Chương 97: BECMI Chapter 96 – Recovering a Regent

I turned around, but the waiting Skulls still did not dissipate, moving instead to accompany us as my group strode back out of the silent room, the honor guards unable to do anything but get out of their way. It would mean word of their shameful actions, scarce better than some southern Imperial human might do, was going to make it to the outside world, but the Overstern dwarves couldn't heap treachery atop of dishonor… not that they dared to even think it with my Skulls watching them.

The gates had been closed for the evening. I brought up a Passwall and strode right through them as if they were not there, the disbelieving gate guards watching us stroll through several feet of stone, wood, and steel as if it was irrelevant to us. The night outside was cold, up in the mountains as we were, the warmth of the hold and magic to keep it heated now behind us, but it made no difference as we paused to look down on the external buildings and walls of the dwarves of Overstern…

irrelevant with them having no Stillflight defenses to stop us if I went airborne.

"The words of men, elves, and dwarves were all in agreement that Overstern and its Regent were fine examples of dwarves, and showed the lack of need for royals to reign in the Halls," Prince Ukker breathed out, still in his native tongue, letting some of his anger go.

"In truth, I was curious to see what they had forged without a King Under the Mountain, and instead I have found only grave disappointment."

"It is a cult of personality," I said softly.

"Regent Himmelstern has led the dwarves of the North since they came this way and settled in, and no thane or Clanholder will speak against him. His importance rose so high that he considered himself above the notion of the honor of the dwarves, and his will defining what dwarven honor is.

"It is a fatal personality flaw for any leader, not just a dwarven regent. The true shame is that the dwarves here followed his example and did not make it right and proper, or even go the bloodthirsty route and commit to greater war in rebellion against the peace being established in the first place.

"They simply let their hate of the beast-men guide them and cared nothing for honor, only the shame of others finding out that they and their Regent acted so dishonorably."

"Can we hope the Regent is merely a fool outside forces took advantage of?" Prince Ukker sighed, knowing how bad this stain was going to taste in the mouths of other dwarves.

"I have my doubts, but nothing is impossible. We will know when we rescue him." Prince Ukker gave me a shrewd glance.

"Not leaving him and the dwarves here to their deserved fates?"

"It will save more lives if we rescue him. The beast-men will lose their leverage, and the dwarves their reason to press their attacks. I will also give the Overstern dwarves the means to buy back their honor, if done correctly."

"One does not buy back honor with gold," sniffed Ukker disparagingly.

"Yet it is entirely the reasoning behind a blood price. If not to return honor, then to ward away dishonor. They seem to value gold more than honor, regardless." The faces of the dwarves behind me twisted.

"That is indeed a dangerous path taken by many a dwarf, to their shame and ruin," Revered Cruxin admitted with a sigh.

"Let's see if we can burn the shame of it out of them, then, shall we?" Prince Ukker nodded slowly.

"That sounds both cruel and appropriate, Lady Edge…" I flipped something out of my sleeve, holding it up for them all to see.

"This is the Knife that Regent Himmelstern gifted to King Antius the Black as a Dwarf-friend. The touch of its maker resounds through it, and with it, I can track him anywhere he is held. We will go to him, rescue him and what remains of his escorts, and end this petty war of dishonor. If you would not be involved in such a thing, tell me now and I will do this alone." All of them straightened up and grit their teeth.

"This matter reflects badly on all dwarves!" Prince Ukker declared grimly.

"We shall do this!" I nodded slowly as I held the long straight Dagger, wonderfully made and brimming with magic, up before me.

"Revered Cruxin, when it comes time for weapons out, you shall treat them all with Mercy. For all their cruelty, depravity, savagery, and downright evil, in this matter, the beast-men are in the right, and you shall not add to the death-tolls of the dwarves." Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. The dwarf-priest bowed once.

"It will be done, Lady Edge!" he promised.

"Then sit your Disks, because we go." The concave circles of black Force trimmed in skulls and roses winked up about them, stacked two and three deep. My dwarves hopped aboard them without the slightest hesitation, my Wings snapping out at the same time. Duum came swooping down out of the night, and I leapt onto his back.

My Wings melted away and fed into his own as the train of dwarves on Disks surged into motion, a great Bat with wings holding stars brighter than those of the mountain skies above following a glowing Dagger in front of him that was streaking towards the east.

The beast-men saw us coming, sort of, more a single point of light streaking across the night sky and wondering what it was. We passed by mountains, hills, and forests, across open plains, and over the slopes of the Nacht Tarnes. There were things in the night sky here, including other giant bats, which swooped in to investigate us. They were warned off with a curt shriek from Duum, at once assuring them he was not there to hunt in their territory and that if they persisted he was going to rip them apart.

All of them withdrew quickly, keeping a very safe distance from the giant Bat with a rider and trailing a bunch of little bipeds in their crunchy shells, all of whom radiated purpose and danger. When the Knife ahead of us finally dipped down, false dawn was actually visible in the east. It didn't matter, as Duum swooped down, following its point.

The anthroids watching from the distance saw only a line of black and silver forms come down out of the sky and plunge into the stone side of a great hill, one deep into their territory and which held one of their greatest subterranean holdings. They shouted and blew horns of alarm and raced to see what was left behind of the diving streaks of light… and found only unbroken stone where surely something should have dashed itself across the rocks.

Stone Shape at base III, Widened for x8, Widened for x8. Base Twenty Caster Level, but at effective CL of 40 when worn by me as a secondary Ringlord. 3200 feet of stone Shaped per six seconds. Or, 128 feet of a 5 by 5 tunnel, stretching out into the darkness ahead of us. Floating on Disks, Dumm himself easily bent over and crouched on two of them, we zipped through the narrow tunnel formed directly through the ground, following the Dagger floating ahead of me towards its maker.

It was a variant spell of something Upcast on Terra-Luna based on Locate Creature and Find the Path called Find the Owner, with the caveat that I could MAKE that path, so following convoluted caves and tunnels and the defenses that came with them was not an issue.

"About five hundred feet ahead," I informed the dwarves behind me.

"I don't expect there to be much fighting, you are here more as witnesses than anything else."

"Understood," Prince Ukker nodded quietly. Mercy need only be applied if fighting was to come. If things went properly, we could be in and out, safe inside a Sound Bubble, and nobody would know anything. I deliberately was coming in under the focus of the Knife, dipping down and beneath to make sure I didn't run into anything as I worked in from the outsides.

Tremblesense told me when I came within thirty feet of an open area, and I avoided those in silence, winding my way around and down through the stone, easily a mile into the mountain and a thousand feet below the nearest surface. We were just outside of what looked to be a rather large cavern system below ground, something definitely not known or mapped by the humans or dwarves of the land above. Still, coming in underneath the focus of the spell wasn't hard.

I slid to a halt, looked up twenty feet above me, and slowly peeled the stone away as I rose up, the dwarves behind me following. Our ceiling vanished, floor to the place above, and the light from Dread faintly illuminated a rough cave hacked crudely out of the stone, with bars set by magic in the doorway, the smell of someone living in their own urine, and one being in chains laying with their back against the wall. A Sound Bubble reached out to cover any sounds as I turned to face the Regent of the Halls.

Himmelstern Karrackheim had looked much better in the paintings made of him. His head had been almost completely shaved, then subjected to fire and his skin now peeling to burn off the last of his hair and beard. He was stripped to nothing but a loincloth, and smoldering metal had been applied to him numerous times, although nothing lethal. He looked to have lost his right thumb and left little finger, the nails peeled from all of them, and all his toes were crushed.

His eyes still opened as the light came before him, dark and wide in the gloom, and he focused blearily on me, not sure of what he was seeing. An elfin in black and red with a monstrous Bat behind her rising up out of the floor was probably a fever dream... The shackles had probably been bought off of a human slaver, then welded into place. I didn't bother to take them off.

Prince Ukker and Revered Cruxin rose up beside me on their Disks, and this time the Regent blinked in surprise, seeing armored dwarves in a style he did not recognize.

"Aye, 'tis the Regent," Prince Ukker said in an unimpressed voice.

"What will you do with him?" I reached out and tapped the bound dwarf. The Regent had no chance to say anything as grayness spread from the point of contact, and in half a breath, he was frozen in stone, petrified completely. An extra Disk peeled off from under Ukker's own, while the manacles were released from the stone by expediently removing the anchors from the rock wall. Funf reached out and lifted the petrified dwarf carefully onto the Disk, manacles and all, while I turned to survey the area.

Detect Dwarf pinged three times.

"There are three more dwarves nearby. They will be coming with us." Both the dwarves nodded, and the wall simply melted away in front of us, ignoring the default entry, and I stepped outside, following the spell to the nearest survivor of the Regent's guards.