His arms are folded and he surveys me silently. He must be just as large as Ullrog, maybe a little smaller. A war axe hangs on each side of his waist.
“Thiem okhreel nah Khroll’verär!” he bellows. I recognize the first and last words, but cannot decipher the meaning of the sentence.
Then there is another.
He appears the same way the first did, clambering out of the tunnel. Then follows another, and another. A steady stream of them flows from the tunnel, and for the first time in a long time, I find myself getting very, very, nervous.
All six of them form a circle around me, cutting off any escape. Not like I could run anyway. Each of them is dark-skinned: four of them grey, one of them dark brown, and one of them green. This green is different from Ullrog’s green, however; it is a sort of green I would see in dark moss.
I tally their weapons. There’s the grey one with the two war axes, who has moved to my right flank. Another with a large battleaxe. Two with greatswords. One with a shortbow. The last with a mace. All of them have fangs.
Some of them are armored, but the armor is unlike the plated metal I have seen Ullrog wear. It is made from fur and leather, hardly any of it metal.
Then the last emerges.
Instead of climbing down the cliff face, he leaps from the edge of the tunnel to the shore. He lands solidly and straightens. He is easily the biggest, taller than me by probably a foot. He steps to the place in front of me, and their circle grows to accommodate him.
His face is battle-hardened. There are four scars on his head alone that I can count in the dark of the night. Several mark his arms. About his chest and shoulders, he wears steel orc-forged armor, the like of which I have not seen before. His hands, legs, and feet are similarly clad. Yellow eyes pierce me from behind his orcish helm, almost glowing in the darkness. Moonlight accentuates his pale green-hued skin.
His long wet fangs shine in the moonlight, his lizard-like tongue drawing across them lazily. “Thiem okhreel nah Khroll’verär!” he thunders suddenly. The other six orcs laugh, some of them drawing their weapons. The sound is booming, carrying across the landscape.
It dies down. Then the seventh, who I assume is their leader, pulls a warhammer from his back. The head is huge, the impact portion flat and the spike on the opposite end very long. A small spike protrudes on top.
He stabs the top spike into the ground at his feet, resting his beastly ironclad hands on the bottom of the weapon. His gaze glances over my wound.
His yellow eyes draw my attention as they try to stare holes through the back of my head. I return his gaze strongly, though I have no idea what will befall me.
“Thiem ushkha rüash’na thien ísh,” he growls. He breathes out loudly, enjoying the fact that I cannot understand him, his breath a white cloud in the air.
“Dragonhammer,” he rumbles. “We have been waiting for you.”
End of Volume II
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Conner McCall is a college student pursuing a degree in music composition with a minor in computer science.
Dragonhammer: Volume II Page 34
