Chapter 18 | Part 3

They never reached the outcrop.

The Grukmar came from the right flank. Exactly where Eldric had predicted, exactly when he’d feared. One moment the forest was quiet. The next, it erupted with screaming.

“CONTACT!” Eldric’s sword was out before Balin could process what was happening. “Right flank! Dulint, Balin—center! Xandor—”

Something crashed through the underbrush. Balin caught a glimpse: grey-green skin, too many teeth, a weapon that looked more like a butcher’s tool than a sword. Then Eldric was moving, meeting the charge with a violence that didn’t match his weathered appearance.

Move, Balin told himself. Move move move—

His body wasn’t listening. His feet had rooted to the ground. His sword was in his hand but he couldn’t remember drawing it. Everything was happening too fast and too slow at the same time.

Sound warped. The clash of metal became muffled, then deafening, then muffled again. He could hear his own heartbeat, absurdly loud, drowning out the screams.

“DOWN!” Someone shouted. Eldric, maybe. Balin dropped without thinking, and something whistled over his head. An axe. A Grukmar axe.

He looked up. The creature was already turning, repositioning, its yellow eyes fixed on him with predatory focus. Not mindless. Calculating.

It’s going to kill me.

The thought was clear, crystalline, more certain than anything he’d ever known.

I’m going to die here.

Another Grukmar came from the left. A third. They weren’t attacking randomly—they were coordinating, cutting off escape routes, herding the group tighter together.

The artifact, Balin realized. They want the artifact.

Dulint was backing toward the center of their makeshift formation, the pack clutched against his chest. Maris had her back to a tree, eyes wide and unfocused, seeing something, useless for fighting. Xandor’s staff was raised, some kind of energy gathering at its tip, but he moved like an old man because he was an old man.

Only Eldric fought like this was normal. Like violence was just another language he spoke fluently.

One Grukmar went down. Then another. But more came from the trees—seven, eight, Balin lost count.

“The artifact!” one of them snarled in heavily accented Common. “Give it!”

“Behind me!” Eldric positioned himself between the creatures and Dulint. “Anyone who wants that pack goes through me.”

Through all of us, Balin thought. He raised his sword, hands shaking so badly the blade trembled.

A Grukmar grinned at him. Actually grinned.

“Little dwarf,” it said. “First time holding sword?”

Balin couldn’t answer. His throat had closed.

The Grukmar lunged.

Balin swung.

His sword connected with something. Arm, side, he couldn’t tell. The impact jarred through his wrists, up his arms, into his shoulders. The Grukmar screamed. Blood—dark, almost black—sprayed across Balin’s face.

No.

The creature didn’t stop. It grabbed Balin’s sword arm with one clawed hand, pulling him closer, its other hand raising that butcher-weapon—

Something hit Balin from the side. Eldric, tackling him to the ground as the Grukmar’s blade whistled through empty air.

“Don’t freeze!” Eldric was already up, meeting another attacker. “Don’t think! MOVE!”

Balin scrambled to his feet. The wounded Grukmar was still coming, slowed but not stopped, murder in its eyes.

Fight or die. Fight or die.

He didn’t make a conscious decision. His body moved without his mind’s permission. The sword came up, thrust forward, and—

—went in wrong. Scraped bone. The Grukmar made a sound that wasn’t quite human but was close enough.

Close enough to haunt him.

The creature fell.

Balin stared at his sword. At the blood. At the thing that had been alive moments ago and was now…

“Don’t look!” Eldric’s hand grabbed his collar, yanking him backward. “Keep moving! Process later!”

Balin moved.

He didn’t process.

End of Chapter 18.3 —> 18.4: Northbound: The Kill