Geneviève held the Dwarf's gaze without blinking. She was naked to the waist in her soul, stripped of her steel shell, with short, wet hair plastering her forehead and soggy bandages still binding her chest—the only vestiges of her lie. But the fear she had felt in the forest with the Damsel was gone. There, she feared divine judgment. Here, before this jailer of stone, there was only the politics of violence.
"My name," Geneviève said. Her voice was not Gilles' low growl. It was her natural voice: clear, cold, sharp as the winter wind. It was the first time she had used it with a stranger in five years. "Is Geneviève. And I am not a spy. I am the only thing standing between your fortress and the poison flowing in your veins."
The Dwarf, who had introduced himself as Thorgard Stonehammer, Captain of the Tunnel Watch, laughed. A dry sound, like gravel crunching. "Big words for an umgi in chains. We found the scroll tube on you. It said the water is poisoned. As if we Dawi couldn't recognize bad water. We drink ale, girl. Water is for washing floors."
"Do your sick drink ale?" asked Geneviève, staring at a spot over the Dwarf's shoulder, where a row of stone stretchers was occupied by motionless forms covered in rough sheets. "Or do you give them pure water for the fever?"
Thorgard's smile vanished. He stiffened. She had touched a raw nerve. "The healers say it's a fever of the depths," snarled the Dwarf, but there was uncertainty in his voice. "It is none of your business."
At that moment, the earth shook. Not a natural earthquake, but a rhythmic, scratching vibration coming from beneath the floor of the prison cavern. Thorgard spun toward the dark corner of the hall, where an old ventilation shaft had been sealed with an iron grate. The grate exploded inward.
Dust and debris flew everywhere. Thorgard was knocked to the ground. From the breach emerged rapid, lethal shadows. Gutter Runners. Skaven elite assassins, wrapped in black cloaks, with weeping blades dripping green poison. They were not there to free anyone. They were there to finish the job: kill the sick and sabotage the defenses from the inside.
"Defend the wounded!" yelled Thorgard, scrambling up and grabbing his double-bladed axe. Two Dwarf guards ran toward the breach, but the Skaven were too fast. They leaped over the Dwarves' shields, using the walls as springboards, heading straight for the defenseless stretchers.
Geneviève pulled at the chains. The iron held. She was bolted to the wall, ten meters from the action. She could only watch as a Skaven landed on the chest of a young feverish Dwarf, raising a curved dagger. The helplessness burned her more than acid. No.
She looked at the spot where the chain was fastened to the wall. An iron ring driven into the living rock. Geneviève did not pray. She channeled everything: the rage, the frustration, the Bull's Strength. The muscles of her arms, defined by years of forging and swordplay, swelled. The veins on her neck stood out like cords. She gave a violent yank, screaming with her true voice, a high-pitched cry of superhuman effort. The rock around the pin, perhaps weakened by moisture or age, gave way with a crack. Geneviève was free from the wall, but she still had two meters of heavy chain hanging from her wrists like steel whips.
The Skaven was about to sink the dagger into the sick Dwarf's throat when he heard a whistle in the air. Geneviève's chain hit him full in the face. The weight of the iron shattered his jaw, flinging him away from the stretcher.
Geneviève did not stop. She was a whirlwind of barefoot, chained rage. She did not have her sword, but she had learned to fight in the mud, dirty and mean. She used the chains as flexible weapons, spinning them to keep the assassins at bay. A Skaven tried to stab her in the side. She parried with her metal-wrapped forearm, then coiled the chain around the beast's neck and pulled. There was a dry snap.
Thorgard, who was fighting two opponents simultaneously, saw the scene out of the corner of his eye. He saw the human girl, half-naked and unarmed, defending his sick kin with a ferocity that would make a Slayer envious. An assassin jumped onto Thorgard's back, trying to stab him between the armor plates. "Behind you!" screamed Geneviève. She threw the end of her chain. The metal hook hit the Skaven's leg, unbalancing him just enough for Thorgard to grab him and crush his skull with the head of his axe.
The fight ended as quickly as it had begun. The five assassins lay dead on the stone floor.
Silence returned to the hall, broken only by the groans of the wounded. Geneviève, panting, let the bloody chains drop. Her hands were shaking. She had deep cuts on her bare feet and a scratch along her ribs that burned.
But everyone's attention was caught by a gurgling sound. One of the Dwarf guards, a young one with a barely braided beard, was on the ground. A Skaven's weeping blade had cut his thigh. The poison acted instantly. The skin around the cut was already black, and the Dwarf was convulsing, green foam at his mouth. Healers rushed over with bandages and ointments, but shook their heads. "It is Black Venom," murmured one of them. "There is no antidote that acts in time. He is gone."
Thorgard knelt beside the soldier, his face a mask of stony grief. It was his nephew. "Hold on, lad. Hold on for the honor of the clan..." whispered the captain, but he knew it was useless.
Geneviève approached. The sound of her chains dragging on the floor made Thorgard raise his head. "Stay back, human," he snarled, tears in his eyes. "There is nothing to see here."
Geneviève ignored him. She knelt in the blood beside the dying Dwarf. "I can stop it," she said. Her voice was calm, devoid of arrogance. "Human magic?" spat Thorgard. "Your sorcery is unstable. You will kill him faster."
"It is not magic," replied Geneviève, placing her dirty hands on the horrible wound. "It is faith. And if I do not do it, he will die anyway. Choose, Captain. Your pride or his life?"
Thorgard hesitated. He looked into her gray eyes, searching for deception. He saw only infinite weariness and iron determination. "Do it," he grunted. "But if he suffers more, I will open your head."
Geneviève closed her eyes. The power came, but this time it was different. She was tired, wounded, starving. Divine Grace did not flow like a river; she had to tear it from her own life essence. Her hands lit up with that crackling blue-white fire. The Dwarf screamed when the light touched the poison. Black smoke rose from the wound, smelling of sulfur and sickness. Geneviève gritted her teeth, feeling the poison trying to climb up her arms, fighting against the purity of her aura.
She had to maintain contact for a full minute, an eternity of shared agony. When she finally pulled her hands away, she collapsed forward, exhausted. The wound on the young Dwarf's leg was closed. The black skin was flaking away, leaving pink, healthy tissue underneath. The soldier's breathing calmed. He was sleeping.
Geneviève remained on the ground, unable to move. She heard heavy steps approaching. Thorgard loomed over her. Geneviève braced herself to be struck, or chained again. Instead, she heard a click. The iron cuffs on her wrists opened and fell to the floor.
Thorgard offered her a hand. A stubby hand, covered in a mail gauntlet, but open. Geneviève looked at it, then reached out, grasping the Dwarf's forearm. He pulled her up with surprising strength, setting her on her feet.
The Captain took off his helm, revealing a tattooed bald head and eyes that now looked at her with a different light. Not friendship. Dwarves do not grant friendship easily. But it was the recognition one gives to a well-made weapon.
"You fought well, for a beardless woman," said Thorgard, his voice low. "And you saved a Dawi when you could have run."
He turned to the other guards. "Bring her things. All of them. And bring her food that doesn't taste of mold."
Then he looked back at Geneviève, who was massaging her bruised wrists. "I don't know who you really are, Geneviève," said Thorgard, pronouncing her name with a hard, rocky accent. "And I don't like you hiding behind a mask. But iron does not lie. And today, your iron was good."
He pointed to his chest with his fist. "You are a guest of Karak-Azgaraz, not a prisoner. At least until we have killed all the rats that poisoned my ale."
Geneviève nodded, tired but alive. As they brought back her black armor, dented and cold, she felt that something had changed. Wearing the helm again would no longer be hiding. It would be dressing for war, knowing that under the steel was someone whom even the stones had learned to respect.