Council of War

by Richard S. Tuttle

  Inside the tunnel was a pile of unlit torches. With a nod of the king's head, the column of dwarves walked forward into the new tunnel. The first dwarf picked up a torch and lit it. He handed it to the next dwarf who then became the head of the line. The torch giver lit another torch and counted as dwarves passed by him. He gave a lit torch to each twentieth dwarf until the entire line had passed into the new tunnel. He held the last lit torch while the king entered the tunnel and then the two strong dwarves slid the wall closed. The king reached into an alcove in the tunnel and extracted a square keystone that had been made in preparation for this moment. He stepped onto a low shelf and knelt with the keystone in his hands as the two strong dwarves forced the lintel to the left. When he heard the faint click, he quickly shoved the keystone into the recess vacated by the lintel. He jumped to the floor of the tunnel, and the two strong dwarves released the lintel. The lintel slipped back to the right a bit, but it could no longer go far enough to the right to release the door mechanism, at least not without someone removing the keystone. The king smiled broadly and nodded his appreciation to the two strong dwarves.

  The king, the torchbearer, and the two strong dwarves receded into the darkness of the tunnel, the flickering flame of the torch getting dimmer and dimmer until finally everything was black. The blackness seemed to swirl and slowly the symbols on the wall in the chamber with the chasm began to form. The symbols seemed to mutate and pair off in strange ways and then a bell sounded. It was a tiny sound, but it meant danger, and Garth leaped to his feet and grabbed for his sword, but the sword wasn't there.

  "Easy," Kalina said with concern. "It's on the other side of you."

  Garth looked at his wife uncomprehendingly for a moment and then turned and saw the sword. "Get the others up," he said quietly, but urgently.

  Kalina nodded and roused Tedi and Natia, as Garth moved swiftly to the edge of the woods. Tedi woke Morro and pointed to the trees. The elven thief nodded and tapped Natia's shoulder. Natia and Morro dashed to the trees they had hid in once before, while Tedi raced to the side of the clearing opposite Garth. Kalina stood casually in the clearing waiting to see what would happen. Garth saw Kalina standing alone, and he motioned for her to take cover. Instead, the mage walked calmly to the narrow trail leading to the road. Garth grumbled under his breath as he broke cover and raced after his wife. He caught up to her when she stopped to pick up a tiny bell.

  "What are you doing?" he scowled softly.

  "I was trying to tell you," explained Kalina. "Fakir Aziz just left the camp with his mule. I doubt that he knew that you had booby-trapped the camp last night. He was the one who set off the alarm."

  "Why didn't you say something?" growled Garth.

  "No one can speak as fast as you can move when you think trouble is brewing," chuckled Kalina. "Speaking of brewing, I was just putting some tea on. Would you like some?"

  Garth took a playful swat at Kalina, but she laughed and ducked. She turned and ran back to the clearing with Garth on her heels, and the others expected a marauding gang of bandits to be following them.

  "You can all relax now," Garth called to the others. "Kalina's little morning joke is over."

  Slowly the warriors came out of their hiding spots, but they were still wary until Kalina explained what had happened. There was a bit of laughter at Garth's expense, but he took it well. While Kalina made the morning meal, Garth stared at the strange symbols that the fairy had drawn in the dirt the previous night. He was so mesmerized by them that he did not hear Kalina asking him to take his plate. Natia finally nudged him to bring him back to reality.

  "What is wrong, Garth?" asked Kalina. "You had another dream, didn't you?"

  "What makes you say that?" Garth asked defensively.

  "You were mumbling in your sleep and tossing about," answered Kalina. "What was it about?"

  "Dwarves," shrugged Garth. "Why did you move my sword?" he asked to change the subject. "You know that I depend upon it being where I can reach it."

  "I never touched it," replied Kalina.

  "Well, someone did," frowned Garth.

  "What about the dwarves?" pressed Kalina.

  "It was just a dream," snapped Garth. "Let it go."

  "Humor us," urged Kalina. "We can use some levity before we start talking about our plans."

  "Yeah," agreed Tedi. "I like dwarf stories."

  "I think dreams are important," added Natia. "I think it is nature's way of helping us solve problems."

  Garth glanced at Natia and shook his head. "It is just your imagination having fun while you sleep," he said.

  "So tell us what you imagined," pushed Kalina.

  Garth sighed and shook his head in defeat.

  "I think it had to do with what Button told us last night," Garth began. "I probably had that on my mind when I went to sleep. Anyway, I saw a huge chamber with a bottomless chasm in it. Hundreds of dwarves came into the chamber singing a song of sorrow and lined up along the edge of the chasm and then the king chiseled that message into the wall. I thought they were all going to jump into the chasm, but they didn't. King Drak led them in a silent procession to another chamber where a secret door was installed to hide a new tunnel. The dwarves had designed some type of blocking mechanism to make it impossible to open the door again from the mine side. The last thing I saw of them was the king and the others receding into the darkness of the tunnel."

  "So the dwarves didn't die after all?" Tedi asked with hope.

  "It was a dream," scowled Garth. "Don't try to make something out of nothing."

  "What does that have to do with the symbols?" asked Kalina. "You were just in a world of your own a moment ago staring at them."

  "They were the last thing I saw when the bell woke me up," said Garth. "In the dream they were changing."

  "How were they changing?" asked Kalina.

  "Like this," Garth said as he picked up a stick.

  Garth redrew the symbols, but he altered some and paired some together. There was no logic to his changes, but Kalina's eyes grew wide as she watched her husband draw the new symbols.

  "Now those are some dwarfish symbols that I do know," she said in awe. "The first grouping means two score and five. The third grouping is directional and points to the south. The fourth grouping is five score, and the sixth is directional meaning up."

  "That leaves two to be deciphered," stated Tedi. "One looks like a pyramid and the other a foot."

  "Forty-five pyramid south and one hundred feet up," frowned Natia. "What is that supposed to mean?"

  "The dwarves walked up a path when they left the chamber with the chasm," Garth said sheepishly.

  "Were there forty-five dwarves maybe?" asked Tedi.

  "No," Garth shook his head. "There were hundreds of them."

  "Could the pyramid mean some kind of angle?" asked Kalina. "As if the entrance was not directly above the message, but in a different quadrant of the mine?"

  Garth stuck his finger into his pocket to discover that Bitsy was gone. He had forgotten that he had sent her to Aranak the night before.

  "Rouse Button for me, Tedi," ordered Garth.

  "What are you thinking, Garth?" Kalina asked.

  "There is a mountain in the Southern mountains," explained Garth. "It is clearly not the largest of the peaks, but it is used as a navigation aid because of its unique shape. It is shaped like a perfect pyramid."

  "Where are you going with this?" Kalina asked in confusion.

  "You have a task for me?" chirped Button.

  "Yes, Button," replied Garth. "I need to see an image of the map Clint has been making. I want to focus on the Isle of Despair."

  As the fairy created the requested image, Garth explained, "The pyramid mountain is one third of a league in height. If the dwarves were trying to use it as a measurement that the Zarans would never understand, that makes the first part of the riddle equal to fifteen leagues."

  "A tunnel fifteen leagues long?" gasped Natia. "Is that possible?"r />
  "It is for dwarves," nodded Kalina. "There are no finer tunnelers than dwarves."

  Garth picked up a stick and placed it on the image that the fairy was casting on the ground. He put one end on Giza and snapped the stick where it passed through Olansk.

  "This is sixty leagues," announced Garth.

  Garth broke the stick in half and discarded one piece. He broke the remaining piece in half and again discarded one piece. He laid the last piece of the stick on the Isle of Despair and rotated it until it went directly south.

  "That is in the Elfwoods," remarked Morro.

  "Are there any elven villages near there?" asked Garth.

  "No," answered Morro. "The Federation does not like our villages to be near the coast. Besides, my people have always tended to keep the villages far away from the Despair River and the city of Despair. I understand in the early days, humans settlers used to raid the elven villages, and my people were forbidden to defend themselves."

  "So it is feasible that the dwarves could have reached the Barrier without detection?" asked Garth.

  "And survived for hundreds of years without anyone knowing?" questioned Tedi.

  "Elves and dwarves lived in Targa for hundreds of years without anyone knowing," declared Garth. "Both races are quite capable of stealth."

  "This is interesting," remarked Morro. "While we were hiding in Aranak, Shawn Cowen asked me if the elves ever did tanning and metalwork in the mountains. I told him that we kept clear away from the Barrier as the Emperor had demanded."

  "Why did the Ranger ask such a question?" asked Kalina.

  "He was puzzled by something he found at the Chute," replied Morro. "The waters there were tainted as if someone upstream was engaged in a lot of tanning and metalwork. I told him that he must be mistaken, and he stopped questioning me."

  "Praise Razil!" exclaimed Kalina. "If the dwarves made it to the Barrier, they probably still exist."

  "That is a mighty leap of faith," sighed Garth. "They could just as easily have been cut down by the Empire when they came out of their tunnel."

  "I know from what you have explained to me about the history of the elves and the dwarves that I should not think of the dwarves as my mortal enemy," frowned Morro, "but I cannot help feeling that way. Part of me would be just as happy to believe that they perished."

  "But the other part of you would not," smiled Kalina. "Old hatreds die slowly, Morro. You must strive to accept people as you find them, not how you were taught to believe."

  "It is hard," confessed the elf, "but if this tunnel does still exist, we could use it to make my people disappear."

  "Button did say that the mine was large enough to house a city," interjected Natia. "If the Federation no longer patrols there, it could hide a lot of people."

  "We can't have thousands of people fishing for dinner," retorted Tedi. "We would have to have some food stockpiled for them."

  "If the tunnel even exists," sighed Garth. "This is just a dream that we are discussing. Our time is better spent concentrating on things that we know are real. We have seen little of the Federation so far, so I think it is time for the five of us to head further south. I want to see the cities of Farmin, Spino, and Despair. We need to glean more information regarding the troop strength of the Federation and the timing for the invasion."

  "Garth is right," conceded Kalina. "We can no longer rely on the belief that the Federation will need to rebuild its navy. If they have portals to Alcea, we have no time to waste."

  "Couldn't Runt crash the ship somehow?" asked Natia. "That would stop the Doors from arriving in Alcea. Maybe he could put the captain to sleep at a particularly perilous moment?"

  "I doubt that the ship we saw in Giza is the only one carrying Doors to Alcea," answered Tedi. "We may have destroyed their warships, but they still have scores of cargo ships capable of making the voyage to Alcea."

  "Correct," nodded Garth. "It is inconceivable that we could single-handedly prohibit the introduction of portals in our homeland. We need to gather information to foil the attack despite the enemy having the portals. Let us set out for Farmin and begin our quest for the information."

  * * *

  As the sun slid towards the peaks of the Barrier, it cast long shadows over the rolling dunes of the Sands of Eternity. The tiny green fairy made one final sweep over the area at a great altitude before diving towards the desert floor. The rush of the air exhilarated the fairy as he hurtled downwards. The sands rose to greet him at a dizzying pace until at the last moment he flared his wings, his feet hovering over the floor of the trough a mere inch from the sand. He grinned broadly and darted into the black hole in the side of the dune. The fairy sped down the dark sloping incline and intentionally darted between the legs of the horses standing on the roof of the buried building. The horses must have sensed the fairy because they whinnied nervously and pranced about. The fairy laughed inwardly as he banked steeply and shot through the hole in the roof of the buried inn.

  Peanut flew down the mound of sand inside the building and soared out the door and over the inner courtyard before turning and gliding back into the entrance room and into the bedroom nearest the entrance. With an aerobatic flip, the fairy landed on the shoulder of Karl Gree who was sitting on the bed with Clint McFarren. The two men had a map spread out between them, and they both looked expectantly at the fairy as he landed.

  "What do you have to report?" asked Karl.

  "Not much has changed in the last two hours," the fairy reported with a military demeanor. "The enemy has started to make camp for the night. They are a little closer to us than before, but not close enough to cause despair."

  "How close is that?" asked the Ranger.

  Peanut looked at Clint and said, "About ten leagues. They stopped for the night right at the edge of the desert."

  "Which means they could be here tomorrow," frowned the Knight of Alcea. "Are you sure that they are not going to continue north?"

  "Positive," replied Peanut. "They are eight leagues east of the Aranak Road which runs due north at this point. If they had any intention of continuing north, they would not have left the road. Besides, I spied on them. Many of the soldiers are grumbling about having to enter the desert tomorrow. They are not happy about it."

  "Then we move out tonight," decided Karl.

  "Are you thinking of trying to go around them?" asked Clint.

  "No," replied Karl as he ran his finger along the map. "We will head due north from here and parallel the Aranak Road. Our goal is to reach the Old Aranak Road that the sands have obliterated. We will take that west to the Aranak Road."

  "That is thirty leagues across the desert," frowned Clint. "That will take us two days if we only travel at night."

  "I am figuring on three days," replied Karl. "I do not intend to ride the entire night. It is too risky to take the chance of being spotted by a roving patrol while we sleep during the day."

  "There is little that we can do to avoid being spotted if the Federation is smart enough to send out wide patrols," stated Clint.

  "But there is," grinned the Knight of Alcea. "Do you remember the hideouts that Garth, Tedi, and Morro built to hide us on the journey here?"

  "I do," nodded the Ranger, "but those were prepared well in advance, and they were built far to the east of us. How can they help?"

  "Each night," explained Karl, "two of the group will ride ahead of the others and begin construction of a similar hideout for the party. It does not have to be as elaborate as the ones the others built. We will carry all the needed supplies with us, and we don't care if the Federation finds the hideouts later. It is only Aranak's secret that we need to preserve. We just need something that will hide us from a distance. The fairies will keep constant surveillance during the day so that we will have plenty of notice if a patrol is getting close."

  "I understand," Clint smiled. "I will have a couple of doors and some tarps loaded on one of the spare horses. I think Max and I should go ahead of the group and
set up the first shelter. Max has a knack for constructing things."

  "Leave as soon as it is dark enough to travel," agreed Karl. "Remember to keep a due north track, otherwise we will never find you."

  Clint rose and departed the small room. Karl rolled up the map and then left to meet with the others. The members of the group had spread out to all of the rooms on the top floor of the inn, but they used the corridor as a gathering place. The Knight of Alcea walked into the corridor and called for everyone's attention. Those few people who were not already in the corridor came out of their rooms to listen.

  "We are leaving Aranak within the hour," Karl announced. "Clint and Max are going on ahead of us to build a shelter for us to hide in during the day, so the ride will be a bit shorter than the night is long. The proposed path is due north for thirty leagues and then due west to the edge of the desert. It is important that no one get separated from the group, so if one of you has a problem, we all have a problem. Prince Rigal, I am going to need some help in booby-trapping the entrance here. I would appreciate it if you would join me at the rear of the column. Shawn, we will be depending on you, Lyron, and Gerant to keep the others safe during the journey. Some of the sailors are not used to riding, so keep the pace set appropriately. Are there any questions?"

  The group had been preparing for the departure for some time and there were no questions. Karl dismissed the group and everyone returned to their rooms to pack for the trip. Within half an hour, Max Caber and Clint McFarren lead their horses out onto the desert floor and headed north.

  Chapter 7

  The Four

  The little green man squeezed through one of the small air holes in the sand-covered trap and flew to land on Karl Gree's shoulder.

  "It is dark out," reported Mite. "The soldiers have made camp, but there are none near us."