The Sable City

by M. Edward McNally

Banner de Trellane was too shaken to even try and stop the Miilarkians from leaving. He made some feeble protests that his Uncle the Baron should be informed immediately of Sir Procost’s end, but Captain Block was adamant. Without direct orders to the contrary the gnome Fitzyear could only shrug. His men helped Tilda with the baggage as Dugan was too covered in gore to carry anything without soiling it, and the gnome led the way into the woods and the hills leaving the sorry scene at the cottage behind.

  Within half an hour they reached a stream where they paused while Dugan did a more thorough job of washing up. He had to strip off his tunic, soak and wring it, and as he did so Tilda was reminded of cleaning out the stirge remains from her own cloak some days before. She shuddered. She could have gotten Dugan a brick of soap, but it was in a pack now carried by one of Fitz’s men and she did not want to go through the rigmarole of fetching it. Not with a headache already throbbing between her ears from her skull-bounce off the cottage.

  Tilda and the others saw the renegade legionnaire’s incriminating tattoo as he worked, a “34th” done in square black lettering on his upper back between left shoulder and neck, whirled around by Tullish-looking designs of the type prominent on the margins of Imperial coins. Something to remember his time in the Legion by, though the man would never see it without a mirror. Dugan wrapped his blanket around his shoulders and carried the tunic on a stick until it dried. The cold seemed not to trouble him.

  The garment had time to dry out for the way was long. For the rest of the morning hours the gnome led the line of marchers on a winding route through the maze of culverts and gullies snaking among the mountain foothills, passing through shaggy copses of pine trees with prickly boughs that made the humans duck while the gnome and dwarf strode on undisturbed. No one spoke a word. Tilda’s headache finally faded but she was footsore and her legs ached by the time a campsite was reached, a semicircle of five small cabins with log walls and roofs of tented canvas. Another half-dozen fellows of Sergeant Fitzyear’s command were there, just beginning to clean some species of wild hill hog for a spit above a kindling fire.

  Though Tilda could dress an animal if she had to, at the moment she could not stand to look at the work being done with heavy knives. The group did not stay in any case.

  Fitzyear was curt and brief, seemingly to his men’s surprise. Speaking mostly in what Tilda now recognized to be Daulic the gnome directed the men from the cottage to stand down and change places with the six at the cabins. While those who had accompanied the band thus far had been lightly armed with short swords and dirks at their belts, the fellows readying themselves now also brought bows or short spears. One hoisted a great maul across his back, and a pair had fearsome picks. Tilda was not sure if the picks were weapons or tools, but supposed they would do in either case.

  There had been familiar calls of greeting among the soldiers but Fitz kept barking unnecessary orders to interrupt conversations between those moving on and those staying here. It was obvious that the gnome intended for the group to leave before the new men were fully informed about the morning’s events, but there were too many of them in pairs, cinching thick leather armor and exchanging baggage, to keep them all from talking. Captain Block had another idea.

  “Dugan, you take that pack and the long case. Matilda, biyn jo waha.”

  Tilda frowned for a moment but then dropped the baggage she was carrying, which was mostly her personal equipment. She slipped her half cloak off over her head, and as ordered, outfitted herself for war in the manner of a Guilder. The men around stopped talking and watched, first with curiosity, then amusement, and finally with vaguely concerned frowns.

  Off came Tilda’s cloth tunic and wool sweater, both rolled up and stuffed into a pack after she first removed a web of leather belting and straps. Over her cloth undershirt remained a leather vest of a shade of brown so dark it looked nearly black. The front of the vest and the lower back were pleated with long, thin, triple-stitched pockets that became armor when specially fashioned lengths of steel were inserted, though Tilda did not have any of those as their great weight had been judged not worth the effort when she and the Captain left Miilark. But the front pockets had another use. From a second pack Tilda produced six sheathed throwing knives, a matched set with the one she always wore at the small of her back. Each had a short handle accommodating only a finger and thumb, with flat, narrow blades honed keen and counterbalanced with a round wooden knob. Three each went into the pockets to the right and left side of the vest’s eye-and-hook clasps, each hanging upside-down and held in place only by snaps Tilda could flick with a thumb.

  Next, Tilda wriggled into two wrist-length sleeves of blackened leather joined together by a back strap, which required a good amount of yanking and twisting to don for the leather was hard and stiff. Each sleeve was in two sections joined by cloth at the elbows, else she would not have been able to bend her arms. There was another sheath stitched to the bottom forearm section of each into which Tilda slid a pair of heavy knives. The points reached almost to the inward bend of her elbow joints and the grips long enough for a whole hand ended at a circular metal pommel that rested at the base of either palm. They were typically both to be drawn at once by bringing the hands together, elbows pointing out. The blades were stout and sharp only on one side, reinforced by the flat-edged so that they were hard to break. Two more just like them went into sheathes in her boots.

  Tilda undid her belt buckle, raising numerous eyebrows. She withdrew half the belt and threaded it through an additional buckle of a kind, then back around her waist. To this buckle was then attached a sheathed short sword in a light wooden scabbard wrapped with eel skin dyed black, as was the cord grip. The metal cross piece above the grip - the quillons - and the knob of the pommel were painted the same hue, with an obsidian stone set in the latter. The blade which Tilda did not draw at the moment was also painted black, excepting on the keen edge. She let the weapon hang from her right hip for a left-handed draw, despite being right handed.

  Another tunic came of Tilda’s packs, this one of much stouter cloth than her traveling gear and heavier by far for within the two-layered knit were thick pads on the shoulders and over her kidneys. Tilda pulled it on, got her braid out of the back of it, then paused and glanced to the Captain. He looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded. While Tilda untangled a particular series of straps from the bunch at her feet, Block set down the kit-bag that was the one piece of luggage he generally carried himself. Tilda buckled on a right-handed shoulder holster, while Fitz and the soldiers now stared at Block as he produced, charged, and loaded a short ackserpa. The word meant “barking snake” in the Trade Tongue, but the simpler term was dag or pistol. He tossed the readied weapon to Tilda who caught it, wound the internal spring that would move the spur-like wheel of the lock when triggered, and holstered the gun under her left arm with the ivory grip forward.

  It was by this point that the soldiers were exchanging worried glances among themselves. But Tilda was not done.

  She got back into her half-cloak and let her long braid hang to her waist beneath it so she could raise the hood without trouble. The voluminous garment hung little different than it had before a small armory had been beneath it, and the triangular cut let Tilda get her hands quickly inside. Across her chest went one more diagonal belt with an open sheath on the back, a modified version of the kind usually holding a quiver of arrows. Instead of a quiver Tilda slid the business end of her buksu into the stiff leather cup at the bottom of the sheath, and stretched to button a strap across its neck just behind her own. This left the long two-handed grip within easy reach, sticking up at an angle behind her left ear.

  The buksu was a traditional style of Miilarkian club dating from long before the coming of any outsiders to the Islands. Proper ones were carved from a single piece of golden swamp oak, though Tilda’s was darkened with tar polish. The grip was rounded with the knob at the end carved to look like a human head with a face. Tilda’s wore a smile and was win
king. Above the grip the weapon had four narrow sides, which on an old club would be scrimshawed top-to-bottom in intricate images, geometric designs, symbols, and pictograms. The whole club curved just a bit and the four faces met at a flat top in an elongated diamond shape, giving the buksu flat faces for swatting plus long edges and sharp points for more compelling blows. There were some that had been kept within tribes and families for generations, each succeeding one adding to the decorative carving. Tilda had bought hers as an aged and shaped but unadorned piece of wood. The only carving, just the knob and a few inches on one face, was her own.

  Almost done now.

  She opened the case Dugan would now be carrying, unlocking it with a small key that otherwise rode in a pouch of lock picks in her boot cuff. The slim case was the kind usually meant to keep a composite bow and extra strings dry. It looked old and worn on the outside though it was in fact brand new, purchased by Block the day before they had left the Islands. The inside was done in emerald green silk, fine velvet, and soft felt. Tilda removed a carbine-length ackserpa with a barrel shorter than a yard and a long wooden stock carved like a buksu, for it too had been fashioned in Miilark. The firing mechanism was imported from Zoku and consisted of an intricate steel lock with pins for a rear sight and a round cap over the internal wheel. From a compartment within the gun case Tilda took out several short, tin vials of powder and a mix of both lead and iron balls, placing several into the deep pockets on the inside front of her cloak. She opened one vial to charge the barrel and tapped home an iron ball with the tamping iron otherwise affixed beneath. She left a small bit of powder in the vial to prime the pan when necessary, and corked it. She stood, pulled on her gloves, and slipped the tin inside of one against the back of her left hand. She wound the spring-wheel, stood to attention, and shouldered arms.

  Stares from all around. Fitzyear finally broke the silence.

  “Yikes, Miss Matilda. Yikes.”

  Tilda shrugged at the gnome. “The right tool for the right job.”

  With the baggage redistributed the new group marched on. Tilda, Block, and Dugan walked in the middle of the line with Fitz and half of his men in front and the other three behind. Tilda went warily, carbine at rest on the crook of her arm and eyes scanning the surroundings, but she did not really believe this area or moment to be particularly dangerous. That had not been the Captain’s point in ordering Tilda to kit-up. Apart from keeping word of what Dugan had done to Procost from spreading, Tilda also suspected Block may have been sending something of a message to the strange men with whom she was about to spend the next several days, underground in the dark.

  Fitz and Block’s efforts had certainly helped the demeanor of the accompanying soldiers, and the last stage of the march was very different than had been the solemn slog from cottage to camp. Hardly anyone had breathed a word on the first leg, but now the scruffy soldiers who had not been present to see Sir Procost’s demise chatted amiably among themselves in Daulic. They even sang a ditty or two which Tilda guessed were bawdy songs by the chuckling that accompanied them.

  The gnome was still quiet as he led the way up out of the hills and to a narrow goat trail of a path that wrapped the western flank of an authentic mountain with a distinctive peak high above that certainly must have given the place a name, though none of the newcomers asked what it might be. They rounded about a quarter of the mountain’s great girth on the path and emerged on the southern side in early afternoon at the foot of the even more magnificent peak Tilda had looked upon from the balcony the day before. The mountain was heavily forested on its long, lower slopes, but the crags high above were too sharp and steep for either foliage or snow, revealing stone of a distinctive yellowish hue. The tall peak appeared almost like a sandstone intruder from another country, that had shouldered its way in among gray, granite neighbors.

  “Yagnarok,” Fitz said, as the whole group had paused to gaze upwards. The gnome turned to Block. “Do you know the name, cousin?”

  “The Yellow Mountain. In the old Dwarf tongue.”

  “How did they come up with that?” Tilda mumbled, and small smiles from a couple of the soldiers nearby let her know that at least some of them spoke Codian.

  Fitz led the way off the path passing down into the clustering pines over the thick carpet of needles. It was another hour or more until they reached a stony ridge as tall as the trees that extended out from the mountain proper just as if it were the root of a great tree, or even the foot of a stone giant. The impression was heightened by a cleft before the lowering ridge sank fully into the ground, leaving a space between either a branching root, or perhaps a gap between toes.

  Three of Fitz’s men put aside their packs and weapons and together began clearing aside brush mounded in the back of the cleft. It did not take long to realize that the majority of it was artificial, consisting of wooden frames and squares bound across by leafy fronds. They were quickly hauled out of the way to reveal a stout wooden door with heavy iron hinges and a crossbar, set in the angle of the cleft.

  “Not the original door, of course,” Fitz said. “That was fashioned by the dwarves, and if it still stood in front of us today we’d not see more than the merest crack.”

  The gnome stepped to the door and produced a large iron key from a chain around his neck. He slipped it into a great lock, turned it to the left rather than right, and left it there. He took a step back and two of his men removed the heavy crossbar from its braces. Only then did Fitz turn the key to the right, remove it from the lock and replace it around his neck. While his men hauled open the wooden portal, Fitz addressed the three visitors in a more serious tone than he had used in the morning.

  “There is a little speech I give here, so bear with me if you please. Stay close together, and stay on the path. The way we are going has been safe for a hundred years, but if you wander down a side passage or otherwise leave the route there is no telling what you may find. The whole place used to be dwarven, but that does not mean there is any hidden gold. It means that rooms may be trapped and halls may be designed to lead you in lost circles until you die of thirst. Besides all that, there are plenty of creepy-crawlies that call the deep tunnels home. We will be Under most of three days, with safe rooms along the way to spend the two nights already stocked with food and such so we needn’t carry much. If there are any questions ask them now, for once inside it is best if we talk as little as possible.”

  Three of Fitz’s men were removing metal lanterns from packs and filling them with oil. Tilda looked to the Captain, who was scowling as if his hangover was still lingering. She supposed he had been told more about this “Underway” by the Baron, but he had certainly shared nothing about it with her. Block of course had no duty to do so according to the traditions of the Guilds, nor was it her place as a lowly apprentice to ask any questions. But Tilda was in a thoroughly foul mood. Her forehead was not throbbing anymore though it was tender to the touch, but she had looked at her reflection in a stream earlier and seen the ugly bruise that looked like some monstrous birthmark. She was not thrilled about it.

  “Fitzyear,” Tilda said. “Just what manner of place are you leading us into?”

  Block frowned at her, but the gnome only blinked his big, bright eyes.

  “Oh. Well, many hundreds of years ago, perhaps a thousand, the dwarves of Garak-Tor established an outpost in this mountain. It grew into a city after they found some pretties worth digging up. They abandoned the place once the veins played-out, I would guess in round numbers something like seven hundred years ago.”

  Block snorted and Fitz looked at him, but the dwarf had nothing to add. Tilda knew the Captain was old, old almost beyond human comprehension, and she wondered exactly how long the crusty old dwarf had been around, and how many centuries of history he had seen with his own eyes.

  “So we are going through a city?” she asked Fitz.

  “Not really. We’ll be keeping down under the main passages most of the way. The south gate where we will exit
is a grander path, but this end of the Way is more like a secret bolt-hole for some old Dwarf Laird. Yagnarok was never meant as a route through the mountains, it just sort of turned out that way.”

  Tilda had another hundred questions, give or take, but she asked none as Captain Block said her name, only once but very firmly. She closed her mouth and after a last look between the two Miilarkians, the gnome shrugged and turned to face the door.

  “Take a look at the sky if you will, for we’ll not be seeing it again soon.”

  Fitzyear and two of his men entered first, followed by Block. Tilda centered herself before stepping after the Captain into the dark. While she had never had any particular fear of enclosed spaces, it occurred to her that she had never really had to spend any length of time underground apart from the dank basement of the Guild House in Miilark. Nor did the dark hold any particular fear for Tilda, for as the saying went back home, the moon is for lovers, the stars are for mariners, the black of night is for Guilders. Still, the thought of up to three days spent in the inky blackness underground was disheartening, and Tilda took a deep breath that smelled of pine before following her Captain through the doorway and down a sharp, rough passage with stone ledges smoothed for steps. One of Fitz’s men carried a lantern in the lead as did one of the three fellows who followed Dugan in behind her. The last man stayed above to close but not lock the wooden door. He replaced the camouflage, swept away footprints, and soon there was no outward sign that anyone had passed this way in years.

  Chapter Nine