You Dirty Rat!

"Auril's frigid teats!" Gywahier cursed as the fortress doors rolled shut behind her. A pair of still-smoking burns smouldered on the frost giantess's left arm and neck. "Where the hells did that mage come from and why didn't someone kill him?"

Dagryg breathed heavily with post-rage exhaustion and, ignoring the giantess for the moment, looked around the smoky corridor for his lieutenant. Two of the other ogres were busily piling huge stones in front of the doors. There was already a whiff of smoke from outside as the humans began their expected attempt to burn them down.

"How many did we lose?" Gywahier asked, wincing as an orc attempted to clean off the worst of her burns.

"Near all the black-feather orcs," Dagryg muttered. "Malok." His face took on a grim expression. Malok had been a fool to climb onto the wall, but a brave fool. He had also been Dagryg's brother.

Finally, he spotted the orc. "Zakath," he grunted, "What now? We can't last long wit' a army camped on our doorstep."

Nodding, Zakath grimaced as he wrapped a bandage around his upper arm, which had been laid open by an arrow. "We have only to last a few hours," he told the ogre chief.

Dagryg frowned but it was Gywahier who spoke.

"How do we even know they're coming back?" she demanded angrily. "And what good would more orcs do against so many humans?"

Zakath finished bandaging his arm and rubbed the wound.

"They will come back," he reassured the giantess. "I told you I had a plan--"

"Here's for your plan!" Gywahier shouted, gesturing rudely at the or.c. "They are slaughtering us, in case you hadn't noticed."

The orc stood up, shaking his head. "On the contrary," he said, "We have taken relatively light losses in comparison to the attackers."

"How you figure?" Dagryg demanded.

Zakath shrugged. "Simple: We lost nine orcs and one ogre -- an ogre we wouldn't have lost if he'd stuck with the plan, by the way -- whereas the enemy has lost three quarters of their archers and many soldiers besides." He pointed toward the barricade. "We have killed twice as many of them as we have lost, at the least, and now they are faced with the proposition of fighting in close quarters with us -- an almost impossible fight for their common footsoldiers." He paced the corridor, listening to the distant sounds of the humans cheering their seizure of the outer fortress.

"Where'd they get all these men?" Gywahier wondered. "I mean, we expected them to come back, but so many?"

Zakath considered the question for a moment. "They can only be out of Melvaunt," he reasoned. "No other city is close enough. But they do not bear Melvaunt arms." His eyes narrowed. "They must be hired swords," he concluded.

The giantess nodded. "Aye, that's likely," she agreed grudgingly.

"Mercenaries will not be inclined to throw themselves against ogres in a confined space," Zakath mused. "They will almost certainly have to use their elite to spearhead any attack inside the fortress."

"Great," Gywahier grunted, rolling her eyes.

"Actually, it could work in our favor," Zakath told her. "If we can take down the elite, the morale of the footsoldiers would be damaged -- not least by the fact that they may not have been fully paid yet."

"Well said," a high, female-sounding voice twittered from behind them. The three leaders turned toward the voice and spied a large brown rat.

"What the h--?" Dagryg grunted, cut off by his own surprise as the rat's form flowed and grew into the shape of a rather dirty-looking human woman in the garb of the mercenaries.

"Who the hell are you?" demanded Gywahier.

"Call me Resa," the rat-girl said. "I come to offer terms."

"We've heard your terms," Zakath reminded her. "But we are unable to comply."

"Nah," she said, showing her unnaturally-long, yellowish teeth in a nasty grin. "You heard the dwarf's terms. Me, I got a different agenda."