Icy salt spray splashed their faces. They were on a tiny rock in the middle of a turbulent ocean, battered by winds and towering waves, beneath an angry sky. The rock was jagged and slippery, and the band clung to each other for fear of falling and being swept away. Stryke acted.
He kept on readjusting the stars as they were transported from world to world in search of somewhere bearable.
In dizzying succession they flashed in and out of lands of startling diversity, including some they found incomprehensible as well as hostile. In one they were attacked by carnivorous birds; another was an environment with a noxious gas for its atmosphere that they were lucky to escape in time. They witnessed abundant orc-sized fish emerging from a huge lake, revealing legs, and jaws bristling with fangs; sentient snakes as big as elephants, devouring each other; a land of perpetual earthquakes where enormous fissures opened and closed with frightening rapidity; a world stifled by sulphur and riddled with blue lava flows; a mighty river inhabited by multi-tentacled beasts with the faces of rodents; gigantic flies that supped on struggling spiders in sticky webs that spanned valleys; a place where great prides of felines waged war amongst themselves; rampaging worms as large as mature oaks; dominions ruled by plagues of rats, and on and on.
Eventually they materialised somewhere that didn't seem immediately threatening. It was a dead world. They couldn't tell if the desolation was the result of war or natural disaster, but it seemed complete. Not far away stood acres of debris and twisted uprights, just recognisable as the ruins of a city. There was no sign of life anywhere, not even vegetation, which the soil looked incapable of supporting in any event. Everything was grey and spent.
The Wolverines stood wordlessly for several minutes, in anticipation of something unfriendly happening. When it didn't, they did more than relax. They collapsed exhaustedly. They were in a sorry state: drenched, tattered, bruised and bleeding. The tyros were near unhinged, and Standeven was a wreck. Some of the band were vomiting. Others nursed wounds or crouched with their heads in their hands.
" That was… one… hell of a… ride," Coilla said when she stopped fighting for breath.
" Couldn't… set the… stars… properly," Stryke gasped back. "No… chance to."
She started to pull herself together, as most of the others were doing. "I… know. Who would… have thought… so many… of the worlds were… so shitty?"
"Least it looks safe here."
"Maybe." She surveyed the barren landscape suspiciously.
"We'll rest for a bit, tend wounds. Then I'll fit the stars for Ceragan."
She nodded and perched herself on a half-melted rock, head down, arms dangling.
As soon as he could, Stryke got some of the recovering grunts to mount guard. He had Dallog look at injuries, fortunately none of which called for major treatment, and ordered iron rations to be broken out.
They spent the next hour or more recuperating and getting their heads straight, during which time Jup came to Stryke with a question.
"What do we do about the humans?"
"Do?"
"Yeah. You planning on taking them back to Ceragan with you? Come to that, what about me and Spurral?"
"I've not been thinking straight," Stryke confessed. "That's a problem I hadn't weighed."
"Can't be blamed for that. But what are you going to do with us non-orcs?"
"You and Spurral are welcome to join us in Ceragan. You'd be the only dwarfs, but you wouldn't be without comrades."
"That's a generous offer, Stryke, and I thank you for it. But I'm guessing it's not one you'd be happy making to Pepperdyne and Standeven."
"No, there'd be no place there for them. But suppose we took them back to Maras-Dantia?"
" That I hadn't thought of. Seems right, seeing as it's where you picked them up in the first place."
"We could do the same for you. Get you back to your own kind."
Jup sighed. "I dunno, Stryke. We had good reasons for leaving. I'm not sure either of us would relish going back, for all that we were born there. Maras-Dantia's fit only to break hearts these days."
"Then my offer of Ceragan stands. Who knows? Maybe we can figure out how to use the stars to find a dwarf world for you."
Jup grinned. "Trying to get rid of us already and we're not there yet. But I reckon we've got no real option. Though I've doubts about us ever finding a dwarf needle in that haystack of worlds we've just seen."
"Maybe. Anyway, that's settled. Maras-Dantia for the humans and you two with us."
"I'll have to talk it over with Spurral, mind. But I reckon she'll agree with me."
Stryke nodded. "Don't be too long about it. I want to get out of this place."
The dwarf glanced at the bleakness surrounding them. "You're not alone."
He left.
Coilla took his place. "Had any ideas on who they might have been?"
"Who?"
"You're not working with a sharpened sword yet, are you, Stryke? Who do you think I mean? That mixed bunch of races that tried frying us, of course."
"No. We've seen a lot we can't explain these last few hours; they got kind of pushed out of my head."
"But what do you reckon? Bandits? Mercenaries?"
"With the way their ranks were made up? And with magic? Really powerful magic? I've never seen any marauders like them before."
"And all they wanted was the stars. Why?"
He shrugged. "Damned if I can figure it."
"Know what I can't understand? Why didn't that elf… what was her name?"
He thought about it. "Madayar. Pelli Madayar."
"Right. Why didn't she kill us when she had the chance? I reckon she could have, with magic that strong. Don't you?"
Stryke nodded.
"Yet she just gave us a bit of a knock. And those magic beams or whatever they were — funny how none of them took any of us out, isn't it?"
"It does seem… odd," he conceded. "Maybe she lied about being with Jennesta, or maybe they were mercenaries who saw the value of the stars."
"How did they know we had them? Or even that they existed?"
"I… don't know. But does it really matter? How likely is it we'll run into them again?"
"There's something you're forgetting. That Madayar more or less told us they'd come from somewhere else, like we did. That can mean only one thing, Stryke. They can world-hop too."
"But they'd have to have stars to do that."
"Unless there's another way we don't know about. Mind you, who says we've got the only set there is?"
"If they've stars of their own, why did they want ours?"
"Search me. Maybe they collect the bloody things. What I'm trying to say is that if they have stars, could be we haven't seen the last of them."
She left him to ponder that.
Shortly after, he gathered the band.
"We've had an interesting day," he told them, raising a few wry laughs. "But now we've had a chance to steady ourselves I can use the stars to take us where we want to go."
"Where's that?" Standeven asked.
"Us and the dwarfs to our world, Ceragan. You two back where we found you."
"Centra — Maras-Dantia?"
"Unless you want to stay here."
"But…"
"But what? Enjoy our company so much you can't leave us, is that it? Or maybe you'd prefer being taken back to Acurial. I'm sure the orcs there'd be glad to see you again."
"Don't we get a say in this?"
"What say do you want? Stay here or go back to Maras-Dantia. That's your choice."
"I think you're being very high-handed," Standeven protested, "and you should at least — "
"Let it go," Pepperdyne told him. He knew his one-time master still harboured thoughts of gaining the instrumentalities, and thought even less of the idea now than he had originally.
"When I want your opinion — "
" Let it go," Pepperdyne repeated coldly, laying an emphasis on the words that he hoped would convey to St
andeven exactly what it really was he should let go of. "We're lucky Stryke doesn't leave us here. Or somewhere worse."
"Too fucking right you are," Haskeer interjected. "Though I reckon it's what we ought to do."
"We do things my way," Stryke reminded him. "Maras-Dantia it is." He took out the instrumentalities and laid them on a rock beside him. Then he reached into his shirt for the pendant. "Get ready to brace yourselves."
He was becoming more adept at fitting the stars together, and now he did it with great caution, careful to follow exactly the order that would get them to their old homeworld.
Just before he clacked the fifth one into place he took a look at the faces staring at him. Many were apprehensive. Several, notably Standeven's and Wheam's, wore expressions that were positively sickly. Stryke couldn't altogether blame them. He wasn't looking forward to what came next himself.
He slammed the star into position.
Reality instantly dissolved and the now-familiar, dread sensation of falling was on them again. They were drawn through the hellish kaleidoscope with no more means of controlling their passage than if they had been leaves in a gale. The only scrap of comfort they had was knowing where they'd end up.
Several lifetimes later, as it seemed, they came to themselves in another actuality.
They were standing on a large circular rock that had been raised like a dais and smoothed flat. The rock was inside a colossal cavern. Surrounding it were a hundred or more startled dwarfs, apparently in the throes of some kind of ritual. Stryke began fumbling with the stars. The dwarfs moved faster. Scores of them swarmed up onto the rock podium, and in a second the tips of multiple spears were pressing against the Wolverines' throats.
"I don't think this is Maras-Dantia," Coilla said.
14
Two things saved the Wolverines' lives: their seemingly miraculous arrival and the presence of Jup and Spurral.
All the dwarfs surrounding the warband were male. They wore kilts woven from coarse material, and sandals, but were bare-chested. Many had necklaces of animal teeth, and a few sported brightly coloured feather headdresses. They were armed with daggers and the stout, bone-tipped spears that currently menaced the warband.
It was obvious that the dwarfs had never seen anything like orcs before, and regarded them with open amazement. The humans they looked upon with disdain, if not actual hatred. But they were confounded most by Jup and Spurral, and it was apparently because of them that they stayed their hands. They either gaped at the couple with something like awe or avoided their gaze almost shyly, keeping their eyes downcast.
"They seem 'specially taken with you and Spurral, Jup," Stryke said, a spear pressing against his throat. "Talk to them."
Jup looked doubtful but gave it a go. "Er… We come in peace."
"That was original," Coilla muttered.
"Doesn't look like it worked," Stryke said.
The dwarfs had blank expressions.
Jup tried again, carefully mouthing, "We are friends. There's no need to fight us."
"Kill us, you mean," Coilla remarked under her breath.
Still the dwarfs were baffled.
"Try Mutual," Stryke suggested.
Jup raised a sceptical eyebrow. "Really?"
"Got a better idea?"
"We mean you no harm and we're here as friends," Jup said in Mutual, the common tongue used by most of the races of Maras-Dantia.
Comprehension dawned on the dwarfs.
One of them, an older individual with a particularly impressive headdress, who was presumably some kind of elder, replied in Mutual, "You come from the sky?"
"Well, what do you know," Haskeer whispered hoarsely.
Jup glanced Stryke's way for a lead. Stryke managed to give him the tiniest of nods.
"Yes," Jup announced, feeling faintly ridiculous. "Yes, we are here from the sky." He raised his eyes heavenward, theatrically.
A chorus of gasps and exclamations of wonderment came from the dwarfs.
"These are your servants?" the elderly one asked, indicating the band.
"Oh, yeah," Jup confirmed. "They serve my every need."
"And these?" He pointed his spear at Pepperdyne and Standeven. "They are your prisoners?"
"Uhm. Well…"
"Do you want them executed now?"
"Exe — No. No. They're… I've decided they should be my slaves."
"It's never wise to allow these creatures to live."
"With you there," Haskeer agreed in an undertone.
The humans, unfamiliar with Mutual, hadn't a clue about what was being said.
"What's going on?" Pepperdyne asked Stryke softly.
"Don't worry about it," he mouthed back.
Jup having faltered somewhat, Spurral decided to push their luck, and took a hand.
"We choose to allow them their lives," she told the elder imperiously, "for the time being. Now release us. Immediately! "
The elder flinched, then looked alarmed. He snapped something to his fellows in their own slightly guttural tongue.
The spears were lowered and the dwarfs stepped back from the Wolverines. The dwarfs moved away from the two humans more reluctantly, and carried on eyeing them with suspicion. Stryke quickly stuffed the instrumentalities into his pouch, hoping no one had noticed.
"You must crave sustenance after your journey," the elder stated ingratiatingly. "Please allow us to lay humble offerings before you."
"Let us at it," Jup replied, trying for an air of command.
The elder ushered them down from the dais and led them away from it. To the band's bemusement, dwarfs bowed as they passed. Not a few prostrated themselves. Pepperdyne and Standeven were viewed less respectfully. They got glares.
"They think we're gods," Coilla whispered.
"Band of heroes," Haskeer boasted, "that's us."
"Don't get above yourself," Jup said. He gave Spurral's arm a pat. " We're the gods. You're just a servant."
Powerless to start anything, Haskeer clenched both his teeth and his fists.
It was obvious that the cavern was a natural formation. Enormous and cone-shaped, it had a round opening in its roof, far above. They could see blue sky through it.
They were taken to one of a number of tunnel openings. The passage was wide and sloped upwards. Their way was lit by flaming brands fixed to the walls. Soon they came to where two tunnels crossed, and they turned right, still climbing. Several more twists and turns brought them to daylight.
They emerged at a high point, giving them a perfect view of where they were. It was a tropical island: sizeable, but not so big that they couldn't see its limits. Around two-thirds of it was swathed in lush jungle. There were white beaches against which an azure sea gently lapped.
The dominant features were a pair of volcanoes towering out of the jungle. One was considerably taller than the other, and strands of grey smoke rose from both. Looking back, the band realised that that they had just come out of a third volcano, bigger than either of the other two. The only difference was that it was extinct.
The day was warm, getting on for hot, and no cloud marred the sky. As the Wolverines followed their elderly guide they started to attract a retinue of dwarfs. There were gangs of children and, for the first time, females. Like their menfolk, they went bare-chested. Jup found that of particular interest until Spurral elbowed him sharply and cooled his ardour.
Coilla gave Stryke a nudge too, but more gently and in order to draw his attention to something. He followed her eyes. High up on the volcano they'd just exited was a broad ledge on the seaward side. Standing on it were a line of five or six trebuchets. The catapults were large, similar to ones the orcs had seen, and used, in sieges.
A little further on they passed a low wooden structure not unlike a squat barn. Its doors were closed and half a dozen stern-faced dwarfs stood guard outside.
The crowd stared, grinned, laughed and shouted as the procession made its way to a clearing. Dozens of huts of various dimensions st
ood there. They were taken to the biggest, a one-storey affair on piles, with a porch on its front. The elder threw open its door and welcomed them in.
The longhouse was generous enough in size that even the Wolverines and their hangers-on didn't overfill it.
"My own dwelling," the elder explained. "I trust it isn't too humble for you."
"It'll do," Jup said.
There were a gaggle of females present. Members of the elder's family perhaps, or his wives or servants. They were gaping open-mouthed at the strange visitors. The elder snapped something at them and they fled, giggling, out the open door.
"I will send you refreshments," the elder told them. "Is there anything else you need?"
"No," Spurral replied in her queenly tone. "You may leave us now."
The old dwarf bowed awkwardly and backed out.
When he'd gone, Haskeer said, "Fuck me."
"You've a skill, Spurral," Stryke told her. "You should have been a troubadour."
"They seemed to think we were somebody important. I just played on it."
Haskeer took in their surroundings. "Not bad, this place. Better than some of the shit-holes we've seen lately."
"Yes, it's all very fine," Coilla said, "but what the fuck are we doing here? Stryke, how come we're not in Ceragan?"
"I don't know."
"Did you make a mistake setting the stars?"
"I'd swear I didn't."
"One way to be sure," Dallog offered. "Try them again now."
"No," Stryke decided. "If they got it wrong this time they could again."
"And we might not end up somewhere as sweet," Jup finished for him. "There are worse places for a billet."
"Maybe it's not as sweet as you think," Coilla argued. "Did you notice those catapults? They have to be here for a reason."
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