Skirting the edge of the great sinkhole, Colin Stonetooth and the Ten in the lead, the people who were now Hylar began their journey. Three and five abreast, the procession was more than two miles long.
Among them were drummers, and as the first of these came abreast of the sinkhole he loosed his vibrar and began a slow, steady beat — a dirge, or a salute. Then others behind him joined in, and, as the procession crept past the sinkhole, the mountains echoed the steady, minor-key thunders of great drums saying a last farewell to the greatest drummer of them all. For the Hylar, as for the Calnar, there would always be the memory of Handil the Drum.
The procession wound downward, past the death-stink of the silent keep and out onto the war-littered terraces. On a hillside in the distance, a little band of humans raised their hands in salute, then turned away, and Colin Stonetooth knew that Garr Lanfel, the Prince of Golash, had made a final gesture in honor of a friendship that would never be again.
Down the terraces, toward the valleys of the Hammersong and the Bone, the new clan of the Hylar marched to the sound of its drums, eyes raised to the Suncradles and the distances beyond.
Never once did Colin Stonetooth turn to look back at what had been Thorin-Everbardin. But some did, and their whispers were bittersweet on the winds.
“Thoradin,” they muttered. For the people who were now Hylar, Thorin was gone. What remained was Thoradin — a memory of the past.
Part II:
The Land of Kal-Thax
Kharolis Mountains
Century of Wind
Decade of Oak
Year of Brass
12
The smoke of a hundred morning fires hazed the early autumn air above the eastern foothills of the Kharolis Mountains. As far as the eye could see, peering eastward from the slopes beyond, little wisps of smoke rose to the north and south, a solid crescent of smoke that rose skyward, then feathered on the breeze to lie like low clouds in the distance.
For weeks it had been like this. Hardly a day passed without sign of the bands of human wanderers who pressed westward, across the plains of central Ansalon until they came to the rising spires of the Kharolis Mountains. And always, then, they pushed toward the great pass below Cloudseeker Peak, and their camp smoke hazed the foothills below. Slide Tolec had learned to predict when the next numan assault would come simply by the smoke over the foothills.
Except for a few remote camps of ogres and goblins, the people out there were a mix of human-kind. Most of them were refugees and wanderers, bands and whole tribes driven westward by the spread of the dragon wars far to the east. They sought places to rest, places to hide, places to resettle, but they were not welcomed in the hills and plains east of the mountains. That was part of the far-reaching realm of Ergoth, and the Ergothians didn’t want hordes of strangers crowding into their land. Thus the knights and armed bands of wardens from Ergoth pushed the travelers onward, toward the mountains.
Refugees and displaced tribes — many of them he had seen at close quarters, when they came up the slopes only to be driven back by dwarves — appeared harmless enough, except for being human. The dwarves of Kal-Thax had learned long ago what happened when humans were allowed to scatter through these mountains. In certain seasons and in certain places — fertile valleys here and there — they managed to survive, for a time. They would spread and multiply. But then the food supplies and the shelter suitable for humans would be too little. The seasons would change and there would be famine, and then the raiding and the looting of the Einar — the dwarves — would begin.
Slide had thought about the harsh sanctions the dwarves had created. No other races were welcome in Kal-Thax. Kal-Thax was for the Einar. Kal-Thax was for dwarves and no one else. Like every dwarf in Kal-Thax, Slide agreed that it was a necessary law, especially where humans were concerned. If humans could just pass through, some had reasoned, maybe it would not be necessary. But humans did not “pass through.” They would come in, if allowed, and they would spread and colonize, and the old troubles would begin again.
A shadow fell across the ledge where Slide squatted, and a wide-shouldered, bandy-legged figure draped in furs scrambled down from the ledges above to drop lithely — and almost soundlessly — beside him. Slide scowled behind his mesh faceplate. It was only one of the many unnerving habits of Glome the Assassin, this penchant for showing up silently and always unexpected. Slide said nothing, though. Those foolhardy enough to offend Glome the Assassin sometimes wound up dead.
For a second, Glome crouched beside Slide Tolec, studying him with quick, close-set eyes beneath a heavy brow that seemed to radiate the force of his presence and the strength of his arms. Then he turned and peered off into the distance, toward the plains where the smoke mounted from alien fires. Only for a moment did he scan the human camps. Turning to his right, he shaded his eyes to look off southward across the expanse of the high meadows which were the crest of a mighty shoulder of Cloudseeker Mountain. In that direction too, there was smoke — not as much as on the distant plains, but nearer by miles. A camp was there, and there were hints of movement and bright colors.
Glome pointed. “Daewar,” he growled. “They camp on Theiwar territory.”
“They’ve been there for a week.” Slide shrugged. “They are here to help us repel the outsiders. Beyond them are Vog Ironface and the Daergar, as well.”
“Forget about the humans,” Glome growled. “I think it is time we dealt with the Daewar. We have wasted too much time.”
Without another word, Glome turned and disappeared into the caves behind the ledge — silently, as usual.
Slide shivered slightly. Even now, with thousands of human invaders massing at the foot of the mountains, Glome still dwelt on his primary ambition, to wage war against the Daewar.
Or was that his real ambition, Slide wondered, to fight the Daewar? Or was it just a means toward some greater, darker ambition lying within the assassin’s mind?
No one really knew where Glome had come from. Somewhere in Kal-Thax, of course, from one or another of the many little bands or villages of the widespread Einar, but no one knew exactly where. Glome had not been Theiwar originally. He had just appeared one day, shortly before the time the old chieftain, Crouch Redfire, disappeared.
No one knew what had become of Crouch Redfire, but Glome had walked into the home lairs of the Theiwar and established himself immediately as a leader, through bullying, threats, and — many suspected — outright murder in several cases. He had an uncanny knack for seeking out all the malcontents in the tribe and getting them to accept his lead. Within a very short time, Glome had a substantial following among the Theiwar. Some had thought that Glome intended to take over as chieftain, but the succession had already been claimed by Twist Cutshank and — surprisingly — Glome had backed him against challengers. Twist Cutshank was a strong, brutal person — not overly smart, but crafty in his way. Now Twist was chieftain, and Glome was his chief advisor, and Slide Tolec wondered what Glome’s ambitions really were. He had the feeling that they went far beyond merely being chieftain of the thane of Theiwar.
Slide turned his gaze eastward again, toward the distant smoke. Always, outsiders had come in the warm seasons — humans and others — trying to enter the closed land of Kal-Thax. But never had he seen so many.
Refugees from distant wars — yet among them would be the raiders and the looters, humans who found in the chaos of war the excuse and the opportunity to take what they could get.