29 – The White Gnome

Gomp dropped to one knee too quickly, and his kneecap struck the floor hard enough to send a jolt of pain straight to his brain.

He swallowed a scream, tears gathering in his eyes from the effort.

“Gomp Glompity and his prisoners, Your Majesty,” one of the guards right behind Gomp announced, striking the heavy butt of his warhammer against the dais.

Gomp felt the burning stares of the human and the dragon from his left.

What do you want from me? The rules for prisoners and visitors are practically the same. We aren’t exactly known for hospitality. Anyway, medal first. Then I explain.

The White King’s gaze was still fixed on Gomp and Gomp alone. The hooded aide beside the throne leaned closer to speak, but the King raised a single hand, cutting the gnome off without breaking eye contact.

His full, undivided attention settled heavily on the trio before him.

An ancient, absolute authority saturated the air. It pressed down harder than the physical gravity of lumbering growlers, warping the atmosphere of the room and forcing an immediate, suffocating quiet.

“Gomp Glompity.” The King’s voice was a low, resonant baritone that cut clean through the ambient hiss of the copper pipes. “Is it true you were the first among us to encounter the demon woman?”

Gomp swallowed, his throat catching in the sudden silence of the hall.

“Yes, Your Majesty. She just… walked in. Down the main tunnel as I was repairing the excavation crawler. Like it was nothing.” He hesitated, his small shoulders twitching before he added, “I told her to piss off. She had no business down there, that is our power source by right.”

The White King steepled his fingers. His gaze moved from Gomp to the aide beside him, then back again, his expression flat and unreadable beneath his pale brow.

“Tell me, Glompity.” The words arrived with the unhurried weight of someone who already knew the answer. “The Growler. You didn’t do anything to provoke that durking demon, did you?”

“Your Majesty?” Gomp’s spectacles slid a fraction down his nose, his voice squeaking in the sudden quiet.

“That excavation crawler you were fixing.” The King leaned forward, his heavy shadow falling completely over the kneeling gnome. “It moved on its own. Didn’t it?”

Gomp went rigid, clamping his jaws together.

Yes, he knows about my invention. This is my day. I feel it.

“Now, Glompity, I hear you are quite an inventor,” the King murmured, his tone dropping to a dangerous register. “Do you happen to know how it moved?”

He wants to know. He wants to know about my invention!

“Yes, I do your kingyness.” The fur on Gomp’s cheeks lifted with a sudden wave of barely contained excitement. “It was my very own invention. A remote guidance apparatus I like to call the Gomper. Everyone said it was impossible, but I installed the receiver during maintenance and…”

The guard behind him squeezed Gomp’s shoulder with a warning grip. Gomp stopped talking, his mouth snapping shut mid-sentence.

“I see,” the White King said. “So you built a homemade device, installed it on a machine without permission or paperwork of any sort, and with this… Gopler–”

The aide leaned close and whispered a rapid correction into the King’s ear.

The old King nodded once, his mouth tightening under the long beard. “–Gomper, right. With this Gomper, you made the machine attack her. Am I right?”

“Well, technically, the forms would have…” Gomp stammered beneath the weight of the King’s stare, his small hands making weak, useless gestures. “Um. I mean. I, uh…”

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“Then the demon woman proceeded to destroy the machine, send my best engineer, Kit Kikkity, flying through the tunnel, and wreak havoc, freezing half of the city we built at such cost.”

The vein pulsed dangerously near the King’s eye. Without looking away from Gomp, he reached sideways, his arm extending like a lever.

His aide, reading the movement with the precision of long practice, slapped a heavy stone slate into his open palm. The King caught it in one smooth motion, his knuckles whitening around the edge.

“So I was right,” the King said, his voice gone cold. “She was minding her own business, and you called her in.”

He hurled the slate with all his strength.

It cut through the air like a hammer blow and struck Gomp squarely on the forehead, sending the gnome toppling sideways with a sharp yelp. His spectacles popped off and skidded across the flagstones.

“You started this war, Glompity,” The King declared.

He rose from his throne and walked to the window overlooking the city. Beyond the glass, flames licked at broken towers, smoke rolled between frozen streets, and sheets of ice glittered over half the lava moat.