white, through regular vision and through the single lens of his goggles.
“Take… me… to… Eralynn!” he shouted.
A sudden twist. His body felt impossibly thin, poised between one place and the next. For a moment, it seemed to stretch to infinity. Then he was borne along on a bright blue ribbon of spellfire that dazzled his eyes and filled his mind with a bright buzzing. Elation filled him. He’d done it! Activated the runestone!
He landed with a jarring thud in knee-deep, icy water that filled his boots and soaked his trouser legs. He staggered sideways and nearly fell. His shoulder struck something hard. Whatever place he’d entered was dimly illuminated by a flickering torchlight that came from behind the enormous pillar into which he’d just staggered. Briefly, he caught a glimpse of a vast room awash with water and filled with dozens of other pillars, each as thick as a centuries-old tree. When he glanced upward, he saw a ceiling covered in stalactites of dark, gooey, dripping slime.
Then the light went out.
A hissing noise like the spray of a waterfall filled his ears, accompanied by a steady, rhythmic pounding. Each thudding beat vibrated his entire body. The air was cold and smelled of wet stone and mildew.
Where was he?
The torchlight-if that’s what it had been-was gone. The only remaining light came from the runestone in his hand. A few sparkles of spellfire clung to it still, bleeding off into the darkness. Then they were gone. He shoved the stone into a pocket. Had that light been a torch, carried by Eralynn?
He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, “Eralynn! Are you here?”
He could barely hear his own voice over the steady pounding and constant, hissing spray. He realized the pounding came from inside the nearby pillars, which reverberated like hollow logs struck by a mallet. One of them was cracked down its length; water sprayed from it in a thin sheet. The sheet pulsed in time with the steady pounding, the spray intensifying in force with each beat, splattering onto a nearby pillar. It was covered in crusty white patches of tiny crystals: salt.
Suddenly, Torrin realized he must be in a portion of the Pumps of Pyraddin-a millennia-old marvel of dwarven engineering that drew water from Azulduth Lake, up on the surface. The pumps pushed the water through a series of charcoal beds far below that filtered out the salt. The purified water then ran through a series of bored tunnels for two hundred and fifty leagues, all the way to East Rift. Built when Underhome was first constructed, the pumps had continued to function ever since, and were still a major source of drinking water for Eartheart.
Why had Eralynn come to this place? Assuming she was at the Pumps. Torrin couldn’t see any trace of her.
“Eralynn!” he shouted again.
A flash of motion, to his right. Something plucked at his sleeve and struck the pillar beside him. An arrow or a crossbow bolt! Torrin whirled. He squinted his right eye shut so he could see through the lens of his goggles. Barely visible through the spray, he saw someone crouched low behind a pillar with one arm raised. Black face, white hair. A drow, aiming a wristbow at him!
Torrin ducked behind the pillar. The thudding of the pumps and the hiss of water made it impossible to hear anything, but Torrin saw a second bolt punch through the spray where he’d just been standing. It disappeared into the darkness beyond. Belatedly, he realized that the rush of water had saved him. It had deflected the first bolt just enough for it to miss.
“Marthammor be praised!” Torrin whispered. The god who watched over wayfarers was protecting him.
Torrin was safe-but only for the moment. He wrenched his mace from his belt and readied it, wondering which direction the next attack would come from. The drow had been wearing a cloak over his shoulders, likely one that would render him all but invisible in the darkness. Keeping his back to the pillar, Torrin peered left and right through the one good lens, desperately trying to watch in two directions at once as vibrations from the pillar shuddered through his back.
A ripple to his left alerted him to-the drow, invisible, wading through the water.
“ Thuldnoror! ” Torrin shouted, swinging his mace.
The mace swept through empty space-the drow wasn’t there! — and smashed into a pillar. As the weapon’s magic activated, thunder boomed, louder than the thudding of the pumps. The mace smashed a hole in the pillar, releasing a spray of water. As Torrin wrenched the mace free, cursing, pain stabbed through his right leg. He twisted, and saw the black-fletched end of a wristbow bolt protruding from the back of his thigh. The drow had gotten behind him!
Torrin whirled around, waiting for his opponent to close, but the drow held back. Torrin immediately realized why, as his thigh went numb. Drow sleep poison! His thoughts slowed, and gray spots clouded his vision as it started to take effect.
A short distance away, the smirking drow suddenly became visible, no longer bothering to conceal himself. Torrin lifted his mace. It felt as heavy and as unwieldy as a sack of anvils. As he sloshed toward his assailant, his legs buckled and he fell face-first into the ice-cold water. His mace slipped from his numb fingers. He sank to the floor, completely submerged. Shivers coursed through his body as the water stung his eyes, filled his nose, and clogged his throat. He couldn’t breathe or even cough the water out. The poison had sapped the strength from him, leaving him as weak as a babe.
He was going to drown.
I’ve failed you, Kier, he thought.
Distantly, he felt hands yank at his pack, lifting him partially out of the water. The drow was looting him.
Dwarf… father, Torrin prayed, each thought as heavy as a boulder. I… convey… my… soul…
Torrin felt his body rise and fall, rise and fall. There was the sensation of moving through space, as though he drifted among clouds-cold clouds that chilled him to the core. He must be dead, he thought, his soul detached from its human husk and on its way to Moradin’s realm to be reborn. Had he a voice, he would have laughed bitterly. He was on his way to the Soulforge, but not as he’d intended.
Moradin grant that I be recast as a dwarf, this time around, he prayed.
Someone spoke in a language Torrin didn’t understand. It was a harsh-sounding language, but with melodic overtones.
That was odd. The pain in his leg was odd, too, as was the sensation of something scratchy and hard under his right hip and shoulder. If he were dead, why did it feel as though he still had a body?
Torrin realized he could open his eyes. Rough stone slid past a short distance away. A dull yellow, flickering light illuminated a wall, casting dancing shadows.
A horizontal line bisected Torrin’s field of view-a curved metal edge. He realized he was lying on one of the magical driftdiscs used by the drow. The oversized floating disc moved steadily forward, bobbing slightly.
The white-haired drow who’d shot Torrin walked a pace or two behind, just at the edge of Torrin’s vision. His black skin gave him a natural camouflage against the dark stone of the tunnel they were passing through, yet he was close enough that Torrin could make out details of his face. He looked old; his face was deeply lined.
The drow turned his head, shielded his eyes from the light with one hand, and stared at Torrin. Then he said something in the same language Torrin had just heard.
Torrin fought to marshal his thoughts. They came sluggishly, as though he were still only half awake. That was the drow sleep poison, he knew, from the wristbow bolt. But the drow hadn’t let Torrin die, after all. He’d been pulled from the water. Why?
Torrin’s leg ached. He moved a hand to touch the wound, to feel whether the bolt was still in his leg. His hand fumbled on his goggles, lying on the driftdisc beside him. They reminded him of another mystery. Why would drow be using torches to light their way? The black-skinned elves could see as well in the dark as any dwarf.
Torrin at last touched his wounded thigh, He winced. No bolt protruded from it. Instead, his leg was bandaged. He was naked, he realized. A blanket had been wrapped around his body, covering all but his head. Though his body was dry, his hair and beard were still damp. It had been some time, then, since he’d fallen into the water.
Slowly, by degrees, Torrin eased onto his back and turned his head the other way. He saw two elves, a man and a woman. Their dark skin at first made him think they were drow, but then he realized their skin was deep brown, rather than true black. And their hair was black, rather than white. They had deeply lined faces, too, and the man’s hair was thinning. Torrin would have guessed their age at about sixty, had they been human. The two were
