My name is Stony Grungnir, and this is the story of how I became the richest dwarf to ever live.

The problem with living underground is that you eventually run out of room. That’s the reason there are so many miners in the dwarf holds. There is no other reason for there being so many jobs hitting rock walls with a pickaxe. It certainly isn’t fun. Just twelve hours a day swinging at a hard grey wall until your arms feel like they’re going to fall off. Then you repeat it again the next day, then again, until your memories of life outside the mine fade into the darkness, each shower of sparks and crack of stone chipping away at your life as surely as you chip away at the rockface.

“Get back to work Stony!” roared Overseer Tradfast, an over-tall dwarf with a greying beard and receding hairline. “Unless you want to work in the outside.”

The outside meant the bare outer slopes of the mountain, far even from the protection of the valleys. It was where the stone chips were hauled by dwarves even worse off than me. Out there with no protection, a dwarf’s skin would turn red and peel off, and he’d fall down to die less than an hour. Everyone feared being sent there.

But despite his appearance, Tradfast was too nice to follow through with the threat. He never even took a cut of our pathetic daily wage of four quartz tetras, unlike some overseers I’d known. Still, having him shout at me was less than pleasant, so with a roll of my eyes I took another swing at the wall and sighed. It wasn’t even lunchtime and I was already sick of working.

I banged at the wall with mock enthusiasm until Tradfast stalked off to shout at someone else, then I sank down with my back against the wall. The cool stone was a relief from the sweaty stuffiness of the mine.

“You know he’ll be able to tell you haven’t been working when he comes back,” said Airon. He was short even for a dwarf, but blessed with blonde hair, a strong jaw and straight nose that made him popular with the women back in town. He was chatty too, and my only friend in the mines, despite me being his opposite in both physique and personality. I had a bulbous nose, lanky arms and legs, and my beard was an ugly brown-grey colour. Conversation was my least favourite activity next to mining, and I brushed off those who approached me for it. But Airon managed to be alright.

“Lizardshit,” I replied. “Tradfast doesn’t notice anything unless it’s happening right in front of his nose. Sometimes even when it is.” I gestured to an old man asleep on my left. Blobs of drool rolled down his white beard a little further with each snore. Probably Tradfast had noticed him, but just didn't see the point in causing trouble by waking him up. The old ones’ brains were usually scrambled after so long mining. Who knows what the old man might do if he were woken up too suddenly?

Airon was more concerned with me, however. He shook his head. “You’re known as the laziest dwarf in the mine, Stony. Tradfast notices you. You really will end up outside at this rate.”

I snorted. “No I won’t. No one ever ends up outside, it’s just a stupid threat to scare the new workers before they wise up to the fact no one really has to do much work down here.”

“I once met someone who got sent outside, even if you haven’t. At least make it look like you’re working. It’s not like you have to mine away like Fastpick up there.”

He gestured to the layer of scaffold above me, and the figure swinging away like a madman, making a visible dent in the cave wall. Granot ‘Fastpick’ was mad, I thought. Out of the hundreds of dwarves up this gigantic, multi platform scaffold, one else was stupid enough to do his job enthusiastically. Maybe I did the least work here, true, but the others weren’t far off my laziness, even Airon. We all knew as long as we turned up to be marked on the roster, we’d get our pay.

“No one needs to swing away like Fastpick,” I said, staring up at the crazy young man, wondering if in the old days all dwarves worked like that. Certainly if the ancients had worked like me, they’d never have tunneled out of Greatpeak, much less down to the roots of the mountain ranges where Airon and I were now. Maybe they had been paid more.

“You’re spacing out again,” said Airon.

“Sorry,” I replied, not sure what for.

I got back into the rhythm of work, more to make Airon happy than anything else. His conversation at least broke the monotony somewhat. It would be a shame if he stopped associating with me.

Another crack, and another. Before long my arms began to tire again. That was a lie. I began to get bored. Telling myself my arms were tired was really just a way to convince myself my body was weak, and not my spirit. I looked around for Tradfast, saw him nowhere, and decided to take one last swing before taking a break.

I raised up my pick axe and brought it down. There was a loud crack, and an electric shiver shot through my arm, nearly making me drop the pickaxe. A big, flat chip of rock flew off, and I gasped. Instead of more endless grey, a brilliant blue caught the light. Exposed in the wall was the facet of a blue gem as big as my palm. And that was only one facet. My heart began to race; I’d never seen such wealth before.

In a sudden frenzy I chipped away at the edge of the facet. Each bit of stone that came off uncloaked more and more blue, until I revealed the whole gem.

It was an enormous octagonal sapphire, exquisitely cut, instead of the rough block it ought to be. Orange lamplight changed to green as it bounced off the surface, tinted by some arcane refraction. I peered forward, and saw my face reflected a dozen times like so many imprisoned phantoms.

“What’s that there?” asked Airon, and I jerked my head around to see him staring at my gem. Still processing the discovery myself, I garbled my words trying to think of an answer. He took a step closer and his jaw dropped.

“It’s a sapphire!” he hissed. “Up here?”

“Why shouldn’t there be one up here?”

“Because sapphires aren’t found up here. They’re found much, much further down. And why’s it cut like that?”

He reached out to run his finger along one of the perfectly smooth facets.

“Someone must have cut it, and placed it in the rock again,” I said, keeping my voice low so no only Airon could hear me, but I knew that didn’t make sense. Gems that size were used to create runes of immense power, the thought of someone putting it back in the rock was inconceivable. And how would anyone put it back in the rock anyway?

Airon’s thoughts went in a different direction.

“Yes, someone did, but who? And why?”

“Who cares? It’s mine now.” I hooked one part of my pickaxe behind the sapphire, and started to wrench it out of the rock. Airon took hold of my shoulder and tried to pull me away.

“You can’t pocket it for yourself!" Airon hissed, spittle flying from his lips. "Tradfast might forgive laziness, but he won’t forgive theft. Don’t you remember what happened to Hardring last month? And that was for an emerald smaller than a tooth!”

The unpleasant image of Hardring hanging from a pole in the town square, his broken limbs hanging limp, barged into my mind. But another image pushed it out. A dream of me feasting on venison every day and sleeping until lunchtime under silk sheets. Of living in an enormous mansion in the heart of the mountain, servants tending to my every whim. A harem of beautiful young women. All the perks of the rich, but most importantly, I’d never have to swing a fucking pick ever again.

“No one will find out!” I wrenched my shoulder away. “At least, not if I get it out quickly.”

“Do you even know where you’d sell it?”

I ignored him and put my cheap shoe against the wall to steady myself. With a final heave the sapphire came toppling out, hitting the scaffold floor with a surprisingly solid thunk. Part of me had expected it to bounce, or shatter like glass, but it barely wobbled as it impacted the planks. I stared down and watched the lamplight glitter off its brilliant blue, sending green flickers onto the planks above, and licked my dry lips. Airon stared down at it too, a look of shock in his eyes.

“Are you really going to keep it?” asked Airon.

“Damn right I am,” I said, and knelt down to scoop it up. It had a weight and hardness to it that set it apart from the chunks of grey I usually mined out. A perfect smoothness too. I put it into my shirt pocket, where it squashed my other gubbins to the bottom and made a conspicuous octagonal bulge.

“Someone’s going to notice that,” hissed Airon.

“Don’t be silly. No one else saw.” I looked around to check that was indeed the case. The wall bulged where Airon and I were, the scaffold curving around it, so not many people were able to see us. Those that did stood, chipping out bits of rock while chatting to their neighbours. Sometimes, one of them looked back while they brushed a shower of rock chips into the collection trough at the bottom of the mining scaffold, but never in the direction of Airon and I.

All apart from the old man next to me, the one Tradfast hadn’t bothered waking up. He still lay there, but he wasn’t asleep. One bloodshot, yellowing eye was open.

“What’s that there?” he croaked. The thunk must have woken him up, or maybe it had been our muffled argument. He stood up, staring at my bulging shirt pocket as he rose. His eyes narrowed, and his mouth made a sour grimace.

“Nothing,” I snapped, and raised my pickaxe to head height. Pickaxes are not designed to be weapons, but I’ve seen them used with terrifying brutality in the occasional town brawl. The iron head is perfectly capable of cracking bone as well as rock. Dwarves who get hurt by a pickaxe stay hurt. I didn't intend to hit him with it, but I hoped it would at least make him back off. The old man growled. “Go back to sleep. I don’t have anything.”

“Stony!” said Airon, warning me not to do anything stupid.

The other man raised his pickaxe too, and from behind him a few other curious miners turned to look at us. Anything to take a break from the monotony of chipping away at the wall is welcome to a miner, even if it is likely to be traumatising. Pickaxe wounds are not nice things to look at.

“I don’t have anything,” I repeated, locking eyes with the miner. He must have been at least fifty, judging by his teeth, which, the remaining ones at least, were ground down to stumps from a lifetime of coarse bread. Perhaps he had spent his whole life in the mines, but at that moment I didn’t really care. My gem was a ticket from poverty to freedom, and I’d do anything to protect it.

“What’s with holding up your pickaxe then?” The old miner took another step closer, right within swinging distance. Silence reigned over the scaffold, as everyone within distance stopped their work to stare at the two of us. Most of the tapping from the level above had stopped too, and when I glanced up I saw a bunch of miners staring down the gaps in the planks to look at the confrontation. Only Fastpick kept up his work, the steady tap tap of his pick giving rhythm to the tension.

“He doesn’t have anything,” said Airon, voice shaking. “We should all get back to work.” In an attempt to show by example, he struck the wall with his pick. “The Overseer will be down soon.”

“I don’t care about bloody Tradfast,” said the old miner, his remaining teeth bared in a snarl. “I want to know what your friend is hiding.”

“I’m not hiding anything,” I said. “And Airon’s right, Tradfast will be down soon. So unless you want to get thrown outside, get back to work.”

Some of the miners watching crowded around closer; it seemed they were being pushed by more dwarves who’d come to see what the commotion was. I wondered where Tradfast had got to. Probably at the other end of the cave.

“Oh I will, once you show me what’s in your pocket.” The old miner wouldn’t let up. He eyed the bulge in my shirt with a mad glint in his eyes. “It looks expensive.”

“Back off,” I said. “Or I’ll hurt you.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” he said. “What’s in your pocket?”

His eyes widened, and he took another step forward.

In that moment, I didn’t care for the law, or the old man, who was just another poor sod like me, being worked to death. All I cared about was the riches in my pocket, and my desire to keep them. All my life I’d been poor, and I knew this was the only chance I’d ever have to begin a life I could enjoy. I kicked him in the shin, and shoulder charged him. He stumbled back, but didn't fall.

“I said back off!” I held the pick tighter. “I’m not afraid to defend myself. Get away from me.” I snarled the last words, but they had the opposite effect of what I’d intended.

“Nearly forty years I’ve worked down here!” cried the old man. “And this young bastard of a dwarf thinks he’s better than me. I’ve never found anything, and you’ve found a diamond the size of an egg!”

“I haven’t got any fucking diamonds! You’re crazy.” I raised my pick, ready to swing. The old man gritted his remaining teeth, and held his own at the ready.

“Stony stop!” yelled Airon, and took a step forward to pull me back. But he was too late, the old man was already charging forward. He made to swing, but I was young, and my reflexes were faster.

My pick entered his skull with the sound of an egg cracking. There was a brief period of no resistance as the metal spike tore through his brain, then a judder went up my wrist as the wooden haft contacted the man’s pate. His face twisted in a silent scream, his eyes, blood leaking from their corners, rolled up, and he dropped his pick with a clatter. He remained standing for a few seconds, before the strength gave out from his legs and he slid to the floor like a sack of potatoes.

It was the first time I ever killed a man, which is why I remember every detail.

Airon gasped. “You fool.”

The gaze of every miner who’d come to watch the fight bored into me. A chill ran up my spine, and my intestines loosened.

Not only was I a thief, I was a murderer.

To be continued.