Durin thumbed the cork out of the vial, parted Frivaldi's lips, and poured a dose of healing potion into the unconscious dwarfs mouth. The smell of honey, herbs, and troll's blood lingered in the air as Frivaldi sputtered, then swallowed. His eyes fluttered and he groaned.
Durin touched the egg-sized lump on Frivaldi's head and felt it slowly sink away as the potion took effect. He clucked his tongue, resisting the urge to scold. The boy would either learn from the experience and be a little more cautious around trapped doors, or not.
Most likely not.
"What… what happened?" Frivaldi asked, sitting up. his voice echoing in the cavernous space.
"There was a pendulum trap at the top of the stairs," he told Frivaldi. "Had you followed standard-"
"So it knocked me down the stairs and I bumped my head," Frivaldi said. "So what? I'm good as new, thanks to the healing potion."
"The pendulum was an axe," Durin continued. "Through luck alone, the wood had shrunk and the loosened blade fell off before it struck you. That axe might have cleaved you in two-killed you-and all because you didn't follow standard delving procedure."
Instead of looking properly contrite, Frivaldi rolled his eyes.
"I know," he said. "LOST."
"L–LOST," Durin corrected. "Listen, LOok-"
Frivaldi rubbed his head and finished for him, "-and Spring the Trap."
Durin sighed. Could he teach his apprentice nothing? He recorked the vial and tucked it back into a side pouch of his Delver's pack, then unbuckled the main flap. Reaching inside the magical pack, he pictured the object he was searching for and felt it nudge his hand. He drew out the map he'd assembled through decades of research and carefully unrolled it. The chamber they stood in was large, extending beyond the limits of his darkvision, and had an arched roof high enough to accommodate a giant. Its floor, once polished, had been cracked by some long-ago earth tremor. Skeletons in rotted leather armor lay on the floor where they had fallen-skeletons with grossly elongated arms and wide jawbones set with small, sharp fangs. These were the goblins that had overrun the kingdom of Oghrann and the stronghold of Torunn the Bold.
Frivaldi clambered to his feet and looked around.
His eye settled on the statues that stood on either side of the staircase.
"Are those supposed to be Moradin?" he asked. "They look like they were hacked out with an axe."
Durin bristled. Frivaldi knew nothing about art.
"They are hewn in a style distinctive of ancient Oghrann," he patiently explained. "Do you see the sharp angles of their foreheads, noses, and chins?"
Frivaldi nodded, but his attention was wandering.
"They are meant to resemble the facets of a gem," Durin explained as he strode over to the nearest statue and ran a hand along the stone.
The surface was precise and smooth, not a chip or a mis-chisel on it. If he'd had a block and tackle and a team of ponies, he would have gladly hauled the statues away. They would have made a fine addition, indeed, to the athenaeum in Silverymoon.
"The arms, legs, and fingers deliberately hexagonal, like rock crystals," Durin continued. "These statues are an exquisite example of their type, a metaphor in stone for the creation of the dwarf race, which Moradin crafted from precious metals and gems cut from the heart of the-"
"So is this the hall we were looking for?" Frivaldi interrupted. He nudged one of the skeletons with his boot. Its skull collapsed, and a rusted helmet clattered to the floor. "I don't see any axe. Lots of goblin swords and maces, but no axe."
Durin sighed. What, by the gleam in Brightmantle's eye, were the Delvers using as selection criteria these days?
"This," Durin concluded, "must be All-Father's Hall. The Bane of Caeruleus lies to the southwest, in the Hall of Hammers."
He paced a straight line across the hall, which turned out to be precisely forty paces wide. Reaching the wall, he turned right-standard delving procedure was ERROR: Enter Right, Return Opposite Right-making a circuit of the octagonal hall. As he walked, he quoted from The Fall of the Bold, a saga he'd spent decades piecing together from fragments: inscriptions on standing stones and feast bowls, dusty parchments long forgotten on library shelves, and bardic song.
And when the Hall of Hammers fell,
Bold Torunn heard his own death knell.
The Bane of Caeruleus he had wrought,
Abandoned lay, 'twas all for naught."
Frivaldi trotted behind him, scuffling and scattering skeletons.
"I don't see any dwarf bodies," Frivaldi said.
"The dwarves carried out their dead," Durin replied. "It was an orderly retreat."
Spotting a crack in the wall that ran square to the floor, Durin examined it according to procedure. FAIL: Feel Air, Inspect, and Listen. He wet a finger and held it to the crack. No air was escaping. He ran a palm against the floor, but found no groove that would indicate that feet had worn away the stone. He gave the wall a sequence of sharp raps with his delving pick, but heard no telltale reverberations. The crack was a natural fissure leading a short distance into the wall, not a secret door.
Frivaldi, all the while, stared idly around. "So why didn't they take the axe with them?"
" 'Weapon,'" Durin corrected as he resumed his circuit of the hall. He passed the staircase. "The precise translation from Auld Dethek is 'weapon.'"
Frivaldi waved a hand and said, "Axe, weapon-whatever. Why didn't they take it with them, if it was so valuable?"
"The Bane was too large," Durin explained. "Only Torunn could wield it."
He paused. A portion of the wall was angled slightly off true. It was time for MISS: Manipulate, Inspect, Slide, Shove. He pressed a raised spot on the wall next to it, but nothing happened. The section of wall didn't slide when he pressed his palms to it and pushed up, then down, then left, then right. Nor did it rotate open under a sharp nudge from his shoulder.
Frivaldi, all the while, continued to be idle. He could, at least, have leant his shoulder to the shove. Instead he persisted with his foolish speculations.
"Torunn led the shield band that broke through the goblin ranks. Why didn't he use the axe against the goblins?"
Durin sighed and continued his circuit of the hall. Frivaldi obviously hadn't been paying attention the night Durin had recited the saga for him. Verses one thousand three hundred and fifty-six through one thousand three hundred and seventy-four clearly stated the purpose of the magical weapon Torunn had forged-to slay a blue dragon that had been troubling the realm for nearly a century: the dragon Caeruleus. The magical weapon would enable Torunn to fight the dragon "claw for claw," according to the poetic language of the saga. Its wielder would be immune to the blue dragon's primary attack-the bolt of lighting it spat from its mouth-and to the aura of fear that preceded the beast like a shadow. Against goblins, however, the Bane would be no more effective than an ordinary weapon.
Since his map had proved accurate, it was all Durin could do to keep his emotions in check. His lip had twitched at least twice, threatening to pull his mouth into a smile-he straightened it into its usual grim line.
If he did succumb to idle mirth, however, he'd have good cause. After decades of searches in the Stormhorn
Mountains, he'd at last found Torunn's Forge. He was certain of it. Recovering the Bane of Caeruleus would be greatest thing he had ever accomplished in his long career. No Delver had ever brought back a weapon of its type. Oh, to think what the order's battle clerics would learn from it. The lost secrets of Oghrann metalsmith-ing would be returned to the light.