“We have so much to do,” Brynwolfn thought to herself as another pressure point in her foot sent a small wave of tension into her leg, followed by a much larger wave of release. Part of her wanted to sit up and ask, “Can we really afford to spend any more time on this?” But of course she knew how the sages would reply back to her. 

“Can we really afford to make any crucial decisions without it?” 

She might have been willing to fight them on this. After all, Brynwolfn never backed down from a fight, unless it was a fight she knew she couldn’t win. But in this case, she also knew that the sages would be right. While she didn’t agree with every Hulfraust tradition, she had long ago learned the importance of this one. So she kept her hands still and said nothing, doing her best to surrender herself to the lengthy rite of passage.

Brynwolfn was reclined in a smooth stone seat, and tried to allow herself to enjoy the massaging of her feet, and accepting the accompanying release of tension. The polished contours of the seat supported the muscles of her legs and back, easing her hips and other joints back into an aligned state. Seated nearby in similar seats, observing the same custom, were the twelve balance sages who comprised the Council of Twelve. Brynwolfn heard their low grunts and sighs as they each received their massages inside the second hall within the Temple of Balance. 

Their first stop upon visiting the temple was, of course, the first hall, which was devoted to The Balance of Possession. It was here where they had each left their shoes, armor, weapons, and outer clothes. The most that anyone was permitted to bring with them into the second hall was the silk undergarments that served as armor against slings and arrows, as well a small silken pouch that could hold their tapping tools and one or two private personal items. The idea was to leave behind anything that might weigh them down or throw off their center before continuing to the second hall.

Having left behind the majority of their outward possessions, they had been admitted into the second hall. This was always the busiest area in the Temple of Balance. It was staffed by dozens of balance sages who devoted themselves to The Balance of Body. These sages were practitioners of the massaging of muscles, joint alignment, pain relief, and posture coaching. When anyone entered the second hall, even another sage, they would first be greeted by a balance sage who would lay their hands upon the new arrival and inform them of any physical imbalances they detected. The attending sage would then provide them with guidance on which services to seek within the second hall that would help them achieve the physical balance required to advance to the third hall. 

When Brynwolfn and the Council of Twelve arrived in the second hall, it was no surprise to any of them that the attending sage had directed all of them to a session of deep tension release through massage. After all, the tension caused by Keledrain’s recent outburst at all of them was undeniable. Even the wisest among them could not be expected to maintain their inner balance after an encounter like that. “And decisions made with an unbalanced body and mind lead to too many unbalanced decisions,” Brynwolfn thought to herself. “Just like Keledrain’s,” she added, grateful that she was alone with her thoughts. 

Right around the time that Brynwolfn stopped wondering how much longer the massage would take, it was over. The Council of Twelve was waiting for her, and the attending sage pronounced all thirteen of them approved to advance to the third hall of the temple. Each of them bowed their heads to the attending sage, avoiding direct eye contact as a sign of respect. 

The third hall was devoted to The Balance of Mind, and was the furthest that most of the Hulfraust ever progressed through the Temple of Balance. But that was fine, because the third hall was exactly where Brynwolfn and the Council of Twelve needed to be to begin the discussion at hand. 

Two of the balance sages attending to the third hall silently greeted the group and led them to a room where they could converse in total privacy. The two sages obviously recognized the Council of Twelve, especially its several members who served alongside them in the third hall on most days. If the sages recognized Brynwolfn, they gave no indication of it, for which she was grateful. 

The room they entered was a perfect hexadecagon. It had sixteen stone walls of exactly the same length, each joined at exactly the same angle. The door they entered through was in the center of one of these walls, and the only other door was in the center of the wall directly across from the entrance. Placed in the center of each of the other fourteen walls were lanterns of different colors. In front of each lantern was a cushioned chair. And next to each chair was a pedestal topped with a quartz surface where each dwarf would be be able to tap out their opinion when it was their turn to speak, as well as where they would rest their malatol speech hammers when it was their turn to listen. 

Fourteen lanterns, fourteen chairs, fourteen voice pedestals, twelve venerable balance sages, and one general. Brynwolfn watched as the Council of Twelve broke into groups of three and silently moved to their usual seats around the room. One trio sat down in the three seats to the right of the entrance, while another trio sat in the three seats to the left of the entrance. The other two groups of three seated themselves together in the three seats to the right and the three seats to the left of the opposite door, the exit. That left two seats open for Brynwolfn to choose between. 

Brynwolfn knew that the imbalance her presence brought to the room would make the balance sages uncomfortable. She knew there was a meaning and purpose to each deliberate choice behind where each of them sat in the room. She also knew that there was no time for struggling over the choice between two perfectly equal seats, nor was she about to subject herself to standing in the center of the room like she had as a young woman when the balance of her mind was to be evaluated for service as a warrior. She didn’t hesitate.

Brynwolfn took the seat between the trio seated to the right of the entrance and the trio seated to the left of the exit, respectively. The others had already placed their malatol speech hammers down on their resting places on the pedestals as they waited to begin, though some looked poised to snatch them up and get in the first word the moment Brynwolfn put hers down. But before Brynwolfn was completely seated, she opened her mouth and used her tongue in a series of clicks and clacks that mimicked the dwarves percussive language. 

“Does anyone object if I begin the discussion?” Brynwolfn asked. 

Several in the room grunted or shifted in their seats, while a few suppressed grins of amusement. By using the tongue-clicking technique to ask her question, Brynwolfn had caught them unawares, but not actually violated the tradition of keeping all hammers silent until they’ve all been set in the resting position. And yet few would have expected an accomplished and respected leader like Brynwolfn to speak using the same technique that small children use when their tiny hands lack the fine motor skills to speak clearly with a malatol hammer. 

Brynwolfn looked straight ahead at the empty chair across from her, setting her malatol down in its resting place while she waited to hear any objections. None came. Brynwolfn was fond of asking the balance sages for their objections rather than their permission. Because while a request for permission required the long process of agreement between sages, a lack of objection took hardly any time at all. 

She continued to stare straight ahead at the empty seat across from her, grateful she had someplace to fix her gaze that wouldn’t lead to unintended eye contact. The last thing she needed was to make them feel threatened. After waiting through another slow inhale and exhale, Brynwolfn picked her malatol up from its resting place and began tapping it on the polished quartz surface. 

“Thank you,” she said. “I’m sure you’re all eager to participate in this discussion, but I’d like to make sure we can address the most urgent matters first. So I’ll begin by asking this. If Keledrain were to somehow follow through with her threat and intense heat of the mountain were gone tomorrow, how long would the nation be able to survive on our reserves alone? Thombel, Hurgadi, Reinegadi, I believe you three are best suited to answer this, correct?” 

Reinegadi replied first. As was customary among Hulfraust men, his long hair and beard were braided together in a pattern unique to him. He wore spectacles with yellowish crystal lenses, and thin steel frames that matched the color of his hair. “With ideal distribution and use of resources,” said Reinegadi, hammering his words with efficient, staccato strikes, “our current inventory of food would feed our nation for approximately two years. But considering the state of affairs described in the most recent balance census taken last year, I believe a more accurate estimate would be approximately eighteen months.” 

“We would still have the ability to produce some additional food for a time, even with the mountain heat gone,” added Hurgadi. Like Brynwolfn and most other Hulfraust women, Hurgadi wore her hair cut short on the sides with a tuft of bristly hair on the top that spiked upward. “The fire salamanders would seek out other nesting grounds at once of course, so we wouldn’t have their meat or eggs to rely on. But the goats herds could continue providing us with milk and meat as long as we keep them fed, and that won’t be a problem until they’ve eaten all the brunigras. And we’ve all seen how overgrown some of the districts have become despite our best efforts, so I suspect it could take five years or more before our herds managed to eat it all.” 

“The goats may be able to eat the brunigras,” said Thrombel, tapping in to the conversation, “but we cannot. And I don’t think I need to remind you that a diet of nothing but goat meat, milk, and cheese is a sure path to destroying the nutritional balance of our people.” The elderly dwarf held his stomach, as if reliving an unpleasant memory of a lesson learned the hard way. 

“That’s true,” Brynwolfn interjected, trying to keep the conversation moving forward and not get sidetracked by a lecture on nutritional balance. “Hurgadi, would the corn, rye, and other crops in the greenhouses be affected if the volcano lost its heat? I always assumed they didn’t rely on the heat all that much since they’re kept on the upper levels.” 

“There are a few peppers we grow further down that we would lose within a few weeks,” Hurgadi responded, “but no, the strawberries, cucumbers, spinach, and other crops in the greenhouses wouldn’t be directly affected as long as we keep the mirror field on the surface maintained, and the sunlight conduits to the greenhouses clear.” 

Brynwolfn breathed a sigh of relief, but then Hurgadi continued. “But honestly Bryn,” Hurgadi said, “focusing too much on food is missing the more urgent need if the mountain dies.” Byrnwolfn suspected that Hurgadi used the old childhood pet name to get her attention. It worked. 

“What need is more urgent than food?” Brynwolfn asked. 

Hurgadi tapped out her reply with three quick strikes of her tool. “Water.” There was a moment of silence as the word echoed around them. “Even in the summer months, the amount of snowmelt that flows down the aqueducts to us is only about a third of what we need for our crops, livestock, and citizens if we relied on the heat from the sun alone. The only way we melt enough of the snow and ice to meet our demands is by piping up hot air through the ventilation shafts. And you know where all that heat comes from.” 

“The volcano,” said Brynwolfn, quietly tapping out the reply. 

“That’s right, Bryn.” From the way Hurgadi used her tool, Brynwolfn could tell she was holding it gently, not reveling in the harsh truth. “The first time the heat went out for the Hulfraust, our grandparents clamored about how devastating it would be to lose our mighty forges and smithies, and all the pride we tie to them. But within a year of that first heat drought, they realized that it was the water they had most taken for granted.” 

Another tapping voice spoke up from the wall on almost the opposite side of the room from where Brynwolfn sat. The strikes were softer, and had a shaky quality that mirrored the hands that made them. The words came from Brekoth, the eldest of all the dwarves on the Council of Twelve, and personal role model of Brynwolfn’s growing up. “I understand your desire to find a path away from the rule of the outsider we’ve put up with all these decades,” she said. “I was only a small girl when Keledrain began her rule over us, and I could tell even then that I did not like her or trust her. Like you, I have dreamed of finding a way to be rid of her.” 

“But what options do we have when the threat to kill the heat of our home seems credible?” Brekoth continued. “If the mountain dies and its heat is gone, what do we have left? Our only option would be to flee and leave the Hulfraust nation behind.” 

There was silence in the room. Brynwolfn waited several minutes to see if any other the others in the council would take the opportunity to speak their mind in response, but it seemed none of them had a reply to the finality of Brekoth’s dire conclusion. Then, having waited long enough, Brynwolfn picked up her malatol again and spoke. 

“Our people could never leave the Hulfraust nation behind,” Brynwolfn said. “We are the Hulfraust nation. We were the Hulfraust before our ancestors settled in this mountain that shares our name, and we’ll continue to be the Hulfraust even if we have to leave it one day. The only way we lose our nation is when we forget what it means to be Hulfraust in the first place. Self-reliance, integrity, and balance in all things. And those are exactly the values we stand to lose if we continue to be ruled by Keledrain. Or worse, if she manages to succeed in using us to conquer others.” 

“I say this council needs to decide what it stands for,” said Brynwolfn. “You can lead our citizens and remind them of who we are and what matters most to us. You can help them find the inner balance they’ll need if the world around them becomes chaotic and unbalanced around them.” 

“As for me,” Brynwolfn continued, sitting up straight, “I have some other preparations to take care of. Which reminds me, I know just what kind of weapon to commission for Keledrain this time.”