The Champions (20 page)

Though his opponent was some way off in the distance, he
appeared much closer than he should. Zorbin became worried. He expected the man
to have strength, or perhaps a magical hammer as did Drummit; hell, maybe even
the ability to walk through stone. Instead his opponent shared a similar
blessing to himself. The dwarf had expanded to three or four times his normal
size. Zorbin picked up the pace, for even the underground colony of dwarves
relied heavily upon the sun for light, and already the day was getting late. He
wished Xanth was with him. The dire wolf would be a great asset in such a
situation as this.

For two hours Zorbin moved to intercept his opponent and
nearing to within a few hundred yards he finally came fully into sight. His
opponent was intelligent. The dwarf had gone to a location that gave him a
strategic advantage. Not only was the unnamed dwarf uphill from Zorbin, but
also there was only one narrow path to gain access to him. All over the
landscape in this area, stalagmites climbed from the ground creating sharp spikes
on the ground in varying sizes.

The russet-haired, giant dwarf stood within a small clearing
inside the stalagmite forest, a long poleaxe balanced over his shoulder. Zorbin
eyed him carefully as he grew nearer, looking for a clear way to approach his
foe but was unable to find one.

The brown-haired dwarf had a vast advantage over him. He had
the upper ground, only one clear approach, and a weapon that gave him an
extended reach. Zorbin had a shovel which he discarded. Useless. He also had a
chain and a chisel. These he kept, tucking the chisel into his belt, and
holding the long chain with both of his hands. He saw no way to draw the dwarf
out to him, and as such had no choice but do exactly what his foe wanted.

Swinging the chain around his head, Zorbin charged his enemy
up the only clear path available to him. He hoped, if the opposition tried to
attack, his chain would tangle around the poleaxe thus allowing him to yank it
out of his hands. As he neared, however, one thing he anticipated and another that
he didn’t happened with unexpected result.

Twirling his chain, he ran full tilt towards his foe, who
lashed out with his poleaxe as expected. Instead of tangling around its long
shaft as Zorbin had hoped, his chain instead bounced off the lowered shaft to
twist around a stalagmite that rose from the ground just a few feet ahead. As
the chain twirled back in Zorbin’s direction, it became slack and, bouncing off
the ground, the jumbled links tripped Zorbin, sending him sprawling forward
totally off balance.

Seeing his opening, the other dwarf struck out again with
his weapon, but Zorbin reacted with yet another unexpected response. Closing
off his blessing momentarily, Zorbin shrank instantly as his enemy’s weapon
sailed overhead. Still flailing as he stumbled through the tangles of his own
chain, Zorbin again summoned his blessing. Now exploding in size he dove head
first towards his enemy. They connected in a wholly unnatural way with Zorbin
driving the top of his head into the groin of his enemy.

 The brown-haired dwarf released his poleaxe as his breath
exploded from his lungs with an awkward squeak. As Zorbin righted himself
slightly, he drew the chisel from his belt and used its sharp edge to plunge
through the Achilles tendon of his enemy. As his foe retreated a step, still
unable to breathe with his stomach in knots, Zorbin yanked the chisel free and
plunged it into the dwarf’s opposite knee with a twist.

With neither leg able to bear his weight, the brown-haired
dwarf toppled over backwards with a twist as he fell. Not even a scream escaped
him as a stalagmite thrust up between his ribs, ripping an ever-widening hole
the further gravity and momentum dragged the dwarf down. For several minutes
the dwarf twitched as nerves in his brain continued to fire.

Zorbin looked around and climbed back to his feet. Luck had
been on his side this time. Without it, his trip over the chain would have been
fatal. He located his dead enemy’s stash and collected a pair of single-edged
axes, a sack filled with food and a water flask. He grinned. At least he would
have a full belly when he went after the remaining two candidates for king in
the morning. Darkness was falling fast, and so long as Zorbin stayed put and
did not bother lighting a fire, the chances of one of his challengers sneaking
up on him were less than slim.

Zorbin quickly ate a meal and drank his fill of water.
Relinquishing his blessing he gathered up the chain and draped it about his
small clearing, spanning the spaces between the stalagmites. It was a minimal
defense, but if anyone ran into the chain he hoped it would wake him. He sat
motionless the last hour before dark upon his small stalagmite-covered hill
peering off into the distance. He searched for anything that appeared out of
place; any movement, or any flash or shine of light.

As dark fell Zorbin thought he spied movement several miles
off, however at that distance, in light that had all but failed, he assured
himself that it was simply a trick of the eyes. Laying back, the pack as his
pillow, Zorbin settled in for the night. For more than two hours he listened to
the darkness before finally drifting off to sleep.

*****

Linaya watched Zorbin’s chain mishap from above, and though
the details were lost at such a distance, even Gumbi and the king thought
Zorbin a goner when he tripped. Each of them was surprised when the member of
the Ironfist clan sent his opponent sprawling over backwards to fall upon the
stone spikes. Though she may or may not have smiled proudly, clapping her hands
like a fool, Linaya reminded herself that there were yet two more dwarves to
subdue. One of them would have to be killed. As darkness fell both above and
below the coliseum and Linaya rose from her kneeling position, she noticed
movement out of the corner of her eye.

Straining against the darkness she was certain she saw a
form darting among the darkest shadows just a few miles away from her fellow
Valdadorian. Darkness then filled the chamber below and all sight was lost.

Rising, Gumbi took Linaya’s arm and guided her from the room
and through several more adjacent chambers where smokeless candles had been
lit. Leading her back out of the capital building and down a side street he
brought her to two stone dwarves that each held an axe over a doorway.

Opening the door, Gumbi allowed Linaya to enter and told her
he would return before daylight the next day. Closing the door behind him,
Gumbi left Linaya to her own musings to return to his own chambers, allowing
her to explore her accommodations.

Linaya inwardly drooled at her surroundings. When Gumbi
turned to leave, so slowly she was certain he did it on purpose, she began to
take stock of the room already. Everything here was lavish and made by expert
craftsmen. The walls were painted in murals of wilderness scenes of the like
only found above the dwarven realm. The floor was covered entirely in thick
lush rugs and there was a selection of places to sit with several styles of
chair. Linaya tried them all, at least briefly, before settling on a favorite.

Rising from her preferred chair, she then strolled into the
next room only to find a huge lavish bed covered in silky luscious pillows, and
canopied in silken linen so fine it appeared to be made of heavenly gossamer.
Again Linaya plunged herself into the luxurious comfort laid out before her and
the bed swallowed her like a giant awaiting a meal. Lying there for several
moments, indulging, she chided herself harshly for allowing herself such
luxuries. The man she loved was upon a field of battle somewhere, quite
possibly fighting for his very life alongside everyone else she knew, yet here
she was upon a silk covered bed that was softer than a cloud.

She wondered suddenly if this is what Garret had imagined
for her all along. He knew the trip was a long shot at best and would more than
likely end in failure. He anticipated her staying here for the long haul, but
even so she was angry that there was literally nothing she could do to help
Valdadore.

From the beginning it had been an unlikely quest. When they
had arrived at Boulder Gate and heard that the king was old and tired, Linaya’s
hopes had fallen further. When he openly admitted he would not march out his
armies without so much as being asked, her hopes had died. Then Zorbin had
literally been tossed into the fire, and suddenly her optimism had been
renewed. She knew the outcast dwarf had what it took, not only to win, but also
to rule this nation. Unfortunately thus far most of the ceremony had been more
luck than skill.

Anything could happen, but Linaya held her faith in Zorbin
and the gods. As neither Garret nor Zorbin would likely get much rest this
night, Linaya crawled out of the luxurious bed, deciding instead to sleep upon
the floor. Sadly, she still felt guilty as even the rugs felt amazing upon her
skin. Such was the case that she quickly fell asleep, a dream of home, and of
Garret, quickly coming to mind.

*****

Sara, within her iron cage, trundled across the frozen lake
in the opposite direction to the flow of Sigrant’s troops. Though multitudes of
eyes fell upon her, she ignored them, knowing if she were to show a reaction
then they would have gotten exactly what they wanted. Instead, she sat upright
in the middle of her tiny cell watching the passage of bodies around her. Most
of the troops were already upon the battlefield but here upon the lake teams of
animals and men pulled war machines and siege equipment across the ice.

Sigrant’s rear lines had caught up with the main body of his
army and Sara made calculations, counted machines and teams, and memorized the
information in case somehow she was rescued. Such information could be
priceless. With her pain and hatred pushed aside in order to preserve her
sanity, she focused upon counting and watching to pass the time.

Hours later, Sara strained her ears as a roaring began to
grow in the distance. Slowly the sound grew and eventually, leaning into the
bars of her cage, Sara could see the great armored beasts slowly crawling
across the ice of the lake. As they grew nearer she witnessed for herself the
smoke that poured from their nostrils as fire peeked out from between their
jagged teeth. Their enormous bodies were covered entirely in plates of
overlapping metal, and handlers ran about the beasts in a chaotic maelstrom of
bodies.

Her cart lurched to a stop, the oxen pulling it becoming
nervous. The man that led them covered their eyes, blinding them from the
potential danger lying ahead. With a few well-placed strikes to the animals’
heads and flanks eventually they began to move again.

Nearer and nearer still the giant metal-covered beasts came,
and she continued to observe them without realizing the obvious. It was not
until they were right on top of her that she understood what it really was that
she was seeing.

The handlers were not handlers at all, but teams of gnomish
engineers and mechanics who accompanied these great war machines they had
designed for King Sigrant. Each of the metal beasts, though appearing a great
lizard-like creature that breathed fire, was no more than a mechanism built of
metal and powered by fire and steam.

The great lumbering machines had no real legs to speak of,
but instead had great spiked steel wheels that spun below them, camouflaged by
armor plates that resembled limbs. The fronts of the machines were designed to
resemble the heads of the great beasts, and fire spat and spewed from their
open mouths, into which the gnomes regularly fed a fuel source that appeared to
be small black rocks. At regular intervals steam exploded from the nostrils of
the machines. Within the lenses of the eyes, if you looked close enough, you
could see yet more gnomes behind the tinted glass pulling levers and twisting
knobs to propel and steer the machines across the ice.

They were by far the most complicated and wondrous machines
Sara had ever seen. She knew the gnomes invented and created a vast many
things, but she would have never imagined such creations as these were
possible.

The line of metal beasts lumbered along and, after a while,
Sara witnessed what many would probably not see in their lifetime. At a point
of apparent panic, gnomes rushed to and fro screaming and hollering with bags
of tools and other various implements that were beyond Sara’s understanding.
One of the great beasts had come to a stop, and the gnomes had removed the
armored side from it, exposing its inner workings.

Though she did not know the proper names for the vast
majority of what she saw, she recognized many of the pieces, and believed she
also had found a major weakness in their design.

Within the metal beast copper piping ran amuck with valves
and tubes seemingly everywhere, but tracing the lines of copper with her eyes,
she saw that they all ran eventually to a great copper container that sat just
behind the mouth and was heated by the fire in the jaw. None of that was the
weakness that she saw, though, as it was all protected by the steel-plated
armor.

Instead it was the larger pieces of the machine that she
thought could be used to bring the beasts to a stop. Though the copper piping
was prevalent throughout, the largest two pipes ran into a box that had a large
cog attached to it. This cog meshed with another which was the first of a
series running to the rear of the machine and finally meshed with the rear
axle. Sara realized two things about the machines. If the fire in the mouth
went out, the beast would stop moving. Also, if something were wrapped about
the axle, causing it to twist up into the various cogs, the machine would
become entangled and unable to move.

Though her thoughts were more or less a distraction to keep
her mind off the inner pain she felt, it was not until she sensed something
else that her emotions broke free of the dam she had constructed before them.
Just as she was passing the last of the mechanical beasts she felt the tug at
her soul as yet another connection was made with her soul.