Page 31

THIRTY-ONE

Fiona

W e left in the early hours the next morning for the city of Neftheim. To my surprise, we were traveling on foot, carrying our overnight packs. Elodie took her sword out of its padded case after about an hour of walking, strapped it to her back in plain sight, and hid the case behind a rock.

The mountain range loomed high and imposing overhead, and the temperature had dropped several degrees as we got closer to the base of the nearest outcropping.

My fingers were practically numb by the time we finally stopped for a water break, and Leigh was muttering under her breath. “Definitely some Lord of the Rings shit.”

But thankfully, we didn’t have much longer to go.

About thirty minutes after our break, a small but broad man with more facial hair than I’d ever seen on a human stepped out from behind a rock, so suddenly that I jumped and barely held back a scream. No one else seemed surprised, though, so I guessed their wolf noses had scented him.

“State your business.” His voice was low and rumbling, except this screechy accent like rocks grating together on the s ’s in business.

“Diplomatic party here to see King Cysernaphus, on behalf of High Alpha Kane, son of Kosta, son of Konstantin, son of Kasmiro, ruler of the nine great packs.”

The dwarf nodded regally, then lifted one arm to indicate we should walk past him. When we did, I grabbed Reed’s arm in surprise. Because while it seemed the dwarf stood in front of a solid wall of stone, when we were about a foot away, the wall seemed to shimmer and grow hazy, allowing us to see a perfectly round tunnel mouth behind it.

When I stepped through, it felt like slipping through a simple curtain, nothing more. But the bright, cheery tunnel was an engineering marvel of its own, and I quickly forgot about the magical curtain.

The walls were high, smooth, and perfectly round. The floor sloped gently downward, and bright, swooping flute music played, though I saw no signs of speakers, wires, or any of the normal accoutrements that might carry sound down an otherwise empty tunnel.

It was fascinating, though when I looked over at Reed, he seemed no more impressed than if we were walking through a pedestrian shopping mall. His dove-gray suit and bright blue pocket square were spotlessly perfect, despite the long outdoor hike it took us to get here, while I was very certain I was a half-sweaty, half-cold mess.

Whatever I was, it didn’t give me any extra physical prowess, that was for damn sure.

Rude .

We didn’t walk far in the tunnel before we came to a security check. Each of us was briefly interviewed by a dwarf guard. Mine was a jolly woman with rosy cheeks named Brunadeta. In under two minutes, she waved me through to where the other women waited.

Everything was going along swimmingly until they tried to separate us from Gael and Reed.

“Please, the king insists. He’d like you to experience the saunas, and they’re divided. The women’s sauna is just through this hallway, the men’s is on the other side.”

Reed was having none of it. “If it’s all the same to the king, we’ll skip the saunas and stay together. One of our delegation is pregnant, and I’m sure you understand that is a fraught time for our females.” He stood staunchly at my side, the arm around my shoulders sending a clear message.

Gael, while less verbose, was scowling furiously at any dwarf who dared make eye contact.

“Yes, we see that you’ve made the interesting choice to have a warrior maiden attend your female. Very interesting indeed given the rumors floating about right now. But, as Alpha Starling is a member of the royal family of Spain, we do understand the extra precaution. I will notify the king that you declined his offer.” The male dwarf bowed and disappeared through a crevice in the tunnel I hadn’t noticed until he was slipping through it.

The smiling Brunadeta waved us on down the tunnels, having no more use for us now that we had passed their security check and declined the sauna offer.

“How secure is that little checkpoint if they let us keep our weapons?” Leigh asked in a hushed whisper once there were no dwarves in sight.

Gael was the one to answer. “Anyone who mistakes dwarves for a primitive race would be sorely mistaken. They were scanning us while we were talking to them. They now know every blade we carry and probably also if we have any dangerous magical substances.”

That was a heck of a surprise, since I hadn’t noticed anything but the friendly chatter. Which suddenly made a lot more sense—appear friendly and distract your visitors from the deeper inspection.

Tricky, tricky.

It also made me wish I had more control so that I could tell when someone was magically scanning me. I thought of the book I’d packed and wondered if they knew about it too now?

Though surely a blank book wasn’t a concern when Elodie had a big-ass butterfly sword slung over her shoulder for all to see, and the skills to use it.

I lost track of how much longer we walked. The tunnel was the same, down and down and down at a gentle slope, with no changes or interesting features besides the slowly dropping temperature. That, and the flute music, which had started out so lovely, was now beginning to grate against every last nerve.

It had to be on a loop. Had to be .

Just when I started to despair that we’d never get back out of this musically cursed mountain, we came to a crossroads.

A stocky dwarf with a pure white beard sat on a stool, dozing and snoring with his back leaning against the stone wall. A hammer half the size of his body rested across his knees, intricate carvings of knot work and sigils decorating the head of it, the shaft wrapped in soft leather that ended in a jaunty green tassel.

We stopped, looking silently back and forth between us, as if to ask if we should wake him, and if so, who?

Reed cleared his throat, and the dwarf’s snore merely hitched before settling back to its regular pattern. But before a more direct approach could be taken, the industrious bustle of footsteps on stone reached us from the leftmost tunnel branch.

“Ardolen!” a feminine voice snapped, and the elder dwarf jolted on his stool, which was sent rocking on two legs with the jerky movement. I held my breath as I watched him regain his balance, fearing he’d fall off and break an arm. Or a hip.

“Karanesa! You startled me.”

“Well, you damn old fool, if you weren’t sleeping on the job, perhaps you’d be better at it. We clearly have visitors from the topside.” She tutted angrily as she passed by but didn’t spare us more than a glance as she bustled past with a pile of linens that nearly blocked her line of sight.

“Visitors, I see.” He hopped down from the stool as if he hadn’t just been snoring, stroking down his beard until it was arranged in a long, fine point that extended past his belt and nearly to his knees.

“Welcome to Neftheim. City proper is straight ahead, where ye can hitch a ride in cart if’n ye need transportation. First ride’s free, then ye’ll need centesimo, liras, or francs for any further transportation. Do you need to change any coin?” He looked hopefully between us, but Reed shook his head, and the man continued a bit less enthusiastically.

“Well, then, prepared visitors. If ye’re here for official business, ye’ll be put up in the dignitary’s wings—ye lot do look the sort. Don’t try to venture deeper into the mountain without an escort. Some of the dwarves down deep don’t take kindly to strangers, and their tunnels are booby-trapped accordingly. Can I answer any other questions for ye?”

“We’ve got an appointment with King Cysernaphus at seven for a welcome feast. Where in the city proper do we need to arrange transportation to the royal residence?” Reed asked.

“Oh, well! Royal guests, are ye?” He patted his belly as if this were exciting news he hadn’t expected. “A royal cart will be sent for ye, fifteen minutes afore yer appointed time. Don’t sass the guards. They’re not as lighthearted as we humble dwarves on the fringe.”

“We’re much obliged, thank you, Ardolen.” Reed was smooth and professional, seeming to know exactly how to handle each person we encountered, whether shifter, human, or dwarf. I suddenly understood why he was exactly the right person to interface with important people on behalf of the pack.

“Mighty welcome, mighty welcome.”

As we continued past Ardolen’s sentry post, the tunnel got noisier rather quickly, until it abruptly ended at what looked like a miniature underground train station, but instead of a train, the dwarves—and a group of six bulky, heavily armored creatures I couldn’t name with tusks protruding from their lower lips—were loading into mine carts. Magically driven, but those were definitely four-seater mine carts on tracks.

Just past the loading dock for the mining carts, a vibrant, bustling city sprawled inside a cavern. Vendors hawked wares alongside the mine-cart tracks, loudly yelling and offering things I wouldn’t have the faintest idea of what to do with.

Most of the dwarves wore great hammers on their backs, but others wore overstuffed tool belts, heavy round-lensed spectacles, or what appeared to be their own strange inventions. One particularly brave dwarf was careening overhead with great leather-backed wings that looked like something out of da Vinci’s notebook.

“Next!” a burly dwarf with a neatly trimmed black beard yelled from the loading station, and Gael waved us all forward.

“I think that’s us.”

Between the five of us and our overnight bags, we had to split between two carts. Elodie rode with us in the second cart, while Gael and Leigh took the bulk of the luggage in the first cart.

“Where to?” the dwarf asked, bored.

“Dignitary’s lodging, for an appointment with King Cysernaphus at seven,” Reed answered.

The dwarf nodded, waved a hand, and just like that, the carts rumbled into motion. It was bumpy for only a second as we left the loading dock, and then we rode along smooth as glass, picking up speed as we weaved through residential neighborhoods.

No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t take it all in. We were moving fast, and there was just too much to see in every direction. The ceiling overhead sparkled a yellowish hue, like the exposed interior of a geode, and the stone-built abodes eventually gave way to grander cave-wall dwellings, as we left behind crying infants and barking dogs and moved farther into the mountain via a very large tunnel.

It was so plebian, yet so otherworldly at the same time. And all the while, the faint crispness of magic permeated the air. Nothing that I could see, but I could nearly taste it on the back of my tongue, like fall air, but more.

“Leaving outer boroughs,” a mechanical-yet-feminine voice sounded from the front of our cart as we exited the oversized tunnel lined with dwellings.

The next cavern was larger and somehow grander. There were no street vendors hawking their wares, no crying babies or twisty, chaotic mine tracks. This reminded me of the ancient ideals of circular cities: the streets ran in concentric rings, wheel-spokes connecting them. But towering over it all in the center was a cylindrical palace.

The exterior was stunning—at least the upper levels we could see from our small cart as it zipped and circled through the streets of inner Neftheim.

Great, arched windows had intricate, sweeping leadwork joining the glass panes, and beautiful, vibrantly painted carvings adorned every single wall, depicting scenes of dwarves engaging in great conquests. Before we reached the entrance, we saw a dwarf kneeling as he was crowned, wielding a mighty war hammer on a battlefield, and yet another constructing a massive tower with hand tools.

Dwarves were clearly a race devoted to craftsmanship.

When finally we rolled to a stop, it was one street over from the grand palace, a tidy row of houses built from stone, still ornately carved, but the luxury and details were in corbels and framing, less so the entirety of the surface.

“Arrived at dignitary lodging. Please disembark,” the mechanical voice chirped again.

As soon as we were out of the carts, the doors snapped shut, and with one last “Mighty welcome to Neftheim,” the carts sped away, twice as fast now that they were empty.

“Wow,” I muttered, staring up at the three-story stone building in front of us.

We’d well and truly gone through the looking glass.

We were all pretty tired after the long journey, most of which had been undertaken on foot. After quick directions from the concierge who waited at a desk just inside the door, we split off into our three rooms to rest, then changed for the dinner. By the time we met back in the foyer to go to dinner, I was absolutely ravenous.

“Anybody know what dwarven food preferences are? I could eat a horse right now,” I said, resisting the urge to rub my belly.

“It’s pretty hearty fare, and they have talented chefs. I don’t think any of us will leave hungry,” Reed answered.

“Thank the Goddess.” Elodie echoed my sentiments exactly.