The army swim-pulls itself through the molten stone. The passage of such a tight formation twists and tears at the magma, creating a roil of currents that impede the runeknights' passage. For Hayhek, trapped inside his hot metal wrappings, the familiar journey is drawn out and torturous like it has never been before. His muscles are already starting to ache, yet he reckons that it has only been a short-hour or so since they waded in.
The heavy heat crushes him as he pulls himself through it. He wonders if the more senior runeknights only barely feel its pressure. Perhaps their skin remains cool and sweat does not bother them. Certainly none of this bothers their Runethane; he has forgotten how it feels to be weak, or perhaps he never knew.
Reach, pull, reach, pull; the army forges forward. The magma grows hotter the closer they come to the sunken city, whose first scattered ruins now show as cut-out voids below. This is unusual, for in Hayhak's experience the magma should be a little cooler here.
Halax holds up a hand. The army halts. A second later, a blazing sphere appears in the extreme range of Hayhek's vision. One demon—the first of many, or just a scout? No more appear following it, and its trajectory is already starting to curve. It comes close. Runethane Vanerak slashes at it with his pollaxe. A ripple travels through the magma and strikes the demon a glancing blow. A few lines of heat come apart and fade, but the demon survives the blow and curves away, vanishes in the distance.
They know we're coming now, thinks Hayhek. Will they sally out to meet us, or engage us within their broken walls?
Runethane Vanerak restarts the swim-march. The ruins below thicken. Bricks turn to blocks, stumps heighten to jagged pillars. Archways appear, and sections of wall, then chambers broken like eggshells. All are carved with runes or pictures or both, and the grandest images Hayhek can make out clearly.
It has always seemed strange to him that none of the dwarves depicted in the city wear armor.
No more spheres of heat come at them. This is unnerving—whenever Hayhek has intruded this far before, they have always met resistance, stiff resistance. He grows more worried. The enemy, instead of dashing at them with a flurry of blows, has raised its hammer back to swing with all the more might.
Further into the city the army swim-crawls. A series of massive obelisks appear at the front of Hayhek's heat-sight and his heart misses three beats. He had heard the reports and rumors about this broken inner wall, yet their scale is totally beyond anything he imagined. They are equal in size to the greatest stalagmites of Hazhakmar cavern, yet stalagmites are natural—these are too smooth on their non-broken edges; they were built, they were a kind of walls.
And then they were shattered and flung down. By what terrible force, Hayhek does not dare to imagine.
The runeknights cross through the broken obelisks like a swarm of anchovies between the gates of a submerged castle. Beyond, the ruins take on new dimensions of scale and complexity. Spires protrude and domes bulge, many nearly intact. Most have doorways and windows in them, from which at any moment could pour forth swarms of demons. Hayhek touches his axe, attached by chain to his hip, and feels little reassurance.
It is all very well to slash one demon. That is easy enough for even a seventh degree to do. Yet what hope is there when two or three or more converge on you? Armor is poor protection against them. The most powerful demons slide through the runic power like water flowing through a sieve.
Runethane Vanerak comes to a high dome and leads the army over the top of it. It is cracked, and Hayhek not-sees right through into the room within, yet no demons lurk in ambush. Where are they? His hands begin to itch. If there is to be a battle, get it over with! When you are in the fight, there is no time to spare worrying. All your focus is on your next strike.
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Past the dome, the runeknights circle around a wide spire. Carved into the expertly cut cold stone are images of dwarves dancing in long, flowing robes, and indecipherable runes run under each band of figures. Did these ancient dwarves leave no stone undecorated? Their masons must have been rich indeed, thinks Hayhek. What is more, there is not a pickaxe to be seen anywhere—though he supposes lovers of beautiful stonework would likely not wish to engrave such things.
The army tilts upward. Perhaps Runethane Vanerak wants to poke his head out and get a proper look at where the city's center is, get his bearings. Hayhek dearly wishes to know where they are also.
But the Runethane stops just short of the surface, tilts, then continues to move forward. Up here the heat-view is bizarre: above is void with cylinders jutting down from it like geometrically perfect stalactites, which then fade away below at the extreme of Hayhek's heat-vision. Around the backs of the cylinders is nothing, no demons, and no floating shards of stone either. A warm, clawed shape comes into range of heat-sight for a moment before quickly dashing away. That is all.
Where are the demons?
The strange view, of void and void-pillars, continues for some time. It is monotonous but for one detail: Hayhek thinks he sees gridded webs like cages far below, and hooks too. They are faint however, being nearly the same heat as the magma, very faint, and he dismisses them as fear-induced illusions.
A wall of not-blackness appears to the front. It might be the face of a great spire or tower, for it is slightly convex, yet if so, what dwarves could construct something so great? How many tens of thousands of masons and miners would have been required? The scale is beyond description. It is like a cliff-face.
Leading into it are long, arched tubes—tunnels or corridors—so comparatively small as to be like worm-holes. Only one even attempts to match the scale of its setting: it is wide enough for twenty dwarves to stride in abreast.
Runethane Vanerak dives down toward it. His army follows. They close in. Hayhek grits his teeth. Surely now, he thinks. Surely the battle is now!
An instant later his wish is granted. Heat pours from the entranceway. It comes at them like a wave of brightness and vividness—though it is neither, just heat—and the magma turns thin and turbulent. Hayhek yells as he is swept downward toward the hundreds of roiling, spinning spheres now flooding out to meet them.
He unchains his axe—cuts. The battle has begun.
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My hammer tings and the spike's music is completed. The melody is of sharp violence; the harmony promises the flowing of blood. I gasp and lay my hammer down, sink to my knees then slump back. My arm is shaking. My muscles are like frayed cables of lead, heavy and useless.
“You should rest,” one of the eighth degrees says nervously. “If you injure yourself, the Runethane will hold us responsible.”
“No time to rest,” I gasp. I stand up. “Two more to go. Halfway. No time, no fatigue. No time! It doesn't exist!”
The eighth degrees look at each other nervously. I must sound like a mad-dwarf, possessed or worse—I don't care.
“You don't exist either!” I hiss. “There is the forge! The furnace! The metal! Get me more water!”
I heat the next disc, place it on the anvil, clasped in the tongs and on its side as usual. I lift the hammer, strike once, twice, a hundred times, a thousand. My arm is too exhausted for me to put force into my blows, so I let the runes work for me. The true tungsten does not seem to mind. It bends in half as I wish it to, then half again, and then again.
“Halfway there,” I say. “Though that's not true. I know it's not. The later stages take longer.”
Now I'm talking to myself. Or maybe I'm not. I'm not sure what my mouth is doing, if I'm tight-lipped or letting my thoughts spill out into the roasting air. It does not matter—the clang of hammer on true tungsten drowns them out anyway.
I reheat the metal and adjust. I lift my hammer, bring it down, up, down. How many times have I made this motion so far? I shake my head violently. This is not the time to be losing focus. I need to give the true metal the respect it demands, or—
A sudden scream of rage and pain rings through the forge. Shards blast into my face, chest and arms. Pain comes, sharp. I fall back, yelling in shock. White sparks dance where the true tungsten was, a wild dance, yet somehow sad. They fade and vanish. The scream lingers for a moment longer, then it fades also.
“No!” I scream. “No! No! No!”
Not even dust remains of the true tungsten disc. It has been totally obliterated.