We reach the exit just as Galar is backing into it. I blink open my eyes to glance at the etchings, but can’t remember if they’re the same ones. Maybe Fjalar is right, maybe Belthur is. Or maybe both ways are wrong.

Up the stairs we hurry, Fjalar before us and Galar behind us. It’s another harsh climb. Each step my thighs sting with pain. If I had a long spear then at least I’d be able to use it like a walking stick, but instead my mace is an extra burden. All the same complaints as before—when will this end? If it’s not to end in my death I have to ignore the pain, yet it’s getting hard to ignore.

The other dwarves are tired too. Every minute or so someone trips and has to be dragged to their feet by a comrade.

“Shit,” Galar curses. “I’m going to have to turn the brightness down!” he calls up. “It’s getting too hot!”

“Keep it going!” Fjalar shouts in reply. “We can’t climb any faster!”

“Moron,” Galar mutters, then flicks the wheel on the weapon down a few notches. “Not the most sympathetic, wouldn’t you say?”

“I don’t know,” I pant.

“Notice how he was first in here and I last? That’s my brother for you.”

“He’s right that we can’t climb any faster.”

“I’ve bought us a head start. We’ll be fine. Hraroth was wrong about my weapon, wasn’t he? In these tight corridors it’s just what we need.”

“It is. Your runes are creative. How did you become so good with them?”

He shrugs. “Just practice: the right kind, where you do a slightly different approach each time, and are never afraid of failure.”

“Does your brother take the same approach? I’ve never talked to him much.”

“He tries, but he’s not as good as I am. He was always holding me back—I see that now we’re forced to work apart from each other. My ideas were right and his were wrong.”

“His craft is still impressive though,” Nthazes points out.

“Better than I expected,” Galar admits. “Boring though. I reckon he wanted to make sure he stayed on the commanders’ good side, rather than take a risk to impress them.”

“Why’s that then?” I ask. “You two have never cared much about that before. You told me yourself you’re happy to stay at the same degree.”

“We were,” he admits. “Things changed, though. Because of the killings and all these mad attacks.”

“You had no choice but to try for something better?”

“Something like that.” He shakes his head. “We can’t waste our breath talking. The darkness is picking up speed.”

I glance back; it is. One by one the steps are vanishing, as if stolen from existence. Yet is this truly the reason he just cut the conversation off?

My thoughts race. I focus intently, so intently that I half feel like I leave my body. I force the pain and exhaustion to dull so I have room in my head to think.

Galar is happy to be away from Fjalar. There is still no love lost between them. So does Jaemes’ idea for the motive make sense? Are they really trying to get revenge on the commanders? I think not. If one or both are the killers, there has to be another motive. But what?

It doesn’t make sense for one to be after the other, or one would be dead by now. And I already established early that there’s no pattern to the victims. They just happened to be in an easy position to target. The identity of the victims doesn't matter; forging is the key. Blood as a crafting material: knowledge forbidden to most dwarves, beyond taboo even, yet one of the geniuses figured out its potential on their own.

So the killer collects blood to forge with, and then what? The Runethane would be able to tell if a weapon presented was forged using blood. There would be some terrible sign, some evil and powerful emanation from the runes that gave the weapon’s origin away.

Was it to slay the Runethane, then take his position for himself? Or maybe give it Belthur. Are they all in it together? Were Belthur’s patrols a cover for the killer, or some way to scout out victims? That seems wrong: Belthur’s just split from us, after all.

The pain is getting to my head again, breaking my concentration. The steps seem endless, and I have no way of knowing how long it’ll be once we reach the top.

I need to think! I need to figure this out, or the killer may strike me in the chaos of this rout. I glance back at Galar. Is he even now plotting a way to get rid of me? If the darkness reaches us, no one will ever find my body to see the way I died.

Fjalar and Galar, Fjalar and Galar! What drives them? Forging does, as it drives all runeknights: yet the desire to craft the greatest creations is stronger in them than most. So what if the killings are an extension of their rivalry, then? What if the weapon of blood is just to be a trophy proving the killer’s superiority to his twin?

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Finally!” Fjalar screams. “An end to these fucking stairs! Turn left, everyone! I think I remember the way!”

“You think?” someone yells in panic. “What do you mean you think? You mean you know, right?”

“Shut up! Stop wasting your breath! Of course I know!”

“Why the hell did you say ‘you think’ then?”

“I mean I’ll know the turns when I see them! Just shut up and follow!”

A shiver of relief runs through my burning thighs as I finally reach the flatness of the corridor. We all stumble after Fjalar, and whenever the corridor branches we trust his judgment. Galar stays at the rear, unleashing the occasional blast from his trident to stop the darkness getting too close.

“Bloody ashes!” he hisses. “It’s getting too hot!”

He’s our only chance against it, I begin to think. The darkness’s power seems to be returning, its speed and ability to resist the devastating blasts of light increasing. The Runethane must be dead at the feet of the monstrous sorcerer, and now the foe is turning its full attention to us.

“Are you sure that turn was the right one?” the same nervous dwarf from before asks. “I don’t think we ever came to a five-way crossroads.”

We come to a halt. Fjalar looks around; I can’t see his face for his helmet, yet I detect a certain amount of panic in his body language. The dwarf is right. We never came to a five-way crossroads, and, come to think of it, the last staircase we ran up seemed too short. We’ve gone the wrong way.

“Let me think!” Fjalar snaps.

He looks from one path to the other. Four ways to go, and maybe each and every one leads to a dead end.

“You got it wrong,” Galar says. “Moron! We should have followed Belthur.”

“You should have!” Fjalar snaps. “Then I wouldn’t have to deal with you.”

“The darkness would’ve got us if it wasn’t for Galar,” another dwarf points out. “Whereas it’s you who’s just got us into this mess!”

“Fine, then, you lead from now on! No? Then be quiet!”

Cowed by the anger in Fjalar’s voice, the dwarf shuts up. Fjalar thinks for another few moments, then makes his choice: diagonal left. We rush along, faster than before now the darkness is gaining on us. The corridor becomes a steep and smooth ramp, an incredibly difficult thing to run up in armored boots, unless you have runes of gripping on them.

Mine allow me to move through the loose column to the front. I position myself just behind and to the side of Fjalar.

“We mostly went right and down on our way to the darkness,” I say. “If we keep going left and up, we might still be able to make it out.”

“What the hell do you think I’m doing? That’s why I just chose left; I’m not an idiot, you know.”

I’m trying to be gentle with my words, lead him into giving up some clue, yet I can’t help but feel a twinge of anger at his rudeness.

“I never said you were,” I say. “Though maybe if you admit your mistake with the entrance, the other dwarves will be a bit more forgiving.”

“Fine, I made a mistake. Happy now?”

“Yes.”

“Leave me alone, then.”

“I have some questions to ask.”

“What questions?”

“Why did you work with your brother for so long? You can’t stand each other, and you work better separately.”

“Why do you care?”

“I’m trusting you both with my life. I need to know that you’re not going to have some petty fight and put us all at risk.”

“We won’t, just so long as he doesn’t try anything.”

“Did he often do that? When you were forging together?”

“Yes."

"For example?"

"What do you care?"

"Like I just said, our lives are in your hands. I want to know if I can trust you both."

"You're a fool if you think that trident of his is going to be our savior.”

“Even you have to admit that it's impressive.”

“Only because we’re in tight corridors. All things considered, my mace is the superior weapon.”

“Is it now?”

“It is. The Runethane didn't raise me further because he didn't want to inflame tensions between me and my brother.”

“He made you present your weapon first, though,” I point out.

“Did he? I don’t remember. It doesn’t matter. My next weapon will be greater than both combined.”

“And what kind of weapon will that be?”

“I don’t know! Do you never shut up? I’m concentrating on escape right now, not bloody forging!”

“All right, all right.”

That’s as much as I’m going to get out of him, it seems. Best not push any further or I’ll bring a grudge against myself.

The ramp steepens, then evens out. We come to another crossroads, and again Fjalar takes the left turn. I make my way back to Nthazes. He looks as exhausted as I feel, his steps more stumble than anything, and his harsh breathing is loud even despite the shadow of soundlessness emanating from the pursuing darkness.

“I still suspect them,” I say quietly. “Jaemes was wrong about the motive, right about the blood being for a weapon, I think.”

“What motive then?” Nthazes asks between breaths.

“They want to outdo each other. That’s what they’ve been trying to do once they were split apart.”

“I see. That seems plausible, but I still don’t see how they transported the blood.”

“We’ll know that once we get hold of the murder weapon.”

“Who has it though? We can’t take both at once, and we shouldn’t touch Galar. The darkness would be on us by now if it wasn’t for his trident.”

“I know. Once we’re out of the darkness we strike.”

At that moment, we hit a wall. For a moment panic strikes my heart: is it a dead end? But no, it’s just a right-angle turn, and the corridor off it is gently curved.

“I think this could be the outer wall!” Fjalar shouts. “Yes, I’m sure of it! It’s curved to the same degree!”

“You expect us to trust that?” someone shouts. “If this leads us to a dead end, I swear I’ll feed you to the darkness myself!”

“You again? Stop complaining! You decided to follow me, didn't you?”

We rush along, and I think Fjalar might be right. It definitely feels as if we’re running around the inside of a circle. Then again, that proves nothing. There might be many circular curves in this labyrinth.

A few minutes later my worst fears are confirmed. The corridor is cut off by a dead end.