made. It serves as a monument to ten thousand dwarves who died here and an emblem of blame for the mad wizard who brought them to their doom!'
'Really? That sounds like a great story! Won't you tell me? Please?'
The kender all but hopped up and down beside the Theiwar, but Gantor brushed him away with a burly hand. 'Time for stories later. I think we should head inside before the sun comes up.'
They had plodded steadily through the remaining hours of darkness, with the kender claiming that he could see the pale massif of the garish mountain rising against the dark sky. This had been the first clue to Gantor that creatures on the outside world had much farther-ranging vision than did the Theiwar dwarves. Of course, even under the moonless skies, the under-mountain dweller had been able to make out every detail of his companion's features, and he had realized that his own eyes seemed to have a greater affinity for the darkness.
In fact, to Gantor, the ground underfoot had been clearly revealed. The dwarf had once pointed out a shadowy gully that the kender had almost rambled right into. Without missing a beat in his conversation, which consisted for several uninterrupted hours of preposterous stories of wandering and adventure, Emilo had hopped down into the ravine and scrambled up the other side. Still overcoming his stiffness and fatigue, Gantor had followed, pondering the difference between Theiwar and kender, not only in perceptions but in balance and movement as well.
Now, however, they stood at the base of the white stone massif, and Gantor did not need the slowly growing light of dawn to reveal the skeletal features, nor the gaping black hole-the 'mouth' of the skull-that offered protection from the imminent daylight.
'Well, this is it,' Emilo announced, drawing a slightly ragged breath. 'Though I'm not sure that we have to go in. In fact, I'm pretty certain we can find water around here somewhere else, if we look hard enough. Now that I mention it, it might even be better water. I don't know if you noticed, being so thirsty and all, but the stuff I got in there was kind of bitter.'
'I'm going in,' Gantor announced, with a shrug of his shoulders. Faced with the nearby prospect of shade and water, he didn't care whether the kender came with him or not.
But then his thoughts progressed a little further. No doubt the kender knew his way around in there. And the place was certainly big, there was no denying that. Who knew how long it might take him to find the water once he started looking?
Furthermore, though the dwarf wouldn't consciously acknowledge the fact, there was another reason he desired Emilo Haversack's company. Perhaps it was just the grotesque appearance of the mountain, but there was something undeniably spooky and unpleasant about the place. Gantor didn't want to go in there alone because, in all utter, naked truth, he was afraid.
'Why don't you come along?' he asked. 'You can show me where the water is and finish telling me that story about your cousin Whippersink and that big ruby he found in… what was that place again?'
'Sanction was the place.' Emilo sighed in exasperation. 'But you're not getting any of it right. First of all, he was my uncle! Uncle Sipperwink! I told you-his mother was my grandmother's older sister! Or younger sister, I'm not sure which. But it was an emerald, not a ruby, that he found in Sanction. And it was in a temple of the Dark Queen. You know, like in the days when there were still gods, before the Cataclysm.'
'I'm afraid you lost me again,' Gantor declared. 'But why don't we find that water and make ourselves comfortable? Then you can tell me all about it.'
'I'm not even sure you want to hear it!' snapped Emilo, a trifle peevishly.
'Well, what about my story, then? I can tell you about Skullcap.'
The kender brightened immediately. 'Well, that's something to look forward to. All right. It's this way.'
Emilo stepped up the sloping approach to the vast cavern, the gap that, even at this close perspective, looked so very much like a sinister maw waiting to devour an unwitting meal. A smooth pathway, like a great, curving ramp, allowed them to easily approach the dark, sinister cave.
The dwarf clumped heavily along beneath the lofty overhang, instantly relishing the coolness of the eternally shadowed corridor within. The air was drier here than in Thorbardin, but for the first time since his banishment, Cantor Blacksword had the sense of a place that was fully, irrevocably underground. Each breath tasted pure and good, and the Theiwar's wide, pale eyes had no difficulty seeing into the darkest corners of the vast rubble-strewn cave.
Overhead, tall stalactites jutted sharply downward, like great fangs extending from the upper jaw of a preternatural mouth. Cantor saw piles of great rocks heaped across the floor, many of them showing jagged cracks and sharp edges, establishing that this was a cavern of violent creation. And that, of course, matched well with the stories he had always heard.
'Let's try this way. I think the path was around here somewhere,' the kender suggested.
'You-you don't remember?' growled the dwarf, spluttering in suspicious indignation. 'How can you forget something like that?'
'I remember.' Emilo's tone showed that his feelings were hurt. 'It was this way, I'm sure. Pretty sure, anyway.'
He led the way before the Theiwar could make a further protest. It took perhaps an hour of wandering, of guessing between this passage and that, before Emilo had rediscovered the small circular chamber enclosing a pool of still water. The two explorers had descended a steep passage of stone, where a few steps remained visible through the wreckage of boulders and gravel that had tumbled onto the floor. Cantor Blacksword wondered idly how the kender had managed to make his way through the impenetrable gloom, for he noticed that Emilo was likely to stumble over rocks and other obstacles that stood clearly revealed-to Theiwar eyes, at least-in their path.
Perhaps it was by sound. There was, in fact, a faint trickling that penetrated the deep chamber, suggesting that the water in this pool was subject to some sort of flowage. Still, the surface was utterly still, free of ripples or waves, as if it had been waiting here for a century and a half for no other purpose than to quench the thirst of these weary travelers.
'Why did you say a century and a half?' asked Emilo when Cantor, his thirst quenched, had belched, leaned back, and voiced his supposition.
''Cause that's how long this place has been here-as Skullcap, I mean.' The dwarf, feeling sated and expansive, decided to grant the kender the privilege of the story that was the birthright of every dwarf born beneath Thorbardin's doming cap of mountain. The Theiwar exile gestured vaguely to the massif rising far over their heads. He was in a fine mood, and he decided he would let the kender live for now.
'What was it before?' Emilo had settled nearby. Chin on his hand, he listened intently.
'This wasn't a mountain. It was a huge tower, a complete fortress, Zhaman by name. A place of mages, it was. We dwarves left it pretty much alone. Even the elves'-Cantor said the word as if it were a curse- 'were content to halt at Pax Tharkas. They, like us dwarves and the humans, gave the fortress of Zhaman to the wizards and their ilk.'
'Why would anyone want to come here, into the middle of a desert. I mean, anyone except a kender who really had to see what it was like?' asked Emilo seriously.
'Well, this much I know: It wasn't a desert back then. That parched wasteland out there was one of the most fertile parts of the kingdom of Thorbardin. Farmed by the hill dwarves, it was. They brought the food in barter to the mountain dwarves for the goods-steel, mostly- that they was too lazy or ignorant to make for themselves.'
Emilo nodded seriously. He pulled the end of his topknot over his shoulder and chewed on the tip, his eyes far away, and Cantor knew that he was visualizing the scene as the Theiwar described it.
'And just like that it would have stayed, too, 'cept for there came one of the greatest banes of Ansalon since Paladine and the Dark Queen themselves.' The Theiwar spat to emphasize the truth of his words.
And as he cursed and growled over the gods, Cantor spoke with utter sincerity. Indeed, the dark dwarves differed from many of their clan mates in scorning both of the mighty deities. To the subjects of Thane Realgar, any god except Reorx himself was viewed to be a meddling scoundrel, and no self-respecting member of the clan would allow himself to be persuaded otherwise.
'Fistandantilus, it was, who goaded the hill dwarves into thinking that we of the mountain had cheated them. Now, I've got no love lost for the Hylar-self-righteous, prissy little martinets, for the most part-but they had the right idea when they closed and barred the gates. We had no choice but to leave the hill dwarves to fend for themselves. Not room under the mountain for 'em all. Never was and never will be,' Cantor stated with
