Douglas Niles: The Messenger

Now it was time to move. “I’ll go first,” Moreen said, as Randall held the rope for her.

“Of course, lady chief,” he replied. “Just be careful.”

She started up, climbing hand over hand, bracing herself against the rocky walls. Within moments she had passed beyond the illumination of the oil lamp and was fighting claustrophobic terror. Soon she could see a glow above from the small candle Mouse had climbed with. Shortly afterward she found herself sprawled beside him on a narrow, mercifully flat section of cavern floor.

“Next!” whispered the boy as she caught her breath. Soon Randall, then Tildey, had joined her, while the rest of their battle party-twenty Arktos she-warriors, and twenty of the Highlanders-made their way up, one by one. The newcomers gathered on the landing, crowding the rest back from the edge.

“Let’s go have a look at Brackenrock,” Moreen suggested.

“I’ll show you the way,” Mouse offered, and she was surprised at the relief she felt that he was here to provide guidance.

The youth led Randall and the chiefwoman up a steep corridor and around several bends. Abruptly Moreen caught a whiff of raw fish, and in another moment the smell was overpowering. She remembered that stink from her earlier battle with the tuskers and felt a flush of primal hatred. Unconsciously she tightened her grip around the hilt of her iron-bladed sword.

Soon they reached the walled-up place Mouse had described. From within the shadowy chamber they could see orange light spilling through chinks in the stones. When she pressed her eye to the gap Moreen saw a huge room, lit by several blazing hearthfires, and containing dozens of the big thanoi warriors. Some were sitting around listlessly or sleeping, though a knot of them were gathered around a big table, arguing over some kind of game.

It made no difference what they did, Moreen vowed silently, with a prayer to Chislev Wilder. They were doomed.

Strongwind saw immediately that his warriors would not be able to hold their defenses for long. His bravest swordsmen stood shoulder to shoulder across the bottleneck gap, but the ogres were too big, too strong, too numerous. All they could do was sell their lives for precious minutes of survival.

Already the Arktos elders and children had retreated deeper into the cave, toward the base of the shaft discovered by Little Mouse. Many of Strongwind’s warriors had followed, though others remained at his side, ready to fight to the death in the big cavern. It was a fight that could have but one outcome. Already dozens of bleeding, wounded men were retreating past him, visible in the smoky light of the twin bonfires. Maybe a hundred of his men were already dead, an equal number grievously wounded.

Strongwind Whalebone was not an introspective man, but he found himself cursing the foolishness that had brought his army forth from Guilderglow. The Arktos woman had enraged him when she so rudely spurned him at their first meeting, then she had humiliated him by escaping from him. Most of all she had fascinated him in a way that no other person ever had. By Kradok, what madness had she worked, to bring him and his army to such a dolorous end?

The madness had come from within himself. His passion for her was a self-destructive delusion. Now, oddly, he found himself hoping that she might make it to Brackenrock, that she would be able to lead at least some of her people to safety.

“Here, you-King Strongwhistle!” He was startled by an elderly woman snapping at him.

“Strongwind!” he corrected the woman angrily, recognizing the cantankerous shaman of the Arktos tribe. “What do you want?”

“Are you going to stand here like one of those rock pillars, or do you want to do something that might give the ogres a little pause?”

“Tell me what you mean!” he declared, ready to seize on any possibility.

“Well, you have a god of your people, don’t you? You call him Kradok the Wild One, we call her Chislev Wilder. But it’s the same god-just like we’re the same people, ’cept some of us are thick skulled.”

“Do you have anything to say besides blasphemy?” demanded the king. For the first time he noticed, in the shadows behind the shaman, his own high priest, now garbed in his ceremonial robes. “Did you hear that foolishness?” he asked.

“Er, actually, sire,” said the man, an elder cleric who had guided the faith of the kingdom since Strongwind’s childhood, “there is an element of truth to her words.”

“This wild goddess? You tell me Kradok is a woman?” The king couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Such matters … really do not apply,” said the priest, his bear skull helm bobbing apologetically. “That is, they are not important now. I suggest that you hear what the shaman of the Arktos has to say.”

“Very well. What are you trying to tell me?” Strongwind said testily, glaring at the skinny old crone.

“Let’s start simple, so you can understand. You see, our goddess deserves respect, and she has a kind eye for her humans, undeserving though we may be. She doesn’t want to see us all butchered like fish in a barrel. So I think she will help us.”

“How?”

The woman-she was called Dinekki, he remembered suddenly-pointed to a great row of stalactites jutting from the ceiling in the middle of the cavern. “Well, she might be willing to knock those down for us. That would hold up the ogres a bit, don’t you think?”

“That could bottle up the whole cavern. It would take them a week to dig through!” He looked at his high priest. “What is your advice?”

“If the woman can form the framework of the spell, I will try to add my power to the earthquake. We may be able to cause quite a collapse-that is, I believe we can.”

“It would halt their attack.” Strongwind immediately saw the possibilities: A barrier would protect them from ogre pursuit long enough that possibly all of the humans could climb, or be lifted, up the chimney to Brackenrock.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” clucked the elderly priestess. “It will take a little spellcasting from us, and a little distraction from you. We’ve got to hold the ogres at that entrance for a bit longer, til we can get ourselves set.”

“How long do you need?” asked the king of the Highlanders.

“Ten minutes should do. Now, let’s get all those people-all them that aren’t fighting ogres, at least-deeper into the cave.”

Kerrick’s fingers probed at the icy snow behind him. The wet snow, where the Axe of Gonnas had touched it, was slushy and wet. For several minutes, he had been forming a fist-sized ball, compacting it into a chunk of ice as hard as a rock.

The huge ogress queen stood a dozen feet away, her back to the elf, looking across the cove at the battle raging around the mouth of the cavern. From here it was obvious that the humans were faring badly. The wall had collapsed in several places, and ogres were pouring into the cave mouth.

Kerrick saw a figure plodding away from the fight, coming towards them, and he recognized Baldruk Dinmaker. Several other ogres formed an escort for the queen, but they were a respectful distance away along the snowy shore. Cutter , still triple-roped to the stone pillar, rested in the placid water a short distance beyond the queen.

The ogress turned and clumped toward Kerrick, silhouetted against the purple sky paling toward brief daylight. He dropped the iceball, let it sit in the darkness next to his hip. The queen had that great axe in her hands, though the fire had faded from the edge of the blade. She turned her attention to the approaching dwarf. “What word do you bring?” she asked crossly.