by Markus Heitz
Everything inside him rebelled at the notion of walking through the fog, but he knew the others were looking to him for leadership. Swallowing his misgivings, he waded into the murky air. There was something about it that reminded him of the mist-like demon that had taken control of Nôd’onn’s mind. It’s only fog, he reassured himself.
They left the tower and turned left, hurrying toward the border. The visibility worsened with every step.
Glancing back at the others, Tungdil could tell that they shared his unease. The cold air stuck in their throats, making it difficult to breathe, and small droplets of water settled on their beards, hair, and mail. Soon their vague sense of trepidation hardened into dread.
“This is worse than a laundry,” grumbled Boïndil, breaking the silence. “Where’s the blasted orc? Anyone would think the fog was protecting him.”
Just then they heard a familiar jangling.
“Did you hear that?” said Boïndil, raising his axes. “We’ve got him.”
The orc was nowhere to be seen.
They pressed on, but the wearer of the armor stayed ahead of them, jangling in the distance, hidden from view.
Apart from clouding their sight, the fog dulled their hearing and warped their sense of time. Tungdil couldn’t say for certain how long they had been walking, and his inner compass, which worked perfectly in passageways, tunnels, and caverns, proved useless in the fog. From what he could see, it was definitely getting darker—much darker.
“Stop,” he commanded. He heard four sets of boots behind him skidding to a halt. It was too dark to see his companions. “Can anyone hear the orc?”
No answer.
The hairs on Tungdil’s neck stood on end. He raised his ax warily. “Boïndil?”
Suddenly the sound of armor was much closer. Clunk, clunk. A shadow loomed out of the mist; its contours looked orcish.
The beast lunged at Tungdil with a two-handed sword.
“At least someone can hear me,” muttered Tungdil, dodging the blow. He brought his ax down smartly as the beast stumbled past. The blade connected, and the orc howled in pain; then the fog closed over him, concealing him from view. This isn’t going to be fun.
Not wanting to give himself away, Tungdil kept quiet and refrained from calling to his friends. His priority was to find his bearings before the orc attacked again. He stepped carefully backward, expecting to come up against a wall of rock, but there was nothing behind him: He had wandered off the track.
Clunk, clunk.
This time the jangling came from the left. Alerted by the noise, Tungdil whirled round, dropped into a half crouch and launched himself at the orc. The blade cut into his enemy’s leg, severing it at the knee. Shrieking, the orc dropped his sword and pitched forward.
“You might live forever, but you’ll never grow another leg,” said Tungdil, taking aim at his head.
Even as the ax chopped down, the orc rolled over and the blade hit the ground. With a scornful grunt, he crawled toward his sword.
Tungdil knew he had to act quickly before noise of the scuffle drew other beasts to the scene.
The orc’s right hand was already closing around the hilt of his two-hander when Tungdil’s ax sped toward him, cutting effortlessly through helmet and skull, and embedding itself at the base of the neck.
The orc slumped to the ground. Tungdil set his right boot on the stricken beast’s breastplate and levered his weapon from the corpse. There was no guarantee that cleaving a skull vertically was enough to kill a revenant, so he positioned himself over the twitching body and severed the creature’s head from its shoulders.
Stopping to catch his breath, he leaned on his ax and listened to the silence. After a few moments he was forced to the conclusion that, contrary to his hopes, Boïndil and the others weren’t somewhere in the vicinity, hidden by the fog. The orc’s shrieking would have drawn Boïndil to him as surely as sparkling diamonds attract a kobold. What a sinister place.
He set off and kept walking until he came to a wall. The gray rock was hard and brittle with ridges sharp enough to injure a careless dwarf. The wall hadn’t been worked or polished, which confirmed his suspicion that he had left the dwarven track.
The mist had led him astray.
Judging by the unremitting darkness, he had wandered into a cave of gigantic proportions. Every nerve in his body was as taut as a bowstring, ready to snap at the slightest noise. The swirling mist played tricks on his mind, conjuring orcs and other phantoms in the shadows.
He tried to remember what he knew of the Outer Lands. His old tutor, Lot-Ionan, had shown little interest in discovering what lay beyond Girdlegard’s borders, and the same applied to the dwarves, who stuck to their side of the mountains.
Apart from a few anecdotes told by merchants and migrants, the only descriptions of the Outer Lands were hundreds of cycles old, dating back to expeditions sent out by human kings. Most of the explorers had never returned, and in human folklore, the territory outside Girdlegard’s belt of mountains belonged to the souls of the dead. Tungdil, lost in the shifting fog, shuddered at the thought. If his soul had to go anywhere, he would rather it went to Vraccas’s smithy.
More determined than ever to get out of the cavern, he decided to follow the wall. Placing one hand lightly against the stone and gripping the ax with the other, he set off as quietly as possible. Deep down, he was terrified about what had become of Boïndil and the others.
After a time, his fingertips brushed against a strange set of grooves. He stopped to examine the wall. A rune! The symbol was unfamiliar to the dwarf, but there was no mistaking the craftsmanship. Elves and dwarves were known for the elegance of their script, but for all the symbol’s ornateness, it didn’t look elvish. It could almost be dwarven, thought Tungdil, recalling the ancient stories of the undergroundlings, who were reputed to inhabit the Outer Lands. What if they’re dwarves like us?
He strained his ears. Clunk, clunk.
Tungdil whirled around in surprise. I cleaved his neck. Surely he can’t have survived? His confusion gave way to fear. “Boïndil, is that you?” he whispered hopefully.
Clunk, clunk.
The noise was definitely getting closer. Backing away, Tungdil pressed himself against the wall, peered in both directions and filled his nostrils with cold, damp air. The only discernible odor was the smell of wet stone.
Clunk. The noise was no more than two arm-lengths away from him. He heard gravel cracking beneath a booted foot.
It seemed to Tungdil that he was surrounded by orcs. He saw them towering over him, he smelled their filthy odor, and his heart beat furiously in his chest. Turning his head this way and that, he waited for the attack that would surely come.
A squat shadow appeared before him.
“Take that, you villain!” shouted Tungdil, sprinting to the right and raising his ax. The blade connected with a steely clatter. He pulled back to take another strike, but his weapon was stuck.
“Careful, scholar,” snorted a voice from the fog. “You could kill a dwarf with a blow like that.”
As Tungdil’s panicked eyes refocused, he realized that Boïndil was the target of his attack. The secondling had crossed his axes defensively, trapping Tungdil’s weapon in a triangle of steel.
“Vraccas almighty, I thought you were an orc.” It was a relief to be reunited with at least one of his companions. “Where are the others?”
“No idea. I thought they were with you.”
“Did you hear me killing the orc?”
“You killed an orc without me?”
“I chopped his head off and then—”
Clunk.
Tungdil gave his friend an almighty shove, and Boïndil toppled backward into the fog. A split-second later, an orc charged out of the darkness, his sword whistling toward the spot where the two friends had been standing. Neither was hurt.
Ireheart, beard quivering, popped up behind the beast. With an ear-splitting shriek, he rammed his left ax into the creature
’s belly and chopped down with his right ax, hewing through its neck. The orc’s torso crashed to the ground, followed by his head.
“I guess there were two of them,” commented Boïndil. Sighing with satisfaction, he wiped his axes on the orc’s jerkin. Viscous green blood stuck to the shabby cloth. “Shall we look for the rest of our troop?”
Tungdil nodded, relieved.
They set off together, running their hands against the wall. Their investigation revealed that the cave had three exits, one of which smelled of fresh mountain air, from which they deduced that it led to the fifthling kingdom.
It took considerably longer to find their missing friends.
Two of them were dead, mauled savagely by orcs. The third had been kept alive by the will of Vraccas, but his inner furnace was cooling fast.
“There were three of them,” he whispered weakly. “Three…”
Boïndil straightened up sharply and listened for suspicious noises in the stubbornly murky fog.
“Which way did they go?” asked Tungdil, realizing at the same time that it was pointless to pursue the surviving orc. He was probably hurrying to join his cousins in the Outer Lands.
“I…” A spasm ran through the dying dwarf, and the fire went out of his eyes. His soul had been gathered to Vraccas’s smithy.
“Let’s get out of here,” said Tungdil, hefting the dead warrior over his shoulder and securing him with a leather belt.
“Aren’t we going to find the other orc?” objected Boïndil, who firmly intended to kill the final beast. He was treated to a long look that silenced further protests. Sighing, he picked up the second of their dead companions, and between them, they carried the third.
Little by little, the darkness seemed to lift, indicating that at some point they had exited the cavern, although neither remembered when. The mist retreated, revealing the starry firmament, which twinkled above them, pointing the way.
Seeing the vast stone arch in the distance, they put on a final burst of speed, stopping only when they reached the gateway. Glancing behind him, Boïndil gave himself a little shake as if to free himself from the sinister pull of the Outer Lands. “It’s a wonder any of those human explorers came back alive,” he said to Tungdil. “From now on, I’m keeping south of the pass.”
Tungdil agreed wholeheartedly with his friend.
* * *
With the exception of the sentries, who were stationed at strategic points throughout the kingdom, everyone was assembled in the main hall, where Giselbert had held counsel, over a thousand cycles before. At one time, the walls had been clad with silver panels inscribed with the fifthlings’ laws, but orcish looters had rampaged through the hall, smashing the precious metal and pocketing the spoils. The most intricate, valuable, tablets had suffered the worst.
But the artistry of the fifthlings was evident in the architecture.
A double door opened onto a circular area twenty paces across, ringed by a low wall measuring a pace in height and extending four paces backward, so as to create a circular ledge. This in turn was ringed by a wall, which extended upward and backward to form the third tier, and so the series of ring-like platforms rose away from the central stage. The arrangement reminded Tungdil of the theater in Mifurdania where he had first met Narmora, Furgas, and Rodario. The fifthlings had even thought about acoustics, and the very faintest of whispers could be heard throughout the hall. Light came from a number of metal racks filled with burning coal.
Tungdil watched from the stage as the other dwarves took their seats above. He scanned the rows; some eight hundred dwarves, including three hundred dwarf-women, had left their kingdoms to form the new fifthling folk.
He waited for the noise to settle. “Thank you for coming,” he welcomed them. “There are important matters to discuss.”
He told them what had happened on his recent expedition and finished by warning of a likely invasion. His listeners took the news calmly; orcs were a constant danger, and fighting against superior numbers was nothing new.
“I led you here, but Vraccas knows I never intended to be your leader,” he said, turning to the second item on the agenda. “From now on, I won’t presume to make decisions on your behalf. Dangerous times lie ahead, and our enemies will be quick to exploit the slightest difference among us. We need to elect a new leader, and the matter should be settled without delay. As you know, I’m a thirdling.” He felt a lump forming in his throat. “Recently, I’ve come to realize that my lineage is a problem. Doubts have been expressed about my loyalty—on one occasion, to my face. Until my trustworthiness has been proven to everyone’s satisfaction, I shall serve the kingdom as a regular warrior and smith.” Raising Keenfire, he turned slowly to survey the tiers of delegates. “Which of you is prepared to lead the fifthling kingdom? Nominate yourself or a kinsman.” He lowered his ax and stepped aside, demonstrating his willingness to make way for the new fifthling king.
The delegates conferred among themselves. Their deep voices echoed through the rock, bringing the Gray Range to life.
Tungdil saw no reason to explain himself further; he was almost certain that some of the delegates had frowned when he mentioned his lineage, and his announcement seemed to have elicited overwhelming approval and relief. He thanked Vraccas for guiding him so wisely.
A brown-haired dwarf-woman rose to her feet and rapped her hammer against the stone floor. The clear tone cut through the hubbub, and a hush came over the hall. “My name is Kyriss Finehand of the clan of the Good Smiths, daughter of Borengar. I understand your decision, Tungdil Goldhand, but I, for one, never doubted your loyalty. The fifthling kingdom needs your scholarly wisdom as well as your ax.” Lowering her hammer, she inclined her head respectfully, then looked up at the delegates. “Our new leader must be someone who enjoys our respect. I hereby nominate Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters, warrior of Borengar.” She listed off the firstling’s accomplishments and deeds.
As Tungdil listened, the hall spun around him, dizzyingly. His eyes clouded over, and a chill crept over his skin, but his inner furnace burned higher than ever, stoked by bitterness and rage.
Make them choose someone else, he begged Vraccas. Anyone but him. Through the fog of his thoughts he realized that the delegates were nodding approvingly. In the short time since their arrival in the fifthling kingdom, Glaïmbar had made a name for himself with the dwarves from the other folks—and no one would dream of questioning his lineage.
You fool, whispered a voice in his ear. You’ve ruined your chances. If you were king, you could post him to the furthest reaches of the Gray Range or send him to fight a band of orcs, but now you’ll have to do the deed yourself. Just be sure to do it quietly: Push him over a precipice, crush him with a falling boulder, splice his skull with an orcish weapon, chase him into the Outer Lands…
Tungdil summoned all his strength and focused on Boïndil’s face. The fiendish voice grew fainter, fading gradually out of earshot, but the hatred remained in his heart, and the sight of the handsome firstling made him tremble with rage. For the first time he understood Boïndil’s urge to hack someone or something to pieces, and he pitied his friend.
His grim thoughts were interrupted when he realized that Kyriss had stopped speaking. She and the other delegates were looking at him expectantly.
“Our first nominee is Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters of Borengar’s line,” he announced with a catch in his voice. “Let the next candidate step forward.” No one stirred. “Are none of you willing to serve your folk?” he asked, venting his bitterness. He tried to look at his rival, but his gaze was drawn to Balyndis, who was standing at his side. “In that case, we have one contender. Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters, warrior of Borengar do you accept the nomination?”
During what followed—Glaïmbar rising and answering with a solemn “yes,” the delegates clapping and cheering as he walked to the stage, the axes rising in his favor—Tungdil’s thoughts were elsewhere, focused
on his beautiful, unobtainable, smith.
At last, when the delegates went down on one knee and raised their hammers, axes, and clubs to the new fifthling king, he tore his eyes away from Balyndis.
“The fifthlings have elected Glaïmbar Sharpax as their king,” he said, scanning the rows of faces and refusing to acknowledge the dwarf at his side. “May he rule with the wisdom of Vraccas.” He left the stage without a bow or a handshake; he wasn’t prepared to humble himself in front of his rival, not as long as he lived.
Once out of the hall, he decided to walk off his anger. He started through the passageways, striding past scaffolding and building sites where the secondling masons had started to repair the ceilings and walls. His feet carried him to the outer reaches of the kingdom where he came to rest among the ruins of an orcish watchtower.
Overcome with emotion, he stood among the rubble and looked up at the stars. Tears of anger and despair streamed down his cheeks, trickling through his beard, and dripping onto his mail shirt.
“You should know better than that, scholar. Your armor will rust.”
Tungdil smiled in spite of himself. “I suppose you’re here to drag me to the banquet.”
“Vraccas himself couldn’t drag you there, so it’s hardly a job for a simple dwarf like me.” Boïndil glanced up at the twinkling stars. “What do you see in them, scholar? I guess they’re pretty after a fashion, but I’d rather look at glittering diamonds in freshly hewn rock. Won’t you come inside? We need to work on our plan—the king has given his approval.”
“Oh really? You didn’t waste time!” Tungdil turned to his friend. “If we leave right away, we might run into more of Ushnotz’s scouts. Is that what you’re hoping?”
Boïndil ran his hands over his stubbly cheeks and smoothed his beard. “Am I that transparent?” he said with a smile. “Listen, I’m not in the mood for singing either. Let’s have our own celebration with Boëndal and tell him about the plan. You never know, it might be just what he needs to unfreeze his blood and get him going.”
