The Nameless Dwarf Omnibus

by D. P. Prior

  Ilesa rolled to her back and forced herself to sit. Her fingers found the hilt of her sword, struggled to pull it free. She was tired. So tired.

  More and more wolf-men loped into view. They bunched into a pack, jostling each other and growling. Then they spread out to either side, some disappearing back into the trees.

  “Flanking us,” Nameless grumbled. “Have they no honour?”

  Ilesa got to her feet and drew her sword and dagger. She stumbled, but steadied herself with a jolting lunge. Nameless spared her a look, as if he were willing her to recover. His eyes were sparkling from the depths of their sockets and she drew strength from them.

  “Can you go on?” he asked.

  Ilesa licked her lips and shook her head. She didn’t even have the energy to maintain the morphing, and winced as her limbs stretched back to normal and the skin of her face grew once more smooth and hairless. She saw the disappointment in Nameless’ eyes, but then she eyed him more carefully.

  There was something about the dwarf that had been tugging away at the back of her mind. Something different. She stared at his gnomic face and then she realised what it was. When she’d first clapped eyes on him the other side of Malfen, he’d been bald as an egg and clean shaven. When he’d fallen from the cliff yesterday, he’d got nothing more than a stubbly growth; but now—impossible as it seemed—he had a good few inches of beard and a thick head of hair. Was that usual for a—

  The big grey wolf-man dropped to all fours and charged.

  “Keep close, and mind the axe,” Nameless said. It sounded like there was a quiver of trepidation in his voice, but it may have been Ilesa’s hearing, for next thing he started to sing in a booming bass:

  “I once knew a girl with a red-bearded chin …”

  Wolf-men tore from the trees either side, and more came from behind, yipping and howling. The forest was alive with their great loping bodies. There must have been half a hundred, if not more.

  The big grey leapt, bared fangs coming straight for the dwarf’s throat. At the last possible moment, Nameless swayed and swung, the double-bladed axe shearing clean through its neck. The head flew like a child’s ball; the body crumpled into a spasming heap, spurting gouts of dark blood from the stump of its neck.

  The pack faltered and began to circle them. A scarred male darted in and then turned back, keeping its distance. Another tried the same thing on the opposite side.

  Ilesa’s heart was thumping strongly now, pumping blood to her muscles and preparing for the fight. It was borrowed strength, she knew from experience, but at least she no longer felt like curling up and dying.

  “That certainly showed them,” Nameless said, raising an eyebrow. “Always take out the pack leader first, I say. Nine times out of ten, the rest will turn tail and flee.”

  “They don’t look much like fleeing,” Ilesa said. The wolf-men were inching closer, snarling and slashing the air with their claws. “Maybe that wasn’t the pack leader.”

  Nameless rubbed his new growth of beard and narrowed his eyes as he looked about. “Perhaps it was the song that scared them.” He took in a great gulp of air and sang, “Her name was Red Tilda, her drink it was gin …”

  The pack howled in unison and pressed in closer.

  “She downed it in gallons that caused her to sing, with a ho humping diddly doo lecherous grin.”

  A wolf-man stood on its hind legs, beat its chest, and ran at them.

  “Forgot the words.” Nameless made a show of scratching his head. “Only seem to remember them when I’ve downed a couple of flagons.”

  Ilesa dropped into a fighting crouch and the wolf-man broke off its attack. “Brave, aren’t they? Speaking of which, you see anything of Nils and Silas?”

  Nameless looked back the way they’d come. “Not since the first attack. Reckon they cut us off deliberately, you know, divide and conquer. Gods of Arnoch, I hate wolves.”

  “You reckon they’re dead?” She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Nils was an ass, but she’d rather he didn’t die. As for Silas, as far as she was concerned—

  “Boy’s tougher than he looks,” Nameless said. “Got a good heart, despite appearances. And Silas is a cockroach when it comes to survival.”

  The wolf-men were circling them faster and faster, working their way up into a frenzy.

  “So what now, wait till they swamp us?”

  “They won’t do that,” Nameless said. “They’ll dash in, take a bite, and withdraw. They’ll keep it up till we bleed out what’s left of our strength.”

  “Well that won’t take long.” Already the new wind she’d got was dropping back down into the doldrums.

  Nameless raised his axe with one arm, and extended the other to sight with. “Ah, then prepare to be amazed.”

  He hurled the axe with such force it knocked a wolf-man from its feet and buried deep in its guts.

  “Not the brightest thing you’ve ever done,” Ilesa said. “Now you’ve got no—”

  Her words died away as the axe wrenched itself clear of the wolf-man and flew gracefully back to Nameless’ hand.

  “Now what did I tell you?” He beamed. “That’ll see them off.”

  “Uhm, Nameless …” Ilesa backed towards him.

  “Hmm? Oh, shog.”

  In a great chorus of barks and howls, the wolf-men surrounding them charged.

  Ilesa’s heart jumped into her throat. She was afraid of no man, but a pack of rabid werewolves was another matter entirely. Nameless shrugged and rolled his shoulders, hefting his axe and grinning like a mad man. She noticed his eyes, though, told another story. He knew what their chances were, same as she did.

  A mangy beast leapt at her, jaws gaping wide. She spun out of the way, slashing it across the snout with her sword and following up with a dagger through the eye. The wolf-man yelped and dropped.

  Nameless’ axe was a glitter of silver, chopping with murderous precision. The dwarf was as planted as a rock, no give in him whatsoever. A flurry of fur stole him from her vision and she was suddenly fighting for her life, ducking and stabbing, tumbling, kicking, twisting. The world was a blur of fangs and claws, and she danced through it on pure instinct, making each move before she’d even had chance to think.

  But perfection is ephemeral, Master Plaguewind had told her back in the guild. It comes only in fleeting moments, sublime patches on a canvas that is, after all, only human. A claw took her across the back and her sword went flying. She whirled with the dagger, but fangs cut into her wrist. She snatched it away, losing skin in a spray of blood, and kicked her attacker in his all-too-human balls, betting he wished that was one part of his anatomy that hadn’t survived the melding.

  She heard Nameless bellowing out his stupid song above the roars of the wolves, but took scant relief from the fact he was still alive. Not even he could last against such numbers, such ferocity.

  A wolf-man sprang from either side. She stepped back, right into the path of another. Teeth snapped down, but somehow she twisted and rammed her dagger through its upper jaw. The wolf-man wrenched away from the blade, spraying Ilesa with its blood. Another hit her hard, knocking the dagger from her hand and spinning her to the ground. She panicked, and in that instant fur began to form on her forearms, but then they were all over her, a stinking mass of mangy fur, ripping, scratching, baying for her blood. She shut her eyes and tensed, waiting for the killing bite, but then a terrific rumble rolled through the earth. The sky rushed closer and the trees at the edge of the clearing fell away as if they’d been dropped into a chasm. The wolf-men yelped and broke off, loping away downhill towards what could still be seen of the tree-tops. When they disappeared from view, Ilesa heard splashing and howling.

  She clambered to her feet and reclaimed her weapons. Nameless stood atop a pile of dead wolf-men. He was riddled with scratches and bites, but he still clutched his axe, the veins on his arms sticking up along the contours of his swollen thews.

  “Come back, you shoggers!” he yelled, s
haking his axe after them. “I’ve not finished with you yet.”

  “What the Abyss just happened?” Ilesa asked.

  They were atop a craggy knoll that had forced its way up from the forest floor. She strode to the edge of the summit and looked down in astonishment. Perhaps thirty feet below, where there had been woodland, there was now water glimmering in the light of the three moons. The knoll formed an island jutting up from the centre of a lake. It was barely twenty feet across, but it must have risen more than that above the water level at its highest.

  The wolf-men were splashing toward the shore some hundred yards distant. One of them screamed, an altogether human sound of terror and pain. The others reached the bank and climbed out, shaking the water from their fur in silver sprays. A huge dark wake trailed them through the water and then abruptly vanished.

  Nameless trudged up beside Ilesa, axe slung over his shoulder. “Suns are coming up again. Shog, things change quickly here.” He glanced at her arm where tufts of blood-drenched fur still covered the skin. “Hurt bad?” he asked.

  Ilesa shielded the wound with her hand, willing the fur to fade. She was left with a vicious gash that wept blood, but at least the skin was human once more. She looked up slowly, expecting to see anger in the dwarf’s eyes. He’d seen it, she was certain. Seen that she’d tried to change, that she’d have left him if she could. She hated herself for it. After all, he’d stayed behind for her, but she’d panicked, changed on instinct.

  “I …” She lowered her eyes, not knowing what to say.

  “You fought well, lassie.” He clapped her on the shoulder. “Did us both proud. Now let’s look at that bite before you go and bleed to death. Should have some thread and a needle in my pack.”

  She held out her arm, but watched the wolf-men on the shore. As the suns rapidly took to the sky, the wolf-men began to cry and shudder. They scampered towards the trees, limbs warping, fur fading, until the last thing she saw was dozens of naked men disappearing into the forest.

  ***

  Nils clung on like an infant sloth—he’d slipped and rolled so that his arse faced the ground twenty feet below, and his arms and legs were wrapped tightly around the branch. Pine needles had got inside his clothes and were prickling like mad. He’d have been scratching like a lunatic if he’d had the guts to let go with one arm; only he didn’t, not with a dozen wolf-men down below, circling the tree and making grasping leaps for the lower branches. Say whatever you like about Nils Fargin, he thought as he struggled to hold on, but he can bloody well climb. Climbing had been his main role in the Night Hawks, probably the only reason Dad had let him join so young. Cat burglary was his thing, and there was no one better. Least no one he’d ever heard of.

  Nils’s ankles came uncrossed on the branch, slipping to either side.

  “Shit,” he swore, kicking upwards and hooking first one leg, then the other back over.

  The wolf-men responded with howls of frustration.

  He couldn’t keep this up much longer. It already felt like he had acid for blood from gripping so tight, and his limbs were growing leaden. Wasn’t just the tree he couldn’t hold onto either. His bladder was full to bursting, and if he didn’t do something about it real soon, the wolf-men would be getting an unexpected shower.

  He sucked in a deep breath, steeled himself, and swung his left leg further round the branch, forcing his body to follow. At the same instant, the tree shook as a deafening roar ripped through the forest. The wolf-men yelped and scarpered, pine needles rained down in great green clouds, and Nils fell.

  He hit the ground with a thud and the breath whooshed from his lungs, hot piss soaking the front of his breeches. Felt like he’d been clobbered from behind with a sledgehammer, and at first he thought he’d broken every bone in his body. Gradually, though, the sensation returned and he was able to twitch his fingers and toes. Nils didn’t believe much in miracles, but he was sure he’d just been on the receiving end of one. Gingerly at first, and then with growing confidence, he climbed to his feet and swept the pine needles from his clothes.

  “Oh my shogging …”

  Above the trees, off in the direction he’d last seen Nameless and Ilesa running, a craggy peak had risen form the earth. The twin suns of Aethir were already streaking blood across the horizon, and in their crimson glow he could see the silhouettes of two tiny figures atop the mound.

  Last he’d seen of Silas, the wizard had bolted for a hole in the ground. There’d been two wolf-men on his tail, and Nils doubted he’d have made it. Just like ferreting a rabbit, they’d have dragged him out by the seat of his pants. He shook his head at the stupidity—weren’t Silas supposed to be educated? That notwithstanding …

  Nils caught sight of the book Nameless had lent him, the Liber that had belonged to a knight called Shader. It was lying open on the ground where it had slipped from his pack. He stooped to pick it up and was surprised, and not a little proud, that he actually recognised some of the words. Nils was starting to think he had something of an aptitude for letters, which was another minor miracle. Nameless said the book was written in Aeternam, a language that Silas pointed out was the same as the Latin used in official Senate documents back in New Jerusalem. It was known as the language of the educated, but Nils was already getting the hang of it. It had fallen open on the passage Silas had been working on with him at dusk. Just before the wolf-men had come.

  For all his annoying ways, you couldn’t deny Silas was a good teacher. Damn sight better than Magistra Archyr, and that was a fact. He unshouldered his pack and put the Liber away. The simple recollection of the reading session by the campfire made him decide he at least owed it to Silas to go look for him. Yeah, maybe all he’d find was chewed-up meat, but he still owed him all the same.

  Slinging his pack over his shoulder, and taking a good grip on the hilt of his sword, he backtracked towards the hole Silas had scooted down. Must’ve been some kind of burrow, Nils reckoned. He shuddered to think what kind of creature made such a big hole.

  He got no further than a few strides when a wolf-man darted out from behind a tree. Nils half-drew his sword as he stepped back, tripped on a root, and fell on his arse. The wolf-man glared at him, then looked up at the suns and whimpered. It turned tail and ran into the woods, and as it did so, Nils saw the fur fade from its body until it was just a naked man.

  A strange silence settled over the forest. No more howling. No bird song, either. Just the gentle blowing of the breeze through the trees.

  He hurried back along the way they’d come until he spotted the burrow. There were two naked men crumpled on the ground outside, both with horribly charred skin. He was about to duck into the hole when he noticed a crisscrossing of red mist over the opening. He stepped back. It reminded him of the tales he’d heard of the Abyss crossing the Void.

  “Silas?” he called. “Silas, you in there?”

  He strained to listen and was rewarded with a sound like the turning of pages. A feverish muttering started up. He thought it was Silas, but he couldn’t be sure. The words were foreign, the tone guttural and inhuman.

  “Silas?” he called again, but the voice from inside continued with its gobbledygook, getting louder and more frenzied. “Silas, if that’s you, hang on. I’m going to find the others and then I’ll be right back.”

  No response, but Nils shuddered at the chill that was creeping its way up his spine. Whatever was going on in there, it didn’t feel right.

  He made his way back through the pines, heading towards the rocky hill that had pushed its way up through the earth. His legs were chafing from the piss, so he was relieved to reach the edge of the forest and see that the hill was actually an island set in the middle of a lake, like the Great Lake of Orph a day’s hike from New Jerusalem, only smaller. It was maybe a hundred yards from the shore to the island on either side. The figures he’d spotted earlier were seated, one examining the other’s arm.

  “Nameless!” he hollered, waving his arms. “Ilesa!” />
  They stood and waved back. Nameless cupped his hands in front of his mouth and yelled, “We’re stuck.”

  “Can’t you just swim for it?” Nils called back. That’s what he’d have done. He weren’t just a good climber. Reckoned he could out-swim a dolphin, if it came to it.

  Nameless dropped his chin to his chest.

  “He can’t swim,” Ilesa shouted.

  “Wait there,” Nils called, immediately realising how silly that sounded. Where else could they go? “I’ll come over and we can help him back.”

  “What?” Nameless looked up. “I am not getting in that water. And besides, I think there’s something in there.”

  Nils shook his head and laughed. “Just hang on.” He started to pull down his breeches and then remembered they could do with a wash, so he left them on. He undid his boots, kicked them off and then stepped into the water. It was icy cold, but he’d put up with worse. He waded out up to his knees and then froze as a gigantic scaly head broke the surface, a long sinuous neck rearing up beneath it. Amber eyes glared hungrily at him, and a wide maw gaped open to reveal a lashing forked tongue and fangs that could skewer a man.

  “Get out of the water!” Nameless yelled, brandishing his axe, for all the good it would do.

  Nils splashed backwards, but it was too late. The serpent lunged at him with the speed of an arrow.

  Even quicker, though, was Nameless’ axe, which whistled through the air like a comet and struck the monster square on the skull.

  The serpent twisted and roared, and Nils gasped as the axe spun in midair and sailed straight back to Nameless’ hand. He backed all the way onto the shore and scooted towards the trees on his rear.

  The serpent swayed for a moment, and then dived beneath the surface, heading towards the island, an enormous V-wake trailing it through the water.

  ***

  “Silas?” a voice cried from outside. It sounded familiar, but impossibly distant, like the fading sounds of a dream upon waking.