About Thurin FoehammerBackground:
Thurin worked the forge. It was a joyless task. It was an emotionless task. Ore was brought in and it was purified. The works of other races came to him and they were melted down. Every day he catalogued and sorted these things without a thought as towards why. He didn't know who would use them. He didn't even know if they would be used. It was his task, he did. The slaves brought in the raw materials and he worked. The slaves took the weapons away and he worked. Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months. The duergar toiled away. The only ones who might have worked harder than him were the slaves, though in a sense, he was as much as slave as they. This changed when he was called for patrol duty. It was another thankless which he performed because it was his clan's duty, and as such it was his. He and his kinsmen would walk the Deep Roads and be on a look out for any trouble. It was duty, and it also refreshed the mind, so that they might return to their craft with efficiency. He had walked those roads dozens of times and he was certain that he would do so dozens of times again. Though this time was different. It was different because he found...a dwarf. Or more specifically the corpse of a dwarf. Well, the remains of the corpse of a dwarf. It had fallen prey to one of the many giant spiders which defended their home. Thurin walked forward to see what was left, and turned his nose up in disgust. The dwarf's armor, which had not been eaten, was ostentatious. What use were the small horns on the helm? They served no purpose. He would never have added something so superfluous. And the axe? It had runes on it, when it wasn't even magical. Runes...that were for show. No wonder the dwarf had died, when it had been so impractical. It was only too bad that the dwarf had died when it could have been a slave. Wasted resources. He almost turned away when he noticed something. There was a piece of metal clutched in the dwarf's skeletal hand. He bent down and pried it open. The duergar's eyes went wide. He had heard of these artifacts before. Used by bards and other psychic practitioners, they held shared mindscapes as reminders of the past and to inspire the youth for the future. The duergar pulled it loose and held it up. "What's happening here?" He heard a gruff voice from behind. Without thinking he put the metal in his pocket and turned around to see an elder approaching. "Dead surfacer. Eaten by a spider." He responded. The elder walked over and looked down at the dead dwarf. "Gather the arms and armor. They can be remade." The duergar nodded. -------- Once home he stared at the piece of metal. He knew that he should be working. He wasn't eating, he wasn't sleeping, he wasn't defecating...so that meant that he should be working. But something about the metal called to him. Using his latent psychic power he clutched the metal and opened up his mind.
Back in Sandpoint, Drazh stared at the helmet. It had been a team effort to haul it back. Ferocia had claimed an amulet that hardened her skin. Marten had claimed a Spellbook, Azalia had an enchanted blade, Miron had a magical breastplate. And he...had this. The familiar on his shoulder hopped down and paced around it. He could feel it’s excitement. He was sure that the others thought him crazy when he claimed the massive helmet. He was certain that the townspeople thought him mad when he had spent nearly every last gold crown he had renting this forge and the supplies he needed. But he was not crazy. That he knew. The helm...within it, under the gold and bronze, was Mithril. He could smell it. He could feel it calling to him in his soul. With a grin he went to work. For days Drazh worked. He didn’t eat. He barely slept. He had a vision! The core of the helm was made of Mithril. And he knew that he could make it into a suit of armor. Something worthy of Torag’s name. His familiar, a gift from the gods, worked furiously beside him. It kept the billows going, it cooled heated metal, and it brought him the tools he needed. By the third day, the proprietor was getting worried. The sound of hammer on anvil did not cease. It was as if though there was an entire team of craftsmen in the small forge. On the fourth day she peeked inside. What she saw was a dwarf, with giant bags under his eyes, cursing as he worked. On the fifth day she snuck in food and water. The two were wolfed down without a word. On the seventh day the ranting started. It was all in dwarven, but a few words crept in that were common. Vengeance. Giants. On the ninth day the dwarf cried as he worked, calling out for his wife. The name Brunhilda was roared to the heavens. He was shaking, seeing things. At times he thought he was at Grung Varn. His clothing had been soaked through with sweat several times over. On the tenth day she had come back with a physician. The dwarf had finally passed out. Before him was a suit of fullplate armor, made from Mithril. It was covered with gold filgree, the names of the dead written upon it. A miracle had occurred. Something which should have take years had been made in a week and a half. It had nearly driven him to madness. It had nearly claimed his life. But the hand of the divine was evident in the marvelous construction. Thurin opened his eyes, and with some confusion raised a hand to his face. Why was his face wet? The duergar pulled his hand down and saw tears upon his fingers. He was...crying? Emotions touched his heart of coal, emotions that he had never felt before. Filled with confusion he got up and put the piece of metal down. He had work to do, and to his shame he had not gotten to it. Minutes turned into hours, and hours turned into days. But time did not creep on without stop. It was felt. Thurin knew something was wrong because when he worked he *thought* which was not right. He was supposed to be lost in his work, but instead he was present. The slaves brought in materials and he noticed them. They looked scared when he looked at them, for he had never done so before. For the very first time he actually acknowledged their presence. It scared him as much as it did them. He lay down to sleep, and for the first time he could not do so. All he could think about was the vision. The duergar crawled out of bed and retrieved the stone. He held it in his fist and opened his mind... ...the next day he was tired. He had never been tired as such before. To his left were a pile of gems that were sorted and ready to send out. To his right was a surfacer’s helmet that was to be melted down. An urge took him…he reached over to the gems and pulled out a diamond. And he went to work…adding it to the helmet. He sweated as he did so, his hands shaking. It was impractical. But he had done so, and he had done it for himself. Because he enjoyed it. The helmet was soon broken and melted down, with fear gripping his heart. He could not let any other see it. It would be the death of him. With a scowl he went to the shard of metal and threw it away into a pile of slag. Days went by and he forced himself to work, but it wore at him. He was mentally tired. Thurin cursed himself for his weakness. He cursed the dead dwarf that he had found. He cursed the shard of metal! And as he cursed the shard he looked up and saw it on his table. Only now it was not just a shard of metal. Now it looked like a small iron hammer. With a trembling hand he reached out and picked it up. As he did he felt a *flash* and a name came to him. Drazh Anviltamer. It was a burly dwarf who wore the mithril and gold armor from his vision. He carried a hammer with a silver head that had a haft covered in dragonskin. The dwarf laughed, a bellowing sound which was completely absent from Thurin's life. With a gasp he stood up, looking around at his spartan home. Trembling he stared at the shard of metal. He knew then that his life was over. He could not live like this. Sooner or later he would be found out and he would be killed for being a heretic. His actions would shame the clan and there would be no forgiveness. The very best that he could hope for was that he would be made a slave. The next day Thurin went to the gates and told the guards that his clan had called him to patrol. They did not question him, for why would he lie? They knew him. Everyone knew each other. He was a duergar of excellent reputation. He never lied, he only worked and did what he was told. The gates opened and with forced calm he walked through. He walked down the Deep Roads as he had done dozens of times before. Only this time he did not look back. --- Thurin walked through the Darklands alone. He did not have enough food, nor did he have enough water. He did not even know where he was going. All he knew was that he had to run, because his Clan would come for him. That he knew, for his actions would dishonor them. He had to escape. So he marched ever onward, driven by a burning desire. Who was this Drazh Anviltamer? Why did that laughing visage haunt him so? He had to know this before he died. The duergar came to the surface. He blinked and squinted at the tyranny of the sun. Half starved and dangerously dehydrated he had completed his own personal Quest for Sky. With the shard of metal clutched in his hand he fled into the alien world, confident that here his people could not pursue him. When he came upon a stream of water he nearly dove into it. Once his thirst was satiated he took stock of where he was and what he had to do… …not that he had the time or opportunity to figure out what he was meant to do. For it was at that moment that he learned that the world did not revolve around him. Talenthanis broke the world, and with that great sin, the transgressions of a lone duegar were suddenly not so important. Time and space meant little to him, for when he opened his eyes he was far, far from home. Far even from the mountains he had previously been in. After the white flash of light he found himself in the Spring Bog, a land that was so foreign to all he knew that he had to wonder if he had died and was being punished for what he had done. It was not until he wandered into Passbog that he realized that he was still amongst the living. Thurin knows little about the surface world. But he knows a few things. First he can speak common, for that is the language that the slaves speak. He can speak dwarven, for it is his own tongue, even if the dialect is different. And he has come to terms with the name of the God that has cursed him: Torag. For the metal shard that he cannot throw away has taken upon the shape of that deity. And he knows that this Drazh Anviltamer was a dwarf that was blessed by the God of Smiths. No longer does Thurin feel the pull of Dorskar, now it is only the song of Torag's anvil that beats in his heart, along with the desire to create. Alone in a foreign land, filled with 'lesser races' that he had only ever thought of as slave stock, the duergar must now find himself, and discover what it is that Torag has called him to do. |
