Victim of Fate (32 page)

The ogre towered over him, club raised to
deliver the killing blow. Alto’s sword had been dropped but he
still had his shield. He raised it up and deflected the ogre’s
downward swing even as it made his shoulder throb. Alto grabbed for
the dagger Thork had given him and yanked it free with time enough
to slam it down into the ogre’s foot.

The ogre howled and leapt back. Alto stared
in shock; he still held onto the dagger that had been impaled in
the creature’s foot. The dagger’s blade was buried several inches
into the stone floor of the tunnel! The ogre spun and grabbed at
its foot where blood was pouring out. Alto saw all of one and part
of a second toe on the floor next to his hand.

He pulled the dagger out and rose to his
feet, and then slapped his shield with his forearm to blast the
ogre with light. It continued to scream and shout in its harsh
language at him. Alto slammed into the massive creature, shield
first. He knocked the off-balance ogre to the ground and thrust the
dagger into its side. The knife kept going, slicing so easily
through his flesh that it wasn’t until Alto’s hand was buried in
the slippery insides of the ogre that he realized it was dead.

He pulled the dagger out and stared at it.
Blood dripped free as though the knife was just too sharp for the
fluid to cling to. Alto shook his head and wiped the knife clean on
the ogre’s shirt, and then put it back in the sheath.

He gathered up his broadsword and prepared to
leave when he realized his feet were still bare. Alto glanced at
the six small goblins and then at the large ogre. With a frown, he
moved and started cutting the shirts off the goblins and began to
wrap them around his feet to protect them.

He had finished with one and more than
halfway through the second when he felt the ground rumble beneath
him. He looked up, worried, and finished tying the second set of
rags about his foot.

Another rumble shook the mountain, followed
by a distant crash. He felt wind at his back, from deeper in the
passage. The wind was faint, but it promised disaster. Alto turned
towards the direction the goblins had been going. They’d been
headed up, at least. He nodded and rose up, and then started to
walk. The pain in his side stopped him, causing him to gasp. He
pulled up the chain and looked at his side to see the jagged edges
of three ribs pushing his skin out.

Alto reached around for his belt pouch and
dug into it. The last time he’d met Thork, when they’d been trying
to find and kill Barador, the troll had given him some potions he’d
said would heal him. Alto had drunk one already. It saved him after
Barador had all but killed him and allowed him to defeat the man.
Now it looked like he needed the troll’s help again.

Alto drained the foul-tasting liquid, forcing
it down his throat in spite of how much it reminded him of what his
father smelled like after he’d returned from a hunting trip to the
swamp. He gasped, fighting against the urge to vomit, and focused
instead of memories of the times he’d gone with his dad on those
hunting trips and the bonding they’d done.

He grimaced and doubled over, his broken ribs
moving of their own accord. He felt them shifting and putting
themselves back in place, but something was wrong. A darkness was
filling his vision. Alto blinked, trying to clear it away but it
kept coming until he could see nothing at all. Was this the terror
Thork’s potion would show him this time, blindness?

"Please no! Don’t do this!"

Alto jerked his head up and around. That was
a woman’s voice. A girl’s. Not any girl, but a girl he didn’t need
to see to recognize. "Caitlin?" Alto mumbled, naming his
sister.

"Let us go, we didn’t do no harm to you!"

Another girl, Alto’s youngest sister Harvest,
cried out for her mommy.

"Save the girl for me."

Alto gasped. He knew that voice, too; it was
Beck’s.

"The rest of them get their heads on pikes as
examples of what happens to those who defy us!"

Alto fell to his knees. He couldn’t see but
he could hear and what he heard was screaming and crying and awful
sounds that ended in a silence far more terrifying than the screams
had been. He felt the tears running down his cheeks and struggled
to breathe. The final words he heard before the darkness lifted and
he could see again were, "Come to me, Alto. Come to me and learn
the price of resistance!"

"They stopped!" Mordrim called out.

Trina turned, pulling Namitus with her as she
spun. He stumbled on his wounded leg and nearly forced both of them
to fall. The gnomes had stopped fighting. They stood back, snarling
and calling out to them in their own language where the two caves
converged into one.

"I smell fresh air," Garrick said.

Kar laughed, and then explained himself when
the barbarian glowered at him. "They don’t care for being
aboveground."

"Bah, cowards," Mordrim muttered. He banged
his hammer against his shield and spat at them.

"Let’s get out of here," Tristam panted. He’d
stayed back with Mordrim to keep the gnomes at bay while the others
fought through the last effort the gnomes rallied to stop them. He
bled from dozens of wounds caused by the sharp nails and teeth of
the gnomes.

Garrick led the way up the tunnel. He paused
at a small room and looked about, expecting trouble. There were
bones scattered about the floor but whatever had left them there
was long gone. Garrick shrugged and continued on, not stopping
until he stood in the opening of a cave high on the side of a hill.
A trail led down through the snow on the mountain to foothills
below.

"It's good to clear the stench from my nose,"
Garrick announced.

"Aye, gnomes don't bathe much," Mordrim said
as he walked up clanking in his full plate armor.

Garrick turned and looked down at him. He
nodded after a moment of staring at the dwarf. "You fought well,
but not like a demon."

The dwarf barked out a laugh. "Aye, I'm no
demon, lad. You fought well, too, if rash."

"Such is our way."

Mordrim shrugged, his pauldrons clinking with
the movement. "Take care you don't use your way to get yourself
surrounded and overrun."

Garrick opened his mouth to respond but
Patrina and Karthor emerged, guiding Namitus between them. Kar and
Tristam came last, eyeing the tunnel behind them.

"Can you seal it?" Tristam asked.

"I've been burning, dissolving, electrifying,
or exploding our foes for a day and a half without rest and now you
want me to bring the mountain down on them?" Kar sputtered.

"Yes, if you've got it in you," the seasoned
leader said. "I'm too damn tired to even lift my sword should they
come after us."

"Over there!" Patrina cried out. She raised
her hand to point into the distance. Faint lights sparkled as the
sun set to the west.

Kar studied the lights and then looked to the
sky. He followed a few of the brighter stars and traced invisible
lines between them with his fingers. "That's Whitecap Watch, where
your wise woman is at."

"It's not that far," she said.

"Farther than I can walk tonight," Kar
muttered.

"Garrick, pick the old man up, would you,"
Tristam said.

Garrick turned and eyed Kar up and down. He
frowned and took a step towards the wizard.

"Just a damned minute!" Kar huffed. "I'll
turn you into a bunny rabbit and sick a wolf on you!"

Garrick's eyes narrowed.

"Thought you was out of magic since you were
too tired?" Tristam asked.

"Extenuating circumstances," the wizard
mumbled.

"Well then, let's get down out of this wind;
it's cold and I could use a real bedroll!" Tristam said.

"Let me try to walk," Namitus said. He freed
himself from Karthor and Patrina and balanced on one leg before
trying to put weight on the other one. A scrap torn off Patrina's
dress served as a bandage where a gnome had buried its teeth into
his leg earlier. The green fabric had been soaked through but now
the blood had dried.

The rogue put his weight on his leg and,
other than grimacing, was able to support himself. He flashed a
smile at Patrina and risked a step forward, only to crash to the
ground as his injured leg wavered and failed to support him.

"You out of magic, too?" Kar asked his
son.

Karthor nodded. "I'm spent."

Kar chuckled and clapped him on the back
before turning away so Karthor could help Patrina lift the crippled
bard back up. Fresh blood ran down the man's leg, prompting Patrina
to tear off another strip of cloth and tie it tightly around his
thigh. She'd removed enough of it now that her dress was hidden
beneath Alto's shirt.

Garrick led the way, his long legs putting
him ahead of the others until Tristam called out for him to slow
up. The barbarian waited a bit and then adjusted his pace so that
he was ahead of them but not far enough that they'd lose sight of
him amongst the hills and trees.

Carrying the wounded rogue, they made poor
time but still reached the village while Kar judged the night less
than half over. Namitus was taken to the great hall and left to sit
at a table, half asleep. The others collapsed onto the benches near
him while Patrina rose up.

"Somebody toss some logs in the hearth; it's
chilled in here," she said before she turned and left the hall.
Garrick trailed after her, catching up quickly and falling in
beside her.

"These are my people. I don't need a guard,"
she informed him. She bit her lip to stop herself from saying
anything else. She wanted to rant at him, to tell him he should
have been the one instead of Alto, but a part of her knew better. A
part of her that wanted to prove that she could be the mature and
responsible person Alto wanted her to be.

Garrick nodded. "Never said I was guarding
you," he growled back at her. He scowled and, in a softer tone
added, "This looks like a northern village, but the huts are bigger
and there's more of them."

"This is barely a village, by my people's
standards." She wiped the smirk off her face when she saw how wide
eyed the barbarian was as he looked around. "And my people's cities
are nothing compared to the great Kingdom cities. Or so I've heard;
I've never been there."

"I will see them one day," Garrick vowed.

Patrina watched him as she walked and found
herself nodding. "I believe you. But for now be silent; my people
do not know you. They value strength and valor, but to them you're
just a barbarian from the north. If I don't vouch for you, they
will have nothing to do with you."

Garrick frowned and opened his mouth to
retort but Patrina had turned down a street away from him. He fell
in beside her and was about to try again when she turned to a large
house and banged on the door with her fist.

Patrina banged again before it lurched open
and a man wearing a nightshirt under a fur cloak stuck his head
out. "What in the name of the saints are—Lady Patrina!"

"Lord Ayerl, my friends and I are fresh from
the mountains and we need your hospitality," Patrina began.

His eyes dropped to take her in. He stepped
out of his hut, forcing her back so the starlight shone fully on
her. "You're wounded!"

"We're all wounded, some gravely. Please,
send for food, water, and a healer to the great hall."

He nodded and turned away, mumbling a few
names of men in his village. He turned back with a start. "My
apologies, my lady, I'll bring them at once!"

Patrina smiled and let her shoulder slump.
She turned to Garrick and let him see the exhaustion in her face.
"Come, let's get back to them."

"You really are a princess," he said.

Patrina sighed and walked away from him.

They reentered the hall to see Karthor and
Tristam staring at them. A fire was blazing in the hearth and
Mordrim had fallen forward onto a table and was snoring loudly. Kar
had curled up beneath another table and was almost as loud as the
dwarf.

"Help is on the way," Patrina told them.
"Food and a healer, among others. How is Namitus?"

"Near death," Karthor admitted. "I've done
all I can; it's in his hands now."

"His hands?" Patrina asked as she sat on the
bench next to the table he was stretched out on. She took his hand
in hers and stroked his arm gently.

"He's got elf blood in him," Karthor said
with a shrug. "That may help him, if his will to live is strong
enough. He's lost a lot of blood."

"And a lot of that was elf blood," Tristam
muttered.

Karthor spared a glance to let Tristam see in
his face that he expected the worst.

Patrina leaned close to Namitus’s ear and
whispered something that was lost to the others. She kissed him on
the forehead and then straightened and looked at the fire. She
blinked away the moisture in her eyes.

"You care for this man?" Garrick blurted
out.

Patrina jerked at the rude question. She
looked up at the barbarian and nodded. "Yes, I do. I was a fool to
think otherwise. He's my brother."

It was Garrick's turn to twitch in shock. He
stared at the unconscious rogue and looked back and forth between
them a few times. "I don't see it. A different mother or
father?"

Patrina sighed. "It's a long story best left
for another time."

To reinforce her suggestion, the door to the
hall opened and Ayerl led the way in. He was still dressed in his
nightshirt and cloak. Other villagers followed him, including a
gray-haired woman who wore a necklace with the symbol of Giga, the
patron saint of fishing, sailing, and the ocean. She walked over to
Patrina first and bowed her head.

"Don't waste time with me; Namitus needs
Giga's blessing most!" Patrina snapped at her.

The healer's cheeks paled and she mumbled her
apologies, and then turned to the supine man. She fought to untie
the bandages on his leg but couldn't force the bloody knots loose.
Patrina drew her dagger and cut them, startling the healer. With
the bandages out of the way, the healer leaned in close to
Namitus’s leg and she prodded at it. Thick blood oozed out of the
deep gouges across his thigh.