Into the Forge

FOREWORD

Events are like stones cast upon waters: they make an immediate splash and waves ripple outward in ever widening circles, diminishing as they go. Significant events, like large stones, sometime send waves great enough to engulf those immediately in the path, perhaps to completely overwhelm them if they are not far enough removed from the event. Sometimes the stone is so very large as to affect the entire world (as the dinosaurs literally discovered).

It depends upon the size of the stone and its entry velocity as to whether the initial wave is enormous or minuscule. Yet whether we sink or swim does not necessarily depend upon the magnitude of this initial wave, nor, to a great extent, our distance from it, for the water is full of expanding ripples, some large, some small, all commingling, reinforcing here, negating there, and several tiny ripples can combine a half world away to cause a great effect-a butterfly effect-just as other waves great and small can completely nullify one another.

This tale is about stones cast upon waters and the intermingling of waves.

– Dennis L. McKiernan August 1996

Author's Notes

Into the Forge is the first book of the duology of Hel's Crucible. Along with the second book, Into the Fire, it tells the tale of the Great War of the Ban, as seen through the eyes of two Warrows, Tipperton Thistledown and Beau Darby.

It is a story which begins in the year 2195 of the Second Era of Mithgar, a time when the Rapt are yet free to roam about in daylight as well as night, although it is told that they prefer to do their deeds in darkness rather than under the sun.

The story of the Ban War was reconstructed from several sources, not the least of which were the Thistledown Lays. I have in several places filled in the gaps with assumptions of my own, but in the main the tale is true to its source material.

As occurs in other of my Mithgarian works, there are many instances where in the press of the moment, the humans, Mages, Elves, and others spoke in their native tongues; yet to avoid burdensome translations, where necessary I have rendered their words in Pellarion, the Common Tongue of Mithgar. However, in several cases I have left the language unchanged, to demonstrate the fact that many tongues were found throughout Mithgar. Additionally, some words and phrases do not lend themselves to translation, and these I've either left unchanged or, in special cases, I have enclosed in angle brackets a substitute term which gives the "flavor" of the word (i.e… and the like). Additionally, sundry words may look to be in error, but indeed are correct-e.g., DelfLord is but a single word though a capital L nestles among its letters.

The Elven language of Syiva is rather archaic and formal. To capture this flavor, I have properly used thee and thou, hast, dost, and the like; however, in the interest of readability, I have tried to do so in a minimal fashion, eliminating some of the more archaic terms.

For the curious, the w in Rwn takes on the sound of uu (w is, after all, a double-u), which in turn can be said to sound like oo (as in spoon). Hence, Rwn is not pronounced Renn, but instead is pronounced Roon, or Rune.

But Mithgar… Mithgar is yet wild, tempestuous, unkempt, savage, turbulent, exciting. We come here to feel alive.