Chris Pierson - Spirit of the Wind

“Do the lice ever complain about how bad you smell?” they shouted gleefully.

“What are you, nine feet tall?” asked others. “I didn’t know they piled dung that high!”

“Do ogre women really like men whose teeth look like smutty corn cobs?”

“Say, you’ve got a great big boil right-oh, sorry that’s your face.”

“Wow! A five-hundred-pound walking wart!”

“Hey, liver-brain! I’ve seen things living under rocks that could outwit you!”

“So, when did you find out your sister and your grandmother were the same person?”

“Great Reorx, you’re ugly. One look at you would make Lord Soth cry for his mother! What are you, part troll or something?”

“Scumlickers!”

“Pigspawn!”

“Overgrown, dimwitted, bandy-legged, slack-jawed, dirt-sucking heaps of rotten goblin excrement!”

Already enraged by the deaths of their comrades, the ogres went utterly berserk. Howling with mindless fury, they charged blindly down the streets after the jeering kender. The kender ran onward, shouting a constant stream of insults as they led the ogres through the confusion of Kendermore’s streets.

Gradually, deliberately, the kender broke up the horde. They split at each fork or intersection, drawing their pursuers in every direction. The ogres surged along the tangled avenues, running as fast as their tree-trunk legs would carry them.

The kender knew where the trip wires were. They saw them as they ran, and hurdled nimbly over them. The ogres, however, could see little but their own crimson rage. They hit the wires, stumbling and falling headlong onto the cobblestones. All over Kendermore, the same thing happened. Hundreds of ogres died, their bodies crushed by the weight of those who came after them.

Many of the trip wires did no more than that; others, however, set off all sorts of booby traps. On Tallowwax Way, a tall rowhouse collapsed, crashing down on the charging ogres and choking the street with broken stone. Across town, on Applebloom Trail, countless caltrops poured from roofs and rainspouts, clattering onto the street like barbed hailstones and crippling anyone who stepped on them. On Tornado Alley, in Moonsong and Stagheart’s wake, a series of wires caused the strings of two hundred carefully arranged crossbows to thrum. Scores of ogres collapsed, their bodies riddled with quarrels. All across the town, pits and snares and rockfalls slaughtered Kendermore’s attackers without mercy.

On Greentwig Avenue, the ogres swarmed over their comrades’ trampled corpses as they continued to chase the kender. They ran with all the speed they could muster, and even caught some of their quarry seizing several unlucky kender and tearing them apart in mindless rage. Still the surviving kender ran, their taunts growing more vicious. As the street twisted and turned, they ducked down alleys or into narrow doorways, their numbers diminishing until only eight remained, pursued by a hundred raging ogres.

Two lagged behind, and the ogres caught them, snapping their necks with their bare hands.

Then, suddenly, they rounded a corner and reached the dead end. A brand-new, twenty-foot stone wall blocked the road, stretching between two four-storey rowhouses.

The remaining six kender didn’t stop, however; in front of them, less than a dozen yards before the wall, were several catapults. They sprinted to the devices and leapt onto their arms. As the ogres rounded the corner behind them, the kender released the catapults’ catches.

The machines’ arms sprung, launching the kender aloft. Behind and below them, the ogres skidded to a halt, staring in astonishment as their quarry flew high into the air, vaulting up and over the wall.

On the wall’s far side, Greentwig Avenue was heaped with loose straw. The kender landed in it, rolled, then leapt up and ran onward, laughing with reckless glee. Back in the dead end, the ogres gawked at the abandoned catapults. Their prey suddenly out of reach, they snarled savagely, shaking their weapons in angry impotence.

When the low, whirring sound first began, the ogres’ eyes narrowed, and they peered about in confusion. The noise seemed to come from all around them, an irritating drone that slowly grew into a loud, high-pitched scream-the shriek of dozens of hoopaks, swinging in unison.

Then the ogres’ confusion gave way to panic as slingstones began to rain down on them from above. Kender appeared on the rooftops of the tall row houses, flinging rocks down into the street. The ogres dropped in waves, filling the air with cries of pain. Those who didn’t fall at first tried to flee, scrambling back away from the wall in a desperate attempt to escape the ambush. More ogres kept coming around the corner from the other direction, however, trapping their fellows and leaving them exposed to the hail of stones. When the last handful of surviving ogres finally broke and ran, they left more than a hundred of their comrades’ battered bodies behind.

So it went throughout the city. Kender led ogres along, dividing them, trapping them and leading them to their deaths in Kendermore’s twisting, mazelike streets. But there were still hundreds of ogres, and there was no stopping them all. Whenever one fell, another stepped over its body to take its place. Though a great many died, they continued to push deeper into the city, down Strawberry Boulevard, up winding Straight Street, along Whitehare Lane and Horsetail Avenue. Hundreds of unlucky kender perished when they stumbled as they ran or tarried too long to taunt their foes.

Inexorably, the ogres overwhelmed Kendermore, pressing inward on all sides, toward the middle of town. In the end, barely two thousand ogres remained-but they had conquered the kender capital.

Which was just what the kender wanted.

The glow of the magma pool faded behind Riverwind and Kronn as they marched onward, following the sinuous, obsidian tunnel. They walked for an hour in silence, pausing only long enough for the kender to light another torch when the shadows grew too deep to see. From time to time, Kronn looked up at the old Plainsman, a question on his lips, then looked away when he saw the fierce scowl that twisted Riverwind’s face.

The passage began to wind upward, like a snake rising to strike. The floor’s glossy surface gave their feet little to grip, slowing them considerably as they fought to keep from slipping. They gripped the walls, pressing their hands against the smooth stone to keep themselves upright. Their legs burned with pain at every faltering step, and the tunnel’s slope grew ever steeper. Once Kronn’s right foot slid out from beneath him, and he stumbled, grunting with pain as his knee struck the floor. He slipped back several feet, scrabbling to stop himself, before Riverwind’s strong hand caught his sleeve. Straining, the Plainsman pulled Kronn back to his feet.

At last the tunnel leveled out, its slope becoming more and more gentle, until finally they could rest without fear of falling. They sank to the ground, panting as they leaned back against the walls. Riverwind groaned, holding a hand against his belly, then leaned over sideways and retched, his chest heaving violently. When the spasm passed, he sat back upright, wiping his mouth with a weak, shaking hand. He smeared blood across his lips.

“Riverwind?” Kronn asked.

The old Plainsman’s eyes rolled toward the kender. A moment passed before they lit with recognition. “Kronn.”

“How long have you known you are dying?” Kronn asked.

“Many months. That’s why I was in Solace when you and Catt arrived-to say goodbye to my friends.”

“And you still came with us?” the kender asked, astounded. “Why?”

“Because I knew no one else would,” Riverwind replied softly.

After another ten minutes of walking, a light glimmered before them once more. The air grew warm, and a sound rose-a slow rhythm of rushing air, like the pumping of elephantine bellows.