The dwarf, to his credit, doesn’t hesitate. He simply nods and starts walking, and I follow him. While we walk I ask some questions that might be relevant in the near future.

“How do dwarves mine? Looking at your tunnels, it seems like the stone has been… disintegrated or something. There’s no tool marks, no chips in the walls, no anything.” I run my claws down a wall and they don’t snag on anything. “They’re just perfectly smooth.”

“Every miner is blessed. We produce no waste material, unless we want to. Every swing of the pick carves out rock and leaves it smooth. It is the only kind of magic a miner can do.”

“What about blacksmiths? You said every dwarf is a miner or a blacksmith?”

“No, I didn’t. But someone obviously told you that. It’s an oversimplification. I myself am a miner by nature, but my job in the Undergallery is to carry.”

“Carry?”

“Yes, carry. I carry things. When there is ore to be moved from the tunnels to the smelter, I carry it there. When there is food to be moved to the dining hall I carry it.” He looks at me. “When there are outsiders to be moved from one room to another, I carry them. Metaphorically. You’re very large.”

I nod. I am pretty big. “That’s a very specific job.”

“Of course it is. Imagine a world where everyone has more than one job. You’d never get anything done, not properly. I’ve heard that human mothers raise their own children, while also doing whatever work they did before they gave birth. How foolish! Imagine thinking you can split your focus down the middle and still perform adequately. We dwarves do things right.”

I nod and change the subject; he’s very militant about dwarven culture, it seems. “Why are the tunnels of privilege only for the king?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

I wait for him to elaborate. He doesn’t, so I give in and ask. “Why not?”

“Because… I don’t know. It’s just how it is. The king’s tunnels are for the king only. No other dwarf can enter them.”

“But why?”

“Because it’s the law.”

I nod. That’s exactly what I’m counting on.

When we arrive at the entrance to the king’s tunnels, I am surprised to see that they have a real, honest to goodness door. It’s almost big enough to let me walk through it without crouching. Right now it’s closed, and a massive beam of some dull metal bars it. More importantly, two dwarves stand guard, holding hammers, and they are giving me quite the look.

“Hello, Ellie Troll,” says one of the guards. “What do you want?”

“I want in the tunnels you’re guarding.”

All three dwarves draw a deep breath. I want to as well but I need to remain calm, or at least appear like I am. The dwarf who guided me speaks first. “You can’t enter.”

“Can’t I? What are the rules? The laws?”

“Only the king can enter the tunnels of privilege,” says one of the guards.

“Is that the real wording? What is the actual law?”

The other guard answers slowly. “The only dwarf permitted in the king’s tunnels is the king himself.”

“So nothing about trolls?”

“No. Only about dwarves and kings. You aren’t the king, but neither are you a dwarf. This is irregular.” The guard scratches his beard. “We should seek the wisdom of the council.”

“After they select a new king, of course,” says the other guard.

“Or you could let me in now, and I could save your king.”

At this, all three dwarves stare at me. “You could do that? Speak true.”

“I’m pretty sure that what I need to cure the king can be found in those tunnels,” I say. “I can’t get it anywhere else.” I hold my breath; I didn’t lie, but you never know with pedantic people. Or pedantic transcription stones.

The guards put their helmets together and start whispering. I can’t hear them, even with my enhanced hearing. When they are finished, they each grab an end of the beam that bars the way. They lift it free and then they open the door. It swings inward and comes to a stop when it hits the walls of the tunnel.

“Enter, Ellie Troll. And when—if—you return, tell nobody of what you see in there.”

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Without another word, I step inside. Soon as I am past the doors, the dwarves close them. I realize I forgot to ask how to get out again. Oh well, I’m sure I’ll figure it out.

The tunnel starts off normally, for a dwarf tunnel at least. They’re too low for me, of course, and I stoop very awkwardly as I walk. After a bit, I stop resisting my urge to stand up straight and tall. My troll instincts want me to crouch all the time anyway, so why not let them win out here? I find a comfortable pace and lope along.

The tunnels are the same as all the rest I’ve seen: smooth and perfect. They’re lit by the same blue lichen that I’ve seen elsewhere in the dwarf excavations. It makes it easy to see, at least.

Something catches my eye. It’s an inscription, carved right into the wall of the tunnel. It’s roughly done and framed only by a scratched border, but it’s still legible.

King Darak of the Undergallery. That I killed my father for his throne is my secret.

Well that is a little morbid. I stare it it for a while, then keep walking. Soon, I find another of the inscriptions. This one is done a little more carefully.

King Darak II of the Undergallery. That I am an illegitimate son is my secret.

My eyes open wide. I think I understand now why the king’s tunnels are only for the king.

I pass several more inscriptions, all of them with secrets that vary from mundane (“That I drank ale intended for my brother”) to horrific (“That when trapped with Kalarad in the tunnel I ate his body when he died”). Then I reach a room, carved from the stone, and it is full of secrets.

The walls are covered in engraved words, all of them written by kings, all of them dated and arranged carefully. It seems that each king writes a secret here when he ascends and enters the tunnel for the first time. I am amazed at just how many there are. Do dwarves live longer than humans? I count twenty columns and fifty rows of secrets on one wall alone; a thousand kings. Each wall is the same, save for one that is only partially completed.

This one is the current one, I assume. I find the last secret written.

King Radavad II of the Undergallery. That I can use magic is my secret.

Oh my. If my guess is right then the king who is currently in a coma is a wizard or something. Is that no good for dwarves? My guide—the carrier—said that mining is the only magic a miner dwarf can do, but apparently he’s not right about that.

This room branches out. There are a number of tunnels that leave it, besides the one I entered. Each of them is silent, with the scent of nothing but ancient stone and stale air. Wait! Not all of them are like that. This one smells like… water. And other things.

Well, that’s the one I’ll investigate first. I crouch down and enter the tunnel. The lichen that lights the way is only on the ceiling, which is unusual. Usually there’s some in the corner where the wall meets the floor. I don’t spend much time worrying about it, and then something sharp nips my ankle.

“Ouch!” I look down and see a creature that looks like a crab or a lobster or something. It’s latched on to my leg and is trying to tear a piece of me off, presumably to eat. I reach down and yank it free.

The cave bug thing is about the size of a cat. It’s pale and seems to have no eyes, but it makes up for that by having way too many legs. What a weird critter! I bring it a little too close to my face and it snaps at me with long, sharp claws. My troll instincts kick in and I bite its claw off, then swallow without chewing. The thing twists up and I pop the rest of it in my mouth quickly, crunching it own just enough that I can swallow it. To my surprise—and disgust, just a little—I like the taste. Mmm, raw cave bug.

I look around a little and see there are a few more of the things, all on the floor, all picking at the stone. They don’t seem to see me, which is not surprising given their lack of eyes, I guess. Very clever, Ellie. Then I see why there’s no lichen on the floor. One of them finds a piece of the glowing plant and tears it free from the rock, then eats it. Another one tries unsuccessfully to climb the smooth walls, but the dwarven mining technique leaves nothing for them to hold.

“Good luck, cave bugs.” I wave at them as I pass. “I might come back if I get hungry.” I’m joking, or am I? I haven’t decided yet. The one I ate was pretty tasty. But the human part of me is kind of grossed out at eating a bug. It’s just like lobster, I tell myself, but it doesn’t sound true even to me.

The tunnel changes direction. Here and there I see places where someone—the king, presumably—carved a piece away from the wall. Was that where they found ore or something? The mined spots are all small. Whatever the ore is, it’s apparently not common. As I continue, the mined out spots get more regular. I also notice that I’m descending, gently at first, but it gets steep pretty quick.

Then the tunnel takes a hard corner and I almost fall. It ends in empty space, and I hear a sound that sets my many teeth on edge. It’s like fingernails being dragged over stone, but times a million. There’s a quiet sound of running water as well. It smells overwhelmingly like the cave bugs, as well as something similar but subtly different. The empty space is too big for me to see the ends of it, but looking down I see the floor. It’s only about twenty feet down, and there is something magical happening down there.

A gently glowing circle of energy swirls on the floor, surrounded by runes that I can’t make out from here. It casts a light that feels wrong somehow, and it takes me a moment to figure out why. It’s a very bright light, but it ends sharply only a few feet away from the swirling energy. It doesn’t light up the space at all. Now and then I see something intrude into the lit space, but I can’t make out what it is. Maybe it’s the crab things. They pull back as soon as they get into the light. How do they know if they have no eyes?

There’s other things glowing too, smaller things that seem attached to the wall. They don’t cast enough light for my eyes to see around them, but they glow enough to make them out. They sway enticingly, like lanterns hanging in a light breeze. It’s kind of pretty, in a way.

“Hup!” I jump down. I’m aiming for the lit space around the swirling circle, and my aim is good, but then things go wrong. Something hits me hard in the ribs before I land. All the air blows out of my lungs, and then I’m yanked backward and slammed into the wall. Ouch! My scaly skin protects me from getting too roughed up, but I’m still a few hundred pounds of troll hitting a rough stone wall at high speed, so it hurts a fair bit. It seems I’m in a little trouble here.

Before I can even get a breath, something hard and sharp slams into my belly followed by a weird sensation, like I’m bleeding but it’s cold. I yell in pain; it definitely stabbed me! I grab at it but it slithers out from between my fingers. I get an impression of something insectile, like a bug’s leg but with way more joints. Then I see what hit me and I know I’m in a lot more trouble than I thought.