Murder in Tarsis

by John Maddox Roberts

  “It is a great worm,” said Hotforge. “A vicious reptile twenty paces long. It eats anything it can catch.”

  “A dragon?” Ironwood asked.

  Hotforge shook his head. “No, the behir has no wings, it does not speak, and it does not have fiery or poisonous breath.”

  “That’s a relief,” Shellring said shakily.

  “Instead, it shoots lightning bolts from its mouth,” said Hotforge.

  “Ah, is that all?” Nistur said. “Well, have no fear. My companion, Ironwood”—he clapped a hand on the mercenary’s armored shoulder—“is a renowned dragon-slayer. You see? He wears the skin of a black dragon he slew some years ago. Such a champion will have no difficulty dispatching a mere behir.” He glanced up and was shocked to see that Ironwood’s face had gone deathly pale, a truly ghastly sight in the fungus light.

  “Let’s get to work, then,” said Hotforge. “Pickbreaker, go find those plans. The rest of you, fetch tools and gather at the old banqueting hall below the palace.”

  The assembly split up, and the little crowd made their way out through numerous exits. There was an air of high-spirited excitement, as if these folk had little to break the gloomy monotony of their lives and they looked forward to this unusual task.

  “This should be enjoyable,” Delver told them, flexing the long fingers of his gnarled hands. “I haven’t done any decent digging in many years.”

  “How far do your excavations extend?” Nistur asked as they followed him into yet another of the endless tunnels.

  “Wherever you see city above, there is underground beneath. My ancestors dug the foundations of Tarsis, and when that work was done they extended the diggings for their own use. There are tunnels that go out under the walls. Once, there were small dwarven villages and towns out there, and the people who farmed the land above them never even knew they were there.” The dwarf sighed. “That was long ago. We are a dying people now. All the villages are deserted, and so is most of the underground, just a few score of us left out of many thousands in the old days.”

  “That is sad,” Nistur commiserated. He fell back a little and said to Ironwood, in a low voice, “What ails you? Is your illness returning so soon?”

  “No, it’s just that—” He hesitated. “Well, news of this dragon-thing caught me by surprise.”

  “But it isn’t a real dragon, they say, just sort of a dragon.”

  “It doesn’t have to be very close! Who cares if it doesn’t have wings? They’d do it no good down here anyway. It’s why the Tarsians put those heavy grates over the street drains.”

  “Well, the dwarves have coped with the creature for centuries, so let us not allow it to dismay us. I have proclaimed your fame as a dragon-slayer, so act like one!”

  “It isn’t as though I have much choice,” Ironwood groused.

  A few minutes later they were assembled in the banquet hall, a long, narrow room with stone tables down its center and open hearths at each end. At one end of a table, the dwarf named Pickbreaker had spread out a scroll and weighted its corners with bits of rock.

  “These are the original plans as made by the master digger when the city was laid out. They’ve been amended over the centuries as new diggings were added and old ones closed off. The last additions were made just after the Cataclysm. That’s when these”—he pointed a stubby finger at some incomprehensible lines and squiggles—“were closed down.”

  “What sort of task are we looking at?” Hotforge asked.

  “There’s a plug of about fifty yards of solid masonry between the nearest access tunnel and the lowest dungeon, where they’re keeping Stunbog.”

  “Fifty yards!” Nistur said, aghast. “Surely you must need many days to carve through so much stone!”

  “If they’d used granite, it would take days, even for us,” Pickbreaker agreed. “Even if they’d used coral stone from the harbor, it would be something of a task. Luckily, though, they used soft tufa from the nearby hills. It would be a hard dig for you, but we are dwarves. We dig as naturally as you breathe.”

  “Make the tunnel large enough,” Shellring advised. “Stunbog is no lightweight, and Myrsa’s as big as Ironwood here.” She punched the mercenary lightly in the stomach, then winced and shook her hand in pain. As she did this a pair of young dwarves scurried into the banquet room.

  “The behir’s in a lair two levels below the dungeon,” said one of them. “But it’s asleep.”

  “I trust it sleeps deeply?” Nistur said.

  “A behir can sleep for years,” said Hotforge, “but this one’s been restless of late. We’ve heard it moving about. It must be getting hungry.”

  “Why haven’t you killed it?” Ironwood said, irritated. “If the thing sleeps like that, it should be easy.”

  “Have you ever killed something that spits lightning?” Delver demanded.

  “Plenty of them have been killed over the centuries,” said Hotforge. “But every time we think we’ve killed the last of them, another shows up. They hatch in the natural tunnels that are below even our own diggings. When a young one grows too big for the old volcano vents, it moves up here where it’s roomier.”

  “Most unfortunate,” Nistur said. “Will your digging activities wake it?”

  “That is what we’ll find out,” Hotforge said. He turned to the other dwarves. “We’ll work in two teams. While one digs at the plug, the other will carry the rubble to block up the behir’s access to us. Maybe that will slow it if it comes for us.”

  “An excellent thought,” Nistur commended.

  “We are as interested in staying alive as you are,” said Hotforge.

  “How far is it to this blocked tunnel?” Ironwood asked.

  “Come along. Ill show you.”

  They followed the dwarf leader from the banqueting chamber to a wide, square door about eight feet high. It was not locked, but it was carved all over with dwarven writing. The most fit-looking of the dwarves were already assembled there with picks, sledgehammers, steel rods, and wedges. A team of older dwarves stood by with wheelbarrows to carry off the rubble.

  “We are standing,” the old dwarf said, “just below the middle of the plaza before the Hall of Justice. Beyond this door was the old access tunnel, one of many used in working on the foundations of this part of the city.”

  “Such tunnels must have been handy things to have,” Nistur observed. “They would give you certain advantages should the folk of the Upper City turn hostile toward your people.”

  “Open it,” Hotforge commanded. With a great creaking of rusty hinges, the door swung back to reveal a solid wall of grayish rock. The stone had been precisely cut, and so compulsive was the dwarves’ sense of tidiness in masonry that the facing blocks had been buffed to a dull gloss. The central block bore a few lines of writing and below it a sigil. Hotforge’s finger traced the lines of script.

  “This says which tunnel was blocked and why, along with the date of the task. This sigil below it is the master mason’s mark.” He turned to one of the workers standing by. “Remove this block carefully; see that it isn’t damaged. We’ll replace it when we restore the work. Well, get to it.”

  Immediately, the dwarves set to their task with the intensity of termites boring into wood. As soon as the inscribed block was free, Hotforge personally pried loose the block immediately below it and carried the cube of tufa to one of the banqueting tables.

  “I’ll inscribe this one with the story of our task and the date and place my own mark on it.”

  “You take your stonework seriously,” Nistur observed.

  The old dwarf’s long eyebrows raised in wonder. “What could be more important?”

  “Ah, what, indeed?” Nistur said.

  “Of course,” Hotforge said sadly, “there may be no one to read it before long. But then, that’s something I want to discuss with Stunbog.”

  “You think he can help you?” Shellring asked.

  “Let’s get him out first,” said the dwarf. “We
can talk about it then.”

  With nothing of importance to do for the time being, the three companions seated themselves at the end of a banqueting table. Some elderly dwarf women brought them food and ale, and the companions set to it with a good appetite.

  “I hate having to wait like this,” Ironwood complained.

  “That is because you are a man of action. I like to employ my leisure time in the acquisition of knowledge. Perhaps we can utilize this time to our mutual satisfaction.”

  “What do you mean?” Ironwood asked.

  Nistur leaned across the table. “My friend, I think it is time we learned about you. For good or ill, our lives have been thrown together. Perhaps another time I will speak of myself, but just now we seem to be deeply involved with you: your past life, your unique infirmity, the odd hostility that certain parties nurse against you. These things affect and endanger all of us.” He leaned back and smiled, raising a cup of finely worked alabaster. “Besides, it might take your mind off that monster sleeping below us.”

  For a long time Ironwood stared at him with a look of near-hostility. Shellring looked back and forth from one to the other uncertainly. Then the mercenary began to speak.

  Chapter Eleven

  “The name of my homeland,” Ironwood began, “is irrelevant. I was of decent birth, and I thought I had high prospects. Of course, I was very young.”

  “Many of us began that way,” Nistur said.

  “Shut up!” Shellring snapped. “I want to hear his story.”

  “My apologies,” Nistur said. “Please continue. I shall strive not to interrupt.”

  “Well, then, I was trained to be a warrior, as were all the men of my family. But I wanted to be more than a common warrior. I knew I was destined to be a knight, a hero.” His face twisted into a rueful smile. “Well, it’s a common enough dream for a young man. Few try to act upon it.”

  He drained his ale cup and put it down. “I was not alone in my vaunting ambitions. In the town next to my father’s estate was another young fellow named Boreas. He was the ne’er-do-well son of the town’s mayor and wealthiest tradesman. We grew up together, roistered and got into trouble together. His father wanted him to follow in the family business, which was the wine trade, one of the most profitable in our part of the world. Boreas would have none of it. He wanted adventure, and he loved to sing and play the harp and act on the stage. All the townspeople were scandalized, for no one of good birth did such things.”

  Now his smile contained a wistful fondness. “He cared nothing for them or their offended sensibilities. Boreas had to have the adulation of the crowd, the applause. He loved to be the center of attention. Unfortunately, he was far too popular with the young women, and a day came when he had to flee.

  “He came to my family’s castle and begged me to go with him. He had heard a tale, he told me. A young black dragon had been seen in the mountains a few leagues from our town. All that night we talked of this marvel. Surely, Boreas said, the creature must guard a treasure, for this is the nature of dragons, or so all the stories tell us. Whether the treasure was worldly or magical we had no way of knowing, but the beast had already killed some travelers, and the area was gaining a dire reputation.

  “Boreas lusted for the treasure and for the sheer adventure of it. He could already see himself spreading the tale of his own deeds with his harp and his voice. But my ambitions were different. I saw only the reputation I would gain by killing a dragon. I knew that most heroes strove and suffered for many years before they gained the esteem of their peers. As a youth, of course, this arduous path held little attraction for me. But by slaying a dragon, I could become a hero with one swift deed. The deadly peril of it only made the prospect more exciting.”

  He turned to Shellring. “Young men often think that way. They want glory, but they do not want to face the long, hard years of effort required to earn it. They are easily tempted into trying feats far beyond their years to shorten the path. This often leads to death or disaster.”

  “I understand,” she assured him.

  “So we set out. Both of us had good horses. I had a lance and my grandfather’s long sword, but only the dingy armor I trained in, for my family was not about to have a new harness made for me until they were certain I would grow no more. Still, I felt every inch the hero.

  “As we drew nearer the lair of the dragon, we began to hear tales of the thing. It was clearly a young one, for it had established its lair only a year or so previously. Boreas found this news disappointing, for it meant the dragon could not have accumulated a great deal of treasure. As I have said, I did not care about the treasure, and I found the news reassuring. As we traveled, I had found my high aspirations assailed by a terrible doubt. Was I warrior enough to slay a great wyrm? A creature that might have slain an army of heroes by the time it attained full growth? Thus, I was relieved. Surely, I thought, I could handle a very young dragon. And, it seemed to me, slaying any sort of dragon would qualify me as a hero.

  “One day, we found ourselves in a village at the foot of the mountains. It was a serried barrier of three parallel ranges, and the villagers told us that their road would take us to the nearest pass through the mountains. The dragon’s lair was high on a slope above the pass in the middle of the second range. They told us of a mountain lake there, surrounded by a heavy forest, and in the shadows of this forest the dragon lurked and sometimes swooped down on travelers passing by.

  They were overjoyed to see us, for the dragon had been costing them much of the caravan trade. Traders and other travelers had been avoiding that pass, and once the dragon had even come near the village and carried off a shepherd. We were feted and praised as if we had already attained the status of heroes. In fact, we found the people’s hospitality so agreeable that we stayed in the village for five or six days, until they began to hint that it was time we were about the business we had come for. So, amid much singing and throwing of flowers, we rode from the village and took the road toward the mountains.” He picked up his refilled cup and drank, then was silent for a while.

  “Well?” Shellring said, impatiently. “What happened after that?”

  “I don’t remember,” Ironwood said.

  “What?” she cried incredulously. “You went out and killed a dragon and you don’t remember? I’ve told judges better lies than that!”

  “Let him relate his tale his own way,” Nistur said soothingly.

  “Aye, it is true, I have no memory of the next three days. I think it was three days, at any rate. What I remember is that I awoke on an icy slope, and I was in terrible pain.” His eyes were haunted. Clearly this was his most vivid, as well as his most painful, memory.

  “I was alone. My grandfather’s sword was gone. My armor was torn, and my right thigh was mangled. With horror I saw how the armor had been shredded and the flesh ripped to the bone. There was blood all around me, and a trail of it leading up the slope. All I could think was that I was alone. What had happened to Boreas? I felt sure that the answer lay at the end of that trail of my own blood.

  “So I pushed myself to my feet, and I will tell you that never before or since have I known so terrible a task. The pain in my whole body was intense, and I was weak and dizzy from loss of blood. I had nothing to lean on, and my right leg would bear little weight. I had to hobble a few inches at a time, and this caused the blood to flow from my wounds. I knew by this, and by the near-blackness of the blood on the ground, that I had been unconscious for many hours, perhaps a day or more.

  “At the top of the slope was a very strange feature: a dense forest contained in a bowl a few hundred paces in diameter, the whole of it shrouded in a dense mist. In the woods I found a fallen branch that I was able to use as a staff, and after that the going was a little easier. It was not so easy to see my blood on the mat of fallen pine needles as it had been on the snow, but I managed. Even through the haze of pain, I could feel that it was much warmer in the forest than out on the mountain slopes.

>   “The distance through the forest was not great, but it was one of the longest journeys I have ever undertaken. I could take no more than two or three steps before I needed to pause, fighting off dizziness and sickness the whole way. Truly, I thought I was dying. But I had to know the fate of my friend before I could give up.

  “After what seemed an eternity I came to the little lake at the center of the forest. It was from this lake that the mist arose. I dipped my hand into the water and found that it was very warm, almost hot. Beyond doubt it was fed from hot springs deep underground, and it was the lake that sustained so heavy a forest in those cold mountains. I never learned where it drained, for no stream led from it. I stripped off my now useless armor and paused for a while to rest and bathe my wounds.

  “The water seemed to have some healing, or at least restorative, power, for I felt far better after bathing in it. My wounds had ceased to bleed, and the pain was reduced to a bearable limit. I took up my staff and hobbled on, around the lake. In time I came to a spur of the mountain that jutted from a steep, stony slope and plunged into the lake. Where water and stone met there was a fissure, and the moment I saw that crack in the stone, I knew that this must be the dragon’s lair.”

  He paused for a while as the old dwarf women cleared away the plates and refilled the cups. His companions waited with barely suppressed impatience. He took another pull at his ale cup and grimaced.

  “I haven’t spoken so much in years. It makes the throat dry.”

  “But it is good for the soul,” Nistur said. “Please, go on.”

  “Yes, what happened next?” Shellring urged.

  “In later years,” Ironwood said, “I learned that black dragons are usually found in the lowlands. They love swamps and deep forest. This one must have just left the nest, seeking its own lair and territory. Perhaps it was at the end of its strength when it spotted that freakish hot lake and its forest and cave. It must have decided that this would do for its first home. As soon as it regained its strength, it began its depredations.