“Are you coming?” she asked.
“No,” said the woman dwarf as she turned and walked down the same hallway they had just come from.
Zyndalia did not know what to expect when she opened the door, but it was not what she saw. There was a single bathing tub made from stone in the center of the room. Above it was a metal pipe, though she could not distinguish its material. The pipe ran the length of the ceiling, disappearing inside the top of the far wall. There was a small cabinet on one of the walls as well as a rack of towels. Aside from the door she entered, there were two other doors, one on each of the side walls. She stepped in slowly and approached the tub. She heard one of the doors open and saw three other dwarven women enter.
“I am Yoosoin and this is Breinca and Dronkia. We will be preparing you for your Judgement of Rock and Stone,” said the taller of the three women.
“Can you explain it to me? What is going to happen?” asked Zyndalia.
“Please,” motioned Yoosoin, though Zyndalia did not understand what she was being asked to do. “Your clothes. Please remove them.”
“Oh, of course,” she answered and began getting undressed. When she was complete, Yoosoin gestured that she should step into the tub. “I did not know there was water this far under the ground,” said Zyndalia.
“There is, but not much. We do not use water for bathing,” answered Yoosoin.
“What do you use?”
“Steam,” she answered with a smile.
One of the other women pulled a lever on the wall behind the door and a large amount of steam began pouring out of the piping above her. She also noticed more steam coming from the floor beneath her. In a matter of moments, the temperature had increase so much that Zyndalia developed a thick layer of sweat over her entire body. Once the sweat had begun forming steady beads, the dwarven women each produced a small, smoothly polished stone and began running it over her skin effectively wiping the sweat away and into the tub. “The Judgement of Rock and Stone will test who you are. You will be subjected to two trials, each of which will be different than the other. First, you will face the Trial of Fire. Should you pass, you will face the Trial of Ice. If you succeed, your judgement would have been decided.”
“What happens if I do not succeed?” she asked.
“Then your judgement would have been decided as well,” she said with a small grin.
“What happens after?”
“You and your beasts will be allowed to go free, should you pass, that is.”
“They are not beasts,” replied Zyndalia.
“Of course, they are, but what type remains a mystery,” answered Yoosoin.
After about ten minutes, the women were satisfied with their task and handed Zyndalia two small towels to complete the drying process. When finished, one of the women took the towels from her as the other two approached, each holding a flat, round vial about four inches in diameter.
“What is that?” asked Zyndalia,
“Hold out your arms,” said Yoosoin ignoring the question. When Zyndalia complied, both women dipped their fingers in the small vial and began drawing various designs on her outstretched arms, extending the markings over almost every part of her body. As they did, Yoosoin continued, “We have found the resonance of truth to be centered in the merits of individual worth. It is this way for all dwarves, and all dwarves eventually face their own Judgement of Rock and Stone. In that, they are found either worthy of their identities, or not.”
“I do not understand,” said Zyndalia as the women continued applying the cool paint over her exposed skin.
“When we are young, indeed, from the time we are born, we are taught it is not what we do that matters, but who we are. Everything flows from that. I am a Stone Maiden. I have always been a Stone Maiden, even before I passed the Judgement, I knew I was a Stone Maiden. And because of that, I was able to endure to become a Stone Maiden. Do you understand?” said Yoosoin.
“I think so, but I am not a dwarf,” said Zyndalia.
“Just because you are not something, does not mean its truth does not apply to you. For example, let us say that I wanted to become a Stone Maiden, but inside of me, the gifts I had been given from the forming of my body to the workings of my mind, were instead the identity of a dwarven wizard, or dwarven cleric. If my desire and authentic identity to not align, then it will be impossible for me to endure the trials of the Judgement. One cnd pass them only if one’s desire and intent are aligned in the truth of authentic identity,” she said as she continued painting even more intricate designs on Zyndalia.
“What happens if I do not pass?” she asked.
“That is not the right question,” said Yoosoin, grinning.
“What is the right question?” she asked.
“It is not a matter of what will happen, but rather, what it will mean. If one can find the meaning of things, then what happens will reveal itself.”
“Ok. What will it mean then?”
“It will mean that your words will not be the authentic replication of your identity. As such, they cannot be trusted,” said the woman dipping her fingers in more of the paint.
“I have told no lie. Everything I have said is the truth,” said Zyn.
“Yes, but whose truth? Is it your authentic truth based on you knowing exactly who you are, or is it based on a foundation that can and will change? The only way words can truly be trusted is if they have been said by one who knows who they are because that is the only unchangeable truth in life,” she said as she drew four lines beginning at the top of Zyndalia’s forehead down the entirely of her face ending at her breastbone.
“What if I do not know who I am,” she asked.
“Then you had better find out and quickly. We are finished,” said Yoosoin. She and her companions walked to the cabinet placing the paint vials on its counter. “Follow me. Your Judgement of Rock and Stone begins shortly.
Only Yoosoin was present as Zyndalia was led out through the door she had entered. But they did not return to the circular pit. Instead, the progressed farther inside the depths of the mountain passing through huge caverns inside which there were many dwarves practicing their arts of war. Some dwarves were throwing spears at and hitting targets farther away than what Zyndalia believed a spear could be accurately thrown. Others were swinging huge axes and hammers at stone pillars so hard she thought the metal they were made of would surely shatter, but much like the resolution of the dwarven people, they held strong and intact. And still others were engaged in coordinated battle maneuvers building in complexity the longer their drills progressed.
From there, she was led to a ledge littered with ropes tied to spikes that had been driven directly into the stone walls. The ropes fell over the ledge for a distance greater than she could see, not wanting to risk a glance over the edge for fear that her footing be lost. During their journey, she felt the temperature of the mountain interior change from its cool and refreshing beginnings into a warm and comforting feeling similar to what she would feel when her childhood hearth had been purposefully stoked.
As they exited a rather long passageway, she saw a grand cavern expand in front of her. It was easily the largest part of the mountain she had been inside. There were several, at least twenty, huge metal structures in front of her, each easily twenty feet wide and each extending upward to the ceiling tapering into the metal piping she had seen in the tub room. Each of the mammoth circular structures had a large and gaping hole covered by an equally large metal gate. From around the edges of the gates, she could vaguely see a faint orange glow.
“Come. Please,” said Yoosoin.
Zyndalia did not notice, but the vast size of the cavern had caused her feet to slow enough to where Yoosoin had to wait for her to catch up. “Apologies. What is they place?” she asked.
“These are the Great Forges of Kronok. They are responsible for heating the entirety of our mountain city,” said Yoosoin, a slight hint of pride in her voice.
“Why are we h
ere?” asked Zyndalia.
“This is where your first Trial will take place. Please, follow me,” answered Yoosoin.
Zyndalia followed her to the center of the large cavern to stand in front of a circular stone slab approximately seven feet in diameter suspended roughly three feet off the ground by four even spaced iron chains hanging from the cavern ceiling. Yoosoin turned to Zyndalia and silently indicated she should climb onto it. “I assure you, it is quite stable,” she added sensing Zyndalia’s apprehension.
After she climbed onto the stone slab she asked, “What must I do?”
“Endure,” replied Yoosoin.
The young woman heard a series of loud clicks and then a winching noise. From above her, she heard and felt the rungs of the chain being to move. There was a momentary shuddering of the stone slab she was on causing her to flinch, but it evened out as she began her slow ascent. She watched Yoosoin disappear from her view, eventually blocked by the stone slab, as she was slowly raised higher and higher into the expanse of the cavern. The higher she climbed, the more prominent the heat became and the more it reminded her of the warmth of her childhood hearth on the cool, late autumn nights when her mother had instructed Rony to light a fire in their fireplace. When the floor had all but dissolved into the shadow of the height, the stone slab came to a halt. As it did, she heard a very low whooshing noise followed by a slight breeze; however, the breeze did not last long and was soon as still as the resolution of the dwarves.
She looked up and saw the piping from the great furnaces combine, divide, and combine again revealing a mass of interconnecting and diverging pipework. Each pipe was impossible to follow from its beginning to its exit. Her mother had told her stories of how her father had planned to do something similar in their small, and humble home, but had never been able to devote the time to it. That the dwarves were able to complete such a complicated process while suspended hundreds of feet in their air stood as a testament to their convictions, or at least, their wills for survival.
She did not know when exactly, but the temperature had risen to an uncomfortable level. Perhaps this is why she was stripped of all clothing, because of the intense heat. She laid down on the slab seeking to cool herself by whatever means she could. She remembered doing the same thing, though not on as intense of a level with her pillow and bed coverings when she was a girl. She would always shift her body, or flip her pillow so she could take advantage of even the smallest portion of cool fabric. And while it had been moderately successful at home, it was not so now. So much so had the heat increased that she felt it difficult to move as if the now oppressive heat had drained her blood of its life sustaining ability. She was sweating profusely, but not the easy and cleansing sweat the steam of the tub room produced. No, this was a desperate attempt for her body to cool itself, not for comfort, but for life. So thick had the air become, it taxed her lungs to their limits, burning them with every inhalation.
“Who are you?” echoed the male dwarf’s initial question within her mind. She had lived in the footsteps of her mother, learning her healing medicines and potions for the better part of her rearing age. Yes, she learned the bow and arrow too, but that was more from Rony’s insistence than any desire on her part, yet she could not deny the vibrational exhilaration she felt when aligning hers with her targets. In all the time she spent with her mother, never had she experienced the peace and contentment than when her vibrations linked with those around her. It was not the hitting of a successful target that gave her a deeply felt satisfaction, but simply the connection of something unique within her to something unique within another.
Pushed by the unrelenting heat and its oppressive gaze of consuming heartlessness, she sought, one thing, and one thing only – to escape its oppressiveness by any means she could. Had she possessed even an ounce of her strength, she would have thrown herself over the side of the slab and embraced the cooling wind as she plummeted to her death. But not even death, it seemed, would relieve her of her current, disheartening condition. Drained, disconnected, and approaching delirium, she could do nothing more than lay there, exposed in all of her nakedness, stretched out like some roasting meal, and exist.
“Who are you?” echoed his voice, still confined to her memory. She drifted, in a haze of forgetting and forgiving, to a single moment in her quickly diminishing recollection wherein she felt more peace than she had ever felt before. In this moment, following a rare, but particularly poignant argument between she and her mother, she had stormed off into the woods to sit and think. Yes, her mother had been right when she accused her of intentionally altering the recipe for one of her healing potions. When times were tough and pelts were scarce, her mother would sell her healing potions and tonics to a few wealthy merchants. Naturally, their repeat business depended on the consistent results her potions produced. If the recipes were altered, then the results would follow. And nothing is the driver of repeat sales if not the consistency of a well-developed product. It would never be known if she had been right to add more gangleroot. Her mother noticed the difference before it had been sold and poured it out.
In the forest though, surrounded by the trees, vegetation, and animals, she had always found it easy to calm herself by focusing on the differing vibrations, similarly to when she was aiming her bow. She knelt down and extended her vibrations into her surroundings. Somewhere, far off and diffuse, she found one that mimicked hers, though it was just out of phase. She concentrated, and before long, was able to bring hers into its alignment. As if the harmonies of the living things around her all played a different instrument and blended into a harmonic melody, the questions of her life dissolved away into a contentment driven breath of honesty. In that moment, she had found something that mimicked her so closely that it was her. In that moment she knew she was not alone. She knew there was a twin, a compliment, and a completion. In that moment, though she did not know what it was, she knew it was her.
Laying, near death having had her hydration drawn from her body and her will reduced to nothing more than the smallest of trickles, she reached for that vibrational compliment again. She reached and she found it. Distant and faint, it still resonated with the same vibrational print as she did. And thus, it still reflected her. She did not know how, but she knew that as much as she still did not know what it was, she knew it was her. And if she could find it, she would be able to answer the most invigorating and fearful questions allowable to the human condition – who was she?
If she had still been conscious, she would have heard the loud clicking followed by a soft whooshing. If she had still been conscious, she would have felt the stone slab lower and the air cool. And if she had been conscious, she would have felt Yoosoin pick her up and carry her to the recovery room where she would be bathed with cool water. Had she been conscious, she would have heard as the male dwarf spoke, “You have passed the Trial of Fire.”
She woke to the easy and light singing of Yoosoin. Though she did not recognize the words, she understood them to be a melody of sadness and loss; yet still of peace, as if one had just witnessed the first budding leaf in a barren forest made so by an unrelenting winter. She sat up slowly, anticipating her body to refute her intention to move. But when she did not feel the residual weakness from her Trial of Fire, she grew bolder in her rising, swinging her legs over the side of the bed and placing her feet on the ground.
“How do you feel?” asked Yoosoin.
“Surprisingly well,” she responded.
“That is good. You responded well to the tonics,” said Yoosoin standing up.
“I assume I passed the Trial of Fire?” asked Zyndalia, seeking a sort of official confirmation.
“Indeed, you did. You survived. So, who are you Zyndalia?”
“I do not know yet, but I know more than I did. I guess that is a start,” she answered as she stood.
The Stone Maiden walked over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder, “Yes. It is a start, though you had better be prepared to continue your
journey. Your Trial of Ice begins now.”
“No rest for the weary,” said Zyndalia under her breath.
“What was that?” asked Yoosoin.
“Oh, it was nothing. Just something my brother used to say,” she said, grinning.
“Very well, please follow me.”
Again, the Stone Maiden led Zyndalia through the very bowels of the mountain, but instead of descending into its depths, she felt a gradual rise to their trek. The journey itself was arduous at best and almost impossible at its more difficult. There were a couple of occasions she doubted they were going to be able to make it, but with Yoosoin’s help, she was able to pass obstacles she thought would be impassible. As they approached the top, at least she supposed it was the top because they had been climbing for what seemed like hours, she could tell the great furnaces of the dwarven kingdom were reaching their limit. Warmth became chill, chill became cold, and cold became distress. Still naked, she started shivering slightly.
Zyndalia saw a faint, natural light coming from around the corner of their current, stone-carved corridor as well as felt a slightly more uncomfortable gust of wind. “Let me guess, that is the way out,” she said.
“If you are referring to the way out of the mountain, then yes, it is one of the ways out. But I can assure you, in your case, it is the way back in,” said the dwarf woman.
“Endure?” she asked.
“No,” replied Yoosoin. “Survive.”
The bitter cold hit her harder than the strongest forgemaster had ever struck his molten metal. Instantly, her body reacted by shivering harder than she had before. She turned back, but did not see the opening she passed through only moments ago. The snow, driven by the strong winds at the top of the mountain, stung like little insect bites. She hugged herself as tightly as she could, hoping to generate even the smallest amount of heat, but felt her arms and legs already beginning to tighten from within. How she was going to be able to survive this trail, she did not know. Though heat was every bit as deadly as the cold, its effect was longer in its development allowing for a greater chance to avoid the end result. But this bone-chilling, blood-freezing cold had only taken moments to penetrate into her dismay. Whatever confidence she had developed from successfully passing her Trial of Fire was quickly being dismantled by the strength of the mountain.
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