After the World

by Maire Brophy

  As I opened it, new words jumped into the foreground. Many of them did not make sense to me. They talked of planes and portals, but eventually there was an instruction. There was a way to protect the cavern by hiding the mountain from all. It didn’t seem too hard. All I needed to do was to read out this incantation. But finding the mountain again would be very difficult. The book contained this instruction, but the mountain would only be able to be found by someone who had been there before and knew the exact nature of the spell. I would need to take this book with me. If magical orcs remained, they would never again be able to find this place without it.

  The other problem was the wizard who was trying to get into the cavern. He was inside the mountain, getting closer and closer. I couldn’t kill the wizard in the pool, because he was already dead, but the other wizard was still alive and could very well do with a bit of orc vengeance.

  I tucked the book under my arm, picked up the sword, and left the cavern. Magical explosions continued to shake the mountain, but I had no idea where they were coming from. I headed back to the mill cavern, occasionally dodging bits of falling debris.

  Aside from the detritus from the explosions, the mill cavern remained untouched. The wizard had not even made it that far. I realized the shadow wizard might have been right ― that this was not some great mage to be reckoned with. I left the main entrance to the mill cavern barred and went out through one of the smaller tunnels. Once through, I tried to cover it with the loose rocks around it. If I could keep him from the beautiful mill cavern, I would. Another explosion, but it felt further away. What was he doing?

  I kept going, with my sword in one hand and the book tucked under my other arm. I needed to hide it before dealing with the wizard. I had no idea where he had got to, but I needed to draw him out of the mountain. I ran to the alarm chamber, where all of the alarms were silent. I surveyed the great hall. There was no one there now, but it was the most affected by the explosions. Rocks from the main entrance blockage had tumbled into the hall. The walls and ceiling had deep cracks, and there was a constant stream of dust and rubble falling from them.

  I needed to draw the wizard out. My best chance seemed to be with the alarms. I hoped the wizard could read these simple orcish markings, but if I triggered an alarm, he might assume it was the main entrance or maybe the hidden door. Could I surprise him using the entrance guard towers or another hidden place? Perhaps I didn’t need to defeat him entirely. I just needed to get him out of the mountain and then read the incantation. Maybe that would be enough.

  I tugged at the alarm mechanism ― it was simple enough. Unlike much of the machinery in the mill cavern, these alarms were common in most orc homes, and I knew vaguely how they were rigged. It didn’t take me long to figure out how to bypass the outer sensor, and I could set it off while in the chamber. But setting the alarms off would just make the wizard investigate where the noise was coming from, which was here. I doubted I could defeat him face to face. I had probably killed a few wizards in my time, but then I had powerful magical protections gifted to me by allies. These days, I had rags and leather I stole from a day creature.

  Wizards were cunning. He would see through something simple. I needed a plan. I needed it to be more than some falsely ringing alarms. I thought about what he knew. He probably didn’t know I was here, or maybe he crossed paths with the cubs I fought with earlier, but the group had made no effort to hide themselves at the entrance. They assumed there was no one to contend with other than the mountain itself. It was strange that the wizard had only made it into the mountain after all the others had left. He may have known about the secret entrance but not wanted to tell the others. I briefly questioned whether it was even the wizard inside, but it was more likely that the explosions were wizard-made than anything else. Dwarves wouldn’t be so careless inside a mountain.

  I was standing there trying to figure out how to trick the wizard, when the main entrance alarm started clicking back and forth. There was someone out the front again. Perhaps the dwarves had returned to get their equipment or their dead. I ran back out to the great hall. I stowed the book and my sword under the pile of dead orcs. Another boom shook the mountain. A shower of rocks rained down on me, and I was stuck by something much larger than a pebble. With blood streaming down my face, I cursed the stupidity of wizards and climbed up the rubble blocking the main entrance. I scrambled up the shifting rocks until I found the tunnel to the sentry point. Pulling the rubble out of it, I squeezed through and crawled as fast as I could to the lookout station.

  I pulled myself into the little room, fighting to get free of the rocks, all the while terrified I would be crushed by the crumbling mountain. The first window showed me the entrance, bathed in twilight. I could see that the rocks had shifted there too. The tunneling efforts had come to fruition now that the mountain could not respond. But mostly, it just revealed the dead bodies of the dwarves and men who were killed by the mountain. Perhaps a rock had tumbled and triggered the sensor.

  I looked through the more outward-facing window and saw the problem ― or at least the further problem. Another damn wizard. This one was even shabbier than the first one. Her cloak might once have been black ― which made me wonder if I had known her ― but I could not see her full face as she pondered the mountain.

  Wizards ― even when they’re dead ―- are like a horned beetle in a goblet of ale. And here was I, alone, and faced with the problem of trying to keep two living wizards away from a cavern of dead ones. I felt a strong temptation to declare this wizard business and to just stay out of it, but then I remembered that this was the home of Isknaga, of orc magic, and the mountain itself.

  The black wizard stood up. She took a deep breath and began to chant. This was not good. Some of the rocks in the entrance started to move. This was powerful magic. I doubted the black wizard would be able to keep it up for long, but perhaps for long enough. It was time for these wizards to meet each other.

  I clambered back into the tunnel, still not sure if I’d make it to the end without a large rock crushing me, but somehow I made it out. My relief in the great hall was not long lived, as I could hear the black wizard’s progress into the mountain. I knew she wasn’t far. I could smell the air coming through the rocks.

  I needed to think. I needed time. I needed to know their moves and think ten steps ahead like I used to. Panic erupted in me. It was too much. I couldn’t think straight. Oh no. It was coming again. My breathing was already labored from climbing through the rocks, but it wasn’t slowing even though I was still. I dropped to the ground, hoping I would stay conscious. But what was one more dead orc in this mountain?

  The world came back into the focus as I lay there. There was something about the uneven floor of the hall that grounded me. I realized I was staring directly into an orc’s face. He held my gaze, even though there were no eyes in the sockets. His look was reproachful, demanding.

  I heard a voice, angry and comforting:

  “You weasel! You lazy, dirty rat! If I catch you lying down on the job again, I’ll nail you to the ground.”

  I sniggered to myself. He shouted this all the time, my old drill sergeant. And yet, he hardly ever nailed anyone to the ground. I heard a crack in the air and felt his whip on my back. I remembered not to flinch. We all used to wind him up, pretending we weren’t scared of him, pretending his arms were too weak to mold us. He’d pummel us into fighters, whether we liked it or not, but we always pretended it wasn’t working. I remember how his eyes bulged when we didn’t cower. I couldn’t suppress a smile.

  I felt a wave of fondness for him, even as he hauled me to my feet and smacked me across the face with the handle of his whip. I giggled. He brought it back across my face in the other direction for good measure. He grabbed me by the shoulders and pulled me toward him. He yelled incoherently in my face. Flecks of spit landed on my face, and the stench of his breath ― made up of ancient, rotten meat and fermented tobacco ― crawled up my nose like smelling salts
.

  He had my attention, and he knew it.

  “I gave you a job to do, soldier, and when it’s done, I’ll nail you to the ground myself, if you’d like!”

  Of course, he was dead now. I couldn’t figure out how that could be when he was here yelling in my face like old times.

  I was upright and no longer gasping for air. I collected my book and sword and saluted my fallen brothers as they lay on the floor, and hurried out of the great hall, toward the secret tunnel.

  The cool night wind hit my face, and the stars fluttered in the sky like flies around a campfire. I climbed down from the ledge, retracing the steps I made when I first came to the mountain. Haste made me careless, and I lost my footing more than once. Each time I fell, I wondered if it would be the end. Most of my falls were only short drops, enough to knock the wind out of me and do damage but not enough to keep me down. I fell awkwardly onto a jutting rock and heard and felt at least one of my ribs crack. I smirked at the idea that my old sergeant would consider nailing me to it, but nothing stopped me from surging forward.

  I scrambled and tumbled my way down the mountainside until I saw the treeline approaching. I dug my heels in as I slid and eventually came to a stop just a few feet short of the first trees. I stood up and attempted to brush the rubble off me. Lots of it stuck to me, glued by my own blood and embedded in the cuts and grazes that were all over me. I still clenched the book, and it was mostly unharmed.

  I cast around for somewhere to hide the book out of the wizards’ reach. The murky forest was no friendlier. Just as they had before, my eyes were caught by the lonely pine I had slept under. It still looked benevolent to me, despite the general aggression of the other trees, and I made the decision for it to be the temporary protector of the book. I scrabbled at the roots, laid the book between them, and covered it in the needles.

  I took a breath and started back up the mountainside. I was losing night, and my legs ached on my ascent. Instead of climbing back to the secret door, I made my way to the main entrance, where I hoped the black wizard would be still struggling to move the rocks. The way was hard without the mountain to help me. I could still hear muffled blasts happening inside the mountain. The surface was uneven and shifting constantly. I climbed to the mountain pass, only to find my way blocked by some newly fallen boulders. They shifted as I climbed over them. One fell and crushed my fingers. The pain was startling and then absent but returned deep and throbbing as I continued on.

  Eventually, with aching legs and a throbbing hand, I came close to the entrance. I slowed to check the whereabouts of the black wizard, but there was no one there. The entrance was now clear enough for someone to walk through. Both wizards were now inside the mountain. The trees were still parted, providing a way out. For a moment, I thought about running. Maybe there was some other mountain somewhere that I could befriend.

  I looked up to the summit, knelt down, and put my uninjured hand against the mountainside. I felt nothing. No hum, no thought, no pulse. Was my mountain dead and gone already?

  I heard a blast in the distance, muffled by the mountain. More pebbles and rocks slid down the mountainside. A large crack appeared. They were destroying my mountain. The time to run had passed. If there was a place and time to stand and fight to the end, it was here and now. I stood up and, holding my broken fingers to my chest, I staggered into the mountain.

  For the first time, I entered the Iret Mountains properly, like the lordly orc I was. Drums beat in time to announce my arrival. Animal hide stretched over wood. Thousands and thousands of them, all in time, for the coming of the great orc general. Ra-thum-thum Ra-thum-thum. They called from deep within the mountain to its peak. The beating heart. Boom-thum-thum. My standard bearers always went ahead. My personal squad flanked me. They were the deadliest orcs. I hewed them myself out of rock. Boom-thum-thum. The drumming merged with its echo. It lost its rhythm. It all merged into noise.

  I entered the great hall. The noise was overwhelming. I tried to pick out the pulse again. There it was ― a throbbing. It wasn’t through the whole mountain, it was here. Just here.

  I looked at my right hand. It was crumpled and swollen. I couldn’t move my fingers. It made no sense. I looked up. I was in the great hall. There were no drums. There were no standard bearers, no chief, no squad. Just me. For a moment, there was silence. I remembered I was alone.

  The floor shook, and I remembered I wasn’t completely alone. It was time to deal with the wizards.

  I staggered to the alarm chamber and reattached the rigged alarm. The piercing sound rang out and echoed through the mountain. I wiped the blood away from my eyes and hid myself among the dead orcs in the great hall. My vision flickered. Sometimes, I saw the hall full of living orcs, drinking, shouting, and squabbling with each other. I’d blink again, and it would be the cold, dead place I knew it to be.

  Another flicker. This time something real and living entered the dead place. The green cloak with a luminous staff fluttered past my eye line. He entered the great hall first and saw the cleared entrance. He was evidently surprised, and he drew his staff before him and spun around defensively. When no attack came, he dimmed the light on his staff and examined the entrance. Maybe he thought it was the return of his friends. His shock abated, and he appeared to think again of the siren that was wailing all the while. He left the hall in the direction of the alarm chamber.

  My eyes followed him out of the hall. His staff had disrupted my vision, but as it returned, I saw a shadow move. This time it wasn’t a carousing, long dead orc. I wondered how long she had been there. Was she there when I hid myself under these orcs? I would have seen her, wouldn’t I? The hairs on the back of my neck bristled. It was the survivalist part of me that still worked when my mind did not. I saw a blade in the dark.

  The wailing stopped. The silence returned like a blanket. The shadow stopped moving. What was that about a shadow? Shadows don’t move. The silence curled around me and settled over me. It pushed my eyelids shut. The survivalist was having none of this. Suddenly, the pain in my hand went from throbbing to piercing. My eyes snapped open. I looked down and saw my own left hand pulling at the broken fingers on my right. I stifled a cry. I was present again.

  The light was coming again. The green wizard came back into the hall. I could see runes and insignia on the green cloak, but they were covered in dust from the mountain. It struck me that these two wizards had been on opposite sides before the breaking, and they seemed no less adversarial now. More than anything, it made me realize that in some ways, the land had returned to a time of chaos. Yes, the day creatures were everywhere, but those who hunger after power were still hungry, roving the world in search of advantage, which had presumably led both of these wizards to my lovely mountain.

  The green wizard returned to the great hall with his staff. The light on it pulsed until a glob at the end floated steadily from it. The glob rose to the ceiling of the hall, still pulsing slightly. When it reached the rock, it dimmed and then burst into bright white light, making the whole hall fill with something akin to daylight. The green wizard examined the entrance again. He muttered several things to himself while doing so. Where was the black wizard? I had lost track of the shadow. The green wizard called back his glob of light, and it returned to his staff. He waved his hands over the open entrance tunnel, and for a moment, it flashed red. With greater caution, he left the great hall. I knew this time I had to follow.

  I let the green wizard go ahead for several minutes. His light would make him blind, and I thought I would be able to see it quite easily from a distance. If the black wizard followed the green, I wanted to be behind her too. I wasn’t sure if either knew of my existence, and I wanted to keep it that way for as long as possible.

  It was very easy to follow the green wizard, for he was without grace underground. I could hear him trip and curse, despite his light, as he wandered through the tunnels. His bearings seemed no better than before, and he unknowingly doubled back on himself mor
e than once. If he hadn’t been so noisy, he might even have caught me by surprise. Even considering his clumsiness, his progress was surprisingly slow. My patience ran thin, and I let myself gain on him.

  Shuffling forward silently and staying in the shadows, I eventually saw what he was doing. I found him on his knees, with one hand on the wall markings. His staff was angled under his elbow, spreading light on the book he was holding open with his other hand. He was lost, and he thought that some kind of book would show him the way.

  He was very distracted, so I wondered if I could get close enough to kill him. My sword was ready. I thought about creeping forward, when he looked up abruptly. He closed his book and hid it under his cloak. I pushed back deeper into the shadows and pressed as hard as I could against the rock. The light on the end of his staff dimmed until it disappeared. I heard him whisper a new incantation, and his staff pulsed with a green light. The green light gave his face a rotten look. The light burst and scattered all over the tunnel. I felt a wave of nausea and disorientation. A new glob of green light hovered over the staff, and with another incantation, it began to move away from the wizard. It traveled down the tunnel away from me, and the wizard followed it. I let them get a little ahead, and then I followed.

  The green wizard traveled with more purpose and direction this time. He was no longer lost in the upper tunnels but actually moving through the mountain. Sometimes, the glob would hover as if undecided on where to go, then it would burst and scatter and be replaced by a new glob. The new green glob would move again with renewed purpose, and the wizard followed it. My heart grew heavy with the gathering surety that he was heading toward the mill cavern.