Dragon magazine

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Monster Manual III

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Dragon #122

The scholar Tantras held up a wriggling
thing in a wooden clamp, taking care not
to touch it with his hands. ?Brethren of
the Council, behold ? a rot grub.? His
eyebrows raised at the ill-suppressed
sputters of mirth audible in the meeting-
chamber of the Council, but he did not
look surprised at the reaction. He had
counted on it.

?Not magnificent, I?ll admit,? the sage
continued with a faint smile, calmly twirl-
ing the clamp. ?Certainly not as impressive
as, say, a dragon, but often?? he paused to
look around the darkened lecture room at
his invisible audience ??just as deadly, if
not more so.?

?Dispense with the cheap theatrics,?
came an authoritarian voice from the
darkness in the back of the hall. ?We are
not impressed with your wit.?

The clamp stopped twirling. A cold light
entered Tantras?s gaze as he looked toward
the rear of the hall. ?I see? he said easily,
his smile twisting. ?But such mighty mages
as are assembled here may have reason to
achieving lichdom should think on the
usefulness of a brainless, sightless body,
tunneled into ruin by these creatures.
Such a body might survive transformation
? but then, it might not. And rot grubs
will eat into carrion ? yea, into anything
organic their mouths can reach, including
undead flesh as well as living.?
take an interest in the lowly rot grub.
Those of you who are even now spending
vast sums in order to learn the secret of
The sudden stillness in the hall was
unbroken for the space of a long minute.
The writhing form in the grip of the clamp
never ceased to move, straining to free
itself. Tantras lowered his gaze to the
mottled brown, tawny, and white grub.

?Well, say on, then,? a nameless Council
member grunted.

The clamp began again to rotate slowly
in Tantras?s hand. ?My thanks, Brother,? he
said in an inflectionless tone, his smile
deepening. ?My part in the Converse to-
night is admittedly not a matter of great
import in the doings of states, nor yet a
delicate point or discovery in dweomer-
craft ?   but I believe many of us here
would do well, every so often, to think on
what is most basic in our existence. Aside
from its value as an exercise in humility,
such a practice yields practical informa-
tion which may in time be of inestimable
value. If Amurathor the Great had known
what I am about to relate concerning the
habits and nature of the rot grub, he
might still be with us, and this Council a
mere whimsy of outlawed, harried work-
ers of magic. But he was ignorant, and he
is gone, and we are neither.

?Harken, then: The rot grub, as you
know, feeds on living flesh. With these??
he indicated with a wooden probe the
successive rings of rasping, razor-sharp
teeth at one end of his specimen ??they
also burrow through offal, dung, dead
flesh, and even such organic matter as
loam or large plants. When burrowing,
either for safety or to kill prey, a grub can
cut away large gobbets of material and
pass them rapidly, by muscular contortion,
straight through its body, expelling them
with some force.? Tantras reached over
and opened a metal box on the table be-
side him, revealing the topmost part of a
large joint of mutton. He then held the
clamp over the box and released the grub,
ignoring the startled gasps from the front
row of the audience. Twisting as it fell, the
worm promptly vanished into the mutton,
spraying tiny pieces of meat into the air
from its burrowing hole. ?As you see, it
works with great speed, and it is this
faculty that makes the rot grub so danger-
ous to man. All of you know that a rot
grub will burrow to the heart of a man or
any larger, living, and blooded creature in
a very short time. Know now that rot
grubs do this in order to breed.

?Rot grubs need flesh soaked in blood
and rich in oxygen, such as that of the
heart, in which to lay their eggs, for only
in such an environment can the eggs be
fertilized. They burrow there by instinct
and lay a cluster of from six to a dozen
eggs even if no other rot grub is present to
fertilize the clutch. My experiments have
shown that all grubs can lay eggs, and all
can fertilize the eggs of others, although
apparently not their own.? Noting some
stirring from the front rows, the sage
lowered the wooden probe and gently
poked at the mutton. ?We are safe,? he
said, ?so long as our friend is occupied.?
The comment drew no laughter. The
sage then reached into a pocket in his
robes and brought out a slim, firmly-
stoppered glass phial. ?These are a bit
small, but it is perilous to expose them to
the air so near a live rot grub. In this phial
are four rot grub eggs: small, green-white
rubbery spheres a little less than the size
of your smallest fingernail. As I?ve said,
one rot grub lays a clutch of these, and if
another rot grub comes into contact with
the host creature, it will also burrow to
the heart, locate the eggs by the scent and
burrowing tube left by its predecessor,
and exude a red, viscous fluid from its
mouth as it rolls the eggs about and exam-
ines them. This fluid penetrates the
outer skin of the eggs. If the second rot
grub arrives within twenty minutes of the
laying of the eggs, successful fertilization
occurs. Otherwise, the eggs die.
 

“Fertilized eggs and grubs can survive
for long periods in carrion, even en-
tombed corpses, or anywhere that affords
protection from crushing, air, water, and
extremes of temperature. They cease to
move and function, and thus cease to
require food, air, or like sustenance. The
rot grub in this meat can wait here for a
very long time for a live host — precisely
how long, my knowledge at present does
not answer, but at least two centuries, as
the opening of the tomb of King Eurovan
of the now-vanished realm of Nuvorene
attests; a tomb-robber was slain by rot
grubs then. In such a suspended state does
the rot grub lie until vibration, the actual
movement of their ‘home’ meat, or contact
with warm, living flesh awakens it.”

Tantras sighed and carefully closed the
lid of the metal box with his probe. The
automatic lock rattled and snapped shut.
“And so it was with Amurathor, who like
many of us believed that rot grubs
shunned the taint of undead flesh. Yet it
took but four of these little creatures to
turn his enchanted and rotting body, rean-
imated by his sorcery into existence as a
lich, into the skeleton which stands by the
entryway to this hall — stripped of all
matter but the very bone itself in a matter
of an hour.” He offered a side look to a
particular spot in the back of the room.
“Not bad work for cheap theatrics.”

The sage dropped the wooden clamp
onto the box lid and casually wiped his
hands on his robes. “Behold, the rot grub.
The most efficient of the natural scaven-
gers, and the deadliest, for its size and
repulsiveness lead all to underestimate it.
Pray do not make this mistake yourselves.
My last suggestion, my Brethren, is that
you leave one of these—” he tapped the
box with a finger “—with your most trea-
sured magical devices and wealth in your
vaults. A mundane defense, perhaps, but
practical. No thief can resist opening a
box. It has been a pleasure to speak with
you. Good evening, and good fortune.”