by Mel Odom
Unless they were killed, Wick remembered. And that had been an accepted solution to the goblinkin problem for a long time.
Moving quickly, Wick lined up several tankards on the countertop, fashioning a replica of the Painted Canyon to better illustrate his story. He tiptoed through the tankards as he continued.
“The fugitives from the south were desperate,” Wick said. “The number of warriors among them had drastically been cut, split off in the effort to hold Teldane’s Bounty, and falling to goblinkin weapons. They needed an escape route. But the Goblin Lord was determined not to let them have it.”
“He was waitin’ on ’em in the Painted Canyon,” someone said.
“He was,” Wick agreed. “He harried the escapees from behind with one army, while he worked around to their flank with another. He planned to ambush them there in the Unmerciful Shards.”
“How did Lord Kharrion get through the dragons?” someone asked.
Wick paced along the countertop. “Foul being that he was, the Goblin Lord had established a treaty with the dragons through the Dragon King Shengharck. Several of those the goblinkin captured were delivered to the spawning dragons in the Unmerciful Shards. And other places. The dragons didn’t have to hunt anymore, and they didn’t have to worry about being destroyed. All they had to do was not attack the goblinkin.”
The horror of the thing washed over the crowd. Wick doubted that any among them had ever seen a great dragon feed on bound prisoners, but he had while in Shengharck’s lair in the Broken Forge Mountains. It was a terrible sight and sound that he would never forget.
“Fortunately, the Unity found out about Lord Kharrion’s ambush,” Wick said. “They were able to muster three armies, though none of them at full strength, and get them to the Painted Canyon. Each of those armies represented the humans, dwarves, and elves who had taken up arms against Lord Kharrion.”
“But there wasn’t a dweller army, was there?” someone asked snidely. “Noooooo. The halfers were hidin’ out here in Greydawn Moors, puttin’ their little Library together, protectin’ the books.”
“Quiet!” a voice thundered.
Every head in the tavern snapped in the direction of the voice. Hands reached for swords and axes. Then, when they recognized Craugh standing in the doorway, the dwarves and humans quickly looked away and were silent.
The wizard walked into the room and a threatening chill seemed to follow him. “Continue your tale, Second Level Librarian Lamplighter.” He paused and looked around the room. “And just for clarification, there’ll be no fighting here tonight.”
“Thank the Old Ones.” Paunsel sighed.
Wick was grateful to see that Craugh had put in an appearance, but he was worried as well. Since the very first time he’d gone with the wizard to the mainland on one journey or another, his life had been at risk constantly. He didn’t think Craugh had shown up at Paunsel’s for the sparkleberry wine.
“Okay,” Wick said. But some of the drama had gone out of the presentation. Craugh was the only person he’d known who had actually lived through the Cataclysm and knew many of the key events firsthand. “Where was I?”
“The Unity forces sent three armies to the Painted Canyon to head off Lord Kharrion’s forces.” Craugh sat at a table near the front whose previous tenants had rapidly evacuated at his approach. He placed his staff across the table and stretched his long legs under it. “One of dwarves, one of elves, and one of humans. Carry on.”
“Right.” Wick tried to marshal his thoughts, but the sparkleberry wine was interfering almost as much as his nerves. “So there they were. Three armies headed for Painted Canyon and the goblinkin hordes. Master Blacksmith Oskarr of the Cinder Clouds Islands led the dwarves. The elves were marshaled by King Faeyn of the Tangletree Glen. And General Crisstun of Promise Wharf commanded the humans. The reached the pass at the Unmerciful Shards under the cover of night before the fugitives and were able to set up defensive positions at Fell’s Keep, an old human trading post that had been abandoned after the dragons had started nesting there.”
The tavern crowd hung on every word. Although none of them had experienced war on quite the level of the Cataclysm, all of them had probably fought for their lives against men or beasts at one time or another. They knew what those armies faced.
“The defenders let the fugitives through,” Wick said, “and settled in to fight. Then came the goblinkin, marching in double-time, their ranks swelled with monsters and dire creatures Lord Kharrion had lured to their dark cause. Confronted with so many goblinkin, the three armies knew they were fated to die. If they tried to fall back, their resistance would fall apart and they would leave the rearguard of the fugitives open to attack.”
Silence rang throughout the tavern.
“They’d already lost so much at Teldane’s Bounty,” Wick said, “that no one could bear to lose women and children again. So it was decided among the warriors of those three armies that they would sell their lives as dearly as possible and hope to slow the encroaching goblinkin horde enough that the fugitives might be able to escape.”
“’Twas a brave an’ selfless thing they did,” Hallekk stated.
“’Twas,” Verdin agreed. “Too bad they had to go an’ get betrayed the way they was. Mayhap more of ’em might have survived.”
“For nine days,” Wick went on, hurrying so the argument wouldn’t begin again, “the defenders of Fell’s Keep kept the goblinkin at bay. They fought till the Painted Canyon ran red with blood. At night, when the goblinkin made camp and slept, elven warders went quietly among them and stole supplies and arrows, and killed goblinkin where they found them—strung up the bodies from the cliff sides, tossed their ugly heads into the campfires, and put horse droppings into the soup the goblinkin had made of fallen enemies—as testimony to the fate that awaited those who continued to fight.”
The crowd listened in rapt attention.
“Goblins know of the Battle of Fell’s Keep,” Wick whispered, pitching his voice to roll over the crowd. “Stories of those days are still told around goblinkin campfires, and they’re whispered among the young to scare each other.” He knew that because he’d sat as captive around those campfires a time or two.
“Who betrayed them?” someone asked.
“No one knows,” Wick said. “Although many tried to guess afterward.” He sat heavily, no longer as sure-footed as he’d been. He didn’t know if it was the sadness of the story or the potent sparkleberry wine that did him in. “On the morning of the tenth day, nearly all of the Unity army took sick and couldn’t even stand to defend themselves. The goblinkin came among them like butchers in the slaughterhouse. No one was spared.”
“It was the dwarven leader,” Verdin insisted. “He spread the sickness among the surviving troops so that his own life might be spared.”
“Watch yer blasphemous tongue there, swab,” Hallekk growled.
“Then ye explain to me how it was Oskarr managed to escape the sickness an’ make it back to the Cinder Clouds Islands.”
“He were a warrior!” Hallekk roared. “He managed to evade that sickness, an’ he got what he could of his troops outta the Painted Canyon an’ retreated.”
“After they’d made a pact to stay an’ die together.”
“Doesn’t make no sense to die when it ain’t gonna help nothin’. They knew if they’d bolted from Fell’s Keep that most of ’em woulda died. The sickness did ’em in afore that. The only thing Oskarr could do was lead them what was healthy enough to run for their lives an’ take ’em outta that death trap. He did it.”
“He went back home and stayed away from the fighting.”
“But Oskarr didn’t leave the war,” Wick said. “Oskarr returned to the Cinder Clouds Islands and worked on the side of the Unity until Lord Kharrion was finally killed.”
“Hammerin’ out swords an’ armor from the safety of his forge,” Verdin accused.
“It’s powerful hard for an army to fight when it ain’t got the t
ools it needs to see the job finished,” Hallekk said. “When it come to a-buildin’ them tools, wasn’t none finer than Master Blacksmith Oskarr. He hammered out a lot of armor an’ weapons them Unity troops needed over them years.”
“Faugh!” Verdin said. “’Twas fightin’ that were needed! An’ after that, Oskarr lived himself out a life that was fat an’ happy.”
“No,” Wick said. “Oskarr died there in the Cinder Clouds Islands. For six years, Master Blacksmith Oskarr and his chief armorers supplied the Unity army. The forges never ran cold and the dwarves worked in shifts every hour of the day, hammering out swords and armor and arrowheads. During that time, it is said, the Cinder Clouds Islands were never silent, and the ringing of hammers filled all of the forges. In time, their work there drew the ire of the Goblin Lord because the supplies Master Blacksmith Oskarr and his people made started to turn the tide of the war.”
“Lord Kharrion attacked the Cinder Clouds Islands,” a dwarf said.
“He did,” Wick agreed. “The Goblin Lord’s spies discovered that Oskarr was preparing another large shipment of equipment in one month. Lord Kharrion put goblinkin ships in the water and went on the attack. He lay siege to Oskarr’s city and waited to starve them out. As everyone knows, there wasn’t much else in the Cinder Clouds Islands but veins of iron ore. It was a hardscrabble place even then. Only lizards and scrub brush lived there. Oskarr and his people depended on trade to keep food on the table.”
“There was fish,” someone suggested.
“The water was fouled by the forges,” Craugh said. “The Cinder Clouds Islands dwarves used forges tapped directly into the volcanoes that spewed forth the island archipelago. Sulfur, soot, and ash clouded the waters around the island and chased away all living things on land and in the sea. It’s impressive that the dwarves were strong enough to survive there. Volcanoes are very hard to tame.”
Wick felt certain the wizard spoke from experience.
“There’s no truer heat than that of a volcano,” a dwarf stated. “Makes metal easy to work with, then leaves it hard as can be. The Cinder Clouds Islands dwarves weren’t the only ones who learned that trick.”
“And they could have only fished out to sea if they had access to the harbor,” Wick said. “With Lord Kharrion’s forces sitting in the Rusting Sea, that wasn’t going to happen. But the Goblin Lord was too impatient to simply wait Oskarr and his people out. Instead, he worked his evil magic and turned the volcanoes the Cinder Clouds Islands dwarves had tapped into against them.” He paused to let the dramatic tension increase. “The Goblin Lord’s spell struck deeply into the heart of the volcano and wreaked havoc with the forges. In seconds, several of the islands—including the one where Oskarr and his hand-picked blacksmiths worked—sank beneath the waves of the Rusting Sea.”
“Oskarr died?” Verdin asked.
Wick nodded. “He did. And nearly every man, woman, and child of his village died with him.” Shuddering at the memory, he tried to forget about the accounts he’d read of the horrifying incident. It was no use. His imagination, in addition to being wild and vivid, also knew no rest. “Throughout the rest of the war against Lord Kharrion, no weapons or armor came from the Cinder Clouds Islands forges.”
“Pity he didn’t die before he betrayed the others at Painted Canyon,” Verdin said.
“Why do you think Oskarr betrayed them forces?” Hallekk demanded.
“He was the only one of the leaders that didn’t succumb to the sickness,” Verdin said.
“That’s because he was a dwarf!” Hallekk exploded. “Dwarves don’t get overly sick!”
“Plenty of other dwarves got sick durin’ that time.” Verdin stuck out his jaw defiantly.
“Is that true?” one of the other humans asked Wick.
The little Librarian hesitated, but he knew he couldn’t lie to those gathered there. “Many of the dwarves did get sick,” he answered.
“But not Oskarr?”
“Not Oskarr.”
“Why not?”
“No one knows.” Wick listened anxiously as silence created a pall over the room. Perhaps that telling lacked something, he told himself. At least they weren’t threatening to kill each other anymore.
Later, when the tavern had cleared out and most of the patrons had returned to their ships, Wick sat drinking quietly at a table with Craugh and Hallekk. Paunsel didn’t dare chase the wizard off because he had no designs on becoming a toad.
Talk was small, generally anecdotes about things they’d seen or done, bits and pieces Wick had read of late, and a few choice comments about the ongoing chess game the Librarian and the wizard conducted through a series of letters through shipboard mail.
Wick could see that Hallekk was mightily disturbed over the argument that had cropped up during the night. He hated to see his friend so troubled.
“For what it’s worth,” Wick said, “I don’t think Oskarr betrayed those men at the Battle of Fell’s Keep.”
Hallekk sighed, and the candle flame on the table between them danced between life and death, then finally stood tall once more. “I know, little man.”
“I tried the best I could to express the situation.”
“I saw that.” Hallekk frowned. “The problem is that that battle is still talked about, even a thousand years later.” He waved at the tavern. “Not just here. But all along the mainland as well. Ever’where ye go, sooner or later, the talk’ll turn to the Battle of Fell’s Keep.”
Wick knew that was true. He’d been in taverns along the Shattered Coast that had turned into great battles themselves between humans, dwarves, and elves over what had transpired in the Painted Canyon at the end of those ten days of siege.
“What happened there,” Hallekk said, “it’s a sore spot that most just can’t keep from pickin’ at. Ye don’t see it come up so much here on Greydawn Moors, but out in the rest of the world?” He shook his big head.
“It’s a serious problem,” Craugh said. “One that will have to be dealt with sooner or later.”
Wick studied the wizard. Although he hadn’t yet said what had drawn him to Greydawn Moors, Craugh had come in looking slightly bedraggled, with halfhealed cuts on his face and hands. Obviously he’d been somewhere dangerous doing something dangerous against someone who had been … dangerous.
Wick was unhappy with his limited mental word choice. Finding new words was somehow beyond him. You’ve got to slow down on the sparkleberry wine, he told himself. It’s making your head as thick as Slops’s mashed potatoes. And they could be used for mortar.
Cleaning the mess those potatoes made on plates after they’d gotten cold had been one of Wick’s greatest struggles while he served as dishwasher aboard One-Eyed Peggie. He hadn’t known how the dwarven pirates had gotten it through their systems. It had to have been a gastronomical feat.
But he didn’t say a word when Hallekk filled his tankard again. Trying to match a dwarf in drinking was usually a strategy bound for painful failure and serious regret, but Wick thought himself equal to the task that night. If only the room would occasionally stop spinning.
“Even with Lord Kharrion out of the way,” Craugh said, “the goblinkin have continued to hold sway in the south, and they look to be turning an avaricious eye to the north. Their numbers are on the increase again, and they’ll soon be back up to fighting strength.”
Hallekk looked at the wizard. “Do ye think they’ll take another run at her? Killin’ out all the other races, I mean?”
Wick hadn’t thought about that. He’d been to the mainland a few times, and he’d seen how the goblinkin empire had fragmented somewhat, but they’d remained particularly strong in the south. Thinking that they might someday unite and take up the genocidal war once more was frightening. Even the magical fog and enchanted sea monsters in the Blood-Soaked Sea couldn’t protect the Vault of All Known Knowledge forever.
“If they do, humans, dwarves, and elves will have to find the strength to once more stand united,” Craugh
said. “If they don’t, they will all fall.” He sipped his wine. “It would be better if they were able to put the Battle of Fell’s Keep behind them.”
“They’re still different races,” Wick pointed out. “There’s some natural discord between them anyway.”
“Yes, but it’s been my experience that those dislikes can be worked through. Prejudice is an ugly thing that feeds on its own energies. It doesn’t bring anything with it; the perceived hatred of others that are different drains and limits.” Craugh tugged at his beard. “But it would be better if the questions over the Battle of Fell’s Keep were resolved.”
“There has to be an answer somewheres.” Hallekk fixed Wick with a curious look. “Mayhap in them books of yers.”
“They’re not mine.” Wick had to work a little harder to make the words come out.
“Haven’t ye got someplace where ye can look up the battle?”
Wick shook his head and felt it sway sickeningly, thinking just for a moment that it had somehow come loose from his shoulders. “We’re still sorting out all the journals, memoirs, and histories. If anything was written by anyone who was there, it hasn’t turned up yet.”
“Perhaps,” Craugh suggested, “those manuscripts never made it to the Vault of All Known Knowledge.”
“But why wouldn’t they?” Wick asked.
“Perhaps,” Craugh said slowly, as if warming to the possibility himself, “those memoirs weren’t yet written at the time the different cities and towns surrendered their libraries.” He took out his pipe and lit up. “It is something to think about.”
Personally, Wick thought he’d be better off thinking about it in the morning. For the moment, he was sleepier than he’d ever been.
When he felt himself swaying, Wick believed at first that he was still asleep. During the night, he’d dreamed of being Taurak Bleiyz rescuing the fair Princess Lissamae from the evil clutches of the cunning wolf’s head, Mamjor Dornthoth in the Gulches of Fiery Doom. He thought the swaying was just his imagination taking him out over the spiderweb spanning the Rushing River.
