Secret of Pax Tharkas

by Doug Niles

  “No!” shouted Brandon, but his voice was drowned out in the melee.

  The Klar had secured the pouch around his waist. The mountain dwarves, forming a tight rank, backed out of the square and down the street from which the attack had burst. The Neidar pursued them, but the Klar force was like a bristling hedgehog, spears and swords pointing out from behind shields, lethal to any pursuer who dared to draw close.

  “They take the stones! Fall on them! Kill them!” Harn Poleaxe cried, cursing frenziedly. Spittle flew from his lips and his face, distorted by rage, seemed to erupt in several more grotesque warts. Brandon could only stare as the Neidar mob, led by his nemesis, raced past him, mere yards away, without taking the slightest notice of one dwarf rooted in place.

  Behind the Neidar fighters, villagers were swiftly moving through the suddenly quiet, abandoned areas, tending to the wounded, pulling cloaks over the faces of the dead. Several Neidar approached Rune, and Brandon stepped quietly away, averting his face. He was not dressed in black armor, so the hill dwarves paid him little attention. He took one longing glance at his axe, where it lay on the table beside Harn’s throne, but there were at least a dozen hill dwarves up there. He didn’t dare try to retrieve it at that moment.

  So he watched the diminishing battle as it moved away from him and realized with a surge of emotion that he was alive, no worse for the wear; he had been unusually lucky, even if the Bluestone was once again gone from his hands. He thrust his captured sword through his belt, trotted down a side street, and made his way down a lane up and away from town.

  From there, he would follow the progress of the retreating mountain dwarves and, Reorx willing, recover his family stone.

  TWENTY

  CAPTAINS OF DWARVES

  Harn Poleaxe led his hill dwarves in another frantic charge, but again and again the Neidar hurled themselves against a solid shield wall of Klar. Poleaxe himself cut down his share of the enemy dwarves, stabbing one laggard then splintering another Klar’s shield, helmet, and skull with a single downward smash of his great sword. Unfortunately, that last blow also snapped off the blade of his weapon, and the huge Neidar finally had to drop back.

  Gasping for breath, he felt as demoralized as his town mates. They had pursued the Klar for more than a mile out of town, at first along the road, then into the narrow side valley. Here and there the mountain dwarves had paused to form up a rearguard. The enemy captain was, cleverly, leading the retreating company through a narrow niche in a rocky ridge. The mountain dwarves were able to bar the entrance to the pass with just ten or a dozen of their number while the rest of the column made good their escape.

  The number of pursuing Neidar had swelled to more than five hundred, but they were defeated finally by the narrow confines. At least two dozen of Poleaxe’s followers had fallen, and the shoulder-to-shoulder press of mountain dwarves holding the gap showed no signs of weakening. Whenever they found an opportunity, the manic Klar even lunged forward, cutting down a couple of hill dwarves who were too slow to jump out of the way.

  The panting, exhausted Neidar were nearing the end of their endurance. Several burly warriors looked at Poleaxe nervously, fingering their weapons and eyeing the impermeable barrier of Klar shields. The dwarves of Hillhome, though they had successfully driven the enemy from their town, were not as well equipped, nor mentally prepared, for a pitched battle on such a steep and rocky slope.

  Rage seethed through Poleaxe’s veins, muscles, flesh, but he understood that rage alone would not carry the day.

  “Fall back,” Harn ordered, his voice tight through clenched jaws. “We’ll take the war to them soon enough.”

  Slowly the Neidar backed away from the line of Klar, ignoring the taunts—“Run away, old women! Go back to your nursemaids’ teats!”—hurled by the victorious raiders. Most infuriating of all, to Harn, was the knowledge that the mountain dwarves had borne away not just the Bluestone, but the Greenstone as well, from the town.

  He blamed himself for forgetting all about the precious artifacts when the fight started. The stupid Klar probably didn’t even know what they had in their possession. The Mother Oracle would be very angry. And Harn was suffering from an almost unbearable thirst. His parched throat seemed barely to allow the passage of breath, and his tongue felt swollen in his mouth.

  For their aggression, the Klar would be repaid with death and destruction, Poleaxe vowed silently. And he would—he must—regain the Bluestone and Greenstone.

  But that vengeance would have to wait.

  He led the dejected Neidar down off the ridge, with the Klar watching them warily until they started on the road back into town. Their taunts against the retreating hill dwarves echoed down from the surrounding ridges as, finally, the rearguard of mountain dwarves broke their shield wall and followed their companions through the rocky niche, disappearing from view as they started on their way back to Pax Tharkas.

  The mood was bitter as the warriors trudged back into the main square of Hillhome with humiliated expressions. Harn went immediately into Moldoon’s and snatched a large jug of dwarf spirits, quaffing a long swallow as he stalked back out into the street. The liquor seared his tongue but seemed, at least a little, to quench his paralyzing thirst.

  Bodies of the slain, discreetly covered with blankets or cloaks, lined one side of the plaza. More than a dozen Neidar had died there, and several times that many had fallen during the failed pursuit. Nobody, not even Poleaxe, felt triumphant that they had driven the attackers away. All of the survivors were painfully chagrined by the knowledge they had been taken by surprise and nearly overcome.

  They all had been too focused on the execution of the mountain dwarf outsider—busy assembling the pile of tinder, with the fire poised to burn, to consume, the wretched prisoner, even as the attack began. Brandon had been shackled and strapped to the rack. Although the condemned spy had been putting on a stoic front, Harn had been looking forward to the moment when his victim’s flesh began to char, his eyes boiling in their sockets. He knew Brandon would have broken down and wept as he died.

  Strange, Poleaxe thought—the thought dawning as a sudden inspiration—how the Klar raiders arrived just at the very moment of the Kayolin dwarf’s doom.

  Abruptly Poleaxe looked around for the prisoner, having forgotten him almost as completely as the vaunted gemstones. He jumped up on the platform and stared, seeing the pile of wood on the ground nearby, but it took a moment for him to recognize the splintered timber as the square rack where Brandon had been suspended, waiting to die.

  And he howled aloud when he realized that the prisoner had escaped.

  “What treachery—where did the Kayolin go?” he demanded, springing down from the platform, striding across the plaza with spittle foaming his beard.

  The Neidar shrank away from the infuriated warrior. Two of Poleaxe’s personal guards, an armored pair carrying massive axes, exchanged looks as their leader stalked to the broken rack and kicked through the debris as if he expected to find the prisoner crouching down among the itty-bitty twigs and pieces of straw.

  “Where did he go?” he roared again.

  A hundred dwarves milled about the plaza, and every one of them was utterly silent in response to Poleaxe’s demand. Thus, when one dwarf groaned softly, all eyes turned to him.

  “It’s Rune!” cried a maid, kneeling beside the warrior and dabbing at his bloody forehead with her apron.

  Poleaxe stomped over to his lieutenant and glared down at the stricken, dazed Neidar. The huge dwarf leader kicked contemptuously at the empty manacles that lay on the ground around Rune.

  “Tell me, fool. How did he get the key?” growled Harn.

  “I was felled by a hammer!” Rune pleaded. “He came upon me as I lay here and wrested it away!”

  “Fool!” bellowed Poleaxe, causing Rune to whimper and cringe against the ground. Trembling in fury, the Neidar warrior gazed around the plaza into the stunned, awestruck faces of his tribesmen. His fingers clutched th
e hilt of his broken sword—he came dangerously close to drawing the weapon and plunging the stub of sharp steel through Rune’s craven heart.

  At the last instant, he held his hand. “Clean this up!” he shrieked, gesturing to the whole square. “I will be back soon.”

  He paused only long enough to take another long drink from his jug of spirits, setting the container beside his chair before he stalked out of the square, through a wide gap that opened up in the ring of staring Neidar. The streets of the town were for the most part empty, and he took some small comfort from the fact there were none to witness his humiliation and despair. A bleak cloud seemed to hover over him, bearing him down as he stomped through the streets toward the shabby hut of the Mother Oracle on Hillhome’s outskirts.

  “Enter!” snapped the ancient oracle, even before he had raised his hand to knock on the door. Hesitantly, he pushed the frail barrier aside and entered the small, darkened room.

  The old crone sat in the same place he had left her the day before. Her milky eyes were open, staring past him, and her gnarled hands were clenched into small fists, curled in her lap.

  “So. You failed,” she spit. “Tell me what happened.”

  He drew a breath and quickly decided against making excuses and dissembling.

  “The mountain dwarves of Pax Tharkas attacked us while we were preparing to execute the Kayolin dwarf. We were taken totally by surprise. The Klar scooped up the two stones, and the prisoner escaped during the battle,” he reported coldly.

  “This is what I have seen,” she said. “You let the gemstones slip from your hold.”

  “I did,” Poleaxe admitted glumly.

  “And you failed to prevent the dwarf maid from coming to me. I was forced to drive her away myself, last night. It took a great effort from an old, tired woman, but I succeeded.”

  “I am sorry, Mother,” Harn said, ashamed. Once again his throat felt dry, his tongue thick in his mouth. He couldn’t even muster enough saliva to present her with an excuse.

  “This is unforgiveable,” she said, but her tone was surprisingly gentle. She raised her wrinkled face, her nose twitching as the lids over her sightless eyes flickered up and down. “You have changed,” she said bluntly. “You have grown but not naturally. How?”

  He was startled by her statement, once more reminded that the Mother Oracle saw far and deep, despite her blindness. When he had awakened that morning, in the room where Gretchan Pax had eluded him, he had felt himself changed and grown. He had stared into a mirror and realized that he had changed physically. He felt in possession of a certain inner strength, a fateful power that he had not known as part of himself before. Anxiously he scratched at one of the bumps that had appeared on his face. It itched constantly, and despite his rubbing, he could not seem to ease the discomfort.

  “I drank something,” he said matter-of-factly. “It was something contained in a bottle of dwarf spirits, but it was not dwarf spirits. I tasted the difference.”

  She nodded, as if his explanation made perfect sense to her. “Good,” she replied. “This I have also seen. This something, this potion, will help you to get the stones back. That is why I am not as angry as you might expect. You must retrieve them soon, of course. As for the Kayolin dwarf, you will have another opportunity to kill him, soon enough, when you recover the Bluestone and the Greenstone.”

  “But, Mother Oracle,” Harn said, puzzled. “Surely the Klar are taking the stones to Pax Tharkas. And who knows where the escaped prisoner will flee?”

  “Oh don’t worry. He, like you, will follow the stones,” she said confidently. “As to Pax Tharkas, you are destined to go there anyway. Destined to attack and capture it.”

  His mind reeled at the lofty goal the Mother Oracle had set for him. He knew that secure fortress well from the outside: its massive towers, the high wall, the vast battlements, the gate strong enough to withstand a dragon’s might. He could only croak, “How?”

  She shrugged, as if that were an issue of no great import. “The answer will come to me and it will come to you in good time. Do not fear. But for now you must act here, in Hillhome.”

  “What should I do?”

  “The people are understandably shaken and angry. You must turn that anger to your cause with a demonstration of your vengeance, giving proof of your power and your command.”

  “Yes. I know just what to do. The other prisoners! There are two Theiwar in the brig. I will make an example of them. They will die in the Kayolin’s stead. And then we will muster our resources and plan a counterattack that the Klar will not soon forget.”

  “Good,” said the old dwarf woman, raising a withered claw. He knelt and kissed her hand. “Go. Plan. Conquer.”

  “Thank you, Mother Oracle,” Harn declared.

  And he did as she advised. As he returned to the town square, he no longer felt despair or humiliation; he felt calm, confident, in control. He took a deep draught from the jug that, not surprisingly, the townsfolk had left untouched beside his great chair. He was feeling better already as he looked across the square. The Neidar were there in teeming numbers, many hundreds, muttering and fretting. They grew silent as the big hill dwarf swaggered back and forth on the platform then flopped into his chair in one smooth gesture.

  “Our vengeance begins this morning, and it will not be complete until total victory is ours!” he proclaimed. A few Neidar clapped or shouted in agreement, but he brushed their mild encouragement away.

  He pointed. “There are still two mountain dwarves imprisoned in the brig,” Poleaxe declared in a calm, measured tone. “Are there not?”

  “Y-yes, Lord Poleaxe!” came the reply from none other than Shriff Keenstrike, who was standing close by.

  “Bring them here!” he ordered, deciding he liked, very much, being called “Lord Poleaxe.”

  Five minutes later the two captives, the Theiwar miners, were shoved into the middle of the plaza. Angry Neidar pressed in on all sides as Poleaxe spoke.

  “Mountain dwarf filth!” he snapped as the two prisoners were shoved to their knees before him. He gestured to the bodies, to the destruction and detritus of battle around the plaza. “This is the work of your kinfolk! A treacherous attack, innocents slain—and then a cowardly retreat. Someone must pay! Someone will pay!”

  One prisoner dared to raise his head and was smacked down again by a guard.

  “Your tribesmen may have fled, but you are here, and you will receive the first taste of Neidar vengeance. Guards—bring me a block!” he cried, and several of his warriors quickly produced a broad, sturdy stump, setting it on the ground in front of the prisoners.

  “Yarrow—is your blade sharp?” Poleaxe demanded of one of his bodyguards.

  “Yes, lord. Sharp—and thirsty,” replied the Neidar axeman with a glare at the two hapless prisoners.

  “Good,” Poleaxe replied. He gestured contemptuously to the pair. “Cut off their heads!” he ordered to an explosion of cheers and shouts from the crowd.

  “Kill them!” cried many of the Neidar, pressing in, faces eager with bloodlust.

  Only Slate Fireforge, far to the back of the crowd, watched the executions with any expression of sadness and dismay.

  Brandon kept following the high ground just below the summit of the ridge, moving steadily away from Hillhome, keeping the mountain dwarf column ahead of him in sight. He was conscious of the captured sword at his belt, but that weapon wasn’t going to be much use to him in his situation. He felt bitter regret at the memory of his cherished battle axe, no doubt treasured by some Neidar thief—possibly even Harn Poleaxe himself. Perhaps he would get it back one day. For the moment he had the sword.

  And that, too, added to his sense that his luck was changing. After all, he was no longer a prisoner, he was armed, and his family’s treasured stone was, at least, in the hands of mountain dwarves, not the vile Neidar. Things were indeed looking up.

  The repulsed attackers maintained a pretty good pace as they marched swiftly toward t
he northwest. They had the advantage of the road, so Brandon was forced to jog along, climbing up and over obstacles, rocky outcrops and clumps of gnarled woods. He was puffing for breath, jogging near the crest, when he realized he wasn’t the only person tracking the column.

  A pair of dwarves accompanied by a large black dog was moving along the slope just below Brandon. Cautiously, he crouched behind a ledge of rock and observed the other pursuers. Then his eyes widened as he recognized the blonde-haired dwarf maid as Gretchan Pax, the historian who had spoken to him in the Hillhome brig.

  What in Reorx’s name was she doing out there?

  Even as he wondered that, he found himself rather impressed by her field craft. Unlike him, she wore a bulky, apparently heavy, backpack, but she trotted along with ease and strength, hopping gracefully across the loose rocks of the high ridge crest. Her blue leggings and soft boots outlined the muscular curvature of her legs, and the sturdy traveling cloak she wore couldn’t completely mask the alluring outline of her curvy shape.

  Her companion, he was startled to realize, was a ragged-looking gully dwarf. The Aghar trailed behind her, apparently keeping up a steady stream of chatter, though they were too far away for Brandon to hear what was being said. Even as he wondered what odd circumstance could have thrown the unlikely pair together, he warily watched the dog that bounded close beside the two. The wind was in his face, so he didn’t worry about his scent wafting down to the animal, but he made sure to walk stealthily, avoiding any untoward crunching of leaves or skittering of stones that might give him away.

  What did Gretchan Pax want with the militant Klar? He couldn’t guess the answer, but he didn’t like the chance that she might discover him. Clearly she was friendly with the Hillhome dwarves, and he wasn’t about to take any chances on her sympathy for him. Was she spying on the mountain dwarves for her own Neidar people? Somehow that explanation didn’t ring true, but what exactly she was doing remained a mystery.