by Doug Niles
“Now is the time to reveal our new war partner. Garimeth, summon the Chaos beast!” the Daergar thane ordered his sister. His voice nearly caught in his throat, for he dreaded the humiliation that would result if she failed. Pounce Quickspring and many of the Daergar dubiously looked to the sky.
Garimeth turned her voice and her thoughts to the sky, speaking once again in that strange language enabled by the Helm of Tongues. She called to Zarak Thuul for long minutes, sending forth a message of her own adoration and desire, unaware of the passage of time as her emotions grew and she reached out, pleading and beseeching and cajoling.
A spot of brightness appeared in the subterranean sky, curling around the shoulder of the Life-Tree. The glowing form quickly grew into a blazing ball of fire that spilled toward the Hybardin waterfront.
Primus spread his vast, flaming wings and dipped down, coming to rest before the astonished dark dwarves. The brightness of his fiery visage was exceedingly painful in the eyes of the assembled warriors.
Even dismounted, Zarak Thuul stood as tall as a large man and towered over the dwarves. His face was blank, stony, yet handsome in a perverse sort of way. His crimson eyes flamed, the light an eerie color against that perfect blackness. Making no sound nor showing any expression, the daemon warrior moved over to Garimeth. Then he dropped to his belly, and gently kissed her feet. Finally he rose again to stand tall and magnificent, master of chaos and lord of the underworld.
In that visage Garimeth discerned images of other shapes as well, a vision of unspeakable blackness, and then a great, undead serpent draped in tendrils of festering flesh. An awareness of his awesome power once again made her knees weak, and she was his to command. The Helm gave her the ability to share his consciousness, to thrill to the awareness of his being.
“Please, my daemon, please know me, and grant me the freedom to sail on your power.”
She murmured the words as if they were a prayer, too quiet for any of the dwarves to hear. But the flaming eyes of Zarak Thuul flared more brightly than ever, and she knew that he had heard and he was pleased.
She realized the creature’s presence greatly exalted her stature in the eyes of Darkend and the other dark dwarves. This knowledge gave her a sudden, powerful thrill.
“All our pieces are in place,” Darkend ventured to say, gesturing to the multitude of dwarves amassed along the waterfront to either side. “Let our great attack begin.”
Garimeth translated his words into that wretched, profane tongue. The monstrous warrior stood and listened impassively. Then she repeated Darkend’s statement, seeking some sign of acknowledgment, all the time feeling the twisting pleasure and longing desire course throughout her being.
“Ask him this,” Darkend was saying. “Can he create a route through the stone whereby our legions can climb upward and strike at the very core of Hybardin?”
Garimeth asked the question, following her brother’s exact wording. Though Zarak Thuul gave no outward sign that he heard or understood, she sensed his pleasure with the violent command and his intent to obey. She turned back to the thanes and explained. “He agrees.”
“I didn’t hear anything,” Pounce Quickspring declared skeptically.
“He told me alone,” Garimeth said, with a meaningful glance at her brother.
“My sister speaks the truth,” said Darkend. “She can communicate with him via this magical device. Surely you can see that!”
“Very well. Let the attack begin!” barked the thane of the Theiwar as he turned to lead his troops.
Immediately the dark dwarf companies were mustered away from the waterfront and they began climbing one of the large piles of rubble that had been left when some of the upper portions of the Life-Tree had collapsed. That mound came into contact with a wall of the overhang, and it was there, Garimeth said, that Zarak Thuul would create a passageway.
A familiar figure, robed all in black, emerged from among the Daergar gathered at the edge of the water, and Darkend and Garimeth were quick to recognize the assassin, Slickblade.
“Ah, Slickblade. I assume this means that Tarn Bellowgranite is dead?” The thane shot his sister a look of cruel triumph, pleased to see Garimeth’s face tighten, her lips trembling slightly as she made an effort to control herself.
“Sadly, my lord, no.”
“My son lives?” demanded Garimeth.
“Aye, for the time being.” The assassin’s voice was devoid of emotion. “I tried to follow him, and I believe he has come here, to the city of the Hylar.”
“Then find him now and kill him!” screamed Darkend.
“I am making every effort, my thane. The half-breed stole a boat from Daerforge with gulley dwarf assistance, and used it to make his way here. I believe that he is somewhere in the vicinity, perhaps skulking around on this very shore.
“Wait.” The thane turned to Garimeth. “Where would he go first? Would he come here to the waterfront?”
“I don’t know,” she lied, certain that Tarn would in fact move mountains to make his way back to the city of his birth at this time of crisis.
“Don’t trust her, lord. She deceives you!”
“Be aware that your own trust may be misplaced,” she retorted, with a meaningful look at Slickblade.
She could tell by a foray into her brother’s mind that he didn’t believe her about Tarn, but he couldn’t see any way to prove that she was lying either. Slickblade melted away into the shadows, but by then Darkend was distracted by the upcoming battle plans, and Tarn was temporarily forgotten.
The fire dragon rose up on wings dripping flame and spark, scalding dozens of dark dwarves who were too slow to get out of the monster’s path. With the daemon warrior riding between its shoulders, the dragon ascended, circled once, then flew into the side of Hybardin’s stony pillar. The fiery beast showed no hesitation as it swept against the solid rock.
Immediately some of that stone tumbled away, and Darkend cursed bitterly as dozens more of his force were crushed by the rockfall. Other remnants of the dark dwarf army scattered in confusion. Before they could reform the monstrous attacker was out of sight. Behind, however, it left a wide cave, remarkably smooth-floored, which curved at a gentle angle upward toward the high levels of Hybardin.
After reforming their scattered troops into ranks and companies, the two dark dwarf thanes and Garimeth led the army into the newly bored passage.
The final attack had begun.
Interlude of Chaos
Zarak Thuul rode Primus into the stone, and the bedrock of Hybardin parted before him like waters breaking before the prow of a sleek ship. Wings of fire seared through the layers of sediment, rock sizzled into dust, and smoke billowed in a great cloud as the mighty serpent forged ahead, digging, driving, boring upward into the great Hylar city.
Primus brayed into the bedrock, and the daemon warrior laughed, relishing the power and the destruction, all the while fondly thinking of the dwarven female who had sent him such relentless and powerful appeals. She was intriguing, that one, undeniably intriguing and tempting. What was it that made her so different, so appealing? He didn’t know, but he realized keen pleasure in working her will. There was one who was worthy, who brandished the unusual power to motivate him. In her name gladly would he destroy.
Despite his glee, the daemon warrior took care to keep the grade of the ascending spiral shallow enough for the footbound creatures to follow, for this was as the dwarven female had wished it. Weapons held ready, cries of war echoing from a thousand throats, the horde of Daergar and Theiwar marched in Zarak Thuul’s wake, led by that entrancing female. In other places the shadow-wights wafted upward in their own way, following the surface of broken rubble, clinging to pipes and shafts and debris as they slithered over faces of bare rock.
Soon the daemon warrior and his fire dragon burst from solid rock into an inhabited upper level of the Hylar city. Some of the more foolish dwarves stayed to fight, and they died in cinder and ash without putting a single blade
to Zarak Thuul or his mighty mount. The others turned and fled, vanishing into the maze of their city’s Level Three.
Now Zarak Thuul and Primus flew down the wide avenues, crashing through walls and buildings, igniting fires that burst from the rock itself and soon filled all this level with a thick, choking smoke. Back and forth they flew, scorching their way through the maze, exulting in the powers of raw destruction and pure, unadulterated chaos. The killings were plenty, the dwarves burning and dying in numbers gratifying to behold.
Sometimes, for the sheer pleasure of power, Zarak Thuul dismounted from his blazing steed and swelled his body into monstrous size, striding through the streets in the guise of a great, skeletal dragon. In this form, devoid of flesh but grinning with razor-sharp fangs, the daemon warrior brought death to any who opposed him.
Then the blazing dragon and his master continued on, boring again into the rock, climbing higher and higher in the Life-Tree. As a worm might bore through the rotten wood in the trunk of some forest giant, Zarak Thuul and his dragon ascended upward into the highest reaches of the Hylar city.
And like that worm, the fire dragon was an agent of weakness and decay, twin factors that in any tree must eventually bring about its fall.
Darkest Night
Chapter Twenty-two
Great gears squealed in protest as the lift lurched to a sudden stop. The massive links of the support chain stretched taut as their tempered steel groaned under a slowly increasing strain. The world itself seemed to shake in a series of rumbles and tremors that brought dust and pebbles cascading down the long tube of the transport shaft.
“It’s jammed!” Axel snarled, kicking at the bars of the cage. He turned to shout into the darkness overhead. “Get this thing moving, by Reorx, or I’ll come up there and do it myself!”
“Patience, my friend,” Baker Whitegranite said quietly, laying his hand on the agitated dwarf’s sturdy shoulder. The thane blinked, trying to focus his blurred vision on the face of his fellow Hylar.
“But what if she’s up there—if she needs me?” demanded the venerable warrior. “Damn it all, we’ve got to keep moving!”
“I know. I’m worried too. I have a son somewhere in this mess,” Baker said quietly.
“I’m sorry. You’re right,” said Axel in sudden chagrin.
Before Baker could reply, the scream of straining metal rose to a shriek around them as the lift jolted free, once more rumbling upward toward the darkness of Level Six. Capper Whetstone and the rest of the thane’s bodyguards looked relieved. The loyal Hylar had been most uncomfortable when their leader insisted on being on the last transport lift leaving Level Five.
The respite lasted only a few seconds, however. Once again the cage screeched to a halt, pinned in the girders that had been gradually twisted by the wrenching forces of Chaos.
Apparently drained, Axel slumped onto a bench in the corner of the cage. He looked at Baker, his expression pleading, and the thane was deeply moved upon seeing the defeat and deep furrows of age so clearly etched into his friend’s face.
“And how do we know she’s alive?” Axel asked for the tenth time. “She could have been killed by Daergar or buried in a landslide. We’d still remember her. It’s only the shadow-wights that sap the memory!”
Baker had already acknowledged these suppositions, but he refused to give in to despair. “We don’t know she’s dead, and until we do I’m going to believe she’s still fighting somewhere, still down there—perhaps fighting a rearguard action or trying to move her company up higher into the Life-Tree.”
He didn’t speak further, but in the dark silence both of them keenly relived the frantic scene below. They had taken stairs down to Level Four in order to seek information on the enemy advance. In the stairwell they had met panicked survivors who had been racing upward. They had reported that Level Four had been overrun before they fled. Those survivors, some of whom were now huddled on the lift with them, had told of the fire dragon bursting onto the level and moving swiftly through the streets of smiths and forges, setting fires that seemed to burn the very stone itself. That flaming monster had eventually disappeared, but the survivors believed it was boring a hole farther upward, extending the assault route toward Level Five and beyond.
Even worse, the dragon’s onslaught had been followed by hundreds upon hundreds of Daergar who had charged through the tunnel that the fiery serpent had left behind in the rock. This was the first clear sign that the dark dwarves and Chaos creatures were now working together. Both Baker and Axel understood how hopeless that alliance made the Hylar’s chances of a successful defense.
Then, as the thane and his party had reached Level Five, the attack had begun anew. The fire dragon and its black rider had torn through an entire quarter of what had once been the finest silver smithies on all Krynn. The few Hylar remaining here had either died in flames and ash or fled in panic from the horrific wave of destruction.
And there had been another beast as well. Though Baker’s guards had shuttled him away at its first appearance, he had a fleeting glimpse of a massive, skeletal body. His weak vision had not provided much detail, though he was forced to wonder if perhaps that was not a slight blessing. Like the fire dragon, this vision of undeath had stormed through the streets and alleys of Hybardin, feasting and slaying with frenzied abandon. Baker had cringed at the noises of the doomed and dying.
All the dwarves could do was fall back to the lift station on Level Five with as much haste as they could manage. Even Axel, despite his bad foot, had made the trip rapidly without flagging. But now, as they tried to ride the cage up to the next level, Baker was forced to wonder what they could really hope to accomplish if Chaos beasts were aligned with the enemy clans.
One passenger had gone over to the corner of the cage. This young, muscular Hylar leaned far over the rail to get a look at the support mechanism above them. Despite his youth, he had an air of competence that Baker found somehow heartening.
“Let’s all shift our weight over here,” suggested the young dwarf. He had a small hammer, and he chinked it against the girder of the lift track. “We might be able to rock it free.”
“Do you know anything about how the lift functions?” demanded another Hylar skeptically. “How do we know you won’t break us loose and send the whole thing falling down there?”
The young Hylar spoke to Baker instead of replying to the questioner. “I’m an engineer, my lord thane. I was a journeyman of some years and was being trained in lift repairs before …” He couldn’t finish the sentence, but Baker could see the skill and determination shining in his eyes.
“Good man, let’s follow your idea. Everyone, obey him!”
Smiling thankfully, the young Hylar began giving instructions. “Everyone get into this corner. Now jump, on my count … now.”
The passengers did as the Hylar engineer suggested, jumping up and down in a coordinated effort to break the cage free. The lift lurched slightly with a shriek of protesting metal.
“Now again. And again!” urged the young mechanic, as the passengers continued their efforts.
A heavy rumble shook the cage and girders violently. From somewhere down below Baker heard crashing noises accompanied by screams of pain.
“Look!” cried the engineer, his voice rising with fear.
All of them saw the crack, a deep, horizontal gouge in the rock wall of the transport shaft. Before Baker’s horrified eyes it spread, growing wider and wider. He saw the metal rails that guided the lift bend and twist from the force of great weight, and it seemed clear to him that the cage was now firmly wedged in a vise of steel.
“Trouble down below!” grunted Capper Whetstone in sudden alarm.
A few of the passengers moaned as they looked down through the screen mesh of the cage floor. Baker’s own blood froze in his veins as he saw a dozen or more of the ink-black shadows creeping stealthily up the walls of the shaft, drawing steadily closer to the cage of the lift.
“We’re trappe
d!” screamed one battered dwarf.
“By Reorx, at least we can die fighting!” Axel declared bravely, but his eyes were hollows of grief.
“No!” Baker’s voice cut through the panic like a sharp blade. “We’re not finished yet. If we’re going to die fighting, it won’t be here!”
He paused, aware of all the blurred faces staring at him expectantly, and realized that his voice, his words, could give these people hope. And with hope, one or more of them might survive to carry on the fight.
“I am the thane of the Hylar!” he barked. “And I say we must escape and survive. Our hope is to climb higher. Keep climbing!”
“Quick! Out the top!” Axel cried, pointing to the trapdoor on the upper side of the cage. He pushed it open with the tip of his broadsword and pointed to the ladder that led to that point of egress. He addressed the two dozen terrified Hylar in the lift, pulling one matron bodily toward the hole. “Climb! Climb for all you’re worth!”
One by one the passengers scrambled up the ladder and through the trapdoor. Some climbed with ease, while others, wounded or paralyzed with fear, needed to be helped.
“My thane, it’s your turn. You must escape!” Capper urged, taking Baker by the arm.
“No! Not yet!” insisted the leader of the Hylar. Baker clutched his small sword, determined to set an example. He was sick and tired of flight, of running here and there and everywhere else in a frantic effort to stay alive.
He had work to do right here.
He gestured to his enchanted weapon, to the blades borne by the guards, and to Axel’s ancient broadsword. “Our weapons have the best chance against these things. Let’s stay back until all the others are safe and give these weapons a try!”
“But you can’t even see very well!” stammered Axel, lending his voice in support of Capper Whetstone.
“I can see well enough when they’re right in front of me!” retorted the thane. “Incidentally, how close are they?”