“Each to his own, Captain.” She nodded at Stonefist and his entourage, below. “You could save a few gnomes, though, if you had a mind to.”
Ravon stood up, his peace shattered. “I’m not kicking them off the rings. That would be Stonefist, or are you blind as well as dumb?”
“Stonefist knows you’re up here. He’s throwing the workers off to goad you. Everybody has a breaking point. Our forge master wonders what yours is. Even the slaves are laying wagers.” Walking off, she said, “I’ve got a few coins in the game myself.”
When Ravon got back to his cell, Finner had washed out his second set of rags and hung them up to dry by the window slit. Ravon noted that the cell was newly swept as well. It almost looked decent.
Noting Ravon’s scowl, Finner said, “It’s what a steward does.” Then he turned to pound the dust out of Ravon’s mattress.
“Nine Hells.” Ravon was now thoroughly stuck with Finner, all four feet of him, including his racking cough and broken ribs.
Finner turned to leave. “I’ll fetch your breakfast.”
“No!” At the halfling’s wide-eyed look, Ravon muttered, “Tell them it’s my gruel, but bring it up here and eat it yourself.” Finner started to protest. “That’s an order. A steward does what he’s bloody well told.”
Finner grinned with what teeth he had left.
One night a storm lashed down on the forge. Lightning erupted as though Eberron itself were on fire. It ought to have cooled the forge down, but it only succeeded in turning the warrens into insufferable chambers of steam. Unable to sleep, Ravon left Finner to his exhausted slumbers and walked out to lean against a corridor wall. The thunder was loud enough to wake the dead giants underground. Between bellowing cracks he heard a familiar jangling sound and looked along the corridor to see Nastra heading down the north stairwell-again. He followed.
Ravon was not a small man, but he had long experience with silent tracking, all the easier when walking on stone stairs in iron halls. He followed Nastra down the steps, open at the top but increasingly narrower as they continued down. It was a reckless thing, to follow her. She carried a small dagger at her belt, and he’d seen her use it. A blade at the throat… the hundred and twelfth way to die, and not as bad as some. Still, Ravon had a hankering to die with a weapon in his hand. Call him sentimental. So Stonefist’s promise of a fight with a bunch of his henchmen was always in the back of his mind.
Nevertheless Ravon followed Nastra to see what villainy she was up to. If she broke the rules, he could use it against her when she tormented Finner.
The elf slipped around another turn of the stairs, the descent growing hotter. By now they had surely passed ground level. Ravon hadn’t thought there was anything past ground level, but down they climbed. Then, from around a landing, he heard a scraping noise.
Peering around the corner, he saw that Nastra had opened a door and, releasing the key back to her collection, she disappeared through it. The door clanged shut behind her.
He was not surprised when he couldn’t open it. What surprised him was that when he touched the door, it burned his fingers.
It was the way of the hellish forge that the most interesting things happened at night. Executions, rapes, orc berserker outbreaks-but this night’s entertainment was of a different sort.
A guard came for him, and Ravon tramped down to the bowel room at Stonefist’s order.
When he saw the purpose of the summons, his heart quickened. Stonefist and Nastra were leaning over the forge maw, as though crooning over a newborn baby.
The sword was complete. Its hilt was heavy with cladding, but nicely wrought. The blade, perfect; the length, a good four feet.
Stonefist lifted it from the receiving tray, holding it up and turning the blade to and fro. “Commmbaaat,” the gnoll rumbled. “Yah.” He turned his gaze on Ravon. “You hold.” He held the sword out, then withdrew it with a sly smile. “But not yet.”
“My time has come, then,” Ravon said, feeling a rush of relief like a window thrown open and fresh air wafting in.
The gnoll smiled. “When Stonefist say. Maybe tonight. Maybe tomorrow. Stonefist choose.”
“But soon.”
Stonefist squinted at Ravon, handing the massive sword to Nastra. “But Captain’s death must be… special. Very sat-is-fying. Nothing…” Words failed him.
“Vulgar?” Ravon supplied.
“No vulgar!” the gnoll boomed gleefully, though Ravon doubted he knew what the word meant. “Nothing… quick,” Stonefist finished.
Nastra locked the blade away in an armory drawer. Ravon realized that she was thinner than ever, wasting away, in fact. Maybe she was sick. The night was just filled with happy thoughts.
With the main event of the evening, the first weapon from the genesis forge, concluded, Stonefist looked for other diversions.
“Lady elf,” he said slyly, “forge need more cage-walk. You get halfling Finner.” He grinned at Ravon, actually drooling. “Night shift.”
Ravon frowned. “He’s already done his shift, boss.”
“Missed work today.” Stonefist put a finger to his forehead. “Stonefist remember. Missing shift.”
“Two shifts in the same day will kill him.” Ravon shrugged. “A waste of a worker when the very important visitor is coming.”
Stonefist paused, processing this idea. Then: “Lady elf-you wake halfling.”
Ravon kept his expression neutral. “Means nothing to me. You’re the boss.”
“Stonefist boss. Vuulgaaar boss, yah?”
“Yeah,” Ravon said, giving an insolent salute.
Stonefist liked a few military flourishes. But he still sent Nastra up to the barracks.
Soon dismissed, Ravon rushed up the stairs to catch the elf. He found her at the door to his cell. “Nastra,” he murmured.
She turned, her face a mask of indifference.
“What’s he doing to you? You look worse every day.”
Her eyes caught a glint from the everbright lantern high on the wall. “What’s it to you?”
Ravon shrugged. “Just wondering why you want to be a lackey for our lovely forge master.”
“Maybe I like the work.”
That had occurred to Ravon, but he wanted to keep her talking. “Leave Finner alone, Nastra. Show a little mercy. Some day you’ll need a favor.”
She smiled, showing surprisingly clean teeth, not that it was a pleasant sight. “I thought you didn’t care about Finner.”
“I don’t. But I made a promise in battle to Finner’s dying lieutenant. I said I’d watch over his steward. Damned if I know why.”
Her dark eyes held his. “It was a promise.”
“Yes.”
For a moment he thought she might be softening, actually affected by Finner’s story. But no, the old sarcasm was at the ready. “Cry me a bucketful,” she snapped.
She turned on her heel and stalked away. But to Ravon’s surprise, she let Finner sleep in peace that night.
The next night, Ravon lay in wait for Nastra.
He hid in a recess by the north stairs and, true to habit, the elf skulked by and disappeared down. Nastra was hiding something, he was sure of it.
What he couldn’t figure out was why he gave a damn.
In the last six months he’d learned not to care, even relishing the prospect of his own death. But then Finner had become his steward, and in Finner’s eyes, Ravon had seen the reflection of the man he used to be. Nine Hells. One foot in the grave and now he had hope again… not a hope to live-no, never that-but hope to have absolution for all that he’d done.
