over obediently.
The cleric glared down at it. “Dwarven,” he observed. “Ancient. Yet a powerful weapon, in the hands of our enemies.”
The four Steel Shields had finished searching the perimeter of the cavern. “All clear,” one shouted. The other three echoed his findings. The four knights seemed to be stout, steady soldiers-all longbeards at least a century or two old. Yet they kept glancing uneasily at the gold-crusted floor. They must have known, Torrin thought, that the gold was cursed, that by exposing themselves they’d succumb to the stoneplague. Yet they’d come on this mission just the same.
Looking at them, Torrin felt fiercely proud of his race. Just like the heroes who’d given their lives at the Gates of Underhome, millennia before, those dwarf knights and their leader were prepared to sacrifice themselves so that the people of Eartheart might survive.
At their commander’s nod, two of the Steel Shields slung their shields over their backs and sheathed their maces. One grabbed Cathor by the ankles while the other lifted him by the shoulders. Although he struggled, they carried him easily.
The other two knights flanked Torrin.
“We’ll be returning now,” the cleric told him.
Torrin’s heart pounded. He glanced at the runestone the cleric held. It was such a wondrous thing, the type of artifact a Delver might spend a lifetime searching for. And not just any artifact, but one that that was linked to the very lifeblood of the Dwarffather. Torrin needed it to complete his sacred quest. The runestone would allow him, at long last, to find the Soulforge. To make his place in the world. Yet it was about to slip out of his grasp.
“You aren’t going to use the runestone to teleport, are you?” Torrin asked.
The cleric glanced up at him and said, “Why do you ask?”
Torrin gestured at the slit in the wall. “If you do, it may call the River of Gold. Molten gold could flood in and burn us.”
“No need for that,” the cleric said. “We’ll depart the way we came. Clangeddin Silverbeard will open a way home for us.”
“The runestone,” Torrin began, still staring at it. He took a deep breath, and plunged on. “The Lord Scepter ordered me to keep it safe.”
The cleric barely glanced at him. “Don’t worry, human,” he said with a chuckle. “It’s in good hands. Your part in this is done. Once we get back to Eartheart, you’ll be free to return to Sundasz, or wherever else you’d like to go. The Steel Shields will take up it from here.”
Torrin bristled. He was going to be set aside, like a chisel that had proved just the right tool for the job, but was no longer required. The cleric would never have spoken that way to him, had he known Torrin was a dwarf. “You don’t understand,” he protested. “I may look like one of the tallfolk, but…”
The cleric wasn’t listening.
“ I’m the one the Lord Scepter sent on this mission,” Torrin continued, desperation suddenly making the words tumble from his mouth. “I’m the one to whom he entrusted the artifact. Lord Scepter Bladebeard’s specific orders were that I be the one to place the runestone in his hand, when my mission was done. And I swore an oath by Moradin’s beard that I would do precisely that.” He raised a clenched fist to his heart. “Would you have me break my oath to the Dwarffather? Or defy the commands of your Lord Scepter?”
The cleric raised his eyebrows. Behind him, the other Steel Shields exchanged glances. Torrin waited, his heart pounding. One didn’t lie to a cleric of the Father of Battle, especially one who’d been gripped by kuldtharn just moments before and still had his axes in hand. Yet Torrin just had.
The cleric at last nodded. With a look of amusement in his eye, he handed the runestone to Torrin. “Very well, then,” he said. “The Lord Scepter will be waiting for us, when we return. You can give it to him when we reach Eartheart.”
The cleric glanced around at the gold-crusted walls and floor, and shuddered. “Knights, prepare yourselves.”
The knights stilled, like soldiers preparing for inspection. The cleric swept his axes up, and crashed their blades together. “ Faern! ” he shouted-the same word Torrin had used the first time he’d activated the runestone’s magic.
The cavern, still illuminated by Torrin’s lantern, disappeared in a final flash of gold as the group was whisked by the cleric’s magic back to Eartheart.
Torrin stood off to the side in the High Commander’s office, his hands clasped respectfully behind his back. He was in the office of High Commander Vorn Steeleye, who was flanked by a dozen or so top ranking officers, as well as the Lord Scepter. Cathor lay on the floor at the High Commander’s feet. Primed with yet another truth potion, the captive filled in more of the story he’d told Torrin.
Cathor, it seemed, had gone to Drik Hargunen at Kendril’s behest. There had been some texts in the temple library, unearthed decades before, at the close of the War of Gold and Gloom, that Kendril had wanted to study. Able to pass as a duergar, Cathor had applied to study at the library and had been accepted.
Students weren’t permitted to handle any of the runestones the library contained; only the librarians could do that. So he struck up a friendship with one, and that was how he heard about the library’s magical runestones — one of them, in particular.
The librarian had boasted that the library contained many powerful runestones, including one that could summon the River of Gold-Moradin’s vein, his manifestation on Faerun. By doing so, Laduguer’s clerics had been able to strike the Lord of the Morndinsamman in his one vulnerable spot. They had inscribed a rune so powerful, it could kill even a god.
With Moradin dead, the librarian chortled, Laduguer’s clerics would at long last have their revenge.
At that point, Cathor’s motivation for stealing the runestone had been simple greed. He wanted to mine the River of Gold. The librarian had been of a like mind. Once Kendril, back in Sundasz, had learned that the runestone could also be used for teleportation magic if the correct words were spoken in Auld Dethek, Cathor and the librarian had used the runestone to spirit themselves-and it-out of the library. “As simple as that,” Cathor boasted.
When they’d arrived at their destination, Cathor had slit the librarian’s throat.
It wasn’t the first time the rogue had gotten blood on his hands. Nor would it be the last. Once mining had begun, he’d seen what handling the cursed gold did to dwarves-and had made the decision to continue.
The rogue provided much detail of the portions of Drik Hargunen he’d visited, as well as the layout of the library itself. Yet he was unable to give any information about where the rune that had poisoned Moradin might have been inscribed. Despite being questioned repeatedly, despite the truth potion, Cathor’s only answer was a shrug.
When the questioning ended, guards dragged Cathor away to a cell. By that time, sunlight was slanting in through the slit windows of the High Commander’s office. Torrin expected to be dismissed himself, but the Lord Scepter motioned for him to stand over by a side wall.
Torrin obliged, bowing his head slightly to hide a yawn of exhaustion. High Commander Vorn Steeleye and his officers discussed what they’d just heard, while Torrin stood and fretted, glancing between the Lord Scepter and the runestone on the commander’s desk. When the meeting was done, it would be locked away in a magically sealed vault, so it could do no further harm. Then the Lord Scepter would depart to convene the Council, so that the Deep Lords could ratify whatever course of action the military commanders decided upon.
Torrin kept hoping to find a quiet moment before then when he might approach the Lord Scepter and ask to use the runestone one last time, once everything was all over, to search for the Soulforge. So far, that opportunity had yet to present itself.
Torrin sighed. He picked at the food that had been laid out to sustain the officers: roast boar and cooked apples, spiced tubers and surface greens, along with jugs of dark brown ale. He plucked a sweetbread from one of the platters and munched on it. The sweet taste of aniseed filled his mouth, scouring away the sourness his breath had acquired.
Voices ebbed and flowed as the officers argued about what course of action to take.
Attack Drik Hargunen and smash it into dust? That seemed to be the favored option, but there were some who argued it was simply not possible. The duergar city was more than three hundred leagues away. Teleporting an entire army to the area would not be feasible; they’d be faced with more than a tenday’s march across the surface
