THE STORY
The sun broke without warning over the mountaintops to the south, spilling much-needed warmth over the camp of the traveler. It had been a hard night, a cold and cheerless one in their rude, makeshift shelter, but he took solace in the knowledge that it would be his last night in the wilds for the foreseeable future.
He shared a few meager strips of smoked beef with his guide, who, ten days into their journey, was every bit as grim and silent as he had been since his services were first engaged on the far side of the high mountain pass. The half-barbarian Tessini were a dark and stocky lot, as little inclined to give up their secrets as the dwarves who lived in massive underground cities somewhere beneath these very mountains. So short and broad-shouldered was the guide that he might easily have been mistaken for a dwarf were it not for the hawkish features on his clean-shaven face.
The guide was very nearly as unfriendly as a dwarf too, the man who was presently calling himself Nicolas thought, vaguely annoyed at his inability to crack the man’s reserve. Even now, with their journey together nearly at an end, the Tessino still refused to meet Nicolas’s eyes and looked away when Nicolas was doing no more than passing him a hardened heel of week-old bread. Though it was irritating, Nicolas found he had to respect other’s stubborn reticence. And, he reminded himself, that reticence served his purpose well.
His hunger satisfied, if not his palate, Nicolas rose to his feet and stretched his arms and back. The sunlight was a godsend, for at the guide’s insistence they had gone without a fire the night before. The cold of the hard and stony ground had worked its way into his bones, leaving him feeling as if he were inflicted with a case of premature rigor mortis. More than once during the night he considered lighting a fire over the guide’s objections, but the thought of trying to find his way through the deadly heights without a guide chilled him even more than the freezing darkness did. Also, it was unlikely that the man’s fears, whatever they might be, were ill-founded, even if he would not do Nicolas the courtesy of articulating them.
For if the Tessini were only half-civilized, that was more than one could say for the wild land in which they lived. The mountains that gave them their name, and from which they scratched out a precarious existence, also allowed them to remain free of any overlord. Were it not for the high, treacherous peaks, interspersed with thickly wooded valleys, one of the neighboring powers, either the Kingdom of Savondir to the north or the Holy Empire of Amorr to the south, would have long ago snapped up the diverse collection of little baronies, duchies, and other petty independences scattered throughout the vast mountain range.
But the shining armor and heavy destriers of Savondir’s knights were useless in a place where even a mule might fear to tread, and all the fabled discipline of Amorran mighty legions counted for nothing in a place where two men could not walk abreast for more than a score of strides before one would find himself stepping off a cliff or walking into a tree.
Nor, Nicolas considered, would the dwarves of the region be inclined to sit idly by and accept human rule over them, since any king worthy of his crown would be sorely tempted to assert a claim to the priceless veins of gold and other metals that ran through the roots of the mountain range like underground rivers. No, the dwarves would fight alongside their human neighbors—if indeed the term could be applied to those who lived in a proximity that was vertical instead of horizontal—to keep their precious mines free of any unwanted influence from the powers in the north and south.
Both kingdom and empire were perpetually pressed for coin, and neither the king nor the Houses Martial that ruled Amorr would hesitate to claim the natural riches of this wild land, if only they could hope to do so
The sun broke without warning over the mountaintops to the south, spilling much-needed warmth over the camp of the traveler. It had been a hard night, a cold and cheerless one in their rude, makeshift shelter, but he took solace in the knowledge that it would be his last night in the wilds for the foreseeable future.
He shared a few meager strips of smoked beef with his guide, who, ten days into their journey, was every bit as grim and silent as he had been since his services were first engaged on the far side of the high mountain pass. The half-barbarian Tessini were a dark and stocky lot, as little inclined to give up their secrets as the dwarves who lived in massive underground cities somewhere beneath these very mountains. So short and broad-shouldered was the guide that he might easily have been mistaken for a dwarf were it not for the hawkish features on his clean-shaven face.
The guide was very nearly as unfriendly as a dwarf too, the man who was presently calling himself Nicolas thought, vaguely annoyed at his inability to crack the man’s reserve. Even now, with their journey together nearly at an end, the Tessino still refused to meet Nicolas’s eyes and looked away when Nicolas was doing no more than passing him a hardened heel of week-old bread. Though it was irritating, Nicolas found he had to respect other’s stubborn reticence. And, he reminded himself, that reticence served his purpose well.
His hunger satisfied, if not his palate, Nicolas rose to his feet and stretched his arms and back. The sunlight was a godsend, for at the guide’s insistence they had gone without a fire the night before. The cold of the hard and stony ground had worked its way into his bones, leaving him feeling as if he were inflicted with a case of premature rigor mortis. More than once during the night he considered lighting a fire over the guide’s objections, but the thought of trying to find his way through the deadly heights without a guide chilled him even more than the freezing darkness did. Also, it was unlikely that the man’s fears, whatever they might be, were ill-founded, even if he would not do Nicolas the courtesy of articulating them.
For if the Tessini were only half-civilized, that was more than one could say for the wild land in which they lived. The mountains that gave them their name, and from which they scratched out a precarious existence, also allowed them to remain free of any overlord. Were it not for the high, treacherous peaks, interspersed with thickly wooded valleys, one of the neighboring powers, either the Kingdom of Savondir to the north or the Holy Empire of Amorr to the south, would have long ago snapped up the diverse collection of little baronies, duchies, and other petty independences scattered throughout the vast mountain range.
But the shining armor and heavy destriers of Savondir’s knights were useless in a place where even a mule might fear to tread, and all the fabled discipline of Amorran mighty legions counted for nothing in a place where two men could not walk abreast for more than a score of strides before one would find himself stepping off a cliff or walking into a tree.
Nor, Nicolas considered, would the dwarves of the region be inclined to sit idly by and accept human rule over them, since any king worthy of his crown would be sorely tempted to assert a claim to the priceless veins of gold and other metals that ran through the roots of the mountain range like underground rivers. No, the dwarves would fight alongside their human neighbors—if indeed the term could be applied to those who lived in a proximity that was vertical instead of horizontal—to keep their precious mines free of any unwanted influence from the powers in the north and south.
Both kingdom and empire were perpetually pressed for coin, and neither the king nor the Houses Martial that ruled Amorr would hesitate to claim the natural riches of this wild land, if only they could hope to do so
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