“He dropped me into the river when we were crossing on the bridge,” said Balodil resentfully. “I can remember how the current took hold of me and dragged me under. I couldn’t breathe. Some time later I woke up. I was with some humans. They fed me and made me work for them but then they sold me and I escaped when the alfar invaded.” He told his story quickly and without a pause. “I ran all the way to the caves of Toboribor. I lived there for many, many cycles. That’s all. I survived from orbit to orbit by stealing from the outlying farms. Until Barskalin found me and took me off to join the Zhadar.” He grinned, raising his arms and flexing his muscles. “I’m the strongest of all of them.” Balodil pointed back to Tungdil. “It was him that dropped me in the water. Even if he used to look different. I recognized him straightaway.”
Ireheart could hardly believe what he was hearing. A chilling story; abstruse enough to be true? It could all be a pack of lies. Did Tungdil maybe tell him about losing his son?
He shook his head. Very few people knew the story of Tungdil and Balyndis’s first child: The effect on Tungdil of the child’s loss had nearly driven him mad with alcohol and grief. And after all the cycles that had passed in the meantime. There were so many other tales that could be told.
Ireheart looked at Balodil and tried to spot similarities between him and Tungdil or, indeed, Balyndis. He saw no resemblance and was angry with himself for giving any credence to the words of a crazy Zhadar. “Whatever… Balodiclass="underline" Just tell me what I can do about all this.”
The Zhadar glanced furtively back over his shoulder. “You have the curse of the elves on you now.”
“You don’t mean to say you used their blood for this revolting stuff?”
“Yes, we did. We found the last of the elves and took them prisoner…”
“I thought the alfar had eliminated all the pointy-ears?”
“No, they didn’t get all of them. We finished the task off. All except two. They cursed us all and anyone who would partake of the drink. If anyone can free you from the stain on your soul it will be one of the two elves still alive.” Balodil cocked an ear. “I must get back to the others. Barskalin has woken up. If I’m away too long he’ll think something’s wrong.” He put his hands on Ireheart’s shoulders. “Swear you’ll not betray me. Nobody must know that we spared the lives of two of the elves. Not until all the alfar have been wiped out.” The grip on his shoulders was painful.
“All right, I swear, for Vraccas’s sake.”
Balodil released him and disappeared into the shadows.
“What do I do when the thirst comes back?” Ireheart asked in a muffled whisper.
“I’ll be there and I’ll help you slake your thirst,” came the answer out of the dark.
He sighed. “Vraccas, whenever I think it can’t get any worse, you have a surprise in store for me,” he grumbled. “My soul is besmirched, I have an elf curse on me and the only pointy-ears who might be able to help me-well, no one knows where they are or if they’re even still around.” He fiddled with his trousers, preparing to give some dwarf-water to the desert. “Oh, and let’s not forget the monsters of the Black Abyss. And Lot-Ionan, who we have to defeat but mustn’t kill. All the usual suspects for a dwarf like me to contend with. Anyone would think it was some marketplace bard coming up with this tale. Perhaps you’ve got a pet storyteller, Vraccas, giving you ideas.” He directed his dwarf-water to describe at least the first letter of his name in the sand.
He was not surprised in the slightest to note that his stream ran black as ink before it trickled away between the grains of sand.
XXV
Girdlegard,
Former Queendom of Sangpur,
Southwest,
Spring, 6492nd Solar Cycle
They left the belt of sand behind them, marched through fields of boulders, traversed valleys and skirted ravines in which, numberless cycles earlier, vast rivers had run. Now they were met only with dust, stones and the occasional bleached skeleton.
This stretch of the Sangpur desert appealed to Ireheart because it resembled his old habitat with its soaring rock walls, its chasms, its echoes, its subterranean passages, here cut by racing water and not by dwarf-hand. The landscape had something primeval to it. I could almost start to like it here if it weren’t hotter than the inside of a maniac’s forge.
Today they were making their way through a labyrinth of sunken walkways in which Franek, at the head of the company with Tungdil and Barskalin, kept getting lost. It was only thanks to the dwarves that they ever found their way out again. One of the Zhad??r climbed up high to get a better view and pointed them in the right direction for the east.
“Our water supplies are running out. We should have got to the village you told us about three orbits ago,” said Tungdil. “If we don’t reach it tomorrow, you’re for the chop, famulus, for having tricked us. I think you’re taking us round in circles hoping we die of thirst.”
The man gasped. “Oh sure, and I’m taking myself round in those same circles to die with you? Not a good move.”
“Who says you don’t have a secret reservoir near here?” Ireheart moved up to the head of the column. “What kind of a village did you say it was?”
“A desert market; a trading station. We’ll get everything we need. They used to sell dwarf-made goods there, weapons particularly. Even today you can get some quite rare items.” Franek looked down at the clothes he was wearing, marked over and over with salt rings. “They know me there.”
“Is that a good or a bad thing?” Ireheart laughed. “I like to be prepared. I’d like to know whether they’ll greet us at spear-point because we have you with us.”
“We’ll be safe enough. The town belongs to me.” He drew in a hot lungful of air. “Well, it was mine until Lot-Ionan chucked me out.”
“What was your research area? I don’t remember-or maybe you never said?” Ireheart looked at Balyndar, who carried the slit water pouch at his belt. He had assumed the damage must have been an accident. Perhaps he had dreamed that the pouch was the head of an orc rising up out of the sand to attack him. Then he must have slashed at it with his knife. After hearing this, none of the others cared to sleep in his immediate vicinity.
Behind Balyndar came the Zhadar who called himself Balodil. Ireheart had stopped believing that he might really be the Scholar’s own son. The age did not seem right. Barskalin told them that only old dwarves were taken into the ranks of the Zhadar. The real Balodil would not have been old. At least, not old for a dwarf.
“I was studying how to maximize size in animals. And in things,” answered Franek.
“Aha,” grinned Ireheart. “That will have made you popular with the ladies, I’ll be bound?”
“It’s not what you think, beard-face,” the famulus retorted. “You, of course, could do with a bit of growth. If you were a few hands taller you’d be able to breathe the same air as I do.”
“I could easily bring you down to size, long-un! I’ve got an iron-clad winner of a spell. I’d only have to let it circle.” Ireheart lifted the crow’s beak, but lowered it when he caught Tungdil’s disapproving eye. “Just wait,” he grumbled.
“Did you have any luck?” the one-eyed dwarf enquired.
“The experiments with plants worked all right. Same thing with simple animal life. Insects were good, as well.”
“Hey! How about a giant gugul!” bellowed Ireheart. “First a wonderful fight with the beast and then a magnificent feast.” He gave Franek a playful shove. “See? Tell us, how much did you get things to grow?”
“The body of the giant scorpion that I magicked must have measured seven paces from tail to tip,” Franek said, putting on a self-important face. “My experiments consisted of getting grasshoppers to grow large enough for us to ride on. They would be splendid mounts for the desert. But there was a high turnover rate. They kept dying on us.”