So after a bunch of shards I FINALLY am able to get the ax from the lair of bandits, and then when I'm 1 turn away from getting back to the dwarves another master conquers the province, grr.

What did I miss out on?

Well, it gets you dwarves...to hire, a bit better than swordsmen.

Well as Jamo says they are in the way of being a better swordsman with quite a few extra benefits, although they do have a few drawbacks as well. Dwarfs start with 4 HP more, 5 more Stamina, 2 more Counter Atk, +1/1 more Defenses, 2 more Resistance, Hills Knowledge They can gain Immunity to poison starting at level 8. Down sides are they do not start off with Parry although they can start getting it at level 2 and above (+2 upto 6 times) and do not gain access to forced march until level 9

The other great thing are their Guards, Dwarven Clan, that you can hire for hill provinces. These are good especially for Provinces with ore deposits of Iron/Marble/Mithril as they give +5/10/15 Gold which goes towards their upkeep which is 15. The defenders contain a Catapult, 2 Ballista and 8 Dwarfs which have an avg lvl of 5/9/12 which is quite good.

Thanks guys! I was wondering what the other buildings you got, beyond the one that lets you hire dwarves as units. The dwarven clan would've been cool!

Quite nice guards, but I'd prefer alliance with centaurs :) Of course their guards are not so powerful as dwarfs, but still they are quite good, and you can hire them in forests and "normal" lands. And what is more important, their daily fee is so low (5 or 6 gold, as far as I remember). Elves are quite nice too, their theater is improving mood in every province, and they have really nice shooting unit (what is more important, it is 1st level unit).

One of the buildings gives access to "dwarven artifacts", which are stuff like the dwarven chainmail and shield. They have good stats and a HP bonus. Not as good as the expensive stuff you find in random shops, but pretty decent equipment.