(on a side note, this is the first erotic writing I've submitted.
Please let me know what you think.)
*
Kara tossed her cards into the center of the table.
"Fold. Can we get on with it?" she asked impatiently.
The fellow sitting to her right, Collen something-or-other, tossed his hand in as well, nodding.
Directly across the table from Kara, Laurent 'Chimney' Silva sucked on his cigar. Sighing a stream of smoke, he set his cards on the table and gestured at the fourth player with his cigar.
"Take it, you freakish son of a wolf and some trickster god."
Stefan Marcel nodded amiably. He moved cards aside and dragged the handful of coins from the center of the table to join his rather larger pile of winnings.
"Who are you robbing that you need four people for the job?" Kara pressed.
"Nothing like that, love." Chimney smiled. "Have you met Collen?" he nodded at the short, stout, shaven-headed fellow on Kara's right.
She glanced over. The man was from the Heavensgate Empire to the West. That much was obvious when he spoke. An ex-soldier. He stank of stale sweat and struck her as over confident. It didn't help her opinion of him that he spent an inordinate amount of time staring at her chest, even considering the usual amount of attention it got.
"Aye." she replied dryly, returning her gaze to Chimney.
"And you've worked with Stefan before, yes?"
Kara nodded impatiently. In truth, they hadn't so much worked together as he had saved her from an unfortunate end. OF course, it had been one of his deadfall traps she had fallen into. Stefan was a hunter and trapper by trade. He spent most of his time in the forests to the north and east of Blanc Mar, coming into the little town every so often to sell or trade furs. All but a few of the townspeople exhibited either a sort of thinly veiled contempt or even more thinly veiled nervousness around him.
Quiet and reserved, it was nonetheless obvious by appearance and by the way he moved that he was lean and strong under his leathers and furs. Something about the symmetry of his face and his bright blue eyes was unmistakeably suggestive of a wolf. Kara had even seen Chimney, an ex mercenary, unintentionally draw back a bit once when Stefan had given him a sudden, faint smile.
When Stefan had helped her up out of his trap she had thanked him kindly and asked if he might be so kind as to bend the truth a bit if the subject of their meeting ever came up in conversation. She offered him a bit of coin, which he refused.
"I'll let on that perhaps we worked together breifly if you'll promise me something." he had said. "Don't come out here and fall in any of my traps again. Pretty a thing as you are, I don't think your hide would fetch much in town." He had given her a meaningful look then. "Next time I may already have gotten around to putting the stakes in the bottom of the pit."
Coming back to the present, Kara nodded.
"You know about the dwarves up in the Ironflank Ridge?" Chimney puffed on his cigar.
"I know what anyone knows. Every town and village for fifty miles gets it's iron from them."
"But have you heard that they've gone? It's been six weeks since they've shown at the entrances to meet anyone."
"I've heard rumours. Not something I spend much thought on." Kara was growing exasperated. And Collen something-or-other was admiring her chest again.
Chimney took a long drag then stubbed the cigar out on the tabletop.
"Several men have supposedly gone down into the warrens. Only one has come back."
"With a heavy load of gold dwarf cutlery?" Kara posed sarcastically.
"No. The lad lost his nerve before he came to anything worth scarpering off with. Dark and echoes do that. He did bring interesting word though. Seems there was no sign of battle, but also no sign of packing. Like the little moles had just up and walked off."
Kara crossed her arms under her bosom and frowned.
"So something that wasn't plague or battle drove off several hundred dwarves and you want to go down there and pilfer what wants pilfering?"
"Aye, well-" Chimney began.
"In the dark!" Kara interrupted him as the thought dawned on her.
"Aye, well, you being of the half elfish persuasion might come in handy..." Chimney said as meekly as he could manage while smiling.
Kara slouched in her chair and glared at him from under her brow. She took a deep breath and sighed loudly.
"What terms do you propose?" she asked finally.
"Even shares. First pick of the loot for you of course, seeing as how scout is the most risky position."
Kara rose and reached across the table to shake his hand.
"Agreed."
It was two days on horse back from Blanc Mar to the base of the Ironflank Mountains. Most of a third day was passed climbing the switchbacking trails to the lowest known entrance to the dwarven city within the mountains. It was this entrance which had traditionally been utilized by those who traded with the dwarves. The four companions dismounted and left their mounts tethered some hundred yards back from the entrance where a natural spring burbled up throught the rock.
Finally coming to the entrance, they found the stout, iron banded oak door standing ajar. The treasure hunters hesitated, glancing at each other. Kara rolled her eyes, lolling her head to one side.
"Great slitherous Cthulhu left the door open for us, I'm sure." she muttered, stepping forward to swing the door fully open.
Kara slowed as she came to a crossroads in the dark halls. Thus far the rumours had proven true. No dwarfs. No sign of battle. Bronze and pewter plates, goblets, trenchers and cutlery still lay on tables as if simply left there after a meal.
As the party had moved slowly from chamber to chamber, a suspicion was forming in the back of Kara's mind. Stefan put his finger on it first. Thought almost everything suggested the entire population had vanished simultaneously without packing, there was something other than dwarves missing. The four had found nothing more valuable than the bronze goblets.
There was, to the treasure hunter's growing vexation, no treasure.
Kara had wasted little time moving ahead of the others. The light from their torches ruined her 'night vision.' Also, thought she wouldn't have bothered mentioning it, the men and their torches made more noise than she cared for.
Reaching the intersection, she stopped and listened, peering down each hallway. Each of the three corridors looked much the same aside from a couple rats scurrying off to her left. Should she wait for the others? Perhaps leave something to show which way she had gone? After a moments indecision she shrugged, drew one of her knives, layed it in the middle of the intersection and gave it a spin.
Right.
Leaving the knife where it lay, she turned and padded off down the hall.
Minutes later she had left behind the faint sounds of the men searching for anyting worth taking. The passage continued at a shallow decline and she still couldn't see the far end. This must lead to a seperate mining project or a whole other section of the undercity, she thought in passing.
Several minutes more she walked before finally spying a typically stout door. She felt a bit relieved and was immediately annoyed with herself. While she had no particular problem with closed in places, Chimney's words had wormed into her mind while she walked. The dark didn't bother her either, but the echoes breaking the otherwise unnatural silence had begun to grate on her subconscious.
Cautious curiosity taking over, Kara crept up. This door was almost identical to the one at the trade entrance through which they had entered the tunnels, down to the fact that it stood slightly ajar. Kara winced as she pulled it open, bracing herself for the inevitable scrape or screech of old hinges. When it failed to sound, she smiled to herself. Dwarven construction.
Once over the threshold Kara proceeded three ghost-quiet steps before her brain accepted the unfortunate truth of what her eyes were seeing. She was not alone here. Her 'night sight' was based largely on the radiation of heat. The mass dominating the center of the chamber, percieved by Kara as a fuzzy-bordered layering of reds, purples and greens, was immense.
Kara froze. Unintentionally holding her breath, she strove against surprise and rising fear.
Think. Move. She cursed herself mentally. Move, damnit!
But her body had ceased taking orders. She stood rooted to the spot, unable to take her eyes from the hulking cold blooded thing before her. To Kara's horror, as she watched, a slit of yellow appeared amidst the colder colors and grew slowly into a perfect circle. She heard more than saw the beast draw a slow, deep breath.
Seeming to eminate from the far reaches of the chamber and, reverberating, build as it drew inward to it's true source, came laughter. Laughter so deep and powerful Kara felt it resonate in her chest. Unnoticed, coins and bars of precious metals shifted and slid from the mounded bed on which the creature lay. The tinny sounds of them striking the stone floor were faint and insignificant in the midst of the wyrm's mirth.
Kara had suspected from the first, but now, as the laughter ceased, the beast moved and it's great head on it's serpent-like neck was silhouetted against the dark of the room. It continued to move, swinging a head like a rum puncheon to rest almost within arms reach of Kara. It's eyes were just a bit higher than her head. The bright orbs were slowly hidden and revealed as it blinked lazily. The beast inhaled, snuffling in short rapid breaths like an animal searching the wind for a scent. Kara reflexively flinched back against the wall.
