From the back rank I watch the frontlines clash. Sparks shower into the air as weapon strikes armor. Shouts echo off the narrow walls a dozen times a second in a cacophony of fury. I stab out with Heartseeker and do not miss. The first death of the battle is caused by me, my black blade goes straight through the eyesocket of a helmet and the eye behind it also.
An enemy spear lashes out, but I see its angle with ease and shift to the side just enough that it barely scrapes my helmet. The dwarf at my side stabs at the enemy’s face, knocking his helmet askew.
Jab, thrust, duck—this is how the battle goes. I see every detail precisely, my arms and hands work in perfect concert to seek out openings and gaps, and Heartseeker hits true on nearly every strike.
I catch occasional glances of awe from the two speardwarves flanking me.
Dwarves in the frontlines of both sides begin to fall, or limp back wounded in retreat. They are replaced by those in the second and third lines. The battle moves and shifts around the center, where our commander and the dwarf in leaden scales duel.
Our commander is equipped solidly, with thick armor, a short sword and a square shield. The way he fights is orthodox: he keeps his shield in front at all times for maximum protection while he stabs and slashes at his opponent with moves as perfectly executed and timed as those shown in manuals of combat.
He’s a fourth degree. He deserves the rank. His equipment is solid and he has studied and trained hard.
But he has never had an opponent like this one. The enemy twists out the way of every strike with unnatural ease of movement. When he blocks, he does so by means of an open palm against the flat of our commander’s sword. He strikes not with one weapon but with four—his fists and feet, and their impacts are like those from hammers.
A particularly brutal side-kick throws our commander backward. I catch a glance at his shield and see it has been caved in by a hundred dents. He scrambles upward just in time to receive an open-handed slap across the helmet. He staggers to his knees.
“Is that the best you can do!” laughs the dwarf in lead scales. “Fight harder!”
His dwarves take the taunt at our commander as an order for themselves, and press the attack. Distracted and demoralized by our commander’s woes, our frontline is pushed back. Several dwarves are cleaved down in showers of blood and chips of splintered steel.
I do my best to hold back the onslaught. Two more enemies fall to Heartseeker. But my fellow speardwarves are not so skilled. A crazed enemy launches himself through the lines and falls upon the one on my left, caves his head in with a mace. Screaming in anger, the speardwarf on my left turns and stabs that macedwarf through the back, then is stabbed down in turn by an enemy glaive.
My revenge blow strikes her killer down, and another follow-up kills my sixth or seventh enemy of the battle, yet the dwarf in lead was correct when he said there were more of them than us—we are at half strength now, and half of those are injured or have their runes so badly damaged they may as well be naked.
And then, inevitably, our commander falls—leaden fingers penetrate his gorget and rip out his upper windpipe in a spray of blood and saliva.
“Scum!” I yell in rage, and stab at the dwarf in lead in his moment of triumph.
He nearly dodges out the way, but Heartseeker is too fast and I get him in the shoulder. He gasps in pain as the black blade slices through his scales which turn crimson with flowing blood.
Through his narrow eyeslits he glares at me in fury.
“Chase down the rest!” he orders his forces. “This one is mine to kill.”
His dwarves yell out and drive the rest of my allies away, down the corridor, leaving me alone with the dwarf in lead scales.
“Once I kill you, they’re dead also,” I say.
He shrugs. “As if I’d care. Besides, you aren’t going to kill me. Other way around.”
He shifts back into his boxer’s stance. His injured arm is dropped slightly—it’s that section of his body I’ll aim for first.
“Think I’m going to be easy just because of your lucky strike?” he asks.
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“No. I’ve learned my lesson when it comes to overconfidence. You have your friend to thank for teaching me.”
“What?”
“Don’t you remember me? You must recognize my voice at least, we’ve talked a few times before. Some very interesting conversations. How’s Danath doing?”
“Ah yes. I remember your spear. Hard one to kill, aren’t you?” he growls.
“I won’t be saying the same once I’m done with you,” I promise, and stab at his chest.
He predicts the move and shifts, the movement as smooth as water. I draw Heartseeker back but he’s already flying forward at me, his right fist rushing toward my head. I duck and shift sideways, but do not account for the fact that he has four weapons instead of just one. His roundhouse kick impacts my side and sends me smashing into the wall.
His range is close, and he’s too fast, easily able to get within my guard. I shift my grip on Heartseeker so that my hands are in the direct middle of the haft and unleash a flurry of short jabs as I back away to create some space between us. They work—he stops his advance, surprised at my speed.
“Little bastard,” he spits. “Picked up some skill at the forge, I see.”
My answer is a strike to the heart so fast that Heartseeker becomes a millisecond-blur. He turns his body so it only slashes across the scales, and leaps forward for another strike. I see the attack before it comes though, notice how his stance shifts subtly, and I draw Heartseeker back as quick as it went out.
He halts his attack and backs away, shaking his head.
“No, no. I won’t be drawn into that trap.”
I strike again, a feint at his head which he ducks and then I follow with a true strike to his right foot. It was a stupid place to aim, I realize too late, one of the most mobile targets. He whips it back and kicks Heartseeker’s shaft with it, knocking the weapon off-guard. He bends his left leg then springs at me forward and up, and is suddenly flying down with a punch from above.
I bring my arm up to block and the impact is terrible. I feel my gauntlet dent and my flesh bruise. He follows up with a punch to my stomach. Luckily I notice it coming and am able to shift back the moment it contacts. The force does not sink in enough to bend the plate, but it does throw me backwards.
He’s relentless! A swinging left comes for my head, then a right darts for my kidneys. I barely manage to avoid them, then stab up under his chin with Heartseeker. But at such close range my weapon is unwieldy and he avoids the strike easily, and clobbers my ankles with a sweeping kick. I stumble back and nearly trip on a body, he front kicks me and sends me falling.
He’s above me, falling on me like a salamander about to bite into its knocked-down victim. He’s not the only one with speed though, and I roll out the way so that he bodyslams the ground instead.
I slash at him as we get up and manage to rend apart several of scales. The brightness of their gold runes dims. We back away from each other.
"Not so tough as you look," I pant.
“Fuck all this,” he swears. “You shouldn’t be this good. Shouldn't have runes that good.”
I shrug. “Jealous?”
“I am, as a matter of fact. Too much strangeness around lately. Like our silver legend, yeah? I hear from Danath that you’re acquainted with him.”
“I don’t want to hear those lies.”
“What lies? Do you know Hardrick or do you not?”
“I know a Hardrick. A drunken miner.”
“We know the same one then,” he sneers. “Though you’re a miner too, aren’t you?”
“Not anymore. Never again.”
I aim Heartseeker at his heart. He shakes his head.
“Funny you should say that,” he continues. “You both really are so alike. Jumped up miners.”
“I’m not Hardrick,” I spit. “He’s a thief.”
“You’re miners. That’s all the similarity there needs to be.”
I draw Heartseeker back slightly. “You’re trying to provoke me. It won’t work.”
“Then I guess I’ll have to be the one to attack.”
----------------------------------------
The interception team has been dispatched, and now Vanerak’s front line is looking very sparse. He taps his foot impatiently. The rumble of mining is much louder now and the ground is shivering. He holds his halberd point out, prepared to fight at any instant.
The odds, he decides, are most decidedly not in his favor. There are only two first degrees standing by him now, plus five second degrees. The rest of the strongest are rushing as fast as they can down the secret route. A plan to take Broderick’s forces from behind—that’s the lie he’s told the army to stop panic spreading.
Zathar! A spanner in the works of the world if there ever was one.
A crunching sounds from the road ahead. A spike of iron appears in the cobbles, slightly curved. A pick. It vanishes.
It is time.
“Brace!” Vanerak calls.
Any second now and a scaffold below in the tunnel, a platform for the miners—or at least, lower degree runeknights forced to take up the humiliating task—will be quickly and violently deconstructed. Then, up the slope of rubble will come the foe.
A grinding is accompanied by a shiver in the ground right where Vanerak predicted. The cobbles become like the shifting of a bubbling lake of magma. There is a sudden crash, and the cobbles vanish down at the same time a plume of dust erupts upward, turning the air gray and tasting of stone.
From the dust leap three golden figures, then one in silver, and following him the enemy army. Vanerak charges to meet them. The Troglodyte Slayers fall on them from above, and the world becomes a chaos of dust, sparks, and shouting.