"Bah, is there no end to this infernal snow?" The aged dwarf squinted his eyes and stared upwards into the clouded skies for a moment before sighing heavily and returning his attention to the goats. "Hurry it up, beasts! Ah have no intention of sleeping in this blasted cart another night!" The dwarf's whip cracked over the heads of the lumbering beasts, both of which seemed unconcerned with how fast they were pulling the cart behind them."Honestly, Ah don't see how that can help," replied the bundled figure to the dwarf's side. Raising a frosted eyebrow, he turned to regard the only other figure in the slowly creaking cart. She had remained bundled in thick furs ever since the pair had left Althea a few days ago.
"Ye don't, do ye? Well, that don't mean that it's not worth sayin', does it?" The dwarf regarded the bundled figure with what he assumed was a charming grin. "Besides, it's not like ye've been all too talkative as of late, eh Grasilda?"
With a heavy sigh, the figure beside him shrugged the blankets from her shoulders, exposing her head to the qoftly whining wind. Turning towards the dwarf, she scowled at him briefly before turning her gaze back to the icy trail stretched out before their cart.
"Let me remind ye, Gradney, that me husband is none other than King Gregor. Ah dun think that he would appreciate his 'trusted guide' saying such things to his wife." The dwarven woman barked out a brief laugh, shaking her head at the thought.
"Bah," said the dwarf known as Gradney the Ironfist, "Ah'm just playing with ye, ye know that." The large dwarf set down the reins for a moment as he withdrew a small flask from beneath his thick overcoat, and held it out towards his companion. "Fancy yerself a swig, m'lady?"
With a widening grin, his passenger, Queen Grasilda, wife to the King of Druskeden, accepted the iron flask from his meaty hand and took a long pull from its contents. When she handed the flask back to Gradney, he was surprised to note that it was nearly half empty. "Gregor," he thought to himself as he finished off what was left of the dwarven whiskey, "did a mighty fine job of finding himself a woman."
The hours stretched slowly stretched past the two dwarves as the goat-pulled cart lumbered along the mountain path. Soon, the ground to the left of the path began to fall away from the road, forming a deep, sloping ditch. On their right, the land had decided to rise sharply, forming a rather steeply sloped hill some twenty feet in height. Gradney had began showcasing his extensive knowledge of dwarven curses as the sun began to dip below the horizon, most of which were directed towards the goats, the snow, or some interesting combination of the two.
Grasilda, for her part, had once more wrapped herself in her heavy fur blankets, and was staring off into the distance, her mind upon the negotiations she had left behind in Althea. "Well," she thought, "perhaps 'negotiations' isn't quite the right word..."
Her husband had asked her to travel south to Althea, the human kingdom under the rule of his old friend Aelaer. She had met Aelaer years ago, of course, when he and Gregor were little more than wandering crusaders. At that time, Gregor had been a young, handsome dwarf devoted to Aelaer and his group of adventurers, the Crimson Eagles. Gregor had been introduced to her father by a local matchmaker while they had still been living in Varlae, a human city far to the east. Her soon-to-be husband and her father had worked out the details of the marriage, of course, as was traditional, though Grasilda had been impressed even then with the quiet dwarven warrior.
Her father, the almost stereotypical dwarven miser and coincounter, had agreed to the arrangement almost immediately. At first, she had assumed that Gregor had merely dropped a sack of gold in front of the aging dwarf and asked for her hand in marriage. And, in truth, it had seemed like little more than that at first. It was only later that she began to learn the whole truth about Gregor; he had been the one, it was said, that had revealed the previous King of Druskeden to be some sort of cat demon. It had been his axe, according to the stories, that had taken the King Orwin's head, allowing the dwarven warriors who had long fought against the tyranny of the King to launch their successful coup against Orwin's demonic adisors. It was her father's hatred of the King, she suspected, that had truly made him decide upon Gregor.
Grasilda sighed to herself, her breath creating a fine mist in the cold air. King Aelaer Ironleaf...he had been with Gregor even then. Shortly thereafter, the two had fled Druskeden with their companions, somehow evading capture by those dwarves who still supported the evil King. Over twenty years ago...and yet, when she had spoken to the King last week, he hardly looked a day older than the first time she had laid eyes upon him. His wife, however, had aged noticably...she could have been his mother, the difference was so great.
Shaking her head, Grasilda banished her current thoughts from her head. If Gregor trusted the human king, that she would not question his judgement. Her husband had, afterall, ruled Druskeden fairly and honorably for the past two decades. She did not have the right to question his methods, no matter how odd they seemed to her at times.
"WHOOOAAA!" called Gradney, snapping Grasilda from her thoughts. Seconds later, the cart lurched beneath her, nearly knocking her from her seat. Gradney was yanking the reins of the beasts pulling the cart, trying to keep the now-panicking beasts under control.
"What's wrong with them?" she asked, her hand finding its way to the small medallion around her neck. Usually the draft goats the dwarves bred were almost fatalistically calm. For the two of them to be so upset...just then, she caught the briefest glimpse of a small figure duck beneath a small outcropping of rock on the ridge to her right.
"It's an ambush!" she cried, as she quickly turned and drew her warhammer from its resting place beneath her seat. Almost simultaneously, Gradney lost control of the goats, both of which bolted forwards, moving far faster than Grasilda had believed was even possible.
The cart bounced and jumped erratically as it rocketed after the still-harnessed goats, nearly jostling Grasilda off her feet. "Nyrgund's Balls!" Gradney swore as he leaned out the front of the careening cart, his short arm stretched towards the goats. "I can't reach the reins!"
Grasilda began to answer him, but her voice died in her throat as she saw what lay ahead. A dozen small, lizard-like creatures were gathered along the ridge ahead, their scaly backs pressed against a jutting spire of rock nearly twice as tall as Grasilda herself. Even as she watched, the rocks gave way and began to tumble down the slopes of the ridge, to the delight of the hopping and cheering creatures that had pushed them.
Snapping out of her stunned silence, Grasilda grabbed Gradney's winter cloak, pulling him fully back into the run-away cart. The rocks were settling in a massive pile of stone and ice just ahead of the cart, and the goats were charging towards the roadblock with an almost suicidal frenzy. "We have to jump!" she screamed into the dwarf's ear, pointing towards the rocks ahead with the hand still clutching her warhammer.
She saw Gradney's eyes grow wide as they took in the rocks barring their path and the frothing mouths of the panicked goats. In a split second, his usually slow mind made the obvious connection between the two, and yet another curse escaped his lips. Gradney could feel the world seem to slow down as his body emptied pure adrenaline into his veins, just as it always did in moments such as these.
In the time it took his heart to finish one beat, he had kicked his batte axe into the air from its place at his feet, tossed it from the cart into the gorge to his left, and wrapped his meaty arms around Grasilda's waist. The next heartbeat found him leaping from the cart and into the gorge after his axe, shielding his queen's from the fall with his own tough body. One more heartbeat and he was standing at the bottom of the ravine, axe in hand, helping a stunned Grasilda to her feet. She had just began to get her bearings when the icy air was torn asunder by the crunch of wood and goat striking solid, unyielding goat. The form of one of the goats appeared far to her left, hanging over the edge of the steep ravine, its bleeding body still harnessed to the broken remains of the cart.
Grasilda quickly turned to Gradney, who was stripping off his winter cloak to reveal the gleaming surface of his breastplate beneath it. "Where in Migdalia did ye find such stupid goats?! The acursed things nearly killed us!"
Gradney tossed his cloak into the snow as his side, his eyes never leaving the ridge above him. "Wasn't the goats. Ah've only seen one beast that can inspire such fear in animals such as those." He managed to tear his eyes from the ridge, and turned his head to lock gazes with the shivering woman beside him. "Run. Run until ye reach the next city. Don't look back, and stay off the roads."
Grasilda could only stare at the warrior in shock. "What?! Dwarves do not abandon their comrades, especially to creatures such as those!" She lifted her warhammer in what she hoped was a menacing stance. "We shall fight them together!"
With a low growl, Gradney whipped around to face her, his hand darting out faster than her eyes could follow and tearing her hammer out of her hands. "Dammit woman, Ah'm not playing! Those lizard things were kobolds, and fer them to be out in the cold like this can only mean one thing! There be a dragon out there, and it be big enough that the goats got a whiff of it and went mad." Gradney shoved the hammer back into her hands roughly, and shoved her away from him.
"Ah'll not be the one what tells King Gregor that his wife was eaten by such as beast. Ye must flee, and fetch the patrols to defeat this beast. Ah shall try to buy you as much time as ah can." And with that, the dwarf began to climb slowly up the steep sides of the ravine.
Grasilda almost called out after him, but it took only a moment to realize that Gradney was right. She could not face a dragon, even a small one, and hope to live. Her fingers found the small amulet around her neck as she whispered a brief prayer to Walgrim. She did not pray that Gradney would return safely, or even that he would somehow defeat the terrible beast above her. No, she was a dwarf; she prayed that the brave warrior's death would be honorable.
As she turned north and began to run through the thick mounds of snow, she vowed to return safely to Haagenbaum; not for her own safety, but rather, so that she could tell her story to Gradney's wife and children, and share his bravery with his clan. He had brought great honor to their names.
