by Jean Rabe
"To Palin," Rig added.
"Thought you wanted to get back to Bloten." The half-elf harumphed. "I know I certainly do. I'm tired of… Wait." Rikali put a hand on Dhamon's shoulder. "I smell somethin'. Thought I smelled somethin' before, smells stronger now." She turned and glanced up the steps, the top of which she hadn't been able to see a few minutes ago. But now the stairs were faintly visible to her oh-so-keen eyesight because of a soft light streaming down from high above. "I think I smell fire!"
"Fire?" Rig said, turning and squinting to see whatever it was she was looking at. He saw only darkness in the distance. "The trolls were done burning before we started down."
Dhamon sniffed the air. "I think she's right."
"But what could be burnin'?" the half-elf asked. Then her eyes grew wide. "Fetch!" she cried. She started up the steps, then stopped as the cavern rocked with a tremor. This time the quake wasn't coming from below, as all the others had. This one originated from above.
* * * * * * *
Fetch wasn't certain how he'd done it-managing to set all six pillars on fire. They were too far apart for the blaze to have spread on its own accord, so he must have done something to help.
He scratched his head. He remembered setting two or three on fire, maybe it was four, picking out the heads on the bottom to roast. But certainly not all of the pillars. Or had he? Perhaps he'd simply lost track of the time.
Maybe he'd merely gotten so caught up with the new dance he'd created-his flame dance he'd dubbed it- that he'd just let everything else slip his mind.
Not that it mattered. The fires would burn themselves out eventually, or maybe the wind would pick up and blow some rain inside and the water would put the fires out. It definitely was raining harder, he could hear the rain clearly, and the wind was blowing.
The fires would burn out-and in the process everyone would be done a great favor. Why, if there were gems or gold hidden inside those carved columns, he'd surely find them when he sifted through the ashes. Maldred would be exceedingly pleased.
"No, he won't," the kobold muttered to himself. "He'll tell me to stop playing with fire spells." He sat and watched the flaming pillars, trying hard to be ashamed of the whole incident, though actually he was awed by the great blaze he had birthed.
All around him the dwarven faces laughed, the shadows and the light playing across their grotesque features. The kobold mused to himself that Maldred would have to admit he'd breathed life into the carvings.
He glanced up and saw the flames dance along the very roof of the cavern, where the tops of the pillars rested, their crowned dwarven kings nothing more than kindling now. It was incredibly beautiful. The red and orange, the white and yellow.
Such intense color and all of it was his doing. Fetch grinned, then frowned, remembering he was trying to scold himself for his bad behavior.
Then his mouth dropped open as the first pillar collapsed, sending embers everywhere and sending him scurrying behind the forge-altar for cover. With a «whoosh» and a «pop» the second came down, the fallen chunks burning on the floor. Fetch poked his head above the altar and his eyes grew wide. It looked as if the god-image on the floor was lit up with smiles, pleased with Fetch's fiery magic.
For a brief moment the kobold thought all the pillars would collapse and burn out before Maldred returned, then he could sweep the ashes out of the cave entrance and no one would be the wiser. But Maldred might notice the wooden columns were gone. And he might smell the scent of charred wood.
"Maldred'll be mad," the kobold muttered to himself. "Really mad. Maybe I can convince him it was an accident." Then he ducked as the third pillar burned itself out, and the fourth also collapsed with a loud "whoosh!" He poked his head up again and breathed a sigh of relief. It would be some time before the last two pillars went. He must have set them afire several minutes after the others.
Then the kobold looked up at the ceiling, where the fire illuminated great cracks that had formed, and more carved dwarves he hadn't noticed before. "Didn't really think the pillars were holding the roof up," he admitted. "Figured they were just for decoration."
The cracks widened as Fetch watched. Then the kobold stood up and backed away, eyes darting between the two shadowy alcoves and the cave entrance.
"This is not a good place to be," Fetch warned himself, as he heard the stone groan and crack. "Not a good place at all. I gotta get out of here." The only question remaining in his childlike mind was which direction.
A glance at the entrance. It was the safest bet, but also the wettest. A glance at the alcove Maldred and Fiona had disappeared into. Maldred should be warned, he was the kobold's master and mentor, after all. But Maldred would be mad and would scold Fetch and perhaps punish him.
A glance at the alcove where Dhamon went. It was closer, by a couple of feet. Well, maybe not that much closer, but Dhamon wasn't likely to yell at him.
When the cracks widened and the rocks groaned louder, and when stone dust started falling every bit as hard as the rain outside, the kobold whirled, his small feet racing over the tile as fast as his heart was hammering in his chest. The first significant chunk of ceiling hit when he still had several yards to go.
It thundered against the floor, sending shards flying through the air. Fetch lost his balance and pitched forward, arms and legs flailing for any purchase. Then another chunk fell and the entire cavern started to shake, the walls wobbling and the carved dwarven faces dissolving. Laughing Lars and Laughing Dretch turned to stone dust.
He forced himself to his knees and into a crawl, moving as quickly as possible, wincing when the first fist-sized rocks struck him as more of the ceiling fell. He made it to the alcove just as the world seemed to explode. Without a second thought, Fetch hurled himself down the steep stairs, apologizing profusely to the carved dwarves he passed and focusing on a faint light far below, which he hoped was the torch Dhamon had been carrying.
The steps were terribly steep, but fear spurred the diminutive kobold on, as the mountain continued to rumble, and rocks and stone dust belched down the stairway after him. He felt like he'd been running for an eternity when he tripped on a crumbling step and tumbled head first for several dozen feet before he was able to right himself, his body a mass of aches and pain. Nonetheless, he got up and hurried on, the mountain still rumbling.
The air was so very close in the stairway, musty smelling, tinged with the scent of rocks. And an odd taste. Enough stone dust had found its way into his mouth. He didn't care for the taste. The light below was bobbing, coming up to meet him. He slowed his course and almost stopped, he was so tired. He let out a sigh of relief when the human came into view.
"Dhamon Grimwulf," Fetch huffed. "Am I so happy to find you."
Rikali was hissing at him and brushed by Dhamon, caught the kobold's throat in her hands and shook him.
Fetch sputtered, arms flailing about, lungs crying for air.
"Put him down, Riki."
"Dhamon, the little rat did somethin' and you well know it." She shook Fetch again and then dropped him on the step. The kobold gasped, more for effect than out of any real pain. He tried to get Dhamon's attention, but now the human was racing past him, feet pounding up the steps, taking the light with him, finally stopping. Several moments later, Dhamon returned with a grim expression.
"There was a cave-in," he reported. "And I think it's impossible that one little kobold could have caused it."
Rikali still glared.
Fetch coughed and pretended he was hurt, that it was difficult for him to breathe. "Was what I was trying to tell you," the kobold began. "Those trolls. You thought you'd burned them. I thought you'd burned them. They was nothin' but ashes. But that arm you threw out of the cave mouth." Fetch gestured to Rig, "It crawled back up into the cave, was growing a whole ‘nother big-as-you-please troll on the end of it. I tried to beat it with my hoopak, but it was too much for me. Then it started rummaging around in the ashes, caught fire, and I thought it would destroy i
tself." He paused, gulping in air, still feigning injury.
"Go on," Rig said.
The kobold could tell from Rig's expression that the mariner had bought the story. Let him think it's all his fault for throwing the arm away. Indeed, Fetch considered, it might have happened that way. The arm probably would have come back if the cavern hadn't collapsed first, and it could have happened just as he was explaining. "Well, the troll arm brushed against one of them pillars and it caught on fire. Soon they were all burning. I couldn't put them out, and I ran down here to get you- and just in time, too, I might add. The pillars must have collapsed and took the cave down with ‘em."
Dhamon looked skeptical, but said nothing. Rikali was still hissing, trundling up a few steps, peering ahead, then running back down.
"So what do we do?" the half-elf asked nervously.
"We got to go down," Rig said, signaling for the torch. Dhamon gave it to him.
"Down? Pigs, you can't be serious!"
"Too much rock up there," Dhamon said as he fell in step behind Rig. "We have to hope that we'll find a way out down below."
"And if we can't, lover?"
Dhamon didn't answer that question.
"And what about Maldred?" Rikali mused, as she slowly followed the procession.
Maldred'll be mad, Fetch thought. If he's still alive.
* * * * * * *
As Maldred felt the mountain shake, he looked up. The walls were cracking, the faces carved in them twisting into weird shapes that no longer looked dwarven. Many feet above, the torch Fiona had lodged in a sconce popped free and disappeared, its light going out.
He grabbed Fiona's hand and raced down the remainder of the steps, wincing as rocks crashed down from the ceiling and struck him.
"Are you all right?" he called to her, not slowing his pace and tugging her to get her to move faster.
"Yes!" She was having a difficult time keeping up with him.
The mountain continued to shake, spitting rocks at them and showering them with dust that filled the air and made them cough.
"Hurry!" Maldred urged. Then suddenly his feet flew out from under him as a step crumbled beneath him. He released her hand, but too late, she was falling down with him. Tumbling down the last fifty feet of stairway, their bodies pummeling each other, the torch flying from Fiona's hand, singeing her tunic and the flesh beneath, then going out amid a shower of stone and dust and plunging them into absolute darkness.
She heard the cry of bats, panicked, perhaps hundreds of them. Then that sound faded and she heard Maldred's breathing. She reached forward with her fingers, exploring, finding rocks, the edge of the stairs, feeling his chest, incredibly broad and muscular but rising and falling quickly. He moved away from her, his feet fumbling and pushing rocks away, then standing and finding a wall to lean against.
"Fiona?" he gasped.
"Here," she answered. She moved some rocks aside that had landed on her, felt her legs to make sure they weren't broken. Then she stood and groped about, connecting her fingers to his. He didn't move away this time. "Are you hurt, Maldred?"
He shook his head, then instantly realized she couldn't see him. "Sore," he answered. "That's all."
"So dark," she said as she groped behind him and felt the wall, searched with her foot and found the bottommost step. "We've got to get out of here somehow."
"Not by climbing up." He pulled her close and felt the gash on her cheek from the troll. It was bleeding again. "That way was sealed with the cave-in."
"Can you see?"
"I can sense it."
"How?"
"I just can, that's all," he said, with a slight edge to his voice.
"Rig and Dhamon!"
Maldred closed his eyes and hummed, shut out her questions and felt the wall behind him, fingers from one hand splayed over it, fingers from the other wrapping around hers to hold her in place. He was performing an enchantment, a simple one as far as he was concerned, but one of great importance to both of them. Within the span of a few heartbeats, he'd sent his senses into the stone, his mind flowing through the rock, up the rubble-strewn steps, through a thick wall of collapsed rock, and into the chamber that wasn't a chamber any longer. It was as if the top of the mountain had broken off and poured down on what was left of Reorx's temple. "No Fetch," he whispered. Then his mind was searching through the rocks, expecting to find the crushed body of the kobold. "Not here. Not here. Not dead."
Fiona was listening to his voice, realizing he had cast some spell, and surprised at his ability to do so. She had thought him merely a brigand. But she wasn't offended by this secret he'd kept, rather she was pleased-as it meant he might find a way out. She wanted to ask him about Rig and Dhamon, but waited, fearing if she interrupted him she could ruin the magic.
"Down this way," he was whispering to himself, his voice almost melodic. His mind flowed through what was left of the other archway, slipped around boulders, caressed the shattered images that had been so painstakingly carved so many centuries ago into walls now forever ruined. "Not as blocked. Light at the bottom." He focused on the torchlight as his senses moved down the passage, noting it was even deeper than the one he and Fiona had taken. There were side passages that had been concealed by the faces and figures on the wall, which were revealed by all the ruptures.
Maldred's mind flowed through a crevice and caught a glimpse of a room beyond. There was a feast hall with a great stone table and stone benches, all carved out of the very mountain and all now unreachable-a great prize destroyed before Donnag could claim it. There was another room, featureless, which he surmised had served as a barracks, with rotted planks of wood and sheets lying about. A third room contained a smaller altar, a miniature replica of the destroyed chamber above, though it lacked the same array of ornate pillars.
Maldred focused again on the light.
"Dhamon," he said finally, sighing. A measure of relief Fiona could not see crept across his face. "He lives. Rikali. Fetch." He paused, his senses trained on the kobold, on his explanation of the troll catching the pillars on fire. And he let out a clipped laugh. "Only Rig truly believes the little liar."
"Rig is alive?"
Maldred's senses travelled farther, past them and down the last of the steps, to an ironbound door partially blocked by rubble. "They're near a door. Some digging and they can reach it," he continued to himself. He wanted to talk to Dhamon to tell him to pass through that door, there was certainly another way out somewhere behind it. The dwarves who carved this place would not have allowed themselves to be trapped with only one entrance and exit. But his magic couldn't let him break inside Dhamon's thoughts-at least not without actually being face-to-face with him.
So then he pulled his mind back away, leaving Dhamon and Rikali and flowing back through the rock toward himself and Fiona, discovering other hidden chambers as he went, nearly all destroyed. He was bolstered by the fact that his good friend was brave and resourceful. "Dhamon will find a way out," he whispered.
Then he sagged against the wall, let out a deep breath, smiled broadly, and released Fiona's hand. "Dhamon, Rikali, Fetch. They are all right. Rig, too. A little beaten down by the rocks, but their passageway did not suffer so much damage as ours."
"Your magic," Fiona began, her tone indicating she was impressed as well as surprised. "I didn't know that you're a sorcerer, that you could…"
"I am far from a sorcerer, Lady Knight," he said with a chuckle. "I am a thief. Who occasionally dabbles in magic. And I just happened to know a simple enchantment that lets me peer through rock. I've found us a way out. It'll take us a while, but the way looks clear."
Fiona wished she could see him, see anything but this blackness. "How can we get to them?"
She was reaching out with her hands again, and he took both and pulled her face close to his. Despite the rain and the stone dust, the faint trace of sweat, she had a fragrance about her. He inhaled deeply. Then, bending, his lips brushed hers.
"Lady Knight, we ca
n't get to them."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Reflections Of Truths
"Pigs, but I'm not gonna die here! I won't have it!" Rikali ground her teeth together and squeezed by Dhamon and Rig, nearly stepping on Fetch in the process. "I'm gonna have me a grand house on an island. Far away from here, and no cave-in is gonna stop me." She felt her way down the staircase, careful not to trip over chunks of rocks and collapsed steps. "Wonderful idea this was, lover, comin' down here lookin' at all of the carved dwarves. I've had my fill of dwarves, I have! All I was lookin' for was a few baubles. Haven't gotten much that sparkles lately. Damn little-everythin' considered-from riskin' my pretty little neck in that valley of crystal gettin' gems so you can buy some old sword from Donnag."
Dhamon shot her a withering look. The mariner's eyes narrowed and he studied Dhamon, his expression souring. "Well, you ain't got nothin' now, lover. Donnag's got all of the gems and that sword too. Donnag's the better thief, I'd say. This is all truly wonderful. Shoulda stayed upstairs and picked the eyes outta those wooden dwarves.
Desecrating a temple to a dead god. Pigs to it all! Never thought much of the gods, anyway."
Fetch started to say something, but the half-elf cut him off with snarl. He shrugged his small shoulders and decided keeping quiet was wiser.
"There's a door down here!" Rikali yelled. "But the damn thing's rusted shut."
Dhamon brought the torch down to her, Rig and Fetch following. There wasn't much left of the torch, a half an hour of firelight at best.
"It better lead outta here," Rikali continued to grumble, giving the door a good kick. "Better be a back door at the bottom of this mountain. Huh?" She put her ear to the door and listened, furrowing her brow in concentration. "I hear somethin'. Maybe the wind whistlin' through some trees. By my breath, that's a good sign." Then she was fumbling in her belt, pulling small metal picks from behind her jeweled buckle. "Prefer to use my fingers," she said more to herself than to Dhamon. "But my nails haven't grown back yet. Pigs on my luck. That light, put it down closer. Hey, not so close it burns me!"