* * *
"Ye're pulling me beard," said Wocco Brawnanvil, brother of Brusco and proud cousin of Mithral Hall's heroic war commander.
"I ain't, and if I was, ye'd be kneeling, don't ye doubt," Ivan Bouldershoulder replied.
"This little gnome's a troublesome one, then," said Wocco. "He's not for building them damn arky-busses, is he? Heared them things blow up in yer face more'n they boom yer enemies."
"Nah, none o' them," Ivan confirmed.
Wocco and all the other blacksmiths standing around him breathed a sigh of relief. Ivan thought discretion necessary. If those dwarves, miners all, understood what Nanfoodle had in mind, they wouldn't be pleased.
"So ye're just wanting a tube of metal?" another dwarf asked.
"But all gotta be the same diameter," Ivan replied.
"And length?"
"Long as ye can make 'em."
The blacksmiths all looked around at each other.
"And Regis wants us doing this?" one asked.
"Got his mark, don't it?" Ivan asked, pointing to the parchment he had handed over, complete with diagrams and instructions and the signature of the Steward of Mithral Hall.
"All the forges?" one of them asked.
"We got lots of weapons to fix, with the fighting up above," Wocco explained. "We're behind already, after outfitting the band Regis sent running down the southern tunnels."
"This comes first," said Ivan. "Bah, if ye're quick about it and make a proper mold, ye'll put them out a dozen at a time!"
Again the blacksmiths looked around at each other, but a couple, at least, were nodding.
"How many ye need?" asked Wocco.
"Just ye keep making them," said Ivan.
He grinned and pulled out another rolled parchment, opening it wide for the other dwarves to see. It contained a diagram, one far more complicated than the instructions for the simple rolled metal tubes.
"And I'm working with impact oil," Ivan said with a snicker.
"Boom?" asked Wocco.
"I'm hopin' I don't slip with me hammer," Ivan said with a laugh, and the others joined in.
"Boom!" several said together.
Wocco lifted the parchments in salute, then motioned for his companions to follow him back to the lines of forges.
Ivan, whose work would be much more delicate, turned and moved off the other way, back to the smaller work area Regis had afforded him near the audience chambers.
He did pause long enough to look across the Undercity to the northwest, to the doors blocking the little-used tunnels, and his smile fast faded. Pikel was down there, with Nanfoodle.
Ivan could only hope that his brother would be all right, and that he would find his heart again, and his laugh.
* * *
Pikel held his shortened arm up and the small bird sitting on it shifted nervously. The dwarf druid brought the delicate creature in close and whispered reassuring words, then lowered the arm and started off down the side passage, which was lit with a soft, reddish glow.
"You are sure of this?" Nanfoodle asked the dwarf. "I have little in the way of weaponry about me and am not even certain that my more potent spells would affect such creatures."
In response, Pikel looked back at Nanfoodle and scrunched up his face, closing his eyes tight, a reminder that the gnome had insisted that they use no fire in the potentially disastrous tunnels.
"Yes, but…" Nanfoodle started to protest.
Pikel just gave a, "Hee hee hee," and started away.
Nanfoodle turned back to the five dwarf warriors assigned as escort and merely shrugged, and so did they, seeming more amused than worried.
"Just bugs, little one," one of the group explained. "Big bugs, but bugs all the same."
To reassure the gnome, the group presented their weapons, including the two enchanted, glowing long swords that had been providing all of their light.
They didn't need those weapons, though, for Pikel had little trouble in persuading the potential enemies that there was no battle to be found, and soon after, all seven were riding rather than walking, atop large beetles with red-glowing glands. Fire beetles, they were called, often coveted by Underdark adventurers for those helpful glands, which would retain their glow for days after the creature had been slain. Of course, there was even more practicality in Pikel's method, because the living beetles never stopped providing the light.
All along the tunnels, the green-bearded dwarf communicated to his new «friends» with a series of clicks and pops, and he even (so he said) managed to glean a bit of useful information out of the giant insects.
Whether or not that claim was true, the dwarf did lead the party to a most curious tunnel, sloping down to the north and reeking of a particularly nasty odor. Streaks of color lined the dark walls, though it was hard to distinguish its true hue in the red light.
"Yellow," Nanfoodle told them, for the gnome knew the smell of sulfur. "Keep a careful watch on your bird, Pikel. You don't want him to fall over dead."
Pikel gave a squeak of protest and brought the brave little bird up close to his face. Almost immediately, the bird began to panic, and Pikel whispered into its ear and sent it flying back up to clearer air.
Beside him, Nanfoodle understood the positive sign, and he pressed on through the reek.
The tunnel ended in a wide, high chamber full of stalagmites that narrowed as they rose, then widened again as they joined with the great stalactites hanging down from above. A haze filled the room, and even the sturdy dwarves had to pull the cloths Pikel had prepared up before their faces.
"Gonna lose me breakfast," one announced, and the others all nodded in agreement.
Nanfoodle, though, was simply too excited to consider such possibilities. He urged his beetle mount up ahead, then quickly dismounted and moved between the pillars of stone to the edge of an underground pool.
His smile erupted when he at last managed to peer through the haze, to see the source of that sulfuric fog, for the water roiled and bubbled, a sure sign of gasses escaping.
"If you lit a torch in here, we would all be incinerated," the gnome somberly announced.
"Hope that breakfast wasn't too spicy, then," chortled one dwarf, motioning over to another who was on his hands and knees gagging.
Those who were able moved up beside Nanfoodle to view the spectacle.
"The gas we need is invisible and has no odor," the gnome explained.
"Could o' fooled me," said one dwarf.
"No no," the gnome explained. "It mixes with other gasses in the pressure below. But you see how it escapes?" he asked, pointing to the bubbles. "Yes, yes, it is all in place."
"Got no idea what ye're talking about, gnome," said a dwarf. "But ye found it, yep? So now we can be leaving?"
"In a few moments," Nanfoodle replied. "We have to know the texture of the stone. We must be prepared when we return, for this will be no easy task."
He looked to Pikel, who was already falling within himself, eyes closed, arms waving.
The dwarf finished, giggled, and lay down, then simply melted into the stone, disappearing from view.
"That one's just not right," muttered a thoroughly shaken dwarf.
"Shut yer trap and get on yer beetle," another sarcastically remarked.
"Doo-dad…." said a third, shaking his head.
Nanfoodle just smiled through it all.
A short while later, Pikel's form reappeared in the stone, like a bas relief carved into the floor. He came forth fully and hopped up, brushing himself off.
"Whew!" he said.
"How thick?" the excited Nanfoodle asked.
Pikel tapped himself on the head three times.
"Fifteen feet," Nanfoodle muttered.
"How'd he know that?" one dwarf asked another.
"Three Pikel's deep," reasoned another.