Chapter 5

"Aye, I know lead formations." The speaker was a swarthy, short man with a long beard. Wearing a leather vest and pants, presumably for protection from mines and the forge, he was a model of squat efficiency in motion.

The two of them had followed the smoke plume that Debra had seen to this place. A short negotiation with the guards at the mineshaft had led to this leader, "Foreman", he had called himself, coming out to parley with them.

The parley was... strained, Esfalan thought, ringed by Dwarves with halberds and axes, as well as hammers and other implements for mining. For some reason, the dwarves bore an animosity - equally divided between Debra and Esfalan - towards outsiders. Esfalan had had no interaction with dwarves before, and Debra had only hearsay.

"There is a crystal that sometimes appears with the lead. The mineral of which I speak is an orange-yellow, long, hair-like crystal. I would trade with you knowledge for a half-pound of this crystal."

The dwarf standing in front of Esfalan shook his head "no". "Nay, Elf, you are in our domain. There shall be more than the exchange of knowledge for this mineral."

"What, then, do you propose?"

"Trial by arms. If you survive combat with one miner each, we may then speak of trading knowledge for this crystal. In this way, we may gauge the worth of the mineral."

Turning to Debra, Esfalan muttered under his breath. "Can you fight?"

She nodded seriously. "I have no weapons to speak of. Esfalan, we should not kill here, nor even maim. You should tire yours until I can bind him. Do not grapple with them, they are grossly strong." She retrieved their coil of rope from the horse, and made a loop at one end.

Esfalan watched her preparations in amused approval, amused because he had so quickly come to accept that Debra was his fellow-in-arms. He turned back to the foreman, and spoke, letting some of his amusement tinge his words. "We accept. No weapons or tools other than what any now carry."

The foreman colored floridly at hearing the amusement. "Elf, you shall try me. Freijor, the female," he snapped.

Esfalan led his horse to the side of the clearing. Noting a dwarf standing nearby, he spoke gently to him. "Here is Nelaur. Her name means "beautiful runner", and, should things go ill here for me, she should bring you much gold in a human market; far more than her worth in a stewpot." Esfalan was certain the other would take it as an insult, though it was the simple truth.

Freijor was an unusually large dwarf, easily the largest in the party that had ringed the two of them, Esfalan thought. Almost six feet tall, he was nearly three-and-a-half feet wide, and massed twenty-five stone, three hundred and ten pounds. Esfalan watched him move out into the circle, trying to gauge his ability to move quickly.

Then the foreman of the dwarves stepped out into the clearing, and Esfalan had no time to watch Debra and Freijor. With a steely ring, a large axe appeared in the other's hand. Esfalan blinked, it must have come from a scabbard on his back, one that Esfalan had not noticed.

Circling slightly, being sure to stay clear of Debra and her opponent, Esfalan still had not drawn steel. He considered his opponent carefully, wondering if Debra's strategy of tiring the dwarf would work. The dwarf facing him grounded his axe, and stood, waiting, watching Esfalan.

Across the clearing, Debra had launched herself at Freijor in a full run. Perhaps six feet before her opponent was a small upthrust of granite boulder, and with Esfalan's knives in her closed fists, she dove at the rock, flipped herself over pushing down on it, and landed with both feet on the surprised face of Freijor.

With a heavy thud, the dwarf fell over backwards. Debra watched him rise, then somehow threw a loop of rope around the dwarf, who spun to face her. With three sharp pulls of the rope, the large loop around his feet tightened, and then pulled his feet out from under him with the third tug, toppling him again, with his feet tied together. As he tried to sit up, he dropped his halberd to scrabble at the rope around his feet, and Debra flew by him, striking his head once with the heavy butt-end of each of Esfalan's knives. She did this three more times in succession, and the third time, the dwarf slumped into unconsciousness.

Quickly, Debra ran back to him, tugged him slightly upward so that she could get his head between her knees, and placed a knife edge at the unconscious dwarf's throat. The message was clear: approach and Freijor would die.

The soft ring of Esfalan's hyandrel drew the foreman's attention as surely as if it had been a ringing hammer blow. "It is just you and I now," Esfalan spoke softly.

Laughing suddenly, Esfalan could feel his fey adding to his mood. And why not? He was strong, and young, though with far greater experience than this old slow stump of a dwarf in front of him. His mirth quieted, but his eyes must have still been shining with it, as his opponent seemed to shiver as he caught Esfalan's glance.

"Why are you the only one to wear warsteel in all this gang?" Esfalan asked in a slightly taunting tone. "Do you need it as a badge of office, or as a tool to enforce your will?"

With a growl the other hefted the axe, but did not otherwise move. Esfalan closed slightly, and saw some rage in the other's face, yet it was bottled. For now, Esfalan judged, it was bottled for now.

"You will have to kill me, you know," Esfalan spoke calmly. "Yet if I only disable or disarm you, you have lost, for your dwarves will never follow you again. And yet again, you shall then have to beg me to kill you." Esfalan was not sure why he had chosen that taunt - it might not have been the case. Though the reaction the other gave lent credence to Esfalan's guess - the dwarf certainly believed it was so.

The rage mounted in the other's hot stare. Esfalan suddenly laughed again, the genuine amusement spurred on by the realization that Esfalan could indeed win simply by driving him into an insane rage, then avoiding the steel until his opponent wore down.

"I do not think I shall grant such a boon, however," Esfalan continued, watching the other's reaction. "For lack of hospitality to visitors, one must learn a lesson, should one not?"

Esfalan saw the cold fury bloom into full red rage. And still, the other did not move. Shrugging, Esfalan walked up to the other seemingly without care. The heavy axe flashed as it rose, and flashed as it fell, and Esfalan simply leaned away from the descending blade, nicking the other under his armpit at the junction of leather pieces with the point of the hyandrel.

A vicious backhand, and Esfalan ducked under it, this time driving the rim of his round shield into the face of his opponent, knocking him backwards. Though the other staggered, he did not fall as the troll had earlier. The blood running down his axe arm was copious, and Esfalan knew the grip would be slick.

This time, the blade came at him from the left side, at rib height. Esfalan hopped backwards, and drove the flat of his shield down on the axe as it passed. With a loud clank, the axe flew out of the dwarf's hand, and slid into the grass at the base of a boulder.

The dwarf straightened, his right arm useless with the shock of the blow Esfalan had delivered, and murderous fury in his eye. The dwarf curled the fingers of his left hand, and Esfalan was able to predict the exact instant his opponent would launch himself towards him. As the other started forward, Esfalan drove his shoulder, leading with the round shield, into the other with all the strength of his legs behind the blow, and was rewarded with an explosion of air from the other's lungs.

Almost regretfully, as the dwarf dropped to his knees, stunned and unable to gather breath, Esfalan stepped around the other, and hit him at the base of the skull with the pommel of the hyandrel.

"The thought has occurred to me," Esfalan said, "That I may have set back relations between curitrelii i vatrelii, between dwarves and elves, here today."

He looked around the clearing, at several hundred dwarves now, all dour and unsmiling. The foreman was still in the center, tied, though the other dwarf, Freijor, was standing free, next to him. The sun was low over the mountain tops, though there would be light for several hours yet.

One dwarf stepped forward. "I am Valsten, brother to the King, and I may speak for him. What has happened here has happened badly. I believe you have done no wrong and indeed, less harm than you might have."

Esfalan nodded, then bowed with a flourish. "I am Esfalan, of the Ehladrihim, once a Captain-Commander of the Mindirrim. I cannot speak for all of elvenkind, though, I think, many elves will comport as I do. And I will apologize for taunting."

Esfalan turned and raised an eyebrow to Debra. Shrugging, Debra stepped forward then, and bowed herself. "I am Debra, The Greenhill."

This caused a reaction amongst the dwarves. Esfalan turned his head, then his entire body around in a full circle, scanning the long lines of dwarves around the clearing, seeing them all murmuring, and stopping again at Valsten, brother to the King. He then turned and looked at Debra, raising an eyebrow.

"Later," she hissed. "Not important right now." Esfalan shrugged.

"Long elves must live, Captain-Commander, for I have heard none of the deeds of the Mindirrim save in history books."

A different chord was struck in Esfalan. "Have you had much contact with elvenkind of late?"

Valsten gazed at him steadily for several long moments. "I have," he said finally. "Yonder southron elves down in Windirway, from the other side of the mountains. From time to time we deal with them, gems and silver, mostly, and gain lightstones and other trinkets in return. Yet, they are not so martial as you of the Ehladrihim. Almost I could believe you were of the fabled Mindirrim. Your cousins are... more of the spirit, I would venture, and less of the rest of Feldare, though they thrive.

"We do not have much traffic with the northern elves, for while you have markets, we have less need to sell to you in trade for the goods of men." Here he looked significantly at Debra, and she bowed her head.

"Shall I get word back?" he asked her.

"Tell them I am well, but my road goes with the Mindir, for a while."

The dwarf regarded her. "I do not know, Debra, I do not know you, or your purpose. Yet, I would guess that such a message shall occasion more questions than answers."

Turning back to Esfalan he continued, "Sir Elf, our hospitality was poor. Our gate-guardian overstepped, I would say, and I am grateful you showed restraint. Tonight, I would you be our guest, as we have guested few in the last several centuries. And I promise you shall see no draft animal meat on our table; Nelaur shall have oats and sweet grasses."

Esfalan laughed, a clear merriment. "Your Grace, we accept."

"How is it you speak elven so well?"

"Esfalan, we are comrades and companions in these mountains. I will go with you for a while, and make your purpose my own. Please, I beg of you, do not ask my reasons."

Esfalan shrugged. "Very well, then Debra. I shall not ask."

It had been a whirlwind of shafts and stairs, passages and natural stone walls passing by the lantern's light. Esfalan had picked up some shards of granite, and concentrated, frowning, on four of them as he walked. Debra watched as they grew a grey-brown crust, then he wiped each on his breeches as he walked.

Looking up, he noticed her attention, as they waited on a landing next to an underground lake. "Please, hold these," he had said, and she held three of the stone shards, now smoothed and shaped like a birch leaf, totally transparent and colorless.

Esfalan felt the chaotic magma beneath the mountains. Sighing deeply for the effort, he drew mana from the deep recesses of the mountain, and began to fill the stones.

Wordlessly, Debra exchanged the stones each time he asked.

Every time he charged a stone, he felt her react to the inrush of mana, and a tiny echo from her.

He handed one to dwarf leading the small party, and as it left his hand, the stone kindled into bright light. The dwarf stopped in his tracks.

"For me?" the rough voice of the young lantern-bearer asked.

"Aye." Esfalan was amused, but only slightly. "For your family and the family of your son and his son after."

"This is a gift worthy of a king, Sir Elf. I thank you, and my family shall not forget you."

Later that evening - if it were evening and not full night under the stars, they were deep in the mountainside and would not know - Esfalan had presented Valsten with two of the hanverri, the lightstones.

Agreements were made, and the Dwarves would find Eritsal, Esfalan's smith, and work out a means to sell ores and ingots of pig iron through Eritsal as agent. Esfalan agreed to have the first dwarves bringing ore be introduced to the chandlers and merchant sailors; even Dwarves must need spices and silks, Esfalan had realized. Esfalan promised nothing but introductions and the outright purchase of fifty hundredweight of pig iron.

The last event was a visit to a cave where orange hairlike crystals grew in small bubbles and cracks in porous dark rock, with blooms and swirls of other colors also. Esfalan gathered nearly five ounces of the mineral, and pronounced it enough for his needs.

Though his dwarven hosts were clearly hoping for an answer to the unspoken question, Esfalan did not volunteer his intent with the crystal.

The next day, as they were walking northward again, Esfalan explained to Debra. "They will begin to experiment with it, and they will soon find its properties when molten in iron in the absence of air. From that they will find better and lighter steels with greater flexibility and resilience than they have yet been able to make. Over time, they'll come to discover just how hard a steel they can make with this alloy. Though I would not simply give them the answer, for they seem proud to me."

Debra nodded.

They walked a few steps more, then he said, "As do you seem proud to me."

She made no answer.

They struck the Salt Road by the third hour past dawn. As they approached the city, Esfalan broke the silence they had shared since breakfast. "What will you? Stay on with me in my travels, join a merchant as guard, become a sailor?"

Debra squinted along the dirt road, the rising sun glaring off a puddle ahead. "Know any good wizards?"

He gave a short bark of laughter. "One, a very good one. His name is Verothlen, and he is coming with me."

"Well, then, there is your answer."

Esfalan made his way to the Citadel, even before going to his mother's house. Since he and Debra had approached the city, a sense of urgency had been growing within him. He felt as if he needed to know what was happening in the larger world, having been removed from any source of news for over a week.

Quickly, he found a clerk who knew where the summary report for Cormorlan was being prepared. He stood at the man's desk, and read the already-written pages of the summary, then started digging through the incoming reports.

Apparently, some group of humans was directing some hatred toward Ehladriel, claiming the "City on a Hill" had boundless magery and unlimited food. There was a massive population shift underway from the center of the Empire, and apparently food was scarce; as the outward migration was consuming food normally transported to the center of the Empire.

Esfalan felt a cold chill simply reading this, and knew Ehladriel could never withstand a crowd a tenth of what might be on the way. There was little word on who was doing the directing, though there were acknowledgements of orders to find out. The distances involved were likely the greatest protection Ehladriel had.

He introduced Debra to the clerk, and received assurances that the clerk would inform his fellows that she was to be given access to the reports.

Esfalan found Debra quarters at the Citadel, and asked that she meet him at the clerks' chamber each morning until he was ready to move again. He promised to introduce Verothlen to her in the morning; until then, she was free to amuse herself in the city.

"Father, in the next week or so, there shall be a number of dwarves delivering some iron for me. I would take it as a kindness if you would introduce them to the Shipmasters and Chandlers; they will have much to trade."

Endalan looked up from his reading. "Why would you offer this?"