Emeraldvein Pass
Raggard could still remember the first time he saw an orc war tower rise above the stone of Emeraldvein Pass.
Even now—long after the blood had been washed from the road and the banners of Gunabash once again marked the route—its silhouette had never truly left him.
Emeraldvein Pass had been found in the earliest years of the mountain halls.
Luxus Emeraldvein himself had cut the first narrow path along the northern edge of the Gunabash Mountains, following a thin, bright vein of ore that broke the stone like a guiding line through the cliffs. Where others had seen only sheer rock and falling snow, Luxus had seen a route.
It was nearly straight.
Nearly unguarded.
Nearly miraculous.
For the growing holds of Gunabash, it became the only reliable way to reach the northern slopes without losing weeks to winding underways and broken ridgelines. Supplies, ore convoys, trade caravans, and patrol columns all passed beneath the jagged skyline of that narrow road.
And, as history had taught the dwarves more than once—
anything of value, once proven, would eventually be challenged.
Raggard had been young when word reached the lower halls.
Not a child.
But not yet a veteran of the shield lines.
A stone giant had claimed the pass.
His name was Xargus.
With him came a warband of orcs, not scattered raiders and not desperate tunnel hunters—but soldiers.
They took the high bends of the road and began to build.
At first, the caravans simply failed to return.
Then came survivors.
Broken wagons.
And finally, a single dwarf courier who staggered into Gunabash with an arrow still buried in his shoulder and one sentence trembling through bloodied teeth.
“They charge tolls now.”
The council called for a reclaiming march before the week was done.
Raggard marched with them.
The approach to Emeraldvein Pass had always been narrow.
A single stone ribbon carved into the mountain’s northern face, its outer edge dropping away into cold cloud and wind, its inner wall rising sharp and unbroken.
The dwarves expected resistance.
They expected ambushes.
They expected howling charges from the upper ridges.
What they did not expect—
was construction.
When the forward scouts signaled and the column slowed, Raggard pressed forward through the shield ranks until he could finally see the bend ahead.
The pass opened just enough for him to glimpse what waited beyond.
Something massive shifted behind the stone.
Then it rolled forward.
Not a creature.
A structure.
An orc war tower.
It rose from behind the bend like a moving fortress—layered stone plates bolted into a brutal, stacked frame. Thick iron braces stitched the body together. Jagged spikes jutted outward at every level, and between them hung trophies—helmets, shields, cracked banners, and bones wired into the structure as warning and display.
Ropes and crude chains dragged beneath its base.
Orcs swarmed along its flanks like insects along a carcass.
High above them, a shadow moved.
Xargus.
The stone giant walked behind the tower as if it were no more than a cart pulled by beasts, his massive hands resting easily on the reinforced stone ribs.
The ground trembled with every step.
Raggard felt the air leave his lungs.
Around him, even seasoned shield dwarves fell silent.
It was not the size that frightened him.
It was the purpose.
This was not built to defend a camp.
It was built to advance.
The first engagement came without a war cry.
The tower halted.
Shutters slid open.
And the pass filled with arrows.
Not scattered volleys.
Measured fire.
The dwarven front ranks locked shields just in time as the narrow roadway turned into a killing channel. The orcs did not rush. They did not break formation.
They advanced behind the tower.
Step by grinding step.
Raggard’s unit was ordered forward to press the flank.
The moment they tried to climb the inner wall of the pass to gain height, stone broke free.
Hidden charges.
Shaped collapses.
Prepared falls.
The rock itself betrayed them.
It was then that Raggard understood.
This was not mindless aggression.
This was strategy.
The tower rolled forward again.
Closer.
And closer.
Ballista bolts slammed into its outer plating and shattered against reinforced stone. Ropes snapped. Spikes tore loose grappling lines. Any dwarf who pushed too far toward the tower vanished beneath a wave of spear thrusts from its lower platforms.
Above them all, Xargus watched.
Not roaring.
Not charging.
Directing.
The giant raised one hand.
The tower halted.
He lowered it.
The archers shifted.
The dwarves lost another line.
Raggard’s shield shook under repeated impacts.
He tasted blood.
Somewhere to his left, a hammer captain fell.
To his right, a banner dropped.
Still, the tower came.
The battle for Emeraldvein Pass lasted the better part of a day.
Three towers were brought forward.
Each one pushed the dwarves farther back along the narrow stone road.
Raggard saw veteran shield lines fold.
Saw engineers cut down while trying to plant charges beneath the moving structures.
Saw friends vanish beneath falling stone when Xargus himself tore loose part of the inner wall to collapse an approach.
But dwarves endure.
And dwarves remember.
When the first tower finally fell, it did not collapse cleanly.
A deep charge detonated beneath its center ribs, ripping the structure apart from within. Stone plates sheared away and crushed the orcs sheltering beneath them. Spikes scattered across the pass like thrown spears.
Raggard ran through the smoke.
He ran because someone had to.
He ran because the opening would not last.
The second tower was still advancing.
And the giant had begun to move.
Xargus was not felled by a single blow.
Nor by a single hero.
He fell beneath weight.
Time.
Relentless pressure.
Dozens of dwarves died drawing him into position.
Engineers detonated charges beneath his footing.
Shield lines broke and reformed again and again just to hold him long enough.
Raggard never remembered striking the killing blow.
He remembered striking.
And striking.
And striking again.
Hammer on stone-flesh.
On iron bindings.
On armored legs the size of siege engines.
When Xargus finally fell, the impact shook the pass so violently that dust rolled along the cliffs like fog.
The remaining orcs broke.
Without the towers.
Without the giant’s direction.
They scattered into the high gullies and broken side tunnels they had prepared for retreat.
Prepared.
Even their escape had been planned.
When the banners of Gunabash were raised again above Emeraldvein Pass, the road itself was barely recognizable.
Stone had been blasted away to widen killing fields.
Sections of the inner wall were reduced to rubble.
Black scorch marks scarred the cliff where alchemical fire had burned for hours.
The remains of the war towers lay shattered along the road—brutal ribs of plated stone and iron still bristling with spikes and hanging trophies.
Raggard stood among them long after the wounded had been carried away.
Long after the fallen had been counted.
He was young.
But not untouched.
Not anymore.
He walked slowly around one of the ruined towers.
The shape was unmistakable.
Layered plates.
Outward-facing spikes.
Reinforced seams.
A structure built not to endure quietly—
but to advance under fire.
To take ground by pressure alone.
That day, Emeraldvein Pass was reclaimed.
But the cost of it followed Raggard for the rest of his life.
It taught him that war was not always rage.
Sometimes—
it was preparation.
It was patience.
It was someone, somewhere, thinking several moves ahead while others still believed brute strength would decide everything.
And it was there, among the shattered ribs of an orc war tower beneath the cold northern wind, that Raggard Thornbeard first learned a truth the forge would later teach him again and again:
Victory is not forged clean.
It is shaped—
by what you are willing to lose to keep the road open.
