Hammer and Axe

by Dan Parkinson

  As the final lift-lines were laid, from the Shaft of Reorx to hewn shelters behind the curtain rods, Gem told himself, “It’s all Willen Ironmaul’s fault, really. He’s the one who insisted that every tool must double as a weapon. And if the Shaft of Reorx isn’t a tool, what is?”

  Clamors echoed along the wide way, from the reaches beyond the Shaft toward Anvil’s Echo and Southgate, then the drums sounded and hundreds of dwarves came streaming past, vacating the outer roadway. They were acting as he had ordered, and he had his guards hurry them on, getting them well clear of the waiting spunstone curtain. He wasn’t at all sure what was going to happen when the curtain was closed and the lid-lines were pulled, but he knew the open tunnel would be no place for any dwarf to be.

  “If I had this to do again,” Gem assured himself, “I wouldn’t think of it at all. This is entirely the fault of those Aghar. If they hadn’t decided to dump their chamber pots in the Shaft of Reorx …”

  Then there was no time for further recriminations. The outer tunnel was clear and vacated, except for four tall figures coming toward him, approaching the great shaft with its “Temple of Stars” lens above it. Wizards. Human wizards, inside Thorbardin.

  “Close the curtains,” Gem Bluesleeve commanded and lent a hand as dozens of his own guard labored to draw the heavy fabric along its curved ceiling rod, while others attached its trailing edges to stone rings below. Within moments, the entire tunnel was sealed off by heavy, dense fabric woven from the fibers of tractor worm nests—fibers that were drawn from stone by the worms and woven by the Klar who worked the worm warrens. It was the same fabric that the Daergar used for insulated garb in their brimstone pit-mines, and smelter-men wore from head to toe in their furnace coves. Better than anything else the dwarves had discovered, spunstone shielded against extreme heat.

  Through a flap, Gem looked out into the great concourse. Three of the four wizards were coming toward the curtain. The fourth was still standing beside the ring-wall of the great shaft, staring upward in amazement at the convex lens called the Temple of the Stars.

  The warden of the watch sighed. It was time to test his theory. “Reorx be with us,” he muttered and picked up one of the lid-lines. Around him, his guards picked up others.

  “Pull!” Gem Bluesleeve shouted.

  The lines came taut, and the dwarves leaned into them. A hundred yards away, beyond the spunstone screen, cable scraped and sang at the lip of the Shaft of Reorx, and far below in the shaft’s north wall hinges creaked and a heavy, metal cap slid open. From the wide hole behind it, water shot out, a great stream of water six feet wide and driven by the weight of three fathoms of Urkhan Sea.

  The wizard beside the pit glanced downward and stared in disbelief. Far below him, thousands upon thousands of gallons of water were spewing from the shaft’s wall, plummeting downward toward the impossibly distant speck of glare below.

  A great roar arose from the open shaft, and the other three wizards, who had almost reached the spunstone screen, turned to look back.

  For a long moment there was nothing to see except the laggard Kryxan leaning over the wall of the deep shaft, staring downward. The roar grew, and other, deeper roars joined it.

  “See what that is!” Porcirin demanded.

  “It’s water!” Kryxan called. “A lot of water, falling into this hole. This thing has sprung a leak!”

  The roars grew as the great tumult of water fell downward and downward, deeper and deeper into the shaft, falling toward the open pit of pure magma a half mile below.

  Then the roars became a bellow as huge, dense clouds of hot vapor shot upward, filling the shaft, exploding above the walled rim and expanding. The wizards screamed, tore at their throats as hot mists scalded them, then sagged and fell as the vapors were pushed aside by a huge, thundering gout of pure, live steam shooting from the Shaft of Reorx. In an instant the entire concourse, from the Southgate plug to the whipping, drumming spunstone screen, was filled with superheated steam. Even the spunstone screen did not stop all the heat. Behind it, Gem and the others dived for their hewn shelters and pulled thick layers of stoneweave over themselves.

  Half a mile away, in Anvil’s Echo, the great vaulted chamber filled with steam and vapors, and dwarves behind their sealed murder holes abandoned their posts and raced for cooler places.

  “That’s enough!” Gem Bluesleeve hissed. “Reverse the lines!” Red-faced and gasping, scalded even behind their protective screen, dwarves dropped the lid-lines and pulled desperately on others to close the lid on the waterfall within the Shaft of Reorx. The roar diminished slowly, though the rumble of expanding steam continued for several minutes.

  Gem waited nearly an hour before chancing a glance through the screen’s flap. Beyond, vapors rolled along the ceiling of the concourse, and the floor was awash in foot-deep water, slowly draining away into the lower levels of Anvil’s Echo.

  “What a mess!” a dwarf beside the warden of the watch said. “Where are the wizards?”

  At first, they saw no sign of the four intruding humans. But then, as the condensing vapors receded and the waters lowered, they saw four indistinct lumps on the floor. Opening the curtain at one end, Gem and a few others waded out into the concourse and paused to stare at what was left of the wizards. It was not dwarven nature to have weak stomachs, but some of them turned away quickly. None of them had ever before seen what live steam can do to living flesh.

  “I expected to see steamed wizards,” a young guard muttered, pale and shaken. “This is just bones and slop.”

  Gem Bluesleeve waded across to the Shaft of Reorx. No water had actually reached the magma, of course. The heat halfway down the shaft had been intense enough to vaporize any liquid. But a great deal of energy had been expended in converting water to steam, and now the “eye” of the magma pit far below glowed smoky red.

  “Breath of Reorx,” Gem sighed. “There will be some who will want to draw and quarter me for this.”

  On the slope below Southgate, the battle had continued, far more fiercely now that most of the human mercenaries were without wizards to give them illusions, and many were thoroughly disappointed as word spread that the coins they had received—and those promised—were not coins at all but simply spell-changed pebbles. As with most humans, the hired warriors were willing to accept magic as part of their world, but when it came to money they wanted true, hard coinage cast in honest foundries and stamped by real molds.

  To make things worse for the marauders, it was plain to see that the great gate above them was closed, and even if they made it that far, getting through it would be impossible. In the meantime, the dwarves pressed the battle with renewed vigor, and more and more of their engines came into play as the field spread and scattered. The big discobel still thundered now and then, its great, whirring disks of death cutting through everything in their path. Also, the dwarves were using dozens of catapults and assorted flingers, now that the ramparts were clear. All sorts of mischief fell among the humans as these engines did their work. The most dangerous missiles were loads of iron rubble, and great baskets of discard from forges and foundries. These odds and ends of metal screamed and whined through ranks of marauders, cutting them down by the dozens. But the most disconcerting were little canisters of bronze that left a trail of smoke behind them as they arced through the air, then exploded with a bang, throwing bits of bronze in all directions. Everywhere one of these exploded, there were clouds of white smoke that smelled like rotten eggs.

  Still, the humans continued their fight, until—abruptly—little fissures and crevices all along the lower slopes began spouting great clouds of hot steam. From every crack and pore in the mountain, it seemed, steam hissed forth directly into the faces of the humans in the lines.

  It was more than reasonable mercenaries—no longer bound by magic—could be expected to tolerate. Within minutes, most of the attacking bands had turned and were in full flight, scattering toward the Promontory and points beyond. Cohorts and com
panies of dwarves raged after them, sweeping the field, but by the time the sun of Krynn sat upon the Anviltops to the west, there was no one left for the dwarves to fight. With their longer legs, the surviving humans had outrun their pursuers and had not turned back.

  It would be estimated by human chroniclers that more than four thousand of the human horde survived the attack upon Thorbardin. In the scrolls of Quill Runebrand, the number would be set at two thousand, seven hundred … human losses of more than four thousand, against two thousand, one hundred and thirty-four dwarves who would not see tomorrow’s sun through the sun-tunnels. There would be great mourning in Thorbardin, and the grief would last a long, long time. But what mattered most was that fortress Thorbardin, almost ninety-one years after its inception, had endured its first full-scale test as a fortification and had stood firm. Old Kal-Thax remained intact, the realm of Thorbardin was tempered by blood and steel, and its people were—as they had always been—the bonded thanes and scattered Einar of the dwarven race.

  When Southgate was reopened, and the bloodied but victorious hosts of Thorbardin returned to their homes, Willen Ironmaul immediately called a Council of Thanes and laid his hammer upon the table. “I am no longer chief of chiefs,” he said. “I have done what I had to do, but if you still want someone to be in charge of all of Thorbardin, get someone else. I will lead the Hylar. But I will never again try to lead all the thanes.”

  Damon Omenborn turned his Cobar captive over to the Gateway guards and went with his father to the council. As soon as he could, though, he hurried away in search of Willow Summercloud. He expected to find her at Hybardin, where he had left her, but no one there had seen the Einar girl recently.

  “She’s around somewhere,” Tera Sharn assured her son. “Did you know she has a kender girl tagging after her? A lot of people aren’t too happy about that, but no one knows exactly what to do about it. Personally, I think the little thing is kind of cute.”

  Damon roamed the markets and the concourses, searching, but there was no sign of Willow anywhere. Then he came across Quill Runebrand. “Your village girl?” The lorekeeper blinked. “I don’t know, but I saw her yesterday. For several days she has been complaining about fog in the north warren, telling everyone she can find to tell. Of course, everybody has been busy, and no one paid much attention. But yesterday she was here again, her and that pesky little kender, complaining about the fog.…”

  “Fog?” Damon frowned, feeling a cold intuition creep up his spine.

  “Fog,” Quill repeated, shrugging.

  “What kind of fog?” Damon asked.

  “Cold fog.” The lorekeeper tipped his head. “She gave up on telling people about it though. At least, I guess she did. When I last saw her, she said she would take care of it by herself.”

  22

  Rage Within

  With the closing of Northgate and the calling of reserve companies to arms, the entire north sector of Thorbardin was nearly deserted. In Gatekeep, behind the north Anvil’s Echo, a few families remained—mostly stone-cutters and their wives and children, and a few shop keepers. Long before the Wizards’ War, Bell Brightluster, Thorbardin’s warden of trade, had devised a plan to convert the cold shaft called Shame of Reorx into wells and storage lofts for oils, grains, and other goods gained in trade with the outside. Those crafters who remained in Gatekeep now were at work on the pit, replacing its walls with a grid-work structure from which nets and lines could be suspended for construction of an auger lift. A dozen or so guards remained with them, and the gate crew from Northgate’s gatehouse.

  Just to the east and a few levels down, the north farming warren was nearly empty. A few Theiwar came from Theibardin now and then to look at the crops, but the growing season was well along, and there was little to be done there until the harvests began. The temporary Einar camps, for the refugees from the assault, had been moved past Theibardin to the shore of the Urkhan Sea, where water was plentiful, and shops and bakeries were numerous.

  Thus the north end of Thorbardin, usually as busy and bustling as any other sector of the dwarven citadel, was nearly vacant for the time being. Almost thirty square miles of caverns north of Theibardin and Theibolden were, for all intents and purposes, deserted.

  But it was to these sectors that Willow Summercloud came, with Shill Quickfoot tagging happily after her. Willow was, for the moment, thoroughly exasperated with Holgar dwarves in general. A dozen times she had tried to sound the alarm that something was wrong in the north warren. A dozen times she had collared guards, craftsmen, and even an entire platoon of Theiwar reserves on their way to Southgate and tried to tell them about the fog seeping into the warren and what it might mean.

  And no one had paid any attention. Everyone was busy, preoccupied with the War of the Wizards going on beyond Southgate. A few had listened politely, especially some of the younger males, and several had informed her—patronizingly in some cases—that Thorbardin was well secured and that an outsider could not be expected to realize just how thoroughly defended it was.

  Two or three of the young males had offered to show her around … after the war was over. One had even offered to take her home with him … after the war was done.

  Many people, here in this smug, snug hole beneath a mountain, seemed not even to have heard of the killing beast that had ravaged Einar villages in the outside world. And even those who had heard the tale saw no connection between that and the cold fog creeping into the north warren. The beast was gone, they assured her. It had been driven away, or something.

  She wished that Damon were with her. He, at least, had been there, had seen what the creature did to her own village. He had helped in the search for the thing. But Damon was far away, occupied with the fighting beyond Southgate, as was everyone else who might know about the fog creature.

  Willen Ironmaul, the chief of chiefs, was away dealing with the war. All of his senior officers were with him. All the other thane chieftains were away, as well, occupied with various things, and even the wardens could not be found.

  “What this place needs is a king,” Willow fumed. “As it is now, there isn’t anybody in charge.”

  It occurred to her to try one more time, to go to Hybardin and tell Tera Sharn what she feared. But by then she was already on her way through Theibardin, heading for the warren. Shillitec Medina Quickfoot skipped along behind her, lugging a fat pouch that had seemed to grow larger and larger each day since her arrival in Thorbardin. Carrying her axe, the Einar girl headed for the Fifth Road that led north toward the warren a mile away. As she rounded a bend, a voice called, “Well, hello there!” She turned. A few feet away, just stepping out of a side route, was a long-armed young Theiwar in battle armor and cloak. He wore a shield at his back, had a curved, dark-steel blade slung at his side, and the mesh faceplate of his helm almost covered his features. As she stared at him, he removed the helm and grinned. She remembered him then. It was Tag Salan, who had been with Damon at Sheercliff, and had accompanied them back to Thorbardin.

  “I see you’ve found some nice clothes,” he said. “Wow! Does Damon know what a lucky guy he is? You’re really …” His admiring gaze shifted, and his eyes widened. “You still have that kender,” he said.

  “Hello,” Shill chirped brightly. “I think I remember you. Of course, as my Aunt Pathtoe says, when you’ve seen one dwarf, you’ve seen them all. But that isn’t really right. You were out there when we met those wizards, weren’t you? I’m glad your beard has grown back.”

  “How did she get into Thorbardin?” Tag asked Willow. “Kender don’t usually get past the gates.”

  “I just walked in.” Shill giggled. “A lot of people were coming in, so I …”

  “Maybe you will listen to me,” Willow Summercloud said. “So far, nobody has.”

  “Listen about what?” Tag asked.

  “About the fog-thing. The creature that destroyed Windhollow. You were there. You saw what it did.”

  “I sure did,” the Theiwar as
sured her grimly. “And I saw where it came from, too. I found its lair. Damon is right, you know. I’m sure those wizards woke that thing up. But I heard it got away, that it’s gone.”

  “It isn’t gone!” Willow said. “I think it’s here.”

  “Here?” Tag’s hand went to his blade. “In Thorbardin?”

  “Or trying to get in,” she said. “You see, I was looking around, and there was fog coming in, seeping through cracks in the stone behind a terrace. It was cold fog, like the fog that creature brought with it to Windhollow.”

  “Cracks?” Tag shook his head. “In Thorbardin? There aren’t any cracks that I know of. Nothing could get in here, though. Not even wizards. They tried it and failed. And even if something did get in, everybody would know about it. There are only two entrances, and they’re always guarded.”

  “There aren’t any guards where I was,” Willow pointed out. “There isn’t anybody there. Everybody is gone.”

  “Oh.” He nodded. “I guess everyone has been off fighting wizards. That’s where I’ve been. But the war is over now. We beat the wizards and their troops. Didn’t Damon tell you?”

  “I haven’t seen Damon,” she said.

  “Well, he’s probably looking for you. He talks about you all the time. You should have seen him out there, dealing with those wizards! I swear, I don’t think anybody or anything can beat Damon Omenborn, once he gets mad.”

  “I can imagine,” Willow breathed. Then she shook her head. “But what about the fog? What should we do?”

  “It’s probably just fog.” Tag shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. Let’s go find Damon and …”

  “You go find him,” she snapped. “I have things to do.”

  Before he could reply, the girl was gone. There was no sign of her, or of the little kender either. He started toward the Fifth Road crossing and stopped as a commotion erupted just across the way.