by Jeff Inlo
Chapter 20
"Another retreat?!" Anger and frustration painted Yave's face. The sight of Voth sickened her. She paced about the throne room, stomping about in a tirade. She shook with tension. "What are you telling me? Are you telling me that the humans beat us again? Not only beat us, but humiliated us?"
Voth Stonepillar now regretted being selected the new War Com. He lacked Strog's confidence. He spat out excuses hoping to quell the tide of Yave's anger. "They allied with the elves. There were archers everywhere. They were ready for us. Every time we got to the surface, we faced another ambush."
The War Com ground his teeth together. His own words fanned a distaste within himself. The humans had beaten him, outmaneuvered him, out-planned and outlasted him; they had indeed humiliated him. He searched for his own redemption as he sought the words to calm the queen. "We were not prepared for this. We were not ready, I see that now. The humans are weak, but they were well-organized. The elves’ doing. That is the explanation."
The attempt rang hollow. Yave glared.
The thickening tension pressed upon the new War Com. He scrambled for a way out. "That's not really what I mean, not all of it. That's why we had difficulty at first, but we overcame that. Even with the odds against us, we rose above our inferior enemy. We suffered against every break, yet we still had victory in our grasp. Despite the humans’ preparation, despite the help of the elves, we began to take the town. We brought down their wall, crushed their structures. To get that far was proof of our superiority. We overcame everything, we had the battle won."
"Then what happened?" Yave demanded.
"A light in the sky, brighter than the sun. A wizard cast a spell of light so powerful I could not believe it. He created daylight during the dark. Not just daylight, light that blinds. We could not fight that. He did not stop there. He broke the ground beneath us. He casts with white light. White light! He has great control over fire, light and earth. I tell you, we had the battle won until the wizard intervened."
Yave was tired of hearing this excuse. There were few spells that could harm them directly, and no living wizard could have attained that level of sorcery so soon after the destruction of the sphere. She hammered at her War Com. "Are you telling me you could not hold your gains until the wizard tired?"
Voth turned to another excuse. "We did not have enough time. Even if we outlasted the wizard's spell, the true sun was coming up. Without proper goggles, we would have been fighting blind."
"Why I am surrounded by incompetence?" Yave bellowed.
"What? What else could I have done?"
Yave's eye twitched uncontrollably. Her thick palm struck the new War Com across the chin. "Don't you question me! I put you in command of our forces. You are the War Com! It is your duty to determine the strategies needed to win."
Voth was now gaining a true appreciation for Strog's struggles with this queen. He wished to be anywhere else than in this room.
Yave continued her rant. "I have heard reports of your attack. This goes beyond a wizard and the rising of the sun. You lost well over half of your force and still Burbon is in the hands of the humans. For some reason, the humans suffered only minor casualties. How could you lose so many compared to their few?"
"It was the wizard..."
"Idiot! Your casualties mounted before the wizard cast his spell! You are not fit to be a War Com. You are not fit to be a general. I would almost bite my own tongue to say it, but I wish Strog was here."
"So do I," Voth mumbled.
The queen was about to strike the War Com again, this time with a closed fist, but a breathless dwarf sentry broke into the room.
"How dare you enter..." Yave began.
It was Yave's turn to be interrupted. The sentry barked out his disturbing news to both queen and War Com. "We are under attack! Sand giants are breaking through into our southern tunnels. They have passed through every measure of defense. They are already in the streets! The sentries have been overpowered. We need warriors."
Voth cursed. "The bulk of what's left of our army is resting in the eastern barracks."
"Recall them!" Yave shouted.
Voth ran from the room with another curse. Though he wished to be free from Yave's presence, he did not need this. He stumbled out into the palace corridor shaking his head. The sentry followed as the queen was left to ponder the news alone.
She glared at the open door used by the departing War Com. Her heart beat with a thick, dull thud against her chest.
Sand giants - the algors.
The words burned her with memories of Tun. She forgot about Burbon, about the humans and the failure of her warriors. The toad-like creatures in the desert dominated her emotions which turned from hot to cold.
Sand giants in Dunop. The same creatures that killed her son. She wished to see them. She marched with malicious determination to a palace balcony. A smooth stone platform welcomed her. She leaned over a black rock railing. A dazzling view of Dunop's closest streets opened for her inspection. The clamor to the south seized her attention.
The sand giants were easily spotted. Their golden color contrasted with the dark grey of Dunop's rock streets and structures. The invaders were monumental in size and they towered over every dwarf that came into their path. Their strength was equal to their stature as they broke through loose dirt and rock with the same ease as dwarf diggers. They left a trail of dust in their wake as they marched toward the palace.
Dwarf sentries fought valiantly. Their mighty weapons ground the legs of the sand giants into dust, but for the moment, they were hopelessly outnumbered. Caught by surprise, and with no sight of reinforcements, they failed to regroup. They fought in haphazard clusters, hoping to hold a position, but the gates were lost and the invaders swarmed through like rushing water.
The sand giants moved forward with frightening efficiency. They decimated the dwarf resistance. They quickly overran all dwarf sentries that dared to block their path. They spread through the dimly lit alleys like a plague. They took no prisoners, and though no dwarf would beg for mercy, such a request would have been beyond these single-minded heralds of destruction.
Unarmed dwarf civilians fled in terror, but most could not outrun their pursuers. The algor creations were by no means fast, but their stride more than tripled the equally slow dwarves. They captured and killed many; they held no regard for differences among the dwarves. They hunted them all.
Yave's hate for the algors was fanned by this spectacle. She thought of Tun, how he perished at the hands of these creatures. The Sword of Decree had bestowed that vision upon her. Now, it was being recreated in her own kingdom. She spat venomous curses at the sand giants as they progressed toward the open spaces of the city center.
Voth finally appeared with formations of dwarf warriors, but even to the eternally optimistic, all hope was already lost. Voth's warriors were fatigued, battle weary. They barely held the strength to maintain their lines. They moved up to meet their foes like sheep ready to be fleeced.
The sand giants, however, attacked with no regard to morale. Such an attribute held no meaning for such creatures. They did not tire, they did not face the ever-swelling emotions of battle. They had but one purpose. They thought not out of self-preservation, and they did not care about their fallen comrades. They simply moved forward with the orders of the algors pressing their every action. Even as one sand giant fell, another stepped up to crush four or five dwarf defenders.
The algor creations quickly took the center cavern of Dunop. They surrounded the palace, and spread out to meet advancing dwarf attackers. In these larger caverns, their advantage was magnified. Without the restrictions of tight dwarf tunnels, the gargantuan invaders used the full force of their power. Despite the courage of dwarf warriors that bordered on fanatical, despite the resolve which burned within them to protect their home, the sand giants began to remove all that was left of the dwarf army.
Fury froze Yave in place. She s
tood upon her palace balcony with pure hate seething through her veins. She watched as the death of her own son was recreated several times over. She could barely breathe. Her chest was tight with anguish. Dwarf after dwarf was taken by the sand giants, crushed like old newspaper, and then tossed aside; killed just like her Tun.
The invaders cared little for Yave's thoughts. They cared little for the display of death which surrounded them. If they were labeled as monsters, it did not matter. If the dwarves suffered pain, it did not matter. What mattered was the simple existence of these dwarves. They were the threat to the algors, and this threat would be exterminated; completely, permanently.
The giants moved to the palace entrance. They sensed the importance of this edifice, the underground hive that held the queen. They would have this place. They were met by the final force of the dwarf army. The carnage defied sanity.
Dwarves were thrown against the stone structure. Their bodies crumbled, bones shattered into powder. Those that did not die instantly, shrieked in agony.
The sand giants ignored each death cry.
Yave bent over the railing to watch the inevitable conclusion. The last soldier was torn apart as several of the monsters grabbed for him at once. Voth.
Yave felt not true loss for her most recent War Com. She felt only hate, hate for the very creatures that now had unobstructed passage to her palace, and hate for the algors that created them. She pulled a halberd from the wall.
"It is better this way. Let them come," she snarled.
She took one last glimpse over the balcony ledge to count the first handful to enter. Another surprise – a large raiding party of goblins. She shouted more curses.
A serp in the throng seemed to stare back at her, appeared to grin.
"Parasites! Rodents!" Yave bellowed. Her hate, born of the sand giants, was now intensified by the sight of a goblin raiding party.