Hammer and Axe

5 Realm of the Thanes

Because of the sheer size of underground Thorbardin, stretching nearly thirty miles from north to south, the assembling of a Council of Thanes took time. A minimum of three days—and more often five or six—was required for the formal, ceremonial assembly of the council members in the Great Hall of Audience. It was a cumbersome, tedious procedure to assemble the Council of Thanes. This time, the council’s purpose was to hear the reports of Mace Hammerstand and the Neidar, Gran Stonemill, although within hours of their arrival at Northgate almost everyone in Thorbardin knew what they had come to report.

Something berserk, something elementally evil, was roaming the mountains, laying waste to scattered villages, killing everyone and everything in its path. Cale Greeneye and ten Neidar were on the track of the thing, but no one yet knew what it was or where it came from. It was a thing as big as a dragon that came in darkness, cloaked in mists. As big as a dragon, but—Mace Hammerstand and the rest who had gone to Windhollow all agreed—probably not a dragon. There was no sign that magic of any kind had been used, and dragons were fond of magic.

Further, Damon Omenborn had taken it upon himself to backtrack the beast westward. He had gone with two Guard volunteers and had not reported back. Mace was becoming increasingly worried.

And, finally, Gran Stonemill had reports of human magic-users running loose in dwarven territory, and a concern about Thorbardin’s safety, because of some old, unused tunnel that most people had long since forgotten about.

It was Gran Stonemill’s concern that prompted the unprecedented decision by Olim Goldbuckle, prince of the Daewar, and Willen Ironmaul, chieftain of the Hylar, to forgo the formal meeting of the thanes and take charge of the situation themselves. The threat Gran Stonemill suggested, if it were true, was unprecedented. In all the decades, Thorbardin had never been threatened by magic. In truth, hardly anyone had ever thought about such a possibility. But now there were wizards in Kal-Thax, and they were up to something.

Some of the Hylar had seen magic used in combat a long time ago, and the memories were frightening.

Olim Goldbuckle agreed. “There just isn’t time to convene the thanes,” the old Daewar prince announced to those around him on the Daebardin wharves. “I know that tunnel. It was my own delvers who made it.”

“And sealed it later,” the warden of ways reminded him. “Nothing has gone through that tunnel in nearly ninety years. It would take an army to get into the place, much less to come all the way here through it. There are seals practically every mile of its length.”

“It is sealed, yes,” Olim agreed, fierce blue eyes blazing in a face as weathered as old leather and framed by hair and beard that still held streaks of gold among the silver. “Sealed, but not against magic. Those seals don’t have the craft that has gone into the gates. We didn’t have such craft then, and who knows what a magic-user”—he shuddered in revulsion—”can do against simple barriers?”

A sizable crowd had grown on the piers and landings of the wharf complex, people from all over Thorbardin who had heard the rumors and knew that some of the leaders would be there, summoning the Thanes to formal council.

Adding to the crowd were long lines of porters, carrying bales of goods from the busy forges for transport to Southgate. For months, every forge in Daebardin and Theibardin had been busy turning out swords, shields, maces, and helms. Bell Brightluster, the warden of trade, had accepted the largest order for arms ever approved for trade to humans. No one knew why there was this sudden requirement for arms in southern Ergoth, but Bell Brightluster had a pledge and a rumor. The pledge was from the Orders of Chivalry of Ergoth, that none of these armaments would be used against the dwarves. The rumor was that someone in Xak Tsaroth—someone of whom the knights approved—would be the recipient of the goods.

Now there was a babble of voices all around, and hundreds of dwarves crowded closer to hear.

But Quill Runebrand, keeper of the scrolls, stood looking aghast, first at Olim Goldbuckle and then at Willen Ironmaul. “But you can’t. . .” he started, then cleared his throat. “You can’t just decide what will be done for all of Thorbardin, as you might for your own clans. That isn’t how it is done. The Covenant of the Forge very clearly states that all matters of importance must be decided by the assembled leaders of all the thanes, in council.”

“We haven’t decided anything yet, Quill,” Willen reminded him, “except that we may have an emergency on our hands and that there isn’t time to go through the procedures of a council.”

“But that’s like . . . like taking it upon yourselves to lead Thorbardin!” Quill insisted. “Two chieftains can’t do that.”

“In an emergency,” Willen said stonily, “even two leaders are too many. It’s better if there is only one.”

Again Quill stared at his chieftain. “But then we’d have a king!”

“We’ll have no kings,” Olim Goldbuckle snapped. “We’ve always opposed kings.”

Barek Stone, captain general of forces, had been with the Hylar chief on his tour of Northgate, and was still present. He stepped forward now, bumping the fidgeting loremaster aside. “I’ll follow either of you,” he told Olim and Willen. “But not both. A command cannot have two masters.”

“You aren’t supposed to follow anybody, Barek!” Quill shouted. “You answer to the entire council, not to any one thane.”

Barek ignored him. “If mages find a way in here,” he told the two leaders, “there won’t be any council or anything for a council to govern. I have already commanded Gem Bluesleeve to place the elite guard in the north warren where the tunnel emerges. Mace Hammerstand will send the best units of his Roving Guard to the old citadel on Sky’s End, where it begins. Now I stand ready to take orders as to what we are to do there. From somebody!”

“They’re talking about disbanding the Council of Thanes!” People in the growing crowd spread the word.

“They’re talking about giving rule of us all to a king!”

“What king?” The question spread through the crowd. “A king from which thane?”

“Probably the Hylar,” some suggested. “They’re usually the best soldiers.”

“Soldier or not, I won’t bend the knee to any uppity Hylar!” many voices echoed.

“Well, certainly not a Daewar!” a burly, broad-shouldered Theiwar blurted. “I’ll worship lead before I proclaim any gold-molder as my sovereign.” He glanced around, then, as several Daewar blades and hammers in his vicinity were raised. “Hold on, now.” He raised his hands. “I’ve got as much right to my opinion as anybody else.”

“Not in Daebardin, you haven’t, cliff-hanger,” a Daewar delver sneered. “If there’s going to be a king here, I’ll support Olim Goldbuckle for the throne.”

“I’m going to see what Slide Tolec has to say about this,” another Theiwar snapped, turning away.

Willen Ironmaul heard the comment and shouted, “You there! Your chieftain should be on his way here right now. I sent word to all the chieftains as soon as I heard Gran’s report.”

“Well, in that case there will be a meeting of the thanes,” someone else in the crowd pointed out. “So what’s all the argument about?”

Willen Ironmaul sighed, glanced at Olim Goldbuckle and shrugged. “He’s right,” he said. “There will be a meeting.”

Again Quill Runebrand pushed his way to the front, his eyes blazing. “A meeting isn’t a council!” he hissed. “We don’t do business that way. To assemble the council, first there must be a general call, and bonded runners must carry the seals to all the thanes. . . Well, all but the Aghar, since they aren’t easily found. Then the points of question must be enscrolled and read by criers in all the concourses, and the council must assemble in the Hall of Audience so everybody who wants to can . . .

A powerful hand closed on Quill’s neck, and he was lifted and turned to stare into the cold eyes of Barek Stone. “With all due respect,” the captain general snarled, “shut up and stay out of the way. We have a situation here.”

“Indeed we do,” Olim Goldbuckle looked around thoughtfully at the growing crowd of dwarves on his wharf. There were thousands of them present now, and more coming. He turned to Barek Stone. “Turn the lore-master loose, Barek,” he said.

When the seething keeper of scrolls was again standing on his own feet, Olim asked him, “You know the procedures by heart, I take it?”

“I certainly do!” Quill nodded. “It’s my job.”

“Then you certainly know the emergency clause in the Covenant, don’t you?”

“Of course. It says that. . . oh,” Quill stammered, blinking. “Oh, yes. There is the emergency clause.”

“And what does the emergency clause say?”

“It just says that in case of emergency the formalities can be dispensed with, and whatever chieftains can get together will decide what to do.”

“Exactly.” The prince of the Daewar nodded. “And we will do that now.” He pointed. Out on the waters, a cable-boat was cutting a broad wake as boatmen hauled at their winches. In the bow was a large group of masked Daergar, with Vog Ironface at the forefront.

“That makes three,” Willen noted. “And Slide is on his way.”

“I’m here,” a deep voice called. The crowds to the north parted as a company of Theiwar marched forward, led by Slide Tolec.

“Four,” Willen Ironmaul counted. “Cale Greeneye is out, searching for that beast-thing, so the Neidar . . .”

“Cale put me in charge,” Gran Stonemill offered. “I can speak for the Neidar if I must.” “Five.” Willen nodded. “How about Pakka Trune?”

“He and some other Klar are right behind us,” the Theiwar chieftain said. “They’ll be here soon.”

“Six,” the Hylar said. “Does anyone know where what’s-his-name is? The Aghar Highbulp?”

“Probably asleep or lost,” someone sneered.

“Just the First.” Quill reminded his chieftain of the name of the gully dwarf leader.

“And one of him is enough,” someone nearby said. “If he doesn’t keep his people out of my root cellar, I’m going to start throwing rocks at them on sight.”

“Well, we won’t wait for him,” Olim said. “When Pakka Trune gets here we’ll meet. . . ah, over there will do. Where the awnings are.”

“Good!” someone nearby snapped. “Then we can have a few decisions.”

“About what?” someone else wanted to know. “About who’s to be king?”

“No kings!” a hundred voices clamored, as others around them chimed in. “It better not be a Theiwar!” . . . “I won’t stand for a Daergar king!” . . . “No Daewar!” . . . “Why would I want a Hylar king? I’m Theiwar!” . . . “I’ll follow none but a Daergar.”

Slide Tolec had reached the other chieftains. Now the Theiwar gazed around, frowning. “We need a bit of wisdom here,” he said.

“We may need a miracle,” Barek Stone offered. “If these people can’t agree on anything, who is going to direct us if it turns out we really are in trouble?”

“You have guards in place on the tunnel, Barek,” Willen Ironmaul said. “Is it secure?”

“For the moment, yes.” The captain general nodded. “But if it is found by mages . . . well, we don’t know what mages can do.”

“If action is needed, Olim can direct it.”

“Why me?” the Daewar prince snapped. “Why not you? Or Slide? Or . . .” “Don’t look at me,” Pakka Trune growled as he stepped up to take his place among the assembled leaders. “You know my people. I can barely control them, much less all of Thorbardin.”

“Well, then, why not Vog Ironface?” Olim pointed at the Daergar chieftain, just now pushing his way through the crowd.

“Why not me, what?” the Daergar demanded, his voice hollow behind his slitted iron mask.

“They’re trying to choose a king,” a frowning dwarf with twin cudgels snapped.

“We are not!” Olim Goldbuckle roared. “No kings! I’ve heard enough about kings!”

“Then what are you trying to do?” several nearby dwarves demanded.

“We’re trying to have an emergency meeting of the council,” Willen Ironmaul shouted angrily. Behind him, the Ten drew their weapons and spread to face the crowd in all directions.

“Who’s calling the meeting?” Quill Runebrand asked, getting out his quills and his paper.

“You heard the report first, Willen,” Olim suggested.

“You’re senior,” Willen snapped.

“Oh, all right! I, Olim Goldbuckle, prince of Thane Daewar, do hereby summon the Council of Thanes to emergency session!”

“To consider what?” Quill asked, his steel nib scratching away busily.

“Questions of state!” Olim roared.

“Of defense,” Willen reminded him.

“Reorx!” Barek Stone muttered.

Far in the distance, in the direction of the Warren Road, trumpets sounded, echoed by others nearer, then by others nearer still. The crowd went silent, and Barek Stone listened intently. His face went pale behind his beard.

“A new report,” he told the assembled chieftains.

“Those three human wizards that escaped the Road of Passage. . .”

“What about them?” Willen asked. “Are they found?”

“No, they haven’t been found. But there aren’t just three anymore. Riders at the Ergoth border say that more humans entered the road two days ago, and now they can’t be found. They’ve disappeared.”

“More wizards?” Olim Goldbuckle grimaced. “How many?”

“Many,” Mace said. “Maybe a hundred or more.”

Cale Greeneye and his Neidar volunteers had located a trail within a few miles of Windhollow. It was the trail of a creature, and the trace itself told them something of what had made it. The thing was big, and it was heavy. Huge talons had gouged deep into the soil in some places, and had crushed small stones in others. It walked on two feet, and it had a long, twitching tail.

And sometimes, instead of walking, it flew. It had wings—scrapes on stone outcroppings said that the wings were barbed with talons of their own—and could fly, but it seemed never to fly very far. A few hundred yards here, to cross a chasm, a dozen yards or so there, to leap a cleft. Elsewhere the tracks led to the lip of a cliff and began again below as though the thing had soared downward, but not far out.

In one place, where it had flown over a thicket of scrub oak, the tops of trees were broken where it had passed.

“Either it prefers not to fly, or it isn’t very good at it,” Cale told his followers. “It doesn’t seek the heights, or spend much time on the wing.”

Eventually, they found a witness. An Einar herder, far out in search of stray goats, had been walking along the bottom of a crevice in late evening when he happened to look up and see something unusual—something large and nebulous—cross a clearing nearby.

He had seen it only briefly. “It was like a fog bank drifting by,” he told them. “Except that there was something inside the fog. I could hardly see it. Then a wind came, and for a moment the mists were swept back. I saw it then. It was gray, like steel. Not bright like Daewar steel, but darker, like Daergar blades. And it was big. It looked like a big lizard, but shaped more like a . . . well, like a skinny turkey except that its head and neck were larger, and thrust forward, not up. Two legs, and two . . . something like wings. And it had a great, long tail that shimmered like wet iron.”

“How big was it?” Cale asked the herder.

“About like this.” The dwarf paced off a distance of more than thirty feet. “Best I could tell, anyway. Maybe even bigger. It was hard to see, except when the fog was blown aside.”

“Was there other fog?”

“No, it was a clear evening. But there was fog around that thing. It wore fog the way I’d wear a fine cloak—if I had such a useless thing as a fine cloak. The fog went with it, and covered it.”

“What did you do?”

“Do?” The herder squinted at him. “I did what anybody would. I hid until it was gone.”

“Did you find your lost goats?” Crag Ironface asked.

“Three.” The herder frowned. “Or maybe four. Something had found them first, and there wasn’t enough left of them to tell.”

“Don’t look for the rest,” Cale told him. “Go home and warn your people. The thing you saw has wiped out three villages so far. Be on your guard, and if you see fog, scatter and hide.”

“Out here, I hide,” the herder said stubbornly. “If a thing like that comes to my home, I fight.”

“They fought at those villages, too,” Cale said, bleakeyed. “They fought, and they died just like your goats died.”

“And still you Neidar are seeking it? What will you do when you find it?”

“I don’t know,” Cale admitted. “Kill it, if we can.”

For another day, the Neidar tracked the fog-thing. Then, in a deep hollow, as dusk shadows darkened, the thing found them.

The first warning came when Cale glanced up from the faint trail and noticed a mist settling over the hollow. Above, the sky was clear, but suddenly they were surrounded by deep mist turning to fog.

“Hist!” He raised a hand and reined in. “The thing is here . . . somewhere. Keep your eyes open. Stay together.”

Their eyes strained as they backed their horses into a tight group. Weapons drawn, they scanned the dimming spaces around them. For long moments, they saw nothing. Suddenly dense fog swirled forward out of dark shadows, a cold, rolling fog that seemed to spring at them, as though to engulf them.

“Retreat!” Cale shouted. “Stay away from the fog!”

They backed their horses away, watching, then turned and ran as the fog bank surged toward them. Just behind them they heard a sound that started as the hissing of wind, then grew to a shriek of rage.

“Spread and hold!” Cale commanded. Eleven horses pivoted and planted solid feet. In their saddles eleven dwarves leaned forward, shields up and weapons raised.

For an instant, the rolling mass of fog seemed to hesitate, as though considering the semicircle of dwarves. Abruptly, the shriek came again, this time a deep, rumbling roar that echoed from the hillsides. With the roar came a surge of fog as though a high wind were behind it. Thick mist engulfed three of the dwarves; from within came the sounds of blows being struck and cries of pain. A dwarf screamed. A horse shrieked in pain, then another. The sounds became sounds of ripping and tearing, of crushing of armor and bone.

“Attack it!” Cale shouted, putting hard heels to his horse. Hooves thundered, and eight Neidar spread, circled, and charged into the blinding mist. Cale drove six yards into blindness, then twelve, and suddenly saw a dark form ahead. Reining his mount aside, he closed and swung a mighty cut with his axe. The blade rang as though against steel, and something very large whisked past him just above his head. He pivoted, followed, and swung again.

This time the blade encountered a softer hardness, like chain mesh, and something roared in anger. He heard other blows being struck, but could see nothing. Then the roar of rage grew louder, and he looked up. Above the low mist, something reared high, a huge head with daggerlike teeth turning this way and that. Cale and someone else—he could not see who—charged in directly under the towering beast, swinging at its underbelly. But again it was as though the blades encountered stone or steel.

The thing reared again, seemed to pause, then pounced, and Cale saw a wide, grasping thing that might have been a foot or a ridged wing with talons drop down upon the dwarf next to him. Bones crunched, blood-mist spewed in the fog, and dwarf and horse were both ripped apart in an instant.

From somewhere a great tail swept around, barely missing Cale and his horse. They backed away. It was no use. They were trying to fight something they could not even see. “Break and run!” he shouted. “Break free! Escape!”

As Cale cleared the mist, another rider was right behind him. He heard other hooves as well, going in another direction.

The fog bank swirled and roared, surging after them, then turned to pursue someone else. Halfway up the slope above the hollow, Cale slowed his horse, turned, and recognized Crag Ironface beside him. They looked back, and the fog was gone. Where it had been, Cale saw only shadows, but he heard the Daergar’s gasp of shock as his miner’s eyes saw what was there.

“Reorx!” Crag breathed. “I don’t know how many we lost, Cale. Dwarves . . . horses . . . There’s nothing whole down there. Only . . . only sundered pieces!”

By morning light they reassembled, those who were left. Cale Greeneye, Crag Ironface, and a Theiwar youth, Pounce Tambac, who was afoot. He had outrun the fog-thing, even though his horse had fallen and been caught by it.

Out of eleven armed and mounted Neidar, only three remained. Three dwarves and two horses.

“Do you think we hurt that thing at all?” Crag asked grimly.

“No,” Cale admitted. “No, I don’t think we even scratched it. We’ve paid a heavy price, and it is still out there, going where it will.”

“East.” Crag pointed. “East, toward Thorbardin.”

“A waste.” Pounce Tambac frowned. “All for nothing.”

“Not for nothing,” Cale said. “We know about the thing now. We know what it can do, and a little of what it can’t.”

“What can’t that thing do?” Pounce squinted at him.

“It doesn’t move rapidly,” Cale noted. “It’s agile, but it’s not very fast. Also, its wings aren’t really wings. They’re more like webbed claws. That’s why it doesn’t fly far or often . . . it can’t. And we know it can’t see through its own fog. Not very well, anyway. It had to rear above it to find us.”

“That’s all very well,” Pounce sighed. “But how do we kill it?”

“I don’t know,” Cale admitted. “We’ll just have to think of something.”

“Are we going after it again?” Crag asked. “The three of us?”

“No. That’s no use. We’ll have to get help.”