Undermind

“Are we there yet?”

Ruhildi shot Saskia one of her patented ‘I am not amused’ looks.

Yeah, the joke was wearing a bit thin, Saskia had to admit. As was her patience and her sanity.

Ten days. Ten excruciating days they’d been descending this impossible path.

The very thought of it was doing Saskia’s head in. Someone must have built the rocky passage that wound its way down this yawning pit of despair, and all of the stairs therein. Hell, someone might have dug out the chasm itself; a pit so deep that were this on Earth, they’d be well into the mantle by now. The fact that they weren’t swimming in magma already was just another item on her list of weird. According to Ruhildi, this world’s magma analogue, molten arlium, was for the most part concentrated in tunnels she called veins and arteries. The chasm seemed to have avoided those tunnels of fiery death, thank dogs, so the temperature remained quite comfortable throughout their journey.

The word comfortable could not be used to describe the journey as a whole, though.

Troll feet were not designed to walk on staircases. Not when the steps were cut to dwarven specifications. And the path was just narrow enough that Saskia found herself peering down a seemingly bottomless void more often than not. She had a pretty good head for heights, but this was ridiculous. One false step, and she’d be taking a very fast trip to the bottom.

Actually, that notion seemed more than a little appealing right now.

The air was always damp, and the ground always slick. This far down, much of the water from the waterfalls that flowed into the chasm had dispersed into the air, forming clouds and a steady, ceaseless rain.

Every now and then they came upon a wide ledge cut into the wall of the chasm, or a decent-sized cave. These were the only places where she could get a good night’s rest, and they came too few and far between for comfort.

If there was one problem they didn’t have, it was finding enough to eat and drink. Many creatures big and small made this place their home, soaring through the mists, or clinging to the walls. Fungi and strange sideways-sprouting trees flourished in the mild, wet climate.

A week ago they’d crossed paths with a party of weary (and wary) dwarves going the other way. Saskia had taken a crossbow bolt in the shoulder before Ruhildi managed to intervene and smooth things over. What fun that had been. Truly the highlight of the journey. It was just as well that in the interests of expedience the necromancer had ditched her retinue of zombies before they ventured into the chasm, or the meeting would have been even more awkward.

Like Grindlecraw’s crew, this party had been cagey about their reason for heading up toward the surface. They obviously weren’t making a social call. Still, they’d made camp together and shared an evening on a ledge after the dwarves got over their fear of the glowering rock troll.

“Spare a thought for those poor bastards,” Ruhildi had told her after they went their separate ways. “If you think ’tis a tiresome journey to the bottom, ’tis much worse going in the direction they’re going. For those of us with limited stamina, leastwise.”

Having spent another week descending the chasm, Saskia was definitely beginning to feel some sympathy toward them. It must take the dwarves twice as long to make the ascent. Poor bastards indeed.

One piece of good news though: her oracle interface was no longer on the fritz. For a few days, when she’d called up her minimap, she’d gotten a sad-face emoji instead. She’d felt like the butt of a joke, except she could only assume the one making the joke had been her own brain. So what did that say about her?

When her interface finally did come back, it came back somewhat…diminished. For a while, she hadn't been able to see as far on her map, and some of her other interface elements had been missing bits of information. It had slowly recovered over the days that followed, and now it was back to normal. Or as close to normal as a constantly evolving hallucination could be.

That lightning strike had really done a number on her. Or maybe it had triggered some sort of reaction with the arlium inside her? Well whatever it was, she’d have to be very careful if she ever went up against another tempest—or stood outside in a thunderstorm. That wouldn’t be a problem where she was going though, would it?

Aaand you just jinxed yourself, she thought. Now there’ll be nothing but tempests. Tempests all the way down.

One of the first things she’d done once her oracle abilities had begun to stabilise had been to pay a visit to Garrain. She’d gone in seeking an explanation for the surge of spellcasting that had nearly cooked her back in Dwallondorn, only to find him in the company of Nuille, his wife, or lifemate, as he called her. Apparently the plucky elf girl had grown tired of waiting for her guy and had gone in after him. Saskia was pleased to see them reunited, but Nuille’s presence made it hard to get answers out of him. With the sharp-eared lady walking by his side, he’d been in no position to speak openly to the demon in his head. Well, not without looking crazy or giving away her presence.

“Wait for me just around the corner, Sashki,” said Ruhildi, jolting her out of her reverie. “I’ll be making rain.”

“It’s already raining,” said Saskia.

“I need to take a piss!” Ruhildi squatted down on the damp stone, fumbling at the straps of her armour. “Do you intend to stand there and watch?”

“Oh! Sorry.” Saskia turned and hurried away.

Another delight of this endless descent: flashing one’s lady bits over a stomach-churning drop made for a supremely relaxing bathroom experience. Also, now she had to wonder how much of this rain was actually rain.

While waiting for her friend to finish her business, Saskia popped over to Garrain’s head for another nosey. She found him standing beneath a tall canopy of trees, catching a slender beam of sunlight with his face. Alone at last.

“Boo!”

The view jerked from side to side, before he let out a groan, and returned his gaze to the sky. “Saskia.”

“Yeah, it’s me. So…magic still working?”

“Far better than I could have hoped,” said Garrain. “I’ve never been able to call forth so much essence with so little effort. I don’t know how you’re doing this, but you have my sincere gratitude.”

“Well I’m glad it worked out for one of us at least,” said Saskia.

“Is something amiss?”

“Yeah, you could say that! Whatever you were doing back there with your crazy rush of spells…you’d better have a damn good reason!”

There was a long pause before he said, “You knew?”

“Of course I knew! Do you even know what it feels like to…” She trailed off, as it suddenly occurred to her that he probably didn’t know how much her body heated up whenever he cast a spell, and perhaps it would be best not to tell him. She didn’t think he’d try to use the effect against her, but she couldn’t be certain.

“Then perhaps you also saw that I was only defending myself? Saw how close I came to perishing? How they killed…” He choked. “How they killed Ollagor.”

“Oh.” She swallowed. “No I didn’t see that. But afterward, I saw him—”

“That was Morchi, you saw, most likely, not his brother.”

“Oh. Well I’m sorry that happened, Garrain.”

Ruhildi’s voice cut through their conversation. “Stop feeling sorry for the leaf-ears, Sashki! He doesn’t deserve your pity.”

“So who were they?” asked Saskia. “Who were you fighting? Were they dwarrows? They were dwarrows, weren’t they?”

Another long pause. “Yes. I…I’ll understand if you consider this a betrayal, but know that I had no choice.”

“Please don’t tell me you killed them all.”

“Not…all of them…”

“Oh you frocking—”

“Before you pass judgement, know this. The stoneshapers are up to something. Something dire. What they’re doing doesn’t just threaten my people, but the whole of Ciendil. I can feel it.”

Saskia shivered, remembering what her father had told her in her dream: “Don’t let the dwarves complete their little funnelling project. It is not the salvation they think it is. It is their doom.” Could this be what Calbert had been referring to? The idea had an awful ring of truth to it. She felt sick. She’d killed to help save those dwarves. Not only had Garrain’s lack of restraint undone some of her efforts, but he might have been right in his actions. It was a disturbing thought.

Of course, this was all just conjecture at the moment. Her hunches often turned out to be correct, but they didn’t always point her on the right path. She needed more information.

“You’d best not keep the other elders waiting, young keeper.”

Saskia recognised the face of the one who had spoken. He’d featured in some of her earliest visits to Garrain’s head—and more importantly, he’d been among those who invaded the Dead Sanctum.

“Indeed, Elder Jevren,” said Garrain, drawing a laugh from the elf, who didn’t have a single strand of grey hair on his head. “I’ll be with you in a moment.”

After Jevren stepped away, Garrain whispered under his breath, “Be prudent when you come calling on me, Saskia. Remember, the Chosen can most likely see you there, lurking behind my eyes. Thiachrin has gone to Elcianor for a time, but on his return…”

“Okay, good point,” said Saskia. “I’ll be going now, but consider this a warning. If you go crazy with your magic again, I’ll come knocking. And if I don’t like what I see, you know what will happen…”

With that, she cut the connection. Returning to her own body, the first thing she saw was Ruhildi, impatiently drumming her fingers against the cliff wall.

“Does the name ‘funnelling project’ mean anything to you?” asked Saskia.

Her friend looked at her quizzically. “No. I’ve not heard of such a thing.”

Saskia sighed. “Never mind. Maybe we’ll learn more in the Underneath. Let’s get going.”

Attempting to steer her thoughts toward happier things as they resumed their descent, Saskia asked, “What are you looking forward to most, when we get to…what did you call it? Torpend?”

“Torpend, aye,” said Ruhildi. “Methinks I desire most…a good long soak in the bathhouses.”

“Good answer! Damn I could go for a warm bath.” Saskia frowned. “Oh but they’d never let a trow inside the city, let alone the bathhouses.”

“Don’t you worry, Sashki. We’ll find a place for you. Mayhap not in Torpend proper, but the ’Neath is big enough for even a trow to find a home.”

Several hours later, her patience had frayed into a single tenuous thread. “Okay so how close are we really?” she asked.

“Very close, Sashki. I’m after telling you earlier.”

“That was five hours ago.”

Ruhildi snorted. “Och you great block of a trow. Look around you. Don’t tell me you can’t see it.”

Oh she could see something, alright. The change had come on gradually, but it was hard to miss. As they made their way ever downward, the wall of the chasm had slowly begun to tilt, becoming the floor of a steep tunnel, with the path zig-zagging down alongside the bank of a surging, foaming torrent. It was like an impossibly large waterslide, except if anyone tried to slide down it, they’d be churned into pulp. Below, she saw that the tunnel bent around yet further, before disappearing from her sight.

“I can see that it’s levelling off,” she said. “You sure this is the bottom though? It could easily curl back down for another…forever.”

“’Tis truly not far now,” said Ruhildi, smiling at Saskia’s eye-roll. ‘Not far now’ had become a running joke, starting on the first day. By now, it was staler than the weeks-old travel rations Gridlecraw’s crew had given them.

Sure enough, as the day wore on, the steep slope became a gradual one, before finally turning into a horizontal tunnel the width of a city block and half as tall. The floor was a barren moonscape, pitted with craters and strewn with the shattered ruins of stone ramparts and the twisted and buckled wreckage of what looked like metal ballistas and catapults. Or were they trebuchets? Well whatever they had been, they weren’t going to be doing any more missile-flinging. Presumably they’d been used by the defending force rather than a besieging army, because she couldn’t think of any way someone could’ve hauled them down the chasm.

“Weapons of war from the Age of Disharmony,” said Ruhildi, as if that were supposed to explain anything.

“That was a long time ago? Things seem pretty disharmonious right now…”

“Three greatspans, leastwise.”

Three hundred years. “In that case, why is it still so barren? There was so much stuff growing back there in the chasm. If the plants here were all destroyed in an ancient battle, there should’ve been more than enough time for them to grow back.”

Ruhildi pointed up at a large symbol engraved on the wall above them. There were more like it, spaced at regular intervals along the tunnel walls. “Life wards, placed by my forefathers.”

“Wards, like the ones in the Dead Sanctum?”

“Aye. Although the magic of those wards were far more intricate and multifaceted. The wards you see here were inscribed by whole contingents of stoneshapers working in concert. They have a single purpose: no plants or fungi will take root in their presence. Even if the wards were destroyed, so it would remain for many greatspans.”

“What? Why would your people do that? This is your land, isn’t it?”

“Greenhands, Sashki. If nothing grows, a greenhand’s power is fair diminished. ’Twere but a small price to pay to deny our enemies.”

“Oh.” Saskia frowned. The dwarves had done the magic equivalent of salting the earth in their own backyard. She could scarcely imagine the mindset of someone who would make such decisions. But if they were fighting for their very survival…

Humans had done worse, for far stupider reasons.

Gradually, the wreckage and ruins gave way to more recent—and seemingly more intact—fortifications and traps, although these remained unmanned—or undwarfed or whatever. There were stone barriers and watch towers, trenches filled with spikes, and huge balls of pitted metal lining the tunnel walls, attached to the ends of chains that reached to the middle of the high ceiling. If those monstrosities should swing free, any besieging army would be having a very bad day.

Of course, any besieging army would also have to spend a week or two descending a ridiculously huge chasm, not to mention all the other perils that lay between here and the surface. She found it hard to imagine that an army would go to all that trouble, but if human history were anything to go by, such obstacles wouldn’t stop the elves from trying.

“Where are all the defenders?” asked Saskia. “I mean, these fortifications won’t do you much good if there’s no-one here.”

“There aren’t enough dwarrows,” said Ruhildi. “Each span that passes, our numbers dwindle. We fall back further and further…”

Saskia shivered. Something told her any respite she might find down here would be a temporary one. Eventually the elves would come knocking again, and when they did, how long could the dwarves hold out?

“When last I came through here, there were at least a few dwarrow patrols walking these paths,” added Ruhildi with a frown. “Though I suppose ’tis to our advantage that they’re no longer here. I were not looking forward to explaining your presence to the watchmen. And now, if luck be with us, I won’t have to. Just a little further on…”

A few minutes later, Ruhildi pointed at the wall. “There!”

It looked like solid rock to Saskia’s eyes. But her minimap told her something else entirely: behind a thin wall of stone lay a hidden passage.

Ruhildi put her hand to the stone, and a moment later, in place of a wall was a pile of dust at her feet. They stepped through the hole, whereupon the dwarrow reformed the wall behind them.

“Wouldn’t want to give away this secret to any leaf-eared invaders who come this way,” she explained. “The forefathers dug out many such passages, allowing us to flank the enemy in time of need.

They followed the twisting passage for several hours, occasionally passing junctions that led back to the main tunnel. It was cramped, cold, and dank, but they’d been through much worse. Saskia endured the journey in silence.

Finally, they came upon a large, deep pool, fed by a swift-flowing river. The passage continued onward, eventually rejoining the main tunnel, but they didn’t follow it. Ruhildi waded out into the pool, gesturing for Saskia to follow. “We’ll need to dive down,” she said, pointing into the murky water. She eyed Saskia with a frown. “’Tis a fair tight squeeze…”

Saskia didn’t like the sound of that. If she got stuck down there…

Drawing a deep breath, she followed her friend into the frigid water. She’d survived a journey through the insides of a giant worm. She wasn’t about to let a little claustrophobia stop her.

What followed were several minutes of painful contortions and burning lungs and rising panic. Ruhildi took the dive backward, guiding her through the twists and turns as best she could. In a couple of especially tight spots, she had to dissolve the rock with her magic, clouding the water with silt.

They emerged, spluttering and shivering, amidst frothing river rapids that plunged down a steep ravine. Ruhildi hopped up onto her back. Saskia could feel her trembling from the cold.

Deciding not to brave the icy water further, she scrambled across the cliff face, feeling a chill of spray against the backs of her legs as her claws sunk deep into the hard rock.

“Are you sure this is the right way?” asked Saskia as they made their descent. “It seems…pretty far off the beaten path.”

“Aye, I’m certain,” said Ruhildi. “’Twere the same route I took out of the ’Neath.”

“Couldn’t you just walk out the metaphorical front door?”

“Och no.” Ruhildi did not elaborate, and Saskia didn’t press her further.

The further they went, the colder it got. A chill wind brushed her skin. Now that they were well up out of the water, it was not an unpleasant sensation. The air tasted…fresh.

Before long, she began to see light far ahead. Climbing around a bend, she stopped, blinking in the sudden harsh glare. This wasn’t the shadowless gloom of her darksight, nor the dim pinpricks of distant phosphorescent growths, nor even the hot brightness of an arlium flow. This was genuine, honest-to-dog daylight.

“What…the…hell?” she breathed.

She all but ran across the rock wall, crossing the last hundred metres of the ravine, where it opened out into…

Her breath caught in her throat, and she felt tears prickle the corners of her eyes. She drank in the sight of snow-dappled trees and windswept hills and craggy pinnacles. And open sky, streaked with golden clouds. The sun wobbled low on the horizon, casting its tangerine glow across a the rippling waters of a wide lake. Fingers of stone jutted from the shore of the lake and the hillsides around it; a forest of stalagmites the size of skyscrapers.

Ruhildi hopped off her shoulder, and they both slid on their butts down a steep mossy slope beside a raging waterfall. Her feet touched soft grass, sprinkled in a light dusting of snow.

Overhead, a vast shadow blotted out much of the sky, as if the world itself had a ceiling. Except in this case the ceiling was the world—the world they’d just left behind. That immense shadow was the underside of Ciendil.

And this place? This was an offshoot; a little branchlet that jutted out from the underside of the main branch.

Except little wasn’t the best word. This place was little compared to Ciendil proper, but it could be as big as one of the larger islands of Japan or New Zealand. The visible portion of the branchlet curled around like a bowl, forming a gently sloping valley with a huge lake at its centre. She couldn’t see much beyond the valley except a couple of slender, leafless tips splaying off to the sides and curling upward like claws.

The structures around the lake were not natural rock formations. She could see that now, as plain as day. They were buildings. On the closest shore, the largest of the structures reached all the way to the underside of Ciendil, forming an immense pillar.

“Spindle,” said Ruhildi, following her gaze. “And that…” She gestured at the surrounding city. “…is Torpend, last great city of the dwarrows. I’d almost forgotten what a sight ’tis to behold.”

Saskia nodded wordlessly.

Smiling up at her, Ruhildi led the way down the steep slope by the light of the setting sun. “Welcome, my friend, to my homeland. And yours, if you’d like to stay. Welcome to the Underneath.”