by Steve McHugh
Chloe touched Layla on the hand. “You okay?” she asked.
“Worried about Nabu,” Layla admitted. “And my father was unusually calm about being sent back to Shadow Falls. Apart from butchering that blood elf back in the mountain, he was practically normal, whatever that is.”
“I for one enjoy his subdued demeanor more than his usual one,” Chloe said.
“My father is many things,” Layla said, “but subdued is not one of them, unless he’s planning something.”
After a few hours the group traveled through a tunnel that went under a mountain, and Layla watched the dozens of heavily armed dwarves who were guarding the entrance. They’d created a huge stone hut with a watchtower that was at least fifty feet high—and the hut on top was big enough to house a double-decker bus.
The darkness of the tunnel soon gave way to light as the procession of horse riders and carriages reached the other end. The group continued on down a slope that curved around the side of the mountain. Looking out of the carriage, Layla noticed there was a drop on one side of the path that looked to be incredibly high. Far below them a forest stretched as far as the eye could see, only broken by a huge river that almost cut the entire landscape in half.
“How far down is that?” Chloe asked, sounding a little nervous.
“About two thousand feet at this point,” Vorisbo said. “The mountain is about forty thousand feet tall, which is tiny compared to our home mountain, but big enough for our needs.”
They continued on the slope for several more minutes, until the city was revealed to them. The city itself would be impossible to see unless you were on the path. Fifty-foot walls sat between the city and the edge of the slopes, and from what Layla could see there appeared to be hundreds of homes inside the walls of Hreidmar.
“How many dwarves live here?” Layla asked.
“About nine thousand,” Vorisbo said. “There are probably six or seven thousand humans too. The city stretches into the mountain itself, which is where most of the dwarves live and work. This is just the external part. We dwarves might have left our ancestral home, but we haven’t discarded the love of having a mountain over our head.”
The group stopped by the main gates, which were opened by the guards, allowing them into the city itself. Shortly after, the carriage stopped, and Layla climbed out expecting freezing cold air to hit her, but she found it to be cool, yet pleasant.
“Anyone else find it weird not to be cold?” Chloe asked. “There’s snow on the path coming in.”
“Modified runes,” Vorisbo said. “They can be changed to buffer against the more extreme weather systems we get here. The humans who live here are mostly farmers, hunters, and the like. They use a lift inside the mountain to get down to the farmland to the north of here. It’s all walled off and protected by soldiers there too. We rarely have trouble from anything but the occasional errant blood elf or a panther that gets too close.”
Layla looked over at the saber-tooth panther as she padded through the gate, gaining stares from several humans on the stone cobbled streets, as well as from the dwarves who guarded the entrance.
“We usually only see saber-cats like yours when they’re trying to eat us,” one of the dwarves with Vorisbo said.
“She won’t eat you,” Layla told him, feeling pretty certain about that. The cat had shown no hint of aggression toward anyone since she’d rescued it. And while that could always change, she got the impression that, once rescued, the cat felt it had gained a new master. She hadn’t quite figured out how she was going to take it back to the Earth realm and, once the fighting was done, walk the streets of Hampshire with a saber-tooth panther. She guessed she wouldn’t have problems with the neighborhood cats using her garden as a litterbox ever again.
Layla walked away with Vorisbo, Chloe, Tarron, and Dralas just behind her. “Where is Nabu?” Layla asked.
“They’ll have taken him to the palace,” Vorisbo said. “They have the best medical facilities there.”
They walked through the human part of the city, which was sizable. Layla noticed that the houses were between two and five stories in height and built of rock. They were magnificent structures, painted a variety of colors with creatures and runes carved into the very rock.
“Dwarven architecture,” Vorisbo said, catching Layla looking up at several buildings. “Dwarves don’t really do anything unless they can go as impressive as possible. But these are human homes, and humans don’t like having twenty-meter-tall gargoyles looming over them from the tops of their houses. We had to make a few adjustments to the living quarters, make them more plain. Although that didn’t stop us playing around with colors and smaller-scale adjustments.”
They continued through the city until they reached an entrance to the mountain that reminded Layla of the hangars she’d seen at Heathrow Airport as a kid.
As they entered the mountain, Layla’s eyes adjusted to the light beyond, and the magnificence of dwarven architecture was laid bare before her. They were standing fifty feet above the dwarven city that stood inside the mountain, and in the very center was a lift roughly the size of the one in Shadow Falls.
The houses were adorned with creatures of all shapes and sizes, and most of them shone with crystals of every color of which Layla had ever conceived.
“This is the main residential area,” Vorisbo said as they descended a large staircase to the street below. Vorisbo and the other dwarves said hello to dozens of their people, who occasionally shook Layla’s hand or offered them some food and drink.
“We don’t get visitors often,” Vorisbo said with a smile. “And dwarves live to entertain newcomers. There might well be a party in your honor tonight. You don’t even have to turn up; any excuse.”
The group got into the lift and were whisked up several hundred feet to a platform that led to a palace that appeared to be made of pure, black stone, like the citadel. It was roughly twice the size of the palace in Shadow Falls, and there were hundreds of dwarves in armor walking around it.
“We take security seriously,” Vorisbo said. “The blood elf attack was centuries ago, but we dwarves live long lives and have long memories.”
Layla noticed the occasional strange look or stare from the dwarves at Tarron, but the shadow elf either ignored them or was used to them. Either way, he didn’t seem fazed by it.
“Most of my people are working in the mines several miles beneath us, or above us,” Vorisbo said, regaining Layla’s attention. “We’re only about halfway up the mountain at this point.”
“This is where your king lives?” Chloe asked.
“No,” Vorisbo said. “We have no royal family. The elders live here, along with anyone else who runs the government and city. There’s a lift at the side of the palace that goes up to the top of the mountain and down to the bottom, so those who live here can go where they need to as quickly as possible.”
The black palace was littered with tiny, sparkling crystals, making the whole thing look to Layla like the night sky.
“Is Nabu in here?” Layla asked.
Vorisbo spoke to one of the dwarves on guard duty, and he replied.
“I really need to learn dwarven,” Layla said. “I know I learned it from Tarron, but some of it seems to be vanishing. It seems to take longer to translate words in my head.”
“That might actually help,” Chloe said. “Vorisbo, any chance you have another one of those machines we learned your language in? I know the one in the mountain is from the ancient dwarves, and you don’t have any of those, but do you happen to have something similar?”
Vorisbo nodded. “Of course. As for Nabu, he’s undergoing treatment. Once they know more, you’ll be contacted.” She spoke to another dwarf, who nodded. “Okay, the elders will take a while to get together. In the meantime, I suggest that Layla learn our language.”
“How long does it take?” Layla asked.
“I’d like to learn too,” Dralas said.
“I already know it,” T
arron replied.
Vorisbo took the group through the palace, moving down several flights of stairs to a temple similar to the one back in the city of Sanctuary, although it was about a quarter of the size. The interior of the palace was a mishmash of cold, stone floor that was dark blue or white in color and walls of black rock; various rugs, weapons, and artifacts adorned the walls. Layla wondered if the people who built it were all using the same plan, or if everyone just did whatever they liked. It sort of worked, but it left her with the feeling that the dwarves who lived here were clinging to their old lives.
“What is this?” Layla asked pointing to the chair that sat in the smaller temple. There were three dwarves inside the temple, all wearing robes of deep red, instead of the armor that the others wore. Only Chloe joined Layla in the temple.
“We’re scholars,” the closest dwarf said in perfect English. She was bald like Vorisbo and also had several piercings on her face, and a tattoo of a dagger over one eye.
“You will need to sit here,” the dwarf said. “The runes we draw on you will enable you to learn our language so long as you don’t have any memories blocked by blood curse marks.” She turned to the rest of the group. “Please tell me she doesn’t.”
“Not that we know of,” Chloe said.
“Nope,” Layla told her. “Why?”
“It tends to unlock them,” the dwarf said with a cheerful expression. “We had . . . issues.”
“Okay, let’s go,” Layla said, removing her armor and piling it up in the corner.
She climbed onto the chair, sat back, closed her eyes, and allowed the runes to be drawn on her face, neck and arms. And then the world went dark.
13
LAYLA CASSIDY
“Hello, Layla,” Terhal said.
Layla opened her eyes and found herself looking up at the sun. She sat up. She was in a field that stretched to the left and right as far as the eye could see. A forest sat behind her, and in front was a large waterfall that cascaded into a river running along the side of the field.
“Why did you bring me to your little part of my brain?” Layla asked. Since Terhal had begun inhabiting her mind, she’d created a small piece of heaven for herself. The deal was that Terhal lived there until Layla needed her, and neither suffered trying to fight for control.
“To talk,” Terhal said, her black, tattered wings flicking in the breeze.
“We’ve spoken a lot over the years,” Layla said, getting to her feet and brushing the grass off her leather armor. “Mostly we talk about how you’re happy being here, and how you want to know if my ability to control you is wavering so you can leave and create havoc. Which one of those two vastly different conversations are we having this time?”
Terhal smiled, showing her sharp teeth. “It’s two things actually.”
“Okay, so what are they? And am I still in a chair in a dwarven city?”
“Yes to the latter,” Terhal said. “Your brain is currently being bombarded with information. Don’t worry, I don’t think you being here will have any adverse effect on your mind.”
“Thanks for the vote of optimism,” Layla said sarcastically.
“The blood elf commanders. I know what they are.”
“Assholes?” Layla asked.
“Yes, that, but also, they’re not shadow elves.” Terhal waved her hand and the view changed to one of a village ablaze. Night had settled in and people screamed as they ran away from a group of attackers who remained in the darkness. The moon cast an eerie glow over everything, and one human ran past Layla, their face a mask of blood.
“What the hell is going on?” Layla asked as everything froze.
“This is the memory of Gyda,” Terhal said. “You see, I know you and the spirits can see one another’s minds and everything, but turns out Gyda was able to keep things hidden from you. From Rosa and Servius too. Mostly because she doesn’t remember any of this happening.”
“And you didn’t tell me this before because?”
“I didn’t know,” Terhal said, sounding more than a little upset. “Gyda believes that she accepted me, and then burst into flames as I told her I was going to murder everyone. She ran into the lake close by, and the flames didn’t go out. I did tell her I was going to murder everyone. I did try to get her to let me take control. And she did allow it. But only through grief. Her village was already destroyed when I took control. The flames I used were to fight the invaders. I want to make it clear that I didn’t fight them because I felt bad over what they’d done to Gyda’s family and friends, but simply because it was fun to fight them.”
“Okay, what were they?”
Terhal waved her hands and the people began moving again. Hidden shadows cut the humans down as the darkness was slowly lifted, revealing the attackers. There were half a dozen blood elf commanders killing the innocent villagers, but among them were three others, who watched the carnage unfold. They were over six feet tall with golden skin and armor that gleamed, even though they were covered in the blood of those who’d died around them.
“Sun elves,” Layla said. “You think the sun elves are the blood elf commanders?”
“A hundred percent certain, yes,” Terhal said. “Never been more sure of anything in my life. Except killing people. But apart from that.”
“How is that possible? They look like big blood elves, and normal blood elves share a skin tone with shadow elves.”
“I don’t know. But I’ve seen both up close and I can tell you they’re the same species. These aren’t just big blood elves, they’re something else.”
“Okay, let’s say you’re right. Why would they attack this place?” Layla asked, walking around one of the elves as it froze in place. “Why would they agree to become commanders?”
“I don’t know the answer to either question, but I know I’m not wrong, Layla. The sun elves came to this land of the dwarves, and they butchered humans. I saw it. I fought them. I killed them. I was outnumbered, and so I used the power that Gyda had and set fire to the village. She gained control as I stood over her butchered family. Shockingly enough, she wasn’t interested in listening to the truth, and her mind snapped like a twig, so her new reality became the reality. One I didn’t realize was false until I saw you split that blood elf’s head open. Nicely done, by the way.”
Layla ignored the praise. “Sun elves.” She rubbed her temple. “Why are things always more complicated than I want them to be?”
“Yeah, well, that other thing? I’m vanishing.”
“What?”
“I’m going the way of the other spirits. It happened to your friend Chloe, and I imagine your father. I can’t stay in your head forever. At least not in the way we cohabit at the moment. So, I’ll only be out when we sleep. It’s a good thing. For you, anyway. It means I get to stay where I am, and you get all of my power. No need for you to let me out to gain your full power—you already have it at your disposal.”
Layla hadn’t expected to feel sad at the loss of the drenik. “That’s . . . I don’t know.” She hugged Terhal.
“I’m not dying, you crazy umbra idiot.”
Layla smiled. “Still, if I don’t get the chance to tell you, thank you.”
“Piss off,” Terhal said. “I’m not your damn pet.”
“Terhal,” Layla said with a sigh. “Just once, just this one time, don’t try to be an ass. Just accept my words as being sincere.”
Terhal smiled. “Layla, I can honestly say that you are the most fun human I’ve ever inhabited. Now, go save your friends.”
“When will you go?”
“When you finally accept all you are.” Terhal waved away the incoming complaint. “You’ve accepted your umbra status, you’ve accepted me as part of it, but that doesn’t mean you’re at one with yourself. Chloe certainly isn’t—that’s why she’s never been able to step up to the pinnacle of her umbra power. But once you do, once you’re finally at peace with who and what you are, I will vanish and you will gain my power in i
ts total form.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Layla replied.
Terhal shrugged. “Oh, one last thing. Before you go, you’re going to want to see this.”
The sun and blood elves moved again. The sounds of the humans being murdered echoed all around Layla, who was about to tell Terhal to stop when she saw two dwarves standing next to the blood elves. One wore full plate armor with a helmet, and the other just chainmail and leather. The carnage froze once more.
“The dwarves knew,” Layla said.
“The dwarves helped,” Terhal said, and the image vanished.
Layla sat bolt upright, almost spilling out of the chair, but catching herself before she fell, as her breathing raced out of control.
Chloe was beside her in an instant, calming and helping her friend to control her erratic breathing.
It took a few minutes, but eventually Layla sat on the cold, stone floor and looked over at the dwarf who had brought her into the temple. The worry on her face made Layla feel bad for scaring her.
“Are you okay?” the dwarf asked.
Layla nodded. “Wait, are you speaking dwarvish?”
The dwarf nodded. “You had quite the reaction to the method we use. We don’t get to test it often, so I’m glad you’re not a drooling wreck.”
“Me too,” Layla said. “And ordinarily I’d be pretty angry that you didn’t tell me about it being untested, but I think I have bigger problems to relay to your elders.”
“What happened?” Vorisbo asked from the door to the temple.
Layla looked at Chloe. “Terhal showed me something. It’s real. And I think it’s going to cause problems.”
Chloe nodded and looked over at Vorisbo. “Can we go to your elders now?”
Vorisbo nodded. “I’ll take you. Your giant friend, he decided to have your shadow elf companion teach him the dwarven language. It’s not as long-lasting as our way, but honestly I’m not sure Dralas would have fit in here anyway.”
