by Rosie Scott
“Gah, I could use a drink,” one of the dwarves mumbled as he passed, the stench of body odor following him.
The dwarf walking beside him laughed tiredly and slapped him on the back. “It'd be a lot easier just to say, 'hey, buy me an ale, would ya?'”
The first dwarf shook his head, though he chuckled. “I'm not gonna ask ya to spend your gold on me.”
“No,” the other dwarf agreed, before shaking her head in humor, “so you'll hint at it until I offer.”
“Aye.” The two chuckled together as they neared the upper exit to the city. I watched their retreating forms, hoping more than anything the Alderi would let them go.
Alas, it was not meant to be. Whether due to their close proximity or otherwise, the assassins nearest the tunnel we'd come from deemed the two miners a threat. Both dwarves stilled at the same time, shuddering as they died from two gouged throats. The stocky bodies were slowly pulled into the side tunnel, leaving a trail of blood over the gray stone.
I grimaced at the scene. I couldn't know for sure why the assassins had chosen to kill the two. Perhaps they'd nearly bumped into one of them. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe someone had gotten antsy, scared, or impatient. Perhaps it was a direct refusal to follow my orders. I suddenly understood Cerin's desire to only lead the dead into battle. Corpses followed orders without question or regard to their own safety. Living beings were often finicky and unpredictable. I could not control my soldiers; I could only guide them. As much as I disliked seeing the deaths of two miners I deemed to be innocent, I could do nothing more. I judged their deaths to have been avoidable. Two of my soldiers had simply judged differently, and I'd given them the freedom to make that decision.
The blood left over the stone was wiped up moments later by a cloth which was as invisible as its owner, erasing all signs of death. Seeing the assassins clean up after themselves made me feel a bit better since that meant the dwarves hadn't been killed in some underhanded attempt to sabotage our mission here.
My hand was tugged upward as Azazel stood, and I followed his lead. We continued down into the depths, approaching the intersection cautiously. After hesitating a moment and listening for nearby miners, Azazel headed left. He hadn't looked for my input, but he didn't need to. The right path would have only taken us into the dead end of the inside of the mountain.
Azazel, Nyx, and I traveled as a group like this for many hours, moving farther through the maze-like mines of Olympia until I lost most of my sense of direction. We passed intersections and stairways carved out of pure stone, and traveled over rail systems meant to transport loads of ore and gems via mine carts. The path naturally sloped downward as we continued, and eventually, it widened. The usually rough stone became smoother, and finally, we came to an intersection that had golden signs beside each route to alert the populace to different locations.
Carlotte Mines, said the sign pointing to the maze of tunnels of the third mountain which we were in the midst of leaving. The path leading into the mountain south of the city read Burghard Mines. Pointing in the direction we were heading to a way which sloped ever downward, another sign announced, Hall of the Dead.
Azazel leaned forward past the stone wall ahead, pulling my hand forward with the movement. The stone floor just before him was a clash of orange firelight and the soft blue of what appeared to be the dim glow of early morning. I moved slowly past my friend to look up toward the city, finding the thought to be correct. The main path here led outside, but that confused me since we'd been walking downhill for the last several hours. Perhaps we had traveled so far we were now at the downward slope of the first two mountains.
I glanced back at the signs. That made a lot of sense. It was possible the dwarves had named the mines according to the mountains they belonged to. If that theory was correct, the dwarves had put their coveted Hall of the Dead straight in the middle of their most massive mountain, forcing the mines to be built around it. That would place it in the center of the city as well, at the best location to be accessible to all civilians.
Azazel still waited for my input. I noted the early morning weather to our left and made my decision. Given the silence surrounding us in all directions, I whispered under my breath, “Hall. Then up.”
Azazel's superior ears heard the words despite only being small releases of air, and he moved forward. Our final trek through the mountain before breaching Olympia would allow me to go inside a Hall of the Dead for the first time, and I found I was excited to see one.
Bjorn had told me many stories of the Halls of the Dead when I was a little girl. He'd spent most of his youth in Oeric, which was the mining town closest to the Chairel border and just north of Hallmar. Despite being a humble settlement, Oeric's Hall of the Dead was magnificent due to the surrounding Quakes. Bjorn had said that many of Hallmar's dead were transported to Oeric to be buried since the city was built on grasslands. Hallmar eventually entered into an agreement with Chairel to establish a Hall of the Dead in the Firn Caps along my home country's northeastern coast. I could remember Sirius talking about the nice income of gold that renting the land to the dwarves afforded him and Sera. Because Celendar was the closest city to the Firn Caps, it should have fallen under the city's jurisdiction, but the Celds had never shown an interest in ruling anything other than their forest.
Nonetheless, Oeric's Hall of the Dead was massive, and Bjorn had told me of its architecture because he had buried friends there and visited it often. He'd also been to the Halls in Hallmar, Brognel, and Narangar, but it was Oeric that was closest to his heart. No matter how our conquest in Hammerton went, I yearned to visit Oeric and see where Bjorn had grown up. It was odd, really; while my own personal mission of taking Chairel was the reason this war was started to begin with, all of my friends had been able to grow and come to terms with their pasts through its events. Freeing Anto had allowed him and Jakan a few more years of happiness and fulfillment, and getting to know Anto had challenged Theron's biases just before his death. Our campaign in the underground had given Nyx the ability to face her mother, we had freed Azazel from his captivity, and Calder had been able to grow from his shame and guilt over Koby's death. Our time in Eteri had allowed Maggie to join us with new purpose, and fighting the Icilic had given Cerin a chance to fight back against the racism which had torn his family apart.
Yet, here I was, ten years after Bjorn's death and still seeking resolution. If Bjorn were still alive, I hoped he would be proud of me. He had admired the war generals and figures of history just as much as I had, and my accomplishments thus far often surpassed those I'd looked up to as a child. I was already a legend and a force to be reckoned with. If I won this war, I would be nigh untouchable.
Yes. Bjorn would be proud of me, I thought, just as two pure gold doors appeared at the end of the hallway ahead. After all, Bjorn's last words to me had been “Give 'em hell, Kai.” For the past decade, I'd been working hard at doing just that.
The two golden doors before us stretched from floor to ceiling and were arched at the top. Gold was such a soft metal that it was rare to see it used with such prevalence in architecture, but the doors here were so far within the mines that they would be protected from most harmful elements. The doors were carved with a design that stretched over the entirety of both. At the top of them was the image of a thick layer of clouds. Above the clouds stood many authoritative dwarves in stances which mirrored the images carved into the rock of the mountains of Olympia. Just below the fog was the shining sun, its rays reaching to the ground where legions of smaller dwarves were waiting. I couldn't tell if the dwarves in the sky were supposed to be gods or figures of history. I knew many dwarves were religious, but they didn't appear to be as guided by their religion as the Naharans.
For now, it didn't matter whether they were gods or simple men; the doors they decorated were blocking our path, and they were so large and bulky in appearance that moving through them could call attention to us. Azazel stopped just before the door on the right. I wa
ited patiently, figuring him to be using his superior ears to listen for approaching dwarves. After a moment, a flash of cream-colored energy flew from thin air to the door.
Alleviate. Azazel wanted the door to be as light as possible to cut down on its chances of grinding or squeaking as it opened. As he finally pulled the door toward us, his foresight was rewarded. Though the door was massive and towered over our heads, it did not make a sound.
The three of us hurried through the door as quickly as we could, and Nyx made sure to close it as carefully as possible. I was speechless as I entered into Olympia's Hall of the Dead, for it was an architectural wonder.
It was as if the entirety of Olympia's second mountain had been hollowed out and dedicated to holding their dead. The ceilings were so high I could not see them, and unlike in Quellden, there were no bioluminescent fungi here to alert me to their existence. The Hall of the Dead was set up much like a library, with no end in sight to its depths left or right, and rows upon rows of stone stretching from our end of it to the other. The rows alternated between extremely tall walls and those short enough for us to look over. Regardless of their height, they were meant for one thing only: holding the dead.
The tallest walls were fifteen or so feet wide at their ends and held horizontally placed sarcophagi in labeled rows and columns on both sides. These burial places were separated into sections; I counted twenty places high and twenty places across, leaving each one carrying four hundred of the dead. Each sarcophagus was bordered with gold and labeled with the name of its occupant, birth and death dates, the family's well wishes, and the person's deeds during her or his life. Between each section of the dead were the figures of dwarves which stood even higher than the labeled graves as if they were ever-watching guardians.
This was just one section of the graves, and it was sixty feet in height and eighty feet across in order to hold so many sarcophagi. There were thousands upon thousands of these segments over hundreds of rows. I was dumbfounded by its grandiosity. I could see no end to the room in any direction. It was like a never-ending library of people. The sarcophagi were not the only methods of burial. Each smaller wall had two glass sides, showcasing thousands upon thousands of personalized urns.
The Hall of the Dead was as well-lit as a massive underground monument could be. Each guardian statue held two stone torches with attached iron braziers holding wild flames. In addition, the aisles of urns were topped with a mixture of oil lamps and candles. Between the small lights were piles of offerings to the dead. The dwarves appeared to consider ornamental weapons and armor to be the best choice for their deceased, though I did see raw precious gemstones and flowers in the mix as well. Some of the items had to have been sitting in their place for years because there were stacks of it. The Hall was well-tended, for there were no dead or dying flowers stinking up the air, and not a fleck of dust could be found marring the shiny weapons and armor.
Azazel led the way to the end of an aisle of sarcophagi, where he hesitated. With a glance on either side of the stone myself, I saw an attendant of the Hall walking past the rows at the next intersection. It was an old dwarven man with as many belly rolls as wrinkles, and he held a torch in one hand and a rag with the other. The dwarf glanced up at the labels adorning the ends of each aisle, waiting a moment before deciding to walk down to our left.
We went right. The early hour ensured that few civilians roamed the halls, but that was all the more reason for them to be cleaned and tended to. As we traveled through aisles upon aisles of the dead, some attendants pulled rolling ladders to various areas to dust the highest of sarcophagi, dying flowers were cleaned up from offering surfaces, and one dwarf was installing a golden plaque on a grave site that hadn't yet been filled with its occupant.
The more we sneaked through the Hall, the more I believed it took up the entirety of the mountain's base. Finally, after a few hours of feeling as if we were walking through the same area in a forever repetitious cycle, just the slight glow of golden doors appeared in the midst of dark shadows. About halfway down our current aisle, Azazel suddenly halted, and Nyx and I piled up behind him.
A dwarven civilian spun around the end of the wall before us so fast it was no wonder Azazel hadn't anticipated his change of direction. The man was middle-aged with the creases of calloused, sun-kissed skin lining his face. A long brown beard braided in multiple places hung over his chest. Brown eyes darted frantically around the air where we stood, and I froze with fear.
Silenci. The illusion spell was recited in my head, and I directed the clear energy to my own body, muffling the sound of my movements. The dwarf walked toward us anyway, and Azazel stiffened beneath my fingers.
“You!” The man called out. Azazel moved slowly to the side of the aisle, pulling us closer to the wall of urns. My heart thudded in my chest as the dwarf neared us before walking past. I watched as an attendant came into view at the end of the aisle.
“Do ya need help?” The attendant asked, as Azazel slowly started to move forward again.
“I'm lookin' for a grave. I can't find it.” The civilian's voice was full of turmoil. “Trumhall Bicket.”
“Oh! I believe ya just passed him.” Two sets of footsteps hurried up behind us, and Azazel abruptly stopped to stay out of their way. The three of us hugged the glass wall guarding the urns as the two dwarves passed us again. The attendant pointed up in the general top-right direction of the wall of sarcophagi. I was bewildered as to how he could so easily find one grave out of tens of thousands. Perhaps each attendant was assigned aisles.
“Thank the gods,” the civilian breathed, holding his face with a hand. “Forgive me. I haven't been here in years. I probably passed him three or four times already.”
“Not a problem, friend.” The attendant smiled warmly at the other man. “Holler if ya need me. Good luck to ya.”
The civilian nodded, before plopping down lazily right in the middle of the aisle just feet before us and staring up at the grave in question with two teary eyes. “Father, I need your guidance. Please.” He hesitated, pulling a flask of alcohol from his belt and holding it close to his chest. “I am torn.”
I glanced behind us. The attendant from earlier was loitering around the opposite end of the aisle as if desperate to overhear the man's ramblings. Perhaps he thought it would be the most exciting part of his day. In either case, we were stuck between the two.
“It has gotten to the point where I can't avoid it anymore,” the man continued, staring up at the sarcophagi as if it would save him. “They no longer ask for recruits. They demand them.”
My ears perked up at that tidbit. I knew little of Hammerton's politics, and the subject would have been interesting to me even if collecting intel wasn't one of our goals.
“They've given us until the 1st of Red Moon to report to the barracks,” the dwarf continued, before audibly swallowing and unscrewing the cap of his flask. “If I don't do as they say, the tax rate on the shop goes up twenty percent. Twenty. I cannot afford it. We've fallen on hard times as it is. Birgetta is pregnant again. I already can't afford to put Gota through smithy trainin', and that's all she has her little heart set on doin'. I can't leave the wife and kids. I have no desire to be a soldier. They tell us their armies are full of necromancers, father. Not just one.” He took a short break from talking to take a swig from his flask. “Many. And ya know all too well the damage just one can do.” A rolling sob racked forth from the man before he rambled off a list of dwarven names which seemed personal to him and continued, “And that's why I'm ashamed to be here like this. I feel like a coward comin' to ya askin' for your blessing to be a different man than ya were. If ya were alive, you'd be jumpin' at the chance to fight, and you'd wonder why I wasn't.” The man took another drink.
The attendant behind us moved closer, feigning interest in rearranging the offerings above the urns. Azazel was tense beside me. My mind started to think of possible ways out of this. I wanted to avoid unnecessary casualties.
�
�Times are changin', father,” the dwarf continued after a moment. “They tell us the gods are alive. And not only are they alive, they're joinin' the fight.” As my mind swarmed with this new intel, the man laughed humorlessly. “I think they're lyin' just to get us to join the army. They say that if we join, we'll get to meet them. Heard rumors that men are joinin' the army with the promise of gettin' a personalized weapon forged by Tyrus himself.” Tyrus. The god of the forge and metal-working. Expressed interest in my whereabouts through Malachi. “I called bullshit. Ain't no gods left on Arrayis. If there were, why'd they be showin' up now?”
Ironically, the dwarf's question was one I had myself. If the gods were working alongside the armies of Chairel and Hammerton, I had to admit to being impressed. The combined fear and hatred of me by both countries and the gods were forcing their hand. Chairel and Hammerton had finally agreed to recruit more allies to defeat me, and the gods were coming out of the woodwork willing to break their own rules to cut me out of the picture. It was a last resort, a desperate measure, but most importantly, it was a good plan for my enemies to adopt. I looked forward to violently unraveling it.
“There've also been rumors that people are escaping south,” the man continued, somewhat lower in tone. “Maybe it's ignorant, but there are lots of good people just not lookin' for war. I heard they're rebuilding an old military checkpoint in the southern Border Mounts. One of the ol' ones ya used yourself when ya fought in the Metal Conflict with Nahara, back when the mountains were split into the Border Mounts and the Jeweled Ridges. Still has markings showin' the old border, so I've heard. It's old and dilapidated now, father. Abandoned, of course. How many years has it been? Ah, no matter. Ya would be proud that they're workin' to get it settled again. Some out of protest for the way things are being handled in the war, some out of fear. Some just for a change of pace, I 'spose. I've been thinkin' I might gather Birgetta and the kids and head there. I'd lose the shop, but as much as I've worked at keepin' it goin', some things are just more important. I hope ya would agree.”