ARELITON ADOR: THE WATERHALLS OF DROWNING
"STUMPY" Thoothmonom, Lapidary of the Rags of Paint
28th Sandstone, 1008U
My apol'gies, in advance, to whoever reads this. I'm still learning how to write with m'good hand. I've been able t'get by at m'workshop with some help from Eliza's lil'uns, but writing ain't the kind of work I've been trained in. That was Salmongod's job up until this year: bookworm, tightly-wound fellow, not the social type and a tough son of a bitch. That is, before the accident.
Y'may note I have no memory for dates. Too much gone by, like booze out the tap. Ask the new bookkeep' if you be wantin' to know the numbers.
I've lived here three years since I departed Kathilmonom with the urge to be somebody. Heard that this rebellion was underway. Real quiet rebellion if you ask me: all this business about a queen surviving the wrath of Ozram and her loyalists fleeing to the farthest cranny of the crankshaft of the Stones Like Bones. That's what mah grandpaps would call the world. Figures that he was a miner, a deep delver. I left him behind in Kathilmonom, and he grunted that I'd see an early grave out on the frontier. More than once these past three years I thought he was right: we've cheated death three times, maybe four. I can't count the number on two hands, for y'see, I only got the one.
I trickled in on a wave of ruffians looking for sanctuary away from society. All rough types, real seedy. At first I thought they were voyagin' to sabotage the rebels, but there ain't no man more loyal than one 'fraid of what's waiting for him back home, be it a terror of a wife or a prison sentence for not makin' enough electrum doodads in time. I got the rap sheets of some of these crooks and they were all tossed out for violating some royal poofbag's orders to construct something impossible. Hown'hell you gonna make a bed out of sunstones? Y'd hafta be possessed by foul spirits.
This plan they had, to build a tower off the land as a symbol of their separation from the former state, it was real inspirin' but the work involved was just improbable. They'd dug to damn near the center of the world with the plan of pumping the core of the planet out and spilling its blood all over the forsaken sea. If I weren't no dwarf, I'd have mocked them for trying. But goddamn it, I admired the bastards and I'd help make it happen. Even if it meant sweatin' bullets in the darkest pit I'd ever known, deeper than my grandpappy had ever dug. This was Areliton Ador: not much drowning or water, dunno why they called it that. Mostly they had fire: down in the basements the glass forges were going one hunnert percent cranking out tubes, screws and blocks for making what the head of engineering Valrandir described to us all as "A threading of magma through the cloth of the stone." 80+ layers of rock had to be dug out, with room for the pumps and a small reservoir for catchin' the earth's blood. They'd o'erlap up from the pits to the surface. At the top, there'd be a spout to pour it off into the ocean where it'd solidify into somethin' workable.
If we didn't screw somethin' up and all die in the process, that is. Valrandir made damn sure to hammer it in that a single melted or fused part would cause the entire construct to collapse on itself, turning the fort they'd carved out into what he called "A bathhouse for ass demons."
We got'ta work settin' up the first designated area for th' pump stack. wern't easy. In fact, it was downright terrifying. Jungle's not a clean and easy place to do work. Had to clear-cut the bastard before we could start constructing the power, and theres plenty of room to hide in the jungle for a certain kind of vermin. Th' kind of vermin you can't trust to take you in a straight fight. Th' kind of vermin what the soldiers were posted out there to keep us safe from.
Th' kind of vermin that put down one of our finest soldiers with a single lucky shot.
Chaos erupted. The soldiers flushed 'em out while we fled, but they couldn't right fockin' bring back Ultimuh now could they?
Never did see a man so angry as Salmongod. He'd been late gathering his 'quipment on the way to the battlefield and when he arrived to see Ultimuh layin' out in the peat like that, well, he lost his shite. Never seen a man wearin' spectacles fire a shot like 'e did.
In th' wake of the battle, Salmongod seemed to take well to his newfound popularity. 'E declared himself mayor, said leadership was in order, a necessary evil in the times to come. Apparently, the place hadn't had a heirarchy for fear of its corruptin' influences, but the rest of the old-timers allowed it. Salmongod was in, and got right to work organizin' the place. Said we needed extra security.
So we made doors. Back then, well, I had my own two hands. I remember not knowing chisel from hammer back then with masonry, but y'learn quick I suppose.
For months the metalworker Taricus, a downright genius of metalcraftin' if I do say so and the mate who's work kept the military alive and kickin' through more ambushes than bright summers in this place, he'd refused to leave his damned forge and kept asking for more and more things. Problem was, none of us could figger out heads nor tails of what he'd been babblin' about. He'd wanted bones, so went some cows to the abbatoir. He wanted blocks, so we made him some damn blocks.
He wanted bars of metal, and feh Armok's sake there be nothin' but fockin' bars of metal down there if there's hairs on m'soddin chin. He wanted cloth, and some of the braver sorts even went down into the caves to fetch some spider's threads jes' to see if he'd bite. But nothin't was good enough. 'Round year's end he snapped and tried to strangle the kitchen staff with his bare hands, frothin' at the mouth. Completely gone. One day, the friendliest sort and then a year later it was like somethin' from beyond was steerin' him about like a beast of burden.
I think I did see Scaraban cryin' his eyes out as he drove the pick through Taricus' own 'ead. Couldn't believe what things had to come to sometimes.
Not a soul was too damn cheerful-likes after that. Valrandir did his best to distract us by testin' out the goblin pit, but there jus' weren't enough goblins to be truly entertainin'.
Always nice to see them dragging on their bellies, I suppose-likes. Salmongod vented his frustration on them from above, takin' his sweet time in using one as target practice for his newfound love of the crossbow. I think the man does it just to spite his condition, or maybe it's deeper than that. F'some reason I hear him countin' his shots every time, like he does it just fer the love of countin' drops o' blood.
It got worse after that. The logging needed to construct the power for the pump stack was a nightmare. Soldiers went out into the jungle, nev' to come back. After seein' Ultimuh's brains spattered on the broadleafs I tried to keep to the gemcutter's workshop and not trouble meh'self with such dangerous work. Proof of how nasty it was gettin' came to a head when the commander of our own fockin' military got his face whipped right off.
Metalmilitia, second in command, was so furious that he lost it right there on the battlefield and tore the rest of the gobbos into somethin' resembling dwarven syrupfloss. Never gonna' argue with 'im about anything ever again. Even the workers were 'fraid to go near, everything to the poor dwarf looked like a gobbo for a week after.
The Doc was outright pissed. He cussed out his nursing staff for the losses, tellin'em that they needed to be right quick on the job haulin' in the injured. Not like it was their fault, in any way or shape: both Ultimuh and Guudespelur died in seconds. But I think the man just needed to get out his frustration.
Not much was goin' anybody's way at this point. The logging was almost done, but the pump stack they'd carved out had too many faults in the location and design. No room for the power to flow. They repositioned it closer to the shore, just a dwarf's thickness from the sea.
The Doc, amongst others, said the dead were walkin' the halls from the caravans they'd murdered early-on. I'd believe them in a gulp of ale: if any one place'd be haunted it'd be this place. I can't count the bones up there on the surface.
I doubt even the mayor could've if he tried. The Doc was real spooked by it.
Salmongod wasn't too happy with his room, said he needed someplace more sublime where he could collect his thoughts. We got to settin' the place up right.
A whole gaggle of us boys. We turned it into a room the queen'd have been proud'a. As we did so, one of the workers came runnin' screaming through the halls damn proud of a trumpet he'd made.
Damn thing can't even play a note, but it was a faithful homage to the memory of the Taricus we all used to know so we kept it around as a keepsake. I admire the boy's craftsdwarfship: Taricus looks like he could come walkin' in off of it tossin' that hammer around like a child's ball n' cup.
Salmongod didn't want us wasting any pig iron. We assured him that there wern't nothin' worth a damn we could do with it anyway, asides from studding his clothes with it or makin' some more steel. Latter jus' didn't feel right with Taricus dead n' all.
Wasn't ready to argue with the mayor. He looked a mite bit strung out those days, and his skill with his machine had gotten sharper than any other.
I stopped walkin' the halls at night 'round those times. Somethin' uneasy in the air.
They called a meeting as for what to do about these apparitions. Most didn't want to think they existed. The rest said it was the damn ocean's fault, bringin' the dead back, and that they had to be appeased. So the masons got to cuttin' up slabs in hopes they'd feel their due had been paid.
We were s'damn sure we'd see the faces of the fallen wanderin' about after all this mess that the forges were fired up in anticipation. Some incredible pieces were made: Ultimuh and Guudespelur were both immortalized. Ultimuh still stands outside the dining hall, his hammer crackin' a fool gobbo's skull wide open.
After the slabs were put down in the burial halls, that chill seemed to let up a bit.
At this point we were really gettin' along. Logging was done, entrances sealed off and the windmill bank was being put in place. Put all of us to the task of learnin' how to jam Tab A into Slot B. Most of us didn't know a damn thing about machines but Valrandir somehow managed to make sure the whole thing stuck together.
I remember, one night, one of the Doc's nurses, name of Mestthos, comin' to me scared out of her mind. I was up working late in my shop when she snuck up to me, eyes wider than the skies, sayin' that she'd been visited by Besmar in her sleep.
She looked terrified to be speakin' those words. I tol' her I didn't know who or what this "Besmar" was, an' she related to me the story of the exile. Tol' me that Besmar'd been standin' in the shadows of her room, her head split open and oozing somethin' foul, skin all hangin' off her head. A real spook tale. Besmar'd tol' her that she had'nae betrayed us: she'd been betrayed by another, who Mistthos dinnae tell me and I don't blame the lass. I asked her if this was the only time somethin' like this had happened to her and she said nae, t'was the fifth time but the only one she'd seen the spook in the flesh. I tol' her that, no matter what the tale, the ghostie needed to be remembered somehow-likes. Poor girl was too scared to do it, though, so sure she was they'd exile her for sympathizing with a traitor. I tol' her this weren't no Merchantsalves, and we weren't no Wet Papers, and to get her beardless arse over to the masonry shop and make the damn memorial. So the girl, without knowin' a thing about cuttin' rocks, carved out a crude slab, decorated it "IN MEMORY OF BESMAR OSSEKVABOK" and dragged it down to the sealed cavern doors.
Put it there, tucked out of sight. I ken she dinnae have more visitations.
And all this before I e'vn lost me hand.
OOC
First of the many updates, but I need to do some IRL stuff today too. More later.
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Topic: Areliton Ador, Community Fort - XXXXU: [The End] (Read 34201 times)