Lisa Smedman - The Gilded Rune

Torrin chuckled to himself and tousled Kier’s hair. “He’s still a boy, Haldrin.”

“He’s old enough to know his manners,” Haldrin replied. “Being summoned by the Council is no light matter. Are you all right? Did they…” As if suddenly realizing he too was asking questions, he changed the topic abruptly. “Sit down. You look exhausted. You must be famished.”

Torrin did so. He was grateful to be sitting down, despite the fact that his knees knocked the underside of the table. He accepted a bowl of cinnamon-scented oat porridge from Gimrick, the gnome who served Clan Thunsonn.

“It wasn’t so bad,” Torrin answered. “They met to discuss the stoneplague. They were worried that I…”

Just at that moment, Ambril entered the room. She settled herself on the bench beside her husband, her pregnant stomach making her awkward and unbalanced.

Torrin quickly amended what he’d been about to say. “They knew I’d recently had dealings with a fellow from Helmstar,” he continued. “The stoneplague is as thick as fleas in an unwashed beard there, and they wanted to ensure I’d been properly cleansed before entering Eartheart.”

“Were you?” Ambril asked. She leaned back from the table, staring in wide-eyed alarm at the spoon Torrin had just taken a mouthful of porridge from, as if it were a venomous serpent.

“There’s nothing to worry about,” Torrin assured her, even though he knew it would make little difference. “The Deep Lords themselves decreed that I posed no danger.”

Haldrin patted his wife’s shoulder. “There,” he said. “You see? Nothing to worry about, dear.”

Kier settled himself on the bench beside Torrin, ignoring his mother’s frantic hand signals to sit somewhere else. “Were they all wearing hoods, Uncle?”

“All except the Lord Scepter,” Torrin replied.

The boy shook his head. “Ridiculous! What did they think you were-some sort of drow assassin?”

Torrin lowered his spoon with a sigh. “It’s what they thought I wasn’t,” he said.

Kier nodded as his eyes gleamed with boyish indignation. “You should have taken me along,” he said. “I would have told them you’re no human.” Just eight years old, Kier was a long way off from sprouting the first hairs of a beard like his father’s, yet Torrin often caught glimpses of the boy’s grandfather in him. Kier had the same daring that had made Baelar Thunsonn one of the most renowned of the knights colloquially known as “skyriders.” No doubt Kier would become a Peacehammer and ride a griffon himself, one day.

Torrin noted the uncomfortable silence that had descended upon the other side of the breakfast table. Ambril and Haldrin were suddenly very interested in their porridge.

Torrin sighed. The Thunsonn Clan had taken him in and given him a home within the city. But that had been an act of charity, prompted by his friendship with Eralynn and cemented by his acceptance into the Delvers. To most of Clan Thunsonn, Torrin might act and dress and pay fervent homage to the Morndinsamman, but he was just a peculiar human.

“Thanks, Kier,” Torrin said. “I’d have been proud to have you by my side.” He grinned across the table at the boy’s parents. “Fortunately, it wasn’t necessary.”

“You’re not being banished, then?” Haldrin asked, finally looking up.

“You’re not rid of me yet,” Torrin said jokingly.

“That’s good,” Haldrin replied, his voice equally deadpan. “If we did lose you, we’d have no one to reach items down from the highest shelves. Poor Gimrick would have to resort to his ladder again-and we all know what a fright that would put into him.”

Everyone around the table chuckled-even Ambril, who at last seemed to have reassured herself that Torrin was not, indeed, a danger to her unborn babes. The family resumed their breakfast in companionable silence.

As they ate, Torrin eased his pack from his shoulders and set it on the bench beside him. The runestone, having being thoroughly examined by the clerics, had been returned to him, and was back inside his pack.

“I do have other news,” Torrin told them. “Soon enough, if the gods are willing, I’ll be setting out on my quest for the Soulforge. I finally have what I need to find it.”

Ambril and Haldrin nodded, only partially listening. Ambril’s twin sister Mara had just come into the room, and was enquiring about the pregnancy. Fair enough-the Thunsonn Clan had heard Torrin go on more than once about his quest.

Kier, however, was all ears. “What, Uncle Torrin?” he asked. “What have you got? Tell me!”

Pleased by the boy’s interest-and understanding how hard it was to be a singleton, in a race where Moradin’s thunder blessing consistently produced twins-Torrin dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “A magical runestone,” he confided. “Want to see it?”

Kier’s rapid nod was all the encouragement that Torrin needed.

“It’s going to be the greatest delve of all,” Torrin told him as he undid his pack. “And this-” he took the runestone out and unwrapped it “-is going to lead me straight to it.”

Kier studied the runestone. “How?”

Torrin shrugged. “I still have to figure that one out.”

“Can I hold it?” Kier asked.

“Why not? Here you go.”

“I’ve planned a delve of my own,” Kier said as he avidly examined the runestone.

“Oh really? Where to?”

“It’s a secret.”

“Even from me, your favorite delving partner?” Torrin chided, humoring the boy.

“You can’t come, Uncle,” the boy said. “I have to do this one solo. There… isn’t room for you.”

Torrin chuckled, wondering which unwatched pantry or dusty storeroom was going to be the subject of the boy’s “delve.” Gimrick had better count his carving knives, lest some “ancient dagger” be plundered. “I hope you’ve made all your preparations,” he told Kier.

“I’m ready,” the boy assured him.

“And that you’ll show me what you’ve delved, once you’re back.”

“Of course. You’ll be the first to see whatever I find!”

Torrin smiled. If only the Delvers would show as much enthusiasm! Yet despite Torrin’s fervent prayers, the gods had yet to convince anyone from the order to join Torrin’s quest for the Soulforge. Likely, he thought ruefully, he’d have to wait for Kier to become a man, in order to finally have a delving partner.

He shook his head. “Moradin grant it,” he said to himself, “that my quest is complete before the boy is as old as that.”

"You’re in trouble, ” a childlike voice said.

Torrin turned and saw Gimrick hurrying up the stair behind him. The gnome servant kept one hand on the iron handrail that was set into the wall. His eyes remained firmly on Torrin, never once glancing down at the canyon floor where the Riftlake sparkled in the sunlight, far below. Gimrick’s face was pale under his short gray beard. Whatever he’d come to tell Torrin, it must have been urgent. Otherwise, Gimrick would have used one of the interior spiral staircases instead.

Torrin squatted on the steps. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Ambril’s looking everywhere for you. She’s furious!”

“Why?”

A dwarf squeezed past them on the stair. Gimrick clung with both hands to the handrail and closed his eyes as she brushed past. “You were supposed to take Kier with you to the market today,” he said.

Torrin smacked his forehead. “I forgot. And I promised him a toy shield, too.” He started to rise. “I’ll go back and fetch him, then.”