The Djerjain Jungle: champion Travail
Minimin briefs the rest of the Company on Sherenyu-Ruk and the old jungle temple that Mock has taken over for its own. The natives come in two types, black-skinned humans called Haansi and reptilian lizardfolk called Ruk, clearly relatives of the lizardfolk the Company met further north in the marshes. In addition, the great warm rivers that run through the jungle are inhabited by intelligent beings called paragon crocodiles, who are respected by the natives as holy guardians of the jungle.
But the weatherbeaten, vine-covered, towering, gorgeous old city of Sherenyu-Ruk is now crowded with many other visitors -- Mock's Leper Rade, swarming masses of the diseased and disease-bearing. Trotting among them are the sickly monsters Minimin had described in his reports, loathsome beings that turn the stomachs of even the strongest who gaze too long at them. It is vaguely reminiscent of The Laughing Man's Carnival of Shadows in Cappadocia, but there merriment and abandon was the rule, while here is an earthier, grittier, more disgusting sense of fleshy decay and pestilence. Maggots writhe in the muddy streets and leeches swarm in the rivers. Rot grub is a constant danger, and the Company is forced to use constant magic and healing to stave off fevers and infections.
Attacking Mock's Champion, Travail, will not be as easy as attacking Bane. Guards patrol the streets and stand watch throughout the temple. The monstrous creatures that are Mock's special creations threaten unknown dangers, and none of the Company except the disease-immune paladins is enthusiastic about courting plague in a temple confrontation. The spellcasters prepare all the defenses they can, and the rule of the day is to protect Halkem, the only in the Company to have access to highest-level healing spells.
The Company spends a week undercover in Sherenyu-Ruk, hidden behind lepers' cowls and rags, sickened by the horrors around them. Each night spells must be cast to ward off the fevers and plague that vulnerable members contract.
At last the Company comes to the inevitable conclusion: there will be no way to safely attack Mock's Champion. After too many days and nights of fruitless planning, the Company ends up where it always does: "get 'em."
Valere and Elianora; Minimin and Earle Remington; Halkem and Pip; Hari and Caprice; in robes and rags they join the grim procession of lepers that file into the vine-covered temple to pay obesiance to Travail.
The corridors of the temple are damp, humid, and tight. The air smells foul, like vomit and rotting flesh. Maggots and rot grub and beetles and spiders crawl over the slimy floor and walls.
Inside a large room filled with crumbling columns and jungle vines Travail holds his plague court. Travail may have once been human, but it's hard to tell now: his body is covered with running sores that weep blood, mucus, and worms. He gags regularly as he talks, sometimes on coils of intestine that he painfully swallows or shoves back down his throat with his fingers. He is surrounded by undead servitors, maggot-headed dogs, creatures of boneless flesh, creatures of dripping lard, things covered in rags that seep noxious liquids ... even the hardiest member of the Company can't help but gag at the stench of rotting, diseased flesh.
On the signal, they attack.
Minimin and Caprice scour the place with cleansing fire; Valere, Elianora, and Hari surge forward, holy swords lifted against the creatures. Pip uses his mental powers to blast away at the monsters around them, knowing all too well that the ether is crawling with cerebral parasites. Halkem, along with Caprice and the paladins, helps turn the undead -- they are protected by being within Mock's temple, but the collective holy power is, at last, enough to dispel them. Earle teleports here and there with potions and spells, doing whatever is necessary with his superior mobility over the battlefield.
The fight is the foulest the Company has ever engaged in: lepers tackle and claw at them, and gangrenous body parts litter the stone floor along with unwholesome secretions and mucuses. Flesh is invaded by disease and rot grubs that burrow eagerly toward the Company members' hearts, and Halkem is soon busy doing all he can to keep the rest of the Company alive and fighting. Faces and hands break out into bleeding, pus-seeping sores, making weapon grips slippery and action painful. Throats swell with illness, eyes burn, noses run. Even the paladins are beset by parasites their magical immunities cannot withstand.
The floor erupts in a mass of ghouls and ghasts, and the clerics and paladins fight to defend the mages and Pip. Horrid spells whirl around them: Bloodstorm, Acid Fog, Rusting Grasp, Verminplague, Plague of Rats, Creeping Doom; Otyugh Swarm. Members of the Company fall, are healed, stand up, are wounded again.
At long last swords reach Travail and fall upon him. The Champion bursts in a gooey explosion of acidic, disease-carrying slime and bugs. The former sears away at the Company's clothing, weapons, and flesh, as the bugs scurry into the dark, damp temple cracks and crevices. Pip and the mages do what they can to destroy as many of the creeping insects as possible, but a new wave of monsters burst into the room, followed by the giant paragon crocodiles sworn to defend the city, and in desperation the Company teleports out, back to the safety of Candor.
Nobody knows whether Mock is defeated; there isn't a sense of global change that accompanied Champion Bane's destruction. But there is no doubt that Travail has been gravely wounded, at best, and Mock's power severely diminished. The next day a recon mission teleports back to Sherenyu-Ruk and wreaks more havoc along the edges of the city. At King Malachi's command, a permanent guerilla squad is set up to continue hectoring Mock's forces. But not the Company itself. For war among the Realms has broken out, and the Company is needed elsewhere.
