‘If it exists at all,’ muttered Fen. It was pitched for Keel’s ears, but Vika’s hearing was sharper than most. She felt a surge of annoyance at the ingratitude. Fen had been as keen as anyone to follow her, back at the hut.
She walked away from them, her boots crunching on the stones, Ruck panting at her side. There was something wrong about this. There was no stair, and no break in the valley walls that might lead elsewhere. Yet she’d followed Hagath’s instructions to the letter, and there was the black tree he’d promised.
Had she been misled? Had Polla-Calls-The-Waters really been to Skavengard at all?
Go back, she thought. This is not the way.
‘It’s a dead end!’ Keel said.
‘We should backtrack while we still can,’ Fen told her. ‘Skavengard is a fireside tale. We’ve walked all night and I barely feel it. With your potions we’ll outlast the dreadknights. Let me guide us out of these mountains.’
They’re right, Vika thought. Go back. Go back quickly, before the dreadknights catch us all.
Something tickled at the edge of her senses. Something she couldn’t quite place.
‘Come, then,’ said Garric, making the decision for the group. ‘There’s no time to waste. Let’s—’
‘Hold!’ Vika cried, lifting one hand in the air. She looked over her shoulder at the travellers, who were already heading back towards the entrance to the valley. ‘You are all suddenly very eager to leave.’
‘Because there’s nothing here!’ Keel told her. ‘Any mudwit can see that.’
‘You’ve trusted me this far,’ said Vika. ‘Trust me now. Besides, you’ll not outrun anyone without me.’
They cursed and grumbled, but they stayed where they were as she turned her attention to the tree. She didn’t blame them for their mistrust. She, too, wanted to leave. It was like a physical pull. Her thoughts flowed towards escape like rivers to the sea, and no matter how she tried to divert them, they still reached the same end.
She was always too quick to doubt. But not this quick. Something was pushing them away.
She reached into her cloak and ran her fingers over the phials there. Each was sealed with a stopper carved with a symbol in Stonespeak, the secret tongue of druids. She found the right one, drew it out and took a swallow.
‘Now,’ she said to herself. ‘What is here?’
The potion crackled through her body like flashfire, spreading from her nape over her skull, racing along her limbs. Her pupils grew wide, irises thinning to almost nothing, and her breath surged in and out like a tide. She felt as if she was falling gently backwards, sinking into another state of being.
Alderbright and haglock, a potion for clarity, to slow the mind and senses. Life was a flurry, seen through a tunnel, always rushing from task to task. It was easy to miss what was right in front of you.
Everything expanded around her. The barren valley became vast, teeming with the ticks and taps of insect life. Every edge turned sharp, cutting the shadows like blades. She smelled the sickness in Aren, heard the wet chill that lay on his lungs. Fen and Keel were murmuring about her behind her back, casting doubts where they thought she couldn’t hear, but beneath the words she sensed things they didn’t mean to say: how distrust came so naturally to Fen that she knew no other way; how Keel had a hole in him he could never fill; and how both had enough belief and affection for the old faith that the presence of a druidess gave them hope.
She wouldn’t let them down.
She approached the tree. It looked huge now, swollen with the centuries and scarred with age. She placed her hands on the bark, closed her eyes and let her fingers roam the cracks and ridges. Immediately, she felt it: a scar that had been placed there with intent. She found another, a line that was too neat and straight, and a knothole, round and perfect. She stepped back and opened her eyes, and what she hadn’t seen before was now clear. A symbol had been crafted onto the tree, a ward of some kind, hidden in the bark. The very sight of it repelled her.
Go back, it said.
‘It’s here!’ she called, grinning with relief. ‘The stair is here!’ For how could it be otherwise, when someone had gone to such lengths to turn seekers away? She stepped back from the tree and swept the valley with her newfound sight. A jagged line in the stone, which she’d taken to be handspan wide, stretched apart beneath her gaze. She saw a perilous set of steps, concealed by folds in the rock, zigzagging upwards.
‘There!’ She threw out a hand and pointed with a wild laugh.
‘She’s shade-touched! There’s no stair!’ Osman said to the others, but Vika hurried towards it, stumbling as the potion dizzied her.
‘It’s here!’ she said again as she reached the foot of it, with Ruck barking excitedly and running around her. Only when she was close enough to touch it did it seem real. Cut into the stone at the base of the stair was another symbol, an arrangement of whorls and curves that branded itself on her mind.
A ward to deter the curious; a ward to hide the stair. Small wonder few ever found this place. I’d wager even the Delvers do not know Skavengard.
They came reluctantly, still half ready to turn back. Only when they were by her side did their faces clear.
‘How did we not see it before?’ Osman wondered.
‘Someone did not want you to,’ said Vika.
She turned to the Skarl carrying the sick boy, and just for an instant she saw something in the tattoos on his face, found sense in a language she didn’t understand. Impressions leaped into her mind, made possible by her state of heightened consciousness. Pictures of heroism, strength of arms, the bloody brotherhood that existed between warriors, and all of it marred and made rotten by the ugly black swipe across his eyes.
Grub saw something in her reaction, and his gaze became dark and hot with danger. She switched her attention to Aren before he could read her. ‘The way is hard. We will need to lash the boy to you. Can you bear him?’
‘Grub can carry Mudslug,’ he said. She could tell by his voice that he suspected something.
‘Then we climb!’ said Garric, with new fervour. Their doubts had fallen away now the power of the wards had been overcome; there was no more griping and grizzling at her lead. Vika took some satisfaction from that.
The stair was steep, sometimes so steep they had to climb it like a ladder, and Ruck had to be hauled up. The steps were worn, made smooth and slippery by centuries of rain, and they went with care: a tumble might take them all down. Vika worried about Grub, who was carrying Aren piggyback, but soon she saw that he was the most surefooted of them all. Though he looked lumbering and clumsy, his sense of balance was superb.
The stair switched back on itself over and over, and they followed each twist, hugging tight to the stone. The wind began to pick up again as they made their way up the valley wall, carrying to Vika a whiff of terror-sweat and the sound of a hammering heartbeat. The way was precarious and there was fear in all of them, but one more so than the others. Looking back down the line she saw Fen, her freckled face half-covered by a hood, eyes fixed firmly on the next step. She gave no outward sign of it, but inside, she was terrified.
She’s afraid of heights, Vika thought. And determined none should know.
Who were these people she’d tied her fate to? Who were these strangers the Krodans had sent their most deadly agents to catch? Was one of them really the champion she sought?
Her thoughts scattered in alarm as Cade stumbled, his foot slipping out from under him; but Keel was close behind, and he grabbed the boy so that he only fell to his hands and knees, and no worse.
Vika breathed again. Her craft would only sustain them so far, and fatigue was setting in as the potion wore off. She dared not give them another dose – the withdrawal from such a powerful drug might kill them. She could only hope they’d last until Skavengard.
‘Thanks,’ said Cade sheepishly as Keel picked him up. He peered over the edge of the stair and the colour drained from his face.
‘Long way
down, eh?’ said Keel.
‘No,’ said Cade, and pointed. ‘Look.’
A cold wash of fear ran through Vika. Three figures were entering the valley, sliding out of the fissure like cockroaches from a crack. They were made small by distance, but it didn’t diminish their presence. She sensed them as much as saw them, and with her expanded awareness they possessed a strange density, as if they were more real than the rock that surrounded them. They were like black holes punched in the fabric of the world, sucking in light and life, windows to elsewhere.
These were the enemy she’d pitted herself against. For the first time, she understood the scale of what she’d taken on.
‘Make haste!’ she hissed. ‘The gate cannot be far!’
They began to climb the stair at reckless speed. Vika led the way, heedless of the drop, her lichwood and lightning-glass staff gripped tight in her hand. Cade slipped again – his prisoner’s boots were not well suited to climbing – but Keel was ready to catch him once more.
As they went, Vika cast glances down below. The dreadknights had stopped at the mouth of the valley as the same arts that had repelled Vika made them doubt themselves. The cowled one, Sorrow, came creeping forward, crouched low to the ground, searching the earth for signs.
Turn back, she thought at them, adding her will to the power that guarded the valley. Turn back. There’s nothing here.
Then Sorrow straightened and lifted his face to reveal a metal mask of howling grief. Though she couldn’t see his eyes, Vika felt his gaze meet hers. The world slowed around her, and just for a moment there was only him and her in it.
She knew one thing with certainty then. She’d been marked, and there was no hiding any more. Wherever she went, Sorrow would find her.
‘I see it! The top of the stair!’
Osman’s voice jerked her back to the moment. Now she saw it, too: the end of the climb, where a hidden shelf, invisible from ground level, cut into the side of the valley.
‘Courage!’ she cried, more for her own sake than the others’. ‘We will outrun them yet!’
Sorrow lifted his swords, and at his signal the dreadknights rushed into the valley, making for the foot of the stair. But Vika felt Skavengard within her reach now, close enough to grasp. She surged forward, and the others followed her headlong into the unknown.
33
They clambered up the last of the steps and onto the ledge, their legs weakening with every step. There they paused, panting before a dark, gaping portal with pillars to either side, worn down to mere bulges in the rock. If there’d been a gate here once, it was long gone, leaving only the faintest signs that this entrance was the work of human hands.
‘Lantern!’ Garric called as soon as he saw it. Osman unhitched one from the side of his pack, and he and Fen set about lighting it with flint and oil. Cade drifted to the portal and peered inside while Vika looked back into the valley. The dreadknights were already at the foot of the stair.
She drew out another phial and unstoppered it. A warning buzz at the back of her skull told her she already had a dangerous amount of poison in her veins, but this was only a mild concoction and she was afraid enough to risk it. She tipped it into her mouth, tasting bitter herbs on her tongue, then turned away from the edge and strode towards the portal, Ruck at her heels.
‘Catch up with me,’ she said. ‘I will see the way is clear.’
‘It’s pitch dark in there!’ Osman said.
‘There is light enough for me,’ she replied as she swept past him.
The corridor beyond was a smashed echo of grandeur. Flagstones were broken and tilted. The vaults overhead had cracked and dropped huge chunks of masonry on the floor. Crumbling pillars marked the way, with tall, shadowy figures between them, mutilated by the ages.
Yet despite lying in ruin, the work of her ancestors struck Vika with awe, and she felt small as she hastened inside. She saw its ancient greatness in hints and patterns: a sculpted edge here, the remains of a mural there. Entering this place stirred some primal, collective pride deep inside her.
Her potion was making her head throb, but it lent her owl’s eyes, and the light from the portal showed the corridor in shades of grey. Ruck followed her, sharing her vision, past dripping stalactites and fallen rubble. To either side were statues of men and women in strange robes and towering elaborate headpieces. They’d been carved from some black, glistening stone that hadn’t held detail well, and their faces were smooth, impassive and alien.
The corridor turned at the end, sending her down ancient steps overlooked by a guardian demon in the shape of a mantis. She was approaching the limit of the light now – even owls couldn’t see in total darkness – but she didn’t want to wait for the lantern. Every moment counted, and if they were to stay ahead of the pursuit, she had to find their path.
She rounded another corner and, with a small gasp of relief, she saw new light. The thinnest sliver, but light nonetheless, creeping beneath the doors at the end of the corridor.
These were the doors Hagath spoke of. If Polla’s story was true, Skavengard lay beyond.
She hastened towards them. Twice her height and cut from metal, they had survived the centuries better than the blank, mouldering statues standing to either side. They were still dense with detail, a swarming tangle of curves and angles that flowed and eddied without symmetry. She searched for a handle or lever and, finding none, she pushed against the metal. When that failed, she found holds with her fingertips and pulled. The doors remained shut.
She stepped back, frustrated. Hagath had made no mention of how to get through the doors once she found them. She searched them again, more carefully this time, and found two hidden key grips recessed in the metal. She tried to turn them, but they wouldn’t move.
I would be fortunate indeed, if it was that easy.
She began to feel around the door, exploring the crevices and edges of its complex surface. Something gave beneath her fingertips with a click. A button! She tried the keys again, to no avail.
There had to be more. The Old Ossians loved their puzzle boxes and finger traps. There was a trick to this. She just had to find it.
Ruck bustled about her feet, snorting with growing agitation as she located another button, and another, and another yet. Soon she’d found buttons hidden all over the door. When some were pressed in, others popped back out.
A combination. But how to guess it?
She heard footsteps behind her, and light grew there.
‘They are coming!’ Osman called as he hurried round the corner, lantern held high. The others came clattering after him.
‘Why doors not open? Open doors!’ Grub cried, Aren still jogging and jerking against his back.
‘They’re locked?’ Cade said, panic in his voice.
‘Put your shoulders to them!’ Keel barked. ‘We’ll break them down!’
‘Silence!’ Vika shouted and rapped her staff against the floor. ‘Brute strength will not help us here. Let me think!’
‘Think fast, then,’ rumbled Garric. ‘They’re not far behind us.’ He began snapping orders to the others, arranging them along the corridor in defensive positions.
Vika set herself to the task again. Her eyes flickered over the maze of shapes and patterns, searching for meaning, finding none. A dark pressure grew at the back of her mind, growing greater with each passing moment. It was the dreadknights, bearing down on them, their presence weighty as the mountain.
Prinn, Ragged Mummer, Aspect of Deceit and Trickery, help me now. Give me the wisdom to solve this.
Ruck barked at her side, calling for her attention. Vika ignored her at first, so intent was she on the puzzle of the doors, but Ruck barked again, and this time Vika sensed her insistence. The wolfhound was sniffing at the foot of one of the statues. Vika caught the faintest of scents, so weak as to be almost a memory. A human scent. Female.
She crouched next to Ruck, her arm over the dog’s back, and peered at the base of the statue. Scratched in the s
tone were three spidery symbols, with a smaller one beneath them as a signature.
Polla-Calls-The-Waters had left druidsign.
Excited, she bent closer. The symbols were messily carved and hard to read, but she made sense of them at last. When she did, her eyes widened.
Enter by Shadowlands.
Quickly she stood, fumbling inside her cloak for another phial. She was already close to the limit of her tolerance; another potion, especially one as strong as this, might do her untold damage. But all their lives were in her hands and she dared not hesitate. She drew out the phial, broke the seal and tipped it down her throat.
‘I hear them!’ Fen called down the corridor.
‘Druidess!’ Garric cried. ‘Whatever arts you have, use them now! Open these doors!’
The potion crashed through her brain like a wave, sweeping her thoughts before it. She staggered and leaned on her staff. It felt as if her head was expanding, ready to split and burst. This was the kind of brew that demanded preparation, meditation and prayer before it was consumed. Swilled down like this, it sent her mind reeling. She hadn’t tried to bridge the Divide to the Shadowlands since that terrible night at the Dirracombe. Now she flung herself across recklessly, and madness swarmed around her.
Find the way. Everything crawled with movement, glimpses of that other realm that lay beneath the surface of the visible world, a dark mirror to the land of the living. She saw strange and twisted reflections wavering just beyond reality. This ancient corridor existed there, as did those statues, this mountain. Those doors.
The doors. Focus on the doors.
She furrowed her brow and marshalled her splintered mind. Some power had been laid over this entrance, a taut membrane seething with dangerous energies. She brushed against it tentatively, ready to recoil, but it didn’t harm her. Whatever sorcery this might be, it wasn’t meant to stop her.
Polla had passed this way and survived. So, then, would she.
Feel it. Feel the answer.
She sensed a shape there, invisible to the casual explorer but not to one trained to see beyond. It was written plainly on the doors, but only in the Shadowlands, as if drawn by a finger on a fogged mirror. She concentrated, and all at once it came to her. A pattern in the buttons, as clear as if she’d been given a diagram.
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