Direfang risked a glance up the slope, registering a thick, orange-yellow ribbon of molten rock erupting over the crater lip and spilling down the side. The glance cost him, as he drew in ash-laced air that sent him into another coughing fit. Horace and Grallik grabbed him, pushing him forward again.
“All of us will die, Foreman Direfang,” the priest hissed. “Not even a dragon can match this beast’s fury.”
Direfang’s lungs felt on fire, his throat and mouth so dry he could not work up any saliva. Never had he felt such pain in his eyes. He wanted to offer a clever retort to the priest, to tell him that not all in his army would die that day. But many would perish, he knew, too many.
It felt like hours, but Direfang guessed it had taken only minutes for the front of the column to reach the foothills. It looked like a brown fog had settled in the low part of the Khalkists, but it was dust that hung several feet above the ground. Everywhere the air was filled with dust or ash or both. All of it was difficult and irritating to breathe. Direfang spotted Mudwort and Brak through the haze.
He bent and grabbed the chains that dangled from the spellcasters’ wrists. Leading the human slaves like livestock, he hurried into the haze, following Mudwort and Brak and hoping those farther back could spot him and follow too.
The mountain continued its upheaval. Faintly, he heard one of the knights call loudly for Grallik and Grallik’s answer. Hurbear had somehow made it, as Direfang picked out the old goblin’s voice shouting orders to his clansmen. Someone was also calling for Moon-eye, asking if the one-eyed goblin had made it safely down the angry mountain.
Direfang doubted he had. Graytoes wouldn’t have been likely to keep up with the brutal pace, and Moon-eye would not leave her, not even to save himself. He pictured the two of them stumbling into the crevice on the trail, not being able to leap over it. Then he thrust the disaster from his mind and yanked on the spellcasters’ chains. He shut his eyes, telling himself it would only be for a moment. They were dry and hurting, and he needed a moment for them to be refreshed.
“Look out, Foreman!” Grallik shouted.
Direfang opened his eyes abruptly. Not releasing the chains, he brought his right arm up and brushed his forearm against his eyes. Through the haze, he saw another ribbon of red, narrower than the last but coming down right toward them, spilling out over the foothills and blocking their path.
“We are done,” Horace said.
Direfang tried to say “not yet,” but his mouth was parched. So he tugged hard, nearly pulling the spellcasters off their feet, and charged toward the lava stream, moving faster with each lunging stride. From somewhere behind, he heard Erguth shout for the other goblins to run and jump. Direfang did just that himself, clearing the lava stream, which was not yet very large, while pulling on the chains to yank the knights over the widening lava stream too.
Behind him he heard an agonizing scream. Glancing over his shoulder, Direfang saw the hobgoblin Grunnt trip into the lava and shrivel and burn, his cries pitifully dying away.
32
It wasn’t just the mountain the goblins left behind that was exploding, it was also the one directly across from it, and at least one other well to the north, that they could see.
“The three are one,” Mudwort was saying, trying to make Direfang and Brak understand. The two spellcasters were also standing close by, listening. “Those three, they are one volcano, not three. One volcano with three mouths. The earth says so.” She gestured to the south, where a narrow trail led between peaks. It was a trail used mainly by goats and didn’t look easy to navigate. A wider, gentler way led to the southwest, but Mudwort insisted that was not the way to go.
Direfang pointed at the southwest route. “The army would do better this way.”
She shook her head vehemently, spittle flying from her thin lips. “Maws of the Dragon, the skull man said. One volcano, though, not three, I say. Beneath the earth is a hidden pool of the hottest fire, and it spreads under the three maws, Direfang. It spreads to the mountains near Steel Town too. The quakes woke up the mountains, stirred the pool of fire, and that is why everything is breaking.”
Done with her explanation, she turned from them and dashed away along the narrow, difficult path, not bothering to look over her shoulder to see if they were following. Direfang had dropped the chains of the priest and the wizard. He looked at them, his expression weary.
“Keep up or die,” he growled. Then he sped ahead, tripping once, but picking himself up and keeping just behind Mudwort. The other surviving goblins, some just arriving out of breath, shouted to see him disappear-and followed.
Above and behind him, ash, rock, and pumice were spitting high into the air. The ash rose more than a dozen miles. Loud cracks and pops caused Direfang to run with his hands cupped to the sides of his face. The noise was as painful as any of the many burns and small injuries he had suffered on the trail.
To the northwest, the eruption column of one of the volcanoes was filled with twisted flashes of lightning. One more loud blast came from that cone, followed by an avalanche of rock as it began to collapse in on itself. In the process, the volcano disgorged a thicker, darker cloud of ash, and rubble crashed down the breaking slope, accompanied by belching, horrendous-smelling gas and melting rocks.
The air was impossibly hot to breathe, and with each step Direfang gained, he cursed himself for leading the goblin army in that direction. In his effort to avoid the Valley of Neraka and a great concentration of Dark Knight camps, he’d chosen instead to bring them straight into the belly of the Abyss.
Magma surged and the ground shuddered. Steam belched furiously, so scalding that it incinerated the goblins at the tail end of the army. Lava oozed up through tunnels and broke through the side of the mountain, creating a second eruption point through which gas and ash and melting rocks escaped. A searing, yellow-white river of molten debris spilled out, looking sluggish but picking up momentum and catching more goblins as it furiously wound its way down the mountain.
Had Direfang been at a high, safe distance, he thought he would have considered the vivid river of fire to be beautiful. But the horrors of the Abyss must be nothing near to it, he reflected as he raced on, coughing and sputtering and thrusting the pain all over him to the back of his mind.
Risking a glance over his shoulder, he saw the Dark Knight spellcasters, with a number of goblins swarming around and past them. They flowed like the lava, he thought. But he couldn’t see much else. The rest of his vast army was obscured. There were just ash clouds in layers of gray and black, white-hot stone shards flying like snow in a blizzard, and in the distance a shower of red ash. The hellish landscape nearly sucked all the hope from him, but he turned back to see Mudwort, who was remarkably climbing higher and somehow faster, with Brak and Bentclaw only a few feet behind.
His fault; he’d brought them to that place!
His fault for thinking there was greater safety in numbers and that staying together was some prudent measure!
He should have told them to scatter with their clans like bugs running from a disturbed nest. Direfang knew he would have gone south, but not so many of them would have been encouraged to follow, not so many of them would have died. He could still hear their screams amid the crackling and popping, belching ash and gas, and the constant, damnable rumbling. No matter how much he concentrated on the sounds of the volcanoes, he could not blot out the goblin screams.
There was nothing he could do to save the doomed; the exploding mountains were not monsters or men he could fight. And no weapon on all of Krynn could combat them-not even the magic of the priest and the wizard, who doggedly trailed him. The hobgoblin doubted he would save himself.