Borehole Lake reveals itself as a shimmer in the snow just like the shimmer you see over distant magma, looking like nothing real. Can we finally be here? Can this terrible harsh journey east across the snow have finally come to an end?

No, I decide. What I see has to be an illusion. The cold has finally made it through my skull and is freezing my mind. Borehole Lake has to still be many miles march distant, for in this white plain of nothing, nothing ever changes, nothing new ever comes into view.

A gust of wind howls over us. I duck and grit my teeth hard against a chill that goes through the skin of my face and deep into the front of my skull. The dragon's final breath of fire killed the runes upon my armor, including those on my helmet that made its front transparent. Now I walk bare-headed, with only my beard to protect my face from the cold.

And with the dragon gone, the cold has become harsher.

“Finally!” shouts Nazak, one of Vanerak's favored first degrees. “Food and the underground!”

I look up. The shimmer I thought to be illusion is still there. It's water, isn't it? Heated water bubbling up from the underworld just like Vanerak told us there would be. There's even a slight haze of steam over it.

“Oh, finally,” Guthah whispers behind me. “Finally.”

“Yes,” I say. “We can have some warmth and decent food. There's fish in the lake, they said. And places where the stones are hot enough to cook them.”

“Really?”

“Hopefully. But at the very least we can have a break from marching. A long break.”

He hasn't taken the journey well. None of my fellow prisoners have—indeed, one perished soon after we left the mountain, succumbing to the shock of cold on his burned skin. They trudge painfully, panting heavily. Their healing chains rattle with each step and need to be tightened every hour or so, to the clear irritation of our guards.

You're meant to stay in bed while being treated with chains. That's common knowledge. But Vanerak does not care about this. He just wants us away from the mountain as fast as possible. Probably his judgement is correct. Yet all the same I still cannot help but hate him for it. Maybe if he'd stepped in sooner—stepped in at all—Xomhyrk wouldn't be dead.

A flurry of snow turns the world white for a few minutes. Again, I begin to suspect the sighting of the lake to have been a hallucination, but just as I become sure of this, the snow dies away and I spot its warm, inviting shimmer again. We really are nearing the end of this first and, hopefully, hardest leg of our journey.

Vanerak does not acknowledge the sighting. He marches on in silence. Nothing seems to tire him or perturb him in any way. Not the snow, not the ice, not the cold nor the wind. He barely talks, not even to me. I'd expected him to bring me up to the front and interrogate me about my powers as we marched, but it seems that he's biding his time.

Perhaps there wasn't room in his pack for torture instruments.

Over the next couple of hours, as we close in on it, the lake's form becomes clearer. It looks to be about seven or eight hundred yards in diameter, and is a perfect circle, betraying its dwarf-made origin. There's a line starting from the far shore and ending in the center, where a small platform floats. It glints brightly—metal. I wonder what it's for.

Other than that, and the thin steam hovering over the surface, it's as featureless as the snowy plain through which we've been marching. There's no trees, no jumping fish, and no obvious tunnels to the underground either.

“Stay strong,” I say to Guthah, Pellas, and the other two prisoners. “We're nearly there.”

Another half hour of marching and we're at the shore. There's no pebbles nor sand, just snow, and the water around the edges is covered by a thin layer of ice. Pale rainbows glimmer on it.

“Halt,” Vanerak orders.

We halt.

“Halax, Helzar, Valeek, you are to find us some food below. The rest will wait by the shoreline. Do not stray too close. The lake is wider than it appears, and there are amphidons within. Their meat is, unfortunately, toxic.”

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The three he called on grab some empty sacks and start around the shore while the rest of us sit down. My armor plates grind and screech as I stretch out my weary legs. I start to lie back, then stop myself. If I do, I don't think I'll ever be able to get up again. I am just that tired.

Nazak passes around some crumbly jerky. It's as hard and cold as ice, but I thank him nevertheless. I have some slushy half-melted snow out my waterskin too. It hurts my tongue and lips.

I watch as the party of three walks around the lake. Their progress seems very slow to me, like they're shadows creeping around in the sun, but I can't really tell—this exhausting journey has confused my sense of time by about as much as if I'd been in the blackest depths of the underworld. How many days has it been since we left the mountain? A few dozen at least.

The battle with the black dragon seems like a half-forgotten dream. Did I really run along its back, striking deep into its old wounds, while Xomhyrk darted from every angle and every dark corner to lance deep with Icemite? Did Braztak's armor really glow like the sun from power brought out by his mortal burning? And did it truly die, its reign of destruction finally ended?

The events seem unbelievable, like something out of a legend engraved on the wall of a runethane's palace, not events from my own memory. But my memory cannot be lying, because how else would I have ended up in this company?

The three runeknights reach the opposite side of the lake and start across the walkway to the center. It shifts and bobs slightly at their passage. I see a hint of dark shapes swarming underneath it. One comes close to the surface.

A line appears in the water where Halax swept his sword through it—I couldn't see the movement, his strike was so fast. Blood blooms. The dark shapes scatter and vanish.

Maybe it was just an amphidon, but—the power of these dwarves! First and second degrees all, each as strong as Wharoth at least, or maybe stronger. Certainly they are far stronger than me. Even if my plate and Gutspiercer were undamaged I still wouldn't be able to so much as scratch them.

The three make it to the center without any further disturbances. They turn and vanish into it. The platform must not be just a piece of metal floating on top of the water, but the start of a shaft leading into the underworld.

We continue to wait. The prisoners have fallen asleep sitting up; their chains shift in time with their breathing. I look at Pellas. She's the worst injured out of all, covered in burns from head to foot. It's a miracle she's alive, especially considering that she has no armor, but is simply wrapped in furs torn from the remains of others' broken suits.

Her fair face is scarred and reddened and pitted in places with black char. Guthah's face has not fared much better and, worst of all, his beard was burned away. Though new hairs are emerging through the links of the chains around his face, I doubt it'll ever regrow to be as thick and long as a dwarf's should be.

I wonder how my own face and body look. If Vanerak ever deigns to provide me a bath and mirror I get the feeling I'll discover quite a few new scars.

The sky becomes crimson, then black. My belly rumbles. I tell Nazak that we need more to eat. He refuses.

“Please,” I beg. “Give us just a bit. A half ration at least.”

“Silence, traitor. You'll get better food soon enough.”

“If they ever return.”

“Are you doubting my comrades? There's nothing here nor under here that could harm them. Nothing at all.”

A few minutes later he's proven correct. A small light appears at the platform, casting three shadows onto the water, which waver in the steam. The runeknights cross the walkway and walk around the lake. They carry armfuls of juicy basket-fungi, and their supply sacks are bulging too.

“Earlush!” says Nazak. “An excellent find. If only we had a still, eh?”

“Distribute one quarter of it,” Vanerak orders.

I get a handful of the stuff and cram it into my mouth gladly. It's chewy, and juice stinking of the caves runs down my beard. After a month of powdery jerky with all flavor but salt burned from it, the earlush tastes like the greatest steak I've ever paid for. A meal fit for a runeking, or at least a runethane.

Vanerak is eating too, I notice with surprise. He's lifted his mirror-mask up a little, revealing a mouth and dark gray beard. Both look fairly ordinary. If his mask is covering up any hideous scar or deformity, it must be located further up.

He finishes his meal and pulls the mirror-mask back down. He turns toward me. He stands up. I flinch.

“Come here, Zathar,” he says, beckoning.

Quickly I get up and hurry over to him. He leads me off around the lake until we're well out of earshot of the others. After he stops, I stay silent. I've learned from observing the other runeknights that with Vanerak, it's best to wait until spoken to before speaking.

“You have fared well,” he says. “Especially considering the state of your armor.”

“Thank you.”

“Though this is not the harshest journey you've undertaken, is it?”

“No.”

“After fleeing the black dragon, you wandered the underground for a decade, did you not? Wearing little but rust.”

“I did.”

“Remarkable. Fateful, some may say.”

“I don't know about that.”

“No. No one knows about fate, if it be real or illusion.”

“I'm worried about the others, my Runethane. Once we pass into the underground, will the rest of our journey be long?”

“Fairly long, but we will be traveling where dwarves are suited to travel. Your comrades will be fine. We will be able to take more rests also.”

“Will it really be safe to rest in a different runeking's realm?”

“Runeking Talamat is no enemy to Runeking Ulrike. Even if he were, I am here.”

“Of course.”

“But I have not called you here to talk about our traveling plans. Zathar, I wish to ask some questions about your runes.”