Resurgent Shadows (Successive Harmony Book 1) (6 page)

“Well, at least you eat like a dverger.”

Caleb picked up the tankard and looked into it, sniffing it tentatively. He had never had alcohol before. It had been against his religion to consume any form of spirits, but what did it matter now? His God no longer cared what happened to him. His God had abandoned this world, if He had ever cared for it to begin with. It was an old argument that Caleb had played over and over again in his mind. He felt his eyes welling up with unshed tears and gritted his teeth in frustration and anger.

He picked up the tankard and downed half of it in two large gulps. It burned going down, but tasted remarkably like root beer with a hint of a nutty aftertaste. He coughed, cleared his throat, and placed the mead back down on the table.

“So what’s the Breaking?”

Sigvid looked at him over the top of his tankard and then looked down into it, as if the amber liquid held the secret answers he was looking for. For the first time, Caleb noticed the hints of gray at the roots of the dverger’s hair and whiskers. Sigvid looked up, his eyes searching out the corners of the room, his gaze unfocused. Dark looks passed between the faces of the other dvergers at the table.

“I don’t know what it was like for you here,” he began in a low voice, “but for us, it started several years ago. Golgent and trulgo came down from the mountains. There were wars everywhere you turned. The gnomes were expanding their tunnels and crafting more powerful and more devious machines, eating into the mother earth without regard for what they were doing. They never do—never care. They raped their mother and she got her vengeance. She awoke the dragons from within her depths and they burst into the earth through her blood and wounds. The fire mountains spewed them out against us, and with them came the Dragonlords.

“They fell upon our world with slaughter and reckless abandon, killing anything and everything in their path. We dvergers had ventured above ground in the centuries before that time, settling in cities on top of the earth as well as beneath. This was once a thriving Enclave—a colony of dvergers—based around a thick vein of gold and silver ore. If only you could have seen it then. Hundreds of us, all working together in the mines and crafting works of metal and gem to send back to Tealcenrir, the dverger homeland far to the east.” Sigvid’s voice took on a note of mingled nostalgia and sadness. “The sprawling underground city had grown up through the base of the mountain, soaring spires arching into the skies.

“Hundreds of us died before we realized that it was too late and called upon Úndin and Atelho to save us. We got word that Tealcenrir, the dverger nation, had been lost in a great raid. Those who were left were hunted down by the Dragonhosts. The aylfins and what human wizards were on our side fought the dragons with magic and sorcery, pushing them back until they turned and fell upon us.

“We had no magic, only blood and stone. We were an easier target. We escaped back underground, sealing the entrances. They didn’t stop—they sent kill squads and wyrms after us, gnomes too.

“Then the earthquakes hit. We thought the end had come. So many of the passages caved in.

“When the earthquakes finally stopped, we decided to go out and see what had happened and found ourselves here. The world was similar, and yet different. It was full of machines and strange men and creatures that we’d never seen before. The Dragonlords brought us here, for they were here, too, waiting for us. They changed the world as we knew it. So many of us died while we hid underground. The world changed, the dverger nation fell. We vowed that we’d never hide again. We stand and fight where we can. We harry the enemy at every turn and do all we can to punish the dragons and their Dragonlords.”

The story rang with such familiarity that Caleb shuddered at the sheer impossibility of it. It was as if someone had opened the pages of legend and myth and then thrust the world into it. This was not the first time someone had brought up dragons and Dragonlords, but this was the first time he’d made the connection to their role as a force behind the golgent and trulgo hordes. He’d thought them simply one more additional nightmare come to life.

He remembered, those first few weeks in the Charlotte city-fortress, all the speculation about what had happened, what had destroyed their world. Some people had blamed it on God, as punishment for man’s folly and ignorance. Others had blamed it on science and the quest for the “God Particle.” Others still had merged science and superstitions, claiming that the blood moon eclipse had been a part of it as well. Caleb didn’t know what to believe. Magic was just as likely a source for him as anything else he’d heard.

“Magic?” Caleb asked, more to himself than to Sigvid.

“Aye boy, magic!” the dverger said to the accompaniment of a half dozen other muttered words of anger or bitter resentment from the other dvergers at the table. Their little group around the table was almost alone in the room, except for the cook, who was busy carving up the remaining meat on the spit, though he unobtrusively cast curious glances at the trio.

“The cursed unnaturalness of dragons and aylfins. Our clerics can call down the holy might of Atelho through prayer, but that is a divine gift, not magic. Curse Úndin for ever giving life to Faerin and her brood!”

All the unfamiliar terms were beginning to give Caleb a headache—either that or the mead was beginning to take effect.

“So the thing that attacked us in the bunker, it was a dragon?”

“That was a wyrm, a dragon throwback that exists for the sole purpose of killing dvergers. Mortan-zai, the leader of the Red Dragonhosts, bred them before the fall of Tealcenrir.”

“If this Enclave stayed hidden for so long, what were you doing in the bunker?”

“We were exploring areas where we could set up a second base of attack should the Enclave ever be taken.”

“Sigvid!”

Unnoticed by their little group, Bothvar had returned during their discussion. His bearded face was livid and his voice accusatory. “What be you doing? Do you be telling this creature the secrets of the hall? The Council will not stand for this!”

“What I do or do not tell him is of my concern, Bothvar, not yours,” Sigvid replied icily. “As the Council reminded you earlier today. Come, boy, we’ll talk in my quarters.”

Caleb took his cue from Sigvid, left his plate and tankard on the table, and got to his feet, the langsaxe at his belt striking the table with a wooden clunk.

Bothvar saw the blade and growled. “He should not be armed!” His voice echoed about the chamber’s stone walls.

The cook looked over at the sudden noise, pausing in cutting a particularly thick strip of meat from the juicy haunch.

Sigvid rounded on Bothvar, and those who had been seated at the table with them fell in around Sigvid like some sort of honor guard.

Caleb took an involuntary step away from the pair. Caleb had only ever known one other person who radiated the inner power and authority that exuded from the dverger and that had been a candle next to Sigvid’s raging flame.

“Are you questioning the workings of the Ferreiro?” Sigvid asked. “I have spoken for this man and his honor is my honor. This is the second time you’ve crossed me today. A third will be your last.”

Bothvar swallowed, visibly wilting beneath Sigvid’s withering glare. He took a step backwards and inclined his head slightly. “The scouts have returned with news, Ferreiro. The Council has requested your presence.”

Sigvid scowled. “Tell them I’ll be with them shortly. Let them know what you did and accept whatever punishment they give you.”

Bothvar’s dark eyes flashed with suppressed anger, but he inclined his head once more and left the way he had come.

Sigvid frowned at the dverger’s retreating back for a long moment, tugging agitatedly on the end of his beard.

“Come on, boy,” he said at last, a touch of resignation coloring his voice. “We’ll finish talking later. The Council wants me to come play at war with them.”

“My name is Caleb, you know.”

“And mine is Sigvid, son of Siglan.”

He followed Sigvid out of the room and down a side passage. “What did you mean when you told Bothvar that you had spoken for me?”

“It means that I convinced the other dvergers not to kill you, for now. Your fate is still undecided. We dvergers are a suspicious lot by nature. We’ve found that you humans aren’t much better than golgent.”

“Not much better than golgent, are we—” Caleb said, his face contorted in anger.

Sigvid cut him off, raising his voice to forestall the coming tirade. “I’m on your side, boy. Not all is dross and slag; there is pure metal yet to be found amongst men even though it is hard to find. In time you’ll come to understand. Just know that I have spoken for you and have taken responsibility for your actions. Amongst the dvergers here that counts for something as long as you’re with me.”

Caleb bit back the rest of his retort. It was true that humanity as a whole was warlike and self-centered, but to paint everyone with the same brush was an injustice to all those who had died defending their families and friends when the world had turned upside down. It was an insult to their memory. It was an insult to Rachel and Benson, both of whom had been innocent of any crime—and it had been the golgent who had delivered the fateful blow. They were the ones who deserved to die.

Sigvid stopped in front of a large door at the end of a passage and pulled out a large iron key. He inserted it into the lock, turned it, and the door clicked open.

“Wait for me here,” he said, standing aside and gesturing for Caleb to enter the room. “These are my rooms, so don’t break anything. I’ll be back soon.”

Caleb grudgingly complied.

The door closed behind him and the lock clicked into place. He’d been on edge ever since he’d awoken underground. The thought of all the stone and earth above his head made him uneasy, but at least it was well lit. It seemed like he had spent the last two days almost entirely locked behind closed doors. He had not been confined since before the Charlotte city-fortress had fallen. He was restless and angry, though the anger, at least, was subsiding.

He glanced around the room. It was easily as large as the communal dining area they had just left, though with markedly fewer tables. A forge rested snugly in one corner of the room, the chimney cut into the stone of the wall and ceiling. He wondered at that. They must have had some way to break up the smoke and smell before it reached the surface, otherwise it would have given them away by now.

Anvils and hammers of varying sizes were placed neatly around the dormant furnace and a table next to it held dozens of other chisels and tools that Caleb didn’t recognize, arranged according to size. On another table, far from the forge, Caleb was surprised to see a massive array of guns and ammunition piled carelessly about. Several boxes of ammunition had burst open and loose rounds littered the floor and hid under most of the tables.

Opposite this table were racks of more dverger-appropriate weaponry. Axes, pole arms, and a variety of knives hung on half a dozen racks and stands, ranging in size from finger-length blades to the nearly short sword length that Sigvid had called a langsaxe. Shields, helmets, and other pieces of armor lay alongside these. Sigvid was obviously a blacksmith.

On the other end of the room, close to where Caleb stood, a few low walls and arches created a private area. Caleb could just make out the end of a rumpled-looking bed in the shadows.

Caleb wandered across the room to the tables full of weaponry. There were enough assault rifles to equip a small army. His own gun was out of ammo and he’d lost most of his magazines, so he sifted through the various rifles, handguns, and ammunition around the table. He found several spare magazines that fit his gun tucked inside a box of hand grenades. He made a neat pile of 9mm ammo boxes on one of the benches, separating the hollow-point and target rounds into separate piles.

The work, though menial, calmed his mind and ebbed his frustrations, so he continued to sort, organizing the various weapons into categories and calibers, and arranging them neatly on the tables and benches. It felt good to be busy, to work with his hands and focus his mind away from the pain and the constancy of the hunt. The haunted feeling slipped away and the nagging fear from the dream the night before passed as he placed the last box of shotgun shells onto its pile.

“You can keep what you want from there,” Sigvid’s voice said from a few steps behind him, “if you promise to show me about these here boomsticks.”

Caleb spun around. He had been focused on his work, absorbed in the labor. He had not heard Sigvid enter the room. He didn’t know how to answer, so he simply nodded.

The dverger’s face was a grim mask, but his eyes were friendly. “These human weapons are a mystery to me, and the metals and materials used in them strange.”

Caleb nodded again, but didn’t say anything.

“The Council would have me kill you, human, but I said you could be trusted. Will you betray that trust?”

Caleb paused halfway between a frown and an open expression of confusion. Why would the dverger have done that? How could Sigvid say anything about trust after only knowing him a few short hours?

“Ack, there will be time for that later,” Sigvid said with a scowl. “First, we should pay respect to the honored dead. This is something that no human has ever seen before. Follow me.”