulder at where the orc stood staring at the flowerbeds. “…is The Grak, Himself.”

Harlon peered around him at the orc who was wearing a much less frightening pair of blue pants and a fine silk tunic that day. “The Grak, Himself?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of him!” The man clutched the pleats on his chest and looked shocked.

“Umm… Barend is pretty isolated.” The man looked dismayed at the news, so Harlon tried to steer his mind in another direction. “Perhaps you’d like to tell me why you’re here and also, how I can help you out in any way.”

“Ah, yes,” he replied with a sad smile. “Grak is a star! I am a producer of small plays for the Natural Exploration Society. Besides entertaining fictions put on by the best actors, I have devised a new type of traveling entertainment based on dramatic speech and a series of artistic murals. I am working on one now.”

Harlon, whose artistic interest barely stretched far enough to ask what his son was working on when he was in town, quirked an eyebrow and frowned. “Natural Exploration Society?”

The man grinned. “Oh yes. World famous really. I’m here to construct a show on the Orcish Horde’s battles of the Krangoth Dyansty.” He waved a hand at Grak again, who had wandered over to the pond. “Grak here is the star of the show.”