Return of the Dwarf Lords (Legends of the Nameless Dwarf Book 4)

by D. P. Prior

  The Warlord’s expression went blank, as if he were uncomfortable receiving praise. “It was the right thing to do,” he said, before walking away to talk with Ardo.

  Gitashan’s eyes never left Nameless as he crossed over to her and sat down.

  “The Warlord is right,” she said. “If we make it to Arnoch, we will have no further need of the portal stone.”

  Nameless shrugged. “They have one the other end. Maybe it can be duplicated?”

  She shook her head. “No need. Whatever happens when we get to Arnoch, whatever we find there, we are never coming back to Thanatos.”

  An insect buzzed past Nameless’s ear, and he swatted it away. “Not going to miss it?”

  “It’s all I know,” she said. “But at the same time, I have always felt there is more to life than this. I suppose it comes down to Ancient Bub reading to me and my sister from the Annals. Tell me, Nameless, is it true the skies of Aethir are blue?”

  “Cobalt,” he said. “And we have two suns, neither of them black.”

  “Two?”

  “Aye, lassie, and three moons, too.”

  She smiled. It was the first genuine softening of her face Nameless had seen. “I cannot wait to see them.”

  “And you will, lassie. You will.” He only hoped he was telling the truth. Passing through the portal was no guarantee of cobalt skies. Arnoch was still sunk beneath the sea, and even if she rose—when she rose, he had to tell himself—there was still the small matter of the dragon to attend to.

  He excused himself from the Matriarch and went in search of Ancient Bub, wanting to talk more about the giant balloon Abednago had found in the highest of Arnoch’s towers.

  Bub was poring over a dusty leather-bound tome. He had a pile of them atop a sack on the ground.

  “All I had time to salvage,” he said. “But the rest is in here.” He tapped his head. “One of the advantages of old age, and of teaching the Annals for centuries.”

  “You don’t forget more with each passing year?” Nameless said.

  “Not me. Not this old head. And I’ll wrestle anyone who says otherwise.”

  Bub told Nameless he was going to need a team of dwarves the moment they arrived. The airship, as he referred to the balloon, was hundreds of years old and, as far as he could tell from the Annals, had never been tested. Inside, according to the designs he’d studied, there were gas bags that needed to be filled with hydrogen. Arnoch apparently had scarolite tanks of the flammable gas tucked away beneath its foundations, and there were scarolite pipes feeding it all the way to the hangar, as the Dwarf Lords of old referred to the petal-enclosed turret at the top.

  “There are dragon guns mounted on the battlements of the citadel,” Bub said, drawing Nameless’s attention to the page he had been reading. “We’ll need them to draw the beast away from the airship.”

  “I know,” Nameless said. “Massive cannons, but no one knows how to use them.”

  “Don’t you worry about that,” Cidruthus Tallish said, ambling over to join them, “it was my House that built them.”

  Before they could go any further with planning what needed to happen on arrival, the Warlord announced it was time to go. Two of his people brought a stretcher for the husk girl, and Grimwart puffed out his cheeks and admitted it was a shogging relief. With Shadrak moving once more, if not quite all there, it would certainly make the rest of the journey that much easier.

  On their passage to the Forest of Lost Souls, the Warlord took them on a course that kept them well clear of the villages. Ardo, who had taken to walking alongside Nameless, explained it was so they didn’t draw the swarming Thanatosians there. It was a rare thing indeed for the creatures to gather in such numbers, and everyone was saying it was an attack directed against the Dwarf Lords by the planet itself. Apparently, the Dwarf Lords had long outstayed their welcome, and had staved off extinction for longer than Thanatos was willing to accept. What that meant, a planet that was sentient and capable of such animosity, was beyond Nameless. But what did he know, coming from a world that was dreamed by a dog-headed ape? It was a strange cosmos, was all he was willing to say on the matter.

  The other reason for the alternative route to the one Nameless and his companions had taken when they left the forest, was that the Warlord didn’t want to come to the attention of the city. Ardo could be drawn very little on the nature of the conflict between the Warlord and the city’s rulers, but Nameless assumed it was on account of the Pressers taking the villagers away as fodder. Ardo conceded that was part of it, but there was something more personal, some kind of feud between the Warlord and a man called Murdane, who was also originally from Urddynoor, and was reputedly the architect and behind-the-scenes governor of what he called New Londdyr. If Ardo were to be believed, it was a situation that had remained unaltered for centuries, almost as long as there had been dwarves in the Dark Citadel. Assuming it was the same Murdane running things for all this time, Nameless was sure he knew the type: a megalomaniac as bad as Sektis Gandaw. Or worse, an undying monster of the ilk of Otto Blightey, the Lich Lord of Verusia. It was just one more reason he was glad they were leaving.

  The wildlife of Thanatos was uncharacteristically quiet as they made their way from the camp to the Forest of Lost Souls. Maybe it was the sight of three-hundred Dwarf Lords armored to the hilt, and the party of black-garbed humans with re-charged and re-loaded weapons that were a match for anything Thanatos might throw at them. Whatever the reason, it was a blessed relief.

  But as they neared the edge of the forest, Thanatosians once more began to gather in the distance.

  The Warlord led them in a beeline for the forest, and rather than skirting around it, he took them straight through. Half an hour in, and the first Thanatosians were spotted flowing between the trees behind.

  Ardo and two others hung back to hinder the pursuers. Nameless felt a pang of trepidation for the strongman, and it blossomed into dread when he heard the rattle of gunfire. Minutes later, Ardo and the other two caught up with the rest of them. Ardo said something to the Warlord, and then they proceeded apace.

  At the clearing where they had first met Kadee, Tarik was waiting with Kaldwyn Gray. While the Warlord exchanged words with Tarik, Nameless and Grimwart clapped their friend on the shoulder and filled him in on what had happened.

  Kal told them how the people of the forest had buried his old body. They’d conducted some sort of ritual over it, and offered him consolation. It was no worse than throwing away frayed and tattered clothes, he said. The new body he had now was far superior. He only wished it weren’t confined to the ambit of the forest. When they told him what had happened to Kadee, he shuddered, and reaffirmed that he had no intention of ever setting foot outside. There was plenty to do there, and enough people to keep it interesting. Tarik had even told him of his theory that the forest would one day expand to encompass most of Thanatos, shaping a paradise out of a hell. Kal’s only real regret was for the people he had left behind.

  It was a brief exchange, as the Warlord was done with Tarik in a minute and keen to press on to the portal.

  “I feel bad I’m not coming with you,” Kal said. “Do you really think this plan will work?”

  “It has to, laddie,” Nameless said. “Else that’s the end of us as a people. I don’t like putting all our eggs in one basket like this, but there’s no other way.”

  “Just remember what you said you’d do for me,” Kal said as they parted. “Don’t forget to tell Glariya. You said you knew what to say.”

  “I do, laddie. Rest assured, I do.” He hadn’t prepared anything, but he’d learned when speaking from the heart, it was better to let the words just come.

  Kal accompanied them to the glade surrounding the portal, but he stayed within the forest as Nameless and the Warlord led the column of dwarves and humans toward the muddy depression the arch stood within. Clearly familiar with the place, the Warlord scorched the boggy earth with a stream of flame. The mud dried out in an i
nstant, and charred and desiccated leeches lay like scabs upon the ground.

  “You live and learn,” the Warlord said.

  At that moment, a Thanatosian blurred away from the tree line behind the portal and flung itself at them. The Warlord brought his gun up too late, and it was smacked from his grip. Nameless caught the Thanatosian’s wrist as it stabbed at the Warlord with a silver dagger. It backhanded him into the stone of the arch and sprang after him. As Nameless warded off a flurry of glittering strikes with Paxy’s blades, he heard the Matriarch cry out, “No! Do not shoot. You will hit Nameless.”

  Nameless wanted to shout, “Shoot anyway!” It would have increased his chances. He parried and countered so fast, Paxy’s blades were reduced to smudges of gold. But the Thanatosian was relentless, and Nameless was bone weary. How the shog Lord Haxon Kly had taken down four of them was a miracle, whichever way you looked at it.

  A glinting blade sliced the air a hair’s breadth from his cheek. Another came darting in at his eye. Paxy got there, but only just in time. The Thanatosian brought its legs into play, kicking, stabbing, dancing a frenetic jig. Nameless grunted as a foot caught him in the guts. He kicked back at the creature, but it dodged with ease. In desperation, he swung wildly, but it leapt clear of the axe head and flowed into a renewed assault.

  The stomp of heavy footfalls behind almost made Nameless turn. If he had, he knew he’d already be dead.

  Silver flashed toward his throat. He blocked. Another blade came at his ribs. Paxy chopped down. There was a chink, and the dagger thudded to the ground. The Thanatosian closed its empty hand around Nameless’s throat, squeezed like a vise. Its other hand came up, dagger gleaming.

  “Duck!” Grimwart yelled.

  Nameless dropped to his knees without a moment’s hesitation, the momentum wrenching his neck free of the Thanatosian’s grip.

  Air rushed above his head, followed by a thud and a pulpy splat. Hot, black blood showered over him.

  He craned his neck to see Grimwart, shield on his back, mace held two-handed and dripping gore.

  “You know,” the Kryptès said, “you were right about my name. Do you think it’s too late to go back to the old one?”

  “Laddie,” Nameless said, pushing himself to his feet on shaky legs. “It’s never too late. Welcome back, Duck.”

  The Warlord’s people came down the bank into the depression, fanning out behind the portal, guns aimed along the tree line. Atop the bank, Gitashan sighed with relief as she met Nameless’s eyes, then she did the unthinkable and gave Grimwart—Duck, once more—a nod of respect. Her sister Thyenna took her hand, and the two stood together as the Dwarf Lords filed toward the arch.

  Cries went up from the tail of the column, which was still within the trees. The last stragglers backed into view behind their shields, coming to a halt atop the rise. Four Thanatosians hurtled out of the forest toward them.

  Blue bolts fizzed, dropped two in an instant, and left their smoking corpses on the forest floor.

  “Howzat!” Cid yelled. “Oh, shog,” he said, as the other two pounced.

  There were two cracks of thunder, and two more corpses.

  Shadrak stepped alongside Cid, eyes still locked to his targets. “Howzat?” he echoed.

  Cid looked at him with wide-eyed awe, and then slapped him on the back. “A man after my own heart, sonny. Now, where in shog did you get those guns? Here, let me have a look.”

  “There are more moving through the forest,” one of the scarolite-helmed guards reported to the Matriarch.

  “Then let’s waste no more time,” the Warlord said. He stepped up to the portal and pressed his stone into its place at the apex. “If anyone knows how to set this thing to go anywhere other than Urddynoor, now would be a good time.”

  Ancient Bub stepped up, dragging his sackful of Annals. “It will know us. The stone, I mean. It will know where we belong.”

  “Know?” the Warlord said. “You make it sound sentient?”

  “All I know is what it says in the Annals.” Bub hefted the sack to his shoulder. “The stone will know where to send us. Each to their own time, each to their own place.”

  “Yes, but what if it’s a homunculus deception?” Shadrak said, coming down the bank with Cid in tow. Anyone would have thought they were old friends, the way Cid had been rabbiting on to the assassin and ogling his flintlocks.

  “We are Dwarf Lords,” Bub said with a frown of bewilderment. “According to the Annals, the homunculi were ever friends to our ancestors. They helped build Arnoch. Why would they deceive us?”

  “Why indeed?” Nameless said.

  After what had happened back at Arx Gravis, when the homunculus thief had substituted a doctored version of the Annals and set in sequence the events that led to the black axe and slaughter, he wouldn’t put anything past the shifty shoggers. It wouldn’t surprise him to learn they’d been playing the Dwarf Lords since the first days of Arnoch. It’s what they did: deceive. They couldn’t help themselves. They were the spawn of the Demiurgos, after all: the Father of Lies. And what’s to say they hadn’t done to Bub’s Annals what they’d done to the Annals of Arx Gravis? Nameless certainly didn’t want the fate of his people to turn on the say-so of a book. But what other options were open to them? Either they did nothing, and the dwarves of Arnoch died, or they placed their hope on a whim and a prayer, which is what dealing with the lore of the homunculi always came down to.

  “Well,” Bub said, “the Annals have guided me all my long life. I see no sense in doubting them now.”

  With that, he stepped through the portal. Lightning arced, and the air filled with ozone.

  In the same instant Ancient Bub vanished from sight, he exclaimed, “Oh my shog!”

  And then even the sound of his voice was gone.

  “Grimwart,” Nameless said, “You go next. Take the girl. Make the introductions.”

  “Duck.”

  Nameless dipped at the knees and covered his head.

  “No, the name. It’s Duck again, remember?”

  “How could I forget?” Though he had forgotten. His mind was all over the place, and he needed a flagon of ale to steady it.

  Duck lifted one end of the girl’s stretcher, and a Dwarf Lord took the other. Together, they carried her through the portal, and then Thyenna started to usher the rest of the Dwarf Lords beneath the arch in twos and threes.

  It seemed to take forever, and Nameless was a nervous wreck, scanning the tree line for any further signs of attack.

  “If they were coming in force, they’d have done so by now,” the Warlord said. “Trust me, I’ve been hunted by those things for so long, I know their ways inside out.”

  “You do?” Nameless said. “What if they know yours, too?”

  The shock of realization hit the Warlord’s face. He held it for a long moment, a frozen mask of horror, and then he laughed. “Got you there, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, laddie,” Nameless said. “You did that.”

  “We’ve been engaged in our game of hunter and prey for an age,” the Warlord said. “A pattern has emerged and stayed pretty much the same. I’d say we’ve weathered the worst of it, and they’ll likely leave us alone now.”

  A scream rent the air, and the back of the column devolved into a chaos of pushing and shoving. Black shapes streamed from the trees so fast, they seemed like shadows. But the blurred movement was on account of numbers, equally as much as speed. There were so many Thanatosians, it looked like the entire charred forest had come alive.

  “Go!” the Matriarch cried to the rest of her people. “Get through the arch!” At the same time, she strode toward the back of the line, scarolite scimitar in hand.

  Thyenna went with her, jogging at first, then breaking into a sprint as she drew her broadsword.

  Nameless was already following, yelling at the last two-score dwarves to move it.

  On the other side of the portal, the Warlord’s group came under heavy attack. Thanatosians swelled toward
them, a seething black tide. A wave of fire met their front ranks. Dozens fell, but others powered on through, skin blistering and smoldering.

  Cid and Shadrak ran to reinforce the Warlord’s people. The old dwarf sent bolt after bolt of blue fire into the Thanatosians, and Shadrak hurled one of his glass spheres. Coruscating white fire exploded with concussive force, and dozens of the creatures were flung high and wide.

  As Nameless crested the low bank bordering the depression, Thyenna and Gitashan slammed into the Thanatosians pouring from the forest. It shouldn’t have been possible. They should have died in an instant, but the two Immortals danced and spun, scythed and hacked with such brutal efficiency, Thanatosians started to fall in droves. In part, it was due to the press of their numbers, limiting their movement, neutralizing their speed.

  And then Nameless was in among them, no longer struggling just to stay alive. His blood was charged with the thrill of battle, but it was unlike anything he had felt before. Paxy throbbed in his grip, and her blades flashed like Aethir’s suns. His heart was a resounding drum beat in his ears, but not the frantic tattoo he’d come to expect. It was languid, and his chest juddered with every beat.

  The Thanatosians seemed to move through molasses now, their every attack signposted. Part of his mind was baffled. Why were they so slow? But the core of his awareness was caught up in the rapture of battle. He weaved in among the Thanatosians, Paxy’s blades a whirling vortex of death. He chopped, creatures fell. And with each new death, Paxy pulsed with violent waves of energy. She was drinking in the slaughter, reveling in it.

  To Nameless’s left, Gitashan was caught in the same murderous dance, gliding and cutting, spinning and slashing, great arcs of black blood slinging in the wake of her scimitar.

  On his right, Thyenna was an indomitable goddess of death, her broadsword rising and falling with sublime precision.

  And as the three drew closer together, the more Nameless’s blood boiled with the ecstasy of it all. It was as if they drew strength from each other; as if Paxy drew on it, too. And along with the strength came preternatural bursts of scintillating speed.