The orc raised the whip.
It never fell.
Fendor’s arrow crossed the mountainside with barely a sound. It struck the orc through the wrist, tearing the weapon from its hand and pinning its arm against the wooden frame of the mine entrance.
The creature stared at the shaft in disbelief.
Then it screamed.
Every head below turned toward the mountain trail.
Kaylor looked at Fendor.
“So much for scouting.”
Fendor drew another arrow.
“He was going to strike the child.”
“That was not criticism.”
The orc tore its arm free, leaving the arrow buried in the wood. Dark blood ran across its hand as it bellowed toward the mine.
The other guards shoved the prisoners aside and reached for their weapons.
Grazim stepped onto the exposed trail.
“We should move before more come out.”
Hexen cracked his knuckles.
“At last, something we all understand.”
They descended together.
The chained villagers tried to scatter, but the iron links joining them allowed only confusion. Several fell. Others threw themselves over the children, expecting arrows or axes to follow.
Instead, the six strangers passed them and struck the orcs.
Kaylor reached the first guard before it could free its axe from the loop at its belt. His sword flashed once, opening the creature’s hide armor from shoulder to chest. The orc staggered backward but did not fall.
It was larger than Kaylor had expected.
The creature snarled and swung one heavy fist.
Kaylor ducked beneath the blow and drove his shoulder into its middle. The impact barely moved it.
For an instant, they stood locked together.
Then Isamu appeared beside them.
He struck the back of the orc’s knee with the edge of his foot.
The joint buckled.
Kaylor twisted away and brought his sword down across the creature’s neck.
The second guard charged Grazim with a mining pick raised above its head.
Grazim lifted his hammer to block.
The impact sent pain through his shoulders.
The orc was powerful, its muscles built by years of forcing captives through stone. It pulled the pick free and swung again, driving Grazim backward toward the prisoners.
He felt the eyes of the villagers upon him.
Fearful eyes.
Hollow eyes.
People who had watched others attempt resistance before.
People who had learned what happened to those who failed.
The orc raised the pick for a killing blow.
Grazim tightened his grip on the hammer.
The strange prayer returned to him.
Not the words he had spoken upon the summit. Something shorter. Sharper.
A command given on battlefields.
A promise made before violence.
The symbol against his chest became hot.
Grazim stepped into the blow.
The pick descended, but a shimmer of golden light appeared between them. The weapon struck the unseen barrier and slid aside.
The orc had only time to look confused.
Grazim’s hammer crashed into its jaw.
The creature spun and fell among the rocks.
The villagers stared at the faint light surrounding Grazim.
He stared at it too.
Then it faded.
From within the mine came the pounding of boots.
“More,” Fendor warned.
Nethnarel raised both hands.
“How many?”
Fendor listened.
“Too many.”
“That is not a number.”
“It is the important part.”
Three orcs burst from the entrance.
A fourth followed carrying a horn.
Fendor loosed an arrow at the horn-bearer, but one of the others struck the shaft aside with a shield.
The horn reached the orc’s mouth.
Nethnarel pointed.
Violet energy raced from her hand and struck the instrument.
The horn transformed into a fish.
The orc stood frozen, holding a large silver trout against its lips.
Hexen looked at Nethnarel.
“You did that on purpose?”
“No.”
The fish slapped the orc across the face.
Hexen laughed and charged.
The battle ended quickly after that.
The first two guards died beneath Kaylor’s sword and Grazim’s hammer. Isamu disarmed the third, twisted its arm behind its back, and drove it face-first into the stone. Hexen struck the horn-bearer with enough force to send both orc and fish tumbling down the slope.
Only the wounded overseer remained.
It pulled Fendor’s arrow from its wrist and fled into the mine.
Fendor drew another shaft.
“Let him go,” said Isamu.
Fendor did not lower the bow.
“He will warn the others.”
“They already know.”
The sound of distant bells echoed through the tunnels.
Not alarm bells.
Iron bells.
Slow and deep, ringing from somewhere beneath the mountain.
The prisoners reacted immediately.
Several covered their heads. One woman began to weep. The children pressed against an older man whose back was marked by fresh lashes.
Grazim knelt beside the nearest chain.
The iron was black and heavy. Each collar had been fitted tightly around the prisoner’s neck and sealed without a visible lock.
“Can these be opened?” he asked.
The older man studied him.
He had gray in his beard and stone dust ground deeply into the lines of his face.
“The overseers carry keys.”
Fendor searched the fallen orcs.
“No keys.”
“The ones at the gate are not overseers,” the man said. “They are dogs.”
Hexen looked toward the mine.
“And the overseers are inside.”
The man’s gaze moved across the six strangers.
“You should leave.”
Kaylor wiped his blade clean.
“We have just arrived.”
“You do not understand.” The man lowered his voice. “There are more below. Many more. Warriors, taskmasters, hounds. They have held these mines for years.”
“How many prisoners?” Grazim asked.
“More than a hundred, when last I knew.”
“And the village?”
The man looked toward the valley.
“Wallowdale.”
The name struck Grazim with unexpected weight.
Not recognition.
Something close to it.
“What happened there?”
“The orcs came down from the mountain three winters ago. They killed those who resisted and took the rest into the mines. Some remain in the village to grow food, repair tools, and serve the garrison.”
“Who commands them?” Fendor asked.
The older man hesitated.
“Gorvath.”
The name caused several prisoners to flinch.
“An orc?” Kaylor asked.
“A thing that was once an orc.”
The bells sounded again beneath the mountain.
The old man looked toward the entrance.
“You have little time. When the deep bell rings, the work gangs are counted. If the guards do not report, Gorvath will send his hunters.”
Hexen crouched beside one of the children.
The boy could not have been more than nine. His bare feet were wrapped in rags, and a dark bruise covered one side of his face.
“Are there other children inside?”
The boy nodded.
“How many?”
“I don’t know.”
Hexen stood.
“We are going in.”
The older man seized his sleeve.
“You will die.”
Hexen looked down at the hand, then at the chained villagers.
“Perhaps.”
He gently freed his sleeve.
“But not before we become extremely inconvenient.”
Kaylor turned to the others.
“We cannot fight an entire mine while these people remain chained in the open.”
“There is a ravine above the eastern trail,” the older man said. “A narrow place hidden by pines. We used it for shelter before the orcs came.”
“Can you reach it?” asked Isamu.
“Not with the chains.”
Fendor examined the collars.
“They are forged together. Breaking one link may be enough.”
Kaylor wedged the point of his sword into the chain between two prisoners and pulled.
The metal did not bend.
Grazim joined him, setting the head of his hammer against the same link.
“Again.”
Kaylor held the chain taut.
Grazim struck.
The sound echoed against the mountain.
The link flattened but remained intact.
Nethnarel stepped closer.
“I may be able to help.”
Everyone looked at her.
She frowned.
“I said may.”
“Your last spell produced a fish,” said Fendor.
“A useful fish.”
“The fish did very little.”
“It surprised him.”
Grazim moved away from the chain.
Nethnarel placed both hands around the damaged link. Heat gathered between her palms. For a moment, the magic remained steady.
The iron began to glow.
The prisoners drew back as far as the chain allowed.
Nethnarel’s eyes narrowed.
A thin bead of sweat moved down her temple.
The link turned orange.
Then white.
“Now,” she said.
Grazim swung.
The chain broke.
A burst of purple sparks followed the hammer strike, showering the ground with tiny lights. Where each spark landed, a small white flower opened between the stones.
Hexen stared at them.
Nethnarel released the chain.
“Completely intentional.”
They repeated the process until the prisoners were separated into smaller groups. The collars remained, but they could move without dragging one another.
Isamu pointed toward the eastern slope.
“Take them to the ravine. Stay beneath the trees.”
The older man did not move.
“You are truly going into the mine?”
“Yes,” said Grazim.
“Why?”
The question silenced them.
It was not suspicion.
It was confusion.
The man genuinely could not understand why armed strangers would risk themselves for people they did not know.
Grazim looked at the monument hidden beyond the summit clouds.
“We are still trying to determine that.”
The child Hexen had spoken to approached.
“What are your names?”
Hexen looked at the others.
It was the first time anyone outside their group had asked.
One by one, they answered.
“Grazim Von.”
“Hexen Brew.”
“Kaylor.”
“Fendor of the Forest.”
“Nethnarel.”
“Isamu Fogson.”
The boy repeated each name quietly, as though afraid he might forget them.
The older man bowed his head.
“I am Marrick. I kept the village mill before the occupation.”
“Then keep these people alive, Marrick,” Grazim said. “We will return with the others.”
Marrick looked toward the dark mine.
“No one returns from below after the third bell.”
The second bell had already sounded.
Fendor retrieved his arrow from the wooden gate.
“Then we should not wait for the third.”
The six entered the mine.
Beyond the gate, the passage descended steeply between walls scarred by tools. Wooden braces supported the ceiling, many bowed beneath the weight of the mountain. Lanterns hung at intervals, burning with a thick oil that filled the air with black smoke.
The smell reached them first.
Sweat.
Blood.
Wet stone.
And something worse beneath it all.
Something rotten.
Isamu knelt near the ground.
“Three guards passed this way. One wounded.”
“The one Fendor shot,” said Kaylor.
“They split here.”
The tunnel divided.
One branch sloped downward toward the sound of metal striking rock. The other remained level and carried the smell of smoke and cooked meat.
“Barracks,” Fendor said, indicating the level passage. “The wounded guard went that way.”
“The prisoners are below,” said Grazim.
“If we descend now, the barracks will be behind us.”
Nethnarel studied the ceiling.
“Could we bring it down?”
Hexen placed a hand against one of the wooden supports.
“Not without burying ourselves and everyone beneath us.”
“That is why I asked before doing it.”
“Progress.”
Voices approached from the barracks passage.
The six slipped into a shallow alcove filled with broken tools and empty ore baskets.
Two orcs came into view.
Neither wore armor.
One carried a clay jug. The other had a strip of roasted meat in one hand and was complaining in a language none of the heroes consciously understood.
Yet Grazim understood enough.
The wounded guard had reached the barracks.
The garrison was arming itself.
The mine exits were being sealed.
The two orcs passed within a few feet of the alcove.
Isamu moved first.
He caught the nearest from behind, one hand covering its mouth while the other struck beneath its ribs. The orc collapsed without a sound.
Hexen grabbed the second and pulled it into the darkness.
There was a brief struggle.
A muted crack.
Silence.
Nethnarel looked at the fallen guard.
“I assume we are not questioning them.”
Hexen lowered the body.
“You may question that one.”
The orc’s head rested at an unnatural angle.
“I think he has become uncooperative.”
Fendor took the lantern from the wall and shaded its light.
“We cannot remain hidden for long.”
They continued toward the barracks.
The passage opened into a wide chamber filled with rough tables, sleeping pallets, weapon racks, and barrels. Orcs moved throughout the room, fastening armor and shouting over one another.
At least twenty.
More doors opened along the far wall.
Kaylor counted them from the shadows.
“We cannot fight them all at once.”
Hexen studied the chamber.
Barrels of lamp oil stood near the cooking fire. Above them, a wooden platform ran along the wall, supporting crates and sacks of provisions.
“There are other ways to fight.”
Grazim followed his gaze.
“The prisoners may need that food.”
“Then we do not burn it.”
Fendor pointed toward the weapon racks.
“If those fall across the entrance, they could block the room.”
Isamu watched the orcs gathering near the central tables.
“Not for long.”
“Long enough,” said Kaylor.
They formed the plan quickly.
Fendor and Nethnarel climbed a narrow maintenance ladder leading to the platform. Isamu moved along the chamber’s edge, using shadows cast by the lanterns. Grazim, Kaylor, and Hexen waited near the entrance.
For several moments, no one noticed them.
Then Nethnarel’s boot slipped.
The platform creaked.
An orc looked up.
Nethnarel smiled down at it.
“Good evening.”
The chamber erupted.
Fendor cut the rope securing the stacked crates.
They crashed from the platform, striking the nearest orcs and scattering the others. At the same moment, Isamu kicked the support beneath the weapon racks.
Spears, axes, shields, and crude blades collapsed across the far doors.
Kaylor charged into the confusion.
His sword met the first orc before it could turn. Grazim followed, hammering another across the ribs. Hexen threw himself into the center of the room with a roar.
This time, the change overtook him completely.
His body expanded.
Bones shifted beneath his skin. His arms lengthened, his hands becoming enormous clawed paws. Dark fur spread across his shoulders and chest as his face pushed forward into a broad muzzle.
Where Hexen Brew had stood, a massive brown bear reared above the tables.
For one heartbeat, everyone stopped fighting.
The bear roared.
Several orcs fled immediately.
The others were not given the chance.
Hexen swept one from its feet and drove another into the wall. Tables overturned. Clay cups shattered. The central fire scattered across the stone.
Grazim fought beside him, trusting the beast without understanding why. Kaylor held the passage, preventing the orcs from surrounding them. Isamu moved behind the enemy line, striking weapons from hands and turning every attempt at organization into panic.
Above, Fendor fired into the mass.
Each arrow found an exposed shoulder, a raised arm, or a leg preparing to charge. He was not trying to kill every target. He was controlling the room, forcing the orcs where the others needed them to go.
Nethnarel raised both hands.
A wave of thunder exploded from the platform.
The blast hurled three orcs across the chamber and tore the remaining weapons from the racks. It also shattered every clay jug on the nearest table and stripped the feathers from Fendor’s arrows.
Fendor stared at the bare shafts in his quiver.
Nethnarel glanced at him.
“I apologize.”
“You will.”
The fight turned.
The surviving orcs retreated toward the blocked doors. Some tried to climb over the fallen weapon racks. Others threw themselves against the wood, shouting for help from the chambers beyond.
Kaylor saw an armored figure forcing its way through the obstruction.
“Commander!”
The doors burst open.
A massive orc entered wearing a breastplate made from overlapping pieces of black iron. One eye had been replaced by a polished red stone. A hooked blade hung from each hand.
It took in the ruined barracks, the fallen guards, and the enormous bear standing among broken tables.
Then it smiled.
“New slaves,” it said in the common tongue.
The red stone in its eye brightened.
Hexen charged.
The orc commander crossed its blades.
A pulse of crimson light struck the bear in the chest and threw him backward. Hexen crashed through a table and slid across the floor.
The commander stepped over the weapon racks.
“This mountain belongs to Gorvath.”
Kaylor raised his sword.
“Not anymore.”
He attacked.
The commander caught the blade between its hooked weapons and twisted. Kaylor barely kept hold of the hilt. A second turn would have torn the sword from his hands.
Isamu struck the orc beneath the arm.
The creature grunted but did not release Kaylor.
Grazim drove his hammer into its side.
Black armor rang like a bell.
The commander shoved Kaylor away and slashed at Grazim. One hooked blade tore across his armor and opened the flesh beneath.
Grazim stumbled.
The red stone turned toward him.
It was not an eye.
Something moved inside it.
A shape like a coiled worm pressed against the gem from within.
Nethnarel saw it too.
“The stone,” she called. “Break the stone!”
Fendor nocked one of his featherless arrows.
The commander moved constantly, using Kaylor and Grazim as shields. Fendor followed it with the point of his bow but could not find the shot.
Could not find it consciously.
Yet somewhere beneath thought, his hands remembered.
He drew the string farther.
The world seemed to slow.
There was no direct path to the stone. Kaylor’s shoulder blocked the angle. The commander’s hooked blade covered the rest.
Fendor released.
The arrow struck the flat of Kaylor’s sword.
It ricocheted.
The shaft passed beneath the commander’s raised weapon and drove directly into the red gem.
The stone shattered.
A high, piercing shriek filled the chamber.
The commander released both weapons and clutched its face. Red smoke poured from the empty socket, twisting into the shape of a long, many-legged creature before dissolving in the air.
The orc fell to its knees.
Hexen rose from the wreckage.
Still in the form of a bear, he crossed the chamber in three heavy strides and struck the commander with one massive paw.
The creature hit the wall and did not rise.
Silence settled over the barracks.
Fendor looked at the path his arrow had taken.
“I knew I could do that.”
Nethnarel descended from the platform.
“You appeared surprised.”
“I was pleased.”
“You were surprised.”
Fendor ignored him.
Kaylor knelt beside the commander and examined the shattered red stone.
“Was that controlling him?”
“Or strengthening him,” Grazim said.
“Or watching through him,” Nethnarel added.
Hexen’s shape began to change.
The bear shrank, bones and muscle returning to human proportions until Hexen crouched among the broken furniture, breathing heavily.
He looked at his hands.
Then at the fallen commander.
“I remembered that.”
Grazim moved closer.
“Becoming the bear?”
“Not exactly.”
Hexen touched the side of his head.
“I remembered being something larger.”
The others waited.
He shook his head.
“It is gone.”
Kaylor retrieved the commander’s keys.
A ring of black iron hung from its belt. There were dozens, each marked with a different symbol.
From deeper in the mountain came another sound.
Not a bell.
Voices.
Men and women shouting.
Then the baying of hounds.
The third bell rang.
Its toll rolled through the mine like thunder.
Marrick’s warning returned to them.
No one returns from below after the third bell.
Grazim closed his hand around the keys.
“Then we will be the first.”
They left the ruined barracks and descended toward the prisoners.
Behind them, flames from the scattered cooking fire climbed one of the wooden tables.
Nethnarel glanced back.
“Should we extinguish that?”
Hexen looked at the chamber.
“We could.”
The fire reached the overturned barrels of lamp oil.
The explosion shook dust from the ceiling.
Hexen winced.
“Too late.”
They ran.
The lower tunnels twisted through the mountain in a maze of rails, ladders, work chambers, and steep shafts crossed by narrow wooden bridges. Heat rose from somewhere far beneath them. The air grew thicker with every turn.
They began finding prisoners.
The first group had been abandoned beside an ore cart when the alarm sounded. Six men and four women stood chained to a wall, their hands bleeding from work.
They recoiled when the heroes appeared.
Grazim held up the ring of keys.
“We have come to take you out.”
No one moved.
A woman with a shaved head stared at the blood on his armor.
“Who sent you?”
“No one.”
“Which lord do you serve?”
“None.”
“Then who are you?”
The heroes exchanged glances.
They had names now.
But no answer.
Kaylor stepped forward.
“We are the ones opening the door.”
He unlocked the first chain.
That answer was enough.
The prisoners led them toward the lower work chambers. At every junction, more captives joined them. Some carried wounded friends. Others seized discarded tools and followed with hammers, picks, and shovels held like weapons.
Whispers moved through the growing column.
The strangers from the summit.
The warriors who killed the gate guards.
The man who became a bear.
The archer who never missed.
The horned mage whose fire changed colors.
The quiet one who walked through blades.
The armored priest carrying light.
The dragonborn with the burning sword.
Most of the descriptions were inaccurate.
None of the heroes corrected them.
They reached the largest chamber shortly before the hunters found them.
The mine opened around a deep central pit. Wooden lifts hung above the darkness, raising baskets of ore from unseen depths. Hundreds of candles burned along the walls, their wax formed from a foul black substance.
Nearly fifty prisoners had been gathered beside the pit.
Orc guards surrounded them.
Between the guards prowled four great hounds with hairless gray bodies and mouths that opened too widely.
At the far end of the chamber stood a raised platform.
A figure waited there.
It was taller than any orc they had yet seen. Iron plates had been driven directly into its flesh. Chains wrapped its arms, and from the center of its chest protruded a red crystal larger than a man’s fist.
The shape inside this stone was clearly visible.
A pale creature twisted behind the crystal surface.
The prisoners fell silent.
Marrick’s words returned to Grazim.
A thing that was once an orc.
The creature spread its arms.
“Welcome,” it said.
Its voice came from the mouths of every orc in the chamber.
“Returned ones.”
The six stopped.
The red crystal pulsed.
All around them, the guards raised their weapons in perfect unison.
The creature smiled.
“I wondered how long the dead would keep you sleeping.”
Grazim felt the symbol against his chest burn.
“Gorvath.”
The creature bowed.
“And you must be what remains of the heroes.”
The prisoners looked toward the six strangers.
The heroes themselves stood frozen.
Gorvath knew what they were.
Perhaps he knew who they had been.
The answer waited across a chamber filled with chains, monsters, and enslaved villagers.
Kaylor raised his sword.
“Release them.”
Gorvath laughed through twenty borrowed mouths.
“You awakened with nothing. No memories. No true strength. No understanding of what was done to you.”
The red crystal brightened.
“You are not heroes.”
Grazim looked at the prisoners surrounding the pit.
At the collars around their necks.
At the tools in their wounded hands.
At the children hidden behind them.
Perhaps Gorvath was right.
They had no memories of being heroes.
But they had not needed memories to come this far.
Grazim raised his hammer.
“Then this will be our beginning.”