Jeff Crook: Dark Thane

“Their plan was foolish, and I should have seen it. Some madness blinded me,” Tarn said, waving his hands in the air before his face as though he still felt his vision and his judgment clouded. “Aiding them in their escape was the right thing to do, but helping them fight Beryl with arrows and ropes, that was more akin to catching a bird in a snare.” He shrugged. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t thinking.”

“You can’t trust the elves, I always said,” Otaxx murmured as his eyes strayed to the elven longbow hanging on his study wall.

“Elves!” Tarn growled huskily. “I wish to the gods I had never listened to them. If Gilthas himself were to stick his pointy head through that door, I’d chop it off.” Snarling an oath, he slapped the pommel of his kingsword and resumed his seat in one of the antique wooden chairs. The chair looked like a sentimental attempt at a throne. There was distinct elven craftsmanship in its woodland motifs—oak leaves and acorns and unicorns passant. The sight of it made Tarn’s stomach turn.

Yet it was unfair to blame his failures on the elves, and Tarn knew it. This only made him angrier. He had no one to blame but himself. How could he go back to Thorbardin and face those who had lost so much beneath the waters of doomed Qualinost?

“I must return to Thorbardin,” Tarn sighed.

Otaxx clucked his tongue and shook his round head ruefully. “You know what you will find there, my king,” he said. “The Hylar thane will seize this opportunity to challenge your authority. It’s just the sort of event he’s been waiting for.”

Tarn stared darkly across the desk at Otaxx, but said nothing.

“Perhaps it would be better to wait… a couple of days, no more, of course. If there are survivors, we should give them time to find their way back here,” Mog offered. “We can send out search parties. Maybe, with confirmation of Beryl’s death, we can lessen the impact of the news.”

“Lesson the impact?” Tarn asked incredulously. “Do you hear yourself? Thousands of dwarves died because I foolishly went against the will of the Council of Thanes.”

“But if Beryl truly is dead—” Otaxx began.

Tarn silenced him with a look. “I can’t put this off,” he said. “I’ve failed, and thousands of dwarves have died as a result. Let no one speak of what happened to the elf city until I have spoken to the Council of Thanes.”

“There are already rumors, my thane,” Otaxx said.

“Deny them,” Tarn ordered.

“Yes, my thane,” Otaxx said, rising from his creaking chair. “When will you go?”

“At first light. Before I leave, I’ll need to draw replacements for my personal guard from your garrison.”

“I’ll escort you personally,” General Otaxx said. “Evil things will be roaming the plains, now that Beryl’s army has been scattered. It isn’t safe for you to cross alone.”

The huge, vaulted cavern was carved in steps of concentric rings that climbed down to an oval stage at the center, but the air was so thick with smoke that it was impossible to see the opposite side of the arena and nearly impossible to see the stage from its topmost steps. Dwarves of every clan and family crowded the steps, some sitting, many standing and shouting, not a few snoring drunkenly on the rough stone floor. The acrid smell of sweaty unwashed bodies competed with the reek of pitch torches and the stomach-roiling odor of the heady alcoholic beverage known as dwarf spirits. The unmistakable ratwarren-stink of gully dwarves lay like an foundation beneath the other smells, pervading everything, much as the gully dwarves themselves lay everywhere, under everything, in the midst of everything and usually in the way, despite the curses (and worse things) hurled their way.

In the center of the arena, two dwarves battled. Stripped to the waist, their beards bound by leather cords, the pair exchanged bone-crushing blows as fast as their fists would fly. Heavy booted feet tore divots from the hard-packed dirt floor as they fought. Swearing and spitting teeth and blood, the two battlers parted for a moment to catch their breath, their pale, naked hacks heaving for air and glistening with sweat in the smoke-dimmed torchlight. All around them, the crowd roared in approval, stamping their hoots in thunderous applause that seemed to shake the very foundations of the cavern. The two dwarves stared at each other with hate-filled eyes for a moment longer.

Then one snarled, “Theiwar pig!”

“Daergar worm!” the other shouted, launching himself in a sudden wild leap that took the Theiwar by surprise. The first dwarf ducked, only to catch the heel of the other’s boot under his bearded chin. His knees buckled and he sat down then toppled over nosefirst into the dirt.

Half the arena erupted in wild screams of delight. The other half, having lost their wagers, stared grimly for a few moments before demanding an opportunity to win back their money on the next fight. A door at the edge of the sunken arena floor opened, and several dwarves rushed out to drag the limp body of the defeated away and to help the victor stagger out, his arms weakly lifted above his head in victory.

“That should settle that old feud once and for all,” Thane Jungor Stonesinger said to his morose companion. The thane of the Hylar dwarves sat in his personal box high above the arena, out of reach of the unruly, jostling crowd of common dwarves. With an amused smile creasing his luxuriously groomed beard, he extended his left hand, palm upward, and wiggled his fingers.

To his left sat a short, dour dwarf with skin the color of a fish’s belly. His cinnamon-brown beard was plaited and rolled into two thick coils beneath his chin and bound with thin copper wire. His black cloak barely covered the vest of studded leather armor he wore. Snarling, he dug into a pouch at his belt and produced a fistful of steel coins. With obvious reluctance, he counted them out onto the thane’s palm, and each clink of a coin seemed to stab him through the heart.

“Why do you always side against the Daergar in these matters?” he asked petulantly when the last coin was counted.

“I do not always side against the Daergar. I simply do not allow clan loyalties to cloud my judgment,” Jungor said with a smile as his fingers closed around the untidy stack of coins. “Your Daergar cousin was overmatched. Anyone could see that, even you, Ferro. No one forced you to accept my wager.”

He passed the coins over his shoulder to the tall, grim-faced dwarf standing behind him. “Hold these for me,” Jungor said without turning.

“As you wish, my thane,” the captain of Jungor’s personal guard answered, quickly pocketing the coins.

Ferro Dunskull scowled at the tall Hylar warrior standing protectively behind his thane, one massive fist resting on the broadsword at his hip. Captain Astar Trueshield was from one of the most respected Hylar families in Norbardin, Tarn’s new city. He bore the long golden beard of a high dwarf of that clan. He returned the smaller, paler Daergar’s scowl with a haughty sneer.

In the arena below, two new combatants entered to a round of thunderous applause and roars of laughter. The first warrior bounded across the arena floor, a long sword twirling from fist to fist in a brilliant display of swordsmanship. The powerful muscles of his arms rippled beneath skin already glistening with sweat. His strong, white teeth shone in a fierce grin through his short-cropped chestnut beard. He wore a vest of mail over his broad back, and his stout legs were clad in leather greaves.

Behind him slinked a miserable creature clad only in rags and dragging a spear far too long for him to wield with any effect. At the sight of him, the crowd howled with laughter and shouted, “Ong! Ong! Ong!” the noise resounding like an iron bell in this deep subterranean cavern. At the sound of his name, the gully dwarf grinned and waved, and he tried to heft his overlong spear in salute to the crowd, only to topple over with its weight. The unruly mob of spectators only howled more loudly than ever, and he seemed encouraged by their noise, jutting out the tangled nest of his filthy beard and strutting cockily a few steps before tripping over his own feet.