The Phantom Dwarf

by J. M. Fosberg

  He realized that he must have lost quite a lot of blood for his mind to be jumping around like a glow frog jumps from fungi to fungi deep under a mountain. Finally, he reached the landing that led to Queen Gemcutter’s chambers. There were two dwarves standing guard in the hallway. Normally, a dwarven king or queen wouldn’t have protection like a human king or queen does, but these were special circumstances. Until he had arrived, Queen Gemcutter had been Phantom Bergmann’s most common target. When the two dwarves saw him moving toward them, looking like he had just come out of a fight, they both drew their weapons and took up defensive postures.

  “He hasn’t taken my body. He took the body of another dwarf and ambushed me in my chamber. I need to talk with Queen Gemcutter.”

  “Wait here, I will go see if she is available,” the dwarf on the right said.

  If she is available? Where else would she be at this hour? He refrained from saying it though. He snapped out of his random bombardment of curious thoughts at the maniacal laugh that came from Queen Gemcutter’s room. The dwarf standing outside the door looked to him.

  “Bergmann has the other guard’s body,” Fuhrung told him. “We have to help Queen Gemcutter.”

  The other guard stepped in front of the door. “He’s my brother.”

  “Not right now he isn’t. We will try to keep him alive, but if you can’t, you know what you have to do. You wouldn’t want him to let Bergmann kill in your body.”

  The dwarf stepped to the side, and Fuhrung charged into the room. Luckily, Bergmann hadn’t taken her completely unaware. She didn’t have her weapons, but she was fully dressed in a leather tunic. She must have been getting ready when the dwarf came in. She was defending herself with a steel torch lifted out of one of the mounts on the wall.

  Fuhrung charged forward. He brought his sword up and would have severed the other dwarf’s head, but he hesitated at the last minute. The delay gave Bergmann time to read the reaction on Queen Gemcutter’s face. The dwarf turned around, swinging his axe wildly. Fuhrung leaped to the side and lifted his sword up with one hand. The other dwarf charged him. Frau dropped the torch and ran toward the bed where her weapons were staged. Fuhrung was holding off the dwarf so far. He wasn’t nearly as effective with one arm immobilized. He knew he just had to hold the other dwarf off until Frau could enter the fight. Then it would be two against one, and the dwarf would have a chance. He saw Frau start in his direction out of the corner of his eye. Before she could reach him, the body of the dwarf Bergmann had taken fell limply to the ground. Standing behind him was the other dwarf from the entrance, holding Frau’s discarded torch.

  Fuhrung bent down to inspect the body. The dwarf was still alive. He watched the other two, waiting for one of them to turn on him but they never did. “He’s alive,” he told the dwarf’s brother. “You only knocked him unconscious. You may have not only saved your brother, but trapped Bergmann, too.” The brother just stared as Fuhrung removed everything that the dwarf might be able to use to harm himself.

  Frau pulled down the banner hanging over her bed. She pulled the rope free and tied the dwarf’s wrist and feet. “Is he in there?”

  “He’s in my brother?” the other dwarf asked.

  “We don’t think he can escape the body once he takes it. We think that is part of the reason he has killed everyone he has taken,” Frau explained to the frantic dwarf.

  “How do we get him out of my brother?”

  Fuhrung put his hand on the dwarf’s shoulder. “If we can keep him trapped in your brother’s body until the necromancer gets here, that is our best bet. We just have to keep your brother’s body tied up so that Bergmann can’t kill him. Our best chance to save your brother and destroy Bergmann is to just keep him from being able to escape your brother’s body.”

  The three of them carried the dwarf to a small cell where his hands were chained to the wall above his head so that he couldn’t use them. They padded the wall behind his head with layers of fur so that he couldn’t smash his skull. Once they were certain that he wouldn’t be able to damage the body enough to kill it, they forced a liquid concoction down his throat made from thorn apple, which was used to numb dwarves and even put them to sleep when they needed surgery or were severely wounded. Most concoctions that humans used would not work on dwarves, but this was did. With the thorn apple in the dwarf’s system and with him bound to the wall, they set a pair of guards on him. He would receive two doses of the thorn apple each day, which should keep him incapacitated. Any more than two doses a day could cause the dwarf’s body to shut down over time, which would lead to the death they were taking so many precautions to prevent.

  With everything in place, all they could do was wait.

  Chapter Seventeen

  A Necromancer’s Power

  Rundo bounced around in the back of the cart, but he wasn’t really there. He was using his link with his hawk Messah to scout the area before they stopped for the night. He had looked ahead of them, and there weren’t any signs of danger. Messah was flying back toward the caravan, and he was about to break the link with her, when he noticed something in the distance. They were just little dots from this distance, which meant they were far behind the caravan, but there was something there. He maintained the link and mentally guided Messah toward the dots. As he got closer, he saw they were people, just over twenty of them. All of them were on horseback. They weren’t riding hard, as if in pursuit, but they were definitely following the trail of the caravan.

  Messah flew closer, and Rundo was able to determine that they were all armed with crossbows and sabers. They didn’t look like soldiers from the city, but they all rode well, and they didn’t seem to be bothered by their gear or weapons, which meant they were accustomed to wearing them while mounted. A person who was not accustomed to wearing a weapon, especially while mounted, constantly adjusted it, trying to find a more comfortable place. A seasoned fighter had already found the best way to wear their gear so that it would settle in one place and not keep moving around. They became comfortable being uncomfortable.

  Now that he was close enough to make them out, he got a solid count. Twenty-four men. He broke the connection with Messah, and his awareness returned to his body. Jerrie was sitting across from him in the back of the cart. Evelyn had fallen asleep on the floor. He looked at Jerrie. “We’re being followed.”

  Jerrie immediately sat up in his seat, and Rundo couldn’t help but notice the hint of excitement flash in the fighter’s eyes. “How many?”

  Rundo looked back in the direction they had come. They had been on the road now for two full days, and this was the first time he had noticed them. He had watched behind them until they were out of sight of the city and then he had mostly ignored what was going on behind them to scout ahead. “Twenty-four men. They aren’t riding hard but they are definitely following us.”

  Ahead of them, Grundel walked alongside his horse. He did that quite a bit. Jerrie knew that he would have been exhausted after a couple of hours of the horse’s pace. They weren’t pushing the horses hard, but the pace was enough to push a man to keep up. Grundel didn’t seem to notice.

  “Grundel,” Jerrie shouted ahead.

  Crissy, the driver, and the necromancer all turned to face him from the bench at the front of the cart. He ignored them and kept his eyes on Grundel. When he turned, Jerrie motioned for him to come back to the cart. As Grundel slowed his walk to let the cart come up beside him, Jerrie leapt out, flipping over Grundel. He looked over at Crissy when he was upside down and allowed himself a small smirk of satisfaction at her shock. He landed effortlessly in the saddle of the horse Grundel was leading, then bent his head down next to Grundel’s, ignoring the others. He saw the smile on Grundel’s face and couldn’t help but share it.

  “She’s going to beat you, you know that?” Grundel asked.

  “That could be fun,” Jerrie joked.

  Grundel just shook his head. “What is it?”

  “Rundo spotted twenty-four men
following behind us. They’re still a few miles back, but they are definitely following us. When we stop, we need to make sure we have some cover.”

  Grundel nodded. He held the reigns up, and Jerrie took them. Grundel walked ahead to the front where his father was.

  Jerrie risked a glance over at Crissy, who looked like she was trying to knock him off the horse with her eyes. He gave her a wink and led the horse closer to the cart. “He’s going to tell Grizzle. We’ll be stopping soon. Grizzle will find a place we can defend from. Let me know if they start to come closer.”

  Rundo nodded, looked over at Crissy and then back to Jerrie. He smiled and then a second later his eyes closed and his body relaxed into the cart.

  By the time they stopped, the sun was barely visible on the horizon. They could just make out Tiefes Loch in the distance, but it was still nearly a week away. Grizzle led them into a grove of trees on the edge of a small wooded area. You could probably pass through the whole thing in under an hour, but it would offer them the cover to defend from. It would also give the men following them a way to approach unnoticed, or it would have if they didn’t have Rundo and Evelyn with them. Once the horses were watered, a small fire was made, and a couple of dwarves went to work preparing their food.

  Rundo sat up not long after. When he did, he found Grizzle, Grundel, and Jerrie sitting around him. Evelyn had been informed of the situation when she woke, and she had taken flight in her huge hawk form. She had no doubt gone off to fly with Messah.

  “They are moving toward the northeast edge of the tree line. Two men rode ahead and entered the trees on foot. They will most likely be approaching the camp within the hour. I will have Messah keep an eye on them.”

  “If they are only sending two, they are either scouting or they are going to try to approach us. What do you want to do?” Jerrie asked Grizzle.

  “If they approach us, then I will speak with them and determine what they want. If they try to pretend they are alone, we know they are setting us up. If they just scout our position, we will watch them watch us through Rundo. If the rest of the group approaches, then we will be prepared for that, too.”

  They all nodded their agreement. “I’ll just grab something to eat and then I will check on them again,” Rundo said as he hopped out of the cart and made his way toward the cookfire.

  “You enjoying yourself?” a voice said from behind Jerrie.

  He turned around, wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her.

  Her lips were soft, and her body was pressed against his. She hesitated for a minute and then she gave in. Her top lip slid between his, and he held onto that kiss. After a moment, he pulled away. She punched him hard in the chest. “What did you do that for?”

  “I figured it was time. If I have to put up with the pestering overprotection of a companion, I should at least reap the benefits.” She hit him again, but there was no anger behind it.

  “You think you are clever, don’t you?” Crissy asked.

  “I would consider myself clever, but I am not sure what specifically you are speaking of.”

  “You did that just to turn my attention away from you being careless with your recovery.”

  Jerrie raised an eyebrow at her. “You think that’s the only reason I kissed you?”

  Her face flushed. The sound of huge wings interrupted them. They looked up and saw the huge hawk form of Evelyn lowering to the ground. The hawk landed, and they all watched as the beak shrank into a nose and the face flattened into human features. The body shrank into human form as the wings condensed into human arms. It all happened in a matter of seconds, and Evelyn stood naked in front of them. All of them except for Crissy had seen this enough times to be familiar with it, but they were not yet comfortable with a woman standing naked before them.

  “The others are in the trees,” she said as she slid her leather tunic Rundo handed her over her head.

  Grizzle walked over. “Jerrie, I want you in one of those trees. Let them move under you. Don’t engage until we fire crossbows. I don’t want you in the mix when we fire. After the initial volley, we will only fire at individuals who expose themselves in the camp. Rundo, I want you in the cart. Use your daggers or your druid magic as you see fit. I’ll have two dwarves firing crossbows from the cart with you. Grundel, I want you over there behind that huge tree. You can jump in and fight with Jerrie after the initial volley. Everyone else will move around the camp normally. We don’t want them to know we are on to them.”

  “Where would you like me,” came the raspy voice of the necromancer.

  They all looked to the man standing in the firelight in his dark robes.

  “You can stay by the cart with Rundo. Between him and the dwarves, you will be safe,” Grizzle told him.

  The necromancer just nodded and went over to the cart.

  Rundo had already returned the small metal bowl he had been eating mushroom soup out of to the dwarves by the fire. He climbed up in the cart and lay down. Evelyn stood outside the cart and before anyone knew it, a large black cat stood in her place. The face wasn’t quite right and the fur laid down too much like a human’s hair, but all in all, it was a very close likeness. She hadn’t had much experience changing herself to a cat. The one thing she definitely had figured out was the long, menacing claws. She smiled at them, which just didn’t seem right coming from the huge feline, and it made her even more menacing as it exposed her sharp teeth. The cat leapt over the cart and climbed up a tree near where Grizzle had told Jerrie to go.

  Crissy chose to stay near the cart, where she wouldn’t get in the way, but would still be able to see what was happening and have some place to take cover.

  The dwarves went about their business. Many of them who were sitting around the fire had cranked their crossbows so that they would be ready, but other than that, they seemed to be completely unaffected by the expected battle. They waited for what seemed like an eternity to Crissy before Rundo sat up in the back of the cart.

  “They’re almost here,” he told the dwarves sitting in the back of the cart. Another dwarf had been standing next to the cart talking with them. He made his way over to the fire to pass the word.

  He had barely sat down on the log next to the fire when Evelyn heard the branch break in the tree line. She turned toward the sound and saw the man standing behind the tree look up. He raised his crossbow toward the dwarves at the fire, but the dwarves had been ready. A bolt slammed into his chest, and he fired his bolt harmlessly into the ground short of the dwarves as he fell to the ground. Bolts from the other dwarves flew into the trees at men she couldn’t see, but she heard their screams.

  She watched as Grundel leaped out from behind his hiding place, and Jerrie drop from his branch. She heard the screams of terror as the huge cat entered the fight. The men were trapped between Jerrie, Grundel, Evelyn, and the dwarves around the fire. She was amazed at how quickly they had trapped the men and put them on the defensive.

  Grizzle and a dozen dwarves stepped forward and got in line. The men were charging as much away from the huge panther as they were toward them. Rundo’s daggers slammed into one of the men and a crossbow bolt took another. A half-dozen other men had fallen at the edge of the tree line from the initial volley of crossbow bolts. Those men now stood and charged past the others. Grizzle prepared to attack the men who should be dead, but then they turned and faced their companions. The confusion slowed the charging brigands. The bodies of the men exploded in mists of blood and flesh as the bones tore from their bodies and buried into the bodies of the approaching men. To a man, they all fell to the ground. Everyone stared on in disbelief. No one moved or said a word. They all just looked at the mutilated bodies that lay between the dwarves around the fire and the edge of the tree line surrounding the camp. After a moment, Grizzle turned toward the cart where the necromancer was standing, the orange glow shining eerily on the pale face under the dark hood.

  “What was that?” Jerrie asked as he came out into the open. “Yo
u raised the dead!”

  “I did not. I am not a dark necromancer. I understand you’re disturbed, but if you would give me a moment to explain,” the necromancer said calmly.

  Grizzle walked over to the necromancer. “Regardless of how any of us may feel about Master Phelim’s actions, they were used to assist us in the fight. He will be allowed his explanation.”

  Phelim looked around at everyone staring at him before turning his attention back to Grizzle. “Thank you, King Stoneheart. As I said, I did not raise the dead. Bringing a soul back to the mortal realm is dark magic, even in necromancy. Many people believe that necromancers are all evil, but there are good and bad necromancers. I can animate the bodies of the dead and use bones as weapons, but I would never create a true undead. The creation of undead is a very dark magic that requires the sacrifice of innocent life. I can communicate with spirits and even summon souls back to the mortal plane to speak with them, but holding a spirit on this plane again is a dark magic and anyone who does that can only be considered a dark necromancer. What I did was animate the bodies of the soldiers who fell during the fight. Their souls had already been released from their bodies. If you look, a number of the fallen bodies I did not raise because they had not yet died and their souls were still tied to their bodies.”

  “What about making the bodies explode?” one of the dwarves asked. When they all turned to see who had asked, they realized he must have been closest to the men when their bodies were ripped apart. He was covered in human blood, and a piece of flesh was dangling in his blood stained beard.