Legend of the Runeforger: A Dwarven Progression Fantasy

After we make it to the top of the terraces, Davath leads us to the corridor he came down through. It's one of many that lead out. They all look identical to my eyes, with high arches of stone that have been softened and smoothed by heat.

“I think this might be the only way,” he says, in that strange sing-song accent of his. “I was the only one who went down this path. It was a little out of the way, and I didn't want to be caught in the crush.” He swallows. “I think the others melted. I could hear screaming through the cracks when I emerged.”

Xomhyrk gives a curt nod and walks into the corridor after him. The rest of us follow, many reluctantly. They don't like the idea of following a dwarf of the hated Uthrarzak into the most dangerous place they have ever been.

The walls of the corridors grow thinner, squeezing us until we're forced into single file. They squeeze further and we're forced to turn sideways and shift along like river crabs. Perhaps crabs that are about to boiled in their shells.

Over an hour of squeezing ourselves through sideways later, the corridor widens a little. Some of us sigh in relief. I am trembling in anticipation. The black dragon is very close now.

We reach a set of steep stairs. Each step is melted slightly, and very smooth.

“We may have some trouble getting up,” says Davath. “I mostly just fell down here.”

There's some muted grumbling. I'd expected more, but we're too tired to shout, or even talk. The dark stairs are blisteringly hot, with that hot, dry, awful heat I know all too well: the heat of the black dragon. It's muted by my armor, of course, but I still recognize it.

I place my boot upon the first smoothly sloped step. My boot doesn't slip as much as it ought to. In fact, it seems to be freezing itself to the step. It takes a small burst of strength to pull off, and when I do I hear the faint sound of ice shattering. My palms also freeze to the wall when I touch it to steady myself.

For most it is a hard climb. The dwarves behind me are groaning, panting with strain. Yet each step I take seems to lend me further energy. Halfway up, and I'm feeling almost no fatigue at all.

My ruby burns.

I reflect again on what Braztak told me: that if your craft is driving you to do something, it's really the you back in the forge driving you. The you in the comfort of your second home, not yet facing the tribulations of the caverns or the surface wilds. He knows that even if you're to falter out there, you must go on, and so he hammers that urge into the crafts you are to wield and wear.

Still, he may be wrong about this.

We come to the end of the stairs and emerge into a wide corridor. Solidified tears run down the walls, which have sagged and buckled. The floor has become like waves. And permeating the air is the dragon's dry heat and the stench of burned flesh. There's a lot of bodies here, all in armor like Davath's, but semi-melted and with dead runes.

“Left,” says Davath quietly. “We keep going left. Then we're at your dragon.”

Xomhyrk says nothing, just turns to the left and walks on. We follow him, stepping carefully over the dead. I half expect some of our number to step on the bodies, kick or even spit on them, but not even Warak does this.

The dry heat, the stench of death—the dead here are not our hated enemies, not anymore, but fellow dragonslayers. I can't even blame them too much for running away. I think the battle was well and truly lost when this lot fled.

We walk along the buckled floor, our column shifting and turning with the bulges of the solidified waves. My strides grow longer and faster. Soon I find myself nearly at the head of the column next to Xomhyrk.

Gollor steps in beside me.

“You are not leading here,” he says sharply.

“Sorry,” I say. My voice sounds somewhat distant.

“You're too eager,” he says. “Eagerness will get you killed on a dragonhunt.”

“It's better than cowardice,” I snap.

“Are you calling me a coward?”

“...no. No, I'm sorry. I don't know why I said that.”

“I've killed more than a dozen dragons, Zathar.”

“A dozen?”

“Alongside Xomhyrk. That's how many our guild has slain. I've been with him since the beginning.”

“I see.”

“I'll give you some advice: obey his orders. He knows what he's doing.”

“I wasn't planning on disobeying.”

“No, but you're losing your mind. Your desire for revenge—”

“It's not about revenge. It's about keeping my oath. Redeeming myself for my sins. Undoing, in some small way, all the damage I caused.”

“Very well. Your desire for redemption is causing you to make foolish decisions. Be careful. Hold yourself back until Xomhyrk gives the order.”

“I understand.”

“You understand now. But when you see the dragon before you, will you still understand?”

I try to think, but my thoughts are clouded. The heat is making me itch. Why isn't my armor blocking it?

Ah, this isn't the dragon's heat, heat from without, is it? It's from my ruby. Heat from within.

“I said, will you still understand?”

“I will!” I say. “Of course I will. My mind hasn't entirely gone.”

“Good.” He nods. “Good.”

We walk in silence for a few more moments. Then he says, softly:

“I understand your pain, Zathar. I've lost many friends to dragons.”

“You didn't lead the dragons to them.”

“No, but... In the heat of battle I've made mistakes. Been outsmarted—Xomhyrk has too, on occasion, though he always pulls through in the end. But always not everyone pulls through. There are always dead.”

“Yes. Dragons are deadlier than other creatures.”

“Because they're not creatures—they're fire made flesh.”

“I feel that. Have felt that many times. Just being near it was like standing next to a furnace, though also not. Furnaces are for creating.”

Gollor nods. “And dragons exist only to destroy."

He says nothing for a few seconds, then:

"Do you know how old our guild is? Can you guess?”

“I'm not sure.”

“Two and a half centuries.”

“Old.”

“Not so old, shortbeard. Not so old. But in all that time, we've only killed a dozen dragons. That's because after every hunt, we have to rebuild. We lose so many. So many.” He shakes his head. “And now we're going for this dragon.”

I feel alarmed. Is the steadfast Gollor, who's never shown a single trace of doubt so far, about to break down?

“You're not scared, are you?” I say, half jokingly, half not.

“If you're not scared you're a fool,” he says. “Fear is a good thing to have in moderation. Xomhyrk has very little, so he needs me to keep him cautious. But now you're here, and he's taken a strange liking to you, and I worry that you're a bad influence on him.”

“Me? Influence him?”

“Yes. For what reason I cannot fathom: after all, your grudge against the dragon is no stronger than that the others in your guild hold.” He shakes his head. “By rights he should have branded you with Icemite after you killed your guildmate. Or slain you. And for some reason he didn't.” He shakes his head again. “Well, whatever. His reasons are his reasons. He's as strong as a runethane. A first degree like myself can't understand him.”

“I don't quite get what you're trying to say, Gollor.”

“Maybe I've gone a little off the tracks. It boils down to this: keep low in the fight. You're not special here, Zathar. Doesn't matter what Xomhyrk thinks, what anyone thinks. You have your oath, yes, but everyone here has their own reasons too, just as valid as yours. So act like you're part of the force. Don't go running off on your own. You hear me? I'm repeating myself, but it needs to be said: don't go running off without orders.”

“I understand,” I say.

“I bloody well hope you do.”

Then, abruptly, the corridor ends.

“Halt!” shouts Xomhyrk, though not quite as loudly as usual.

We stumble to a sudden halt. The dwarf behind bumps into me and I skid forward slightly. Gollor grabs hold of my shoulder to stop my momentum. I get the sense that he's glaring at me, but my eyes are focused firmly ahead.

Past the broken corridor is a downslope of solidified magma, and past that is a glass-smooth floor of a thousand shades of stone all twisted and coiled together. Bodies, their armor half melted into the stone, lie scattered around—thousands of them. Past them, coins and gems glitter. Broken armor and shattered weapons shine, though their runes seem dulled.

They turn to a dense carpet toward the center of the cavern, then rise up into a hill of a hundred different shades of precious metals.

And on top of this hill of treasure slumbers the black dragon.