[OOC: This was initially part of the second half of Interlude, but - Due to its length - it felt more natural as a separate chapter.]

"Yet man will never be perfect until he learns to create and destroy; he does know how to destroy, and that is half the battle."

― Alexander Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

Interlude - The Craftsman and the Dwarf

Feo Jera, Eleven Months Ago

The Stranger never slept.

Even in the eternal twilight of Feo Jera, where the sun never reached, there was an order to things. The Dwarves, perhaps more than anyone, were conscious of the cycles of day and night - For without structure, the mind would wander in dark places, unbound by the reassuring certainties of linear time. As all knew, that was a recipe for tunnel madness and paranoia, the slow twisting that turned a craftsman against himself.

But the Stranger never slept.

And so the city's lanterns and glowstones were dimmed or kindled in echo of the sun and moon, as the dwarves of Feo Jera went about their sunless days. Consciously or not, the rhythms of life in the city echoed the ones above: There was a time for work, for taking picks to the veins of ore in the mines, and a time to kick back in the White Beer or the Black-Gold Beard for mushroom stout or cloudwine.

Such was the way things had been, since time immemorial. Or so the dwarves would have preferred, given the choice.

But change had come, all the same. The wounds from the great war against the Evil Deities - more than two centuries ago - were still raw, but a more recent indignity had loomed. The blunt savagery of the Quagoa tribes had driven the dwarves from Feo Raizo, surrendering the results of more than a century's toil.

If anything, the loss of Feo Raizo rankled more than that first injury. For Feo Berkana, it was said, was a cursed place now: More, it was the home of a clutch of Frost Dragons, and little could be done about that. There was no shame, the Regency Council proclaimed, in accepting what could not be changed - And yet, it made the loss no less bitter.

Until now, at least.

For the impossible had happened: The Dragon Lord Olasid'arc Haylilyal and his kin had been slain, the gibbering hordes of the Quagoa driven wailing into the dark. A great and terrible slaughter had been wreaked, and with it came opportunity.

The mood in Feo Jera was almost festive, as the beginnings of a grand expedition slowly but surely took form. In less than a month, the dwarves would set foot in the halls of their ancestors, to lay claim to the ancient capital of Feo Berkana once again.

And, most astonishingly of all, the architect of all this had been a single man. Not some Dwarven hero or lost heir to the Runesmith King, but a human. Some itinerant adventurer, some wanderer. Kin to no-one, brother to none. An outsider, in all ways that mattered.

To some, it was a mark of shame. That it was - of all things - a human that had accomplished a task that the dwarves alone should have been set to. The glory of taking back Feo Berkana, it was argued, was tainted now: After all, the stalwarts of the Dwarven Army - who had once sworn a solemn oath, by dark and stone, to never rest until their ancestral homeland was restored to its rightful owners - had nothing to do with their salvation.

Others, more pragmatic, were simply grateful that the deed had been done. That the avaricious Frost Dragons and ferocious, ore-eating Quagoa alike had been put to the sword. In the words of the Regency Council, only a fool would argue with results.

If the greatest threats to the Dwarven Nation had been brought to heel by a surfacer, by some man - Known only by his absence of Dwarven lineage - what did it matter? In the end, it was the outcome that counted, not the steps taken to get there.

And so they toasted their good fortune. Praised the agent of their deliverance, but mostly their own foresight. For surely, it was their wisdom that had brought the Stranger amongst them, that had moved him to reclaim what had once been thought to be forever lost. Privately, they wondered at his nature: What kind of man was he, to take such a task upon himself?

Gondo Firebeard knew the truth, of course.

As others would later say:

The Stranger was not any kind of man at all.

A week after the cleansing of Feo Berkana, the Stranger had been brought before the Regency Council. Beyond the walls, the bodies of the Quagoa - Thousands upon thousands of them - had been heaped into great pyres, and the stench of burning had hung in the air like a miasma.

They'd thanked him for all he'd done for them. He would, the High Priest of Earth had informed him, be immortalized in the sagas, commended to the ever-watchful Gods. According to the Master of Caves and Mines, the Stranger would forever be a friend of the Dwarven Nation, welcome in Feo Jera for as long as he lived.

And, at last - once the formalities were observed - they asked him what he wanted.

The Merchant's Guildmaster had looked faintly queasy, as a thoughtful silence descended. By then, it was an open secret that the Stranger had claimed the horde of the Frost Dragons for himself, as was his right. With a King's ransom in his grasp, the Council had reasoned, the Stranger would need little more. The question would be posed, but what could a man who had everything possibly desire?

Yet the Guildmaster knew, better than anyone, that avarice had no limit: He feared what the Stranger might ask in return.

But it was the Forgemaster that the Stranger turned to, in the end.

"I have need of your forges," he'd said, simply. "-I wish to build."

Eyebrows had risen. Brows had furrowed, thoughtfully - But the Council had agreed, unanimously, that the Stranger's request was a worthy one. Cheap, too, at that price.

And so great fires had roared to life in the foundries, the familiar reeking smoke of heatstone pluming upwards in a choking fog. Alone, the Stranger set to his task, the sound of muffled workings wafting upwards at all hours, faint tremors coursing through the stone. Like all of Feo Jera was a giant mechanism, and they were merely passengers in it.

A week had passed, and then another. In all that time, the Stranger never left the halls set aside for him. Laden with ores both common and rare, rolling stock had rumbled down the railway, vanishing into a flame-lit gloom that rang with the echoing noises of industry. He paid for what he used, in ancient gold and glittering gems - Treasure from the horde of the Frost Dragons, put to a worthy use.

No visitors had been admitted. The curious saw only the carts returning, the workers well-paid for their silence.

At first, the Council had thought little of it. Only the Forgemaster had initially expressed reservations, stemming from his innate conservatism - A human, after all, had no place in a Dwarven forge - until he'd acquiesced, with surprising grace.

"A craftsman needs his privacy," he grumbled, tankard in hand. "-We agreed to this mannish folly. Best to leave him to it, I suppose." His brows had drawn together, and he'd briefly glowered at the others: Remembering, no doubt, of the many times he had been interrupted when at work.

All the same, guards had kept a close watch on the forge. Eventually, a low hum emanated from the stone - Strange, glowing lights flickering to existence behind the walls, shedding an eerie actinic glow. An unnatural sound, like the endless turning of great wheels, had joined the steady drone, audible even over the noises of a city girding itself to venture forth.

The days had passed, with no signs of an ending. At last, as curiosity had turned to dread, their thoughts had turned to the weapons the Stranger had employed against the Quagoa.

The stringless crossbows that spat forth endless volleys of magic bolts.

The great clouds of living, hungry flame, and the silver sand that blinded and maimed.

The spheres of razor wire, and the lanterns that turned flesh to salt.

The breakers-of-stone, and the Armageddon clocks.

"What could he be doing in there?" the High Priest had said, stroking his beard. "What is he building?"

Uneasily, thoughts had turned to things beyond belief: Unholy amalgamations of flesh and iron workings, the horrors that the Magic Craftsman had only touched upon in the oldest of the tales. They'd kept their word to the Stranger, trusted him - But perhaps it was best to be sure that their trust was not being abused.

And so a messenger had been sent to Gondo Firebeard, and Gondo had been sent to meet the Stranger once more.

After all, he was the one who'd invited him here.

The great doors were barred, of course.

"No surprise, there," Gondo muttered, under his breath. Like all dwarves, he was stoutly made, well-muscled from long hours in the mines. Newly prosperous, his long, pleated beard now sporting rings of gold, he cut an impressive figure in the flickering light: Silver knotwork coiled across his waistcoat, his belt-buckle and steel-capped boots so new they still gleamed.

In truth, the finery of his garb sat uncomfortably on him. His clothes itched, damnably, part of him longing for his sturdy coveralls and the familiar weight of his pickaxe in his hands. Oh, he had an axe, all right - No self-respecting dwarf would've been caught dead without one - but it was smaller, lighter, lacking a proper heft.

He'd been hard at work when the messenger had arrived. As it turned out, getting the runesmiths together was like pulling teeth: There were centuries worth of grudges, suspicion, bruised egos and simple bull-headedness to work through, never mind the sheer weight of inertia that had set in after long decades of decline.

It was enough to drive a dwarf to drink.

"You can't rush these things, Gondo," Bigosa had told him, over bowls of rich, dark stew at the Bearded Lady. "You've made a good start, but this is the work of years." Still chewing, he'd gestured with his spoon - "It's our nature to be obsessive. Just look at my son, eh? He's been chasing tales for almost ten years now. My guess is, he'll be at it for ten more. We're set in our ways: Change comes slowly to us, if at all."

Good advice, he knew. Besides, Feo Jera was still buzzing with jubilation at the news of the great victory. The ancient capital, recaptured. Honor restored.

Some of that shine had rubbed off onto Gondo. His star was very much in the ascendant, now: The Master of Caves and Mines had inquired about his plans for the future, and the Merchant's Guildmaster had - Casually, like it was a matter of no import - mentioned that he had a daughter, of agreeable temperament and appearance, who would like to meet him.

And so on, and so forth.

It would've been a breach of etiquette to rebuff two of the Regency Council's most powerful members. Besides, the offers had been genuine ones, and well-intentioned at that. But they came with responsibilities, too: Responsibilities that drew his time and attention away from his life's dream, a dream that seemed to recede further into the distance with each day.

The dwarf shook his shaggy head, pushing those thoughts away. Bigosa was right: Anything worth doing took time. Time, and backbreaking effort.

Well, unless you were the Stranger, of course.

When he'd first met the man in the tunnels of Feo Raizo, he wasn't quite sure what to make of him. Humans rarely roamed this far, let alone ones who carried all they owned on their back: Still, an agreement had been struck, the first steps on a winding, improbable path that had taken him-

Here. In front of one of Feo Jera's own forges, afraid to go in. Yes, afraid - For Gondo had always been a realist, in all but one aspect. He'd seen what the Stranger could do, when he'd wiped out the Frost Dragons in a single night; Even now, he woke sweating, remembering the roars and the screams, the unspeakable energies that lit up the eternal night like a false sun.

After all that, a little caution was warranted.

The great steel knocker clanged hollowly against the doors, the clatter echoing far further than one would expect. Rune-marked, Gondo noted, with some satisfaction - Older than he was, yet still as solid as the day when it was forged.

He waited, until the echoes died away. Knocked again, harder this time.

Still nothing. The weird light continued to flicker, to pulse; the walls reverberated in time to the deathly hum that seemed to well up from far beneath the earth.

For a moment, he wondered if he might've - somehow - come to the wrong place. That he'd taken a wrong turn somewhere, and ended up someplace he wasn't supposed to be. In truth, Gondo didn't want to go in there, didn't want to see what lay beyond the doors: With each passing day, he was beginning to understand why caution was a virtue.

After all, he had so much more to lose, now.

"Stranger!" he bellowed, raising his voice to be heard over the constant hammering. "It's Gondo Firebeard!" Then added, more quietly - "I must speak with you."

There was no pause in the din. But - after a moment - bolts clanked. The doors swung open together, blossoming outwards: Framed panels of ancient mountain oak parting right down the middle, without the faintest creak.

Light spilled out from within.

And Gondo wouldn't have been a dwarf, if he hadn't paused to think - Now that's craftsmanship.

He went forward. Already, he could see the small orange sparks dancing under the high roof, like fireflies. As Gondo padded his way across black tiles - worn dull by centuries of dwarven feet - he could taste the electricity in the air, all the way in the back of his throat.

He'd felt this before, during his time in the Dwarven Army. In those first, frantic days after the retreat to Feo Jera, every able-bodied dwarf had been needed to hold the line against those damned Quagoa. When they came in great numbers, in a serried tide of flashing claws and gnashing teeth, only lightning could break their momentum: It tore through their ranks like the scythe of Surshana himself, stopping black hearts and filling the air with the wretched smell of burning fur.

At substantial cost, a supply of enchanted quarrels and lightning-spitting artifacts had been acquired, held in reserve for this very occasion. They'd more than paid for themselves, each time the Quagoa were repelled - But the charged feel of so much lightning magic concentrated in one place was something he'd never forgotten.

Like a migraine. Like a nosebleed.

Like copper, on the tongue.

Between that and the stench of burning heatstone, he couldn't imagine spending a full day here, let alone a week. The merciless thumping and banging continued somewhere up ahead, around the next turn - As if an entire army of blacksmiths was hard at work, laboring to stave off the apocalypse.

But the Stranger was alone. Wasn't he?

Gondo opened his mouth to call out, then thought better of it. Instead, his hand settled on the haft of his axe, the thud of his boots lost in his clamor as he made his way to that final threshold-

For a moment, he hesitated. Wondering if he could still turn back. Wondering if he'd already come too far. There was something almost…unclean about the sickly radiance up ahead, a penetrating light that shone like nothing that had ever come from a wick or a lantern, that cast strange and twisted shadows against the far wall.

He snorted, shook his head. Carried on regardless, across those last few steps.

And when he turned the corner into the main hall, by an eerie radiance unlike anything he'd ever known, he saw the dragon.

The first sight of that hideous visage struck him like a blow, that brought a strangled oath to his lips. The great, fanged skull, vast and terrible, cast in the shadow by the alien light of the forge: For one blank moment of horror, Gondo knew - Just knew - that the Frost Dragons had returned to take their vengeance…

-But then he glimpsed the ivory shimmer of bone, and breathed again.

For the dragon was dead. Dead, but - alarmingly - not yet in the grave. Bones the length of ship-beams had been stripped of flesh, rendered bare, then galvanized in steel and brass. Some anatomist's hand had set them in new alignments, threaded them together with wire, metal connectors where joints should have been.

An anatomist who had never, ever seen a dragon, it had to be said.

Even at rest, it was a hulking thing: Strange, terrible, majestic, a mountain of black iron and armor plating. There were lines in the figure's shape that made it vaguely humanoid, hunched and somehow simian - A creature from an older, more atavistic past.

It was hard to judge its size, massive as it was, but by Gondo's guess it was almost two storeys tall and nearly half as wide. The edges and panels of the armor that shrouded its long-limbed, oddly skeletal frame were sheened black, without ornament or trim: At times lightless, at times lustrous and opalescent, there was something oddly disturbing about the oily reflections that swam within the metal, distorted and never quite true.

Scaffolding had grown up around the beast, like the bars of a cage. It was not alone, Gondo could see now: The dark reaches of the forge growled and sparked with the throbbing pulse of great machines, even as glittering silver things flitted about the monster's frame. Like giant metal insects, wings droning to keep themselves aloft - Welding sparks flared from extruded torches, the fine manipulators of their skittering limbs worming into the workings between armor plates.

To Gondo, they looked like scavengers swarming over the carcass of some tremendous beast, trying to find a way through the tough hide. But the reverse was true: Strange tools spun with a high melody, fastening clamps into place, locking struts, layering more components in place.

Metal for limbs. Pistons for muscles.

"-What is this?" the dwarf muttered, uneasily. He realized, right then, that his mouth had been hanging open, and shut it with a click. He'd seen a lot of things, but this defied the limits of all he'd ever known, the way the sun eclipsed a lantern. Against his better judgment, he took another step forward, then another - Part of him expecting the insect swarm to descend upon him any moment now, disjoining and dismantling, stripping the flesh from his bones…

But they never did. Instead, they merely continued their arcane tasks, darting near-invisibly through the gloom. This close, Gondo could make out the details that had been mere outlines in the darkness before: The thick bundles of fiber-cable under the armor plates, the iron-bound barrels that thrust from the gaps in the shoulders. Heavy, ringed with brass, saurian heads carved over their mouths.

He'd never seen anything like those before, but - With the surety that came instinctively to all dwarves - Gondo knew they were weapons. Dreadful ones, no doubt, for the Stranger seemed incapable of creating anything else.

Not for the first time, Gondo thought of the fate of the Quagoa. When great beams of annihilating radiance had started tearing through their ranks, even the frenzy evoked by the potent musk of their pack-leaders hadn't been enough. In the end, they'd been trampling each other in their desperation to get away, ripping with claws and fangs for just one more moment of life.

He shuddered, despite himself. He could live without ever seeing that again.

Above, a faint glow caught his eye. A harsh white light, cold like a spike of ice: Like a miniature sun, orbited by swarms of vampire butterflies. The dwarf's hand came up - instinctively - in front of his face to shield it from the radiance…

Gondo paused. Reconsidered. He lowered his arm, and took a step towards the source of the hard-edged radiance. It shone forth from a hollow in the metal beast's great torso: Plates of armor hinged open to reveal slow-turning gears and complex mechanisms, clicking and whirring, framing-

His breath caught.

It was the single biggest gem he'd ever seen, shimmering at him from its cradle of midnight-black adamantite. Even at rest, it made the air ripple, as if the light itself had mass - Waves of distortion curving and twisting across its surface, a constant heat-haze. It caught and held the eye, sucking one's gaze into its fever-dream depths.

He'd taken another step, without thinking. Then another, close enough that he stood within the great machine's shadow. Gondo reached out, stubby fingers shaking, a child trying to grasp a star…

"-It's a Caloric Stone. Quite something, isn't it?"

The spell broke. Gondo spun around - Heart thudding in his chest, hammer-on-anvil. Without thinking, he'd snatched his axe from his belt, peering into the gloom. For there was a change of texture in the darkness, something that could almost have been…

Recognition dawned, as the shape came forward. Became recognizable.

"Gods of Earth," Gondo muttered, shaking his head to clear it. "Warn me next time. You could turn a dwarf's beard white-"

The Stranger shrugged. His cloak, the one Gondo had gifted him, fluttered and curled around him like smoke, threads of silver glimmering faintly in the fabric. As always, he wore his talisman - the glassy black stone on its long, thin chain - smoldering a fiery red-green at its heart.

"I did," he said, matter-of-fact. Amusement flickered across his features, there and then gone: "You weren't listening, that's all."

Pale blue eyes settled on the dwarf's axe, and the Stranger frowned.

"-This isn't a social call, is it?"

The canteen was a simple chamber of dressed stone, where smiths and craftworkers would take their meals between shifts. The floors had been worn smooth by the passage of time, the walls and ceiling inscribed with scraped frescos and glyphs.

Generations of dwarves had come and gone, here. Driven by some simple, elemental urge, they'd left marks of their presence - A reminder that they'd once been here, something that would linger long after memory itself faded. Reassuring, in their regularity: That the wheel of ages might turn, that centuries might pass, but life would continue in much the same way it always did.

But now, the hall was empty. Empty, and echoing silent - A place that could have held hundreds was host only to two. To Gondo, it was uncomfortably like dining amongst ghosts, made more so by the long shadows that clung to the walls, the ghostly flares of distant light as the silver insects continued their work.

The Stranger had been the very soul of courtesy. There had been a meat dish, braised fowl in stinging marinade; Mushrooms sauteed in garlic butter, spiced pilaf with savory fritters and curried fish, skewers of vegetables sweet-roasted to perfection. All of it fresh, faintly steaming as if straight from the oven…

But when and how they'd been prepared, Gondo couldn't begin to guess. It was excellent fare, no doubt about that, but the Stranger ate little if at all - He'd filled his plate, picking at his food more for the look of the thing than from any actual hunger.

If anything, he looked…tolerant. Like a well-mannered but faintly put-upon host, one seeking to put his guests at ease before they got down to business.

"Drink?"

Gondo blinked. The Stranger proffered a green glass bottle, something black and effervescent fizzling within. It was cold, so cold that condensation gathered on the gleaming surface, running in fat beads along the red-and-white swirl of the label.

"I don't…" the dwarf began, more out of habit than anything else.

"-I know. Nevertheless."

Well, what was the harm? After all he'd seen, a drink would steady his nerves.

In the end, it wasn't alcohol. It tasted of vanilla and raisins, tart and with notes of citrus. Sweet without being cloying, with a faintly bitter tang that wasn't off-putting. Something to be swigged rather than sipped, it felt like - As Gondo looked up, the Stranger was smiling: Not his usual bland smile, but something more earnest, almost nostalgic.

"What do you think?"

"It's…interesting," Gondo admitted. "Do you have more?"

Liquid glugged, as - obligingly - the Stranger tilted the bottle.

"Savor it," he advised, a contemplative note to his voice. "They don't make them like this any more."

"Indeed? A shame." Foam frothed and sizzled, short-lived bubbles dancing as Gondo took a long draft. The dwarf fought down a belch, wiping his mouth - "Much obliged to you, then," he said, and meant it.

Privately, he wondered who 'they' were: Like so much else about the stranger, it was another mystery, one with no answers forthcoming.

Still, he'd put it off long enough. With a heavy sigh, Gondo set his mug aside, sitting a little straighter on the worked-stone bench. This was the part he wasn't looking forward to.

"This might seem churlish, but…You were right." A grunt issued from the dwarf, as he loosened his belt. The rich fare was weighing heavy on his stomach, and it made him feel all the guiltier. "The Regency Council summoned me, and…"

"They want me gone, don't they?"

"Yes, they-" Gondo began, then blinked. "You knew?"

"From the beginning." Those cool blue eyes never wavered. "'Those in power exalt you only when they need you, and not a moment longer.' In fact-"

There was the faintest twist to his lips, now. Somehow knowing, liked he'd expected it all along.

"...I'm surprised it took them this long."

A leaden silence descended, the Stranger's words hanging heavy in the air between them. Unmoving, he seemed a graven image, something as solid and distinct as the stone underfoot.

Somewhere, the sounds of industry continued: The droning, cackling hum of mechanisms articulating, the rattling clanks of gears turning and cogs continuing their spin.

Gondo shifted in his seat, uncomfortable. He fought the absurd urge to claw at the collar of his new vest, so tight it felt like it was choking him. It hadn't been his idea, of course - Far from it. But he could still feel a kind of guilt by association: For he was part of this, too, no matter that he'd been compelled.

No matter how little he liked it.

At length, the Stranger sighed. He pushed his mostly-untouched plate aside, as if suddenly weary of it. Not for the first time, Gondo couldn't help but think that he'd never actually seen the man eat.

"The truth is, Gondo - I rather like your people."

"You do?"

"Does that surprise you? You take pride in your craft. Innovation, industry, perseverance - Even your leaders work with their hands." For a moment, those cold blue eyes lost their hard glitter, became a shade warmer. "It's like…solidarity, if you will."

"That's one way of looking at it," Gondo muttered, wondering what he was on about. Honestly, he'd never thought of it that way: It was dwarven nature to simply get on with the task at hand. As any miner knew: Someone had to check the shaft was well-braced and steady, or you had no-one to blame but yourself when it caved in.

"It's just how we are, I suppose," he said, stocky shoulders lifting in a shrug. A bushy eyebrow rose: "First time I've heard a human mention it. Sentiment's appreciated, all the same."

The Stranger chuckled, at that. Softly, as if at some private joke.

"I haven't…" he began, then seemed to think better of it. Absently, the Stranger's hand went to his amulet - A claw of gold clasping the black stone in place, fingers brushing the faceted surface. It seemed to flicker beneath his touch, a lambence that quite defied the chamber's light.

"-You don't have to be afraid of me, you know," he said, mildly. The Stranger spread his hands: Broad-fingered and thick-nailed, yet oddly pink and soft for all that. No dirt under the fingernails, no calluses on the palms.

Less like the hands of a laborer, and more like the hands of an expensive doll.

Gondo's head jerked up, a guilty start. "I'm not-" he began, but he'd already given himself away. His beard bristled, as the dwarf stiffened in his seat. Belatedly, it occurred to him - with a flash of something approaching panic - that the Stranger might be reading his mind…

He met the Stranger's unblinking gaze. Met those cold blue eyes, flat and unwavering.

"It's not you the Council fears," he said, at last. Gondo's throat had gone dry, dry as the plains after a great fire: He drained half his mug in a single gulp, but it didn't help in the least. "It's what you've done."

"Save the Dwarf Kingdom? Liberate Feo Berkana?"

"-Aye, you have," Gondo said, more sharply than he'd intended. He'd stepped in it, now - And sometimes, the only way out was through. "You've saved us from the Quagoa. From the Frost Dragons, no less. And believe me, no-one's more grateful than I: If not for you, I'd be dead, no two ways about it."

For a moment, Gondo remembered that day: The hunting cries of the Quagoa, their foul wet-dog stench. The pitiless light in their hungry eyes, fanged maws yawning wide-

Despite himself, he shuddered. It took a lot to rattle him, but he'd been seeing them in his nightmare for a long time to come. The dwarf lowered his voice, softer, more somber now.

"...But the question they're asking, the question everyone wants to know is: What now?"

His words seem to echo in the stillness, coming back at him hollow and drained of affect. Gondo thought of the dread black shape of the war machine taking form, larger than any golem he'd ever seen. The dull glint of hydraulic workings, of mechanisms beyond imagination…

"Change," the Stranger said, low. Almost to himself. "-It's change that you fear."

"Can you blame them?" Gondo said, and almost flinched when those cold blue eyes fastened on him. He pressed on, all the same: "Who are you, Stranger? You're not like any human we've ever known. What lands do you hail from? Not Re-Estize, certainly. Not the Empire or the Theocracy or the Council State. And, most of all - What do you want?"

He caught himself. Looked down, staring at the pitted surface of the table.

"I told the Council," he said, gruffly. "Told them it was none of their business. Told them - You were the man who saved my life, and that was enough for me."

The dwarf lifted his gaze. "But they said they'd send another, if I didn't go. I-"

A thought struck him, then. Gondo shook his head, wonderingly.

"All this time," he said. "All we've been through, and…I still don't know your name."

The Stranger hesitated. As though he'd forgotten the answer - Or as if he didn't know how to respond.

"Dantès," he said.

"Dantès?"

"Yes." The Stranger stared off into the middle distance, the corners of his mouth twitching upward. "He was a man from nowhere, too."

He rose from his chair.

"-Come with me."

They walked side-by-side now, footsteps echoing through the forge. Gondo had started towards the chamber that held the golem, but the Stranger - Dantès, or whatever he chose to call himself - had shaken his head.

"Not that way," he'd said, indicating the flight of steps leading to the lower halls. "There's something you should see, first."

Even with the faint glimmer of light-orbs, it was dark. But the Stranger strode on briskly, with purpose, as if the gloom hindered him not at all. The forge may have been built on a dwarven scale, with proportions to fit - But in a way, he'd made this place his own.

In the distance, there was a glimmer of orange light. The air was growing warmer and warmer. Gondo could hear the ring of hammer-on-anvil, the hiss of steam, the crackle of distant flame…

Familiar sounds, to any dwarf. But there was something else, too: Scuffling and clattering, the shuffling of feet, the patient click of claws on stone.

A smell, a reek, a pungent stench…

Gondo's eyes went wide.

"Quagoa-"

He clawed for his axe-

The Stranger's hand closed on Gondo's wrist, and held his arm fast. The casual strength in his grip was irresistible: It was like being seized by an iron vise.

"Don't," Dantès said. "-Watch."

And, though he'd rather have done anything else, Gondo did.

They emerged on a balcony, a narrow platform jutting outwards into the smoke-stained air. The angular rail of iron that ran around it was body-warm to the touch; With his free hand, Gondo clutched at it, as if for some grip on reality.

"This is-"

The chamber below was a long, wide gallery. A huge, dwarf-made cavern, the stone scored and pitted with age. Vast columns rose up in the center, up and up into the shifting darkness far above; Beneath it, fires burned, booming drum-rolls echoing through the cavernous emptiness.

The yawning space was full of Quagoa, ragged shapes moving through the boiling darkness. Dozens of them, hundreds of them, black shapes against the firelight. They hammered at anvils, working at the fires and the crucibles like some dark parody of men or dwarves; Sparks skittered against the floor, great machines looming from the gloom - Pistons rotating in brass sheaths, metal beaten against metal as plumes of steam spurted from pipes and valves.

Even as Gondo looked on, a wagon piled high with heatstone rumbled down the track. Like pallbearers, the Quagoa dragged it along, all the way to the flame-belching mouth of the furnace. This close, the heat should have flash-burnt their fur to cinders, cooked their flesh on their bones - But they plodded on, relentlessly, until their cargo was emptied into the waiting maw.

Only then - as poison smoke gusted from the vents, as the leaping flames surged with renewed life - did they shamble back the way they'd come, step by slow step, hauling the wagon with them. The others paid them no mind, lurching stiffly towards the racks that stood against the distant walls: Racks stacked high with bright blades, steel glittering with a hard-edged illumination that cut through the dark.

There was something unholy about the sight. The mere thought of the Quagoa moving with silent discipline, harnessed to a single purpose - It was so disquieting, Gondo felt a cold chill course through him, despite the furnace-heat.

What have I been sheltering? he thought, his gaze fixing on the hunched, canine shapes. It was their silence that disturbed him most of all: None of the grunts or snarls that presaged an attack, or the shouts that would rise above the ring of hammers and spit of flame-

Realization struck, like a lightning bolt. Gondo's eyes bulged in his skull, the heat pressing against his face as he twisted to look up at the Stranger.

"They're undead," he said, his voice thick with dread. "-All of them."

In life, the Quagoa would have snarled, screeched, roared, and hissed with every step. But in death they were voiceless, vacuous husks, made ghoulish by their slackened mouths, the hideous stiffness of their limbs, the unholy radiance that glowed in the hollows of the eyes.

Necromancy on a grand scale, grander than he could have imagined. Like something out of the old tales: The endless ranks of the shambling dead, advancing pitilessly on their enemies, countless bodies harnessed to a single will-

"Yes." The Stranger's voice was matter-of-fact, as if they were discussing ore quality or the weather. His face never changed, pale blue eyes fixed on the mighty contraptions of brass and black iron below. In the perpetual gloom, they hissed and pounded like creatures from a nightmare, ever-hungry for sustenance.

"Alive, they were a threat to your people. But now - Look at them, Gondo. They're tireless. Uncomplaining. They need no food or pay or rest. Automatons, really…their world begins and ends with their tasks." There was a growing animation to his voice, now, as he warmed to the subject. "A hundred of them could do the work of a thousand. Never slowing, never ceasing, never wearing out."

The Stranger gestured, a sweep of his arm taking in the vast tableau before him.

"Look what I've done. Look what I've achieved, in a matter of weeks." His words hung in the air, heavy with portent. "What I've done for this forge, I can do for the entire city. Imagine it, Gondo: No more scrabbling for survival. No more Whitesnow sickness. No more numbing toil - From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."

He paused, letting it sink in. "The worker of the future-"

"Worth more dead than alive," Gondo finished.

There was a terrible, damned pause. Like the moment before an aftershock hits, when all the world seems to hold its breath.

Below, in the fiery murk, the Quagoa labored on. Great crucibles released rivers of molten metal, lines of red and yellow and searing white running through channels in the floor. Something vast was being built here, strange mechanisms and assemblies of twisted metalwork that were almost but never quite recognizable.

Glowing embers scattered, the orange light flickering on pallid grey fur and bare dark metal: The brief flare of illumination did nothing at all to the darkness, except make it dirty.

The dwarf could feel his throat burning, each breath he took full of the sting of smoke and the wretched stench of the Quagoa. Seized with a sudden, awful dread, Gondo could feel his guts turn to ice-

He could die here, he knew. He could die without ever realizing what hit him.

For he knew, better than anyone, how fast the Stranger could move.

But Gondo held himself still. Held himself steady, stocky legs firmly planted. For he knew he was right: A small thing, but it made all the difference.

"This is what you've been doing?" Gondo said, into the burning air. He could feel his eyes drying out: He didn't dare blink. "Creating this…horror?"

It may have been his imagination, but - even from here - he could smell the sickly-sweet stench of decay, a plague wind rising from the great fire itself.

How long had it taken him to make this many? The dwarf felt his stomach churn, nausea roiling in his gut at the thought of the Stranger - His face forever fixed in that mask of confident certainty - moving amongst the dead. Commanding them to rise, one at a time or in their dozens. Setting them to work, crafting his tools of death, like some necrotic parody of the glory days of Feo Jera…

Before the descent of Divanack, and the great horror that had come after.

The Stranger's expression was unreadable, as he stared directly at Gondo. But for an instant, the dwarf saw - thought he saw - a flash in those ice-blue eyes, a flicker of carefully-hidden emotion.

Against all odds, it felt like disappointment.

"Isn't this what you wanted?" he said. "A better life for the dwarves. An end to the slow, miserable decline." The Stranger's hard gaze wandered the great emptiness, held fast by a conviction only he could understand.

"Things could be different, this time," he went on. "We could show them the way: Liberty, equality, fraternity and all the rest. The things I've seen - the corruption and the injustice, the misery and the suffering…It's not too late. Not here."

His hand bunched into a fist, tendons starting from the taut skin.

"The world could be put…right. For the many, not the few - Isn't that worth fighting for? Isn't that worth everything?"

The Stranger's voice was low, now. Hushed, almost.

Like he was willing Gondo to understand. Willing him to accept the future he foresaw.

"I just wanted-" Gondo muttered, into his beard. Dimly, he wondered what the Stranger meant by this time.

"...I just wanted to preserve what we had. Honor my father, and those who came before. Stop the Art from dying out…"

His voice trailed off to nothing, as he braced himself for what came next.

"I - We - owe you everything. But this…" Gondo squared his shoulders, trying to make him see. "The Regency Council would never agree. The dwarves would never agree. What you're proposing-"

For in that moment, he could see the shape of the future.

The old cities echoing to the synchronized pounding of metal, and the roar of flame. Armies of the dead, waiting for the order to march.

"…It would be the end," Gondo finished. "Of everything."

Silence, undercut by the ceaseless din. But from up here, it seemed so far away: Dulled by the slow smoke, the eerie light glowing through the heatstone fog.

The Stranger stood there, staring down at what he'd wrought - Then, as if suddenly weary of it all, he shook his head.

"-I see," Dantès said, his voice low.

The dwarf blinked. "You do?" he said - But the Stranger was already turning away, his boots ringing on the cold stone as he strode towards the distant annex.

Before Gondo followed, he spared one last glance down. At the flying sparks, the leaping flames, the shadows moving amid the raining hammers. The eternal, endless drone of the cycling machines, dread shadows towering above all the rest.

One day, if the Stranger had his way, all the world might look like this.

Gondo had never considered himself particularly devout. He'd had little to do with the Gods, other than the observations on feast-days and the ritual prayers to the Great God of Earth before a shift commenced…But that was just good sense.

Yet here and now, he couldn't help but hope - Quietly but fervently, like a prayer - that when the time came, he wouldn't be there to see it.

Once, the workshop would have been a place of wonders. Every forge had one: A place set aside for the runesmiths to work their art. With the tools of their trade - Adamantite chisels, tinctures of rare earth and jet, brushes of ash and sable - the greatest products of Dwarven craftsmanship would be uplifted into something legendary.

Even now, the tales still lingered. How Gondo's grandfather, the left hand of the Runesmith King, had labored over a single, perfect ingot of orichalcum, crafting the instrument of the Dwarven race's vengeance with an iron focus that brooked no distraction. It was his great warhammer that had been taken into that valorous, hopeless battle against the Evil Deities, a weapon made to slay the unkillable.

Six runes. Six.

Power enough to crack the sky, and shake the earth. Too much, some would whisper, for any one mortal to wield. Such a weapon was a curse on both warrior and foe alike, for all it could bring was ruin.

A legion of five thousand had marched forth, driven by transcendent spite. For only blood could answer blood, and - God, demon or thing from beyond - no force would stop the dwarves from avenging the unspeakable insult that had been done to them.

In the end, none had returned.

That was the beginning of the decline, though none had known it yet. The dwarves had never been a populous race: The loss of so many was a disaster beyond imagining. Entire family lines had ended, lost in chaos of war, never to be restored. Worse, it had been but the first blow of many - A harbinger of the disasters yet to come.

And so the workshop, like so many others, had been abandoned. The stone tables left to gather dust, the shelves stripped of their precious tools. A monument to faded glory, and a warning of what lay ahead.

Until now.

The Stranger's latest project lay suspended before him - A slab of oil-black steel, as long as a dwarf's entire body and then some. It was in pieces, like a clock half-disassembled to find what made it tick: Black cylinders, plates of metal and coils of crystal prised away to reveal the workings within.

A barrel projected from one end, cuffed by twin rotating rings. Lances of blue fire burned at Dantès' fingertips as he worked, the blunt frame warping beneath his touch.

He was shaping it. Working the metal like it was clay, using nothing but his hands.

It was a pointed message, Gondo knew. If the Stranger passed on his knowledge, if he shared the secret with the dwarves - Who knew what wonders they might fashion?

What horrors?

"The thing you have to understand," the Stranger said, apropos of nothing - "When you get down to it…I'm not much of a fighter."

Gondo had to laugh at that. A dry chuckle, made drier by the bleak heat that came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

"The Frost Dragons might disagree," the dwarf said, taking a long pull from the green glass bottle. He'd seated himself on an upturned crate, looking on with equal parts fascination and incomprehension as mechanisms clacked and shifted, the main assembly cycling to life with a metallic whirr.

"Not that any remai-"

"It's true," Dantès said, as if Gondo hadn't interrupted. He was inspecting the various coils and switches that clung - like scales - to the base of the device, with insect patience. "I was - A man of letters, I suppose."

"You were a scribe?" That didn't seem believable to the dwarf. He tried to imagine the Stranger - tall, rangy, perpetually weather-beaten - behind a desk. Putting a quill to parchment, surrounded by ledgers and books of account.

"No. I taught a course on…The past." Dantès narrowed his eyes, straightening as he stepped back from his task. Gently, ever-so-gently, he rubbed his thumb against the tips of his fingers, his expression going farther away.

"Voltaire and John Locke, Marx and Engels. Others, too…Tolstoy, Chekov and Dostoevsky. They were great men - Pioneers, really: Explorers of the human condition. Seekers of a better world."

Gondo watched him carefully; To the dwarf, the names meant nothing, but he knew better than to break the spell.

"I just…I wanted to know, I suppose. What it was like, when the world was still worth living in. How - and why - it changed."

Dantès' voice had fallen to a murmur. "The more I looked, the less I found. Yes, there were dates. Yes, there were reasons. Sometimes there were even actual accounts. But the way things were, before the collapse…It just wasn't there."

Something about the way he spoke - It made Gondo feel thin, unreal, like he was made of paper. Like when the surety of solid stone crumbles beneath your boots, and all that remains is the yawning abyss beyond. The dwarf stirred, uncomfortably: The Stranger had always seemed so calm, unflappable. Invulnerable within himself.

To see him like this-

He's flesh and blood after all, Gondo thought. Somehow, it didn't make him feel any better.

"-I kept looking, deeper into the records. It became an obsession, I suppose…Finding fragments of the past. Scanning books both historical and fictional, from old archives, from the sub-departments no-one visited any more. In secret, of course: Even then, I knew it was dangerous."

There was a faint glow of witchlight, as the tame blue flames flickered and died. Steam rose, faintly, from Dantès' hands - He didn't seem to notice, his sharp features cast in shadow once more.

"I wasn't really thinking. I was just…I don't know, honestly, what I was doing, what my goal was. Like I said, I was obsessed. And in the end, I realized-"

His jaw set, the flesh around his cold eyes furrowing.

"Our rulers had decided that the past was no longer fit for public consumption - And so it had to go, all of it. It was a subtle thing, you see? So much was missing, gone, erased. Compared to that, the destruction of what remained - of everything that came before - was easy."

The Stranger paused, some unknowable emotion in his voice.

"They'd already ruined the world. Now they wanted us to think it'd always been this way - 'For those who control the present, control the past and those who control the past control the future.'"

Gondo thought about that. Thought about the relentless march of time, and how it ground down all things. Fragile things, really: Little more than the faded glory of the past, and the faint hope that - one day, somewhere in that distant, unknowable future - it might yet return.

Thought about the kind of person who would destroy something like that.

"You rebelled, didn't you?" Gondo said. "Against your nation. Against your King."

"Oh, I tried. I had allies, you see: Something of a following, even. People who thought that maybe - just maybe - life didn't have to be this way. That there was value in what I'd found, what I'd managed to save."

A sigh. Slow, like the Stranger was breathing out a lifetime of regret. "I just wanted - I wanted to get the word out, I suppose. The truth was being destroyed: Someone, somewhere, had to care. Someone had to remember, before it was all gone."

He laughed, then. A sharp, flat bark of a laugh, utterly without humor.

"Some rebel I was," he said. "They knew the whole time, of course. The networks were monitored - They'd tagged me from the very beginning: they just wanted to see how far I'd go. Who else I'd flush out."

His fingers settled on his forearm, where a pattern of sleek, parallel lines stood out against the skin. "'Dissemination of anti-social ideas', they called it. The others got nerve-stapled and put to work: Hard labor, in the red zones. I was lucky - I got permanent restraint in a signal-filter complex."

Dantès looked up. There was a cold gleam in his eyes, now.

"Imagine it. Indefinite solitary confinement. No communication, not even with the other inmates - Even the indents are surgically deafened. The only contact you'll ever have with the outside world: Filtering electronic communication, flagging potential sedition as part of the Social Ministry's data-mine. Helping them track down anyone like who you used to be. All that, and it was still better than I deserved."

"But you got out-"

"Did I? I'm not sure." The faintest tendril of doubt crept into the Stranger's voice, his hand settling on the solid stone of the workbench before him. As if he was reassuring himself, as if searching for some grip on the here and now.

"The Social Ministry monitored DMMO-RPGs, too. It used to be more tolerant, but I suppose they were just building a case. Greater corporate regulation, more oversight…It was the very idea of dissent, you see. It had to be made - impossible."

He drew a slow, shuddering breath.

"I thought there was something I could do," Dantès said, in a sudden burst. "They were watching me - They were watching everyone - but I thought I had a chance. I couldn't tell anyone, not even in-game, but there's always been a gray market for virtual currency. I was an educated man: If I could make enough…The rules could be bent, maybe. Broken, even, for the right price."

A thin-lipped frown crept across his features. Contemplating something he didn't understand, something that defied all reason.

"Then the servers went down for the last time, and-"

"And?" Gondo prompted. Carefully, almost delicately - For he understood the Stranger's tale only abstractly, but knew it meant everything to Dantès. That was reason enough to ask.

The Stranger stood there for a long moment, his head bowed. For a moment, he looked very alone.

"...And I learned that everything I had ever known was just the prelude. That power concedes nothing without a demand."

He picked up one of the pieces of metal, and then another and another, each one snapping together, his hands moving with fluid speed. When the last piece locked in place, there was a thrum of rising power, a low, charging hum - Green telltales flickering to life, snapping arcs of copper lightning leaping between the rings.

With a single, fluid motion, the Stranger lifted the linear cannon from the plinth. Racked the slide, the first massive round clunking into the chamber. It was a sound that made Gondo think of crypts being opened, the hollow scrape of stone on millenia-old stone.

"Once, a long time ago, a wise woman wrote: '-You cannot buy the revolution. You cannot make the revolution. You can only be the revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere.'"

A smile creased his features, and the dwarf felt the chill vise of dread around his heart - For the Stranger's smile was mirthless and cold and utterly without mercy.

"That's why I'm here, you see. To change the order of things: To cast down tyrants and raise the people in their stead. The revolution is in me, and nowhere else."

In that moment, standing as tall and proud as a prince of Hell, all he looked was invincible.

A month later, the Stranger left Feo Jera for the last time.

He departed much the same way he'd arrived - Alone and unheralded, accompanied only by a single covered wagon. Of the wonders and horrors he may have worked in the forge (if any existed), there was no sign.

Few watched him go: The reclamation of Feo Berkana was in full swing, and - by then - there were countless caravans setting forth from the new capital (now the old capital) of the dwarves. Both cities bustled with activity like never before, points of light in a sea of darkness that was, for the first time in two centuries, neither as dark nor as unknown as it once appeared.

"So," the Commander-in-Chief said, at last. "-That's the end of that, then."

There was a murmur of acknowledgement from all corners of the hall, a general sense of affirmation and relief. Honor had been satisfied: The pact had been upheld. If the gray-green mist spilling forth from the foundry had been more poisonous than usual, if strange, inexplicable lights and sounds had issued forth from the murk - Well, in the end, no harm had been done.

"I told you," the Forgemaster muttered, around the stem of his pipe. "It was best to leave the outsider to his task. Is that not so, Assistant Master of Caves and Mines?" Gimlet eyes fixed the Council's newest addition with a knowing look, one that saw deeper than most.

Gondo - Councilor Gondo, now - shifted in his plain, hard seat. Trying, against all odds, to find a modicum of comfort in the cold stone. According to tradition, no Councilor should ever sit easy: Still, he supposed that a cushion or two wouldn't have gone amiss.

For what felt like the hundredth time today, he brought his hand to his vest, close to the inside pocket. Felt the Stranger's gift, close to his skin.

"Here," the Stranger said. "-A going-away present."

The slim rod of dark metal was a lustreless thing. It barely shone at all, in the sulfur radiance of the light-orbs: Cool and faintly oily to the touch, it was nearly invisible against Gondo's callused palm.

The dwarf frowned, not understanding.

"And this is…?"

"The key to the Royal Treasury."

It took Gondo a moment, but when understanding dawned - His eyes went wide, his legs buckling like he'd been punched.

The Vaults of Feo Berkana. The legendary wealth of the fallen Dwarf Kingdom: Sealed to all, except to those of the now-extinct royal family. For a moment, he nearly laughed, nearly asked if it was some joke, some jest-

Instead, he just stared. Goggled at Dantès, trying to keep himself calm, to will the world into making sense…

"Gondo?"

"I just-" he shook his head, blankly. "How? How did you…do that?"

"Ah," Dantès said. "It was a challenge, I'll admit - But a welcome distraction. If you're asking…"

As the words sank in, Gondo couldn't seem to catch his breath. But then his mouth caught up with the rest of him, just in time.

"I mean - Why? Why would you…" The words seemed to catch in his throat, but he forced them out all the same. "Why me? Why not…"

The Council, Gondo nearly said. But he didn't mean it, not really.

"You have a dream, don't you?" The Stranger's voice was mild, almost curious. "Something you'd give everything to achieve. Isn't that what you told me?"

"I-" How many times had Gondo thought about it? How long had it been driving him on? He'd always known it would take more than dogged determination, more than belief.

More than the sole heir of an impoverished and forgotten family could ever hope to earn in a single lifetime.

You could have used this, Gondo thought. You could have brought the Council to their knees. Left them begging to serve you.

You could have made the Dwarf Kingdom yours-

He looked up, into those cold, flat eyes.

A thought struck him, then:

Maybe they were neither as cold or flat as they appeared.

Maybe, just maybe, they were merely veiled.

It stayed with him, as - Slowly, reverently - he closed his thick fingers around the key. Such a small thing: A world-changing thing.

Then, a little gruffly - For it wouldn't do to let the Stranger hear the hoarseness to his voice, the slight tremor to his hands - he said:

"Aye," Gondo said, at last. "-Aye."

It was all he could say, but the Stranger nodded. As if he'd read Gondo's mind, and sensed what he couldn't put into words. He clapped the dwarf on the shoulder, just once - For once was enough.

"Do what I couldn't, Gondo," Dantès said. "-Make your dream come true."

He smiled, then. A little compassionate, a little sad.

"After all…If not you, then who else?"

"Councilor?"

That single sharp word brought Gondo back to the here and now. He straightened, in his seat - Uncomfortably aware that they were all looking at him now.

The Commander-in-Chief, radiating a quiet impatience, clearly longing to get back to the business of reclamation. The Forgemaster, frowning at Gondo like he was a promising but unruly apprentice, one that needed to be taken in hand. Even the Master of Caves and Mines, his foremost ally, as if wondering whether he'd made the right choice.

Gondo cleared his throat. Reached for his mug, found that it was empty.

"Indeed," he said, humbly. "-Indeed."

"It is a pity, though," the Master of the Merchant's Guild mused aloud. "If our guest could have been convinced to divulge his secrets, to share the-"

The High Priest's grinding voice cut over him. "Back to the issue of Feo Berkana, then. The omens are propitious; The Gods favor our present course of action."

"As if there was any doubt," the Guildmaster muttered, unhappy at being interrupted. "I suppose that is the foremost concern. That, and laying claim to the Royal Treasury…"

"Little chance of that," the Cabinet Secretary said. "The knowledge of the wards was lost a long time ago, I'm afraid. Unless…"

He glanced at the Forgemaster - A brief, fleeting glance, one filled with a vague hope. The older dwarf snorted: Slowly but firmly, he shook his head.

"Anyone else? Anyone at all?"

The Secretary waited, expectantly. Looking from face to face.

Robes rustled, as none met his gaze. Gradually, the room went silent as a tomb.

This was it. This was the moment.

Gondo rose, his chair squealing as it slid back from the table. Heads snapped round to look at him, as he cleared his throat.

"Honored councilors," he began. "I believe I may have a solution…"

And inside, he thought:

Wherever you might go, whatever path you choose-

May the Gods walk with you, Stranger.

Good luck, my friend.

Next: Lord of Shadow (II)