“Seldom have I need to visit these quarters, and it was a hundred years before I next came this way and found that the stone had gone. First I searched here; then I went out into the world to seek the farmer or his family. But, of course, by this time he was dead, and I could not trace his descendants; and although my quest was discreet the morthbrood came to hear of it, and they were not long in guessing the truth, throughout the region of the plain they coursed, and even to the bleak uplands of the east, towards Ragnarok, but neither they nor the ferreting svarts found what they sought. Nor, for that matter, did I.

“Should Firefrost come into Nastrond’s hand my danger would be great indeed; for although he is powerless against the magic it contains, if he could destroy the stone then the magic, too, would die away.

“Firefrost was an ancient spellstone of great strength before the present magic was sealed within, and it would not readily suffer destruction so while the light shines here I know that somewhere the stone still lives, and there is hope.

“There you have the story of my troubles, and, I trust, the answer to your questions. Now you must return to your home, for the hour is late and your friends will be anxious—and they may have ample cause for worry if we cannot solve this evening’s problems soon!”

They went back into the Cave of the sleepers, and from there climbed upwards by vast caverns till the way was blocked by a pair of iron gates, behind which the tunnel ended in a sheer rock wall. The wizard touched the gates with his staff, and slowly they swung open.

“These were wrought by dwarfs to guard their treasures from the thievish burrowings of svarts, but without magic they would be of little use against what seeks to enter now.”