The Half Dwarf Prince

by J. M. Fosberg

  Grundel and Rundo looked at each other. They couldn’t really argue his reasoning, and they knew whatever his more personal reasons were, they weren’t any of their business. The conceded the point.

  “Even if our distraction only helped you carry out your plan, you still saved our lives, so thank you for that,” Rundo said, looking back at Jerrie.

  Jerrie dropped the bundle he had carried up the stairs onto the bed and smiled at them. “If the Black Dragons are after you guys, you will need this stuff. I pulled it off the ones we killed. This,” he said, holding up a belt buckle that he had taken off one of the brothers, “will absorb any direct magical attack. For instance, if a wizard shot a bolt of lightning at you, it would be drawn into the belt buckle instead of slamming into your chest and leaving you flailing around on the ground,” he said with a smile as he tossed the buckle on the bed next to Grundel. “Obviously, if the wizard hit you with enough spells before the buckle could dissipate the magical energy, or if a really powerful wizard hit you with a spell that overpowered the magic of the enchantment, well, it can only do so much.

  “This ring,” Jerrie continued, “will actually deflect a magical blast just slightly off its path so that it misses the one wearing it.” He slipped it onto his middle finger on his right hand. “These daggers have the ability to penetrate magical shields and armor. You obviously don’t need them, Grundel, seeing as your axes are much more powerful,” he said, holding the two knives out to Rundo. “Finally, this jacket that the wizard was wearing. It will protect against minor magical attacks and most weapons. It won’t protect against the force of a blow, but it will stop it from getting through, so if a hill giant hits you with a cudgel you will still go flying through the air. It's basically just magical armor in the form of a jacket. It’s too small for the behemoth or me to wear. It should fit you all right, though. That wizard was pretty scrawny. If you use your new knife you could even hem it up.”

  Grundel and Rundo were both just staring at the man in amazement. “Why are you giving us this stuff, and how do you know all this? Are you a wizard, too?” Grundel asked.

  Jerrie couldn’t help but laugh out loud. “No, I am not a wizard of any kind. As to how I know about the items, well, a man can’t give away all his secrets. Why am I giving this stuff to you? That is easy. It seems the Black Dragons have an issue with you, and I have an issue with them, so I’m hoping I can come with you wherever you’re going. Plus, you helped me acquire these things even if you had no way of knowing it.”

  Grundel stared at the man for a minute. “If you’re looking for a fight with the Black Dragons, then you won’t want to come with us. We are just here to gather supplies for the dwarves going to Shinestone.”

  Jerrie smiled. “What if I had some information about the dwarf mountain?”

  Grundel couldn’t deny he was curious. Why would anyone in Ambar have any information about Shinestone? He decided one more person wouldn’t matter. “If you want to follow us to Shinestone, you’re welcome, as long as you don’t cause any trouble.”

  Jerrie smiled mischievously. “As I said before, the Black Dragons seemed to want something from you. Now I know what that is. The word in every place where Black Dragons in Ambar gather is that their leader, Vingaza, has taken up residence in Shinestone with a group of dwarves. He is apparently worried about the mage Anwar Alamira. Word is that some of the Black Dragon wizards of Ambar have already made their way to Shinestone, and some people are saying that, until Alamira is dealt with, Shinestone could become the center of operations for the Black Dragons here in the north.”

  It was Grundel’s turn to smile. He thought about keeping the information he had to himself, but Anwar had destroyed the majority of the orcs, and the Black Dragons, as powerful as they might be, didn’t have the strength to take on the dwarves. “Anwar Alamira is with the Father of Balance.”

  Jerrie stared at Grundel in disbelief. “The Father isn’t real.”

  Grundel and Rundo shared a look now. “We have both seen and talked with him. He came for Anwar after Anwar destroyed the orc army—and most of the Black Dragon wizards. Your information about the orcs and dragons is new to us, though. It would have cost additional lives if we had walked into the mountain unsuspecting. Your experience fighting wizards will be helpful, too. You are welcome to come with us if you want to.”

  Jerrie just smiled. There was a knock at the door, and he waved at the other two to relax as he went to open it. Outside stood a woman with a bowl of water and a roll of bandages. “Brian sent me. He said that someone had been attacked by the Black Dragons and was wounded?”

  Grundel took off the towel that he was holding against the wound and held up his arm. The girl stared in shock for a moment, but not at the wound. Grundel wasn’t surprised—most of the people he had met outside of Evermount looked at him like that. He just smiled and shook his head.

  “You can’t take care of my friend from out there, can you?” Jerrie asked.

  The girl snapped out of it and walked into the room. She started a little when Jerrie closed the door behind her. She went to Grundel and set the bowl of hot water on the bed next to him. “Do you mind?” she asked, reaching for his arm.

  Grundel just held his arm out. She took his hand and stared at the wound. “It’s deep, down to the bone, but it didn’t hit any arteries. It needs to be stitched up.” She looked at Grundel, who just shrugged. His arm hurt, but he was still a dwarf. It was said that dwarves’ pain tolerance was a lot higher than the other races’. He didn’t know if that was true, but dwarves almost never got sick, and they healed more quickly then the other races, so he supposed it was possible.

  “I need to clean it first. Do you mind coming to the sink?”

  Grundel followed her to the sink in the bathing chamber. He stretched his arm out over the sink. “This is going to hurt,” she said. Grundel just shrugged as if it didn’t matter. When he thought about it, it really didn’t matter that it was going to hurt. There wasn’t anything he could do about that, and the wound needed to be tended, so he might as well just get it over with.

  The girl poured hot water into the six-inch gash down the outside of his forearm. When Grundel didn’t pull away and she was certain he wasn’t going to lash out at her, she poured more water into the wound more comfortably, and then she spread some kind of salve into the gash. “You can go sit back down now. We need to stitch it shut. Would you like something to dull the pain?”

  “Not worried about the pain, but I wouldn’t say no to an ale,” Grundel said. He heard Rundo laugh off to the side.

  The girl attempted a smile unconvincingly. She was nervous, and he could tell. “I’ll make sure to tell them to send something up when I’m done. Are you ready?”

  “Ready as I’m gonna be,” he said, holding his arm out for her.

  She turned it back and forth a little here and there until the skin lined up the way she wanted, and then she poked the needle into his arm. He forced himself not to flinch. After the shock of the needle going in initially, the rest wasn’t nearly as bad. She ran stitches through the skin all the way up until the gash was closed. “I would leave those in there for a couple weeks at least. It really was deep.”

  Grundel lifted and looked at his arm. He knew the girl was intimidated, nervous even, but it didn’t show in her work. She knew how to work a needle. “Thank you,” he said, and she smiled. She went to the bathing chamber to retrieve her bowl and then headed to the door. Jerrie opened the door for her. She turned just before she walked out.

  “I’ll make sure they send up some ale for ya.” Then she was gone down the stairs.

  Chapter Seven

  Kobolds

  “It’s kobolds!” Geischeit said. “The demon must have burrowed down into the lower planes. Now the mountain is exposed underneath. We have to push them out and collapse the tunnels that are too deep. We have lost a dozen of the orcs that were clearing rubble down there. They were caught off guard, then they chased the kobo
ld scouts down deeper without any weapons.”

  “Get a hundred orcs down there to block the tunnels that the kobolds came out of,” Fredin ordered. “Send them first, then I want a thousand orcs sent to that level to block every tunnel. If they see kobolds they are not to chase them—just defend and send for more orcs. Start sending every platoon you can find after that. I want two thousand orcs in reserve on the level above that to defend and clear tunnels.”

  “And the wizards?” Geischeit asked.

  “What kind of orcs would we be if we needed humans to defeat and defend against kobolds?” Fredin responded angrily.

  Kobolds were pesky little creatures—gray-skinned humanoids, short like dwarves, but extremely skinny and weak. In the open they weren’t very effective, but in enclosed spaces like this their extreme quickness could make them deadly. There are three things to overcome when fighting kobolds: their speed, their ability to throw javelins with incredible accuracy, and their lizards. Kobolds were known to ride cave lizards, which could reach five to six feet long with another three feet of tail. Other races had attempted to tame them, but the kobolds were the only ones with any success. From the floor to the top of their backs, cave lizards were only about two to three feet tall, making them easy for kobolds to ride in the enclosed spaces of mountains, caves, and the lower planes. The lizards were quick, with extremely sharp teeth, and their tails presented a threat of their own.

  Things had been going so well. Fredin had claimed all the orcs under the mountain and Hure. He had twenty thousand orcs now. There weren’t many clans that were much bigger, not in this area, at least, not after the disaster at Evermount. Just when everything was working out he had to deal with this.

  “Hure, you stay here. I am going to deal with this,” he told her.

  “I’m coming. I won’t be left out of the fight,” she said.

  “If you die before you give me a son, I’ll find you in hell and kill you again.”

  “It’s just kobolds,” she retorted, and fell into step with him.

  When they got to the floor they realized it was more than just kobolds. The first hundred orcs that were sent down had been overwhelmed, and the next hundred that had followed were in a pitched battle at the only entrance to this level on this side of the mountain. Fredin walked up the stairs to the next level, where orc platoons where beginning to stage. He found one of the platoon leaders. He put orcs that showed any intelligence whatsoever in charge of others. It didn’t mean they were smart, but he knew that they could follow orders, at least.

  “Take a hundred to the stairs on the other side of the mountain and make sure none make it up. If you lose half of your force, run back here and get another platoon to come help you,” Fredin said. The orc didn’t even respond; he just turned toward the orcs behind him and started yelling for them to follow.

  Fredin looked around. There were two platoons off to his right that looked nearly whole. Two hundred would have to do. He called out to the two platoon leaders. “You two, come here.” The two platoon leaders came running over. “Each of you give me your ten best. They will come down to the front with me. Once we push forward, your platoon”—he turned his head and poked the orc on his left in the chest—“will come down and clear right.” He looked at the other orc. “You will come down and go the other way.” He figured if the first one didn’t know which direction was right, at least the second would just go the other direction. His suspicions were confirmed when each sent a different number of orcs over. One had sent fourteen and the other had sent twelve. It didn’t matter. He had what he needed.

  Fredin walked down the steps with Hure and the twenty orcs following close behind. The first orc had his platoon following down the stairs. As Fredin pushed forward through the orcs that were defending the stairs, kobolds began throwing javelins toward him. He just smiled and pushed through. When there were only two orcs between him and the kobolds, he surged forward, drawing the two dwarven-made swords off his hips and leaving his greatsword on his back.

  He broke through the line, swinging both swords down and out in front of him in wide arcs. Two of the kobolds to his right fell to the ground dead. Both of the ones he was trying to hit on the left had leapt away. He waded through the creatures, swinging his swords out in front of him. Hure was on his left, fighting through any that tried to come back in at his side. The other orcs were filling in the gaps and following as they came down the stairs. A number of javelins flew at him. He was able to dodge most of them because they were aimed for his face. He slapped one away that nearly caught him in the chest. He turned to his left too late to stop another that was aimed at his chest. The sword in his right hand was coming up, but not fast enough, when the javelin was deflected and barely missed him. He looked down at Hure, who had knocked the missile out wide with her shield.

  The whole line of orcs was pushing out now, with Fredin leading, and the kobolds began to escape down the tunnels. When the chamber here was empty he yelled to the orcs. “Follow them! Clear this level. If you find another level that goes down, leave orcs there, and don’t let anything up.” Geischeit had made his way down now and was headed in his direction. “Make sure there is a constant flow of orcs into this level,” Fredin ordered Geischeit. “You’re in charge of keeping platoons pushing out. I want this level cleared. Go get the wizard. Explain what is going on. Tell him I need the wizards to collapse tunnels. When a platoon finds a tunnel leading down, have them send back a runner. Have one of the wizards to go with them and collapse that tunnel, so that those orcs can continue to clear.”

  Geischeit nodded and ran back to the platoon leaders, relaying Fredin’s orders to everyone he passed on his way back up the tunnel. He wasn’t excited about talking to the wizard, but those were his orders.

  Fredin started down the tunnel on his right. He barely made it ten steps when he saw a javelin come flying out of the darkness. He dodged to the left into Hure. He still got grazed and a cut opened on his right arm. It wasn’t anything serious, but he had heard the thud of the javelin driving into the orc behind him. When he looked back he saw that it had driven through his throat, which was why he hadn’t heard the orc cry out. Now the orc fought for breath as he drowned in his own blood. Fredin pushed the tip of his sword down into his chest, putting him out of his misery, and then turned and headed forward again.

  Orcs’ eyes were innately able to see well in the dark, but the kobolds had the upper hand now that they were out of the well-lit chamber at the base of the stairs. Kobolds were creatures of darkness. They lived in darkness and could see much farther in the dark than orcs could. This was the ideal fighting ground for them—tight, dark tunnels with lots of directions to escape and ambush from. Fredin slowed as he approached the intersection of two tunnels. When he got close the javelins came. He was expecting them this time, so he reached out to Hure and went to a knee. He heard a thud as one javelin hit the shield of an orc behind him. Another found flesh, by the squeal of pain he heard. Then he was on his feet and charging to the right where the javelins had come from.

  He was planning to overcome the kobolds that were throwing the javelins and force them into a fight; instead he found a cave lizard charging at him with frightening speed. He reacted completely on instinct. He leaped up and forward over the lizard’s head, avoiding its teeth. As the lizard passed under him he drove both of his swords down. He was aiming at the neck, but by the time his blades met flesh, he connected only with the beast’s shoulders. The lizard shrieked. It tried to turn back toward him, but Hure brought her mace down hard on the lizard’s head. It twitched twice before it went still.

  Gescheit knocked on the door of the Black Dragon wizard. “Come in!” came the voice behind the door. He walked in to find the wizard sitting at a table with two other Black Dragon wizards. He knew they were wizards because they wore those black robes with the small dragon emblem on the front.

  The wizard was obviously surprised that it was not Fredin or one of the other humans by the curio
us look on his face. “Fredin sent me to find you. The mountain is being invaded by kobolds from underneath. Somewhere in one of the lower levels there must be a tunnel that leads to the lower planes. Fredin and the others are now clearing the highest level that the kobolds have reached. He has other orcs securing every passage that leads down. He wants some wizards to come collapse those passages so that no more kobolds will make it up.” He could see that the wizard was irritated, but he also knew that the wizard was smart enough to know that he didn’t want to deal with an angry Fredin after the fighting was over.

  Vingaza looked at the two wizards sitting in front of him. They really weren’t busy anyway. He hadn’t heard from Malvagio and Cattivo. They rarely let him down. More than likely, that fool Allocco had done something stupid to get himself hurt or killed, and now he couldn’t return to report what the brothers had discovered. When this orc interrupted, he had been discussing with these two wizards whether they should send someone to figure out what had happened.

  “Let’s go,” he told the other two as he stood. “We don’t want the orcs to lose their precious mountain. Kobolds would make much more annoying roommates.”

  Geischeit understood the stab at the orcs, but he really didn’t care. The only opinion he was interested in was Fredin’s. He led the wizards down to the level were the fighting was. The area at the foot of the stairs was still free of fighting. There were two orcs waiting for him when he arrived.

  “Have you two found tunnels that go down?” They both nodded like idiots.

  He looked at the wizard Vingaza, who just said, “Go.” The other two went with the two orcs, leaving him standing at the bottom of those stairs with the human and the hundred orcs who were making sure no kobolds made it to the next level.