A workable scheme still hadn’t come to him by the time Skragrott and his retinue returned. This time, as well as his gaggle of hangers-on, the Loonking had something in tow, a wagon of some sort heaved along on rusty wheels by another massive troggoth. Skragrott stopped and looked over Borik with a critical eye before shaking his head ruefully.

‘Well you’re a zoggin’ state and no mistake,’ he said.

Borik knew it was true. The fungal curse was consuming his flesh, he could feel it spreading and pinching with every passing minute. The fleshy toadstools had doubled in size since Skragrott’s last visit, and to his revulsion a few of them were beginning to show signs of rudimentary features. A shallow pit here that flared like a snuffling nostril. A translucent blister there that could conceivably be an eye. One of the damned things was growing teeth, which jutted obscenely out of pink flesh that looked for all the realms like a gum. Borik could feel that his sanity was fraying along with his anatomy. He could feel skin and muscle softening and becoming rubbery and pliant, his physical form slouching and slowly breaking down. His body was one thirsty, hungry howl of agony, and each time he glanced at himself his revulsion at his own mutating flesh built. He wanted to claw at himself and scream. Instead, he could only sit and suffer as he felt himself teetering upon the brink of madness. He felt sick. He wanted to sob and giggle all at once. But he was Kharadron, and so he did neither.

‘Let’s try again, before you’re too far gone to speak proper,’ suggested Skragrott.

Borik grunted at him. Skragrott produced an amulet from within his stinking robes and brandished it in Borik’s face. It was crudely carved, as though it had fought against chisel and awl. It looked like an idiot’s approximation of a staring eye.

‘Who are yer mates?’ asked Skragrott. ‘Where are yer mates? And what are they up to? Tell me all dat, and I’ll fix ya. I swear it on the Bad Moon itself. But you lie to me, and dis here loonstone trinket is gonna light up like da Bad Moon isself.’

Insane as it seemed, Borik believed Skragrott truly would fix him. Even with his vision pulsating between psychedelia and the colours of putrefaction, even with his hearing echoing weirdly and vile itching sensations shuddering through his tortured body, Borik was sure he heard sincerity in the grot’s tone. Skragrott could fix this curse, and if he was willing to swear on his deity, he must genuinely be prepared to do so.