The Dungeoneers Page 22

  “Hot spot,” he said.

  The ground leapt beneath them. The oxbears had just enough time to give a few unhappy growls before a sound like a distant roll of thunder reached them. After about ten anticlimactic seconds Durham saw the center of the ruins slowly fold together then sink down into the ground. The broken pillars and buildings around them followed suite, tipping toward the center and then sliding down, expanding out in a ring, the ground tumbling with shocking speed. Durham caught a glimpse of a great dark hole appearing in the center of the collapse before a massive billowing cloud of dust rose, obscuring the view of the last remnants of the city of Tanahael. A massive crater had taken its place, three quarters of a mile across and a quarter mile deep. The dwarves watched in silence as the cloud of dust lifted and was caught by the breeze, stretching out across the horizon, turning the afternoon sun into a smoky ball of sullen red.

  Squitters barked.

  “That’s going to confuse the hell out of the next adventurers that come along to explore Tanahael,” Nibbly said from the seat next to Thud.

  Thud chuckled. He produced the boiled egg that was Alaham from inside his vest. Gammi had painted a friendly looking skull on the side of the egg to make sure that he didn’t mix it up with the eggs that didn’t have boiled necromancer lich kings inside of them. He set the egg upright in a knothole atop the wagon’s forewall, with the skull facing forward.

  “Whaddaya say, Hamenegg?” Thud said. “Let’s go have an adventure.”

  Afterword

  I’m going to make an assumption here, so bear with me for just a moment. That assumption is that you reached this afterword by means of finishing the story rather than, say, jumping here midway through chapter two. As such, I’m going to make the further assumption that you have an interest in hearing more of the exploits of the Dungeoneers. Well, have I got news for you! But not here. You can subscribe to Dungeoneers news at my website. Don’t worry — any emails I send will be along the lines of “New Book Coming Out!” rather than “Ten Dwarven Beard-Care Tips. You Won’t Believe Number 8!”. If you’d like the news plus a bit extra you can also track me down on Twitter. Hope to see you there!

  I’d like to thank my beta readers — a role people are more happy to sign up for than to actually do. Hopefully they’ll forgive me for any of their advice that ended up ignored and gloat about the mess that the book would have been without them.