It was then that the panicked humans realized they had fled into a trap. They spun about in desperation. But even as they turned, raising bloody weapons, a hail of bronze bolts, sling-stones, and various other flung objects erupted through the grating to smash among them. Everywhere, men fell, but they were not alone. A heavy dart sang between two of the men, missed Derkin's face by an inch, and buried itself in the skull of a dwarf behind him. And as men pitched forward, dying, more missiles thudded among the dwarves.

"Hold!" Derkin roared. "You in the cell! We're on your side!"

The hail of missiles stopped abruptly, and a voice beyond the grating shouted, "Well, rust th' buckets! It's that Hylar! Come on, let's get out there and help!"

Barricades were tumbled aside, and the big gates lurched open, dwarves by the hundreds streaming through. Some had weapons and some did not. All were ragged, filthy, and disreputable-looking, but the fervor with which they fell upon the few remaining humans bordered on sheer, savage joy. Within seconds, the only living souls in the corridor were dwarves.

Pushing and cursing, Derkin shouldered his way through a thickening crowd. "Follow me!" he shouted, trying to be heard above their babble. "Let's get out of this place!"

Gradually, with a lot of help from his lieutenants and others, he got the crowd silenced and headed for the open pit. He found himself caught up in a stampede of dwarves. Strong hands on both sides of him clutched his shoulders and hurried him forward as a wedge of dwarves plowed through the moving crowd, clearing a path with fists and curses.

"Make way!" someone roared. "Make way for the leader! He can't lead from back here, for rust's sake!"

Abruptly, Derkin was at the head of the exodus, and the hands at his shoulders set him down. In dim torchlight, he recognized the Neidar slave called Tap, and the Daergar miner called Vin the Shadow.

"Glad you made it." Tap smiled at the Hylar, admiring his bright garb and glistening armor. "Though I'd never have recognized you if you hadn't opened your mouth back there."

"I'm here to get you people out," Derkin said.

"We know," Vin the Shadow rasped, a grin splitting his matted beard. "That bowl told us."

Derkin didn't have a chance to ask what bowl he was talking about. They were moving along the corridor at double time, and at that moment more dwarves met them, just inside the entrance. The first one stopped, gawked at the resplendent Hylar with the horde of fighters and slaves behind him, then turned and backed away. Behind them, a double file of ragged slaves had entered the tunnel, dragging the bleeding, mutilated corpses of several human guards.

"These tried to get away," one of the new dwarves explained, squinting. "We, ah… sort of guessed that you didn't want them to."

"They're pretty messed up," another said, as though apologizing. "Chains and hod-poles do that, you know."

"Thanks," Derkin said. "Now stand aside. We have to get out of here before-"

"Out?" a dwarf interrupted, frowning at him. "You don't have everybody yet. There are three more cells, in the other three pits."

"I didn't plan on…"

"We sent word through the tunnels," a slave assured him. "It shouldn't take long. Everyone will be ready to leave as soon as you free them. What are you going to do about our chains, though?"

Tap Tolec stepped past Derkin. "Get your friends out of their cells," he said. "We'll get their chains off of them."

Derkin glared at the slaves around him, and realized that-leader or not-he didn't have the deciding vote on this. He had come for two thousand slaves. He would leave with eight thousand, or not leave at all. "All right!" he snapped. "Chosen Ones, follow me! The rest of you, keep to cover and be ready to break chains. Reorx!" he added to himself. "By now every human in Klanath will have heard the fighting."

"Probably not," a slave said. "Couldn't hear much at all, out in the pit. I doubt if anybody above heard a thing."

Derkin had planned for not more than a quarter-hour in the pits. Strike hard, move fast, and get out quickly had been his strategy. But the campaign took on a life of its own, as campaigns do, and an hour had passed by the time the Chosen reached the fourth pit. There had been only a few sleepy guards in pits two and three, and the releases there had been quick and fairly silent.

There was a surprise, though, at pit four. Moving fast and silently, seasoned now by practice, the Chosen Ones stormed that pit's cell corridor, killed the entrance guards cleanly, and were on their way to the cell beyond when dozens of robed and armored humans appeared, coming around a turn in the tunnel. The man in the lead was the pit boss himself, Shalit Mileen.

The men stopped, gawked at the bloody weapons and hands and the fierce eyes of the advancing dwarves. Mileen's mouth dropped open, then he drew a broadsword from his shoulder sling, shouted "Kill them!" and charged. Derkin Winterseed, in the lead, deflected the burly man's first slash with his shield, but the impact of it bowled him over. He rolled to the side, broke the knee of a man going over him, and knocked the feet out from under another, then struggled upright. Furious combat filled the ringing tunnel, and more than a few dwarves fell as they bore down on the humans.

Abruptly, though, the clatter diminished, and only one man remained on his feet. It was Shalit Mileen. The man stormed and flailed about him, keeping dozens of dwarves at bay with his flashing broadsword.

Quickly, Derkin laid down his arms, removed his chest armor, and tugged his blouse from beneath the waist of his kilt. With hard hands, he unwrapped the length of heavy chain from around his waist, doubled it, and swung it in a circle over his head. "Back away!" he ordered the dwarves. "This one is mine."

Shalit Mileen whirled at the sound of his voice, and cruel eyes brightened. "Ah," he said. "The red-cloak. What do you have there, dink? A chain?"

"You should know," Derkin rasped, his voice as deep and cold as mountain snow. "You gave it to me."

The man's eyes widened. "I gave it… Yes! I know you! Troublemaker!" With a roar of rage, he sprang at Derkin, his big sword flashing downward. The Hylar dodged aside, and the blade clanged on stone. Derkin lashed out with his doubled chain. The heavy links struck like a snake, coiling around the human's ankle, and Derkin set his feet and pulled. With a crash, Shalit Mileen went over backward. He rolled, trying to get to his knees, but Derkin was astride his back, pummeling his ribs with drumming heels. The chain slipped around the bull neck of the pit boss, and the dwarf's shoulders bulged as he looped it and pulled, tightening it like a garrotte.

Shalit Mileen thrashed and tumbled, rolled and struggled, but the dwarf clung to him like a shackle, never for an instant releasing the brutal pressure on the chain. The man's face went dark, his eyes bulged, and his tongue protruded. Flailing, he rolled onto his back, with the dwarf beneath him, still increasing the strangling pressure of the heavy chain.

For a moment more, the man struggled, his thrashings diminishing to twitches. Then he was still. Derkin clambered from beneath him, tossing aside the ends of the chain. He looked around, found his hammer, picked it up, and pointed it at the slave cell. "Open that gate," he said. "Let those people out."

"Look at this," a dwarf said nearby. Someone raised a lantern. Beyond the cell, where the gate was being opened, the light revealed another cavern-a large, newly delved place, half-filled with heaps of bright, rich metallic ores.

"He was hoarding the ore," a dwarf said, delivering a kick to the body of Shalit Mileen. "He thought he could become Master of Mines."

"He isn't master of anything, now," another freed slave said. "That hammerhand over there"-he pointed toward Derkin-"if anyone is master of the pits now, I'd say it's him."