“Up!” Varrowyn commanded.
The dwarves surged up again, following their brave leader.
“Pikemen to the axe!” Varrowyn yelled.
In response, the pikemen advanced to the front of the axe formation. The shieldmen and dwarves with battle-axes stood to either side and fought off the Grymmlings that tried to overwhelm them by sheer numbers.
A half-dozen Grymmlings overpowered one of the dwarves, tangling his feet and dragging him down. Their knives descended mercilessly, turning crimson and spreading blood all over the floor and walls. The dwarves in the fallen warrior’s axe fought to defend their friend, but Juhg knew from the blood and the grim looks of anguish and anger on the dwarven warriors’ faces that they were too late. None of the Grymmlings escaped alive, and the dwarves’ attentions were as merciless as the foes they fought.
When the dwarves drew even with the door to the research room, Juhg pushed through their ranks, avoiding the quick hands that tried to stop him. He had to know what fate had befallen Grandmagister Lamplighter and Craugh. Twenty dwarves, their numbers already lesser by three and their inability to hold up their attack against innumerable enemies, had barely made this distance.
Even with Craugh’s wizardry, Juhg held little hope that the two had survived. He rushed into the doorway, taking cover as long as he dared, then peered around the corner. A mournful cry escaped him as he saw what had happened.
There, in the center of the room amid the three hundred nineteen books—at least, where those books had been—a huge jumble of broken rock stood.
For a moment, Juhg did not know where the rock had come from. Without the lanterns to light the room, mostly shadows filled the great expanse. Then, as his eyes—keen dweller’s eyes that could see in the dark almost as well as elves and nearly as well underground as dwarves—adapted to the lack of light, he spotted the huge gaping hole in the ceiling.
Awe filled Juhg at the thought of the sheer magnitude of force that had been necessary to rend the thick stone separating the research room from the upper one. His agile mind, filled with the different paths through the various rooms that had been honeycombed throughout the Knucklebones Mountains, quickly let him know that the upstairs room had been one of the twenty-nine that had been devoted to elven histories.
Then he saw the books spread over the rubble. The volumes lay torn and scattered. The violence done to the books had spread them like confetti. A few of them showed burning embers, as did the crushed mouth of a Blazebull almost buried under the fallen rock.
Looking at the carnage, knowing the loss the Library had suffered, Juhg felt his knees go weak and his stomach twist sickeningly. So much had been lost.
And all of it irreplaceable.
The realization haunted his thoughts, making him numb even to the bell still clanging in the distance and echoing through the Vault of All Known Knowledge and the sounds of battle out in the hall.
Only then did Juhg realize that the mystical gate extended beyond the room where it had originated. Crimson lightning streaked the violet sky revealed through the gate that stood above the heap of broken rock and destroyed books that reached almost to the point where the ceiling had once been. In that same instant, he realized further that the rock couldn’t have fallen in such a pile, that it had been deliberately shaped and stacked to block the mystical gate.
Craugh,
Juhg thought.
Shapes slithered and shadows leapt from the gate in the room above. More and more of the creatures continued to enter the Library. Most of them flooded the upper level across a massive dead tree that someone or something had shoved out into the Library from whatever world they came from.
But, his luck holding true, Juhg was spotted by some of the evil creatures. Grymmlings scampered and skidded down the pile of rock toward him. Their yellow eyes turned on Juhg and their jackrabbit teeth clacked. A Dread Rider turned its Blazebull from the makeshift tree bridge and guided its mount down the massive hill of broken stones. Others followed, including other creatures that Juhg did not recognize.
Darting back out into the hall, Juhg found that the dwarven war party had advanced thirty feet onward, never realizing that they had left their flank open to the attack only now coming from the research room. Their axes and pikes flashed as they fought by the dim light of the lanterns strung along the way. Three more of their number lay unmoving in the hallway.
The buzzing drone of Grymmlings’ voices filled the room behind Juhg. He ran, ignoring the painful twinges of his legs, hoping only that they did not fail him.
“Varrowyn!” he yelled. “Varrowyn!” He was almost upon the dwarves when the last one in the group turned to him. When the dwarf’s eyes turned hard and his massive jaw dropped slightly, Juhg knew the warrior had seen the threat.
“Our flank!” the dwarf yelled grimly. “To our flank!” He turned around and raised his bloody pike.
Other dwarves at the rear of the war party turned with him. In seconds, the dwarven advance was crushed as two groups stood fore and aft to face them.
Juhg hesitated only long enough to pick up a short-hafted single-bitted axe shieldmen used to cleave the skulls of their opponents or grab onto their opponents’ shields and strip them away, leaving them open to another dwarven fighter.
The axe felt heavy and uncertain in Juhg’s hands, but he made do. Long years of working in goblinkin mines, lifting rock and a pickaxe for years, had left him with strength. Though years had passed since he’d done those things, he was still strong enough to lift the axe. At least for a while. Looking at the foes arrayed against them at either end, Juhg felt certain that his life’s blood would give out long before his strength did.
Varrowyn divided the dwarves into four anvils, two facing either way. Juhg was placed in the rear of one of those formations in place of a missing dwarf. He raised the axe and tried very hard not to be afraid, but he failed.
The two enemy forces suddenly realized they had the upper hand. The Dread Riders took command of their groups, speaking in the harsh clacking tongue they had. Three of the Grymmlings darted forward anyway. At a signal from one of the Dread Riders, a Blazebull snorted fire over the three small predators and crisped them on the spot. Their blackened bodies tumbled to the stone floor.
“Stand yer ground!” Varrowyn growled, holding his two-handed axe at the ready. Blood leaked down from his helm, proof that the Grymmlings’ blades had found flesh behind the armor, and black soot stained the plate where he had not always been able to take cover behind a shieldmate.
One of the Dread Riders urged its mount forward. Its fierce gaze raked over the dwarves standing almost shoulder to shoulder in their formations. The Blazebull, cut and bleeding from a dozen wounds, stamped its feet impatiently. Fire curled from its black nose.
The Dread Rider lifted its head as if stretching its throat. When it spoke, it spoke in the common tongue that all the races knew.
“You do not have to die today,” the Dread Rider said in a cold, flat voice.
Varrowyn spat in disgust. “Today is a fine day to die.”
The Dread Rider worked its throat again. The language was obviously known to it, but it was unfamiliar in its use. “You are a fool.”
“Mayhap,” Varrowyn replied, “but I’ll die a courageous fool with me honor intact if’n that’s what it takes.”
The other dwarves cheered and pounded their armor or shields with their weapons in support of their leader’s bold declaration. But they never dropped their eyes from those of their enemies.
“You would have died anyway,” the Dread Rider promised. “Your passing would have been easier.”
Juhg quaked where he stood. He couldn’t help it. Even after the harsh life he’d barely lived through in the goblinkin mines, he had a hard time facing the certainty of death. Always before there had existed a chance, however small it was, that he might escape and—
Someone grabbed his ankle.
Startled, Juhg stepped back and peered down. He drew up the axe and got ready to bring it crashing down, thinking that one of the Grymmlings had sneaked through the dwarves’ defensive line. The uncertain light, most of it cast by pools of flames spat out by the Blazebulls that clung to the hallway walls or sat in fat puddles on the floor, made it difficult to see who had grabbed him.
Instead of a Grymmling hand as he had expected, Juhg saw a dweller hand glowing ghastly green flare open. A muffled voice said, “Juhg! Give me a hand!” The hand reached forward, exposing more of the arm.
Recognizing Grandmagister Lamplighter’s voice and trained by years of friendship as well as work, Juhg bent down and caught hold of the hand. The Grandmagister’s flesh felt cold but strong.
“Pull,” the Grandmagister said.
Juhg pulled, and as he pulled, Grandmagister Lamplighter oozed through the stone floor. Marveling at the sight, suddenly aware of what the spectral form glowing green and translucent before him must mean, Juhg exclaimed, “Oh, Grandmagister, they have killed you! I am sorry! This is all my fault!”
“Juhg,” the Grandmagister said in a fierce tone, “I am not dead.”
Studying the green glowing figure before him, Juhg said nothing. He was confused.
Do I believe what I see before me, or do I believe the Grandmagister?
“Craugh worked a spell,” the Grandmagister said. “The gate extends all through the Library. It has taken root like a carrot and driven down into the levels from top to bottom. We have viewed all the floors.”
The three dwarves who made up the anvil Juhg currently stood in stared at the glowing figure of the Grandmagister with confusion and some trepidation.
“Stand ready!” Varrowyn yelled to his troops.
The Dread Rider marshaled its troops. The Blazebull shifted and moved like an earthquake beneath its loathsome master, stamping its feet and snorting great clouds of bright orange embers from his black nostrils.
“Hold fast to my hand, Juhg,” the Grandmagister ordered.
Juhg squeezed the hand tightly.
“Varrowyn,” the Grandmagister called out.
“Yes, Grandmagister,” the dwarven commander replied.
“Have your men link hands,” the Grandmagister instructed. “You’ll die if you stay here.”
“Well, now,” Varrowyn said, shifting his axe between his hands, “we’re not afeared of dyin’, Grandmagister Lamplighter.”
“Oh, and wouldn’t that help with all the problems facing the Library now,” the Grandmagister stated reproachfully. “Here I am, needing every person I can get, and you’re willing to die.”
Varrowyn blinked at the Grandmagister. Juhg marveled at the dwarf’s skill, for Varrowyn never took his other eye from the assembled enemies before him.
The Dread Riders held their forces in check, obviously wondering what the Grandmagister’s sudden and strange appearance held for them. The Grymmlings crooned and buzzed their bloodthirsty song of want.
“Grandmagister,” Varrowyn said, “I just—”
“You’ll just live,” Grandmagister Lamplighter declared impatiently, “until such time as I can no longer help you do that. I’ve lost too many friends and too many Librarians I was responsible for today to willingly allow anyone else to die. Now, take hold.”
Varrowyn gave the command. One of the dwarves grabbed Juhg’s hand in a mailed fist. Excruciating pain shot through Juhg’s hand, but he didn’t say anything.
Evidently growing less fearful of what the spectral figure in the midst of the dwarves might do, the Dread Rider gave the order for the groups massed on either side of the Library’s defenders to attack. They surged forward.
“Craugh!” Grandmagister Lamplighter yelped.
In the next instant, Juhg felt the floor beneath his bare feet turn as mushy as lime-flavor salted seafoam cake batter. The Grandmagister sank through the floor like a man sucked deep into the deadly embrace of a marsh muck pit. Before he could even cry out in alarm, Juhg sank through the floor as well. Frozen in fear, he watched as a thrown spear came right at his chest, then passed on through, leaving only a cold tingle that washed through him the way the incoming sea did when he was checking lobster pots out in the harbor.
Then he was within the stone floor, feeling the rasp of the rough rock somehow, even though it never touched his skin.
15
“Our Enemies Have Struck Us a Grave and Serious Blow”
A flickering torch held the darkness at bay in the hallway under the one where Juhg had been trapped with Varrowyn’s dwarven guards. He stared in disbelief at his new surroundings as he floated toward the floor. Grandmagister Lamplighter suddenly jerked away from him, as if caught in the fierce talons of some fearful beast, and his hand jerked free of Juhg’s grip.
Then Juhg stopped floating and started falling. He thudded into the floor almost on top of the Grandmagister. The impact dazed him for a moment, but Grandmagister Lamplighter was already up, hooking his fingers into Juhg’s hair and jerking him into motion.
“Get up,” the Grandmagister ordered, pulling Juhg. “Hurry. The dwarves are falling and their armor will injure you.”
Glancing up, twisting through the pain of the Grandmagister’s uncompromising grip in his hair, Juhg watched as the dwarves—all of them spectral green—dropped through the floor. As soon as each was clear from the stone ceiling that had been the floor above only moments before, that dwarf took on a flesh and blood appearance again. And they fell like rotten fruit.
One after the other, as noisy as hailstones on a tin roof, the plate-mail-clad dwarves dropped onto the stone floor hard enough to chip the surface in places. Sparks flashed from their armor. Varrowyn was the last to drop, and he only held on to the hand of the dwarf before him. However, a Grymmling had hold of the dwarven commander’s leg and was pulled partially through.
“Up!” one of the dwarves cried in warning, forcing himself to his feet. “To arms! They’re comin’ through after us!” He raised his pike.
Varrowyn landed flat on his back with a growl of pain. He never lost his grip on his battle-axe.
Then a green mist breathed out of the stone ceiling. The wriggling Grymmling suddenly stiffened and mewled in terror or pain. With the buzzing drone the thing made, even afterward Juhg was never sure what that awful noise was.