by Sam Ferguson
CHAPTER 7
Year 3,711 Age of Demigods, Mid-Summer.
2nd year of the reign of Aldehenkaru’hktanah Sit’marihu, 13th King of Roegudok Hall.
Al’s cavedog moved almost effortlessly through the winding tunnels as he led the rescue group down to shaft thirty-seven. The explosion had been felt all the way up in the throne room. He had called for a group of volunteers moments after, but he had little hope in his heart that he would find anyone alive. Even the miners that had been on their way to replace Tareggh and his crew told Al it was a hopeless effort. They had been a quarter mile outside of shaft thirty-seven and they had still been assaulted with a wave of heat that coated them in dust from the explosion.
Still, Al was king. He could not sit idly by while others did work he felt he should be doing. After all, it was his command that had sent the crew down to the mine in the first place. In his mind he recalled the wreckage at Valtuu Temple. They had needed to dig out survivors there as well after the battle with Tu’luh. Yet, there were survivors. That was why Al was not about to waste precious moments. If he could get there and start the work faster by riding upon a cavedog, then perhaps it could make the difference between life and death for one of the trapped miners.
His determination burned hot as he and the others reached the point of the cave-in. Al leapt off from his cavedog and started calling out to the rescue group.
“Split into two groups. Fifteen of you will work the rubble. Clear it away as quickly as possible.” Al turned to the cavedog riders farther to the back of the group. “You fifteen take the loose rocks and boulders out so we can clear a path. Let’s get on it!”
Al moved in with the rest of them, pulling rocks free from higher up on a sloped pile and handing them down to the other dwarves that would shuttle the removed stone away from the cave-in site. It was hard, sweaty work, but none of the dwarves complained. They moved in perfect harmony with each other. The diggers grabbed the rocks and pivoted at the waist, hardly looking before they set them into hands already outstretched and waiting to take the stone away and pile it along the sides out of the way.
They worked for hours before the other mining crew arrived on foot. They dutifully moved in without being told where to assist and started adding their efforts to the rescue crew’s own efforts. With the extra hands to help, it only took another ninety minutes before they cleared enough stone away to find the blast marks on the left side of the wall.
“Looks like they found another chamber,” one of the miners said as they turned their attention to the charred hole.
Al moved through the others, taking a closer look. He saw dark brown spots on some of the stone. He knew at once that this was where the other miners had been.
“Hello?” Al called out as he pressed his face close in to the blocked passageway.
No answer came.
Al shook his head and smacked the wall with his fist.
“Shall we keep digging, sire?” one of the rescuers asked.
Al nodded. The others began removing rocks while Al moved to the back of the group and took a drink from the canteen hanging from his cavedog’s saddle. “What next?” he grumbled to himself in a low whisper. “Empty mines, dry wells, emigrating dwarves that would prefer to live on the surface than under my rule, and now dead miners.”
Al hung the canteen back onto his saddle and took in a deep breath of musty air.
“It isn’t your fault,” someone said.
Al turned around, but all of the dwarves were busy hauling stone away from the passageway.
The voice came again, more faintly this time. “It’s not your fault.”
Al looked up the tunnel, but no one was there except for the rescuers and miners.
“You are destined to find the Wealth of Kings,” the voice said in a soft whisper.
Al spun around. What in Hammenfein’s name is going on?
The voice disappeared without another word.
“You alright my lord?” one of the miners said as he walked by carrying a hefty boulder half again as large as he was.
Al nodded and wiped a hand over his face. “Just a bit tired,” he answered.
“Well, take a rest then, Sire. We can manage.”
Al shook his head. “That isn’t the kind of king I wish to be,” he said as he walked back to the blocked passageway.
He bent down and pulled a massive, oblong boulder out from the pile. He rolled it away carefully, letting the rough edges slam down to stop its own momentum before other dwarves hauled it away. He then pulled a black sphere of stone and tossed it to another dwarf. He continued working the front of the line until they broke through the passageway.
“By Icadion’s beard,” Al muttered as he broke through to see a large chamber. There were bags on the ground with gems and crystals spilling out of them. Unrefined hunks of gold and hunks of diamond sat on the ground on the northern side. Pickaxes littered the ground. But, there were no bodies.
Al turned around to face the others and shook his head. That was when he saw a streak of blood stretching across the wall beyond the charred stone. He pointed to it. “Can an explosion make the other miners disappear?” Al asked.
The mining crew entered the chamber and began looking around.
One of them bent low, picking up a ragged piece of canvas. He smelled it and then looked to the blood on the wall. “I’m not sure what to make of it, sire, but there should be…”
“Should be what?” Al pressed.
The miner held up the ragged cloth. “Pieces,” he said flatly. “Not to be crude, but the explosion should have left evidence of the others.” He then shook his head and pointed around the chamber.
“I have blood here,” another miner called out.
“I found some here too,” said a third.
“Sire, over here!” another called out.
Al moved around a column to see a dwarf squatting inside of a lava tube. “What is it?”
“Blood, a lot of it.” The dwarf turned and pointed to the bottom of the tube, slowly tracing a line with his hand and turning to point at the back of the tube. “There is a wide trail of blood that goes back down the tube.” Then the dwarf pointed up. “Diamonds too,” he added. “A big vein of gold off to the outside of this chute as well.”
“Come out of there,” Al said quickly. The miner did as he was told.
Without warning, Al’s cavedog sprinted into the tunnel and started making clicking noises. Its pink, forked tongue flicked in and out as it licked the air and its muscles tensed. Then, the animal did something that Al didn’t know a cavedog could do. It made a guttural sound that was something between a bird’s cry and a snarl. All of the other cavedogs filtered into the chamber around the dwarves and formed a defensive wall between Al and the lava tube. Two of the cavedogs even pushed the miner farther away from the tube’s opening.
“What are they doing?” one of the rescuers asked.
Al shook his head. “I haven’t the faintest idea, but it seems they believe there is danger coming from that tube.”
“They might be right, judging by the blood we see around the chamber,” the miner with the piece of cloth said. “I’m no expert with war, but if there is something in that tunnel, I could seal it off with explosives. My bet is that’s what the others tried to do when they were attacked.”
“Attacked by what?” Al asked. “There isn’t anything down here but stone.”
“With respect, sire, that isn’t entirely true, if you believe the legends.”
Al turned a curious eye on the miner. “Why would the others blow the tunnel while they were still in it?”
The miner sniffed the cloth again and shook his head. “I’m not for knowing that,” he said. “But, I can tell you that Kirrik was one of the best explosives engineers we have ever produced. If his powder was set to detonate, you can be sure he did it on purpose.”
“Could have been an accident,” one of the rescuers put in.
“Ha!” the miner said
. “Kirrik wouldn’t accidentally set off his explosives even if he was sleeping with a torch in one hand and a bomb in the other. No, he set it on purpose.”
Al sighed and moved toward the lava tube. The cavedogs fought against him, blocking his path and trying to push him back, but he pushed through all the same. He jumped up into the tube, followed a half second later by his cavedog.
“Stubborn lizard,” Al snarked.
The lizard made a clicking noise in its throat and its tail went rigid as it zipped around Al and stared down the tube. Al shuffled forward, and put a hand on the wall to steady himself as he leaned over the edge. The light the others brought into the chamber was enough to penetrate a few feet of the darkness as the tube dropped into oblivion below. Al saw streaks of dried blood and knew that there had been something in the tube. He reached down and patted his cavedog on the head.
“Stubborn, but smart,” he said as he offered the creature a smile. It didn’t look at him. It kept its eyes on the darkness below and remained still. Not until Al was safely buffered by the other cavedogs did Al’s lizard come out of the tube.
The others waited quietly for Al’s assessment.
Al looked around the chamber. There was wealth to be had in here, but not enough to risk dying for. “Gather up the diamonds and other treasure they found and move it into the main shaft. Once that is done, blow the lava tube shut.” Al pointed to the passageway. “Then start piling those stones in here and seal this place off. Hopefully the blast you drop in the tube will kill whatever it was. If not, then we will bury it inside.”
The others hopped to work without a word. It took them little more than ten minutes to gather all of the gems and gold. What struck Al, though, was the fact that none of the cavedogs moved from their defensive positions in front of the lava tube. Whatever it was, cavedogs could sense it, and they hated it.
Even when they prepared to blow the tube, the cavedogs stayed in place.
The explosives expert, Rupit, pulled several long, cylindrical bombs and wound their fuses together. Unlike Al, he was not quite strong enough to push through the cavedogs and get into the lava tube, so he lit the fuse and then tossed the bomb to the back of the tube. It bounced off the back wall and then the sizzling sound faded as it descended into the mountain’s depths.
“Back up,” Rupit said as he hurried back through the throng of angry lizards.
Seven seconds later an explosion erupted and the tube was illuminated with hot, yellow and red light. A wave of smoke and dust blew out from the tube, shooting over the cavedogs and settling slowly in the chamber. That was immediately followed by a rumbling tremor as rocks clacked and smashed into each other deep within the tube.
“One more time?” Rupit asked.
Al looked to the cavedogs. They still stood rigid, guarding the dwarves. The king nodded. If the cavedogs still sensed danger, then best to be safe.
Rupit repeated the process, gathering several bombs together. “You all might want to go out and take shelter for this one,” he said matter-of-factly. Everyone left but Al, who stood in the passageway so he could watch from behind cover.
Rupit lit the bomb and tossed it in. This time he didn’t meander through the cavedogs to get away. He ran and hopped around them, scurrying for cover. He made it to the passageway with time to spare. Al was about to ask him why he had run, but the answer roared through the tube a moment later as flames and shards of rock exploded out and sprayed into the chamber.
Al ducked back, pushing Rupit out into the main shaft as a great quake shook the ground. Dust fell from the ceiling and everyone held their breath until the shaking stopped and the dust settled.
“I think that did the trick,” Rupit said.
Al slowly inched back into the chamber and saw that the cavedogs were now filtering out into the hall as well. The lava tube was sealed, entirely caved-in. He smiled and nodded. “Alright, let’s set the miners to work in here on extracting everything we can from that gold vein. Once this chamber is dry, then use this as a place to stack the stone from the main tunnel while we continue to expand down the original mine. I want a guard set as well, just to be on the safe side.”
“Sire?” one of the miners asked.
Al pointed to the bags of wealth. “This will help, but it won’t solve our food shortage problem. I need this mine cleared. However, if the cavedogs can sense whatever attacked the others, then the answer is to assign soldiers with cavedogs to each mining unit. That should ensure safety while also keeping our mining operations going at full capacity. Also, none of you are to speak of this. I don’t want hysteria running through the mountain.”
The miner nodded, but what else was he going to say to the king?
Al counted out ten soldiers from the rescue party and sent them up to the main hall with the bags of treasure, and with orders for Benbo to set up proper shifts for guards in each of the open mines. The other twenty stayed to watch over the current miners, as their shift wasn’t set to end for a few more days.
“I’ll send some runners down with extra food and provisions,” Al promised as he saddled his cavedog and started his way back to his chamber.
He felt confident that the cavedogs would make short work of anything that would dare come out of the depths again. Now he needed to solve the riddle of the Wealth of Kings. He needed a space to think. There was a balcony adjoined to his bedchamber that overlooked much of the valley beyond. It was peaceful and, best of all, secluded from any visitors or advisors.
*****
Hiasyntar’Kulai moved his tired wings just enough to maintain his altitude as he soared high above a deep chasm that scarred the land between great, forbidding mountains covered in lush vegetation and teeming with animal life. He followed the canyon’s path for several minutes, propelling himself quickly over a dozen miles.
As he banked to the north and soared over the top of a rocky cliff, his eyes caught sight of a sparkling in the distance. It was hard to see at first, but the sunlight reflected off of it so brightly that he was sure he had finally reached his destination.
A large spire was the first shape Hiasyntar’Kulai made out clearly. It was green, with golden trim shining in the sunlight. Even with all the wonders the golden dragon had seen, this was his favorite construct in all of Terramyr, for it reminded him of his home on Kendualdern. As he flew up over another small incline that broke out into a wide plateau, the dragon roared and smiled at the magnificent castle of green glass before him. There were no walls around the structure, but the castle’s keep itself rose up into the sky more than fifty feet. The tops of the pointed towers ascended many stories higher still, with golden crests that reflected the sunlight with a fiery intensity that warmed the golden dragon’s heart.
He flew to the castle and stopped to land in front of the grand double doors that boasted hinges made of solid gold. A long handle bar was affixed vertically to each door and was made of the same, bright yellow gold as the hinges. However, the gold was not what the dragon admired most. Of course the gold called to him, singing its healing melody, but it was the clear sheets of thick glass that he appreciated the most, for they were formed from a special crystal that added its song to the gold and literally invigorated the mighty dragon with its melodies. From a distance the glass appeared green, but that was only because each sheet of glass was so thick that the crystal panes appeared green if viewed from specific angles.
The dragon closed his eyes and a golden sphere of light enveloped him. He felt the strange, tickling sensation as his body shrank down into a human-like form. He was not human, but he had the power to assume a smaller shape while in this particular palace.
As he opened the doors with a wave of his hands and passed beyond the doorway, the doors swung shut, creating a vibration through the hallway that was felt reverberating through his chest.
From the inside, the glass was so thick that he could only see through one wall at a time, meaning that rooms deeper within the palace were hidden by a screen of be
autiful green. There were no lamps, torches, or candles. The palace itself radiated with its own light.
He was surrounded by many people, or spirits rather, as they were all dead. Being a dragon, he could see the ghosts easily. They were all dressed in fine silk robes of white, red, green, blue, and yellow. They were all busy walking through the palace, some carrying books, others engaged in deep conversation. However, when they noticed him, they all stopped and looked at him expectantly.
“Go on about your business,” Hiasyntar’Kulai instructed. “I have matters to tend to down below.”
The spirits obeyed silently, moving into rooms filled with bookshelves lined with books and scrolls, or sitting at tables as they continued their conversations. The dragon watched some of the people gather inside of a small room and grab a couple of books from the shelves. Then, the dragon saw the old, familiar light blue energy flowing through the glass, humming sweetly and creating additional light within the room where the spirits were reading from the books.
Hiasyntar’Kulai began to walk again, but was stopped by a stout dwarf spirit.
“My king,” the dwarf greeted. “There have been stirrings in Roegudok Hall. Might I be permitted to go and lend aid to the king of the mountain?”
The dragon nodded slowly. “See that you do not interfere more than is necessary. We can whisper words of aid and subtly guide, but we cannot intervene in the lives of mortals.”
The dwarf spirit nodded. “As you say, my king.”
Hiasyntar’Kulai watched as the spirit of Al’s father walked away quickly, disappearing around a corner. The dragon smiled then. The dwarves had had a long disconnect from the Ancients, but things were being put back together now. The Father of the Ancients felt a burgeoning hope that everything would work out in the end.