Commandment (9 page)

“Balderdash!” A fourth jumped in. Cicero gestured to the newest participant, Eurphios. Ovid, however, refused to abandon his center stage post.

“Fool! May the pillars of the Tabernacle tumble when reason succumbs to mythology!” Eurphios lambasted his predecessor.

“These days, among all, you slander myth?” Plutus interrupted from the edge. “You seek historical fact? What is history, but the distillation of rumor? And what is rumor, but the fabric of myth?” He turned to Lakif. “Know you, Acaanan that the shield can be lowered, and in its swath towers will crumble. At the world’s end, the Colossus will walk the city, wreaking havoc and destruction!”

It seemed Plutus’ remark struck a nerve, for a rumble issued from all quarters. A jumbled chorus of corrections, explanations, and assertions exploded from the garlanded scholars. Some supported the incendiary comment, whereas others derided it as nonsense. Cicero wailed in vain for order, but his protests were drowned out by the bickering of his colleagues, each trying to outshout his neighbor.

Lakif could see an intellectual storm was brewing and decided to bail out, just as the circle’s composure crumbled. Angry intellectuals hurled diatribes that not so much advanced their own theory as impugned their neighbor’s much vaunted scholarship. As polysyllabic words soared overhead like thrown chinaware, Lakif quietly finished her drink and slipped away.

The uproar attracted the whole roster of the Titan’s Toe to come flocking in. A gaggle of scholars zeroed in on the circle. Lakif squeezed in between the gawkers. She rescued her socks and quietly made for the vestibule.

Moments later she donned her damp tunic, hoisted her sack, and left, leaving the Laureates of the Titan’s Toe Tabernacle entrenched in a didactic brawl.

Maybe the stigma was right, that discord truly did shadow Acaanans.

W
HATEVER STORM RAGED WITHIN THE
T
ABERNACLE, OUTSIDE THE RAIN HAD
largely abated. Only a fine drizzle chilled the square. If Lakif kept to covered galleries, she could avoid being sodden by the end of her trip.

The brief respite catapulted Lakif into a comfortable mood. She had sipped enough wine to relax her nerves. There was no telling how long the ugly weather would stay in abeyance, so she darted forth from the Tabernacle, hoping to make good headway. She gauged that, with a robust pace, the trip would be short. But her ankle revolted under the stress, and she was forced into an easy stroll.

Soon, the drizzle dimmed and vague sunlight streamed through murky clouds. Now it was threatening to become a pleasant day. The weather truly was fickle in Grimpkin.

Her buzz was disappearing when she realized she was close to the Vulcan. There was no change in her physical surroundings to herald in the famed ironworks. Instead, there was a clear change in the ambient temperature. The air noticeably warmed, carrying the acidic aroma of sulfur. Even the nature of the rain changed. The frothing, fiery air of the Vulcan blasted the drizzle to a fine, warm mist that billowed through the avenues like a dragon’s sneeze. The mist patting her face came as a welcome change from the biting rain. It wasn’t long before the gallery ended abruptly and she was left teetering at the edge of the Vulcan.

Before her, the gray veneer of Grimpkin collapsed into a yawning, circular pit. It was so wide that a shout fired from the Acaanan’s mouth wouldn’t have reached the ear of a spectator on the other side. Curiously, the surrounding structures hedged right up to the drop-off point.

Several metal girders extended inward over the pit like spokes of a wheel. Their bases were welded into sturdy supports spaced more or less equidistant around the Vulcan’s perimeter. The girders united at a metal dome suspended centrally, high above the pit’s base. Several chains looped from that metallic core down into the Vulcan. Other chains paralleled the underside of the radial girders to run to the peripheral loading docks. The entire array reminded the Acaanan of an iron spider capping the Vulcan.

As she watched, a square elevator rose from the depths toward the metallic dome. The elevator entered through an aperture in the dome’s base, only to appear moments later sliding underneath one of the radial girders. Its course would lead it toward one of the loading docks on the far side.

The air before her was a fuliginous storm of choking smoke that blotted out the sky. The steamy clouds billowed up from the Vulcan’s belly. The heated air venting upward warped the images of the distant buildings into watery, shifting apparitions.

Fell creatures of all shapes and sizes haunted the surrounding structures. Countless erinyes perched leisurely in the arches of neighboring edifices. Other more mundane birds soared high above the Vulcan, diving and pitching as if locked in aerial combat. These citizens were undoubtedly attracted to the sultry clouds mushrooming up from the iron works. Lakif even spotted a wiry wyvern wrapped around a turret, basking in the sauna.

Lakif looked deep into the Vulcan. The pit’s walls were so steeply sloped that had Lakif taken a healthy step forward, she would have fallen all the way to the Vulcan’s base, scores of yards below.

At that base, a pool of molten lava bubbled and churned slovenly. Skirting the lava pit was a flat deck. At several points, tunnels were drilled into the walls at various elevations. From many, heady smoke curled forth. These clearly accessed other arms of the ironworks.

Lakif shed her cloak and tucked it in her rucksack. She certainly had no use for it in this torrid climate.

She made for the nearest of the six loading docks. One was located at the rim where each radial girder was bolted to the earth. It seemed that all the goods forged below were raised through the central dome and distributed to a pre-assigned loading dock via the system of chain pulleys that laced the girders.

The dock was abuzz with activity. A team of laborers was unloading a metal beam from the trolley. A scaffolding of chains faithfully supported its massive weight. Curiously, the girder was bent like a wishbone. The laborers were heavily muscled and dripping with sweat and grime. With collective heaves and grunts, the crew managed to hoist it into the back of a cargo cart. The fruit of their labor inspired little interest in the Acaanan. She had no idea why a bent piece of metal would be considered useful.

Instead, her ever roving eye drifted to the front of the cart. There, a pack of durges were yoked in tandem, two abreast one another. They painted a bizarre portrait. At first sight, they resembled water buffalo. Their hairless green hide, thicker than any leather armor, was riddled with minute creases. Each of their six legs ended in flat footpads with the consistency of rock. Two gimlet tusks protruded from a wide mouth. Their eyelids were so drooping that the Acaanan wasn’t sure if the creatures were awake or asleep.

Durges were the true behemoths of the animal kingdom. An average adult possessed the weight of ten men. As such, they were the perfect beasts of burden. While they plod a disappointingly slow course, a single durge could pull several times its own weight for extended periods of time. These creatures lived only to eat and sleep—feats at which they excelled. But despite their formidable size, it was claimed that their brains were the size of a grape.

Puny intellect notwithstanding, it would be hard to overstate the value of the beasts to the daily functioning of Grimpkin. Coffled together, they were the ideal instruments to deliver the ironworks fashioned below to local distribution centers. From there, the goods were disseminated throughout the district. It is fair to say that Grimpkin’s economy was carried on the backs of these beasts of burden, as they conveyed all the raw materials that kept the district breathing. Where this particular crash was headed was unknown, for it wasn’t clear what industry would benefit from a bowed metal girder.

In spite of the key position the durges occupied in Grimpkin’s trade, Lakif had never actually seen one before. They were never found in the common thoroughfares of Grimpkin. Their transportation lanes were confined to specialized routes that crisscrossed the Old City, well hidden from the normal byways.

As Lakif skirted the cart, she caught sight of a dark-skinned figure disappearing into a shiny building. Lakif imagined it was a reflection of herself, a future shadow perhaps, leading the way or a mirage induced by the heated air on her skittish mind. She quickened her pace to catch up to her double. As she lobbed into the structure, she was confronted with a small, dead-end cell.

The figure within was waiting for her to enter. It was not, as Lakif had anticipated, an Acaanan, although the coal-black skin would suggest otherwise. He was far too muscular to hail from Acaanan stock. The only clothing he wore was a heavy leather kilt that hung down to his calves. A chain hung over a knobby shoulder. It crossed his chiseled chest and supported a leather pouch on the opposite hip. All manner of tools sprouted from the sack.

The brute was completely bald. Indeed, Lakif couldn’t even spy the slightest hair shadowing the sides of his head. He didn’t acknowledge the Acaanan’s entrance. In fact, he simply stared ahead with soulless eyes.

After she entered the elevator, the man grabbed the gate handle and, with a single motion, threw it closed. The gate slammed shut with such violence that the Acaanan wedged herself into the corner. Gears rumbled, superimposed on the coarse grating of metal. Out of the corner of her eye, Lakif continued to peruse her fellow passenger, who was no doubt a Bodak.

Lakif had known for some time that should she ever acquire a Rare Earth Stone, a trip to the Vulcan was in order. To this end, in true Acaanan fashion, she had pestered the locals for stories of the ironworks prior to her trip to Ebon Myre. Although the Vulcan was well known by all, surprisingly few had ever visited the site.

As a result of her queries, she had naturally heard of the Bodaks. In fact, it seemed hard to talk about the ironworks without also speaking of this race. These brutish folk were only seen in the environs of the Vulcan, never around the district at large. They were so few in number that many wondered if they were indeed classified as a distinct race, although from this proximity Lakif wouldn’t have questioned it. She wondered if the dark skin was indeed natural. It could equally have been accumulated soot caking scalded skin from their endless toil in the ironworks.

Faced with the skin tone, Lakif now felt a little uncomfortable. She had never seen another ebony-hued person beside an Acaanan. Now she had a slight appreciation of how the so-called superior races felt about Acaanans.

She felt like firing off a few questions to the Bodak, but on second thought held her tongue. They probably couldn’t communicate with each another. The Bodak’s tongue was probably baked dry like old leather.

Minutes later the elevator rocked to a halt, startling Lakif. Beyond the gate, a tunnel opened into the Vulcan’s base. With a stalwart heave, the Bodak swung the gate open and marched off.

Lakif had expected a flurry of activity around the lava pit. But no one was to be seen, excluding the Bodak who had just exited. The proximity to the lava made the temperature skyrocket. Lakif now understood why only Bodaks and the blacksmiths moiled in this area. No ordinary man could brave the igneous environment for long.

Lakif wondered about the tectonic disaster that had released such magma. Popular wisdom held that the boiling ooze was liberated from the earth during the cataclysm that ended the Renaissance. Such was fortunate, for the labyrinth of ironworks was instrumental in shaping the face of the district and inaugurating the subsequent growth of civilization.

The laborer stooped near a pile of tools. In the heat, his form shimmered like an apparition.

“The blacksmith?” Lakif asked. Without looking up from his activity, the laborer pointed toward a tunnel nearby. Lakif hurried for it, hoping to put some distance between herself and the lava.

The tunnel slanted down at an easy angle. A radiant glow emitted from a subterranean chamber ahead. What she entered was no natural cave, but a chamber purposely hewn out of the rock.

Within percolated another lava pit. The factitious walls and floor were polished smooth, even shined with a reflected glow. Aside from the boiling pool, the chamber was host to an armament of metal implements leaning against the walls.

The Acaanan wiped her brow free of glazing sweat. In fact, her shirt was already matted wet with perspiration. She wasn’t left to wonder about where to go, for a heartbeat later the blacksmith emerged from a tunnel on the opposite bank of the pool. Although Lakif had heard stories about the famed blacksmiths of the Vulcan, nothing could have prepared her for the actual sight.

Foremost to smite her was the blacksmith’s staggering size. With the height of two men, and probably the weight of eight, he was truly of Herculean proportions. His hand could have fit around the Acaanan’s head as easily as Lakif would hold an apple. The giant was naked save for a titanic pair of pants, fashioned from canvas. The trousers could have doubled as a sail for a skiff. The material was thick enough to seem impenetrable to arrows. A chain, of the same caliber used to yoke the durges in file, was wrapped around his waist. It served as a belt to support the massive garment. His flesh was an indurated shell that doubled as armor. In many places, particularly the shoulders and palms, it was thickened into gray plates, reminding the Acaanan of protective calluses. The giant’s bare torso was riddled with scars, the vestiges of countless years of laboring in the ironworks.

The creature’s peculiar face was as riveting as its stature. A single eye occupied the center of his forehead. It was larger than a cantaloupe. His forehead protruded out over his face like the mantle over a fireplace and was dented in places like a crushed can. Above the brow a single, curved horn sprouted from his forehead. The horn was pearly white—a bony extension of his massive skull.

In one hand, the Cyclops hoisted a metal girder over his shoulder. Although Lakif suspected it was at least a hundred pounds, the blacksmith supported it like the Acaanan would a walking staff.