It took me a moment to realize that the scuttling sound behind me was in fact Mimi. She leaped through my legs and continued her forward shuffle at high speed as I jogged.

“What are you doing,” I hissed after her black and white frame. She let out a soft indignant squeak when I grabbed her and moved out of the way.

“You’re not supposed to-“

The little jumping spider had no intention of listening to me. She leaped forward again, her body bouncing impatiently as she waited for me to catch up. Well, there was nothing for it. I didn’t know what a Void Weaver was, but the way that Dane had said the name made me think she was special. Maybe even rare.

If she and I had some sort of bond then I was about to put it to the test.

As the sound of voices echoed from the tunnel beyond I slowed to a stop, pressing myself into the wall. Mimi, who had started ahead, quickly doubled back towards me. The soft glow of my sand dagger pulsed in my hand. The magic shifting.

Mimi’s black eyes studied me as I pointed.

Bad guys I mouthed. You wait, stay hidden. Then..

I mimicked a grabbing motion with my free hand and pressed it to my face. Mimi shifted her weight from leg to leg but gave no indication that she had understood. Could she even understand? Only god knew, and so far the big man upstairs hadn’t shown his face. The sound of footsteps on rock drew my attention.

This wasn’t just a few men. By the sound of it, there were maybe half a dozen. 1 v 6? Alright, the odds were stacked against me. But then again, I never learned to fight fair.

***

Thormac was tired. Tired of searching these gods-forsaken tunnels. Tired of listening to Jorg run his mouth about every fight he’d ever been in. And a few, Thormac suspected, that he hadn’t been in.

In truth, it was what he had expected. He’d even seen it coming long before the chief had chosen to assign the insufferable youngster to his crew. Thormac had protested of course, but when the insufferable brat in question is the chief's second son… well. The decision had already been made.

“This is a waste of time,” snarled Jorg, spinning a rune-bound axe in one hand with a nonchalance that set Thormac’s teeth on edge. To see a divine weapon handled so carelessly was enough to make him grimace.

“Orders are orders,” said Thormac, trying to steer the conversation into safer waters. Jorg’s beady black eyes slid to him, and the young dwarf grinned. It was a mean look, the kind of look that usually proceeded with some kind of insult.

“Orders are orders,” repeated Jorg, his mean eyes glittering. “That just might be the stupidest thing you’ve said all day, old man. Tell me, how is it that you managed to screw this up so badly? The apothecary himself said the concentration of the poison would be enough to kill a brood of Razerhounds and yet you stab the bastard and he just… slips away?”

Several of the other dwarves, sycophants of the Chief’s second son, laughed. The sound bounced off the walls in a carrying echo that seemed to mock him. Thormac felt a surge of anger but he knew better than to act on it. A cool head was what he needed here, not a fight with a much younger and much larger warrior.

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“A good question, young master,” he lied, rubbing at his beard. “And you would be correct…were our target any other Dwarf? But Dane Callihan is a different story. Underestimating him is akin to sticking yourself in the eye with a knife. That’s why your father was so adamant that w-“

“Dane is an old washed-up warrior,” Jorg interrupted his eyes flashing with irritation. He flipped his axe and caught it, The magic runes humming as they cut through the air. “Eliminating him,” continued the Chief’s son, “Especially when he was unarmed and half drunk in a Tavern should have been simple enough. And yet, Thormac, you managed to fuck it up.”

The sycophants sniggered even as Thormac suppressed a new surge of anger. There would have been a time when he would have had the welp by the throat up against the cave wall but those days had long passed. Calm, his wife was always telling him, is the difference between a man standing in the water, and a man lost at sea. So instead he drew in a breath of the damp cave air and exhaled it.

Beside him, Ram gave an approving nod, even as he scanned the tunnels ahead.

“Of course, it was my mistake,” lied Thormac. He was Trying to look anywhere but at Jorg’s smug face. Even with his hair tied back in a war tail and the beginnings of a beard at his chin he still looked eerily like his father.

“The barkeep had claimed to see him in the backrooms drinking since noon,” Jorg continued, his irritating bravado bouncing off the cave walls and making everyone wince.

“So he was drunk, unarmed, and unsuspecting.” Jorg’s grin showed a set of strong pearly white teeth as he looked down his nose at him. It must get exhausting, Thormac thought, to be such a monumental prick.

“Respectfully,” said Thormac, fighting to keep his voice low. “You’ve never fought Dane the Black Hand. And if that poison really did work, you can count yourself lucky that you never have to. The rumors about him aren’t rumors at all. Fool and drunk he may be. But he’s a hand in a fight. Vicious and without mercy. He’s left more experienced warriors than you and I bleeding out on the Tavern floor.”

Ram grunted his agreement, but Jorg seemed unimpressed.

“Fairytales,” he grimaced pulling at the straps of his shoulder armor. “There are no God-chosen warriors, no divine interventions. Just a bunch of fearful old men too frightened to venture out beyond the wards and make their name.”

Thormac opened his mouth to respond, but a sound made him pause. It was light and repetitive, a soft scraping sound, much like the patter of several tiny feet. He frowned and tried to catch Ram’s eye. The veteran warrior was staring down the cave, his eyes seemingly fixed on a point Thormac couldn’t see.

“I’m talking to you old man,” drawled Jorg, taking a step forward. But Thormac’s attention was drawn to the darkness beyond the glow of the party's lanterns. There was something there in the gloom… something moving.

“Weapons!” shouted Thormac, his hands darting for his own short sword not strapped at his waist. He cursed himself as he fumbled at the hilt. Around him, the other dwarves reacted with varying speed. Ram had his axe halfway out of his belt before it struck. There was a whistling sound and a gleam in the darkness.

The dwarf who had been standing next to Jorg folded like a piece of sodden paper. He hit the ground with a wet squelch. His mouth was still hanging open like some grotesque parody.

“What the-“ started Jorg but he was cut off a moment later as Ram barreled into him, knocking him into the cave wall. Another unseen projectile lanced past, missing the chieftain's son by inches. Instead, it blew through the knee of one of Thormac’s warriors and the dwarf stumbled. Another dwarf from somewhere behind screamed. Thormac spun, short sword raised – when had he drawn the damn thing – and saw to his horror that something had descended on one of his warriors.

It was black and white and it was eating his face.

“Gods,” he whispered, making the sign of the thirteen. He sensed it coming long before he saw it. Focused as he was behind him, Thormac was slow to react. A shape had materialized from the darkness. A shape that resembled a man. In each fist, a golden dagger seemed to hum and pulsate with golden light.

“Are you the leader?” asked the man. The light of the daggers cast odd shadows around his face but his eyes were intense. Thormac gripped his blade tightly in his fist then nodded.

The man grinned.

“We need to have a talk.”