In time the tombs grew farther apart, and eventually the last of them fell behind, just a pale shadow in the dimness. They kept walking, moving toward the center of the chamber. It seemed impossible that such a large space could exist under the ground, yet the cobbles showed no sign of giving out.
At least-not until they did, with a suddenness that nearly spelled Croy’s doom. Without warning the floor simply ended, opening up into empty space. He managed to stop well clear of the edge, but Malden had no warning and blundered into him from behind. Croy spread his arms and legs to try to balance on the edge, but one of his feet went over and he felt his balance shifting. It seemed he was falling into the gloom, into nothingness-and his panicked brain thought that pit must go down forever.
Then Morget’s massive hands caught his arms and roughly hauled him back, away from the edge. Croy let out a desperate breath and calmed himself. He brushed down the front of his brigantine and tried to control his vertigo.
Malden mimed an apology, spreading his hands outward in supplication. Croy nodded brusquely, then reached up to quietly slap Morget’s arm in thanks. The barbarian just shrugged.
The five of them spread out along the edge, their lights showing only where the floor ended and the abyss began. The edge was curved, like the wall they’d left behind, but it was more obvious here. It seemed the center of the round room was only empty space.
It was not perfectly featureless, however. The little light that strayed down into the abysm showed it was lined by a sheer wall of closely fit bricks. Knobs of some colorless fungus stood out from the bricks like ears and noses.
Slag held up one hand, two fingers pointing down. He bent and then straightened each in turn to suggest a pair of legs walking down a flight of stairs. Croy nodded and together they headed around the edge of the pit, careful to watch their footing.
They found no stairs leading down. However, off to the left the featureless floor was interrupted by a pillar of smooth rock that stretched upward into the dark. The pillar stood athwart the edge, descending into the depths just as it lifted upward. Bolted to this pillar was a massive iron chain, as thick as Croy’s bicep, that stretched across the pit, much like the line Slag had used to bisect his charcoal circle. Malden was already examining this chain as if he intended to walk on it.
Morget stripped off his pack and rummaged inside it. He took out a carefully folded tent and started ripping it to pieces. It quickly became apparent what he had in mind. He broke a piece from one of the tent poles, then tore a strip of canvas and wrapped it tightly around the end of the pole. The canvas was waxed to make it waterproof, but that also made it highly flammable. Lighting it from the candle in his lantern, Morget soon had a wildly burning torch in his hand.
Before Croy could stop him, the barbarian whirled around and tossed his torch far out over the face of the abyss. It fell rapidly away from them, letting them see a little more as it fluttered past.
The pit was illuminated only for a moment, but in that time Croy made out several interesting details. The opening in the floor was at least two hundred feet across. It was perfectly circular, and it was crossed only by three massive chains like the one Malden was investigating. The chains met in the center of the pit, where they anchored an enormous round globe of crystal, thirty feet across.
Croy could not begin to guess what purpose that globe served. He was far too busy, anyway, following the brand with his eyes as it fell into the depths. He could see the pit went down for hundreds of feet, maybe even a thousand. It was perfectly cylindrical in shape, and its walls were everywhere streaked and encrusted with the fungal growths. It was not, however, totally uniform. Around its circumference countless openings showed-some small and square, like windows, others very broad like galleries. The pit must be like a vast tower turned inside out, so that its various floors were on the outside of its wall. Floors was the correct word, he thought-from where he stood, he could look down on dozens of levels of the dwarven city. Every one of those galleries might open on whole suites of rooms, broad halls, winding tunnels-even other shafts like this one.
For the first time Croy had an inkling of the vast size of the Vincularium. He had seen what the dwarves called cities in the North, and was disappointed by how cramped and narrow they were. He had always imagined the Vincularium would be the same: a small village’s worth of homes and workshops built into a series of enlarged mine shafts.
This city, though, might be as big as the Free City of Ness, if all of its houses and churches and palaces and shops and manufactories were stacked neatly on top of each other, then buried under a mountain. The entirety of Helstrow could have been dropped into that central shaft and not filled its volume.
“By Sadu’s burning arsehole,” Malden swore aloud. After the prolonged silence, Croy felt the words like rocks raining down on his shoulders. He tried to shush the thief, but the others ignored him.
“Indeed,” Cythera said. “Slag, did you have any idea it could be so big?”
Even the dwarf looked awestruck. “Fuck no.”
Chapter Thirty-three
It seemed to take hours for the torch to fall through the shaft, though it must only have been a few dozen seconds. It landed on something wet, but it went out so quickly and so far away that it was impossible to tell what it had struck.
Then the shaft was dark again, and its secrets were hid once more.
“There used to be more of us,” Slag said, when the shock of the Vincularium’s size had worn off a bit. “More dwarves. There had to be.”
“How many more?” Croy asked. It seemed the rule of silence was utterly broken. “I would imagine the entire population of the dwarven kingdom could live here, and not feel crowded.”
Slag nodded. “Surely. There are maybe ten thousand of us left.” His lips moved quickly, as if he were doing some calculation in his mind. “This place could have held millions. And just look at the design! Hmm. Interesting. Central shaft for ventilation and access. Stratified construction, probably with reinforcing spars on each level-of course, you’d need more at the bottom, to hold the weight of the upper levels, but then what keeps the mountain up? This is some very complex engineering.” He shook his head. “We’ve lost so much. My people couldn’t build one of these now if life depended on it.”
“Slag,” Cythera said, “that giant crystal ball hanging in the middle of the shaft-what is its purpose? Mother has one but it’s only the size of a cabbage. She uses it to scry with. Is this something similar?”
“No fucking clue,” Slag said. “But no. I can vouch for the fact no dwarf ever peered into a crystal ball.” He strode away from the edge and took his piece of charcoal out of his purse again. For a while he just wandered around, looking for somewhere to draw more figures.
Poor dwarf, Croy thought. He’s looked on the glory of his ancestors and now he needs to draw more magic charms to protect himself against sheer awe.
“All right,” Morget said. “Enough gawking. Let’s make camp.”
Croy stared at the barbarian in pure surprise. “Here? Now? When we know there’s someone out there, willing to do us harm?”
“I’m tired. I’m sure the rest of you are exhausted. So yes, here. Unless you wish to trek back to the barricade,” Morget told him. “This is the most defensible spot we have. The-The upside-down graves over there,” he said, gesturing behind him.
“Mausoleums,” Croy said.
“The dead dwarves will screen one flank. Anyone trying to get through there will be slowed down, at the very least. On the other flank we have the pit.”
“Something might come climbing out of it,” Malden suggested.
“The mountain could fall on our heads at any time,” Morget pointed out in return. “I’ll stand watch while you rest, little thief. Anything that comes out of the pit,” he said, and brandished his axe, “will find me waiting.”
They placed their lanterns together in poor imitation of a campfire and sat around them in a circle. Croy was not surprised to see that Malden fell asleep almost at once, or that Cythera lay down with her head against the thief’s shoulder. He was glad they could take some comfort from each other’s presence, his betrothed and his best friend. Slag sat unquiet, however, passing his piece of charcoal from one hand to the other. As for himself, Croy was
