Editing Takeda BW XXXI

“Look! They have breached the Radyke!  Prepare yourselves; they will be upon us soon!” The cry rose up the steep side of a great, rock-strewn mountain to where Takeda perched.  It came from the centre of a line of dwarf infantry who were five or six hundred feet above a deep ditch which stood before a huge stone rampart, that snaked for over a mile across the lower foothills.  The rampart was more than ten feet thick, over one hundred foot high and had no obvious gate.  It was studded with semi-circular towers that protruded thirty foot beyond the rampart, each rising half as high again as the wall.  Crenelated, the wall and towers provided vantage points for hundreds of dwarf crossbow and each tower used massive ballista to devastating effect.

The rampart and its defenders were all that stood between a host of fell looking beast from the lower planes of the abyss, and all manner of siege engines, arraigned across the rolling foothills, and a second rank of dwarves positioned higher up.  As Takeda looked on, it became obvious that the evil host had breached the rampart in several places and were massing to scale the walls in others.  The dwarves began to fall back – some into the wall and others withdrawing up the steep slope towards the oriental.  All the dwarves around Takeda began to speak at once: “Retreat! To Kaled Zem…”; “Back to Minas Emras!”; “What now?  The line is smashed…” they cried in diamay.
      
“Maddor’s men have broken.  Archers, give them covering fire!”  Screamed an impressive looking dwarf close to where Takeda stood, struggling to make himself heard above the noise of warnings emanating from his aides. This was an unusually tall and broad version of his race who, despite his obvious age, appeared formidable.  Dressed in elaborately crafted plate armour and carrying an enormous lucerne hammer, he moved among his troops, passing orders and building morale.  A volley was sent into the sky to fall, an unseen killer, on the advancing enemy below. “Riarn!  Riarn!” the dwarf Lord called across the heads of the archers to his right, “move your infantry to the lower level – get set to receive a charge.”

“Yes my Lord, Destrin!” Came the response before Riarn, armed and heavily armoured, with war helm visor raised, put a large ram’s horn to his lips and blew hard to signal advance.

“Archers!” the Lord shouted again above the wailing din of the horn blasts, “give them another – further back this time.”  

A moment later, waiving his massive hammer in the general direction of the enemy, the dwarf, Takeda now understood to be Destrin, continued his orders, “Dwarves of Emras, prepare to meet the enemy!  Harnack take your troops to the left!  Ragnor to the right!  The rest, follow me to the lower level behind Riarn, prepare to charge but await my orders.”

The dwarves moved slowly, carefully making their way down the steep slopes of Kaled Zem, beneath the towering Minas that pointed upward to the dark leaden skies, accusingly.  Rank upon rank moved down, covered by volley after volley of quarrels, eventually spreading out across the high ledge that twisted and turned for over there miles across the mountains.  Riarn’s heavily armoured defenders took up a position towards the front of the ledge ready to repel any adversary intent on scaling the mountain.  Behind them was Destrin’s sally force, dressed in chain and armed with hand axes they were more mobile and must have been trained to charge in formation over difficult terrain.  Destrin appeared confident despite the number of enemy below his position.

Then came the shock.  To Destrin’s left, way to the south, beyond where the ledge fused to the mountainside appeared a Dragon.  Rounding the spur of the great mountain, which jutted out and almost reached the plains many miles in the distance, came the gigantic red beast, belching fire and laughing wildly.  Banking at a steep angle, wings fully stretched, the Dragon was the stuff of legend and nightmares.  The first warning shouts came from Harnack’s flank and they did not take long to reach Destrin’s ear.

“Stand fast!  Archers, bring down that beast!” He shouted, overcoming his immediate paralysis and trying to work out the best course of action.

“My Lord,” shouted Harnack, “We will be engulfed in flame; we must find cover!”
It took no time for the dwarf Lord to see sense, “Break ranks and find cover!  All of you…Go!” he screamed running as best he could back up the steep slope.

Chaos ensued in the moments before the first blast of searing fire struck Harnack’s ranks, instantly turning all to charcoal.  The echoes of the dwarven trumpets had only just died before being replaced by the high-pitched whine of flame striking air, flesh, bone and rock.  The bright red, orange and yellows shattered the gloaming as the heat, even at a safe distance, was sufficient to warm all on that mountain. As soon as the red flower bloomed it dissipated, leaving naught but charred remains.  Hot enough to split rock, nothing could withstand its power; what was combustible instantly vanished and all else melted, so there was no after fires. Next in the nightmare sequence of sounds came the advancing yells and horn blasts of the Demon’s Army as, elated and unmolested by crossbow fire, they ran up the slope.  

Destrin looked over his shoulder to see the dragon pass and begin a wide left-hand orbit out over the enemy’s advancing troops.  “Archers, fire one bolt and then retreat!” Destrin called as if not wholly giving up.  Pausing a moment, he removed the gauntlet from his right hand and reached into a pouch, pulling out a small green stone, which he held up before him.  Turning his body to face the enemy, leaning heavily to his left on the shaft of his hammer and with right arm outstretched, he held the gem before him between thumb and forefinger of his right hand. 

“No!” shouted Harnack who had also stopped to check on the enemy’s progress, “That is not meant for your use my Liege.”

Without taking his eyes from the stone, Destrin began his answer with questions, “Then what would you have me do, eh?  Witness the death of all my folk?”  With no reply forthcoming the dwarf Lord mumbled, “No it is they that will die,” before shouting, “By Odin’s will and through Thor’s almighty power, I call upon all that is good in the natural world to smite this foe and save those that serve the Prime.”

Almost immediately the sky turned darker and the wind picked up, rain began to fall and got heavier, turning to sleet, then snow, and then hail.  Instinctively, the dwarves got low, finding shelter where they could.  The worsening weather obscured their view of both the dragon and the forces below, which was probably just as well.  Time and again, thunder clapped loudly close by as lightening forked horizontally at first from the edge of the ledge before turning down to strike the foothills in many locations. The ground shook and convulsed as what appeared to be a longitudinal wave of stone lifted the ledge where the dwarves had been but moments before; this wave travelled rapidly downhill, growing in length and depth as it did so, crashing into the dwarven carved rampart - the Radyke – destroying all that had crossed it. The hail pounded, lightening forked, the ground shook and the air swirled wildly for what seemed like an eternity before, just as suddenly as it had begun, it was over.  

The dark clouds dissipated quickly, revealing a pale blue sky and watery late-afternoon, autumn sun, which silhouetted Kaled Zem ominously.  The dwarves slowly picked themselves up and began to survey the scene below.  The enemy was utterly destroyed and the rampart was completely torn down.  For a moment not a single creature moved on the foothills below, and there was no sign of the Dragon. All the dwarves looked worried, perhaps even scared as they stared down into the gloaming below.  Slowly the dwarves’ relief became palpable.  Maddor’s men, who were but a moment ago in the jaws of the enemy, began to get up.  Shaken and stunned, they slowly stood and looked around disbelievingly.  There was no sign of the enemy; it was as if they had never existed.  It appeared that the mountain had been returned to its original state, before dwarf or demon had interfered with its natural being.