The Last Thane cw-1

by Douglas Niles

  Somehow he forced out the words. "Then go, and good riddance to you," he snapped. "I don't suppose you have told Tarn?"

  "Our son has known of my intentions for a long time. He has promised to visit me when I am settled in my old clanhome back in Daerforge."

  That, at least, was true. She reflected that her son was the one good thing to come from her overlong dalliance among the Hylar. Without further words she left Baker, and sent a message to her son as soon as she was back in her own house, the house that had been hers for too many decades, now.

  Garimeth was thoughtful as she packed her most cherished clothes. She would send later for her full wardrobe, since she wasn't about to stick around here for another day. It would take several such days before the full array of her belongings could be gathered.

  She passed into their sitting room, determined to bring a few boots and items of outer wear that she had left in the cedar wardrobe. Upon opening the door she noticed the familiar bronze gleam of the possession she had dubbed her husband's 'toy'.

  In truth, she knew better. The Helm of Tongues, an artifact cherished through generations of the Whitegranite family, had uses that she herself had only begun to appreciate. Of course, it was useful for simple purposes: the wearer of the Helm could decipher text written in any language, reading it as though it were printed in precise mountain dwarf. That made it invaluable to a fussy scholar such as Baker Whitegranite.

  But Garimeth had discovered something when she had first donned the metal object some three or four decades earlier. It had a benefit far more suited to her tastes. In addition to its powers of translation, the Helm of Tongues allowed its wearer to sense the deepest thoughts and feelings of other dwarves, without the target ever suspecting that he or she was being thus revealed.

  Garimeth had learned through discreet questioning that the latter ability seemed to be unique to her, or at least, particular to dark dwarves. Perhaps the Hylar temperament was too naive for this use.

  Now her first impulse was to cast the item aside and continue to gather her jewelry, but with a tight smile she paused, then picked up the metal helmet. Even after all these years it felt surprisingly light in her hands. She looked closely at the intricate scrollwork marking the smooth bronze surface. She couldn't resist placing the object on her head.

  As always, it felt marvelously comfortable, as if it had been molded to fit her scalp, though, as far as she knew, it fit Baker's larger head with similar comfort. But the sensations she was feeling went beyond, far beyond, mere comfort. Already there was that familiar tingling in her nerves, like a caress of blissful delight quivering in her belly, tightening the focus of her mind. Her senses felt exceptionally keen. The rusty colors of the tapestry hanging in the room were brightened to a blood-red crimson that shimmered like a living, breathing thing. The deep-paneled oak seemed to have a texture like a dramatic landscape, all valleys and ravines and lofty crests.

  These senses extended beyond the natural, and she suddenly felt a presence in the next room, knew that her husband's house-servant Vale was moving about in the dining chamber. Though that loyal dwarf made no sound, the helm allowed her to picture his exact position. A thick wall of solid stone separated them, and still it was like she stood right behind Vale, watching as he went about his cleaning.

  The servant reached high with a feather duster, sweeping the top of a cabinet, and Garimeth was seized by a capricious impulse. The power of the helm augmented her thoughts. With her mind she reached out, grasped him by the wrist, and pushed. The feather duster hooked around the base of a delicate candelabra, moved sharply, and the glass object fell to the floor.

  The shattering of crystal, and Vale's gasp of dismay, were audible even through the closed door. Under other circumstances the dwarfwoman would have hastened into the dining chamber and relished the chance to rebuke the clumsy servant, but now she merely shrugged. Her husband's possessions were no longer any concern of hers.

  At least, his mundane possessions. Removing the helmet, she looked at it again, and made a sudden decision. With a barely concealed smile of pleasure, she tossed the object into her traveling trunk and continued to prepare for her departure.

  Perhaps Baker wouldn't miss her, but by Reorx he would certainly notice that she was gone.

  Chapter Three

  Long and Short Views

  Amid eggs of gold and bronze, of silver, brass, and copper, there was an orb of purest platinum, a spherical treasure blessed by Paladine himself.

  Thai the Graygem came to the Grotto as it came to the rest of Krynn, as a harbinger of Chaos that reached into the substance of the world, and planted its wild seed. And the platinum egg was changed by the essence of Chaos, and changed it would remain.

  While the other eggs hatched, and the dragons were born, the egg of platinum had been changed, altered by the chaotic force of the Graygem. And so it remained in the nest and so it would stay, until a true ruler of the dwarves would raise it, and release the power from within.

  — From the Early Chronicles of Chisel Loremaster

  I like those words as much today as I did when I wrote them, more than three thousand years ago. I know Baker Whitegranite gave them careful thought when he translated them just a fortnight past, though it is true that at that time he did not ascribe to them their proper worth.

  In another few weeks, of course, he will number them among the most important phrases he has ever read.

  But that time lies still in the future, and I think it would be good, now, to consider the Kingdom of Thorbardin as it is, at the height of its glory, shaded from the brutal sky during these hot summer days. The Storms of Chaos loom on the horizon, and over the world, but the bitter winds have yet to commence their sweep across Krynn.

  The "house" of Baker Whitegranite and Garimeth Bellowsmoke lay in many ways at the very heart and the ultimate height of this great dwarven kingdom. Situated on Level Twenty-eight of the Life-Tree, its balcony commanded a vista of the great sea nearly three thousand feet below, while the pulse of the kingdom's greatest city measured its beat at the house's doorstep and beyond. And in its garden were the cool, brilliant waters that gave such pleasure to the acting thane of the Hylar.

  Hybardin, called the Life-Tree, was a place unique in the world of Krynn, and among all the planes for that matter. It existed in a massive stalactite, a half-mile in height and that same distance in width, at least at its widest diameter, which, naturally, was at the very top. The great shaft of living stone tapered as it plummeted downward, passing through the many levels of the Hylar city, each layer somewhat smaller and more compact than the levels above.

  Water flowed everywhere in Hybardin. The dwarves had channeled countless natural springs to form fountains, pools, gardens, canals, and small, trilling brooks. These served a practical function in keeping the city clean, but they were cherished for their beauty, for the cool mists that soothed the lower levels where the forges smoked and roared, and for the splashing vitality they brought to neighborhoods and homes.

  As well as water, Hybardin was a city of light, for more than any other clan of mountain dwarves the Hylar loved to behold the world with their eyes. They had keen hearing and acute smell and they could discern some shapes even in nearly complete darkness, but they maintained a network of constantly burning lanterns, torches, and fires so that each of their streets was illuminated, and within every inhabited house could be found the friendly glow of candle, lamp, or coal hearth.

  As an observer reached the middle strata of the Life-Tree, he would notice that the streets and byways of the city moved from regions of noble manors to the crowded houses of hard working dwarves. Finally, descending into the lower levels he would find smithies clanging, bellows roaring, and furnaces baking as they flamed and seared the metals dwarven crafters could meld like no other artisans. Yet even here the pragmatic Hylar retained their love of beauty, and thus there were gardens, fountains, and streams even in the midst of their soot-stained work and the fiery heat.r />
  The tapered column of stone did not extend all the way into the lake. Rather, it reached a blunt terminus some distance beneath the floor of the city's Level Three. Through a span of forty feet of space, the bottom of the stalactite was joined to the rocky islet below by a multitude of metal stairways and no less than five transport shafts. Four of the latter provided service only to Level Three, but the greatest of the transports occupied a long, hollow cylinder in the very center of the Life-Tree. This, the Great Lift, was a transport that extended all the way from Level Twenty-eight down through the base of the stalactite to a platform in the center of Level Two, which was a raised plaza above the encircling ring of the city's waterfront docks that formed Level One. Twin cars, one going up while the other descended, could carry more than a hundred dwarves each.

  In its extent and beauty and populace, Hybardin was a true wonder of the world, yet it was not the only remarkable place in Thorbardin-which, after all, is a realm boasting no less than seven great cities. Still, the Life-Tree serves the chronicler as a useful center, a focal point and a commencement for any look at the kingdom of the mountain dwarves.

  Hybardin was linked to the rest of the underground realm in many ways. Dwarves were ever delving, and through the centuries they had bored tunnels through the rock at the top of the stalactite. Some of these had been pressed forward to such extent that they linked with similar tunnel networks outlying the other dwarven cities. In this way was the whole mountain a honeycomb of passages. It is safe to presume that the total network of such tunnels was too vast for any single dwarf's comprehension.

  The bustling docks and wharves of the city's Level One served as the prime location for commerce in the realm, for from these berths goods came and went from across the Urkhan Sea. Four great chain ferries connected the Life-Tree to cities and roads around the shore of the lake. Several teeming cities-Daebardin, Theibardin, and Daerforge-pressed close upon the shoreline. Other cities such as Daerbardin, Theiwarin, and Klarbardin dwelled deeper under the mountain or along a sinuous fjord of the subterranean sea. And all of this great kingdom-cities, sea, tunnels, roads and vast warrens-was an underground domain roofed by the massif of Cloudseeker Peak and the lofty crest of the High Kharolis.

  But Thorbardin was more than a kingdom of cities. It was an amalgamation of dwarven clans so different as to make a casual visitor wonder how they could share a common heritage. The mountain dwarves dwelled in five clans, each of which was centered in one or two cities.

  Each of these clans was ruled by its thane, and these five dwarves were the most powerful citizens of the kingdom.

  In the best of times these thanes were united under the King of the Mountain Dwarves, a post that Glade Hornfel Kytil had held since the War of the Lance. But now the king was gone, and Thorbardin was home to five thanes, each unique to his clan.

  Close allies to the Hylar were the Daewar, the other light-loving clan. They dwelled in a large, well-ordered city on the north shore of the lake, but in these days of tension they had been swept into internal crisis. Daewar eyes were turned inward, upon themselves.

  At the western end of the Urkhan Sea were the cities of the Theiwar, dark dwarves who cherished the magic that lingered in the lightless alleys and byways of their domain. Spells of seduction and betrayal were worked amid creations of wicked beauty. The Theiwar hated the dwarves of all the clans, but their most passionate loathing was reserved for the Hylar, the dwarves of light and water and solid, honest stone, the antipathy of everything held dear by the Theiwar.

  Darker even than the Theiwar was the clan dwelling at the eastern end of the great sea in the twin centers of villainy called Daerforge and Daerbardin. In the cities of the Daergar murder was a form of high art and treachery a skill learned in infancy.

  Daerforge rose from the edge of the water like the facade of a grand fortress. The city was arrayed in three vast levels, while turrets, balustrades, and overlooks jutted across the face of the rock in a forbidding display of fortified stone.

  The lowest level lay at the water's edge. Here docks extended into the lake, and the links of the great chain ferries clinked steadily between the city of dark dwarves and the brilliant beacon of Hybardin, gleaming ever brightly- hatefully-across several miles of underground lake water. Behind the Daerforge waterfront great ovens and furnaces roared and despite huge ventilation shafts the air retained a taste of soot and ash.

  The second level of the city was rife with the scent of molten metal. Here the great smelters and casting plants capitalized upon the heat generated a hundred feet below.

  The upper level of the dark city was a place of living compartments, a teeming den of Daergar houses ranging from splendid manors arrayed along the ramparts above the sea to crowded alleys so low-ceilinged that even dwarves had to hunch downward to walk here. A dozen or more Daergar might live in one small room, and it is to one of the smallest and darkest of these warrens that the chronicler now directs the reader's attention. For it is here, in the crowded and roaring festivity preceding a great celebration, that another branch of our story begins.

  The dwarf was as dark as the shadows through which he moved. Cloaked in a robe of supple silk, he crawled through a tunnel that served as a ventilation duct from deepest Daerforge. On his back was a blocky shape marked by the distinctive wooden thwart of a heavy crossbow. The weapon, like the dwarf himself, was fully wrapped in dark shrouding. Upon his feet were moccasins of soft leather, also black, and his hands were concealed by gloves of a rubbery, skintight membrane.

  His eyes-pale, luminous, and staring-peered through a narrow slit in the robe that covered his face. He moved with utter silence, testing each handhold and foothold as he crept upward through an angling shaft. For many hours he had passed through the inky darkness, and now as he drew near to his destination, he would make no mistake, nothing that would yield a telltale sound or sign of his presence.

  The shaft turned at right angles so that it ran horizontally, but even here the cloaked dwarf moved with painstaking care. Placing one knee after the other, one careful handhold at a time, he crawled forward. Eventually he drew near an iron grate that allowed air, smoke, and sound to waft into the stone-walled duct. He heard sounds of laughter and argument, the boasts, insults, and curses that were the hallmark of any Daergar gathering. Once those noises swelled into angry shouts and the masked intruder stiffened, wondering if he had missed his chance. But the bitter words settled into murmurs again, and apparently no blows were exchanged.

  Finally he reached the grate. Ever so slowly he extended the top of his head over the opening, giving himself a view into the chamber below. The room was utterly dark, but the Daergar's eyes were keen enough to penetrate that murk.

  About a hundred dark dwarves were crowded into the room. The smells of sweat, ale, and vomit were thick in the air, clear indication that the festivities had been going on for a long time. Most of the crowd was male, though the watcher could see a few females working and playing among the dark dwarf warriors. The observer took his time, scanning the sea of Daergar in the crowded banquet hall until he found the one that he sought.

  Khark Huntrack was the strong, sturdy dwarf, seated amid a ring of burly bodyguards. Additional guards stood at the two doors that gave access to this chamber, and these barriers were closed, locked and solidly barred. A sharp rapping came from one of those portals, which was opened a crack by guards holding drawn swords. They left an aperture just wide enough to let a few more dark dwarf wenches slip into the room. Each of these was frisked with some enthusiasm by one or another of the guards, and only when it had been determined that none of them were armed were the bawdy females allowed to enter and mingle with the celebrating Daergar warriors.

  Another keg was tapped with a loud hammer blow, and pitchers were filled from the foaming outflow. Khark Huntrack himself took a big swig from one of the first mugs, wiping the back of his hand across the froth on his beard. He uttered a loud belch that was greeted with applause, but the surr
eptitious observer knew Khark wouldn't be caught drunk. His bodyguards, too, were sober.

  Grinning behind the gauze of his face mask, the watcher wriggled around in the ventilation tunnel until he could reach the frame of his crossbow. He assembled the weapon and tightened the mighty spring with silent, practiced movements, all the while keeping his eyes on the gathering in the room below. At last he removed a steel-shafted dart from his small quiver, laying the missile into the groove atop his small but powerful bow.

  Only then did he pull the gauze from his face. He settled the weapon onto the edge of the grate and took his time, drawing a careful bead on his target. When he was absolutely certain that he had a clean field of fire, he removed a tiny vial from a pocket at his shoulder. Uncapping the bottle, he smeared a dark, oily substance on the arrowhead.

  He took aim again, exhaling slowly as he felt the sweet tension in the spring and pressed the smooth wood of the stock against his cheek. His finger seemed a piece of the weapon, melding itself to the trigger, slowly applying tension. Never blinking, he studied his target with those luminous eyes.

  Khark Huntrack took a long pull from his mug, leaning his head far back to drain the last drops. His eyes, shrewd and slitted, met the stare of the figure perched at the ceiling grate and widened in surprise.

  The chunk of the crossbow's release was a sound that cut through the boisterous crowd in the hall. The missile flew downward, missing the mug and Khark's upraised arm, vanishing into the nest of tangled curls that was the Daergar's beard. The dark dwarf tumbled backward, his chair smashing onto the floor, and Khark's lips worked desperately, struggling to make a sound, perhaps to utter a curse or a prayer.

  The room had fallen into a stunned, shocked silence.

  "Poison!" hissed one bodyguard, leaping to his feet and snatching up his master's drained mug.

  But another of the guards was more astute. He knelt beside the stiffening corpse, touching the shaft of the missile that jutted upward from the nest of the messy beard.