The War of the Dwarves

She heard a loud knock on the gates to the forecourt. Runes lit up throughout the palace, the signal for a servant to rush out and determine whether to admit the waiting person or persons.

But the palace staff had been discharged.

For want of a doorman to answer the knock, Andôkai uttered an incantation, and the gates swung open to reveal a tall slender woman and a young man.

The pair stepped into the forecourt and headed toward the steps. Dressed in black leather armor, the woman was carrying a weapons belt with two outlandish weapons that Andôkai recognized as unique to their bearer. Porista, like most ruined cities, was plagued by looters and thieves, and this particular woman preferred to be armed. She walked briskly and fearlessly, while her companion hurried after her, scanning the forecourt anxiously and hugging his pack to his chest.

A shadow fell over Andôkai.

“It’s all right, Djern,” she told her bodyguard, keeping her eyes on the couple. “They’re quite harmless.” She flashed him a wry smile. “Although quite frankly, I wouldn’t mind if they were Nôd’onn’s chief famuli.” She looked up at the towering warrior, eying the demonic metal visor that always masked his face. “Even hostile apprentices would be better than none at all.”

Djern stayed where he was, diagonally behind her. He seemed to be watching the approaching couple, but the eyeholes in his visor gave nothing away. His helmet appeared to be empty, but he was capable of fixing his enemies with terrible rays of violet light.

His stillness was also deceptive. Clad from head to toe in armor, he looked heavy and inert, but at the sight of an enemy, or if his mistress was in danger, he moved with incredible agility, running, jumping, and fighting as if he were made of shimmering silk. Few could say what lay beneath his armor—and it was better that way.

The woman and her frightened companion ascended the steps. Andôkai realized that she had been mistaken. “Narmora, who’s this?” she demanded, forgetting to welcome her guest. “I mistook him for Furgas.”

The half älf smiled. Like Djern, she was careful to hide her striking features from strangers, and her pointed ears were covered by a crimson headscarf. The daughter of an älf and a human, she had thrown in her lot with the men, elves, and dwarves, but älfar were feared and hated throughout Girdlegard, and she knew better than to expect any mercy from a baying mob. The headscarf was vital for her safety.

“Maga, I found him roaming the city. He wanted to see you, but he was too afraid to knock.”

The man lifted his eyes and saw Djern, who stood three paces tall. His gaze traveled fearfully over the metal breastplate that mimicked the curve of bulging muscle. He took in the tionium gorget, the terrifying visor, and the ring of metal spikes encircling his helmet like a crown. “What in the name of Palandiell…” Stepping back, he almost tumbled down the staircase, but the nimble Narmora grabbed him by the elbow. “Djern won’t hurt you,” she assured him.

The man did his best to compose himself. “Wenslas is my name. I served Turgur the Fair-Faced,” he said timorously.

Andôkai’s heart sank. The only famulus in Girdlegard, and he was trained by a preening dandy. “There’s no need to be afraid,” she told him. “Which tier did you reach before your magus died?”

“I didn’t,” he said softly. “I wasn’t actually a famulus. My name was on the list for the academy, and I was waiting to take the exam. I heard the Estimable Maga was looking for students, so I came to Porista.”

“That’s when I found him,” chimed in Narmora. “He saw the ruined city, and his courage failed him, so I escorted him myself. Did I do well?”

Andôkai looked the man up and down. “I need to know how strong you are, Wenslas. You’ll do the exam right away.” Privately she doubted that the nervous young man had the mental fortitude to handle complicated formulae and strength-sapping rituals. He knows nothing about magic. It will take cycles to turn him into a tolerable apprentice. Turgur had put him on a waiting list, which meant only one thing: Wenslas was a last resort.

Turning sharply, she went into the palace. “I’ll need your help, Narmora—if you can spare a little time.”

“Furgas was busy when I left him—he won’t mind if I stay for a while.” She gave Wenslas a little shove; he sidestepped quickly around the armor-plated giant and set off after Andôkai.

The little party made its way through the deserted palace. Wenslas’s boots echoed through the empty marble passageways, setting him further on edge. None of the stories he had heard about the tempestuous maga had prepared him for meeting the real-life Andôkai and her disquieting companions. He was about to announce that he had decided not to go through with the exam when they passed through a doorway and came to a halt in the conference chamber.

The hall, once famous for its domed roof of gleaming copper, was in ruins. It was here that Nôd’onn had revealed himself as a traitor and an enemy of Girdlegard, and his battle with the council had destroyed the ancient room. Large chunks were missing from the ceiling, some of the pillars had been smashed to pieces, and ash, blown into the chamber from the burned-out city, had mingled with rainwater, forming a thick black sludge on the marble floor.

Amid the wreckage stood the fossilized form of a man, an enduring reminder of Nôd’onn’s treachery. The cruel magus had used his dark magic to turn Lot-Ionan the Forbearing to stone.

Wenslas stepped over the fallen columns and followed Andôkai to the center of the chamber where the floor was littered with splintered malachite.

“I’m going to send a charm in your direction—only a weak one, so you won’t come to any harm, but enough to gauge your aptitude for magic.” She signaled for Narmora to position herself behind him and catch him if he fell. “Ready?” Without waiting for an answer, she hurled a glowing blue sphere toward Wenslas, who raised his arms unthinkingly, palms outstretched to stop the missile.

The spluttering sphere hit his hands and sent him flying backward. There was a hissing noise, and he yelped in pain and shock. Narmora was behind him straightaway, holding him by the armpits to save him from the splinters on the floor.

But the glowing sphere continued on its path.

Whizzing through the air, it spiraled higher and higher, gathering speed for its next attack. Like an angry wasp, it circled above them, then swooped toward Wenslas.

“Maga?” gasped Narmora, alarmed. When no help was forthcoming, she laid Wenslas gently on the floor and prepared to face the magic weapon. Using a wooden plank as a shield, she took up position and watched as the sphere zigzagged crazily toward her. It came within half a forearm of her; then it burst.

Andôkai’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Congratulations, Wenslas,” she praised him. “I believe in challenging my pupils; it brings out their talent.” She walked over and examined his scorched palms. “Don’t worry about your hands; the skin will soon heal.”

Groaning, Wenslas clambered to his feet. “Estimable Maga, it’s no use pretending that I passed,” he said dejectedly. “We both know that I didn’t stop the sphere. It’s nice of you to be encouraging, but I’m not a magician. If you hadn’t taken pity on me, I would have been killed.” He picked up his bag. “Turgur told me that I wasn’t cut out to be a famulus, and he was right. If only I could… Oh, what’s the use?” Sighing, he bowed before the maga and took his leave. “May the gods be with you.”

They heard his footsteps echoing through the arcades, then Djern set off after him to escort him through the gates.

The maga studied Narmora’s face. “So it was you,” she murmured incredulously. “You destroyed the sphere.” Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “How? You told me you inherited a few tricks from your mother, nothing more. Correct me if I’m wrong, but älfar can’t do magic.”

Narmora seemed as surprised as she was. “I… I didn’t use a spell or anything. I just wanted the sphere to go away. I was thinking about it disappearing and then…” She tailed off and raised a hand to her eyes. “It disappeared, just like that,” she whispered. She seemed almost scared.

Andôkai was the first to recover her composure. “Do you know what this means, Narmora?” she said excitedly, laying her hands on the half älf’s shoulders. “I’ve found my apprentice! It won’t take long before you’re ready to—”

“No.”

Narmora’s refusal was spoken with such intensity and conviction that Andôkai let go and took a step back. “No?” she said uncomprehendingly, searching Narmora’s face for signs that she might be swayed. “You can’t mean that.”

Narmora drew herself up to her full height. “Yes I can.” She wasn’t afraid of Andôkai’s wrath. “I’m sure there are better candidates, and I’m willing to help you find them, but I won’t be your famulus.” She met the maga’s questioning stare. “Remember what happened at the Blacksaddle? It’s a wonder that we survived. No more adventures, that’s what we decided, and I’ve given Furgas my word. We came to Porista so that Furgas could help you rebuild the city, and I’m here because of him. Nothing is going to separate us again.” She paused, noticing the maga’s baffled expression. “It doesn’t make sense to you, I suppose.”

She sat down on a fallen column and lowered her voice. “Listen Andôkai, I want to grow old with Furgas; I want to have children and grandchildren, and I want to see them grow up. How am I supposed to do that if I train to be a maga? I don’t want to risk my life for Girdlegard; I love Furgas, and I’m happy the way I am.” She lifted her loose-fitting breastplate; her figure was fuller than usual. “I’m going to be a mother,” she said, stroking her bump. “The baby is due in ninety orbits.”

Andôkai snorted angrily and made no reply.

The news hadn’t produced the intended effect. Narmora took a deep breath. “Excuse me, Maga, it’s getting late. It’s time I went home to Furgas.” She got up and walked to the door.

“Is there anything I can say to persuade you?” the maga called after her, undaunted. “How can I change your mind?”

Narmora glanced over her shoulder and saw Andôkai silhouetted in the light of the rising moon. “I don’t intend to break my promise,” she said firmly as she made her way out.

Sighing, the maga went over to the statue of Lot-Ionan, formerly a man of flesh and blood. “My poor friend, I could do with your support,” she whispered absently. Her fingers stroked the smooth marble, tracing the folds of his cloak. The magus of Ionandar was dead—dead like Turgur the Fair-Faced, Sabora the Softly-Spoken, and Maira the Life-Preserver.

She turned around sadly, surveying the wreckage of the hall.

Narmora was a fool to sacrifice her talents for love of a man.

Richemark,

Southeastern Gauragar,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

King Bruron stood at the gates and watched as a steady stream of loaded wagons left the storehouse. His entourage was made up of seven bodyguards and two stewards, whose job was to write down how many drums of grain were heading north.

The first wagon had left the capital at dawn, on course for the far reaches of the kingdom, where the soil had been blighted by the Perished Land. The fields and meadows were beginning to recover, and by summer they would be fertile, but there was nothing for the farmers to sow. They desperately needed seeds, not to mention food to see them through.

“Supplies are dangerously low, Your Majesty,” said the first steward, noting another figure on his wax tablet. He pointed the stylus at the convoy of wagons.

“The silos are almost empty,” replied the king, dressed inconspicuously in dark brown cloth as if he were an ordinary stocktaker. He watched for a moment as the last of his provisions left the capital for the provinces, the drums of grain jiggling up and down in the wagons. “I’ve taken the necessary measures. Yesterday King Nate received payment for five thousand drums of grain to be delivered to the northern provinces. Idoslane will supply the rest.” He smiled and thumped the steward on the back. “I’ve been keeping count as well. None of my subjects will go hungry—another five thousand drums are on the way.”

His bodyguard alerted him to a group of riders who seemed intent on cantering through the gates of the storehouse. There were thirty in total, three dwarves and the rest men, and their grim faces left little doubt as to their mood.

Bruron’s smile vanished from his lips. The arrival of the delegation wasn’t entirely unexpected, but it filled him with dread. It was too late to slip away unnoticed, so he would have to face his troublesome guests.

The first rider reined in his horse. No sooner was he out of the saddle than a group of servants surrounded the horse and led it away. His soldiers stayed mounted, but the three dwarves lined up beside the man. “Greetings, King Bruron,” said the ruler of Idoslane with a cursory bow.

“Welcome to Richemark, Prince Mallen,” the king replied warmly. “I was heartened to hear of your victory against the orcs.” He turned to the dwarves and smiled. “Please extend my thanks to your commanders. The people of Gauragar won’t forget how the allied army saved them from the green-hided beasts. They’re very grateful.” He laid a bejeweled hand on his chest. “As am I.”

One of the dwarves thumped the ground with the poll of his ax. “Yet you handed the Blacksaddle to our enemies while we were fighting on your behalf. Is that how you show gratitude? I call it disloyal and underhanded, and I don’t mind telling you that I expected better from a human king.”

Bruron looked pained. “Those are harsh accusations, master dwarf—especially as I had no choice. I agreed to take over the watch when your kinsfolk left the Blacksaddle, but I had no way of knowing that a centuries-old agreement would force me to—”

“Betray your allies,” the dwarf finished for him, the creases on his forehead deepening into furrows.

Prince Mallen studied the wagons of grain. “An agreement, you say?”

“Many cycles ago, the house of Gauragar signed a treaty with Lorimbur’s folk, according to which the Blacksaddle was ceded to the thirdlings—for perpetuity and with no recourse.”

“Are you sure the document is genuine?” asked Mallen.

Bruron inclined his gray head. “I’m afraid so. My archivists scoured our deepest vaults and highest towers—and the evidence confirms the terms of the agreement. The thirdlings helped my forebears to mine Cloudpiercer’s riches, and the Blacksaddle was their reward.” He turned to the dwarves. “The stronghold belongs to the thirdlings,” he said apologetically. “What was I supposed to do?”

“Refuse?” suggested one of the dwarves.

“My forefathers signed a treaty with the thirdlings, and it behooves me to uphold its terms. Surely the dwarves, with their fondness for tradition, can understand the situation?” His tone had undergone a sudden change, becoming sharper and more impatient; it was obvious that he considered the matter closed. “The Blacksaddle belongs to the thirdlings; I’m not thrilled about it either, but the honor of Gauragar is at stake.”

Mallen looked at him squarely. “I won’t presume to judge you, Bruron, but in your position I would have advised my allies of the treaty and looked for a better solution.”

“I didn’t have the luxury of—”

“You could have requested more time—a few extra orbits to check the treaty’s terms,” cut in Mallen. “Instead you allowed the dwarf killers to seize a stronghold that poses a strategic threat to our friends. We’ll soon find out how Lorimbas intends to use his advantage.” He locked gazes with the monarch, smiling coolly as the other looked away. It was obvious that Bruron had been offered some inducement to remind him of the treaty’s terms. “I see what this is about,” he whispered in the king’s ear.

“You have no idea,” hissed Bruron. “My subjects are starving. Grain costs money, and I’m spending a fortune to keep them alive! If my allies would waive the cost of the—”

“It’s rude to whisper,” boomed one of the dwarves. “We won’t inconvenience you any longer—we’re needed in Dsôn Balsur. But don’t worry, King Bruron; we’ll be sure to tell our kinsfolk what you said. No doubt the high king will reach his own conclusions about your obligations.”

The three dwarves raised their hands and took their leave with a gesture that could have passed for an obscenity or a wave.

“So you sold it,” said Mallen angrily as soon as they were out of earshot. “You traded the Blacksaddle for gold.”

“No,” snapped Bruron. “My forebears signed a treaty; I kept to the terms.”

“And risked the wrath of the dwarves? What if they cut their ties with the human kingdoms?” Mallen shook his head bitterly. “I said before that I wouldn’t judge you, but I’ve changed my mind. You’re a fool for ceding the Blacksaddle to the thirdlings.”

The king turned on him angrily. “How dare you—”

“I speak only the truth,” broke in Mallen, weary of Bruron’s excuses. “Even a king must be censured if he errs. Don’t you realize what’s happening in Dsôn Balsur? The dwarves lost three hundred warriors in a night! They were murdered in their sleep—duped by älfar who claimed to be envoys from Liútasil. And now a strategically crucial stronghold, complete with weaponry and supplies, is in the hands of the dwarf killers. How do you think our friends will react?”

Bruron’s self-assurance vanished. “I hadn’t heard,” he said, concerned. “I’ll tell my advisors to find a way of annulling the treaty.”

“You do that, King Bruron. New friendships are easily sundered. The dwarves are valuable allies; we can’t afford to lose them.” He paused, deciding that he had said enough. “By the way, I came to tell you that we’ve started setting fire to the forests around Dsôn Balsur. The trees are harder to burn than we thought, and we’ll need more pitch—but it’s working. The assault on the älfar’s black kingdom will soon begin.”

“I have news for you as well, Prince Mallen,” said the king. He hesitated. “The thirdlings want to speak with you. Their spokesman is in the capital, waiting for you to send word.” He gave Mallen the name of a boarding house. “I’ve met a few groundlings in my time, but these ones are…” He checked himself and tried to mask his disquiet. “In any case, you’re more experienced at handling them than me.”

Mallen swung himself onto his horse. “I’ve nothing to say to the thirdlings. We’re leaving this very orbit. A couple of orcish commanders are limping back to Toboribor and I intend to destroy their troops.” He raised his hand in farewell.

“Palandiell be with you and your men,” said Bruron sincerely.

“May the alliance hold strong,” replied Mallen. At his command, the cavalrymen formed a guard around him and they left the storeroom in the direction they had come.

The king of Gauragar lowered his yellow-flecked eyes and examined the lists that his stewards had prepared. After a moment’s consideration, he reached a decision—for the good of his kingdom.

The three cases of gold that would arrive in the capital in nine orbits’ time would allow him to purchase further supplies. There was no point in throwing the thirdlings out of the Blacksaddle until he had accumulated enough gold to secure his kingdom’s future.

Bruron was certain that Mallen and the dwarves would think differently if they knew the suffering of his people. No other kingdom was ravaged as badly as Gauragar. After orbits of eating moldering wheat, my subjects shall have fresh bread. Happier times are ahead for my kingdom.

“See to it that the silos are emptied,” he told his stewards. “Tell the farmers in the northern provinces to till every inch of fertile land. And order another nine thousand drums of barley from Tabaîn. I won’t have my subjects eating crumbs.”

I’m sorry I wasn’t in when you called.”

The deep voice sounded from near Mallen’s feet. The prince, unaccustomed to being addressed in such an irreverent manner, stopped admiring the red-tinged clouds above Richemark and looked down to identify the speaker. It was a heavily armed dwarf, who had slipped past his guards.

“I didn’t call,” he said coldly. “There was nothing to discuss.” He raised a hand to reassure his guards, fearing that any action on their part would result in blood-shed.

The dwarf’s armor was unlike anything that Mallen had seen. His reinforced spaulders were fitted with finger-length spikes, sharp blades glistened on his vambraces, and his gauntlets boasted sharp metal studs. Even without drawing his weapons he could wound or kill a man.

“If you don’t have a name,” said Mallen, “I’d be happy to choose one for you—although it might not meet with your approval.”

“In which case, I’d knock you out of the saddle—and I’m loath to hurt your splendid horse.” The dwarf smiled unpleasantly, the black tattoos on his cheeks rearranging themselves briefly. “If you care for your mount, you’d do well to call me Romo—Romo Steelheart of the clan of the Stone Grinders, descendant of Lorimbur, and nephew of King Lorimbas. I’m here on my uncle’s business.”

Mallen’s gaze traveled over the dwarf, taking in his breastplate, the steel plates protecting his thighs, and the three-chained morning star on his belt. “You’re dressed for war, not business. With a tongue like yours, you’re bound to find enemies, I suppose.”

“My enemies are your allies, and our war has been raging since the creation of the dwarves.” He reached down and pulled a sealed leather roll from his boot. “From my uncle—he told me to bring him your reply.” He held out the roll for Mallen to take.

It seemed to the prince that he should read the missive; if nothing else, it would apprise him of the thirdlings’ intentions. He broke the seal, opened the roll, and pulled out the parchment.

He was expecting some form of blackmail, which was exactly what the letter contained. It referred to an ancient treaty between the house of Ido and the thirdlings in which the latter agreed to provide assistance in combating Toboribor’s orcs.

The arrangement still stood. Idoslane’s defenses depended on the dwarves’ undying hatred of orcs. Dwarven warriors, renowned for their toughness, staffed the outposts in parts of the kingdom most vulnerable to the marauding hordes, but it was difficult to know which of them were thirdlings because, unlike Romo, they looked no different to ordinary dwarves.

According to the letter, the thirdlings’ services were conditional on Mallen sticking to the terms of an agreement signed by his forefathers. It was the first he had heard of such a deal.

“I’m afraid your king is mistaken,” he said firmly, lowering the parchment. “Tell him I don’t like his scheming. First he seizes the Blacksaddle; then he tries to turn Idoslane against her allies. Nothing can induce me to pick a fight with the fourthlings.” He dropped the letter, watching as it floated toward a pile of horse dung. “King Gandogar is more than an ally; he’s a friend.”

“How touching,” scoffed Romo, seemingly unsurprised by his refusal. “Perhaps my uncle can take his place in your affections. We demand that you keep to the terms of the agreement. Your forebears signed the treaty of their own free will.”

“I won’t be held to ransom by your uncle. My forefathers weren’t allied to the fourthlings and their adherence to the treaty was never tested. In fact, I can’t recall any reference to an agreement with the thirdlings; it wouldn’t surprise me if the document were a fake.” He leaned forward in his saddle. “Tell King Lorimbas that bribery worked on Bruron, but it won’t work on me. He can keep his gold.”

“We didn’t bribe Bruron; we paid him.” Romo poked the letter with his boot, watching as the parchment sank into the brown, soggy dung. “You must be very proud of your kingdom, Prince Mallen. I suppose your cavalry is strong enough to deal with the orcs—provided you’ve got enough mercenaries watching your borders.”

“Is that a threat?”

“A threat?” echoed Romo, feigning surprise. “My uncle merely said to tell you—”

Mallen didn’t wait to hear the rest. Dropping the leather holder into the mud, he kicked his heels into the horse’s flanks and rode away. He had said everything he wanted to say.

The cavalrymen, noticing their monarch’s displeasure, took their leave from the dwarf without ceremony. Their places were taken by the traders and citizens of Richemark, who trampled the dung-soaked parchment underfoot.

Romo watched Mallen’s departure with a contemptuous grunt. He’ll see the consequences of his obstinacy soon enough. The dwarf was pleased that the passers-by were careful not to crowd him; they were nervous of dwarves, and his demeanor did nothing to calm their fears.

Mallen’s refusal to ally himself with the thirdlings meant that Romo was obliged to continue his journey in a northeasterly direction. He could be sure that his advances would be looked on more sympathetically there.

A group of children ventured closer, stopping a few paces away and staring at him with open curiosity.

“Are you a dwarf as well?” asked the eldest among them. “Why do you look so funny?”

“For the same reason you look so ugly,” he growled. Then he realized the implications of the child’s words. “Of course I’m a dwarf, a very special dwarf—a warrior, if you must know.” He smiled a crooked smile. “Are more of my kind in town?”

The children jumped up and down, nodding eagerly.

“What a wonderful coincidence. Can you tell me where I might find them?” He took a coin from his leather purse and threw it to the tallest boy. His right hand closed around the metal haft of his morning star. He intended to end his business in Richemark on a high.

IV

Southern Entrance to the Fifthling Kingdom,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

It hasn’t changed since last time,” said Boïndil, gazing at the crumbling ramparts and fallen towers that were all that remained of the stronghold’s glory. He, Tungdil, Balyndis, and a group of twenty handpicked warriors were marching ahead to survey the land. The gateway to the fifthling kingdom lay before them, tall as a house and tantalizingly close. The doors had been smashed to pieces. Boïndil looked back at the steep path leading down the mountainside. The remaining dwarves were about a mile away, working their way to the top with their belongings and supplies. “They’re moving too fast,” he muttered. “They need to be more careful with Boëndal’s stretcher—and they shouldn’t be making so much noise.” He dispatched a warrior to pass on the message.

Tungdil left the little group, ducked behind the weathered ruins, and darted toward the gateway, moving as quietly as he could. Mindful of the possible dangers, he had taken his ax from his belt and was ready to strike at a moment’s notice. A few paces from the gateway, he stopped and crouched behind a pile of rubble.

“Hey, that wasn’t the deal,” growled Ireheart, setting off after him. “What are you playing at, scholar? The first ten orcs belong to me.” He ducked down, charging from rock to rock and sheltering behind the ruined ramparts, now almost fully visible beneath the melting snow. Balyndis and the others ran after him, rattling and clunking like an army of tinkers.

Tungdil rolled his eyes. “You couldn’t be more obvious if you were singing dwarven war songs,” he hissed irritably. “I’ve a good mind to make you take off your chain mail.” He focused his attention on the dark gateway leading into the mountain; everything was still.

The silence was broken by dripping water. All around them, stalactites were melting, and not far from the gateway, a waterfall, free at last from its icy prison, was cascading down the slope. Spray rose into the air, lingering in a haze of iridescent mist.

“I’d sooner shave off my beard than take off my chain mail,” protested Boïndil. “I’m naked without it.” He flared his nostrils, sniffing the air for orcs. “Not a whiff of them—or their rancid armor.” He turned to Tungdil and Balyndis. “Remember the orcs in the smelting works?” His eyes lit up with the memory. “They were packed in so tightly, just waiting to be killed. I couldn’t swing my axes without disemboweling a dozen of them by accident. Do you think—”

“Quiet!” ordered Tungdil, conscious that Balyndis was looking at him.

She had been true to her word and joined the expedition—not as his fiancée, but as a friend. At her side was Glaïmbar Sharpax, to whom she would soon be melded.

Tungdil didn’t know how to behave around her. In the space of an orbit, he had gone from being a lover to a friend, but his tortured heart refused to accept the change. “I’ll go first,” he said.

Stooping low, he darted off and stopped to the side of the gateway, pressing his ear to the wall and listening for sounds from within. Hearing nothing, he slipped inside and disappeared into the gloom.

Boïndil jiggled his axes impatiently. “I can’t stand it!” he spluttered. His inner furnace was overheating, stoked by his fiery spirit and concern for his brother’s life. “We should be seizing the Dragon Fire furnace and making my brother well. I’m going straight to the fifthling smithy, and no one can stop me—not you or a hundred orcs!” Throwing caution to the wind, he jumped up and ran through the gateway. Balyndis, swearing softly, hurried after him, followed by the others.

The tread of their boots on the rock sounded different in the tunnel. Balyndis found herself imagining that she was running across the roof of a cavern, but she pushed the thought aside.

A moment later, she and the others almost barreled into Tungdil, who had come to a halt at the end of the tunnel. “Forget what I said about keeping down the noise,” he said testily. “They’re bound to have heard us by now.” He gripped Keenfire with both hands. “It’s time to find out whether Tion’s beasts are still squatting in our stronghold or whether they’ve found themselves another home.”

“That’s more like it,” said Boïndil cheerily. “Dwarves don’t hold with sneaking and skulking; it’s cowardly and underhanded.” He flashed them a ferocious grin. “Show me where the runts are hiding—I’m dying for a fight.”

“How unusual,” said Balyndis, cross with him for breaking rank.

They set off through the passageways, Tungdil, Balyndis, and Boïndil, who knew the stronghold from their previous visit, leading the way. The likenesses of dead fifthling chieftains greeted them, axes hefted, from gleaming palandium panels on the walls.

They soon found evidence of orcish activity: a trail of dirt and muddy prints—some booted, others unshod—leading toward the exit. It seemed the beasts had marched through the stronghold on their way to the Blacksaddle.

On reaching a many-columned pentagonal chamber, they took the passageway to the Dragon Fire furnace.

Tungdil’s memories came flooding back. He heard Gandogar’s booming voice taunting Nôd’onn’s hordes, he saw images of his dead friends, and he braced himself for grunting orcs and squawking bögnilim—but the halls were deathly still.

“Botheration! It’s empty as an ogre’s skull,” cursed Boïndil as they reached the smelting works adjoining the furnace. The fires had gone out beneath the blast furnaces, the chamber was cold, and the air stank of excrement and orc. “They’ve abandoned the halls,” said Boïndil, striding toward the door. “What are you waiting for? To the Dragon Fire furnace! What’s the betting it’s still alight?”

Tungdil realized it was useless to reprimand his reckless friend. Consumed with worry about his brother, Boïndil was at the mercy of his temper. Finding some orcs would give him an outlet for his anger, and stop him harming the rest of the group.

Boïndil was driven by hatred for Tion’s creation, which made him a fearsome warrior—and a danger to others and himself. Unless he vented his rage, the flames of his furnace would burn higher and higher until he threw himself on whoever had the misfortune to be in his way. His fiery nature was a blessing and a curse.

They entered the Dragon Fire furnace, and immediately noticed a change in temperature.

Twenty hearths and eighty anvils were arranged around the central furnace. The vast room was filled with an odor so foul that the dwarves, covering their noses, tried not to gag. Decaying corpses lay strewn across the floor—orcs, bögnilim, a handful of älfar, and even three trolls. This was the work of Bavragor Hammersmith and the undead fifthlings who had given their lives so that Tungdil and the others could escape.

“By the beard of Beroïn, what a battle it must have been!” murmured Boïndil respectfully. “I never thought the merry minstrel had it in him.”

They sifted through the bodies, hoping to give a proper burial to their friends, but nothing remained except chain mail and cloth; the valiant warriors had been overpowered and torn to pieces.

“Look!” said Balyndis, pointing her ax at the main furnace. “It’s still burning!”

Tungdil breathed out in relief. With Dragon Fire, his worries about forging weaponry, armor, and other equipment for the kingdom were instantly solved. “Fan the flames! Giselbert’s kingdom belongs to the dwarves!”

The dwarves shoveled coal onto the furnace, taking care not to extinguish the flickering flames. Then they pulled on the chains connected to the giant bellows and breathed new life into Dragon Fire’s heart. Tungdil sent Boïndil and nine others to relay the good news to the rest of the company and guide them through the passageways.

In the meantime, Balyndis set about opening the vents to the flue. The fifthlings had sabotaged the mechanism to stop the orcs following Tungdil and the others through the chimney. She looked up at the ceiling, eighty paces above. A stone staircase led to the flue, which was blocked by a pair of solid metal plates.

“I’ll need a bit of time, but I can fix it,” she said, raising her voice so that Tungdil, who was standing nearby, would have to respond. “The chain came down because they destroyed the main sprocket. I’ll have the mechanism working in less than an orbit.”

Tungdil nodded but didn’t turn round. “It shouldn’t take long to clear up the forge. The bodies can go in the furnace—we’ll find a use for the melted armor.” He bent down and discovered tongs, hammers, chisels, files, and other tools hidden beneath the rotting remains. “We’ll soon have the smithy ringing with the sound of our hammers. The fifthling kingdom has been waiting for hundreds of cycles to hear the music of the forge.”

Glancing round to check no one was watching, Balyndis strode over to Tungdil and grabbed him by the arm. “Tungdil Goldhand, what did I do to deserve this?” she demanded, her brown eyes smoldering as fiercely as the furnace.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he said, scanning the hall intently, as if he were planning the details of the clean-up operation. Balyndis’s powerful fingers, accustomed to toiling at the anvil, refused to let him go.

“Are you ignoring me as a punishment? You shouldn’t treat me this way—I’m your friend!”

“My friend?” erupted Tungdil. “We were in love, Balyndis, we wanted to be joined by the iron band! And then you decided to pledge yourself to a stranger, just because he’s a Sharpscythe or a Bluntax or whatever…” He broke off and looked at her hopefully. “You haven’t finished with him, have you?”

She closed her eyes. “No, Tungdil. It’s the law. I have to obey my clan.”

“Even at the cost of your happiness?” My happiness, he corrected himself.

“Yes,” she said simply. “There’s nothing more sacred, nothing we prize more highly than tradition. Tradition has kept our society together for thousands of cycles; it allows us to live in harmony; it keeps our clans alive. Sometimes it means we have to make sacrifices, but it’s all for the greater good. You’ll understand when you’ve lived in a dwarven kingdom for a while; at least I hope you will.” She let go of his arm and went to stroke his cheek, but he jerked away.

“Don’t do this to me,” he said bitterly. “You’re making it worse.” Too choked to talk, he turned away and hurried out of the forge, where he bumped into Boïndil, who was leading the procession to the furnace. The four dwarves carrying his frozen brother were just behind.

Glad of anything that might distract him from his thoughts, Tungdil set about sorting the dwarves into groups and sending them into the passageways to scour the stronghold for hidden orcs.

Over the course of the journey, Boëndal’s stretcher had been strapped to a pony or, when the terrain was uneven, carried by his fellow dwarves. They walked the stretcher to the middle of the room and set it down by the furnace. The flames were becoming brighter and fiercer all the time.

“What now?” enquired Boïndil, eying his brother’s pale face. “Do you think he’ll wake up?”

Tungdil laid a hand on Boëndal’s brow. It felt cold and dry. “No change yet, but the furnace isn’t up to temperature—we’ll wait a bit longer for the pure white flames.”

“And then what?” demanded Boïndil. He reached for his brother’s hand and clasped it tight. “We could fill a tankard with glowing coal, add some beer, and pour it down his throat,” he said hopefully.

Tungdil shook his head. “I can’t make sense of the riddle, but I promise you this: We’ll ransack the fifthlings’ archives until we find a solution.” He got up and signaled for the physicians to attend to Boëndal. “Come on,” he said, thumping Boïndil’s broad back. “There’s work to be done.”

The two dwarves left the forge, leaving Balyndis to stare after them sadly.

The following orbits saw the peaceable takeover of the kingdom continue apace.

The secondling masons lost no time in beginning the restoration work on the badly damaged chambers and corridors, with everyone lending a hand when it came to transporting the stone.

The firstling smiths fired up the blast furnaces and forged metal strips and bands to reinforce the gateways and doors. Their constant hammering echoed through the underground halls, reminding the mountain of the activity within it, six thousand cycles before.

In the early stages of the project, there wasn’t any call for diamond cutting or gem polishing, so the fourthlings helped wherever they were needed and set about exploring every passageway, chamber, nook, and cranny of the kingdom.

But no matter how hard they searched, there was still no sign of a tablet or document containing the key to Dragon Fire’s power. And so the orbits passed, and Boëndal continued to lie by the fire, his inner furnace cold and weak.

Tungdil and the others were barely aware of the passing time. New treasures were discovered every orbit, and the fifthlings’ craftsmanship became a source of continual delight. The firstlings, who had hitherto considered themselves experts in the art of working gold and other precious metals, readily admitted that the smiths of Giselbert possessed skills in excess of their own.

After orbits of searching, Tungdil decided that nothing in the halls and chambers would help them to revive the frozen dwarf. He gathered an advance party of warriors and set off in the direction of the Stone Gateway, hoping to find something there.

If he were honest, it was also a way of escaping Balyndis, who was torturing him with her beautiful smile, her loveable manner, and her irresistible curves.

The idea of Balyndis living side by side with Glaïmbar Sharpax, her Iron Beating kinsman, was enough to make his spirit plummet deeper than the darkest mine. Worse still, it encouraged his thoughts in untoward directions, and he found himself wishing that Glaïmbar would die.

He allowed his mind to ponder the prospect. His death would solve everything, wouldn’t it? said a voice in his ear. If Balyndis were widowed, no one would object to her taking a suitor, whoever he was.

Tungdil bristled. If Balyndis took a new suitor, it would obviously be him.

Everyone would be happier, whispered the demon inside his head.

Tungdil, shocked at himself, banished the voice.

He was so withdrawn and miserable that Boïndil, who had insisted on joining the expedition, couldn’t help but notice.

“I suppose there’s a downside to being a dwarf,” commented the secondling when they stopped to rest their legs. They were sitting on the rocky banks of an underground stream, far enough away from the band of fifty dwarves for their conversation to go unheard. It gave Boïndil the courage to speak freely. “I’m no scholar,” he said, puffing vigorously on his pipe until the tobacco caught light. “I don’t have a knack with words, but I can listen; it doesn’t take much brains.” He crossed his arms and leaned back against the rock, waiting. “It’s time we talked.”

“About what?”

“Whatever’s bothering you.” He prodded Tungdil’s chain mail with the stem of his pipe. “I can shout her name until you tell me,” he threatened.

Sighing loudly, Tungdil cut himself a slice of dried mushroom to go with his cheese. “It’s not fair,” he said succinctly. Then his pent-up anguish came out in a torrent of words. “I thought we could still be friends,” he said finally. “I wasn’t expecting it to be so hard.” His appetite gone, he put down the mushroom and took a long draft of brandy instead.

“I’d go easy on the drinking,” warned Boïndil, still puffing noisily on his pipe. “You wouldn’t be the first to drown yourself in brandy. I don’t like seeing you like this—especially when me and Boëndal are to blame.”

“How do you figure that?” asked Tungdil, running a hand over his beard to wipe away the drops.

“Remember all the things we talked about on the long march to Ogre’s Death?” his friend said earnestly. “You asked about our customs, but I guess we forgot the most important ones—or maybe we should have explained them better. It’s all about family, clan, and folk. The laws are there to keep order, to protect us, to keep us safe. Without them, everything, er…”

“Falls apart,” supplied Tungdil, realizing that Boïndil was struggling.

“Exactly! So Balyndis didn’t have a choice, do you see?”

“I grew up in a human realm…”

“Do humans choose their partners willy-nilly, with no regard for their families?” demanded Boïndil.

“No,” conceded Tungdil, “but love comes first. I thought dwarves would be the same.” He leaned back against the rock next to his friend. “Look, I’ve been thinking—the fifthlings should choose a new leader.”

“What for? You’re the one they want: Tungdil Goldhand, hero of the Blacksaddle, rightful heir to Giselbert’s belt, and the only dwarf who can kindle the power of Keenfire.”

“They need a dwarf who grew up with our lore, someone who knows the traditions and respects them. There aren’t many of us, and we’re miles from the other kingdoms; our future depends on us pulling together. Keenfire and I will fight if we’re needed—I don’t have to be leader as well.”

Boïndil removed his pipe and blew smoke rings through his mouth. He waited for the blue smoke to disperse. “I understand what you’re saying, scholar. I’ve never known anyone so wise,” he said admiringly.

Tungdil reached into the bubbling stream and scooped a handful of water into his mouth. It was wonderfully clear—slightly metallic, but delicious. It tasted a hundred times better than any overland spring or river, and it slaked the thirst at once. “Is it wrong of me to wish him dead?” he asked softly, damping his hair with his hands.

“Who? Glaïmbar Sharpax?” Boïndil roared with laughter. “I’ve been wishing him dead since I met him; anyone who makes my best friend unhappy and pilfers his girlfriend deserves as much.” On seeing Tungdil’s shock, he laughed again. “What’s the matter? I’m crazy, remember? My inner furnace has melted my mind.” He made an effort to be serious. “Honestly, Tungdil, I’d challenge Sharpax to a duel if I thought it would do any good, but rules are made for a reason. One rash deed leads to another, and before you know it, it’s a bloodbath.” He thumped Tungdil on the knee. “Chin up, scholar. You’ll find another maiden who’ll give you a place in her heart and her bed—you’ll forget about Balyndis.”

“No,” said Tungdil.

“It’s the only way,” his friend advised sharply. “You can’t store up your anger forever. Believe me, I know.” He handed his pipe to Tungdil, who took it gratefully.

Long moments passed as they sat in silence by the stream.

If it weren’t for Glaïmbar, you and Balyndis would be happy, said the fiendish voice in Tungdil’s head. She’ll be miserable with Glaïmbar. Do her a favor, and kill him when you have a chance.

“How will you do it?”

“Do what?” asked Tungdil guiltily, sure that Boïndil could read his thoughts.

“Tell them you don’t want to be leader. How will they know whom to choose?”

“Oh… I’ll say what I said to you,” he said carelessly. “They should pick a leader of proper dwarven stock.”

He fell silent because Boïndil was on his feet, sniffing the air excitedly. His axes flew to his hands. “You can’t say the Gray Range doesn’t look after us; it gives us everything we ask for: water for our gullets—and orcs for our blades.” His eyes glinted as he grinned at Tungdil. “Can’t you smell the stinking runts?” He pointed to a passageway on the right. “This way—down the tunnel!”

The tunnel was labeled with an ancient inscription to signpost the route. It led upward, toward the Stone Gateway.

Their brief rest was over.

Hurriedly they packed their things and lined up for battle, with the warriors at the front. The masons, more accustomed to splitting granite than crushing orc skulls, brought up the rear with their chisels, hammers, and other tools.

The unit of dwarves moved off down the corridor at a jog. By now Tungdil could smell the beasts’ acrid perspiration and the rancid fat on their armor. The foul odor was anathema to any dwarf.

“I knew they’d turn up sometime,” said Boïndil gleefully as he jogged at Tungdil’s side. “Nôd’onn or no Nôd’onn, they can’t keep away from our borders. Girdlegard is too tempting for a band of hungry orcs.”

Tungdil spotted light in the distance—they were nearing the end of the tunnel. The Stone Gateway, a miracle of dwarven masonry, awaited them on the surface, along with an unknown number of enemy troops.

“Word won’t have got out that the dwarves have recaptured the fifthling kingdom,” said Boïndil, tossing his black plait over his shoulder. “I reckon we can kill at least a hundred before they catch on. We’ll storm out and take them by surprise.”

“You’ll do no such thing,” his friend told him sternly. “I want to see who we’re dealing with.” He tiptoed to the end of the passageway and peered outside.

Two dozen or so orcs were standing in a huddle on the site of the ruined gateway. The portal was wide open, the five powerful bolts that had once protected Girdlegard from invasion in pieces on the ground. At some point during the orcish occupation, the beasts had pried the metal from the doors.

The leader of the band pointed to a flight of stairs leading up to a watchtower. They didn’t seem in a particular hurry, and Tungdil had the impression they were studying the defenses.

As if to confirm his suspicions, one of the orcs bent down to inspect a fragment of bolt, while the rest set about climbing the stairs.

“How many are there?” asked Boïndil eagerly, banging his axes together. “A hundred? Two hundred? How many runts can I kill?”

Tungdil described the group.

“What? Only two dozen?” spat Boïndil. He gave the others a threatening look. “Don’t even think about it! These are for me! You’ll have to find your own orcs.”

“They’re acting strangely,” said Tungdil. He quickly explained his hunch. “If you ask me, they’re scouts. They must have been sent ahead to find a means of destroying the defenses forever.”

It was all the encouragement Boïndil needed. “Hurrah! In that case, we’d better stop them!” He sprinted off, heading straight for the watchtower. Bounding up the stairs, he caught up with the orcs and killed three in quick succession. Only then did the rest of the troopers realize they were under attack.

Muttering under his breath, Tungdil ran to the base of the tower and stopped. Dead orcs tumbled down the stairs, landing in a heap by the door. His help wasn’t needed.

By the time the rest of the dwarves caught up, twenty or so orcs had died by Ireheart’s hand. The watchtower was too narrow and the orcs too broad-shouldered for close combat with a raging dwarf. At last, Boïndil started to make his way down the staircase, stepping over the muddle of dead orcs, whose efforts had been hampered by their cumbersome swords, clubs, and axes.

“Quick, I want him alive,” said Tungdil, pointing to the orc who had stopped to inspect the bolt. His chance of interrogating any of the troopers would be lost if Boïndil got there first. “Four of you capture the beast; everyone else, come with me—we’ll meet Boïndil halfway.”

They climbed the bloodied stairs, squeezing past bodies, taking care not to slip, and steering clear of falling corpses.

Suddenly a clawed hand reached out and grabbed Tungdil by the ankle. Growling and snarling, the orc lunged toward him, but Tungdil struck out, burying his ax in the creature’s right shoulder.

With a pained grunt, the orc pulled on Tungdil’s ankle, knocking him off his feet. Toppling backward, Tungdil landed in the arms of the dwarf behind him, and the orc, still attached to Keenfire, came too.

He should be dead by now, thought Tungdil, noticing the wounds inflicted by Boïndil’s axes. Summoning his strength, he wrenched his blade from his antagonist’s shoulder and kicked him in the kneecap to stop him getting up. Then, swinging Keenfire as savagely as the confines of the watchtower permitted, he took aim at his neck. The orc’s head hit the wall and bounced down the stairs; the rest of him slumped to the floor and showed no sign of movement.

“Stubborn bastard,” said the dwarf behind him, glowering at the corpse.

A terrible thought occurred to Tungdil. “Shush,” he commanded. Judging by the grunting and jangling at the bottom of the watchtower, Boïndil’s other victims were clambering to their feet.

“Everyone back!” he ordered. “The beasts aren’t… dead.” His mind was gradually clearing. Only the Perished Land had the power to raise the dead—but its influence stopped at Girdlegard’s border, beyond the Northern Pass. It doesn’t make sense… His success in defeating the revenant seemed to confirm that there was only one sure way to deal with the beasts.

“Chop off their heads!” he bellowed. At the bottom of the watchtower, the dwarves at the rear of the unit were fighting off the sharp claws and hastily drawn daggers of a horde of undead beasts. “They’re revenants!”

The battle started all over again, only this time it was fiercer and more dangerous.

Tungdil fought his way out of the tower, brandishing Keenfire. The ax lit up, vaunting its legendary power.

Runes ablaze, the shimmering blade sliced through the air, leaving a trail of blinding light, but the spectacle seemed to bypass the orcs, who attacked with undiminished savagery. The beasts were natural fighters, quick to exploit the slightest mistake, and the dwarves, hampered by the height difference, were hard pressed to behead them.

“Aim for their throats!” yelled Tungdil, ducking and swinging his ax. He brought down his opponent with a blow to the leg and followed up with a decapitating strike.

Panting heavily, he straightened up and looked around. The battle was shifting in favor of the orcs: All around him, dwarves were being killed or wounded after assuming—mistakenly, as it happened—that they had dealt their antagonists a mortal blow.

Most of Tungdil’s companions, unfamiliar with revenants, were on the defensive, slashing pluckily but pointlessly at the orcs. Their axes cleaved through flesh and bone, but the undead orcs fought on regardless, faltering only if they lost both arms. The determination faded from the younger warriors’ faces as the casualties grew.

“You need to behead them,” shouted Tungdil, rushing to the aid of a dwarf who was hacking frantically at a clawed hand that was closing around his throat. Green blood spurted in all directions, but the orc, caring nothing for his injuries, merely tightened his grip. With three powerful strikes of Keenfire, Tungdil felled and killed the beast.

The beasts had to be brought to their knees before they could be beheaded, which was troublesome and tiring, but the indefatigable Tungdil seemed to be everywhere at once. Inspired by his example, the dwarves regained their confidence and overpowered the undead orcs.

Victory didn’t come cheap. Tungdil’s unit had started with superior numbers, but fifteen had fallen and another twenty were seriously hurt. To everyone’s relief, the slain dwarves showed no sign of rising from the dead to turn on their erstwhile friends.

“To the tower!” shouted Tungdil to the survivors. He and the others raced up the steps, nearly colliding with Ireheart, who had cornered the final beast. The secondling swung both his axes simultaneously into the creature’s groin. Yelping, the orc sank to his knees and dropped his sword, which clattered down the stairs past the warriors’ boots.

“I need to behead him, right?” he shouted. His axes sped forward, severing his antagonist’s vile green head. He wiped his face, which was dripping with sweat, blood, and foul-smelling filth. “Well that was fun,” he sighed happily, bending down to clean his axes on the dead orc’s jerkin. “By the hammer of Vraccas, if only we could fight on narrow stairways all the time—it’s the best way of making sure the cowards don’t escape. I wasn’t counting on fighting revenants, though—not after we defeated the Perished Land.” He fell silent and counted the bodies. “There’s one missing,” he said grimly, a crazed glint returning to his eyes. “Unless you miscounted, scholar.”

Tungdil, his mind chafing at the reasons for the orcs’ longevity, wasn’t prepared to enter a discussion. “We’ll talk at the top,” he said firmly, shooing his friend up the stairs.

Boïndil led the procession, and soon all the dwarves were gathered at the top of the fortified tower. From there they were able to survey the land on both sides of the gateway, including the track leading north out of Girdlegard.

“No sign of the enemy,” said Tungdil, relieved. With the stone doors wide open and the bolts in pieces, there could hardly be a worse time to fight off an army of orcs—especially if they were revenants. He didn’t feel ready; Girdlegard wasn’t ready.

“What made them keep fighting?” persisted Boïndil. “Was it the curse of the Perished Land?”

Loud, brutish snarls heralded the arrival of the missing trooper, dragged and pushed by his smaller captors to the top of the tower.

“Maybe he can tell us,” said Tungdil. This time he didn’t need to warn Boïndil to keep his axes away from the prisoner; judging by the warrior’s pained expression, the message had got through. “Bring him over,” Tungdil instructed the four dwarves, who promptly pinned their victim against the battlements.

It had clearly taken considerable effort to capture the orc, and the dwarves had set about their task wholeheartedly. The beast was bleeding from manifold gashes, mainly to his thighs and abdomen. His jawbone had been smashed by a dwarven hammer, and nothing remained of his tusks except two jagged stumps. Any ordinary mortal would have died of such wounds.

The beast’s deep-set yellow eyes darted nervously between the dwarves, taking in their bearded faces. His flat nose quivered as he sniffed the air. The rise and fall of his grease-smeared breastplate mimicked his shallow, rapid breathing.

“What brought you here?” demanded Tungdil, hefting Keenfire. The diamond-encrusted blade glittered in the sunlight, dazzling the prisoner. Squealing, the orc shied away, but his back was against the parapet. “You’re right to fear my ax,” said Tungdil, speaking in the tongue of the orcs. Once again, he had cause to be grateful for the cycles of study in Lot-Ionan’s library.

The orc’s terror gave way to surprise. “You speak orcish!”

“Where are the others? What made you immortal? How strong is the Perished Land?” He swung his ax, stopping just short of the creature’s nose. “Talk, or we’ll kill you.”

“It’s because of the water,” stammered the orc. “The blood of the Perished Land turned us into…” He tailed off. “I’m not allowed to tell you.”

Just then Tungdil, who was working on the assumption that the orcs had invaded from north of the border, realized that his logic was flawed. How would an orc from the Outer Lands recognize Keenfire? Could news of the weapon have spread beyond Girdlegard? Would an orc be scared of an ax that he knew only from hearsay? “You know this weapon, don’t you?” he challenged him. “You know the weapon, and you know who I am. You’ve come from the Blacksaddle, haven’t you?” He glared at him menacingly. “You’d better tell me about the water.”

“I can’t,” the orc said hastily, keeping his eyes on the blade.

“Do you want me to kill you?”

“No, but Ushnotz will…” The orc broke off and looked around frantically. Tungdil read the signs correctly and jumped aside in time to evade the charging beast.

But neither Tungdil nor his captive had reckoned with Ireheart’s smoldering spirit. Shouting wildly, the secondling warrior threw himself on the orc, using both axes to slice through his neck. Blood gushed from the headless body, which slumped to the floor.

“Bravo, Boïndil,” said Tungdil sarcastically. “We can safely assume that the prisoner is dead.”

“He tried to attack you,” said Boïndil meekly, knowing that his friend was right to be cross. “Did he tell you what they were up to?”

“He might have done, if you hadn’t cut his throat.” Tungdil looked thoughtfully at the corpse. The name Ushnotz seemed familiar, but he couldn’t work out why. “Search the bodies,” he ordered. “And keep an eye out for anything that might link the revenants to the battle of the Blacksaddle.” He bent down and rummaged through the dead orc’s pockets and rucksack.

Boïndil, full of contrition for killing the prisoner, hovered behind him. “If they came from the south, they must have sneaked past our sentries,” he said evenly, fixing his gaze on the surrounding peaks.

“Not necessarily—they probably got to the Gray Range before us and lost their way in the tunnels. The signposts wouldn’t be any good to them because they can’t read dwarven runes.” He picked up the dead beast’s waist bag and turned it upside-down. “They weren’t carrying much, which means one of two things; either they’ve been traveling for orbits and finished their provisions—or they’ve set up camp nearby.”

The crazed glimmer faded from Boïndil’s eyes. For a short while his mood would be stable until he was filled again with a burning desire to hunt down Tion’s hordes. A cool breeze buffeted his face, drying the blood on his beard, as he contemplated the ruins of the gateway.

“They pulled the bolts off,” he said, thinking aloud. He noticed gouges around the upper edge of both doors—it looked as though someone had attacked them with a chisel. “Look, they were trying to take down the doors, but their second-rate tools weren’t strong enough. They must have settled for ripping off the bolts.”

“Our smiths and masons will put everything to rights,” Tungdil reassured him. He hadn’t found anything yet to indicate where the orcs had come from. He searched methodically, frisking the orc’s clothing and removing his mail shirt and armor to check underneath. At last, a small chunk of wood fell out of the cuff of his glove. It was clumsily engraved with the insignia of an orcish chieftain, and it was darker and heavier than ordinary wood.

Boïndil leaned over to take a closer look. “It’s fossilized,” he said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it came from a dead glade, like the one we saw in Gauragar.”

The memory snapped into place. Tungdil’s last encounter with Ushnotz’s troopers had taken place in Gauragar before he met the twins. While hidden in a tree, he had eavesdropped on the orcs’ plan to attack the village of Goodwater. Strictly speaking, Ushnotz and his band belonged in Toboribor, the orcish enclave in the southeast of Girdlegard. Toboribor is fifteen hundred miles away. What would Ushnotz be doing in Gauragar? And why would he send a band of troopers to reconnoiter the Northern Pass? He shared his thoughts with Boïndil.

“It stands to reason, doesn’t it? Escaping across the Northern Pass is the perfect solution for the orcs. Ushnotz lost a decisive battle, and the allied army is waiting for him to return to Toboribor. If you were a lava-livered runt, you wouldn’t go home either.”

“I think you’re right about them leaving Toboribor,” said Tungdil, nodding. He joined Boïndil at the weathered battlements, leaning over the parapet and running his fingers over grooves and pockmarks created by cycles of rain, wind, sun, and snow. Straightening up, he fixed his gaze on the legendary peaks of the Gray Range. “But if you ask me, they don’t intend to leave Girdlegard: They’re planning to settle here.”

“What?” growled his friend. “In our mountains?” He spat on the fallen orc. “May Vraccas beat your soul with a red-hot hammer and torture your spirit with burning tongs!”

Thinking about it, Tungdil felt certain that Ushnotz had intended to occupy the fifthling kingdom. It’s lucky we got here first. He doubted that he and his warriors could have liberated the stronghold from an army of orcs.

It was difficult to know what the troopers had been doing at the gateway. Trying to close it or destroy it? He wondered whether the orcish chieftain had been planning to charge a levy for crossing into Girdlegard. A toll system would be an excellent way of securing weaponry and supplies. Ushnotz struck him as the type to exploit a situation for maximum gain.

Tungdil, having made the connection between Ushnotz, the dead glade, and the revenants, realized with a sinking feeling that he and the others were soon to be visited by some very unwelcome guests. How big was the orcish army? Four thousand, at least…

His gaze swept the mountains, valleys, and ravines and came to rest on the mighty summit of the Dragon’s Tongue.

“I promised to win back the fifthling kingdom for the dwarves,” he murmured softly. “The orcish invaders brought misery on Girdlegard. I don’t care how many necks we have to sever, we won’t let the Stone Gateway fall to the beasts.”

Boïndil nodded. “Well said, scholar. To blazes with the orcs! If they’re the same lot we saw in Gauragar, they’ll be stronger in numbers: The odds aren’t impossible—but it’s a sizable challenge.”

“We’ll have to behead them, don’t forget. Undead orcs are four times more difficult to kill—we lost a lot of warriors today. We won’t defeat them on our own.” He thought for a moment. “We can’t ask the firstlings—they won’t get here in time.”

“What about the elves?”

“They’re too busy reclaiming Âlandur and destroying the älfar. We can’t rely on their help.”

“Hmm.” Boïndil stared at the sheer flanks of the Great Blade. “Who can we ask?” His eyes lit up as he thought of the perfect solution.

“The outcasts,” said Tungdil, thinking the same.

“Look!” shouted a dwarven warrior, peering across the border to the Outer Lands. A milky fog had descended on the mountains, shrouding the Northern Pass in mist. “There’s something down there! I saw movement on the track.”

Tungdil frowned. He and his warriors were in no position to defend themselves against an army of beasts. Considering how many had been killed or injured already, they could scarcely hope to hold the gateway for longer than a peal of orcish laughter would take to echo across the pass. “Be quiet while I listen,” he commanded.

They strained their ears, listening for noises in the thickening fog. The tension showed on their faces. Boïndil peered into the mist, chewing absentmindedly on his braids.

Thick tendrils of fog crept toward the gateway, slipping nervously through the opening as if afraid that the doors would close.

After listening for a while longer, Tungdil breathed out. “You must have been mistaken,” he said, relieved.

“I knew I shouldn’t have got my hopes up,” grumbled Boïndil, letting his arms hang limply by his side.

A muffled jangling sounded from below, its source obscured by the thick veil of fog. In an instant, the tension returned.

“Sounds to me like badly forged armor,” said Boïndil. He turned to the four dwarves who had captured the orcish prisoner. “You checked the gateway for survivors, didn’t you?”

They looked at each other uncertainly.

“I think so,” said one of them, but he didn’t sound sure.

“Which is to say, we might have missed one,” surmised Tungdil, realizing that the boulders on either side of the path were plenty big enough to hide an orc. It wasn’t a reassuring thought. “We’d better check.”

“Let’s catch him before he tells everyone in the Outer Lands that the border is open,” said Boïndil, jiggling his axes. “For all we know, he might be a northern trooper, not one of Ushnotz’s scouts.”

Tungdil had no desire to fight off an invasion from the north, especially with Ushnotz marching on the kingdom from the other side. He signaled for Boïndil to follow him and picked out three dwarves who had acquitted themselves well in the previous skirmish. “You lot come with me, while the others keep watch.” He and his warriors hurried down the stairs.

Porista,

Former Realm of Lios Nudin,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

Take that, Nôd’onn, you traitor!” boomed a heavily armored man, leaping somewhat inelegantly out of the shadows to challenge the cloaked figure in the middle of the room. His voice was muffled by a helmet, which made it sound like he was speaking from inside a bucket. He struck a heroic pose. “Your cruel campaign against Girdlegard is over. With this ax I shall slay your inner demon and bring peace to these lands. Prepare to meet your death!” He raised a shimmering ax and swung it above his head. The blade left a trail of red light in the air, whereupon smoke filled the room.

Yelping, Nôd’onn backed away; the valiant warrior lurched after him, armor tinkling unheroically. The magus retaliated by bombarding him with fiery sparks.

“Your dark arts can’t save you,” prophesied the warrior, sparks rebounding from his breastplate. Lunging forward, he wobbled slightly before raising his weapon to deliver the final strike. Even as the ax slammed into Nôd’onn’s torso, an almighty explosion sounded from somewhere, filling the room with blinding light.

When the glare finally faded, Nôd’onn had vanished, and the warrior was stamping frantically on the smoldering remains of his cloak. It wasn’t until the flames were well and truly extinguished that he turned to face the front.

“And that, worthy spectators, is how your hero, the fabulous Rodario…” He broke off and fumbled unsuccessfully with his visor. After a time, he yanked it impatiently, and the clasp came away in his armored hand. “Of all the confounded—”

Dropping his ax, which planted itself in the floorboards a hairsbreadth away from his foot, he raised both hands to his helmet and pulled with all his might. When that failed, he flung out his arms theatrically, causing his armor to emit an ear-splitting screech.

“As I was saying,” he started again. “I, the fabulous Rodario, assisted by Andôkai the Tempestuous and my loyal helpers, the dwarves, rescued Girdlegard from Nôd’onn’s clutches and restored our kingdoms to their rightful rulers. Thank you for your indulgence, worthy spectators. Donations will be collected at the door.”

He stepped forward to take a bow, stood on a wobbly floorboard, and tumbled off the makeshift stage. The orchestra pit, usually packed with musicians and technicians, was empty. His armored body clattered to the floor.

The audience of two burst out laughing and hurried to help him up. “Congratulations,” said Narmora dryly. “Do you think you can repeat it on the night?”

“Get me out of this helmet,” came Rodario’s muffled voice. “I can’t breathe!”

Furgas, chief theater technician at the Curiosum, examined the broken clasp. “You’ve ruined the mechanism. It won’t be easy.” He got to work on the visor and a few moments later, Rodario’s aristocratic features were revealed. His pointed beard had suffered terribly from his unconventional exit from the stage. In fact, his whiskers were sticking out in all directions as if to express their shock.

“Thank you,” he said gratefully. He turned to Narmora and looked at her expectantly. “What did you think?”

“A hero must wear his armor convincingly or the audience will boo him off the stage. You were swaying from side to side.”

“Don’t you know anything about tactics?” said Rodario sniffily. “A good warrior wrong-foots his opponents.”

“Narmora has a point; you need more practice,” chimed in Furgas. He was dressed in tight black clothes and his hair was specked with powder. He tried to shake it out. “For my part, I need to work on the effects. Another flash of light like that, and our audience will be blinded. On the whole it was good, though.” He thumped Rodario’s armored back. “Oh, one last thing—why was Andôkai’s costume so skimpy?”

“Skimpy? The Estimable Maga likes to flaunt her figure. I can’t be blamed for portraying her as she is.”

“Of course not,” said Narmora sweetly. “But what possessed you to cast her as your mistress?” Her smile became decidedly arch. “I hope you haven’t forgotten she’s sending Djern to watch the play. You remember Djern, don’t you? Three paces tall, bristling with weaponry and strong as ten men… Oh, and he’s fast as an arrow as well.”

The impresario turned to Furgas. “I don’t like to tell you this,” he said in a wounded tone, “but your wife is a heartless harridan who takes pleasure in other people’s misfortunes.”

“Only in yours,” Narmora corrected him with a smile. “Anyway, you should be grateful to me. Don’t say you weren’t warned.”

He narrowed his eyes and cast her a scornful glance. “My dear Narmora, I’m using my artistic freedom. Even the Estimable Maga must submit to the playwright’s pen.” He turned again to Furgas. “Since your wife has no compassion, perhaps you, as a caring father-to-be, will have the goodness to free me from this metal dungeon…” He stuck his arms out tentatively and managed to lift them as far as his waist. “How can anyone fight in this get-up?”

“Most warriors manage to stay upright,” said Furgas dryly. “Wait here while I fetch my tools. You’ve twisted everything out of shape.”

Narmora went with him to the cramped workshop where he designed and tested all kinds of incredible theatrical effects. Furgas could build props, make fireworks, cause flames to appear from nowhere, and create illusions worthy of a magus, for which he was rewarded by the audience’s gasps and cheers.

He gathered up a hammer, a pair of dainty pliers, a chisel, and a crowbar, while Narmora examined his latest drawings.

“A crane on wheels,” she said admiringly.

“It saves the effort of taking it to pieces and moving it by cart. We can roll it wherever it’s needed.” He beamed. “We’re making good progress. It won’t be long before Porista rises from the rubble, a hundred times more splendid than before.”

Narmora kissed him impulsively. “Our child will grow up in a city built by its father,” she said proudly. “Think what you’ve achieved here!”

“I’m glad you persuaded me to work for the maga.” He put his arms around her tenderly, taking care not to squash her belly. “If it weren’t for you, I might have turned down the chance to rebuild Porista. I had another offer from Girdlegard’s leading actor. He wanted to reopen the Curiosum in Mifurdania, you know.”

“Girdlegard’s leading actor—do I know him?” quipped Narmora, ruffling Furgas’s spiky black hair. “I’m proud of what you’re doing. You’re too talented for the theater.”

“I heard that!” came an indignant shout from the stage. “I heard everything! Stop delaying him, you poison-tongued witch! You’ll be sorry if I expire!”

Furgas laughed and stroked Narmora’s face. “The theater has its attractions—but the maga pays better.” He pressed his lips to hers. “Why don’t you go ahead? The hero of Girdlegard needs a hand with his armor.”

Narmora unwrapped her arms from his neck, walked to the back door and opened the latch. Turning, she watched as he hurried out with his tools to rescue his friend.

Even as she stood there, she knew that Furgas meant more to her than anything in the world. Andôkai could offer her all the money and power in Girdlegard, but it wouldn’t match their love. Maybe the maga is right, and the gift of magic lies within me, but I’m happy to let it slumber.

Her gaze fell on a sheet of foolscap half-hidden by a pile of drawings. She pulled it out and gasped. It was a design for the most beautiful cradle she had ever set eyes on. How sweet of him to hide it from me. She slipped out quietly and closed the door.

Inside, Furgas was attending to the trapped impresario. He worked a chisel between the buckled plates and pried apart the armor. “I don’t believe there’s a warrior in Girdlegard who could damage his armor as thoroughly as you.”

Rodario nodded modestly. “Excellence comes naturally.”

Screeching in protest, the plates returned to their original position. Furgas took up the pliers to straighten the hasps. “I’m glad you moved the Curiosum to Porista.”

“What choice did I have? I needed my brilliant Furgas to dazzle the audience with his fireworks. The Curiosum depends on your jaw-dropping, purse-opening tricks.” Realizing that he had furnished his friend with grounds for a pay rise, the impresario bit his lip. “It’s a shame the people of Porista aren’t especially wealthy,” he added hastily. “A few lucky souls are on the maga’s payroll, but the rest of us make do with what we’ve got.”

Furgas smiled to himself. “I’m sure you won’t live in penury for long. You own the best theater in the bright new city of Porista at the heart of Girdlegard’s only enchanted realm—and the playhouse was a gift from Andôkai, don’t forget.” The pliers battled with a steel fastening, forcing it into shape. Furgas finished the job with his fingers by unhooking the breastplate deftly. “There you go.”

“Excellent work, my dear Furgas.” The impresario pulled off his helmet, shook his hands free of his gauntlets and smoothed his tousled beard. “It was getting hot in there. Why would anyone want to be a warrior? Thank the gods that acting is a talent that appeals to women as well as lovers of the arts.”

“It didn’t work on Andôkai,” commented Furgas, gathering his tools and setting off for his workshop.

Rodario picked up his armor and hurried after him. “O cruel Furgas,” he wailed. “You break my heart with the mention of her name.” He flung out his right arm dramatically. “Look, there it lies, broken into a thousand pieces. How will I find the strength to make it whole again? Have you no pity?”

“You seem to have forgotten we’re not rehearsing anymore,” said the prop master, returning the hammer, chisel, and pliers to their proper places. “Leave the armor on the workbench. I’ll take a look at it tomorrow.”

The heartbroken Rodario forgot his sorrows and deposited the armor happily on the bench. “My dear friend, an actor must exercise his talents. My words must flow freely and effortlessly like water in a stream.”

“Perhaps you’d like to divert your waterway to the tavern; I’m sure the gentlewomen of Porista and their daughters will find it most refreshing.” Furgas extinguished all the lamps but one, locked the back door, and propelled his friend through the theater. “Be careful about flowing too freely. We don’t want hordes of husbands, fiancés, fathers, and brothers banging on our door. Remember what happened in Sovereignston?”

Rodario silenced him with an imperious wave. “I don’t water every blossom,” he said dismissively. He turned on his heels, picked up his cloak and tossed it over his shoulder theatrically. “But if they incline their petals prettily toward me… I’m too well mannered to refuse.”

The Curiosum was four hundred or so paces from the palace and even closer to the market. They left through the front entrance. Furgas padlocked the door and held out his hand. “Good night, you old charmer. Sooner or later your little Rodario will end up on the end of a pitchfork or dangling from a flagpole.”

“Even then its prodigious size will put other men to shame.” Rodario winked at him roguishly. “I appreciate your concern.” He pointed to the brightly lit windows of a tavern. “How about a beverage? I’d be flattered if the architect of the new Porista would buy me a glass of wine.” His proposal was rejected. “In that case, I’ll meander among the flowerbeds of Porista.” He raised his left hand and placed his right on his heart. “Don’t worry; I’ll stick to the path.”

Furgas smiled and started on his usual route home. He and Narmora had found an abandoned house near the marketplace, within easy reach of the many building sites under his jurisdiction. The physical labor was accomplished by those who were builders by trade; his job was to make their work as easy and efficient as he could. Andôkai the Tempestuous wasn’t known for her patience, and she was depending on Furgas to rebuild the city overnight.

For his part, he suspected that her interest in restoring Porista had little to do with the good of its citizens. More buildings meant more people, and more people meant a greater chance of finding suitable candidates to train in the art of magic, which would spare the maga a troublesome journey in search of apprentices.

Just then a shadowy figure leaped out of the rubble and barred his path. A dagger glinted in the darkness. “Your money or your life!”

Northern Pass,

Fifthling Kingdom,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

Tungdil set off in pursuit of the orc, followed by Boïndil and the trio of warriors. They were halfway down the stairs when they found themselves knee-deep in fog. Thick clammy air swirled around their legs like fast-flowing water. Tungdil hesitated for a moment, reluctant to venture any further. Don’t be ridiculous, he told himself sternly.

Everything inside him rebelled at the notion of walking through the fog, but he knew the others were looking to him for leadership. Swallowing his misgivings, he waded into the murky air. There was something about it that reminded him of the mist-like demon that had taken control of Nôd’onn’s mind. It’s only fog, he reassured himself.

They left the tower and turned left, hurrying toward the border. The visibility worsened with every step.

Glancing back at the others, Tungdil could tell that they shared his unease. The cold air stuck in their throats, making it difficult to breathe, and small droplets of water settled on their beards, hair, and mail. Soon their vague sense of trepidation hardened into dread.

“This is worse than a laundry,” grumbled Boïndil, breaking the silence. “Where’s the blasted orc? Anyone would think the fog was protecting him.”

Just then they heard a familiar jangling.

“Did you hear that?” said Boïndil, raising his axes. “We’ve got him.”

The orc was nowhere to be seen.

They pressed on, but the wearer of the armor stayed ahead of them, jangling in the distance, hidden from view.

Apart from clouding their sight, the fog dulled their hearing and warped their sense of time. Tungdil couldn’t say for certain how long they had been walking, and his inner compass, which worked perfectly in passageways, tunnels, and caverns, proved useless in the fog. From what he could see, it was definitely getting darker—much darker.

“Stop,” he commanded. He heard four sets of boots behind him skidding to a halt. It was too dark to see his companions. “Can anyone hear the orc?”

No answer.

The hairs on Tungdil’s neck stood on end. He raised his ax warily. “Boïndil?”

Suddenly the sound of armor was much closer. Clunk, clunk. A shadow loomed out of the mist; its contours looked orcish.

The beast lunged at Tungdil with a two-handed sword.

“At least someone can hear me,” muttered Tungdil, dodging the blow. He brought his ax down smartly as the beast stumbled past. The blade connected, and the orc howled in pain; then the fog closed over him, concealing him from view. This isn’t going to be fun.

Not wanting to give himself away, Tungdil kept quiet and refrained from calling to his friends. His priority was to find his bearings before the orc attacked again. He stepped carefully backward, expecting to come up against a wall of rock, but there was nothing behind him: He had wandered off the track.

Clunk, clunk.

This time the jangling came from the left. Alerted by the noise, Tungdil whirled round, dropped into a half crouch and launched himself at the orc. The blade cut into his enemy’s leg, severing it at the knee. Shrieking, the orc dropped his sword and pitched forward.

“You might live forever, but you’ll never grow another leg,” said Tungdil, taking aim at his head.

Even as the ax chopped down, the orc rolled over and the blade hit the ground. With a scornful grunt, he crawled toward his sword.

Tungdil knew he had to act quickly before noise of the scuffle drew other beasts to the scene.

The orc’s right hand was already closing around the hilt of his two-hander when Tungdil’s ax sped toward him, cutting effortlessly through helmet and skull, and embedding itself at the base of the neck.

The orc slumped to the ground. Tungdil set his right boot on the stricken beast’s breastplate and levered his weapon from the corpse. There was no guarantee that cleaving a skull vertically was enough to kill a revenant, so he positioned himself over the twitching body and severed the creature’s head from its shoulders.

Stopping to catch his breath, he leaned on his ax and listened to the silence. After a few moments he was forced to the conclusion that, contrary to his hopes, Boïndil and the others weren’t somewhere in the vicinity, hidden by the fog. The orc’s shrieking would have drawn Boïndil to him as surely as sparkling diamonds attract a kobold. What a sinister place.

He set off and kept walking until he came to a wall. The gray rock was hard and brittle with ridges sharp enough to injure a careless dwarf. The wall hadn’t been worked or polished, which confirmed his suspicion that he had left the dwarven track.

The mist had led him astray.

Judging by the unremitting darkness, he had wandered into a cave of gigantic proportions. Every nerve in his body was as taut as a bowstring, ready to snap at the slightest noise. The swirling mist played tricks on his mind, conjuring orcs and other phantoms in the shadows.

He tried to remember what he knew of the Outer Lands. His old tutor, Lot-Ionan, had shown little interest in discovering what lay beyond Girdlegard’s borders, and the same applied to the dwarves, who stuck to their side of the mountains.

Apart from a few anecdotes told by merchants and migrants, the only descriptions of the Outer Lands were hundreds of cycles old, dating back to expeditions sent out by human kings. Most of the explorers had never returned, and in human folklore, the territory outside Girdlegard’s belt of mountains belonged to the souls of the dead. Tungdil, lost in the shifting fog, shuddered at the thought. If his soul had to go anywhere, he would rather it went to Vraccas’s smithy.

More determined than ever to get out of the cavern, he decided to follow the wall. Placing one hand lightly against the stone and gripping the ax with the other, he set off as quietly as possible. Deep down, he was terrified about what had become of Boïndil and the others.

After a time, his fingertips brushed against a strange set of grooves. He stopped to examine the wall. A rune! The symbol was unfamiliar to the dwarf, but there was no mistaking the craftsmanship. Elves and dwarves were known for the elegance of their script, but for all the symbol’s ornateness, it didn’t look elvish. It could almost be dwarven, thought Tungdil, recalling the ancient stories of the undergroundlings, who were reputed to inhabit the Outer Lands. What if they’re dwarves like us?

He strained his ears. Clunk, clunk.

Tungdil whirled around in surprise. I cleaved his neck. Surely he can’t have survived? His confusion gave way to fear. “Boïndil, is that you?” he whispered hopefully.

Clunk, clunk.

The noise was definitely getting closer. Backing away, Tungdil pressed himself against the wall, peered in both directions and filled his nostrils with cold, damp air. The only discernible odor was the smell of wet stone.

Clunk. The noise was no more than two arm-lengths away from him. He heard gravel cracking beneath a booted foot.

It seemed to Tungdil that he was surrounded by orcs. He saw them towering over him, he smelled their filthy odor, and his heart beat furiously in his chest. Turning his head this way and that, he waited for the attack that would surely come.

A squat shadow appeared before him.

“Take that, you villain!” shouted Tungdil, sprinting to the right and raising his ax. The blade connected with a steely clatter. He pulled back to take another strike, but his weapon was stuck.

“Careful, scholar,” snorted a voice from the fog. “You could kill a dwarf with a blow like that.”

As Tungdil’s panicked eyes refocused, he realized that Boïndil was the target of his attack. The secondling had crossed his axes defensively, trapping Tungdil’s weapon in a triangle of steel.

“Vraccas almighty, I thought you were an orc.” It was a relief to be reunited with at least one of his companions. “Where are the others?”

“No idea. I thought they were with you.”

“Did you hear me killing the orc?”

“You killed an orc without me?”

“I chopped his head off and then—”

Clunk.

Tungdil gave his friend an almighty shove, and Boïndil toppled backward into the fog. A split-second later, an orc charged out of the darkness, his sword whistling toward the spot where the two friends had been standing. Neither was hurt.

Ireheart, beard quivering, popped up behind the beast. With an ear-splitting shriek, he rammed his left ax into the creature’s belly and chopped down with his right ax, hewing through its neck. The orc’s torso crashed to the ground, followed by his head.

“I guess there were two of them,” commented Boïndil. Sighing with satisfaction, he wiped his axes on the orc’s jerkin. Viscous green blood stuck to the shabby cloth. “Shall we look for the rest of our troop?”

Tungdil nodded, relieved.

They set off together, running their hands against the wall. Their investigation revealed that the cave had three exits, one of which smelled of fresh mountain air, from which they deduced that it led to the fifthling kingdom.

It took considerably longer to find their missing friends.

Two of them were dead, mauled savagely by orcs. The third had been kept alive by the will of Vraccas, but his inner furnace was cooling fast.

“There were three of them,” he whispered weakly. “Three…”

Boïndil straightened up sharply and listened for suspicious noises in the stubbornly murky fog.

“Which way did they go?” asked Tungdil, realizing at the same time that it was pointless to pursue the surviving orc. He was probably hurrying to join his cousins in the Outer Lands.

“I…” A spasm ran through the dying dwarf, and the fire went out of his eyes. His soul had been gathered to Vraccas’s smithy.

“Let’s get out of here,” said Tungdil, hefting the dead warrior over his shoulder and securing him with a leather belt.

“Aren’t we going to find the other orc?” objected Boïndil, who firmly intended to kill the final beast. He was treated to a long look that silenced further protests. Sighing, he picked up the second of their dead companions, and between them, they carried the third.

Little by little, the darkness seemed to lift, indicating that at some point they had exited the cavern, although neither remembered when. The mist retreated, revealing the starry firmament, which twinkled above them, pointing the way.

Seeing the vast stone arch in the distance, they put on a final burst of speed, stopping only when they reached the gateway. Glancing behind him, Boïndil gave himself a little shake as if to free himself from the sinister pull of the Outer Lands. “It’s a wonder any of those human explorers came back alive,” he said to Tungdil. “From now on, I’m keeping south of the pass.”

Tungdil agreed wholeheartedly with his friend.

* * *

With the exception of the sentries, who were stationed at strategic points throughout the kingdom, everyone was assembled in the main hall, where Giselbert had held counsel, over a thousand cycles before. At one time, the walls had been clad with silver panels inscribed with the fifthlings’ laws, but orcish looters had rampaged through the hall, smashing the precious metal and pocketing the spoils. The most intricate, valuable, tablets had suffered the worst.

But the artistry of the fifthlings was evident in the architecture.

A double door opened onto a circular area twenty paces across, ringed by a low wall measuring a pace in height and extending four paces backward, so as to create a circular ledge. This in turn was ringed by a wall, which extended upward and backward to form the third tier, and so the series of ring-like platforms rose away from the central stage. The arrangement reminded Tungdil of the theater in Mifurdania where he had first met Narmora, Furgas, and Rodario. The fifthlings had even thought about acoustics, and the very faintest of whispers could be heard throughout the hall. Light came from a number of metal racks filled with burning coal.

Tungdil watched from the stage as the other dwarves took their seats above. He scanned the rows; some eight hundred dwarves, including three hundred dwarf-women, had left their kingdoms to form the new fifthling folk.

He waited for the noise to settle. “Thank you for coming,” he welcomed them. “There are important matters to discuss.”

He told them what had happened on his recent expedition and finished by warning of a likely invasion. His listeners took the news calmly; orcs were a constant danger, and fighting against superior numbers was nothing new.

“I led you here, but Vraccas knows I never intended to be your leader,” he said, turning to the second item on the agenda. “From now on, I won’t presume to make decisions on your behalf. Dangerous times lie ahead, and our enemies will be quick to exploit the slightest difference among us. We need to elect a new leader, and the matter should be settled without delay. As you know, I’m a thirdling.” He felt a lump forming in his throat. “Recently, I’ve come to realize that my lineage is a problem. Doubts have been expressed about my loyalty—on one occasion, to my face. Until my trustworthiness has been proven to everyone’s satisfaction, I shall serve the kingdom as a regular warrior and smith.” Raising Keenfire, he turned slowly to survey the tiers of delegates. “Which of you is prepared to lead the fifthling kingdom? Nominate yourself or a kinsman.” He lowered his ax and stepped aside, demonstrating his willingness to make way for the new fifthling king.

The delegates conferred among themselves. Their deep voices echoed through the rock, bringing the Gray Range to life.

Tungdil saw no reason to explain himself further; he was almost certain that some of the delegates had frowned when he mentioned his lineage, and his announcement seemed to have elicited overwhelming approval and relief. He thanked Vraccas for guiding him so wisely.

A brown-haired dwarf-woman rose to her feet and rapped her hammer against the stone floor. The clear tone cut through the hubbub, and a hush came over the hall. “My name is Kyriss Finehand of the clan of the Good Smiths, daughter of Borengar. I understand your decision, Tungdil Goldhand, but I, for one, never doubted your loyalty. The fifthling kingdom needs your scholarly wisdom as well as your ax.” Lowering her hammer, she inclined her head respectfully, then looked up at the delegates. “Our new leader must be someone who enjoys our respect. I hereby nominate Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters, warrior of Borengar.” She listed off the firstling’s accomplishments and deeds.

As Tungdil listened, the hall spun around him, dizzyingly. His eyes clouded over, and a chill crept over his skin, but his inner furnace burned higher than ever, stoked by bitterness and rage.

Make them choose someone else, he begged Vraccas. Anyone but him. Through the fog of his thoughts he realized that the delegates were nodding approvingly. In the short time since their arrival in the fifthling kingdom, Glaïmbar had made a name for himself with the dwarves from the other folks—and no one would dream of questioning his lineage.

You fool, whispered a voice in his ear. You’ve ruined your chances. If you were king, you could post him to the furthest reaches of the Gray Range or send him to fight a band of orcs, but now you’ll have to do the deed yourself. Just be sure to do it quietly: Push him over a precipice, crush him with a falling boulder, splice his skull with an orcish weapon, chase him into the Outer Lands…

Tungdil summoned all his strength and focused on Boïndil’s face. The fiendish voice grew fainter, fading gradually out of earshot, but the hatred remained in his heart, and the sight of the handsome firstling made him tremble with rage. For the first time he understood Boïndil’s urge to hack someone or something to pieces, and he pitied his friend.

His grim thoughts were interrupted when he realized that Kyriss had stopped speaking. She and the other delegates were looking at him expectantly.

“Our first nominee is Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters of Borengar’s line,” he announced with a catch in his voice. “Let the next candidate step forward.” No one stirred. “Are none of you willing to serve your folk?” he asked, venting his bitterness. He tried to look at his rival, but his gaze was drawn to Balyndis, who was standing at his side. “In that case, we have one contender. Glaïmbar Sharpax of the clan of the Iron Beaters, warrior of Borengar do you accept the nomination?”

During what followed—Glaïmbar rising and answering with a solemn “yes,” the delegates clapping and cheering as he walked to the stage, the axes rising in his favor—Tungdil’s thoughts were elsewhere, focused on his beautiful, unobtainable, smith.

At last, when the delegates went down on one knee and raised their hammers, axes, and clubs to the new fifthling king, he tore his eyes away from Balyndis.

“The fifthlings have elected Glaïmbar Sharpax as their king,” he said, scanning the rows of faces and refusing to acknowledge the dwarf at his side. “May he rule with the wisdom of Vraccas.” He left the stage without a bow or a handshake; he wasn’t prepared to humble himself in front of his rival, not as long as he lived.

Once out of the hall, he decided to walk off his anger. He started through the passageways, striding past scaffolding and building sites where the secondling masons had started to repair the ceilings and walls. His feet carried him to the outer reaches of the kingdom where he came to rest among the ruins of an orcish watchtower.

Overcome with emotion, he stood among the rubble and looked up at the stars. Tears of anger and despair streamed down his cheeks, trickling through his beard, and dripping onto his mail shirt.

“You should know better than that, scholar. Your armor will rust.”

Tungdil smiled in spite of himself. “I suppose you’re here to drag me to the banquet.”

“Vraccas himself couldn’t drag you there, so it’s hardly a job for a simple dwarf like me.” Boïndil glanced up at the twinkling stars. “What do you see in them, scholar? I guess they’re pretty after a fashion, but I’d rather look at glittering diamonds in freshly hewn rock. Won’t you come inside? We need to work on our plan—the king has given his approval.”

“Oh really? You didn’t waste time!” Tungdil turned to his friend. “If we leave right away, we might run into more of Ushnotz’s scouts. Is that what you’re hoping?”

Boïndil ran his hands over his stubbly cheeks and smoothed his beard. “Am I that transparent?” he said with a smile. “Listen, I’m not in the mood for singing either. Let’s have our own celebration with Boëndal and tell him about the plan. You never know, it might be just what he needs to unfreeze his blood and get him going.”

They set off through the passageways, taking the route that led to the forge where Boëndal was lying on his camp bed by the Dragon Fire furnace. Tungdil sat at the frozen dwarf’s bedside and talked to him as if he could hear every word.

Their hopes that Boëndal would make a miraculous recovery were disappointed that night.

Porista,

Former Realm of Lios Nudin,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

The highwayman’s features were hidden beneath a mask, but Furgas recognized the voice immediately. He put his hands on his hips and confronted his assailant. “Don’t be an idiot, Rodario. If the guardsmen see you—”

“Your purse,” said the highwayman harshly, waving his dagger. “And make it snappy.”

“What, no flowery speeches?” Furgas stepped toward him. “Put away the dagger before someone sees us; we don’t want anyone rushing to my aid.”

The highwayman stood his ground and ran his finger menacingly along the blade. Furgas was assailed by doubt. In view of his prospective fatherhood, it seemed best to be careful. He unhooked his purse from his belt and threw it to the ground.

“That’s more like it,” growled the stranger, stooping as if to retrieve the loot. All of a sudden he threw up his arms, pulled the mask from his face and roared with laughter. “You fell for it,” crowed a jubilant Rodario. “How do you rate my performance now?”

“I could tell it was you,” said Furgas, picking up his purse. “What’s got into you?”

“Consider it payback,” said Rodario smugly. He paused for a moment to draw out his victory. “I heard the two of you slandering my reputation while I languished in my armored prison. Given the choice, I would have ambushed Narmora, but—”

“It’s a good thing you didn’t,” exclaimed Furgas. “The Curiosum would have to look for a new leading man.” He took the dagger from the impresario’s hand and tapped his forehead. “For someone who’s quite clever, you’re amazingly stupid.”

“Your money or your life,” said a voice from the rubble. “And make it snappy.”

Furgas rounded on his friend. “Don’t tell me there’s more!”

The impresario was white as a sheet. “Mine was a one-act play. I’m afraid he must be real.”

They turned around slowly to face a masked assailant holding a knife. The weapon glinted as it sped toward them. Skipping aside, Furgas plunged Rodario’s dagger into the highwayman’s arm.

The blade slid into the handle, re-emerging when the stranger stepped away. He and Furgas stared at the dagger in confusion.

“It’s a prop,” explained Rodario. “I’d never draw a real weapon on a friend.”

With a scornful laugh, the highwayman bore down on Furgas, slashing at him with the knife, which seemed to be coated with a strange yellow fluid. The prop master retreated, ducking and spinning away from the poisoned blade.

“I’m coming, Furgas,” shouted his friend, arming himself with a plank. Just then a second man stepped out of the rubble, raised a cudgel and brought it down on Rodario’s head. “How unsporting,” mumbled the impresario, drifting out of consciousness.

“Are you Furgas?” demanded his attacker. The voice echoed through Rodario’s dazed mind. He opened his eyes; a sword dripping with yellow fluid was pointed at his chest.

“Over here,” shouted the first man. “Furgas is over here.”

“If you’re looking for Furgas,” whispered Rodario feebly, “I’m your…” Despite his wooziness, he made a grab for the highwayman, but his fingers closed on thin air. The maneuver earned him a kick to the head, and darkness came over his mind.

Meanwhile, Furgas had been forced against the wall by the smaller of the men. “What do you want?”

“Your money,” hissed the highwayman. His companion ran over to join them. “Hand it over.”

Furgas unhooked his purse for a second time that evening and cast it to the ground. “There you go. It’s all I’ve got.”

The first man picked it up and weighed it in his hand. “Good. In that case, we’re done.” He was about to say something further when a shadow fell over them.

Looking up, they saw the dark outline of Djern’s armor silhouetted against the moonlit sky. The maga’s bodyguard was crouching on a raised portion of wall, in his left hand a sword two paces long. A purple glow emanated from the polished visor. Then the light intensified and Djern let out a terrible growl.

“Palandiell forfend…” stuttered the smaller highwayman, transfixed by the monstrous warrior. He took a few steps backward, unable to look away. “He’ll tear us to—”

Djern launched himself from the wall and soared through the air. Just then the second highwayman came at the astonished Furgas with his sword.

The blade rammed into his stomach, passing through his guts. A second later, the highwayman fell to the gutter as Djern, bringing down his sword, landed beside him and cut him lengthways in half.

The sword continued in a sweeping arc, lifting perpendicular to the floor as Djern whirled around and struck the other highwayman from behind. The blade caught the man above the pelvis, penetrated his unarmored midriff, and exited the other side, coming to rest in a wall.

Legs attached to his upper body by a ribbon of flesh, the highwayman slumped to the ground, whimpering unnaturally as his intestines poured from his stomach on a tide of crimson blood. A moment later, he was still.

Djern stepped over the corpse and retrieved his sword. Standing motionlessly by Furgas’s body, he waited until the torches of Andôkai’s guardsmen appeared in the distance; then, as the jangling armor grew louder, he slipped into the night.

V

Northern Gauragar,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

Five orbits had passed since Tungdil and Boïndil left the fifthling kingdom with a company of ten warriors on their way south through the sparsely populated countryside of Gauragar. They were looking for an entrance to the underground network, the location of which was marked on Tungdil’s map.

Springtime had arrived in northern Gauragar, breaking many cycles of bondage to the Perished Land. It seemed to the dwarves that everything was blossoming and burgeoning with new vitality. The flowers seemed to drip with honey-yellow nectar, and the pure country air was abuzz with industrious bees.

Not that the party, with the exception of Tungdil, took much interest in the scenery: In their view, nothing compared to the beauty of underground halls. Most were unaccustomed to daylight and resented the sunshine because it dazzled their eyes. To save their sight, they broke camp before dawn, slept in the afternoon and walked from dusk until the middle of the night.

It was Tungdil and Boïndil’s second journey south from the Gray Range. On the first occasion, many orbits previously, they had set off with the newly forged Keenfire, stopping in Âlandur to throw off their pursuers, confident that neither Nôd’onn nor his orcish army would think to look for them in the home of their ancient foes. This time, they traveled due south, making straight for the nearest entrance to the underground network. Their mission was to find the outcasts, a mysterious group of dwarves who haunted the tunnels. No one knew exactly where they lived.

The company had left the fifthling kingdom in a hurry, which suited Tungdil on several counts.

For one thing, preparations were underway for Balyndis’s melding with the new fifthling king, and he didn’t want to add to his heartache by sticking around for the banquet. Quite apart from that, time was running out. Ushnotz’s scouts had made it as far as the Northern Pass, which meant the rest of the orcish army would be following close behind. Tungdil needed to find some reinforcements and get them to the fifthling kingdom before the hordes arrived. And he couldn’t discount the possibility of a separate invasion from the Outer Lands.

The journey passed mainly in silence; the exertion of marching, coupled with the weight of bedrolls and provisions, limited their conversation to the briefest of exchanges.

Boïndil, whose thoughts were with his brother, barely said a word. It had taken considerable effort to persuade him to leave his frozen twin, and he had done so only on the basis that Boëndal had no use for his axes, whereas Tungdil did.

On the morning of the sixth orbit they spotted the walls of a settlement. Adjusting his course, Tungdil made a beeline for the city. “Boïndil and I will find out what we can about the orcs. The rest of you get some sleep and be ready to leave this evening. With a bit of luck, we’ll reach the tunnels by dawn.”

Entering the city through the main gates, they were surprised by the lack of guards. By the time they made their way through the winding maze of narrow alleys, they were acutely aware of the silence.

“Humans are rarer than diamonds in this city,” grumbled Boïndil. “Do you think they’ve died of the plague?”

They headed for the nearest tavern to look for some answers.

The publican, a hirsute fellow of some forty cycles with the yellowest teeth that Tungdil had ever seen, practically fell over himself to welcome them. “It’s an honor to receive such distinguished guests,” he said with a bow. “Hillchester welcomes you.” He wiped his greasy hands on his apron. “I’ll give you my best room, of course, but I expect you’re in hurry to get to the market. The sun ceremony is the highlight of the cycle.”

Boïndil and the others stared at him in bemusement. They weren’t used to human ways.

“No wonder,” whispered Tungdil. “Everyone’s at the marketplace!” He followed the publican up the creaking staircase. “I’ll explain in a moment,” he hissed to Boïndil.

The publican rushed away and came back seconds later with a tub of water. While they washed the dust off their faces, Tungdil told them what he knew about the sun ceremony. “It’s a cyclical festival with stands selling food and drink and all kinds of attractions. There’ll be peddlers and hawkers and music and dancing… Boïndil and I will head over there now. If it’s worth seeing, the rest of you can take a look later—you’ll have something to tell the others back home.”

“Don’t wait for me,” said Boïndil, shooing him away. “If we search the city separately, we’ll be done in half the time.”

“Only if you promise to talk to them politely,” said Tungdil cautiously, remembering an earlier incident involving singed whiskers and an altercation in a tavern. It was a miracle that no one had been killed.

“Don’t worry, scholar, I know how to deal with long-uns,” breezed Boïndil, steering him out of the room. “See you at dusk.”

“Very well,” said Tungdil with a smile. “But I don’t want to have to break up any fights.” He closed the door behind him.

The spacious bar was remarkably empty. Sitting in the corner by the remains of the fire was a lone guest who, judging by his outfit, wasn’t a regular drinker at the tavern. He was wearing an expensively tailored tunic and knickerbockers of the finest cloth. His thin legs were clad in tights, and his fancy shoes were adorned with sparkling silver buckles. A ridiculous little hat perched on top of his bobbed black hair. He was clean-shaven and smelled as perfumed as a lady.

Tungdil couldn’t help grinning at his preposterous attire. To his astonishment, the man jumped to his feet and hurried over.

“There you are! I was beginning to think you weren’t coming!” he exclaimed, visibly relieved. “I’m Truk Elius. I’ll show you the way.” Without waiting for a response, he turned and strode to the door.

Tungdil scratched his beard. “I’m afraid I don’t…”

“Hurry up,” the man said sharply. “Come on, groundling, your services are required. We’re late enough already.” His pointed shoes drummed impatiently against the floor.

“Oh,” said Tungdil. He knew that most itinerant dwarves were blacksmiths, and it wasn’t uncommon for humans to assume that all dwarves were metalworkers. Still, blacksmiths weren’t in the habit of carrying weapons like Keenfire. The man was obviously stupid or blind. “You should probably ask someone else. I’m a bit out of practice.”

“Nonsense! Any groundling could handle a job like this.” The man’s blue eyes narrowed to slits. “Is this about money?” he asked suspiciously. “You’ll get the same as the others, and not a penny more. Another word, and I’ll report you as a troublemaker; you won’t be hired in Hillchester again.”

Tungdil decided to play along. Metalwork came easily to him, and it would be a good opportunity to ask some questions about the orcs. Besides, he didn’t want the citizens of Hillchester to think that his kinsfolk were unreliable—unlike gnomes and kobolds, the children of Vraccas could be trusted to keep their word. “I’ll do what I can, but it might take longer than usual—and I’m not a groundling; I’m a dwarf.”

Elius laughed. “After the first few strokes you’ll be fine.”

Tungdil had a sudden thought. “I haven’t brought any tools.”

“We’ve got everything set up for you,” said Elius, pointing to the door. “Let’s go.”

They hurried through the alleyways, heading for the center of Hillchester. Tungdil found himself jogging to keep up with the long-legged man.

Judging by the number of people who greeted them, Elius was a well-known personality in the town. After a while it dawned on the wheezing Tungdil that Truk wasn’t a forename, as he had supposed, but an honorific title. It seemed likely that his new employer was in the service of King Bruron.

Ahead of them, the alleyway broadened, opening into a proper street. Tungdil detected the hum of several hundred voices. They were still some distance away, but Tungdil guessed from the music and laughter that the festivities were in full swing.

Truk Elius rounded a corner and came to a halt. Tungdil stared at the vast gathering of people. From his standpoint, their legs and torsos formed a single impenetrable wall. There was no way through.

His pessimism wasn’t shared by Elius, who clearly thought it beneath him to make a detour around the square. “Out of the way,” he shouted, stepping briskly into the marketplace. “Out of the way, citizens of Hillchester!”

The crowd separated obediently, allowing the man and his stocky companion to pass.

After a while, Tungdil noticed a big wooden stage in the middle of the square. They seemed to be heading straight for it.

Standing on the rectangular platform were four soldiers and eight civilians dressed in nothing but thin, grubby rags. Steel handcuffs encircled their wrists, and blindfolds covered their eyes.

It looks like an execution, thought Tungdil, confused. Looking around, he realized that the festivities weren’t quite as harmless as he had imagined; the citizens of Hillchester were celebrating the imminent death of eight of their number—three women and five men. Elius ascended the steps to the platform, pausing when he realized that Tungdil had stopped. “Get a move on,” he ordered, signaling for him to follow.

It finally dawned on Tungdil that their route through the marketplace wasn’t a shortcut to the forge.

He thinks I’m an executioner! Tungdil stepped back. “There’s been a mistake,” he said loudly. “I’m not an executioner.”

The crowd gasped.

Elius strode down the steps toward him. “What’s this?” he hissed. “I warned you not to haggle. The rabble wants blood—if you don’t kill the prisoners, they’ll settle for yours.” He scrabbled around in his purse and pressed a few coins into Tungdil’s hand. “All right, here’s a little extra from me. Now get up there and do your job!”

“You don’t understand,” said Tungdil, determined to put an end to the confusion. “I’m not an executioner. My name is Tungdil Goldhand. I’m here on a—”

“Tungdil? I don’t know any Tungdils!” said Elius, taken aback. “We hired Bramdal, the best itinerant executioner in Gauragar.”

The crowd’s surprise turned to anger. It was clear from the shouts and jeers that they weren’t prepared to wait.

Elius glared at the dwarf. “I don’t care what your name is or who you are; all I need is a groundling.” He grabbed Tungdil’s shoulder and tried to drag him up the stairs, but the dwarf was determined not to budge. “Keep this up, and I’ll have you arrested,” threatened Elius. “I order you to behead them.”

“No,” said Tungdil, giving up on Elius and deciding to chance it with the crowd. The man seemed to fear the citizens of Hillchester, which Tungdil took as a positive sign. His legs carried him up the stairs and onto the podium.

A loud cheer went up from the assembled masses when the dwarf appeared on the stage. Tungdil looked at the rows of crazed faces, all baying for blood, and suspected that Elius was right. No one would leave the stage alive unless the execution went ahead. He and the eight prisoners were trapped.

The executioner’s block was at the center of the stage. The furrowed wood was stained with patches of dark red blood and bore the marks of countless executions. A broad-bladed ax lay two paces to the side.

The guards pushed a woman to the front of the stage. After a quick drum roll, a herald read out her name and her crime.

Tungdil gathered that his first victim was a disloyal spouse. The woman’s husband had died and she had been seen with a new suitor before the full period of mourning had elapsed. She wasn’t a murderer or a violent criminal; her only crime was love. Love. He suddenly thought of Balyndis.

The woman was dragged to the executioner’s block and forced to her knees. The guard’s movements were forceful and precise. He pushed her head against the wood, seized her long hair and wrapped it round a metal pole. Now her neck was exposed and she couldn’t turn her head or move. The drumming grew louder and faster.

A violent shove sent Tungdil stumbling forward. His hand touched the woman’s back, and he felt her shaking body through the flimsy fabric of her vest. Her sobs were barely audible, which made him pity her all the more. He stared at the soft, smooth skin on her neck and shoulders; she was only a girl, condemned to death by a law that, in Tungdil’s opinion, was downright absurd. If the humans want to kill her, they should do it themselves.

“What are you waiting for?” snarled the guard. “Hurry up and chop off her head. There’s another seven to go.”

“For the last time, I’m not an executioner!” shouted Tungdil, holding Keenfire in the air. “My name is Tungdil Goldhand. This blade killed Nôd’onn and freed you from the Perished Land. I’m not your henchman.” He picked up the executioner’s ax and held it out for the guard to take. “Here, do it yourself if you’re so keen for her to die. I won’t do it for you.”

His speech caused an uproar. Pushing and shoving, the crowd surged forward, determined to see blood.

“Now look what you’ve done, you stupid groundling,” snapped Elius, staring fearfully at the mob. It was clear that the soldiers were barely able to restrain the frenzied crowd.

Tungdil offered him the ax without a word.

“What are you doing? I’m not an executioner, I’m a Truk,” said Elius indignantly. He stooped down and shoved his face into Tungdil’s, filling the dwarf’s nostrils with his perfume. “You’ll rot in prison for this, groundling,” he hissed with a shake of his ridiculous little hat. “Although I’ve a mind to throw you to the crowd.”

Another cheer went up, louder and more triumphant. Tungdil and Elius swung round.

A powerfully built dwarf was limping across the stage toward them. He was dressed in black with brown leather armor and heavy boots. His features were hidden by a leather mask, and long fair braids hung down from his chin.

His footsteps thudded against the planked floor. “I was delayed,” he said tersely. Without another word, he took the executioner’s ax from Tungdil and marched to the block. He didn’t stop to take aim, just hefted the weapon with two hands and swung it mid-stride.

The blade cut a whistling arc through the air and connected with the prisoner’s neck, killing her outright. Her head thudded to the floor, and blood spurted from the grisly stump. Her headless torso twitched a final time, showering the front row of spectators with droplets of blood, then her body fell from the block.

The black-clad dwarf sliced through her hair to free the head from the pole. He held it up for the crowd to see. The ax had chopped cleanly through skin, sinew, and bone. Bramdal certainly knew his stuff.

“Get out of my sight,” hissed Elius to Tungdil, who quickly obliged. Hurrying away from the stage, he found himself a spot not far from the marketplace and settled down to wait for Bramdal. It didn’t occur to him to return Elius’s money; gold was gold.

The crowd cheered for a bit, then went quiet, a pattern that repeated itself at irregular intervals another seven times. Then the music started and the citizens of Hillchester laughed, cheered, danced, and celebrated while the severed heads were hoisted on flagpoles next to the stage.

A short while later, the black-clad dwarf appeared at Tungdil’s side. A few specks of gore flecked his boots and his armor, but his clothes bore no trace of his grisly work. Tungdil looked him up and down. His leather mask was dangling from his belt.

“I heard about the mix-up,” laughed the executioner. “It’s not often I’m mistaken for another dwarf.” He held out his hand. “I’m Bramdal Masterstroke.” There was a pause while he waited for Tungdil to reply.

Tungdil studied his features. Bramdal Masterstroke, professional executioner, was many cycles older than he was, but his deep brown eyes were bright and shiny. Despite his gruesome trade and the many deaths he had witnessed, he seemed neither gloomy nor remorseful.

Tungdil cleared his throat. “Why do you do this?” he demanded, gesturing toward the eight heads hoisted from the flagpoles.

“Why not? Some dwarves are smiths, some are bakers, and I’m an executioner. It’s just a trade.” His eyes smiled at Tungdil from under the black headscarf that covered his fair hair. His cheeks were shaven except for a small circle around his mouth and chin. “Shall we go somewhere quieter?”

They set off down the alleyway.

“Which kingdom are you from, Tungdil Goldhand?” enquired the executioner in a soft, gentle voice. “I’d like to hear news of my kinsfolk. It’s a rare pleasure to meet another dwarf, and you don’t look like a tinker or a traveling smith. Are you an exile?”

“I was going to ask you the same,” said Tungdil, thanking Vraccas for introducing him to the dwarf. In spite of the initially unpromising circumstances of their encounter, it looked as though Bramdal might be the key to locating the tunnel-dwelling dwarves. “Are you an outcast?” he demanded.

Bramdal laughed. “Yes and no. I’ve found a new home, far away from the other folks. I didn’t like the rules in my kingdom, so I broke them on purpose. I’m an exile by choice.” He played with his corn-colored braids. “Nothing would induce me to go back. How about you?”

Tungdil was about to introduce himself properly and explain the nature of his mission and the fortuitousness of their encounter when he suddenly thought the better of it and decided to let Bramdal think that he was an outcast too. “I loved a maiden and her heart belonged to me, but she was promised to someone else. I killed him in a quarrel.” The lie came easily—too easily. He looked away.

Bramdal nodded. “Not all of our laws are just, and it’s time they were changed.” He looked at Tungdil intently. “What if I were to tell you that there’s a place where dwarves aren’t tied to the precepts of family and clan?”

He stopped in front of a tavern and held the door open for Tungdil, who was digesting the news. They sat down by the fire and the executioner ordered two beers.

“Is there really such a place?” asked Tungdil, after taking a long draft of beer.

Bramdal nodded. “There is indeed, Tungdil Goldhand. It’s a place where dwarves live together as equals, free from the tyranny of traditions and laws.”

“Isn’t it chaos?”

“We still have rules,” admitted the executioner. “The king and queen make sure we stick to them, but it’s basic stuff about working for the common good and not harming each other. There’s nothing about clan lore and other bunkum. We’re equals, and no one can tell us what to do.”

Tungdil looked at Bramdal over the rim of his tankard. “So why are you in Gauragar, chopping off heads?”

“For the money, of course,” the executioner said coolly. “I used to be really busy when the Perished Land was still around. With revenants all over the place, my skills were in demand. Besides, I like to help humans; it’s our Vraccas-given task.”

“Help them?” exclaimed Tungdil. “You’ve made it your business to kill them. How does that make you different to an orc?”

“I’m protecting them from themselves. I don’t kill for the sake of killing; my duty is to clear out the dross. Vraccas wants us to help the humans, so I rid them of lawbreakers like the eight men and women on the stage. A quick blow to the neck, and the city is a safer place. Criminals are as dangerous as orcs.”

“What about the widow who didn’t stick to the mourning period? Was she a danger?”

“She broke the law, and that’s the danger. It’s not my place to question their laws,” said Bramdal, emptying his tankard. “It’s stupid to have too many laws, but it’s important to keep the ones you’ve got. Humans, elves, dwarves—we’re all the same.” He cocked his head. “You didn’t answer my question,” he said.

“What question?”

“About your lineage.”

“I’m a…” He stopped short, unsure of what to say. The beer and the memory of Balyndis weighed on his heart.

“Only a thirdling would hesitate like that,” observed Bramdal. His voice was calm and non-judgmental. “You’re not obliged to answer. In any case, lineage doesn’t matter where I come from.”

Tungdil leaned forward. “Do you mean you’ve got thirdlings in your kingdom?”

Bramdal roared with laughter, delighted by Tungdil’s amazement. “Our halls are open to all exiles, regardless of where they come from—including members of the thirdling kingdom. All we ask is that everyone sticks to the rules; if they don’t…” He laid his right hand on his ax.

The executioner’s explanation only added to Tungdil’s confusion. He was looking forward to seeing the outcasts’ kingdom for himself. “How do I get there?” he asked. “I’d like to visit the place you speak of. Are you sure they’ll let me in?”

Bramdal gave him directions to a pond that Tungdil judged to be located near the entrance to the tunnels. “Strap weights to your ankles and jump into the pool. It’s important to sink to the very bottom—only then will you be admitted to the freelings’ halls.”

“Is that what you call yourselves?”

“Free by nature, free by name.” Glancing up, Bramdal spotted a man sitting two tables to their left. “I’ll be back in a moment,” he said, picking up his rucksack and limping across the bar. He and the man talked in hushed tones.

Tungdil wasn’t sure what to make of the instructions. Dwarves were famously suspicious of water, regardless of the depth.

He still had painful memories of traveling across Girdlegard with the twins, neither of whom would set foot on a boat, resulting in constant detours. Like most of their kinsfolk, they believed that contact with water would lead to certain death. In their opinion, any lake, tarn, river, or stream outside a dwarven kingdom was a threat.

How am I going to get Boïndil to weigh himself down and jump into a pond when he won’t even tread in a puddle? Tungdil leaned back in his chair and racked his brains. He had to hand it to the outlaws—it was the perfect way of hiding their existence from the other folks. It’s going to be a real challenge. He watched the man push a couple of coins toward Bramdal, in return for which he was handed a small object wrapped in cloth.

“What was that about?” asked Tungdil nosily when the executioner returned.

“You don’t want to know. It’s superstitious human stuff,” replied Bramdal in a tone that was affable but firm.

Rather than press him for details that he probably wouldn’t get, he tried another tack. It had occurred to him that some of the dwarf-like inhabitants from the Outer Lands might have crossed into Girdlegard, and he wondered whether Bramdal might have met one. “You’ve been living with the freelings for a while. Have you ever seen an undergroundling in your realm?” He ran a finger around the rim of his tankard and traced a moist rune on the tabletop. It was the mysterious symbol from the cave. “Do you know what this means?”

Bramdal raised his eyebrows. “No idea. Undergroundlings, did you say?”

It was too much to hope for. “It’s just a rumor I’d heard of. Where are you heading now? The roads aren’t safe at the moment. An army of orcs is marching north toward the Gray Range—we had a run-in with some of their scouts.”

The executioner shook his head, braids flying to the side. “It’s all right, I’m on my way south. I’m needed in the next city: The prisons are overflowing with criminals and justice must be done.” He held out his hand. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Tungdil Goldhand,” he said solemnly. “Perhaps our paths will cross again. I hope I’ve been of some assistance. May Vraccas guide you to your goal.” He shouldered his rucksack and limped to the door. Outside, it was pouring with rain. Bramdal took a step back, put up his hood, and slipped away.

“Excuse me, but do you happen to know what the executioner sold to that man?” asked Tungdil when the publican collected his empty tankard. The man bent down and whispered in his ear. Tungdil’s eyes widened: Bramdal was trading in body parts.

“They make excellent talismans,” explained the publican. “Candles from the tallow of murderers will cure most illnesses, and a thief’s little finger is good against fire. I’ve got one myself.” He raised his hand with the empty tankards and pointed to the ceiling. A shriveled scrap of blackened flesh was fixed by a nail to the beam. With a bit of imagination, it was possible to make out the shape of a finger. “This street has been struck by lightning on two occasions, but my tavern has never been hit.”

Tungdil shuddered and paid up quickly, keen to escape before he was hit on the head by a dead man’s finger. He set off to tell his friends of his discovery. The outcasts would be easier to find than he had imagined—although there was still the challenge of persuading his companions to dive into a pond.

As he trudged through the alleyways of Hillchester, he realized that Bramdal hadn’t told him the reason for his banishment. The word murder haunted his thoughts.

At last the laughter died down.

Boïndil ran a hand over his eyes to wipe away his tears of mirth, while the others lay back on their beds and struggled for breath.

“That was a good one, scholar,” chuckled Boïndil. “But, joking aside, how do we get to their realm?”

Tungdil sighed. “I just told you. I was quoting Bramdal exactly.”

Boïndil’s grin disappeared. “Let me get this straight: You’re asking me to jump into a pond.” He leaned forward and sniffed Tungdil’s breath. “Ha, no wonder! How many tankards have you had? Weights on my ankles, I ask you!” He noticed the grave expression on Tungdil’s face. “By the hammer of Vraccas, I won’t do it! Elria’s curse is bad enough, but drowning ourselves on purpose…” He folded his arms in front of his chest and stuck out his chin, black beard aquiver. “Not in a million cycles!”

“How do we know that Bramdal’s not a thirdling?” piped up one of the others. “He could have made up the stuff about the entrance to trick us into drowning.”

Boïndil whipped around. “Exactly!” he said fiercely. “It’s a trick! We’ll get there, and he’ll be hiding in the bushes, waiting for us to drown in his confounded pond. I bet he’s dreaming up a way to thieve our armor.”

“There might be dwarf-eating fish in the water,” ventured one of his companions.

Tungdil raised his eyebrows. “All right,” he challenged them. “Name me a dwarf who died by drowning.”

“I’ve heard all kinds of terrible stories,” said Boïndil balefully. “I can’t remember the poor fellows’ names.”

“I’m not talking about stories,” persisted Tungdil. “I want names: names of friends, friends of friends, or relatives, who died by drowning. It seems to me that Elria had plenty of opportunity to kill us on the way to the Blacksaddle, but no one died, as far as I know.” He stared into their wrinkly faces. “Well?”

No one said a word. Boïndil examined the runes on his axes while the others stared at the ceiling or rearranged their clothes.

“I won’t do it,” said Boïndil at last. “I don’t mind looking at the pond, but it had better be shallow. If it’s deeper than my knees, we’ll head for the tunnels, like we said.”

“Fine,” said Tungdil, pulling off his boots. It seemed futile to discuss the matter any further, especially when he himself was beginning to doubt the wisdom of the scheme. “We’ll get moving as soon as I’ve had a bit of sleep.” He lay down on the straw mattress and dozed for a while, only to be woken by jangling chain mail. He looked up to see Boïndil standing by his bed. “I meant to tell you: I spoke to a merchant, and he reckoned he’d seen some orcs.”

Tungdil sat up. “How long ago and where?”

“He said they were coming from the east—from Urgon, he thought. They were marching toward the Gray Range, and he said they were moving fast.”

Tungdil leaped out of bed, fetched the map from his rucksack and laid it on the floor for the others to see. He traced the route with his finger.

“They must have turned east around here,” he surmised, pointing midway between the dead glade and Dsôn Balsur. “By sticking close to the border with Urgon, they slipped past the allied army and the älfar without being seen.” For an orc, Ushnotz was remarkably cunning. “Where exactly did the merchant say they were?”

Boïndil placed a finger on the map. According to Tungdil’s calculations, the spot was only four hundred miles from the fifthling kingdom. Gauragar was hilly, but there weren’t any proper mountains or other obstacles to slow them down. The territory suited the dwarves, but their longer-legged foes would have the advantage. Orcs were formidable marchers.

Tungdil rolled up the map and stowed it into his rucksack. Even if everything went to plan, he couldn’t bank on recruiting the outcasts in time to save the fifthling kingdom. His boots were still wet, but he pulled them on regardless, and reached for his cloak.

“We’re leaving,” he told the others. “From now on, we only stop if we have to.”

The next orbit, the dwarves had a niggling feeling that something was wrong. It wasn’t tiredness or stomach cramps or any physical sensation, just a general uneasiness that made them nervous and withdrawn. All around them the grass was getting greener as if to flaunt its victory over the Perished Land, but the burgeoning vegetation did nothing to ease their trepidation, and they longed for their mountain homes.

The mood became tenser and the dwarves more irritable, but they kept themselves going with the occasional song. After a time, the path led into a forest, and the singing dried up. From then, they continued in silence, trudging bad-temperedly along the overgrown track.

Tungdil had a fair idea what was causing their edginess, but he wasn’t inclined to share the news. The others would hardly be heartened to know that they were traveling through Lesinteïl, former home of the northern elves.

The älfar had conquered the kingdom many cycles ago and wiped out their cousins, before invading the Golden Plains, killing the elves, and founding the älfar kingdom of Dsôn Balsur. Only Liútasil’s elves in the dense forests of Âlandur had survived the älfar’s crusade against their race.

Tungdil suspected that he and his friends had crossed into the first of the fallen elven kingdoms, and that Lesinteïl was expressing its old antipathy toward the dwarves. Either that, or the land was drenched in the sinister memory of Sitalia’s slaughtered elves.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t reckoned with eagle-eyed Boïndil, who spotted the remains of a statue half hidden by a thicket of brambles and creepers.

“By Vraccas, if that isn’t a statue of Sitalia!” he exclaimed, bringing the little procession to a halt. “What’s it doing in a godforsaken forest like this? Don’t tell me we’re in Âlandur already!”

Needless to say, the whole group looked to Tungdil for guidance. “There’s a chance we’re in Lesinteïl,” their leader conceded quietly.

“Unbelievable,” snorted Boïndil, aiming a kick at the elegantly sculpted marble. “First you ask us to jump into a pond, and then you lead us straight to the heart of the pointy-ears’…” He stopped short and corrected himself. “Straight to the heart of an elven kingdom. No wonder I’ve got the shivers; it’s no place for a dwarf.”

“If you’ve finished complaining,” said Tungdil, “I suggest we carry on. You seem to have forgotten that we’re friends with the elves.”

“Tell that to the forest,” growled Boïndil, setting off behind him. He turned and glared at a nearby tree. “Trip me up, and I’ll hack you to pieces. Consider yourself warned.”

It was probably coincidence, but at that moment the wind got up, whistling threateningly through the trees.

Boïndil whipped out his axes and banged them together, filling the forest with a high-pitched jangling of metal. “Was that supposed to scare me?” he shouted defiantly. “Do it again at your peril!”

Footsore and tired, the dwarves continued their journey, eating and drinking on the move. At dawn, the tops of the trees were wreathed in mist. The sun was still rising slowly as they made their way out of the forest and stopped at the edge of a meadow. The terrain was completely flat, but the grass, a mixture of dead stalks and fresh new blades, came as high as their chests.

Scattered about the meadow was the wreckage of an elven town, and beyond that, a pond, just as Bramdal had described. For some reason, the executioner had omitted to mention that the water was as black as the night. Devoid of light or sparkle, its surface swallowed every particle of sunlight. Tungdil was reminded of the dull, forbidding water of the dead glade.

Boïndil wouldn’t stop shaking his head. “I wouldn’t have minded if you could see the bottom, but this…” He pointed to the pond. “It’s the work of the Perished Land.”

One of the others nodded. “It’s as black as pitch. I’ll be darned if I dip my toe in it, let alone the rest of me.”

“We need to get a proper look,” said Tungdil, tramping through the grass.

Tendrils of ivy twisted playfully over scattered blocks of stone. Unlike the elves of Âlandur, the founders of Lesinteïl had favored solid, imposing buildings, but the weather and the älfar had taken their toll, and it was difficult to imagine how the town had once looked.

“Don’t wait for me—I’ll catch up,” said one of Tungdil’s companions, stopping among the ruins. Bigor Stonecolumn was a stoneworking secondling, who was drawn to masonry of any sort. He ran his calloused fingers over crumbling carvings, cracked sculptures, and once-beautiful friezes, the colors of which had faded in the sun. “Not bad for a bunch of flower-pickers,” he said admiringly.

The dwarf studied the intricate workmanship and found no sign of faulty hammer strikes or careless chisel cuts. In spite of himself, he wished the elven town were still standing so that he could see it in its original glory.

Meanwhile, Tungdil had arrived at the pond. He looked around for Bigor, but the secondling was nowhere in sight. “Bigor?” he called.

“Don’t worry, scholar. He’ll be admiring the ruins,” said Boïndil.

“Or answering a call of nature,” chuckled one of the others. “The grass will be glad of some water.”

Tungdil peered at the pond. In front of him were the sorry remains of a pier, and, further left, a tumbledown shrine, which, according to the worn inscription, was dedicated to Sitalia, goddess of the elves. A flight of stone steps led down to the water.

Right, here goes… He crouched at the water’s edge, pulled off his gloves, and hesitated briefly before lowering his index finger into the liquid darkness. The water felt cold. “It seems harmless enough,” he said to the others. “The pier reaches almost to the middle of the pond. With a proper run-up, we should be able to reach the—”

“Hang on a second, scholar,” interrupted Boïndil. “I’m not in the habit of questioning your decisions, but you can’t seriously be suggesting that we should jump in there.”

Tungdil didn’t like exploiting his friend’s weaknesses, but he was left with no choice. “You’re not scared, are you, Ireheart?” He scooped up some water and threw it at the dwarf. “Ooo,” he teased. “Can you feel it trying to kill you? It’s only water, you know.”

The tactic worked. Boïndil puffed out his chest, wounded honor triumphing over his instincts. “Why would a warrior be afraid of Elria?” he asked proudly. “Look, I’ll dive in and prove it.” He clambered onto the pier, but Tungdil held him back.

“Hold on, we can’t leave without Bigor.” He called the mason’s name and waited in vain for an answer. “We’d better look for him. Everyone spread out.”

“I reckon he’s been kidnapped by the forest,” said Boïndil, pulling out his axes. “Elvish trees can’t stand us dwarves.”

“You threatened them,” commented one of his companions. “What do you expect?”

“For them to behave themselves,” snapped Boïndil, hacking at the high grass to work off his temper.

They spread out and advanced in a line, sweeping the meadow for the missing dwarf, and calling his name.

Next to a marble column, shielded by head-high grass, they found Bigor, or what was left of him.

At once Boïndil and the others formed a defensive ring around Tungdil and the corpse.

Bigor’s mail tunic had been pulled halfway over his head and his leather jerkin ripped to shreds, exposing his torso. His flesh was covered in bite marks and some of his bones were missing, including his ribs. The trampled grass around the body glistened moistly with blood.

“This was the work of an animal,” reported Tungdil.

Boïndil glared furiously at the sea of rippling stems that blocked their view in all directions. “It was a thirdling trap,” he growled. “Your friendly executioner was trying to feed us to his pet.” He shifted his weight, planting both feet firmly on the ground. “The dwarf-eating monster won’t be gobbling any more of our kinsfolk. I’ll deal with the varmint, you’ll see.”

Noticing a wide channel of trampled grass, Tungdil concluded that the predator was by no means small, which led him to wonder why no one had heard it pouncing on Bigor. Judging by the dwarf’s half-eaten remains, the creature had been disturbed mid-meal. It must be lurking nearby, he thought with a shudder. He tried to predict the creature’s next move. There were two possibilities: either it meant to attack them, or it was waiting to finish its meal.

Just then a strong wind gusted through the field. Amid the rustling grass, the hiss of an approaching arrow went unnoticed by the dwarves.

Its arrival was so sudden and unexpected that the dwarf to the right of Boïndil barely realized he was hit. Staggering backward, he raised a hand to his chest and closed his fingers disbelievingly around the black shaft protruding from his mail shirt. Pierced through the heart, he slumped to the ground.

“Älfar!” came the shouted warning from Boïndil. Not wanting to offer an easy target, he threw himself onto his belly. The arrow intended for him sailed over his head and pierced the back of the dwarf behind him. Groaning, the stricken dwarf keeled over. A third dwarf took two arrows to the chest.

Seeing the arrows come thick and fast, Tungdil realized that there was more than one archer. By his reckoning, at least three älfar were hiding in the grass, making it all but impossible for the dwarves to fight and win.

“Get down and crawl,” he ordered, throwing himself to the ground. He lowered his voice. “Make for the pond. We’ll soon see whether Bramdal was telling the truth.”

“Are you blind or something?” barked Boïndil, wriggling through the grass beside him. “This is the Perished Land! We can’t—”

Tungdil grabbed a handful of grass. “Look, it’s green, not gray! The Perished Land has been banished.” An arrow whistled over their heads. “No more talking; I’ll see you at the pond.” He pushed himself carefully across the ground, intent on disturbing as few blades as possible. The älfar were bound to be looking for movement in the grass.

What brought them here? he wondered feverishly. Lesinteïl’s occupation ended cycles ago. It was too far north for älfar scouts, especially when their troops were in action on the fringes of Âlandur and Dsôn Balsur. Tungdil could think only that they knew of some secret weapon in the fallen kingdom that they were hoping to use against the elves.

The rustling increased as if hundreds of älfar were swarming through the meadow. During his long crawl toward the pond Tungdil heard five more agonized screams.

Seized by fury, he felt like drawing Keenfire and confronting his pursuers, but common sense convinced him otherwise, thereby prolonging his life. The älfar were expert marksmen, and neither mail shirts nor solid armor could halt the arrows that sped from their bows. A dwarf, stationary or moving, was an easy target, and Tungdil knew better than to break his cover. He hoped to Vraccas that his surviving companions would stay out of sight.

Just then Samusin, commander of winds and god of equilibrium, noticed the outnumbered dwarves. The wind changed direction, blowing across the pond toward the dwarves and their pursuers.

Tungdil decided to get out his tinderbox and set light to the grass.

“Burn the meadow!” he shouted, rejoicing at the sight of the dancing flames working their way up the dry stalks and spreading like lightning. A moment later, several other columns of smoke appeared above the field. The breeze fanned the flames, sweeping them toward the älfar.

Protected by the smoke, grass, and flames, Tungdil kept crawling until he reached the edge of the pond. Glancing around, he spotted two of his companions; of the others, including Boïndil, he saw no sign.

Before he could instruct his companions to dive into the water, a shadow fell over them and a vast creature emerged from the field.

The saddled bull was barely ten paces away. It was wearing a helmet of gleaming tionium and its horns were sheathed in metal. Smoke rose from its coat, and its hooves were singed, as Tungdil could tell from the acrid odor.

There could be no doubt of its intentions. It turned to face the dwarves, lowering its broad head, scraping its hooves against the ground, and snorting aggressively. Its tail swept from side to side.

“Quick, to the pier,” commanded Tungdil, drawing Keenfire. Deep down, he knew the ax could do nothing to stop the charging bull. The beast weighed at least a quarter of a ton and was made of pure muscle without an ounce of fat. “Dive into the water—it’s our only chance!” They started running.

The bull watched them with fiery red eyes. Opening its jaws, it let out a bloodcurdling roar, showed them its jagged incisors and broke into a trot, accelerating as it thundered behind them, churning up the ground. Tungdil realized that the beast would be upon them before they reached the pier.

“Hey, over here, you cud-chewing brute!” A split-second later, Ireheart shot out of the grass. Grabbing the bull by its tail, he dug his heels into the churned-up soil and pulled back with all his might.

The bull charged onward, dragging Boïndil, whose boots carved two deep furrows in the ground. Suddenly it stopped and whipped around to glower at the intrepid warrior hanging off its tail.

“I’ll teach you to eat my friends,” shouted Ireheart, pulling one of his axes from his belt. The blade cut a deep gash in the bull’s behind. “Keep going, scholar. I’ve got your back.”

Tungdil peered into the raging wall of flames that separated the pond from the meadow, but the älfar were nowhere to be seen. After assuring himself that the coast was clear, he signaled for the others to follow and hurried onto the pier. Thereafter they were in full view of any lurking archers. From the corner of their eyes they watched as Boïndil jabbed at the raging bull with one hand and clung to its tail with the other. Bucking and turning, the beast tried to shake itself free, but Boïndil’s grip was like iron and he stayed out of reach.

“I’ve killed bigger beasts than you,” the dwarf warned him. “What are you, an oversized cow? You won’t be around much longer.” Swinging his ax rapidly, he hacked at the creature’s legs. Crimson blood flowed from countless gashes, then the hind legs caved in, and the bull bellowed with helpless fury. “Now for your ribs,” roared Boïndil.

“Watch out! They’re—” With a final shriek, the dwarf next to Tungdil toppled over, a second arrow piercing his back as he fell. Gurgling incoherently, he convulsed and died.

“Älfar!” shouted Tungdil, stowing away his ax and grabbing his dead companion by the shoulders. He hoisted the body into the air and held it in front of him like a shield.

Unable to see anything, he took a step back, only to hear his other companion fall prey to the älfar’s arrows. Five times he heard the same sequence of noises—a soft whirr, a jangle of chain mail, and the terrible sound of metal burrowing through sinew and flesh. The dead dwarf splashed into the water.

Tungdil didn’t dare raise his head above the corpse to look for his attackers. Instead he stumbled backward toward the end of the pier. “Listen to me, Boïndil,” he ordered, doing his best to shout. “You can’t risk the pier: You’ll have to wade in from the side.”

Boïndil was standing beside the bull, both hands on his ax and aiming for the creature’s sturdy neck. “I’m not getting in that water!” he shouted, swinging his ax. “This cow needs to be—”

Just then the bull tensed its mighty muscles and its head jerked around. Its horns hit the dwarf’s belly, knocking him off his feet.

Boïndil flew four paces through the air and splashed into the somber water of the pond. His weapon followed a split-second later, disappearing with a gentle gurgle. Bubbles floated to the surface, but neither dwarf nor ax reappeared.

Tungdil decided that his friend’s unexpected flight was the work of Vraccas. He was preparing to launch himself after him when footsteps hurried down the pier.

Even as he lowered the corpse to gauge the distance, his right shoulder was hit by an arrow.

The strength drained out of his arm and his makeshift shield slipped even lower, exposing more of his body.

The älf dispatched another missile, this time hitting Tungdil’s chest. He crashed to the ground. Groaning, he tried to crawl out from under the corpse. Whether or not he reached the end of the pier was no longer of importance; his only chance of survival was to enter the water as fast as he could.

His pursuers were getting closer.

Glancing up, he saw a female älf wearing a half mask, her features veiled by a strip of black gauze. She was running toward him, calling something at the top of her voice. Without stopping, she raised a sickle-like weapon not dissimilar to Narmora’s and hurled it at his chest.

“My life is in your hands,” he muttered to Vraccas as he snapped the shaft of the arrow and rolled off the side of the pier. “I hope Bramdal wasn’t lying.”

He let himself fall.

The dark surface of the pond came closer and closer; then, just as he was approaching the water, he came to a sudden halt.

Someone had grabbed his weapons belt.

Pendleburg,

Southwest Urgon,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

My uncle, King Lorimbas Steelheart of the clan of the Stone Grinders, ruler of Lorimbur’s folk, sends his heartfelt condolences for the loss of your nephew. Urgon has been deprived of an exceptional king,” said Romo Steelheart, inclining his head in a gesture that was barely a bow.

He was standing at the foot of a throne, and the throne was in a modest palace—in Romo’s opinion, a humble fort. It was situated on the tallest of the three hills that made up Pendleburg, the capital of Urgon.

Wood was a rarity in the mountainous kingdom, and so the people of Urgon built their houses of stone. From a distance, it looked as if the city were made of thousands of colored cubes. There were no tiled roofs, only flat stone slabs on which laundry, fruit, and meat were laid to dry.

Pendleburg owed its colorfulness to the different types of rock available to the masons, who created mosaics and bold geometric patterns from the contrasting hues. Romo felt at home among the solid walls and soaring mountains, which bore comparison with the peaks of his native range.

“I didn’t want to be king,” said the man on the throne. He was probably about forty-five cycles old, small and rather portly. He pointed to a portrait of a young man with long fair hair. “Lothaire was a true king of Urgon…” His voice cracked and he broke off, burying his lopsided face in his hands. Tears seeped between his fingers.

Romo, who couldn’t abide weakness, masked his scorn by staring at the ceiling until the sobs had subsided.

“Forgive me,” said King Belletain, wiping the salty tears from his clipped brown beard. “The loss is still very fresh. My dear brother, Lothaire’s father, died seven cycles ago in the war against the trolls, and as for me…” He raised his hand and tapped his helmet. “I took a blow to the head. Since then I’ve had a face like a lopsided pumpkin, and I have to wear this helmet or my skull will fall apart. I thought I’d suffered enough, but the gods stole my nephew. I loved him like a son.”

That was Romo’s cue. From what he had seen so far, the king of Urgon would be easier to deal with than Mallen. “I don’t mean to be disrespectful, Your Majesty,” he ventured, knowing that if he hit the right note, Belletain would dance to his tune, “but the gods didn’t kill Lothaire. It was the dwarves.”

The king raised his head wearily and stared at his visitor. “Your kinsmen killed my nephew?” His hand reached for his sword. “Kneel in front of me, dwarf. Lothaire’s death must be avenged!”

“Not my kinsmen,” said Romo hastily. “I was referring to the fourthlings, the dwarves of Goïmdil whose stronghold lies to the northeast of your kingdom, the dwarves who live off the treasures of the Brown Range—treasures that belong to you.” Romo took a step toward the invalid on the throne. The king’s face was empty and unresponsive. “The fourthlings stood by while your nephew took arms against the magus. If they’d fought at Porista like they did at the Blacksaddle, Lothaire would have lived.”

“Tell me about your folk. Don’t they call you the dwarf haters?”

“Indeed, Your Majesty, which leaves me at liberty to expose their deceit,” he said quickly, determined to steer the conversation to less treacherous ground. “Remember the ax that killed Nôd’onn? It was in the fourthlings’ possession all along. They kept it back because they wanted to be Girdlegard’s saviors. It was their intention that the human armies should be crushed.” He leaned forward. “They could have defeated Nôd’onn whenever they wanted, but they let your nephew die.”

Belletain gave him a long look, then roared with laughter. “I’m not falling for this nonsense. Why in the name of Palandiell would they—”

“Glory,” cut in Romo. “Glory, and power. The way they saw it, the human kingdoms weren’t showing enough gratitude for their defense of Girdlegard’s borders. And now they’re heroes, thanks to their scheming. They set themselves up as Girdlegard’s saviors because they wanted to take the reins. Thousands of humans died because of the fourthlings, and you thanked them for their treachery. Girdlegard is ruled by the dwarves; you welcomed them into your kingdoms, and even Lord Liútasil has fallen for their tricks.” He glanced at Lothaire’s portrait. “Thankfully, the thirdlings are loyal guardians of your people. We don’t want to rule your kingdoms—it’s enough to guard the gates.”

His speech had struck a chord, as he could tell by the expression on the king of Urgon’s face.

“I need to think,” said Belletain wretchedly. “If what you’re saying is true… It hurts my head to imagine what…” He broke off and raised a hand to his helmet. Even the light pressure of his fingers caused the broken sections of his skull to move apart. “Leave me a while. I’ll call for you when I’m…” He cried out, clutching the arms of his throne, and slumped to the side.

The doors flew open, admitting three physicians who set about reviving the king. One held his head, the other loosened his helmet, exposing his bandaged head, while the third unwrapped the dressing and inserted a needle into his skull. Romo watched in amazement as pale pink fluid spurted from Belletain’s brain, splashing into a bronze bowl.

“Wait in your quarters,” said one of the healers, whose efforts were focused on holding together his ruler’s crown. “His Majesty will be incommoded for some time.”

The dwarf assented with a growl, turning and leaving the chamber. Once outside, he smiled: Belletain would side with the thirdlings, and a wedge would be driven between the dwarves and their allies, just as his uncle had planned.

Porista,

Former Realm of Lios Nudin,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

Narmora raced through the corridors of the palace with little thought for the unborn baby in her womb. The person whose life she valued more than any other was critically ill.

She stopped and clutched her side, gasping for breath and feeling her lack of condition. The baby was still kicking in protest at the sudden burst of speed.

Her path was barred by Djern, who was standing guard outside the chamber where Andôkai was tending to the two wounded men.

“Let me through,” she said sharply, reaching for the handle. The metal giant stood firm, blocking the doorway entirely with his bulk. “Andôkai,” shouted Narmora angrily, “tell your bodyguard to let me in or I’ll force my way past him, I swear.”

A muffled answer sounded from the chamber, and Djern snapped out of his paralysis, allowing her to pass. Narmora heard his armor creaking and groaning as if the metal were under tremendous stress.

She rushed forward and burst through the double doors. The maga was bending over Furgas’s bed. His eyes were closed, his forehead shiny with perspiration, and the sheets looked damp.

Narmora hurried over. “Furgas,” she whispered fearfully. “His lips… They’re blue.” Glancing down, she saw the blood-soaked bandages around his abdomen. “He’s not…”

“No,” said Andôkai quickly. “Keep your voice down; he needs absolute quiet or he won’t recover from his wounds. The blade was poisoned; with what, I don’t know. It’s lucky the watchmen found him and brought him straight here. Samusin saved him.”

The half älf kneeled before her, sobbing with relief. “Thank you, Estimable Maga. I don’t know how to repay you.”

Andôkai signaled for her to rise. “You won’t be so eager to thank me when I’ve finished,” she said darkly. “My magic is strong enough to keep him alive, but I don’t have the power to cure him.” Her clear blue eyes searched Narmora’s face. “Furgas was poisoned by someone with knowledge of dark magic. The men who attacked him weren’t highwaymen; they were famuli of Nôd’onn’s. Furgas was brought here with a blade in his belly. It was stamped with Nôd’onn’s crest.”

Narmora straightened up and took hold of his cold, clammy hand, warming his fingers in hers. “Famuli? Why would the magus’s famuli ambush Furgas?” She stroked his pale face. “He knows nothing of magic.”

“No, but he works for me, and that’s enough. Nôd’onn’s famuli thought that the palace would pass to them; in their eyes, I’m a usurper.” She laid a hand on Narmora’s shoulder. “While the servants of evil are at large, Porista is in danger, and no one in Girdlegard is safe. Nôd’onn’s famuli must be defeated before it’s too late.” She paused. “Listen, Narmora, I need an apprentice—someone I can rely on, someone whom I can trust with my life. What if I were to die in the struggle against the magus’s supporters? Who would continue in my stead? When I’m gone, the enchanted realms of Girdlegard will fall to Nôd’onn’s disciples.”

Narmora closed her eyes. “If I were to help, could we heal him?” she asked hoarsely.

Andôkai interpreted the question as a pledge of support. “I’m sure of it,” she said, visibly relieved. “Together, you and I can make him well—but Furgas must be healed in half a cycle, or the poison will be his death. Your apprenticeship will be intensive.” She laid a hand on the half älf’s rounded belly. “Can you cope?”

“Yes,” came the determined reply. “No child should be born to a dead father and a grief-stricken mother.” She let go of Furgas’s hand and clenched her fists. The whites of her eyes darkened and fine lines spread like cracks across her narrow face. “My nursery songs will chronicle the passing of those who conspired against Furgas. No punishment can be too great.”

On the other side of the room, Rodario watched the scene in silence. His bandaged head was pounding horribly from its encounter with the highwayman’s cudgel, which counted among the least enjoyable experiences of his life. He was keenly aware that Narmora hadn’t looked in his direction, but he magnanimously forgave her. The father of her child was in a coma, and she had other things on her mind.

After the attack, Andôkai’s guardsmen had carried him to the palace while he watched in a daze as the ruined streets of Porista passed before his eyes. In spite of his wooziness, he knew for a fact that Andôkai hadn’t deemed his condition worthy of a charm or a spell. After a while, someone had cleaned his wounds and bandaged his head; he could picture the hands, but not the face.

Andôkai glanced over. “Feeling better, Rodario?”

Not wishing to appear a weakling, he mustered a valiant smile.

“Excellent,” she said briskly, “I’m sure you’re in a hurry to get home.”

His smile became a pout. “Fine,” he said proudly. “You’ve made it perfectly obvious that you don’t want me here.” He sat up cautiously, expecting his head to start spinning, but instead he felt irritatingly well. Sighing, he slipped his feet into his buckled shoes, stood up slowly and went over to Furgas’s bedside.

In the meantime, Narmora had composed herself and the signs of her älvish heritage, brought on by the emotional intensity of the situation, had disappeared from her face. Her eyes returned to their usual color, and her skin was flawless again. She looked the model of an expectant mother. “Rodario,” she said apologetically, laying a hand on his arm. “You mustn’t think I’m ignoring you. It’s just I’m a bit…”

Rodario waved airily. “Don’t apologize; I understand.”

The maga looked at him squarely. “Answer me this: Can you take over from Furgas?”

“Me?” He raised his arms in astonishment. “You’re asking me, the best impresario in Girdlegard, to rebuild your city?” He was about to refuse when something made him change his mind. “I can always try.”

“Trying isn’t enough; I need someone who can do it,” she snapped. “If you don’t have the skill, I’ll hire someone else.”

“Never fear, Estimable Maga,” he assured her. “While poor Furgas is in a coma, your city will be in capable hands.” She eyed him skeptically, but he was too busy thinking about his salary to care. He gave a flamboyant bow. “As for my own affairs, they can wait. The construction of my theater, the premiere of the masterpiece that I—”

“Very well,” she said, interrupting his overblown speech. “Go home, get some sleep, and be ready to start in the morning. I don’t want any extra delays.” She turned to Narmora. “I’ll ask for your things to be fetched to the palace; there’s no shortage of space, as you know. I’ll leave it to you to choose a room.”

“I’ll stay here with Furgas. It’s big enough for—”

“No,” ruled Andôkai. “Furgas needs peace and quiet. Too much noise could elevate his heart rate and push the poison through his system. Come, we’ve lingered long enough.” She steered them to the door. “You can visit every orbit,” she told Narmora. “Sit with him, hold his hand if you want to, but don’t speak to him, and stay no longer than an hour. The slightest agitation could be the death of him.” She opened the doors, and Djern shifted to let them pass. “I’ve got a few things to do here, but I’ll join you in a moment.”

Narmora accompanied Rodario out of the palace. “Would you do me a favor?” she asked. “You’re an expert in disguise and dissimulation. Can you find out whether the assassins were acting alone?”

He beamed. “You’ve come to the right man. I’ll slink through the streets of Porista at the dead of night, searching for the magus’s treacherous disciples and…” He trailed off, remembering his encounter with the cudgel. But the thought of poor Furgas gave him the courage to play the hero in a drama without a script. “I’ll disguise myself properly for my protection. Leave it to me. The city will be rid of Nôd’onn’s accursed famuli sooner than Andôkai thinks.”

“I’d rather you didn’t tell the maga.”

“You want revenge? Dearest Narmora, are you sure it’s advisable in your condition?”

“Right now I feel stronger than ever; I’d fight Djern if I had to.” She unlocked the side gate, reached for his hand and gave it a squeeze. “You’ll do it, won’t you, Rodario?”

He gave her a hug. “I’ll do it,” he said reassuringly. He looked both ways; there was no one in sight. “I promise,” he said with a wave, and hurried away.

Free from prying eyes, he found the courage to open his left hand.

All the while he had been hiding a drop of the mysterious substance that, according to Andôkai, was responsible for poisoning his friend. He had been spattered with it when the second highwayman mistook him for Furgas.

Rodario raised his hand to his eyes and peered at the strange fluid. It was yellow, almost luminescent, and it reminded him of something, but he couldn’t think what. He thought about what Andôkai had said about the blade. He had no recollection of a crest or any kind of symbol on the dagger; in fact, the only part of the story that he could corroborate wholeheartedly was that Furgas had been the target of the attack.

It seems like someone isn’t telling the truth… In an instant, his reservations vanished: He couldn’t wait to get to the bottom of the mystery, so long as it wasn’t anything too sinister or dangerous…

VI

Fallen Kingdom of Lesinteïl,

Gauragar,

Girdlegard,

Spring, 6235th Solar Cycle

Tungdil’s weapons belt was stretched to its limits. The leather cut into his shoulder, embedding itself diagonally across his chest. His downward journey toward the safety of the water had ended with an almighty jolt, forcing the air from his lungs, but there was no danger of him fainting; the pain from the arrow wounds kept him agonizingly awake.

Above him, his captor panted with exertion. The female älf could barely hold him, let alone lift him onto the pier. Tungdil knew from her urgent shouts that she was calling for reinforcements: In a few moments, they would reel him in like a fish on a line, and there was nothing he could do.

He was trapped.

Dangling from his belt, he watched the blood leak from his chest and shoulders and splash into the pond below. Desperate to free himself, he thrashed around with his arms and legs, praying that the älf would be forced to release her grip. At last, one of his feet made contact with the pier, and he pushed off vigorously, shuttling back and forth.

The tactic seemed to work: His antagonist groaned with the effort and said something that he took to be a curse. “You’ll never take me alive,” he shouted defiantly, feeling her skid across the pier toward the water. “I’d rather drown us both.”

Shouts echoed across the pond as the älf’s companions rushed to her aid. Before he had time to realize what was happening, he felt himself being hauled inch by inch toward the pier.

He wasn’t ready to concede defeat.

The next time his boot hit the pier, he pushed back with all his might to catapult himself toward the middle of the pond. The älf and her friends clung on determinedly.

His belt was the first to give in.

The buckle, like most buckles, wasn’t designed to withstand the full weight of a dwarf, especially an armored warrior. The pin cut into the leather, which promptly gave way. Moving from hole to hole, the buckle chewed through the belt, slicing it in two.

Tungdil felt a rush of elation.

Then it dawned on him: Keenfire! His weak fingers snatched at the disappearing belt. I can’t let the älfar get…

Already he was plummeting through the water, which was as cold and forbidding as it looked from above. His chain mail weighed him down, dragging him relentlessly toward the bottom. He focused on holding his breath, a trick that he used to practice in the bath.

He seemed to fall for an eternity, sinking deeper and deeper. After a time, the darkness thickened, perhaps because of the water, perhaps because of his air-starved mind.

Tungdil could feel himself weakening. Briefly, he was tempted to open his mouth and fill his lungs with air, but his fading consciousness warned him that he would drown.

At last he saw light.

It was all around him, wrapping him in a comforting cocoon. Even as he reached out eagerly, he heard the roar of bellows. The eternal smithy! Vraccas has summoned my soul…

He got a clip on the ear for presuming to know the Smith’s intentions.

Shocked, he jerked away. A hand struck his cheek, knocking his head to the side.

He saw the blurry outlines of a dwarven god, who looked surprisingly like a regular dwarf. The red halo intensified, expanding into the darkness and filling it with light.

“That’s right, scholar,” the Smith said testily, preparing to strike again. “I’ll keep this up until you tell me to stop.”

An arm sped toward him. This time Tungdil had the presence of mind to reach up with his left hand and grab the dwarf’s wrist. “Stop,” he coughed, trying to drag himself out of the water. Someone reached down and hauled him out. He spewed a mouthful of water, coughing, sneezing, choking, and swallowing until his lungs filled with air.

He looked up. His cheeks were flushed from coughing, and his eyelids were swollen, but he could see.

Crouching beside him and beaming enthusiastically was a dripping wet Boïndil. Their watery journey had ended on the shores of an underground lake.

Tungdil traced the noise of roaring bellows to a waterfall that was tumbling into the middle of the pond from the ceiling of the cavern, ten paces above. There was no sign of a furnace, only strings of lanterns with tinted panels that bathed the lake in a deep red glow.

The cavern itself was a mile long by a mile wide. Tungdil and Boïndil were sitting on the only section of dry rock; elsewhere the water came right up to the walls.

“Quite a drop, eh?” said Boïndil, pointing to the torrent of water. “It pitched us into the middle of the pool, and the current washed us ashore.” He furrowed his brow. “Are we the only survivors?”

Tungdil nodded weakly.

“Damn the älfar,” thundered Boïndil. “I’ll give those cowardly murderers a taste of my axes.” He thumped the floor with his hand, then remembered that he had something important to convey. “We’re in the realm of the freelings; they’re fetching a doctor.” He inspected Tungdil’s wounds. “You were lucky, scholar—assuming the arrows weren’t poisoned…”

“I’ll be fine,” said his friend in what he hoped was a convincing tone. The truth was, the cavern was still spinning, but then again, he had lost a lot of blood. Don’t let it be poison. He raised a hand and ran it over his chest, then looked for his weapons belt.

“You must have lost it on the way. The chute between here and the pond was pretty narrow; I almost got stuck.” Boïndil stood up and peered into the water. “I suppose you’ll have to dive for it.”

“It’s gone,” groaned Tungdil, laying his head against the ground. He was still too dizzy to sit up.

“Gone?” echoed Boïndil, fearing the worst. “Tell me you lost it in the water…” He kneeled down and stared at his friend in horror. “Are you certain? Anything would be better than losing Keenfire to our enemies.”

Tungdil made his report.

“That’s bad news,” muttered Boïndil. “Still, with a bit of luck, Keenfire could have fallen into the water while they were hauling up the belt.”

“Do you think we should—”

“We’ve brought a stretcher,” said a deep voice behind him. “We’re going to take you to a doctor; Gemmil will deal with you after that.”

Four dwarves with incredibly pale skin stepped into Tungdil’s line of sight. Bending down, they placed him gently on a stretcher.

After studying their faces, Tungdil concluded that they looked like ordinary dwarves, only paler and without the usual dark brown eyes. One of their number was almost entirely colorless: His red eyes smiled at Tungdil from an ashen face.

Boïndil, unnerved by the pallid dwarf, placed a hand on his ax. “I’ll hack them to pieces if they attack us,” he promised, lowering his voice so only Tungdil could hear. He nodded surreptitiously at the back of the colorless dwarf. “Do you think he’s a ghost? It doesn’t seem natural.”

Tungdil had considered the matter already. “On the contrary,” he said, remembering the books about animal life in Lot-Ionan’s library. “I’ve read of cave-dwelling frogs who are born with no eyes. They live in total darkness, and their skin is pure white.”

“I see,” said Boïndil uncertainly. He wrung out his beard and turned his attention to his plait, trailing water as he walked. “But the dwarves in the other kingdoms live in underground halls, so how come—”

“That’s different. They don’t stay underground forever, do they? They come up to the surface to tend their cattle, trade their goods, set out on adventures…” Tungdil hadn’t studied science in detail, but he was sure that the loss of pigment resulted from living in darkness for a considerable time.

They exited the cavern, leaving the thundering waterfall behind them. The corridors reminded Tungdil of ancient waterways carved by rivers through the rock. Straight ahead was a small metal door that led into a simple room. Tungdil’s stretcher was lowered onto a table.

“I was expecting worse,” said a clear, bright voice like the ring of a hammer against an anvil. “Cut away his garments; I need to see the wounds.”

Two dwarves fitted a pair of sharp-edged pliers around the bottom of his mail shirt, while a third dwarf squeezed the handles. Ring by ring, the blades cut through his armor as if it were paper, not metal. The mail shirt fell to the table in two neat halves. Next the dwarves tore open the leather jerkin, exposing his chest.

“Let’s see what the älfar have done to you,” said the voice. Its owner stepped into view: a delicate dwarf with snow-white skin.

The sight of the dazzling stranger sent Tungdil’s memories of Balyndis up in smoke. He had never seen a more beautiful dwarf-woman.

“I’m Myrmianda,” she said. Her red eyes smiled at him, traveling down his face to study the arrow shafts protruding from his naked chest. She was dressed in dark brown robes and a leather apron. A golden circlet rested on her head, holding back her long snowy hair. “Everyone here will vouch for my skill. I’m a medic—I know what I’m doing.”

She leaned closer to examine the flesh around the wounds. Her fingers were remarkably slender and delicate for a dwarf. He breathed in her scent, which was clean and fresh without a hint of sweat or smoke. If anything, he detected an aroma of herbs.

“No discoloration or swelling—Vraccas was on your side,” she told him. Straightening up, she signaled to her assistants, who maneuvered Tungdil into a sitting position, pushing away the remains of his chain mail and slitting open the rest of his jerkin. “The älfar use arrows with detachable heads. We can’t leave anything in the wounds, so it’s no use pulling on the shafts. The only solution is to push them through.”

No sooner had she finished speaking than she placed her middle and index fingers on the broken shafts and pushed the arrows through his flesh.

Tungdil clenched his jaw, grinding his teeth together furiously. It felt like red-hot pokers were passing through his shoulder and his chest. Myrmianda reached around him, taking hold of the arrowheads and pulling them from his back.

“Not all my patients are as brave as this,” she said approvingly, casting the arrowheads into a tub of water and washing her bloodied hands. She took some wet moss from a bowl and placed thick compresses on his front and back; then, with the help of her assistants, she bandaged his wounds. “Blue moss,” she told him. “It’s the best way to stop the bleeding. We’ll wait a few hours and change the dressings, and by tomorrow you won’t feel a thing.” She added a powdered substance to a beaker of water, and thrust it into his hand. “Here, this should boost your strength and help against fever.”

“By the hammer of Vraccas, that’s what I call efficient,” Boïndil said to her admiringly. He was almost tempted to get himself injured so that he could profit from her skill.

The medic nodded briskly. “Thank you. I’ve treated a fair few arrow wounds in my time.”

Tungdil was transfixed. Myrmianda spoke educated dwarfish, her accent was faultless, and she was bound to be well read; her delicate stature pointed to cycles of handling parchment rather than laboring in the mines. In short, she was nothing like Balyndis, who was twice as muscular and imposing, as befitted a smith.

He gulped down the contents of the beaker. “I’m Tungdil Goldhand,” he said, pulling himself together. “And this is Boïndil Doubleblade of the clan of the Swinging Axes of Beroïn’s line.”

She dried her hands on a towel and placed it on a little table. “The hero of the Blacksaddle and his trusty companion,” she said, inclining her head toward them. “It’s an honor to meet you. As far as I’m aware, slaying Nôd’onn isn’t against the rules of the dwarven kingdoms, so you must be here by chance. Did you fall into the water when the älfar attacked?”

Tungdil wished that he could be more upfront with Myrmianda, who, apart from being exceptionally beautiful, had treated and bandaged his wounds. “I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly, “we can’t discuss it until we’ve spoken to your king.”

For a moment she seemed disappointed, then she flashed him a smile that brought color to his cheeks. “In that case, I was wrong. You’re here for a reason, whatever it might be.”

Tungdil watched as she packed away her instruments: thin-bladed knives, hooks, surgical saws, and assorted paraphernalia that would be lethal in the hands of a warrior. Myrmianda rolled them up in a cloth, secured each end with a leather strap and took her leave. “I hope you feel better soon.”

A white-haired dwarf appeared at the door. His skin was whiter than white, and his eyes were the loamy brown of fresh soil. He wore a mail tunic, and an ax hung from his belt.

“May your inner furnace burn for many cycles,” he said welcomingly. “My name is Gemmil Callusedhand. I’m the elected sovereign of the freelings’ realm.”

Tungdil and Boïndil introduced themselves. Their names made an immediate impression on the king. “I’m honored by your visit. You bring news from the other kingdoms, I suppose?”

“Bramdal Masterstroke told us about your realm,” said Tungdil, launching into a lengthy explanation. He told Gemmil about the new fifthling kingdom, his meeting with the executioner, his efforts to find the exiles, and the älvish ambush at the pond. “Pardon me,” he said suddenly. “I should have started by thanking you for your assistance in defeating Nôd’onn. Your warriors stopped the orcs from overrunning the underground network, for which the kingdoms of Girdlegard will be forever in your debt.” He bowed as best he could with his bandaged chest. “Boïndil and I have particular cause to thank you—we couldn’t have forged Keenfire without the freelings’ help.”

“It’s as well you left a message in the tunnels,” said Gemmil, smiling. “We’re exiles, but even an exiled dwarf is a child of the Smith. Girdlegard’s safety is our priority; we couldn’t allow the magus to prevail.”

“Perhaps you could tell your subjects—”

“They’re not my subjects,” the king corrected him gently. “The dwarves in this realm are free in word and deed. We elect a king to take decisions on behalf of our community, and, at present, that honor falls to me. In three cycles, my term of office will be over, and we’ll hold another vote.”

“You pass the crown between you?” exclaimed Boïndil, laughing out loud. He clearly found the notion quite preposterous. “That’s a fine kind of monarchy!”

“The best,” agreed Gemmil, failing to take offense.

“Your Majesty,” said Tungdil, jumping in before Boïndil could insult the king again. “The freelings came to the aid of Girdlegard when it mattered. Would you be willing to fight with us again?” He summarized what he and Boïndil had seen at the Stone Gateway and outlined his fears about the army of orcish revenants marching north. “We think Ushnotz wants to seize the Stone Gateway. The new fifthling folk won’t survive the invasion of four thousand undead beasts, not to mention an influx of orcs from the Outer Lands, which is exactly what will happen if the missing scout tells his cousins that our defenses are down. Without you and your warriors, the kingdom will fall before our masons can fashion its gates. Only the freelings can reach us in time.”

The king frowned, his eyebrows joining together in a long white line that reminded Tungdil of a ridge of salt. “This is bad news indeed—and the loss of Keenfire makes it all the more serious. If the ax fell into the water, we won’t get it back.”

“If it’s gone, it’s gone,” said Boïndil lightly, knowing that Tungdil would be blaming himself for its loss. “We’ll get Balyndis to make a new one. Keenfire was forged to wipe out evil, so it won’t be much good in the hands of an älf. Besides, their axmanship is atrocious.”

“It’s more complicated than that,” said Tungdil thoughtfully. “Keenfire is a special dwarven weapon, a symbol of our victory over Tion’s hordes. Its loss will do us greater injury than any number of undead orcs.” He turned to the king. “Please, Your Majesty, I entreat you in the name of Glaïmbar Sharpax, king of the fifthlings, don’t let us fight this threat alone. Your warriors will give our kinsmen new courage. A doubting dwarf is easily conquered; your army will make us strong.”

Gemmil came straight to a decision. “I’ll send out messengers to spread the news. As soon as I’ve raised an army, I’ll dispatch it to the fifthling kingdom.” He stroked his white beard. “If the orcs attack before my warriors get there, you’ll have to hold out as best you can—Vraccas willing, it won’t be for long. Go back and tell your king that the freelings will answer his call.”

“How many can we count on?”

“As many as I can find,” said Gemmil with a shrug. His eyes settled on Tungdil’s bandages. “You won’t survive another run-in with the älfar. Take Myr, some of her assistants, and a few of my warriors. I can’t have you traveling alone.” He turned to leave.

“Can I ask a question, Gemmil?”

The king stopped at the door and nodded for Tungdil to continue.

“Our intention is to rebuild the kingdom in Giselbert’s name. Would any of you like to join us?”

“And swap our freedom for the unbending laws of a dwarven kingdom?” Gemmil paused. “It’s a charitable offer, Tungdil Goldhand, but we should focus on winning the battle against the orcs. After that, I’d like you to visit us properly so you can see the difference between the freelings and the other folks. I think you’ll understand why most of us would prefer to stay here.”

“What nonsense!” trumpeted Boïndil. “I’ve never heard such foolishness from a king.” He stomped toward the door, stopped in front of Gemmil, and looked him in the eye. “We’re just as free as you are!”

“I suppose you’re allowed to do whatever you please?”

“Too right we are,” said Boïndil stubbornly.

“So you wouldn’t have a problem disobeying your chieftain’s orders if you thought he was wrong?”

Boïndil was momentarily thrown. “Our chieftains are always right,” he snapped testily, looking to Tungdil for support. The argument wasn’t going as he had intended, but he was too hotheaded to back down.

“I’m glad to hear it. Wise chieftains never engage in pointless feuds about long-forgotten grievances.”

“Our chieftains never forget a grievance,” growled Boïndil.

“I’m sure they don’t,” said Gemmil. “And I expect they’re happy for you to meld the maiden of your choice…”

The disgruntled warrior said nothing, folding his hands in front of his chest.

“I’m not trying to score points,” said Gemmil earnestly. “I was merely suggesting that your laws aren’t always fair.”

Looking at the monarch’s face, Tungdil was convinced of his integrity, and even Boïndil was appeased.

“Change isn’t welcome in the old dwarven kingdoms,” the king continued. “The chieftains and elders are too attached to the power inherited from their forefathers. I can introduce you to dwarves who campaigned for greater freedom and were banished from their kingdoms. They’re freelings now, of course.”

Boïndil, who had been racking his brains for a comeback, spotted a weakness in Gemmil’s argument. “Let’s not forget that you accept all kinds of outcasts into your realm—murderers, troublemakers, and the like. Not all of them were banished for speaking out of turn. Surely it can’t be good to have criminals in your ranks?”

The king seemed suddenly eager to put an end to the debate. “We never ask why a dwarf was banished from his kingdom; all that matters is that he accepts our ethos and contributes to the common good.” He stepped backward into the corridor. “You’d do well to remember that some of our so-called criminals will soon be defending your kingdom against the orcs. Whatever their misdeeds, dwarves who risk their lives for the good of Girdlegard won’t be made to hump coals in Vraccas’s smithy. Our god will forgive their sins.”

The door closed behind him with a bang.

“Ha, did you hear that?” cackled Boïndil smugly. “He didn’t answer my question. Maybe he’s not so clever after all!”

“You shouldn’t have provoked him,” scolded Tungdil, who secretly agreed with Gemmil on a number of points. “We need his help, remember.” He slid down from the stretcher and walked over to his friend, who draped a blanket over his shoulders. “At least we’ve got what we came for; our poor companions won’t have died in vain.”

They kneeled down in front of the hearth, feeling the comforting warmth of the little fire. Closing their eyes, they prayed to Vraccas to bless their fallen companions and summon them to his smithy.

Tungdil’s thoughts turned to the freelings.

He was especially keen to see one of their cities. I wonder if they’ve got their own architecture, he mused. This question and a dozen others would remain unanswered until the last army of orcs had been chased out of Girdlegard, but Tungdil was determined to return one orbit and see how the freelings lived. I’d like to stay for long enough to understand their customs.

Tungdil was thrilled by the thought of seeing new things and discovering different ways of life. While dwarves like Boïndil were happiest in their kingdoms, Tungdil longed to know as much as possible about the wider world. He was interested, for example, in how Myr’s assistants had cut through his chain mail. The sharp-edged pliers were like nothing he had seen.

Boïndil finished praying and made his way to the corner of the room where the freelings had left them some food. He shoved a hunk of bread into his mouth and beckoned to Tungdil.

“Dig in,” he instructed him between mouthfuls, spraying his beard with crumbs. “It’s going to be a tough march with your injuries, but at least Myrmianda can help.”

I’m glad I was wounded, thought Tungdil, picturing the freeling’s face. Even the soft down on her cheeks was the color of snow with a faint hint of silver…

He felt a pang of guilt, and the vision of Myr morphed into Balyndis. He remembered how he had given her his heart. It doesn’t count anymore, he told himself. She’s melded to Glaïmbar. “We’ll be in capable hands,” he said casually. He strolled over to join Boïndil in the corner.

“Their food tastes nice enough,” said the secondling grudgingly. He could barely talk because his cheeks were fit to burst. “Still, I’m not sure I like the idea of fighting shoulder to shoulder with criminals. How do we know they weren’t banished for murdering other dwarves?” He helped himself to a wedge of cheese that smelled strong enough to asphyxiate a band of orcs. “Dwarves don’t get banished for no reason.” He stopped munching and looked at Tungdil questioningly. “Their kinsfolk were right to banish them, weren’t they, scholar?”

Tungdil nodded briefly and pretended to be swallowing a mouthful of bread. He reached for the jug of dark ale.

Gemmil’s criticisms of the dwarven kingdoms had struck a chord.

He wasn’t prepared to admit as much to Boïndil, but he could see the sense in the freelings’ ideals. He had been brought up in a school where opinions were exchanged freely and nothing was exempt from scholarly consideration. Tungdil had been taught that ideas were fluid and ever-changing, but the outlook of the dwarves resembled their kingdoms: rigid, inflexible, and unyielding.