by Kalthanan
“What an ugly subject. Is it a giant?"
“Sort of,” she said, distractedly. She continued to work on the fine details of the sculpture, alternately chipping with a tiny hammer and chisel or rubbing with a cloth.
“It’s awful. What is it?”
“It’s a gift for the new lord.”
“Jason? He’s just a boy, Kithren. Just a boy,” repeated Gathor, under his breath.
“He deserves our respect, husband, especially now that he’s the new Lord.” She took a file to a rough edge, smoothing the subtle curve of the cloak.
“Because of who his grandfather used to be, aye,” he said. “Too bad about the other one.”
“Yes, too bad. Thank you for mentioning it. I’ll be sure to bring it up at the coronation ceremony.”
“Can’t help thinking about what the boy’s father did to the city. Bad omen, that.”
“He’s nothing like the deserter. His grandfather’s blood flows in his veins. There’s no arguing with that.” She looked up and met his gaze. He nodded in quick agreement and looked away.
She placed her bundles into the wagon alongside the tarp-covered statue. It would take her a few days to reach the city with only one stubborn mule pulling, but she wouldn’t mind the quiet days. She’d keep her weapons close by, though: the roads were still not safe, despite the efforts to tame the shattered lands—and wrecked spirits. The survivors of the disaster had quickly adapted to a scavenging and roving lifestyle to meet their needs.
Civilization had been stripped away along with the soil and livestock that kept human beings three meals away from savagery. Miss one meal and you’re uncomfortable. Two meals and you start to worry where the next one is coming from. One more and all the trappings of society come off. Then you’re ready to steal or kill; it’s just basic instinct.
The first human she passed on the road nodded to her in greeting; she nodded in return. He was mounted on a dappled mare with what was probably his entire life strapped across her back. His hand was resting on his dagger’s pommel, but he didn’t have the tension of a man preparing to attack. She kept her hand on her hammer regardless. The rest of the day passed uneventfully.
The familiar trunk of a split and decayed tree jolted her out of a near-doze. It was close to evening, and the sun’s red reach painted a menacing portrait of herself perched atop her wagon in the road ahead of her.
Her eyes crept up the overgrown path where she’d followed her mother so long ago.
Kithren saw a stricken look on her mother’s face when the messenger had whispered his news to her, then ran off to deliver more presumably bad news to other dwarven women.
“Stay here, child. Mother has to go help Father and the rest of the clan.”
Mother had gathered up some rags and towels, the water bucket, and a long knife before walking quickly out the door of the hut and up the dusty street.
Opening her mouth to speak, Kithren automatically went after her mother. She’d watched as several of the clanswomen gathered together in the village square and then started off toward the east, with a pony leading an empty cart. The dwarf child followed her mother doggedly, staying just far enough behind on the path to avoid being seen.
Eventually, they arrived at a fork in the road. A tall tree, split by lightning, marked the head of the path. The group of dwarven women that Kithren was following paused for a moment, and one of them started weeping, astonishing Kithren. Even dwarven children rarely wept. Although quickly silenced by the others, her tears continued to reflect the orange light of the sun.
The group of women left the main road and continued up the smaller path. The foliage was heavily upset in this area; there were unnumbered broken branches and leaves trampled under by heavy boot marks and claw prints. Some could have been dwarven in origin, but many were not. For the first time, Kithren began to be afraid of what was ahead.
She whimpered unknowingly, but continued to follow the other dwarves. The path widened, the trees grew fewer, and some of the dwarven women cried out, and separated. Kithren crept up to the open area and reluctantly looked.
Bodies were scattered everywhere. The bodies of dwarves, humans, horses, and a few things that Kithren didn’t know the name of. The ground beneath them was turned into a sickening slurry of bloody mud, and some things that made Kithren be sick behind the tree.
She was trembling, but the little girl had a thought that couldn’t be shaken. “Daddy?”
She got up off the ground where she had been rocking back and forth and peered around the tree. She recognized some of the dead dwarves; one was a kindly man who was a friend of her father’s.
“Daddy?” she said, coming out from behind the tree and advancing slowly into the carnage.
“Daddy!” she yelled, walking faster through the litter of bodies. She was grabbed from behind and jerked around. It was her mother.
“Kithren, I told you to stay at home. This is no place for you.”
“Where’s Daddy?” Kithren said, her hands drawn into little fists.
Kithren’s mother stood back up and looked around. “I don’t have time to take you home. You’ll stay with me so you don’t get hurt.” She leaned down and shook the little girl to get her attention. “Hear me? Stay with me, or something bad might happen to you.”
Kithren nodded and started looking around the battlefield again.
“We’ll find him,” said her mother.
The dwarven women were calling out the names of loved ones and going through the corpses. Sometimes one would stop and cry out. As a woman dragged her husband off of the field, Kithren had a sickening realization of what the cart was for.
Some of the dwarves were alive, and were bandaged as well as could be. Some of the enemy were alive but wounded, and the dwarf women grimly finished the tasks that the men had started.
Suddenly in front of them, a giant figure rose. It looked human, but enormous. Covered in blood and cut with many wounds, the figure stared them down. Kithren closed her eyes and started to cry.
“It’s all right, child. This is one of the humans that was helping us,” said her mother.
Kithren opened her eyes and looked up. The human towered over both of them, and his bloody leather rags seemed incomprehensibly foreign.
Suddenly, she realized that he was carrying something on his shoulder. Kithren’s mother realized it as well, and gasped. “This way,” she said, and walked quickly back to the edge of the forest.
The giant man wavered for a moment, then followed them, his great legs kicking up dirt and gore with every step. “Here” she said.
Fiercely, the giant looked around with unseeing eyes, then slowly unshouldered his burden. He gently laid the body on the ground, then pulled a huge scarlet-stained sword from his belt. He screamed a great cry, holding the weapon over his head. His eyes closed and he stumbled, then collapsed to the ground.
Her father had still been alive after the battle, but his wounds were great. Kithren and her mother, and all of the remaining villagers, had nursed the survivors back to health. Some died later, from wounds on the battlefield. Others had lost limbs or their sight. The village was greatly weakened, but the tribe would live on because the joint venture of humans and dwarves had succeeded in destroying the great band of roaming bandits that had been preying on them all slowly over the past months.
Most notable was the tales of the huge man in battle. Many of the dwarves said that the human, Kyle Torgard, had performed impossible feats of strength, slaying dozens of the raiders himself. Some muttered that magic was involved, and a few even whispered that the enormous man’s eyes had glowed, and dark runes had appeared on his skin.
Torgard had come to visit her village on a few occasions over the following years, bringing some of his men with him. Kithren remembered a furtive, dark-haired young man with Kyle on a few occasions; Kyle’s son John.
Kithren eventually reached the city, and asked to see the new lord. She was brought to him, and she presented him with the statue; told him who it was.
“My what?” said the boy, the young lord.
“Your grandfather. He was a great warrior. He fought beside my father in the Troubled Times.” The statue glowed in the bright sunlight streaming through the windows above. She’d had help offloading it from the cart and into the Great Hall. She brushed the thick braids of hair back from her eyes and faced the young leader.
“I remember one day when my father was trying to teach me the way of the warrior, your grandfather came to our house. He told my father that I wasn’t destined to be a fighter. He said my hands, and my mind, were too fine for that kind of work.
“My father protested, but eventually he listened. It’s hard for a father to see his child choose a different path.”
“I don’t remember my father very well,” said Jason, softly. She could see the echo of his grandfather’s strong face in the boy. His father’s hair was raven-black, but Jason favored the grandfather’s features and had a shock of unruly orange hair. It was a good thing he didn’t closely resemble his father, considering what damage the deserter, the traitor, had done to the family, and to the city.
“I’ll not encourage you to speak against your father,” she said. “We know what was done.” She paused for a moment. “Your grandfather was a great human. A great man. He built this city up from the ruins of the Great Rending, bringing people back together from starvation and poverty. He helped fight off raiders and great beasts instead of hiding behind his civic duties. He was a warrior and a wise leader, a combination for which we dwarves have a great respect.”
The boy nodded, his attention focused on the statue. He traced the fine features of the figure with a finger, felt the point of the raised sword.
“Is this really what he looked like?” he asked, not taking his eyes off of it.
“Oh yes. His eyes were like emeralds, and his beard was like a torch. They joked about how his bright beard drew the goblins and orcs, and the flies!”
Jason gasped at the way she talked about his grandfather, but when he turned to look at her, he saw the way she smiled sadly and her thoughts were decades away.
“So they were good friends,” he guessed, watching the dwarf now. “Oh yes, your grandfather and my father fought together many times. Many’s the time he would come home with a new scar, laughing about how your father’s scar was bigger, or how many raiders he’d cut plain in half with that massive human sword of his.”
“I’d heard stories about it from my mother. She said it was eight feet long and sharp as a razor.”
“Well, not quite eight feet,” Kithren said. She reached into her cart and pulled out a long wrapped bundle. She cleared her throat and bowed to Jason. “My lord,” she said formally, and extended it to him.
His mouth hung open, but he bowed and accepted the heavy bundle. He unwrapped it, revealing a great longsword, the blade engraved with blocky runes. The hilt was wound with a leather thong, but had emeralds embedded on either side of the guard.
“My father couldn’t be here,” she started to say. She cleared her throat again and said, “He couldn’t be here, so I came to present your grandfather’s sword, the sword of the founder of this great city, to you, Lord.”
Not knowing what else to say, Jason bowed deeply, and accepted it.
“The hope of the city rests on your shoulders, Jason. Your grandfather’s spirit will surely guide you on the right path.”