14
Down they went into darkness, but there was light below. They descended a sloping ramp, but it was paved where the town’s streets were not. Then it leveled off, and they found themselves in a mine, shored up by timber—but the wood was smoothed and polished, and the surface between the beams was cream-colored stone. Oil lamps lit the tunnel, attached to the posts. Alea exclaimed with delight, for the dancing flames brought out glints of brilliance from the stone walls. Looking closely, she saw that the blocks were cut into regular rectangles and mortared neatly in place. “Surely the giants didn’t do this for you! Even I must stoop!”
“Even as you say—they didn’t.” Retsa chuckled. “Giants abhor close, tight places. We glory in them. But they did teach us this much of their craft.”
“What is that ringing ahead?” Gar stared down the tunnel toward the sound of metal on metal.
“Come and see,” Bekko invited.
Stooping to fit a five-foot ceiling, they followed him down a completely clean, almost antiseptic stone hall. Suddenly it opened out, and Gar stood up with a groan of relief, for they had come into a domed chamber with a twenty-foot ceiling. Lamps lit its walls, but most of the illumination came from a dozen forges placed around the room, with dwarves stripped to the waist hammering metal on anvils. Over each forge was a metal hood with a pipe leading to a central vent.
“This is for ironwork,” Bekko called over the din.
The noise quieted amazingly as the smiths caught sight of the strangers. They stared openly, not even trying to hide their astonishment. Alea was interested to notice that some of the smiths were women, wearing only a sort of double halter above the waist; she guessed it was to hold their breasts in place as they swung and bounced their hammers.
“Guests,” Retsa called to them. “We’ll introduce you all at dinner. We feast tonight, for these strangers led many pigs to us.”
“Well, that’s one way of looking at it,” Saret said, grinning. “The next chamber is for finework,” Bekko said, leading them on, and the hammering started up again. “Gold and silver.”
“Why so high a ceiling?” Gar asked as they threaded their way between forges.
“This was a mine at first,” Retsa explained, “and still is, below us. Our parents dug the iron out of this stope, then walled it with the very stone they’d had to dig out. Most dwarf villages are built on top of mines this way.”
“And when you’re done taking out the metal, you make the bracing sure and secure, and turn the stopes into underground shops.” Gar nodded with a smile of wonder. “Very efficient.”
It also struck Alea as amazingly industrious. She was overwhelmed to think of the amount of labor it had taken. So much for the notion of lazy, greedy dwarves who could be stirred to work only by the sight of gold.
“Since we mine iron here,” Bekko explained, “we trade with other dwarf villages for other metals.”
He led the way through another tunnel and into a second chamber with rings of workbenches, where dwarves sat rigidly erect, sculpting wondrous pieces of ware from gold and silver.
“Why do they make the benches so high?” Alea asked. “And why do they sit so straight?” Gar seconded.
“If they don’t, years of toil will make slabs of muscle and a bend to the spine that will make them look like hunchbacks,” Bekko explained.
Alea almost exclaimed out loud, but caught herself in time. To the children of Midgard, dwarves were indeed pictured as slit-eyed hunchbacks. Apparently earlier generations of small people had learned the lessons of posture the hard way.
The third chamber held workbenches with parts the size of a finger joint. The finished work was a rectangular gray block the size of her hand, and she had no idea what it was for—but Gar asked, “Radios?” and Retsa nodded.
The fourth chamber was divided into two separate workshops with a hallway between the dividers. They couldn’t go into either one, but they could look through wide windows and see the dwarves at work. They wore white from head to toe, and were making boxes with windows in the front.
“Why can’t we go in?” Alea asked.
“Because even specks of dust are too much here,” Retsa answered.
“They’re making computers,” Bekko explained.
Alea didn’t understand, but she told herself she would remember this, and some day it would make sense.
She found a few minutes to discuss it with Gar after they came out of the tunnels, and while they were sitting on the village common, waiting for the pigs to roast. The dwarves were gathering slowly, chatting with one another, obviously in a holiday mood. Retsa, Saret, and Bekko had left off being their hosts for a few minutes and were chatting with their neighbors, so Alea could marvel at the contrast between dwarf and giant without worrying about anyone overhearing by more than chance—at the contrast, and the resemblances, too.
“They are both craftsmen,” she told Gar, “but each on a scale that befits them. The giants craft walls and towers that are far bigger than themselves, while the dwarves craft things far smaller than themselves.”
“Doesn’t that fit in with the stories you were told as a child?” Gar asked.
“Why—yes, it does!” Alea said in surprise. “The dwarves were supposed to be wondersmiths, hammering out marvelous things in their caverns—and the giants built huge stone castles.”
“I’m sure the giant village we visited would look like a castle to people who never saw the inside,” Gar said, “and the workshops we’ve just seen would certainly seem to be caverns, if you ignored the stonework and finishing that have made them pleasant places to work.”
“You don’t think the first storytellers had actually been to Jotunheim and Nibelheim!”
“No, I don’t,” Gar said. “In fact, I think those tales were being told before the first giants were born, and before the first dwarves escaped from slavery. But I suspect all of them heard those stories in their childhood, and remembered them so deeply they may not have thought of them until they’d been exiled. Then, though, the stories came to mind, and they thought that was how they were supposed to behave.”
“Could they really pattern their lives after stories?” Alea asked in wonder.
“Haven’t the Midgarders done just that?” Gar asked. “And the bandits are quickly making up stories to justify the way they live. Of course, it could be that the giants began building huge houses simply because of their size, and found the work very satisfying.”
“And the first dwarves burrowed for safety, accidentally dug up metal nuggets, and found they enjoyed making things of that metal?” Alea nodded slowly. “It could be. Will we ever know?”
“Probably not,” Gar said, “but after dinner, I’m going to ask Bekko to let me have some time with their village computer. After that, I’ll see if I can use their radio to talk to our friend Garlon to tell him we’ve arrived safely—and what we’ve learned.”
“He probably knows it already,” said Alea, “if the giants and dwarves talk to one another as much as they say.” Then their hosts came back, and the banquet began. There was much talk and laughter, and as much ale as pork, or so it seemed. When they were done eating, the dwarves began to tell stories. Alea listened wide-eyed as Obon told the tragedy of the heroic dwarf Alberich, who agreed to guard the Rhinegold for the Lorelei, and took it down into the caverns of Nibelheim to hide it from the wicked gods of Asgard. But Wotan called on the sly god Loki, and the treacherous two sneaked into Nibelheim and stole the gold anyway. Alberich fought to defend it, and the gods slew him most ingloriously for his loyalty to the Lorelei, and his struggle to keep his promise.