Secret of Pax Tharkas

by Doug Niles

  Already the two ranks of the defenders had withdrawn almost completely out of the center of the hall. Doors opened behind them at each far end as, one by one, the Klar and Hylar warriors slipped away into the towers themselves, leaving smaller and smaller pockets of their companions to pretend a defense of the interior.

  The lift slammed to rest on the floor, knocking Brandon over. But he stood up and held up his empty hands before anyone could approach him—a gesture he hoped the Neidar would take as proof of his nonhostile intentions. The dual battles raged some distance away, but more than a hundred hill dwarves had gathered around the platform. It rested on a docking shelf a couple of feet above the ground, so it almost felt like a small stage. Turning through a circle, Brandon exhorted the dwarves to all sides.

  “Get out of here while you can!” he shouted. “Spread the word. There’s a whole shelf of rocks up there”—he gestured toward the ceiling—“thousands and thousands of tons of them! The mad Klar is waiting for the chance to dump it on the lot of you!”

  “What about you?” one of the Neidar shouted hostilely.

  “Yes, me too!” Brandon shouted back. “I’m risking my life to warn you!”

  As more of his listeners looked upward, more turned and made for the gate, many of them shouting and gesturing to the Neidar still pouring in to turn around and go back. The purpose of the Tharkadan trap was well known to all dwarves—hill dwarves as well as mountain dwarves had been saved the last time it was used, long ago during the War of the Lance. Any enemy breach in the old days would be defended by filling the interior with rubble. Most of the hill dwarves thought that mechanism had been destroyed beyond repair. They didn’t realize that Tarn Bellowgranite had dedicated himself to restoring it.

  “You!” the voice shot through the din of the battle, and Brandon turned to see Rune charging him. “Bastard! Spy!” shouted the hill dwarf, raising a battle axe over his head as he sprinted closer. The sight of the enemy who had so tormented him inflamed Brandon with a fiery determination to fight—and kill—his old enemy.

  And even more significant to Brandon’s eye was that battle axe itself: the Neidar Rune carried Brandon’s own weapon, the family heirloom that had been Balric Bluestone’s, stolen from Brandon upon his first capture. The Kayolin dwarf growled an almost animal sound and flexed his knees, stepping toward the edge of the platform. Even though he was unarmed, he eagerly awaited the hill dwarf’s charge, and he looked almost foolishly vulnerable to his frenzied attacker.

  With a howl of rage, Rune sprang upward, hesitating only slightly in the face of Brandon’s reckless advance. That was all the opening the Kayolin dwarf needed. He stepped back nimbly, and Rune stumbled as he tried to land on the lift platform, which was a few feet higher than the floor. Brandon lowered his shoulder and charged, driving into his opponent’s solar plexus, plunging too close for the long-hafted weapon to come in to play.

  The two dwarves tumbled to the platform, rolling to the side, and Brandon—his muscles fueled by long weeks of frustration and indignity—drove a fist into the underside of Rune’s jaw. The hill dwarf’s head snapped back with a crack of bone as his spine fractured. He fell dead, and Brandon snatched the axe from his lifeless fingers before his body even stopped twitching.

  Still tense from the sudden combat, he raised the axe over his head and shouted at his dumbfounded observers. “I’m telling the truth! Get out while you can!”

  The flow of the attackers coming in the gate had slowed dramatically as they heard the warnings from Brandon and from other fleeing Neidar, and in another few moments, the advance had stopped altogether, the front rank of hill dwarves remaining outside the gate, peering nervously upward and edging back. More and more of Brandon’s listeners were streaming toward the gate as well.

  Getting the attention of the dwarves actively engaged in combat was a tougher challenge, the Kayolin dwarf knew. “Warn your comrades!” he exhorted his listeners. “Get them out of here—as many as will listen. There’s no time to waste!”

  Some of the Neidar did head toward one or the other pocket of battle, though more thought ill of the risk. Brandon stayed on the lift platform, waving and shouting, drawing the attention of more and more Neidar. Then he heard an enraged shout, a voice that compelled his attention.

  “My prisoner!” roared Harn Poleaxe, rushing toward him from the skirmish at the base of the East Tower. The enemy commander stood head and shoulders above his men, his own hulking size augmented by the helm with its lofty plumes.

  “He’s condemned to die! Don’t listen to him, you fools!” cried the Neidar commander, swatting at several dwarves. He shouted at the warriors waiting outside the gates. “Attack! Hit them now while the hour of victory is at hand!”

  Looking shamefaced and sheepish, the hill dwarves tried to swallow their fears and move, albeit reluctantly, back into the hall. Harn had his sword drawn as he charged toward the mountain dwarf, through the ring of Brandon’s listeners, his face contorted with rage. Brandon was shocked to see that face, scarred as it was by blisters and scabs, lumpy and misshapen, swollen like an overripe melon too long in the sun.

  “He’s the spy we had in chains!” cried Poleaxe to warriors left and right as he raced toward Brandon. “What kind of idiots are you—letting him talk you out of our great victory? Leave him to me; my sword will put an end to his lies.”

  Brandon, with relish, raised his axe, the haft so familiar that it felt like an extension of his own hands. He met Harn at the edge of the lift platform, parrying the Neidar’s first blow with a crossing block, but he was sent stumbling back, overcome by the big hill dwarf’s strength. Harn sprang upward onto the lift platform, raising his sword to brush aside Brandon’s return slash, a powerful overhead swing. His face was crazed, more monstrous than dwarf, and he closed in with a rush. The two blades met with a ringing clash, and again Brandon stepped back, astonished at Harn’s strength.

  Harn had always been a big, sturdy dwarf, but it was obvious to Brandon that he had grown in size and power since their journey from Kayolin. It all had started, Brandon remembered, on the day Poleaxe had presided over his trumped-up trial in Hillhome’s square. The dwarf had seemed magically enhanced that day and from that day on. Brandon understood that he was in the fight of his life and that he was at a clear disadvantage with his opponent.

  For several seconds the two dwarves circled each other on the lift platform. Brandon was grateful, at least, that the rest of the hill dwarves didn’t rush to their leader’s assistance. Not that Harn needed help in any event, but as the hill dwarves pressed closer to the lift to watch the fight, they seemed more curious than angry.

  Harn charged in a bull rush, and the Kayolin dwarf parried and blocked, skipping nimbly to the side and falling back. He avoided the corners of the square platform, knowing he’d be trapped if he let Poleaxe force him into one of them. The big Neidar came at him again, swinging his sword over his head and bashing it down with the full weight of his brawny muscles and his white-hot rage. It took all of Brandon’s strength to hold his axe up, canting the blade at an angle to deflect the enemy’s blows. He couldn’t hope to stop Harn’s blow, but at least he could knock it aside.

  Dusk had fallen outside, but the pitch of battles inside the tower only mounted in fury. The Neidar had nearly attained their victory as the last of the small pockets of mountain dwarf defenders fought to little effect outside the doors leading into the towers. One by one the garrison’s warriors were escaping through those doors.

  Harn shrieked and foamed in growing frustration as Brandon continued to dodge and weave away from him. The Neidar watching the duel were muttering their disappointment in their champion as the Kayolin dwarf used his venerable axe to bash aside another series of crushing blows. Out of the corner of his eye, Brandon noticed many hill dwarves making their way toward the great gate and the growing darkness outside, casting nervous glances upward as they hurried to depart.

  Apparently Harn Poleaxe, too, noticed the be
ginnings of a withdrawal, for he abruptly turned to face the warriors retreating. “Get back here, you cowards!” he roared.

  And Brandon saw his chance. Harn’s attention was distracted for only a split second, but that was enough time for the Kayolin dwarf to strike. He lunged and drove the blade of his axe down through the shoulder plate of Poleaxe’s metal armor. The weapon cut through skin, sliced the bone of the hill dwarf’s ribs and shoulder, and penetrated the flesh and lung below.

  With a wheezing gasp, Harn Poleaxe stumbled away, dropping to his knees while Brandon wrenched his deadly axe free of the ghastly wound. The hill dwarf coughed, and blood spumed out of his mouth. Eyes staring, he looked at Brandon in disbelief. He tried to speak, and more blood spilled. Swaying on his knees, he dropped to his face and lay motionless in a growing pool of sticky crimson.

  Exhausted, panting, holding his bloody axe with the blade pointed down, the mountain dwarf felt no sense of victory—only a weary relief. He slumped to his own knee, trying to catch his breath, hearing the distressed muttering of the surrounding hill dwarves. He wondered if they were going to attack him; he didn’t really care if they did. But his ears pricked up; they weren’t talking about him and Poleaxe. They were muttering in fear.

  Only then did he raise his eyes to see the cause of their fright. Harn’s lifeless body was twitching unnaturally, bulging and squirming at the back, the legs, the head. It was as if the Neidar’s flesh were a sack containing some writhing creature—a creature that wanted very much to get out.

  Abruptly the body burst open, spattering blood and bone and flesh in an explosive spray. Immediately a great shape, winged and black as night, rose from the ravaged corpse like an apparition, looming above the dead Neidar. It fixed a monstrous gaze on Brandon and opened eyes that glowed like the very fires of the Abyss.

  Gretchan had worriedly watched Brandon’s descent. She couldn’t hear his words over the clash of swords and the shouts and cries of the battling dwarves, but she could see he wasn’t being attacked immediately and seemed to be attracting more and more listeners. She was awed by his courage but even more so by his goodness toward a former enemy. She’d never known that kind of dwarf before, and she shook her head in amazement.

  She had started back along the catwalk when the door to the tower opened, admitting Tarn Bellowgranite, Otaxx Shortbeard, and Garn Bloodfist to the open-sided platform where the control lever for the Tharkadan trap was cocked and ready.

  Garn immediately started for that lever.

  She rushed to stop him. “You can’t do this!” she cried.

  “Don’t try your sorcery, witch, or I’ll have you killed!” The Klar sneered.

  “I can’t stop you with magic,” she admitted truthfully, addressing the thane and the general even as the Klar captain moved to block her path. “You have to stop this madness for your own reasons, with your own hearts! Thane Bellowgranite, is this the legacy you want to leave to history? A catastrophic massacre of your own race? A taint on your reputation and on dwarf hearts that will be worse than the wounds left by the Cataclysm?”

  “That is not my legacy!” Tarn replied testily. “It is not my choice. We are hard pressed, under attack by foes; you can see that yourself. We must defend ourselves!”

  “This is not the way to win!” Gretchan cried. She gestured over the edge of the catwalk to the two small pockets of battle swirling down below. “Look, your garrison has almost completely withdrawn. They’ll be safe in the towers—they could hold those doors for weeks, I’m certain, if they had to. You have, in fact, safely defended Pax Tharkas. You don’t have to go the rest of the way. You don’t need to kill all those hill dwarves.”

  “The priestess is right, my liege,” interjected Otaxx, causing Tarn to raise an eyebrow and Garn to curse under his breath. “Each tower is a fortress unto itself. And we command the top of the wall, as well. We can threaten the Neidar with the trap and force them to withdraw, but we don’t need to crush them to every last man.”

  Tarn Bellowgranite scratched his beard, considering that reasonable suggestion.

  “Don’t tell me you’re going to listen to this witch?” Garn Bloodfist spit at Tarn Bellowgranite’s feet in disbelief. His eyes darted wildly from the thane to Gretchan to the lever that would release the trap.

  “My thane, this is a historic opportunity,” he cried. “Never again will our enemies be so completely in your power. We must act—now!”

  “The Neidar will be your enemies forever if you do!” Gretchan insisted. “If you kill all those in this army, you’ll be faced by ten times as many, all of them out for blood, next time. You can never wipe them all out, and future generations will dream of blood revenge. This is not the way to peace and unity among the dwarves!”

  At that moment, the clamor from down below suddenly dwindled. The reason was the last of the mountain dwarves had withdrawn from the hall, leaving the vast space filled with milling, confused hill dwarves who, for the moment, were unable to reach their enemies. Those enemies sheltered behind stoutly barricaded doors. There was no one left to fight.

  “If you won’t act, I will!” cried Garn, lunging to the lever that would release the trap. He seized the shaft and pulled, activating the big flywheel that would tug the cable and pull the pins holding up the trap door. The mechanism of the Tharkadan trap began to groan.

  At the same time, a shrill cry keened through the hall below them. Gretchan looked down to see a black shadow, large as a giant and a hundred times more menacing, rise above the floor.

  Brandon Bluestone, a bloody axe in his hand, stood alone before it.

  Gus had unspooled a long section of cable, winding it off of the big stone wheel. He scaled down the wire while Berta, still grumbling about Gretchan, grudgingly held the line above. Gus swayed back and forth dizzyingly, but he’d almost reached the ledge where Kondike was trapped. The dog barked and wagged his tail eagerly, watching the Aghar descend toward him. If Gus could just reach Kondike’s side, he thought he could wrap the cable around the dog and, with Berta’s help—or maybe even some big dwarves—lift the stranded animal to safety.

  Abruptly the hub above him, the great stone from which he had removed the wire, began to spin. He couldn’t know that Garn had pulled the lever, had started the mechanism in motion. He could only see that the massive stone wheel was spinning with increasing speed.

  But even though that hub had been connected to the gear itself, bearing the huge weight of the chain, the gear didn’t move. In his effort to save the dog, Gus had unspooled the cable that connected it to the flywheel. The Aghar slid down the vibrating cable, remembering to hold onto the end of it as Kondike gave him a sloppy lick on his face.

  But for the first time, he wondered what it was he held in his hand. He looked at the spinning wheel, the disengaged gear, and he knew exactly what had happened.

  “Oh, no!” he wailed, slumping next to the big dog. “I broke it!”

  The dark creature rose like a black tower above Harn Poleaxe’s ravaged corpse. The monster was taller than a giant, and it exuded menace with its great, arching, black wings and hideously glowing eyes. The huge maw gaped like a cave mouth, studded with jagged fangs like stalagmites and stalactites. Brandon needed all of his strength just to keep his grip on his axe. His knees shook and his guts churned at the sight of the horrific thing.

  What remained of Harn Poleaxe was shriveled and ghastly, like a discarded suit of skin. The monster reared above the bloody mess and looked toward Brandon, who felt helpless in the gaze of those horrid red eyes. The creature swelled even larger, looming to an impossible height, flaring those black wings, and casting its gaze over the whole of the great hall. The fanged jaws gaped, and a roar bellowed forth, the sound reverberating from the walls, shaking the very bedrock of the floor.

  The hill dwarves around the lift platform recoiled in horror, many of them running out the fortress gate, others whispering prayers to Reorx and staring in wide-eyed fear. The monster roared again, and Brand
on found some control of his limbs, stumbling away in abject fear. Still clinging to his axe, he sprang down from the platform and staggered across the floor, feeling those crimson eyes burning into his back.

  He felt a shocking chill and looked back to see the black beast pounce after him, springing like a massive winged cat. Brandon ducked to the side, falling and rolling across the floor as the monster came down on the spot where he had been. All around, the hill dwarves were fleeing, shouting in panic and dismay, thronging into a packed bottleneck in their frantic efforts to get out of the massive gate.

  The monster spun and roared again, the blast of sound actually brushing Brandon’s hair and beard like a gust of wind. He could never outrun it, he knew, so he raised his axe and his voice, roaring a war cry of his own.

  “For Bluestone and Kayolin!” he cried, rushing forward with his axe upraised. The monster reared, wings flapping, as if it couldn’t believe the dwarf’s effrontery. Brandon swung his axe, the ancient blade of his ancestors, the keen steel slashing through the talons of the monster’s foot with a hiss like red-hot metal touching water. The beast howled in fury. With one backhanded blow, it knocked the dwarf to the side, sending him tumbling like a gaming pin. It took all of Brandon’s concentration to hold on to his axe as he rolled across the floor.

  “Behold the true power of Harn Poleaxe!”

  Gretchan’s shouted voice rang out amid the suddenly eerie silence of the great hall. She was riding down in a second lift platform, her staff grasped in her hand, her golden hair shimmering in the light from the glowing anvil of Reorx. She pointed to the monster but addressed the gawking, awestruck hill dwarves who still remained in the hall and were trying to decide what to do.

  “This is the corruption that ate away his soul! This is the power that drove him to this mad war—that almost resulted in death on a scale you can’t even imagine.”