words were, to say the least, amusing.
“It will take a great deal of time,” the dwarf said, tapping his fingers on his workbench. “You know what I mean, working the material. Magic. It will take me two months to make the first designs.”
“The key must be ready in a week,” Elodssa replied sternly.
“Do you want me to work day and night?” Frahel asked indignantly.
“Why not, if we pay you well for it?”
“How well?” the dwarf asked, screwing up his eyes.
“Name your price.”
Frahel thought for a moment and named it.
“I agree to a quarter of the sum named.”
“This is a serious conversation,” the dwarf snapped.
“Plus you can have all the material that remains after working.”
“You offer me leftovers?” Frahel exclaimed furiously.
But this was only for form’s sake. The cunning craftsman knew perfectly well that even the small scraps of the mineral which were certain to be left over would be beyond price.
“All right,” he said, chewing on his lips with a discontented air. “Have it your way, Tresh Elf. I’ll start work immediately.”
“Then I will not dare to distract you any longer,” the elf said with a bow.
The dwarf waved casually in farewell to Elodssa. In his mind he was already at work.
The elf hated these cursed underground halls and corridors with all his heart. The stubborn bearded gnomes who built these rocky tunnels had not been concerned about the fact that elves were a lot taller than their own stunted race. And so, for most of the way to the chambers that the dwarves had allocated to the prince of the House of the Black Flame, Elodssa had to walk hunched over, almost doubled over in fact, to avoid hitting his head on the low ceiling. The entire maze was enough to depress and dismay anyone who had been born under the green crowns of oaks and not in the bowels of the earth.
One wrong turn at a crossroads, one heedless moment, and you could say farewell to life. You would find yourself in some old workings long-ago forgotten even by the gnomes who had created them, and you would never see the blue sky and your native forests again. Perhaps your remains might be found a year or two later, when some drunken gnome or dwarf stuck his nose into the wrong corridor. And the worst thing was that the populated parts were right there beside you: Take just one step, turn the right corner—and you would be saved.
The elf shuddered. To him a death like that, seasoned with a large dose of despair, seemed the most terrible death possible.
Elodssa and his guide walked on for an interminably long time. The elf had long ago lost his bearings in the capricious bends of the corridors that must have been carved out by gnomes whose brains were befuddled with charm-weed. Only once did they meet a group of bearded miners. With glowworm lamps attached to their helmets, clutching work-mattocks and other tools in their hands, the gnomes were bawling out a simple song at the tops of their voices as they walked down toward the very heart of the earth.
“Why are there so few people here?” Elodssa asked his guide.
“Who would agree to live here?” the dwarf asked, surprised at the question. “This is the fifty- second gallery. It’s an eight-hour walk up to the surface! Everyone lives higher up. Only our master craftsmen, like the venerable Frahel, require seclusion for their work. To avoid being disturbed by anyone, or accidentally affecting them with their magic. And then sometimes the gnomes walk through on the way to their workings. But in general this area is deserted. If you get lost, you’re really in trouble. We’re here, my lord elf.”
They stopped in front of a lift. There was night below it and night above it. The travelers had to go up more than nine hundred yards through the round tunnel. Of course, they could make the ascent on the steep stone staircase that threaded through the body of the mountains in a dizzying spiral, but that would have required too much time and effort. So they would have to trust their lives to the precarious swaying platform.
There was a drum on the lift, and the dwarf struck it three times. The sound went soaring upward, and after a while Elodssa made out a quiet reply, muffled by distance.
“Off we go!” the dwarf said with a smile, taking hold of the railing.
For just a moment the lift lurched downward, taking his heart with it. But almost immediately it began slowly, but surely, creeping upward.
“Here we are, then,” his guide said good-naturedly, getting off the platform. “The twenty-eighth gallery, if you count all the way from the top. Will you find the way on your own, sir elf?”
“I don’t think so.”
“It’s all very simple. From here you go straight along the main corridor, through the hall with the emerald stalactites, and then count the branch corridors. The sixth on the right is yours. Then after every second crossing turn left three times, and you’ll find yourself in the sector where we accommodate our guests. Don’t be afraid, it’s almost impossible to get lost here. If anything happens, ask one of our people the way. But not the gnomes—just recently those bearded clowns have completely forgotten how to use their heads. All they can do is cut new galleries!”
After that the dwarf climbed back onto the lift, struck the drum, and set off downward.
