FIFTEEN

Anduin realized that Magni’s compliment wasn’t an idle one. He was indeed the only human—indeed, the only person who wasn’t a dwarf or a gnome—present as those who would witness and participate in the ritual assembled in the High Seat. Magni had donned his most formal armor. Gone was the avuncular dwarf whom Anduin had become so fond of. Today Magni was fully embracing what he needed to be for his people, and he was every inch, short though it might seem to Anduin, a king. Anduin, too, had dressed in the finest clothes he had brought with him, but still felt a bit out of place. Fortunately, he knew many of the dwarves.

One, though, was not present, and he missed her keenly. He wondered what she would have thought about this. Would Aerin have deemed it superstitious nonsense, or a practical method of finding out information? He would never know.

Magni’s eyes swept the assembled gathering. There were not many—High Priest Rohan, several herbalists, High Explorer Magellas, and Advisor Belgrum from the Explorers’ League. “Would that me brothers were here,” Magni said quietly, “tae witness this. But there was no time tae notify them. Come, let us go. Each moment we linger distresses poor Azeroth th’ more.”

Without another word he strode toward a large door toward the entrance of the High Seat. Anduin had noticed the door there before but had never asked about it, and no one had ever mentioned it. Magni nodded, and two attendants stepped forward bearing a huge iron skeleton key between the two of them. Another brought out a large ladder; the door was so gargantuan even the slightly taller Anduin would not have been able to reach the lock. The dwarves cautiously ascended and hefted the mammoth key into position. Working together, they twisted it. With a deep, protesting groan, the key turned and the lock yielded. The dwarves descended and moved the ladder out of the way.

For a moment nothing happened, and then slowly the door magically swung open of its own accord toward the onlookers, revealing a yawning darkness.

The two attendants who had opened the door had set aside the giant’s key and now moved ahead of the small procession, lighting sconces along the way as they went to reveal a simple descending corridor. The air was cool and moist, but not stale. Anduin realized that there must be huge open areas beneath Ironforge.

They followed the corridor in silence as it led them ever downward. It was precise and linear; no twining path this, not for the dwarves. One of the attendants moved up ahead of them, and when they reached the end of the hallway, there was a brazier burning brightly ready to greet them. The hallway opened into a large cavern, and Anduin gasped.

He’d been expecting the neat hallway, but what he saw startled him. Beneath his feet was a platform that branched out to two paths. One was a set of stairs, carpeted and surprisingly new looking, which led upward. Another path led downward, this one plain, unadorned stone. What took his breath away was what was on the walls and above.

Clear, gleaming crystals jutted from the walls and ceiling. They caught the light of the brazier and the torches the attendants held, sparkling and seeming to radiate clean white illumination of their own, though Anduin knew that was but a trick of the imagination. Nonetheless, it was beautiful, this blending of the glories of the natural formations of this place and the simple lines of dwarven architecture.

“The crystal—it’s so beautiful,” Anduin said softly to Rohan, who was walking next to him.

The priest chuckled. “Crystals? Lad, these are no crystals. Ye’re looking at diamonds.”

Anduin’s eyes widened, and his head whipped back up to regard the gleaming ceiling with new respect.

Magni was purposefully striding up the stairs to a broad platform large enough to accommodate a group several times their size. He turned and nodded expectantly.

“I think it no accident that right when we needed it, we have uncovered a tablet that contains information that might be of great help,” he said, his voice echoing in the cavern. “Nearly everyone present here today lost someone he or she loved dearly three days past. Reports come from all over Azeroth that summat is mightily wrong. The earth is wounded, an’ is shaking—cryin’ out fer aid. We are dwarves. We are of th’ earth. I have faith in the word of the earthen. I believe that what I do here—this rite that is unspeakably old—will let me heal this poor, hurtin’ world. By my blood an’ bone, by the earth an’ stone, let this be done.”

The hair on the back of Anduin’s neck prickled. Even though Magni’s speech had been spontaneous, there was something about it that made his breath catch. He felt that just as he had descended into the heart of the earth, so he was about to descend into a ritual that was deep and unfathomable.

Belgrum stepped forward, a scroll in his hand. Magellas stood beside him, his hands clasped behind his back. Beside these two stood Reyna Stonebranch, a dwarf herbalist, holding a crystal vial full of a murky-looking liquid. Belgrum cleared his throat and began to speak a strange language that sounded hard and blunt and made Anduin shiver. It seemed colder here now, somehow.

After each phrase, Magellas translated for Anduin’s benefit. The young prince remembered Magni reading the same phrases to him just yesterday.

“An’ here are the why an’ the how, tae again become one wi’ the mountain,” intoned Belgrum. “For behold, we are earthen, o’ the land, and its soul is ours, its pain is ours, its heartbeat is ours. We sing its song an’ weep fer its beauty. For who wouldna wish tae return home? That is the why, O children o’ the earth.”

Home. Azeroth was truly home to all of them, Anduin thought as Belgrum continued with the specific directions on how to prepare the draft. Home wasn’t Stormwind, or even with his father, or Aunt Jaina. Home was this land, this world. Here they now stood, in the “heart of the earth,” embraced by diamonds and stone that felt sheltering rather than oppressive. Magni was about to speak to the wounded Azeroth and find out best how to heal it. It was truly a noble goal.

“Wi’ a finger’s pinch o’ the soil that nourished them, consume the draft. Speak these words wi’ true intent, an’ the mountain shall reply. And so it shall be that ye shall become as ye once were. Ye shall return home, and ye shall become one with the mountain.”

Reyna now stepped forward, handing the muddy-looking elixir to Magni. Unhesitatingly the dwarven king took the transparent, slender vial, brought it to his lips, and drank it down. He wiped his lips and handed it back to Reyna.

Magellas now handed him a scroll. With a bit more hesitation than Belgrum had displayed, Magni read aloud in the ancient language while Magellas translated.

“Within me is th’ earth itself. We are one. I am o’ it and it o’ me. I listen fer th’ mountain’s reply.”

Magni handed back the scroll, then spread his hands imploringly. He closed his eyes and furrowed his brow in concentration.

No one knew what to expect. Would the mountain suddenly begin to talk? If so, what would its voice be like? Would it speak only to Magni, and what would he hear? Could he speak to it? Would—

Magni’s eyes flew open. They were wide with wonder, and his mouth curved in a soft smile. “I … I can hear …” He lifted his hands to his temples. “Th’ voices are in me head. Lots o’ ’em.” He chuckled softly, his expression one of stunned joy and triumph. “It’s not just one voice. It’s … dozens, maybe hundreds. All the voices o’ the earth!”

Anduin shivered, his own lips curving in a smile. Magni had been right! He could hear the earth itself—themselves? It was so confusing!—speaking to him.

“Can ye understand them?” asked Belgrum excitedly. “What are they saying?”

Magni suddenly threw his head back, arching. He seemed to try to stagger backward, but his feet were held as if rooted in place. No, not rooted … Anduin realized his black boots were turning almost translucent, as if they were suddenly made of glass—as if his feet themselves were suddenly made of glass—

—or crystal … or diamond …

One with the mountain …

No, oh, no, it couldn’t be—

Suddenly Magni’s foot quivered and a bulge of clear stone formed atop it. Like a living ooze of rock, it began moving upward, along his legs, his torso. It spiked here and there with a sudden groaning sound, forming long crystal spears, as if Magni Bronzebeard was a crystal forming crystals of his own. Magni opened his mouth in a long, wordless cry and lifted his arms high over his head. Diamond ooze scurried to wrap around his hands, shooting out to encircle his body. Magni screamed, a gut-wrenching cry of pure horror. But the merciless clear liquid stone poured into his mouth, silencing him in midscream, hardening so quickly he didn’t even have time to close his eyes.

Everyone had been staring, open-mouthed, but now was galvanized into action by the sound, echoing in the diamond cavern, bone-chilling, like no cry of pain or horror they had ever heard.

Rohan began to cast healing spells. Magellas and Belgrum moved forward, seizing Magni’s arms, trying foolishly to somehow pull him away from where he stood. But it had all happened too fast, and now it was too late. The echoes of his single shout died away. Magni looked like he had been both turned to stone and encased in it, his head thrown back, his arms spread, the tendons in his neck standing out in pain. And over him, like some bizarre costume, were ragged, gleaming chunks of jagged crystal.

Anduin broke the shocked silence. “Is he … can you …”

Rohan stepped close to Magni, placing a hand on his king’s arm and closing his eyes. A single tear leaked beneath the closed lids as he stepped away, shaking his head.

Anduin stared. Disbelief rushed through him, the same disbelief he had experienced after the land trembled and buried Aerin beneath the crushing weight of tons of rock. But … this wasn’t possible!

He dragged his gaze to Magellas, who stared as aghast as he.

“I was certain,” he murmured, “that it was not literal … we checked every source. …”

“You mean—it worked? This is what the ritual was supposed to do?” Anduin cried, his voice treble with his shock and horror.

“Not literally,” Magellas said, looking like a panicked hare. “But we—we d-did perform it precisely correctly. …”

Unable to help himself, Anduin sprang forward. With a cry, he took the hilt of his ceremonial dagger, and before anyone could stop him, had struck the figure on the shoulder. The hilt shattered beneath the impact, part of it whirling erratically away. The impact jarred his hand, and he dropped the part of the hilt he still held. Clutching his stinging hand, he stared.

There was not a single mark on the image. Magni had been turned into one of the hardest known materials in the world.

As Anduin stared at the diamond lump that had once been a vibrant, hale dwarf, some of the words of the ritual floated back to him. For behold, we are earthen, of the land … For who would not wish to return home? … And so it shall be that you shall become as you once were. You shall return home, and you shall become one with the mountain.

The dwarves were descendents of the titans. Magni had become what he had once been—and paid for it with his life. “He’s gone home,” Anduin whispered past a throat tight with grief. Tears welled in his eyes and blurred the image of Magni Bronzebeard. As the torchlight glinted off the statue, Anduin saw only beautiful, fractured lights dancing before his gaze.

He blinked hard, gulping, tears trickling down his face for the kindly dwarf who had only wanted to do what was best for his people, who had wanted to talk to a wounded world in order to help it heal. And for that goal, he had been lost to them.

What were the dwarves going to do now?