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tearing up the dry grass in the parched fields.
He reached the village only to find the streets ; deserted. He slowed, caught up on his breathing, and
5 wondered where the hell his army had gone* A dark !' shape, wings extended, jumped out of a nearby
tree, landed on the ground near Kang.
"Gloth sent me to find you, sir."
"What's going on?" Kang demanded. "Where is everyone?"
"The dwarves are holed up in the distillery storage shed, sir. The Second Squadron has surrotmded
the shed. The First Squadron's holding the road to the center of town, where a large group of dwarves
are assembling, sir."
"Well, what's the hold-up? Tell the Second Squadron to storm the damn shed!"
"There's a problem, sir." The Baaz was apologetic. "The dwarves have locked the doors to the shed
and are threatening to dump their brew before they'll hand it over to us, sir."
"By the Dark Queen's heart!" Kang swore, shocked. "Are they serious?"
"We have to assume that they are, sir." The draconian looked worried, as well he might.
Kang raced off to assess the situation. When he arrived, the draconians were hissing and howling and
clashing their swords against their breastplates. At the dire threat to dump the spirits, the draconians were
near to forgetting their orders against bloodshed.
"What's the meaning of this?" Kang's voice boomed in anger. "You're draconian soldiers, by god, not
a pack of dim-witted goblins! Put those swords away!"
"But, sir!" Gloth came bounding up, red eyes blazing. "Sir, they say they're going to dump it!"
"That's right!" came a gruff voice from the window of the storage shed. "Come any closer, and we
pop the stoppers! We've taken an oath. I'm Vellmer, chief brew master, and long as there's whiskers on
my chin, I'll never again hand over my best brew to you, lizard-bastards!"
"I think you're bluffing!" Kang shouted back in dwar-ven. He'd picked up quite a bit of the dwarven
language during the past twenty-five years. "Men, go ahead."
The draconians surged forward.
"Oh, yeah! Is this bluffing?"
A dwarf rolling a barrel appeared on the roof. Silhouetted in Solinari's silver light, he raised an ax and
let it faU, staving in the sides of the barrel. Liquid gurgled out,*platted on the ground. The draconians
gasped and came to a standstill. A sigh like a gust of wind swept through their ranks.
"You've got to stop this, sir!" Gloth cried in agony.
"I will," said Kang. "Stand back."
Lifting his hands, he formed the prescribed circles and slashes in the air and mumbled arcane words.
Gloth looked expectant, waiting for something spectacular, perhaps a red dragon to arrive and fly off
with the dwarves.
Nothing happened. No dragon. Nothing.
"Sir, your spell must have fizzled," Gloth said, disappointed, but respectful.
"Wait," Kang counseled.
A sudden flurry of activity could be heard inside the shed. A moment later, the doors flew open. The
dwarves burst out, running as fast as they could from the building. They were gasping and choking, had
their noses and mouths covered with handkerchiefs. Several lurched to a halt, doubled over, and began
to vomit.
"Let 'em go, men," Kang ordered. "They're not important. You know what is."
The draconians were already on the move. Ignoring the desperately sick dwarves, the draconians
charged inside the shed to restopper the kegs and claim their prize. But the first draconians who dashed
in dashed out again almost as fast as had the dwarves,
"Phew! That smell's vile!" Gloth snorted and snuffled.
"Give it a minute," Kang said.
The smell was already beginning to dissipate from the warehouse. Kang coughed and took a few
steps upwind.
"What do you call that spell, sir?" Gloth was impressed.
"Stinking Cloud," said Kang, letting the words roll off his tongue.
Though he was skilled with a blade and enjoyed the organized, disorganized, brutal confusion of
bone-crunching melees, Kang experienced a deep satisfaction when using his magic. He had once
thought that he liked magic for the power it gave him over others. But lately he'd come to discount that
reason. As a commander, he held life and death power over all his troops, with or without magic. His
magic allowed him to create even if it was nothing more than a horrendous smell. And creating was far
more satisfying to him now than destroying.
"What does that remind me of?" Gloth muttered, frowning, trying to recall. "I know I've smelled that
before. Gow dung mingled with puke and sour apples... Wait! I almost have it..."
"Remember that crazy minotaur officer we worked for, toward the end of the War of the Lance?"
Kang asked, rocking back on his heels, allowing himself to rest, momentarily, on his large tail. "The one
who did his best to try to get us all killed? The one who came to such an unfortunate and propitious end?
The one who got drunk on hard cider ..."
"That's it!" Gloth shouted. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]