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the Dokkalfar of each procession. Above, on the ravaged mountainside,

more Dokkalfar hacked away at a new road, with a busy clashing of

picks and hammers and shovels. The mine portals glowed with fiery

light, outlining the many scuttling forms of Dokkalfar, carts, and horses

and lending the entire valley a lurid, foreboding cast of light. Clouds of

acrid smoke belched from the tunnels and showered the slopes below

with sparks and cinders.

Thurid watched, muttering to himself and clutching his staff. The

knob of his staff glowed, shining through his fingers when he passed his

hand over it.

“How does he dare do this?” he growled restlessly. “I’ve never

seen such a desecration. He’s even mining the rocks for their minerals

to make the destruction of the mountain’s power more complete.

He must be stopped.“ He turned his blazing eyes upon Leifr.

”Fridmarr, this will be your greatest triumph.“

“If we can do it,” Leifr interrupted gloomily.

“We can do it. There are powers within this mountain yet. I

can feel them, like a voice calling out for help.”

“Help? We’re the ones who need help,” Leifr protested. “We

can’t do it without some powers that will help us, instead of us

helping them. This isn’t going to work, Thurid. I have a nasty feeling

in my bones that this is going to turn out very badly.” He stood up,

stretching his cramped muscles. “Let’s go back. I want to talk to

Gotiskolker.”

Stealthily they left the house and climbed up the hillside, gaining

a better perspective on the hellish scene below them. As they started

down toward the horses, Thurid suddenly reached out and gripped

Leifr’s arm in warning. “Something is wrong,” he whispered. “Back

over the top, quickly!”

They dived into the shelter of some rocks and looked down. Leifr

murmured, “I don’t see any horses. Nor the dogs either.” He had

commanded them to stay behind, which they had done with the utmost

reluctance. He whistled once and got no response.

“Gotiskolker must be gone too, or dead,” Thurid said. “I hope

he’s dead, because if he isn’t, it means he has left us to look for Sorkvir

and his eitur.”

“Maybe not,” Leifr answered. “Maybe some Dokkalfar

were getting too close, so he moved. We’ll have to look for him. He

might have left a signal to show which way he went.”

Thurid grunted and shook his head with a fatalistic sigh. “I’ve

seen how eitur works before. There’s no loyalty to anything but the

drug when the victim begins to feel the need for it.”

Leifr quelled the panic rising within him, swallowing hard

against the silver torque. “We’ve got to find him,” he said grimly. “Our

horses were carrying all our provisions and equipment. We can’t get

along without them.”

“I fear you won’t see them again, once the Dokkalfar get

their hands on them. At least I still have this.” Thurid pulled

Bodmarr’s sword out of his satchel, then thrust it back in, although it

was considerably longer than the satchel was deep or wide. Astonished,

Leifr felt the satchel to see if a sword were sticking through the bottom

of it. There wasn’t, and Thurid snatched it away, snapping, “Don’t

touch that satchel, you fool; it’s got spells on it to protect it from

thieves. How would you like your hand to wither up and drop off?

Don’t be curious about wizards’ satchels. They’re unpredictable

things.”

Leifr wondered whether he meant the wizards or the satchels and

looked forward to the day when he would have no dealings with either.

“Come on,” he whispered sternly. “We’re going down for a look

to see what happened to Gotiskolker.”

“We’ll look, but we’ll do it my way,” Thurid said, raising his

staff aloft and lighting it with a sputtering roar, bathing the little ravine

below in instant light.

“Look at that!” he gasped, as eight or ten dark figures scurried

away. “It was a trap! Gotiskolker must have helped set it!” Ignoring

Leifr’s bleak glare of protest, he stifled his light. “Back to the house,”

Thurid whispered. “They won’t think of looking for us that close.”

The Dokkalfar rallied quickly from their fright at the alf-light and

scattered over the mountainside on horseback. Gradually they worked

their way closer to the ruined house. From their insignia and

headpieces, Leifr recognized them as Sorkvir’s Dokkalfar guardsmen.

“So they won’t think of looking this close, eh?” Leifr growled as

they watched the Dokkalfar quartering the hillside above. “We’re

trapped, Thurid.”

Thurid fidgeted with his rune sticks, listening to the Dokkalfar

outside. “I wonder what the whetstone spell would do to them?” he

mused.

“I’m not going to sit here and wait for them to find me,” Leifr

said. “Especially if you’re going to experiment with your spells on

them.”

“We’d both better go while we can,” Thurid replied, putting all

of the rune sticks into his satchel except one, which he concealed

inside his sleeve.

Outside, Leifr silently beckoned toward the west, away from

Dokholur, and dodged from the cover of the house to a fallen stable and

pigsty and from there into the rocks and thickets beyond. The Dokkalfar

had discarded their broken equipment by shoving it down the

mountainside, so Leifr discovered huge fractured cauldrons, slabs of

broken furnaces, worn-out sledges and carts, and the bones of many

unfortunate horses. As he crouched half-inside some huge old mining

machine, waiting for Thurid to catch up, the Dokkalfar surrounded the

house in a concerted move that Leifr might have admired under

different circumstances. As it was, two Dokkalfar rode by so close

that he could have touched the horses’ legs as they passed. Silently

he cursed Thurid, wondering what was delaying him.

Thurid waited until all the Dokkalfar were gathered around the

house, their attention focused on the search of the interior. Then he

crossed his fingers and recited the spell on the rune wand, hoping he

had remembered it correctly. Closing his eyes, he stretched out his staff

for the final words of the incantation. The force of the explosion

staggered him backward a few steps, and a brilliant fireball lit up the

sky as the ruin exploded with a deafening report. Rocks, timbers,

Dokkalfar, and horses were tossed in all directions. Those of the

Dokkalfar who were able staggered out of the ruins in tatters, while

most of the horses picked themselves up and dashed away in desperate

panic.

After watching a moment to be sure the Dokkalfar were no

longer interested in stalking their quarry, Thurid turned and

followed Leifr. He passed the machine where he had seen his

companion hiding, after peering into it to make sure he wasn’t there.

“Fridmarr!” he whispered in mounting irritation.

There was no answer, nor did any of his subsequent

whispers receive answers. By the time he had searched all around the

ruins and halfway up the western slope, his mood had gone from angry

to worried. His explosion had summoned forth more Dokkalfar, who

picked through the ruins for the dead and nearby hillsides.

Thurid crept from clump to clump of gorse until he reached

some rocks on the top, where he sank down dejectedly to consider

his situation. He had scarcely made himself comfortable when the tail

of his eye caught a movement. A dark shadow reared up from the

shelter of a rock. Thurid grabbed his staff and scrambled backward,

spluttering over a spell that had suddenly escaped from his memory.

“Thurid, it’s
me—Gotiskolker!” a voice called softly.

Thurid recovered his aplomb quickly. “Where have you been?

We didn’t know if you’d been captured or if you’d gone back to the

eitur.”

“Neither. I had to hide, and they took the horses. But the worst of

it is that they’ve got Fridmarr now. I saw them take him while you were

watching your fire. If you’d only turned around, you might have saved

him.”

Thurid gaped at Gotiskolker in dismay and shock. His

thin shoulders slumped. “Alive, I hope?” he asked.

“I don’t know. There were six of them. They hauled him away,

slung across a horse, into the mine. One thing I do know is that once a

man goes into Dokholur, he never comes out alive.”

Thurid’s nostrils quivered, and his eyes gleamed with a fanatic

light. “Well, this is one time it’s going to be different. We’re going into

that mine and we’re not going to give up searching until we find

Fridmarr—and we’re going to bring him out. Is that understood?”

Gotiskolker sat down and rested his forehead wearily in his

hands. “We have no equipment, no supplies—”

“We’ll steal them. Whatever it takes, we’re going to find

Fridmarr.”

When Leifr realized that he was not dead, his first reaction was

surprise. The six Dokkalfar had been waiting for him with cudgels and

clubs. For a short while, he had fought brilliantly with his mace, stirred

on to a masterful performance by sheer desperation. The last thing he

remembered was a great wallop on the back of the head and finding

himself lying on his back somehow, with the twisted faces of the

Dokkalfar and their weapons spinning around him in a garble of

unintelligible voices. It all went black, and then he awakened to

firelight and a stale, earthy smell in the damp air.

His entire body ached from bruises, and one of his eyes defied all

attempts to open it. A swollen mass gripped half his skull; when he

raised one shaky hand to feel what on earth it might be, a voice

murmured something in the same strange garble the Dokkalfar had

used, and a cold rag was placed over his battered eye. Through one

narrow slit, he discerned a woman bending over him and he felt that it

must be his sister, the gentle Thora, who always bandaged up his

scrapes and bruises. He was lying on the ground on an old cloak. For

this small bit of comfort, he felt inordinately grateful.

“Thora?” he muttered. “Where are we?”

A huge, untidy heap separated itself from the shadows and

descended to stare into his face with small, bright eyes in a vast,

tranquil countenance.

“Still talking out of head,” a voice rumbled.

Leifr’s senses were beginning to clear, and he recognized

Raudbjorn. “I’m not out of my head,” he growled. “Where’s my sister?

She was here, wasn’t she?”

“No,” the woman replied. “I’ve been watching you. Do you

know who I am?”

Her voice haunted him. He risked shaking his head slightly

and was rewarded with shooting pains. “No. Not here. It can’t be

Ljosa.” He tried to focus his good eye, but all he could get was a blurry

image of a woman in a gray cloak, her face almost hidden by her hood.

“Yes, I fear it is true. Sorkvir came to Hjaldrsholl and brought me

here as a hostage. He’ll trade me for the sword, Fridmarr, but you

mustn’t do it. Don’t worry about setting me free. It’s more important to

finish the Pentacle and find the grindstone so you can sharpen

Bodmarr’s sword.”

Raudbjorn shook his head. “No chance now. Thralls can’t

escape from Dokholur. Fridmarr never see sun again. Life here bad for

poor thralls.”

Leifr felt himself slipping away helplessly, and their voices

once more burbled in meaningless confusion. When he next

awakened, he was still aware of the discomfort of each bone and

muscle that had cause for complaint. Forcing open one eye a crack, he

peered around himself, seeing the walls of a cave, a small fire, and

heaps of rags that seemed to be breathing, moaning, or snoring. On the

other side of the fire sat Raudbjorn, smiling upon him with great good

fellowship.

“Halloa, Fridmarr. Better today? Ready to go to work, old thrall?”

“Don’t call me thrall, you lard-bucket,” Leifr grunted. “What

are you doing here, anyway? Where’s Ljosa?”

“Sorkvir took her away. You all right now.” Raudbjorn pursed

his lips and clucked with sympathy. “Sorry fix you in, Fridmarr. You

don’t remember. Sorkvir sold worthless carcass to Skrof, thrall-driver.

Too bad, too bad. Should have let Raudbjorn kill you, eh?” He chuckled

ponderously.