transition 01 The Orc King

by R . A. Salvatore

  Obould leaned forward at their approach, dropping one elbow on his knee and stroking his chin. He didn’t blink as he measured the steps of the pair, his focus almost exclusively on Dnark. Ung-thol hoped that his wrath, if it came forth, would be equally selective.

  “Wolf Jaw performs brilliantly,” Obould greeted, somewhat dissipating the tension.

  Dnark bowed low at the compliment. “We are an old and disciplined clan.”

  “I know that well,” said the king. “And you are a respected and feared tribe. It is why I keep you close to Many-Arrows, so that the center of my line will never waver.”

  Dnark bowed again at the compliment, particularly the notion that Wolf Jaw was feared, which was about as high as orc praise ever climbed. Ung-thol considered his chieftain’s expression when he came back up from that bow. When the smug Dnark glanced his way, Ungthol shot him a stern but silent retort, reminding him of the truth of Obould’s reasoning. He was keeping Wolf Jaw close, indeed, but Dnark had to understand that Obould’s aim was more to keep an eye on the tribe than to shore up his center. After all, there was no line of battle, so there was no center to fortify.

  “The winter was favorable to us all,” said Dnark. “Many towers have been built, and miles of wall.”

  “Every hilltop, Chieftain Dnark,” said Obould. “If the dwarves or their allies come against us, they will have to fight over walls and towers on every hilltop.”

  Dnark glanced at Ung-thol again, and the cleric nodded for him to let it go at that. There was no need to engage Obould in an argument of defensive versus offensive preparations, certainly. Not with their schemes unfolding in the east.

  “You were gone from your tribe,” Obould stated, and Ung-thol started and blinked, wondering if the perceptive Obould had just read his mind.

  “My king?” Dnark asked.

  “You have been away in the east,” said Obould. “With your shaman.”

  Dnark had done a good job keeping his composure, Ung-thol believed, but then the shaman winced when Dnark swallowed hard.

  “There are many rogue orcs left over from the fierce battles with the dwarves,” Dnark said. “Some strong and seasoned warriors, even shamans, have lost all their kin and clan. They have no banner.”

  As soon as he spoke the words, Dnark shrank back a step, for a murderous scowl crossed Obould’s powerful features. At either side of the tent chamber, guards bristled, a couple even growling.

  “They have no banner?” Obould calmly—too calmly—asked.

  “They have the flag of Many-Arrows, of course,” Ung-thol dared to interject, and Obould’s eyes widened then narrowed quickly as he regarded the shaman. “But your kingdom is arranged by tribe, my king. You send tribes to the hills and the vales to do the work, and those who have lost their tribes know not where to go. Dnark and other chieftains are trying to sweep up the rogues to better organize your kingdom, so that you, with great plans opening wide before your Gruumsh-inspired visions, are not cluttered by such minor details.”

  Obould eased back in his throne and the moment of distress seemed to slip back from the edge of disaster. Of course with Obould, whose temper had left uncounted dead in his murderous wake, none could be sure.

  “You were in the east,” Obould said after many heartbeats had passed. “Near the Moonwood.”

  “Not so near, but yes, my king,” said Dnark.

  “Tell me of Grguch.”

  The blunt demand rocked Dnark back on his heels and crippled his denial as he replied with incredulity, “Grguch?”

  “His name echoes through the kingdom,” said Obould. “You have heard it.”

  “Ah, you mean Chieftain Grguch,” Dnark said, changing the inflection of the name to put emphasis on the “Gr,” and acting as if Obould’s further remarks had spurred recognition. “Yes, I have heard of him.”

  “You have met him,” said Obould, his tone and the set of his face conveying that his assertion was not assumption, but known fact.

  Dnark glanced at Ung-thol, and for a moment the shaman thought his chieftain might just turn on his heel and flee. And indeed, Ung-thol wanted to do the same. Not for the first time and not for the last time, he wondered how they could have been foolish enough to dare conspire against King Obould Many-Arrows.

  A soft chuckle from Dnark settled Ung-thol, though, and reminded him that Dnark had risen through difficult trials to become the chieftain of an impressive tribe—a tribe that even then surrounded Obould’s tent.

  “Chieftain Grguch of Clan Karuck, yes,” Dnark said, matching Obould’s stare. “I witnessed his movement through Teg’ngun’s Dale near the Surbrin. He was marching to the Moonwood, though we did not know that at the time. Would that I had, for I would have enjoyed witnessing his slaughter of the foolish elves.”

  “You approve of his attack?”

  “The elves have been striking at your minions in the east day after day,” said Dnark. “I think it good that the pain of battle was taken to their forest, and that the heads of several of the creatures were placed upon pikes at the river’s edge. Chieftain Grguch did you a great service. I had thought his assault on the Moonwood to be at your command.”

  He ended with an inflection of confusion, even suspicion, craftily turning the event back upon the orc king.

  “Our enemies do not avoid their deserved punishment,” Obould said without hesitation.

  At Dnark’s side, Ung-thol realized that his companion’s quick-thinking had likely just saved both their lives. For King Obould would not kill them and tacitly admit that Grguch had acted independent of the throne.

  “Chieftain Grguch and Clan Karuck will serve the kingdom well,” Dnark pressed. “They are as fierce as any tribe I have ever seen.”

  “They breed with ogres, I am told.”

  “And carry many of the brutes along to anchor their lines.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “In the east, I expect,” said Dnark.

  “Near the Moonwood still?”

  “Likely,” said Dnark. “Likely awaiting the response of our enemies. If the ugly elves dare cross the Surbrin, Chieftain Grguch will pike more heads on the riverbank.”

  Ung-thol eyed Obould carefully through Dnark’s lie, and he easily recognized that the king knew more than he was letting on. Word of Grguch’s march to the south had reached Obould’s ear. Obould knew that the chieftain of Clan Karuck was a dangerous rival.

  Ung-thol studied Obould carefully, but the cunning warrior king gave little more away. He offered some instructions for shoring up the defense of the region, included a punishing deadline, then dismissed the pair with a wave of his hand as he turned his attention to the annoying Kna.

  “Your hesitance in admitting your knowledge of Grguch warned him,” Ung-thol whispered to Dnark as they left the tent and crossed the muddy ground to rejoin their clan.

  “He pronounced it wrong.”

  “You did.”

  Dnark stopped and turned on the shaman. “Does it matter?”

  CHAPTER

  THE SURBRIN BRIDGE

  The wizard held his hand out, fingers locked as if it were the talon of a great hunting bird. Sweat streaked his forehead despite the cold wind, and he locked his face into a mask of intensity.

  The stone was too heavy for him, but he kept up his telekinetic assault, willing it into the air. Down at the riverbank, dwarf masons on the far bank furiously cranked their come-alongs, while others rushed around the large stone, throwing an extra strap or chain where needed. Still, despite the muscle and ingenuity of the dwarf craftsmen, and magical aid from the Silverymoon wizard, the floating stone teetered on the brink of disaster.

  “Joquim!” another citizen of Silverymoon called.

  “I…can’t…hold…it,” the wizard Joquim grunted back, each word forced out through gritted teeth.

  The second wizard shouted for help and rushed down to Joquim’s side. He had little in the way of telekinetic prowess, but he had memorized a dweomer for just tha
t eventuality. He launched into his spellcasting and threw his magical energies out toward the shaking stone. It stabilized, and when a third member of the Silverymoon contingent rushed over, the balance shifted in favor of the builders. It began to seem almost effortless as the combination of dwarf and wizard guided the stone out over the rushing waters of the River Surbrin.

  With a dwarf on the end of a beam guiding the way, the team with the come-alongs positioned the block perfectly over the even larger stones that had already been set in place. The guide dwarf called for a hold, rechecked the alignment, then lifted a red flag.

  The wizards eased up their magic gradually, slowly lowering the block.

  “Go get the next one!” the dwarf yelled to his companions and the wizards on the near bank. “Seems the Lady’s almost ready for this span!”

  All eyes turned to the work at the near bank, the point closest to Mithral Hall, where Lady Alustriel stood on the first length of span over the river, her features serene as she whispered the words of a powerful spell of creation. Cold and strong she appeared, almost godlike above the rushing waters. Her white robes, highlighted in light green, blew about her tall and slender form. There was hardly a gasp of surprise when a second stone span appeared before her, reaching out to the next set of supports.

  Alustriel’s arms slipped down to her sides and she gave a deep exhale, her shoulders slumping as if her effort had thrown out more than magical strength.

  “Amazing,” Catti-brie said, coming up beside her and inspecting the newly conjured slab.

  “The Art, Catti-brie,” Alustriel replied. “Mystra’s blessings are wondrous indeed.” Alustriel turned a sly look her way. “Perhaps I can tutor you.”

  Catti-brie scoffed at the notion, but coincidentally, as she threw her head back, she twisted her leg at an angle that sent a wave of pain rolling through her damaged hip, and she was reminded that her days as a warrior might indeed be at their end—one way or another.

  “Perhaps,” she said.

  Alustriel’s smile beamed genuine and warm. The Lady of Silvery moon glanced back and motioned to the dwarf masons, who flooded forward with their tubs of mortar to seal and smooth the newest span.

  “The conjured stone is permanent?” Catti-brie asked as she and Alustriel moved back down the ramp to the bank.

  Alustriel looked at her as if the question was completely absurd. “Would you have it vanish beneath the wheels of a wagon?”

  They both laughed at the flippant response.

  “I mean, it is real stone,” the younger woman clarified.

  “Not an illusion, to be sure.”

  “But still the stuff of magic?”

  Alustriel furrowed her brow as she considered the woman. “The stone is as real as anything the dwarves could drag in from a quarry, and the dweomer that created it is permanent.”

  “Unless it is dispelled,” Catti-brie replied, and Alustriel said, “Ah,” as she caught on to the woman’s line of thought.

  “It would take Elminster himself to even hope to dispel the work of Lady Alustriel,” another nearby wizard interjected.

  Catti-brie looked from the mage to Alustriel.

  “A bit of an exaggeration, of course,” Alustriel admitted. “But truly, any mage of sufficient power to dispel my creations would also have in his arsenal evocations that could easily destroy a bridge constructed without magic.”

  “But a conventional bridge can be warded against lightning bolts and other destructive evocations,” Catti-brie reasoned.

  “As this one shall be,” promised Alustriel.

  “And so it will be as safe as if the dwarves had…” Catti-brie started, and Alustriel finished the thought with her, “dragged the stones from a quarry.”

  They shared another laugh, until Catti-brie added, “Except from Alustriel.”

  The Lady of Silverymoon stopped cold and turned to stare directly at Catti-brie.

  “It is an easy feat for a wizard to dispel her own magic, so I am told,” Catti-brie remarked. “There will be no wards in place to prevent you from waving your hands and making expanse after expanse disappear.”

  A wry grin crossed Alustriel’s beautiful face, and she cocked an eyebrow, an expression of congratulations for the woman’s sound and cunning reasoning.

  “An added benefit should the orcs overrun this position and try to use the bridge to spread their darkness to other lands,” Catti-brie went on.

  “Other lands like Silverymoon,” Alustriel admitted.

  “Do not be quick to sever the bridge to Mithral Hall, Lady,” Catti-brie said.

  “Mithral Hall is connected to the eastern bank through tunnels in any case,” Alustriel replied. “We will not abandon your father, Catti-brie. We will never abandon King Bruenor and the valiant dwarves of Clan Battlehammer.”

  Catti-brie’s responding smile came easy to her, for she didn’t doubt a word of the pledge. She glanced back at the conjured slabs and nodded appreciatively, both for the power in creating them and the strategy of Alustriel in keeping the power to easily destroy them.

  The late afternoon sun reflected moisture in Toogwik Tuk’s jaundiced brown eyes, for he could hardly contain his tears of joy at the ferocious reminder of what it was to be an orc. Grguch’s march through the three remaining villages had been predictably successful, and after Toogwik Tuk had delivered his perfected sermon, every able-bodied orc warrior of those villages had eagerly marched out in Grguch’s wake. That alone would have garnered the fierce chieftain of Clan Karuck another two hundred soldiers.

  But more impressively, they soon enough discovered, came the reinforcements from villages through which they had not passed. Word of Grguch’s march had spread across the region directly north of Mithral Hall, and the war-thirsty orcs of many tribes, frustrated by the winter pause, had rushed to the call.

  As he crossed the impromptu encampment, Toogwik Tuk surveyed the scores—no, hundreds—of new recruits. Grguch would hit the dwarven fortifications with closer to two thousand orcs than one thousand, by the shaman’s estimation. Victory at the Surbrin was all but assured. Could King Obould hope to hold back the tide of war after that?

  Toogwik Tuk shook his head with honest disappointment as he considered the once-great leader. Something had happened to Obould. The shaman wondered if it might have been the stinging defeat Bruenor’s dwarves had handed him in his ill-fated attempt to breach Mithral Hall’s western door. Or had it been the loss of the conspiring dark elves and Gerti Orelsdottr and her frost giant minions? Or perhaps it had come about because of the loss of his son, Urlgen, in the fight on the cliff tops north of Keeper’s Dale.

  Whatever the cause, Obould hardly seemed the same fierce warrior who had led the charge into Citadel Adbar, or who had begun his great sweep south from the Spine of the World only a few months before. Obould had lost his understanding of the essence of the orc. He had lost the voice of Gruumsh within his heart.

  “He demands that we wait,” the shaman mused aloud, staring out at the teeming swarm, “and yet they come by the score to the promise of renewed battle with the cursed dwarves.”

  Never more certain of the righteousness of his conspiracy, the shaman moved quickly toward Grguch’s tent. Obould no longer heard the call of Gruumsh, but Grguch surely did, and after the dwarves were smashed and chased back into their holes, how might King Obould claim dominion over the chieftain of Clan Karuck? And how might Obould secure fealty from the tens of thousands of orcs he had brought forth from their holes with promises of conquest?

  Obould demanded they sit and wait, that they till the ground like peasant human farmers. Grguch demanded of them that they sharpen their spears and swords to better cut the flesh of dwarves.

  Grguch heard the call of Gruumsh.

  The shaman found the chieftain standing on the far side of a small table, surrounded by two of his Karuck warlords and with a much smaller orc standing across from them and manipulating a pile of dirt and stones that had been set upon the table. As he
neared, Toogwik Tuk recognized the terrain being described by the smaller orc, for he had seen the mountain ridge that stretched from the eastern end of Mithral Hall down to the Surbrin.

  “Welcome, Gruumsh-speaker,” Grguch greeted him. “Join us.”

  Toogwik Tuk moved to an open side of the table and inspected the scout’s work, which depicted a wall nearly completed to the Surbrin and a series of towers anchoring it.

  “The dwarves have been industrious throughout the winter,” said Grguch. “As you feared. King Obould’s pause has given them strength.”

  “They will anticipate an attack like ours,” the shaman remarked.

  “They have witnessed no large movements of forces to indicate it,” said Grguch.

  “Other than our own,” Toogwik Tuk had to remind him.

  But Grguch laughed it off. “Possibly they have taken note of many orcs now moving nearer to their position,” he agreed. “They may expect an attack in the coming tendays.”

  The two Karuck warlords beside the brutish chieftain chuckled at that.

  “They will never expect one this very night,” said Grguch.

  Toogwik Tuk’s face dropped into a sudden frown, and he looked down at the battlefield in near panic. “We have not even sorted out our forces…” he started to weakly protest.

  “There is nothing to sort,” Grguch replied. “Our tactic is swarm fodder and nothing more.”

  “Swarm fodder?” asked the shaman.

  “A simple swarm to and through the wall,” said Grguch. “Darkness is our ally. Speed and surprise are our allies. We will hit them as a wave flattens the ridge of a boot print on a beach.”