Jeff Crook - Dark Thane

“Nothing will go wrong, Thane Stonesinger. Tarn Bellowgranite will not reach Thorbardin alive.”

Captain Ilbars Bleakfell stopped before the tent and muttered a curse as he scraped a clod of clinging black mud from his boot. Around him, half a dozen campfires burned wanly in the misty twilight, each with its company of five or six miserable dwarf warriors huddling near it against the damp and cold. Though still several hours before sunset, the sun had already been swallowed by the thick mist that hung perpetually over this place. Known as The Bog, this swampy region lay on the Plains of Dergoth north of Thorbardin, between the mountain and the ruined magical fortress of Zhaman.

“They call this a road?” Ilbars swore. “If this is a road, I’m a gully dwarf.”

“You stand now on a wandering ridgeback of land that stretches from the plains in the north to Thorbardin in the south,” Ferro Dunskull said as he exited the tent, wiping his mouth on the back of his dusky hand. The pungent aroma of dwarf spirits wafted before him, and he belched a contented sigh. Waving his hand at their gray, dripping surroundings, he continued, “To either side of this road stretch endless miles of sucking bogs, strangling mud, quicksand, and bottomless pools.”

“Bah! Ridgeback of land!” the Daewar captain snorted. “There’s a pool of water under my tent. And the flies!” He swatted the air about him, momentarily scattering the humming swarms of tiny bugs that hung perpetually around his head.

“You don’t get out of Thorbardin much, do you?” Ferro commented in disgust.

“That’s funny coming from a Daergar,” Ilbars said with a sneer. “I thought you and your Theiwar were going to melt in the sun this morning.”

“We suffer so that we may be the first to greet our king,” Ferro answered dryly.

“An honor guard of Theiwar, led by a Daergar, come to welcome a Hylar king back to the mountain!” Ilbars laughed. “Why didn’t they send gully dwarves and make a parade out of it?”

“You forget that Tarn Bellowgranite is half-Daergar by his mother,” Ferro muttered as he pushed past the Daewar captain and edged close to their fire. Two Theiwar warriors grumbled as they made room for him.

“Now we Daewar, I can understand sending us to welcome the king,” Ilbars continued, nodding his shaggy head toward a squad of the doughty warriors squatting around the next fire. “We’re loyal and trustworthy. By my mother’s beard, I wouldn’t trust a Theiwar any farther than I could throw a spear.”

Ferro spat into the fire and glanced at the two Theiwar warriors sharing their camp. They glared into the crackling flames, obviously holding their tongues firmly in their teeth. Because Captain Bleakfell had been ordered by the Council of Thanes to meet the king and escort him back to Thorbardin, they dared not challenge him directly. He was well known as a brash and arrogant commander of the Council Guard and a close friend of the Daewar thane, Rughar Delvestone.

“Well, at least we don’t have any arrogant Hylar to deal with on this trip,” Ilbars said, laughing.

“That is a blessing,” Ferro agreed. The two Theiwar snorted appreciatively but continued to say nothing. Ferro picked up a damp stick and began to poke at the fire, stirring up a plume of sparks that rose a few feet into the damp air before they died. Ilbars pulled his cloak closer around his shoulders and shuddered.

“Is it summer yet?” he asked.

“It’s hard to say,” Ferro sighed.

“What a miserable place. I hope the king arrives before dark, if it ever grows completely dark here. I think it is never dark nor light, just this miserable interminable gray.”

The mist seemed to have drawn closer, fading to ghostly outlines of the stunted trees lining the opposite side of the road. Wisps of fog crept along the ground like ethereal serpents, nosing into the scattered tents of the Theiwar and Daewar guards.

“Haven’t we a Theiwar sorcerer who can dispel this fog?” Ilbars asked.

Ferro shook his head in exasperation then looked up as they heard a sentry shout in challenge. After a few moments, a Theiwar scout hurried toward their campfire. Long strands of dank gray hair hung over his face, and droplets of oily water clung to his beard. His boots were spattered with black mud, his cloak tattered and filthy. He knelt beside Ferro to deliver his report, ignoring Captain Ilbars for the moment.

“A large force is approaching from the north—” the scout said in a hurried whisper.

“I am in command here,” Ilbars angrily interrupted.

The scout glanced disdainfully at the captain, but Ferro nodded his head. His lips curled in a sneer, the scout continued his report, now to Captain Ilbars. “They are not more than a league away.”

“How many?”

“I could not tell in the mist. It was a large force, more than two score,” the scout answered.

“That will be the king’s company,” Ferro said, rising from the fire and straightening the short sword hanging at his belt. “I anticipated his arrival within the hour.”

“You might have told me that you had information as to the king’s schedule,” Ilbars said to Ferro.

The Daergar ignored him, instead dismissing the scout and ordering the Theiwar guards to prepare for the king’s arrival. Before he had finished, several tents were already being collapsed and packed away.

Ilbars watched the activity in a confused fury. The Council of Thanes had sent him, after all. Ferro Dunskull was merely an advisor of scouts attached to his command by Thane Jungor Stonesinger. Yet ever since they had left the north gate of Thorbardin, the insufferable Daergar had acted as though he were in command. Ferro had chosen the location of their encampment in what Ilbars suspected was the most sodden and desolate part of The Bog, long leagues from Thorbardin. They might have awaited the king’s arrival back in the foothills surrounding the mountain, high up above the stink of the bog and with good solid stone to rest their backs against. Against his better judgment, he had allowed the Daergar to lead them into this reeking morass, to make their camp amid the mud and the flies and the serpents.

Ferro reappeared from the mist, followed by Ilbars’s personal guard of six Daewar warriors. The captain approached him angrily, thrusting out his curly beard.

“I am in command here,” he said.

“Of course you are, Captain. I shall see to the arrangement of the Theiwar troops while you take your warriors to greet our king and show him the way to our encampment,” Ferro said hurriedly. He ducked into a tent then reappeared wearing a steel helmet with a bronze nasal and silver rivets.

“I shall go ahead and welcome the king while you remain here,” Ilbars said to him.

Ferro bowed deferentially then hurried off to continue his supervision of the packing. Satisfied, Ilbars ordered his six guards into line and marched off into the mist.

When they had gone, Ferro paused, listening. At a sharp word, the other Theiwar ceased their bustling activities and lined up in defensive ranks, hands on their weapons, faces staring grimly along the path Captain Ilbars and his guards had taken.

Ilbars marched at the head of his company, his heavy boots slogging through the muck, pleased to have left Ferro Dunskull behind. He didn’t like sharing the glory with anyone, especially a Daergar—not that there was much glory to be gleaned from this ceremonial duty. Still, the king would probably welcome the sight of a friendly face appearing unexpectedly as if by magic out of the gloomy mist, welcoming him home from his long and dangerous journey.

He was within earshot of Tarn’s company before he remembered why the king had gone in the first place—to rescue the Qualinesti elves. Ilbars reminded himself to be sure and ask the king how everything had gone. Not that it really mattered. The elves were no concern of his.