The Journal of Gothmar og`Vallenti pg. 1

i guess i'll start at the beginning for you. mr phegrain did a good job of teaching me how to write. my brother greenbloods ask me to write their names and the names of their loves all the time. it's how i made my first connection with them after they called me "inkie's pet" and "brainy runt".

they don't call me that now. cause of these smarts i've got what you'd call "influence". my rivals get carted off in barrows after my plans get done with them. clurg says that i'm like he was when he was younger. that makes me feel good since he's the smartest ogre i've ever met! the bouncers sure got better when he came back from his travels. and when it comes to bashing, the bouncers have got the stuff!

ok, where was i? oh yeah, the beginning. i was in the yard playing with the armadillos when soonog went passing by. soonog's my boss in the greenbloods and he's the boss of all the knights in oggok. he's not as smart as clurg but boy is he mean. and powerful too. guess he's one of my heroes too since he don't take any smack from anybody without this really wicked stare. even makes the crackneks get antsy, it does! yeah, soonog's got it right.

there i go again. mr phegrain says that i got trouble focusing. says it's cause of a curse or something. either way, it means i get going on one point and then get dragged off on another before i finish. it happens alot. and i mean alot. there was this one time when i was talking about this little bar in neriak called the maiden's fancy. there was this ogress there who bossed around this half elven dancer like she was the queen of kelethin! it was right there the best thing i'd ever seen ever... her all meek and all with that lovely ogress shouting orders and stuff. made me think of...

ok, i got to get it together. mr. phegrain picked me up from being just another ogre. i was running errands for the bashers when i was little. they tossed me scraps like the other "pups" we was called but i was kinda scrawny so i didn't get much... which made me scrawnier. that made mr. phegrain mad and he picked me up (i said i was a little one, eh?) by the scruff of my neck and said "You, little one, are coming with me!" before carting me through the swamp and out into the wide world.

it's funny. back then he could say i was a human kid. he looked human too, sometimes. he could change into all kinds of different people and we went all over the place doing secret missions and sneaking around. he called me his esquire or assistant... never called me servant or slave. treated me good, he did. we ate good food and drank good wine. he learned me my letters, like i said, and had me deliver messages around town while he worked his magic persuasions on the people. in the meantime he'd also show me how neat the magics were... though i couldn't do them right... and how to twirl a staff to crack the bad guys on the head. he was pretty good at those staves.

well, after a few years of going with him, i started noticing that i was looking down on him. he started having to leave me outside of town when he went in on missions cause i was bigger than any human could be. he was explaining the history of the world to me and i understood that once we ogres was the biggest baddest peoples around. then we got boomed by something... got the giants too... made us not so smart. but that's ok, we're still plenty strong and crafty too!

one day we were passing through the desert and we stopped at the gypsies. he told me to wait behind a big dune but i thought those gypsies were so pretty i had to take a look. well, they got sharp eyes or something cause they saw me quick. mr. phegrain had to throw his magics around as he shouted at me to run south. i did, real fast-like cause those gypsies were out for my blood! a little bit later mr. phegrain met me but he was looking all weak and drawn out. he told me to carry him to oggok and so i did.

he slept the whole way, murmuring and sweating. guess he hurt himself but the gypsies sure couldn't. mr. phegrain is unstoppable! i got to say, even though he's smart, he sure did scare me with his shallow breathing and hazy eyes. we got into oggok and i took him straight to the shamen. i was so focused on him i didn't notice that everyone was looking at me funny. sure, i was wearing some freshly pressed clothes (mr. phegrain got them for me in halas, with some spares too!) and i was clean, cept for my boots, anyway, but i was like some kinda freak to them. why, i remember the first time i saw toomak, he laughed at my purple shirt and fine leather breeches. i taught him a lesson... they never found the body.

oh yeah, the shamen honored the alliance with the tier`dal and healed mr. phegrain. i was glad and sat next to his bed. the ambassador visited once and left a letter (that i didn't read, though i could have if i wanted to!). he sneered at me but didn't say anything.

when he woke up, mr. phegrain thanked the nameless (that's the super-god who made everything he says, though i thought cazic-thule made it all, but i don't disagree with mr. phegrain, he knows everything) that we were both still alive and then suggested i not peek at gypsies anytime soon. i agreed, they don't look so pretty when they want to kill you. his eyes fell on the letter and he opened it. i could feel his cold rage as his eyes ate up the page but he was all smiles and smooth voice when he looked up.

"Gothmar, my friend," he says, "it seems I have a mission in which you cannot play a part." I didn't really know what he meant right then but he repeated for me, like he can read my mind, "I think it's time you took up some duties here in your home. Oggok has need of your strength. I must speak with Soonog."

i didn't like the way that was going but figured mr. phegrain knows best. next thing i knew, he was gone and soonog came to tell me i was a greenblood! i got to train alot and got some uniform armor and weapons. i put away my fine clothes and hunted the lizardmen and other beasties of the jungle. it was alot of fun! not as fun as meeting pretty, nice smelling ladies or getting information out of the people we grabbed but bashing things is really satisfying.

when i got a letter from mr. phegrain, i was surprised. it'd been a while since i'd read anything but it was still all there. he asked me to fight well and write about what i'm doing. so here it is. just like it happened. i'm going to go to fight in the desert soon so there ought to be lots of neat stuff to write about there. i hope it's good enough. thanks, mr. phegrain!

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