into the smoke-laden cavern, imagining how all of Fernia would be harnessed for a new and bloody war. He felt something small and burning flicker in him, but wearily, he pushed it away.
Leaving Nastra crouched on the stairs, he climbed back to the upper realm. He hardly remembered going up the stairs, passing the hot door and, regaining the fourth level, entering his private cell.
There, on his bed, lay Finner. He was dead. Laid out, his rags smoothed, but not enough to hide the gouts of blood where he’d been struck through with a blade.
Pinned to the halfling’s shirt was a note, almost illegible: We tested sord blade witout yu. Work good! It was signed with a bloody fist.
He knelt by Finner’s side and closed the steward’s bulging eyes. After a moment, his body trembling, Ravon rose to his feet. Rage filled him, flooded his mind, released his shackles. Where had he been these many months? Where had the fight gone, and the old Ravon Kell? He shook his head, as though clearing away a dream. The surge of power in his body, in his heart, told him he was ready now, to fight. All he needed was a sword.
A movement at the door. Nastra stood there. Her gaze went to Finner’s body. “He didn’t deserve that,” she said. To his astonishment, she was holding out her ring of keys.
Ravon strode out the door, snagging the keys as he went by. His steps were long but deliberate as he stalked past the cell blocks, his mind afire. He might not be able to fight Cannith or the demons or the hag, but there was one enemy he meant to settle with, and by Dolurrh, nothing was going to stop him.
When he got to the bowel room, no one was there except a couple of goblins, who backed away from him when they saw the expression on his face. Using the blue key he’d seen Nastra use, he opened the drawer where she’d locked in the sword.
Its weight was solid and lush in his hand. But he had no time to admire the forge’s handiwork. He bellowed out Stonefist’s name. Over the groaning of the forge’s ugly heart, he heard his voice echo. The goblins crouched out of his way as he rushed into the corridor.
“Stonefist,” he bellowed, “you ugly son of a sovereign bitch!”
He roared the gnoll’s name again and again as he stalked down the halls with a warrior’s tread, his footfalls deliberate, balanced, deadly. He knew how to enter battle. He remembered from the old days, which were not so very old, being only six months ago, back when he was Captain Ravon Kell, of his majesty’s army. That Ravon Kell was back.
As he passed the twentieth cell block, a dwarf stood at the entrance. She nodded to him, pointing to the door far down the passage. Ravon understood. The forge master was on the rim. The forge master was out there throwing off slaves.
He flung open the door, letting the first light of day into the gloaming prison.
Stonefist was on the outside rim thirty yards away. Several large orcs kept him company. At the sound of the door opening, Stonefist let go of a human slave, letting him sink into a terrified puddle.
The gnoll turned to face Ravon. “Hah, Captain!” He noted that Ravon was armed. “You like sword, yes?”
“Yes.”
Ravon had not moved from his place near the door.
Stonefist backed up slightly to keep his distance as the rim bore him slowly forward. “You like fight my orcs?”
“When I’m finished with you,” Ravon said, “then I’ll fight the orcs.”
A slow grin crawled across the gnoll’s face. Waving the orcs to stand back, he pulled a great curved blade from his belt, rumbling, “Stonefist finish you.”
Ravon stepped from the doorway onto the inner rim as it moved in Stonefist’s direction. He paced slowly backward, keeping distance from the gnoll as the two rings conspired to bring the combatants together. Between the rings was a furrow that would grind off a misplaced foot.
At the top of the forge a few artificers had emerged from the keep to look on.
Ravon hoped they would allow the fight to proceed. To fall from an artificer’s bolt of power was the eighteenth way to die, and not unmanly, but not the noble end of hand-to-hand combat with an enemy like Stonefist. He stepped over the gap between the rims.
The outer rim was as broad as two gnolls lying end to end, but still there was little room to maneuver.
Ravon found his balance, feeling the sword in his hand like a magical extension of his arm. “The Demon Lords will teach you to lick their boots, Stonefist. Maybe you’re too dumb to know that.”
Stonefist grinned wolfishly. “Death hag and demon lord work for Stonefist! They open pipe to the fire. After pipe open”-he spread his arms wide-“it stay open. Nothing can close it, so artificers say. We no need hag or demon, then.”
A double cross. Impressive, Ravon had to admit.
The forge master went on. “Stonefist invite hag up to rims and shove her in.” Grinning, he pointed to the lethal gap. Then, raising his curved blade, he beckoned with a long arm. “Come to Stonefist.”
Ravon didn’t meet his opponent’s eyes. In the stories, you boldly held the enemy’s gaze, but in a fight you watched his chest for the first sign of movement, to gain a split second advantage.
A twinge from Stonefist betrayed a back-handed swipe, and Ravon’s sword was there to greet it. He felt the shudder of the blow ring in the bones of his arm. He spun away and then around again, pricking the gnoll’s upper arm.
Stonefist didn’t feel it, not yet. But it riled him. “How Finner like new sword?” He lunged, missed, lunged again, as Ravon backed up.
Ravon feinted toward the gnoll’s left side, then sliced his sword right. Stonefist sprang back. The gnoll was solid on his feet, and strong, but his blade was not as long as Ravon’s. The forge master would die. But he was stronger than Ravon, so as much fun as the foreplay might be, it was time to finish it.
Behind Stonefist the orcs watched uneasily. They’d be the next fight, Ravon knew. He wasn’t going to walk away from this battle, but he’d take a few of them with him.
Stonefist was swaying, warming up for his next lunge. “I give your eyes to the goblins for a meal!” he brayed.
Ravon shook his head. “But Stonefist, that would be vulgar.”
“Vulgaaar!” Stonefist yelled in joy and rushed forward. Ravon jumped onto the inner rim. Then, the movement of the rim taking him past Stonefist’s position, he hopped back on the outer one.
Now behind Stonefist, and before the gnoll could turn, he swung the great sword in an arcing slice at the creature’s neck, knocking his head half off. It lay on his shoulder, the stump erupting with thick blood. Absurdly, Stonefist tried to put it back on, managing to tip it back into place. The forge master staggered around to stare at Ravon.
The gnoll stood as still as a rock outcropping, his gaze lit with understanding.
Ravon kicked a boot forward. “For Finner,” he said, connecting hard enough to send Stonefist staggering backward. The gnoll teetered on the edge of the forge for a moment, then plummeted.
A roaring noise. The artificers sending a bolt of searing wind, no doubt. But then the roaring continued, and as Ravon became more aware of his surroundings, he saw that every window, door, niche, outcropping, ramp, and hole held a slave or five, and they were all cheering. The orc guards, who had started to approach Ravon, looked up in alarm.
The real battle of the genesis forge began at that moment as dwarves, gnomes, humans, halflings, and all the rest surged onto the rings, tearing the guards apart and throwing the pieces after their master. From above, the artificers sprayed bolts into the throng, burning many, but seeing the sheer number of slaves scrambling up the sides toward them, they retreated.
The traveling rim Ravon stood on had come around to the back side of the forge, and Ravon looked for a new way to enter the forge. He had another duty to discharge. Now that he was alive, after all.
Inside, chaos ruled as the cell blocks emptied, their occupants armed with pieces of wood, old iron implements, and broken bottles. Ravon heard the roar of dwarves taking command, directing the melee, even as their meaty arms swung improvised weapons against orcs and goblins. Carnage filled the halls, but Ravon stalked through, heading for the north stairs.
The shrieks and cries of battle receded as he rushed down, fumbling with Nastra’s keys, looking for the red one, finding it. He inserted it into the hot door. Then down again, this time in silence, or in as much quiet as could exist in a manifest zone poised over the Lake of Fire that was Fernia.
