Chapter 58: Ch. 058 – (Then) The Last Straw

For two more weeks, Jonathan’s life continued just like that. Every morning he would get up, and then blearily spend the day digging through shit for enough stone salts so that his jailers would actually feed him for another day. Soon, all of those awful days started blending together. The only thing there was ever enough of was water, though it was brackish and foul tasting enough that he wondered if it was somehow tainted by either the sewage or some other chemical that the mill might use to turn his white stone salts into dangerous black powder. 

In those first two weeks he saw two coffins carried out of the prison to the rail platform where they would presumably be transported to their final resting place, and one dwarf that was beaten to death by the guards. It was strange, Jonathan thought at the time, that the guards would be the ones to murder a disobedient prisoner, rather than the other way around. None of the dwarves that went into the caverns every day had anything left to live for, but even though that was the case, he had yet to see any violence between them. It was almost like they’d bonded together under the intense heat and pressure that was this awful place. 

He didn’t think that forced camaraderie applied to him, of course. Everyone had made it very clear since the first day that he wasn’t exactly welcome here, but as long as he kept his head down and did what he was supposed to, everyone mostly left him alone, even if they wouldn’t stop gossiping about him. By now, there were only two topics of conversation amongst the other dwarves on his crew: what he did to get sent here, and how much longer he would last. It was a grim subject, but since they didn’t have much else to talk about, that was pretty much the story every day. 

Until one day, halfway through their shift, a small group of dwarves decided to make his problem. Jonathan could tell what they wanted from the conversations between them in the stone tongue. “Go on, ask ‘em,” one dwarf urged, followed by another egging on their unlikely messenger, Brund. 

“What are… ye here?” the dwarf with a braided beard asked. 

His awful attempts at Wenlish though, gave Jonathan the perfect excuse to play dumb to their requests. 

“I’m sorry,” Jonathan said, shrugging helplessly as he played dumb, “I don’t understand.” This exchange went on for several minutes, with the dwarf growing more and more frustrated, and Jonathan trying very hard not to look amused before they left in frustration. 

Honestly, he wanted nothing more than to make friends here, but these dwarves were anything but friendly. He didn’t know if they were looking for an excuse to beat him or mock him, but the last thing he wanted to do was give them either. 

That night over dinner, Jonathan finally found out the real reason, talking to the dwarves. It was a bet of some sort. The dwarves in his crew had all bet their day's beer to whoever could find out the reason why Jonathan was in the powder mill before the heat finally did him in. It was a tempting reward. It was probably just enough for one lucky dwarf to get a little drunk. Jonathan didn’t care for drinking, but even he could see the temptation in that. That just made him shake his head though. That was the last sort of attention he needed from dwarves with nothing but time on their hands. 

He knew he hadn’t heard the end of that little bet when he went to sleep on the floor that night. Not from the pieces of conversation he heard when he was falling asleep for the first time. He didn’t expect to be woken up hours later by a dwarf with a crazed look in his eye and a knife in his hand. 

“Where from ye,” Brund demanded in Wenlish, “Why ye here?” Jonathan tried to move to crawl away, but the dwarf grabbed his ankle.

From the sounds of snoring, Jonathan could tell that almost everyone was asleep, but a quick look showed a couple dwarves were sitting on their beds watching the little drama play out. It was clear that they had no intention of putting a stop to it either. That left Jonathan all alone against a dwarf that was already starting to painfully squeeze his leg. 

At that moment, all he could think of was that Ekrom would have known what to do in this situation. Jonathan was clueless, though. “Get off me!” he yelled finally in stone tongue. He hadn’t meant to. He wanted to save that little piece of information in case he ever needed it, but things were starting to get wildly out of control, and he didn’t really feel like he had another choice. 

“We’ll ye look at that,” Brund smiled manically, making him look even more crazed. “The giant speaks our tongue. Ye been holding out on us, boy!”

He pulled Jonathan slightly forward, so he was that much closer to him, and gestured again with the knife. “Me and the boys wanted to know yer story, and figured tonight was as good a time as any to tell tales. What do ye say?” 

“I don’t tell anything to people that are holding me at knife point,” Jonathan shot back, trying to keep the fear out of his voice. 

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“Well, aren’t ye a brave one,” the dwarf said mockingly. “I thought that fear would have loosened your tongue enough to sing, but maybe you’ll have to lose a few toes before we get to that point. We can— Ahhh! What in the blazes?”

Jonathan didn’t think about it. It just happened. He saw the blade moving slowly towards his foot, and he just reacted. Suddenly the blade Brund’s hand was red-hot, and he dropped it on the floor. He didn’t let go of Jonathan’s leg, though, and when he started to tighten his grip further, Jonathan reacted by pulling the leg up towards his body. Dwarves were incredibly strong, but not as heavy as you’d think, so since his attacker didn’t let go, he came along for the ride. That ride ended when Jonathan brought his other knee up into the dwarves face, flattening his nose with a satisfying crack that left Brund groaning as blood poured from his wound. 

Jonathan was up like a shot after that and grabbed the now cool knife before anyone else could. Then he stood there holding it at the ready while he stared down the watching dwarves. One had woken up in the scuffle, and he had an audience of three now, but they didn’t seem inclined to intervene to help Brund now than they had moments before. Was this all just entertainment to them, he wondered? Had someone set this whole bet up just because they knew it would lead to a fight and a little entertainment?

The thought sickened him, but delayed him just enough for his attacker to get back to his feet. “Lad - that was the worst mistake ye ever made,” Brund said, wiping the blood from his face. “Do ye even know who I killed to get sent here? Do ye know how many goblins I killed before that? I’m going to rip your fingers off one at a time until—”

“Do you think I care?” Jonathan interrupted, glaring coldly at the dwarf. As weak as he was, he doubted he could win in a fight against him, and he was certain he couldn’t win in a fight against two or three dwarves. “I’ve killed worse monsters than you ever will, and I’ll add you to the list if you get any closer.”

He knew with a terrible certainty that he could kill everyone in this room before they choked the life out of him. Pushing the fire out of his body every hour or two was a difficult task, but unleashing the fire that danced in every object around them every moment of the day? That would be the easiest thing in the world. He couldn’t reach the powder mill from here to try to blow it up too, but he could certainly turn this room into a firestorm as a final act. He’d never thought about killing anyone on purpose before, and he tried hard to push that darkness down deep inside of him, but it was there, just waiting to come out like the fire that saturated the stone all around him. 

“And just who is it ye killed, then, cold blood? Yer mommy? Yer Daddy?” Brund laughed. “This deep ye can barely stand let alone fight me lad. Give me back me knife, and I’ll think on letting you live.” The dwarf’s words stung, however unintentionally. He’d meant them as an off the cuff joke about how pathetic he was. Jonathan knew that, but even still he couldn’t help but on some level he knew that he had killed them. Both of them. He hadn’t held the weapon, but in both cases they were dead, and he’d played a part. 

He couldn’t say any of that though, so instead he barked “I killed a troll that took bigger shits than you Brund, and I was bleeding out at the time.” Jonathan held up his arm to show off the nasty scar caused by the goblin’s blade and the subsequent burn that was the only reminder left of that awful day.

“We all got scars, kid,” Brund said, laughing as he moved closer. 

Jonathan raised the knife, unsure what the consequences would be if he used fire, obviously enough to torch the dwarf in this place. In seconds, he wouldn’t have a choice, but as soon as he started to pull fire for what was going to happen next another dwarf at the far end of their barracks called out. “Stop it right there, Brund.”

To Jonathan’s complete surprise, the dwarf actually did stop and turned to answer. “But the giant broke my nose. He—”

“I saw what he did,” the other dwarf said. Now that Jonathan could take his eyes off the dwarf that was about to tear him to pieces, he could see that one of the older dwarves was the one talking. Jonathan didn’t know his name, but he had long gray braids in his beard, one milky white eye, and he spoke with the voice of authority. “But right now, I want to hear about this troll.”

Brund stormed off, and the old dwarf turned to face Jonathan, “Ye tell us a good story, and it just might save yer skin giant. Ye lie to me, and I’ll know it, too.” 

Jonathan swallowed hard. He believed the old man on both counts, but more than anything he was tired. All he wanted to do was lay down and snatch an hour’s sleep here and there before the ground heated up enough again to make sleeping impossible once more. That wasn’t an option, though, so instead Jonathan told them everything. He started with the steam engine explosion, trying to put himself in the best possible light, for these hardened criminals, but quickly got to the good part when he saw that he was losing their interest. By the time he got to the trap gone wrong, every dwarf in the room was awake and giving him their full attention. After that, he glossed over the goblin fight and the trip through the tunnels, before telling them all about the firestorm he’d unleashed as he burned the troll to a crisp, though he left out the part where it had almost cost him his own life in the process. 

The old dwarf nodded when it was done. “Yer a brave lad, but bravery ain’t much good down here.” Jonathan wasn’t really sure what that meant, and the dwarf didn’t elaborate. He just rolled over and went to sleep, along with everyone else, leaving Jonathan alone to worry about what would happen next if he dared to close his eyes again.

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