Blood of the Emperor

by Tracy Hickman

  His mind wandered for a moment to the dragon song. He could not hear it nor, for that matter, could anyone except those of humankind and then only those who had any descent from the Korypistan region of Drakosia in the ancient days before the Fall. Yet he had heard a description of it from Drakis. Nine syllables, followed by seven syllables then two lines of five syllables each. Nine Crowns under the dwarven mountains, he thought, and seven peaks in the Aeria Mountains. It must be a coincidence, he thought. Dragonkind were of Drakosia as was the infernal magic of the Aether long since usurped by the elves. Aeria was the land of Aer, the magic of earth and sky. The true magic.

  “Dwarf Jugar,” Pyrash repeated. “You must rest. We will descend from the sky and stop for the night.”

  “No!” Jugar croaked out. “Fly on.”

  “But Dwarf Jugar…”

  Jugar took in a ragged breath as best he could before he spoke. “Dragon Pyrash, do you see that tallest of the peaks before us in the distance?”

  The dragon swung his head to look ahead once more. “Yes, Dwarf Jugar. It is the second to the right of our course.”

  “There are three canyons to the left of its peak,” Jugar said, his watering eyes fixed on it. The warmth of the dragon against his chest was welcome as he clung to it with both arms. “The farthest leads up into a mountain bowl surrounded by three lesser peaks. Do you see it?”

  “Yes, Dwarf Jugar,” Pyrash nodded as he spoke.

  Karak-su’un, Jugar thought closing his eyes. The Palm of the Sky. He could imagine the glacial lake fed by the permanent ice sheet extending down from between Karak and Dugun peaks. It was the High Watch of the Nine Crowns and the place of last resort for the dwarven kingdoms. “Make for that place. You’ll see a pillar of stone jutting up from the snow on the right-hand side. I want you to leave me there.”

  “I should like that,” Pyrash purred. “Mountain stone and aerie caverns are the proper place for a dragon to perch. This pillar sounds to my liking.”

  “The Hammer of the Sky is not to be squatted upon by you or any other creature!” Jugar tried to shout but ended with a loud belch instead. “It is a stela on which is carved the history of all the Nine Dwarven Kingdoms and the roots of our race. If there are any dwarves to be found, they will be in this sacred spot.”

  “Sacred?” the dragon asked in surprise.

  “Yes, sacred!” Jugar continued. He was not particularly cold on the dragon’s back but he was shivering nevertheless. “Only dwarves are supposed to come near it and it is certain that no dwarf will show himself to me if an enormous beast such as yourself were settled on it like some impossible crow. You’ll leave me there at the Hammer of the Sky and then go wait wherever suits you to the west of Heparion.”

  “West of where?” Pyrash asked.

  “Heparion!” Jugar blurted out. “That tallest peak I pointed out earlier. “You just stay out of sight of the stela for three days then come back for me.”

  “Three days?” Pyrash nodded although Jugar sensed that the dragon was not happy at the thought. “It will be bitterly cold in the mountains without me there to watch over you. Do the dwarves survive such weather regularly?”

  No, we do not but I don’t intend to spend more than a few minutes in that dreadful weather, Jugar thought to himself but he spoke differently to the dragon. “We are a hearty folk and love the bracing joy of places bereft of both heat and air to breath. But most of all we are a shy folk who hide ourselves at the very sight of dragons. If I am to find any remaining dwarves then I need you to be as far from me as possible.”

  “Do you think your dwarven people will be here?” Pyrash said with deep concern.

  “No, they are no more,” Jugar said quietly. “But we have promised Drakis for his sake that we will try. Three days will be enough and then we will return with our sad news.”

  Jugar pulled his hand off the dragon’s neck. The night sky vanished once again into the reality of day. The mountains ahead of them that had been so clear a moment before that the dwarf felt he could touch them were suddenly once more obscured with haze and distance. Jugar gripped the harness with both hands and despite feeling ill smiled to himself.

  Jugar knew that what he had just told the dragon was a lie.

  Jugar turned away from Pyrash as the dragon withdrew from near the base of the stela. The sweep of the dragon’s enormous leathery wings beat the powdery snow into a white flurry that engulfed the dwarf, making it impossible for him to see. He turned away, shielding his eyes from the wind and ice swirling around him. Then just as quickly the gale abated, the billowing snow once again drifted back toward the ground.

  Jugar lowered his arms. He was nearly shoulder deep in the high mountain snow and knew he could easily sink deeper with very little effort. So he stood still where he was and watched as Pyrash circled around the great bowl of the mountain vale, gaining altitude from the wind rushing up its steep slopes until the dragon lifted himself over the western ridge and vanished from sight.

  Jugar shivered from the cold around him. He had rather hastily gathered warm clothing that would fit him from the encampment before setting off on their flight. His leather jacket he had lined against the cold and it was keeping his body warm but the gloves and boots proved inadequate despite their layers. He would have preferred to go about his business but Jugar was a patient dwarf—more patient than anyone knew.

  As he waited, Jugar looked around the mountain bowl. It emptied to the north down a steep canyon. The outlet from the glacier lake was not visible as it ran under the snowpack but he could hear its tumbling course and crystal waterfalls rumbling from their cascades far below. Those waters would eventually make their way down to the Vestasian Savanna and follow a long, tortuous route to the sea. Other than this steep and narrow cleft, the bowl was surrounded by sharp ridges and cliffs. The Karak and Dugun Peaks shone in the waning light of day, their jagged pinnacles still aflame with the light of the late afternoon sun when most of the bowl was now cast in shadow. The long glacier ran down between those peaks. In late summer the snows would have all melted and the mountain lake at the base of the glacier would sit like a turquoise jewel near the base of the Hammer of the Sky. Now, however, the lake was largely frozen over and only the stela itself could be seen above the blanket of snow.

  The Hammer of the Sky rose above him and he reveled in its sight. Here was the history of the dwarves laid out in intricate detail. The top of the stela reflected the very foundations of the world and its origins among the dwarven folk—powerful and glorious in the beginning of days. It was they who forged the other races in defiance of the gods and were cursed when the gods gave the other races their freedom to afflict the dwarves from those days onward. There near the top was the Age of Frost and the Omrash-Dehai—the ‘Peace of Reasoned Thought’ when dwarves, chimerians, and manticores all were united until the Bloodless War and its decline into the Age of Mists. He could easily read the descendants of kings down through King Brok of the Hammer and the Sundering when the descendants split into branching roots of the Nine Thrones under Aeria. Then the Age of Fire came after the Long Abyss and the War of Desolation in the north. It was here that the stela inscriptions vanished beneath the level of the snow. There was more below it, of course, it was a marvel of dwarven stonecraft that the stone of the stela extended as one piece into the roots of the mountain, being thrust upward and carved whenever new history was forged below. Jugar knew it by heart to its base and had every intention of adding to it in a most glorious fashion.

  “Stay where you are!” a voice growled behind him. “Stand forth and be recognized!”

  Jugar did not turn but he did speak. “Well, which one is it to be?”

  “What do you mean?” the voice snarled. There was a nervous edge to it and Jugar thought it sounded young.

  “If I stay where I am I can hardly stand forth to be recognized,” Jugar’s deep voice rumbled. “So do you want me to turn around or not?”

  “Turn around!” the voice co
mmanded less certain than its words would indicate. “Hands out!”

  Jugar extended his hands out to either side, his gloved fingers splayed open, palms flat and facing forward to show that he had no weapons in them. He slowly turned around to face his captor, plowing his way through the snow, and smiling to himself at the thought of the guard’s reaction upon seeing his face.

  It was a young dwarf, as he had suspected. The helmet was a little too large for him which meant that no one had bothered to fashion a proper one for him. His beard was one hand’s length long and the skin at the corners of his eyes was still smooth, which told Jugar that his challenger was young and inexperienced. His chain-mail armor overlaying his thick cloak against the cold was tarnished and several of the links were damaged which Jugar credited to the armor’s experience rather than that of the young whelp who had somehow inherited it. Still, the halberd which the youth wielded remained steady in his hands and was held at the prescribed angle dictated by the “Book of the Guardians,” which meant that the dwarf had at least been trained in combat. His eyes were gray and unblinking.

  What both disappointed and astonished Jugar was that the youth showed no reaction at all upon seeing him.

  “State your name and craft!” the young dwarf cited verbatim from the text of the “Book of the Guardians.”

  “You don’t know me?” Jugar sputtered.

  “You answer to me, thin beard!” the young guard demanded.

  “Thin beard?” His once-glorious beard was still not nearly as long as it had been before the elves had shaved him for a slave but the insult was not about its length but its thickness, calling him decrepit and old. Jugar put both his hands on his hips, his voice commanding. “Who are you? What is your name and your section number?”

  “I’m asking the questions here!” the guard sputtered.

  “Name and section number…NOW!”

  “Dalgrin, son of Vakinag,” the guardian responded. “Section 31045318.”

  “King’s Guard, eh?” Jugar chuckled. “Isn’t that ironic? So did Wadex send you out here or is he no longer in charge?”

  Dalgrin ignored Jugar’s question and lowered his halberd menacingly. “You have trespassed upon the sacred dwarven realms—both you and the monster upon which you came!”

  “Ah!” Jugar smiled. “So that’s why Wadex sent you out here all on your own? The warrens of Hammer of the Sky must contain an entire dwarven Legion by now with more than a hundred warriors guarding the stela at any time and yet they send only you. You’re the bait!”

  “Bait?” Dalgrin blinked, confused. “You’re my prisoner!”

  Jugar stepped back, looking up at the Hammer of the Sky rising to dizzying heights above him and began shouting. “Let the Marshal of the Hammer come forth! Tell him the day is come and this night will his clan be called blessed as once it had been before the King of the Ninth Throne!”

  The intricate carvings of the stela shifted just above the level of the snow. The snow around Jugar also shifted and suddenly he was surrounded by a phalanx of dwarven warriors.

  From the opening in the stela, a barrel-chested dwarf strode onto the snowpack. His beard was interrupted on one side by a long scar and he wore an eye patch over his right eye. His arms, however, were still massive and powerful despite the streaks of age showing in his rust-red beard. He carried a double-bladed ax whose blade was etched with dark runes. His thick cape was trimmed in fur. The look on the dwarf’s face was grim as he approached, his eyes narrowed in the glare of the snow.

  “Marshal Wadex,” Jugar said. “It was destined that we should meet again.”

  Marshal Wadex stopped in his tracks, gazing at Jugar for a moment before wonder and awe dawned on his face. In an instant, the old Marshal of the King’s Guard Legions fell to one knee, bowing his head as he planted the head of his ax down into the snow.

  “King Aerkan!” Wadex shouted.

  Dalgrin’s eyes went wide.

  The dwarven guardians instantly followed Wadex’s example, suddenly falling to their knees in homage.

  “It is good to see you once more,” Jugar said as he stepped up to where the Marshal knelt, lifting him by the hand as permission to stand.

  “By the gods of the deep,” Wadex muttered. He removed his cloak at once, wrapping it around Jugar. “We had received word that you were walking beneath the sky but there had been silence for the last two months. We feared you were lost to us forever. Yet here you stand with us once more.” Wadex turned to one of the guardians kneeling near the still-open stela access. “Kelva! Run at once with all haste and spread the word throughout the warrens! The Last King has returned!”

  “I have returned,” Jugar said, gathering the warm cloak about him, “but not for long. I must walk under the sky a while longer, old friend. But we have three days before I must leave again and there is much that must be done in that time.”

  “Then let us waste none of it,” Wadex said, gesturing toward the opening in the stela.

  Jugar nodded. He took a step toward the entrance, longing to get below ground and feel dwarf-hewn stone about him once more, but he stopped as he passed Dalgrin. The young dwarf was bowing so low that his face was almost planted in the snow. Jugar reached down with his left hand and lifted up the chin of the dwarf.

  “Cheer up, Dalgrin,” Jugar said with a strange smile. “You are about to become a Hero of the Dwarven Thrones…if Wadex doesn’t execute you first for insulting the last remaining of the dwarven kings.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Dark Heart

  JUGAR LEFT THE WORLD of light behind.

  It was taking him longer to get used to the darkness again than he cared to admit, even to himself. Dwarven eyesight was particularly suited for the underground, capable of seeing clearly even in the dimmest of light. They were perfectly comfortable either aboveground or below but dwarves who had stayed aboveground for extended periods of time occasionally became “sky-blind” as it was known among those who dwelled beneath the mountains of Aeria. Their transition back underground took somewhat longer than those who moved freely between the world above and the world below.

  A king blind in his own realm, Jugar thought grimly as he peered into the blackness ahead. He could hear the anxious voices echoing from the space before him. Will they follow me blindly as well?

  Jugar had been traveling for nearly a day under the mountain, its tunnels, caverns, passageways, and chambers leading him ever deeper beneath the mountain. A single day’s travel was all he could afford: he only had three days before Pyrash returned to fetch him. That left him only one day to accomplish his mission before he would have to start once again for the bright surface of the mountain bowl above him.

  The dark was framed by the dim outlines of an ornate arch with a carved label above it proclaiming the space beyond to be the Council Chamber of a dwarven settlement called Fedrith-nar. The place could barely be called a village but it was within a single day’s journey from the Hammer of the Sky. Its location, therefore, dictated that Fedrith-nar become the place where Jugar—here known as Aerkan, Last of the Dwarven Kings—would triumphantly appear before the surviving dwarves. The warrens immediately surrounding the stela were certainly grand enough for such an occasion as were three grander cities than this minor and otherwise forgotten town but each of those were too far for the dwarven Thanes to reach in a day’s time. It had once served as a waypoint for dwarves on pilgrimage to the stela but this otherwise undistinguished dwarven township was now overflowing with dwarves rushing from diverse redoubts deep within the mountain to hear the will of the Last King. He would address them all in time but first he had one very important gathering to command.

  “Thanes of the Seven Peaks,” boomed the voice of Wadex standing just beyond the dark portal. “Gather to hear and be heard by Aerkan—King of the Ninth Throne of Aeria.”

  Jugar heard the Thanes rise from their chairs in the darkness, their boots stomping against the stone in perfunctory welcome.

  Th
e king almost did not recognize his name as he was announced. When he realized the stomping was for him, he smiled. He had been Jugar for so long that his true name was foreign to his ears. Jugar reflected that the original bearer of the name would have appreciated the humor in all this. He had, indeed, been the king’s court jester; a position that doubled as his personal guard. It had been his greatest performance and his final joke to exchange clothing with the king as the elven armies assaulted the Yungskord. The king then hid in the secret treasure trove beneath the Ninth Throne while the jester took his place. It was the jester Drakis had killed atop the embattled throne while the king waited unseen beneath the carnage. The jester had been a trained and able warrior as well as a capable performer. The king missed his old companion but had all this time taken solace in knowing that the joke lived on in him.

  A joke for which the king was determined to have the last, bitter laugh. The Jugar is dead; long live the new Jugar!

  The last of the dwarven kings stepped through the dark portal. Still partially sky-blind, he could make out the extent of the room. It was a modest hall so far as dwarven craftsmanship was concerned, suitable for its town council duties without taxing the capabilities of the local community. It was round after the common practice of any dwarven meeting hall but plain to the point of embarrassment. The floor was slightly uneven and the wall carvings practically nonexistent. There were nine pillars evenly spaced against the wall of the curved room climbing only fifteen hands to the shallow dome overhead. Each pillar was topped by a carving of one of the nine kings as was typical for such ceremonial rooms throughout the dwarven realms but the figures were obscured to his eyes and Jugar could not pick his own out from among them. What he could see more clearly were the twenty-five Thanes who had gathered within the room, most still stomping their left feet against the ground.