Degel stood statue still over Bim and did not explain what the actual hell was all that about when Feb asked. He stood very still with his face very rigid, pain evident in his glassy eyes. He held his position for a moment seemingly frozen in time as dwarves continued to walk passed him.
“Okon.” Degel finally said. “We should find Okon.”
“He's dead.” Dumplin replied.
“Then we'll find him all the same.” Degel replied tightly. “If he's fallen then the records should say how. A dwarf deserves as much.”
Dumplin said nothing. It meant very little to risk a life she planned to throw away.
In terms of language systems Dwarven is an entirely alphabetic. Letters form words which hold meaning and form sentences which communicate ideas. If Dwarven were a pictographic language, and thereby expressed ideas in images rather than words, their pictogram for “Valor” may well be Degel the ragged militia dwarf declining peaceful rest to seek out his lost comrade for proper burial. The Onslaught of Smoke had ravaged Arrowstockades, crushed it's military, killed it's commander, scarred the land, and cut the baboons from nine to three. Exhausted, beaten, and low on ammunition the group was weaker than in it's early days when Inod and Degel stood alone. Degel pushed forward undeterred. The long death march that had been this day would soon be over one way or another and Okon's fate would not remain unknown while he lived. If this hypothetical pictographic dwarven language had a word for “out of place” it may well be an image of Dumplin.
Dumplin walked with less fire. She joined Degel only in physical form and was well aware that if they recovered his body it only meant that the engravers would have to go to work immediately rather than wait six days until the overseer declared him missing and therefore dead. If his body was at all recoverable then it would be recovered regardless, the mass hauling would begin shortly and broken bodies would be cataloged in vile detail. They would be thrown into the corpse pile and the Bookkeeper with his frightening precision would describe their condition and number. There was no special reason it had to be them to do the nasty business or to make a special job of it before the alert was deactivated. Dumplin had no special desire to find Okon's broken corpse or say words over it before it was thrown in a stone coffin and forgotten.
The pointless work went reasonably quickly, navigating the forest wasn't particularly difficult with the undead slaughtered and Dumplin would much rather be in bed. Though there were certainly no more undead Degel's decision that they should split up was still in her eyes completely idiotic. She made an awkward zigzag east and Degel going west.
To busy herself Dumplin thought of something more meaningful- the manner in which she would end her life. Walking into the river would be fine but stepping into the trash compactor may be quicker and less tedious. She could also finally take a run at Feb One-Eye, Bim seemed to enjoy it and it would be satisfying but there was always the possibility he would hack off her arms and legs and then send her to jail. But perhaps her best bet was--
Dumplin stopped with her crossbow at the ready. She'd detected movement just ahead. She skulked quietly forward and barely stopped the panicked muscle contraction from firing her weapon. There in the clearing Okon and Lolor lied in a bloody pile, Okon had his crossbow leveled at her and Lolor weakly held her sword in a defensive fashion. Around them were over a dozen bodies in various states of decomposition. They had apparently held up in the clearing and only a few of the zombies had broken off the main horde to attack them. They were wracked with horrible injuries and utterly ragged but they were alive.
“Dumplin!” Okon croaked weakly. “Is it over?”
She didn't respond. She was busy convincing herself that even though she was wrong about Okon dying she'd made the right choice with the information she had and that she wasn't a coward for abandoning him. She tried to convince herself that had she brought the baboons on such a mission they would have attracted more undead attention and they would have all died anyway, the only difference is that Dumplin Degel Okon and Lolor would not have lived either. Suddenly Okon turned his weapon in another direction. There was a familiar cry of anger and frustration that inspired Dumplin to run. It was very rare for a dwarf to have a second chance in Arrowstockades and the faintest possibility drove her forward. She pierced through the trees quickly and easily her crossbow perfectly level and fixed to fire.
There between the trees stood Ashmon, quite alive and fighting a lone zombie. He dodged a swipe wearily and threw half a punch groaning with frustration as his fear prevented the blow from connecting. Dumplin fired and the bolt sailed through the air striking the zombie's head with perfect accuracy and passed through the other side. Ashmon looked shocked and gaped at her. She ran forward to meet him. She stopped suddenly.
Ashmon began explaining something or other as she dropped her crossbow and stared blankly.
The towns of Windpromised is not a source of genius. It's exports are cotton and wool textiles with the occasional raw fruits and vegetables mixed in. The work of the city is primarily for individual subsistence. There are ten or twelve men and women who have achieved reasonable wealth and earned for themselves a dining room with a statue or perhaps a home with a single room for sleeping and no unfamiliar faces dwelling within. There is no exorbitant wealth in Windpromised but every dwarf who lives there finds a bed and the peace of mind that accompanies a full days work. Though dwarven treasure would be snapped up greedily by the King a few pieces of pewter dinnerware or some luxury such as barrel of passable candies would trickle from the capitol to the cities and somewhere before coming to rest in the tiny villages on the outskirts of the Kingdom it would be picked through by Windpromised. On those few and fortunate days there is much rejoicing and every dwarf beams with pride to their elven human and goblin neighbors.
“Look!” They say, “The shape of this goblet is generally fine and it's flaws can be counted quite easily provided you remove one shoe and make use of the toes of that foot. Surely it is a miracle of Dwarven craftsmanship. And look here again! These candies are more flavorful and pleasant to eat than a potato or even a fruit that is not particularly fresh. ”
Dumplin Lakewanders did not travel to Windpromised. She went to Arrowstockades where resplendent beauty and abject horror merged into one bastard entity of endless suffering.
Oh the wealth and grandeur of Arrowstockades. Where the smell of decomposing flesh hung foul in the heavy air, where pointless trinkets were churned out by the thousand at the cost of life and limb, where the most miserable souls of the earth ,already resigned to death, fought to defend it's unassailable walls, where every child went to bed in fear that the night would bring more bloodshed, where life advanced at a miserable pace, where vast quantities of food and drink sat long months brewed and slapped together from whatever stood most plentiful in the stocks to defend against starvation when the armies of it's many foes beset them.
Oh Arrowstockades where broken, ragged dwarves mill about like stinking corpse flies preforming their grisly work with psychotic and unyielding drive. Where glorious fabrics formed magnificent rainments that were caked with mud and vomit and stained by the blood of one thousand and some odd dead and wrapped around the grimy living husks that populate the blasted place. Where dwarves worked night and day to no discernible purpose save the creation of unneeded and unwanted wealth to be horded in vast stockpiles. Where the the miners labored timelessly in black, sunless pits to expand the great tomb that housed the sum of the fortress' dwarven dead.
Oh Arrowstockades where nightmares never cease. Where each odd day is filled with soul rending terror meted out by things dwarven eyes were never meant to behold. Where each even day is filled with long hours spent in mind warping paranoia and the knowledge that peace simply means you cannot yet see the foe. Where nameless horrors crawl from the depths, ancient titans descend from the skies, and the armies of each race set upon the place from all directions.
Oh Arrowstockades with it's vicious promises of wealth and glory ensnaring naïve dwarven minds. Where Dukes and Barons and mayors all under the Kings command spin webs of flawless design and leave perfect, beautiful lies in the ear of every merchantman who happens by. Where platinum, gold, and silver, are crafted into objects of terrible beauty and set with crystals forged with the tainted ash of the ever burning corpse ovens.
If Dumplin was better with names or the fortress hadn't stopped speaking to her she may have realized that Kilrud Coldabyss captain of the Yellow Barrels had quite some time ago been killed by the Fortress Guard after murdering a farmer in a fit of rage. Two dwarves from his squad were missing when the militia did roll call. One had been Lolor Siltlock. The other dwarf was the latest captain who fled into the forest to find his wife. If Dumplin had kept abreast of the goings on in the fortress she would know that the yellow barrels were still called Kilrud Coldabyss' squad because the new captain was a garbagedwarf whose wife was a hardened criminal, an accused vampire, a known Bold-Snuggler and all around mad woman. This poor foolish captain learned that his wife was outside the fortress walls and enlisted the help of a guardsman to run into the forest to find her shrieking to Feb One-Eye that Dumplin had to be rescued from undead hands. Asen Hateumbra, foolish captain of Kilrud Coldabyss' infantry squad had died searching for his wife and was reanimated by the dark power of the Necromancer General.
Oh Arrowstockades where, under the setting sun Dumplin Lakewanders shot her husband in the head.