But more impressively, they soon enough discovered, came the reinforcements from villages through which they had not passed. Word of Grguch’s march had spread across the region directly north of Mithral Hall, and the war-thirsty orcs of many tribes, frustrated by the winter pause, had rushed to the call.
As he crossed the impromptu encampment, Toogwik Tuk surveyed the scores—no, hundreds—of new recruits. Grguch would hit the dwarven fortifications with closer to two thousand orcs than one thousand, by the shaman’s estimation. Victory at the Surbrin was all but assured. Could King Obould hope to hold back the tide of war after that?
Toogwik Tuk shook his head with honest disappointment as he considered the once-great leader. Something had happened to Obould. The shaman wondered if it might have been the stinging defeat Bruenor’s dwarves had handed him in his ill-fated attempt to breach Mithral Hall’s western door. Or had it been the loss of the conspiring dark elves and Gerti Orelsdottr and her frost giant minions? Or perhaps it had come about because of the loss of his son, Urlgen, in the fight on the cliff tops north of Keeper’s Dale.
Whatever the cause, Obould hardly seemed the same fierce warrior who had led the charge into Citadel Adbar, or who had begun his great sweep south from the Spine of the World only a few months before. Obould had lost his understanding of the essence of the orc. He had lost the voice of Gruumsh within his heart.
“He demands that we wait,” the shaman mused aloud, staring out at the teeming swarm, “and yet they come by the score to the promise of renewed battle with the cursed dwarves.”
Never more certain of the righteousness of his conspiracy, the shaman moved quickly toward Grguch’s tent. Obould no longer heard the call of Gruumsh, but Grguch surely did, and after the dwarves were smashed and chased back into their holes, how might King Obould claim dominion over the chieftain of Clan Karuck? And how might Obould secure fealty from the tens of thousands of orcs he had brought forth from their holes with promises of conquest?
Obould demanded they sit and wait, that they till the ground like peasant human farmers. Grguch demanded of them that they sharpen their spears and swords to better cut the flesh of dwarves.
Grguch heard the call of Gruumsh.
The shaman found the chieftain standing on the far side of a small table, surrounded by two of his Karuck warlords and with a much smaller orc standing across from them and manipulating a pile of dirt and stones that had been set upon the table. As he neared, Toogwik Tuk recognized the terrain being described by the smaller orc, for he had seen the mountain ridge that stretched from the eastern end of Mithral Hall down to the Surbrin.
“Welcome, Gruumsh-speaker,” Grguch greeted him. “Join us.”
Toogwik Tuk moved to an open side of the table and inspected the scout’s work, which depicted a wall nearly completed to the Surbrin and a series of towers anchoring it.
“The dwarves have been industrious throughout the winter,” said Grguch. “As you feared. King Obould’s pause has given them strength.”
“They will anticipate an attack like ours,” the shaman remarked.
“They have witnessed no large movements of forces to indicate it,” said Grguch.
“Other than our own,” Toogwik Tuk had to remind him.
But Grguch laughed it off. “Possibly they have taken note of many orcs now moving nearer to their position,” he agreed. “They may expect an attack in the coming tendays.”
The two Karuck warlords beside the brutish chieftain chuckled at that.
“They will never expect one this very night,” said Grguch.
Toogwik Tuk’s face dropped into a sudden frown, and he looked down at the battlefield in near panic. “We have not even sorted out our forces…” he started to weakly protest.
“There is nothing to sort,” Grguch replied. “Our tactic is swarm fodder and nothing more.”
“Swarm fodder?” asked the shaman.
“A simple swarm to and through the wall,” said Grguch. “Darkness is our ally. Speed and surprise are our allies. We will hit them as a wave flattens the ridge of a boot print on a beach.”
“You know not the techniques of the many tribes who have come into the fold.”
“I don’t need to,” Grguch declared. “I don’t need to count my warriors. I don’t need to place them in lines and squares, to form reserves and ensure that our flanks are protected back far enough to prevent an end run by our enemies. That is the way of the dwarf.” He paused and looked around at the stupidly grinning warlords and the excited scout. “I see no dwarves in this room,” he said, and the others laughed.
Grguch looked back at Toogwik Tuk. His eyes went wide, as if in alarm, and he sniffed at the air a couple of times. “No,” he declared, looking again to his warlords. “I smell no dwarves in this room.”
The laughter that followed was much more pronounced, and despite his reservations, Toogwik Tuk was wise enough to join in.
“Tactics are for dwarves,” the chieftain explained. “Discipline is for elves. For orcs, there is only…” He looked directly at Toogwik Tuk.
“Swarm fodder?” the shaman asked, and a wry grin spread on Grguch’s ugly face.
“Chaos,” he confirmed. “Ferocity. Bloodlust and abandon. As soon as the sun has set, we begin our run. All the way to the wall. All the way to the Surbrin. All the way to the eastern doors of Mithral Hall. Half, perhaps more than half, of our warriors will find tonight the reward of glorious death.”
Toogwik Tuk winced at that, and silently berated himself. Was he beginning to think more like Obould?
Grguch reminded him of the words of Gruumsh One-eye. “They will die with joy,” the chieftain promised. “Their last cry will be of elation and not agony. And any who die otherwise, with regret or with sorrow or with fear, should have been slaughtered in sacrifice to Gruumsh before our attack commenced!”
The sudden volume and ferocity of his last proclamation set Toogwik Tuk back on his heels and had both the Clan Karuck warlords and guards at the perimeter of the room growling and gnashing their teeth. For a brief moment, Toogwik Tuk almost reconsidered his call to the deepest holes to rouse Chieftain Grguch.
Almost.
“There has been no sign from the dwarves that they know of our march,” Grguch told a great gathering later that day, when the sunlight began to wane. Toogwik Tuk noted the dangerous priest Hakuun standing at his side, and that gave the younger shaman pause. He got the feeling that Hakuun had been watching him all along.
“They do not see the doom that has come against them,” Grguch ordered. “Do not shout out, but run. Run fast to the wall, without delay, and whispering praise for Gruumsh with every stride.”
There were no lines or coordinated movements, just a wild charge begun miles from the goal. There were no torches to light the way, no magical lights conjured by Toogwik Tuk or the other priests of Gruumsh. They were orcs, after all, raised in the upper tunnels of the lightless Underdark.
The night was their ally, the dark their comfort.
Once, when he was a child, Hralien had found a large pile of sand down by one of the Moonwood’s two lakes. From a distance, that mound of light-colored sand had seemed discolored with streaks of red, and as he moved closer, young Hralien realized that the streaks weren’t discolored sand, but were actually moving upon the surface of the mound. Being young and inexperienced, he had at first feared that he had happened upon a tiny volcano, perhaps.