The industrial part of the mine fanned out in a half-circle from the hillside, with the actual town sprawling out less regularly beyond it. We agreed the sword wouldn’t have been kept there and so we focused on the mine complex itself.
Serah led the way, walking with her eyes closed as she tried to detect any traces of the sword’s presence. I doubted it would work - it had been a month since it was here, how could anything still be felt? - but both Serah and Tiriel seemed confident it wasn’t just a waste of time.
I walked in the rear, together with Thord.
“What do your mines look like?” I asked him as we walked in between two of the huge buildings.
“Nothing like this,” he said. “They are all underground. We don’t have those noisy buildings.”
“How do you handle the smoke, if it’s all underground?”
“We don’t need all this smoke!” he grinned. “We use magic instead.”
Oh, of course. Magic again. I tried to remember what everyone had been telling me. “Dwarves have... earth magic, right?” I hazarded.
“Exactly,” he said. “You’ve met one of our battle mages. That’s a honorable profession, but the greatest mages work in the mines.”
“I don’t understand. How does it work?”
He shook his head. “I do not know it well. They use their magic to shape the stone, to make tunnels and halls and caverns, but also to... pull the stone apart and take out the metals. I believe humans use fire to do that.”
“Yes,” I said. “Arndrir said they mine coal here too. Coal and iron.” Just then we passed an open door with heat and yellow light spilling out. I gestured at Thord and we took a few quick steps to glance inside.
The building was probably ten stories tall, and ladders and girders disappeared into the shadows above. Right in front was a tall complex of pipes and girders. Intense light shone from an opening at the bottom, where molten iron was being poured out into a metal bucket. People in thick leather suits scurried around the bucket, and there was continuous roaring noise.
“What is that?” Thord shouted.
“It’s some kind of blast furnace,” I shouted back. “That’s where they melt the iron ore.”
“Hey!” Caveria’s voice from behind made me turn around. “Don’t go poking around,” she said sharply. I exchanged a grin with Thord, but we followed her meekly back to the others.
A blast furnace - that was fairly advanced, I thought. Especially with all these pipes. How do they make those, I wondered.
“They heat the iron ore and coal and pump air into it,” I explained to Thord. “That causes a chemical reaction that... purifies the iron.”
He nodded. “I know our mine mages pull the iron out of the stone, so it can be worked.”
“They must have foundries here as well, to build all these things,” I speculated. “They can’t import it on that small road...” I was struck by a thought. “How do they get the iron and coal out of here? We didn’t meet many wagons or bearers along the way.”
Thord grinned at me. “That’s Ruula’s secret,” he said. “It’s not just that there’s coal and iron here. Down below the valley runs an underground river that emerges on the plain. They use barges, boy!”
An underground river, I mused as we followed Serah around the perimeter of the mining complex. That would be something to see. Especially one large enough for barges. I couldn't see any way to do that, though. Thord and I hadn’t strayed any more - people looked at us suspiciously as we walked among the buildings, and we’d been stopped a couple of times. It hadn’t been a problem - Tiriel had shown the note from the mine chief and they’d let us continue - but there was no way we could get down into the mines.
By mid-day, we headed down into the town part and found a tavern.
“I haven’t felt anything,” Serah said as we settled around a table in the corner and waited for our food. “I doubt the sword was kept in the workshops, and if it was, any traces will have been scoured clean with all this fire energy about.”
“Is it worth to continue?” Arndrir asked.
“I’m not sure,” she sighed. “I would like to get a look at those abandoned mine shafts in the hill. That would have been a better hiding place and the traces would linger for longer there.”
“I doubt the mine chief would be happy if we went up there," Arndrir said. "He did allow us to talk to miners in the taverns as well. That may be worth trying.”
“Maybe,” Serah said doubtfully.
“You might be able to sense if they know more than they say, at least.”
She shrugged in response.
After lunch we decided to ask around in the taverns. The most important person was still Serah, but we couldn’t all stand around and listen as she talked to people. Caveria and Tiriel decided to stay in the tavern while Arndrir and Serah went over all the other taverns and went down to the guest inn. That left Thord and me - with an opportunity, I thought. We could ask around too, and some relevant questions about mining might open doors that questions about the sword wouldn’t.
I put this forward, and Tiriel frowned deeply back at me. “I don’t like this place,” she said, “and I want to get out of here. This is not a place for elves.” She softened and smiled at Thord. “Although I can see it’s a place for dwarves, perhaps.”
“Not up here,” he said. “All the interesting places are below.”
“We will not cause trouble,” I assured her. “We will just talk to people in the taverns, if they want to talk to us, and see if we can find out anything.”
She sighed. “Very well. That should be fine.”
We thanked her and headed out of the tavern, to another one we’d seen that looked dirtier. Tiriel had decided against it because of the coal dust covering everything in it, but in my opinion that was a plus. More miners there, I suspected.
There were miners there, yes, but they didn’t want to talk to us. I wondered just how bad it had been here, since they seemed completely fed up with adventurers, or any non-miners.
Thord and I went to a couple of taverns, without luck anywhere.
“What now?” he said when we stepped out of the third one we’d tried. “They do not want to talk.”
“No,” I agreed. “It seems difficult.” Perhaps we should give up, but I didn’t want to. I had no idea if I’d ever come back here, and I really wanted to learn something more about the whole site and their methods. The whole question about technology and magic was nagging at me, more and more. Lumaria seemed to be just like Earth except they also had magic, but here at Ruula they had technology which was very similar to home.
“We have not tried the taverns to the north,” Thord said innocently. I glanced at him.
“Are there any taverns there? I thought it was mostly abandoned mine shafts and buildings.”
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He shrugged. “The main shaft is in the center, over there, and they seem to have a lot of buildings to the south. It would be reasonable to have at least something in the north as well.”
I suspected he wanted to go check out those old mine shafts. He’d muttered about explosives and shovels several times already, and wanted to see how such a tunnel would look. The one we’d passed yesterday had been dwarf-built, with a very smooth rock-surface.
For my part, I wanted to see if they had any foundries. We could make a slightly wider circuit of the place while looking for taverns, and if we just stayed out of the furnace area it should be fine.
“Let’s go look,” I suggested, “but let’s stay away from the mining complex. Let’s follow the town road around it.”
The town seemed to have been originally situated along the perimeter, but had sprawled over the years further down into the valley. As we walked around towards the north, farther up the valley, the houses became fewer and less well-kept. Some of them looked abandoned, in fact.
The road followed the half-circle back towards the hillside, and from here we could see the gaping maw of the main shaft. It must have been several stories tall, and I saw cable cars moving in and out of it, hanging on cables suspended from the ceiling. It looked as big as the mine shafts on Earth, or bigger. You could easily have driven a large mining truck down this hole.
“Mister Peter,” Thord said, clearing his throat. “There are some buildings ahead that might hold a tavern or two. We should go there, I do believe, but we could take this road to the left to get there. It passes close to a few of those old shafts, it seems.”
I chuckled at him. He had certainly relaxed since we’d left the plains. When I’d first met him, he had seemed very strict and humorless. I was feeling rather invigorated by the whole place - which was ironic, since I'd sometimes referred to my job as "going into the mines" on bad days. On the other hand: maybe that was it, maybe that was why it felt a bit like home.
“We could go that way,” I agreed, “and then return along this way to meet up with the others.” I wanted to check out the buildings ahead - they were low but wide, with multiple smokestacks rising from each one. They could well be foundries or some kind of factories.
We nodded solemnly in mutual understanding and set off down the smaller road. It led away from the town, towards the far end of the valley, past overgrown fields and dilapidated buildings. It was vaguely depressing, and I was a bit surprised. The mining complex and the town around the main gate had been grimy and sooty, but in good order.
After a kilometer or so we turned right on another road that seemed to lead back to the hillside, and followed it across the gently rolling terrain. We were about halfway to our goal when something rustled in the woods to our left and three grimbears came rushing out. I pulled my sword and Thord drew his axe, but they stopped when they saw us.
Two of them turned and ran, but one of them - the largest - rushed straight at us. I took a few steps to the side and slashed my sword through the air. The bear growled as it ran, but when it was a few meters away it threw itself aside and raced over the field and back into the woods.
“Hm,” Thord said. “They seemed agitated.”
We continued along the road. We didn’t meet any more grimbears, but we saw another pack of four trotting across a field some distance away.
“I do not like this,” Thord said. “Something that stirs up grimbears cannot be good.”
We didn’t have any choice, so we went on. We weren’t far from the hillside, and followed the road as it climbed a short distance up the side. Just ahead of us several mine shafts delved into the mountains. These were much smaller than the large one, and didn’t look like they were used very much.
We walked past a couple, peering inside, until Thord stopped outside the next one. “I want to look inside,” he said. “Keep watch.”
I stood with my back against the rock while he walked a few steps into the tunnel. He craned his neck to see and ran his hands over the surface.
“Rough, but functional,” I heard him mutter. “I wonder what they did here. What are these curved markings...?”
A sudden noise from the low brush across the road made me draw my sword. Four grimbears trotted out, and spread out opposite me.
“Thord!” I called. “Come here! Grimbears!”
Two of them rushed towards me while the others circled around to my left. I heard Thord’s footsteps as he came running out of the tunnel, but before he’d arrived the first bear jumped at me, claws extended. I took a step aside, went down on one knee and thrust my sword up and through from below. As I pushed it into the air I tried to twist it aside, down on its comrade. I felt its claws dig into my back as it reached over my head, and I hoped the head wasn’t just above my head.
Thord shouted as he leapt up and swung his axe towards the closest bear, and I stumbled to the ground as I’d misjudged my attacker’s speed. I scrambled frantically to get out from beneath it and pull my sword loose. One of its feet swept past my face and I felt warm blood on my cheek as the claws grazed my skin. This wasn’t going so well, even if the one that attacked me was now lying still on the ground.
Thord was spinning his axe in front of him and pushing the second bear backwards, but where were the other two? There - trying to climb up on a rock to jump down on us. I hesitated - join Thord and kill that one, or run over to stop the others?
Before I could act, something else crashed out of the woods further up the road and came running towards us. I froze - this was no grimbear! A grim elephant, maybe. It was as big as one, but instead of an elephant’s trunk it had an elongated trunk with rows of sharp-looking teeth. It still had elephant’s tusks, but they were straight rather than curved and seemed to have razor edges along the underside. Together with long, curved horns on its head it looked - formidable.
Terrible was a better word, and it wasn’t just I who thought so. The two grimbears trying to climb the hill gave a warning cry and bounded down across the road and back into the low shrubs. The one fighting Thord looked suddenly desperate. It snapped at him, and glanced fearfully at the monster elephant.
“Thord!” I called, “there’s something else coming!” He glanced towards it and swore, but he stepped back from the bear. It promptly turned and fled.
“Up on the hill!” he shouted, and I followed him past the tunnel entrance and up the loose rock on the hillside. We scrambled frantically to get up on the rock - the same one the grimbears had aimed for - as the monster bore down on us.
“We need help,” Thord grunted as he pulled me up. “That one’s too big.”
“Hey!” I shouted towards the mining complex. “Help! Monsters! Hey! Hey!”
Thord got out a small metal disk and clanged it against the axe shaft. That seemed to annoy the monster-phant, who roared and reared as it stopped beneath our rock. It slashed its sharp trunks and forced us to press ourselves against the rock to avoid it.
“Help! Help!” I kept shouting. To my relief, I could see people running up the road from the nearest building.
“They’re coming,” I gasped. “What is this thing?”
“I do not know,” Thord grunted. “I have never seen one of these.”
The miners who came running up carried long knives and some of them had what looked like round trash bin lids. They started beating them together to make a huge racket. It seemed to bother the monster-phant - it stopped trying to reach us and roared towards them. For a moment, we looked down at its broad, brown back. Then it turned and ran back the way it had come. The ground shook as it broke into a gallop.
The first miners who arrived glanced up at us but continued a short distance up the road, still clanging those lids. The other ones stopped some steps from the rock and glared up at us. They were still brandishing those knives.
“Alright,” one of them bellowed. “Who are you two? What are you doing here?” He looked up at us with a deeply suspicious frown. “No, don’t come down!” he continued. “You just wait up there and don’t do anything stupid until the guard comes here. They know how to deal with spies.”
Thord and I looked at each other in dismay. “We’re not spies,” I began, but he wasn’t interested in listening.
“Quiet!” he bellowed. “Talk to the guard.”
I could see armed men running up from the mine now, a large group. Damn, I thought, this was all going wrong. I didn't look forward to explaining this to Tiriel - she’d wanted us to keep a low profile and not cause trouble.
I was even less keen on explaining it from inside a Ruula jail, but to our luck the others had started to wonder where we’d gone and had gone back towards the mine offices, and so they’d heard the commotion and our cries for help. They were on the heels of the guard force, and somehow Tiriel managed to convince the furious guard captain that we were of her party rather than spies. She was forced to promise we would leave Ruula immediately, without going back though the mining complex or the town.
The miners and most of the guards went back down to the mine, but a group stayed to make sure we left properly. My face burned as we climbed down from the rock. Thord seemed unfazed and met Tiriel’s glare directly. I couldn’t; I looked away. Caveria looked neutral, except for a slight curve to her mouth.
Serah had, discreetly, wandered up and down the road, past the other mine shafts, but as Tiriel thanked the guards and told them we were leaving, see, just going up this road here and then taking the long detour across the valley and down the other side, just as we’d agreed - just then Serah came walking back to us with her eyes wide.
She was practically jumping with impatience as we started walking up the road, and as soon as the guards were out of earshot she beckoned us into a close huddle.
“It was here!” she exclaimed. “The Blade! I sensed it, in that tunnel. There’s definitely been strong dragon magic there. It’s still seeping from the walls.”
“Yes!” Tiriel laughed and did a pirouette. She beamed at Serah. “You found it! I knew you would! How wonderful! Now we know it’s real!”
She did another pirouette and came to a stop facing Thord and me. Her expression was stern. “You two -” She shook her head. “You could have caused a diplomatic incident.” Suddenly her expression flicked back to beaming happily. “That was very wrong of you and please don’t do it again. Peter, you and I will talk about promises and lies and evasions.”
She tried to look stern again, but she was grinning too widely. “On the other hand we found what we wanted, and I cannot be angry any more. I hate being angry anyway! Now we can leave this horrible place and go back to proper elf country!”
She stretched her arms out and grinned up towards the mountains rising beyond the end of the valley.
“We can go home!" she cried. "To the mountains!”