And far, far above the Grimwall, high in the sky outside, came a black speck growing: a mortally wounded Dragon hurtling down.
“Shak fhan!” shouted the Utrun holding unconscious Thork, the Stone Giant cupping his hands about the Dwarf’s head and shoulders, the Utrun sitting and curling his body about Thork’s, protecting him with arms and legs as well.
The other Stone Giants seemed to meld into the rock, arms and legs outstretched, fingers and toes clutching stone, anchored in the basalt, muscles straining, as if trying to hold this part of the mountain together by grip and strength alone, as if forming a living barricade, a living shield wall to protect Thork. . against what. .
And down came the Dragon, faster and faster, as if he were hurling himself at the earth. Straight down he came, straight and swift, as an arrow loosed from some daemon’s bow. Straight and straight and straight.
And through the very stone itself the Utruni watched the Dragon hurtling down and down and down, the black speck growing larger and larger, until it was an enormous monster rushing to doom. And they braced themselves for what was to come.
And down plummeted Black Kalgalath, Rage Hammer flaring, embedded in his skull, straight down into the gullet of the firemountain, flashing past the crest, down the throat, toward the bottom. And driven by the full mass of a hurtling Dragon, Adon’s Hammer whelmed into the floor of the volcano.
Never had the earth been struck such a blow.
The mountain exploded.
The blast flattened entire forests for sixty miles around, trees blown down like straws in the wind, all pointing away from the center. And it was said that the sound was heard in the Lands beyond the Avagon Sea, and perhaps beyond the Weston Ocean as well. And the entire continent trembled from the whelming. More than half the mountain was blasted into choking dust, an inconceivably vast cloud of pulverized stone flying up into the sky, a hot churning mass of gas and rock and ash and ice, the cloud so hot that where it touched the ground, pitch boiled out from felled pine trees, and animals dropped dead in their tracks, lungs seared beyond recall. For miles, nothing living above ground survived. Hundreds of leagues away, swirling choking clouds of ash descended, suffocating life, snuffing it out. Magma vomited forth from the caldera below. Ice and water in streams under the land exploded in the volcanic heat, spewing hot clouds of ash and steam hundreds and thousands of feet into the sky. Mudflows avalanched, and torrents of snowmelt hurtled down, walls of water crashing over all within their path. Mountain streams became raging monsters, hurling boulders and splintered trees and ash and mud down across the land. Rain fell through the sky, the droplets dark, black with dirt.
For league upon league the land was ruined beyond comprehension.
And for years afterward, all about Mithgar, winters were colder, summers were shorter. Yet spectacular sunsets graced the eventides, and more rain fell upon the world than ever before.
And decades later, in the nights, those travelling through these mountains could see eerie blue flames flaring within the devastated crater-Kalgalath’s ghost-fire, some said.
Yet like a maimed hand, the middle slope of the eastern slant of the mountain still stood upon the base, topped by a vertical wall, a wall that Thork had plummeted down, a wall kept intact by the power of the Stone Giants.
Three Utruni had died in the blast, but the hammer-wielding Dwarf had been saved.
CHAPTER 42
Winter’s End, 3E1603
[This Year]
Far to the north in the frozen wastes where the whelming wind thunders endlessly down upon the ’scape, far below the everlasting shriek, down within deep black granite, a shadow sitting upon an ebon throne felt a hammering wave rush through the very fabric of existence, and he knew that a mighty token of power had flared into life. Brightly the energy burned, calling out to all who knew how to read its arcane signature that the might of the Rage Hammer had been unleashed. For long, long minutes it blazed, yet suddenly was quenched. The shadow upon the throne considered possibilities, pondering, wondering if it meant that his plan had come to fruition, wondering if at last it was time to gloat.
“Attend!” he hissed, and scuttling Rūcks within the chamber froze in terror, quailing, and ceased their pointless activity at the banquet table, ceased setting places that would not be used, ceased clearing it away but moments afterward. And they rushed before the throne and flung themselves face down upon the floor, grovelling before the dark presence.
The wickedness coiled past their prostrate forms and to the head of the table, and Foul Folk sprang up and stood behind each chair, as if serving guests at a great feast.
Darkness filled the chamber, and a whispering voice hissed forth, a voice speaking to empty chairs, boasting of deeds done.
“Centuries agone it was I who lulled a Dragon into true sleep,” hissed the shadow. “Not just any Dragon, but Black Kalgalath, himself.
“And I whispered to him of the threat of the Kammerling. Fool that he was, he thought that the hammer was meant for him, as I knew he would. And I played upon these fears, telling him that it was the inattentive Utruni who warded that most dangerous of tokens deep within their halls far down in the living stone of Mithgar. And so I spoke of a time soon to be, when the bright Moon at night would slide into darkness, eclipsed for a while by shadow, a time when the earth would tremble, a time when the Hall of the Giants most certainly would be empty, a time when the uncaring Giants would leave the hammer unguarded, a time when a Drake could enter and take that which threatened, and bear it to one of power who would guard it most zealously.
“I whispered to him the plan that would assure this end, speaking Andrak’s true name into the sleeping Dragon’s ear.
“And Black Kalgalath, fool Kalgalath, took the bait, never knowing that it was I who set this scheme before him.
“When came the eclipse, it was at a time I knew the wandering stars would also be aligned. And I reached down and caused the fault to yield, the stone to slip, the earth to quake in violence.
“Then did the Giants rush through the rock to smooth the join, to ease the strain, to quell the tremor.
“Then was the Hall abandoned, as I knew it would be.
“Then did the Drake slither down into the juddering earth and take the token from its place of safety-safe from all, perhaps, but Wizards and Dragons working in concert, even though the Dragon knew it not, and then only at the time of the Grand Alignment-to take this token from its place of safety, the Drake bearing it to the holt of Andrak, a place where it could be stolen by the strong or the cunning or the fortunate, or by those of the prophecy, a prophecy made possible by me.
“This was my plan: that sooner or later someone would steal the Rage Hammer, someone with the skill to use it-”
— Of a sudden, the black granite chamber juddered, shock hammering through, as if the very world itself had been struck a whelming blow. Stone jolted and shuddered, crockery and pewter rattling aclatter, Rūcks crying out in fear, reeling back, terrified eyes staring at the stone above, fearing that it would come crashing down.
The dark hall filled with blackness as the malevolent presence within sought to determine the cause of this battering, his senses swelling upward and outward, seeking the culprit, only to discover that it came from afar, from southward, whence had flared the Rage Hammer, now quenched.