Gwen watched as a work crew rushed off into the Grand Forge to free the trapped pilots of the Dreadnaught with something resembling the Jaws of Life. With any hope, the survivors were badly concussed and only half-alive, but alive—for disabilities could be mended or augmented and whatever temporary agony they were in could be resolved with Essence-infused Maotai.

  On their side of the wrecked smithery, Hilda and Urmrak Kül, her great uncle, stood face to face in the open, one side smouldering with sulphur and Magma, watched by a ring of Golems with shimmering Spell Swords, the other lonesome and deflated.

  “Welcome home, Daughter of the Lumen,” the Balefire’s vox units poured out a shameful confession like lava oozing from the earth. “Though our home, dear child, is now the possession of another.”

  As a Mage blessed with the means to decipher archaic Dwarven, Gwen paused for thought.

  She had heard this narrative before.

  The Dwarves dug too greedily and too deep… they awoke in the darkness of Khazad-dum... shadow and flame.

  But the cautionary tale wasn’t parallel, as far Gwen could discern. Here, the Dragon had always been there, and the Dwarves were merely doing what normal civilisations do when their population expands. Insofar as she could judge, there was no avarice, no good versus evil. If anything, Deepholm’s problems were as natural a disaster as they come, with the anomaly being why a balance of power held for longer than Human history had disintegrated overnight.

  “Regent—!” Hilda called out. “May I introduce you to Great Uncle?”

  With absolute confidence that her unique Contingency Ring would resolve a king punch, Gwen strode forth, followed closely by Strun and his long, tailing shadows.

  “This is the Regent of the citadel-above, Magister Gwen Song of London, commander of the Rat-kin forces, and Pale Priestess to a covenant of millions.”

  Billions… Gwen mentally corrected the Dwarf’s calculations even as she agreed the final part should be omitted from any reasonable introduction.

  As she closed the distance in her crow-skin armour, Gwen marvelled at the experience of meeting her second Balefire Dreadnaught in the flesh, or metal, if she had to be pedantic. Akin to the one she had soul flayed, Urmrak was enormous, creating the impression that she was talking to an anthropomorphic building. Unlike her prior encounter, however, Urmrak radiated an aura of control where its addled peer had only exhibited loathing and rage. Even close enough to touch, the Balefire’s glowing exterior with its blue-white Runescript reminded her of a hearth fire rather than the Magma that fuelled its internal furnace.

  “A Daughter who leaves the Deep Dark returns with a Regent and her armies, feet soiled by the mud of the Himsegg, trailing filth over the sacred grounds of the Ancestors.” Urmrak’s low voice sounded like an echo chamber. “Were the city not lost, Daughter, such acts would be Vadam.”

  “It’s nice to meet you too, Lord Urmrak,” Gwen replied in what she hoped was archaic Dwarven. “If you have strong feelings for our presence, shall we vacate the Forge at your behest?”

  The Balefire shook its head, shedding ash like dandruff, adding to its air of smouldering melancholy. “Us dead have no authority here, as spoken by the Ancestors. As the sole remaining voice of the Deep Speakers, the Daughter may proceed as she pleases.”

  Gwen turned to Hilda, whose grimness made Gwen forgive the Balefire’s xenophobia.

  “Grand Uncle, we need to know what happened,” Hilda was, to Gwen’s admiration, still in full control of her rational faculties. If she were to arrive at a shattered Shanghai, and everyone she knew was missing or gone; she could not guarantee the ruins would remain standing. “Is it safe for us to make camp at the entrance? How did Deepholm fall? What happened in the thirty cycles since my departure?”

  The smaller Balefires flared—though with a wave of his hand, the living bonfires calmed themselves.

  “Tis a short tale,” Urmrak’s voice was so low Gwen could feel her chest resonating with the Balefire’s simmering furnace. “We were first infiltrated, then betrayed.”

  So they didn’t find an Arkenstone. Gwen felt reassured. Betrayals and infiltration were, at the very least, people's problems that could be solved by feeding the people responsible to Caliban.

  A part of her wanted to find a place to sit so their army could grab a cup and listen. Urmrak’s tale, however, proved far shorter and more succinct than her wild projections of conspiracy.

  “As you may know from the Daughter, when the Black Dragon’s Awakening severed the Low-ways, the Deep Council desperately sought to break through the mangled Dyar Morkk and reconnect with the Citadels. With food running low and rations restraining every aspect of labour, the Deepdowners divined pathways that lead to the still-active Echo Stones.”

  Gwen knew of the Echo Stones, for the Low-way Divination Repeaters crafted by Petra’s magic were derived from the same material and designs, only adapted for general use by Humans and Dwarves.

  “However, in place of our kin, the expeditions found dead ends, failed shafts, monstrous creatures, and Will Devourers.”

  Sinneslukare. Gwen mouthed silently.

  “Sinneslukare. That’s what our Kin of the Northern Citadels call them,” Hilda clarified for the Balefire. “I was captured by an Engineseer who tried to implant one of their larvas in my head. Gwen here saved me, and we exorcised them from our citizens with the help of her unique bodily fluids. Those same fluids can also act as a deterrent to new infection.”

  The Balefire’s glowing coal eyes made Gwen’s exposed face bronze with their curiosity.

  Gwen felt her cheeks burn. Thankfully, the Balefires thought nothing of her bodily secretions.

  “We know of these creatures now,” Gwen added. “In the surface realm, they are also becoming a persistent… weapon used by our mutual foes.”

  “So, the Sinneslukare,” the Balefire moved its head slowly. “An apt name. Unfortunately, we possessed no means to understand these creatures or their goals. When finally one of their kind was accidentally revealed in a heated council debate, enough of them had found their way into the helms of our Deepdowners that the discovery was dismissed.”

  “Did the Sinneslukare open the gates of Vrithr avor Il-Jrogor?” Hilda asked, her voice tense with sadness. “Is that how our home fell?”

  “No,” the Balefire once again controlled its kindred. “Worse. The Dragon was summoned from within the Heart Furnace. The Gates of Il-Jrogor became our doom, for none could escape when it remained steadfastly sealed.”

  An unpleasant flashback to the statues at the gate told Gwen all she needed to know.

  “That means—” Hilda’s face was a mask of pain. “The majority of the Deepdowners were... changed? No one else can access the Sacred Singularity at the centre of the Heart Furnace. That knowledge was guarded directly by the descendants of the Ancestors.”

  “We do not know, dear Daughter,” the Balefire moved its limbs, stirring the airflow with its heat. “Dhànthárian the Hungerer was already there when we forced open the inner sanctum. Inside, my brother Balefires were all consigned to the forge. We fought as best as we could, Golems, Balefires, warriors, miners and mechanics all, but there was no dislodging the beast from the energy source it had desired for half of eternity. Its kin poured from the Heart Forge like a tide, and we could do nothing.”

  “Is the creature that strong?” Gwen asked for the sake of her Rat-kin. “Balefire Golems such as yourself were no match?”

  Urmrak’s face remained impassive. “Our supplies were constrained, our people starved. Our leaders were turned or gone, and our miners were being burnt alive or turned to stone everywhere we fought.”

  “I am so sorry,” Gwen gave her most sincere condolences. “I truly am.”

  “Nonetheless, Dhànthárian is not insurmountable,” the Golem rumbled. “We’ve bested it for millenniums. But neither could we extinguish its life, nor could it penetrate our city’s walls. Deepholm was overcome because we had never fought Dhànthárian as a creature tapped into the ley-line the Ancestors had harnessed for our people, and we had no tools to exorcise it.”

  “Great Uncle,” Hilda spoke softly but audibly. “Where are our people now?”

  The Balefire’s gaze swept over its smaller counterparts.

  “I do not know,” the Balefire’s reply made their hearts grow cold. “Many were turned already, but those were talented smiths, seers, warriors and craftsmen. Many more were eaten or petrified. I can only assume they were relocated somewhere, for all that remains in our home now are relics like myself and the Reforged.”

  “Reforged?” Gwen turned to look at the smaller Balefires.

  “The Soul Forge was the last to be sealed.” Urmrak gazed again at the smaller, mute Balefires with a glow of reverence and sadness. “Those who remained in the Crafter’s Guild had no more food, no more water, only their souls, their grudge, and all the knowledge and tools necessary to make a final stand.”

  “How many of you were there?” Hilda bowed her head at the smaller Balefires, who did not seem to acknowledge her. “These brothers and sisters, can they not speak?”

  “Most in history had not survived the ascension,” the Balefire reminded them. “Even Engineseers emerge with a part of their minds melded into the metal, much less smiths and warriors of the middle castes. There were ten thousand of us, though most were hunted down or scattered now into the depths of Deepholm. Some went mad when they left the mould, running into the deep dark, screaming bloody vengeance. Others perished right there, liquified by the molten metal.”

  Gwen shivered despite her supreme constitution. Ten thousand Dwarves, lowering themselves into the Soul Forge with the fatal determination of Schwarzenegger’s robot ego.

  “Will the Dragon return?” She asked. “We need to replan our approach if so.”

  “It is safe enough here, for now.” Urmrak readjusted its frame. “The Dragon drinks deep the flames that once kept our nation warm and prosperous, slumbering away the time as its body grows uglier. Only its minions find their way to Deepholm’s crust, and those we exterminate in the hope that a part of our home will be preserved for those who return.”

  “If you were expecting us,” Gwen raised a point of contention. As Regent, she could afford the occasional rudeness. “Why did you attack Hilda’s Dwarves?”

  The Balefire glowered. “Strangely specced machines, aliens clad in metal and Humans Mages do not make for a triumphant return of the true heir. You seem more like an army collected by the Will Devourers, here to loot the city.”

  “Reasonable,” Gwen decided not to pursue the matter. “Hilda. What’s the plan?”

  “We will recover the city,” Hilda said without hesitation. “Great Uncle, if we exorcise the Dragon. can we return the city’s core functions to normal? Are the great Machines still operational? There are a great many number of us living on the surface, and most still harken for the sacred depths of Deepholm. If we can make it safe, our home can be repopulated, remade.”

  “The foundries are asleep, damaged, but will function if coaxed by the right prayers and repairs,” the Balefire clenched its fist. “But, Daughter, I do not know how our people may dislodge cruel Dhànthárian from the Heart Cog.”

  This time, Gwen noted Hilda was looking intently toward herself.

  With a little arrogance, she concurred that Hilda had come to the right place.

  “Regent!”

  Gwen looked up from her ornate, Elf-carved divan, then lit up when she saw that her personal guard and the Marshal of her forces had returned. She genuinely felt for poor Lulu, who had been in a slump since Tianjin, where she had been the Yinglong’s scalpel and had clashed with her self-nominated role as Gwen’s defender.

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  After Shalkar’s calamity and its subsequent restoration, the Sword Mage regained her confidence by practising what she had preached. Tirelessly, she had worked for the city of the “saviour” who had plucked her from the maws of a carrion slug, cowing Rat-kin, Centaur and Humans alike.

  “Lulu,” Gwen hugged her Marshal, disregarding the decorum of their mutual office, then turned to the advisor she had sent for after their conversation with the Balefire. “Alex, welcome to Deepholm.”

  “I am welcomed.” The Red Dragon was evidently anticipating a similar act of intimacy, and after a moment of hesitation, Gwen gave it. The intimacy seemed to stimulate Slylth, whose body grew rigid as her arms enveloped his waist and her nose briefly brushed the side of his cheeks.

  “All supplies are accounted for, and the reserve forces are ready, Regent,” Lulan reported after straightening her body suit, its design custom-made by Dwarven masters to allow the generation of disposable reactive iron plates. “Richard reports increased movements from the Russian Towers. From the looks of it, they’re laying down supplies and creating countermeasures against Garp by modifying their side of the terrain.”

  “The Russians are renovating my lands, are they?” Gwen scoffed. She knew that Moscow had not committed its forces only because of the uncertainty of her Dragons, her Shoggoth, and her Garp. And now, considering what they saw here in Dwarf home, the destruction only showed the importance of countries espousing the MAD Doctrine—her personal acronym for Mutually Assured Dragon.

  Hence, she had asked Slylth to descend into the depths.

  “Richard says that you may exercise your full attention here, and that he and Natalia have everything under control, insofar as control can be asserted,” Lulan spoke with her legs slightly apart, looking very much the commanding officer. “Petra has sent over a thousand Stone to Flesh potions, and she’s in the process of securing the Greater variants. Magister Walken said he will source a score of experts from London, incase the potions fails to satisfy.”

  “Good on em,” Gwen trusted her seconds like she trusted her right hand and knew that her cousins rarely disappointed.

  Besides Lulan, the ever-curious Slylth was taking in the sights, marvelling at the home of the Dwarves and taking mental notes.

  “Slylth, sit, I require your counsel.”

  The Dragon-kin sat on her divan, taking up most of the space.

  Gwen lowered her gaze to the small space left for herself beside the Dragon-kin. Whether intentional or otherwise, the Red Dragon had thrown his gauntlet, and she was happy to receive it.Waltzing past the contemplative gaze of her companion, she sat heavily on the cushion, depressing the padding so that their hips touched.

  Awakened from his fascination with Deepholm, Slylth stared at her face.

  “We’ve got a Dragon problem down here,” Gwen said with a hand on her counsel’s knee, using her fingers to trace the circumference of his patella. “A BIG problem.”

  Slylth’s eyes darted left and right, likely wondering if there was a lumen recorder set up somewhere, possibly by his gregarious cousin, Golos. Ahead, Lulan looked on without so much as a blink.

  “I’ve er… heard,” the Dragon-kin cleared his throat. “Dhànthárian, is it? The Great Earth Wyrm.”

  “He sounds so harmless when you say it like that,” Gwen winced at the recollection of the Dragon’s victims. “This is far more serious, Alex. A lot of Dwarves died. A lot.”

  “I understand,” the Dragon nodded, though Gwen could see that the lizard in front of her was merely borrowing her sympathy rather than feeling sympathy from the depth of his draconic guts. After all, Slylth was young, and his only domain was his private abode in the World Tree of Shalkar. While the Dragon might feel for his favourite Rat-kin cooks or the Harpies who played checkers with him in the Sky Garden, he certainly saw the Dwarves as mere faces in the numberless crowd of her followers—not unlike her attitude toward the minnows in her Shoal.

  “As someone inducted into The Accord,” Gwen continued. “I know that the Dragons have this agreement. If someone attacks a Dragon and succeeds in maiming it or its young, the rest of the Dragons are bound to respond.”

  “This is correct.” Slylth nodded. “Not all are equally enthused, of course. Uncle Tyfanevius would certainly make a move. Mother would put in a stern word or send someone to do her bidding, while our cousins of the Frost wouldn’t even spare a glance. Furtherer abroad, some of the older Dragons might blow up an unrelated city to prove a point.”

  “So, does Dhànthárian have mates?” Gwen asked. “Is he or she a popular Dragon?”

  “He.” Slylth answered. “At least as mother spoke of him. Maybe he might change his mind if a good brooding partner is found, but those are rarer at his age.”

  The Red Dragon paused for thought. Gwen noticed that a scholarly hand was also walking onto her knee. She allowed it since they seemed to be playing a game. That, and she was wearing her crow skin plates.

  Slylth winced when he touched a spiky Da-peng feather, making her smirk.

  “What does your Draconic Burke’s Peerage say about our Wyrm?” Gwen asked. “Any war crimes other than this one? Do we have cause to claim Deepholm other than the obvious rationale that Hilda remains its rightful… heir?”

  Slylth took a moment to organise his thoughts. Gwen liked the bookish face the Dragon made when in deep thought, because it reminded her of simpler days among peers in Fudan.

  “… Lord Dhànthárian is an Elder Drake, younger than mother, much younger than Uncle Tyfanevius. I would place him around the same age as the Yinglong, though Earthen Dragons hail from a less sagacious and celestial bloodline. He’s a bit mysterious since he rarely makes his spirit known, and kin at mother’s level of prestige would never consider him a peer. As far as I know, he doesn’t have direct siblings or close allies other than his spawns. His original domain as well, is unknown to us.”

  “You guy meet in spirit, huh?” Gwen tried to imagine an online meeting where Dhànthárian was permanently stuck with a low-frame stream while the nobler Dragons projected their will in HD 4K THX Surround Sound.

  “Well, what happens when we make a move with Hilda?” Gwen moved to the next stage. “I want Deepholm back to its rightful people.”

  Slylth straightened his back. “For one, we can’t use strategic magic here. It’s too deep in the Elemental Plane of Earth. You’ll need Creatures Cores from truly ancient beings to power your Mandalas. Your powers are also poorly matched against Dhànthárian, whose scales are impervious to magic and only slightly less impervious to immense force. Of course, if you get very lucky with the Black Blade...”

  “No general Void Magic?”

  “There isn’t enough here for you to eat,” Slylth looked at the Dwarves tinkering with the silent foundries. “Biomass is scarce down here, you realise.”

  “So I’ve been told,” Gwen thought of the Dwarves’ unending search for food and water. “Dhànthárian’s not good eating?”

  “I can’t answer that,” Slylth gave her a mournful look. “The energy you will spend to pierce Dhànthárian’s carapace will be truly obscene.” “Hmm…” Gwen grew contemplative.

  “Can the Dwarves share?” Slylth asked something ridiculous. “Ruxin seems to do well with the human under his rule, and they’re happier for it.”

  “The Dwarves need that Forge and its Singularity to fuel the city, not feed a Dragon,” Gwen said. “Do you think Dhànthárian will share?”

  “A loner like that is probably not the sharing kind,” Slylth conceded.

  “Right, we go on the offense then?” Gwen considered the possibility of flooding Deepholm with her Lampreys.

  “Not quite. According to what Mother has taught me, we need to contact Dhànthárian and formally challenge his claim to Deepholm. As a member of The Accord, and a Guardian blessed with both a domain and the Essence of an Elder being, you’re certainly qualified to make that claim.”

  “I can’t just ambush him?” Gwen thought about how she might speak to this Dhànthárian, especially when he had committed a whole catacomb of atrocities in the decades since his capture of the city. “Sneak a Caliban up his…”

  Slylth coughed, almost choking on his next words. “If you want to establish yourself with that reputation, you'll open Shalkar to the same treatment. When some avaricious Dragon takes a liking to your domain, Mother and Uncle won’t be able to intervene if someone ambushes you or your city out of the blue.”

  “Okay, then what?” Gwen asked, striking the young man’s knee. “You know, for primordial beings with the power of the forces of nature, you guys seem awful keen on convention.”

  “You realise the Dragons that remain are the survivors of a time when there was no convention.” Slylth faced her with his ruby red orbs, which made her think of rare jewellery. “The rest have found their peace in the Unformed Land, or simply found their peace, through ultraviolence and the altering of landmarks.”

  “This is the Elemental Plane of Earth,” Gwen reminded her Red Dragon. “Do the rules still count?”

  “They count if you make an effort. Nonetheless, I don’t think you’ll be able to negotiate Dhànthárian away from his new home, considering how long he has schemed to acquire it,” Slylth said sadly. “The Dwarves will pay with lives, and us as well. Killing Dhànthárian is as likely as China dislodging the Yinglong, though we can vex him enough to make him leave once the damage piles up.”

  “Not to mention he might be working with the Sinneslukare. You know, I am getting a bit sick of hearing about these brain-bug buggers.”

  “They’re desperate as well,” Slylth remarked. “Most survivors from the Far Planes are. Mother says there’s no guarantee their fragment Planes won’t implode at any time, for any reason, so any chance they get to latch onto stability, they will.”

  “Not with that attitude, they’re not. But first, we need to make our intentions known.” Gwen growled. “Does Dhànthárian have a postal address?”

  Slylth cocked a brow. “You know where he lives. He’s down there, isn't he?”

  “What, put myself in front of his fucking face?” Gwen pictured herself standing before an open maw and a gullet resembling a tunnelling machine from a Frank Herbert movie. “That doesn’t seem fair.”

  Her Red Dragon placed a hand on her shoulder, squirmed at the Da-pend feathers under his transmuted flesh, then retracted his digits.

  “You want to contest his domain like a Dragon—then you need to confront him like one,” Slylth snorted. “On my end, I can inform Mother and Uncle so that if Dhànthárian does come crying to the Elder Council, they’re forewarned of his deceptions and may tell him to go eat dirt.”

  “Fine. Then I shall inform our allies.” Gwen stood, then ruffled a bit of her Dragon’s copper-coloured hair. “Thank you, Slylth. Lulu, come. You’re with me.”

  “Any time,” the Dragon rested a hand on where she sat a moment ago. “When you do get down there, don’t be too rude to Dhànthárian. He’s an elderly being, and they’re too old to change.”

  When Gwen returned, the Dwarven pilots had been recovered, and the rest of the expedition was settling into the Forge to reignite parts of it required to construct fortifications of a forward operating base capable of making terrestrial Dragons mildly annoyed.

  After what amounted to permission from Urmrak, the Rat-kin were free to map the city, considering that the sacred places were either sealed by the final efforts of their defenders, looted by brain-wormed Dwarves, or laid to waste by a possessive Dragon whose only purpose was to make himself a nest free of its prior owners.

  Advanced orders were given to retreat if they found hostile Balefires, and the squad leaders were given hastily forged Rune plates that projected Urmrak and Hilda’s signature Glyphs, though either was likely futile against survivors driven mad by the reforge.

  At the centre of what looked like a Golem Foundry, Gwen and Lulan met again with their hosts. Urmark was receiving much-needed maintenance on his body’s internal wear and tear while Hilda and Axehoff mulled over the growing sand-scape map of their spherical home, lubricating their thoughts with generous steins of Mao-tai.

  “… So that’s how it is, regarding Dhànthárian,” Gwen explained. “If I challenge the old bloke as a member of the Accord as its equal, things will be different to if we simply attempted to murder it in the Heart Forge by, say, collapsing this Singularity of yours.”

  Earlier, Hilda and Axehoff had been devising designs for machines that could capture, crush, dismember, and likely annoy the Great Wyrm Below. However, as Gwen explained, there were only two ways to convince Dhànthárian to leave Deepholm semi-permanently. The first was to gut the Wyrm and shatter its core—an impossible prospect, and the second was to have it grudgingly concede Deepholm to a superior Dragon.

  When her delivery finished, the Deepdowners fell into a prolonged silence.

  Hilda sighed deep and long. “We owe you much, Regent. Yet, I did not think we would owe Deepholm itself to you. If you succeed, every Dwarf who finds his home in the Ancestor’s Halls would be your willing vassal, proudly so at that.”

  Gwen said nothing. Every other time she wanted to be polite and say that she was doing things for the Dwarves out of the necessity of her good heart, the Dwarves fought back with a ferocity that bordered on violence. For a boon as large as the recovery of their ancestral home, not even she could imagine how their relationship may progress.

  “A Debt of Haj-Zül can be repaid in generations,” the voice of the Balefire spoke from the swirling steam and sparks conjured by the artisans. “But it will be repaid. To the Regent, her children, and her children’s children.”

  “The Regent will be around for a long time, Great Uncle.” Hilda had not fully explained Gwen’s particular advantages. “She will outlive all of us and remain even when your Core splutters and your gears are grounded smooth.”

  “Then let us be indentured to the Godling,” Urmrak rumbled. “Whatever else we may lose, the Ancestor’s Hall cannot be barred. The Foundry cannot be left to cool, and a Dragon must not usurp the Heart Forge. I shall not fault your people, Daughter, if you so choose to abandon Deepholm. Many of your Murk folk are children of the Himmseg. They owe their callous home nothing.”

  Axehoff looked to both herself and Hilda.

  “No, Deepholm will be restored,” the Deepdowner reiterated Hilda’s intent. “We will not be a people without a homeland. Regent, what do you need?”

  “According to Slylth, I need to shirt-front Dhànthárian,” she said, then realised the Ioun Stone had translated her Gwenism. “Which means we need to confront him vis-a-vis. There’ll be some sort of negotiation that involve threats, and then hopefully, I return in one piece, and we get the whole operation started.”

  “How shall we fight?” Axehoff looked at her with grim seriousness. “Many of our expedition are volunteers, and many still have little ties to Deepholm. I am not sure we can ask them to lay down their lives in what would be a futile struggle to reclaim our heritage.”

  “Well,” Gwen pepped up with confidence. After speaking with Slylth, she had been thinking about how to deal with the Earthen Wyrm, and she had thought deeply about that very subject, especially the cruel and immature bullshit she had done to earthworms when she was a bored kid neglected by Helena. “Slylth said that we won’t be able to kill Dhànthárian no matter what we did. My Void powers would tickle it, and my lightning would do nothing. My Shoggoth might give it a good go, though success would mean a whole legion of upset Dragons who shall see me as an existential threat. However, he did say that our purpose is to discourage Dhànthárian, and that means we need to vex him enough to consider Deepholm not worth the candle.”

  The Deepdowners looked at her, equally perplexed.

  “Dhànthárian is attracted to the Elemental Magma, and he’s incubating himself in the energy. Now, what if we’re able to make Deepholm completely hostile to his purpose?”

  “How?” Axehoff furrowed his white brows. “Every inch of the city was forged from steel and magma. How can we transmute Deepholm itself?”

  “Well, therein lies your sacrifice,” Gwen spoke with great care. “The gravity here is warped, correct? We’re standing here, but its downward force increases as we venture closer to the Heart Forge and the Singularity. That means everything in the city flows downwards unless re-directed by runes, ending up in the Heart Furnace created by your Ancestors. Correct?”

  “That is correct,” Hilda was equally puzzled. “Do you plan to vex Dhànthárian with garbage? Shalkar does indeed produce an incredible volume of refuse. The heat is great as we descend, however. I don’t think…”

  “Oh, no, no, no, nothing so crude,” Gwen opened both palms like a car salesman about to strike the deal of the century. “Did you forget I’ve got Leviathan Cores by the half-dozen? We’ve still got the Ancient Core, one that’s ready for action but yet to be mounted into the whalebone of my Tower. You recall the Strategic Mandala we engraved onto its foundation setting, don’t you? The one we’re going to use to tame Wildlands?”

  The Deepdowners’ eyes widened. “Oh no…”

  “Oh—YES,” Gwen nodded sagely. “My only concern, alas, is how well we can defend the Leviathan Core against Dhànthárian and how resilient your city may be to, say… forty cycles of unending, unyielding, all-consuming flood?”

  Vol 7 is out! (see below)

  New VOL 12 COVER - THE SEA OF FLAMES

  VOL 11 COVER - THE BLOOM IN WHITE! MISTRESS OF TRYFAN, QUEEN of the Elves of Light