My demand is met with silence. Fjalar shakes his head.

“I refuse.”

“Why? That only confirms your guilt.”

“You really think anyone here believes your ridiculous tale?”

“I don’t see the ridiculousness. I’ve seen stranger crafts than what I’ve just described.”

“Or so you claim.”

“I have. Down here you forge weapons of light and little else, but in the realms above there are powers you can’t even imagine.”

And herein lies the problem, I realize. I’ve seen many an absurd craft in my battles. An axe that can split a stone wall from half a mile away. Chainmail embedded into skin to render its user impervious to attacks. Heartseeker, which almost has a life of its own. Most insane of all, a lost crown that turned trolls into something I fear is superior to dwarves.

Compared to all that, is an amulet that steals the life of its victims so absurd? I do not think so. Certainly it’s no more absurd than the existence of this lost city down here, sealed away for untold years yet still potent with death.

These dwarves won’t believe me though. Certainly they won’t believe that the craft is from one of their own. With their sense of time atrophied, they can’t understand that Fjalar and Galar are likely many hundreds of years older than them. They see only in terms of degrees, judge time based on accomplishments.

Fjalar and Galar never put their accomplishments in the open. They locked them away, not desiring the responsibility and danger that comes with rank, until their fight became so bad that they decided each needed to create a weapon of such power that it would prove once and for all who was the superior craftsdwarf.

Galar was honest. He trusted in his skill, and strived to create the greatest weapon he could: the trident.

Fjalar was dishonest. He suspected Galar would win and, jealous, created a way to increase his power through the worst means possible. He would never be satisfied with just as good, or slightly better than his brother. He needed to make his skill beyond compare.

Considering the timing, it’s likely he’d been working on it for a while in secret. Probably he’d suspected their relationship was close to the breaking point. This meant that as soon as their contest started, he could begin the killings.

The dithyok threw a wrench into his plans. If it hadn’t torn him apart so badly, he’d have proved his superiority by now, with a mace brighter than even the Runethane’s. If he’d had the time, Galar’s trident would be the barest torch in comparison to his weapon.

Even looking at the mace as it is—a better design than my own, in terms of metalwork at least—I am frightened by how little time it took him to make it. A week at most passed from his leaving the infirmary to presenting it to the Runethane,

“Remove your armor, Fjalar!” I repeat. “Or at the very least, your breastplate, so we can examine your amulet for ourselves.”

“You wish me to remove my armor while the darkness is on the verge of breaking in?” he says angrily.

“Armor is no protection against the darkness. It doesn’t care how thick our plate is. And your plate is half-broken anyway. Pull your amulet through one of the gaps.”

“I will not expose my amulet. You have not forged one yet, I’ve heard. If you had, you would understand. An amulet of unaging is no less than a runeknight’s life!”

“A few seconds is all it would take for us to confirm.”

“I refuse.”

“Strip off your breastplate or I will tear it from you!”

“Stop this!” Hirthik shouts. “Zathar, your idea is absurd.”

“It is only absurd to you down here because you have not seen all that runes can do. I saw a crown turn a troll into something beyond even a dwarf, and it transformed the rest of his tribe also. Compared to that, Fjalar’s craft is almost ordinary.”

“That is an even more ridiculous story, yes,” says Fjalar. “No one believes you, Zathar. Silence yourself!”

“You don’t need to believe me. None of you have to take my word for it! All we have to do is examine Fjalar’s amulet.”

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“I will not remove it.”

“Then that proves your guilt.”

“It proves nothing!” Hirthik cries. “No one would agree to make themselves vulnerable down here!”

“Ten seconds is all it would take us. The runes are in scripts you know well.”

“Then I for one cannot believe it,” another dwarf says. “We don’t have runes that could accomplish what you say. Maybe up above there are different runes, and I’m sure some of them could strip the life from a dwarf and put it into another. The darkness does something similar, maybe. But our runes can’t do that.”

“No,” someone else says. “Our runes are plain ones, for strength and toughness and light.

“It’s not the runes that give a craft its properties,” I say. “It’s how you put them together.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You have many more runes—I cannot read half your armor, and you even brought down new runes of light. But down here, knowledge doesn’t come often. We don’t have enough for the kind of flexibility you dwarves up above enjoy.”

Nthazes steps in: “I understand this tale may be hard to accept,” he admits. “But think on Galar’s craft! With the same runes of light we all use, he created something that outshone even the Runethane’s mace. Fjalar is of equal skill at least, so is it that hard to believe he could have created something equally brilliant, though for evil purposes?“

Some of the dwarves glance at each other. Nthazes is one of these deep dwarves, so they’re more likely to believe him. I give him a look to encourage him to press the attack.

“All he has to do is draw out his amulet,” he continues. “The darkness is guarded against. He doesn’t need to fear it.”

“Fine!” Fjalar says. I tense, expecting one last gamble. “I will show you all my amulet. But not now, with the darkness so close by. I’ll show it once we’re at the top of the Shaft, where it’s not so easy for the darkness to reach us—because it’s weakened, I doubt it’ll want to venture so far up. But I won’t do it here. Does that satisfy you, Zathar?”

A terrible anger fills me, directed not at him, but at myself. He’s outsmarted me. His request is too reasonable—I can’t refuse if I'm to have the support of any of the other dwarves, and now he has gained plenty of chances to make sure I won’t ever be able to accuse him further.

“All right,” I say, eventually, with extreme reluctance. “The moment we reach the top of the Shaft, you’ll show it to us.”

“Good. Then the discussion for now is over. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” I say, trying not to let my anger show.

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

We wait in the building while the injured treat their wounds as best they can, and try to get our strength back. There are plenty of rations left, despite the fact about half of us threw our packs away in panic. They taste bitter to me. Even the water tastes bitter, and I am afraid.

Fjalar is going to try to kill me. I’m sure of this: if I make it up the Shaft, I’ll force him to show his amulet. His only chance then is to try and make sure I die down here and hope that none of the others will continue my accusations.

How will he strike? He might not even use the murder weapon to do it—in the confusion, why not bash me over the head with his mace and claim I attacked first? More dwarves believe him than me, after all. Maybe none believe me except for Nthazes.

But I’m right, I’m sure of it! If only I’d been able to drag one of those bodies back—I should have shouted for help. A few would have come to help me carry the corpse away, if I’d told them the slain might be alive. Then they’d have seen the truth.

Yet that evidence is now gone. Fjalar’s amulet is the only proof left. I must expose it!

How, though? Do I take a chance and strike first? Then the other dwarves will turn against me, break me with their maces before I get the chance to tear the amulet free. No, my best bet is to survive until we get to the Shaft and keep my promise.

He’ll refuse again, of course. I’m still going to have to fight. Yet then Fjalar will be the unreasonable one.

The darkness’s attempts to break into the room grow bolder. Before long, just two on door duty are not enough. I join, making sure to show everyone that I’m one of them and committed to escape.

There is harsh coldness outside. Through the tiny gap I sense nothing at all, like the door opens to a precipice on the edge of a great void, a terrible blackness like that which is said to hang above the world when the sun goes down.

“We’re going to have to leave this place soon,” says the dwarf beside me—Melkor, as Nthazes called him. His voice is deep and serious. “In fact, the sooner the better. If we don’t break out now we might end up trapped.”

“I’m still weak,” one of the injured says. “A lot of us are.”

“But we have no choice,” Melkor says simply.

“One last charge,” says Hirthik. “One last chance to prove we’re not cowards.”

“One last charge in any case,” Nthazes says. “We can win it though. The darkness thinks we’ve all but given in.”

“No one can know what it thinks. No one knows if it even does think.”

“We should charge now,” repeats Melkor.

Fjalar nods. “Agreed. I shall lead it. Form a wedge.”

Silently, we form up. The injured stay in the middle, while the senior runeknights—fourth degrees like Nthazes, no third degrees survive—go to the front behind Fjalar. As fifth, maybe he should be relinquish the lead to one of them, but no one is keen to be first into the darkness.

I go to the back, as far away from him as possible. I won’t give him any easy opportunities.

“Ready?” Fjalar asks us.

I'm not. My insides churn at the thought of facing the blackness and soundlessness once more. Yet we must do this, and win; if we fail there will be no one left to keep the evil here from flowing upward unimpeded. That's a goal even more important than stopping Fjalar.

“Ready,” I declare, and the rest of the dwarves repeat my words

“Charge!” Fjalar shouts.