The Creed of the Archangel. Sara
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from the Eastern River Delta and curved South toward the fork where Remliel had landed upon her arrival to Akkolon.
She reached the river by nightfall, since it wasn't far from the gates of Iqocan. She made rest on the bank of the river for the night, creating a small wooden post with her powers to tie her steed up to. She didn't want him to run away in the night.
She pulled out her map and studied it through the night. She looked up at the sky, seeing the moon slowly descending to the East, watching the stars sparkle up in the protective dome of the world. She sighed to herself, both out of happiness and sadness. She was proud of the world her mother, the One, had created, but she longed for her company and missed living with her and her brother in the Emptiness.
When the sun rose from the North, Remliel stood, untied the horse from the post, and waved her hand, making the piece of wood disappear. She then mounted the steed and rode over the Eastern River. She saw the Forsaken Hills were close, so she rode to them.
The mountain range was the smallest of the three on Akkolon, and there lived the Southwestern clan of Dwarves. Dwarves were the most stubborn race, and they liked to hide away amongst their riches, shutting out the rest of the world's problems. The only thing the Dwarves had to worry about was trading and Dragons, but with the abominable creatures all the way in the North upon the Dead Peaks, Remliel doubted that the Southwestern clan even knew about them. After all, almost all of Tetrasiel's creatures were dwelling near him, ready to serve his darkness at a moment's notice.
Remliel rode up to the Forsaken Hills, seeing the enormous mountain peaks stretch into the sky the closer she got. Upon reaching them, she saw a small gravel walkway to the middle of the mountain range. There was a door engraved into the stone, but all Remliel could see was the outline of the doorway: there was no handle, no hinges, nothing to allow entry into the mountain.
She knocked three times on the stone, hoping the Dwarves inside would hear her. She looked at the Dwarvish language engraved onto the doorway and read it aloud to herself: “If ye be a kindly folk, or if ye be full of hate; we welcome you unless you cloak, your intentions coming through our gate.”
The stone began to move, the doorway protruding from the mountainside and allowing entry into the Dwarf kingdom. Remliel walked her horse inside with her, feeling the door close behind her. She was immediately plunged into darkness. The steed stayed rather calm, much to the surprise of the Archangel, but she tightened her grip on the reins nevertheless.
She stretched out her other hand, allowing her power to flow through her and create a beam of light for her to see with. There wasn't much to see under the mountain, so she called out for the Dwarves.
After her voice echoed through the cavern for a moment, torches along the walls began to light themselves. Remliel put away her own light and followed the dim glow of the fire. She saw that she was in a long hallway with a high, domed ceiling. Everything around her was made of stone. The hall went forward for a while until it branched off into four different directions. Each branch had a large arch of stone with Dwarvish embedded into it. There were torches down each of the four hallways, all of them lit, and a hot, bright light coming from the bottom of the leftmost hall.
Remliel called out once again when she got to the fork, hoping she would see at least one Dwarf today. Luckily for her, a group of miners were coming up the leftmost hall toward the fork, and she got their attention. “Excuse me, do you mind showing me to your ruler?" she asked.
They stopped and stared at her for a moment. “You know Dwarvish?” one asked. “Only Dwarves know Dwarvish.”
“I know all tongues,” Remliel answered. “I am not from this world."
“Where are you from then?”
“The Emptiness, the vast Universe. I come from the One.”
“I'm not sure I understand."
“I will explain all on our way to your King.”
The group of Dwarves approached Remliel, guiding her down the rightmost hall. She told them everything about the One, her brother and his evil deeds, and her arrival on Akkolon. The only thing she didn't know, however, was all the languages of the people on Akkolon. “Everyone speaks a different language, so how do you trade and fight alongside one another?”
“There is one common language among all creatures,” one of the Dwarves said. “We call it Onuin, the Common Tongue.”
They finished their long walk down the rightmost hall until they reached yet another fork, this time with two halls going opposite each other. “You will take the left hall down to the City,” the Dwarf said. “We have to get back to our mine. Best of luck to you.”
The Dwarves departed, going back up the way they came. Remliel took a deep breath and walked down the hall. She descended a flight of stairs, followed a few twists in the hall, and climbed down yet another flight of stairs until she came to the City. The arch over the entrance read, in Dwarvish, “The City, the Lifegiver of the Dwarves, our Royal Hideout.”
Remliel entered the city and looked in awe at what she saw. The ceiling was hundreds of feet in the air, with rainbow colored stalactites hanging from the roof of the cave. There were magnificent buildings made of clay, gravel paths and streets, and a shiny structure larger than the rest built into the back wall of the City.
The Dwarves, Remleil observed, were all full of hair, in order to keep them warm under the cold mountain. The men had great beards that reached the tops of their protruding bellies, and the women had long hair that seemed to wrap itself around their faces like beards. They all wore thick, leather and fur jackets that reached their ankles, some of which were tied shut, but others hung open to reveal their brown, black, or white colored tunics, and black pants that were neatly tucked into black boots.
The Archangel led her horse through the main street of the Dwarvish kingdom, looking down at the shorter race that surrounded her. They looked up at her and her horse both in awe and in fear. The crowd of people parted for her as she made her way to the back wall, toward the shining building.
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