Filed Teeth

IX

The dawn gods were heaving buckets of blood up over the eastern horizon. Fetch formed us up for a pep talk. "Queen of the dwarves," Brandy mumbled. She was comical, so tiny was she when standing before a mounted Lord Hammer.

"Lord Hammer believes we are about three miles from the Gate of Kammengarn. The valley behind me will lead us there.

From the Gate those who accompany Lord Hammer will descend into the earth almost a mile. Captain Bell weather and thirty men will stay at the Gate. Six men will accompany Lord Hammer and myself."

Her style had changed radically. I had never seen her so subdued.

Fetch was scared.

"Bellweather, your job will be the hardest. It's almost certain that you will be attacked. The people of these hills believe Kammengarn to be a holy place. They know we're here. They suspect our mission. They'll try to destroy us once we prove we intend to profane their shrine. You'll have to hold them most of the day, without Lord Hammer's help."

"Now we know," Brandy muttered. "Needed us to fight his battles for him."

"Why the hell else did he hire us?" Chenyth demanded.

"Knock it off back there!" Fetch yelled.

Lord Hammer's steed pranced impatiently. Hammer's gaze swept over us. It quelled all emotion.

"Lord Hammer has appointed the following men to accompany him. Foud, of the Harish. Aboud, of the Harish. Sigurd Ormson, the Trolledyngjan. Dunklin Hanneker, the Itaskian. Willem Clarig Potter, of Kavelin. Pavlo della Contini-Mar-cusco, of Dunno Scuttari." She made a small motion with her fingers, like someone folding a piece of paper.

"Fetch!..."

"Shut up, Chenyth!" I growled.

Fetch responded, "Lord Hammer has spoken. The men named, please come to the head of the column."

I hoisted my pack, patted Chenyth's shoulder, said, "Do a good job. And stay healthy. I've got to take you back to Mom."

"Will..."

"Hey. You wanted to be a soldier. Be a soldier."

He stared at the ground, kicked a pebble.

"Good luck, Will." Brandy extended a hand. I shook. "We'll look out for him."

"All right. Thanks. Russ. Aral. You guys take care." It was a ritual of parting undertaken before times got tough.

The red-eyed horse started moving. We followed in single file. Fetch walked with Bellweather for a while. After half an hour she scampered forward to her place beside Lord Hammer. She was nervous. She couldn't keep her head or hands still.

I glanced back, past Ormson. "Fight coming," I told the Trolledyngjan. Bellweather was getting ready right now.

"Did you ever doubt it?"

"No. Not really."

The mountains crowded in. The valley narrowed till it became a steep-sided canyon. That led to a place where two canyons collided and became one. It had a flat bottom perhaps fifty yards across.

It was the most barren place I had ever seen. The boulders were dark browns. The little soil came in lighter browns. A few tufts of dessicated grass added sere browns. Even the sky took on an ochre hue...

The blackness of a crack in the mountainside ahead relieved the monochromism.

It was a natural cleft, but there were tailings everywhere, several feet deep, as if the cleft had been mined. The tailings had filled the canyon bottom, creating the little flat.

I searched the hillsides. It seemed I could feel eyes boring holes in my back. I looked everywhere but at that cavern mouth.

The darkness it contained seemed the deepest I had ever known.

Lord Hammer rode directly to it.

"Packs off," Fetch ordered. "Weapons ready." She twitched and scratched nervously. "We're going down. Do exactly as I do."

Bellweather brought the others onto the flat. He searched the mountainsides too. "They're here," he announced.

War howls responded immediately. Here, there, a painted face flashed amongst the rocks.

Arrows and spears wobbled through the air.

There were a lot of them, I reflected as I got myself between my shield and a boulder. The odds didn't look good at all.

Bellweather shouted. His men vanished behind their shields...

All but my baby brother, who just stood there with a stupefied look.

"Chenyth!" I started toward him.

"Will!" Fetch snapped. She grabbed my arm. "Stay here."

Brandy and Russ took care of him. They exploded from behind their shields, tackled the kid, covered him before he got hurt. That got his attention. He started doing the things I had been teaching the past several months.

An arrow hummed close to me, clattered on rock. Then another. I had been chosen somebody's favorite target. Time to worry about me.

The savages concentrated on Lord Hammer. Their luck was poor. Missiles found him repulsive. In fact, they seemed to loath making contact with any of us.

Not so the arrows of Bellweather's Itaskian bows.

The Itaskian bow and bowman are the best in the world. Bellweather's men wasted no arrows. Virtually every shaft brought a cry of pain.

Then Lord Hammer reached up and caught an arrow in flight.

The canyon fell silent in sheer awe.

Lord Hammer extended an arm. A falling spear became a streak of smoke.

The hillmen didn't give up. Instead, they started rolling boulders down the slopes.

"Eyes down!" Fetch screamed. "Stare at the ground."

Lord Hammer swept first his right hand, then his left, round himself. He clapped them together once.

A sheet of fire, of lightning, obscured the sky. Thunder tortured my ears. My hearing recovered only to be tormented anew by the screams of men in pain.

It had been much nastier above. Dozens of savages were staggering around with hands clasped over their eyes or ears. Several fell down the slope.

Bellweather's archers went to work.

"Let's go," Fetch said. "Remember. Do exactly what I do." The little woman was scared pale. She didn't want to enter that cavern. But she took her place beside Lord Hammer, who laid a hand atop her disheveled head.

His touch seemed fond. His fingers toyed with her stringy hair. She shivered, looked at the ground, then stalked into that black crack.

He only touched the rest of us for a second. The feeling was similar to that when he had caught me after my run-in with the siren tree. But this time the tingle coursed through my whole body.

He finished with Foud. Once more he swept hands round the mountainsides, clapped. Lightning flashed. Thunder rolled. Bellweather's archers plied their bows.

The savages were determined not to be intimidated.

Lord Hammer dismounted, strode into the darkness. The red-eyed stallion turned round, backed in after us, stopping only when its bulk nearly blocked the narrow passage. Hammer wound his way through our press, proceeded into darkness.

Fetch followed. Single file, we did the same.