by Bill Albert
Luvin nodded and moved away keeping his eyes squarely on Gallif as long as he could. Despite the explanation it was obvious he still felt she had let him down.
Gallif and Jakobus joined Blinks and made sure the last of the web wall was burned away.
“Luckily there were no eggs,” Blinks said when the last strand was gone. “It’d be bad if there were eggs, so, no eggs is good,” he continued.
“Spiders like that don’t leave their eggs in the nests,” Jakobus said. “It takes so long for them to gestate and they have to be absolutely still, so they leave them in some dark and damp place.”
Gallif, Marassa, Acrufix and Luvin left the area and started walking towards the Burial Grounds.
“That’s good,” Blinks smiled.
“Places like the tunnels and underground caverns we are going in to,” Jakobus said as he walked away.
“You could have stopped at the good part,” Blinks said. He took one last curious look under a pile of dead leaves and then ran to catch up.
There was some light left in the sky and the forest brush cleared enough that they could see the cave entrance from twenty yards away. As they got to the clearer area the yellow coloring of the dirt became more and more prevalent. The grayness of the sky above gave a sickly tint to the yellow and they walked faster. Gallif estimated only a few minutes walking and a few more of climbing would put them near the mouth. Gallif and Marassa led the walk with Jakobus and Blinks directly behind them. Luvin had drifted back to join Acrufix at the rear.
“Thank you,” Luvin said to Acrufix. “You looked after me back there. You’re as good a fighter as people say.”
“You too, my friend,” Acrufix said. With the blackness of the face it was impossible to tell where he was looking, but Luvin felt as if the man’s eyes were on him. “I was watching you. You’ve achieved some very complicated combat moves.”
“Most of it is the hammer,” Luvin blushed. “It’s been cast.”
“My sword has as well, but, whether its cast or not, it still needs a good hand to guide it.”
“Thank you, again,” Luvin said with a broad smile. He was feeling really good and neither the storm approaching nor the mouth ahead of them could bring his spirits down. “I’ll never be as good as you.”
“No, you won’t,” Acrufix said, but before Luvin’s smiled faded, he quickly added, “I didn’t even pick up a sword until I was your age, so you are more advanced than I was. You’ll be better than me.”
Luvin walked off with pride thinking how he could take on all of the aquilus by himself.
“I want Marassa to come in with me,” Gallif said once they were closer to the cave mouth. “Just a few feet. Everyone else stay out here,” she said looking at Luvin as she spoke.
By now the sky was ominously dark even though there were several hours of daylight left. Though the storm was almost directly overhead there was no rain yet. The lightning still crept along the clouds, but the thunder was barely a rumble in the distance. With very little light whatever was inside the cave was buried in darkness.
Gallif and Marassa disappeared inside and the others waited patiently outside. Jakobus and Blinks kept scanning the path they had traveled looking for more spiders or other forms of attack. Acrufix stood still facing the hole, but it was impossible to tell where he was looking. Luvin stood near him facing the man but his eyes were unfocused as if he were looking but not actually seeing him.
Blinks looked back where Gallif and Marassa had gone and then asked Jakobus, “How long should we wait?”
“Until she gets back,” Jakobus said without taking his eyes off the horizon.
There was a flash of light from the cave and they all turned to see Gallif emerge.
“Come on in,” she said waving for them to join her. “There are five bodies in a chamber just inside,” she warned them. “They’ve been there for quite a while.”
Gallif went back into the cave and joined Marassa who was examining what was left of one of the bodies. There wasn’t much left of the skin, but the skeleton was still intact despite the fact that the leather armor had been torn up. A boot was still left on one foot and there was a broken blade near the hip.
“I’m not sure what happened,” Marassa admitted. “It looks like most of what happened to the armor happened before death.”
“Yes,” Acrufix agreed. “There are cuts that would indicate combat wounds. A good fight,” he added.
“Not good enough,” Jakobus looked over their shoulders. “They lost,” he pointed out to them.
“There are also signs of damage of a different type. Something that came after death,” Marassa continued after a glance at Acrufix.
“Have you any idea what could have happened here?” Gallif asked Marassa.
“I think I do,” Blinks said, and they all turned to him. His eyes were blinking so fast it almost looked like they were completely closed. “It’s more of those things,” he said pointing outside the cave. “One of those, those, those…” he said taking his hand making a crawling motion up Gallif’s arm.
She quietly pulled away from him and said, “Spiders.”
“Exactly what I was thinking,” Blinks said. “The Necression.”
“That’s very good, Blinks,” Jakobus said as he scratched his beard. “Smaller ones, newborns, feeding inside the dead body.”
They stood and swallowed hard trying to hold back the horrible images Jakobus had given them. Marassa was the first to recover.
“I should tell you,” she said to Jakobus. “There’s one further back that I am sure is a dwarf. The size indicates a male.”
Jakobus excused himself and went to look at the body. Gallif watched Acrufix as he stood silent and anonymous. Despite his reputation she was finding it more difficult to trust him. She was also bothered by that fact that he had shown no recognition of her. Why? Was their meeting in the forest that unimportant and forgettable? She couldn’t help but dislike how, underground, being surrounded by yellow dirt discolored his shined armor in an unsettling way. She considered talking to Luvin about it and suddenly realized that he was not with them. He was still standing just outside of the cave and she went to him.
“You coming in?”
“In a minute,” he said without looking at her.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked. She started to reach out to him but held her hand back a few inches away from him.
“It’s more caves in there, isn’t it?” Luvin said shifting uncomfortably.
“Just some caves,” she said and finally put a hand on his shoulder. She instantly withdrew it and hoped it had been so fast he hadn’t noticed.
“Like the last ones we were in,” he said looking at the dark sky.
“No, not like them,” she said brushing back her red hair. “We’ve got more people than when we went in to Starpoint Mountain, we don’t have anyone plotting against us, and this time we have an easier exit,” she said not knowing one of her excuses was wrong.
“I just don’t want to go through some of that again,” he said reluctantly wishing he didn’t have to speak to her.
“The tremors? The dragon?” she asked so only he could hear.
“No,” he said angrily and swung to look at her with blood shot eyes. “The fear of you dying.”
She gasped at the sudden rush of emotion and took a step away from him. She knew the fear she had felt inside the mountain and had forced it and some of the darker memories out of her thoughts. She heard those whispers now and pushed them away again.
“Gallif,” Jakobus called. “You’d better come here.”
She ran to join the dwarf and, responding to the urgency in his voice, Luvin followed close behind.
Jakobus was standing near the body of the dwarf holding a three-inch-high figure of a dwarf carved out of glass. “I found this on the body. Do you recognize this?” he asked and held it out to Gallif.
She looked closely at it and then nodded. “It’s just like the one your parents we
re holding way back when we met.”
He turned the figure over and showed Gallif there was a small chip missing from the bottom the figure’s left foot. He reached just inside his armor belt and pulled out another glass carving. He held them together and it was easy to see why he was so worried.
“They’re alike,” she said slowly. “How can that be?”
“In fact, they are the same thing,” he stressed. “It’s an exact match just like everything else on the dwarf. The remains over there,” he pointed. “They’re human remains about the size of a young boy, fifteen or sixteen years old,” he said glancing at human. “Two adult human remains,” he said with a quick gesture to Marassa and Blinks. “This one over here,” he said walking to the last one. “Could this be a human female in her late teens?” To prove his point, he reached down under the torn leather skirt and pulled a twelve-inch knife from its sheath. Gallif gasped as her hand shot to where she kept her own knife. “These aren’t just remains. They’re us.”
TWELVE: TREMBLING
Gallif couldn’t stop looking at the remains that could easily have been hers. She bent down and ran her fingers through the torn leather armor. The tint of the casting was gone so it was regular leather now and couldn’t have repaired itself. It would be unable to protect the wearer either. There was no way to tell if it was the same armor, but she took a shard of it and held it up next to what she was wearing. She let it fall back to the body, looked at the remaining boot, then extended her own for comparison. The touch of rust on one of the buckles on her boot was matched with the other.
Jakobus had stayed with the dwarven body that could be his. Marassa and Luvin had wondered over to their own bodies though Luvin kept staring at the body near Gallif. Only Blinks stayed where he had started.
“What about…what about…you?” Blinks asked and they all looked up at him. He was pointing at Acrufix who was standing alone watching them. “There isn’t one for you.”
They all looked around the cave and realized that Blinks was right. Gallif stood and said, “There’re six of us but only five bodies.”
“I am aware of that,” Acrufix said flatly. “What are you suggesting?”
“I’m not suggesting anything,” she said matching his tone. Not trying to hide her suspicion she added, “We’re coming into this as a group, the six of us, and we find a battlefield with what could be the remains of five of us. I can’t help but wonder what happened to the other.”
“We’re not even sure if they are us,” Luvin said and walked over to stand by Acrufix. “How do we know this isn’t part of a cast trap to mislead us? That it’s not an illusion?”
“It’s not an illusion,” Jakobus said as he joined Gallif. “I tried to remove it, concentrated on what I knew was real, but they remained in place.”
“It’s okay,” Acrufix said to Luvin. “This is an unusual situation for all of us. Like so many others have she will learn to trust me,” he said with more than enough confidence in his voice.
“Marassa,” Gallif called without taking her eyes off Acrufix. “Does this area fit any of the drawing or descriptions you have?”
“Nothing for this area exactly. There are notes about one survivor who talked about something happening straight north of the main entrance. Something about strange lights they encountered.”
“Ok, we’ll start that way,” Gallif said sternly. “I want Marassa with me, you,” she said looking directly at Luvin, “I want you with Jakobus in the rear.”
Without another word she turned and started marching up the northern cave. Blinks started to follow but Luvin cut him off.
“I’ll take it from here,” he said. “You can stay with Jakobus.”
“But, she said, you know, I’m sure what she said, she meant anyway,” Blinks stumbled as he tried to protest.
“We’d better hurry,” Acrufix said, ignoring him, and grabbed Luvin by the shoulder and they hurried to catch up.
Before Blinks could say any more Jakobus nudged him forward and they started walking as well.
They had only travelled a hundred steps when the cave suddenly widened into a cavern. The yellowed walls on each side rose suddenly in to pitch black and none of them could see how high the roof sat. The path was marked with a dozen piles of odd-looking stones. Gallif held the rest back as she examined the piles from a distance. She waved her flame sword around slowly to put as much light as possible on the piles. These stones weren’t cracked or jagged, but very round and very smooth. Her first impression was that the stones had been dulled by years of water dripping on them and corroding the rough surface, but the area was relatively dry.
She took a few steps forward but stopped when she heard a whisper. She looked back to see who was trying to attract her attention, but the others shook their heads indicating it was not from them. Just after the first stone pile started moving, she drew her frost sword and was ready to fight. She knew that, against golems, even swords that were cast could do little damage, but she hoped the two of them together would help tip the fight in their favor. The golem nearest her swung hard and she barely managed to step out of the way of its stone fist. She swung up and away with the frost sword and then drove the flame sword in hard. She struck her target but saw that the sharp edge and heat had done very little against the solid chest of the golem. A second golem took another attack on her from behind. She moved sharply to avoid getting hit by the first golem and moved far enough away the second golem’s path missed her back but still bounced off her bare left arm. She ground her teeth in pain and took a few steps back to prevent herself from being caught between them. Before these two could reorganize Jakobus barreled into the combat. He swung his cast axe and connected with the second golem. His strength and aim were good and he caused some damage but, like Gallif’s swords, the axe only did minor damage.
On her left Gallif saw Blinks join in. His fighting style was as rapid as his blinks and he quickly made several successful hits. Gallif hoped he would be careful and realize just what he was fighting. Blink’s sword was not cast and could be permanently damaged. She was thinking how she should make sure he got a cast sword when the first golem she had encountered struck her hard in the chest. She was almost out of the golems reach, but the force was enough to knock her back several steps. She regained her footing and struck the golem with each sword.
A flash of light off to one side informed her that Acrufix had also made his first attack. She wondered how it would feel for the man to fight with something more powerful, and much more dangerous, than an elf.
Between Gallif and Jakobus they managed to bring the first golem down but by now all of them were moving and they were badly outnumbered and overpowered.
While Jakobus was working on the second golem Gallif moved to attack another. She glanced back to see Marassa and found her still standing just outside the cavern. Her wand was in hand and she looked like she was trying to take careful aim. Gallif imagined this many targets in the confined space would make casting difficult. She was relieved to see Marassa finally make a cast. She tried to follow the direction and see if there was any effect but saw nothing. Either the cast had failed or Marassa had missed.
Gallif concentrated on her own opponent and changed her tactics. She held the flame sword closer to the golem between strikes hoping that the heat would at least distract it or slow its attacks. She heard crumbling and glanced to see one of the golems shatter into chunks of yellow rock and fall harmlessly to the ground. Gallif smiled and thanked Marassa for an accurate cast. She was making some advantage against her golem when another managed to get behind her. Its fist slammed in to Gallif’s right hip and she screamed in pain and dropped to ground. Both golems moved in on her and she crawled away on her back as fast as she could. She saw where Jakobus and Blinks were and knew they would not be able to help her. The closest golem raised both its arms as it readied an attack on her. She was on her back, barely able to defend herself, and there was nothing she could do to stop them.
The golem’s arms had just started moving when there was a flash of light and one arm shattered at the shoulder and crumbled to pebbles. The impact was enough to stop its attack completely and it turned to defend itself but Luvin was too fast. He hit again, the blunt surface of a hammer could do a great deal of damage to stone, and the golem’s remaining arm was destroyed. Only a few more hits and the entire golem was a pile of broken stones scattered across the ground. By this time the healing cast on the armor had given Gallif her strength back and she jumped up ready to fight.
She defended his back as Luvin started removing the golems. As a golem moved in from behind she took several strikes at it but did only minor damage. Gallif shook her head several times to try and keep herself centered on the combat, but her hand had started to tremble. Between trying to keep up with Luvin’s rapid movements and the continuous danger from behind she found it difficult to concentrate and some of her failed attacks were due to her own hand being off. Blinks had realized his sword was almost useless and had joined her, but Gallif wasn’t sure if he was protecting Luvin or her.
Jakobus managed to make some progress on his own. He was smart and strong, and he varied his attacks to cause as much damage as possible eventually destroying the golem.
Acrufix had kept moving from golem to golem doing as much damage as possible and then moving on. He planned each step carefully and herded them one at a time in Luvin’s direction.
“BACK,” Marassa called and they all glanced in her direction. “Back, back, back,” she repeated as she moved in their direction with a focus crystal in one hand and her wand in the other. There were five golems remaining and Gallif, Jakobus, Blinks and Acrufix quickly did as they were told and stepped away. Marassa gave a quick chant holding the focus crystal tight in one hand and waving the wand with the other. The five golems had started to reorganize and group together. Their images shimmered as if a heat wave had passed through them and the forms started to melt away. In a few seconds they were turned in to harmless puddles of mud on the ground.