"If they did not run away, the day was ours." Urlgen insisted to his fuming father. "Gerti's giants fled like kobolds!"
King Obould furrowed his brow and kicked the face-down body of a dead orc, turning it half up then letting it drop back to the dirt, utter contempt on his ugly face.
"How many dwarfs?" he asked.
"An army!" Urlgen cried, waving his arms emphatically. "Hundreds and hundreds!"
To the side of the young commander, an orc screwed up his face in confusion and started to say something, but Urlgen fixed the stupefied creature with a wicked glare and the warrior snapped his mouth shut.
Obould watched it all knowingly, understanding his son's gross exaggeration.
"Hundreds and hundreds?" he echoed. "Then Gerti's missing three would have done you's no good, eh?"
Urlgen stammered over a reply, finally settling on the ridiculous proclamation that his forces were far superior, whatever the dwarves' numbers, and that an added trio of giants would have indeed turned his tactical evasion into a great and sweeping victory.
Obould took note that never once had his son, there or when Urlgen had first arrived in the cavern complex, mentioned the words "defeat" or "retreat."
"I am curious of your escape," the orc king remarked. "The battle was pitched?"
"It went on for long and long," Urlgen proclaimed.
"And still the dwarfs did not encircle? You's got away."
"We fought our way through!"
Obould nodded knowingly, understanding full well that Urlgen and his warriors had turned tail and fled, and likely against a much smaller force than his son was indicating-likely against a force that was not even numerically equal to their own. The orc king didn't dwell on that, though. He was more concerned with how he might lessen the disaster in terms of his tentative and all-important alliance with Gerti.
Despite his bravado and respect for his own forces-ore tribes that had thrown their allegiance to him-the cunning orc leader understood well that without Gerti, his gains in the region would always be restricted to the most desolate patches of the Savage Frontier. He would be doomed to repeat the fiasco of the Citadel of Many Arrows.
Obould also knew that Gerti wasn't going to be pleased to learn that one of her giants was dead, lying amid a field of slaughtered orcs. With that unsettling thought in mind, Obould made his way to the fallen giant, the behemoth showing few wounds other than the fact that his throat was almost completely torn away.
He looked over at Urlgen, his expression puzzled, and offered a prompting shrug.
"My scouts said it was a big cat," his son explained. "A big black cat. Jumped from that tree to the throat. Killed the giant. Giant killed it."
"Where is it?"
Urlgen's mouth twisted, his formidable fangs pinching into his lower lip. He looked around at the other orcs, all of whom immediately began turning questioning looks at their comrades.
"Dwarfs musta taken it. Probably wanting its skin."
Obould's expression showed little to indicate that he was convinced. He gave a sudden growl, kicked the dead giant hard, and stormed away, furrowing that prominent brow of his and trying hard to figure out how he might parlay this disaster into some son of advantage over Gerti. Perhaps he could shift the blame to the three deserters, explaining that in the future her giants would have to be more forthcoming of their intentions to the orcs they accompanied on raids like this.
Yes, that might work, he mused, but then a cry came in from one of the many scouts they had sent out into the surrounding areas. That call soon led to a dramatic redirection of thinking for the frustrated and angry orc king.
Soon after, Obould furrowed his brow even more deeply as he looked over the second scene of battle, where three giants -the missing three giants, including one of Gerti's dear friends -lay slaughtered. They weren't far from where Urlgen had set his camp the night before the catastrophic battle, and it was obvious to Obould that the trio were missing from the march because they had been killed before that last march began. He knew it would be obvious to Gerti, who surely would investigate if he pushed the issue that the disaster was more the fault of her giants than his orcs.
"How did this happen?" he asked Urlgen.
When his son didn't immediately respond, the frustrated Obould spun around and punched him hard in the face, laying him low.
"Obould is frightened," Ad'non Kareese announced to his three co-conspirators.
Ad'non had followed Obould's forces to both battlegrounds and had met with the orc king soon after, counseling, as always, patience.
"He should be," said Kaer'lic Suun Wett, and the priestess gave a little cackle. "Gerti will roll him into a ball and kick him over the mountains."
Tos'un joined in the priestess's laughter, but neither Ad'non nor Donnia Soldou seemed overly amused.
"This could break the alliance," Donnia remarked.
Kaer'lic shrugged, as if that hardly mattered, and Donnia shot her an angry look.
"Would you be content to sit in our hole in boring luxury?" Donnia asked.
"There are worse fates."
"And there are better," Ad'non Kareese was quick to put in. "We have an opportunity here for great gain and great fun, and all at a minimal risk. I prefer to hold this course and this alliance."
"As do I," Donnia seconded.
Kaer'lic merely shrugged and seemed bored with it all, as if it did not matter.
"What about you?" Donnia asked Tos'un, who was sitting off to the side, obviously listening and obviously amused, but giving little indication beyond that.
"I think we would all do well to not underestimate the dwarves," the warrior from Menzoberranzan remarked. "My city made that mistake once."
"True enough," agreed Ad'non, "and I must tell you that Urlgen's report of the size of the dwarven force seemed greatly exaggerated, given the battleground. More likely, the dwarves were greatly outnumbered and still routed the orcs-and killed four giants besides. Their magic may have been no less formidable."
"Magic?" Kaer'lic asked. "Dwarves possess little magic, by all accounts."
"They had some here, as far as T can discern," Ad'non insisted. "The orcs spoke of a great cat that felled the giant, one that apparently disappeared after doing its murderous business."
Off to the side, Tos'un perked up. "A black cat?"
The other three looked at the Menzoberranyr refugee.
"Yes," Ad'non confirmed, and Tos'un nodded knowingly.
"Drizzt Do'Urden's cat," he explained.
"The renegade?" Kaer'lic asked, suddenly seeming quite interested.