They had put me in chains. I stood clasped in cold hard relentless merciless ugly foreboding gripping doomful manacles before the granite throne of the Dwarf chieftain. 

His bare arms rippled with bulging rocklike practiced sinewy imposing impressive boar-fed battle-forged sweat-sheened muscles.

He sat there, haughty, awash in orange firelight. Torches mounted on the walls ringed his audience room. It was all for show; the Dwarves always cut skylight shafts into the ceilings of their mountain chambers, so there would have been decent light in there anyway since it was still early afternoon, but he clearly liked the look of all the fire.

He held a huge axe. It looked sharp, and was engraved with shining runes; the usual.

He always used the axe when he gestured anywhere – hey, you there, stoke the fire; hey, bring me that joint of yak meat on the bone; hey, drag that skinny prisoner man over here so we can all mock him and say hurtful things. It was all just needlessly aggressive.

But worse than the chains, manacles, and axe-threats was the humiliating song they all sang at me. It was just uncalled for. The chieftain – his name was Thorfin Nosecrusher – signaled to his stout hall guard and they all lined up. They were formidable-looking warriors with beards up their faces nearly to their eyes, and, I knew – because I had heard them before – fine singing voices. They started a song while doing timed high-kicks (which were not very high, honestly; I think they could have done better):

Who, then, shall shoot me a quizzical glance?

Who can deliver me magical pants?

Why am I prisoner of the Dwarves?

I should be home working at the wharves

hauling out slippery fish to eat

‘cause I’m too chicken to hunt red meat.

I live on tubers and berries and nuts

which I’ll also serve to my weak friends in huts.

I rolled my eyes. They always went on about how dumb we villagers were for living in houses rather than in mountain halls. The song was also annoying because we did, of course, hunt deer and boars and anything else we could find, but they had caught me when I happened to be out gathering mushrooms. I would never hear the end of it.

I sang back to them:

I was just picking up mushrooms;

toadstools.

I won’t stand here for this mockery

from fools

who sneak to my town to buy socks

on the sly

and then deny that they do it;

just lie.

That hit a chord with them, as I knew it would. They all looked down at the stone floor, and avoided eye contact with each other. It got very quiet, and a couple of them cleared their throats. 

They always wanted to sell this tough-guy, or I guess tough-Dwarf, image of themselves wearing just leather and iron and wool, nothing else. Maybe they would admit to weaving some things out of hemp? I wasn’t sure. But it would have to be rough hemp! Skivvies made of rope, essentially! But in reality, more and more over the past few years they had been coming down to our town all covered up in hooded cloaks to buy lumber and then “I guess a bolt of cotton just for the wife.” Plus socks, long johns, nightshirts, you name it. Anything that could be hidden beneath their gambesons, chainmail, cloaks, et cetera. 

This had been getting more and more common as we people in Enkel Kanindal opened river trade with our growing neighbors to the south, the Venedians. All of our vendors were starting to keep cabinets of soft things within easy reach no matter what else they sold. The Dwarves would keep their purchases quiet, but they weren’t fooling anyone. It was to the point where some of our storekeepers would stock small wooden items like matches and clothespins which the Dwarves would buy so they’d have an excuse for a shopping trip in which they really just wanted to load up on underwear.

And sometimes they’d send down their beleaguered kobold servants to buy things. It would always be like, “Master Thumbgrinder needs a new awl handle, and flus” – they meant “plus” of course, but couldn’t pronounce their p’s – “uh, just for me, you know, I’ll take three Gossyfium tunics.” Yeah, like that wasn’t obvious – these oppressed dog-men just happening to have enough shillings of their own to get new Enkel-made clothes of fine Venedian cotton. 

“All right then, we’re not dwelling on those accusations,” Thorfin said, standing up suddenly and pointing his axe toward me (of course.) “My warders tell me you were apprehended on SwornBorn land, taking our property without permission.”

“You all hate mushrooms!” I said. “I’ll share if you really want them.”

“NOT THE POINT!” he roared. “We will – not – allow (he shook the axe at me with each word) outsiders to linger in our territory without the express leave of the SwornBorn.”

“By the way,” I said, “since when are you this ‘SwornBorn’? I thought you guys were the OathBorn? What happened to that?”

That really seemed to set off Thorfin. The small bit of his face which I could see now turned even redder than it had been already.

“We’re not OathBorn anymore! SwornBorn is more cool. And . . . the Dwarf clan up north of us in the Death Crags was already using OathBorn, we found out, although they hadn’t told many people. You would think they’d have the courtesy to . . . ” but he kind of trailed off, sputtering. One of his hall guard captains noticed this, and jumped in front of him and started singing. His comrades joined in, and in an instant they were rolling:

We rule these mountains – we’re SwornBorn!

Terrifying goblins and dunters we see!

They take one look ‘round them, and they know we’ll pound them

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Dwarves will always deal them a beating or three!

No disaster we can’t surmount!

Got too many heroes to count!

SwornBorn!

SwornBorn!

Masters of the Gray Mount!

The Dwarves up in Death Crags are losers

Can’t get rid of dragons that live right outside.

Chasing them with brooms and trying to use their slingshots,

But they just will give up and go hide inside!

Come and join us in our proud song!

Let’s dig deep, nothing can go wrong!

SwornBorn!

SwornBorn!

Le - gendary strong throng!

They went on like this, soon jumping up onto the tables. They would then do this thing in which they motioned to their friends and then jumped off into the crowd. They would be passed overhead, hand to hand, rolling around on all the upraised arms. I just watched, along with Thorfin on his throne, who was unmoved. Then an older gray-haired Dwarf came up to me and pulled out a big brass key.

“I reckon we’ve accomplished what we wanted to do,” he said. He popped open my manacles one by one.

“Wutherby,” I said. “Good to see you.”

“And you, Flicker.” He shook his head. “The young folk today. You know. Thorfin has his hands full with them.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said, as I stepped out of the chains. “I know he has to look busy and all, but I was gathering in the same place I have ten times before.”

He nodded. “Come this way.” He led me out of the boisterous hall. The last I saw Thorfin, he was still just watching his guard dance. Someone had brought him a flagon of something. A number of female Dwarves had come to join everyone, which seemed to lower the temperature considerably. They were just as stout as their men, but wore lighter-colored clothing and of course were beardless. Or relatively beardless.

Wutherby walked next to me down the hall.

“It’s that upstart Vigbond Thighbreaker, you know,” he said. “He’s putting pressure on Thorfin all the time to crack down on – whatever. Vigbond just keeps complaining about everything. And he has some of the young dwarves behind him.”

“When you say young,” I asked, “you mean–”

“Forty and below. The kids, you know. The whelps. But Thorfin still has to demonstrate his strength for them, all that kind of thing.”

I knew this, which was why I put up with the occasional slights from the chieftain. He was a good guy, really, a decent enough friend to our village, and a known quantity. We didn’t want to see him deposed by some volatile Dwarf pup.

“It’s not easy being a Dwarf-lord,” I told Wutherby.

He stopped. 

“That’s right,” he said. “That’s so right.”

He breathed in deep, held out his arms, and I knew I was in for it. He had a great voice, though. He started barking:

It’s not easy being a Dwarf-lord

sitting high atop your gold hoard

watching nephews, grands, and great-grands

grow ambitious for their own

Gotta keep one eye behind you

worryin’ some Dwarf brat will find you;

take your seat atop the stone throne;

steal your yak meat on the bone.

He resumed walking, then, but kept singing:

I don’t envy any Dwarf chief

who’s just searching for some re-lief

shoring up his iron doors

and keeping one ear to the ground

Fighting goblins, wyverns, wizards

avalanches, mountain blizzards

and he cannot let his guard down

or they’ll repossess his crown.

I put my hand on his shoulder, then, and raised one finger in the air. I took over:

It gets tiresome being a Dwarf-lord

dreading some clown with a broadsword

’s gonna say you’re getting washed up

and try to steal away your Guard.

You’ve been forging fearsome axes

digging mines! Earning taxes!

but there’s rivals on your heels;

you gotta work late, gotta go hard.

“That’s right, Flicker!” Wutherby said, and then he punched me in the shoulder. It was supposed to be a friendly, comrade-like little acknowledgment, a congratulatory whack, but it knocked me off my feet and into the corridor wall. His arms were just massive.

“Crying out loud, Wutherby,” I said. “What are you doing?” I picked myself up. 

“Oh, sorry there, mate. I kind of forgot who you were. But that’s a compliment, isn’t it? You’ve got some fine verse in you.”

“Well, thanks. I guess.”

“Those last two lines could have rhymed, though. I mean, they don’t absolutely need to. But they could have.”

“Yeah, I’ll work on it.”

We had reached the exit of the tunnel. It had a heavy iron door that Wutherby pushed open with a nudge. We both squinted in the sunshine.

“There you are,” he said. “Look at that, still daylight. You didn’t even lose too much time. Oh, and I set your bag out there.”

It was the sack of mushrooms, right outside on the grass.

“Kind of you, thanks,” I said.

“You know, I probably wouldn’t come here to gather any for a few days. Maybe give it a week.”

“That sounds wise.”