Rising of a Mage: Book 03 - A Mage Risen by J. M. Fosberg Read Free Book Online

table. A dozen dwarves sat around it. His son sat to his right and Jabaal sat to his left as a guest. Scouts had returned , reporting that close to a hundred thousand orcs were marching south toward Evermount. They had to assume this was what Delvidge had meant.
    “It doesn’t matter how many orcs come. One hundred or one million , they cannot climb the mountain, and they are welcome to come up the steps and be slaughtered if they are that stupid. We will never lose a single dwarf.”
    Grindel wished it were that easy. He sat and listened. He saw the looks his son and Jabaal shared. They knew it wasn’t that simple either. Jabaal was smart enough to stay silent. His son was the one who made the initial argument.
    “How long can we sit in our mountain before we begin to starve? How long could we sneak through the passage before the orcs discovered it? We assume that this will be an attack controlled by the stupidity of the orcs. We forget that Delvidge is sending these orcs. He will not simply send the orcs to slaughter. No doubt he will not care that they die, but he has a plan. Believe that these orcs will not just march up those great steps and let us knock them down. There is more happening than we know, and we must prepare for a war.”
    One of the dwarves stood up so fast he knocked his chair over. “This war was brought on us by your wizard friend. Don’t you remember?”
    Now Grindel stood up. Slowly and silently he stared at the accusing dwarf. Slowly and deliberately he spoke. “Before you make your accusations, remember, without that mage Miskrull would have destroyed us all. Remember that this war was started in Shinestone. Remember that you are a dwarf. We will stand against the orcs. We will fight whoever shows up at our doorstep. Now let us quit this koboldish bickering and make plans to defend the mountain against a god.”
    With that , all arguments were ended, and the dwarves and Jabaal began to prepare for the coming battle.
     
    S chmutzig had led his horde south quickly. The chaos god had appeared the night before last and tortured him. The goblins had made good time, but they had gone too far west. They were three days to the west of the city. They would still make it in time. His goblins were taking off in small raiding parties, attacking the farms. They needed all the food they could get until they got to the city. He would not get lost again.
    When the god of chaos had come two nights ago, he was terrified. The god destroyed him. He watched as his own stomach had bulged until his insides popped out. It was the worst pain he had ever thought possible. He had tried to scream but his throat was raw. His hands and feet had caught fire, and when he finally had thought he was going to die, his eyes exploded in his skull. Then he had been healed. Schmutzig could not imagine more pain. Even though he was healed now, when he thought about it the hint of pain was still there. He could not go through that again. He could not fail. He was pushing his horde faster than they were used to. There were more fights and deaths every night than was normal, but death was better then failure.
    They would be at the city outside the forest of fairies tomorrow. He would have the goblins surround the city and wait till the next day. Then they would attack when the sun was high in the sky. This was what the chaos god instructed, so this was what he would do. He would not fail the chaos god. He would kill himself if he did, just so that he could not be tortured again. Not again.

C hapter Nine
Goblins
     
    It had been two days since they had come upon the first burnt farm. They had seen dozens more since then, still following the path of the goblins. It was obvious the goblins were headed in the same direction they were, but they knew the goblins wouldn’t be going to the fairy forest and that at some point their paths would split. It was nearly midday when they first saw the forest on the horizon.
    Seeing the forest was