21. Under the Earth

“Though the goblins theoretically out number the dwarves ten thousand to one, it cannot be denied that their ability to hew stone into defensible fortifications is impressive. Our first attempt to slay the dwarves ended with a confused and angry gathering at the bottom of their mountainous fortress, while rocks and boiling oil rained down overhead.

‘We will go under,’ Zalak had said.

I now find myself once more deep beneath the earth, waiting for yet more tunnels to be completed by effort of claws.

I have noticed the strangest feeling of confinement. Where once I despised the overworld, the sky too blinding and the spaces dizzyingly wide, I now find that I miss it. Perhaps when all this is done I can leave the Grorginite Empire behind me, and go and live in an overworld cavern somewhere, so that I might freely tread between bright expanses and the familiarity of enclosed darkness.

In any case, I hope that we will break through to the dwarves soon. If Agrak is their captive, then we can free him more quickly, and if he has been hidden elsewhere then we must widen our search at once.

And if they have found some way to kill him, then I have no clue what I should do.”

Hjorvarth sucked in slow, measured breaths. He struggled to stay awake, his strength of body and mind both waning. He could feel himself dying. He had tried to escape, but found only darkness. He had ran for an hour, and when the giant rats finally cornered him with spears it had taken only a few minutes to return from where he had started.

Escape eluded him. Darkness shrouded all.

No matter how much he breathed. No matter how he sat unmoving. The air grew thinner and thinner in his lungs. He worried he would soon die in silence.

Hjorvarth pushed the warm shoulder beside him. Dan barely murmured. Hjorvarth had carried Sam’s son on their last attempt at escape, though he had begun to wonder whether he could even call it that. The giant rats whimpered and cowered when they lost their weapons, taking away any thoughts he had of murdering his way out of the place.

They cocked their hairless heads as if they understood him, listened to his words, but cared not at all to answer his questions. Mute by nature or silent by choice removed.

“We have to try again,” Hjorvarth muttered, his words leaving him breathless. “Dan. We have—”

“No,” Dan murmured. “I need to sleep.”

Ocher darkness encroached the earthen horizon.

Hjorvarth squinted, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment to see if the coloring faded. “They’re coming.”

Mail jingling preceded the kobold guards now the light intensified. Shadows appeared in the tunnel that led to the cavern prison, stretching behind the mounded earth and banded planks that now served as a door. Their captors seemed to have expected dormancy and compliance at first, but erected the barrier after the last escape.

The kobolds, instead of removing the door, burrowed their way through the wall on one side of it.

They entered, armoured better than most men Hjorvarth had known, holding squat candles in their hands that seemed a fifth of the usual size. The kobolds kept grips on their spears with other hands, but did not brandish them.

“You,” the helmeted leader said. “You come. The king requests it.”

Hjorvarth slowly rose. “I would… take my friend with me.” He pointed to the sagging figure of Dan. The young man wore shredded clothes both dusty and bloody. Hjorvarth winced as he remembered the goblins piled atop him, roaring in pain while they were ripped to pieces by explosion after explosion.

“You!” the leader repeated. “Not him. You!”

Hjorvarth frowned, bending to lift the young man from the floor. Dan blinked up at him and made an effort of holding on.

“Stop!” the leader ordered. “Stop! Drop! Drop him!”

Hjorvarth shook his head, balancing the weight across both arms. “I cannot leave him.”

“Cannot?” the leader’s pink face creased. The three armoured kobolds with him appeared equally perplexed. “Cannot. Oh. Come, then. Rubinold may know a way for you to drop him. He is a wise king.”

“I am glad to hear it,” Hjorvarth managed, wishing nothing more than that they would start walking, that the kobold king held his audience in a place where he might catch his breath.

“As are we,” the leader assured, dipping his head. He span on his clawed feet, then waved his men forward.

The four kobolds made a persistent rattle of armour as they entered the neighboring tunnel. They squeaked between themselves.

Hjorvarth could not mark their quiet words, but found it an oddity that he could understand these overgrown animals at all.

He struggled to imagine how they had ever managed to craft such fine weaponry and armour with their clawed hands. Hjorvarth’s legs buckled under him, the kobolds turned in surprise or concern, but then the huge man managed to rise.

The leader’s gaze lingered longer than the others. “You almost did it!”

Hjorvarth blinked. “Did what?”

“Dropped him. You almost dropped him.”

“Oh.” Hjorvarth trudged forward. “Are we close to the king?”

The leader’s beady eyes wandered. “A little this way,” he answered, with a small shift of his wrist. He thrust his arm into the air several times. “Then, up, up, up!”

“Eluna break the thread,” Hjorvarth whispered, his throat painfully dry. “Up, up, up,” he encouragingly repeated.

The kobold’s smile lent prominence to twin teeth. “Yes, yes. Come, come.”

Hjorvarth followed him to a crossroads, which adjoined to curving tunnels on two sides, and led to a much steeper rise ahead. The kobold hurried up the earthen slope, his spear shaft scuffing with each step of the ascent.

Hjorvarth almost sighed, but feared he could not spare the breath. He stared at the rise ahead of him, then forced himself forward. “Here is my greatest enemy,” he thought. “I will die from lack of air… consequence of my own fool notions. As if life is as simple as I pretend. As if I can charge blindly forward to fulfill an oath of protection because I have failed my father. Or did I truly have nowhere else to go?

“Gudmund was in Timilir, come to take his revenge against Jarl Thrand. Is Engli with him, or is he still waiting at the Lake? Are they all with him—all those that stood after the massacre at Horvorr? Am I the odd man out, under the earth, when I should be standing with them? Well I am not, am I? I am here. Nowhere. Darkness. Seeing by the light of a candle that is about to burn through that giant rat’s hand. Yet he seems not to care at all for the heat of molten wax.

“I have buried myself. Worse still, I have buried the son of the man I came here to save. Will I ever stop making Dan’s life a misery? I did when we were children, and I remember that plainly enough. So does he, if his ever wary gaze is any measure. What even am I? Not a member of the Black Hands. Not a member of Horvorr’s Guard. I am the man in the stories that you are supposed to despise. I am an outlaw. Murderer. Violent. Thoughtless. I have styled myself in imitation of Ragnar the Red when I could be no further from that fabled hero.

Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

“Where could I be now if not here? How many wrong decisions did it take for me to come here? Reject Brolli. Reject Gudmund. Reject Astrid. Reject Ruby. Reject the Stone Sons. Walk into the venom jaws of a withered Jarl with a coward’s heart. And what do I do now? Walk forward, carrying my friend’s son up this endless slope for a dual execution.

“And where is Astrid? Laughing somewhere. Drawing pictures of this climb. Easy enough for her to mark out the lines of a scene that never changes. What would Isleif say? Am I lost in the earth? Am I like him, only I will never find my way back? I have no son to go home to. No family at all. What would Brolli say? Or would he simply laugh to see me on my way to meet the king of rats? I have never met a king, perhaps because I am not worthy. But had Arnor not said that all things change? Keep walking forward in the hopes that they’ll get better.

“Things will get better,” Hjorvarth promised himself. “You are not dead. Dan is not dead. Keep forward. Stay the course. You are not yet dead. All can still be well.”

“Hjorvarth?” Dan’s tired voice broke the huge man’s reverie. “Where are we?”

“Almost here,” the kobold leader answered. “King Rubinold will show us how to drop you.”

***

Hjorvarth’s breathing came easier now he strode into the candlelit cavern of King Rubinold the Fifteenth. Though he still appeared uneasy as the prospect of suffocation dwindled, and as he strode warily between the earthen benches that flanked him on approach to the monarch’s mud throne.

He felt, in his dazed state, that the scene was altogether surreal: in the depths of the earth watched by the many gazes of giant rats, those that seemed to share the clothing sensibilities of Timilir. The place appeared no less a mock court than Gudmund’s Hall a season before or the marble approach of Jarl Thrand’s Estate, only now it was a host of animals, overgrown rats, that sat in place to lay judgement, as if these monstrous big-teethed creatures had, had grown tired of scampering between the feet of humanity.

Hjorvarth wondered, seeing desperate flames dancing in a hundred black eyes, whether this was the Lady’s Shadow. Whether he had died in that prison… or even sooner than that. Whether he had died outside the walls of Horvorr when he was finally surrounded, and this life that followed was much like life but different: a life of endless missteps and sufferings so great and numerous that they threatened to smother him.

The rat monarch that sat the throne appeared more regal than any man that he had ever seen. He wore a robe dyed to the colour of blood, trimmed by pristine fur. Gold finery glimmered as he shifted on his seat.

In the distant reaches of Hjorvarth’s tired mind, he could hear the squeaking and screeching of what sounded like a thousand angry rats. He fell to his knees, earth unyielding against bruised bones, and settled Dan before the throne.

The kobolds in audience, who had heard how the huge man had been cursed—unable to drop the other man—met the spectacle with an enthusiastic chorus of amazement.

King Rubinold himself appeared quite pleased to have so easily broken the curse. He smiled for a moment, before growing tired of the clamour in the cavern. “Silence! Silence! I will have silence!” He waved his golden scepter. “Am I not king here?”

Hjorvarth thought that an odd question. Nausea swept through his stomach when the giant rats behind him answered in the voices of men and women. He sucked in a tired breath, but it did little to stop the throbbing in his skull. “King Rubinold.”

King Rubinold flinched at the rumbling address. “Yes… goblin?”

“My name is Hjorvarth, son of Isleif, and I would like to be taken to the open air. I fear I will die here if I stay much longer, and my friend is in no better health.”

Murmurs of excitement rippled through the benched audience.

“Isleif?” King Rubinold asked. “This Isleif?” He pointed off to a vast and shadowed mural on the far wall, artistically painted, of two lithe men standing before a kobold king, watched by an audience that wore furs, moleskin, or no clothes at all.

Hjorvarth barely recognized the youthful visage of his ginger father. Despite familiarity, he could not place the handsome face of the black-robed man with golden hair. “I am confused.”

King Rubinold’s pink face creased. “I do not understand your answer, goblin.”

“Who painted this?” Hjorvarth asked. “Were these men in your company?”

Rudrun the Old cleared his throat. “It is a painting by the pink goblin known as Golden Hair. It is of the painter, and his companion, Isleif the Bard, in audience with King Rubinold the Twelfth. There are none among us old enough to have witnessed the event,” he explained. “Not even I.”

Hjorvarth searched the ocher-hued cavern, walls all bare earth save for that one mural. The clothed kobolds watched him in silent amazement. He turned back to the rat monarch. “Is Isleif the Bard a friend of the kobolds?”

“Of course,” King Rubinold enthused. “Why else would he send you here to save us in his stead?”

“I have not come here to save you.”

“Oh, but you must! You must! I have asked it of you!” King Rubinold stared down from his throne. “Am I not king here?”

The communal affirmation swept through the cavern.

Hjorvarth paused for a long moment, seeing his escapes blocked by armoured guards on all sides. “You have imprisoned others. Others like me, and the man with me.”

“Yes, yes.” King Rubinold nodded. “I can see you know your purpose.”

“I would have them released to the stone city.”

“What?” Rubinold shook his head. “No, no, no. I would have you release them to me!”

“If I may,” the pregnant kobold interjected, pulling her purple robe tighter about her belly. She awaited refusal for only a moment. “The prisoners that you seek have by stolen by the usurper Zelerath. Cousin to Rubinold. He wishes for you to venture into the domain of Zelerath and to retrieve the prisoners.”

King Rubinold thrust his scepter into the air. “Yes, yes!”

“So you have no prisoners?” Hjorvarth asked.

“Two. You, and you.”

“And the prisoners you took from the mines were taken by your foe, Zelerath?”

“Indeed,” Rubinold gravely agreed.

“And you wish for me to venture forth and rescue them, to bring them back to you?”

“Have I not just told you all this, goblin?”

“You have, but I see no gain in it for me. If I managed to free these prisoners why would I not just flee to the world above and take them back to the city of Timilir!”

“Treachery!” Rubinold screamed. “Guards—”

“Hold, Rubinold!” Rudrun pleaded. “This goblin may be our only chance!”

King Rubinold paused, his scepter looming in the ocher air. “He must do as I command! Am I not king here?”

The communal affirmation sounded out more loudly than before. Dan murmured on the floor, his eyes fluttering open.

“King Rubinold,” Hjorvarth began, his deep voice careful, “I will do as you wish. But I will need a guide to find Zelerath’s caverns. And I will need this… goblin, to accompany me. Does that sound fair?”

“No,” Rubinold hissed. “Why would you want to carry this goblin after I so kindly freed you from the burden?”

“He is a member of my clan.”

“Oh… oh.” Rubinold’s pink lips drew up over his twin teeth. “Then I will keep him. And I will hand him over when the other pink goblins are returned to me.”

“I think that would be a mistake, King Rubinold.” Hjorvarth glanced around the cavern, but each tunnel only seemed to lead further down into the earth. “You told me that Isleif the Bard was friend to the kobold people.”

“Did I?” King Rubinold rose from his throne. “Guard! Come close!” He scratched at his own belly. “You will find my goblins, goblin. You will bring them to me. Or I will make your clan member dead. Do you hear me, goblin?”

Hjorvarth’s pale eyes grew cold now he rose to his feet. “I hear you clearly, king.”

“Son of Isleif,” the pregnant kobold shouted over the worried murmurs of the gathered kobolds. “Beyond vents, this place is sealed from the surrounding earth. Without a guide, you will wander until you die of thirst, for water or air, in the darkness. It is plain, to me at least, that your goblin is in no health to travel.”

Hjorvarth rounded on her as armoured kobolds rattled closer on all sides. “He will die in the place you kept us!”

“We will store him in a higher cave, one with a steady flow,” Rudrun offered. “He will be fed and kept safe. And even if you do not return, we will ransom him back to the pink goblins of the stone city. This is his best hope, son of Isleif,” the old kobold insisted. “As you are ours. Zelerath has taken our prisoners… those that we need for ransomed riches of bread and pastries. We will starve if you do not help us. War encroaches the kingdom of Rubinold on all sides. If you do not intervene then all the goblins she has taken will die… we will all die, goblin. Would you truly wish that end on us?”

“No,” Hjorvarth conceded, drawing in on himself. “I wish to see the place where you mean to store him. I wish to see him fed, myself as well, and I wish to be armed and armoured. If that is agreeable, then I will venture forward, with a guide, in the intent to free the prisoners that this Zelerath has stolen.”

“Am I not king here?” King Rubinold shouted, answered by a belated affirmation. He hissed in surprise. “Your requests are agreeable, goblin,” he declared. “I would have them fulfilled. Rood!”

The armoured kobold lifted his helmeted head. “Yes?”

“Escort this goblin to the metal hole,” Rubinold instructed. “And arrange for a group of pipers to guide him into Zelerath’s tunnels.”