by Dan Willis
His father had given him the sword on his twentieth birthday and Bradok had treasured it ever since. With a practiced flourish, Bradok slipped the blade back into the scabbard and slid it home with a click. His father had told him the sword was magical, made by some elf wizard-smith, but Bradok had never found any proof of that. The magic in the blade had always been the feeling of the father who had given it to him. It was one of the rare times he’d enjoyed being with his father, one of the few times he’d ever even thought of Mirshawn as a father.
Bradok pushed the bitter memories aside and returned to the task at hand. From a cabinet above a workbench, he pulled out a small sack and a long strip of soft cloth. He opened the velvet boxes and laid out the jewelry pieces they contained. Each one was a masterpiece, the pinnacle of his art and even though he doubted he’d need them wherever he was going, neither could he bear to leave them behind. He carefully laid each piece out on the soft cloth and folded it into a flat, walletlike pack that he stowed in the little bag, which then went in his pack.
With a last look at his orderly workshop, the place that had been the center of his life for more than twenty years, Bradok cinched his pack closed, slung it over his shoulders, and walked out, shutting the door behind himself.
When he reached the foyer again, he found Sapphire there, waiting for him. At the sight of the sword on his belt, her face fell. Some of her haughtiness melted away.
“It’s true, then,” she sniffed. “You’re really planning to leave.”
“Yes, Mother,” he said. “There’s a cooper in the Artisans’ Cavern who had a vision. He’s building a boat, or he was until they arrested him. It’s partly my fault that he was arrested. I want to make amends. I’m going to his shop to finish the boat.”
“Madness!” Sapphire scoffed. “You’ve always been a sensible boy, Bradok. You know there’s no such thing as visions.”
“No, I don’t really know that, Mother,” he said, turning to look her square in the face. “I’m beginning to doubt everything I thought I knew. Perhaps I don’t know anything much at all.”
“Well, I can agree with you on that,” she returned. “But what makes you think this cooper has any answers? What makes you think helping him will make one bit of difference?”
“It’s just a feeling I have in my gut,” Bradok said, opening his front door. “I guess it’s something you’d have to take on faith.”
He left Sapphire standing in the hall with her mouth agape as he turned and strode briskly down the steps to the street. In his haste, he didn’t even shut the door.
CHAPTER 7
The Day of Destruction
We should have grabbed him when we had the chance,” Jon Bladehook said one week later, pacing around the front of Mayor Arbuckle’s office. “We had a nice, easy plan until he came along.”
“I agree,” the mayor said easily, leaning back in the hard, wooden chair behind his desk. “But it’s too late for that now. We just have to let things play out. Bradok and the rest of those fools can’t stay barricaded in the Artisans’ Cavern forever.”
“They don’t have to,” Bladehook fumed. “Today is the deadline, and anyone who doesn’t renounce their beliefs needs to be dealt with. If Bradok Axeblade can defy us, even for a single day, it will sow the seeds of rebellion among the people. They’ll see us as weak.”
“How will they see us if we lose twenty or thirty guardsmen in an assault on that barricade?” Arbuckle demanded. “The whole guard is only one hundred or so dwarves. How will we be seen by our enemies if a third of our soldiers are killed?”
Bladehook scowled but made no answer. He doubted Bradok and his little band of boat-builders could or would kill thirty guardsmen, but he had to agree with Arbuckle: it wasn’t worth the risk.
“So we’re just going to leave them down there?” he asked.
Arbuckle nodded. “They’ll get hungry sooner or later,” he said, smiling broadly. “Besides, every day that passes without any ‘wrath’ from their god only makes them look more and more foolish. I predict it won’t be very long before their followers start deserting them.”
Jon sighed. “I wish this day were over,” he said, flopping down on a padded couch that sat against the back wall. “This day of doom! The sooner it passes, the sooner we can get back to reality.”
“Patience, Jon,” Arbuckle said, consulting the tall clock that stood in the corner. “In six hours it will be midnight and we will have won. The government will be all ours, without interference from those busybodies in the temple.”
Jon grinned at that.
Arbuckle rose and crossed to the cupboards behind his desk. He took out a crystal decanter and two short glasses, and poured some amber liquid into each glass. “You and I, Jon,” Arbuckle said, handing him a glass. “We’ll rule this city like kings. Just like we always talked about.”
He held up his glass, and Jon clinked his against it.
“To the kings of Ironroot!” Bladehook said with a chuckle before he pitched the drink back, downing it in one gulp.
“Care for another?” Arbuckle asked, holding up the decanter.
“Why not?” Jon said, holding out his glass.
At that moment, the door to Arbuckle’s office burst open, admitting the captain of the city guard, disheveled and out of breath. Arbuckle and Bladehook were startled by the sudden appearance of the captain and spirits sloshed down Jon’s front.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Jon demanded, hurriedly brushing the liquor from his expensive shirt.
“The … prisoners,” the captain gasped. “They’re … uh, gone.”
Jon exchanged a worried look with Arbuckle.
“What do you mean, ‘gone’?” he asked.
“They disappeared,” the captain explained, finally catching his breath. “Right out of their cells. Every one of them.”
“You mean the street preachers?” Arbuckle demanded.
The captain nodded.
“Damn it, man,” the mayor said. “Call out the guard. Seal off the city. I want them found. And I want to know who’s to blame!”
“I know,” the captain said. “I’ve already ordered those steps taken. But there’s more. You see, I thought they might have taken refuge in the temple, so I had my men search the building.”
“And?” Bladehook asked.
“And the priests are g-gone too!” the captain stammered. “All their belongings are there: the candles and fires are lit, there’s even a meal on the table, but the priests have vanished.”
Arbuckle swore in a long streak of barely-related expletives. For his part, Bladehook felt like he’d been punched in the gut.
“We can’t let them get away!” the latter said quickly. “If they all escape, the believers will claim it was some kind of miracle, and then we’ll be back where we started.”
“Or worse,” Arbuckle agreed.
“I’ve got men stationed at the upper gates and on all the side tunnels from the main cavern,” the captain said. “We’re stretched pretty thin, though. If only we knew where they were headed.”
“They must be trying to reach Bradok,” Jon said. “They’re the only support left for believers in the city.”
“Then we have to stop them,” Arbuckle said. “Captain, assemble as many men as you can and meet us in the Artisans’ Cavern.”
With that, the three dwarves charged out of the room, leaving the liquor bottle standing open on the desk.
Bradok blew the dust and shavings from the hole he’d just finished drilling in the front end of the ship’s keel. He slipped a long brass bolt into the hole and hung a small lantern on it, bolting it in place. The lantern held a glowstone, a rock that had been blessed by a priest so that it gave off a bright purplish light.
He straightened up, leaning back to crack his spine, then strode proudly to the ramp that led down from the completed ship. When Bradok arrived the week before, work on the ship had all but ceased. News of Silas’s arrest had dispirited those who believ
ed him. Since then, Bradok had rallied Silas’s friends and family, convincing them that he would finish what Silas had started.
The job was finally finished.
They’d had to tear down the shop and some of the nearby walkways to find all the necessary wood, and they’d had to virtually barricade themselves inside there, away from the increasing encroachment of the city guard, but they’d done it.
“How much food do we have left?” he called to Perin.
The human looked up from where he’d been stacking their meager supplies. “Not more than three or four days, I’m afraid,” he said ruefully.
“Better hurry up; get it all loaded,” Bradok said. “At the risk of repeating myself, this is the day. I’m afraid we’d better get ready. Things are liable to get ugly before too long.”
As if on cue, the burly smith Kellik came scurrying around the stone chimney of the forge. “Bradok,” he called ahead. “There’s some trouble at the barricade. You’d better get down there.”
Bradok glanced back at Perin as he descended the narrow ramp. “Go ahead, get the women and children on board,” he ordered.
The barricade had been erected a little ways from the shop, in a narrow part of the cavern. Almost from the day Bradok arrived to help with the shipbuilding, Kellik had joined in and made the defense of the barricade his main responsibility.
As Bradok approached, he saw a knot of ragged, armed dwarves, each gripping his weapon. On the far side of the tangle of metal and wood, he could make out a small group of dwarves milling about.
“Much!” Bradok said when he got close enough to make out faces.
“There you are, lad,” the old dwarf said from the far side of the barricade. “Am I glad to see you!”
“What are you doing here?” Bradok asked.
“I … well, if it isn’t too late, we’ve come to join you,” Much said abashedly.
Behind Much, Bradok recognized the delegation of hill dwarves who had petitioned the council on his first day. The tall, red-haired woman who he had noticed then, and still vividly remembered, stepped up beside Much and addressed Bradok.
“We are believers,” she said simply, lowering her eyes humbly. “We ask that you grant us sanctuary.”
“It isn’t much of a sanctuary,” Bradok replied honestly. “This barricade won’t hold long if the city guard attacks.”
“We know all about you and prefer to take our chances with you,” she said, raising her eyes to meet his. “If you’ll have us.”
A hand dropped on Bradok’s arm, and he turned to see Silas’s son, Chisul.
“We’re already low on food,” Chisul whispered to Bradok.
“I don’t think a few more will matter much after today,” Bradok whispered back gruffly. To Kellik he said, “Let them in.”
“Thank you,” the woman said. “My name is Rose, Rose Steelspar. We met before.”
“I remember,” Bradok said.
Rose put her arm around a solid-looking dwarf with a handsome face and Bradok’s heart sank. “This is Tal,” she said. “Our village is too poor to have a priest, so Tal trained as a doctor. He’s well-versed in the healing arts.”
“Welcome,” Bradok said as Rose, Tal, and a considerable number of other dwarves close behind them squeezed through the barricade.
As they passed, Bradok turned back questioningly to Much.
“I’m no believer,” Much declared, staring at his feet. “But I have thought about it long and hard. I can’t be a part of what the council is doing. Will you have me stand with you?”
Bradok smiled and slapped the dwarf on the shoulder. “Of course, you old badger,” Bradok said. “I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have at my side.”
“You’d better be quick about letting him in, then,” Chisul said, gesturing up the passage.
Bradok turned to see, in the distance, a large group of dwarves moving toward them. Even with that gap, Bradok could clearly make out the blue tabards of the city guard.
“Close up the barricade,” Bradok yelled, pulling Much through.
“Every dwarf to their station,” Kellik yelled, shouldering his massive warhammer.
“Where should we deploy?” Rose asked, swiftly pulling a short sword from beneath her cloak. The other hill dwarves were also producing a variety of weapons from belts and packs.
Kellik gestured toward the dwarves lining the barricade. “Just find a hole and fill in,” he said.
As the newcomers scrambled to do that, Bradok studied the oncoming force. At least half the city guard seemed to be among the contingent, as well as several members of the council. He spotted Mayor Arbuckle and Jon Bladehook in the lead.
“Bradok,” Mayor Arbuckle called when he’d drawn near enough to see beyond the barricade, but outside of any hand-thrown missile range.
“Right here, Mayor,” Bradok said, coming forward and gesturing so Arbuckle could see him clearly.
“What’s going on over there, Bradok? We’re trying to capture some escaped believers and priests. They came this way.”
“No believers over here,” Bradok said good-naturedly, provoking a ripple of laughter from the dwarves surrounding him.
“C’mon, you don’t belong over there, Bradok,” Arbuckle said, trying to sound conciliatory. “You have your father’s legacy to uphold. You’re no believer; you’re one of us. Lay down your weapons and come back,” the mayor coaxed. “Come back and all will be forgotten.”
“I can’t do that,” Bradok said evenly. “I know what you’re planning. I can’t let you murder or even arrest these people. We don’t want a fight, but we’re ready for one, if that’s your pleasure.”
“Who’s talking of murder?” Arbuckle said uncomfortably. He held his hands up, cautioning Bladehook and the city guard to hold their positions without advancing. “The day is gone, the priests have fled the temple in fear now that their fraud has been exposed. The believers have been proved wrong. We can let bygones be bygones. There is no reason to fear, nor any reason to fight.”
“Listen to him, son,” Sapphire’s voice rang out as she pushed her way through the guardsmen. “I’ve talked to the mayor. He’s even agreed to restore your council seat. Everything will return to normal. You just have to come out. Now stop this nonsense. There are no gods, and there never were.”
Bradok made a show of examining his watch. “I count five more hours till this day is done,” he said. “I’m busy right now. If you want to come back later-”
“There won’t be a later, Axeblade,” Bladehook shouted, no longer able to contain himself, as he stepped up next to the mayor. “This charade ends here and now …one way or another.”
“We are determined to live as free dwarves,” Bradok spat, his temper flaring. “And if necessary we will die as free dwarves.”
“You will die for nothing!” Bladehook screamed, spraying spattle into his beard. “There are no gods! There is no Reorx! There-”
Bradok never knew if Bladehook finished his sentence. At that very moment, a shudder shook the ground so violently that he was hurled from his feet. He tried to rise again, but the ground bucked heavily a second time, throwing him onto his back. A rumbling roar swept the tunnel, followed by the tortured grinding of rocks being torn from the beds of centuries.
Kellik’s rough hands grabbed Bradok and hauled him to his feet.
“Look out!” someone yelled.
Bradok didn’t have to be warned. Up the tunnel, behind Arbuckle and the guards, he could see what was happening in the central cavern of Ironroot. The shaft of sunlight from the overhead crystal shone down on the statue of Argus Gingerbeard; then the light abruptly vanished and a chunk of crystal and rock the size of a building fell on Argus, crushing the statue.
The sight shook Bradok more than anything else he had experienced up to that time. To him Ironroot had seemed eternal, like the mountain itself. However, as he watched, a rain of rocks and debris poured down, obliterating everything beneath it.
“This i
s it!” Bradok yelled as a gout of dust whirled down the tunnel and washed over him. “Hurry! Get to the boat!”
“Wait!” a voice shrieked through the noise.
Bradok turned to see his mother, struggling to rise from where she had fallen. The ground was shaking and cracking. He didn’t see Mayor Arbuckle and Bladehook; they had vanished amid the dust and landslide.
“Son!” she called as their eyes met. “Please! Take me with you.”
Bradok hesitated. It lasted only a second, but that was enough. A rock the size of a cart shook loose from the ceiling and landed on top of Sapphire, flattening her.
“Good-bye, Mother,” he said softly, before he turned and ran.
The hill dwarves and the believers raced ahead of him. Rose Steelspar’s blazing hair flew like a banner for him to follow. In the distance, he could see Perin busily helping a crowded file of dwarves up the narrow ramp and into the boat.
He glanced back as he ran. There was Mayor Arbuckle and the guardsmen, not far behind, charging over the barricade with crazed eyes as the upper tunnel began to collapse behind them.
“Look out, Bradok!” Kellik yelled.
Bradok’s head snapped around just in time for him to avoid running headlong into a chunk of rock that had fallen from the ceiling.
Kellik and Perin stood at the top of the ramp, helping Much into the boat.
“Hurry up,” Kellik called over the roar of the trembling earth.
A chunk of ceiling slammed down just to Bradok’s left, and he felt stinging pain as pieces of rock pierced his exposed face and arm. Blood ran into his eyes, and he could taste it in his mouth.
He staggered, trying to wipe the blood from his eyes, but raced on. His boots hit the ramp, and he surged upward. The most violent tremor yet shook the entire cavern, and the ramp shook free of the boat, bouncing Bradok back to the floor of the cavern.
