Kjell's Arc

Chapter 13 of 27

The coin lay cold in Kjell's palm, but its rune still burned. He turned it north, toward the hall's broken door. The glow pulled that way, steady, like a needle to iron. Somewhere under the mountain the true master waited. Kjell knew the direction now. He did not know the road. Peaks ringed the hold on every side, and no path he had walked led through them. "North," Kjell said. "But north how? We'd freeze crossing those ridges blind." Thorin leaned on his father's axe. His knees had carried him through the whole climb, and they shook now. "Then we don't cross blind," he said. Gunnar crossed to the far wall. He set his soot-black hand on the stone and pressed, the way he read metal at his forge. "Hollow," he said. "Behind this. Cut, not natural." Thorgar swung one axe and struck the wall. Stone cracked. He struck again, and a slab fell inward. Dust rolled out. Behind it a low passage ran back into the dark, its walls squared by old tools. Merlyn came to the gap by sound. His branded arms gave a dull light. He laid his fingers on the passage stone and stopped. "Marks here," he said. "Not a trap. A road-sign. Old work." Kjell held the coin into the passage. The glow brightened. "It agrees," he said. "This runs the way the coin points." Merlyn shook his head. "The stone won't tell me where it ends. Only that men cut it to reach the mountain's heart." He reached into his pack and drew out a heavy book. Its stone-toned covers were carved with pillars, cracked with age. He set it on the broken slab and opened it by touch. "This names the deep roads. If the sign matches a page, we know our path." Gunnar knelt and lit the last splinters at the passage mouth. The small fire threw light on the open book. Merlyn traced the carved sign, then dragged his fingers down the page. Kjell watched the marks. He read what he could. A road named. A gate at its far end, under the northern peak. "There," Kjell said. "This tunnel meets the deep road. The road ends at a gate below the master." Merlyn closed the book. "Then we don't cross the peaks. We go under them." Thorgar hefted both axes and stepped into the dark first. His shoulders scraped the walls. Thorin followed, slower, one hand on the stone. Gunnar gathered the coals into a clay pot to carry the fire ahead. Kjell stood at the threshold with the coin. The glow leaned down the passage, sure now, no longer lost. He had a road. He closed his fist on the coin and went into the mountain after the others. The dark swallowed the last of the hall's light. Ahead, the tunnel dropped. The air turned colder, and it smelled of old stone and something worse beneath it.