Chapter 15

“Less than a kilometre away, southeast.”

The words drifted down through the canopy, and Falagrim Felhammer nodded in the direction of two scouts awaiting his instructions. The pair headed off in the direction indicated, their shrouded forms soon vanishing into the murky gloom of the undergrowth. The Dwarf that was reporting from above floated down, his boots scraping over the exposed roots and stone nearby.

“The watchers were right,” he said. “Demis’re getting started early this year. There are more signs of raiding all over this side of The Neck.”

“What about you three?” Falagrim’s gaze turned to the others standing nearby.

“Weather’s been normal,” one adorned in a grey robe said, “plants and animals we’ve seen don’t look sick.”

“Nothing in the soil,” said another in platemail. “Doesn’t seem like anything’s changed at all.”

“Then why the hell are they so frisky out there?” Falagrim grumbled, “This is all out of season.”

“Good time to rebel,” the robed Dwarf ventured. “Bugbears’ll be swollen with their whelps about now, so the Gobs might have taken advantage of it.”

“Little shits are too cowardly for that.”

“Maybe a hero popped up?”

Falagrim spat noisily to the side. That was the last thing that they wanted.

“Should we scry ahead?” The robed Dwarf asked.

“No – let our scouts do their work,” he told him. “I don’t want anyone giving us away too soon.”

He turned away from the trio, crossing his arms as he tried to peer through the trees. With evening falling, two dozen of his people were working to break camp. If the tribes of The Neck were really up to something, they would have a long night ahead. Falagrim went around, making sure that everything was in order as things were packed up.

Roughly an hour later, the scouts returned. The senior between them – a Deepwarden who had worked in the company for over three decades – came up to Falagrim with their report.

“Place got ransacked pretty hard,” she said. “Looks like they tried nabbing everything they could in a hurry.”

“What got ‘em?” Falagrim asked, “You sure they didn’t just clear out of there on their own?”

“Looks like someone came in first,” the Deepwarden answered. “There’s signs of fighting, but it didn’t cover a wide area. Looks like whoever came just took over and the Gobs carried their stuff out.”

“Bodies?”

“None. S’all nice and squeaky clean.”

“Damn it all.”

The scout mirrored his sentiment with a nod. All of the company veterans knew what it probably meant: Hobgoblins. Out of all the Goblinoids that could be found in the Abelion Wilderness, Hobgoblins were by far the most dangerous. Unlike their more feral and savage cousins, adult Hobgoblins tended to be intelligent, orderly and militant – capable of forging legions out of their lesser kin. They represented a risky, yet lucrative prospect; Falagrim and his followers would have to go about their approach carefully.

“Which way did they go?” Falagrim asked.

“East. I saw more of the same stretching pretty far out, but we might be able to catch up in a day or two.”

Falagrim nodded, waving the scout away with a grunt. As long as these Hobgoblins weren’t travelling in a direction that led them towards Dwarven strongholds, then it was an opportunity rather than a threat. The tribes of The Neck were limited to whatever they could fashion out of wood and stone, plus whatever old, tarnished weapons looted from gods knew where.

“Hurry it up!” He shouted over the camp, “Our profits are wandering off!”

Hopefully, these Hobgoblins would take their sweet time. He didn’t feel like chasing them halfway to the Slane Theocracy.

Fifteen minutes later, they were ready to go. Two cargo beds were shouldered by four Dwarves each, while those remaining formed into an escort. There were a hundred thousand trails through the wilderness, but none were suited for wagons. There were certainly no roads. Everything was carried by foot or flown if it was worth it. Falagrim nodded to the scouts in the front of their procession, and they slowly headed off.

After they were well on their way, Falagrim turned to speak to the Cleric walking beside him.

“Agni,” he asked, “when’s the last time we had Hobgoblins?”

“Twenty years ago?” She answered, “Baerwynn was able to put our haul to good use.”

“Could’ve been better,” Falagrim muttered. “Their idiot general thought it was a good idea to head south and end that pretty little bit of business.”

“That’s how it always ends,” Agni said. "They always get a big head after a couple hundred thousand.”

“Greedy Humans won’t even let us run salvage,” Falagrim grumbled.

“Well, we are basically arming their enemies…”

“Hmph,” Falagrim snorted dismissively. “It’s no different than anything else – sell a Beastman some tools and none of their neighbours complain that you’re helping out their enemy. It’s Humans that are all messed up in the head: they only whine at ya if they think they have something to lose from what you’re doing.”

Falagrim’s thoughts turned dark as he thought about the Humans in the nation to the south. They had strict laws, traded slaves and were fiercely protective of their borders, just like his own people. Despite these similarities, the Dark Dwarves had been branded as ‘evil’ by the Theocracy’s leadership sometime in the past two centuries due to the Theocracy’s tendency to pick fights with their non-Human neighbours.

Since the Dwarves sold said neighbours with equipment, they had ended up at odds with one another. The Human nation had the penchant for directing their fervently religious nation against what their leadership saw as inconveniences at any particular time, turning popular support in favour of whatever their militant aspirations entailed. Rumour has it that it had recently happened to the nearby Elf nation in the Great Forest of Evansha – who had been the Theocracy’s long-time allies up to that point – and war had broken out. The insufferable knife-ears should have known better.

Untrustworthy, chaotic, short-sighted and selfish: the calling cards of a short-lived race. Falagrim considered Humans no better than the Demihumans of the wilderness, and often much worse.

They came upon the remains of the Goblin camp, and it looked exactly as the scouts had described. The loose ring of crude hovels was abandoned; everything useful stripped away. A conspicuously large gap in the undergrowth to the east marked where the former residents had been marched off towards. Falagrim wrinkled his nose at the lingering stench – that was the worst part of doing business in The Neck.

“Hey,” he called out to no one in particular, “how many Hobs was this?”

“By the prints,” someone answered, “at least four…no more than six. Most of the tracks are from Gobs.”

“Any sign of different raiding parties working in the area?”

“Hard to tell so far. We could fly someone up to take another look.”

“Do it,” Falagrim told him, then turned towards two scouts at the edge of the abandoned camp. “You and you: follow that fresh trail east. We’ll be right behind you.”

They moved according to his orders, and Falagrim watched one of the company’s mages send a scout up with a Fly spell. The Dwarves carrying the cargo litters set down their burdens, massaging their shoulders.

“There’s something big to the south,” the scout said after he floated back down, “twenty kilometres. Main body of the Goblin army, or one of them at least.”

“How many?”

“By the fire smoke,” the scout replied, “more than a few thousand. Depends what they’re made of. If it’s mostly Gobs like this group that came through here, could be up to fifty thousand.”

When did that even happen? It clearly didn’t start out in this part of The Neck, else the watchers would have reported it far earlier. Maybe a tribe had been pushed out of the hills in the west.

“Let’s stay clear of that for now,” Falagrim said. “We’ll catch up to these outriders and make sure they know we’re around.”

The Dwarves moved eastwards again. The trail had been trampled flat, and they made good time. These Hobgoblins were past the point of favouring stealth, which was a good sign for his company. The Dwarves traded frequently with the tribes of the wilderness, exchanging tools and equipment forged in their underground cities for slaves and salvage. Everyone knew who they were, and how things worked. Still, the Demis got a bit too frisky sometimes, so it was better to ensure that there would be no unwelcome surprises before approaching a large number of them.

“If this gets as good as the last time,” Agni said from beside him, “no one will be able to keep you from going back.”

“Hah!” Falagrim barked a mirthless laugh, “That ain’t how it works, and you know it.”

“I do,” Agni’s voice grated, “and everyone still knows it’s a sham. One good push and you’ll blow this entire farce apart.”

Falagrim snorted, the steel rings binding his braided beard glimmering in the fading light that slashed down through the trees. Agni was a devout Cleric that served the god of the forge and stood steadfast in her beliefs. Unlike her sister Baerwynn, however, she was absolutely terrible when it came to politics and intrigue. She wasn’t exactly naive – it was more that she adamantly insisted on walking down her narrow path, and Falagrim supposed that was what a Cleric was supposed to do.

“All that matters is this tattoo,” he pointed at his scalp. “The other princes can make as big a deal out of it as they see fit to keep things as they are.”

“Baerwynn must have an answer for that after so long.”

“Baerwynn’s hands are probably full just keeping the clan running,” Falagrim replied. “We lost all of our mines and half of everything else besides.”

“Like I said,” Agni reasserted, “a sham. They can’t keep it up forever.”

“But that’s the beauty of our whole situation, ain’t it?” Falagrim said, “My being out here is the only thing keeping us solvent. Even if I force my way back onto the council, it won’t get back what we lost. Without the slaves and scrap that we bring in every year, Clan Felhammer will go under. That’s the whole point of stripping the mines away: I have to keep everything out here going, so I can’t influence things back in the capital.”

The tattoo on his scalp was the mark of a criminal; the crime severe enough to result in exile. Aside from a few loyal retainers that had chosen to follow him, Falagrim’s entire company was made up of the dregs of Dark Dwarven society, sentenced to a fate worse than capital punishment. It took a long time to whip them into shape, but time was something he had plenty of. For the last fifty years, he plied the wilderness to ensure his disgraced clan survived.

Beside him, Agni’s face held a sour expression. It was the same one she put on whenever they talked about going home.

“If they’re so damned adamant on keeping you out,” she muttered, “then maybe we should all just find a new–”

“Hey.”

“Apologies, my prince.”

Her outbursts, though still rare, were getting more frequent with the passing of years. She had been away from home for too long, and increasingly pushed for a fresh order to be established – maybe he should send her back after this new Demihuman army met with its eventual fate.

Clerics rarely left their subterranean nation – the only reason they had Agni was because her sister had sent her along in her place. Unlike the other retainers of his clan, who could take turns working on the surface, replacing a powerful Cleric would be difficult. Dragging her around for decades with that same reason was even more unreasonable, however. Clerics held a revered place in Dark Dwarven society, and Falagrim understood that Agni should be living life in a position more appropriate to her power and experience in the capital instead of trudging around in the savage wilderness year after year.

They came to the next settlement: a large collection of crude hovels arranged around a low outcropping overlooking a small brook. There was a shallow cave – its entrance high above the water – making the location a highly-contested site that could only be held by a strong tribe. Like the previous settlement, it was picked clean.

Falagrim wandered between the remains of the simple dwellings, watching his company overturn everything as they searched for anything of value. He eventually came to the sheltered rise marking the cavern entrance. Several Dwarves stood about, discussing quietly amongst themselves.

“Anything?” Falagrim asked.

“A whole lotta stink,” one answered. “Was a big group living here too.”

“The way this place came down was too clean,” said one of the Deepwardens. “Wasn’t ransacked by a raid – just dismantled. Next to no sign of fighting either. Just a bit of it inside the cave.”

Falagrim frowned and made his way inside. The overpowering odour of Bugbear assaulted his senses, so thick that he swore that he could taste it. He followed the incline, down through two dozen metres of tunnels scrawled with crude designs and images until he found Agni standing between two grey robes.

The cave wall near to them was awash in dark stains that painted over what images were drawn there. At their feet lay clumps of wet sand.

“Hobs, then?” Falagrim said after a glance.

“That’s nearly for certain, now,” one of the robes nodded towards the stains on the wall. “It wasn’t a raid. Whoever came just walked in, offed whoever the biggest, baddest Bugbear was in here to show the rest who the new boss was, then marched everyone away.”

“They’re on the warpath,” Agni said. “This is a place that tribes usually fight to hold, but it looks like they left with no intention of returning.”

It was good news, but it also made things more dangerous. The Hobgoblins would welcome the opportunity to arm their best troops, trading some of their numbers away as slaves for Dwarf-forged equipment. That was only if they knew who they were dealing with, however; war-crazed goblinoids tended to be indiscriminate about their targets.

“How are we going to do this?” Agni asked, “The scouts said the trail splits from here: one group is continuing east, while the other headed south."

The ones going south were probably delivering their newly-acquired troops to the main body of their army, so this was probably Falagrim’s chance to catch up. Should things turn violent, they could handily deal with a smaller group.

“We’re headed east,” he said. “That bunch’ll be some of their regulars moving to ‘recruit’ the next tribe they find. Meeting with them should be enough to get the ear of their commander.”

Agni and one of the robes nodded in agreement. The other appeared uncertain.

“Should we scry ahead of us to make sure?” He asked.

Falagrim’s frown deepened, and the other grey robe cleared his throat.

“He just came on with us this season,” he explained. “The kid has some divination spells, and he’s been looking to earn his keep.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

“A-apologies, my prince.”

Why they had been cast out, who their enemies were, and of what use they could be – Falagrim knew the circumstances of every single man and woman that came under his employ. One would have to be foolhardy beyond imagination to not possess that knowledge when leading a band of Dwarven exiles.

“You,” Falagrim turned to the other robe. “Do you have spells that prevent your scrying from being detected?”

“No?”

Falagrim narrowed his eyes. He of course knew exactly what the mage was capable of, but the mage himself seemed entirely oblivious to the purpose of his question. The fact that someone was a magic caster always added value to an individual, but Falagrim thought that he should maybe have this one killed before he did something terminally idiotic.

“There are a couple million Gobs in The Neck,” Falagrim told him, “probably more. It’s pretty much guaranteed that there are at least a few mystics out there that can look back if we scry them. If you’re extra lucky, one will have a spell that will blow up in your face. Keep that in mind, Peeper.”

“P-peeper?”

“How’d you think you got that?” Falagrim pointed to the brand on his forehead, “If you somehow haven’t figured it out yet, you went and saw something you shouldn’t have back home, and you were too stupid to cover your tracks.”

The young Dwarf looked down at the ground, unable to answer. Falagrim turned to address the other grey robe.

“Make sure his tent is outside of the camp from now on,” he told him, “just in case he decides to get himself killed anyways.”