by D. M. Almond
Not for the first time, Logan found himself dwelling in melancholy and had to shake his body to work it out of his system. Bipp turned and raised a questioning eyebrow at his friend. For a moment they locked eyes, and Logan irrationally worried that the gnome had read his thoughts.
Logan snapped his head up and called over to the mage, “Isaac, earlier you mentioned some lost kingdom in these mountains?”
“That is correct,” the mage said without looking back.
“So you’ve been here before?” Corbin asked.
“In a manner of speaking,” Isaac replied cryptically.
“Please pardon me, Master Isaac, but Nero has no knowledge of any nations that held residence in the Horseshoe Mountains,” Nero said.
“Well, that’s no surprise to me,” Isaac said.
“Really?” Logan furrowed his brow. “That’s strange. Nero seems to know practically everything about every nation on Acadia.” He carefully peeked over the edge of the cliff to see how far up they had come. He instantly regretted doing so.
While he was daydreaming, they had traveled quite far. The mountain plummeted hundreds of meters down, and the dense forest in the basin now looked like some miniature version of itself.
“Ah, I see the tin man’s confusion,” Isaac said, holding up one finger as the idea struck him. “Yes, no, of course, I do not believe any humans lived in the Builder’s lands in Nero’s time.”
Logan eyed the mage’s robed back shrewdly. Isaac was using his tall white staff as a walking stick, as he often did when traveling by foot, and Logan suddenly wished he too had some sort of balancing tool.
“You don’t actually believe that my folk used to have a city up in a mountain?” Bipp scoffed, grabbing handfuls of the thick green ivy that ran up and down the mountainside as he marched along.
“I’ve said no such thing.” Isaac waved his hand, dismissing the notion.
Logan thought the gnome had the right idea and felt much more comfortable with his left hand grabbing a fistful of the plants. He was happy that the mountain was to his left because his mechanical right hand would easily tear the ivy apart if he was not careful. “Honestly, could you stop speaking in riddles already?”
Isaac stopped dead in his tracks so quickly that Bipp walked straight into the mage’s legs and bounced off, landing on his backside. Logan had to hop back lest he stumble right over the downed gnome.
Oblivious, Isaac stared across the valley in contemplation. “Did I speak a riddle? No, no, I think not. Which part did you think was a word puzzle, dear boy?”
“Are you crazy?” Logan growled, helping Bipp to his feet. “We could have just fallen over the edge.”
“Well, I did warn you the path was dangerous.” Isaac shrugged as Corbin and Nero halted their progress to see what was going on. “Now please speak plainly. What riddle do you believe I’ve asked?”
“You know, for someone who doesn’t like androids, you sure do think like one sometimes,” Logan accused.
The mage looked offended, but not enough to dwell on.
Logan shook his head and pointed over the edge of the cliff, across the basin at the bulk of the mountain range still before them. “We just want to know where this supposed kingdom is and who in the heck used to live there, that’s all. And don’t say anything dumb like, the inhabitants, ‘cause I think Bipp might take a bite out of you if you do.”
Isaac chuckled. “Oh, that. Why didn’t you just say so in the first place?”
Logan gripped Bipp’s shoulders in an effort to keep him from lunging at the mage.
Isaac noted this and it only made him chuckle that much harder. He waved for them to calm themselves and pointed the tip of his ivory staff to the northeast. He directed their attention to the midsection of the expanse, some distance away, as he explained, “Why it’s as plain as day, there for all who would truly look to see.”
Logan searched the area he was pointing at for some sign of ruins. All he saw was a sheer mountainside overgrown with foliage, no different than that they had been hiking up for hours now. The mage waited expectantly, and Logan looked down at Bipp. The gnome returned his look of confusion and shrugged.
“Surely you see our destination?” Isaac teased.
“Let’s see…I see mountain and more mountain,” Logan said, squinting his eyes to try to make out some feature that would indicate a city once thrived in the mountain pass.
“The eye sees what it believes is there, my boy,” Isaac said with an air of authority. “Corbin, what do you see?” Logan’s brother looked just as perplexed. Isaac quickly corrected, “Not with your eyes, lad, with your senses. Use your ability.”
Logan searched his brother’s expression for some sign that his psionic senses recognized anything out of the ordinary, but all Corbin managed was a shake of his head. Then all at once, his face twisted up in a confused stupor. He walked right up to the edge of the cliff like some stupefied zombie, his eyes glued to the mountain as he craned his neck forward, trying to make out something none of them could see.
“What is it?” Logan asked.
“I don’t know…it’s hard to explain,” Corbin said, unable to peel his eyes from the spot. “It’s like…there’s some sort of strange wind over the mountainside.”
“Huh? Air feels pretty calm to me,” Bipp said.
“Let me show you,” Corbin said. He pressed a hand against his left temple to focus and pointed across the expanse.
Logan felt the psionic funnel that stretched out from his brother to envelope them. As it passed over his body, the mountain changed, altering to show him what his brother was detecting. Bipp let out a gasp as the midsection of the range rippled with a myriad of colors, dancing where the air bent in cascading waves over its surface.
Logan gawked. “What is that?”
“It feels like some sort of magical ward,” Corbin thought out loud.
“That is the entrance to the lost kingdom of Miradùr,” Isaac proclaimed.
“But who could create such a thing?” Corbin asked in awe. “Is it another Citadel?”
Isaac scoffed at the notion that the ancient magic before them could be the work of another failed human starship. “As if the Acadians ever possessed such power. No, dear boy, what you see before you is the work of the dwergaz.”
“Dwarves?” the group of them repeated in near unison.
Isaac nodded proudly. “None other.”
Logan stared at his brother, who had dropped the psionic funnel to raise an eyebrow at Isaac. It was Bipp who snickered first, but as soon as he did, the three of them were roaring in laughter. Logan was racked with such amusement that he had to hold onto the vines behind him to maintain his balance, lest he fall right over the edge, and Bipp was on his arse, slapping his knees and howling with laughter.
Isaac did not share in their amusement, staring back at them with an honest look of incomprehension. Nero was not laughing, though his eyes did seem to have an extra glow to them, and he was smiling.
“I fail to see what is so amusing,” Isaac said dryly.
“D-d-dwarves,” Logan managed to say between bouts of laughter, except once he got the word out, he could only point at the mage and laugh with tears coming out of his eyes.
“Yes, dwarves. What is your point?” Isaac opened his arms and shook his head. He was beginning to look irritated. Logan figured that was just as well, since the mage seemed to take such a sadistic delight in riling up his companions’ nerves half the time.
“Come on, Isaac,” Bipp said, “don’t tell me you still believe in dwarves. What’s next, the Green Fairy’s going to come down and bring us presents for being good little boys?”
Logan was trying hard to catch his breath, but he choked on another bout of laughter at the gnome’s jibe.
“I fail to share in your amusement over the key to your salvation,” Isaac replied haughtily.
It was Corbin who first sobered up enough to speak, “Seriously, you don’t actually think a race of d
warves lived in that mountain, do you? Everyone knows they’re just fairy tales.”
“I know no such thing,” Isaac said coldly enough to freeze a flame. “And frankly I’m a little astonished by your childish outbursts.”
Logan was surprised by the mage’s indignant look as he folded his arms across his chest and turned away from them. He suddenly felt bad for his reaction, though who could blame him? Sometimes it was hard to remember that Isaac had spent over a century with no human contact, living in isolation in the White Tree, and that it was not easy for the mage to communicate with others.
“Look, guys,” Corbin said, holding up his hands for everyone to quiet down, “I’m sure there’s a logical explanation here. Isaac, why don’t you just tell us what you know of this place we are headed to?”
Isaac looked grateful and nodded in agreement. “But we better get a move on while there is still daylight. This pass will not be as easy to traverse in the dark, and we should make as much headway as possible before then.”
They all agreed and began marching again.
“We are in the Valley of Eilor, which came to be known as the Horseshoe Mountains. The common belief is that they are named such because of the way the range curves around on itself, cupping the valley below, like a horseshoe. However, in the dawn of the Second Age, the forest here was small, and the valley a wide plain. Here the dwergaz permitted Aerimin, the men from the Grey Sea, to come and live in their shadow. For the Aerimin brought with them a great treasure to the dwergaz: horses.”
“Horses?” Bipp snickered.
Isaac ignored his sarcasm and continued. “The Aerimin were master breeders, living as one with their steeds, and this the dwergaz found very interesting. Little is known of these first men from the West, and they are unimportant in this conversation, only serving to show you how names can change and twist over time. Of course, Eilor means rider of the plains in dwergaz, and so the Valley of Eilor became the Horseshoe Mountains. And the Cliffs of Dùr come from the original name of this land.
“You see, behind that magical ward lies the Kingdom of Miradùr,” Isaac said, pointing across the valley to the curve of the range where Corbin had detected the flickering lights.
“Like Siribel’s vision?” Corbin whispered in awe.
“Precisely. Miradùr was a great bastion of dwarven civilization, and one of the few that still remains on Acadia.”
“You think the dwarves still live there?” Corbin asked doubtfully.
Isaac shook his head, ignoring the grin Logan and Bipp shared. “I have scryed these halls only once before, over two hundred years ago, in my Master’s Leaving Well.”
“So you’ve never actually been there?” Logan asked. “Then why do you believe it used to be inhabited by real flesh and blood dwarves?”
“My Master’s scrying magic was as strong as any I’ve ever seen in this realm or any other,” Isaac said resolutely. “I may not have physically walked those halls, but our spirit forms did. During our visit, we were able to study much of the existing architecture and map out the upper chambers.”
Corbin’s head perked up and he swung about. “You have a map of this place?”
Isaac shook his head and motioned for Corbin to continue marching. “Sadly no, the only chart that remains after all these years is the one in my mind.”
“As if that’s reliable,” Bipp muttered under his breath.
“Listen, Isaac,” Logan began slowly, “I don’t know how to tell you this, but dwarves…they aren’t real. They’re kiddie stories to make children laugh. No fat, jolly little men are going to come down and feast with us on Hollumen’s Eve.”
“What your limited experience has led you to believe is no concern of mine,” Isaac replied with absolutely no ill will. “All you need to accept is that this is the path that Siribel scryed would lead us to your underground homeland.”
“And we appreciate that,” Corbin said, throwing his brother a pleading look.
Logan knew Corbin would be entirely grateful if he just shut his mouth on the subject, but the notion was too tempting, and they had so much time to kill. “You actually think there was a race of short men that raised massive cities before humans and gnomes existed on Acadia? Creatures who were more advanced than mankind, who used to rule over the planet before they inexplicably vanished one day, leaving behind absolutely no traces of their civilization?”
“Absolutely not,” Isaac said. Logan was silent for a moment, trying to make heads or tails of that admission. “The dwergaz empires still existed in the dawn of the age of man’s arrival, as I’ve already taught you. It was not until the Third Age that they vanished from the Nine Worlds.”
Bipp groaned. “Now he’s talking about the Nine Worlds…”
“Really, good gnome,” Isaac said, “I would expect this manner of ignorance from the Falians and even the tin man over there, but to hear you deny your cousins, the dwarves, is downright puzzling.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Bipp said, “let’s just agree to disagree, hmm?”
And they all did. The rest of the march was quite uneventful. The group remained quiet throughout it, each lost in their own thoughts. True to Isaac’s word, the narrow ledge became much more difficult to traverse once evening came. Until the second moon peeked her green celestial body around the side of Clotho, its ringed sister, they could barely make out the ground. This was nothing new to them, but when you are miles up with an uneven terrain at your feet and each step could be your last, a little moonlight is a blessed thing.
By the time the third moon rose over the horizon, the group was marching along at a nice, steady pace again. Logan had to fight the urge to look up, knowing that one glance at the stars, which were even worse at this dizzying altitude, could throw him into a fit of vertigo. There was something about the never-ending field of stars and that great void beyond that grated against the being of a man who had lived his whole life under the comforting cavern ceilings of the underground realms.
Isaac recommended that they march straight through the night, since it was not safe to slumber on the tiny strip of walkway left to them. Dwarves or not, Logan did have to admit that someone had clearly carved out the trail skirting the mountains. No doubt it was once a trade route between human kingdoms.
It was not until the three moons were slinking back down under the horizon and Themis was just lighting the sky with warm rays of dawn that the path finally began to widen.
Logan’s legs were stiff and his calves ached from the long uphill hike. He was glad for the reprieve when they broke for a meal and some rest. Looking back the way they had come, he could barely make out where they had begun miles below. He wanted to rest longer, but as soon as the meal was finished, the rest of the party was eager to be on their way.
The daystar was high overhead now, shining down on them. It was not long after setting out before Logan felt hot and exhausted. He wondered how much longer they could go on before resting again. Soon the trail widened enough for them to walk three abreast and leveled out, making the hike a little easier.
Bulky outcrops of rock jutted overhead, providing pockets of shade that Logan relished. He could see the entire valley to his right, with mountains stretching away to the north on either side. When they reached the center of the range, Isaac called for them to halt.
Logan surveyed the area for some sign of an entrance into the mountain. “How do we—” he began, but he was cut off by the mage’s upraised hand.
Isaac tilted his head as if he were listening to something nearby. He pointed at three different outcrops of rock overhead as he mumbled, “You see there? Is that proof enough for you?”
What is he talking about? Logan wondered. He stared at the thick sections of the mountain, jutting out at odd angles and overgrown with vines.
“Is that…?” Bipp whispered.
Wait a minute. Logan suddenly felt there was something familiar about the curves and angles of the outcroppings, something unnatural, manmade. He gasped as he b
eheld an eye carved into the face of the mountain, peeking between clumps of vine. Stepping back, Logan tried to make sense of what he was seeing.
Corbin’s hand in the small of his back was all that kept him from falling clear off the edge. “Óðinn’s beard, man,” Corbin scolded. “Be careful!”
Awestruck, Logan gaped at his brother then at the edge of the cliff in turn. He stupidly pointed with a trembling finger up toward the stone eye.
“Whoa! What in the—?” Corbin said.
“Indeed,” Isaac said. “Those are the Twin Paladins, a tribute to the first smith, he who founded this kingdom.”
“B-but that can’t be,” Logan stammered. “They can’t be real, this can’t be…”
“This coming from a man who only six months ago firmly believed the surface of Acadia was an uninhabitable ball of ash and fire,” Isaac said.
Logan had no response to that point.
Isaac smiled and gestured for them to follow him farther up the trail. “We’ve come to our entry point. If my estimations are correct, and I believe they are, the way inside lies just ahead.”
The companions marched up the trail into an exterior tunnel, where the rocky overhang extended far enough to form a curved stone canopy, with the right face of rock dotted with circular openings.
“Is it just me or did it just get really chilly out?” Logan said.
Nero nodded. “The temperature around these cliffs has dropped ten degrees. It is as if the cliff overhang in this area is creating a localized climate.” Logan had a hunch the temperature change had nothing to do with the shade.
Isaac traced a circle with his staff, from which a halo of powdery white light bloomed. He ran his palm across the wall as they walked, fingertips brushing aside the greedy, clinging vines, and muttered an incantation. All the while he tapped his staff against the ground, as if to the beat of an unheard song. There was an audible difference when the staff came down on a hollow spot, and Isaac stopped where he stood. The halo of light stretched away from his staff as if it was being pulled toward the wall by some invisible force. It reminded Logan of the way a candle looked when a draft blew past, except it just kept going until it tapped the mountainside.
