Secret of Pax Tharkas

TWENTY-FOUR

G arn Bloodfist went straight to the thane, finding him-as always-on the catwalk high inside the Tharkadan Wall. Tarn Bellowgranite was supervising the placement of the rocks, nearly all of which had been lifted up from the floor where they had lain for more than eighty years. Bloodfist clenched his fists, shaking his head in a physical effort to remind himself to be calm when all he wanted was to grab Tarn by the shoulders and shake him into some sense of alarm.

The thane cut the Klar captain off before he could speak. “This last step is crucial,” Tarn explained, gesturing at the complicated mechanism of gears and chains and pulleys, clearly entranced by the sight and taking no notice of the fact that his listener was trying to get a word in edgewise. “The counterbalance is important; it’s why the simple pull of a lever is enough to dump half a million tons of rock down into the gateway.”

“Yes, I see,” Bloodfist said, stopping himself from rolling his eyes. How long had he feigned interest in a task that, to his mind, was endless and meaningless?

“I’m glad you do see, my captain,” replied the old dwarf. Garn was startled at the earnestness with which his ruler addressed him. “For this great task is almost completed. At one time I felt that it would not happen during my lifetime; now I think the chances are good that I will see the final rocks raised into the trap before the end of this month.

“But when I’m gone, my valiant Klar, this great mechanism, this fortress, these hallowed towers will all be the responsibility of you and the other clan captains. I want you to welcome this trust, and I trust you will prove worthy of the task you shall inherit.”

“My liege,” Garn said, driven by exasperation to disrespectful bluntness. The image of his father’s gashed and bleeding body, the mute plea for vengeance he saw every time he looked skyward into those dying eyes, would not allow patience. “I believe you have done a great service to the Hylar and Klar exiles by your work here in Pax Tharkas. But I want you to know: my goals remain higher. Pax Tharkas is a splendid base for us, a fortress we can use to launch the next campaign. But you must know that I am still determined, before my years are through, to regain our status in Thorbardin itself!”

Tarn Bellowgranite sighed. “I understand your ambitions, my bold warrior. But I hope you will come to see that you are advocating a hopeless and destructive course. Thorbardin is sealed from within, and any intrusion by ourselves, or anyone else, would surely be met with crushing force. No, Garn, Jungor Stonespringer might as well have caved in the mountain on that entire dwarven realm, for it is lost to us and the surface world forevermore.”

“I know there is bitterness in your heart, my thane; surely it was a rank betrayal that brought us to exile! You know it cost my father his very life! But I think you are letting it cloud your judgment!”

“Don’t be a fool!” snapped Tarn. “The Hylar and the Theiwar would unite against you in a finger snap. The Daergar would not be your friends either! You would invade Thorbardin with a few hundred warriors and meet an army of ten thousand!”

Garn took a deep breath, conscious of the eyes-and ears-of the nearby laborers who had paused in their work. He trembled at the rebuke, and his own eyes bulged while his hands clenched into fists. With every fiber of will, he reminded himself that Tarn Bellowgranite was a revered figure among the Hylar exiles. It would be foolish to display overt contempt for the thane. So he hung his head with a humility he did not feel. “I accept your reasoning, my liege. Please accept my apologies. I spoke not from the head, but from the heart.”

“I understand, Garn. It is not easy to live as we do, with the memories of past greatness all around us. But we must be strong and our path must be reasoned.”

Had the old, senile thane abandoned all hope of future greatness? Garn wanted to scream the question aloud, but instead he bowed and walked meekly away.

Yet his passive demeanor marked a growing anger and a fierce determination. He had come to speak to Tarn Bellowgranite about a different matter, and as it turned out, he had not been allowed a chance to even broach the issue. He was still shaking, and only with a conscious effort was he able to unclench his fists. Reorx curse him-it was Tarn Bellowgranite who was the fool!

Never mind. He didn’t need his thane’s permission to make important decisions! By Reorx, the fool was so busy lifting his rocks, he didn’t care what else went on in the world anymore.

Garn maintained his apartments in the East Tower, claiming one floor of the tower for his own use and garrisoning the three hundred dwarves of his mobile company on the floors just below. He strode onto the uppermost of those garrison floors, where a number of his warriors were playing gambling games while others were busy sharpening their weapons or catching up on their sleep.

He nodded to two of his oldest followers, burly mountain dwarves with a great capacity for violence and an almost nonexistent penchant for analyzing the moral aspects of whatever tasks Garn Bloodfist assigned them. “Crank, Bilious,” he barked. “Come with me, and bring your swords.”

The two armed dwarves willingly accompanied him down the long series of stairways leading to the ground level and into the dungeon below that. The two thuggish Klar warriors asked no questions as Garn led them into the deepest levels of the east dungeon. They were always eager for action and oblivious to causes or motives.

“We’re going to put an end to some irritating mischief,” the captain explained as they reached the lowest level. “This prisoner is proving to be more trouble than he can possibly be worth.”

They advanced into the portcullis room, the square chamber connecting to the deepest dungeon passage, and here Garn came up short as he spotted a ragged little figure sleeping in the corner.

“You again?” he barked, rousing the gully dwarf with a sharp kick. “Didn’t I warn you to get lost?”

“Oh, great prince!” cried the miserable creature, throwing himself on the ground at Garn’s feet and salaaming the Klar. “Thank you for come here!”

“Get out of my way,” the Klar captain growled. “I have work to do!”

“Oh, not with dwarf prisoner, no!” insisted the gully dwarf with startling conviction. He stood defiantly in the path of the mountain dwarves. “My mistake. Go away!”

“What’s this?” muttered Garn, almost amused.

“Move, you,” declared Crank, whipping out his sword and waving the blade at the bold Aghar.

“You move!” declared the runt, dashing forward and biting the armed mountain dwarf on the knee.

“Hey! Ouch!” howled Crank. “You miserable little half-pint!”

He swung his blade, but somehow the gully dwarf, who was almost under his feet, scampered away. Bilious also moved to cut him off, blocking him from fleeing through the door deeper into the dungeon. “Where do you think you’re going?” the menacing warrior demanded.

The two armed dwarves closed in on the Aghar, but the little fellow dived to his belly and scooted right between Crank’s legs.

Garn had been chuckling, but he had had enough. “Cut him down and be done with him!” snapped the Klar captain. “We’ve got more important things to do!”

The mountain dwarves spun and pursued, and the gully dwarf dashed out the door. But Bilious had anticipated the move and leaped to block the Aghar’s escape. The dirty gully dwarf found himself trapped, his back to the corridor wall, one armed mountain dwarf inside the square room, the other blocking his passage down the corridor. Bilious stabbed, aiming low, and the Aghar sprang upward, flailing with his hands, clawing at the mold-slick stone on the dungeon wall. There was nothing to grab there on the surface of the wall itself, but his hand came into contact with a metal lever jutting up from a narrow slot.

The gully dwarf seized the lever with both hands, intending to pull himself up and away from his attacker’s blade. Instead, his weight caused the lever to drop sharply, plunging him onto his rump on the floor. A catch was released and unseen chains made a rattling noise as Bilious charged, stabbing wildly. The frantic gully dwarf tumbled out of the path of the attack, and the three enraged mountain dwarves stumbled over the Aghar, sprawling across the floor of the dungeon.

The chains rattled louder and faster, metal clanging against stone, as the two portcullis gates dropped into their deep sockets on the floor. Two metal grates closed off the chamber, blocking the way into the halls of prisoner cells and also closing the way back up into the East Tower. The small square room was, for all intents and purposes, a cell in its own right.

And Garn Bloodfist, Bilious, and Crank were all trapped inside.

The army of hill dwarves snaked its way through the rugged terrain, skirting the Plains of Dergoth, advancing on Pax Tharkas from the south. At its head marched Harn Poleaxe, hailed as “Lord Poleaxe” by one and all. He sat astride a horse, a mighty sword resting in his lap, while all the rest of his army advanced on foot. The plumed helm rested on his head, and he kept the visor closed-except when he took a drink-because he had seen that his dwarves were shaken by the sight of his increasingly bloody, lumpy face. Still, he barely noticed them, strung out in a column more than a mile long behind him. His eyes, for now and forever, were fixed ahead, on the future.

And the future would be found in Pax Tharkas.

Harn had been pleased and rather surprised when more than three thousand hill dwarves had answered his summons to war. They had come from the farms and villages and towns of the Neidar scattered throughout the valleys and plains below the lofty summits of the High Kharolis. Marching eagerly, singing ancient songs of war, gathering from pairs to platoons to companies as they converged on Hillhome, they had responded to his call with a cheerful eagerness to make war and a seemingly unquenchable thirst for revenge.

Some of the Neidar were grizzled veterans, bearing scars earned during the War of Souls or the Chaos War or, for some of the eldest, even the War of the Lance. They limped and cursed and argued, but they marched and were ready to fight. Far more of them were strapping adults or callow youths, unblooded and unscarred but eager to face the ultimate truth of battle. Some were drunk, others were crazed, but most were hale and hearty.

All of them shared an abiding hatred of the mountain dwarves. That hatred had seethed and simmered for years and, finally, had its fuse lit by Poleaxe’s message. All had seen the damage, felt the injustice, of the Klar raids that had terrorized their lands for the past decade. An assault against Pax Tharkas had been considered a hopeless, quixotic notion. But they had been swayed by the eloquence of Harn’s appeal.

“Aye-uh,” said Axel Carbondale, a legendary captain of axemen through the course of three wars, upon his arrival in Hillhome. “I couldn’t have said it any better myself.”

“I’ve been trying to say it for years!” declared Carpus Castlesmasher, mayor of Bloodford, a hero who had been decorated five times for his company’s doughty defense against draconians and ogres over the past decades. “But you said it in a way that all the Neidar understand,” he admitted, his eyes shining with admiration as he offered Harn Poleaxe his sword and his life.

There were more than four hundred pikemen from the villages around the Plains of Dergoth. Nearly twice that many hill dwarves armed with crossbows and daggers came from small woodland villages. The foothill mines produced five companies of heavy infantry, each dwarf protected to the eyelids by heavy plate armor and bearing axes that could split the shield, or the skull, of any foe with a single blow. Swords were sharpened, spare spears fashioned, and provisions collected from every field, silo, and barnyard.

They had gathered on the slopes around Hillhome, camping in the great square and in the fields just beyond the town, carousing in the inns every night and generally driving the good citizens of the town to cower in their homes, bar their doors and windows, and wait for the scourge to be gone. Fortunately for them, Poleaxe was eager to start the expedition.

He summoned all the captains, and as many of the men who could squeeze there, into the plaza of the town. They crowded in there to hear him with battle lust in their hearts. He wore his helm, seeing that all would come to recognize the lofty plume of black and white feathers. The visor was lifted, and he took frequent sips from the jug he carried.

“I want you to hearken back to the days of the Dwarfgate War, my hill dwarf kinsmen!” he had declared when the last recruits arrived and the volunteer army stretched as far as the eye could see. He stalked back and forth on the raised platform in Hillhome’s square, his voice booming out, ringing across the plaza, carrying even to the ranks of dwarves packed into every side street. His listeners were rapt, absorbing every word. When he turned his blood-spotted face, more than half covered with bloody warts, toward those in the front rows, they stared back at him in a mixture of horror and awe. But they absorbed his words and thumped their chests in response to his commands.

“These mountain dwarves in Pax Tharkas are the hated Klar, the arrogant Hylar! They are the ones who sealed Thorbardin against our kind long ago, when the gods sent the Cataclysm raining down upon our world! And they are the ones who visited such terrible devastation upon us when the wizard Fistandantilus, wanting only fairness for our ancestors, sought passage through the undermountain lands.”

He drew a breath, letting the powerful images of the past, each evoking a tragic racial memory, wash over the gathered fighters. Taking a long drink, he allowed the tension to build before he spoke again.

“This Hylar captain who struck Hillhome out of the calm of a peaceful morning, whose warriors slaughtered our women and children and left their bodies to bleed in the street, he should be the first to die… and then all the arrogant ones like him. I ask you, my clansmen, are we to put up with Hylar arrogance forever?”

A resounding “No!” roared from a thousand and more throats-at least from the throat of every hill dwarf who was close enough to hear what Poleaxe was saying. The rest filling the streets, the throng extending to the far outskirts of town, also cheered and shouted as the message that was passed to them increased in shrillness and hate.

Then a murmur, followed by a hush, spread through the gathering, moving in reverse of Harn’s message, like a wave flowing from the town’s outskirts toward the central square. Poleaxe was surprised to see that the wave originated from the narrow lane where the Mother Oracle lived, and as he watched, he saw the crowd of hill dwarves parting to allow one, still unseen from the square, to pass. He allowed himself to hope.

She came! The old dwarf crone hobbled forward, leaning on a crooked staff, her shawl wrapped tightly around her skinny frame, exposing only her wrinkled face, her pale, blind eyes, and the clawlike fingers of her hands. The hill dwarves gawked at her rare appearance-she hadn’t been outside of her hut in years-and gave her a wide berth, pressing onto the sidewalks and alleys as she tottered along the center of the street.

As she entered the square, the whole town fell silent, and a wide path appeared in the throng as it became clear that she was making for the raised platform where Harn Poleaxe stood. He hopped down to the ground and took her hand as she reached the edge. Still holding the jug in his other hand, he guided her up the steps and onto the dais.

“Behold, my Neidar!” Harn bellowed. “The Mother Oracle has come to bless our endeavor!”

The cheer that washed over them was sudden, loud, and sustained. Harn, who loomed over the old woman, was conscious of her stature, as if she were the large one. He stood back and, as the warriors settled in to listen, the crone raised her hand and waved it in the air. The Neidar, as a group, sighed in pleasure as if a physical blessing had been bestowed.

“My beloved hill dwarves,” she began, in a high-pitched voice that, somehow, seemed to carry to all the many thousands of ears in attendance. “Today you embark upon a mission that is blessed by Reorx himself. For ever is our god a foe of injustice, and never has a people suffered greater injustice than his Neidar.

“The mountain dwarves have wronged you, tortured you, made war upon you for many centuries. For all those years, you have been patient and virtuous, disdaining the vengeance that is so rightfully yours. Yet each crime against you, each murder and theft and injustice, has been catalogued by the Master of the Forge. And soon, my Neidar, that record of wrongs shall be made right!

“For know: you march on a quest that is greater than your own desires, mightier than the wrongs that have been done just to you warriors alone. You march to right the wrongs that have been done to all your people, for all the years of the world. You march in righteousness! You march to vengeance! And most of all, you march to victory!”

At her last word, she clenched her talonlike fingers into a fist. A cloud of smoke erupted from the place where she stood, provoking gasps of awe. Even Harn Poleaxe took a step back, gaping in astonishment as the smoke dissipated and he discerned that the old dwarf woman was gone. He raised his jug and took a long drink, aware of the murmurs growing into a dull roar from the gathered throng.

Poleaxe stood tall, raising his long arms over his head and clasping his hands together into a single triumphant fist. The power of the potion pulsed through him, and he felt as though he could smash down the walls of Pax Tharkas with the blows of his own flesh.

But he had an army to carry those walls.

“My Neidar!” he cried, and his voice was like the roar of a bull ogre. “March with me! Make war on the mountain dwarves! Carry their fortress, and end their miserable lives!”

And, he told himself with a private smirk, he had an even more potent ally in reserve-a creature whose desire for killing and vengeance rivaled his own. As the roars of approval rose from the throats of his troops, he sensed the power of his great band, and he knew they were invincible.

“Now, hill dwarves! Now we march! We march to avenge our ancestors! We march to punish our foes! And we march to bring the Neidar to the greatness that has ever been denied!”

The final roar swelled like thunder, carrying through the town, into the air, up and over the ridges of the surrounding hills. The noise had echoed, like terrible thunder or the crashing of powerful waves, as the hill dwarves zestfully hoisted their weapons and marched to war. Even then, a week’s march north of the town, drawing ever closer to their ancient objective, the songs of war and victory rose from the Neidar throats, resounding from the mountain ridges, carried on wings of battle toward the ears of Reorx himself.

“Open this gate, you miserable runt-you filthy gully dwarf!” roared the dwarf captain, pounding his fists against the bars of the portcullis. “Or I’ll tear your arms off and stuff them into your useless mouth!”

Gus huddled on the floor, just on the other side of the closed portcullis-wisely staying far enough away that the trapped mountain dwarves couldn’t reach him with their swords, which they had poked through the grid as soon as they realized they were trapped. He was too terrified to do anything, much less run away.

The Aghar stared, open mouthed, at the enraged dwarves. He wasn’t sure how they had managed to get trapped, though in the back of his mind he suspected it had something to do with the lever he had grabbed. The eyes of the great captain bulged so far from his face that it seemed as though they might pop right out of his head.

“I only want to climb wall,” he protested. “I not try to drop gate!”

His pleadings only seemed to inflame the dwarves. The big captain practically foamed at the mouth, while his two big henchmen each took hold of the nearest gate. Working together, straining until sweat streaked their skin and veins bulged on their foreheads, they were able to lift the massive barrier only scant inches before it crashed back down and they collapsed, gasping for breath.

“I tell you-if you don’t open this gate immediately, your fate will be a suffering that your worst nightmares could never imagine.” The captain’s eyes were wild, bulging, and staring, and he snarled like a wild animal, straining to reach through the closely set bars.

Gus, having endured some very terrible nightmares in his pathetic life, found the threat to be ominous indeed. But he simply didn’t know how to raise the gate, and all the blustering warnings in the world weren’t going to change that. He was terribly afraid of the big, furious dwarves, but it gradually dawned on him that he might sneak away from there and, so long as the gate remained closed, his antagonists wouldn’t be able to chase him.

Thus, he wheeled and sprinted off into the darkness, hearing the sounds of the infuriated Klar cursing echoing through the dark passage behind him.

He came to the wardroom leading to Gretchan’s secret room, but she had been so upset before, he didn’t dare approach her. A big mess, he thought miserably, it’s all a big mess.

Still running, he realized he was headed toward the passage where the Kayolin dwarf was imprisoned, which terminated in a dead end not far beyond Brandon’s cell. As long as he was in the neighborhood, he might as well see if the bad kisser dwarf was still alive. He peeked in.

There came a sound from inside the cell, and a fist appeared, clutching the bars on the door. “Hello?”

The question was tentative, suspicious. Gus looked upward and saw Brandon’s face appear in the small, barred window. The Hylar, upon seeing a mere gully dwarf staring back, shrugged his shoulders and moved back into the cell.

Gus thought for a moment, feeling helpless and afraid. The bad kisser dwarf didn’t seem so bad up close, and he hadn’t even tried to kiss Gus.

He ought to do something, he told himself, thinking of the trapped angry dwarves and all the mistakes he had made. There was only one thing he could think of: he went back to the secret door outside of Gretchan’s room. Mustering all of his courage, he knocked on the wooden panel, suddenly worried that she might not be there.

And when she opened the door, she did not look as mad as she had been when he had so anxiously retreated from her presence a day or two earlier.

“Hello, Gus,” she said, frowning down at him. “What do you want this time?”

He wanted to throw himself into her arms and beg forgiveness, but instead he mustered all of his noble character and spoke to her.

“Mean dwarf prince comes to hurt prisoner. I sorry for before and try help. They locked up now, but they still want to come here and hurt him, us. We gotta get prisoner out of there, or else… or else…” He sniffled loudly and wiped away a tear.

To his immense relief, Gretchan did lean down and pat him on the shoulder. “Thank you for coming,” she said, all very matter-of-fact, as though she had known he was coming and what he would say. “That was very brave. Now what do you mean, ‘locked up’?”

“Here, let me show,” he said, tugging her hand, pulling her out of the garrison room and into the corridor. “Wait here,” he whispered as they came closer to the place. “You listen.”

He strolled forward around the last corner and was immediately spotted by the big dwarf captain, who was down on his knees, grunting as he tried to budge the cage.

“You! Gully dwarf! Come here, damn your eyes! Turn that lever and pull this gate up, or so help me Reorx-”

Gus didn’t wait to hear more. He raced back around the corner and was surprised to see that Gretchan was laughing. At first he was insulted, but then his chest swelled with pride as she clapped him on the back and whispered, “Well done!”

Then she frowned. “But you’re right. We have to get Brandon out of here before they’re freed, or they’ll… I don’t know what they’ll do, but I don’t want to find out. We’d better hurry. Others will be coming down to see what happened to them.”

With Gus and Kondike racing along behind her, she hurried to the cell where the dwarf was imprisoned. Pressing her face to the grate, she called to him. Immediately he appeared.

“Trouble,” she said. “No time to explain, but we’ve got to get you out of here now.”

“I’m all in favor of that,” Brandon replied. “But how? Did you bring a key?”

She shook her head. Pulling her little silver hammer from her belt, she warned the dwarf: “Stand back.”

“Why?” Brandon asked incredulously, giving a slight chuckle. “In case the hammer breaks and a piece goes flying?”

“Suit yourself,” Gretchan replied. She hoisted the little tool, which had a head shaped much like the anvil on her staff, and swung it lightly against the latch on the cell door.

The explosion was so deafening, Gus covered his ears. Wood splintered and iron screeched as the portal was blown off its hinges, the bulk of the heavy door sent flying back into the cell, where it knocked Brandon onto the floor. The heavy wooden beams forming the door were shattered, and the lock itself had shattered into a hundred metal shards.

“How did you do that?” gasped Brandon, sitting up in astonishment and pushing the wreckage of the door off himself. Aside from some nicks and bruises, he looked only a little worse for wear. “It looked like you only tapped it!”

“Looks can be deceiving,” she replied slyly. “Now do you want to have a long conversation, or do you want to get out of there.”

“Get out!” Brandon replied, shucking away the broken beams and pushing himself up. He glared at her. “But you could have warned me.”

“I tried,” said Gretchan, grinning.

The big mountain dwarf stepped to the door of the cell then stopped. “Wait. I know you carry that hammer with you everywhere; you had it in Hillhome. So you could have done this anytime? Gotten me out of here?”

“I told you-there’s no time to talk!” she snapped in agitation.

“Damn it, I want some answers!” Brandon growled. “You’ve been feeding me, bringing me soup-by Reorx, you kissed me through the bars of the cell! When all this time you could have let me out with one swing of your hammer! It’s like I’ve been some kind of caged pet!”

She snorted but then looked away, abashed. In another moment, her face hardened. “Look. We can talk about it later. For now, I’m getting away. Are you coming along?”

“Oh, I’m coming, all right-if only to get those answers you promised!” Brandon muttered, emerging into the dark corridor. “Who’s that?” he said immediately, pointing to Gus and wrinkling his nose.

Gus sulked and pointed back at Brandon, wrinkling his nose in similar fashion.

“Oh, that’s just Gus,” said Gretchan. “He helped save your life. After he almost got you killed. It’s another long story for later. Now come on!”

“Where are we going?” asked Brandon as she led all three at a trot back out of the dead-end corridor.

“Just trust me,” she said. “This place is full of surprises, and I’ve been learning a lot of them.”