The Soul Forge (15 page)

Gilkor nodded, but the past still clearly haunted this dwarf. Thomas nodded again, more to himself than to anyone else. He thought of the dead, of the necro-caster who was hiding in the darkness, and a surge of fear bubbled into his throat and threatened to erupt from his mouth. But he clamped his hand into a fist and fought the fear down, feeling that the ale may have not completely burned out of his system.

“I’m not goin’ to ask you to come down there with me,” Thomas said, “but we have to
get out of here. We have to get that sword and get it to the Makers, or we all die. Lead me to the door, and I’ll go. You can work on this end,” he finished, gesturing to the sealed entrance.

“You ain’t going down there alone,” Zach said, springing to his feet. Cynthia and Miranda joined him, each one nodding.
Thomas could see there was no point arguing, so he simply nodded his appreciation to his friends.

“No.”

This denial came from Gilkor, and Thomas stared at the dwarf in confusion.

“What?” he asked, hoping he hadn’t heard what he had clearly
heard.

“No,” Gilkor said again. “No way I’m letting you kids head down there to face a necro-caster.

“Not alone.”

“Gilkor,” Thomas started to say, but Gilkor held up a hand to cut him off.

“No. This is a dwarf problem. And I will not allow a human to handle a dwarf problem. We’ll handle it together.”

Thomas smiled, looking back at his friends. “
Together, or not at all?” he asked.

“Together,” Zach smiled back.

“Or not at all,” Cynthia finished.

“
You all have been spending far too much time together,” Miranda chuckled, shaking her head.

“Come on,” Thomas said, “spend some time with us then. Zach’ll hold yer hand if ya get scared.”

Miranda raised her eyebrows, stealing a glance at Zach and licking her lower lip. Zach didn’t see this, staring as he was at Thomas with a betrayed expression.

Thomas winked at them both before turning away.

“We need whatever counts as weapons, and we need to hurry,” Thomas said to Gilkor. Gilkor nodded, moving behind a wall and returning with several swords, a mace and a hammer.

“We keep weapons in here. Just in case of…”

Thomas nodded, allowing the dwarf to not continue.

Just in case of him.

Once they were all armed, Thomas nodded to Gilkor. Taking a deep breath
, Gilkor walked towards the back of the mine.

They were almost mobbed by the dwarves who saw them leave.

“What do you think you’re doing?” one dwarf said, a shorter than average dwarf with a black beard and matching eyes.

“We’re going to find another way out of here,” Thomas replied, hoping his response would be just vague enough to work.

“There is only one other way,” the dwarf replied, “and Gilkor knows that way is closed off. Permanently.”

“Maybe there’s another,” Cynthia said, “maybe we can cut a new path out.”

The dwarf shook his head. “The mountain surrounds us on all sides. It would take weeks to tunnel out with a full work force, and all we have are a half dozen axes.”

“Then we have to take the other way out,” Thomas said, locking eyes with the dwarf.

“That way must remain shut. To keep out the vile… unnatural…”

Thomas nodded. “I understand
. And I promise you, when we open that door, the dead ain’t gonna leave it. You won’t have to worry about that bastard from this day on.”

“Promise me. Swear on something that matters.”

Thomas thought for a second, wondering what he could swear on that would truly convince the dwarves.

Then he felt a kick to his shin, and found there was really only one thing that truly mattered.

“I swear on the lives of my family, of the little girl under my charge, I will kill the necro-caster.”

The dwarf stared him in the eye
, and finally he nodded.

“Alright then,”
Thomas said, taking a breath, “Gilkor, lead on.”

They resumed their walk, moving slower than was strictly necessary.
Gilkor said nothing, perhaps steeling himself for what he was about to face. Thomas realized he should be doing the same, but he didn’t know how. For a long moment, he simply walked, feeling nothing. Never before had he willingly walked into a dangerous situation. Every other time, he had been forced, or the situation had found him.

Now he had volunteered.

The silence soon became deafening, as they trudged along. Thomas wanted to say something, but he couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Should they say their goodbyes, just in case? Make a rallying speech? Or should he just continue, silently, and act as if nothing was wrong, that this was all business as usual?

Suddenly, Gilkor stopped in his tracks.
Thomas pulled up short, and Zach bumped into him.

“What’s the matter, Gilkor?”
Thomas asked the frozen smith. In answer, Gilkor raised his hand and pointed.

There was a golden door, the
glowing metal obviously enchanted to keep it from ever opening.

It stood wide open.

Thomas moved forward, snapping his fingers to light a flame. It erupted without resistance. He flung it out, throwing a small tuft of fire down the hall. It didn’t go far, but it went far enough to reveal that nothing was in the hall.

The scent that returned to Thomas was beyond foul. It smelled like
filth that had been rotting in the sun for weeks smothered in rotten eggs. Thomas gagged, trying not to inhale it, and wretched away. The others did so as well, unable to stand the smell.

“That’s horrible,” Zach said, covering his mouth.
Thomas could only nod his agreement as he tried to survive without oxygen.

“Yeah,” Gilkor said, “that’s the smell of the necro-caster.” He alone seemed untroubled by the smell. Thomas realized sadly that it was because he was too busy contending with his memories. Thomas opened his mouth, but he found that he was unwilling to ask the question, nor did he really want Gilkor to have to answer it.

“Miranda,” he said instead, “how do you know about the necro-caster?”

Mirando shook her head, and he saw tears sparkle in her eyes. “I… I…”

“Fohor wasn’t the only one working with me that day,” Gilkor replied, his face chiseled from stone. “Miranda’s father was here as well.”

Thomas had no answer. There wasn’t one to have.

“Gilkor came back,” Miranda said finally, clearing her throat, “and told me what had happened. Dad was just there to secure a trade, and he had gone with Gilkor to waste time, maybe lend a hand…”

Thomas bowed his head, placing his hands over his eyes and rubbing his temples. Gods, magic caused far more harm than it did good.

He looked up, daggers in his eyes, as he silently vowed he would change that. Starting now.

Ignoring both the stench and his friends, he grabbed a torch off of the wall, lit it, and sprinted down the tunnel as fast as his legs would take him. He ran into nothing, not the slightest thing out of place
.

Then he emerged into an antechamber that was bigger than the dwarf tavern, and it was crawling with bodies.
They were carved, mutilated, some missing eyes or noses and others missing whole body parts. It took all of Thomas’ effort not to vomit right there.

“Who dares?!”

It was not a shout but a scream, a noise that sundered the silence and made Thomas’ hair stand on end.
He drew his blade, staring at the bodies with the hope that none of them were actually alive.

“Show yerself,” Thomas hissed, his face screwed up in anger.
He twirled the blade in his hand, his eyes focused on the whole room at once.

“You enter the domain of the Necro-Caster,” the voice said at a more reasonable level. The voice itself carried no breath, no pitch,
no actual sound of life. It was just a gasp with no semblance of humanity inside it.

“Yeah?
And who’s that? Some coward hiding behind an army of corpses?”

“Fool. You know not who you insult. Look upon me, look upon your new master!”

Something flickered at the edge of Thomas’ vision, and he turned to see something separate from the undead throng. It was a man, Thomas was almost sure of it, but not a man that Thomas had ever seen the like of before. He was all skin and bone, taller than he was but skeletal, emaciated.

“Gods,” Thomas said, “how are you still alive?”

“I was no fool. I knew I could be discovered. So I stockpiled supplies. So many supplies. I could have lived here until the end of time.”

“Well, yer not,” Thomas spat, “you ain’t goin’ to live past today.”

“Ha. Better than you have tried to end me, boy,” the Necro-Caster spat. Then he raised his hand and shouted a very familiar word. Thomas still didn’t know what it was or what it meant, but he could easily guess their purpose.

They charged towards him, their dead hands
raised as they lumbered forward. Thomas drew his sword, unsure if he could actually fight the monsters.

Then his friends showed up behind him, and together
they charged.

His sword bit into a zombie, but the beast couldn’t have cared less and swung at his head. He ducked it, and Gilkor smashed in its head with a hammer. Normally, this would have stopped
any other threat, but these foes were not normal. The zombie wretched for a moment before chasing Thomas, despite lacking a head.

Cynthia decapitated another one, but it was just as useless as anything else.
Zach kicked a zombie to the ground, but it simply crawled towards him on its stomach. Miranda slashed like a woman possessed, cutting zombies apart, but if they had a single limb remaining they still approached.

“What do we do?” Zach yelled, retreating to Thomas’ side. The others followed his lead, gathering around Thomas.

“If we cut off their legs,” Thomas said, “they can’t chase us.”

“Okay…” Miranda said, and they moved forward. Gilkor flattened a zombie with his hammer, and while the monster was distracted
Thomas cut off its legs. It tried to pull itself with its arms, and Thomas cut those off too.

Unfortunately,
it took two of them to take down one, and there were a dozen of them. Cynthia, Zach and Miranda brought down two on their own, leaving nine more who were closing in on them.

Then the Necro-Caster entered the fray.

He somehow seemed taller than before, livid as he looked. Without Thomas noticing, somehow the man was only a foot away, occupying what had been empty space a moment previously. Surprised, Thomas couldn’t react before the Necro-Caster tackled him to the ground.

“First, you die. Then I’ll make you kill your friends.”

The Necro-Caster flexed his hands and rubbed his fingers together, and Thomas saw forks of lightning start to form there. Before the Necro-Caster could reach out for him, Thomas’ hands shot out and caught the Necro-Caster’s. The latter tried to pull his arms free, but Thomas stubbornly held them in an iron-grip. Gilkor was held off by three zombies, the other six pinning in the rest of Thomas’ friends. They were undaunted, unstoppable, and no one could permanently fell one.

The lightning was starting to form in noticeable amounts now,
and soon the Necro-Caster would be able to attack him.

How were the zombies able to attack? Thomas couldn’t figure it out. They cut off their heads, removed body parts, crushed their skulls, and still they kept attacking. Without brains, without life, how were they…

The answer was so obvious Thomas couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it sooner. His gaze again the Necro-Casters, unrelenting and angry. If there was ever a time he needed to use his abilities to their fullest, now was it.

He closed his eyes, feeling the sparks of lightning start to travel down his arms.
The Necro-Caster was about to fry him.

His eyes shot open, and as they did he slid his hands down the Necro-Caster’s arms.
The residual friction was enough to ignite Thomas’ inner fire, and the worn down, worm-infested jacket caught flame.

The Necro-Caster immediately pulled off of him, trying to get his coat off as quickly as possible. Thomas stood, his temper surging
as the zombies all turned their attention to him. His first clenched as he stared at the horde. His allies tried to fight them off, but all of their attention was fixed on him, just like the Necro-Caster wanted. The depraved magic-caster shouted the same word Thomas was beginning to loathe, and the zombies attacked him in earnest.

But Thomas had the measure of the word now
, and it was all too easy to copy.

Which he did, angr
ily lifting his hand as he shouted the word to the world.

Immediately, pain surged in his head, but he ignored it.
There were only a dozen or so zombies, nowhere near the size of the horde Thomas last had to control.