One should rest after a terrible ordeal. Both my mind and body are fatigued beyond measure, and I would like nothing more than to be able to lie down in my blankets, sleep for many hours, only waking to eat and drink, and live like this until my muscles are repaired and my mind clear of the fugue that sets in after I stagger back down to the chamber of the Shaft alongside Jaemes.
But the situation remains dire. Eleven dwarves won’t be able to defend against the next incursion when it comes, especially now that all the senior runeknights have perished. Something must be done. Reinforcements must be called down.
Jaemes wraps my ribs in healing chains retrieved from the infirmary while we discuss what course of action to take.
“The Runeking must be contacted,” says Nthazes. “That much is clear.”
“Yes,” says Notok, the other fourth degree who survived besides Nthazes and Melkor. “The question is how.”
“Perhaps a letter,” someone suggests. “We can send it up with the next caravan. I believe the chamberlain had some kind of seal he affixed to those kinds of things. I imagine it’s in his office, or else in the Runethane’s private chambers.”
“Is it really all right to break into those?” Hirthik asks nervously.
“Yes,” Melkor says. “It is a rule of the fort that if the Runethane should perish, his responsibilities fall temporarily to the next most senior runeknight. That would now, in this case, be me, Nthazes, and Notok. And I give us permission.”
“I don’t know if a letter would be urgent enough,” Jaemes says. “Letters are easily ignored.”
“Not if they have a Runethane’s seal affixed,” counters Hirthik.
“Even then, it could be lost. I think the message should be delivered in person. One of you should carry it up.”
“No,” says Melkor. “We are needed to defend the Shaft.”
Jaemes shakes his head. “Making sure the reinforcements come is more important than having one extra defender, to my mind.”
“I agree,” says Nthazes. “One of us must travel to the Runeking’s realm directly, to his capital, and tell him what happened.”
“It should be the most senior we have,” says Notok. “I volunteer.”
Nthazes shakes his head. “You wield one of our most powerful crafts, and are in good fighting shape. If the darkness comes up sooner than anticipated, you’ll be needed most.”
“Who then? Zathar, with his experience of up above? But he is not one of us.”
“I uncovered the killer,” I say sharply. “Does that not qualify me?”
There is a long silence. Melkor breaks it.
“I say that it does. In fact, I declare it so. Zathar, you are one of us. A valued guard against the deep darkness.”
I bow my head deeply at the honor, though it feels a little underwhelming. Maybe I'm just too exhausted to feel the full gravity of it.
“I feel that there should be some kind of ceremony,” Melkor continues, “but we don’t have time to waste on such.”
“Your confidence is enough. I’m honored beyond words.”
“Then Zathar is to go up,” says Notok. “It is decided.”
“On his own?” Hirthik says. “He may be one of us now, as declared by Melkor, but he doesn’t look like one of us. The Runeking may not believe him, even think he’s some kind of spy. We all know how much back-stabbing goes on up there.”
“I’ll accompany him,” Nthazes says. “I look the part, and my weapon of light will prove I’m no fake beyond all doubt.”
“I would prefer it if you stayed here to help the defense,” says Melkor. “You were spectacular against the darkness, Nthazes. It would have crushed us if not for you.”
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Nthazes removes his helmet. “Blink open your eyes for a second,” he says. “Look at me!”
I wince. He looks aged. His skin is yellowed, and his hair which was the color of platinum-gold is dulled to ash. His hands are shaking and his eyes are bloodshot.
“I’ll recover,” he reassures us, putting his helmet back on. “But it’ll take some time—a concept we should all be a little more aware of from now on. So I would like to accompany Zathar up to the Runeking’s capital.”
Melkor nods. “Very well.” He turns to Jaemes. “And how about you, human? I imagine you’ll want to leave this place also.”
To my surprise, Jaemes shakes his head. “No, I wish to stay down here. I swore that I’d discover the mystery behind the darkness, and I’ve finally gained my first knowledge. Zathar told me a little of what you discovered down there.”
“We will not be returning,” Notok says in a warning tone.
“You do not wish to, of course. But Zathar says there was a chance of victory against it, if Belthur had not come.”
“I think otherwise. The strongest of us were down there, and still were defeated. There was never any chance.”
“Perhaps. The next Runethane—who will have to be appointed from outside—may see things differently. If he does, I can’t pass up the opportunity to see for myself what lies down there.”
“If the next Runethane decides to repeat Yurok’s mistakes, I will refuse to follow him,” someone spits. “I won’t undertake another suicide quest.”
“We don’t have to assault it, perhaps,” says Melkor. “And I think we at least have a duty to retrieve those who fell in the tunnel.”
“I won’t go back either,” says Hirthik.
“In any case those decisions don’t have to be made yet. Not for... a long stretch of time, if I understand the idea correctly.”
“You do,” I say.
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The chamberlain had the schedule for the supply caravans, and so his office is searched. In it we find not only the schedule, but his seal, many bags of gold coins, and several returned requests from the Runeking for more dwarves and materials. This worries me—yet we’ll just have to try and persuade him as best we can.
Surely he cannot overlook a disaster on this scale. The loss of a Runethane is no small thing.
After this, Jaemes and I make a search of Fjalar’s chambers. Nthazes, still weak, declines the opportunity, desiring instead to rest and help with the funeral preparations for the two dwarves who died on the lift.
After several hours of clearing and searching, we find a square cut into the stone. It’s a trapdoor. I prize it open.
Within are rolls of metal beaten thin and covered with runic poems of blood and theft, taking and extruding, death and life. I pull them all out. Below are shards of glass with drafts of the poem Melkor read to us. The hole goes deep. Fjalar must have been working on his evil craft for a long time.
However Galar’s chamber, even after many hours of thorough searching, reveals nothing incriminating.
“If only we’d searched Fjalar’s chambers first,” I say bitterly to Nthazes, after we return to the chamber of the Shaft with several chests packed full with evidence. “None of this might have happened then. The Runethane would’ve been forced to admit the killer wasn’t the darkness, and no one else would’ve had to die.”
“Or maybe he would still have refused to believe. We can’t know. At any rate, I’m glad that in the end we were doing the right thing.”
“I’m still angry about it.”
“So am I. I think we’ll always be angry about it.”
“Have you worked out the caravan manifests yet? I want to know when we’re leaving.”
“I’m keen to get away as well, but I have some bad news. We found a letter saying that the next load is delayed for up to fifty long-hours.”
“A long-hour?”
“It’s how they measure time there,” Jaemes explains. “They don’t have days like dwarves nearer the surface, so the Runeking’s capital, Allabrast, has a great sand-timer. A long-hour is equivalent to three or so days.”
“Then we’ll have to wait months!” I cry in despair. “Then our journey will take time, then persuading the Runeking, and then the reinforcements will take a while to come down as well, I’m sure.” I turn to Melkor, who’s removing the contents of the evidence chest and reading over the runes. “Can you really hold off the darkness for that long?”
He pauses and looks up at me. “We damaged it very badly. The next incursion won’t come soon.”
“You can’t be sure, though.”
He shakes his head. “No.”
“Damn this!”
Nthazes shrugs. “It is what it is. We’ll have some time to recover at least. And I believe there’s still a craft you have to do.”
“You mean remake my mace? It stung, being forced to drop it like that. Then having to use another dwarf’s. Felt wrong in my hands, even despite the circumstances.”
"No. I mean your amulet of unaging.”
I nearly laugh. I’d half-forgotten. After all, age has been the least deadly threat against me down here.
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In the quiet, dim forging hall, I prepare my materials. My gems are arrayed, and the metal that’s to be their setting also. I couldn’t find the drafts of the poems I’d intended to carve into them, but that doesn’t matter. I’ve improved my forging drastically in my time down here, and the most important lesson I’ve learned is that I should let the runes flow.
Well, sometimes that can have unintended effects, of course. Yet for this craft, which must be attuned to mind, body and soul, I think letting my talent out unimpeded is the correct decision.
I pick up the jeweler’s chisel with my right hand, the octagon-cut ruby with my left, and begin.