Into the Second World Page 29

  Then came the incident with the elf skull, and our successes became failures overnight. The skull was our one piece of tangible evidence, snatched at the last instant by Cosmas. All else was lost in the terrifying vortex that had closed the portal. It had been the centerpiece of Queller’s courtly visits. The Emperor himself had handled it.

  The beginning of the end came via the Royal Society of Londinium, which requested the skull for research, they said. This was not the first such request, but it was the first Henrik granted. With the prestige of the Royal Society, the professor could hardly have refused.

  So he brought the elf skull to Londinium, gave it over to what we all believed was a group of respectable scholars, and waited for several days while Professor Queller was toasted by the best of society. These scholars then announced their own lecture, which they proclaimed would be a refutation of all our claims. The response was so large, the Society moved the event to the grand lecture theater at Londinium University. Hundreds had to be turned away.

  There we heard about the Piltdown Elf.

  The skull, these scholars declared, was a fake, merely an old but quite ordinary elf skull. They labeled our entire expedition a fraud, a work of journalistic trickery perpetrated by a crackpot professor, his failed nephew in need of money, and a nondescript young journalist eager for fame. We all, it was alleged, simply took a long vacation, then turned up in Wales with our story and our skull, taking unforgivable advantage of Fournier’s disappearance. As for Bessarion, that dwarf had gone into hiding, no doubt paid off by the conspirators.

  Their evidence was cunning. They claimed to have found a certain bit of dirt in between the skull’s teeth, which analysis showed indisputably could have come only from a particular abandoned gravel pit near the English village of Piltdown. This, they further alleged, was why the Queller Expedition had “left” from Austria but “returned” in Cumbria.

  We were condemned, but we were not ruined. Despite the actions of the Royal Society, some voices rose in our defense. We were not guilty of fraud, some said, but only of delusion. This was hardly a redemption. A few claimed the exposure itself was fraudulent, perpetrated by men with a personal grudge against Professor Queller, and I found this line of reasoning persuasive. Two of the men who had criticized Henrik in scholarly circles were among those revealing the supposed Piltdown Elf scandal, but Henrik refused to believe responsible scientists would deliberately try to destroy him. Most likely, he said, the skull had been contaminated inadvertently, at some point. He did not say this to Cosmas.

  As months passed, so did the furor. The opportunities now were fewer and more modest, but we had each proved ourselves in our own ways. I could write and had an audience. More and more, I wrote on the intersection of science and social justice, and in advocacy for the Surface gnomes. Nik had led several successful expeditions by the time of the scandal, and he was still able to find backers. The professor still lectured, though no longer before the nobility. As he aged, he traveled less and wrote more. He and Cosmas received visitors at the professor’s modest home.

  The reader will note I’ve said nothing of Bessarion. His path went elsewhere. He became the founder of a new sect, the Reverence of the True Ancestors. He taught that the First Dwarves were not superior to modern dwarves, but were to be respected all the more for their accomplishments. His sect was never large, but it was stalwart.

  He got married, had children. Nik claims Beso and his followers deliberately sabotaged the lower reaches of Lamprecht’s Cave so the Long Dig could never be found. I wouldn’t put it past him. The dwarf knows those passages better than anyone.

  As for the Second World, we have all had to come to terms with knowing an inimical force lies beneath our feet. We know there will come a day when the drow find a way to the Surface once more, or else a future expedition will find another route downward. What happens then is open to speculation.

  For myself, I can only hope that drow and dürgar may learn to live in peace, and that gnomes everywhere might find at last a true home. I look forward to a day when a young family will pack their bags and go to a portal, where they can embark on a wondrous adventure, without fear, into the Second World.

  THE END

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  Other Altearth Tales

  A Child of Great Promise, 2018

  Goblins at the Gates, 2017

  Mad House, 2016

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  Next Altearth Tale

  The Falconer, a fantasy, but based on the true story of how Emperor Frederick II Hohenstaufen came to power. Except this one has wizards and trolls.