Part 18 (1/2)

Nothing further of him appears in the histories.

I have enclosed this legendary note, Your Grace, for your enjoyment as much as anything else; I cannot swear to its veracity. Yet I FEEL - and I hope you do as well - that there is a least of hint of real destiny in the tale.

As to the rest of my a.s.signment, I can report little progress. Many have heard tales of a brave courier of the Khalkists - one who carried historical texts of the dwarves into the mountains on the eve of the Cataclysm, there to conceal them for some future age. But no one can give me even a hint of the whereabouts of such a cache.

As always, I shall continue my labors to bring to light more of this obscure phase in the history of our world!

Your Most Humble Servant, FORYTH TEEL, Scribe of Astinus *****

O Exalted Historian!

Please forgive my inexcusable delay in the filing of this report. I beg your indulgence, only to hear the tale of my recent discovery - and of the light it sheds upon our earlier image of history! I write to you by faint candlelight, from a windswept vale in the high Khalkists. My reasons for coming here, and my news, I shall endeavor to communicate while blood still flows through my cold- numbed fingers.

I have not sent word, Excellency, for I have been on the pathways of history for many months. I journeyed into the mountains to investigate a report that had filtered down to me from the most convoluted of sources - a young stable hand, who has a cousin who visits the high country, and there hears tales of the shepherds, and so forth.

The gist of the tale that reached my ears was the story of a cheesemaker who kept a herd of milk cows in the highest valleys of the Khalkists. In search of shelter one day, this humble dairyman stumbled upon a cave that had lain hidden since the time of the Cataclysm and had been only recently revealed by avalanche.

Within the cave he found a skeleton and a bundle of tightly wrapped scrolls. A shred of the wrapping was brought to me. Your Grace can no doubt imagine my excitement when the pattern of dye marked the sc.r.a.p as dwarven - PRE-CATACLYSMIC dwarven!

Could this be the lost messenger? The one who carried the records of the dwarves into safety, even as the Cataclysm showered death across the lands of Istar? I hoped, but could not believe for certain. Yet the piece of evidence could not have come at a better time. Due to my ceaseless and uncomplaining diligence, I had exhausted every other bit of doc.u.mentation in my local sources. It had begun to seem that the tale of the Khalkist dwarves would vanish into legend a full century before the Cataclysm, but now - now I had HOPE! Indeed, the proof was profound enough to draw me from the comfort of my study, uncomplainingly, to make the strenuous pursuit ofknowledge for the library.

My journey into the heights has been arduous in the extreme. I wish you could see, Excellency, the slopes that yawned below me, the dizzying spires of rock poised above, as if waiting for the moment to cast a crus.h.i.+ng javelin of stone onto my poor and unprotected head!

Always I kept in mind my duty, to be borne without complaint, as you command.

But I digress. I finally reached the small, remote village of Saas Grund, still some miles below the cheese-maker's farm. Here, however, that worthy dairyman met me and provided me with one of the scrolls he discovered. That volume piqued my hunger for more, and so it is with resolute and uncomplaining vigor that tomorrow I accompany the man even higher into the mountains, to his lofty abode. No matter the precipitous slopes before me, nor how deep the depths of snow! Not even the icy bite of the killing wind shall deter me, nor make me long for this comfortable fire ... the fire that even now sends its warmth to my bones and soothes my weary muscles and promises to restore life to my poor, benumbed fingers. The fire, and a little spiced wine ...

Forgive me - once again I lose my path.

In short, I pen this note to you tonight, Most Esteemed Historian, in the hopes that you soon shall receive the remainder of my tale. But even in the one scroll I have perused I have discovered a story of relevance to my earlier work. I admit, however, that I present it to you with some embarra.s.sment, since it seems to contradict an incident I had earlier reported.

The scroll I read is the family journal of Horgan Oxthrall - the young warrior I told you about who miraculously drew away the oxen at the Battle of Thoradin Bridge. It was written later in his life, in 92 PC, to be precise, as he worked in the service of his thane.

Horgan recalls, in this journal, the story of that day of battle, when the human invasion had been broken. He described that st.u.r.dy wooden river-crossing that he had only later learned was called Thoradin Bridge. The battle of twenty-five years ago was a memory that had been etched, vividly, against the canvas of his brain. In his mind he could still hear the white water frothing below him. He saw, as if it had been this morning, the snorting oxen lumbering toward him, steaming breath bursting from the monstrous creatures' black nostrils.

And, as always with the memories, came the guilt, the lingering sense of shame that would never quite give him the room to breathe.

He knew the tale that legend had created, of course: the power of Reorx had blessed him at the moment of battle-truth, and he had cast a thrall over the ma.s.sive oxen leading the human train, luring them away from the charge that certainly would have opened the escape route across the bridge. Horgan even remembered the looks of awe upon the faces of his comrades as they witnessed the ”miracle.”

Yet, in his own mind, he recalled the stark terror that had seized him like the coils of a constricting serpent, threatening to crush his chest and squeeze his bowels into water. All he could think of was escape, but shock prevented his legs from responding even to this, the mostbasic of emotions. Even as his comrades streamed away from him, panicked by the oncoming beasts, Horgan stumbled numbly until he stood, alone, before the lumbering charge.

We see proof of one thing in his words, Excellency: oxen did indeed inspire a panicked terror in the dwarven troops - a terror that seems peculiar to their race. Of course, most of the Istar War had been fought in terrain too rough for the beasts to play any major role, but on flat ground the huge, buffalolike creatures loomed over the dwarves and were truly intimidating.

Horgan's mind reeled, and here - in his own words - we learn of another source of his shame. It seems that the young hero was stinking drunk! Before the battle - quite against orders - he and several in his platoon had snitched a bottle of potent rum. Horgan claims to have guzzled far more than his share. Indeed, he states that his hands shook so much that he spilled the stuff all over himself.

Now he stood there, dumb with shock, gesticulating wildly - to some mysteriously. Finally, his brain's frantic messages to flee reached his legs, and Horgan turned toward the ditch. The bridge stood open to the human wagons.

But the oxen ignored their drivers' commands and veered sharply from the road. Bellowing loudly, pawing the earth with their great hooves, and snorting in agitation, the beasts lumbered after Horgan, following the dwarf determinedly into the ditch. To the other dwarves, it had seemed a miracle. The wagons were immediately mired, blocking the road and the bridge, and the entire human army was crushed. Only Horgan Oxthrall knew the real explanation.

The oxen stared at him stonily, their eyes glazed, their breath putrid ... and rank with rum. You will remember that the poor creatures had been fed a goodly dose of spirits themselves. Now, in the midst of battle (probably starting to sober up), they sniffed out this equally intoxicated dwarf and followed him in eager antic.i.p.ation of more rum!

Of course, none of the other dwarves figured out what was going on. Horgan was a hero. After the battle - when presumably, EVERY dwarf stunk of rum - the thane appointed Horgan to the elite order of Thane's Scouts.

As one of the scouts sworn to High Thane Rankil, Horgan's job was to routinely patrol the rugged Khalkist heights, which formed the border of a dwarven nation surrounded by enemies. The scouts were drawn from the finest, proven veterans of the Istar War. It is in the service of his thane that Horgan Oxthrall labored for twenty-five years, a full quarter century after the victorious war. Lonely patrols through the heights, battles with groups of human brigands and trespa.s.sers - it was a solitary and adventurous life that seemed to suit Horgan well.

Incidentally, My Lord Historian, it appears that Horgan performed well among the scouts. He mentions that he held the rank of captain and was a.s.signed to patrol the most remote areas of the realm. He was one of the few dwarves who worked alone.

His words tell us of the way his service changed in the years preceding 92 PC. He patrolled the mountains as always, alert for human incursion. But lately there hadcome another foe, one that presented a grave threat to the lonely scouts, isolated in their posts on the frontier.

Ogres. For long years the dull humanoids had avoided the mountains, since the inherent hatred between ogre and dwarf ran deep and universal among both races. The dwarves, with greater organization and led by heroic fighters, had banished the ogres in earlier centuries, but now they came again, fleeing from the even greater menace of the Kingpriest's bounty hunters. Those ruthless killers sought them out, together with hobgoblins, minotaurs, and other creatures that had been branded as ”evil” by the ruler of Istar. The scalps and skulls of these unfortunate beings - including females and young - were taken to Istar, where a handsome bounty would be paid in the name of the G.o.ds.

Horgan Oxthrall began his journal while he was on the trail of one of these ogres. Apparently many thoughts had been churning in his mind for some time, no doubt agitated by his long periods of solitary marching. His writing shows a need to communicate, for he shares the tale of these days in some considerable detail.

He first spotted the ogre from a distance of many miles, across the expanse of a high basin. To the best of Horgan's knowledge, the ogre had not seen the dwarf. Only through the most diligent efforts did Horgan locate the creature's trail.

For three days, Horgan tracked his quarry along the valleys and slopes of the Khalkists. The ogre worked his way through a series of low, brushy vales, moving slowly and cautiously. The dwarven scout gradually shortened the gap between them, though during the pursuit he did not spot the ogre again. Horgan wondered if the creature knew he was being followed. If so, he might be leading the dwarf into a trap. But then the dwarf shrugged, accepting the threat implicit in that possibility but undeterred from his single-minded pursuit.

In any event, Horgan ALWAYS eyed his surroundings as if he expected an ambush at any moment. The dwarf's keen eyes examined each patch of rough ground, each shallow stream bank or nearby ridge, considering them for lines of fire, potential cover, and routes of retreat - all the while steadily pumping his stocky legs.

The trail wound downward from the lofty crests. The ogre and, some miles behind, the dwarf, skirted the foothills of the Khalkist Mountains near the borderlands, where the outposts of Istar a.s.serted the Kingpriest's arrogance at the very feet of the dwarven realms. Alert for humans, Horgan nevertheless maintained his pursuit, steadily closing the gap.

On the fourth morning, Horgan reached the ogre's most recent campfire to find the ashes still warm. His quarry, he deduced, was less than four hours ahead of him. The monster's trail led along a crude pathway that followed the floor of a narrow, winding valley. A deep stream alternately meandered and thundered beside Horgan, in the same direction as the ogre's trail.

The mountainsides to the right and left loomed so close, at times, that the place became more like a gorge than a valley. The view before Horgan was often restricted, though sometimes the dwarf would come around a bend tosee several hundred yards of the path before him. Every once in a while the route crossed the stream on a crude but st.u.r.dy log bridge.

It was as he approached another of these bridges, where the stream had dropped through a deep chute some fifty feet below, that his long pursuit reached its climax. A trio of tall, straight pine logs had been lashed together to form a crossing. Horgan's instincts tingled, his senses heightened.

The dwarf saw footsteps leading to one side of the path, before the bridge. Turning to investigate, he peered between a pair of sharp boulders. The trail of the ogre led to the mouth of a narrow cave, less than a hundred feet away, and disappeared within.

Shrewd, thought Horgan Oxthrall, studying the shadowed niche. The vertical slash in the rock stood perhaps nine or ten feet high, but only half that in width.

The ogre might lurk anywhere inside, perhaps armed with a crossbow or spear. Either weapon, hurled at the dwarf, could end the fight before it began.

Then, to his surprise, Horgan saw movement within the cave. A dark form loomed in the entrance. Tension surged through Horgan's body. His right hand clenched the smooth shaft of his axe, while his left reached behind to pull his s.h.i.+eld from his back.

The hulking shape moved forward, abandoning its sheltering darkness. Horgan saw it, felt the ancient racial hatred that lay so deeply within the dwarven character. An urge to attack the ogre swept through the dwarf with frightening intensity. The monster's great mouth dropped open; the thick gray lips moved grotesquely. Horgan noticed that the creature had three great teeth jutting from its lower jaw - an extra tusk near the center of its lower lip.

”Gobasch fight.”

The words - crude Common spoken in a deep, guttural voice - shocked Horgan. He had pictured his opponent as a dull beast, incapable of communication or articulation. The dwarf stared at the ogre, too surprised to reply.

The creature loomed over Horgan. The ogre's barrel torso rested upon legs as thick as gnarled oak roots. The face, despite its trio of sharp tusks, did not look b.e.s.t.i.a.l. Arms, bulging with straps of sinew, rippled downward to hamlike fists that swung nearly to the ogre's knees. He wore a jerkin of stiff, dirty leather and, in his right hand, held a battered long sword. The ogre's eyes were small but surprisingly bright, and they glittered at the dwarf with frank appraisal.

Horgan claims that he felt no fear of his opponent's size. (Indeed, Excellency, nimble dwarves with their diminutive stature had historically outmatched much larger ogres in hand-to-hand combat. Too, there is no reason to suspect that he would be less than candid in his private journal.) Then the dwarf astonished himself by feeling a grudging awareness of respect. The ogre had emerged from concealment - where he could have lurked in ambush - to confront his enemy in a fair fight.

”Unless you want to surrender to the rightful authority of Rankil, High Thane of the Khalkists,” the dwarf told the ogre, after a few moments of mutual a.s.sessment, ”you don't have any choice except fight me.”

The ogre snorted scornfully. ”Gobasch not quit -Gobasch KILL!”

Despite his bl.u.s.ter, the ogre did not advance. Gobasch raised his sword and Horgan saw that the weapon was longer by several feet than the dwarf's entire body. The blade was mere bronze, marked with many nicks and grooves. The ogre held the weapon across his body, ready to parry but not to attack.