by Cebelius
"I would be," Tyra said, now dry-washing her hands. "Shame you destroyed him though. I've wanted to head out to see him for years. It's one of the reasons I transferred out here. My master was the one who built him."
"You had years, why didn't you go?" Angie asked.
Tyra scowled and didn't answer. Not being particularly curious, Angie didn't press.
"Well, we'll see for ourselves about the campaign on our own way through," Ingvar said, waving a hand absently. "What can you tell us about the hobs in Svartheim."
"Indeed," Brenna chipped in. "I've never seen a hob. No one here has. How many are there? What are they like?"
"The bergsrå of Svartheim has told us that somewhere around a hundred hobs remain in Svartheim, along with an unknown number of their goblin kin. Hobs are somewhat like orcs in size and shape ... though they are better disciplined. My limited experience with them keeps me from saying much more."
"A hundred orc-like opponents, and the Mistress sends only six combat-ready dwarves?" Ingvar scoffed. "How are we supposed to do this? It's suicide."
"The Mistress sent virtually every combat-ready dwarf left in Sidastrgeil," Brenna replied, folding her arms across her chest. "Along with two master smiths to see to their armor and weapons, and a runesmith to enchant them."
"Abram is a master wizard," Angie added. "And once Sif is back in her mountain, she will be formidable. The whole of the dungeon will turn against the hobs and their goblin kin."
"Tell us about this master wizard," Tyra said. "I had meant to speak to him, but he ... isn't very approachable."
"No, he isn't, and you shouldn't try," Angie said. "Abram will more than carry his weight, rest assured. When we reach Svartheim, you will be told his abilities, and his part in the assault will be planned."
"Eccentric is he?"
Sigrid spoke for the first time, and her rough voice gave Angie the impression she spent too much time with a pipe in hand.
"That's putting it mildly," Angie said, willing to play up the dwarves’ impression.
Besides ... it's true, she thought. Abram is nothing if not eccentric.
"Very well, we'll get the details on him later. I'm sure you're tired as well. Would you tell us your name?"
Angie blinked, then realized that introductions had never actually been made. Sif had simply announced that she and Abram were her hirelings, and nothing more had been said of it.
"My name is Angie," she said, deciding to stick with their earlier story for now. "I am a reaver. Abram and I have been working together for some time. When we entered Svartheim, we found Sif, and she hired us to come get dwarven support to retake her home."
"Why agree?" Sigrid asked. "She doesn't control Svartheim. She can't have had much to give you and most surfacers don't risk Subterranean Celestine on empty promises."
Angie smiled grimly. "We liked her, and we don't need a better reason than that. She's a good girl, and we'll take care of her until she gets what's hers. Then we'll get what's ours and see what happens. It was good to meet you."
She opened the door, and no one stopped her or asked anything else of her. Five minutes later she was back in the room she shared with Sif and Abram with her armor off, and five minutes after that she was asleep.
"What do you think?" Brenna asked as she glanced around the room.
Tyra said, "I think I've never met a wizard who worked for promises, and I've certainly never met one who walks around barefoot."
"I think I've never seen a woman that looks quite like Angie does," Sigrid put in. "What's her race? She's got muscle, but she's too tall to be one of us."
"I think that leather the bergsrå's wearing was bought at the dock we just left," Ingvar put in. "It's new, I recognize the craftsmanship, and I've met the trog that makes the stuff. He did a belt for me a few years back."
"What do you think," Sigrid asked, looking at Brenna, who scowled.
"I think when Sidastrgeil's Mistress gives me orders, I follow them," she said. "She told us to help these three retake Svartheim, and further that we should stay and support the dungeon until we get recalled. I think you three and Gunvor being sent along proves she wasn't taking this lightly, that she expects us to succeed."
Brenna shrugged. "So that's what I'm going to do."
"Yeah, fine," Ingvar growled as he idly cracked his knuckles. "We get that you follow orders, but what do you think?"
She hesitated, then sighed and showed her hands as she said, "I think this whole thing smells like sulfur, and if that wizard isn't way more powerful than he looks ... we are all fucked."
24
With or Without You
Abram blinked, then glanced warily around. He was walking with Sif on his right, Angrboda on his left. The three of them were leading a small column of dwarves across the bridge from the empty plain of stone where they'd encountered Kappi to the mushroom forest, and the smell of death and rot was thick in the air.
Confusion washed through him as he realized that he didn't remember most of the time between when he'd gone to sleep on the barge and the present moment.
Hantu?
'Yes?'
Did we skip forward or something?
'Not really, but you haven't exactly been paying attention. Eat, sleep, shit, repeat has been your modus operandi for the last few days.'
That begs the question why I'm paying attention NOW, Abram thought, making a note to himself that he needed to check the date when he logged out next. It seemed to him that he'd spent most of the last few days working off-line, though the details all blurred together.
'You'll have to answer that yourself,' Hantu replied.
"These bodies, they were organized by the three who agreed to come back to Sidastrgeil with you?"
Abram glanced back and saw the paragon in silver armor ... Brenna was her name, had stepped up to join them and was looking to Angie for her answer.
"Yes," she said.
"That's unusual," Brenna commented. "The bodies of the fallen aren't typically retrieved until the campaign is finished."
"They told us they'd been injured early and left behind," Angie said.
Brenna nodded, glancing back toward the other dwarves.
They were just now passing the rows of armored — and now heavily decayed — corpses. Abram noticed the other dwarves, at least the ones not wearing helmets, were also looking askance at the bodies.
The fact that the three they'd taken on were apparently shady through and through made him wonder again what it was he'd missed the first time. He was virtually certain now that it had been some sort of set up, but who could have possibly known they'd be coming?
The blip on his radar heading toward Sidastrgeil popped into his head again, and he frowned.
The more I think about this, the more I think someone's fucking with us, he thought. But how could they be both behind AND in front of us? That dwarf chick at Sidastrgeil knew we were coming, and wouldn't say how.
Hantu made no reply, and Abram was forced to put it on the back burner again as Brenna said, "The fact that we haven't seen any signs of the campaign does not bode well. They're late."
They're DEAD, Abram thought, but didn't dare say. He didn't even glance toward his companions as he said, "Their objectives have nothing to do with ours, and we are pressed for time. What happens to them is of no concern."
"Abram!" Sif said sharply. "Have respect. These campaigners are kin to those who travel with us."
"I am paid for my abilities, not my bedside manner," Abram replied, folding his hands into his robes as he covered up his mistake as best he could by playing the role of crotchety wizard to the hilt. "I don't care what they were sent here to do. We are bound for Svartheim. What I want is there."
"They were sent to clear the Broodmother out of the way so that we could begin construction of a road to the Rift," Brenna said quietly. "Word is that Torp has fallen, and no one has moved to retake the city. With them gone, the Undercity Syndicate plans to lay claim to the mineral resources in this
part of the Kaldebrekka."
Abram made no visual sign that he'd heard her, but he certainly had, and didn't like it. Those mineral resources would go to him. With the campaign wiped out and the Broodmother in his pocket his flank was covered for now, but he made a mental note to revisit this issue before it came back to bite him. He also resolved to find a trog who could give him advance notice of dwarven movement on the Sea of Two. How to make that kind of communication possible would have to be something he worked out later.
And I'll have to find out what the hell 'Torp' is, or was. Another dwarven faction maybe?
Again Hantu failed to chime in, and Abram reminded himself that, at least ostensibly, his familiar only knew what he himself could possibly know, and no one had mentioned Torp before now.
"We will have to discuss terms for such a road, should it come to pass," Sif said quietly. "Svartheim's resources will, of course, remain under Svartheim's control."
"Naturally," Brenna conceded. "We would like you to divert long enough for us to at least see how the campaign fares."
Abram gritted his teeth and said nothing, then smiled as Sif said, "No. My wizard may be rude, but he's not wrong. We are pressed for time. Svartheim comes first. I am not going to risk a confrontation with the Broodmother or her spawn. We should consider ourselves lucky that your campaign has at least cleared the way, or this would be a much more difficult journey."
"You wouldn't have even gotten to Sidastrgeil on your own had our campaign not emptied this wild for you," Brenna said with a scowl.
"Hmph."
Abram said nothing more, and after another moment, Brenna dropped back to rejoin her companions, presumably relaying what they'd been told.
"Hopefully they follow us and not their inclinations," Angie said sotto voce. "Fighting them to keep them from seeing the fates of their companions won't serve us."
"They swore. They'll obey me," Sif said just as quietly before adding, "though it doesn't help to needlessly antagonize them."
"I've been dead quiet for days," Abram said. "Nobody's perfect."
"Speaking of which," Angie said, "is something wrong?"
He shrugged and said, "With nothing going on, I just took some time to see to other things, that's all."
"See to other things? You spent most of the last few days staring blankly at a wall," Sif said.
"I spent most of the last seven years staring blankly at a stone ceiling no thanks to you," Abram spat. "I guess old habits die hard, huh?"
Sif made no reply to that, and Abram was happy to let the conversation die. He felt a vague flash of unease at referencing the 'time' he'd supposedly spent chained to a table, but it got her to drop the subject and that was good enough. Mission accomplished.
Still, I'll have to find some way to cover up being gone when I inevitably have real shit to do, he realized. The fact that this game just keeps moving may motivate more play time, but that there doesn't seem to be any way to cover my absences is just ridiculous. This is like Total Recall shipped to your door.
"We need to turn early," he said after a while. "Sif, you know the way back to Svartheim, right? Isn't it like a beacon to you?"
"I ... yes. I can always find my way home."
"Turn early. I shouldn't have to say why."
"You don't."
Soon after, Sif re-entered the mushroom forest, leaving the trail of devastation behind. Abram paused at the edge and half-turned, watching as the dwarves hesitated. Several of them had a heated exchange, and one of the females that he'd tentatively identified as a scholar pointed at him, making no effort to disguise the gesture. Brenna shook her head, and one wearing full armor that hid his features gestured broadly down the track they were leaving.
"Here it is," he murmured to himself. "So now the question becomes whether we get the help we asked for, or leave more bodies on the pile and waste the last week and change."
"I'm not entirely sure we can even kill them all if we have to," Angie said quietly.
"Oh we can't. Not all at once anyway. If they challenge us, Sif runs, you fight until your proxy is destroyed, and I'll escape once you go down. Between my efforts and the Broodmother's, we'll get the rest. I'll target the hero units first, and leave the grunts for last. As long as I get those two scholars and the champion, the rest are fodder."
He glanced back and saw Sif staring at him with wide eyes.
"What?" he asked.
"After all we went through, would you really just kill them?" she asked, her tone one of disbelief.
"I'll let them walk if they just leave, but anyone that turns on me dies. After the shit I've been through, can you blame me?"
"Without them, we can't retake Svartheim."
"Maybe, maybe not. I've gotten new bond powers, and a greater understanding of the gifts I have available. Given a bit of time, I might be able to finish the hobs myself. Napalm. Poison gas. Zombie plague. Hell, I don't know — my options are practically limitless. These dwarves make things easier, but now that I have all the affinities I'm exponentially more capable than I was when we set out."
He glanced back toward the still arguing dwarves as he said, "What we really need those knuckleheads for is those two smiths, and the scholars. I'd love to pick their brains. There's a lot about magic I still don't know, stuff I really need to learn. But if they turn on us here, better to wipe them out and look elsewhere for the knowledge I need."
Hantu Raya's text scrolled by, 'Your mouth is writing checks I'm not sure your mana can cash.'
Abram didn't answer him, saying instead, "This is all academic. If they follow us, all's well. If they go to the Broodmother, and we let them, it can't possibly benefit us, no matter how it ends. Best case she kills them instead of us. Worst case they prove surprisingly competent and kill her. If that happens I lose her bond gift — not to mention future generations of fodder and a useful ally — and then we still have to kill the survivors given they'll almost certainly find out we helped her win to begin with. And that fight will be harder, because I will be weaker. No matter what happens, if they go to the Broodmother, we lose. Better to kill them here and at least preserve Yara. If I have to pick between these stunted thundercunts and her, I choose her hands down easy every time, no questions asked."
He tilted his head enough for his cowl to move as he added, purely for emphasis, "Period."
"Why do you hate the dwarves so much?" Sif asked.
"Because of how they treated the last template they got hold of," he said shortly. "Angie may be the forgive-and-forget sort, but I am not. No more questions. We wait, watch, and get ready for the worst. If they start walking the wrong way, I will charge and lob a fireball before we close. If they're dumb enough to let me charge it fully, I may just wipe them out in one shot."
By now the discussion among the dwarves seemed to be reaching its resolution. Brenna had her arms folded, and was looking around at both the trades and the lone armored figure who seemed to represent the soldiery.
Shoulders slumped, eyes dropped, and the dwarves turned and moved their way.
Sif and Angie both let out audible sighs of relief. Abram just turned away and said, "Lead on. The sooner we get to the Great Stair, the happier I'll be."
The bergsrå exchanged a glance with Angie that Abram couldn't quite read, then nodded and turned, heading deeper between the stalks. Angie took a few steps to open a gap between herself and Abram, and the two of them watched the dwarves walk by.
Brenna was at the back, and they flanked her. Angie said, "It seemed a difficult choice."
The dwarven paragon nodded, then shrugged and said, "In truth, the consensus is that the campaign failed. We know roughly where the broodmother lairs. If they had victory, we'd have seen them waiting to embark when we docked."
She hung her head and sighed. "They were prepared the best we knew how. We were sure they'd be enough. The Mistress practically celebrated their victory before they left. I don't understand. She's never been wrong about the allocation of forc
e. Her judiciousness was a template-granted bond gift."
"Was it now?"
Angie's voice was devoid of any hint that she felt more than curiosity. Abram glanced at her, saw that her face was just as blank.
Brenna just nodded. "That's why we're with you now. The Mistress of Sidastrgeil always knows just who to send."
She looked over her companions, then said, "The campaign's failure has shaken faith in this expedition as well."
"You need not worry about this expedition," Abram said quietly. "I will not permit failure."
Brenna cast him a sharp glance, but he knew she couldn't see him. Not really.
"I look forward to seeing what you can do," she said at last, turning her attention back to the march.
He smiled.
25
Crazy, Mad, Insane
"Finally. Finally, I'm home."
Sif lifted a hand and swept it to one side. The rough stone of the cave wall in front of her rumbled, then flowed away to reveal the squared-off entrance to the Great Stair.
"So this is where it was," one of the dwarves murmured. Abram glanced around. He couldn't tell who had spoken, but the fact that any of them said anything like what he'd just heard did not bode well for the prospect of long-term peace with the dwarves.
His lip curled, but it wasn't hard to put thoughts of a fight he wouldn't be having today on the back burner in favor of a much, much more pressing issue: the stairs.
Hantu Raya was his usual helpful self.
'You had four days to come up with a solution to this, but instead you chose to walk around like a zombie. Good job, hero. Now you get to show the dwarves how the mighty wizard can't manage a flight of steps.'
You call me a hero one more time and I swear you'll pay for it. Meanwhile show me the details for a spell that will siphon my mana regeneration into my stamina.
'There is no such spell, and if you pour your mana into your body, well ... the results won't be quite what you have in mind, Master. Fortunately for you, there isn't a spell for that either. Such a thing can only be done as a consequence of will.'