The Hammer of Fire (9 page)

Brogus shook his head and smiled, “I don’t
believe that nonsense, it’s impossible, but even if we have to
walk, we’ll be better off with the army than trying it on our own.
Those are wild lands in the center of the world, I’ve talked with
traders that went all the way to Sea’cra in the east, it’s
dangerous, at least ten thousand miles to the south too, maybe
more.

“I don’t believe that bit about portals
either,” said Milli with a grin she could not suppress and glowing
eyes, “but I guess we’ll find out, won’t we!”

Half an hour later Milli stood at the
entrance to the Hall of Relics chatting with a young dwarf who wore
a heavy set of chain armor and held a massive pike upright in his
right hand. His wore a broad smile on his face as he explained
something apparently quite important to the girl, and two other
guards stood next to them and interjected their thoughts quite
frequently. Milli smiled as they told their stories, gently
touching an elbow here or a shoulder there, as she laughed in a
musical way.

Brogus and Dol stood about a hundred paces up
a long, marble floored corridor and gazed at one of the many
sculptures that adorned the passage. The one they examined depicted
a squat dwarf with relatively short beard who held a double-headed
axe held in both hands while a raven perched on his shoulder. Flat
letters imprinted onto an iron plaque on the wall declared, “Harras
Drawhammer and Orc Cleaver”. The two spoke in low tones as they
glanced occasionally at the thick stone statue.

“How long should we give her?” said Brogus
with a glance down the hallway as he fingers tapped his upper thigh
and he rocked back and forth on his heels.

Dol said, “Milli will signal, like she
said.”

“It’s been too long,” said Brogus with
another glance down the hallway, and his fingers increased their
drumbeat on his leg. “I’m going to go.”

Dol quietly reached out with his hand,
grabbed the heavily built dwarf apprentice by the elbow, and gave
him a squeeze.

“That hurts!”

“Wait,” said Dol quietly without relaxing his
grip.

“Fine, let go of me, I’ll wait.”

Dol released his grip and then looked back to
the statue with a placid expression on his face. “The three main
families are the Drawhammers, Blackirons, and Firefists, but
weren’t there five major families at one point?”

“How am I supposed to know that?” asked
Brogus looking at the statue and shrugging his shoulders. “What
does an apprentice like you care about the important families and
the High Council anyway?”

Dol looked steadily at Brogus, “Was it the
Highhelms? And that raven, wasn’t there something about a family
that spoke with ravens?”

Brogus gave out a snort and shook his head,
“Fine, if you want to yak about this nonsense be my guest, but
don’t expect me to say anything. Aren’t you even a little excited?
We’re about to steal the most important relic in all of Craggen
Steep, leave the mountain for the first time in our lives, join up
with Corancil’s army, and head to the southern end of the
world.”

Dol looked calmly at Brogus and smiled, “The
pIan is to be inconspicuous while Milli does her thing.”

“Incon what?Anyway, why do we have to do
everything exactly the way we plan?”

Dol nodded, “Otherwise there is chaos.”

“A little chaos might do you some good, Dol.
You’re too damn calm, too quiet; it’s why you don’t have many
friends. You’ve got to get a little crazy, a little wild, do
something at random!”

“No,” said Dol firmly and glanced down the
hallway towards the halfling girl and the guards. “I think Milli is
signaling us.”

Brogus turned sharply and spotted the girl
twirling her long hair with one hand while laughing gaily at
something one of the dwarves said, “Let’s kick in the door!”

“Slowly, keep cool,” said Dol in a low tone
turning to walk slowly up the hallway towards Milli and the heavily
armed dwarves at her side. “Keep talking about the statue.”

Brogus bounced along at his side, unable to
keep a lively hop out of his step, while Dol continued to move at a
steady, smooth gait, both even and calm. When his companion got too
far out in front, Dol reached ahead and pulled him back with a firm
tug of the cloak. Brogus partially spun around and slapped Dol’s
hand away which let his jacket fly open for a moment to reveal the
handle of a heavy short axe underneath. It was made from solid oak
and worn smooth with time, the gift from his father, and his father
before him who knew how many generations. The blade was sharpened
to a razor edge and glinted in the bright lights of the
hallway.

One of the dwarves with Milli looked up
towards the approaching two but the girl put her hand on his chest
and looked him deeply in the eyes long enough to distract him away
from the approaching dwarves. Another few seconds, another couple
of strides, and then they were upon the soldiers.

Brogus pulled out his axe with a smooth
motion, twisted it so the blunt end came first, and hammered the
lead guard over the head with it. The soldier went straight to the
ground without making a sound. The second and third guards turned
to the Brogus with eyes wide in shock but their military training
took over and they lowered their massive pole arms towards him.
Milli put her foot out as the first stepped forward uttering some
sort of exclamation; he stumbled to the ground, and dropped his
weapon with a clatter. The third and final guard shoved the sharp
point of the pike at Brogus who tried to knock it aside with his
axe but only managed to slightly alter its course and took a
shallow, scrapping wound to his shoulder.

“Intruders!” shouted the second guard from
his knees but Milli pulled a small dagger from her belt and hit him
over the head with the butt end. He crumpled face first onto the
ground and gave off a slight moan, but the third guard remained in
the fight and took a step backwards while waving his heavy pike at
Milli and Brogus to keep them occupied.

“Get back, both of you!” he shouted.
“Alert!Alert!”

Brogus made a move forward towards the guard
but a quick stab from the pike sent him back again as he waved his
axe at the much longer weapon.

“Alert! Alert!” shouted the guard again and
he did not hear the sound of breaking glass behind him. “What do
you think you’re doing? Milli, this is the Hall of Relics, the
council will throw you into the dungeons!”

“I’m really very sorry,” said Milli in her
sweetest voice as she turned her lips down and made a little face.
“It’s all a misunderstanding. Put down that pike and we can discuss
it?”

The guard looked at her, blinked his eyes
twice, and slightly lowered the pike.

Dol kicked him in the back of the knee and
the guard stumbled to the ground with a thump, letting his pike go
as it skittered across the floor. “I’ve got it,” he said and
motioned with his head to the exit. “Let’s go.”

“Lead the way, Brogus,” said Milli as she
scrambled away from the entrance just as another couple of heavily
armed guards approached from down the hallway. “They’re trying to
steal the Drawhammer Shield,” she screamed in a high pitched voice
and pointed back into the room.

Both of the guards looked at her for a moment
and then dashed past the group and into the Hall of Relics.

“Can you say anything to a man that he
doesn’t believe?” asked Brogus as the trio made their way quickly
down the marble hallway, not quite running but not walking
either.

“You are the most perceptive and handsome
fellow I’ve ever met,” she said with a little pursing of her lips
as she put her arm around the dwarf.

“Really?”

“No,” said Dol with a shake of his head as
they continued their fast walk down the corridor. “Which way,
Brogus?”

“You fools!” came a shout from behind them.
“They’re getting away!”

“Don’t look back,” said Milli and put her
arms around both of the dwarves, “keep walking. Maybe they won’t
recognize us.”

“Turn here,” said Brogus. “We need to get
into the mine shafts; luckily the Hall of Relics is pretty deep in
the mountain. It’s not that far to the break in the wall. Come on,
come on!” he said with an elevated voice as he took a quick glance
backwards.

“Don’t look!” said Milli, but it was too
late.

“There, there they are!” came a shout and the
girl recognized the voice of Cleathelm, “it’s them. It’s Delius,
the girl and that oaf Brogus! After them, you idiots, they’ve got
the Hammer of Fire, they stole it!”

“Now we run,” said Milli.

The three broke into a sprint as they dashed
around the corner towards a large pulley operated lift, Brogus
headed towards it but Milli grabbed him by the arm, “No, you fool.
They’ll pull us back up, the stairs, where are the stairs?”

Brogus looked to his right and said, “This
way, around the corner, where are you going?”

Milli had boarded the lift, the big stone
chamber was roomy enough to fit a dozen broad shouldered dwarves
although not nearly the size of some of the mammoth elevators that
brought up tons of ore and rocks from the deep mining operations,
and was frantically pulling levers. With a lurch the thing suddenly
started downward and the tiny halfling girl made a dash for the
gate but the motion of the lift threw her off balance, her foot
struck one of the controls, and she fell to the floor with a
startled little cry.

“Milli,” shouted Brogus as he turned to the
fallen girl, “You said don’t go in the lift! What are you
doing?”

“Don’t stand there looking down my blouse,
pull me out, you idiot,” said Milli looking up from the floor of
the lift.

“I wasn’t …,” said the dwarf.

“Pull me out!” she screamed as the elevator
began its descent down.

Brogus took two steps to the lift, fell onto
his belly, and reached down to the girl. With a lunge Milli grabbed
his hand and he yanked her up and out with a tug so hard that she
actually flew through the air and landed face first against the
hard stone. She sprang to her feet, blood already showing from a
scrape above her left eye, “Down the steps, now, they’ll think we
took the lift!”

The three dashed around the corner to an open
passage that led to a series of marble stairs that went down twenty
steps to a landing and then doubled back on itself. Each landing
they passed contained a little alcove where a bust of a dwarf stood
with a small iron plaque declaring his importance in the history of
Craggen Steep.

“I’ve never taken the stairs before,” said
Brogus, stopping to examine a particularly magnificent bust that
depicted a fiercely scowling dwarf with a long scar above his right
eye. “It says …,”

“Hurry up, you idiot. That lift trick won’t
distract them long. How many flights down?”

“I’m not sure by stairs,” said Brogus with a
shake of his head as he turned to Milli and Dol. “I know what level
it is. Don’t the doors have numbers or something?”

“Come on then,” said Milli with a shake of
her head. “This is the worst planned escape I’ve ever been a party
too.”

“How many escapes have you been in on?” asked
Brogus and even Dol gave a little chuckle.

“Did you just laugh?” asked Milli and turned
to the short-haired dwarf and put her hands on her hips.

“No,” said Dol but he stopped to pull a small
piece of cloth from one of his pockets and dabbed quickly at the
blood on her forehead. “You’re bleeding.”

Milli reached up and touched the slick spot
on her head, “It’s nothing, a girl has to have a scar or two to
make her look rough. C’mon. How many levels down on the elevator
was it?”

“About five, I’d guess,” said Brogus with a
lingering last look towards the alcove and the impressive bust in
it, “I wonder who that was. I never knew they put statues in the
stairwells.”

“Between Dol’s stubbornness and you stupidity
I’m not sure we’re going to make it out of Craggen Steep let alone
to the south,” said Milli just as an echoed shout came from up
above. “Hurry up, they’re coming.”

“Here it is,” said Brogus and pointed to a
strange symbol on the stone door that exited the landing they came
to in a rush. “We get off here and then it’s not too far.”

“Go one more down,” said Dol as he continued
down the stone stairwell. “We’ll double back on one of the other
stairwells.”

“Are there other stairwells?” asked Milli,
but she followed Dol as he trundled down the stairs. He wore a
thick glove, given to them just a short time before by Uldex, that
glowed green and held the hammer with it. “Is it hot?”

Dol looked down at the hammer for the first
time since he smashed the case and thought for a moment, “Not too
bad, but I feel it.”

“The handle, it’s so small,” said Milli
looking closely at the great weapon as they made it to the next
landing and quickly darted through the door. “Where is this other
stairwell?”

“It should be around the corner,” said
Brogus. “We dwarves like to stick to the blueprint.”

“There it is,” said Milli as they came around
the corner and found an open doorway, exactly like the one they
just came through, down to the engravings on the silver door knob,
and they quickly dashed back up to the floor above.

“What if they’re waiting for us?” asked
Brogus as they stood for a moment on the landing. “They might know
our plans.”

“Uldex promised me that he would distract the
chase.”

“It doesn’t make any difference,” said Dol, a
small frown on his face, and he immediately strode through the open
doorway and into the corridor beyond. This deep in the mountain,
the hallways lacked both the gleam and finish of the grand chambers
above. The corridors didn’t have the smooth stone walls of the
upper chambers and, in particular, the ceiling lacked the
professional finishing that dwarves put on all their stonework.