Without cheg the Skoetiikos, Tenebroum was uaily how many years it had bored to erode the bulwark that was the All-Father. The God was a craggy edifice of pure tradition and willpower, so any normal effort to do what the Lich was doing might well take a millennium. It was certain its pns would e to fruition much faster.

  Gods weren’t immortal, though. Tenebroum had proved that already, and this had already been going on for more than a decade, so it was sure that it would bear fruit soon. Of course, it had believed the same thing about that cursed Lunaris until retly, it thought with rising bitterness.

  Then, just like that, his whole pn had been apparently undone, and she was whole once more. The moon had apparently recovered seemingly ht from the terrible poison it had ied her with. Its Queen of Thorns could devour a thousand lesser nature goddesses, and it wouldn’t be worth half what it might have been t the moon down. So, now, the Lich was redoubling its efforts. It would not allow another of these troublesome gods to slip through its fingers.

  So, now, instead of basking in the prayers of its worshipers and priests as it had done while it watched her slowly fade to nothing, it stormed around the catabs at the heart of its ir like a dark storm, causing terror aation in its worshipers by turns. Now, it was focused. Now, it was monit the progress of every major effort. The Lich sent messeo every er of its dark empire with demands for updates and new, more ambitious orders. The Lich did not know what happened, but it would find a way to have its revenge.

  The only pn that had born fruit, i memory, were the efforts of its huntress and hound. They had located what was very probably the third part of this dark godling it had sought for so long. That was tantalizing, and Tenebroum was sure that it would learn much before it devoured them.

  The find was being transported night by night under guard. So, it would yet be weeks before the seal sarcophagus arrived, but that table.

  The Lich would use that time to prepare a secure area for study. It was imperative that it uand those three strange divinities and the way that their broken souls fit together. That said, it was equally imperative that they not join together until or unless it decided that was the correct move. Layers of binding runes and wards would be prepared. Each cell would be ringed with all the knew for these little monsters so that it could experiment on them as long as it wanted.

  Until that good news was received, though, things had been quiet. The Voice of Reason was still on her way back south and had cimed a new isnd of primitive worshipers for its growing religion, and its armies to the north were making only limited headway against the humans they faced off against there. It would seem that they learned from the sughter of their cousins to the south. There had not yet been as of light-eyed Temprs, but the men of the north had their own magics that were proving to be quite formidable. Tenebroum was looking forward to learning those as well.

  None of that was as important as the hat the All-Father was on the verge of crag, though. That report had caused it to drop everything and rush to the giant storehouse where it kept the trove of dwarven artifacts that it had sacked and stolen during the endless gueril wars that Krulm’venor was engaged in.

  In almost all cases, ons, armor, and jewelry were melted dout to work in other, more important projects. That was both because they had no apparent effe the God and because it could get such rare metals nowhere else. Mithril was scarce, even to a dwarf, but their tombs were full of the stuff, and the Lich would put it all to use.

  The crystalline skulls of the honored dead, though, those had a higher purpose, and of the hundreds of thousands of such things it had stolen so far, nearly a huhousand had been tainted and then pced in the ever-growing cathedral that Verdein had been strug for some time now.

  It wasn’t plete. In fact, it might never be plete, but that didn’t stop it from being ready for its purpose. Already almost fifty thousand skulls had been added to the niches carved into pce. That number would only grow over time, but the summoning circle that was its primary focus had long since been pleted. It had to be; the Lich had long been ready to face the All-Father, but soon the All-Father would be ready as well.

  Still, even inplete, the thing was a sight to behold. It was a giant der a dozen stories tall, built to mock Mourn-den, and other smaller ossuaries that the dwarves had built over the turies. Hundreds of thousand eyeless skulls would stare down at a broken anvil in the ter. That would be the only moo the dwarves left when its servant had finished sc them from the underworld.

  Mo or not, though, each soul that the Lich tainted was a drop of poison in the blood of the All-Father, and though dwarves could resist poisoer than ahey were not immune.

  In some way, it had yet to fully uand the souls of the dead dwarves still existed in both their remains and their God. It was a duality that should have made the God even more powerful. Tenebroum had used such teiques for the ring that bound its power to the world like a scar. Should it even be defeated otlefield, the magics that swirled thickly in those bloody passages would birth it once more.

  Well, some version of it at least. The Lich did not like to pte the possibility. It felt too much like a pretender rising up to take its thro would prefer that a Tenebroum be the oo quer the world, of course, but iy, it would accept no one else.

  That duality did not strehe dwarven God as it strengtheenebroum, though, because it left pieces of itself scattered across the world in a way that anyone might take them. This gave the dwarvey a terrible weakness. Ahose remains were scattered around haphazardly, they created a terrible vulnerability.

  Now, after tirelessly exploiting that vulnerability with the souls of goblins and profane symbols, things were finally bearing fruit. Now, some of the skulls they had not yet defiled were already found dim and damaged in the piles. The damage that its servants had been causing for so long was adding up, and every day, the divinity was getting closer and closer to colpse. Tenebroum could feel it.

  That was why it was unwilling to slow or s. Instead, it sent more wraiths to probe the Iron City for weaknesses and ways in even as it devoted more servants to the cause of inflig a death by a huhousand cuts on its enemy.

  The dwarves would have certainly called it dishonorable. In fact, they did, often. The spirits that were bound to the horrible tasks wailed and chaffed against their task, the same way that Krulm’venor had early on. They cursed the Liaking them do this, and they swore that it would be defeated. It made no effort to silehese pints. It ehem. The only thing sweeter than the prayers of the devout were the curses of the suffering, and it soaked them all in.

  None of that stopped their busy hands from doing an excellent job of defaming and tormenting their elders who still dwelled within their God. Now, though, the work reading. The curses were appearing on skulls that had not yet been iionally tainted, which meant that the cracks it had long sought to create in the armored edifice of dwarven faith were spreading on their own. Things like this tended not to move all for a long time before moving suddenly and sharply, like an avanche.

  Tenebroum no longer restlessly passed through its ir looking for answers regarding the moon or status updates for other projects. Instead, it hauhose dark and spacious rooms, watg for more signs of stress that indicated that its long-pnned schism was immi.

  The avatars of the All-Father had taken the field on more than one occasion. They were mighty if temporary things. Soon, though, that ic craftsman wouldn’t have enough power to ent a sword or an axe, let alone el a spell like that to his priests.

  For weeks, the only thing that it did beyond lurk and watch was to order Krulm’venor to prepare to assault the Iron City itself. Su attack would be suicide, even for its fire godling. The same might be true if it sent a dozen armies, though. The giant city buried hundreds of feet below the ground was a fortress that was utterly immuo any ventional attack it could think of. That was why it was going to kill their God to distract them.

  It was distracted by these thoughts when it happened, but only for a moment. The first indication that something moal was about to happen was the way the skulls began to dim in unison. Whole ses of the piles began to flicker and fade out as ohen the screaming started.

  Tenebroum had never wondered what half a million crystalline voices screaming out in pain would sound like, but now it khe Listantly ordered its terrible tome to dot that in musiotation as best it could. Suddenly, High Priest Verdenin’s cathedral would have another use now, os primary use was pleted. They would put on an opera voiced solely by the dead: The Death of the All-Father.

  Feions, dwarven society had been unified by a single idea. There was only one way to live a good life. There was only one way to tribute and be remembered, and anything less fell short of that idea and, therefore, of tributing to divinity. What the Lich had done was shatter that. Now, their God lintering uhe weight of darkness and insanity it was direg into the dwarven afterlife, and it doubted very much that their culture would survive any more than their God would.

  . . .

  Krulm’venor had crouched in the cramped airshaft a doze above the market street for weeks now, basically unmoving. He didn’t mind that. He had found a way into the city without drawing the Lich’s attention, and he had waited for further orders.

  It leasant a and as he’d had in years. For the first time in a very long time, the normal noises of a dwarven city were enough to block out all the terrible whispers and deranged howls that echoed through his soul.

  The sound of merts hawking their wares and housewives haggling for every st copper was a balm to his soul. He knew he would have to move whecatchers came through this area or when the Lich gave its and, but for now, he just y there, staring out of the iron-barred grate at the street far below him, idly fidgeting with that damn button as he tried to remember what it had meant to be a dwarf.

  He might have dohat forever, but when the Lich whispered to him to be ready to begin his assault, he khat perfeent was all but over. What he did not expect, though, was for the world to go insane.