The Hammer of Fire

by Tom Liberman

  “Of course I’m a witchy woman,” she said with a smile that revealed at most half a dozen teeth. “You think an old woman can live out here in the wild without being a powerful witch?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it,” said Brogus with a smile, “people always say I’m a little bit slow. Mom always says I got the brawn but not the brains.”

  The old woman laughed out loud, “Fair enough then, fair enough. Now, dearies, I’ve got a kettle of Meadow-Wort stewing over there but we can put something for eating on in about two hours. Can you wait that long? You look famished.”

  The three travelers looked at one another and shrugged at almost exactly the same moment, “I think we can wait,” said Milli. “What’s Meadow-Wort?”

  “I’m kind of hungry now,” said Brogus in a whisper but a sidelong look from Milli, filled with menace, immediately silenced him.

  The old woman hooked her arm under Milli’s and led her over to the large kettle which was at a low boil. “Some folks call it Lady of the Meadow but we witchy types like to go with the most foul sounding name. It impresses the yokels. Meadow-Wort has a sweet flavor but I use it for aches and pains not for spicing. You boil the roots with water for a few hours and then let them dry. Once they’re ready I powder them and add a little secret of mine that I don’t like to give out, you understand I’m sure. The powder is good for headaches and the like but it does tend to upset the stomach and that’s why I add my special ingredient. Are you interested in the herbal ways? You’re a beautiful girl, there’s not a lot of call for types like you in the witchy world.”

  “I’m an old hand at flattering people to get what I want,” said Milli as she turned to the boys with a smile and squeezed the old woman’s arm, “so don’t try that with me.”

  Old Petra guffawed out loud and put her arm all the way around the little Halfling girl, “I’ll make a witchy woman out of you, pretty or not. Come over here and let’s talk. You boys get some more firewood, stoke that blaze. I’ve got cooking gear in the wagon, get that and bring it out. I know dwarves, yes I do. You just might find a keg of hard cider in there as well. Tie your mules up next to Harpus there and get to work.” With that proclamation the woman led Milli over to the boiling kettle and left Brogus and Dol to carry out her orders.

  Three hours later the four sat before a low fire with half a dozen pots and pans scattered around the clearing, a jug on its side near Brogus, empty plates on their laps, and full bellies.

  “You’re quite a cook, Old Petra,” said Brogus leaning back and patting his belly. “I haven’t eaten that well in almost two weeks, since we ….” He suddenly stopped and clamped his mouth shut.

  The old woman glanced towards Brogus with a flicker of her eyes but then continued on as if she didn’t notice the sudden end to the sentence. She put one last forkful of food in her mouth and then smiled broadly at him, “I guess you don’t want any pie then?”

  “Pie?” said Brogus with a huge grin. “I never said I was full. By the way, how did you know my family is the Horncalls?”

  Petra smiled, “I’ve met quite a few traveling dwarf caravans over the years. You have the jaw line of the Horncalls and you certainly don’t have the demeanor of a Firefist, Blackiron, or Drawhammer. Even if you were an apprentice fleeing your indemnity you’d have the arrogance of one of the three families.”

  “What do you know about the three families?” said Dol as he stood and began the cleaning process. He didn’t wait for the woman to answer but immediately started gathering up pots, pans, and plates.

  Petra nodded her head and gave off a short little snort like laugh, “You dwarfs and your hidden citadel. Do you really think no one knows about Craggen Steep? It’s been up in the mountains for a thousand years at least and times are changing out here in the world. Corancil tamed the north, brought down the Fist of Stav’rol, the Iron Gates of Das’von; he’s negotiated a peace with the sea kings of Sea’cra, and now he’s planning to invade the southern realms. It’s only a matter of time before he turns his eye towards the gold in those mountains. If I know about it, then you can bet he does as well.”

  Dol looked at Brogus, Brogus looked at Milli, and Milli looked at Dol. “She has a point,” said Brogus with a shrug of his shoulders. “Now that I think about it, it does seem rather silly to think people don’t know about us. We send out trading caravans. There’s that road leading right up to the mountain.”

  “Do you know where Corancil is right now?” said Milli. “We hoped to join his army and head south with the invasion.”

  The old woman watched as Dol carefully cleaned each plate of debris, putting the scraps in a little paper sack which, when full, he tossed well away from the camp, “I can take you there if you’d like. I’ll need payment of course,” she said with a little shrug.

  “How much,” said Milli with a sideways glance at the old woman.

  “A gold coin a day seems reasonable,” she said with a frown. “It is out of my way and I’d be losing all the clients who come to me here for their potions and such.”

  “That’s no problem,” said Brogus with a smile and immediately began to reach for the pouch hidden away deep in his jerkin.

  “We should talk about this,” said Milli and tried to stop Brogus.

  Brogus ignored the girl, stood up, rummaged around under his thick fur coat, pulled out a sack that made a loud chink, extracted a dozen heavy gold coins, and then handed them to the old woman, “That’s good for a couple of weeks, right?”

  Petra blinked rapidly for a few seconds and then held out her own hand to take the offering, “Yes, maybe a little more than that.”

  Brogus gave her the coins, which she lifted up and down for a few seconds unable to keep a wide smile off her face, “Did you say something about pie?” he asked with a broad smile and tucked the still heavy pouch away.

  “Oh,” said Petra suddenly emerging from her reverie with a wide smile on her face. “Yes, of course, a pie. No extra charge!”

  Chapter 9

  The snow covered mountains to the north of Das’von reflected the blinding winter sunlight into the glacial bay for only a few hours during the deepest winter months but the city itself thrived year round. Now, with the army of Corancil gathered in a ramshackle tent encampment built outside of the city the place thrummed with the life of not only the huge influx of people but also from the massive ongoing construction projects that sprang up at virtually every corner. Dol, Milli, Brogus, and Petra spent their first two days after arriving at the city simply trying to get into the center of town but utterly failed in that endeavor. The ancient city was being transformed from wood to brick and stone at a frenetic pace and much of the central region that housed the bustling expanded government of Corancil was off limits to anyone accept workers and diplomats.

  It didn’t take long for the three mountain dwellers to learn the value of the gold coins that they carried. Petra steadfastly refused to give them a return on their original and vast overpayment for services. “Consider it an expensive lesson,” she said once and then refused to take up the subject again. Eventually they settled outside of the city in a ramshackle zone used by soldiers, hangers-on, and other never-do-wells that always seem to accumulate around conquerors. It was dirty, unpleasant, and overcrowded but there was no denying the buzz of energy all over the city. Despite the conditions people almost universally wore smiles on their faces and went about their business in a cheerful fashion.

  On this bright and sunny day, Dol and Brogus climbed out of the ramshackle hut a quarter mile outside of town that had served as their domicile since they arrived at the city almost two weeks before. “It’s impossible,” said Brogus as he looked around with bleary, morning eyes despite the fact that it was already noon. To their north lay the city where a thousand workers scrambled over the old walls tearing them down stone by stone as they expanded the outer perimeter. “We’ve been here two weeks and we can’t even get near the palace. There are ten thousand soldiers in tents and twi
ce that many petitioners trying to get to see Corancil. This was a mistake from the beginning. We’ll never get to see anyone in power.”

  “What do you propose,” said Dol as he also rubbed his eyes and took in the hustle and bustle of the city. It wasn’t as big as he originally expected although clearly the new ruler had plans for massive expansion. On their first day in the city they wandered around and found the proposed Grand Plaza at the center of the city. For now it was merely a dug up patch of earth and dirt that was once a great slum a mile in diameter. The old buildings and poor people now took up residence either outside the city walls or in some of the new housing districts still under construction. According to rumor, Corancil planned some sort of permanent art exhibition in the dug up territory and that, in addition to the expansion of the city walls, the building of grand new structures, and the influx of countless soldiers made the place hum with excitement. “We’re here now. I will return to Craggen Steep with my head low.”

  A young boy, of perhaps seven or eight, wearing a ragged overcoat that dragged the ground around his ankles stopped and looked up at the two for the briefest of instants as he heard the name of the hidden citadel and then dashed off dodging a pair of tall warriors as they emerged from around a corner.

  “No, no,” said Brogus shaking his head. “You’re right about that. We can’t go back to Craggen Steep like this, but there is no way we can get an audience with Corancil. The best we can hope for here is to be recruited as common soldiers. That’s the plan as far as I can tell. What do you want to do?”

  Dol shook his head at that suggestion but did not reply.

  “The girls will figure out something,” said Brogus as he turned and looked towards the hundreds of other little half-built wood shacks that lined the muddy thoroughfares that made up the city outside the city. “This place stinks, I haven’t bathed in weeks, I stink.”

  Dol scratched his head through heavily matted hair and nodded, “We need to find our own way south.” He looked to the icy bay where hundreds of ships docked and unloaded goods from the southern lands to feed the throngs in the city. “We should find a ship heading south, join up with them.”

  Brogus turned back from their little shack, kept moderately tidy but still a hovel at best, and looked towards the clear blue water of the bay. “I’ve never been aboard a ship. I’ve heard the motion will make you sick.”

  “At least we’ll have clean water,” said Dol as he watched a neighbor dispose of a chamber pot by throwing it into the street. “My sense of smell is gone but my eyes water from the filth of this place. I will not stay a day more. I’m going down to the docks to find a ship.”

  Brogus watched his friend gather up his equipment, including the great hammer which he wore around a loop on his belt so that the head swung free. They’d tried to cover it up early in their trip for fear dwarf pursuers might see the distinctive weapon, but a couple of incidents where Dol caught himself on fire eventually persuaded them to use the current arrangement. The hammer seemed to be growing more lively each day Dol handled the thing.

  “I’ll wait for the girls,” said Brogus with a half-hearted yell and waved at his friend. He felt low. They arrived in the city with such high hopes but their inability to make any headway in their efforts to see the new conqueror, the oppressive environment of the tent city, and the general sense of their impending failure seemed to sap all his strength. He slumped to a seat on a tree stump near the little shack and began to pick up little sticks from the ground, break them, and toss them away. That’s how Milli and Petra found him two hours later when they returned to the hut.

  “Brogus, how long have you been sitting there and where is Dol?” asked Milli as she stood over the dwarf with a frown on her face. She had tied her hair back in a bun so tight that it stretched her face, she wore a thick coat covered with grime, and she appeared wan with little color in her face.

  Brogus simply sat there without answering as he looked at the twig in his hand.

  “Brogus,” she repeated and smacked the dwarf on the shoulder. “Where’s Dol?

  Brogus looked up with a glassy eyed gaze and shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not sure.”

  Milli looked at Petra, “This place is killing us. The cold, the inactivity, the filth. We’ll never get to see Corancil. We need to leave.”

  “That’s what Dol said,” said Brogus although his tongue felt like a thick layer of fur rested on it and the words seemed to ooze like tree sap.

  Milli shook her head and turned to the old woman, “That’s it. We’re leaving tomorrow morning. We’ll head south on our own. How far did you say the southern volcanoes are from here?”

  “I’ve never been anywhere near that far south,” said Petra with a shrug although her own complexion was pallid and her voice barely carried beyond her two friends. “I know there are some great lakes in the center of the continent and those are said to be ten thousand miles from here.”

  “If that’s the center of the world then how much further is the southern tip?”

  The old woman shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. “A lot further than that gold you gave me will take you.”

  “We gave you enough gold to last five years,” said Milli with a fierce look at the old woman. “You can pretend it was an expensive lesson but you’ll get nothing more from us. You can leave anytime you want.”

  Petra smiled and patted Milli on the back, although the Halfling girl turned and stepped away from the contact. “No, no. I’ll stick with you for a while longer. This is proving to be a most interesting trip and I’ve seen those little pouches of gold coins and gemstones you carry. I could do far worse for travelling companions.”

  “Don’t mention the gold,” said Milli in a hushed voice. “If these cutthroats knew the value of our purses then our lives wouldn’t be worth the price we paid for this shack. We need to go find your wagon up in the hills and get out of here.”

  “What about the mules? Do you want to bring them along as well,” said Petra with a wicked grin as she asked the question in a toneless voice that belied her amusement.

  Milli spun around and started to spit out something but managed to stifle her anger and just glared at Petra. After a moment Milli turned back to Brogus, “What did Dol say?”

  “He said we need to get out of here. He was going to hire a ship,” said Brogus with a nod of his head towards the crystal blue water in the bay.

  Milli looked over to the water and the many ships that bobbed placidly on its surface. A few days after they arrived, a winter storm blew through the capital and half a dozen of the small ships crashed on the rocks killing many people. “I don’t know about ships. I don’t know how to swim and neither do any of you. That water is cold,” she finished with a shiver and remembered her one attempt at a bath in a secluded little arm of the bay.

  “A ship would be a faster way to get to the southern realms,” said Petra. “Although we’d have to leave the mules behind.”

  Milli suddenly smiled and her yellow eyes shone so brightly that a pair of young soldiers stopped and looked at the pretty Halfling girl. Her smile turned into a snarl, “What are you looking at?” she snapped at them and put her hand to the dagger at her side.

  The soldiers laughed, punched one another in the shoulder, and eventually wandered off. They wore sky blue jerkins with the silhouette of a small cat imprinted on the front and carried long swords in their belts. One of them called out over his shoulder, “See you later, cutie!”

  “Argggh,” said Milli. “This place is filled with boys and all of them gross. I thought it was bad back at home but this is ridiculous. At least dwarves don’t just pinch you for no reason. Did you say Dol went to get passage on a ship?” she asked, turning to Brogus with narrowed eyes and lips tightened into a line.

  Brogus nodded his head and continued to fiddle with a little stick in his hand.

  Milli slapped the stick away, “Put that down. What is wrong with you?”

  Brogus shrugged again
and reached for the stick but Milli put her foot on it. He looked up at her lazily and smiled in a goofy way.

  “That’s it,” said Milli. “There is something in the air or the water. We need to get out of here as quick as possible or we’ll be stuck forever.”

  Petra raised her eyebrows, “From what I can tell he’s been drinking mostly beer and wine since we arrived.”

  Milli shook her head, “He’s a dwarf! He can handle his beer. Their mothers spoon it to them when they’re babies to keep them sedated.”

  Petra shrugged, “All these soldiers, nothing to do, it’s a recipe for trouble. Dwarf he may be but he’s a male, and males are all susceptible to the same vices.”

  “That’s a fact,” said Milli and put her arm around the older woman. “We gals have to stick together.”

  At that moment, Dol limped into camp. His right sleeve was torn and blood from a scrape on his knee had dried to a crusty brown. “Hello.”

  “What happened to you,” said Milli rushing over to the dwarf.

  “Some soldiers thought I might be an easy mark,” said Dol with a smile and his eyes blazed red for the briefest of seconds.

  “Are you ok?” asked Milli as she shoved Brogus off the stump, sat Dol down, and began to examine the scrape. “It doesn’t look too bad.”

  “You should see the other guy,” said Dol with a smile and Milli took a step back and looked at the dwarf with her arms folded over her chest. “It’s got to be the water in the place. Dol, you haven’t been drinking, have you?”

  Dol shook his head, “No. The beer is vile but the water,” this with a glance to the glacial stream that poured tens of thousands of gallons into the bay every second, “is exceptional. I cannot fathom why anyone would drink the slop they serve in the common houses.”

  “It’s not that bad,” said Brogus with a little smile.

  “Yes, it is,” said Milli with a shake of her head. “You’re not drinking any more beer as long as we’re in Das’von.”