realization, he knew that the batteries, and the brave elves entrenched below the crests of the dunes, the giants and gnomes deployed in reserve… they would not be enough.
When he looked to the rear, he saw that his concern had been anticipated by Gallupper. The batteries could be pulled out of line quickly, each hauled by a couple of powerful centaurs, and a rough pathway had been cleared, leading down the dunes and into a patch of scrubby pines beyond. Still farther away, two or three miles from the beach, rose a range of rugged, rock-crested hills.
“If we lose the shoreline, we will fall back to the hills,” Gallupper was explaining, following the direction of Karkald’s gaze. “There are narrow ravines leading through them, and we will deploy to block them, to bottle up the Deathlord’s army for as long as we can.”
“Aye,” Karkald said, relieved that the plan had been made, disappointed that it was not just advisable but essential. He looked seaward again and could have sworn that the armada was another mile closer to landing.
“Just beware, old friend,” he said, clapping Gallupper on his equine shoulder. “And do not wait too long to pull out.”
Darann took only the time to don her sandals and a light robe, the soft deerskin a hallmark of an earlier time, when trade between Axial and Nayve had been commonplace and profitable for the merchants of both circles. Now, the warmth of the soft fur gave her just a suggestion of the life and the security she had once taken for granted.
She hurried to the lift station, leaving Hiyram to make his way to the stairway. Coolfyre lights blazed from each of the Six Towers, and she could see below the great city coming to life for another interval. Darkbulls pulled carts toward the marketplace, formations of royal guardsmen marched back and forth for the change of the duty, and the hammers of early rising forge men were already battering their irons.
The lift cage was quiet, however, lacking even the low hiss of steam that indicated pressure. Almost groaning in despair, she reached toward the test pipe, felt the cold metal.
Why now? She wanted to scream. The lift went through a half interval’s maintenance every cycle or so, but how could she have the accursed bad luck to find it shut down now, when she so desperately needed haste?
She wasted no time in turning around and racing back to her apartment, unlocking the door with haste and charging into the anteroom. “Hiyram?” she asked, louder than she intended, hoping to catch the goblin before he departed.
There was no answering sound. She charged through the kitchen and found the delivery door closed and latched. Pulling it open, she ducked through the narrow passage beyond and found herself at the edge of the deep, central pit that ran the full length of the pillar’s center. There was a metal handrail before her, and she seized it, swaying to a sudden onset of vertigo.
It was not just the long drop that made her dizzy. As she drew a breath she nearly gagged from the foul stench, a mixture of garbage and other, unidentifiable odors that clogged the air with a greasy, penetrating miasma. Somewhere near the bottom a coolfyre beacon flickered, and another illuminated the landings near the top of the tower. Darann was near the middle, five hundred feet from each of the feeble lights, perched on a brink of a well of impenetrable shadow.
She was trying to decide if she dared call for the goblin, knowing her voice would echo up and down the vast shaft, when she saw a shadowy figure advancing up the stairway. Recognizing Hiyram just before she gasped out an alarm, she allowed herself to slump back against the wall and waited for her loyal friend to join her.
“Lady? What you here? Take lift-make haste!” he hissed, his mouth close to her ear. Even then, the sounds he made sounded disastrously loud in the close space.
“I can’t,” she whispered back, quickly explaining about the maintenance shutdown. “I have to go down this way, or wait.”
Hiyram looked alarmed, his eyes growing wide, glowing dimly even in the faint light. “No dwarf ladies here!” he insisted. “Goblins, pailsloppers, wretches, and rats… not for you! But no wait, neither… not to give warn to Honored Fatherbeard!”
“I have no choice,” the dwarfmaid replied, oddly taking some comfort in the fact that Hiyram obviously knew this place. He was right: she had never been in here before, had never climbed by foot all the way up or down from her lofty apartment. “Show me the way, won’t you?”
Reluctantly, he agreed, pointing out the steps that seemed shockingly narrow, with a long drop from one to the next. The stairway spiraled around the inside of the great shaft, which was otherwise lined with a web of cables and landings that, she assumed, were used by the freight lift that carried supplies up to the many apartments that lined the outer face of this lofty pillar. There was a metal rail, slick with moisture but, fortunately, pocked with enough rust that it seemed to give a good grip to the hand that she clasped, very tightly, around it. The wall to her right was cold and slick with fungus, while the drop to her left was… she didn’t want to think about what it was.
Urgency overcame her fear, and she descended as quickly as possible behind Hiyram as the goblin padded down the stairway. His broad feet slapped slightly with each step, but otherwise he remained silent, looking around constantly, pausing every minute or so to give Darann time to catch up. The spiral was a dizzying descent, and even going as fast as she could they had only gone a quarter of the way before they had to stop so that she could catch her breath.
She grimaced and despaired, as each inhalation sounded like a bellows to her ears. The goblin, apparently unfatigued, simply waited until she was ready to move, then started onward again. Her hand was cramped from clutching the railing, but she dared not let go; the drop to her left was dizzying and certainly lethal, and in places the steps were crumbled or slicked with oil, water, or some combination of treacherous slipperiness.
Hiyram let out a hiss and suddenly sprang forward, leaving Darann to cling to the rail and try to see and hear. Angry screeches filled the air, claws scratching at the stones as small bodies climbed and jumped away; she realized with revulsion that the goblin had scattered a pack of rats that were clustering on a nearby landing, feasting upon a pile of rotting garbage. Holding her breath, she inched past, then hurried on, ignoring the sounds behind her as the angry rodents returned to reclaim their prize.
The light grew more intense as they neared the bottom of the shaft. They heard a door open down below, a beam of bright coolfyre spilling in as dwarven workers hauled in several crates and stacked them on the platform of one of the freight lifts. Darann and Hiyram froze, crouched against the wall a hundred feet above, and the dwarfmaid felt new despair at this evidence that the city was coming to life around them.
Finally the workers departed, and they all but flew around the last few spirals to the bottom of the shaft, arriving out of breath and weak-kneed from the long descent.
“You go on now, Lady,” Hiyram said, pointing to the door the workmen had closed. “Not be seen with me… I come out later.”
“Thank you, my friend,” she said, giving the goblin a firm embrace.
She stepped toward the portal when she was startled by a stern bark. A dwarf was there, standing hitherto unseen in the shadows beyond the lift. The beacon reflected off his silver helm, marking him as one of the Royal Guard.
“Halt there!” he cried, then raised his voice in a pitch of excitement. “Goblin! Goblin in the tower!” He rushed forward, drawing a short, fat-bladed sword.
Hiyram yelped and bounded back up the stairs as Darann bolted for the door, sensing freedom. She pushed the portal open and rushed forth, only to have her arm seized by another guard, this one apparently posted outside the door.
“Keep that bitch right there!” shouted the first guard over his shoulder as he clattered up the stairs. “She’s a goblin friend, I warrant. Lord Nayfal will want some words with her! I’m after the gob!”
By that time he was out of sight, but two more guards advanced to surround Darann, pressing her against the wall at the base of the pillar. She fought back an urge to sob, seeing that the city was fully awake now, knowing that Hiyram was in terrible trouble, and that her father was going, all unwitting, into Lord Nayfal’s trap.
Borand awakened to a sensation of suffocating pain, as though his ribs were on fire and a giant vise had been clamped around his chest. Dimly he remembered the fall, and the temblor that had shaken the First Circle with such brutal violence. There was a pale light coming from somewhere outside of his line of sight, and hot pain jabbed through his neck when he tried to turn his head. Still, he was able to ascertain that he was in some sort of niche or cave. Beyond the mouth, the ceiling of the Underworld reflected the light barely a hundred feet above, so he knew that he was still high up on the barrier wall.
