Expansion - Chapter 13

 

13 – Brikel – Other Tunnels

“I hate mapping Waste Pits,” Mardek says as he digs into his Forge‑Breath meal.

“You hated being used as a runner and begged to be put on mapping duty,” Helka replies without looking up.

Thavrin hides a smile behind his mug.

“All of you are laughing at me,” Mardek mutters.

“Not at all,” Yivra says. “Every junior surveyor does the dirty work first.”

“Had to crawl through waste tunnels to map blockages,” Broddik adds.

A round of nods follows.

Durnek clears his throat. “Thavrin… my next chamber looks to be full of silk. Should I request a Legion team, or go straight to the Senior Legionnaire?”

A hush settles over the table.

“How much silk?” Thavrin asks.

“I couldn’t tell. The whole entrance is choked. I’d need to cut into it to see anything.”

Yivra frowns. “That’s the chamber north of where Brikel’s working.” She turns to him. “Have you mapped the north‑facing tunnel yet?”

Brikel shakes his head. “Not yet. Four tunnels left. I was going to start with whichever one showed the most wear.”

Thavrin wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “You’ve already got a Legion team. Keep them with you and take the north tunnel. If you hit silk, have your team clear a way in.”

Helka raises an eyebrow. “Clear how? Axes barely cut it.”

“Burning works,” Fenrik offers.

“Burning sometimes works,” Korvik mutters. “Depends on how thick it is. And how fresh.”

Thavrin nods. “Use lamps first. Heat softens the outer layers. If you must cut, do it slow. Don’t strike hard—vibrations carry.”

The table goes quiet again.

Everyone knows what that means.

“If there are spiders,” Thavrin continues, “the light and noise should keep them back long enough to get a look. Don’t go deep. Just enough to map the entrance.”

He turns to Durnek. “I’ll request a dedicated Legion team for your chamber. If it’s as choked as you say, we’ll need more than surveyors poking at it.”

Durnek exhales in relief.

Brikel glances at his own notes, then at the lamps hanging along the dining hall wall.

Silk.

Spiders.

And four unmapped tunnels.

He suddenly wishes he were back in Coppervein Reach, where the stone behaves itself and nothing alive waits above your head.

 

Brikel shakes his head as he walks in the center of the Legion team. The sound of the stone‑clackers from the rear-guard echoes sharply off the tunnel walls, each click bouncing back in uneven rhythms. The larger brass lamps—mounted on long poles and carried by the others—throw harsh white light ahead of them, turning the cleared tunnel into a bright, noisy procession.

It is the opposite of how he prefers to work.

“Wait here,” Hadrun commands as they reach the rope tunnel‑seals his men placed earlier. He checks each one with practiced efficiency—tug, twist, listen—before cutting the final seal on the northern tunnel and coiling the rope over his shoulder.

“Light team, move forward.”

The Legionnaires step ahead, raising their pole‑lamps to flood the passage with light. Hadrun turns to Brikel.

“Are you ready to measure and mark?”

Brikel nods and lights his grum‑tal. The regulated‑burn lamp glows with a steady amber flame—soft compared to the Legion’s blinding lamps, but perfect for close work. He begins making notes, marking distances, angles, and the subtle shifts in stone texture.

The clackers behind him are maddening. Each sharp click disrupts his concentration, but he forces himself to focus on the task.

They move steadily until the tunnel narrows and the air grows still. The light ahead hits something pale and dense.

A wall of spider‑silk.

Brikel lifts his lamp. The silk is thick—layered, dusty, and stretched tight across the tunnel like a woven barricade.

“This is as far as we can go for now,” he says quietly.

“Fall back to the chamber,” Hadrun orders. Then he steps forward, cups his hands around his mouth, and shouts toward the silken wall:

“Cut‑and‑Burn Team! We’re at the tunnel mouth. Should be your south side!”

For a moment, there is only silence.

Then, through the dense silk, a voice answers—so muffled it sounds like someone speaking through a pillow:

“Working…!”

The sound vibrates faintly through the webbing.

 Muffled screams rip through the silk.

“Pull back! Pull back!”

The sound is distorted, swallowed by the dense webbing — but unmistakably scared. A moment later, high‑pitched hisses and rapid, staccato squeaks echo through the tunnel. Brikel’s blood runs cold. He has never heard spiders, but every instinct tells him what those sounds mean.

“Men, fall back to the other tunnels!” Hadrun barks.

The Legionnaires don’t wait. They retreat at a near‑run, abandoning the clackers entirely. The only sounds are their boots on stone and the harsh rasp of their breathing. Brikel brings up the rear, clutching his equipment, trying not to imagine what is happening behind the silk wall.

 

Back in Root‑Stone Hearth, he forces himself to steady his hands long enough to update his map. Only when the lines are clean and the measurements are correct does he carry his notes to Yivra.

 As he approaches the map room, he hears shouting — distant, frantic — from the tunnel complex where Durnek’s team is working. The echoes bounce strangely, making it impossible to tell how many voices there are.

Yivra takes the slates from him, scanning them quickly. “Good. Thank you.” Then she frowns. “Brikel… can you check on Mardek? He’s working alone in the waste chamber. With all this noise, I expected him back early.”

Brikel nods. “I’ll find him.”

He grabs his lamp and rope and heads toward the waste tunnels. The air grows warmer, thicker. The smell hits him first — damp rot, compost heat, the earthy musk of worms and fungal decay. The slow, humid draft carries it like a living thing.

“Mardek!” Brikel calls. “Let’s finish up early. They’ve got trouble with spiders — we’re packing up for the day.”

No answer.

He moves deeper, lamp held high. The light glints off wet stone and the slick sheen of decomposing matter. The compost chamber opens before him, a wide, uneven pit with a deceptively dry crust stretched across its surface like brittle skin.

“Mardek?” he calls again.

Then he sees him.

Face‑down. Motionless. Half‑submerged in the crust.

Brikel’s breath catches. He rushes forward — then stops just short of the edge. The crust is fractured around Mardek’s body, the dark slurry beneath still shifting with slow, sickening bubbles.

“He knew better,” Brikel whispers, anger and fear twisting together.

He spots the long metal rod Mardek had been using and snatches it up. Kneeling, he taps the crust around the pit — listening for hollows, mapping the edges by sound. The crust is thin, treacherous. One wrong step and he’ll join Mardek.

“You fool,” he mutters, voice cracking.

He hooks the rod under Mardek’s arm and pulls. The body comes free with a wet, sucking sound. Brikel drags him onto solid stone, then drops to his knees beside him.

“Mardek. Mardek, come on.” He tries to clear the airway, tries to breathe for him, tries anything — but the heat and fumes of the compost pit have already done their work.

With a mixture of sadness and anger, Brikel lifts the young dwarf onto his shoulders. His boots echo in the tunnels, each step heavier than the last. Tears blur the lamplight, but he keeps walking, all the way back to Root‑Stone Hearth.