Duzberyl ambled toward the wall, grumbling incessantly. “Two hundred pieces of gold for this one alone,” he muttered, pulling another glittering red jewel from his enchanted necklace. He reached back and threw it at the nearest orcs, but his estimate of distance in the low light was off and the jewel landed short of the mark. Its fiery explosion still managed to engulf and destroy a couple of the creatures, and the others fell back in full flight, shrieking with every stride.
But Duzberyl griped all the more. “A hundred gold an orc,” he grumbled, glancing back at Alustriel, who was far off to the side. “I could hire an army of rangers to kill ten times the number for one-tenth the cost!” he said, though he knew she was too far away to hear him.
And she wasn’t listening anyway. She stood perfectly still, the wind whipping her robes. She lifted one arm before her, a jeweled ring on her clenched fist sparking with multicolored light.
Duzberyl had seen that effect before, but still he was startled when a bolt of bright white lightning burst forth from Alustriel’s ring, splitting the night. The powerful wizard’s aim was, as always, right on target, her bolt slamming an ogre in the face as it climbed over the wall. Hair dancing wildly, head smoking, the brute flew back into the darkness as Alustriel’s bolt bounced away to hit another nearby attacker, an orc that seemed to simply melt into the stone. Again and again, Alustriel’s chain lightning leaped away, striking orc or ogre or half-ogre, sending foes flying or spinning down with smoke rising from bubbling skin.
But every vacancy was fast-filled, ten attackers for every one that fell, it seemed.
The apparent futility brought a renewed growl to Duzberyl’s chubby face, and he stomped along to a better vantage point.
Limping from foot and hip, Catti-brie watched it all with equal if not greater frustration, for at least Alustriel and her wizards were equipped to battle the monsters. The woman felt naked without her bow, and even with the gifts Alustriel had offered, she believed that she would prove more a burden than an asset.
She considered removing herself from the front lines, back to the bridge where she might prove of some use to Asa Havel in directing the retreat, should it come to that. That in mind, she glanced back—and noted a small group of orcs sprinting along the riverbank toward the distracted wizards.
Catti-brie thrust forth the wand, but brought it back and punched out with her other fist instead. The ring’s teeming magical energies called out to her and she listened, and though she didn’t know exactly the effects of her call, she followed the magical path toward the strongest sensation of stored energy.
The ring jolted once, twice, thrice, each burst sending forth a fiery ball at Catti-brie’s targets. Like twinkling little stars, they seemed, as if the ring had reached up to the heavens and pulled celestial bodies down for its wielder to launch at her enemies. At great speed, they shot out across the night, leaving fiery trails, and when they reached the orc group, they exploded into larger blasts of consuming flames.
Orcs shrieked and scrambled frantically, and more than one leaped into the river to be washed away by cold, killing currents. Others rolled on the ground, trying to douse the biting flames, and when that failed, they ran off like living torches into the dark night, only to fall a few steps away, to crumble and burn on the frozen ground.
It lasted only a heartbeat, but seemed like much longer to Catti-brie, who stood transfixed, breathing hard, her eyes wide with shock. With a thought, she had blown apart nearly a score of orcs. As if they were nothing. As if she were a goddess, passing judgment on insignificant creatures. Never had she felt such power!
At that moment, if someone had asked Catti-brie the Elvish name of her treasured longbow, she would not have recalled it.
“It’s not to hold!” Charmorffe cried to Hralien, and a swipe of the dwarf’s heavy cudgel sent another orc flying aside.
Hralien wanted to shout back words of encouragement, but his view of the battlefield, since he wielded a weapon that made it incumbent upon him to seek a wider perspective, was more complete, and he understood that the situation was even worse than Charmorffe likely believed.
Few dwarves came forth from Mithral Hall and a host of orcs poured through the lower, uncompleted sections of the defensive wall. Huge orcs, some two feet taller and more than a hundred pounds heavier than the dwarves. Among them were true ogres, though it was hard for Hralien to distinguish where some of the orcs ended and the clusters of ogres began.
More orcs came up over the wall, launched by their ogre step-stools, putting pressure on the dwarves and preventing them from organizing a coordinated defense against the larger mass rolling in from the east.
“It’s not to hold!” Charmorffe yelled again, and the words rang true. Hralien knew that the end was coming fast. The wizards intervened—one fireball then another, and a lightning chain that left many creatures smoking on the ground. But that wouldn’t be enough, and Hralien understood that the wizards had been at their magical work all day long and had little power left to offer.
“Start the retreat,” the elf said to Charmorffe. “To Mithral Hall!”
Even as he spoke, the orc mass surged forward, and Hralien feared that he and Charmorffe and the others had waited too long.
“By the gods, and the gemstone vendors!” Duzberyl roared, watching the sudden break in the dwarven line, the bearded folk sprinting back to the west along the wall, leaping down from the parapets and veering straight for Mithral Hall’s eastern door. All semblance of a defensive posture had flown, creating a full and frantic retreat.
And it wouldn’t be enough, the wizard calculated, for the orcs, hungry for dwarf blood, closed with every stride. Duzberyl grimaced as a dwarf was swallowed in the black cloud of the orc horde.
The portly wizard ran, and he reached up to his necklace, grasping the largest stone of all. He tore it free, cursed the gemstone merchant again for good measure, and heaved it with all his strength.
The magical grenade hit the base of the wall just behind the leading orcs, and exploded, filling the area, even up onto the parapet, with biting, killing fires. Those monsters immediately above and near the blast charred and died, while others scrambled in an agonized and horrified frenzy, flames consuming them as they ran. Panic hit the orc line, and the dwarves ran free.
“Mage,” Grguch muttered as he alighted on the wall some distance back of the enormous fireball.
“Of considerable power,” said Hakuun, who stood beside him, having blessed himself and Grguch with every conceivable ward and enhancement.
The chieftain turned back and fell prone on the parapet railing. “Hand it up,” he called down to the ogre who had flipped him up, indicating a weapon. A moment later, Grguch stood again on the wall, hoisting on one shoulder a huge javelin at the end of an atlatl.
“Mage,” Grguch grumbled again with obvious disgust.
Hakuun held up a hand, motioning for the chieftain to pause. Then, from inside the orc priest, Jack the Gnome cast a most devious enchantment on the head of the missile.
Grguch grinned and brought his shoulder back, shifting the angle of the ten-foot missile. As Hakuun cast a second, complimentary spell upon the intended victim, Grguch launched the spear with all his might.
The stubborn orc lurched toward her, one of its legs still showing flashes of biting flame.
Catti-brie didn’t flinch, didn’t even start as the orc awkwardly threw a spear her way. She kept her eyes locked on the creature, met its gaze and its hate, and slowly lifted her wand.
She wished at that moment that she had Khazid’hea at her side, that she could engage the vile creature in personal combat. The orc took another staggering step, and Catti-brie uttered the command word.