“There always is,” Balzarak continued. “In case of cave ins, or siege, or anything else that might trap the royal family in their keep, dwarvish architects would always have built a rear exit.”
“Where is it?” Erik asked.
“I don’t know,” Balzarak replied. “I would suspect that it is in here somewhere. Where, I do not know. But we must find it.”
Erik shook his head. Dwarvish tricks were beginning to annoy him.
“Gôdruk,” Balzarak said, “you and Thormok search the far wall. We are looking for a doorway.”
Balzarak’s cousins complied as the others—except Bryon who looked to be slipping in and out of consciousness—quickly joined them. Even Turk left his charge.
They ran their hands along the walls of the treasure room, the dwarves sticking their noses almost against the stone, looking for some hidden doorway. Threhof even took to searching the floor in front of the wall, and Dwain looked through chests large enough to conceal an opening and stairs. All the while, the temperature in the treasure room grew hotter, the walls continued to shake, and Erik thought he heard distant thunder, as if the monsoons had somehow snuck into the deepest parts of the Southern Mountains.
“Is there a trigger, General?” Turk asked. “Maybe something that would reveal the door?”
“Perhaps,” Balzarak replied, “just keep looking.”
Erik vigorously wiped sweat from his brow. The air in the treasure room had almost become suffocating.
“Where would it be?” Turk asked over his shoulder, his stubby fingers moving over the wall as if they were playing a musical instrument.
“I don’t know,” Balzarak replied, now looking himself, “but I would guess, if it isn’t in here, it would be in the throne room.”
The general seemed uncertain of his answer, and as Erik looked to the tunnel that led to the throne room, he could now hear the dead up there, congregating, laughing. Part of the barrier had broken, the thing that had held them back. Perhaps it was the dragon. The finding of the scroll. Anything. But the dead were coming closer, but he had to check.
“I will look in the throne room,” Erik said. “Turk, keep an eye on Bryon. General, you and everyone else, keep looking in here.”
The general nodded, seemingly accepting that Erik might start giving out orders.
“Thinking about it, as much as we may find a door, I believe we will also need a key,” Balzarak said.
“Truly?” Erik asked.
Balzarak simply nodded.
“And I suppose you don’t know where that is,” Erik said.
“I would guess …”
“The throne room,” Erik finished.
Balzarak nodded again.
Erik walked towards the tunnel, and as he did, he heard Balzarak say in Dwarvish, “We are doomed.”
He could feel them, hear them, smell them. They were there, in the throne room.
The ground underneath Erik’s feet shook. He saw a ripple in the stone, heard it cracking off in the distance, heard some of it breaking loose from the ceiling and falling.
“Hurry, Erik,” Balzarak called. “As she nears, it will get hotter in here. We will all die before ever meeting her.”
“So, what we saw, walking through Orvencrest?” Erik asked over his shoulder as he made his way up the ramp.
“The dragon,” Balzarak replied. “Melted stone, existence completely obliterated … and now the attack on Bryon … it’s the only explanation.”
He could sense their excitement heighten, knew they were there, waiting for him. He unsheathed Ilken’s Blade and readied his shield.
This isn’t a treasure room, or a city. It’s a giant tomb.
The earth rolled again and then something that sounded again like a crack of thunder ripped through the treasure room. Erik found himself down on his knees, clutching his ears. In that thunderclap, he heard a voice, an ancient voice speaking an ancient language that sounded ugly and hateful. The dragon.
Another deafening roar and the walls shook in its wake. As he reached the end of the passageway, Erik heard Switch screaming, dwarves yelling, men praying. He felt the floor roll under his body and had to work hard to get back to his feet. He steadied himself and stared resolutely at the tunnel’s entrance in front of him. A deep, blood-like hue crept from the firelight in the treasure room and now it continued to dull and dim.
Erik felt it as he passed into their realm. The moment he stepped further toward the reddish darkness that was now the throne room, a thick, inkiness overwhelmed him, and he knew he now dwelt in a place that crossed between dreams and the waking world. This world down here, this world within the mountain, was pure evil and, if the Creator ever allowed it, Erik had never felt so afraid in his life.
His strongest desire became one to leave this place and never return, but then, with a further twisting of his stomach, he knew he would have to come back. When he left, he would have unfinished business in this place. He sought to shake off all such thoughts and told himself to get moving.
He didn’t need a torch in this place. There was enough of the reddish light that he could see. He felt hands grasping at him as he walked up towards the throne room. He felt fingers brush against his arms. He swiped with Ilken’s Blade, and as his sword passed through rotting flesh, he heard their screams.
Sweat poured from Erik’s brow as the heat rose and the air grew thick.
Erik stopped. Fox, rotting and decayed and black with death, stood in front of the opening to the throne room.
“You,” Erik said through gritted teeth.
Fox nodded his head slowly, seemingly leering at Erik from black, eyeless sockets. A bit of flesh, purple and rotted, hung from a cheekbone and his red hair stood on end in haphazard splotches, crusted and barely clinging to decaying scalp. Erik felt the others behind him. He felt them clawing at his legs and arms. He stepped forward.
“How are you here?” Erik asked. “Is this some place that crosses the land of the living and the land of the dead?”
“You thought you could rid yourself of me,” Fox said, his smile revealing broken teeth. Insects crawled from his mouth, and as a centipede tried to escape the rotting maw, Fox extended a blackened tongue and licked the bug back into his mouth. Erik could hear the crunching of exoskeleton. The smell that came from the dead man’s mouth was so sickening he felt his stomach churn and bile rise up in his throat. When Fox wiped the back of a rotted hand across his mouth, a bit of his lip tore away, revealing dead teeth and gums regardless of whether or not he closed his mouth. “But now you have stepped into my realm, the realm of the Shadow, the place where she is master.”
“She?” Erik asked. “The dragon?”
“She is powerful,” Fox hissed, “and your death, the deaths of your brother and cousin, will bring her great pleasure. I will live once again and be more powerful than any who might call themselves leader.”
“You’re a fool,” Erik replied. “You were a fool in life. You’re a fool in death. You’re a slave, a pawn. And you don’t scare me. Now move.”
“Your thoughts betray you,” Fox said. “We know you are scared. Terrified even.”
“That’s no mystery,” Erik replied. “Any man would be scared. Now move.”
Erik felt them creep up behind him. He turned hard, swinging Ilken’s Blade. The sword caught bone and rotting flesh. Screams filled the tunnel. The stink of pierced, bloating skin filled the space. But Erik cut through them easily … too easily. It was a rouse, a distraction.
Erik turned, and Fox was almost on him. The undead man had no weapon, only bony fingers. One of them, one of those black, boney appendages, grazed Erik’s cheek. The wound burned. Erik brought his knee up hard into Fox’s stomach as the creature lunged forward. The attack sent the dead slaver backwards. Erik attacked with his blade. The Dwarf’s Iron caught Fox’s ribs, and as it opened his flesh, worms spilled out. Fox screamed. Erik kicked out, catching a knee, breaking it. As Fox lunged again, he blocked with his shield,
pushing the undead back again. He slashed, opening the creature up, maggots crawling from the wound.
“You’re not that powerful,” Erik said, and then slashed, slashed again, and punched his blade through Fox’s chest.
Fox erupted into thousands of insects—maggots and roaches and beetles—spilling to the ground and scurrying away. Erik heard the undead behind him. He turned, cutting one down after another, backing towards the throne room. They kept coming, throwing themselves at him, but they were no match for Ilken’s Blade.
When Erik stepped into the light of the throne room, they stopped … waited in the darkness of the tunnel.
“I’ll see you tonight, in my dreams,” Erik muttered with an insincere smile.
Erik inspected the room. As they had before, when they were looking for the treasure of the Lord of the East, he touched everything, pushed every stone, pulled every melted trinket, and moved every dilapidated piece of furniture. He looked to the throne. There was no lever or button. He felt all around it, even inside the small compartment that had held the Lord of the East’s scroll. Nothing.
I’ll find the key first. Then, maybe the way to open the door will reveal itself to me.
He inspected the remains of the king, still where they had left him. He didn’t find anything that could pass as a key. He frantically looked through the pockets of the king’s robes, practically scattering the dwarvish bones. The room grew hotter, and as the temperature rose, Erik’s breath quickened. His hands trembled, and his mouth went dry. He was sure he had only been in the room for a little while, but with the screams of the undead coming from the tunnel, the rumbling thunder of the dragon, and the thought of his dying cousin, it felt as if he had been in the room for hours. He tried to concentrate on slowing his breathing, closing his eyes for a moment.
He looked down at the scattered bones of the king. Balzarak would have killed him if he saw this, and Erik’s stomach knotted. The dwarvish king deserved better. Then his gaze drifted to the prince. Could it be so simple?
“Fool,” Erik whispered to himself as he lifted the robe that covered the dwarvish child’s remains and saw a long, thin, cylindrical pendant hanging from his neck, one end studded with what looked like a diamond. The key.
He broke the chain on which the key hung so he didn’t have to disturb the prince’s remains like he did the king’s. What did it matter? The dragon would probably disturb everything when she came.
Erik felt lightheaded as he stood and inspected the key. He could barely see past the sweat streaming down his face, and another roar in the distance shook the room. He stared at the tunnel. Rotting hands reached out towards him from the reddish darkness. They laughed and screamed as he inched closer.
“Keep laughing,” Erik yelled. “I’ll send each and every one of you back to the Shadow.”
We’re already in the Shadow.
It would be a hard fight, making his way back to the treasure room. He already felt weak. And each roar, each roll of the earth, threatened to throw him to the ground. This may have been a fight he could not win. But then he remembered the moon fairies and their dust. He retrieved the bag from his haversack, took out a handful of the dust, opened his hand, and blew it towards the tunnel.
As if some errant wind had found its way into the ancient city of Orvencrest, the dust blew towards the darkness, each speck lighting up and floating haphazardly. In the flutter of a fly’s wings, it lit the tunnel up, and the undead fled in one ear-piercing chorus. Erik thanked the moon fairies, wherever they were, for their gift. As he stood in front of the tunnel, he looked at the throne. Something had to open the exit in the treasure room.
But then, he saw it—a single sconce with a torch set snuggly in it just inside the tunnel. He could see it clearly, enlightened by the fairy dust. It was so dark in there, he hadn’t seen it before. The torch looked as if it had never been set afire. It made sense. Erik pulled on the torch, and it and the sconce moved as one. He heard a click, and then the throne began to move behind him. He smiled.
“Dwarvish trickery.”
As the throne moved behind him, returning to its original position, and closed off the tunnel to the throne room, he heard yelling from the treasure room. He could make out that a doorway had appeared.
Erik raced down the tunnel, bracing himself with one hand against the wall. As he entered the treasure room, he heard another rumble, this one louder and, like the one before, he thought he heard a voice buried somewhere within the sound. It was angry and evil.
“I think I found the key!” Erik yelled.
“Everyone, to the door,” Balzarak commanded.
As Erik burst into the treasure room, he could see the silhouette of a door must have revealed itself as the throne slid back into place. Turk and Befel lifted Bryon, still practically unconscious, and carried him as the rest ran to the door.
“How do we bloody open it?” Switch asked.
“A key,” Wrothgard, “Erik said he found a key.”
Erik produced the pendant and looked for something that matched its shape until he found a small hole in one top corner. The pendant was a perfect fit, the diamond at one end lighting up as Erik slid it into the keyhole. It stopped, and Erik heard a clicking sound and turned the pendant. The door rumbled, moved inward, and began to slide open.
Erik retrieved the key as darkness glared back at them.
“Freedom,” Switch said.
“Perhaps,” Erik replied.
Chapter 14
They stepped into the darkness of the tunnel. The light from torches and lanterns, and even Bryon’s magic sword—which Wrothgard held—and Balzarak’s circlet, seemed to do little to illuminate the passageway. The blackness around them drank up the light, extinguishing it just as it left the flame. Another deafening sound shook the wall, the floor, the ceiling. Erik heard the voice again.
“Hatred,” Erik whispered.
“What?” Turk asked.
“The roaring, the rumbling, the sound,” Erik said, “it is filled with hatred.”
“That is what a dragon is,” Balzarak said. “A dragon is hatred. It is living death. It is famine and pestilence. A dragon is the stuff of anyone’s worst nightmares. A dragon is the minion of the Shadow.”
“I hear a voice in the dragon’s roar,” Erik said softly.
“A voice?” Turk asked.
Erik nodded. “Aye, a voice. It’s a language I don’t understand, but I hear a voice, and it speaks with pure malice. It reminds me of the language Befel was speaking in the hallway when we first entered Orvencrest.”
Erik turned and looked over his shoulder. The treasure room seemed almost a pinpoint of light, but then it glowed brightly, lighting up like a red sun and casting that same dark, reddish light that Erik remembered from the tunnel that led to the throne room. As the treasure room cast its sickly light into the tunnelway, a deafening roar echoed past the men and dwarves, this one louder than ever. It shook the ground, the walls, the ceiling, the whole earth. The dragon now was truly angry.
****
She crawled through the hole high in the cavern ceiling. She had dug it out centuries past, an easier way for her to get to the treasure room. Her slaves could not come here, could not enter the treasure room. An ancient spell. But she could—once. The treasure held no value to her but recognized its power to corrupt and create evil. She fed on evil. Once, she was able to bask in the magnificence of dwarvish gold. But then that put her to sleep. Never again.
She dropped through the ceiling, dispelling the illusion of the room being covered she had put there years before, and walked through the treasure room … and saw her offspring’s tail. And she smelled that stink, so fresh. The smell of dwarves. Why did her daughter not answer?
She crawled over the mound of gold and saw it. The body lying limp at the foot of the hill, the head, severed. She rushed to it, her wings spread and rattling with such hatred. She nudged the dead body. She whimpered and cried as it lay there, motionless. Now her rage had n
ever been greater. They would pay. All those stinking creatures that walked on two legs. She would wage such a war on them, and all would know her presence, tremble at her sound, her sight. And her mate, he would know too. She would make sure of it. So far away, she would signal him, and he would join her. They had killed his offspring too.
She screamed and spit fire and flapped her thunderous wings. Her tail snapped like lightning against the wall, and it cracked. Gold and iron melted under her breath. Her wings hurled coins and gems into a glimmering tornado. She saw the door and with all her strength ripped the opening away into a gaping hole. Oh, how they would pay.
****
“What happened?” Switch asked.
Erik couldn’t see the thief, but knew he was right next to him.
“I don’t know,” Wrothgard replied.
Even Bryon’s sword and Balzarak’s circlet gave off no light.
“I can’t even see my hand in front of my face,” Befel said. Erik could hear the panic in his brother’s voice.
“Bryon’s sword isn’t even hot anymore,” Wrothgard said. “It’s as if the magic is just … gone.”
“Can that happen?” Wrothgard asked.
“This is an even deeper magic,” Balzarak said. “An ancient, evil magic. She is one with the Shadow.”
“Blood and guts and magic,” Switch hissed.
Erik heard it. Chuckling. Giggling. A child’s laughter off in the distance. A whistle. The shuffling of feet. Something scratching the wall.
“We see you …” The voices of the dead echoed through the dark tunnel.
“What, by the Creator?” Befel muttered.
“An be merciful,” Balzarak said.
“We see you.” It was a chorus of voices, ones Erik recognized. “We can taste your fear.”
“A deep, evil magic,” Balzarak repeated. “Be ready.”
“You can hear them?” Erik asked.
“Aye,” Balzarak said.
“This is truly evil magic then,” Erik said.
“What?” Wrothgard asked.
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