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The dwarves could only stare.
The gate had opened of its own accord. There were no levers, no hands, and no password muttered under breath. It had swung wide as if the mountain itself had chosen to breathe in. That could mean only one thing: their god had personally welcomed the barbarian.
For several stunned heartbeats, they simply froze, trying and failing to make sense of it.
“Make way.”
The voice came from behind them: heavy, iron in the throat. Dwarves shuffled aside at once, a lane opening through beards and breastplates. A single dwarf walked out between them.
Ketal’s brows lifted. “Oh?”
This one was strong. Not merely stout the way dwarves were famous for being, but honed—weighty as a thunderhead. If someone called him a Hero, Ketal would not have argued. The dwarf’s eyes, narrow beneath thick brows, measured him for a long second.
“So you are the one our god spoke of,” he said at last. “Let him pass.”
“B-but, Your Majesty…”
“He is a guest of the god. We will treat him as such.”
Mouths closed, and axes lowered. The crowd parted, and Ketal stepped through the ramshackle outpost at an unhurried pace, dwarven gazes prickling across his skin like sleet. He ignored the whispers and followed his escort into a hut large enough to pass for a hall among dwarves.
“Welcome,” the dwarf said. “I am Grombir Ironhand, King of the Dwarves. I am also a man who failed in his duty, whose holy halls were wrested from him by the spawn of Hell.”
“I’m Ketal,” Ketal said, taking the seat indicated to him. “I set aside my own duties to come here.”
They traded those plain introductions without bowing or embroidery. Then Grombir’s tone gentled.
“I know of you, Ketal. You’re the barbarian wanderer, friend...
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