When he opened his eyes again, he didn’t know where he was. His mouth felt dry like the desert as his stomach growled. By a stroke of luck, no creature had found him and eaten him. He knew that he couldn’t stay here and slowly stood up. It was morning again but he knew that he couldn’t have been there that short. This already must be the next day.

  With the sun to help him, he would be able to track down where he was, going straight to the water. Once he got there, he didn’t even try to hide where he was, falling into the water and starting to drink what he could.

  At first he just gulped down the water, letting himself get soaked in it before stopping. He knew that drinking this fast was bad and instead he slowed down, taking smaller sips. As he continued this routine, he started to feel sick again, having drank too much on an empty stomach.

  Unlike previously, he knew where to go and he could actually see. Walking to the mushrooms was slow and painful but once he got there, he would carefully grab them, inspect them before shoving it in his mouth.

  After having his fill, he’d go back to the edge of the forest, still sick and shaking but at least he had something to eat. Now he had a choice as he looked at the mountain in the distance. Either he’d go slowly and less chance to be seen or he just… walked. At this point, he didn’t think he’d be able to get far crawling so he just started to walk over them open field.

  When he finally made it to the mountain, he didn’t even know where the entrance was to the cave. He hadn’t been paying a lot of attention when he left which he now realized was a big mistake. Luckily enough for him, as he was standing there, someone seemed to emerge from the mountain around seven meters away from him.

  Ulf got to him wielding a battle pickaxe, looking around to make sure that nobody was looking at them. For as far as he could see, nobody was there with them. Before anyone could see them, he would grab Lehtern and dragged him to the cave entrance, squeezing in with him and continuing to pull him further away until it was pitch dark.

  “What was that all about!?” The dwarf sounded angry as he turned to face Lehtern. His voice echoing through the cave as Lehtern shook his head.

  He couldn’t see the dwarf but he could still be upset at him. “You realize that I had no food or water? I had to find my own and judging on how I feel, something might’ve been wrong with the water I drank.”

  Hearing this, Ulf would back down a bit, groaning and grunting as he tried to find something to hate the elf with. “Did you at least find the king?”

  “Yeah, from what I heard he and other royalty tried to start a rebellion. Thousands of skeletons have been captured and put naked in some kind of camps, all chained to each other. Your king and other leaders have been put in the castle jail, being more heavily guarded.”

  “All ores on a stick.” The dwarf didn’t seem happy with this information as he then went back to hating on the elf. “You still almost betrayed this entrance to the skeletons by just walking!”

  “I don’t think that there’s anyone left except in castles and such. Nobody left in houses or anything like that.”

  That information was pretty big, shutting the swarf up as he thought about the possibilities. In the end he would look up before making his final statement. “So the rebellion is officially over. It was too good to be true.”

  Having said that, he turned around and started to walk away, leaving Lehtern behind. Not wanting to stay behind, he quickly followed him.

  It didn’t take long for Ulf to reach his donkey, untying him and grabbing a torch and lighting it. Seeing as his mind was a bit clouded, it took him a bit to realize that they came here without a donkey which meant Ulf had gone back.

  “How are the others? Did… Did they all die?”

  That question wasn’t answered for a while, just walking with the donkey. He was sure that Ulf hard heard him so he just thought to stay quiet and follow him.

  Just because he didn’t immediately get an answer doesn’t mean that he didn’t get one at all. Eventually Ulf slowed down a bit, eyes closed before completely stopping.

  “Barty and Crouch are dead. The other three are still alive but have some severe wounds. When I went back for the donkey, I managed to stabilize them but that was about it. I managed to send a message to the nearest dwarven village in the hopes that they could help but I left before they came as I needed to wait for you.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Now back to business. And you take me back to the Forest Gurge before they leave the pass?”

  The dwarf nodded, finally having a smile on his face. “Yeah, we won’t attack them directly but we did managed to cause an avalanche. Before they can continued they need to clear the debris and since the stones can only go forwards and back, that part of the passage now only let a few people through. All and all together, since we left you had two weeks. With the days you wasted, you have around a bite more than a week.”

  “If that’s the case then allow me to…” He finally sank through his legs and lie down on the ground. “I think I deserved a day of rest.” Even though the ground was very cold and unwelcoming, Lehtern managed to fall asleep in just seconds.

  Ulf was standing there, confused with the sudden actions of the elf before grunting and going back for him. “Elves… I’ll never understand them.” He knelt down, grabbing one arm of Lehtern as he tried to throw him over the donkey. Sadly enough Lehtern was rather large and heavy for being skinny.

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  “You fat…” While Ulf was a lot fatter than Lehtern, he still couldn’t hold back and called him fat, doing his best to get him on the donkey. Once he finally did it, he started to walk with him again, making his way to the promised spot.

  As they got back in the cave where they had been attacked, he saw that it was empty. The three remaining dwarves being gone as well. This was good as it meant that the councils survived and were being take care of.

  When Lehtern woke up, he felt something soft underneath him. He smelled fresh and he seemed to have shorts on with nothing else on him. Looking around, he found himself in a room on the ground with two matrasses put against each other in length to be able to accommodate him.

  It quickly became clear that he was back in the house of the dwarf and had been washed. He didn’t know who had washed him but he already felt bad for the one having to undress him and see him naked.

  He surprisingly also felt a lot better, taking in a deep breath as he got almost a sweet taste in his nose. Nearby were freshly plucked flower, giving the room and Lehtern a nice and sweet smell.

  Lehtern got up and let out a loud and long yawn before going to the door and opening it. When sunlight finally hit him, he could see that shorts he had gotten mostly likely belonged to Ulf. For now he only saw the wife when he came out the room, walking to her.

  “Morning miss. Or afternoon, I don’t know how late it is.” He tried to sound nice, bowing his head as he stayed a respectable distance away from her. “Where’s Ulf?”

  She turned around to face him, holding a nice and hot bowl of soup. “Ulf is making arrangements. He has been called upon to become part of the council. And before you ask, no I don’t know what arrangements and besides, it wouldn’t be any of your business anyway.”

  While she sounded nice, she was also very firm, pointing at the table as she put the soup down. She then gave him some kind of weird smelling drink as well. “And don’t call me miss. Call me Tangy.”

  Like a good boy, Lehtern sat down at the table. He didn’t like this at all and looked at the drink, smelling it and turning to look at Tangy. “I’m sorry Miss Tangy but I rather not drink alcohol right now.”

  Hearing how he called her, she would twist the towel she had used in the air and slapped him on his shoulder. It was a strong hard slap, showing that she used to work in the mines before settling down. “No miss!”

  “Ouch! I’ sorry okay!”

  “And that’s not alcohol! That’s medicine! Ulf told me what you told him now drink it little wimp or I’ll force it into you!”

  Lehtern quickly nodded as he couldn’t hold back a smile, starting to talk to himself in his own language. “I can see why he married you.”

  That was met with another slap on his shoulder. He quickly turned to look at her, grabbing his shoulder. “Hey! Aw! What now!?”

  “In this house you speak what I can understand, understood!?”

  “Yes yes, okay. Jeeze, where was this furiosity when you first saw me.”

  “I didn’t need it back then. My husband was enough to keep you down and if he wasn’t, I’m sure that my son could’ve taken you.”

  Ouch. That hurt his ego a little bit as he turned to drink the rest of the medicine and eat the food. If only he had an army of spicy woman like this, the skeletons wouldn’t even dare. He couldn’t help but chuckle at this idea, quickly turning to see if she would hit him for laughing. He was lucky though as she seemed to focus on the dishes.

  He finished his food as he then looked at Tangy. She still had her back turned to him so he got up, bringing over the empty bowl towards her.

  Once she noticed that he had gotten up instead of resting, she would be ready to give him another slap. That was until she saw that he brought her the bowl. “Hmm, thank you but you should rest a bit before you go back to your Gruge.

  Lehtern nodded but he would walk to the front door, slowly opening it and looking down the ledge. At the bottom were still a stream of skeletons but it seemed to be getting less dense. The end of the army was getting closer but due to the mountain wall, he couldn’t see too far.

  With the time that he had been gone, it shouldn’t be too long before the first couple of skeletons should be reaching the exit and would stream out into the valley. “I took too long.”

  Tangy came next to him, looking down as well. She seemed to get a face filled with disgust as she looked at them before looking back at Lehtern. “You did what you could. Don’t worry, we’ll get you home in time.”

  “Thank you.” As he said it, he seemed to be a bit distant, not really looking at her as he tried to think of what to do with everything going on. Eventually when Tangy started to softly guide him away from the door would he move and close it, sighing.

  His head felt empty and hollow as he walked to the too small couch as he lie down in it. He had to wait for the husband anyway so why not take a quick nap. He hadn’t even finished those thoughts or he was already asleep.

  When he was woken up, he felt a bit groggy. Looking up, it was the husband, having changed his clothes to what looked like dwarven knight armor. Not questioning it, he got up as he rubbed his head. Instead he would look at the windows, seeing that it was slowly getting dark. “Great… more time wasted.”

  Ulf knew what he meant as he started to walk to the backdoor seeing as Lehtern couldn’t use the front one.

  Lehtern was still barely clothed so getting outside like this made him shiver, wrapping his arms around himself as the wind cut through his flesh. Outside was the donkey from before with filled bags hanging over him. A bit further away were standing many dwarves, fully armed and also in some kind of heavy duty armor. They didn’t use a donkey but instead used goats to carry their stuff.

  While he was shivering in the cold, Ulf came back with clothes that seemed to fit him but were also extremely fancy. When putting it on, he immediately started to warm up as these weren’t normal clothes. It didn’t take him long to figure out where these came from.

  “I guess this isn’t made by dwarves?”

  While what the dwarves did was to their ideals justified, Ulf still felt a bit bad as he nodded slowly. “It wasn’t made by dwarves.”

  Even though he didn’t want to wear dead men clothes, he still didn’t take them off as he could use the extra heat that it gave. While he was enjoying the warmth, Ulf told him to get on the donkey.

  He got up but he would also look at the other dwarves. This time the council hadn’t joined them. As Ulf got to walking and the others followed, Lehtern would start to ask questions.

  “Why the armor? Do you think we’ll be attacked?”

  While it might have been a good question, he still didn’t like the elf that much. This only made his dislike for him stronger. “Because we already lost a dwarf last time that we were traveling. Not only that, we’re later than expected. This means we might have to fight some skeletons to get you through.”

  “Okay then, when do you think we will arrive. I still need to go all the way to the Forest Gruge to tell them my findings.”

  “Yeah well, to that we can’t really help you. We will give you a clear path from the skeletons in the valley but only for you to pass to the Forest Gruge.”

  While he understood why they only go that far, he wasn’t so happy with it. Nevertheless, he was going to fight it seeing as he still needed the dwarfs and he wouldn’t be able to go through these caves all alone.

  Luckily for them, this time there wasn’t a golem on their path and they made it all the way without much trouble, setting up camp in what Ulf called, the last campable area from here on out.