The Great Betrayal

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Skulls

Bone fragments peppered Snorri’s armour as he shattered the goblin skull with a warhammer.

Kicking off the bone chips still littering the flat rock he was abusing, the dwarf prince went to grab another skull when he saw Morgrim watching him from the archway.

‘Quite an impressive collection you’ve got, cousin,’ he said, indicating the fifty or so flensed greenskin heads Snorri had piled up. Several days old, they were the gruesome leavings from the brodunk. The dwarf prince had severed the heads himself. Stuck in the earth next to them, nigh hilt-deep, was a broad-bladed knife. It was flecked with goblin blood. There was no sign of the skin or flesh.

‘Threw it over the edge for the screech hawks,’ said Snorri, as if reading his cousin’s mind. ‘I’ve heard they like the taste of grobi.’

Morgrim closed a heavy wooden door behind him, and stepped out onto a rocky plateau. Surrounded by a low wall punctuated by crenellations, it was one of the eagle gates of Karaz-a-Karak; just without its Gatekeeper, whom the prince had dismissed for some solitude.

Morgrim sucked in the mountain air, relishing its crispness.

‘Didn’t think you liked the outdoors,’ he said.

Snorri lined up another skull and smashed it with a heavy blow, like he was hewing timber for the hearth fire.

‘I’m learning to live with it. I’ll be seeing a lot of it in the coming months.’

‘You think we’ll go to war, then?’

Another skull capitulated noisily beneath Snorri’s hammer.

‘It’s inevitable. Every dawi knows it. It’s only my father that won’t acknowledge it.’

‘He doesn’t want a war.’

Snorri looked up from his bludgeoning. ‘You think I do?’

‘You’re out here smashing grobi skulls, venting your anger, cousin. I think you have some pent-up aggression.’

‘My father talks when he should be strapping on az and donning klad. I am frustrated, Morg. And I don’t understand why he cleaves to the elgi so much. What have they ever done for us but cause trouble?’ No longer in the mood, Snorri tossed the hammer down and sat on a different rock. He rubbed his shoulder to ease out the stiffness. ‘Every day brings news of more murder and theft, yet my father does nothing. He hides in his Grand Hall, bickering with the other kings. Right now the elgi are nothing, just a few thousand warriors and the odd drakk, scattered across disparate settlements. We could defeat them in a month and reclaim the Old World as our own.’

Morgrim picked up where his cousin had left off, choosing a particularly ugly goblin skull to split.

‘You make it sound so simple.’

‘It is! It’s easy, Morg. If an enemy threatens you, take up az and klad, step into his house and kill him. Drogor can see it, why not you?’

Morgrim looked down at the skull he’d just sundered. ‘Drogor is not the dawi I remember.’

‘You were little more than beardlings when you knew each other. Despite what our ancestors say, dawi can change.’

Morgrim took another skull. ‘Not that much.’

‘He is a little strange, but I just put that down to his ordeal to reach the karak or living under hot sun for the last twenty-odd years. Southland jungles are no place for dawi.’

‘Aye, perhaps.’ Bone fragments exploded furiously across the ground. ‘I can see why you enjoy this.’ Swinging the hammer onto his shoulder, Morgrim hefted a third skull. This one had belonged to an orc. ‘He certainly hates elgi.’

‘Wouldn’t you if they’d slain your kin? And is that such a bad thing?’

‘I do not doubt his cause, but if he turns your mind towards similar thoughts then yes, it is bad.’

Snorri scowled. ‘I’m no puppet, Morg.’

Two-handed, Morgrim split the orc skull in twain.

‘I know that, cousin. I’m sorry.’ He took off his war helm to wipe the sweat dappling his forehead. ‘Thirsty work.’

‘I have ale…’ Snorri pulled a damp tarp off a modest-sized barrel he’d kept in shadow beneath the tower wall. He handed Morgrim a pewter tankard. ‘And hoped you would find me up here.’

Taking a long pull of the foaming brew, Morgrim said, ‘Tromm, but that is fortifying.’

‘Drakzharr, one of Brorn’s special reserves.’

A companionable silence fell between them as they supped together, the sun on their faces and a light wind redolent with the scent of the earth filling their nostrils.

Morgrim breathed deep as he took a long swig of the liquor.

‘Been too long since we did this.’

‘Aye Morg, it has. I am sorry too. My father…’ Snorri bit his lip to keep back his anger. ‘He treats me like… like…’

Morgrim smiled reassuringly.

‘Like his son, Snorri. And that means he judges you harshest of all dawi.’

‘Why won’t he let me show him what I am capable of? I am of the Thunderhorn clan, of Lunngrin blood. I am Whitebeard’s namesake, by Grungni, and yet he favours elgi over his own kin.’

Morgrim shook his head. ‘No, cousin. He does what he must to hold on to the peace he’s fought so hard to create.’

‘And what if I want war?’ Snorri’s eyes were crystal clear as he said it. ‘What if what Drogor says is right and the elgi cannot be trusted? Is it not better to strike first?’

‘When have you ever known a dawi to strike first, cousin? Besides, Drogor seems full of bile. Be wary that you do not heed him too much.’

‘He is your friend.’

‘Not one I recognise.’

‘What is it you can see that he and I cannot? You have befriended this Imladrik-’ Snorri tried but failed to keep the sneer from his face, ‘-and of all the elgi, he at least seems honourable, but the rest… this elgi woman and the other, this Salendor…’

‘Imladrik is the ambassador of the elgi king, the one who resides across the sea. If anyone speaks for their race, would it not be him? Why do you see the others as enemies? They are acting no different to you, cousin. Your belligerence and mistrust is a mirror which they reflect back.’

Snorri smirked. ‘Have you been talking with Morek, cousin? You sound as cryptic as the runesmith and his master.’ Finishing the drakzharr, he wiped his mouth and poured another. ‘A drakk slayer, one destined to be king. That is what Ranuld Silverthumb prophesied.’

‘I remember,’ said Morgrim.

‘Only elgi ride drakk and they are supposedly our allies. How then must I go about killing one if that will always be true?’

‘Nothing with prophecy is ever clear. Even Ranuld Silverthumb doesn’t know its meaning and he is runelord of Karaz-a-Karak. Do you think you can decipher it so easily?’

‘Times are changing,’ said Snorri, looking off into the high peaks where dark clouds had started to gather, wreathing the pinnacles of the mountains like smoke. ‘I can feel it, Morg.’

There was a danger of the conversation souring again, so Morgrim sat down, clapping his cousin on the shoulder to dispel any growing tension. ‘These are hard times for everyone,’ he said, ‘but I am still hopeful that a peaceful outcome to the troubles can be reached.’

Snorri paused in his supping, eyes darkening.

‘It may already be too late for that.’

Incredulity deepened the lines in Morgrim’s face. ‘The High King is still in council, so how can that be so when no decision has been made?’

Snorri met his cousin’s questioning gaze.

‘Varnuf and Thagdor have already mustered armies. They wait in the hills and valleys not far from Karaz-a-Karak. Luftvarr too has over two thousand dawi warriors awaiting their king’s return. And I reckon there will be others too.’

‘And what do you plan on doing, cousin?’ Morgrim had set down his tankard, the ale more bitter than it was previously.

‘Several clans see as I do. Regardless of the council’s decision, I am marching on the elgi. We attack now or regret our temperance at length.’

Morgrim was on his feet. In his haste he kicked over his tankard, spilling the precious brewmaster’s ale. He barely spared it a glance.

‘Varnuf is a rival of your father’s, so too Thagdor of Zhufbar. Luftvarr is just a savage. How can you be thinking about throwing your lot in with them, possibly against the High King’s wishes? It is beyond reckless, cousin.’

Snorri stood up too. ‘It is reckless to do nothing, cousin. The elgi have enjoyed our understanding and flouted our hospitality for too long. We must show them who the true lords of the Old World are. My father will declare war. What other choice does he have?’

‘And if he doesn’t?’

Snorri’s eyes were hard as granite. A harsh wind tossed the curls of his beard, making him appear even more belligerent.

‘Then I shall declare it for him.’