‘Hurts like Helda just sat on it wearing full armour,’ Snorri complained, wincing as the ruddy cloth was re-tightened.
Morgrim laughed out loud.
Helda was one of many would-be consorts that Snorri’s father had attempted to arrange for the young prince. She was of good stock, too good in Snorri’s opinion given her impressive girth. A dwarf lord was said to be worthy to marry a rinn if his beard could wrap around her ample bosom at least once. Snorri doubted Helda would ever find a mate able to achieve that feat. If she did it would be a longbeard and past the age when siring an heir was amongst the dwarf’s concerns. In fact, one night Helda would likely test the poor sod.
Her father, the King of Karak Kadrin, was a strong ally of Karaz-a-Karak and had offered a sizeable dowry from his personal coffers to secure the union but Snorri had objected and then declined. Comely as she was, he had no desire to bed such a walrus and continue the Lunngrin bloodline. Besides, he had eyes for another.
‘She was a broad girl,’ admitted Morgrim, wiping tears from his eyes as he finished binding the wound anew.
‘As an alehouse, cousin.’
‘And a face like a troll.’
‘Trolls are prettier.’
Morgrim was holding on to his sides, which had begun to pain him, when he saw the light. It was faint, like a distant fire or a partly shuttered lantern.
And it was moving.
‘Hide!’ he hissed. Both dwarfs moved to the opposite edges of the gallery and hugged the walls.
Snorri gestured silently to his cousin, asking him what he had seen.
Morgrim nodded to the lambent glow in the distance. The reek of soot had grown stronger too.
Dawi? Snorri mouthed.
Morgrim shook his head.
Not this deep.
Karak Krum was a tomb in all but name. It only harboured creatures and revenants now. It fell to the dwarfs to find out which this one was.
The blade of Snorri’s axe caught in the light from the brightstone, signalling his intention.
Nodding slowly, Morgrim drew his hammer and followed his cousin as he crept along the opposite side of the gallery. All the while the patch of light bobbed and swayed, but never got any closer. Tales were often told to scare beardlings of cavern lamps or uzkuzharr, the ‘dead fires’ of dwarfs long passed who were slain in anger or because of misfortune. Such unquiet spirits did not dwell with the ancestors, nor did they eat at Grungni’s table, but were destined to walk the dwarf underworld. Jealous of the living, they would lure young or foolish dwarfs to their deaths, drawing them on with their light and their promises of gold. Often these dwarfs were found at the bottom of chasms or crushed to death under a rock fall.
Snorri and Morgrim knew the stories, they had been told them too during infancy, but now they were faced with such an apparition made real. The dwarfs kept it in their eye line at all times, using the eroded columns at the sides of the tunnel that held up the ceiling to hide behind. The tunnel led them to another room. It was small and had once possessed a door, which stood no longer. Only rusted hinges and wooden scraps clung to the frame.
It was a temple, obvious from the icon of Grungni carved into the wall, and had no other visible exits. A figure clad in a simple tunic, hose and chainmail was kneeling down inside. Old, if the bald pate and greying locks were anything to go by, he was muttering whilst casting rune stones onto the ground in front of him. A lantern was strapped to his back via some leather and metal contrivance and shone brightly without need of a flame. Its light gave him an unearthly lustre. Seen side on, he appeared to be conversing quietly with someone out of view.
Snorri mouthed, Not alone, and the two dwarfs crept closer until they could hear what the old dwarf was saying.
‘Dreng tromak, uzkul un dum?’ the old dwarf asked. ‘Are you sure? Nah, cannot be that.’ His low, sonorous tones made Snorri think of slowly tumbling rock.
‘What?’ Morgrim hissed, but Snorri pressed his finger to his mouth to silence him.
Casting the stones again, the old dwarf muttered, ‘Dawi barazen ek dreng drakk, un riknu…’ It was Khazalid, the language of the dwarfs, but archaic to the point where it was almost incomprehensible. ‘Not what I was expecting,’ he said, looking up at his companion, who was still obscured from sight. ‘Any ideas?’
Morgrim had reached the very edge of the temple and gestured to the old dwarf’s ‘companion’.
It was a stone statue of Grungni.
‘He’s mad,’ hissed Morgrim, frowning.
Snorri nodded.He recognised some of the old dwarf’s words, which now seemed prompted by their arrival. Death and doom, he knew. Also there was destiny and king.
Uzkuzharr lure their victims with promises, and their malice is as old as the earth, the words of his mentors returned to him.
‘Uzkul un dum.’ The old dwarf nudged a rune stone with his knuckle, arranging it above another. ‘Dreng drakk… riknu…’
The markings were ancient, wrought from chisel-tongue and hard to define.
Suddenly, the old dwarf turned, fixing them with a narrowed eye.
‘I see a dragon slayer in my presence,’ said the old dwarf, reverting to more common Khazalid. ‘One destined to become king.’ His eyes were slightly glazed, as if perhaps he was still unaware of their presence.
‘Ears like a bat!’ hissed Morgrim, hammer held ready.
Hackles rose on the back of Snorri’s neck. His tongue felt leaden, and he tasted sulphur. He hefted his axe in two hands, glad when his voice didn’t quaver. ‘Stand, creature. Make yourself known.’
In the glow of the lantern, the strange dwarf looked almost hewn from stone, no different to the statues of Karak Krum’s fallen king and queen. Snorri had heard Morek the runesmith speak
