Page 10 of Court of Treachery (Empire of Blood and Malice #2)

10

SARADON

I t was the darkest hour of the night. Afnirheim, the dwarven stronghold to the east of Valtivar’s capital, Keldheim, slumbered, unaware of the nightmare that was about to unleash itself upon the dwarven city.

The last sheaf of rock crumbled away, opening a fissure to what lay beyond. It was only slightly less pitch black than where they stood. Saradon detested the cramped tunnel, but he bore being hunched over without complaint. It was time to show his goodwill to the goblins, fulfilling his end of the bargain, so they would serve him when the time came. Around him, they shrieked and chattered with excitement as the rush of cool, fresh air whooshed past them. Saradon breathed a sigh of relief. Even his wards had not been able to shut out the most permeating of the goblins’ stench.

Behind him, the horde awaited the pascha ’s signal. They filled the honeycomb of roughly hewn and hacked passages, which tunnelled through the rock, like a rot creeping from the depths to snare the roots of what grew above, for that was what they were. A plague that would consume Afnirheim from below. It had taken every tooth and claw at the pascha ’s command, along with Saradon’s own magic, to bind them. Goblins did not work in unity, but Saradon forced them—otherwise, surprise and success would not be theirs, and both were crucial to his machinations.

At the pascha ’s screeching command, the goblins surged forward into the lower levels of Afnirheim. It was so far into the kingdom of Valtivar, and the dwarves had no idea they were there. Saradon allowed his face to split into a wide grin as the feral beasts surged past him. Like a tide, they swept through the caverns where the dwarven goblin slaves, the tikrit , were kept. All were freed from their bonds and hauled from the grill-covered pits to join the horde. And join it they did, gleefully. They could now exact revenge on their dwarven masters.

They took the settlement by surprise. Against the undiminished battle rage of the goblins, the slumbering dwarves stood no chance. It was not long before the air was tainted with the iron tang of blood, the cool quiet of Afnirheim riven by an ear-splitting, crescendoing cacophony of goblin shrieking and dwarven screaming.

Saradon had neither love nor hate for the dwarves. They were simply a necessary casualty—and their deaths were on the goblins’ hands, not his own. War was coming. They would be the first of many to die. After all, the wheel had to be broken before it could be rebuilt. Saradon did not need to stay to see what transpired next. By the bloody dawn, Afnirheim would belong to the pascha , and the pascha would belong to him.