Dark Thane

12

Tarn refused to be carried into Thorbardin, though Mog and Otaxx argued all the way to the mountain's door. The entrance into Thorbardin was made to look like the rock surrounding it, so that when it was closed, it was invisible to those who did not know its secret. The morning of Tarn's return, the massive valve, several feet thick, had already been opened. Hundreds of dwarves crowded the streets near the gate, awaiting their king. A drum and pipe band stood just within the entrance. Their enormous bronze kettledrums looked more like weapons of war than instruments of music.

But though they had come prepared for a celebration, the mood swiftly darkened upon Tarn's approach. Tarn had insisted that those slain in the battle with the draconians, and those too wounded to walk, should proceed ahead of him into the mountain. These long lines of litters dampened the spirits of the crowd, and so did the walking wounded. They were followed by the soldiers from Pax Tharkas, many of them returning home for the first time in years.

Last of all came Tarn, walking slowly and grimly, with Mog, Otaxx, Ferro, and Ilbars in attendance. Tarn's face was pale from the wound to his chest, but also from the deeper wound to his soul. The people had come expecting a triumphant return, with the king leading his army of thousands. Fewer than a hundred actually passed through the gates of Thorbardin, and most of those returning were either wounded or carrying some wounded or dead member of their party. Many of those waiting at the gate shook their heads in dismay. "So few?" some muttered. Others hoped that the majority of the army was still in the forest, helping the elves hunt down the last of Beryl's army. But most realized that to be a vain and empty hope. They began to grumble among themselves.

Once through the gate, the survivors entered a broad hall carved into the heart of the mountain. Streets, alleys, and doors opened into it at regular intervals, and windows lined the way, filled with dwarven faces staring down at them anxiously. Tarn ordered the gate closed, while the various groups quickly split up-the wounded toward the houses of healing, those bearing the dead toward the clan centers where their families were already gathering to claim them. Otaxx led the soldiers from Pax Tharkas to temporary guard quarters on the third level. Tarn, accompanied by Mog and a small squad of guards, followed the wounded. Ilbars stuck close to Tarn. Ferro was not far behind.

Tarn's new city of Norbardin was not so grand and humbling as the cities it sought to replace. Before the Chaos War, all the different clans had had their own cities scattered around the great cavern and underground sea that lay at the heart of the mountain. The Daergar had lived in Daerbardin, far to the south across the black Urkhan Sea, while the Daewar inhabited Daebardin on the sea's eastern shore. The Hylar, hereditary rulers of Thorbardin, lived in a magnificent city carved from an enormous stalactite that hung over the Urkhan Sea. Called the Life Tree of the Hylar, it had been one of the marvels and wonders of all Krynn. But now the Life Tree was dead, most of it having broken off and fallen into the sea following the Chaos War. Chaos dragons of fire had burned tunnels through the solid rock, weakening it structurally until it could no longer hold its own weight.

Tarn had carved his new city from the area known as the North Gate complex. Once its halls and galleries had served to house those guarding the North Gate of Thorbardin, and for hundreds of years it had remained largely unoccupied except for a few soldiers, for once the massive gate of Thorbardin was closed, the mountain was virtually impregnable to assault. Under Tarn's direction, the dwarves had expanded the halls and houses, built shops and markets, and carved new tunnels into the stone. But most of the new construction consisted of filling the vast area known as the Anvil's Echo with new warehouses, barracks, strongholds, residences, and butteries. The Echo had once been a vast pit crossed by a narrow bridge. But the dwarves' immediate need following the Chaos War was for living space, and the Anvil's Echo had first served as a refugee camp, then gradually the temporary structures were replaced with permanent ones. The soaring bridge had fallen during the war and was never rebuilt. The Anvil's Echo was now the location of the Daergar and Theiwar quarters of the city, a dark region with close alleys and narrow streets, and high defensive walls separating the people of the two clans. The son of a Daergar mother, Tarn felt as much or more at home here as in the lamplit, glittering marble-paved boulevards of the Hylar section.