TST (33 page)

At first appearance Azerick’s spell did not appear to have any visible effect. It was not until the jet of fire was abruptly cut off with an accompanying crash and sick crunch of bone that gave proof that the sorcerer had done anything at all.

A massive boulder, only slightly smaller than the one Azerick hid behind, fell from the towering face of the mountain. It came to a rest over a hundred yards from the base of the steep slope, the runaway juggernaut’s flight arrested by a dense stand of hearty trees. Once the dust began to settle, Azerick stepped out from behind his stone barrier, which was still radiating a great deal of heat, and went to examine the destruction his spell had wrought.

The massive, horned head of the dragon lay still upon the rocky ground. A large rent in its hard, glittering scales oozed blood about six feet back from the huge, wedge-shaped head. A glint of white showed the cusp of one of the creature’s great vertebrae protruding from the ghastly wound. Azerick’s eyes traveled up the cliff face and examined the smooth indentation that marked the spot where his spell had undermined the stone that held the big boulder in place that had proved to be the dragon’s demise.

“I take no pleasure in your death, great dragon. Despite your greed and arrogance I find you to be a magnificent creature,” Azerick spoke to the enormous corpse.

It was not until Azerick squeezed past its massive bulk that he truly realized how impressive the dragon really was. From his studies, he estimated that the dragon, much like him, would be considered to be just at the transition point of being considered an adult by its own kind. The tunnel that led to its lair was long and the dragon’s body blocked most of the waning outside light from reaching very far into the cavern so he conjured up his own magical illumination.

From the looks of the huge claw marks, the dragon had widened much of the long passage in order to accommodate its great girth. Large patches of stone had been worn smooth, most likely by the continual scraping of the dragon’s hard scales. It took several minutes of walking before the tunnel opened into a huge central cavern. Azerick circled the vast chamber and saw that much of its walls had been scraped smooth by the dragon just as the tunnel leading in had been.

The chamber looked like a giant stone bowl turned upside down with Azerick trapped beneath it. He ran his hand along the smooth, almost glassy walls where the dragon must have used magic or the heat of its own powerful breath weapon to melt the stone smooth.

By far the most impressive feature of the dragon’s lair was the massive glittering pile of treasure that lay piled near the back wall of the cavern. A great mound of gold, jewels and numerous other items of value lay in a heap as tall as the sorcerer and twice that in width at its base.

Azerick doubted that even the king’s own treasury contained so much wealth. In fact, only the church could likely match or exceed this horde’s value in all of Valaria. As Azerick cautiously approached the immense source of riches, an ominous rumbling filled the chamber. A loud crack sounded from the direction of the cave entrance followed by the deafening sound of thousands of tons of stone crashing down and spewing a choking, blinding cloud of dust into the cavern.

Azerick hunkered down and covered his nose and mouth with his sleeve. Even that bit of protection could not prevent his lungs from getting a thick coating of the fine grey powder. As the rumbling ceased and the dust began to settle, Azerick’s lungs violently tried to expel the contaminants. His coughing brought up mouthfuls of grey, gritty phlegm but that finally abated as the dust settled enough for him to see and breathe.

A fine grey powder coated everything in the cavern including the sorcerer. Azerick looked like an animated statue while the pile of treasure appeared to be an oddly shaped boulder. Azerick crossed the cavern to examine the passageway to the outside. His findings were not optimistic. Several feet in, the entire passage was blocked with rubble. From the amount of dust and the force of the cave-in, Azerick surmised that the entire passage thousands of tons of stone, if not more, now choked off the entire passage.

He cast the spell that he had used to bring the boulder perched above the cave entrance down onto the dragon’s neck. Several square yards of stone turned to little more than dust in an instant. A second rumbling immediately sounded as more stone fell into the opened passage, blocking it off once more and sending another cloud of dust into Azerick’s face. He sighed in exasperation at his failure.

“I probably would have died of thirst before I could tunnel all the way out anyway,” he muttered to himself.

He circled the large chamber, slowly examining the walls in search of another way out. Fortune smiled upon him for once when he found a small crevice from which he could feel a faint breeze. Azerick cast his excavation spell once more and the crevice became a passage large enough for him to crawl through. Just as he had hoped, the crevice opened into a larger tunnel that he could easily negotiate.

Azerick returned to the main chamber and examined the treasures before him. He found his books, including the large ancient tome, and his scrolls near the top of the pile. The scrolls, still safely rolled into their scroll tubes he dropped into his pack. He picked up the large tome, blew off the thick layer of dust, and began flipping through its yellowed pages for a particular passage he had studied before. He sat upon a dust-covered pile of coins and began studying the pages before him.

After two hours of study, he picked up the short spear he had snatched out of the surprised gate guard’s hand on his way out of Riverdale and began drawing a series of runes in the dirt floor all around the pile of treasure. Once he felt his work was complete, he compared his work to that shown in the book and felt confident that it would do. He cast a minor spell that would ensure that the runes would not be contaminated or accidentally marred by a small animal or a limited amount of water should any rains seep through. The magical sigils glowed faintly for a moment then subsided.

Careful not to step on his own work, Azerick filled a pouch with gold and silver coins and several cut gems. He packed the precious tome into his pack and crawled through the exit he had created, leaving behind the large chamber and its treasures. Once he gained the larger natural cave that lay beyond he magically carved exit, he cast his excavation spell once more and caused the small passage to collapse, sealing off the treasure chamber once more.

“Great, I’m in a tunnel again,” he muttered to himself, something he was doing more and more frequently.

Azerick was confident that it would not take him nearly as long to find the surface as it had when he and the others had escaped from their captivity and forced servitude. That confidence began to wane as the second day of his spelunking came and passed.

His water was nearly gone and his food was running short. To make matters worse, the tunnel he was traversing was growing smaller and smaller until he was forced to crawl on his hands and knees. It did not take long before the knees of his trousers were rubbed through and the skin beneath were worn raw.

Azerick pulled a heavy shirt out of his pack and tore it into strips that he wound around his hands and knees to protect them from the coarse flesh-scouring rock beneath them. The tunnel soon became so narrow that he was forced to remove his pack and push it along ahead of him.

“How in the abyss dwarves can stand living like this day in and day out all their long lives without going stark raving mad is beyond me,” he said to surrounding grey stone.

“Oh we get used to it pretty quick and rather enjoy it. Then again, maybe we’re all just stark raving mad,” a gruff voice answered what was supposed to have been a rhetorical question.

Azerick wriggled around until he was on his back and looked up into several short, wide bodies with prominent potato noses and thick scruffy beards. The one that had answered grinned down at him, his white teeth shining in Azerick’s magical light through his thick beard and moustache. Azerick returned the grin but before he could spout a greeting, the dwarf’s heavy boot came down onto his head sending stars blazing across a field of blackness.

Two of the stout dwarves reached down and dragged the human intruder the rest of the way out of the small tunnel from which his head had emerged rather unexpectedly. The mining crew had just arrived at the cavern to begin their day of chipping away at the rock walls in search of iron ore or valuable metals, as dwarves are typically found doing, when they noticed Azerick’s light glinting out of the small chute at the end.

Azerick had a peculiar feeling of weightlessness as he swung slightly from side to side. The next thing he noticed was that his wrists burned and his ankles felt constricted. He tried to mutter a curse and that was when he realized that a thick braid of cloth had been tied around his head and ran between his jaws like a horse’s bit. Azerick opened his eyes and found that his wrists and ankles were bound together and looped around a long timber being carried on the broad shoulders of two of the stout dwarves.

I really need to stop getting hit in the head before I end up with brain damage,
Azerick thought to himself.

“Looks like our young trespasser is wakin’ up, Togar,” One of the dwarves called out to the dwarf that was leading the small group.

Azerick looked around and saw that there were four of the short, burly creatures, one several yards ahead, the two carrying him like a fresh kill from a hunt, and one following a few yards behind. The one they called Togar wheeled about and strode towards Azerick’s hog-tied form.

“As ye can see, wizard, we dwarves don’t take too kindly to trespassers,” the dwarf said with the same wide grin he wore just before he had kicked Azerick in the head.

Azerick tried to protest that he was not a wizard and he did not intend to trespass but all that came out was a stream of unintelligible mumblings.

“That’s right, we know what ye are though you don’t look much like a wizard,” Togar pointed out as he waved Azerick’s scroll case in front of his face. “I thought all you wizards wore those big fluffy dresses. I never seen one carrying a spear neither. Of course, who can say? All you wizards are half mad anyhow.”

Azerick rolled his eyes and tried to protest once again.

“What are we goin’ to do with ye?” Togar interpreted. “Hard to say just yet, but I can tell ye I’m mighty hungry. Can’t raise cattle under a mountain ye know and I need my meat.”

Azerick’s eyes went round for a second but fortunately, the other dwarves sniggered at what must have been an attempt at a joke. Togar flashed Azerick another bright white, big-toothed grin and resumed his lead as the dwarves moved out once more.

Azerick’s wrists seriously chafed and ached from bearing much of his weight. He tried to shift his weight to relieve some of the pressure on his wrists and restore at least a moment of circulation to them. His pole bearers stopped and warned him to stop his squirming.

A sharp crack immediately followed by the crashing of stone and a large cloud of dust erupted from just ahead. When the dust cleared, Togar was nowhere to be seen. In his place was a mound of rubble that completely blocked the passage ahead.

The dwarves bearing Azerick dropped the unfortunate sorcerer painfully to the ground and raced forward, calling out to their lost comrade. The dwarves took their picks to the stone with abandon in an effort to rescue Togar. Strong stubby fingers pulled out stones the size of a dwarf’s head and tossed them carelessly behind them.

Azerick was forced to roll about to avoid being struck by some of the wildly tossed stones. Some of the rocks blocking the passage were the size of boulders and weighed several tons and more. Sharp flecks of stone flew in all directions as the dwarf-forged steel rang against the resilient barrier.

Azerick tried unsuccessfully to spit the wad of cloth out of his mouth. He closed his eyes and turned his focus towards the Source with all his will. The sorcerer found and channeled the Source easily enough, but lacking the use of his hands and mouth made forming the magical energies into a useful form was arduous.

The sorcerer had practiced shaping the Source without the verbal or somatic hand gestures but never both at the same time. In fact, he was not at all certain it was even possible. He bent his considerable will into the task and was amazed at the amount of effort it took to form what should have been an extraordinarily simple casting. The slightest distraction or errant thought that flashed through his mind tore the weave apart like a spider web in a windstorm and forced him to start all over again.