The Mine Lord: A Dwarven Survival Base-Builder

Yorvig proceeded outside, followed by the three cadre chiefs—Hobblefoot, Warmcoat, and Sledgefist—as well as Shineboot. He hadn’t seen any of the herders within. As he expected, he found them standing around the opening of the sheep fold, keeping their flocks beneath the stone. Crookleg was there.

“Can you keep them within for three days?” Yorvig asked.

“Ay, if we feed them on turnips and radishes. Else they begin to starve. This time of year, we should be flushing their weight up for breeding.”

“How much a day?”

“For the whole lot?”

“Make it strict.”

Crookleg frowned and thought.

“A quarter ton of roughage a day.”

Now it was Yorvig’s turn to frown.

“That is too dear. Lead them out in rotations, or cut them forage from the riverside. Go together, and go armed. Tell Greal to lend you more yowgan.”

The herders always guarded the flocks and brought them in at night, but they could be overwhelmed in a daytime attack. The outlying claims had acted as a cushion between Glint and the approaching ürsi, but it felt wrong to be thankful for it.

Crookleg nodded and glanced between Sledgefist and Yorvig.

“Are you rinlen again?”

“He’s Irik-Rhûl,” Sledgefist said. The herder’s eyes widened in surprise and he pursed his lips.

“It will be as you say,” he answered.

Yorvig started to leave, but turned back.

“If it comes to it,” he said. “Stay out of the fighting. Save yourselves and the flocks."

With that, he walked to the center of the dell to await the new militia. Behind him, the herders began to make their plans. They were a stout lot, though perhaps they cared for their beasts a bit too dearly. Maybe that is what it took. Gardeners and herders were essential, every dwarf in Deep Cut knew that. It didn’t change how folk thought of them, though. Yorvig had come to feel otherwise, after his time in the wild. The lot who’d come to the claim were stout dwarves, and keen, and they couldn't survive without them.

Balmhand and another dwarf were carefully carrying a beeskep toward the Low Adit. At least they had the sense to bring them close. Yorvig hadn't thought about the bees in all this. One of Striper's offspring came tearing up the dell in long leaps, grabbed the post of the High Adit Tower in its claws, and pulled itself upward. Yorvig squinted at the cat, and then looked up at the ridges. Were they watching, already?

Within an hour, forty-three dwarves stood on the slope of the dell, with an odd mismatch of spears, axes, picks, and a handful of crossbows. Yorvig had no doubt that in a close-quarters brawl with the ürsi, they would do admirably. But the ürsi were not likely to get into such a fight with them, not unless they could gain some advantage. The dwarves had no armor. Javelins and sling-stones could slay them as well as a close blow. They had the eight crossbows Onyx had made, which had up till then remained in the owners' possession, plus the two heavier ones that they had first fashioned. Early in the summer, Yorvig had ordered the mine smith to forge more crossbows on Onyx’s pattern for the hunters. But the loss of the hunting party meant the loss of the crossbows. That was a terrible blow of itself. The forge had been lit continuously, seeing to the needs of picks, hammers, chisels, drills, pots, pans, cauldrons, latches, hooks, and dozens of other things the mine needed to function. There was only so much time and iron was short. Still, he should have found a way to make more, somehow. Every day was an argument of priority, and every decision came upon his shoulders. If he had to carry the weight of every failure until the day he died, so be it. He could not let it distract him, now. His folk needed him.

In addition to the crossbows, they had eight signal horns, some made of actual horn, others of metal. Most came from the herders. The smith had only managed to forge a single bell in the short time, a crude thing of iron, but Yorvig told him to keep working until he had ten at least. They would pass back by on their way south.

“What’s the plan?” Sledgefist asked. The owners present stood around Yorvig in a knot a little way from the kulhan.

“We’ll head north first. Keep your cadres together, but put about ten yards of space between them. And follow me.”

At that moment, Yorvig saw the hunter coming toward them, squinting hard in the light.

“You can stay here, Hillmane,” Yorvig said.

“No. I know where the other claims are. I know the country better.” The dwarf was obviously suffering the effects of drink, but Yorvig could tell he would not be deterred. Besides, the hunter’s presence would be an asset, without doubt. Decency would make him stay, but Yorvig could not allow for decency.

They moved out, three groups of dwarves clustered together, letting loose with horn-blasts that echoed between the great ridges. There was no way they could know where all the other claims were, even with the ones the hunter could locate. Hillmane knew of at least nine claims. Survivors had already come from two of them.

As they moved up river, they blew the horns, rang the bell, and called out at close intervals, hoping that any dwarves sheltering near would hear the sound and join them. The noise echoed between the ridges. Yorvig knew that any ürsi would likely know of their movements, anyway, so there was no point in stealth.

The first claim was four miles upriver, nestled against a descending branch of the east ridge. When they arrived, they found only struggle-scuffed dirt and blood-stains on the ground. The supplies and tools were gone. The prospectors had sunk an adit twenty yards into the ridge along a seam in the rock, but they had no door. There was blood inside the drift, as well. The hole would have been nothing more than a death trap. The ürsi could have simply thrown javelins or slung stones down the straight adit drift without ever approaching the dwarves. Yorvig knew that it could have easily happened to them the same way in the beginning.

Hillmane was quiet the whole march, and Yorvig kept him close. As they reached the marsh flats, and the remains of the hunters’ camp, he pointed:

“It was there.”

There were scattered remains of a fire, more bloodstains on the ground, and the trampling of ürsi tracks. None of them were able enough trackers to tell just how many, for it looked like the area had been crossed and re-crossed. Yorvig hoped it had been quick for Tonkil and the others.

They did not linger there. Hillmane led them to another claim. Everything was taken except the blood and the broken rock and ore-piles. There was gold-bearing quartz there as well, crushed and ready for the sluicing. The dwarves who had worked this claim must have numbered five or more to accomplish so much, and yet they had not seen to their defenses. The mine was open, and it seemed they had still been sleeping in a lean-to shelter against the hillside made of logs and pine branches. It had been toppled onto a cookfire and partially burnt.

Hillmane felt the coals. They were still warm. He suspected the attacks there had taken place during the night, the same as the attack on the hunters.

“How many ürsi, to attack so many in the span of one night?” Hobblefoot said.

Yorvig shrugged. How many would it truly take?

They moved on, heading toward the next claim, still sounding the horns and ringing the bell at intervals, when they heard voices calling in dwarvish. Yorvig stopped the march and they returned the calls. Soon, a band of four dwarves came through the woods, clinging to axes and burdened with heavy prospector packs of tools and supplies. One of them limped, using a tree branch as a crutch.

“They hit us two evenings ago,” the limping dwarf told them.

Two evenings. That meant the ürsi had started raiding before they’d attacked Tonkil.

“How did you survive?” Yorvig asked.

“We smelled 'em just in time and closed our door,” the red-bearded dwarf said, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb. “Still got a sling-stone in my leg. We’ve been holed up but we heard you.”

Only one other of the northern claims was still populated. The three dwarves there joined them as well. Their adit drift had a sharp ascent and a stair that they had managed to hold. Those were all the claims that Hillmane knew in the north, but the other prospectors told of even more in the vicinity. It seemed the different claims had already started to form loose relationships, and the prospectors knew many by name. There were too many to reach, sometimes miles apart. Yorvig feared splitting up their small host, but if they wanted to try to save as many as they could, they needed to split up. There were more claims in the south. While they stopped for a rest and a drink on the riverbank, five more dwarves came, lured by the noise of the march in the river valley. The safest thing was to stay in one host, but the longer they waited, the easier for the foe to slay more of the isolated prospectors.

Yorvig inquired of all the refugees, but none of them had seen more than ten or twelve ürsi at a time. Still, that didn’t mean they’d seen the same ones. The attacks had come quickly and all within a short span.

“Warmcoat,” Yorvig said. “Take your cadre and all the prospectors and gather the dwarves from all the claims they know, and any who hear you.”

That would give Warmcoat twenty-four dwarves. Yorvig hoped it was enough to hold his own should they be attacked. He made sure they had half the horns. In trying to save the prospectors, was he just sending more to their deaths? How could he know? He felt responsible both for the dwarves of their own claim, and the many they had lured so far from home.

“Reach as many as you can,” Yorvig said to him. “But keep your head about you.”

“The Bluechip claim has nearly ten prospectors who joined together,” the wounded prospector said. “They must have made it.”

“Go there first and add to your number," Yorvig said. "Don’t get into a fight you can’t win. And be mindful of ambushes.”

“Ay,” Warmcoat answered with a nod.

They parted ways, and Yorvig backtracked south. They had already spent most of the day, and while it would be well after nightfall, Yorvig hoped to reach the dell again before they halted. They were tired and had covered at least fifteen miles already, but this was no time to go easy on themselves.

Two miles north of the dell, while walking along the riverside with the glint of the moon on the rising water, Yorvig heard a scream from among the dwarves, then a ruckus of shouting and another yell of pain. It was chaos as Yorvig tried to figure out what was going on. It wasn’t until something sped so close to his own head as to hear it that Yorvig knew: slingers in the dark. The wind was against them, blowing from the west, and they hadn’t smelt the ürsi. They needed cover. He looked around. It was late summer and the river was low.

“Get below the riverbank!” Yorvig shouted. “Get below the riverbank!”

Dwarves began sliding down, sloshing their ankles into the water at the edge of the river. The bank was only about three feet from water to top there, but the edge was shallow, full of loose cobbles. More stones whizzed and skipped off the top of the bank as the dwarves slid down and crouched low, their backs exposed to the river but at least under cover toward the woods.

“Sledgefist, Hobblefoot!”

“Ay,” they each shouted.

“Injured?”

Yorvig peeked over the bank but ducked as a rock skimmed off the dirt near his face. He looked around, trying to find some way they could defend themselves. The bright moonlight shone down on them and dazzled their eyes, making it harder to pick out movement in the shadowed trees further from the river.

“I’ve got five injured, but they’ll make it,” Sledgefist called.

“Six hit, one dead,” Hobblefoot called.

Dead?

Yorvig splashed down toward Hobblefoot, keeping his head down, and crouched beside him in the water.

“Dead?” he asked.

“Through the head,” Hobblefoot said, motioning over the riverbank. “He’s still up there.”

“Shit,” Yorvig said. A few other dwarves poked their heads up, only to have stones come whizzing past. "Keep your heads down!" he shouted. Yorvig hoped Warmcoat was faring better. There was cursing and grunting from the injured dwarves. A slung stone could embed deep like a crossbow bolt.

Sledgefist sloshed over in the water at a crouch.

“How are we getting out of here?” he asked.

Yorvig saw one of the crossbow-bearers spring up, loose a bolt into the trees, and duck down.

“Save your bolts!” Yorvig said. “Until you know you’ll hit.”

The dwarf looked over, obviously annoyed, but he held his tongue.

“Hillmane!” Yorvig shouted. The dwarf came sloshing through the ankle-deep water.

“Ay?”

“How deep is the river here?” Yorvig asked.

The river was wide, and stones stuck up nearly the whole way across. Still, the dark water moved quickly toward the center.

“We’ve forded it a bit further north,” the hunter said. “But I can’t say here. It’s treacherous.”

Yorvig pursed his lips together, thinking.

“Crossbows, here to the center! Make room for them. Make room.”

The crossbow dwarves arrived quickly, huddling together with their heads down. There were six of them. The rest had gone with Warmcoat. Yorvig risked a peek up, and he saw an ürsi moving closer through the trees. Another of the beasts yanked its arm up to sling a stone, but Yorvig ducked.

“I think they’re moving closer.”

“How many?”

“I can’t tell.”

“Should we just keep our heads down and wait for daylight?” Sledgefist asked. “They don’t like daylight.”

“I worry it will give them time to bring help.”

“There are thirty of us,” Hobblefoot said. “Would they truly attack?”

Just at that moment, an ürsi ran up to the riverbank a few yards down, slung a stone hard down at one of the dwarves, and bounded away. One of the crossbow dwarves lurched up to shoot, but before he could take aim, a rock glanced off the stock of his crossbow and he ducked back down. Now, the ürsi broke forth in hideous shrieks and howls that rose into the night and echoed in the narrow valley. It was difficult to tell how many there were from the discordant cries, but he didn't think they were many.

The dwarf who’d been hit had fallen back into the river and was struggling up. Others nearby helped him.

“Are you alright Cavebender?” Hobblefoot called.

“Shit kulkur broke my shoulder!” Cavebender shouted in anger.

They needed to do something before the ürsi could take any greater toll. He risked a glance above the riverbank. He could see only a few forms in the trees. They kept shrieking. Were they calling for more?

“Listen up!” Yorvig shouted. “Crossbows, stay on the riverbank and ready yourselves. On my call, the rest rush out into the river after me, but don’t go further than fifteen yards.”

“We’ll be wide open out there!” one of the dwarves said.

“This is not the time for questions,” Yorvig snapped. “Crossbows keep your heads down when we go, count five seconds and rise up. Don’t rush it! Make sure of your mark before you fire. Understood?” There were six crossbows among them. Hillmane had taken one, as the hunters were practiced in their use.

There was a chorus of mutterings and nodding heads.

“Ready to follow me?” Yorvig asked, looking up and down the line. He saw the dwarves turning, ready to spring up and run.

“Now!” Yorvig yelled, springing up and splashing into the river, his feet sending cascades of water up around him. He could hear others following him, but the river grew deeper far faster than he anticipated. He was up to his waist well before ten yards were through. He waited for a rock to hit him from behind, or for his life to snuffed out with a stone through his skull, but it didn’t come. A fresh shriek and cry rose from the ürsi behind as the water reached his chest.

“Hold!” Yorvig shouted. They could not risk being swept away. He spun around in the water, feeling the current pulling at him. The crossbow dwarves were frantically re-loading. “Back to the shore!”

The dwarves turned and rushed back. When they reached the bank, Yorvig shouted them on.

“Up! Attack!” He rose over the berm of gravel and soil, using Treadfoot to aid him, and he rushed forward toward the trees. There were bodies on the ground. He saw a few low forms flitting in the woods, but as the dwarves rushed forward they fled. If it weren’t for the blinding moonlight, the fight would have been easier.

“Hold now!” Yorvig shouted, keeping the dwarves from pursuing. He turned back. Five bodies lay on the ground, one of them the dwarf who’d been killed at the outset.

“Crossbows!” he shouted. The six dwarves came forward up the bank.

“Forward and take trees,” Yorvig ordered them, and they obeyed. “Hillmane!”

The hunter was there in moments.

“Where is the best shelter?” Yorvig asked.

“Either up the ridge, or to the dell,” he said. “Or the rocks half a mile back.”

Yorvig didn’t want to try to force his way further up the ridge, being harried all the while, only to put another ridge between them and the dell, nor did he want to backtrack. He looked up. A long cloudbank was rolling in from the south, and in minutes the moon would be hid. Good. They would see much further into the trees then.

Shouting hurried orders, Yorvig had the dwarves form up. They carried the body of the fallen dwarf, and the injured had to walk. They kept the crossbows to fore and rear and along the side of the column, and headed at as quick a pace south as the wounded could manage. A few times, they saw the ürsi stalking them, and rocks harassed them, but the trees grew thick up to the riverside, and the ürsi had to get close to have a clear throw. With the fresh cloud cover, the crossbows could give what they received. One more dwarf was injured by stone, but at least one ürsi was grievously wounded as well. The foe held back.

At last, they pushed up into the dell.

“Get the wounded within” Yorvig ordered. He was surprised when nearly a third of their number dispersed into the Low Adit door.

“Why not all within?” Hobblefoot asked.

“We must watch the gardens,” he said. “We can’t lose them.” Just last week, Foundstalk had assured him that in another month, the bulk of the harvest would be in storerooms, but until then, they risked losing a great source of food that they could not replace. More than ever, they would have to depend on what they raised in the dell. They could not send out hunters as long as the ürsi remained.

For the next hours of the night, the dwarves took broken mullock-pile rock from around the High Adit and built fortifications for themselves around the gardens— just enough to keep themselves from the effects of slingstones and javelins. Then, Yorvig let them sleep for a couple hours in shifts upon the ground behind their hasty dry-stone walls. Once again, he had survived. Once again, at least one dwarf had died following his orders. His thoughts were with Warmcoat.