Deepforge (15 page)

“Oh, crap!” Bruno yelled. “Protect the Emperor! Brendon’s a traitor!”

All divisions suddenly grabbed weapons and engaged Brendon’s warriors in battle, not really understanding what was happening. Chaos ensued.

Grognor lay motionless at Victoria and Brendon’s feet as the two warriors struggled with their locked swords.

“Victoria, I thought you understood what we were doing here?” Brendon spat out.

“Clearly, you’re the one who’s misled, you son-of-a whore!” She feigned a motion, and then kicked, knocking Brendon back and disengaging the swords.

They circled each other as Teelena came screaming to Grognor’s side. He had a bad wound in his back, and was bleeding profusely. He was dying. In pure rage, she jumped up and threw her hammer at Brendon. Brendon stepped aside as the hammer flew past him. The raging Empress ran at him as Victoria yelled for her to stop. It was too late. Brendon met Teelena with the point of his sword, running her through.

“Join your beloved husband, you horrendous creature,” Brendon said as he kicked Teelena off the sword.

Bruno panicked and ran to grab Grognor. He was horrified as he saw the attack against Teelena. “Shit!” he yelled. He concentrated and placed his hands on Grognor, trying to use his mental talents to heal him. It wasn’t working, his wound was too severe.

Brendon looked up just as Victoria swung her sword down, catching him on the shoulder. He swung up, deflected the blade and spun around for a piercing attack. She jumped back, avoiding the attack and swung down to deflect the blow.

Behind them the battle raged, with Eugene and the Naw-nee killing several treacherous warriors with arrow shots, and the Stone Children pushing back Brendon’s division. The others stood confused, simply defending as a few got through. Most of them had no idea why this fight broke out, except for Bruno’s exclamation. It was clear that Brendon had been accused of being a traitor, but none of them save the elite few directly involved knew the details. Victoria’s division stood ready to attack and defend her against Brendon. She looked over to them and shook her head ‘no’. It was understood; this was
her
fight.

Bruno continued to try his best at healing, but the Emperor continued to bleed and slip further away. “Damn it! Come on! You can’t die now!”

Victoria lunged forward and feigned a swing, then swung down the other side. Brendon jumped out of the way and hit Victoria in the mouth with his fist, busting her lip open. She blocked the next sword blow and kicked him, knocking him down. She then jumped to stab him as he struggled to get up, scoring a glancing blow in his side. Blood began flowing down his side. They stood apart, circling and sizing each other up.

“You wanted them dead, just admit it,” Brendon said, taunting her.

“I rose above the need for vengeance. For peace. You, however, were a traitor. You went against the Queen’s orders and attacked them like the coward you are.”

“Coward? We took on the brave task of attacking the malevolent dwarves when no one else would! We’re heroes!”

He lunged forward, but she deflected his attack and retaliated. He deflected her attack, and then she deflected. After several minutes of the exchanged blows and clashing swords, she dropped and rolled, knocking him down. Brendon lost control of his sword as she began stabbing at him, missing. He grabbed her sword and the two wrestled for it. Finally both losing control, her sword went flying. He managed to get to his feet and kicked her in the head. The blow knocked her back, but she quickly recovered and returned the favor. She grabbed a hold of a sapling and swung around; hitting Brendon in the side as he nearly got his sword from the ground. He hit the ground hard, her on top of him punching his face as hard as she could. He managed to get his arm around her and get a choke hold, which she easily twisted away from. He then reached up, grabbed a rock and smashed it on her head. She fell away and scrambled to recover.

He didn’t give her a chance to get fully upright before he body slammed her into a tree. Ribs snapped, and she screamed in pain and anger. He backed up to get a better position, and saw her sword close by. He lunged for it, but she stopped his movement by throwing herself on him. They both went down, snapping a couple of his ribs. As they wrestled on the ground, he finally got another choke hold on her, he kneeling with her in front, nearly sprawled. He twisted and squeezed, screaming in anger as he desperately tried to close off the circulation in her neck.

One of Victoria’s division shot an arrow, hitting Brendon in the face. He released her and fell back, bleeding. It wasn’t a fatal shot, but it did make him struggle to get it out. As he did so, Victoria caught her breath and jumped for her sword. She grabbed it about the time he retrieved his. He turned her direction just in time to see her sword pierce his side. He yelled and hit her in her broken ribs with his elbow. She screamed and jumped back as he swung down with his sword. She deflected and swung at him, missing as he jumped aside. She spun around and swung again, losing breath as a snapped rib punctured a lung.

Brendon deflected the blow and then kicked at her, causing her to stumble against a tree. He then lunged at her and scored a piercing blow to her chest. His sword went all the way through, pinning her to the tree. Brendon released the sword and stepped back, leaving her pinned. Victoria’s division rushed Brendon until he threatened with his dagger to finish the job.

She dropped her sword and grasped down on the one in her chest, struggling to get a breath. As her life began to fade, she pulled as hard as she could to remove the sword. Blood poured out of her wound, mouth and nose as she struggled.

“
You’re
the traitor, Victoria,” Brendon said. “Even after everything that’s happened. Even after he killed your husband
right in front of you
, you still align with him? We’re patriots of the human race, not cowards aligning with the dwarven scourge. Die a traitor’s death, bitch.” He looked up at her division ready to tear him apart, and at the battle going on against his comrades. He knew; he wouldn’t leave this battle alive. He approached her as she successfully wrestled the sword from her chest and fell to the ground.

Bruno continued to try and heal Grognor, but his wound was just too severe. Blood poured out. “Damn it! No!” he yelled.

Eugene joined him, trying his best to close the wound, the blood flowing out like a fountain. “Keep trying. I’ll stitch the wound together!” He quickly produced a needle and thread, and hastily stitched up the wound, stopping the biggest artery from spewing blood.

Bruno continued to concentrate, and it slowly began to work. The blood vessels started to mend.

“It’s working!” Eugene yelled, and continued to stitch as fast as he could.

Teelena coughed and began to come-to. Her horrible wound bled also, but she was not as bad as her husband. She crawled to him, crying and yelling, “Damn it, Husband! Don’t you dare leave me now! I’ll find you in the afterlife and kick your ass!”

Bruno saw her and knew she would need help as well. She bled nearly as bad as Grognor.

“Concentrate!” Eugene yelled.

Grognor coughed and opened his eyes.

Brendon knelt down to the mortally wounded Victoria as several arrows pierced his side. Victoria’s division was quickly closing the distance. He fought through the pain and raised her head, exposing her neck. “Go to the afterlife, knowing you’ve betrayed your race, whore.”

He put the razor sharp blade against her neck as she suddenly moved, shoving his own sword up through his torso. It pierced through his stomach, up through his heart, and out his shoulder. He stumbled back, gasping for breath as the dagger fell to the ground.

She fell forward, saying, “Go to Hell, traitor!” Her life quickly faded away.

Her division rushed Brendon, assured he was dead, and checked on their dead leader. They screamed in rage, and then turned to rush the other traitors. They were stopped short by the Stone Children.

Grognor saw the whole thing and looked up at his wife as Bruno and Eugene began working on her. He rose up and crawled to her side. “I love you, Wife.”

She smiled up at him. “I love you, too, Husband. Don’t you
ever
scare me like that again, asshole.” She punched him in the nose.

He smiled and kissed her.

As Victoria and Brendon died, the battle stopped. Brendon’s co-conspirators, what was left of them, dropped their weapons and surrendered to the Stone Children. The rest of the division moved away, incredulous.

Grognor and Teelena, now mostly healed, went over to Brendon and Victoria.

“Bruno, can you save her?” Teelena asked.

“No, it’s too late. Her spirit has already left her body, and that wound…well, it’s worse than Grognor’s. There’s no way we could have healed that.” He looked at Grognor. “Damn, that was a close one, Sire.” He looked over at Eugene. “Nice work, I couldn’t have saved him without your help.”

Eugene nodded. “Nor I. We work well together.”

Teelena and Grognor knelt down next to Victoria’s body as a crowd formed around them. Grognor turned her over on her back. Her open eyes looked lifelessly up at the sky, anger still on her face. Teelena reached down and shut them, tears rolling down her cheeks.

“What a waste,” Bruno said.

“Such a valiant warrior, and a good soul. We’ll miss you, Victoria,” Grognor said. “Look at that wound, right through the heart. She hung on just long enough to take Brendon down. She was dead before she scored the last blow.”

Eugene stood back and looked up at everyone. “This was my fault, all of it. Me and big mouth.” He hung his head down in shame.

Bruno patted him on the shoulder. “No, Eugene, this would have happened one way or another. It was obvious he knew. It was just a matter of time. Place the blame where it belongs.” He motioned to Brendon’s lifeless body.

Eugene nodded.

“Prepare a funeral detail immediately,” Grognor said, to everyone’s astonishment. “I know what I said, but…it must be done. We…I…owe her that.”

Grognor then got up and walked to the treacherous co-conspirators. They were all on their knees with their hands on their heads. A circle of warriors watched them closely with weapons drawn, Victoria’s division ready to tear them apart.

“What shall we do with
you?
” Grognor asked.

There was no response, just looks of hatred coming from them.

Grognor looked up at Victoria’s division and the Stone Children holding them back. “Execute them. Execute these traitors immediately.” He turned and walked toward the others, not caring to see the execution or cast his gaze upon the traitors again. “Put Brendon’s body with them and hang their worthless corpses from the trees,” he ordered, angrily.             

The brutality of the traitors’ deaths at the hands of Victoria’s division cannot be humanely described. The screams echoed across the mountains.

A short while later, the funeral pyre was set high above the ground, with General Victoria’s body beautifully lying on top. She was cleaned up so that she looked like she was simply taking a nap.

“I killed her father during the wars,” Grognor began as he addressed everyone. “She had vowed vengeance, but let that go in the interest of peace. Mind you, she wasn’t just putting it on hold because of our mutual enemy. She genuinely wanted peace, regardless of what happened. Imagine. Peace was truly more important to her than vengeance.”

He slowly shook his head from side to side and paused for a moment. An overwhelming feeling of grief welled up inside him. He looked down at Teelena, who was already crying.

The Emperor continued, not the form of a deadly warrior, more of a person mourning a close friend, “When we were recovering from the battle with the Drakmids, she challenged my disapproval of the funerals going on. She said, ‘humans need this.’ Well, I’ve discovered a deeper truth to her words, a truth I’ll keep with me the rest of my life. We
all
need to grieve. It’s not just a human thing…” he paused as tears rolled down his face. He heaved just a bit from the emotional pain. He was crying fully now. “We
all…
need to grieve. She was truly a good soul, and this world is a bit darker without her. If there are indeed benevolent gods and an afterlife, then surely she resides with them in paradise. Goodbye, Victoria….respected fellow warrior…friend.” He nodded to Bruno, who lowered the torch. The funeral pyre was set. The not-so-fierce Emperor then went to his beloved, and cried in her arms.

Chapter 14

T
hey wasted no time getting underway. Grognor took Victoria’s sword as his own, knowing she had no family to leave it to. Her division and what was left of Brendon’s were assigned to General Lucas.

The army traveled along with Brendon, Teelena and the rest of the leaders in front. Bruno and the Stone Children walked ahead. Bruno fell back a bit to fall in line with Grognor.

“Sire,” Bruno said as he walked alongside the horse-mounted Grognor, “I’ve been wracking my mind trying to figure out what went wrong.”

“I just really don’t care, Bruno.”

“Well, I guess not. But, there’s something missing from the note we forged.”

“I said I don’t care.”

“Just, please indulge me. We could actually still make this work, from the other side.”

Grognor tried to ignore him, looking straight ahead.

“What is it, Bruno?” Teelena asked.

“In Brendon’s note to Daemon, he mentioned a position. Where we were, where we were headed. I thought this was a bit redundant when I first read the note, since Daemon already knew the plan, but then I realized; this was a critical part of the note. They always mention their position. We didn’t mention where Daemon supposedly was.”

Grognor glanced over at him, but said nothing.

“So,” Teelena started, “you think we can still find out who’s behind this, and who’s involved?”

“Yea, probably. If we can get the language right.”

Grognor looked over at him, apparently annoyed. “This is bullshit.”

“Husband?” Teelena looked at him.

“You, Bruno…or Michael, whatever. You’re powerful beyond anything we’ve seen. I suspect you could take down the metallic dragons without a second thought, couldn’t you?”

Bruno turned away, ashamed and knowing where this was going.              

Grognor raised his hand, stopping the caravan. He looked down at Bruno with disdain. “You’re a god, Bruno.”

“No, I’m an immortal—”

“Bullshit! You can become anything, you cannot be harmed, and you will never die. You have healing talents, and who knows what else! You’re a damned god, and you’re acting like a mortal. You could have easily prevented the fight with Victoria. You could have stepped in at any point.”

“Well, I—”

“I don’t know what kind of screwed-up game you and your kind are playing here, but I won’t have it. From this point forward, you’ll not be restricting yourself like you’re a damned mortal!”

“Sire, Just—”

“What other talents do you have? Can you teleport? Can you speak to others with your mental talents? What?”

Bruno prostrated himself to the Emperor. “Yes, Sire. I can do all those things, but magic is not available on this world, or I could do more. There hasn’t been an energy breach big enough to allow it.”

Grognor didn’t understand some of what he said, but Delvin said, “Oh, right!” seemingly understanding perfectly.

“Then,” Grognor said, “you’ll leave us to continue this trek, with your comrades guiding us. You will contact Deccon, let him know what’s happened, and join him. Together you two will find out what the
hell
is going on, and report back.
Is that clear?!
”

“It’s not that simple, Emper—”

“You could kill me with no hesitation if you wanted to, couldn’t you?”

“Yes, Sire but I would never—”

“That you haven’t means you are a good god. You have put yourself at my service, and
goddamit!”
he screamed. “You
will
be!”

Bruno decided not to argue the ‘god’ part, and simply nodded. “Yes, Sire.”

“We won’t be using that stupid mechanical bird. We’ll be using you, Bruno. Go, carry out your orders!”

Bruno nodded and closed his eyes, concentrating on Deccon’s mind. “Deccon, can you hear me?” he called out to him telepathically.

“Bruno? Yes, of course. It’s nice to hear your thoughts again. Why haven’t you done so before, old friend?”

“Give me an image of your surroundings.”

“Sure, but why? You can’t teleport?”

“Yes, actually I can. Long story, but I learned how. Just do it, we need to talk in person.”
[2]

“Um, ok. Wow, ok…this is where we are.” Deccon sent a mental image of the encampment with the war machines trudging along.

“Got it. Be there in a sec.” Bruno looked up at Grognor. “Got him, I’ll see you shortly, Sire.”

Grognor nodded grimly and motioned for the caravan to continue.  Bruno concentrated. The space around him seemed to collapse. He disappeared.

“Wow! That’s kind of like when the dragons do it,” Teelena said.             

Grognor nodded, a single tear rolling down his cheek.

Deccon walked alongside the war machines and the rest of the army on the River Valley road. Suddenly, space warped and expanded, revealing Bruno. Those nearby jumped back a bit, startled.

“Deccon, we need to talk in private,” Bruno said.

The two of them walked a bit away from the group.

“What’s wrong, Michael, I’m sorry, I mean Bruno?”

“We found a traitor, Brendon and several of his division.”

“Traitor?”

“He’s been working with at least one person here, Daemon.”

Deccon seemed a bit shocked. “Daemon? But, he’s an elven elder?”

“There’s probably a network. They were sending messages back and forth using a mechanical bird. They mention an ambiguous ‘She’ as their leader.”

“Damn. So, what of Brendon?”

“He and General Victoria had it out. They were both killed, and Brendon’s co-conspirators were executed.”

“Damn. Then, we need to find out who Daemon’s working with. What if all the elves are involved? They’ve never been too keen on our idea of peace and harmony with all races.”

“Well, I have an idea…”

“Has there been any word yet?” the Black Queen asked. She sat on her throne, adorned with jewels and fine garments, looking very much like a Queen.

The High General knelt before her. “Not yet, your Majesty. We suspect there’s been a compromise.”

“It’s entirely possible. How’s the radio coming along?” She stood up with the gracious help of her favorite servant, Jennifer.

“The techs say it should be ready soon. Something about neutralizing the tubes.”

“Good, let me know when they contact our operative in Deepforge. I hate being in the dark.”

“Yes, your Majesty.” He exited hastily.

“Sire, I’m Cray, Bruno’s second in command,” the Stone Child introduced himself.

Grognor nodded. “How’s the trail look?”

“Well, It’s a bit hard to say. For us it’s an easy trek, but for you and yours it may be difficult. There’s also a storm coming. Looks like a late winter storm, the last of the year.”

“What will it mean for us?”

“Well, Sire, as you can see, the ground and the lower snow caps have started to thaw with the warmer spring weather. This will all be reversed with this coming storm. The ground will freeze, there will be heavy snow, and temperatures will drop drastically.”

“We’re mountain dwarves, this isn’t an issue.”

“Yes, Sire, but there are other races here, you need to watch them closely. Travel will slow down as well. We’ll probably lose a day as the storm passes through.”

“That still puts us ahead. Thank you for your report, continue on.”

“Yes, Sire.” Cray bowed and continued on ahead.

Grognor looked back at the army, and then over to Teelena. “We need to get food. The nights may be a bit too harsh for the humans and halflings.”

She nodded and looked over at Eugene. “Send out your hunters and take down as many stags as you can before nightfall. There’s a storm coming.”

“Yes, my Lady,” Eugene said. He motioned to several of his people, and they disbursed into the forest.

Daemon stepped away from the group a bit and looked through his backpack. He pulled out his spare mechanical bird, and quickly assembled it. Just before he had it completely put together, he heard someone approaching behind him.

“Has anyone seen Daemon?” Alva asked.

“He went out to relieve himself, I think,” Kalentoff said.

“Look, is that them?” Dove pointed as she straightened out her camping supplies.

The elves looked up at the cloud of dust rising in the east. Unseen to them, a mechanical bird flew behind them toward the west.

Bōddy nodded. “Yea, that’s got to be them. Let’s step into the forest and wait, just in case.”

Daemon emerged from the forest and saw them all looking east. “Finally. I can’t believe how slow they are.”

They all stepped just barely out of sight, which for anyone else meant they disappeared completely. The thick green forest north of the road concealed them perfectly.

Deccon was the first to be seen, walking along in front of the war machine division. Behind him, the massive rolling structures of war slowly approached. As they came parallel to where the elves waited, Deccon stopped the procession.

“We’ll make came here,” he announced. He knew the elves were out there waiting.

Moments later, the elves came out of the forest to greet them. Daemon met Deccon’s eyes and locked on them for a short moment before turning away. He quickly made himself busy helping to set camp for the weary travelers.