Secret of Pax Tharkas dh-1

  Secret of Pax Tharkas

  ( Dwarf Home - 1 )

  Douglas Niles

  Doug Niles

  Secret of Pax Tharkas

  PROLOGUE

  Being a Proclamation of the Word of ReorxThrough the Vessel of His Most Faithful One: The King of ThorbardinHigh Thane Jungor Stonespringer

  My faithful dwarf children:

  Our age is full of ill omens and dire portents. Know you all that it is only the resolute faithfulness of your leaders, and your own hearts, which holds mighty Thorbardin fast to its path of righteousness. Know you all that it is our cherished blessing to keep our gates sealed against the pernicious influences, the wicked and vile practices of the world that so relentlessly decays beyond the solid walls of our mountain home.

  And know you all that there are those, even here among us, sharing the sacred protection of our keep, who would seek to undo all of the protections that our proud and all-seeing god has labored so hard to render into place.

  I, your humble king, take this occasion to recount these threats, both the perils and successes of the recent past, and to warn against the looming menace that threatens all of our people should we fail to heed our stern and caring deity.

  The vengeance of our righteous god is already manifest in the destruction of Qualinesti, our former neighbor to the north. The land of the elves has become subject to blight, their once-great city rendered a poisonous morass-just punishment, to be sure, for that haughty and intractable race. The elves themselves are scattered and even now struggle to survive in a world where all are their enemies. Spare the elves no sympathy, my fellow dwarves, for their suffering is deserved. If Reorx has his way, we have seen the last of the elf race, which has ever been a scourge upon the surface of Krynn.

  Nor need we dwarves concern ourselves any longer with the petty affairs of men, not deep in the sanctity of Thorbardin. But understand, my people, that humankind is ever a lingering threat, and the only real security, the only hope we have of avoiding inevitable contamination, is to avoid humans and treat them like the plague. Here, too, we are blessed by Reorx, for our steadfast walls and sealed gates offer us adequate protection, and no human could hope to penetrate our undermountain realm.

  We are safe here from the ancient ogres, ever a danger to our race, and from the minotaurs that, Reorx in his wisdom has revealed to me, swarm the eastern lands of our continent like a pestilence of insects. Neither ogre nor minotaur can reach us in our undermountain sanctuary, and for this we owe our god, the everlasting Forge and Fire, most sublime thanks. Yes, even the wicked wyrms of dragonkind are barred from our realm, for the mountain summits, the granite walls, the great shell of Cloudseeker Peak, all will stand fast as bastions against these and other enemies.

  It may be recalled by some that our Failed King, Tarn Bellowgranite, upon his exile some ten years ago, tried to terrify the dwarves of the clans with his claim of a fire dragon, somehow lingering since the Chaos War, still dwelling in the halls of the mountain city. Tarn Bellowgranite has been shown to be at best a misbegotten fool-though the proof came too late for the thousands of brave dwarves he sent to their doom in his mad quest to aid the elves of Qualinesti. The wrath of the gods smote Qualinesti, and it is to our eternal grief that the dwarf army, as well, was caught in the wholesale destruction.

  That loss, that tragedy which still echoes in the silence of so many dwarven homes, is the legacy of the Failed King. His words were and are false, and his many threats-of dragon menace and internecine strife-have been seen as lies. For there is none among us, not a single dwarf of Krynn, who has seen any evidence of this fire dragon, and in those years since Tarn Bellowgranite has been banished, is there any doubt that it was a cruel hoax the Failed King tried to perpetrate on us?

  No, my people, none of these dangers loom now. Yet there are new dangers that Reorx, in his benign kindness, has deigned to send me in a vision, that I might take the necessary steps to safeguard our nation. I regret to report, my beloved dwarves, that the threats which alarm Reorx have their roots not in elves and humans, nor even in rumored dragons, but lie within the hearts of dwarves themselves.

  But take heart, my people, children of Reorx, for in this close threat we may indeed renew our hope of redemption. For a threat that is born of dwarfkind can be faced and defeated by dwarfkind. The struggle will require faith and courage, and everlong have we displayed those traits in abundance. It will require a discerning eye for treachery-and a determined and ruthless strategy to combat that treachery, to root out enemies within and obliterate them by whatever means necessary.

  In this enterprise, we have been blessed by Reorx, for he has seen that Thorbardin is now ruled by a king and a council of thanes, who all possess the requisite wisdom and resolve to achieve ultimate victory. This is a virtual certainty.

  The taint of the Failed King, it is known to all, has been cleansed from our nation. He whose name is forever accursed dwells in exile now, a pathetic recluse in the hollow shell of a place that was once the great Pax Tharkas. That barrier, erected to mark the border between Thorbardin and Qualinesti, has concluded its purpose with the destruction of the elven realm. Let it languish now as a dwelling for exiles and enemies. Though a thousand dwarves, even a small army, might shelter there, they have no means to reach Thorbardin. From the Failed King, we in Thorbardin are secure.

  Many of our people will recall the Mad Prophet, Severus Stonehand: he, too, betrayed his own and because of him the Daewar clan has fallen from high favor in Thorbardin. Even as the smoke of the Chaos War still lingered in our mountain halls, the Mad Prophet gathered the dwarves of his clan-those who were foolish enough to credit and follow him-and bore them away with him to the east in his doomed quest to restore the lost might of ancient Thoradin. That undermountain realm, so it is said, is older than Thorbardin, and at its height was nearly as auspicious as our own nation.

  But that height was many, many centuries ago. Even before the Cataclysm, Thoradin had waned as a power, corrupted by the Kingpriest and the multiple impurities of commerce and traffic with the disparate realms of humankind. It is only right that Reorx, when he hurled the mountain down upon the surface of Krynn, saw fit to obliterate Thoradin. Now Reorx has revealed to me the true scope of the Mad Prophet’s insanity, for the many Daewar who left Thorbardin with their leader were borne to a sea of fire, with three great mountains spuming smoke into a black sky and liquid rock pouring through the very fabric of the world. They found madness in the shell of Zhakar, and there, Reorx has shown me, they all perished. Their faithlessness in Reorx, their foolishness in adhering to false prophecy, was their undoing, and let it stand as a common lesson to all the rest of us, my people.

  Nay, do not weep at their loss, my blessed fellows. Those few Daewar remaining among us owe gratitude to Reorx for their deliverance; it was their decision to stay here, within the safety of Thorbardin’s walls, that has preserved their lives to this day.

  Nor is there threat to our well-being to be found in the remote fastness of Kayolin, in the north. That nation of dwarves has long been lost to us, the once-true cousins. Reorx has revealed to me that the lord of Kayolin has taken to call himself “king”-as if dwarfkind could ever have two kings! Kayolin has opened its gates to men and hill dwarves, and the inevitable bastardization cannot but weaken the pure fiber of mountain dwarf sinew, the pure stream of mountain dwarf blood. Kayolin has become a land of merchants and shopkeepers, mocking its people’s former greatness. Kayolin may be lost to us, but that is not a matter of concern; it grows weaker by the year and soon will fade as it flows forth and merges with the inconsequential world.

  The ridges and slopes around our mountain fastness, wherein dwell a veritable plague
of Neidar hill dwarves, are not the source of the dangers revealed to me by Reorx. True, hill dwarves have ever been a vexing annoyance, as they are well known to be arrogant, greedy, and stubborn as rocks. Our war with their kind cannot be said to ever be fully settled, not while any single Neidar, not one of the ill-bred, survive. But that will happen in time and is no cause for concern at present.

  Hill dwarf perfidy is endless and never more transparent than in the case of the Failed King, who took a hill dwarf as his wife. Who is to say whether King Bellowgranite would have embarked upon his path of folly if it weren’t for the seditious whisperings of his wife-from-beyond-the-mountain? However, the Neidar are barely worthy of our notice and, indeed, with our gates closed and sealed, they are a disease that has been quarantined. They cannot challenge us, they cannot steal our goods, they cannot add impurity to our bloodlines. They merely lurk without.

  Where, then, lies the immediate threat to our future, to our purity, to our status as the favored sons of Reorx? You may ask this question, my people, and it deserves an answer. But it is not an answer that gladdens my heart, for the truth is painful.

  For I repeat, the threat to Thorbardin, my dwarves, comes from within the hearts of its own people!

  Know that I have labored with every iota of my being over the years of my reign to recognize and eliminate this threat. I have probed the full circle of our clans, the lofty Hylar, the proud Daergar, the clever Theiwar, the impetuous Klar, and those few who have remained of the lost and lonely Daewar. I have sought with my one good eye to investigate the weak and identify the cowardly-though sometimes it seems as though my eyeless socket, with its orb of smooth gold, sees with more clarity than true vision.

  Over the years of my reign, I have presented the peoples of Thorbardin with important edicts, some seventy-eight of them to date. Every one of these new strictures has been designed to uphold the righteousness of this place, root out enemies, and hold my people fast to the true forward path of dwarf history. Though I, together with you, my people, have made good progress, our efforts have been only modestly successful.

  That is not enough. Reorx has shown me more must be done.

  I have been given visions of the terrible corruptions wrought among us by the females of our kind and come to know that, for too long, we as dwarves have tolerated the foibles of our weaker sex, allowed females to dictate, to weaken, to sully our greatness in ways that will, if unchecked, inevitably lead to our downfall.

  I have been alerted to the growing dangers presented by the outlaws who inhabit our realms, from the vile magics of the Theiwar wizard called Willim the Black to the depredations of the Klar criminal Mog Bogcutter, formerly a captain loyal to the Failed King. The former seeks to undermine our will while the latter and his ilk raid our food warrens and corrupt our youth with promises of treasure and adventure behind city walls.

  I have seen too much faith placed in the heroes of the past and not enough loyalty given to the dreams of the future. By dwelling on the legacy of our people, we deprive ourselves of the wisdom and guidance of our current age, and this sin cannot be borne.

  Perhaps most deplorable of all, I have beheld vile gully dwarves roaming carefree throughout our cities, bringing with them sickness, filth, and depravity. Ever immoral and ignorant, these worthless beings represent a slur on all the proud dwarf race.

  Thus I have created new edicts, sworn as law with this posting, to counter these evils.

  Stonespringer Edict Number Seventy-nine: Regarding the Census of our Peoples

  Commencing immediately, all family patriarchs are to compile a listing of all the male scions in that family. Such totals must be presented to the clan leaders by the end of the year, and the clan leaders must present their totals to their thanes within a fortnight following year’s end.

  The census shall count only males, as they represent the true core of Thorbardin’s population.

  Stonespringer Edict Number Eighty: Regarding the Rights of Female Citizens

  It has been recognized that the wily female, with her sexual allure, her soft words, her penchant for temporization and forgiveness instead of strength and resolve, has long been a weakening influence on the foundation of the nation. For too long, we have tolerated female ownership of businesses, female laborers working at our forges and mines, females as soldiers, even females as thanes of our clans. Females have inherited estates, and females have employed males as servants and laborers.

  From this day forward, those roles are forbidden to the women of Thorbardin. No female may own property in Thorbardin. Property titled to female owners must be immediately transferred to a male relative. If no male relatives are available, the property shall be claimed by the female’s clan thane for appropriate disbursement. Those females working in manufacturing, engineering, or at any military pursuit are hereby removed from their duties and consigned to their homes, where their husbands or fathers shall be expected to assign them proper roles. No male shall accept instruction or assignment of work or any other task from a female.

  It will be noted that the former thane of the Theiwar, Brecha Quickspring, stands as a stark example of female insidiousness. The wicked wench even attempted to distract me, her king and yours, with foul temptations of fleshly rewards. It should bring relief to all our people to know that she has been removed from her seat at the council and, after being appropriately disfigured, has been confined to the dungeon of the Royal Fortress.

  As presented as law in Edict Number Four, the king high thane shall, in due time, appoint her successor as thane of the Theiwar clan.

  Stonespringer Edict Number Eighty-one: Regarding the Corrupting Influence of Graven Images

  Commencing immediately, all public images portraying the former leaders of Thorbardin, as well as those busts and statues of both historical and personal significance displayed within private dwellings, are to be destroyed. It is known to all that, as mandated by Edict Number Twenty-two, all images carved in stone to portray beings who are not dwarves-the most notable being the statue of the former elf king Kith-Kanan-have already been destroyed.

  But Reorx has shown me that this destruction is insufficient. So long as we admire the graven visages of our former heroes, we are unable to move into the future of new might, new greatness, and new leaders.

  The Public Guard enforcers of each clan will be responsible for tearing down any statuary on exhibit in public locations. Each property owner is required to destroy any privately held images. Such destruction must be accomplished by the end of the year; after that time, all such property that is discovered will be confiscated and its owners arrested for violation of this edict.

  Stonespringer Edict Number Eighty-two: Regarding the Primacy of Reorx

  Reorx has long been the favored father of all dwarfkind, but he is displeased to see that small shrines dedicated to other gods-however secondary to his primacy-have various places of honor in Thorbardin. No such religious center, temple, shrine, or altar to any god other than Reorx shall now be tolerated.

  Citizens coming upon such shrines shall immediately report their existence to the clan thane. It is the thane’s obligation to see that the blasphemous site is shut down, the shrines to other gods destroyed.

  Any dwarf caught worshiping at such a site or carrying any talisman or sign associated with any god other than Reorx shall be put to death by slow strangulation.

  Stonespringer Edict Number Eighty-three: Regarding the Elimination of the Aghar Race

  Gully dwarves are a bane on the existence of the true dwarf races. For too long these “gullies” have been tolerated, working their mischief, spreading their diseases, and stealing our food, our goods, and, indeed, our honor. To the eyes of Reorx, a state of war has always existed between his hard-working, devoted children, the mountain dwarves, and these bastardized pests who have so long infested this nation.

  To this end, the Aghar “gully” dwarves are banned from Thorbardin. Those who do not leave within one week are sentenced to de
ath. Death may be administered by any male or female dwarf of clans Hylar, Daergar, Daewar, Theiwar, or Klar.

  At the discretion of the clan thane, a bounty not to exceed five steel pieces may be paid for every Aghar head produced at the clan bounty house. The bounty is limited to adult gully dwarves; the little nits who survive, assuredly, will not be long for life.

  It is hereby announced that the gully dwarf “thane,” Grumple Nagfar, has already been put to death. His throne has been removed from the Council of Thanes, never to be restored.

  Such edicts are written be decree of the king high thane, and to all Thorbardin they shall be known as law.

  Signed

  King High Thane Jungor Stonespringer

  ONE

  Scum Gutters of a gharhome

  Plop.

  Gus watched the globule of sludge fall from the ceiling, plummeting-as he had known it would-straight down onto Pap’s bald, wrinkled pate. The ball of gooey liquid exploded noisily, spattering Mam and Birt. But most of the gunk ran down Pap’s face or draped his very prominent ears like the draperies that used to ornament Thane Grumple Nagfar’s palace. (Gus had seen the palace once when Thane Highbulp Nagfar, drunk, had fallen down outside the drain hole that was his palace entrance, and Gus, who also was drunk, had tripped over the thane and tumbled down the slick and slimy shaft.)

  Just as he had anticipated the sludge’s fall, Gus knew what would happen next.

  “Move!” Pap snapped, roughly elbowing Mam from her small rock and sidling sideways to claim the newly vacated seat. His own perch, the largest rock in the entire Fishbiter household, he left unoccupied.

  Mam kicked One Eye (Birt was his real name, but the family called him One Eye ever since that thing that happened when the brothers were fishing) over and took the space on the floor where he had been sitting. It was the only flat spot on the rocky, rubble-strewn floor of the lightless house, so she settled herself there with a stern look at Birt, Ooz, and Gus.