R. Salvatore - Archmage

Kenneally’s fireball spell was lost in her throat then, and all she could do was fly up for the ceiling, her eyes wet with tears, and gasping for breath she could not seem to find.

She took some heart as she rose, though, to see her four kin maintaining their dweomer. Toliver had straightened and completed the square just in time. Upward fell the dwarves, then upward they floated, to land lightly on the ceiling.

And dwarves on the landing threw them ropes, which fell up to them, that they could be hauled to safety.

And upward fell the pursuing monsters, too, then upward they floated, and not one got to the ceiling before a dwarven crossbow launched a bolt into its torso, and the dwarves already up above were ready for them anyway, cutting the disoriented and confused goblinkin apart in short order.

“Hurry, pull them in!” she heard Tuckernuck commanding. “Kenneally’s spell will not last much longer! We will lose any not on the ledge!”

Kenneally nodded agreement and focused on the task at hand. She was more than halfway to the ceiling, the jumble of falling dwarves and monsters just in front of her. Now she concentrated on that tumbling mess, picking out monsters.

A line of magic missiles shot out from her fingertips, striking a goblin, killing it, and taking out the one beside it as well.

Kenneally chanted the spell for a lightning bolt, and when she executed it, she perfectly angled it to blast several enemies, with not a dwarf singed. The power of the bolt jolted one large demon too, sending it spinning out of the area of her reverse gravity, and as soon as the beast went out of the dweomer, it fell back the other way, more than fifty feet to the floor.

And so Kenneally realized a new and deadly tactic, and one executed by a simple spell she could cast quickly and repeatedly. She picked out her targets with gusts of wind, blowing them out of the reverse gravity field, sending them falling back for the cavern floor, living bombs to drop upon the sprawling horde below.

She would avenge Connerad, she determined, and she narrowed her eyes and sent a dozen goblins flying free of her enchanted area.

Tuckernuck Harpell looked up, or rather down, nodding approvingly of Kenneally’s exploits.

But noting, too, that fewer and fewer dwarves were among the dozens falling upward, and that little fighting continued on the floor.

He glanced the other way to see most of the living dwarves already out of the enchanted area, scrambling on ropes with their crowded brethren grabbing at them and hauling them over the lip of the landing.

He looked back the other way, back to the floor. He saw no dwarves, none living at least, but now more and more monsters were taking the leap.

Tuckernuck could only hope that he wasn’t killing more dwarves then, but he flew backward and dropped his arms, ending the ritual enchantment of the Field of Feather Falling. He flipped back upright, and waved his three fellow Harpells back as monster after monster tumbled past to crash against the ceiling, or, soon, to crash against the bodies of those that had already crashed against the ceiling.

He looked down again to Kenneally, and he gasped and cried out. A pair of ghastly creatures, like giant houseflies with human faces, flew upon her at either side, biting and tearing at her.

“Kenneally!”

He began to dive, but a fireball below stopped him before he ever truly moved.

Kenneally’s fireball dropped right upon herself.

The flames cleared and the chasme demons, their wings burned away, tumbled for the floor, bearing poor Kenneally with them.

Again Tuckernuck began to dive, and again he stopped short, for Kenneally’s powerful dweomer ended then, and a host of monsters and dead dwarves fell from the ceiling, and those falling upward in the field paused, then went tumbling back the other way.

So enthralled by the strange sight was Tuckernuck that he didn’t notice a swarm of chasme demons soaring up at him until it was too late.

Covered in blood, much of it his own, Bungalow Thump was the last dwarf holding the landing, and the one who hauled Toliver, the only Harpell to reach the landing, over the edge. The powerful dwarf sent the wounded man skidding back through the door, then his eyes widened in horror to note the other two nearby wizards caught suddenly by the horrid, insectoid demons.

Bungalow fell back in shock, barely avoiding yet another of the darting chasme. He would have been caught and surely killed, but a dwarf within the doorway grabbed him by the shoulder and hauled him back and to the ground-and the pursuing chasme caught a swarm of crossbow bolts right in its hideous face.

The door slammed shut and Comragh na Uamh, the Battle of the Under Way, came to an abrupt and disastrous end.

Oretheo Spikes harrumphed repeatedly as he paced across the bridge over the small pond in Gauntlgrym’s entry cavern. The veteran Wilddwarf had grown quite fond of Connerad and missed the young king, but even worse, in Connerad’s absence Oretheo had been given control of the finishing touches for the defenses of the vital cavern.

Oretheo Spikes was a fighter, as fine a warrior as Adbar had ever produced, and not a yard boss!

And there was a battle soon to begin, he knew, if it hadn’t already, for the whispers said that Connerad and his boys-almost all from Mithral Hall and Felbarr-had pushed into the final reaches of the upper level of the complex and expected to breach the lower caverns in short order. By all expectations, there would be dark elves waiting for them.

And Oretheo wouldn’t be there. He looked around as he moved across the bridge yet again, this time heading back for Gauntlgrym’s castle-like wall. He noted the many engineers, masons, and blacksmiths hard at work, finalizing the triggers and springs that could drop the bridge from a single command point.

He turned his gaze wider about the huge cavern, where a thousand dwarves worked or watched from the stalagmite towers that had been hollowed and set up as guard posts. Even out in the hallway, the dwarves labored with defensible positions-anyone coming in here would fight for every inch of ground.

That thought bolstered him, but he couldn’t shake off the notion that almost all of the dwarves in this rear guard area were from Citadel Adbar. As were almost all of the dwarves working in the throne room and adjacent chambers. Because of King Harnoth.

Despite his earlier protestations to the contrary, Oretheo Spikes truly wanted to blame king Emerus and King Bruenor, and even King Connerad. He wanted to pretend that this was Mithral Hall’s fault, or Citadel Felbarr’s. But he could not, because he understood the truth and the way of dwarves.

He and all his boys had participated in the call of Kith’n Kin with all their hearts, had given their fealty wholly to their Delzoun heritage and the rebuilding of Gauntlgrym, and he knew that their pledge had been accepted honestly and with open hearts, open arms, and a mug of magical ale courtesy of Bruenor’s marvelous shield.

But this snubbing of the Adbar dwarves was not an emotional decision by the kings of the other clans, as was proven by the fact that the thousand dwarves who had joined in from Mirabar were also here in this cavern, or scattered about at other tasks in securing the ground they had gained. The decision to take the dwarves of Felbarr and Mithral Hall was purely a practical one. In any expedition to the as-yet unconquered reaches of Gauntlgrym, the mission would be led by a dwarf king. And no king would spearhead his battle group with the boys of another clan when his own trusted warriors- in Connerad’s case, the famed Gutbuster Brigade-were readily available.