The Game of Fates (81 page)

“Arren!”
the little kobold called.  Another kobold, this one clearly female, stopped
next to him.

Arren
looked down at him curiously.  After a moment, he smiled in recognition. 
“Trallik, my little fellow!” Arren called down.  “Tell me, what news of the battle?”

“This
huge dragon showed up!  It’s burning our valley!”

“Yes,”
Arren called back, “I noticed that.  Tell me, what of the ants?”

“They’re
chasing us, but we’re going to form a perimeter here in the clearing!”

“But
what of the dragon?” Arren asked.

“I
don’t know, but we’re hoping it doesn’t come after us before we can fight off
the ants,” Trallik said.  The female kobold grabbed Trallik’s arm and pointed
back the way they had come.  It was obviously time to go.

“Well,
good luck with that!” Arren said.  “I’ll see what I can do to help.  Please
tell your people to not shoot me!”

Trallik
nodded and began running after the female he was with.  Not twenty steps later
the first of a flood of ant warriors was passing beneath Arren’s tree.  As he
watched, hundreds of ant warriors flooded by, crashing headlong into the
kobold’s newly formed shield wall.  As the moments passed, more and more ant
warriors came flooding through the trees and out into the clearing, pressing
around both sides of the kobold line, until the few thousand kobolds gathered
on the broad, flat hilltop had to finish forming a large circle, swords and
spears pointed outward, with hastily gathered wounded companions lying about
the inside of it among the units of archers and wolf-riding cavalry.

Gorgon,
Goryon, and their two teams soon found themselves very much alone on the
steep-sided stone hill as the entire kobold line withdrew under pressure from
the ant queen and her hosts, and with fear that the dragon may very well come
after them next. 

Running
up onto the lip on the south side of their position, Gorgon Hammer yelled down
to the rest.  “They’re reforming in the clearing!” he called.

“Son!”
Goryon called.  “Grab your hammer!  It appears the ants didn’t like our little
part in this battle!”

Running
to the eastern edge of their little hilltop, Arbelk, Jerrig, and Troka stopped
in horror as they saw what had to be at least a hundred ant warriors all piling
up on top of each other, working together to build a living ramp that their
companions could climb to get at the great bow teams.

Turning
to look at each other for a moment, Arbelk and Troka ran back and hefted one of
the great bows, dragging it, stand and all, to the east edge of the hilltop. 
While Jerrig picked up rocks and threw them down on top of the ants, Gorgon
joined the other two and together the three of them aimed the Great Bow
downward and fired into the mass of ants, skewering several of them and causing
part of the ant pyramid to collapse.

“Load! 
Load!  Load!” Gorgon called out as Arbelk and Troka fumbled with the iron
levers.

Suddenly,
from the rear of their little hilltop position, a few ant warriors came
chittering up to attack.  Turning his great bow, Goryon fired the massive bow,
cutting one ant warrior in half and skewering two others before he dropped it
and picked up his own hammer and shield.  Yelling a challenge, he charged at
the dozen or so ant warriors who had already arrived, followed by the three
other warriors of his team.

Arren
watched as the kobold archers fired volley after volley into the ants that
ringed the perimeter, while the shield wall fought desperately for every inch
of ground.  Though he hadn’t counted formally, such a task would take too long
after all, Arren could see that they were easily outnumbered by at least two to
one by the ant warriors.  Despite their best efforts, soon the kobold perimeter
began to compress, as warriors were slain or driven back.  Though they tried to
regain every bit of lost ground, it was clear that the ants were having more
success driving the kobolds back into the center of the circle than the kobolds
were having in maintaining their perimeter.

Then,
suddenly through the trees came a series of crashing sounds as branches and
trunks went flying.  Soon, pushing through the trees, Arren saw the largest ant
he’d ever seen.  It was immense, bleeding, and thoroughly enraged.

As
the elf watched, the ant queen pushed through the trees not twenty steps away
from him, arriving at the edge of the clearing to the sound of two large trees
falling over at the same time.  All about her, the warriors of her brood were
going crazy with the pheromones she was releasing, chittering and charging in a
super-heated frenzy.  Spotting a clear path toward the obvious targets of her
anger, the ant queen shook the ground as she stomped forward toward the kobold
perimeter.

Quietly
pulling the bow from his back, Arren withdrew one of his bilandrium-tipped
arrows.  It wasn’t everyday that he would fire one of these, the silvery metal
being exceptionally valuable, but then it wasn’t everyday that he met a giant
ant queen either.  Looking at the tip of the arrow, he ran his fingers along
the magical runes engraved in it, then arranged the fletching, straightening
out the eagle’s feathers placed to straighten and tighten the arrow’s flight.

Nocking
the arrow to the bowstring, he pulled it swiftly back to his ear.  Then,
sighting along the length of the arrow, he released the bowstring.  The arrow
leapt from the bow with a power that only arrows enhanced with the power of
Dharma Kor could possibly channel.  As Arren watched, the arrow sped toward the
massive monster as she approached the trembling little warriors standing firm
in their shield wall looking at their death approaching.  As the arrow struck,
a small mist of blood appeared on the side of the ant queen’s head.

Suddenly,
as if she had been swatted with a massive hammer, the ant queen’s head jerked
to one side, and her legs splayed out to keep her from falling over.  All about
her, ant warriors ran away and the kobold shield wall began to step backward.

As
Arren’s second silvered arrow struck her head also, the massive front legs of
the trembling beast slipped out from under her, dropping her head to the
trampled grass of the clearing.  Her front legs were followed by her middle set
of legs, though her rear legs stayed strangely erect, holding her abdomen high
up into the air.  Like an animal with distemper, she thrashed about, trying to
get her legs underneath her, while at the same time wildly lashing out at
anything around her with massive mandibles.

All
around the ant queen, it was as if a shockwave had gone through the ant
warriors.  Suddenly, where they had been deliriously focused on breaking the
kobold line, instead they looked about with uncertainty.  Without their queen
mother motivating the ant warriors with her mind-controlling pheromones, they
soon became a mass of disorganized warriors, each looking to its own needs,
fighting among themselves as they fed on the bodies of the dead from both
sides.

From
all around the circle of kobold warriors a loud cheer slowly erupted, starting
with those nearest the ant queen, until all who saw the ants’ confusion joined
in.  Taking the cue, the Kobold Gen cavalry that had been holding back in the
middle of the circle charged forward, breaking out of the circle and driving
ant warriors before them.

With
a cheer, many sub-leaders of Kale Gen companies, and in fact units all around
the circle, began to surge forward, driving the distracted ants before them. 
Soon the ant warriors began to route, being driven into the forest by bands of
kobold warriors, each determined to exact revenge for the destruction the ants
had wrought.

Coming
down from his tree, Arren walked calmly over to where Trallik and his female
companion stood, companions of the kobold who seemed to be most in charge in
this large mass of gleeful warriors.

G
orgon was so absorbed in smashing
ant warriors with his two-handed hammer that he only noticed they had stopped
attacking when there were no more milling around the top of Great Bow Hill. 
Breathing rapidly, he looked about himself, slowly coming to the realization
that the danger had ceased.

On
the east end of the hilltop Jerrig was forming his hands into a diamond, a
point of fire forming and flying out from between his fingers to strike down an
ant warrior at the bottom of the hill.  Arbelk and Troka, on the other hand,
were loading up the great bow to take a shot at the ant warriors who had stopped
to feast on the corpses of the mingled dead where the kobolds had held the line
at the top of the slope.

At
the rear slope of the hilltop, Gorgon saw his father and two of his warriors
desperately trying to save the life of their fourth companion and teammate
whose neck had been punctured by an ant warrior’s arm spike.  Blood was
spurting everywhere, however, and in a couple of moments he stopped thrashing
about.  It had been a day of much death already, but Goryon took his warrior’s
death personally.  Much to Gorgon’s surprise, his father had tears streaming
down his face.  It was the first time he had seen his father cry since his
mother had died.

“Gorgon! 
Goryon!” a call from behind him brought him back to the present.  Jerrig was
pointing up into the sky.  A low dread had crept into their hearts, even as the
ants’ attack had begun to fall apart, but none of them had paid heed to it. 
After all, none of them had expected to live, so what was fear?

Instantly,
Gorgon knew where the fear came from.

“The
dragon!” Jerrig called, and everyone on the hilltop turned to see where he was
pointing.

“Hurry!”
Gorgon called as he ran to his father’s great bow and grabbed an iron lever to
begin loading it.  “Troka!  Fire that great bow you’re holding!”

Troka
backed up.  “I don’t think I’ll hit,” he said.

From
behind Troka, Gorgon’s father Goryon ran over to the already loaded great bow,
pushing Troka out of the way.  Carefully he aimed through tear-filled eyes,
then ever so slowly pulled back on the trigger.  In an instant the missile flew
out into the air, seemingly hanging in mid-air as it spun away from them and
toward the dragon. 

He
didn’t understand it, but in his heart, Gorgon just knew his father had hit the
great beast.

Suddenly
the dragon turned, as if to come in for a quick landing.  The great bow’s bolt
struck him exactly at a joint in the middle of his left wing, however, causing
it to fold.  Like a kite whose string has been cut, the dragon plummeted the
remaining hundred or so feet to the ground, landing in the middle of the
clearing and in the middle of the thousands of rejoicing kobolds.

Kobolds
ran in all directions as Mananthiél fell from the sky.  Landing heavily, he
waited a couple of moments, then rolled over to his feet before slowly standing
up on all fours.  He was still a bit wobbly from the impact, and many things in
his body hurt, but he knew he was not among friends, so he moved as quickly as
he could.  Though dragons had immense power compared to the lesser races on
Dharma Kor, he knew that half of keeping the raging mobs at bay was the fear he
projected, and the fearsome image he maintained.

Shaking
his head about, he let out a loud roar, shooting flames out into the air while
stomping the ground with one of his front legs.  This was all a distraction
from the real issue, which was his left wing.  While he was roaring and
stomping about, he was moving the wing about, testing it to see if perhaps it
might hold his weight.  He didn’t like what he felt.

Looking
about, he could see kobolds running in every direction.  The screams of the
little dragon-spawn only egged on by the dragonfear Mananthiél naturally
exuded.  He knew this wouldn’t last forever, however.  He didn’t have time to
summon the words of power to mend his wounded wing, nor could he concentrate on
such a thing in his current situation.  No, he would have to ‘wing it’ for
now.  Mananthiél smiled at his own smug little joke.

As
the dragon looked about the clearing, trying to think of ways to keep control
of the situation, his eyes caught hold of one kobold dressed a bit better than
most, with a crown of bronze on his head.  Running forward, he pounced on the
kobold, catching it in a cage of his claws and pinning it to the ground as its
crown went rolling.  After sending a particularly muscular kobold flying with a
swat of his tail, the rest of the kobold’s personal guards scattered, and the
wolf one of them had been holding ran for its life with its tail between its
legs like the kobolds it served.

“You!”
Mananthiél roared.  “What is your role among these vermin?”

The
kobold didn’t answer.  After a second of watching the kobold gasp, Mananthiél
realized that he was probably crushing him.  He lifted his foot ever so
slightly.

“Speak!”
the dragon roared.

Coughing
and sputtering, the kobold eventually spoke.  “I am Lord Karthan” it spoke in a
calm, almost resigned voice.  Mananthiél was puzzled by how calm the kobold
was.  From the corner of his eye he could see a small number of kobolds
beginning to come toward him from different points around the edge of the
clearing.  Were they insane?

“Are
you lord of all of these kobolds?” Mananthiél asked, continuing to monitor the
kobolds.

“No,
great dragon,” Lord Karthan spoke.  “I am Lord of the Kale Gen, but there are
kobolds here from the Kobold Gen and from the Krall Gen as well, and some from
the other gens in the northern valley.”

Mananthiél
growled in frustration.  He’d wanted to get this over quickly by capturing
whoever was in charge of all the kobolds here, but the Fates didn’t seem to be
on his side today.  And now there were a handful of these annoying little
creatures approaching from different angles around the clearing. 

Inconsequential,
certainly, but he was more used to little creatures running away, not coming
toward him.  Perhaps he was getting to be a bit obsessive himself, he thought. 
Perhaps Marsa, his larger female mate, was rubbing off on him.  Things that
were out of place just annoyed him nowadays.

Kale
stood in the center of the clearing watching the dragon.  He was rooted to the
spot, not by his own will, and yet not by fear alone.  Perhaps it was a mix of
both fear and the power of the Kale Stone he could feel welling up in his
hands.

As
he stood there, fixated on the dragon to his front, he heard a voice from off
to his right.  Daring to take his glance away from the dragon, who had by now
swatted away Khazak Mail Fist with its tail and pounced on Lord Karthan, Kale
looked over and saw Durik running toward him, followed closely by his much
older chief elite warrior, Manebrow by name, and a female kobold whose name he
couldn’t remember at the moment.

Looking
off to the other side, he saw his younger brother gathering up a shield that
someone had thrown down and running toward him as well.  He smiled at that,
though he felt certain he would be dead soon.  No matter what, his brother had
always stood by him.

In
a few moments the five kobolds were standing together, and they were preparing
for what they thought would come next.  As they steeled themselves to confront
the dragon, however, a subtle power began to emanate from the stone, calming
their almost frantic nerves and emboldening them for the confrontation ahead.

“I
want you to tell your gen that they are now my slaves,” Mananthiél spoke in his
gravelly, thunderous voice.

“No,
dragon,” a little voice said from not too far away.  Looking up from his little
prisoner, Mananthiél saw that the small handful of kobolds had mostly gathered
together into one group and were looking defiantly at him.  In front of them
two kobolds stood, the one who spoke had a nicely inlaid, golden-hilted sword.

Under
normal conditions, Mananthiél would have just blasted the creatures into
oblivion, but the sword was of good make, and might have magical properties as
well.  It would make a nice gift for his mate, which she would probably need…
especially if he couldn’t find that Krech Stone and the elf that had taken it.

Narrowing
his eyes a bit, Mananthiél let up on his prisoner and walked over toward the
little group until he stood immediately in front of them, his hot breath
washing over them, the liquid fire that boiled up within him aching to be
released.

“And
who, might I ask, are you?” Mananthiél asked flatly, the contempt in his voice
for these little creatures clear.

The
other kobold, who had not spoken yet, lifted one hand.  Suddenly, a brilliant
flash of light caused the red dragon to recoil and cover his eyes with his
front leg.  “I am Kale, son of Kale, inheritor of the power of the Kale Stone,
by whose right I rule!” the little kobold spoke in a voice that pierced the
massive dragon to the heart.

Mananthiél
backed up, the intensity of the power that confronted him was different from
anything he had ever faced before.

“What…
power is this?” he grunted as he winced in pain.

“It
is the power of The Sorcerer, by His Covenant with our world Dharma Kor!” the
little kobold with the stone spoke in a voice that held an immortal power.

“And
it is the power of Morgra, Keeper of the Covenant and protector of our race!”
the kobold with the golden-hilted sword spoke by the same power.

Finally
regaining some of his senses, Mananthiél breathed in, closed his eyes, and
roared liquid fire at the small group of kobolds.  As he watched, the fire sped
at them and washed over them as if there were a spherical shield around them,
protecting them from his fire.  As the fire engulfed them, then flowed past,
the light broke forth again from the stone the one named Kale held, blinding
Mananthiél again and causing him to recoil yet again.

“Ah!”
Mananthiél wailed, despairing at his sudden turn in fortunes.  “What would you
have of me?  Why do you vex me so?”

“It
is not us who vex you, it is you who have destroyed our home!” the one named
Kale spoke.  “You bring fire to our valley, burning our homeland!  You brought
orcs down upon us!  For your greed you have slain many, seeking to take all
that is not yours!  Even now you plot to kill your own mate!”

Mananthiél
was amazed and rebuked.  The light of this power the little kobold held had
laid bare his own plotting for these little… kobolds to see.  The pain of the
holy light probing every crack and crevice of his evil, twisted soul was more
than he could bear.  As if to add insult to injury, several arrows and magical
bolts of fire bounced off his hide at random as the kobold spoke.

“Know
this,” the kobold continued.  “We shall bear your evil no longer!  Leave this
valley, and never return, foul beast!”