Forest talk

The forest, seen from above, was a sea of dark canopies swaying under the rain, as if the earth itself breathed in slow, silent waves. Renee stopped at the lookout, the wet wind hitting her face, and felt the pickaxe vibrate against her back. It was not a vibration of alarm, but of recognition. As if the hammer knew something was approaching, and did not know whether to fear or wait.

She descended the steep trail that led from the lookout to the edge of the forest. There was no light there, except for the occasional flicker of a distant lightning bolt, but Renee did not need light to see. The pickaxe pulsed in a rhythm that was not blind; it was a guide.

She walked for almost half an hour, her feet sinking into the mud, the rain running down her hood and streaming over her face. The forest was alive with night sounds, but they all diminished as she advanced. The crickets stopped. The night birds fell silent. Even the wind seemed to hesitate.

And then she saw him. He was sitting on a fallen trunk, as if resting from a long journey. But it was not the rest of the tired; it was the rest of one who waits. His back was leaned against the fallen tree, and his eyes, those blue-gold eyes, were fixed on her, as if he had seen her arrive long before she realized it.

Around him, on the ground, there was a circle of wet leaves that had not been there before. They had been torn from the trees, as if an invisible force had knocked them down. A nearby tree, one of the largest in the clearing, was split in half, the trunk cracked like a broken bone, and the upper half fallen beside it, forming the seat where he now rested.

There were no marks of axe or saw on the tree. There were only finger marks, as if he had split it with his hands.

Renee stopped a few meters from him, the pickaxe still on her back, her heart racing. She did not know what to say, but she did not need to; he spoke first.

"You came," he said, his voice deep and hoarse, as if accustomed to speaking with mountains. "That is already more than I would expect from a human."

Renee did not retreat, though every instinct screamed for her to do so.

"Who are you?" she asked, her voice firmer than she felt. "And what do you want with me?"

The man tilted his head, and his eyes gleamed for a moment, like embers being blown.

"I am Dwalin, son of Dwalin," he said. "And I did not come after you. I came after what you carry."

His gaze shifted to the pickaxe, exposed in the young woman's hands, and something in his face tightened. It was not hatred; it was an ancient pain, a wound that had never healed.

"Do you know what you are carrying?" he asked. "Do you know what it truly is?"

Renee placed both hands on the handle, protecting the pickaxe.

"It is the Brutal Pick," she said. "Moradin's hammer. He chose me to carry it."

Dwalin laughed. It was not a laugh of scorn, but of bitterness, the sound of someone who had heard that claim before and always knew it was wrong.

"He chose you," repeated Dwalin, as if savoring the words. "You think being chosen by a god is an honor, girl? You think it is a blessing? Let me tell you something about Moradin, about the god you hold in your hands."

He stood up, and Renee realized that, even short, he commanded a presence that no height could match. He stared at her, and those golden eyes seemed to see through her, not as if reading her thoughts, but as if reading her very soul.

"Moradin is the god of the dwarves," Dwalin continued, "the forger, the creator. He gave fire to humanity, taught them to forge metal, to build, to create. But look at what they did with that gift. Look at the world they built with the fire he gave them."

He extended his arm, pointing beyond the forest, to where the city stretched under the rain, its pale lights gleaming like wounds in the dark.

"Decadence," he said, his voice heavy with disgust. "They turned the fire of souls into weapons, metal into shackles, knowledge into tools of domination. This world, this plane, is a distortion of everything Moradin intended. A shadow. A distorted echo of Nidavelir, the perfect world, the world he created for his true children."

He took a step toward Renee, and she felt the weight of his words like a physical burden.

"And Moradin, like every god in his infinite goodness, in his loving blindness, keeps trying to save them. Keeps sending signs, sending prophets, sending... you." He stared at her, and there was something close to pity in his eyes. "But the mistake, girl, is not that he tries. The mistake is that he never gives up."

Renee felt the pickaxe vibrate against her palms, as if Moradin were listening, as if he were trying to respond. But the vibration was weak, distant, like a voice coming from far away, tired of shouting, of saying something that Renee had not heard, but had witnessed on the night Moradin fell asleep.

"Moradin needs to rest," Dwalin continued, his voice now softer, but no less firm. "He needs to return to Nidavelir permanently, to the place that belongs to him, to the world that is perfect because it is whole, because it has not been corrupted by the presence of humans. He needs to be freed from this prison you call Earth."

He pointed at the pickaxe.

"And that thing," he said, "that Brutal Pick, is the chain that holds him here. As long as it exists in this world, as long as it is in your hands, Moradin will be divided. One part of him will be here, suffering, wasting away, while the other part tries to rebuild itself in Nidavelir. You are killing him slowly, girl. And it is not out of malice, I know that. It is out of ignorance."

Renee felt her hands tremble. Dwalin's words were not just accusations; they were a truth she herself had begun to suspect. Every time she used the pickaxe, every time she touched it, she felt something wear away. Moradin's signal grew weaker. His voice, more distant.

"If the pickaxe is destroyed," Dwalin said, "Moradin will be freed. He will be able to fully reconstitute himself in Nidavelir, in his own world, where he belongs. The door it represents, the connection to the deluge that Poketnaru almost unleashed, will be closed forever. There will be no way to open the rift again."

He stared at her, and for the first time, Renee saw something beyond conviction in his eyes. She saw weariness. She saw sadness.

"I know you love him," Dwalin said. "I know you believe he chose you. And perhaps he did choose you. But what he asked of you, what he gave you, is not a gift, girl. It is a burden. And you are wearing yourself out to carry it, just as he is wearing himself out to be carried."

Renee stood in silence for a long moment. The rain fell on both of them, and the forest seemed to hold its breath, waiting for her response.

"You want to destroy the pickaxe," she said, finally, her voice low. "You want to destroy the only link I have with him."

Dwalin tilted his head.

"I want to free him," he corrected. "And, in doing so, free you as well."

Renee felt a tear run down her face, mingling with the rain. She did not know if it was sadness or anger or something in between.

"What do you know about what I want?" she asked, her voice trembling. "What do you know about what he means to me?"

Dwalin stared at her for a long moment, and something in his face softened, just a little.

"I know you are afraid," he said. "I know you fear that, without the pickaxe, you will lose the only thing that makes you special. But you are wrong, girl. You were never special because of the pickaxe. You were special because of what you already were before you held it."

He turned around, his back to her, and began to walk back into the darkness of the forest.

"You have one week," he said, without looking back. "One week to decide whether you will hand over the pickaxe voluntarily or whether I will have to tear it from your hands. I do not want to hurt you, Renee. But I will do what needs to be done."

And then he disappeared among the trees, as silently as he had arrived, and the forest seemed to exhale, as if it had held its breath throughout the entire conversation.

Renee stood there, alone in the rain, the pickaxe weighing on her back like never before. She did not know if Dwalin was right. She did not know if he was wrong. All she knew was that, for the first time since Moradin had chosen her, she was not sure she wanted to be chosen.

She unwrapped the cloth that covered the pickaxe and looked at the hammer, its dark surface gleaming under the rain, the orange veins pulsing faintly, like a heart that refused to stop beating.

"What do I do, Mory?" she whispered.

There was no answer. Only the rain. Only the forest. Only the weight of a world that seemed to be collapsing on her shoulders.

A small, thin whisper echoed in her ears.

"He is right about you. You are not special because of me. You are special with me."