The pool of blood around the fallen dragonslayer spreads over the stone. My worst fear has come to pass—yet another dwarf has died for my mistakes. And no longer do I have the excuse that I am young, a foolish tenth degree who knows nothing of the underworld.

“Do you still refuse to tell me?” asks Vanerak.

I remain silent. What can I do? I cannot allow Vanerak to know the secrets of runeforging, yet how can I allow Pellas to die?

“Cut her where you please,” Vanerak orders.

Helzar stabs her barbed spear into Pellas' right foot. Pellas shrieks. Helzar then draws it out slowly and at an angle. Pellas shrieks louder. Blood pours out over the stones, its flow pulsing. Once the spear is fully out, Helzar holds it horizontally to show me the shreds of flesh hanging from its barbs. Her burned mouth curls into a grin.

“Stop!” I cry, and I try to pull forward, but Nazak and Halax hold me back.

“What are you hiding from me, Zathar Runeforger?” Vanerak demands.

“Wait!” I beg. “Wait!”

Is there some lesser lie I can think of? Something believable enough to placate his anger?

“How do you shape your runes?”

“Wait!” I beg again.

“I will not wait. Helzar, cut her once more.”

“No!” screams Pellas.

The word is elongated into a high scream as Helzar mutilates her other foot.

“I draw power through myself!” I shout. “That's what happens, that's what I figured out when I made my runic ears!”

“Explain further.”

“The power comes up through the magma sea—I will it to, but once it starts it's hard to stop—and as it passes through me—”

“Through what part of you? You say you have no body there.”

“I don't! It comes through my soul, or the center of whatever of me is down there. I put meaning into it—I think of a word and what I want it to mean, what connotations it should have, what aspects of meaning, and the rune is formed.”

“It is formed? Do you form it or does something else? Something else that you are not telling me of?”

“I form it! But I don't know why I make the shapes I do. They just seem the right shape. I can't explain further.”

“You cannot explain further? Helzar, again.”

“But I can't!” I scream, as Helzar thrusts her spear into Pellas' thigh. She rips it out in a draw-cut and blood streams from the punctured steel. Pellas' third high shriek is like needles in my ears.

“Stop!” I scream. “I can't explain why I make the runes the shapes—how they are—I don't know! It just feels like they need to be that way! I don't know why!”

“Maybe you do not, but I sense that you are still hiding something from me. You were on the edge of mentioning another secret as you burned from your latest forging.”

“I wasn't!” I cry. “Please believe me!”

“You lie again. You uttered the specific-importance article before stopping your tongue. You have another close secret. You are not alone in the magma, are you?”

“I am alone!”

“Helzar, again.”

Pellas screams like an animal as Helzar's spear takes yet another deep bite of flesh and blood. Helzar is still smiling as she does this—she's been smiling the whole time; her grin never leaves her face. Halax's face is blank—he does not care about the pain of others. Nazak looks troubled—though he enjoys killing, maybe he does not have the stomach for torture.

And behind his mirror-mask, Vanerak is enjoying this even more than Helzar. To most he seems emotionless, but I know him too well. He enjoys killing. He will put his goals aside, albeit briefly, to inflict pain, for it is the only thing that makes him feel joy. Behind his mirror-mask, I am sure that he is smiling broadly.

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“Stop!” I beg. Tears are streaming from my eyes. “Please stop hurting her. She's done nothing wrong.”

“The only one who can stop her pain is you,” says Vanerak. “Tell me what you are hiding.”

“There's a sphere,” I say. “When I go down into the magma, there's always a sphere near to me. Usually behind.”

“What kind of a sphere? Explain further.”

“It's of metal, though I can't tell what. An alloy, maybe. It's enruned all around with tiny runes. I can't read them.”

“How big is it?”

“I have no body so I can't tell for sure. Maybe just larger than a dwarf, or maybe it's thousands of times bigger than that. I can't tell.”

“Is it solid or hollow? Do you think it holds something?”

“I have been in it once, when I forged the runes for my shield. It held three shadows. They were cold.”

“Shadows of what?”

Vanerak leans forward; he's excited. I think anyone listening can tell this. There's enthusiasm in his tone I've never heard before.

“I think they're of dwarves.”

“You could see this?”

“I could feel it. One—one was cast by me. And the two beside me—one I felt love for. The other I hated. I couldn't tell anything else, my Runethane, please believe me—it was only for a moment—a brief moment!”

“I believe you,” he says. “Tell me how the sphere affects your power. Does it control how you shape your runes?”

“I don't think it controls my power. But it brings it up. It brings it up from the depths and directs it through me. I felt this clearly during my last runeforging.”

“If only you had told me then, this wouldn't have had to happen.”

Pellas' face is white. She has lost far too much blood.

“Please let her go, my Runethane. She has done nothing wrong. Give her some healing chains. Please!”

“No,” says Vanerak. “Your transgression has been too severe for me to consider such mercy.” I am sure that behind his mirror-mask his smile has just broadened further. “She is to die. Helzar, make it quick—yet she should also suffer. Zathar must hear her scream one last time.”

“Stop!” I yell. I throw myself forward. Nazak's grip loosens just a touch, yet Halax's remains firm and I cannot move.

Helzar pushes her barbed spear into Pellas' guts. The movement is slow, and Pellas tries to pull away, but cannot pull away far enough. The sound she makes fills my mind, fills the chamber, stains every part of my hearing. Helzar twists and the sound grows louder, then she pulls her spear out inch by slow inch and the scream cracks and stops. Pellas' eyes bulge. Something in her throat has broken.

Strings of flesh swing back and forth from the barbs. Blood gushes down Pellas' legs. A section of gut has been pulled through her armor, and it stains the steel around it with bile. The guards keep her standing up until her final strength drains away, then they let her fall face first onto the floor. Her blonde hair splays out into the pool of blood and is dyed crimson.

“Do not lie to me again,” says Vanerak. “Do not disobey me. You know that I have one more of your friends. He will suffer much worse, and for much longer than she just did, should you lie to me again. I repeat: never lie to me. Do you understand?”

I continue to stare at Pellas' body. I try to speak, but my throat feels blocked.

“Do you understand, Zathar Runeforger?”

“Yes,” I manage to whisper.

“You will now be returned to your quarters. After you have been given some time to reflect on your crimes, and what has resulted due to them, you will return to your runeforging. It will not be a long amount of time, though neither will it be overly short. A hundred long-hours or so should be enough. Or perhaps two hundred. I will decide after we speak again.”

He turns to address his runeknights:

“You will say nothing of what happened here. What has been uttered is a secret within secrets. I trust my first degrees, but as for you fourth degrees, if rumor spreads of the true nature of Zathar's runeforging, or of the deaths of these two, your tongues will be severed. Do you understand?”

“Yes, my Runethane!” they chorus.

“Good. These two perished on the magma shore. That is all that will be said of their fates. Nazak, return Zathar to his quarters. Feed and water him as before, but take out his furnishings. He is to have no distractions from his reflections.”

“Yes, my Runethane.”

I am dragged from the chamber by the guards, for I barely have the strength and will to walk. Pellas' blood and that of the dragonslayer stains my feet.

Their deaths were for nothing.

----------------------------------------

Can it truly be? The miner swings again. The rock does not chip. He draws his pick back behind his head, and swings with all his might. The iron rebounds from the stone, bent, and that is the final proof he needs. He has found some!

“Impervious!” he cries in joy. “It's impervious!”

“Rubbish!” spits the miner next to him. “Let me hit it!”

He brings his pick down in a violent vertical strike. The iron sparks and shatters. The force sets the second miner's arms trembling, and he collapses backwards into the gravel.

“You're right!” he says. He breaks into tears suddenly. “We've found some!” He cries, then coughs hard on the rock-dust. “We can finally rest! Rest!”

A tremor runs through the stone, as if the mine is responding to their cries. The miners are too thrilled to care.

“We've found some!” yells a third, and he yells down the tunnel to the beardless boy who carts down the gravel. “We can rest!”

“No!” shouts the boy. “No, you lie!”

“It's no lie!” yells the first miner. He laughs loudly. “We've found some! We can rest!”

Another tremor runs through the stone.

“We can rest!” yells the second miner through his tears. “Rest!”

The tunnel swings violently to the left, then to the right. The boy is knocked from his feet.

“It'll stop soon!” says the third miner. “Don't be afraid!”

The tunnel jerks up suddenly, then is pulled down. Gravel floats in the air for a few seconds. The first and third miners, and the boy, are thrown from their feet. The second is thrust from sitting to lying and he yells in pain as his spine bends against a large chunk of stone. Their lantern shatters and all becomes black.

“Shit!” the second miner cries.

“We're going to die!” screams the boy.

“No!” yells the first. “We're going to rest! We can finally rest!”

The tunnel jerks up once more, then comes down faster, and keeps going down. The rock roars. Light blazes beneath the falling miners from a thousand widening cracks. The world has shattered around them. Alongside great dark chunks, they are plummeting down toward the magma. Above, they can see the glint of the picks of other miners, also falling.

All is falling, down, down, down toward the magma sea.