Soldiers of Avarice

by Stephen L. Nowland

  “Tell me again why we’re doing this?” Pacian asked timidly, looking up at the doors. The stark reality of the place was becoming apparent, even to him.

  “In your case, money,” Aiden reminded him, removing a glove and reaching out to touch the rough, weathered stone.

  “Aye, we’re not here fer glory or fame.” Clavis nodded soberly, taking out his crossbow and checking it carefully. “Twice before, this place has thwarted me attempts at recovering the lost treasures of me kin, and I consider meself fortunate to still be drawin’ breath. But I can see the looks in yer eyes, and ye needn’t worry — if’n it looks too dangerous to push through, we’ll call the whole thing off.”

  “How far in do we need to go?” Aiden asked, peering through the gap in the doors and seeing only darkness beyond.

  “The fifth floor down was the height of the flooding, if memory serves,” Clavis explained. “I’m thinkin’ we’ll swing through the fourth level, and maybe see if’n there might be a way to get at the things on the fifth. Might have to go for a bit of a swim, though. We can rest inside, where it’ll be safe and sheltered from the worst o’ the weather.”

  He hefted his repeater and took a step inside the ruined doorway, peering around cautiously, with Sayana following in his footsteps. Aiden waited patiently for the better part of a minute before they heard Clavis declare it safe for the rest of them.

  A small tongue of flame appeared about twenty yards in, dancing in the palm of Sayana’s hand. The light it shed wasn’t nearly enough to gauge the look of the place in which they now stood, but it was comforting nonetheless.

  “We can set up camp here and get some kip,” Clavis called as Nellise whispered a prayer, which caused the tip of her staff to glow with soft light. “We’re in the main foyer, a vast chamber thirty feet high and a hunnerd long, so if there’s something living in here, it’ll find us whether or not we have a fire going.”

  “Nobody and nothing comes here,” Colt muttered. “This place is cursed, and even the animals know that.” Aiden and the others tried to ignore this cheery assessment as they prepared, then ate, a hot evening meal to ward away the chill.

  Aiden slept fitfully during the uneventful night, until awoken by Nellise. Concepts of day and night simply didn’t work down here in the perpetual gloom, but awakening to her exquisite face and golden eyes in the flickering orange firelight was one of the perks of adventuring with her, though Aiden would never actually tell her that.

  They ate breakfast with a measure of enthusiasm for the coming day. Nobody was more excited than Clavis, however, who was well refreshed from his night’s rest and ready to tackle his lifelong dream — again.

  With their supplies packed, they readied their weapons and fell into line behind the dwarf. Sayana used her talents to shed light on their surroundings, but the sheer size of the space they walked through meant they could barely see the ceiling, let alone the walls.

  The stone underfoot was smooth and unblemished, despite having been carved into shape centuries before. There were no signs of any tracks or other disturbances in the immediate vicinity, giving Aiden hope that the place really was deserted.

  A few minutes’ walk from their camp was another set of double doors, similar to the massive gates at the entrance, only this time still intact. They were closed, and bore the marks of heavy siege equipment from some time in the past.

  “Whoe’er cracked open the outer doors tried the same approach on these,” Clavis explained, as would a tour guide. “Little did they know that the ceiling behind these doors collapsed not long after the city were abandoned. Hunnerds of tons of rock have made sure they will never open again.”

  “I assume you have some sort of alternative route?” Nellise remarked, raising her glowing staff high to take in the former majesty of the doors before them.

  “Sure do,” Clavis replied, gesturing to the left. “Figurin’ there was still some treasure to be found below, they opted to dig their way around the inner gates.”

  He led them over to where the walls had been rent by heavy tools. A tunnel of sorts had been dug in through the surrounding rock, circumventing the blocked doors. Clavis didn’t hesitate, stepping straight into the roughly-hewn tunnel, closely followed by Aiden and the others.

  “Was this carved by dwarves?” Aiden asked curiously, drawing an irate look from Clavis.

  “Does this look like the same quality as the foyer ya walked through?” he asked irritably. “Whoe’er did this had no finesse, no skill at all. Just wanted to get into the city and grab whate’er wasn’t nailed down. Little more’n grave robbers,” he added for good measure, although it was unclear if he was disgusted by the grave-robbers, or the poor quality of their stonework.

  The tunnel curved around in a large arc, then rejoined the main structure of the city’s upper floor after a short distance. Not far to their right stood the doors they had travelled around, along with several hundred tons of rock piled up against them. The granite was heaped all the way to the ceiling, a stark reminder that they were walking around inside a hollowed-out mountain.

  “Somehow, several pillars came down in the first years after the exodus,” Clavis observed quietly. “Eventually, the ceiling gave way in the unsupported areas. The rest o’ the place is holding up fine, in case ye were worried about a collapse, by the way.”

  “No, why would we be thinking about that?” Aiden remarked dryly. The chamber they were now in was lined with what appeared to be empty houses, carved with intricacy and care from the surrounding rock.

  Supporting columns similar to those Clavis had described lined what could only be called a street, which continued off into the darkness beyond their lights. In the echoing stillness, they walked along the deserted avenue, mindful of the people who had once filled this place with life.

  “Most of the food services worked up on this level,” Clavis continued, “so the smoke from the fires could get out o’ the ceiling vents. ’Twas the most efficient way to feed the city, so everyone who lived up here was a cook o’ some sort.”

  “I suppose the people who lived on the top few levels were the first out, then,” Aiden mused, looking in through one of the empty windows of an abandoned residence.

  “The MacTavish clan was the most predominant up here,” Clavis answered darkly. “Fancied themselves the kings o’ the upper levels. When the surge of people running up from below flooded this place with men and women lookin’ ta get out as quick as they could, the MacTavishes joined them, without thinkin’ o’ the real king o’ Ferrumgaard, Arland the seventh, trapped down below in his throne room.”

  His speech was laden with barely disguised hatred, so much so that Aiden turned and looked at the normally cheerful dwarf to make sure it was the same person.

  “If the place was flooding, it would have been suicide to try and get down there to save them,” Nellise noted in a quiet voice.

  “He was their king, and they shoulda saved ’im,” Clavis reiterated firmly, before he noticed that everyone else was staring at him and quickly shook off the dark mood. “That’s all in the past now,” he muttered in a more reasonable tone of voice as he continued on, with Aiden exchanging a worried glance with Nellise.

  The cavernous hallway ended in a large stone wall, with a wide stairwell carved into it. The stairs seemed sturdy enough, in spite of being chipped and cracked in places. They were fully enclosed by solid granite on either side, preventing any chance of plunging to one’s death.

  Nellise and Sayana walked alongside Clavis to light the way down, carefully avoiding fallen chunks of rock that had accumulated on the stairs over the past century. The air was noticeably warmer here, and as they reached the bottom of the stairs, a clearly-defined street stretched out before them, threading its way amongst tightly-clustered buildings.

  “Each o’ the buildings you see around us was a craftsman’s forge,” Clavis proudly explained. “There be a hunnerd of ’em on this floor alone, and back in the day, the sound of all them hamm
ers workin’ away was like nothing else ye ever heard.”

  They continued along the street until they came to another collapsed section blocking their passage. Clavis was unperturbed, instead choosing a different route through the ancient city that avoided the obstruction.

  The closely-grouped buildings ended abruptly, giving way to an immense open area before them. In the middle of this cavern was a gargantuan device, much like a giant pot — it had to be over fifty feet in width, and Aiden couldn’t even guess at the weight of the thing.

  One of the massive braces holding it up had failed years ago, leaving the cauldron leaning heavily to one side. Old and decaying leather gloves, rusty metal tongs, and other equipment were strewn around on the stone floor at its base, as well as a fine layer of sand that had spilled out of a large clay vessel.

  Huge blocks of stone, carved to channel molten iron, hung suspended by big, rusty chains over a gaping hole in the floor, where white-hot metal had once flowed. Their puny lights could not penetrate the darkness of that hole well enough to see the bottom, though Aiden could see the outline of a stairwell not far from their position.

  Beyond the pot, a colossal furnace lay dormant, charred black from years of use, and decaying slowly with time. A solid layer of rust covered the machine, along with scattered parts to what must have once been an elaborate pulley system. Aiden stared in amazement at the sheer scale of the foundry, unable to fathom the need its vastness.

  “Told ya ye’d be impressed.” Clavis chuckled at their expressions. “This is a hint of what the dwarves of Ferrumgaard were capable of back in the day, and I doubt we’ll see their like again. They’d forge massive engines here, both for peacetime and for war, and of course parts for maintaining the city’s infrastructure.

  “There’s no point dwelling on the distant past, for the real treasure lies beneath us. The stairwell beckons, over yonder.” He pointed towards an area past the gaping maw of the furnace, over near the northern wall.

  Wordlessly, they moved on to the stairwell and down to the next floor. It was like the last staircase they had taken, wide and smooth. This one circled around the great hole in the floor where they would have been able to see the machinery of dwarven industry at work, had it still been operating.

  The air was becoming stale as they descended into areas where fresh air couldn’t readily reach, and the dry smell of stone and dirt was becoming stronger. The architecture of the nearby buildings returned to the closely-built, multi-story structures the dwarves seemed to have favored, although here they seemed to be less intricately carved than on the floors above. Several of them had collapsed over the years, leaving large chunks of rock strewn about on the empty streets.

  “Housing for the workers,” Clavis grunted as way of explanation. “Our industrious grave-robbers were probably disappointed with what they found when they first set eyes on this place. We’re close to the collapsed section that stopped me progress a few years back. It’s naught but a five-minute walk from here.”

  The dwarf led them past the remains of his people’s engineering accomplishments and through a narrow street, lined with the crumbling tenements of the dwarven working class. “If it’s so easy to get to this point,” Pacian inquired as they travelled, “why has it taken you years to get back down here?”

  “It’s hard to find anyone crazy enough to come with me,” Clavis muttered ruefully. “Ferrumgaard is no place to travel alone, something I learned the hard way. That’s why together, we’ll beat this place, and ye’ll all be the richer for it.”

  Twice, in the next few minutes, they had to clamber over piles of rock, or detour around even larger piles of rock. The place really was coming apart. As if to tweak his fears, Aiden swore he could feel a slight vibration through the soles of his boots, although it was possible he was imagining things.

  It was closer to ten minutes before they reached a towering section of fallen rock, large enough to bury several buildings completely. There wasn’t any way around this one that they could see within the range of their light sources, so Aiden assumed this was the collapse that Clavis had spoken of.

  “Here it be,” he muttered, looking up towards the unseen ceiling somewhere above.

  “This?” Pacian remarked incredulously. “This is what stopped you, last time you were here?”

  “Aye, lad,” Clavis answered solemnly.

  “I see. So how, exactly, were you planning to get around it?” Pacian asked. “It’s as big as the pile blocking the big doors upstairs.”

  “Ah, this time I came prepared, with tools and knowledge,” Clavis answered, giving the others a wink. He took off his backpack and pulled out something wrapped in hessian. He withdrew a few things from the wrapping, and then carefully assembled a heavy pickaxe, with a flat-bladed shovel on its other end.

  “You’re going to dig through all that with a bloody pickaxe?” Colt asked flatly. “I don’t suppose you brought enough for all of us?”

  “By me calculations,” Clavis said, oblivious to the pessimism brewing in the group, “the uppermost rock will be the thinnest, and will only take a day or two ta clear a way through to the other end o’ the hall, which will lead us to the stairs down. Ye can help me move some o’ the looser rock, and to be sure that’ll speed our progress. I’d ask that one of ya keep watch on our little excavation site, though, just to be safe.”

  “I’ll do that,” Pacian volunteered. “The rest of you can move rocks around all day long if you like.”

  “Ever the gallant gentleman,” Nellise remarked dryly.

  “Well, I would assume that Clavis isn’t asking the women to do heavy lifting; am I right?” Pacian pressed.

  “Only if’n they feel like it,” the dwarf replied. “But no, I was thinkin’ our big ranger friend might help me out.”

  “Fine by me,” Colt shrugged, removing his equipment and his leather tunic and undershirt. “Don’t think for a moment I don’t know you’ve taken guard duty to get out of real work,” he added to Pacian.

  “I’m not going to dignify that with an answer,” Pacian stated flatly, then walked off to look around the area. Clavis took a torch out of his pack and lit it, then carefully started negotiating his way to the top of the rock pile. Aiden took off his leathers and shirt to lend a hand, while Nellise took out a few torches from her pack, lit them up, and tossed them around the site to provide more light.

  “What’s that over there, sticking out of the rock?” Sayana said, appearing beside Aiden suddenly. He turned and peered in the direction she was pointing and saw something other than rock at the bottom of the pile, close to the edge of the light. It was yellowish-white, and seemed to be sticking out from the stone at an awkward angle.

  Curious, the two of them moved in for a closer look. “Is that what I think it is?” Aiden asked, as the object took on a disturbing shape.

  “It looks like bone to me,” Sayana answered clinically. She knelt down and moved away some of the rock and dirt with her free hand, to reveal the forearm of a deceased person. The arm was reaching out from the rock pile, as if the person had been trying to pull themselves out.

  “There’s probably more of him under the rock,” Aiden commented darkly, not exactly enthusiastic about trying to find out. He couldn’t tell if it was male or female, and wasn’t sure it was important. The bones were clean, without any trace of flesh on them.

  “What have you found?” Nellise asked, coming over to see what the fuss was about. She gasped slightly when she saw what they were looking at, and then leaned in to inspect the remains with a professional eye.

  “This is the forearm of a human male,” she stated, pointing at the elbow. “Women have different elbows, and the other races have a different bone structure and size from ours.”

  “Any idea how long it’s been here?” Aiden asked.

  “It’s hard to say from looking at the remains,” Nellise mused. “But I can pray on this ,and ask for divine inspiration to provide me with an answer.”

&nbs
p; “You can do that?” Aiden asked, surprised.

  “Of course. With a little help, I will find the answers I seek. Now please, move aside; I need to be close to the remains.”

  Aiden obliged her, stepping back to give her some space. Sayana did likewise, though with a frown on her fair features. She tilted her head and looked around, puzzled for a moment, as if she wasn’t sure if she’d heard something or not.

  “What is it?” Aiden whispered.

  “I thought I heard ... no, felt something nearby,” Sayana whispered back.

  Aiden looked directly at her, suddenly very serious. “Kind of like a vibration?”

  “I suppose so, yes. I’m not sure what to make of it.” She shrugged.

  “But you definitely felt it,” Aiden persisted. “You weren’t imagining it, right?”

  “Certainly not,” Sayana replied archly. “I didn’t survive in the wild unable to tell the difference between real and imagined things.”

  “Right, sorry,” Aiden mumbled in apology, too distracted to pay much attention to what she was saying. If the vibrations he’d felt earlier weren’t his imagination, then what were they?

  “Hey, you can stop working, I found a better way to get through that rock pile,” Pacian called out as he jogged back towards the site where Clavis and Colt were starting to really get things moving.

  “Don’t waste yer time, lad,” Clavis replied from his perch near the top of the rock pile. “The only way through to the tunnels beyond is behind these rocks.”

  “Or the bloody big tunnel I found over on the northwest wall,” Pacian replied smugly. “But you can keep digging if you really want; I’m okay with that. I’ll sit down over here, and—”

  Colt interrupted his speech by letting a heavy rock drop to the ground with a loud thud, and then dusted off his gloved hands. “Sometimes you don’t know when to shut up, Pacian,” he growled, leaning over to pick up his armor again. “Clavis, are you sure there wasn’t another way through that you missed?”