The High Hall of Stone Eater tribe was not a building.

  It was a cavern so vast that clouds formed near its ceiling, slow-moving and heavy with moisture. The distant thunder of subterranean storms rolled endlessly through the stone, echoing like the growl of an ancient beast. Rivers of magma cut through the obsidian floor in glowing veins, casting a hellish red light that turned every shadow into something alive.

  At the center of it all stood the throne.

  Not carved. Not forged. It had been torn from the mountain itself — a jagged, brutal mass of black stone rising like a fang from the floor.

  Upon it sat Gorm.

  High Chieftain of the Stone Eaters.

  He was not merely large. He was wrong — seven feet of granite-colored flesh, muscles knotted like iron cables beneath skin so thick it looked almost armored. He wore no furs, no warplate. Only a loincloth of cured hide and a massive collar of black iron engraved with ancient runes of conquest.

  His aura rolled outward like pressure from the deep earth.

  Peak Bronze.

  Bordering on the terrifying threshold of Silver.

  It pulsed around him in slow waves, each one heavy enough to make warriors drop to their knees. Even the Elders stood stiff and rigid under its weight.

  Before him knelt Krag.

  His forehead pressed against the hot stone floor. The heat burned his skin, but he did not dare pull away. Tears streaked down his face, hissing into steam when they hit the rock.

  To Krag’s left and right stood the Elders — ancient men wrapped in grey robes, their bodies frail but their eyes sharp with cruelty and calculation.

  Behind them waited Krag’s brothers — tall, broad-shouldered warriors with scars carved across their flesh — and his uncles, each gripping a warhammer large enough to crush a horse’s skull.

  The entire bloodline of the Stone Eaters watched him kneel.

  “Raise your head,” Gorm rumbled.

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  The sound was not a voice.

  It was tectonic plates grinding together.

  Krag slowly lifted his face.

  He was shaking.

  “Father…” his voice cracked. “I… I failed… Gorak—”

  “Gorak is dead.”

  The words slammed into the hall like a falling boulder.

  “My brother,” Gorm continued. “My right hand. The hammer that shattered cities. You were sent to watch him. To learn. To become what he was.”

  Gorm leaned forward slightly.

  “Instead, you return with nothing but your skin.”

  Krag sobbed. “The tribes betrayed us! The Broken Claws turned! The Black Fangs ran! The Red Hands attacked our flank! It was a trap, Father! The Lowlanders knew! They were waiting!”

  “A trap,” Gorm repeated slowly.

  He stood.

  The air itself recoiled.

  Magma veins dimmed as if afraid.

  “Or perhaps,” Gorm said, stepping down from the throne, “Gorak was a fool who charged a wall he could not break.”

  His massive footsteps cracked the stone.

  “And perhaps you…” he loomed over Krag, “…are a coward who let him die so you could run.”

  Krag recoiled. “No! No! I tried to rally them! I fought! I bled!”

  “Silence,” Gorm commanded.

  The word struck like a physical blow. Krag froze.

  An Elder stepped forward.

  Vor, Keeper of the Lore.

  “Great Chieftain,” Vor said smoothly. “The loss of the Vanguard is grievous. But the greater wound is betrayal.”

  He gestured toward Krag without even looking at him.

  “The lesser tribes defied us. If that defiance goes unpunished, the mountain will crack. Others will rise. Others will think the Stone Eaters weak.”

  Gorm’s jaw tightened.

  “I know this.”

  “Krag failed,” Vor continued. “But failure can still be useful. He knows the traitors. Their camps. Their chiefs. Their paths through the ravines.”

  One of Krag’s brothers snorted. “Let him die buying back his shame.”

  Vor nodded. “Send him back. Give him the Stone Walkers. Let him drown his cowardice in blood. If he returns with the heads of the four chieftains, his name is redeemed.”

  A thin smile touched Vor’s lips.

  “If he does not… then weakness is purged from your line.”

  Soft laughter rippled through Krag’s brothers.

  Krag stared at them, horror dawning. “Father—!”

  Gorm looked down at him.

  He saw everything.

  The fear.

  The doubt.

  The smallness.

  “Vor speaks wisdom,” Gorm said.

  He stepped closer and placed one massive hand on Krag’s skull.

  The pressure made Krag gasp.

  “Take twenty Stone Walkers,” Gorm growled. “Take three hundred men. Go to the Hollows.”

  His fingers tightened.

  “Burn the Black Fangs. Break the Claws. Silence the Wolves. Cut the Hands.”

  Gorm leaned close, his breath smelling of sulfur and iron.

  “Do not come back without their heads, Krag.”

  His grip crushed until Krag whimpered.

  “Or I will mount yours on the throne beside Gorak’s.”

  Krag nodded frantically. “Yes! Yes, Father! I will bring them! I swear it! I will kill them all!”

  He scrambled backward, tripping over his own feet, then fled the hall.

  Laughter followed him.

  Gorm turned away.

  He stared at the massive map of the mountains carved into the cavern wall.

  Past the tribal lands.

  Past the Hollow of Skulls.

  Down to the small valley at the base of the peaks.

  Blackwood.

  “And when the traitors are dead,” Gorm murmured, his aura flaring violet with killing intent, “I will go down there myself.”

  His eyes burned.

  “And I will see what kind of man is this new Lord.”