Almost done now.
She opened the case Dugan would now be carrying, unlocking it with a small key that otherwise rode in a pouch of lock picks in her boot cuff. The slim case was the kind usually meant to keep a composite bow and extra strings dry. It looked old and worn on the outside though it was in fact brand new, purchased by Block the day before they had left the Islands. The inside was done in emerald green silk, fine velvet, and soft felt. Tilda removed a carbine-length ackserpa with a barrel shorter than a yard and a long wooden stock carved like a buksu, for it too had been fashioned in Miilark. The firing mechanism was imported from Zoku and consisted of an intricate steel lock with pins for a rear sight and a round cap over the internal wheel. From a compartment within the gun case Tilda took out several short, tin vials of powder and a mix of both lead and iron balls, placing several into the deep pockets on the inside front of her cloak. She opened one vial to charge the barrel and tapped home an iron ball with the tamping iron otherwise affixed beneath. She left a small bit of powder in the vial to prime the pan when necessary, and corked it. She stood, pulled on her gloves, and slipped the tin inside of one against the back of her left hand. She wound the spring-wheel, stood to attention, and shouldered arms.
Stares from all around. Fitzyear finally broke the silence.
“Yikes, Miss Matilda. Yikes.”
Tilda shrugged at the gnome. “The right tool for the right job.”
With the baggage redistributed the new group marched on. Tilda, Block, and Dugan walked in the middle of the line with Fitz and half of his men in front and the other three behind. Tilda went warily, carbine at rest on the crook of her arm and eyes scanning the surroundings, but she did not really believe this area or moment to be particularly dangerous. That had not been the Captain’s point in ordering Tilda to kit-up. Apart from keeping word of what Dugan had done to Procost from spreading, Tilda also suspected Block may have been sending something of a message to the strange men with whom she was about to spend the next several days, underground in the dark.
Fitz and Block’s efforts had certainly helped the demeanor of the accompanying soldiers, and the last stage of the march was very different than had been the solemn slog from cottage to camp. Hardly anyone had breathed a word on the first leg, but now the scruffy soldiers who had not been present to see Sir Procost’s demise chatted amiably among themselves in Daulic. They even sang a ditty or two which Tilda guessed were bawdy songs by the chuckling that accompanied them.
The gnome was still quiet as he led the way up out of the hills and to a narrow goat trail of a path that wrapped the western flank of an authentic mountain with a distinctive peak high above that certainly must have given the place a name, though none of the newcomers asked what it might be. They rounded about a quarter of the mountain’s great girth on the path and emerged on the southern side in early afternoon at the foot of the even more magnificent peak Tilda had looked upon from the balcony the day before. The mountain was heavily forested on its long, lower slopes, but the crags high above were too sharp and steep for either foliage or snow, revealing stone of a distinctive yellowish hue. The tall peak appeared almost like a sandstone intruder from another country, that had shouldered its way in among gray, granite neighbors.
“Yagnarok,” Fitz said, as the whole group had paused to gaze upwards. The gnome turned to Block. “Do you know the name, cousin?”
“The Yellow Mountain. In the old Dwarf tongue.”
“How did they come up with that?” Tilda mumbled, and small smiles from a couple of the soldiers nearby let her know that at least some of them spoke Codian.
Fitz led the way off the path passing down into the clustering pines over the thick carpet of needles. It was another hour or more until they reached a stony ridge as tall as the trees that extended out from the mountain proper just as if it were the root of a great tree, or even the foot of a stone giant. The impression was heightened by a cleft before the lowering ridge sank fully into the ground, leaving a space between either a branching root, or perhaps a gap between toes.
Three of Fitz’s men put aside their packs and weapons and together began clearing aside brush mounded in the back of the cleft. It did not take long to realize that the majority of it was artificial; wooden frames and squares bound across by leafy fronds that were quickly hauled out of the way to reveal a stout wooden door with heavy iron hinges and a crossbar, set in the angle of the cleft.
“Not the original door, of course,” Fitz said. “That was fashioned by the dwarves, and if it still stood in front of us today we’d not see more than the merest crack.”
The gnome stepped to the door and produced a large iron key from a chain around his neck. He slipped it into a great lock, turned it to the left rather than right, and left it there. He took a step back and two of his men removed the heavy crossbar from its braces. Only then did Fitz turn the key to the right, remove it from the lock and replace it around his neck. While his men hauled open the wooden portal, Fitz addressed the three visitors in a more serious tone than he had used in the morning.
“There is a little speech I give here, so bear with me if you please. Stay close together, and stay on the path. The way we are going has been safe for a hundred years, but if you wander down a side passage or otherwise leave the route there is no telling what you may find. The whole place used to be dwarven, but that does not mean there is any hidden gold. It means that rooms may be trapped and halls may be designed to lead you in lost circles until you die of thirst. Besides all that, there are plenty of creepy-crawlies that call the deep tunnels home. We will be Under most of three days, with safe rooms along the way to spend the two nights already stocked with food and such so we needn’t carry much. If there are any questions ask them now, for once inside it is best if we talk as little as possible.”
Three of Fitz’s men were removing metal lanterns from packs and filling them with oil. Tilda looked to the Captain, who was scowling as if his hangover was still lingering. She supposed he had been told more about this “Underway” by the Baron, but he had certainly shared nothing about it with her. Block of course had no duty to do so according to the traditions of the Guilds, nor was it her place as a lowly apprentice to ask any questions. But Tilda was in a thoroughly foul mood. Her forehead was not throbbing anymore though it was tender to the touch, but she had looked at her reflection in a stream earlier and seen the ugly bruise that looked like some monstrous birthmark. She was not thrilled about it.
“Fitzyear,” Tilda said. “Just what manner of place are you leading us into?”
Block frowned at her, but the gnome only blinked his big, bright eyes.
“Oh. Well, many hundreds of years ago, perhaps a thousand, the dwarves of Garak-Tor established an outpost in this mountain. It grew into a city after they found some pretties worth digging up. They abandoned the place once the veins played-out, I would guess in round numbers something like seven hundred years ago.”
Block snorted and Fitz looked at him, but the dwarf had nothing to add. Tilda knew the Captain was old, old almost beyond human comprehension, and she wondered exactly how long the crusty old dwarf had been around, and how many centuries of history he had seen with his own eyes.
“So we are going through a city?” she asked Fitz.
“Not really. We’ll be keeping down under the main passages most of the way. The south gate where we will exit is a grander path, but this end of the Way is more like a secret bolt-hole for some old Dwarf Laird. Yagnarok was never meant as a route through the mountains, it just sort of turned out that way.”