“This pathetic dwarf-kisser in the dirt was sent by Obould to meet with Bruenor?” Grguch asked incredulously, as if he could not believe his ears.

“So we believe,” Dnark answered.

“It is easy enough to discern,” came a voice from behind, among Clan Karuck’s ranks. All turned, Grguch with a wide, knowing smile, to see Hakuun step forward to stand beside his chieftain. “Would you like me to question the emissary?” Hakuun asked.

Grguch laughed and glanced around, motioning at last to a dark cluster of trees off to the side of the path. Dnark began signaling to his ranks for orcs to drag the prisoner over, but Grguch cut him short as Hakuun launched into a spell. Nukkels contorted as if in pain, and curled up on the ground—until he was not on the ground, but floating in the air. Hakuun walked for the trees, and Nukkels drifted behind him.

Away from the others, Hakuun obediently put his ear in line with that of Nukkels. The transfer took only a moment, with Jack the brain mole slipping out of Hakuun’s ear and into Nukkels’s.

As he realized what was happening to him, Nukkels began thrashing wildly in the air, but with nothing to orient him, with no pull of gravity to keep him upright or even on his side, he began to spin—which dizzied him, of course, and only made Jack’s intrusion that much easier.

Jack came back out, and back into his more usual host a short while later, having ripped Nukkels’s brain of every detail. He knew, and soon Hakuun knew, of Obould’s true designs, confirming the fears of the trio who had summoned Clan Karuck from the bowels of the Spine of the World.

“Obould seeks peace with the dwarves,” Hakuun remarked in disbelief. “He wants the war to be at its end.”

A very un-orc orc, said the voice in his head.

“He defiles the will of Gruumsh!”

As I said.

Hakuun stalked out of the tree cluster, Jack’s magic yanking the shivering, slobbering, floating Nukkels along behind him. When Hakuun got back to the others on the trail, he waved Nukkels in and let him drop hard to the ground.

“He was bound for King Bruenor,” the shaman of Clan Karuck stated. “To undo the damage wrought by Chieftain Grguch and Clan Karuck.”

“Damage?” Grguch asked, furrowing his thick brow. “Damage!”

“As we explained to you upon your arrival,” said Ung-thol.

“It is as our friends have told us,” Hakuun confirmed. “King Obould has lost his heart for war. He wishes no further battle with Clan Battlehammer.”

“Cowardice,” spat Toogwik Tuk.

“Has he found enough spoils to return to his home?” Grguch asked, his tone mocking and derogatory.

“He has conquered empty rocks,” Dnark proclaimed. “All that is of value lies within the halls of the Battlehammer dwarves, or across the river in the realm of Silverymoon. But Obould—” he paused, turned, and kicked Nukkels hard—“Obould would parlay with Bruenor. He would seek a treaty!”

“With dwarves?” Grguch bellowed.

“Exactly that,” said Hakuun, and Grguch nodded, having seen Hakuun at his work too many times to doubt a word he spoke.

Ung-thol and Toogwik Tuk exchanged knowing grins. It was all for show, all to rouse the rabble around the two chieftains, to garner outrage at the utter ridiculousness of the apparent designs of Obould.

“And he would parlay with Grguch,” Dnark reminded the ferocious orc chieftain. “He would summon you to his side to gain your approval. Or perhaps to scold you for attacking the elves and dwarves.”

Grguch’s bloodshot eyes opened wide and a great snarl rumbled behind his trembling lips. He seemed as if he would leap forward and bite off Dnark’s head, but the Chieftain of Wolf Jaw did not relent. “Obould intends to show Grguch who controls the Kingdom of Many-Arrows. He will coax you to join his way, so certain is he that he follows the true vision of Gruumsh.”

“To parlay with dwarves?” Grguch roared.

“Cowardice!” Dnark cried.

Grguch stood there, clenching his fists, the muscles in his neck straining, his chest and shoulders bulging as if their sinewy power could not be contained by the orc’s skin.

“Oktule!” he cried, wheeling to face the orc who had arrived with King Obould’s invitation.

The emissary shrank back, as did every orc around him.

“Come here,” Grguch demanded.

Oktule, trembling and sweating, gave a quick shake of his head and stumbled back even more—or would have, had not a pair of Clan Karuck’s powerful warriors grabbed him by the arms and walked him forward. He tried to dig his feet in, but they just dragged him, depositing him before the wild gaze of Chieftain Grguch.

“King Obould would scold me?” Grguch asked.

A line of wetness ran down poor Oktule’s leg, and he shook his head again—though whether in response to the question or in simple, desperate denial, no one around could tell. He focused on Dnark, pleading with the chieftain who knew that his role was unwitting.

Dnark laughed at him.

“He would scold me?” Grguch said again, louder. He leaned forward, towering over the trembling Oktule. “You did not tell me that.”

“He would not…he…he…he told me to come to get you,” Oktule stammered.

“That he might scold me?” Grguch demanded, and Oktule seemed about to faint.

“I did not know,” the pathetic courier protested meekly.

Grguch whirled to regard Dnark and the others, his expression brightening as if he had just sorted everything out. “To gain the favor of Bruenor, Obould would have to offer something,” Grguch realized. He spun back on Oktule and slapped him with a backhand across the face, launching him to the side and to the ground.

Grguch turned on Dnark again, his smile wry, nodding his head knowingly. “He would offer to Bruenor the head of the warrior who struck against Mithral Hall, perhaps.”

Behind him, Oktule gulped.

“Is there truth in that?” Dnark asked Nukkels, and he kicked the prone orc hard again.

Nukkels grunted and groaned, but said nothing decipherable.

“It is reasonable,” Ung-thol said, and Dnark quickly nodded, neither of them wishing to let Grguch calm from his self-imposed frenzy. “If Obould wishes to convince Bruenor that the attack was not of his doing, he would have to prove his claim.”

“With the head of Grguch?” the chieftain of Clan Karuck asked as he turned to Hakuun, and Grguch laughed as if it was all absurd.

“The foolish priest showed me nothing of this,” Hakuun admitted. “But if Obould truly wishes peace with Bruenor, and he does, then Chieftain Grguch has quickly become…an inconvenience.”

“It is past time I meet this Obould fool, that I can show him the truth of Clan Karuck,” said Grguch, and he gave a little laugh, clearly enjoying the moment. “It may be unfortunate that you interrupted the journey of the one in the dirt,” he said, nodding toward the still-squirming Nukkels. “Greater would be King Bruenor’s surprise and fear when he looked into that basket, I say! I would pay in women and good gold to see the face of the dwarf when he pulled out Obould’s head!”

The orcs of Clan Karuck began to howl at that, but Dnark, Ungthol, and Toogwik Tuk just looked at each other solemnly and with nods of understanding. For there it was, the conspiracy spoken clearly, openly proclaimed, and there could be no turning back. They offered their nods of thanks to Hakuun, who remained impassive, the part of him that was Jack the Gnome not wishing to even acknowledge their existence, let alone allow them the illusion that they were somehow his peers.

Grguch hoisted his two-bladed axe, but paused then set it aside. Instead, he drew a long and wicked knife from his belt and glanced back to the Karuck orcs standing around Oktule. His smile was all the impetus those orcs needed to drag the poor courier forward.

Oktule’s feet dug small trenches in the wet spring ground. He shook his head in denial, crying, “No, no, please no!”