The Hammer and the Blade Read Free

smoke. Nix put his face in his sleeve to shield his nose and mouth against the stench. Egil, unable to do anything but hold himself upright, had to endure it.
      The acid popped as it ate at the surface of the floor and the heads of Egil's hammers. Had they been standing on the floor, the substance would already have eaten through their boots and started dissolving flesh. Tiny droplets from popping bubbles hit Egil's bare forearms, burned pink pinholes into the hairy flesh. The priest grunted at the pain, the stinging reek.
      "Egil?"
      The lucky dice Egil carried with him on every expedition slipped from his pocket and fell into the acid, asp eyes up. The ivory pyramids cracked, shattered, and dissolved. Egil loosed a stream of expletives cut short when he inhaled the smoke and started to splutter. The coughing upset his balance and he swayed.
      "Nix!" he gasped between coughs.
      Nix adjusted his weight, steadied himself on three points, and reached out and back to grab Egil by the ankle.
      "Got you."
      They hung there over the acid, two friends and adventurers, one balanced precariously on his melting hammers, the other hanging on the wall in a desperate three-point perch. The whole affair struck Nix as hilarious, but he swallowed his laughter lest a guffaw dislodge him from the wall and kill them both.
      "Here's a moment, yeah?" Nix said through gritted teeth.
      "Shut up."
      "I hope you bought better hammers than usual," Nix said, watching the metal of the weapons smoke and crack.
      "Do not make me laugh," Egil said. "I'll pull us both down."
      "I'd let you go before that. But I'd mourn you, rest assured. For a few moments, at least."
      The acid, spreading thin across the floor of the chamber, soon bubbled less, smoked less. In a few more moments the popping ceased altogether and the smoke diminished, crowding close to the high ceiling in a stinking yellow-black cloud. Nix gave it another sixty count, then said:
      "That's it. It's inert."
      "You're certain?"
      "As certain as I was about the magic key," Nix said.
      "Shite," Egil answered.
      Nix chuckled as he released Egil's ankle, hopped off the wall, and landed in the thin layer of black liquid that coated the now-pitted floor.
      "See?"
      Egil lowered his feet to the ground and stood. "Pits, man!" He covered one nostril and blew snot from the other, each in turn, then hocked and spit.
      The hallway behind the now open door was barely a hallway at all, being only a few hand spans deep and there blocked by another door, of similar make to the one they'd just opened. The walls, too, were made of the same odd metal as the doors.
      "You see what they did here?" said Nix appreciatively. "They sealed this compartment and poured acid in through the holes above the door. Time spared us, I suspect. The acid must have been wizard-made to last this long. It was probably much stronger once. Your hammers probably wouldn't have lasted had we entered this tomb a century ago."
      Egil eyed his hammers, the metal heads pitted and discolored, the prayers he'd engraved on the metal effaced.
      "Time didn't spare us, Nix. You did."
      Nix colored under his friend's praise. "You've done the same for me many times."
      "Nevertheless."
      Nix put a hand on Egil's shoulder, moved past him, and studied the second door. He sensed no ward, no bottom seal, no holes, no sign of any traps at all. And the lock appeared similar to the one he'd just picked.
      "It's like the other. A simple lock to charm."
      "Do it, then," Egil said.
      Nix looked back. "You're certain? We just got a second chance. We could still walk away."
      Egil shook his head, the set of his jaw hard under his thick beard. "This tomb and its idiot wizard-king owe me hammers and owe you boots." He eyed his pitted, discolored weapons and shook his head in disgust. "Give me your crowbar. These'll crack on the first skull they mean to split."
      Nix took