That wall had to hold. It had to.
If the enemy was indeed sparing the artifact, which ate stone like glutton pies, then I had to hunt for it. To slay the draugr, to make sure the last wall would not be met by a calamity, a horrible surprise which left us with no time to perform my miracle, was of utmost importance. I scurried forward amidst yells, harsh commands, and men moving in shadows.
All our remaining people were getting ready, eating what they could while running, rousing those who could sleep in a storm, some of whom had actually died in their sleep to wounds they had not complained about. Their weapons were spent, but we had spent hours before the battle to heap new stones on the wall, and that would enact a horrible price on the attacking enemy. It already had.
I made my way along the wall, until I saw the hundreds strong contingent of the dverger, who turned to stare me with nonchalance. They ate and drank, their weapons, near perfect, still, despite having hewed down hundreds of the enemy. There were some four hundred of them left, and I thanked the gods indeed for their presence. I squatted near them.
“Got the message, jotun?” Narag asked. His face was dark as night, and chin wide as both my fists.
I nodded toward the city. “King of Harrian. And Balic, possibly?”
“Possibly,” he rumbled. “King of Harrian, and he’s called Larran, by the way, though that hardly matters, since he is actually dead, and the dead should have no names, is holed in a mansion few hundred feet from the walls. He is issuing orders before the battle, and a constant stream of messengers are leaving the house. You should have come immediately.”
“I know,” I answered. “And if I die? Will you help Quiss?”
Narag nodded. “Don’t you worry about the preparations.” He shook his head. “Kill the draugr Lord or even Balic, and this wall will still fall. You know this, right?”
“It will,” I said tiredly. “How many can we take with us?”
He gestured at the troop. “Give me fifty now, more would make no sense in that place.”
I tugged at his arm. “Make sure we have at least one with magic.”
He winked at me. “Many. Let’s make sure he is still there while the boys open up a way.”
The dverger rushed around, and fifty or so surged away to work on a nearby building. Narag sprinted up the stairs for a tower, and I went after him. We passed frightened and wounded men, preparing arms, hauling rocks, and carrying javelins and arrows. They grinned grimly at us, and a woman with a wounded face spat blood and slapped my foot as I passed. She gave me a wink and a leer. I was swallowing down tears, as I followed the dverg.
He snorted. “Just like your father. Give them a dying pet human, and they begin to shed tears.”
“You were there?”
“Huh?”
“When Father betrayed the Queen of the Draugr?” I asked him. “I read the book.”
His eyes sought mine, as his steps faltered, and then he turned away to walk on up. “I’m not sure what happened that day, jotun. We were doing the fighting bit with the other armies, pushing back the fanatic horde of humans. Their Queen Mara had died to a sword, and they were in a vengeful mood, and we had no time to take breaks to observe what happened near the gate. Morag and his father were up there, with most of the clan. Some saw them seize the Queen, and dozens of them paid for it with their lives. She, that Timmerion lady, an elf, I you believe, wasn’t what she appeared to be. They say she was just like Balic’s lot, and that spell she was releasing, an abomination if any, was enough to confirm it. Dead moving. Thousands. But, she was different from the draugr. Something else entirely. We didn’t go down to that cave. We had to smash in skulls, you see. I guess it doesn’t matter I tell you this, since you read it. We made an oath not to speak of that creature. Best forgotten.”
“Well, she is not forgotten. Balic wants her. We will have to stop them from releasing it,” I told him. “That’s the plan, you see.”
“I guess that would be the plan,” he answered. “I bet Thrum and Baduhanna guessed it would be. Kept you under a shroud. Probably thought you’d do something stupid. And you did! They have the Black Grip, two of your kin as draugr, and here we are, hoping to save the Aesir while besieged by veteran armies!”
“You don’t have to remind—”
“No time to scold you now, boy,” he chortled, as we reached a platform in the gatehouse, and I tried to keep up with the short, round shadow. “Hearten up, boy. Your father hated to lose soldiers, at first. He learnt the skill from his grandfather. I think you’ve done well,” he said graciously, as he reached the wall, where he moved aside several defenders, who were training their bows at some probing enemy. The dverg expertly spat on one, who cursed up at him, but the vicious dverg spat again, and the man yelled with disgust and disappeared. “Give me a bow,” he chortled, “and they’d die weeping. Never missed in my life.” His eyes scanned the middle section of the city, packed with preparing enemy.
“A One Eyed Priest,” I said. “Do you see him.”
“Don’t give a lizard’s turd what they call themselves,” he muttered, and I realized he could see in the dark. He stopped looking all over the place, and squinted. Then, he pointed a finger at a spot near a mostly decorated building, a mansion of a merchant, no doubt, where there was a great bustle ongoing. “We are lucky. He’s still there.”
“Balic?”
He shook his head. “There’s a horse, with golden braid and red harness, outside the house. Something’s there. Perhaps Balic. If he stays there for a moment, we can get there from here.” He thumbed behind us. “The tunnel back there, it leads to that house. I know it.”
“Excellent,” I said.
“Sitting inside, scribbling orders, I see his ugly face in the window. I don’t see the other one. Red cape and that odd hat. Something you might wear for a jest, normally?”
“That’s the one,” I said. “Let Balic be there.”
“Let us be able to kill him,” Narag added sensibly.
The companies of the enemy were chanting now.
The dverg whispered, “We have to hurry. That bastard’s stack of papers is growing thin. His man is looking expectant, and whomever he is speaking with, is stalking back and forth.” We turned to rush back down. Narag shook his shoulders. “Thrum Fellson told you nothing? I know he didn’t approve of the way Baduhanna tried to bury the story.”
“Thrum Fellson? I don’t even know his last name,” I laughed.
“Queen of the Draugr,” he said silently, “was a beautiful creature, indeed. There were two such elven generals in the army. One was the leader, while the other one led the main host on a terrible path of destruction and punishment through the Verdant Lands. The Queen’s banner was raised on the Gate to Nifleheim, and from there, she sent the armies forth. The Timmerion family are at the heart of the war for Hel’s eye. She was a youngest sister of the mightiest elven house of Aldheim.”
“Elven betrayal,” I said. “Seems as deadly as any other.” We passed the previously wounded woman, who was dead now. I avoided looking at her pale, lifeless eyes. And still, my legs stopped moving.
Narag urged me on. “No crying, jotun. None of that, no. Must hurry. Yes, elven betrayal.” He was speaking to keep me moving. “Don’t know what took place with Hel’s army in the South. Never heard of them. One, a terrible general, took yet another army for the ancient Golden City in the East. Medusa, she was called, a gorgon and servant of Hel, and her sisters, Euryale and Stheno, had actually stolen the Eye. They were at odds.”
“I know nothing of the Eye,” I told him.
“Eye of Hel. You have a lot to learn.” He laughed. “The theft of the all-seeing eye of the lonely goddess, Hel, and what followed, is a story worth knowing. The Medusa took a smaller army to the East, and disappeared there. We were indisposed, you remember, while your father and the remaining jotuns survived to lounge in splendor.” He gave me a feral look. “We ate mushrooms for thousands of years. Grown in shit, even. Imagine eat
ing shit-grown mushrooms, and drinking shit-brewed mushroom ale? No. You cannot.” We reached the troops; a dverg was gesturing at a doorway of a fine storehouse.
The man Ragga had spoken to, the one I had asked for, came up, his spear high, as he bowed to me. “Lord, they asked for—”
“A courier,” I said, with a pale smile. “I need one. Do you fear a bit of darkness? You will follow, and stay in the shadows, as we hunt for some dangerous pray.”
“I can do it,” he said, and tugged at my arm, then looked like he had touched a snake. He removed his hand, placing it behind his back. “Meaning to say, Lord, I thank you for the trust. I thank you. I’ve been close to hanging twice, and you— “
“Enough,” I said hoarsely, and felt nauseated. “Later. You ready?”
He shook his head, eyes twitching with fear. “No man is ready for the Old City. But, for you, I’ll crawl in Helheim, and steal the jewels of a dragon.”
I turned away, avoiding Narag’s gaze, who sensibly didn’t ask anything. “Lead on,” I told the dverg, pushing to the doorway.
In the shadows of the storehouse, the dverger lifted their heads to as we came in. One pointed a finger down to a hole, where wind blew forlornly.
Narag simply dropped in, and I followed. He went down a rubbly hill, and the Old City built a blanket of night around us. Narag kicked at a doorway, and billowing dust coughed out of the yawning portal. He peeked inside. “Yes, this will do nicely.”
“It began,” a dverg muttered, and the others were chattering, and I think, praying.
The screams and discord of a terrible battle drifted down at us, and somewhere ahead, the thump of thousands of feet made the whole ceiling shake. The ballistae coughed, catapults thumped, and dust fell like a mist of tears, as we hiked under the butchery. We scuttled forward in a tight passageway, passed old block of crumbled streets, and then, we found a stairway up. Narag and some of his friends opened a thin wooden wall, went up an incline, and lifted a huge stone aside carefully as mice creep in hay, and climbed up. Dozens followed him, their armor uncannily silent, as they moved like ghosts. I got up, and tried to keep the noise down. I reminded myself to keep breathing.
There was a thick doorway, we all heard scuffling movement in the room beyond, where light burned and cast beams in between the cracks of the door.
A voice spoke. “My lord. We already took two walls, while the Minotaur shit-shields held their tiny cocks, failing to take the walls, and the ones in the Harbor pissed themselves. I will go on, my lord, of course I will, but no force in Midgard can make the men take two walls. You will not release your stone to me, High King, and you will not accompany us, and I do not know what you expect.”
I stared at Narag, who was nodding enthusiastically, as the room filled with his kin. Their eyes were gleaming eagerly, and I almost pitied the King of Harrian. But, I had no pity for Balic, who was obviously in the room.
We approached the door, and heard hissing speech demanding something, and it was clear Balic wasn’t happy with the way the things were going.
“Yes,” the King said thinly, his patience short. “We must hurry over. We shall do our best, and may gods take the Headless Horse, if we fail. I will be with them, my king. Soldier! Take this message to General Malaud, if he is alive.”
Rustling sounds were followed by men yelling outside the house.
The draugr King went on. “As our lord, One Man here, commands,” he was saying respectfully, with a subdued voice, “remove the best men from the fight. Bunch them all on the same ladder. Tell them to triple the efforts on the left side of the tower, all the bastards up that wall, and then, throw in the ladder on the right side, and the beefy bastards must make it up and hold the wall. Kill as many as you can, and cut off the roads to the last ring. No matter how many fall on their faces, tell the men to go over the wall, even if it costs them their virginity. Now, I’ll join you soon, after our business with the High King is concluded.”
I heard a chair creaking. Footsteps were receding.
Narag glanced at me. “Probably dozens in that room,” he whispered. “Maybe a dragon?” He grinned, his men nodded, and Narag intentionally poked at a pot on a table, which tottered around, then fell. I stared at it in disbelief. Narag winked, and stepped to the side of the door. I cursed, stepped to the other side of the doorway.
Someone scrambled from the other side of the door. “What’s there? A squatter? A thief? Or just a cat?” the voice said, as the draugr walked forward. He was close, very close. He grabbed the handle and we tensed as the fifty dverger bunched near the door.
Silence. The shadows flickered behind the cracks.
I felt my hair stand up in the back of my head.
The doorway seemed to bulge, expand, and an explosion rocked the room. A bolt of blue-white energy flashed in the room, and we fell on our asses, while many of the dverger immediately behind the door simply fell apart. The stench of the burning flesh filled the room with its nasty odor. The survivors were covered in guts and blood, and I could barely see the horned mask peering inside.
“Welcome, jotun,” the voice said, laughing. He looked inside, expecting to see a jotun-sized corpse, but instead saw a throng of dverg eyes and mine. He took a step back, then another.
Rage for the death of my dverger poured out of my mouth with expletives. I surged up, seeing dots and sparks. I grabbed the flaming doorway, pushed my sword at the retreating figure and roared my way in, swinging the weapon unsteadily. I saw there was no Balic in the room. The blade struck his helmet, taking a horn, spilling the draugr on the desk.
I had no time to ponder the absence of Balic, who had obviously bolted, but instead, hacked down at the King again. He grasped my armor, and pulled me over him. We fell in a heap, struggling, cursing, and pummeling each other in the close quarters. I heard footsteps, rushing and swift, thrumming down stairs, and glimpsed harried movement in a stairway. I saw soldiers surging down. The first such man, aiming a spear for my back, fell with a dverg javelin in his skull, another got past stunned dverger, and struck a glancing blow in my helmet with a mace, which hurt terribly, but I held on to the struggling King of Harrian. He slapped me with the pommel of his sword, raked his fingers across my neck, and braided together a spell of fire, which flew wild to the roof, then through, as I grabbed his arm. I pushed it to the ground, saw his pale eyes glowing under his helmet, and pummeled my sword’s hilt into an eyehole.
He twitched, his neck broken, skull caved in.
Around me, the dverger hacked and slashed, invading the room with unsurpassed savagery. Some of the enemy ran out in panic, and I saw how, outside, a troop of cavalry dismounted, shouting warnings.
I turned to Narag. “Balic?”
“Not here, Lord!” he screamed. His face was red with a close call by the spell which had mauled dozen of ours. “We have to leave fast.”
“One moment,” I roared. “Balic! He might be out! His horse was!”
“But, this one knew you were here—” he began. I got up, shaking my head, walking for the door, and he sighed, and growled orders to his dverger.
An especially thin dverg intercepted me, nodded at Narag and gleefully to the doorway. Outside, surprised yells filled the street, but the dverg wove together a crackling, blue-red wall of fire, which spread across street. The terrible, sad screech of equine pain and the horror of men hollering terribly filled the air.
Then, the dverg turned into ice.
It spread up, wove itself around, and inside him, his nose, ears, and mouth raining icy flakes.
He explodes softly into shreds of red, glittering ice.
Dozens of Balic’s golden-armored guards entered the hall in a rush, and many others came down from above. They were all draugr, and they had been expecting us.
Dverger whirled and fought, but the attack was a savage one. I was slapped down by a halberd wielding brute of a draugr, and whips of fire grew in undead hands, as they shred many of the dverger. Thirty or so remained, and moved
in to fight them, and a terrible, panting melee ensued.
Trap. It was a trap. No Balic, only his horse and his Guard.
I was hefting myself up, as an evil face appeared. A fist connected with my face, and hand, cold as ice grabbed me. The sword coming for my throat was swift as a lighting, but Narag’s ax saved me. The dverg cut the foe down so savagely his two parts crashed over me. I struggled, panting, trying to get up. Instead, a fiery spell whip slashed the nearby air, Narag was shoved away, and I was struck in the back with something heavy. I lifted the shield, which was trashed by a terrible ax-strike, a clawing hand grabbed my helmet, and the fiery whip curled around my leg. I was yanked off of my feet, and dragged across the floor.
For the door.
My leg was burning, wild pain surging up and down. The chain-covered boot was smoking hot, and I tried to yank it from the grip of a draugr pulling me out, but others were there to help him, kicking and hammering me like evil spirits, dragging me through the floor, planks, and then dirt, like they would a pig for a butcher. I bled my way out of the hall, held on to the sword, land screamed as sharp claws ripped at my side. I fell to the street, and there, a gorgeously armored Captain of the Guard grabbed me by my throat next to a smoking carcass of Balic’s horse, and his men held me down, one on each arm and leg. One forced the sword out of my fist.
The Captain, a blue-eyed, tall draugr peered at the building, where a fierce battle was taking place. “Fast, fast, we shall be. This won’t take much of your time, o king jotun. Know this. The One Man is pulling down this wall, and then, he’ll find your princess. He’ll have a present for her. You are wanted by the gates, boy.”
I struggled, as the draugr pulled together a spell over me. A glowing fiery rod grew out of his hand.
“Or, rather,” he said, “A present of your head. It’s wanted.”
He brought the rod up, draugr struggled with my arms and legs, as I thrashed. On the sides of the building, eyeing the battle, and the execution, Harrian’s legionnaires were observing the scene nervously. Some saluted me, other bowed. A draugr fell out of the window, broken, dead, showing its disfigurement and rot. It made the men flinch, and I was sure there were plenty of rumors of the odd nature of their kings and queen after that night.
The Queen of the Draugr: Stories of the Nine Worlds (Thief of Midgard - a dark fantasy action adventure Book 2) Page 31
