Standing around all the tables and benches, either cleaning the weapons or testing them or simply hefting them in their hands, were at least fifty O’gúl soldiers, all orcs. Some looked like they’d been a part of the fight in the Heart’s courtyard less than twenty minutes ago. Others were fresher-looking as if they’d joined the party in the weapons room and had missed all the fun before Cheyenne returned her drow coin to the altar. All of them glared at L’zar, practically skipping down the center aisle between the metal tables toward the double doors on the opposite end of the room.
The first orc they passed thumped a metal club against his meaty palm and snarled. “Nilsch úcat.”
L’zar looked quickly at the orc and feigned insult, leaning away and placing a mocking hand to his chest. “Who, me?”
“Nobody wants you here, Weaver.”
“She’ll grind you to dust before the end.”
“Blood and fire, nilsch úcat.”
“The next time any of us see your face, it’ll be in the halls of the unmarked dead!”
The snarling, growling curses flew faster from the orcs’ mouths, growing in volume until they were all shouting after L’zar, spit flying from between their protruding tusks with the force of their hatred. The drow didn’t change his pace across the room, meeting many of the soldiers’ gazes and dipping his head in approval, grinning as if they were congratulating him for his efforts instead. One orc at the far end of the room got so worked up, he swung a wickedly sharp ax back in a wide arc and sent it crashing into the metal table in front of him with a roar. Sparks flew, and the table dented significantly beneath his blow. By the time L’zar reached that table, the orc’s chest was heaving as he scowled at the drow, thick spit flying in strands around his tusks.
L’zar stopped, looked the orc over from head to toe, and dipped his head. “Nice arm.”
The weapons room echoed with unintelligible curses and O’gúleesh obscenities. Cheyenne and Ember stopped behind L’zar as his gaze wandered over the other set of doors in front of him. The halfling turned to glare right back at the enraged soldiers and raised an eyebrow. “They’re gettin’ worked up over this. Over you.”
“Ah.” L’zar passed his hand over a section of the metal doors, then looked over his shoulder at his daughter. “This is nothing. Wait ‘til we get outside.”
Great.
Cheyenne glanced at Ember, who flinched when another orc pounded some heavy metal weapon into a table or a bench with an echoing clang. Then she looked at the halfling with the ghost of a smile. “Even you’re not this much of a sore loser.”
“At least we can make that distinction.”
An unseen heavy metal lock slid aside within the doors’ mechanism, and L’zar pressed his hands against the metal surface before leaning back to peer at the screaming, roaring soldiers behind them. “You only have a fortnight. Don’t waste it.”
Then he shoved open the doors, and the mid-afternoon light from the open streets of Hangivol’s inner circle spilled into the weapons room. The instant L’zar, Cheyenne, and Ember stepped outside, the orcs launched their weapons at the heavy doors that were slowly swinging back inward. The blades smashed into the slabs, glancing off with deafening echoes of metal on metal. A spear struck the door and stuck fast, the shaft quivering at the impact. The deadly blade of a war ax stuck into the very edge of one slowly closing door a second before a black metal dagger whistled through the air, spinning hilt over point as it passed through the last four inches of space between the doors and sailed over Cheyenne’s shoulder.
On instinct, she slipped into drow speed and turned slightly to snatch the suspended dagger from the air. When she returned to normal speed, the doors of the Crown’s fortress shut with a resounding boom behind her. She scowled at the dagger in her clenched fist.
L’zar glanced at it and raised his eyebrows. “Feels like you just reached into a frozen body and ripped out an icy heart, doesn’t it?”
“Quit saying crazy shit like that.” Cheyenne chucked the dagger at the ground and stuck her hand in her jacket pocket to hide her urge to wipe it on something.
“Honor, Cu’ón!” A drow man in a dark-blue, shimmering suit cut at weirdly sharp angles lifted a fist in the air and shot a blast of silver and black light toward the magical dome stretching high above the entire city of Hangivol. The spell raced toward the dome and the gray-filtered light and crackled against the shielded wall with a muted hiss.
L’zar met the other drow’s gaze, stepped forward on his heel with the toe of his borrowed Earthside shoe pointing straight up, and spread his arms in an exaggerated bow.
The other drow chuckled as his cry of recognition was taken up by the dozens of other drow stepping out of dark, shimmering doorways. They each sent a blast of their magic into the dome until the filtered light dimmed beneath the hissing crackle of impact and the dark streaks of magic racing across the curving wall of the shield for every citizen of Hangivol to see.
Cheyenne’s mouth popped open at the sight of so many other drow gathered in the square outside the Crown’s fortress. She immediately forced it shut again but couldn’t help but stare at all the glowing eyes and bone-white hair and slate-gray skin like her own. They were all well-dressed, standing tall and dipping their heads toward L’zar and his daughter as the Cu’ón led the way through the square. I had no idea there were this
