A Will to Leave

CHAPTER THREE

I felt a faint sense of dizziness and was about to throw up, but strangely Edwin had no effect from the travel, he continued to walk into the storey. I followed him to the floor from the other end, an entrance to one of the most artistically crafted courts, built in an elvish style of architecture. The floor was neatly cut, shining marbles perfectly stuck together with cream in the middle, through which green leaves of irregular sizes peeped out. It contained fewer people than the training ground, the ceiling was close enough supported by pillars and one giant spider statue in the middle. The walls spread like expertly carved wooden designs, and there were statues everywhere, statues of people I didn't recognise, statues of armours in the size of orcs, statues of weapons, finest of them all was the one in the middle, a metal spider with no head but posed like a real one climbing to the ceiling. There were lots of chambers closely built, chambers big enough to hold a hundred dwarfs, chambers with single narrow floating tables, and chambers with one long phase.

Edwin took me to the control room, which was something similar to a shiny rail cockpit. There were an enormous number of levers, clock-like dials, gauges, knobs and tiny switches tossed by a dwarf named Armdan. Armdan Silverfoot was the second most important person in Condor, the right arm and mentor of Edwin, he never spoke more than two sentences. His apron was covered in oil stains, a communicator similar to Edwin's tied with the belt, and his bald head was restrained with a war helmet. After switching the whole row he pushed down one of the big levers which immediately put off all the lights, turning the room into a dark night, save a few red lamps. He unloaded an almost empty cylinder from a holder and dropped it into a narrow opening. He opened a cupboard under him and unpacked another cylinder from it. The leather pouch tore open, the cylinder glowed like a huge cut of crystal, an element thick as oil danced inside it, illuminating the whole room. Armdan inserted it into the holder and immediately the lights went back as the lever pulled itself up.

We walked together to the corridor after a short inaudible argument between Edwin and Armdan regarding the communicator. A wide bridge supported by long piers spanned above us. We reached a room that almost looked like a library, the shelves hit the ceiling, yet instead of books, they were filled with folders and papers. Armdan pulled a folder and passed a leaf of paper to Edwin, who carefully pressed his inked thumb on it without much reading. He put back his gloves before passing them to Armdan. Edwin thanked me again before we left the room to pick up the arms.

Armdan took me back to the elevator, the gate opened and it was empty as we left it. I stepped in after him and saw the storey disappearing between the slits as the gate shut.

"So it's been six years, isn't it?" Armdan said.

"Yes, it is."

"Returning after six years, just to face the end."

"I admire your expectations," I continued, "but there won't be a chase tonight."

"Will see."

The carriage started to smell like ripped beans toasted by the elements. I stood still, waiting for the gate to open, waiting to grab the truck. That was when Armdan took his communicator and spoke to himself, he banged it thrice and spoke again; tried all the levers and switches, but received only a few beep sounds. He looked around and above, and requested me to give him a hand. I knelt down and extended my hands on which he climbed and caught the ceiling without any warning. He unscrewed the metal plate with the tools he had in his apron, hanging like an ape. He smashed the plate and made it fly out. "It's stuck," he announced.

I was in the world's most coveted arsenal, stuck in an elevator with a smelly smith named Armdan Silverfoot, unsure of what would happen next. He pressed my shoulders with his big fat boot and climbed above the ceiling. I faced the ceiling with a wide open mouth hoping for an explanation. He finally dropped his hands, spreading the rough fingers. Should I climb the rest of those floors? "Here," he commanded, extending his hands even longer, I climbed the ceiling to find the door five feet above us. He requested me to bend again, but this time more like ordered. He climbed above me and somehow pushed open the gate.

I froze in place, bent over like a crane, staring at my feet when the explosion sent him flying back to the ceiling. His blood flowed onto my cleats, making them wet, and he lay there motionless, his breath no longer coming. He was dead.