The doom of dragonback, p.32
The Doom of Dragonback, page 32
‘The Angboks are going on a mission.’
‘Those mad Angboks are at it again.’
The voices hushed and silence filled the hall.
Actual silence. The pounding of the goblin engines had ceased.
‘The snows?’ someone asked quietly.
‘Have they come? Is it the snows?’
‘Winter’s here, proper, by Grungni’s shade!’
‘Let’s see them green-skinned beggars deal with a blizzard or two and see how they like mountain life.’
‘They’ll be pushing harder than ever to get in,’ Skraffi warned. ‘If the snows have come. Better in than out, and they’ll want in worse than ever.’
Suddenly a boom resounded through the hall, passing from south to north, setting the lanterns to shaking. The dwarfs fell silent again, cowed by the enormous sound. It came again, a few heartbeats later, the noise spreading along halls and tunnels like ripples on a mountain mere. And again, a third huge impact that made Gabbik flinch even though he had almost been expecting it.
And then a double-thump came, worse than the single boom of before, like a monstrous heartbeat.
‘Giants,’ Haldora said. ‘The giants are at the main gate.’
A collective sigh rose up from the assembled dwarfs. Giants, not snow.
‘It’s only a matter of time,’ said Haldora. ‘Rune-bound or not, the gates can’t hold forever.’
‘They just have to hold long enough,’ Gabbik replied. ‘Until the snows come proper.’
‘That’s not going to help!’ shrieked Haldora, her patience finally worn out. ‘Snows could bury the army and they’ll still keep coming. The orcs aren’t going anyway, not with the snows, not ever.’
‘You don’t know that,’ said Gabbik.
‘I know that they’re not going to be held back from the North Gate forever, pa. Even if the South Gate holds, we’ll be surrounded sooner rather than later. We won’t be able to get out.’
‘What of it? We’re not going anywhere.’
‘Why must you be so stubborn?’
‘Why do you have to be so foolish?’ he bellowed. He regretted the words instantly and dropped his voice. ‘I swore an oath, Haldi. An oath by our ancestors. You know what that means. Would you have Awdhelga and all the others cast from the Halls of the Ancestors because we did not have the heart to see this through to the end?’
‘So, we have to join them first, do we?’ his daughter snapped. She shook her head and turned away. ‘And it’s Haldora.’
‘I’m staying.’ Friedra had come up behind Gabbik without him noticing. She laid a hand on his arm. ‘When we wed I swore oaths too, to protect and serve my family above everything else. We have to stick together.’
‘We’ll all die here, ma,’ said Haldora, turning back, tears streaking her blood- and grime-coated face. It was the first time Gabbik had seen her cry since she had been an infant and knew no better.
‘We all die somewhere, dear,’ said Friedra. She patted Gabbik’s hand and then moved to join her daughter, wrapping an arm across her shoulders. Another boom of a gigantic impact shuddered across the hall. Friedra looked up and tutted. ‘Might as well die at home as anywhere else. That’s what being kin is about.’
Haldora let out something of a sigh and a sob combined, her shoulders quaking for a moment before she regained some control. Wiping tears and snot from her face she looked at Gabbik, fierce rather than sullen.
‘Family,’ she said. ‘Live together, die together.’
‘Durazut Angbok karak,’ Skraffi said quietly. He held out a fist in a symbol of solidarity.
‘Durazut Angbok karak,’ the rest of them replied, holding out clenched hands too.
Gabbik noticed that there was a ring of other dwarfs watching them. He suddenly felt self-conscious and drew his hand back with an embarrassed cough. Pulling out his axe he stood up and glared at the onlookers.
‘What’s the matter, nothing else to do?’ he snarled.
‘What’s to be done, Gabbik?’ Fleinn replied.
Another hammering blow echoed past.
‘I don’t know about you lazy beggars, but I’m going to go and see who’s damn well knocking.’ Gabbik brandished his axe, the blade notched but still sharp, catching the light of the lanterns overhead. ‘And I’m going to give them short shrift if they’re not polite.’
Gabbik gathered quite a following as he marched through the halls, up towards the South Gate. Haldora suppressed smiles as she heard mutterings of ‘Gabbik Wyvern-burner’ and ‘those Angbok lunatics’. More than seven hundred dwarfs ended up following, some stirred by Gabbik’s defiant streak, others not sure what was going on but damned if they were going to miss out.
They had entered the Second Deep, a level below the gate when the thunderous hammering stopped. Not sure what this meant, the gaggle of warriors hurried on, almost running up the last sweeping set of stairs in the hall behind the gate.
The wide space was already packed with dwarfs, most of them in the colours of the king and his clan. They formed a solid semicircle around the buckled gates, which had been shored up with timbers and piled rocks. A few bolt throwers had been salvaged during the retreat from the walls and were pointed at the huge portal. For all that the orcs looked about to make immediate ingress, the atmosphere was disconcertedly relaxed.
Gabbik and his vocal band slowed to a halt when confronted with the gate’s defenders. The other dwarfs turned and looked at them, most with disapproving glares. A small party broke away from the rest and headed towards the Angboks. Haldora’s spirits lifted when she recognised Prince Horthrad.
‘Gabbik, what are you doing here?’ the prince asked, shooing away the bodyguards that had followed him. Horthrad put his axe over his shoulder and looked at the dwarfs still coming up the steps. ‘And why have you brought so many friends with you?’
‘We, that is, I, er,’ Gabbik floundered under the prince’s scrutinising stare. He was reduced to a mumble. ‘The giants. We, that is, I was going to kill the giants. I mean we were. The giants.’
‘Thank you,’ said the prince. He took a step back and gestured towards two half-naked, heavily tattooed dwarfs with red crests sitting on the lower steps of one of the tower stairs. They both looked glum, even for Slayers. ‘The thought is appreciated but the Slayers heard about the giants first.’
‘They’re dead?’
‘One of them is, and the other is missing an arm and I doubt will be back soon.’ The prince darted a quick smile at Haldora. ‘I see you wish to add giant-felling to your generous list of talents.’
Haldora smiled back and stepped close to Horthrad, indicating that she wanted to talk privately. The prince escorted her a few steps away from the others, and kept his voice low.
‘You really shouldn’t be up here, it’s very dangerous.’
‘No more than anywhere else I’ve been fighting,’ said Haldora, patting her axe haft in her hand. ‘But let’s not get into that here. You have to help me.’
‘What can I do for you?’
‘My father swore an oath, in hasty mood, and now we can’t leave the hold.’
‘There’s a lot of that around,’ said the prince, casting a glance to where the king was with his hammerers, discussing plans with Rodri. ‘I don’t see how I can help.’
‘The king could release him from his oath, if you spoke to him.’
‘I see.’ Horthrad looked across the hall to Gabbik. ‘Did he swear the oath to the king?’
‘I’m not sure. It was more of a general oath-swearing. By our ancestors and such.’
‘I don’t think it’s in my father’s power to waive such an oath,’ the prince said with an apologetic shrug. ‘He could relinquish fealty again, but he did that when he gave the thanes permission to leave Ekrund more than a hundred days ago.’
‘Damn,’ muttered Haldora. She forced a smile. ‘It was worth trying.’
She was about to step away when Horthrad’s hand on her arm stopped her.
‘Are you so eager to leave?’ he said. ‘Do you think we have no hope?’
‘Slim hope, no hope, what’s the difference?’ she said. She tugged free from his grasp and waved her axe at the buckled gates, the cracked pillars and the bloodstained tiles of the floor. ‘There’s nothing left to defend, except pride.’
‘And revenge,’ said Horthrad. ‘The longer we stay, the more greenskins we kill. You’re right, Ekrund can’t hold much longer. All we can do is make the taking of our home as bloody as possible for them.’
‘And that’s it? I thought you had loftier goals than revenge.’
‘We are all bound to the wills of our fathers,’ Horthrad said with a nod towards Gabbik. ‘Princes more than most.’
Haldora went back to her family, nothing more to say. The crowd had already started to disperse, drifting back down into the lower halls, the promise of battle unfulfilled. The Angboks followed them in silence; there was nothing they could say to each other that would change what had to be.
They had reached the second deeps and were passing a side tunnel when Haldora heard her name called from behind. The voice sounded familiar and she turned back to see who it was. A lamp light in the smaller tunnel caught her attention and she headed towards it. At first she could not see the figure holding the lamp, but as he placed the lantern in an alcove the yellow light illuminated the features of Glorri, the ranger.
‘Hello, Haldora,’ he said, giving her a grin missing several teeth. ‘How you been keeping?’
‘Well enough, if you leave out the death and misery,’ she said. The smell of tobacco hung in the air, though she had not seen a dwarf smoking a pipe in quite a few days. ‘What do you want?’
‘To help you, my maiden in distress. Surely. I overheard what was being said down below, with you and your folks. It’s a right pickle, no mistaking that.’
‘What of it?’
‘The North Gate, it ain’t gonna hold forever, and once it’s gone…’ Glorri clapped his hands together sharply, making Haldora flinch. ‘We’re all gonna be stuck.’
‘I know that. But my father’s oath can’t be broken.’
‘His oath, not yours, and not mine.’ Glorri looked around conspiratorially. ‘And the North Gate ain’t so safe any more, leastways not once you’re outside. The last few families what left, they never got more than a league from the gates before the goblins caught them. Night goblins, in the caves above the road now, and wolf riders if you make it as far as the Crooked Pass.
‘We’re not leaving,’ Haldora said, more firmly than before.
‘I know another way,’ said Glorri, winking. ‘Out through the mines. Spotted it a few days ago. Nobody else knows about it, and the goblins don’t neither. We can slip out that way, head west to the coast and then be up to Barak Varr without so much as a spot of bother from the greenies nor princes.’
‘You want me to run away with you?’ The thought made Haldora ill, and if she had eaten anything in the last three days it might well have turned her stomach. As it was, her gut was so empty it felt as hard as stone. ‘The two of us, together?’
‘Not just us,’ said Glorri, eyes bulging with surprise. ‘I’d go on me own if I thought it was safe, but I figure I’d like some friends around if I do happen to run into the odd wolf or orc, if you understand me. What nobody knows, nobody needs to know, oath-wise and such, if you take my meaning.’
‘I understand you. You think we would forget the oaths we swore, damn our forefathers and foremothers to shame and torment? Just so you can get away from here with someone to watch your back?’
‘Mutual interest, isn’t it?’ said Glorri. He tried to paw at her arm but she knocked his hand away with her shield. Snatching back his hand, blowing on rapped knuckles, Glorri glared at her. ‘You’re all going to die here, and it ain’t worth a pot or the pee in it. You’ll all die and nobody will remember or care.’
He snatched up the lantern and disappeared down the tunnel, leaving Haldora alone in the dark, breathing quickly, anger making her tremble. The rat of a ranger thought he could scare her into leaving, with his talk of dying and being forgotten. Glorri made it sound as though there was nothing more at stake than pointless pride and empty grudges. It made her want to shout and scream in frustration.
Mostly, because he was right.
Chapter Twenty-four
‘At about this time the mining clans banded together to form the first Dragonback guild. They did so to raise complaint to the king about the conditions where they were living. The mines were being worked all day and night, and they had to tramp to the surface to get food and kip each shift end. They wanted the king to put his money to the furnishing and improvement of their quarters underground.
Grimbalki told them that they were a bunch of moaning grumbaki and if they wanted to live like soft elves they were welcome to take their own furnishing down the mines. The miners refused to work, but Grimbalki brought in non-guild clans from Ankor-Drakk to replace them at the royal mines. Blackboots they was called. This caused a great deal of a ruckus, as you might expect, and no few fistfights, though no blade was ever drawn in anger.
Eventually the blackboots were sent back to Ankor-Drakk and the king agreed to pay an extra coin in a hundred for the ore and coal being taken out of the mines, which the miners gratefully accepted, though a year later the king raised his taxes by the same and dispute threatened again.’
‘There’s none I’d rather have by my side,’ said Thundred Norbrocker. There were affirmative grunts from the dwarfs around him. ‘As it always was, the king commands and we obey, right?’
Again this was met with nods and muttered assurances. The ageing dwarfs had taken it upon themselves to re-form their old fighting company, eschewing their clans in favour of oaths and shared experiences far more binding. The hall around them buzzed with the chatter of the assembling dwarfs, as did the corridors and hallways above and below. The king had summoned them all for one final push, to drive the orcs back from the South Gate and into the unforgiving grip of winter. Erstukar had made it clear that this was a gamble, and many of them would not return, but if they were successful it could be a smarting defeat that would lead to the fracturing of the shaky alliance that bound the green horde beneath their warlord. The enemy were, the king had claimed, more desperate with cold and hunger than the dwarfs, and if it could be shown that great strength yet remained in the halls of Ekrund they would lose the last vestiges of their will to fight.
It had been a good speech, Skraffi had thought, full of determination and thankfully short of pointless optimism. Erstukar had not tried to pretend that there would be an instant end to the woes of the hold, but he had promised them an opportunity not to surrender meekly to their doom.
The idea for the old band to get back together had come from Thundred. It still surprised Skraffi to see one of the king’s most trusted captains at the head of a rag-tag bunch of ageing dwarfs. They were longbeards and greyhairs to the last dwarf, veterans of the elven war each and every one of them. Not one was less than five hundred years old and Bokri Harkenthrak was nearly seven hundred. He lifted a brass trumpet to his ear.
‘What?’
‘As the king commands, so we obey,’ Thundred said again, a little louder.
‘Aye, that’s right,’ shouted Bokri. ‘Champions, every one of us.’
‘There might be only thirty-one of us left,’ continued Thundred, looking sternly at each of his warriors, ‘but we’re still the Four Dozen Blades in our hearts.’
‘The Four Dozen!’ they all declared, raising their rune axes in unison, saluting each other. ‘The fell Four Dozen!’
‘It is the gift of our ancestors that we are here today, and that we are called upon to fight in this war, most likely our last. We were born to the bloodshed of battle and though we knew a scant few decades of peace, it was never our lot to know it for long. I stand before the shades of those of us who grew old and died in their beds, surrounded by family and friends, and I would not change places with them for a moment. We were the scourge of the elves, the Dour Axes of Ekrund, and our deeds have become legend. Yet we can build a greater legend upon its foundations, and be known as orc-bane and goblin-hewers also.’
‘I’ve already killed about three hundred of the beggars,’ said Bokri, grinning. ‘Poor sport, all of them.’
‘He today who sheds the blood of our foes beside me shall be forever my brother in battle,’ Thundred intoned solemnly. The others repeated the words, renewing the oaths they had sworn to each other before the walls of Tor Alessi and Athel Toralien and Athel Maraya, at Griffa Ridge and Dorin’s Stand and The Vale of Four Waters, and on a dozen other battlefields whose names Skraffi had never learnt. ‘He who today sheds his blood beside me shall be forever counted amongst the honoured dead, and in whose stead I shall seek revenge and in whose absence I shall raise a pot of beer, as and when I get the chance.’
They all had tankards in hand for this moment, though there was no beer.
‘Wait a moment, lads, we can’t swear oaths with silt water and spit,’ said Skraffi. He reached under his cloak and produced a large clay jar, as might once have held pickled eggs or perhaps a good portion of jam. He unstoppered the top and tipped a little of the contents of the jar into each of the tankards, a golden liquid that smelt of pastures and trees.
‘Stinks of elf wee, if you ask me,’ muttered Bokri, rather more loudly than he perhaps intended.
‘Is this your bees’ water, Skraffi?’ asked Thundred, lip curling in distaste.
‘The finest, and probably last, from the Angbok meadery. Drink deep and toast the bees that stung those greenskin thugs when they came for my hives.’
They each drank from their cups, some less enthusiastically than others. However, there was much smacking of lips and surprised expressions all round.
‘I take it back, my old pal,’ said Thundred. ‘That’s not a bad drop at all.’
‘Worthy for a toast to our ancestors and the fallen dead,’ added Bokri with an apologetic look.
This sentiment was echoed by the others, who slapped Skraffi on the back and declared Angbok’s Bee Water to be a triumph against adversity. It was one of the proudest moments of his life, up there with the time Gabbik had killed his first goblin and seeing Awdhelga’s blackbeer get second place in the Brewers’ Guild’s ‘King’s Champion’ Beer award.
