Michael Pearce - Diaries of a Dwarven Rifleman

Deandra shifted the Big 14 to her left hand and adjusted her pack. Engvyr had taught her to shoot while he was laid up, and heavy as it was she was glad to have it now. The gun would be of little use if the main body of the Baasgarta caught them short of the pass but it was a comfort nonetheless.

At the best of times it was nearly a half-days march to Cougar Creek Pass on the main road south from the Makepeace Valley. The refugees, over thirty-five hundred men, women and children, were strung out in clumps over nearly a half-league. She looked back and could see the glitter of pikes at the end of the column over a mile away. The main body of the 2nd battalion was bringing up the rear, as mixed platoons of pikemen and gunners patrolled up and down the line. Engvyr and the other rangers were scouting ahead.

The patrols seemed too little to protect the column, as the infantry platoons couldn't be everywhere at once. Engvyr had explained that the soldiers needed to fight as a unit to be effective, but she still would have felt better with an armed trooper walking beside her.

She was tired, having risen in the middle of the night. The kitchen staff had already been stirring when she was sent to rouse them. She had helped them make great pots of porridge and coffee. Gathering and packing their things, the dwarves sleeping in the great hall had been able to grab a hot breakfast before departing. Militia came in and took food and coffee to the others camping in the palisade. There was a tent kitchen in the camps south of the hold doing the same things for folks there. Everyone would have a chance for a last hot meal before they evacuated.

Engvyr had stopped in to drop off traveling clothes, a rucksack of extras and the Big 14. When she had a moment she dressed quickly, keeping the pack and gun near to hand.

Finally word had come that it was their time to move out. The dwarves in the kitchen simply left things as they were, though it took an effort of will to leave dishes and pots dirty. Deandra added an ammunition pouch to her belt, then slung on her ruck, grabbed the gun and joined the column of refugees.

She had looked about the great hall as she passed through, possibly for the last time. The massive beams covered in carving, the overstuffed chairs by the hearth, the benches and tables, it was all dear to her. It had been her home for months, and more than that it was the place that she and Engvyr's love had grown. As she passed over the threshold she had kissed her fingertips and brushed them against the doorframe in farewell.

They had passed out of the palisade and down through the tent camp. Wagons of supplies and drovers herding their livestock had left almost as soon as Ynghilda had decided to evacuate the valley. Hopefully they would make it through the pass long before the refugees arrived.

The column had assembled in the predawn light. Farmers carried axes or bill-hooks and many of the others had walking staffs. Some carried light hunting bows or crossbows, and many had wood-knives or other long blades at their hips. Of course they all had their sax-knives as well.

Deandra had grinned to herself. These Dwarves! She had thought, Common folk fleeing for their lives, and they were better armed than the peasant levies of some human armies.

She turned and started up the slope again. For all their friendly ways and kindness Dwarves were at heart a fierce people. She had been given to understand that long ago their race had been slaves, and each and every one of them took that personally. They were fiercely determined to remain free and to survive as a people. Most took training with weapons, or at least learning to fight with what they had, as a personal responsibility. They felt obliged to be able to defend themselves and their neighbors. She hefted the Big 14 and realized that she was one of them now, not of their race but of their people. Among humans a woman such as she would never bear arms, might even be afraid of them.

The straps of the rucksack cut into her shoulders and she shifted its weight for what seemed like the thousandth time since they began this march. The relief didn't last long as the cursed thing always seemed to settle right back into place. They were about two thirds of the way to the pass and her legs ached, her back was stiff and sore. All of that was forgotten in an instant as horns sounded along the length of the column.

Baasgarta cavalry poured out of the forest a few hundred paces east of the column of refugees, falchions raised high. She just had time to shrug out of the ruck and level the Big 14 before the nightmare was upon them. Goblin riders on what looked like jet-black rams. Then she saw the wicked teeth grinning from their elongated jaws. Ulvgaed.

There was no time for fear or panic. She simply did as Engvyr had taught her, focusing on the front sight, letting her breath half out and stroking the trigger. WHACK. The heavy slug punched through the beast's chest and it went down. The rider landed hard, rolling along the ground, and dwarves pounced from several directions, sax-knives flashing.

The main body of the cavalry tore into the column. But these were dwarves, and the column tore right back. What followed was a pandemonium that Deandra survived more by luck than skill. She heard a volley from the nearest infantry platoon and her ears were pummeled by the high-pitched shrieks of mortally wounded ulvgaed.

A kaleidoscope of images remained with her. A dwarf neatly side-stepped and cut upward with a broad-axe, shearing through the neck of an ulvgaed and into its rider's belly before their momentum tore the axe from his hands. He was struck down from behind a second later. A rider slowed and a woman threw her rucksack in the face of his mount. As the creature savaged the pack dwarves closed in pulling the rider and beast down. A farmer plunged his pitchfork into the chest of another ulvgaed. It latched onto his shoulder and shook him like a terrier with a rat. Without thinking Deandra leapt forward, slamming her gun’s butt-stock into the creature’s skull. Another woman swept its rider from the saddle with a bill-hook before the goblin could cut her down. Then the Baasgarta had passed, leaving a full third of their number broken upon the ground.

She looked up and down the shattered column in shock. For two hundred paces the ground was littered with the dead and dying. People were shouting for their loved ones, kneeling beside the victims and hacking at downed Baasgarta and ulvgaeds. She couldn't process it, it was too big. It was as if her mind was a moth bumping against an invisible wall of reality and recoiling, over and over. She reloaded the Big 14, hardly knowing what she was doing. When a wounded Baasgarta tried to raise himself to his knees she shot him in the back without even a passing thought.

Suddenly the wall between her and the world vanished and her mind snapped back into function. She began to move among the wounded, tending to them as she could. After a time the platoon of medics from the battalion were there as well. Weeping dwarves were gently separated from their dead. Walking staves became the poles of litters. The mortally wounded were given fatal injections of extract of poppy, except the Baasgarta. The medics simply slit their throats and moved on.

“Deandra!” she heard a voice call. She had just finished tending one of the last of the wounded. She felt soul-sick and exhausted. She waved tiredly to Engvyr and Taarven as they rode up. She and Engvyr embraced, then separated again more quickly than either would have liked. She wanted to cry, to babble, to tell him what she had seen and done but she had no words. She looked deep into his eyes and knew that they were not needed.

“Well,” Taarven said, “I don't think they'll try that again anytime soon. There must be nigh a hundred of them dead.”