Trembling with fright, Divelg looked up into Ambrose's face and whispered, 'I know what you are.'
With a curse Ambrose hurled the old man toward Ogier. Divelg tumbled over a chest, spilling the contents. To no one's surprise, a small fortune in gold and silver coins poured onto the cold stone landing.
'Think of all the bottles of Malaturno this could buy,' Kern murmured, eyes as wide as the largest gold doubloon. He knelt down to examine the hoard. The coins came from every land surrounding Sithicus and a few places more distant. There were also currencies that Kern couldn't identify; they'd been struck with odd images and odder names, like Cormyr and luz.
The politskae surrounded Kern. 'I wasn't going to take anything,' the miner said, smiling up at them. The silver axes that appeared in the men's hands made it clear they didn't believe him or didn't really care.
'We're wasting time,' Ambrose boomed. Even the stoic politskae jumped at the uncharacteristic fury in the man's voice. They parted for Ambrose, who pulled Kern up from the floor. 'I should let them kill you,' he rumbled, 'but you won't get off that easily.'
Kern and Ogier were herded to the back of the landing while the rest of the boxes were loaded. Ambrose ordered Divelg to gather up the money he'd spilled. The shopkeep and a tight ring of politskae encircled him, ensuring that every coin was returned to the cache. When the work was done and the lid was about to be hammered back into place, Ambrose plucked two coins from the hoard. He handed them to Divelg.
Kern craned his neck to see what was happening. 'Did he just give Divelg some money?' he asked.
'Uh huh,' Ogier replied, 'but the old guy don't look so happy about it.'
In fact, Divelg looked heartbroken. He stared at the small black coins in his hand, turning them over and over again. Finally he mouthed a short, silent prayer and faced Ambrose. 'It's back there, isn't it? It really exists.'
Ambrose wrapped an arm around Divelg's shoulder and led him away from the throng. It might have been the light from the guttering torches, but the shopkeep's expression appeared to flow manically between glee and sorrow. 'Yes, it exists. In fact, that's where Ambrose had his little 'accident' all those years ago.' With one pudgy hand, he closed the old man's fingers around the coins. 'Keep a tight grip on these. You'll need them sooner than you might think.'
When the last box was loaded onto the lift, Ambrose ordered the landing cleared. The miners, even the politskae, crowded onto the lift. Only Ambrose and his two friends were left behind as the elevator shuddered, then began its ascent.
Divelg had been one of the last onto the lift. He stood at the very edge of the press, politskae to either side of him. Just before the elevator passed above the shaft's ceiling, he crouched down. 'You must've had the heart of a titan to keep control of it for so long,' he said to Ambrose. A slight, sad smile on his face, he tossed the coins onto the landing. 'Those two will need them more than me. I know Fm not coming back.'
The last words echoed after the lift had carried the old man out of sight. Kern stomped on one of the coins, which was rolling crazily across the stone. Lifting his heel, he found a black Sithican penny. It had landed rose side up, a bad omen.
Ogier picked up the other penny. 'I don't think I get it,' the big man said.
A slither of dread shot up Kern's spine. He understood the pennies' significance perfectly. When a corpse was set upon its funeral pyre, a penny was placed upon each eye. Fired red-hot by the blaze, they would sear through the dead man's eyes. His ghost would be blind, unable to find his home should his spirit rise up from the grave.
The meaning of Ambrose's gesture, handing the two pennies to Divelg, was clear: The old man would soon be a corpse. That Divelg should think their need for the pennies was more urgent-Kern found that message even easier to read.
Fortunately, the coins' ominous meaning seemed lost on Ogier. 'Don't worry about it,' Kern said, patting him on the back. 'Divelg probably meant us to have them for good luck.'
'He sounded like something was wrong,' Ogier said plaintively.
Such a large man and so little in the engine house, thought Kern. Out loud, he said, 'What could be wrong? We have our friend Ambrose here, and he'd never let anything happen to us.'
The shopkeep was standing far back on the landing, in the mouth of the abandoned tunnel. 'I've already saved you from a nasty death on the battlefield.'
At Ogier's puzzled look, Ambrose continued: 'The rumors about the mine closing down are correct. Azrael is pressing everyone into the army. Well, almost everyone. A few choice individuals are being put into special service, away from the fighting.'
Kern regarded his old friend coldly. 'Which brings us to that 'special duty5 you've lined up for us.'
'Exactly,' Ambrose said. 'If you'll come this way, we'll start your training.'
Ogier happily clomped over to Ambrose. The big man peered into the darkened tunnel, then turned back to Kern. 'Let's go,' he chimed. 'The sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can relax.'
'I couldn't have put it better myself,' Ambrose noted. He held out an empty hand toward Kern, who shot him a look of utter disgust and went back to his search for a way off the landing.
Kern was not particularly surprised to find there wasn't one. All the emergency ladders had been removed, if any had ever reached the cross shaft. There wasn't even a way to call the lift back, not that he could see anyway. Ambrose had obviously planned this little ambush carefully.
'Come to think of it,' Kern said, forcing a smile, 'I've always wanted to see a big battle firsthand. You should too, Ogier. Broaden your perspective.'
'It's far too late to change plans now,' Ambrose said darkly. He moved behind Ogier and placed one hand conspicuously on the big man's shoulder. With the other he gripped a chunk of rock jutting from the wall. 'We want to stay together, Kern,' he noted. 'This tunnel's a bit treacherous.'
One squeeze, and the rock crumbled to dust.
Ogier spun around and whistled. 'Hey, you're right. The walls are kind of quaky.'
Scowling, Kern walked to the tunnel. 'I think Ambrose had the better word for it,' he said. ' Treacherous.' '
Kern and Ogier went first, though Ambrose never let them get out of earshot. When the tunnel broadened into a smooth-floored hallway, he positioned himself between them, a falsely friendly hand on each man's back. Ogier trudged cheerfully along, oblivious to the danger that Kern had recognized long ago. If there was nothing to be done to save themselves, Kern hoped to keep his friend blissfully ignorant until the very end.
'This place is pretty,' Ogier exclaimed, eyes wide with wonder at the statues lining both sides of the hall. He pointed up at the ceiling, carved to give the illusion of clouds and birds and open sky. 'Why don't we ever come down here?'
Kern stopped just short of the arched doorway at the end of the hall. Torches had flickered to life in the room beyond, providing just enough light for him to glimpse the altar, the melted benches, the dark shapes flowing in a hideous, gleeful dance across the walls and floor. He'd never really believed the old miners' stories about the Black Chapel or the salt shadows that had been spawned in that unholy place. Kern realized now that he'd been wrong.
He realized, too, what Ambrose had planned for them.
The shopkeep stepped in front of Kern, blocking his view. 'Down deep, I'm sure part of me is sorry for this,' he said. An insane giggle bubbled from his lips. 'But I'll be damned if I can find that part.'
The shadows swarmed out of the chapel, flowing around and over Ambrose in a hissing torrent. Kern's scream finally drew Ogier's attention away from the hawks and butterflies on the ceiling. The big man wailed in horror. As that cry echoed through the hope-forsaken tunnels of Veidrava, it sounded for all the world like the bleat of a lost lamb.
It was known forever after as the Night of Skulls.
As the armies mustered at Veidrava and a half-dozen other places throughout Sithicus, Lord Soth and his thirteen skeletal warriors rode out from Nedragaard Keep. The hoofbeats of their undead mounts reverberated through the night, curdling dreams into nightmares. Their passing kicked up clouds of choking dust so thick they blotted out the face of Solinari.
The raiding party was already in full retreat when Soth's patrol caught up to them. The mercenaries were scrambling north through a steep-sided canyon in the Arden Valley, back toward the Invidian border. They'd obviously heard the thunder of the patrol's approach and fled without a second thought of meeting the charge. So,
