Dan Parkinson: The Swordsheath Scroll

For a moment, Derkin merely stared at him. Then slowly, he said, "I thought maybe nobody would notice that there's been an escape. I guess they'll notice now, though."

"What difference does it make, once we're gone?" Calan rasped.

Shaking his head, Derkin pointed toward the enclosed cell. Then, realizing that Calan couldn't see his hand, he lifted the robe and pointed again. "Because of them," he said. "They'll all be punished for this, you know. For the dead guards."

"I thought you didn't care about the rest," Calan muttered, relieving one of the dead guards of his club. "Come on, lef s get out of here." He raised the cowl of his robe and disappeared from sight. "Follow me."

"How can I follow you if I can't see you?" Derkin hissed.

"Oh, rust! Here." Derkin felt a strong, cloaked hand grasp his wrist. "Here, put your hand on my shoulder, and don't lose me."

As the old dwarf led the way, Derkin pulled up his own cowl and followed. "There will be more guards up ahead," he whispered. "Do you plan to kill all of them, too?"

"Not unless I get the chance," Calan said casually.

"Reorx," Derkin muttered, still hot with anger. He couldn't think of any reason why the old dwarf should have killed those sleeping guards. The act was worse than unnecessary, it was stupid. Still, he had the impression that, whatever else Calan Silvertoe might be, he was not stupid.

The corridor turned, and ahead was its end, with the floor of the mine pit beyond. Several armed humans were at the entrance, three of them kneeling on a tattered blanket, playing bones, while others dozed or slept nearby.

"Keep your face covered," Calan whispered, slowing. On silent feet, they crept past the guards and out into the torchlit pit. The big hole was quieter than its normal daytime bedlam, but still there was activity. Ore carts still rolled from the various shafts, and small groups of slaves, watched over by human guards, worked at sorting heaps. Derkin gazed across at the steep ramp that was the only exit from the place and cursed quietly. Halfway up the ramp, a small fire had been built, and a dozen or more humans sat around it. The ramp was blocked.

"We'll never slip past that bunch," the Hylar whispered, pulling Calan to a halt. "There isn't enough room to pass."

"We're not going there," the old dwarf's voice came back. "I told you, I know a way out. A better way."

Clinging to Calan's invisible shoulder, Derkin found himself being led diagonally across the pit, toward a stone wall marked only by a hanging scrap basket beside an outcropping of rock. As they approached, though, a human guard sauntered past them, paused beside the basket, turned, and looked around, then yawned and leaned back against the outcrop.

Calan halted. "Rust!" he muttered.

"What?" Derkin asked.

"That man is in our way," the unseen voice said. "That's where we're going. There's a hole behind that thrust of stone." He paused, then said, "You wait here, Derkin. I'll draw the man away. As soon as he moves, you go to that hole and wait. I'll be right behind you." He pulled loose from Derkin's grip and was gone.

With nothing else to do, Derkin stood still, waiting. A minute passed, then another, and suddenly a howl of pain echoed around the pit. He turned in time to see a human pitch forward onto the ground, screaming. Then another fell a few feet away, and another, their screams joining the first as if in chorus. Other humans hurried toward them, and Derkin saw a wooden club materialize beside one man and lash out at him. The man fell, as the others had.

By the stone outcrop, the lounging guard stood erect, gawking at the melee out in the pit, then drew his club and hurried toward it. Keeping his invisible cloak tight around him, Derkin raced to the wall, found the shadowed hole behind the stone, and stepped into it, then stopped. "Hole?" he muttered. "There is no hole here. It's a dead end." He turned, started out of the shallow trap, and collided with something solid and invisible. Thrashing legs appeared as Calan fell backward, then disappeared again. "Watch where you're going!" his angry voice demanded. "I told you to wait here, didn't I?" A cal-lused hand appeared and pushed Derkin back into the shadows.

"You said there was a hole here, a way to escape," Derkin rasped.

"There is!" Calan spat. "Just be quiet and hold on to my shoulder."

It was only two steps from the opening to the back of the concavity, but as they approached it, the rough stone receded, and the opening became a lengthening tunnel. "Magic!" Derkin rumbled.

"Of course it's magic," Calan said, ahead of him. "Shut up and come on. I don't like magic any more than you do."

"Then why are you using it?"

"Stop complaining. It's the only way. Come on."

The tunnel lengthened ahead of them, dim and curving, seeming totally dark, yet somehow lighted faintly by a slight, greenish glow that came from nowhere.

"I thought you weren't going to kill any more guards back there," Derkin snapped, still peeved at the seemingly senseless killings of the leeping guards outside the cell.

"I didn't kill these," Calan snapped. "I just broke some kneecaps to make them yell. It worked. They yelled."

"How did you find this tunnel?"

"A friend showed it to me. Will you stop yammering and hurry? All this magic makes me nervous."

A few steps farther on, the tunnel widened, ending in a small cave deep within the mountain stone. The same slight, greenish glow provided just enough light to see. Calan stopped, shook free of Derkin's hand, and became visible from the feet up as he pulled off his unseen cloak. "We won't need these now," he said. "From here on there will be no one to see us."

Derkin pulled off his concealing garb and breathed deeply. As with most dwarves, the very presence of magic was offensive to him. He tossed the cloak aside, then immediately wished he had not. It might take an hour of crawling around to find the thing by touch, and, magic or not, such a thing might prove useful again.

As though reading his mind, the old Daewar rasped, "Forget about the cloaks. I told you, we won't need them anymore."

The only feature of the place was a shallow, dark bowl resting on the stone floor, and Calan approached it. Derkin followed Calan, stooping once to pick up the unseen cloak he had dropped. He could not see it, but his fingers found it. Quickly, he rolled it, thrust it under his tunic, and secured it beneath the chain wound around his waist.

The darkwood bowl contained an inch of milky liquid. Calan squatted beside it, staring into its silent, mysterious depths. Derkin glanced at the bowl, then went on past, to the back wall of the cave. With spread hands, he started exploring its surface, wondering where the next tunnel would appear.

Behind him, he heard Calan say, "Despaxas? We are here."

Derkin turned, but there was no one there except the old dwarf squatting beside the dark bowl. With a shrug, he turned back to the wall. "Where is the next tunnel?" he asked. "I can't find any…"

Abruptly, the stone seemed to swim before him. He felt dizzy, lightheaded, and disoriented. He closed his eyes, opened them again, blinked, and fell on his back. Overhead, stars glittered in a vast sky, and the light of a rising red moon silhouetted the branches of a tree. Not far away, precipitous slopes rose on both sides, great walls of stone climbing away toward the sky. He struggled upright, feeling slightly sick to his stomach. A few feet away, old Calan squatted on stony ground, bracing himself with his one arm and shaking his head. "Rust, but I hate that," he growled.

"What… what happened?" Derkin gasped. "Where are we?"

"Away from the mines," Calan said. "I told you I knew a way out." Still shaking his head, the old dwarf got to shaky feet and rubbed his belly with a gnarled hand. "What happened was a transport spell. Magicians use them sometimes."