“Ye both be daft!” Rom saw that neither would be swayed. Shrugging, he added, “But if it’s a way to Grim Batol ye want, then I’ll not set that task to another. I’ll take ye there myself!”
“Ye cannot go alone, Rom!” snapped Gimmel. “Not with the trolls on the move and the orcs near there! I’ll go with ye to watch ye back!”
Suddenly, the rest of the band decided that they, too, needed to go along in order to watch the backs of their leaders. Both Rom and Gimmel tried to argue them down, but as one dwarf was generally as stubborn as another, the leader finally came up with a better notion.
“The wounded must return home, and they need some to watch them, too—and no arguments from ye, Narn, ye can barely stand! The best thing to do is roll the bones; the half with the high numbers comes with! Now, who has a set?”
Vereesa hardly wanted to wait for the band to gamble in order to find out who would be traveling with them, but saw no other choice. She and Falstad watched as various dwarves—Narn and the other wounded excluded—set dice rolls against one another. Most of the hill dwarves used their own sets, Rom’s question having been responded to by a veritable sea of raised arms.
The last had made Falstad chuckle. “The Aerie and the hills might have their differences, but you’ll find few dwarves of any kind who don’t carry the dice!” He patted a pouch on his belt. “Can see what heathens the trolls were; they left mine on me! ’Tis said that even the orcs like to roll the bones, which makes ’em a step up from our late captors, eh?”
After much too long a time for Vereesa’s taste, Rom and Gimmel returned with seven other dwarves, each with determined expressions on their faces. Looking at them, the elf could have sworn that they were all brothers—although, in fact, at least two hinted at being sisters. Even female dwarves sported strong beards, a sign of beauty among members of the race.
“Here’s ye volunteers, Lady Vereesa! All strong and ready to fight! We’ll lead ye to one of the cave mouths in the base of the mountain, then ye are on ye own after that.”
“I thank you—but, do you mean that you actually have a path that lets you journey into the mountain itself ?”
“Aye, but it’s no easy one . . . and the orcs don’t patrol it alone.”
“What do you mean by that?” burst Falstad.
Rom gave the other dwarf the same innocent smile that Falstad had given him earlier. “Have ye not heard they’ve dragons?”
The sanctum of Krasus had been built over an ancient grove, one older than even the dragons themselves. It had been built by an elf, later usurped by a human mage, then seized long after its abandonment by Krasus himself. He had sensed the powers lingering underneath it and had managed to draw from them on rare occasions, but even the draconic wizard had been surprised to one day discover the concealed entrance in the most remote part of his citadel, the entrance that led to the glittering pool and the single, golden gemstone set in the midst of the bottom.
Each time he entered the chamber, he felt a sense of awe so rare for one of his kind. The magic here made him feel like a human novice just shown his first incantation. Krasus knew that he had only touched a bare trace of the pool’s potential, but that was enough to make him leery of trying to seize more. Those who grew greedy in their need for magical power tended to eventually become consumed by it—literally.
Of course, Deathwing had somehow managed to avoid that fate so far.
Despite being so deep underground, the water was not devoid of life—or something approaching it. Even though no clearer liquid existed in all the world, try as he might, Krasus could never completely focus on the tiny, slim forms that darted around, especially in the vicinity of the gemstone. At times, he had sworn they were nothing but shimmering, silver fish, yet now and then the dragon mage swore that he saw arms, a human torso, even on a rare occasion—legs.
Today, he ignored the inhabitants of the pool. His confrontation with She of the Dreaming had given him some hope of aid, but Krasus knew that he could not plan for it. Time swiftly approached when he would have to commit himself.
And that had been why he had come here now, for among its properties, the pool seemed able to rejuvenate those who drank from it, at least for a time. His use of the poison in order to reach the hidden realms of Ysera had left Krasus drained, and if matters demanded he act quickly, then he wanted to be able to respond.
Bending down, the wizard cupped a hand and gathered a small bit of water. He had tried a mug the first time he had dared sip, only to discover that the pool rejected anything crafted. Krasus leaned over the edge, wanting any drops that escaped his palm to return from whence they had come. His respect for the power within had become that great over the years.
Yet as he drank, a rippling in the surface caught his eye. Krasus glanced down at what should have been the perfect reflection of his human form—but, instead, turned out to be something much different.
Rhonin’s youthful visage gazed up at him . . . or so the wizard first thought. Then he realized that his pawn’s eyes were closed and the head lolled slightly to the side as if . . . as if dead.
Across Rhonin’s face appeared the thick, green hand of an orc.
Krasus reacted instinctively, reaching into the water to pull the foul hand away. Instead, he scattered the image and, when the ripples had finally subsided, saw only his own reflection again.
“By the Great Mother . . .” The pool had never shown this ability before. Why now?
Only then did Krasus recall the parting words of Ysera. And do not undervalue those you think only pawns . . .
What had she meant by that, and why had he now seen Rhonin’s face? Judging by the glimpse the senior wizard had just had, his young counterpart had either been captured or killed by the orcs. If so, it was too late for Rhonin to be of any more value to Krasus—although having apparently reached the mountain fortress, he had fulfilled the true mission on which his patron had sent him.
Combined with other bits of evidence that Krasus had let the orcs in Grim Batol discover over the past several months, the dragon mage had hoped to stir up the commanders there, make them think that a second invasion, a more subtle one, would be slipping in from the west. While quite a force still remained based in the mountain fortress, its true power lay in the dragons bred and trained there . . . and those grew fewer with each passing week. Worse for the orcs in the mountain, the few they had were more and more being sent north to help the bulk of the Horde, leaving Grim Batol bereft of almost all its defenses. Against a determined army comparable in size to that now fighting in the vicinity of Dun Algaz, even the well-positioned orcs in the mountain would eventually succumb, thereby losing the chance to raise any more dragons for the war effort.
And without more dragons to harry the Alliance forces in the north, the remnants of the Horde would at last crumble under the continual onslaught.
Such a force could have been raised and sent in from the west if not for the general lack of cooperation on the part of the leaders of the Alliance. Most felt that Khaz Modan would fall in its own time; why risk more on such a mission? Krasus could not believe that they would not use a two-pronged assault to finally rid the world of the orc threat, but that proved once again the shortsighted thinking of the younger races. Originally, he had tried to persuade the Kirin Tor to push the course of action to Dalaran’s neighbors, but as their influence over King Terenas had begun to slip, his own comrades on the council had turned instead to salvaging what remained of their position in the Alliance.
And so Krasus had decided to play a desperate bluff, counting on the devious thinking and paranoia inherent in the orc command. Let them believe the invasion was on its way. Let them even have physical proof to go along with the rumors he and his agents had spread. Surely then they would do the unthinkable.