Dwarf Tales

There was a dwarf called Helgar who lived at Ormrock on Island where his family had lived since dwarfs had inhabited the place. His family name was Helgarsson. So he was Helgar son of Helgar just like his father before him and his father's father before that. Down the long ages of Dwarf, Helgar son of Helgar had walked the black earth of Ormnrock and had fashioned the grey volcanic rocks in any manner that was pleasing to him.

Helgar Helgarsson was a warrior and a dwarf held in great esteem. He was a great orator and was was the first to speak at the vapnatak or local council, he was the first in combat and he was a great kriks krak player. He could shave the black basalt to the fineness of dwarf hair with his axe and could build a wall of dry stone one by eight in a short morning. He was, in many ways the kind of dwarf that many a she-dwarf would have shaved their beard for, but none ever did, for he was devoted to his childhood sweetheart and she to him.

Now Helgar had a daughter who he called Helga, because she was the first-born to his she-dwarf and tradition had it that the first-born was to be called after the father. She was beautiful for a dwarf: craggy and rugged, a true stone maiden with hair the colour of the Ormrock bog but she was the source of great sadness to her father. Near the time of her birth there had been strange portents and she had been ripped untimely from the belly of her mother she-dwarf and though the dwarfish shaman had made the stone dance over her, she was never again to be able to grow another dwarf within her. Thus the long line of Helgar Helgarsson had come to an abrupt end.

Yet Helgar never spoke his sadness to any living thing and he taught his daughter in the manner of all dwarfs. He showed her the ways of stone: of fault and grain and fissure. He taught her how to wield axe and mattock, short sword and knife. He took her to the vapnatak so that she could learn how to persuade other dwarfs with argument and so that she could stand in awe of her father's prowess. He taught her the skill of kriks krak. She was truly like a son to him and, with the genetic make up of young she-dwarfs mimicking the visible appearance of he-dwarfs (hair) she was indeed a son to him.

That is not to say that Helga was not also accomplished in the skills of a she-dwarf. Her mother taught her the skill of the bow and she could pick off a rabbit's eye at forty paces. She could mend clothes and chain mail as well as any he- or she-dwarf and she could cook and brew like a true mistress. It was true that neither of her parents chose to teach her the mysteries of sex, but she was a consummate learner and managed a more or less self taught approach to this aspect of the dwarfish pysche. Like all she-dwarfs however, it was in the mimicry of he-dwarf behaviour that the likelihood of her survival to adulthood at the age of twenty-five was thereby increased.

Now on the other side of Island at a place called Runeriverdale, there lived a dwarf called Lothki who was the son of Rungar. Lothki was ugly even for a dwarf and his legs were shorter than most and they were bowed and so he was know as Lothki Bentknees. He was a sour creature and this coarse title did not improve his outlook on life.

Lothki had a son called Lothar of whom he was immensely proud, even for a dwarf and that is saying much. In truth, although the boy was for a dwarf, big of build and was skilled in weaponry, he was not very bright. Indeed it was often said that there must be more than half troll blood in Lothar Lothkisson although it was never said within his hearing.

On day, Lothar was leading a hand of ponies across Island to the summer fairs at Ormrock Fell where he hoped to fetch a good price for them. As he crossed the Trellsgut Bridge he heard a she-dwarf laughing somewhere below him. Curious, and in the hope of seeing something that perhaps he should not, he leaned over the precarious parapet.

Far below in the icy waters he saw Helga Helgarsdottir. She was bathing and washing her hair and she was laughing and splashing at a small creature that was scampering about on the river bank nearby and barking furiously at her. Lothar gave little thought for the terrier as he stared with unguarded lust and delight at the naked form of the she dwarf and though he was only young, no more than twenty years on this earth, he knew from the stiffening in his loins that he must have her.

It was not a good thought for a dwarf, it was a thought more suited to the treacherous minds of humans but it lodged itself, grew and then festered in his mind as he carried on his was to Ormrock Fell. No more was he thinking of the ponies or the gold that would be made from their sale, for they were the finest ponies on Island. His mind was consumed by the sight of Helga and thoughts of those things that he might do to her although it has to be said that his experience was weak and his understanding of such matters was poorer.

By the time that he reached the Fair he was almost delirious with desire and people wondered at his behaviour, thinking perhaps that he had been bitten by the Mire Midges that inhabited the moors and tunnocks in the remoter parts of Island through which he had passed. So strange was his manner that folk tended to avoid him and looked less favourably upon the ponies that he brought with him so that in the end, he made a poor return and one that would not please his father when Lothar finally returned home.

For his part, the dwarf cared not, so consumed was he with desire for the daughter of Helgar. He dropped the gold coins that the gaveller had passed over to him from the sale into his leather purse, barely aware that they were gold and insensible of their number and then he turned towards the maede hall to set his treacherous plan in motion.

For her part Helga was unaware that she had been spied upon in her undress. She had luxuriated in the cold clear water and by the time that Lothar was struggling stiffly once more on his way to the market of Ormrock Fell she rose from the stream like a goddess, dressed herself and headed also for the fair on a pony that she had tethered nearby.