Yemi could always tell when Audun was trying not to cry. He’d tuck his lower lip under his teeth, clasp his hands behind his back, and bob his head up and down. He also didn’t speak, as opening his mouth would mean bawling. So Yemi walked beside him silently and just assumed that his mother had been terrible to him.

“You’ll be staying with us now,” she said to him when Gund called for the people to stop and rest. “I made both Halfur and Klar promise. Klar spoke with your mother and threatened to have her flogged by Bloody Rykka if she ever comes close to you again. I know I’m not my mother, but I’ll do what I can to protect you. Alright?”

Audun nodded, but it was days before he began to open up. Yemi didn’t ask him anymore if his mother had hit him. His face had no bruises, for one thing, though Yemi knew she would at times have Audun’s brothers kick him in the ribs, and she once saw bruises on his arms where his mother had pinched him. Yemi couldn’t understand how a woman could have so much hate for her own child, and it was difficult for her not to let her own heart fill with hate for the wretched woman. “I understand those feelings,” her mother told her, “but they will poison your heart, and make it difficult for you to feel love and joy. Take my word, Yemi. I lived the first half of my life this way, and it took half the second half of my life to heal. Don’t put yourself through that torture over some horrible fool.”

Yemi was struggling now to follow her mother’s instruction. Hate was creeping into her heart from all directions. She remembered well the chase from High Alden; the fear when the roof began to collapse, the sadness of watching Halfur lay close to death from the assassin’s poison, and the horror of the gnolls and their pet monster. Worst of all was the pain in her tummy when she saw Magni in smouldering ruin atop the Brow. And now hate was fueled by the plight of the sick and wounded about her, and the pains of the very old as they tried to keep up with the rest of the kingdom. Dwarves are an enduring people, a thing Yemi was proud of, and remained hale and hardy till almost the end of life, but once the threshold of age was crossed the journey to the Hidden Door was short.

Several old ones perished within sight of Cloud Hammer. Their bodies were laid in caves dug into the mountains, and her sister gave speeches to honor them. Both her and Klar tried to convince Halfur to give the speeches, as he was in line for the throne, but he refused, saying Klar was better suited to offer comfort than he. It made Yemi angry, but she kept it to herself, knowing it was useless to try and convince Halfur to do anything he didn’t want to do.

It was halfway through the night when they reached the foothills of Mount Ennead. Yemi choked back tears when she looked up at Ennead’s summit and saw Aurvandil, one of Cloud Hammer’s three observatories. Aurvandil was a third the size of Magni, and only had nine telescopes that were less than half the length of the Master Lens. But still, seeing Aurvandil’s copper telescopes reminded Yemi of Magni’s many golden eyes.

Gund called for a halt and directed the people to make camp. Gund seemed to be ruling the people instead of Halfur, and Yemi felt relieved, seeing how Gund cared for the older ones and small children. Klar had pressed for rising the steps to Aurvandil that night, but Gund reasoned that they would not be able to secure asylum so quickly, and that Could Hammer didn’t have the space to house all their people. Yemi realized then that most of the people would live in camps until they took back Thrond, and she felt uncomfortable at the thought that she would likely be living in the comfort of a mountain while so many were forced to stay out under the open sky.

She did her best to involve herself in setting up the camp, tired as she was. Her body wasn’t fatigued, of course, but her heart was. Never in her life had she seen so much pain, and fear over her parents’ well being was growing within her. She busied herself clearing out caves for those who were ill with what people were calling sky sickness. She felt light headed and queasy herself, and had to frequently sit down. To her amazement, the sky had no effect on Audun. He labored tirelessly alongside her, handing her tools, holding supplies for her, bringing her food and water, or sometimes he would just be by her side. He never spoke, and when they stopped to rest he stared upwards to Aurvandil.

“Do you want to see it?” she asked.

He nodded.

She looked around at the camp. There was plenty to do, but all around her were cared for and laying down to sleep, and she knew she couldn’t help everyone in the kingdom. She wanted to help Audun now, so she took his arm and dragged him behind her to the cave set up for her and her siblings. Halfur was sitting on a seat made of piled stone and draped with indigo cloth. Klar was sitting at a bench in front of a board of food she’d barely touched, and Urum Brann and Gund were speaking quietly with Halfur, along with a strange dwarf in a red and yellow toga.

She went over to her brother and coughed quietly. The three men looked at her; Gund patiently, Halfur expectantly, the strange man blankly, and Urum kindly. “Can we go to Aurvandil?” she asked. “My friend would like to see it.”

Halfur rolled his eyes, and Gund began to speak, but Urum interrupted him.

“May they, Yul?” he asked.

The strange dwarf looked at Audun for an uncomfortably long time, then smiled and nodded. “I’ll look after the princess and her friend. No doubt they could use a distraction from this tragedy. May I have your name, young man?”

Audun was silent, so Yemi said his name and apologised for him not speaking. Yul asked them to wait for a moment while he discussed important matters with the lords of Obrus, and promised to lead them up the stair soon.

It was longer than Yemi expected before Yul emerged from their cave, and she was beginning to feel quite perturbed. He spoke gently, though, along the walk up the mountain stairs. He expressed his sorrow over her parents’ captivity and the shock they all must be suffering. “A terrible thing for one your age to endure,” he kept saying, “but you will learn from it. Don’t hide from your sadness, Dread Highness. Does a soldier hide from his armor and spear?”. She ignored him after a while. More pressing on her mind was fear that her parents were not simply being held captive.

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The stair was long and steep, and many times she had to leap and crawl up a step. She worried over Audun, but he managed better than her it seemed, using his hands and feet on every step, even if he didn’t need to. The mountain was carved on either side of the stair in a constant motif of a flowing river. Unlike Thrond, Cloud Hammer was built more like a human castle, with wide terraces and courtyards built onto the mountainside, rather than placed within. Level after level of cylindrical houses with long, narrow windows lined the higher slopes in such great number that Yemi wondered if they had built anything within the mountain at all.

The stair wound up to the hips of the mountain. It opened up onto a wide and bare terrace pocked with small, smoothly rounded holes. Audun paused to look at every hole they passed near. Yemi asked Yul what they were.

“They help us count the stars,” Yul replied. Yemi looked closely at one of the holes and saw that it was lined with a reflective metal. Audun pointed up and she saw a large awning of plain white fabric circling around the entire terrace, then she saw that there were many such terraces on Ennead’s hide. Yalla was high in the sky, and sunlight was brimming on the horizon, but she could still see faint pinpoints of light on the screen of fabric stretched across the awning.

She felt the urge to look over her shoulder at Obrus, but she was afraid that seeing her home from there might make her cry, and she was trying to be a princess. Yul pounded his fist on a certain spot on a large door in the mountainside. A deep sound echoed from within, and the door slid upward. They walked through a series of dimly lit chambers and halls to a winch lift. Yul pulled on a chord hanging from the roof above. A bell rang and he guided them onto the lift, then pulled the chord again. The chains to the winch creaked and they were on their way.

The lift brought them directly to Aurvandil. It was much smaller than poor Magni, but it was still a large space, with a vast number of dwarves working busily. Most of them seemed focused on massive star charts carved into open spaces on the summit floor, and there were large statues of the Lords of Night standing tall between the telescopes, with Ferenrar and Emvolo in the center. Yemi looked at Artorus, the Weary Knight, and thought to herself that he looked how Obrus must feel, with his greathelm bowed and shoulders slumped, leaning on his lance as if it were a cane.

Her want for home moved her to risk the tears of looking back. The sun had climbed to the rim of the sky, and warm pink light spread cozenly over a grey, weeping world, but Obrus looked as it always had; hulking and dour, a grim warden chosen for some noble purpose, guarding an ancient secret perhaps, or standing watch for a critical time. The loss of its golden eye and the capture of its king and queen seemed to go unnoticed by the great mountain. With a quiet sigh, Yemi turned and followed Audun and Yul to a nearby telescope.

Each one was of identical size and design. Yemi wondered at the point of having nine telescopes of the same type. Wouldn’t just one do? And why not have different types if they wanted more? She shrugged the thoughts away as Yul opened the door to the telescope’s dome. Audun entered the dome, and Yul closed the door behind him. He was in there long enough for Yemi to grow tired of waiting for him. Come on, Audun, she thought impatiently. I’m tired. How much is there to see in one spot? When Audun finally exited, he was beaming ear to ear. “The last arrow,” he said.

Yemi scrunched her nose and shook her head.

“Would you have a look, Dread Highness?” asked Yul. “This lens points at Autumn’s Relief. You may know it by a different name.” He gestured toward the dome, and Yemi reluctantly entered. She put her eye to the lens, but until the door was close all the saw was pinkish grey haze. When the door shut and the dome darkened behind her, the Titan’s Torch came strikingly into view. She’d seen it many a time, but not through a telescope. She jumped backward, then slowly pressed her eye to the lens again.

It’s halo flared like fingers of flame, but within that thin ring of fire it was a solid red sphere. Its surface looked pebbled like the skin of a tarrasque, and here and there were tiny spots of black. The blue light that flickered at its core looked like another thing entirely. It was not round, nor was it entirely blue. White and gold light flowed like rivers in thin lines up and down a deep and intense blue diamond. The diamond pulsed like a heartbeat, and there was a small orb of silver at its center, like the pupil of a great eye. A dark blue haze emanated around its edges, undisturbed by the rivers of gold and white flame. The edges of the outer blue faded into indigo and violet as the light blended with the red, and seemed to be flowing either into our out of the red star.

Yemi stepped slowly out of the dome. She was worried by what she saw. “It’s not a star, is it?”

Both Audun and Yul shook their heads.

“The red orb behind may be,” said Yul. “It’s difficult to tell, but it shares many aspects of stars, though cleary it is much closer than all the others. Or, it may be it’s glowing so much more brightly because it’s young. The blue light, however, is a complete mystery. It looks too complex, too alive.”

“Do stars have mothers?” Yemi asked. “The blue could be a creature that makes stars?”

Audun raised an eyebrow, and Yul merely shrugged. “Who knows?” the old starmancer said.

“Yul,” a younger man called from the next telescope. It was pointed downward, and the dwarf was jogging towards them.

“What is it Hemahd?”

“Prince Ror and his army has come. All look well. No wounded, and the number Chief Yormun reported.”

Yemi’s heart leapt. She was not worried of Ror being wounded or slain, but she did not like the look on his face when he set out to attack High Alden. She was afraid what would happen if the worst proved true, and if Ror were forced to harm Cara’s father, or even Cara herself. She hurried back to the winch lift and pulled on the chord, waving for Audun to hurry to her.

Yul laughed. “The chord is only a signal for the men up top. Hemahd, would you?”

Hemahd pulled the crank once they all stood in the lift. Yemi’s heart raced as they plummeted downward. She was glad for many reasons that Ror had returned. Not only did she miss him, and worry over him, but even when angry or sad, Ror always managed to make Yemi smile. And the people would find strength in his return. He'd come back from punishing the traitors who sold them to their enemies, the first step in reclaiming Thrond. They would look to him, and be safe in his care. Yemi might even be able to find a moment to be alone and not be a princess for a little while. Then she could think about Thrond and Magni, and her parents, and if she dared, her poor dead uncle Balvor.