by Markus Heitz
“No,” the king’s answer rang hollow in the tankard. Gandogar blinked over the rim, set the tankard down, swirled the remaining liquid round the sides to clear the froth and downed the rest of the beer in one. “He is already here, my good Glaimbar.”
Girdlegard,
In the Red Mountains on the Eastern Border of the Firstling Kingdom
Spring, 6241st Solar Cycle
F idelgar Strikefast, a well-built dwarf with a bright yellow beard, sat down, took the small metal box out of his rucksack and placed it in front of him on the stone table. He had completed his first round and was granting himself a rest in the extensive cavern whose high roof rested on stone pillars. In the old days there had been wagons running here on the rails, but in recent cycles there had been little call for them. His task was to check out the passages, and they were all long.
Baigar Fourhand, working away with a hammer and a hook at an upturned wagon, turned to look at him. He had draped the braids of his brown beard over his shoulder to keep them out of the way of the red-hot forge. Next to him there was a portable smithy as used by traveling craftsmen. It was large enough to let him carry out minor repairs. “Everything nice and quiet?” he asked and looked at the box with curiosity.
“Now that I’ve killed four orcs and wiped out a troll, yes,” he joked, taking out two beakers and a flask engraved with the sign for gold. “No, it’s all quiet.”
Now Baigar put his tools on one side and nosed his way forward. “What have you got there?”
“A Trovegold novelty.” Fidelgar stroked the edges of the little box, opened the clasps and lifted the lid with care. The smell of spices and brandy wafted out. Baigar saw some brown objects inside that were about the size and shape of a finger. “Smoke rolls.”
“From Trovegold? The city where the freelings live?”
“Exactly. One of their traders passed through. I just had to buy some.” He took a smoke roll out and held it out to Baigar. “Rolled tobacco leaves stored in spices. Or maybe they put the spices in.”
As Baigar sniffed at the smoke roll his beard braids slid back down over his chest. “So you cut a bit off and stick it in your pipe?”
“No. You don’t need a pipe. The freelings have thought up something to save time.” Fidelgar stood up, went over to the forge and used the tongs to extract a red-hot coal. He put one end of the smoke roll in his mouth and held the other end to the glowing coal. There was a hissing sound as the tobacco caught. “Then you drag on it like with a pipe,” he explained indistinctly. Several quick puffs and he was closing his eyes in pleasure. It smelled good, like vanilla and honey and some other aromas he could not name.
“That looks like a great idea.” Baigar took a roll out and copied what the other dwarf had done. The smoke was stronger-tasting, and hotter, than what he was used to from his pipe. And the effect was more powerful. His head was spinning. “I would never have thought that trading with the freelings would bring us so many advantages.” He waved the glowing smoke roll in the air. “And I don’t just mean this thing here. What about gugul meat? And then their herbs are really useful, I’m told.”
Fidelgar moved his smoke roll to the side of his mouth and opened the flask, pouring a clear liquid into the two beakers. “And they have this Trovegold goldwater. It’s a liquor with flakes of gold in it.” He nodded encouragingly. “Tastes great.”
“Flakes of gold? In liquor?” Baigar sipped at it, trying out the thin flakes on his tongue. “Tastes like…” He smacked his lips as he searched for the right word. “Gold… Nothing else can describe that exquisite taste.” He gave a contented sigh. “Incredible. I can feel it coursing through me; the tiredness is disappearing and my mood is lifting. Seems like a miracle cure.”
“The gold or the alcohol?” Fidelgar grinned. “They can adapt the taste according to which spirits you have and what type of gold you use. You can’t get nearer to gold than that, now can you?” He took another mouthful of it and pulled on the smoke roll again. He took a look around. “Incredible how peaceful everything is.”
Baigar puffed away and tried making smoke rings. “Sure about that? No rock gnomes?”
“Would I be sitting here smoking?” Fidelgar glanced at the broken wagon Baigar had been working at. “Why bother mending the cars if we don’t use the tunnels anymore?”
“You never know,” replied Baigar. “And anyway, we do use them. We send out the building squads in them to do repairs. And why do you do your guard rounds if there are no monsters left in Girdlegard?”
“Because you never know,” laughed Fidelgar. He pointed to the four tunnels the rails ran into. “It’s a shame. Just when our dwarf folks are united, these underground networks are still lying useless. Curse that earthquake the Judgment Star caused.”
“Never fear. Vraccas is on our side.” Baigar shook his head. “We’re getting round to mending the main tracks. Just yesterday one of the gangs managed to clear a good half-mile of tunnel.” He sighed. “The rubble is just the half of it. It’s an enormous job renewing the rails that were damaged in the rockfalls. Some of the rails have to be forged new on site.” He pointed over to the wagon. “If you have rails that are bent like that then the axles get out of shape. That’s happening all the time when the work squads use them. All means more work for me.”
“Those were the days when you could travel from one dwarf kingdom to another in the blink of an eye,” enthused Fidelgar, sending up a perfect smoke ring. He apparently had had a lot more practice at this than Baigar. “The cars would fly along the rails and the wind would whistle in your hair and beard and tickle your stomach.”
“So you traveled that way?” asked the astonished Baigar.
“Yes, I was there when Queen Xamtys II left for the secondling kingdom and we fought Nod’onn’s hordes. That was a battle!” He blew at the glowing tip of the smoke roll so that the tobacco would not go out. “I can see it as if it were yesterday, how we-”
Baigar raised his hand abruptly. “Hush!” He listened at the black tunnel entrances. “Thought I heard something.” He removed his smoke roll and put it on the stone table.
“Could be. The work gang must still be out and-”
They heard a terrible scream coming from the furthest left of the four tunnels.
Fidelgar recognized the sound of death. A dwarf had that moment died. Then came the second scream, followed by cries of panic. “Come with me!” He jammed the smoke roll in the side of his mouth. It had been expensive and he did not want to let it go to waste. Hastily he grabbed his shield and ax and strode over to the tunnels.
Baigar took up his bag of tools and two flaming torches and ran after Fidelgar. In the old days he would have immediately thought of an orc attack, but now he assumed there must have been an accident.
They both ran into the straight passageway meant to let the wagons brake safely before reaching the halls at the end of their journey.
The shouts were getting nearer, and the rattlings and clankings of machinery could be heard. It sounded to Baigar like winding gear running, cogwheels spinning and then the dwarves’ stone-mill grinding. But he had never heard all those sounds at the same time before now.
Ahead they discerned a glow of light, in the middle of which a monstrous creature was rearing up, completely blocking the tunnel. It was whirling its many shining claws and bronze-colored arms, while the dwarves of the work gang were desperately attempting to hold it back. But their picks had not the slightest effect on the skin of this monster, and the handles broke like matchwood.
Every time a claw hit home there was a bloodcurdling scream from the victim. Dwarves flew through the air to lie motionless on the passage floor.
“Vraccas, help us! What on earth is this?” Horrified, Fidelgar had to watch as a hideous claw penetrated one dwarf, exiting on the other side of his body; then the arm was withdrawn, pulling the quivering prey close enough to reach with another set of claws. The living dwarf was quartered as he lay and torn to shreds.
Only one of the work squad was still alive, and badly injured, lying groaning on the ground, trying to crawl to safety. Meanwhile the monster made its way forward.
“We must help him,” said Baigar, running to the injured dwarf. Fidelgar had no hesitation in following.
As the pair approached the monster they realized their error. This was not some creature of flesh and blood but a diamond-shaped thing advancing, point foremost.
Its skin was a covering of riveted armour plating. The arms, a good two paces in length, were made of metal, too, ending in blades and toothed claws, which were grabbing and snapping shut randomly. They could not see the monster’s means of locomotion. Below, there was a metal skirt protecting the mechanism from attack.
“This is not a living beast,” cried Baigar in horror, staring at the victims’ blood that dripped from the claws and coated the metal surfaces. He could make out runes on the plating, and their meaning sent shudders through him. He needed to get out alive to report to his queen.
“Mind out!” Fidelgar pulled him back by the sleeve, so that a grabbing claw missed him by a beard-hair’s breadth. He stumbled backwards. “We need to get out. Here, take hold.” The two dwarves lifted the injured man up and helped him along.
The thing hissed and covered them with a cloud of steam that stank of oil, making breathing impossible. Coughing and spluttering, they dragged their comrade back with them away from the machine come alive that was following them.
The beast had no intention of giving up, but thrust its bloody claws into the heavy repair vehicle that carried the tools and the portable forge, simply pushing it backwards along the rails.
“Stop it!” called Fidelgar, jumping into the wagon and pulling hard on the brake. At once the advance of their unearthly opponent was slowed but the wagon was still moving relentlessly on. The strength of the thing was enormous.
“That should give us enough of a start,” said Fidelgar and he hopped out of the wagon on his way back to Baigar and the injured dwarf. They hurried along the tunnel as fast as they could with their burden.
When they had reached the open hall, Baigar prepared to leave them. Fidelgar handed him his smoke roll. “I’ll maneuver another wagon into the tunnel,” he explained breathlessly. “Get him to a healer as quickly as you can and alert more of the guards.” He made one of the wagons fast with an iron hook attached to a chain that they used for the giant pulley. Because it would take too long to start the steam engine that normally dealt with the heavy lifting, he had to rely on the strength of his own muscles. He used the emergency winding gear; the chain clanked slowly into place and took up the slack.
“Tell them to bring long iron rods,” he called after Fidelgar.
The guard dragged the wounded dwarf out. “What shall I say when they ask what sort of monster it is?”
“Tell them it is a new fiendish device of the thirdlings’ design,” answered Baigar.
Fidelgar could not believe it. “How can that-”
“I saw dwarf runes on the armour plating.” Baigar was sweating heavily from the exertion and just managed to lift the wagon with the help of a pulley. “ Beaten but not destroyed, we bring destruction,” he quoted through gritted teeth. “It can only be the thirdlings. Tell the queen this for me if I should die.” The muscles of his arms and upper body swelled and flexed as he pushed the heavy wagon over to the rails.
In the nick of time. Hissing sounded out of the passage and a white cloud flew out through the mouth of the tunnel, signaling the murderous monster’s approach.
“Off you go!” yelled Baigar. “I don’t know how long it can be held back!” He made ready to let the wagon down.
“Vraccas protect you!” Fidelgar nodded, took the wounded dwarf over his shoulder and ran off.
He had never moved faster in his life and for the first time it struck him that the vast extent of the dwarf kingdoms was not an advantage. He shouted out to attract attention. The other dwarves left their work and rushed to arm themselves, so that he had soon collected fifty warriors about him. He left the wounded dwarf in someone’s care and then hastened back to the hall with his companions.
Yet they arrived too late.
The wagons lay overturned on the rails blocking the tunnel mouth diagonally like a barricade. They had prevented the monster from passing into the hall and thus into the firstling kingdom.
But they could not find the courageous Baigar-only part of his leg, a scrap of his jerkin and the blood-soaked smoke roll. It was impossible to make out where the rest of him was amongst the remains of the other dwarf corpses, in scattered heaps against the walls and piled up to the roof.
Fidelgar looked back along the tunnel but could see no sign of the monster.
Their new enemy had retreated and must be waiting in one of the passages, ready to attack. The thirdlings had declared war on their brothers and sisters again after an armistice that had lasted five cycles. He would inform the queen of this himself, as Baigar had asked.
Girdlegard,
The Gray Range on the Northern Border of the Fifthling Kingdom,
Spring, 6241st Solar Cycle
T ungdil set out on his way through Glaimbar’s kingdom toward the Stone Gateway, on the same road as before, when he had traveled with Balyndis and Boindil.
The beauty of the landscape distracted him from his usual worries, and from the discontent that had insinuated itself into his mind. But not from the pain which waited in some corner of his brain ready to pounce like a vicious animal; all too often it emerged, fixing its cruel claws into the most vulnerable part of his being, into his very soul. Ever since that fateful day the two had been his constant companions: discontent and pain.
The slight distraction that let him forget momentarily was shattered when his ear caught the sound of a child’s carefree laughter. It cut through his heart and tore at his soul so that it bled afresh until Tungdil stilled the bleeding with alcohol. But beer was too fluid a bung to stop the loss and it had to be constantly topped up. That was how habits started.
Swaying slightly, Tungdil reached the great gate with its two huge doors that only once had been breached by treachery. Apart from that one time the doors had withstood all monster attacks for thousands of cycles.
And that was how it would be again. The damage had been repaired by the stonemasons; the five bolts were in place, only to be moved when the secret password was spoken.
“If you had only one eye and were singing I’d take you for Bavragor Hammerfist,” bawled a voice behind him, jolting him out of his reverie.
“One dead man speaks about another?” he replied, whirling round too quickly for his own feet. Two strong arms held him fast to save him from falling.
“Well, Scholar, does a dead man look like this?”
Tungdil took in every detail of the muscular, stocky build. The dwarf’s long black hair had been shaved away at the sides of his head and a plait hung down his back; the beard of the same color reached to the buckle of his belt. Chain mail shirt, jerkin, boots and helmet completed the warrior look. A hooked crow’s beak war hammer with a spur as long as a forearm was propped next to him on the rock, handle against his hip.
“Boindil?” he whispered incredulously. “Boindil Doubleblade!” he called out in delight, pulling his friend toward him. They had not seen each other for five long cycles. He was not ashamed of his tears, and the loud snuffles by his ear told him that even the other veteran fighter was not holding back his feelings.
“At the grave of my brother Boendal at the High Gate-that was the last time we met.” Boindil was crying with joy.
“Then too we wept in each other’s arms,” said Tungdil, clapping him on the back. “Boindil! How I’ve missed you!” He released the friend with whom he had shared bold adventures; they had gone through so much together-good things and bad, sadness and wonder.
The warrior twin wiped away the tears that were coursing down his beard like drops running off a bird’s plumage. “I keep oiling the bear
d, you know,” he said, grinning. “Scholar, I have missed you.” Tungdil looked for signs of the furious madness that slept within the dwarf and sometimes escaped to the surface. But the brown gaze was friendly and warm with no trace of wildness. “Death changes the living, too, you told me once.” He patted Tungdil’s chain shirt. “But if you go on like this when you’re alive, the change will be your death,” he teased. “Does Balyndis brew you such good beer?”
“Our beer is bought from traders, and it’s nowhere near as good as the dwarf beer. Same effect, though, and a worse hangover the next day.” Tungdil did not take offence at the remarks about the size of his belly.
But his friend’s thick eyebrows were raised in remonstration. “In other words, you’ve turned into a drinker, like Bavragor,” he summed up. He noted the strong smell of sweat, the matted hair and the face, old before its time. “You have let yourself go, my fat hero. What has happened?”
“We haven’t seen each other for over five cycles and you’re preaching a sermon,” complained Tungdil. “Why don’t you tell me what’s brought you here to the High Gate?” He looked around and saw all the fighting men, arrayed in ranks behind them, ready to practice their combat techniques.
“Nothing has driven me here. I no longer lust after battle and the fire in my blood has lessened. It was the Great King himself who asked me to go with you. Somebody’s got to look after you, after all.” He touched the handle of his crow’s beak. “And somebody must see that my brother’s memory is honored. The hammer spur wants to fight, even if I don’t. It is burning to sink itself into a snout-face’s belly.”
A thirdling was running up and down in front of the ranks of warriors; the black tattoos on his face told of his origins and of the skilled profession he followed. A few cycles earlier this thirdling and these very dwarves he now commanded had faced each other as opponents on the field of battle. That boundless hatred was no longer around. Not everywhere.
Boindil followed his gaze. “I’m still amazed,” he admitted. “Apart from a few exceptions,” he laid his hand on his friend’s shoulder, “I really can’t stand thirdlings. I can’t forget that some of them vowed to destroy us, to annihilate us. I am afraid of their deviousness.”
