Douglas Niles - Fate of Thorbardin

He knew better than to waste time arguing, so he muttered a curse and started forward, carrying his axe, jogging fast enough to stay a step or two in front of the cleric. He crossed through a wide room that looked like a barracks mess hall, though the tables and benches had been overturned by combat. Some dwarves of Tankard’s legion were dragging the bodies of slain defenders into a large pile off to the side, while other dead fighters, wearing the blue and black of Kayolin, were laid out in neat rows. A quick glance suggested that more than two dozen of his troops had been slain in that chamber alone.

The knowledge made him sick to his stomach and more determined than ever to break through the next obstacle. Crossing to the far side of the mess hall, he found Tankard himself and a hundred of his dwarves warily looking through a wide double doorway into a long, open hallway. More Kayolin dwarves had been killed there, and their bodies-most pierced by lethal crossbow quarrels-still lay where they had fallen.

“Hullo, General,” Tankard said grimly as Brandon knelt beside him to study the constricted approach. He could see the balconies near the far end, well above the floor of the hall, where the enemy archers obviously lurked.

“You can see it’s a tough nut,” Hacksaw continued. “They have probably fifty crossbowmen up there, back in the shadows. Even if we bring our shooters up for cover, we can only squeeze ten or a dozen around this doorway. Meanwhile, they have shots at every dwarf that tries to charge down that hall.”

Brandon could see that the doors at the far end of the hall were tall, double doors of solid stone. “I assume they’re barricaded?” he asked.

Tankard nodded grimly. “Pretty damned solid too. We hit them with two score men and we just bounced off, like we were slamming into a cliff wall.”

“What about a ram?”

“That’s the next attempt. I sent a platoon back to find something big and heavy that we could use. Ah, here they come now.”

The general turned to see two dozen dwarves approaching across the debris-strewn mess hall. They had a portion of a sturdy stone column hoisted onto their shoulders and held the makeshift ram ready as they reached the officers at the entryway of the hall.

“Perfect,” Tankard Hacksaw said. “Why don’t you stay here and watch us work?” he suggested to Brandon.

“Forget it. I’m coming with you on the charge!” the Kayolin commander protested.

“That’s not your job!” Gretchan barked before Tankard could voice his own objections. But as Brandon rounded on the priestess, his subordinate chimed in.

“She’s a smart one, General,” Hacksaw said. “Your axe will do a lot of good once we get through that door. But until then, you’d just be making yourself a target, and a high-value one for the enemy at that.”

Though it went against every instinct he possessed, Brandon was forced to agree that the captain was right and he should be cautious. “All right,” he agreed through clenched teeth. “But I’m coming up with the rest of your legion the moment you bust through that door.”

“And a welcome sight you’ll be,” Tankard agreed cheerfully. He raised his voice to address his men. “Now I need all the bowmen right here,” he commanded, gesturing to the door. “We’re charging down there with that ram, and I want you to do everything you can to pick off those bastard Theiwar who try to shoot at us from the balconies!”

There was no shortage of willing crossbowmen, but Brandon saw the truth of Tank’s earlier complaint: at the most, twelve of the Kayolin archers would be able to crowd into the doorway to provide covering fire while many more defenders would be able to concentrate their missiles against the ram-wielding attackers.

“Tankard,” Brandon said, placing a hand on his old friend’s shoulder before he realized that he didn’t really have anything to say, just wanted to delay the departure of the dangerous attack for another few seconds. “Be careful-and good luck,” he declared.

“I’m always careful-and lucky!” the captain replied with a breezy grin. He turned to the platoon that had brought up the ram. “All right, you slugs! Carry that thing like you mean it! Now let’s go!”

Gretchan held Brandon’s arm almost as if she expected him to charge forward with the ram. Instead, he clasped his own hand over hers and watched as the brave Kayolin dwarves, with the stone column supported at shoulder height, sprinted into the hallway. As soon as they had charged through the door, the archers moved into position, immediately firing at the enemy crossbowmen who swarmed forward onto the balconies. A few of the Kayolin missiles found targets, but the defenders fired an initial volley that felled six or seven of the ram-bearing dwarves at once.

Others raced forward into the hall, helping to support the heavy column as Tankard urged his men onward. They closed against the double doors quickly, and the makeshift ram smashed into the barrier with a resounding boom. The attackers stumbled back, but Brandon was encouraged to see the doors shaking from the force of the impact.

“Again!” shouted Tankard Hacksaw, and his men reared back to drive the column once more into the doors. “And again!”

But the arrow fire from above was lethal. One bolt caught Tankard in the shoulder, and he stumbled and fell. More of his men were killed, and many of those who ran to assist were shot down even before they could reach the heavy ram. Under the steady hail of missiles, the Kayolin dwarves buckled and wavered, finally dropping the stone column to the floor.

Brandon broke free of Gretchan’s restraining hand. He raced into the hall, feeling an arrow knock into his breastplate and ricochet away. Tankard was kneeling, trying to pull the missile out of his shoulder. Brandon grabbed his old friend by his other arm, pulled him to his feet, then stumbled and careered back to the door. Together they fell into the mess hall, where other willing dwarves pulled them out of the enemy’s line of sight.

“The rest of the men!” Tankard gasped, his face covered in a sheen of sweat. “Get them out of there! Order the retreat!”

By the time Brandon rose to his feet, there was no need to issue any orders. The only Kayolin dwarves left in the corridor were the dead.

“Smell that! Smell fire!” Slooshy chirped excitedly.

“Maybe food with fire?” Gus said, feeling the first glimmer of hope he’d felt since they had picked over the small berry bush several-two? — days earlier.

Since that time, the three Aghar had wandered through the wilds of the Kharolis foothills. They’d come upon a few farms and villages and inns of the hill dwarves but had been driven off in each case before they could even begin to try to steal some food.

In one case, a hill dwarf innkeeper had loosed several ferocious hounds on the gully dwarves, and Gus had lost the seat of his trousers to a savage bite as he’d tried to scramble up a very thorny tree. The fact that Berta and Slooshy had been laughing at him from the higher branches had only served to further fuel his anger and disappointment.

But Slooshy was right: there was a distinct odor of wood smoke on the breeze. “Come this way-find food!” Gus urged, diving into a thorny thicket and pushing through to the other side. His companions came noisily behind, but he didn’t bother waiting.

Stumbling forward eagerly, Gus tumbled into a stream and came up, gagging and choking, to find that he was standing in waist-deep, very cold water. It flowed with a noisy current, and it seemed to him that the smell of the smoke was coming from upstream, so the Aghar charged right through the icy liquid, climbing over slippery rocks, advancing up a channel that seemed to be bounded by two close-set stone walls.