"It's not the Peak of Flame," said Hadar.
"But what if it is?" replied the portly pirate. "Maybe Dendar the Night Serpent took the dragon's egg."
"This isn't the Peak of Flame," repeated the half-ore.
"I'm just sayin'. We don't know where we are. This could be the Peak, and if it is, and the Serpent took the dragon's egg, then this is the beginning of the end."
Clay heard a scuffle, then he felt his chin run smack into Hadar's back.
"This isn't the Peak of Flame", Hadar said one more time.
They continued on. Around the next corner Clay began to see a faint red-orange glow. The smooth rock reflected the light, making the ground and the walls look quite slick. The farther they went, the brighter the light became. The curve in the passage continued around and finally opened into a large chamber.
A snaking pool of bubbling lava split the room in half. A walkway of hardened stone ran along each edge toward an opening on the other end. The red-orange of the molten stuff lit the room, exposing several jagged shelves and pillars of cooled lava.
"Look out!" shouted Tabor.
A dark figure fell upon them, concealed from above by one of the basalt shelves. Clay shifted to his right, bringing his dagger up with his left hand. The creature landed square upon the polished steel blade, and it let out a terrible noise-a scream that sounded like the combined anguish of a man and a wolf.
Still unable to make out what was attacking him, Clay pulled his impaled blade from the creature and swung back across its body. The beast lifted its head, its eyes locking with Clay's. The captain's dagger connected with the creature's neck, and the beast slumped to the ground, thrashing once then falling still.
Clay stepped back from the body. For lack of a better name, the creature on the ground before him was a dwarf. It was short and squat, and it's arms, chest, and legs were thick with ropy muscle. But other than general size and shape, the thing had no other resemblance to the civilized Tabor.
"Tabor, it's your cousin," quipped the half-ore.
"Laugh it up, pig boy," spat the dwarf.
"Enough." Clay leaned over the creature and asked, "What is this thing?"
"Looks like a wild dwarf," Tabor replied.
"A wild dwarf?"
"Not our greatest moment," Tabor admitted.
A loud hoot echoed through the chamber, and there wasn't time for further discussion. More of the scraggly figures dropped from the overhead shelves, filling the room. Clay and his mates were under attack by nearly two dozen wild dwarves.
In an instant Tabor had his rapier out and skewered the first of the mangy dwarves through the gut. Hadar ran another through with his stump knife. Mansa grabbed one by the forearms, locked into a grapple, but that was all Clay saw. The chamber turned into a flurry of claws and flying steel. The pirate captain knocked one attacker to the ground, burying a thrown dagger in his eye socket. Dodging left and right, slashing at eyes and avoiding teeth, he danced with the growling foes.
At one point he heard Mansa shout some words of praise to Umberlee. There was a brief flash of yellow light and half of the dwarves cowered from the portly pirate as if they had seen a pit fiend. In the clearing they left, Clay could see the bodies of at least half a dozen of the wild dwarves, lying at the feet of his mates. He'd killed three himself, and several were either cowering against the far wall or outright fleeing the chamber.
Hadar cut another through the belly, lifting a second off the ground with his good hand and hurling it into the bubbling lava. The creature let out a howling wail, and it thrashed like a man overboard in a tempest. Tendrils of black smoke rose from the dwarf's body, and its sustained cry of pain grew in pitch. Those bits of exposed flesh that weren't already submerged in the magma burst into flame, and in a flash of orange-yellow, the flailing dwarf was consumed.
Two of the wild dwarves stood before Tabor, menacing him with their claws, but the well-dressed pirate held them both at bay with the tip of his rapier. He was cut across the face, and his normally well-kept pantaloons had a large tear across his thigh. Though bloodied, he looked no worse for the fight than just a couple of scrapes.
The half-ore was another story. From head to toe he was covered in blood. There was no way to know if it was his own or the blood of his foes. Most of the time, he wielded his stump knife with great finesse. But sometimes his bloodlust got to him, and he became a bit more messy.
"What I wouldn't give to be back in the Copper Coronet right now," mumbled the captain under his breath.
Clay remained mostly untouched. The first of the mangy creatures had caught hold of his left hand with its grimy claws. He had a painful cut along his thumb and down his forearm, but he'd had worse. During the course of the fight, all four pirates had worked their way into the middle of the room. They were precariously close to the pool of lava, and the captain took a step back from the edge, just for good measure.
Turning to check on Mansa, he heard the first mate yell, "Look out!"
Clay glanced up just in time to see another wave of dwarves climbing toward them. Unlike those they had fought in the first wave, some carried heavy clubs and several even had good steel weapons. If it was the whole tribe, Clay had no intention of parlaying with their leader.
"Run!" he shouted.
Reaching the opening on the other end, Clay glanced back over his shoulder. Tabor was right on his heels. Mansa was several steps behind, and Hadar was covering the rear. There must have been at least fifty wild dwarves already on the cavern floor, and more poured down the walls.
Ducking his head, Clay plunged himself into, the pitch-black tunnel, fleeing what was surely a massacre. His right hand on the wall, his eyes open as wide as they would go, Clay charged through the tunnel as fast as his feet could carry him. At any moment he expected to be knocked flat by a low hanging stalagmite. Behind him he could hear the labored breathing of his mates and the cacophony of footsteps of their pursuers.
The dark cavern took a sharp right turn, and Clay nearly lost his balance making the corner.
"Hard starboard," he shouted, then he dashed on.
Around the corner, the light began to grow. Bursting out of the darkness, Clay entered a large, hollowed-out chamber. The floor roiled and popped, being little more than a lake of molten lava. A narrow ledge snaked its way halfway across the chamber along the cavern walls. Overhead, huge stalactites hung from a shadowy ceiling, looking like inverted mountaintops.
In the center of the molten lake, splayed out over a mound of hardened black stone were five glowing pillars arranged in a semicircle. They seemed to defy everything about the place. Made from a translucent blue stone lit from inside by a brilliant white light, the pillars looked like huge icicles, light and cool in the smoldering bowls of an active volcano. In the center of the crystals, inscribed on the basalt of the cavern floor, was a series of arcane runes, lit just like the pillars, each touching the next until together they made a half-moon shape. At the focal point of the two crescents sat a tremendous gemstone.
"Praise the Bitch Queen," blurted Mansa.
The first mate froze, his eyes locked on the precious stone as if it were a siren. As big as the world's largest half ling, the teardrop-shaped topaz glowed a deep orange-red, lit by the molten lava.
"The dragon's egg," whispered Clay.
The island the egg sat upon was surrounded on all sides by burbling lava, except for a small walkway that led to a large opening at the far end of the cavern.
The first of the dwarves began pouring into the chamber. The mangy creatures seemed to almost roll over one another in a frenzy to reach the four pirates. Hadar was already in a crouch, ready to take the first of them. Tabor pushed past Mansa to back up the half-ore. Balancing on the ledge of hardened lava, he held his rapier poised to strike.
"We're trapped," Clay said as he looked to the hardened lava island. It was too far to jump. He pulled his daggers and prepared to fight. "If you've got any bright ideas or last words, now would be a good time to voice 'em."
The scrabbling sounds of the wild dwarves racing around the edge of the chamber came to an abrupt stop. The riling mass turned toward the small entrance to the cavern and collectively dropped to their knees.
Through the sudden silence, a voice boomed through the cave, "Who dares enter the chamber of Ras Nsi?"
From out of the darkness a figure appeared. Tall and lean, his skin looked pale and unhealthy even in the ruddy red glow of the molten lake. His eyes were sunken and his head shaved. But the most remarkable feature was a blue triangle, tattooed in the middle of the man's forehead.
Clay turned to Hadar and asked, "Ras Nsi?"
The half-ore replied, "A bara who hunted down and exterminated the Eshowe people for their crimes against Ubato." Hadar glanced back at his captain. "That was four thousand years ago."
"You recognize that mark?" Clay asked, pointing to his own forehead.
"It's from Mezo," said the half-ore. "The holy city."
"What does it mean?"