Trouble in the Land of Dwarves
Chapter 19
Dwarven Workshop
The raging storm outside, with all of it’s
lightning bolts and thunder crashes, went
completely unnoticed by those within the
mountain fortress of the dwarven inventors.
Princess Nataleigh and Maid Madelyn were
both awestruck by the size of the workshop
as they were led through it’s many
cavernous rooms and multi-leveled
catwalks. Each room they entered was like
walking into the heart of a living thing. The
whole mountain seemed alive with moving
parts. Machines whirred and hummed
everywhere around them while steam hissed
out of vents beneath them and water
gurgled through pipes of every size over
their heads. Gears turned, levers pumped,
and pulleys rotated in every nook and
alcove of the scientific structure.
“Please do not touch anything!” their
guide warned as Nataleigh stepped closer to
inspect a multi-armed contraption on large
wooden wheels with various pieces of
dwarven armor in it’s clamps. “That ees the
‘All-Terrain Fully Automated Armor
Bearer’ machine. Eet can travel anyvhere a
knight does and can strap a full suit of
armor on it’s target in 10.4 seconds! But
eet has a glitch in it.”
“A
glitch?” Nataleigh asked. “What kind of
glitch?”
Frangen stopped and
shook his head sadly. “Unfortunately, the
machine gets a bit confused vhen applying
the armor. The last time ve tested it on my
brother, Boz, it took Hiendel and I a veek to
get the boot off of his head and the helmet
off of his hinder!”
He smiled and
continued, waving them on. “Luckily, that
vas after Hiendel had invented the
‘Saw-bladed Power Can Opener’ or ve
vould have never gotten heem
out!”
“How many inventors
work in this huge place?” Maid Madelyn
inquired.
“Only my two
brothers and I, but Hiendel does most of the
inventing stuff. Boz and I just help. Eet is
safer that vay.”
He finally came
to a stop at a round wooden door with a
small barred window in the center. “Come.
My brothers are in here verking on
Hiendel’s newest creation. Since you like
horsees so much, you vill love thees vun!
Vatch your step.”
The two
maidens followed the dwarf into a huge
room filled with all kinds of wheeled
inventions, vehicles, catapults and other war
machines. The most impressive of these
was a 30 foot tall wooden horse on a
wheeled platform. A small wooden door
stood open in the side of the horse and a
rope ladder hung down to the platform.
Inside could be heard the banging and
mumbling of Hiendel as he worked on his
invention.
Their attention was
suddenly drawn to the top of the horse as
they noticed another dwarf on it’s back.
This one was shorter than both of the
others, but looked the strongest. He wore a
vest made of iron and some baggy shorts
with no shoes. Sweat matted his long red
hair as he pushed against the great horses
wooden tail trying to move it like a giant
lever. Slowly he shoved it downward
behind the horse, but it was taking all of his
strength to do so. Hiendel’s muffled voice
could be heard inside the horse coaxing him
to hurry.
With a loud grunt of
determination, the hefty dwarf gave a final
push and succeeded in getting the tail where
he wanted it. There was a loud click as a
hidden latch within the horse locked the tail
in place. Boz wiped his sweaty face and
leaned against the tail for a moment to catch
his breath.
Then he noticed the
three newcomers and waved at them with a
toothy grin. “Fran, my brother!” he
shouted.
There was a loud
clinking sound as the latch holding the tail
in place released and the stocky little dwarf
was catapulted across the cavern like a
living cannonball right into a large pool at
the far end. Hiendel suddenly appeared in
the door on the side of the
horse.
“Oh, hello dere.” he said
as he noticed Frangen and the visitors.
Then he looked up at the tail and asked.
“Did it verk, Bozwin? Hello.
Bozwin?”
He shook his head
and looked back down at the others. “Vere
did he go?”
Frangen pointed and
Hiendel’s eyes followed his finger in a wide
arc that ended at the water. “Oops.” he
said.
The three on the ground all
ran to the water’s edge and Frangen
released a valve that quickly drained the
water out of the pool. There at the bottom
stood Boz, wringing the water out of his
hair and smiling the same toothy grin he
had greeted them with a moment
earlier.
“Are you alright, Boz?”
Frangen asked.
Boz was
jubilant.
“Da! Eet vas a blast!
I vant to go again!”
Frangen
breathed a sigh of relief and turned to
Princess Nataleigh and Maid Madelyn.
“There, you see? There is nothing to fear.
He is fine.”
Maid Madelyn also
breathed a sigh, but the princess was no
longer concerned about the inventors and
their antics. Something else had caught her
attention. She seemed frozen in place on
the edge of the deep pool as she stared
down into it.
Frangen noticed
the strange look on her face and asked,
“Um, excuse me, young lady, but are you
feeling alright?”
At that moment,
Hiendel ran up behind them and shouted
down at Boz, who was climbing up a ladder
that was built into the side of the stone pool.
“Bozwin, vhat are you doing standing so
close to ze tail like dat vhen you tell me to
‘fire’?”
Boz looked up at him
as he climbed. “I did not tell you to
fire.”
“Yes you did! I heard
you.” Hiendel countered.
“No,
I didn’t.”
“No? Then I suppose
I vas dreaming vhen I heard you say ‘Fire,
my brother!’”
“I didn’t say
‘Fire’, my brother. I said ‘Fran’, my
brother! I vas greeting Frangen.” Boz
explained. He was nearly to the top of the
ladder now.
Hiendel turned to
Frangen. “Is that what he
really....?”
Hiendel stopped in
midsentence as he noticed Frangen waving
his hand in front of Nataleigh’s face like he
was trying to snap her out of a
trance.
“Vhat in ze name of
scientifics are you doing, Frangen?” he
asked. Then his face brightened as he
remembered. “Ah yes, the girl’s size
problem! I forgot about that! You are
trying some new hypnosis treatment,
no?”
Frangen looked puzzled.
“Vhat?”
“You are using
hypnosis to treat ze young damsel.”
Hiendel repeated. “An excellent
prescription! Frangen, you are a
genius!”
“I am?” Frangen
scratched his head. “How interesting. I
don’t even know vhen I thought of
it.”
Maid Madelyn touched her
shoulder. “Princess, is something wrong?”
Nataleigh kept staring as she
finally spoke. “Look at it, Madelyn. It’s
bigger and better than I
remember.”
The others followed
her gaze down into the pool where they
saw, resting on two docking clamps near the
bottom, a large, iron-wrought
submarine!
Chapter 20
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