The Iron Tower: A Mithgar Tale

by Dennis L. McKiernan

They rode through a snow-covered land that slowly rose up out of Spindle Valley to become a flat prairie with but few features. Behind, they could see the massive Barrier clutched unto the land, looming sapless and iron hard in winter sleep, waiting for the caress of spring to send the life juices coursing through the great tangle, to set forth unto the Sun a green canopy of light-catching leaves, to send the great blind roots inexorably questing through the dark earth again. Immense it was, anchored from horizon to horizon and beyond, a great thorny wall; yet as the Warrows rode, distance diminished it until it took on the aspect of a vast remote hill stretched past seeing. At last it sank below the horizon, and although Tuck rode in the company of friends, still he felt as if he had been abandoned, yet whether it was because the loss of the Thornwall meant that he’d truly left the Bosky behind, or whether he felt exposed and vulnerable because he now rode upon an open plain, he could not say. Ahead, here and there, lone barren trees or winter-stripped thickets occasionally appeared, but they, too, were slowly left behind on the snow-swept prairie. A thin chill wind sprang up, gnawing at their backs, and soon all cloak hoods were up and talk dwindled to infrequent phrases and grunts. On they went, stopping once to feed the ponies some grain and to take a sparse meal. At times they walked, leading the steeds, giving the animals some respite. On one of these “strolls in the...

And then, bursting through the spectral shadows clutching the sinister hills to the south, erupted the enemy: Ghola upon thundering Hèlsteeds, striking down upon the standing train with shattering violence: cruel barbed spears driven by running Death, slashing tulwars cleaving into innocent flesh, slaughter racing upon cloven hooves, shocking into and through and over Women and children, oldsters and the lame, the ill and wounded, the sundering blades and impaling shafts riving a great bloody swath through the unprepared caravan. Some stood stunned and were cut down like cattle at butcher. Yet others turned to flee and were slain while running: thus did Saril die, clambering to hide in the waggon.

Once more Igon drove Rust toward Laurelin, crying out her name, but again Ghola blocked the way, this time attacking in concert. Three, then four, fell upon the youth, and he was hard pressed; yet Igon’s blade hewed into the enemy, driven by fury and desperate strength. Another Ghol fell dead, his skull cloven in twain, and Igon’s voice cried out, “For the Lady: For the Lady Laurelin!”

“The earth sustains us while we are alive, and we return to it after death. But fire, stone, soil, or even the sea, it matters nought, for it is the way of our living that is testament to our spirits, and perhaps the way that we die; and the way of our burial means little, for what we have been is gone, though our spirits may live on in the hearts of others . . . for a little while, at least.”