Belly of the Beast Warren Thomas (e novels for free .txt) 📖

the color got closer and closer. He struggled to breathe. This quenching would be the most important of his life. If he failed, and the blade cracked…

            Tane didn’t want to think about. Not with the enemy right at his doorstep.

            “Now!” he shouted.

            Tane pulled the sword blade out of the coals, held it high with the tongs, and turned to the quenching barrel. The water looked dark and cold, but he knew it was probably pink with Joelle’s and Raven’s blood.

            He thrust the glowing hot blade into the water, even as he muttered the final prayer over the blade. Steam exploded out. Tane listened intently for that telltale ting. If he heard it, the blade was ruined. Cracked. Useless.

            “Nothing! I did it!”

            “Great!” Raven cried.

            BOOM!

            Tane spun to gawk at the entry. Why were the vast silver doors closed? His friends engaged the locks as he watched. They sealed them all inside.

            Trapped like a rat.

            “Is the Sword of Power finished?” Armin asked.

            Tane turned back to the barrel. He pulled the sword out and held it high. Steam rose off it as the water dried quickly on the still hot steel.

            Tane named the blade, “Kamain’s Wrath!”

            Hot and cold flowed down from the blade. Down his arm, and spread out throughout Tane’s body. He froze, eyes huge. Nothing like that had ever happened when he named a blade. Tane had never heard of anything like that happening to anyone naming a blade.

            “I felt the magic come alive,” Joelle said, cringing back. Her voice dropped. “The blade radiates power.”

            “What’s that glowing inside the fuller?” Raven asked.

            Tane lowered the blade to study it. He’d never seen anything engraved in a blade glow like that. But the runes glowed with the same color as the forge fire. Meanwhile, the actual steel remained a dark, dark gray.

            “Kamain’s Wrath indeed,” he whispered. “I just have to polish and sharpen, and then she’ll be ready.”

            Ka-Boom!

            The huge silver doors rattled with the impact.

            Ka-Boom!

            “Well fuck me to tears,” Raven said, tightening her hand around the hilt.

            “What she said,” Quinn said. “I’d forgotten about the battering ram. Fuck.”

            “Joelle, is there any magic on the doors to protect them from such an assault?” Armin asked.

            “Not that I can tell,” she said. “I cannot see God Magic. While I do feel some kind of ward on the doors, I cannot determine what is protects against.”

            Ka-Boom!

            “We all know the wards are to protect against everything but a battering ram,” Raven said. “That’s how life works.”

            “Get to work, Tane,” Quinn said. “Get a hilt on it first thing. We might need it before you finish prettying it up.”

            “Yes. You’re right,” he said, turning back to the other broken swords.

            He started putting the parts of the hilt back together. The tang he crafted wasn’t an exact fit, so some adjusting work had to be done.

            Ka-Boom!

            “I’m hurrying!” Tane cried. “Just keep them out as long as possible.”

Chapter 92

            Ka-Boom!

            Dust came trailing down from the ceiling as the sound echoed through the abandoned dwarven city. Jessy held her hands over her ears, looking distressed.

            “Smash them down!” Nizar cried.

            “It’s not even making a dent, Your Grace,” Jhonny said. “Could the doors be steel cased in silver?”

            Nizar never thought of that, but it didn’t make sense. Why would the dwarves who built the temple even consider the possibility someone would try to batter down the doors? Putting that much valuable silver just in the doors would show their love and obedience to Dakar. It was an impressive sacrifice, which he was sure even Dakar appreciated at the time.

            “Maybe it has a steel substructure,” Jessy said. “I came from a family of smiths, and I’ve heard of lots of different structures having steel bars inside to give them strength.”

            Ka-Boom!

            He watched the double-doors vibrate, more dust falling from above. Then he remembered the main entrance. It wasn’t the doors that gave, but the structure they were attached to so long ago.

            “Jhonny, what if we moved the ram over to the side, and tried to smash out one side’s hinges?”

            The mercenary considered it a moment. “Might work, but knocking the bottom hinge loose won’t give us access, Your Grace. It worked up front because we smashed out the top hinges.”

            “If your magic can’t affect the silver doors,” Jessy said. “How about bespelling the battering ram?”

            “What are you yapping about now, girl?” Nizar said. He so wanted to backhand her. She was too full of herself. The girl didn’t know how to properly speak to a man, her superior. “The ram is fine. Nothing we’re doing will harm…”

            Nizar stopped, a thought coming to him. Jessy, infuriating as always, smirked as she lifted a brow.

            “I think you understand, Your Grace,” she said. “Can you actually put a little more oomph in the battering ram? Enough to smash the doors down?”

            “I don’t know, but we will find out,” he said. “Get her swinging again! I’ll tell you win to strike the door.”

            The mercenaries and zombies worked together to get the massive tree trunk swinging within his rough-hewn frame. Nizar moved up close behind. He watched to get the timing, while praying to Dakar for what he wanted to do. His God seemed distracted, and didn’t answer right away. Even then he just felt a sense of acceptance.

            “Now!”

            The ram swung backwards, even as the team shoved the frame up against the door again. At the top of its back-swing, Nizar threw “power” into the log. It bristled with kinetic energy as it swung forward much faster than before.

            Ka-BOOM!

            That produced a dent. The whole structure rolled back with the impact. The team got it swinging again, faster and faster.

            “Now!”

            They pushed it back against the doors. Nizar infused it with even more kinetic energy. The battering ram shot