Tarl Vertison
He held me against the wall, his knife a quarter of an inch from my eye. I froze, fearing any movement would cost me the eye at a minimum. He snarled, and said, "You see this knife? See the serrated edge? If you look really, really close, you can see the little stingers in them."
"This knife was originally the claw of an outsider. When an outsider comes for you - and I promise, they are coming - the first you'll know of it is the clicking sound as eight of these claws strike the ground as it advances on you. Once you hear it, they are already too close to flee, so you have no choice but to stand and pray. If you're lucky, and you're strong, and there's only one, maybe you'll survive. But it will come at you with those claws, and when it gets to you, it will first cut you with the straight edge-" with that, he put the tip on my cheek and dragged it down to my chin, "then it will drag the claw back." He dragged the serrated side back up, nearly piercing the skin, and burning like poison ivy, up to my eyelid.
"You'll probably be dead by then. If you aren't, you'll almost certainly be wishing you were. You'll need to fight through that pain, that itching, burning pain, to somehow strike back at the creature." Even with the skin intact, it burned and swelled where the knife had touched. "I suggest you look for a joint where a leg attaches to the torso. If you have a spear, and can get just the right place, you can slide it in and pierce the heart. Then all you'll have to do is hold on while the poison courses through you. If you miss, though... Well, you can imagine what it will do with eight legs, each tipped with one of those claws, while you writhe on the ground in pain?" I wanted to writhe on the ground in pain myself, or flee the bar and throw myself off a cliff. But he still held me, and that damned knife was still too close.
He seethed for another moment, then dropped me to the ground. In a low voice, that was somehow scarier than the snarling one, he said, "What were you asking about? How I got my scar?" I scrambled backwards, and as soon as I could, stood and ran from the bar. I learned an important truth that day, about asking inappropriate questions of well armed Orcans, and keeping it in mind has served me well.
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