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[Grym Boulderbrew]

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Grym hadn’t slept in weeks. Lately, his dreams saw more flames than the bowels of a great dragon. He woke each night with a jolt, and the acrid smoke seemed to linger and sting at his nostrils. Dwarfs were known for their endurance and grit, but the vivid clarity of their memory could outlast even the unfaltering pace of their march. The surges of pride from centuries-old glories would still beam brightly in Dwarven hearts, but Grym’s was forever drowned in the eternally fresh hurt of his greatest failing.

Grym touched a hand to the mangled and sloped remains of his left eye socket. The gnarled feel of cracked and jutting bones greeted him. His memory raced, and he felt those bones shift and crumble, and heard the sharp crack of the orc maul. His head spun as he remembered the rush and tumbling of overwhelming blackness. His insides curled at the thoughts that flooded through his mind, but he welcomed and embraced them. Against a chorus of dark laughter, he saw the oak walls of his brother’s tavern slump in on themselves and succumb to the dancing flames of orc torches. He saw himself, bloody, broken, but upright, carving the hair from his head with his dagger and sewing the grim oaths of the Slayer Cult into his body. He saw something else that was foreign to him, for though it was desperately sought, it had not yet occurred. Grym saw himself. He was falling to his knees, his beard dripping with blood. He was surrounded by a thousand worthy foes as his brother looked on. In his mind’s eye, Grym was smiling as he died, but today his face carried the weight of a hundred mountains.