by Rachel Ford
“I know. I’m surprised by how careless you are, actually, Jordan. That conversation earlier, with Jack.” He shook his head. “That’s not the kind of thing a boss wants to hear.”
Her cheeks got a little pinker, and she looked like she might argue.
But William went on. “Don’t worry, though. The recording stopped before I ever entered the game.”
“Did it? How?”
He grinned. “I told you: I know the system.”
“Oh.”
“Which actually brings me to the question of my payment.”
“Your…payment?” Jack repeated.
“I’m going to help you get out of here, Jack. I’m going to get you through this puzzle.”
“How?”
“I’ll be your fourth player, so you can get the artifact, and get on with the game. But, I will need something in return.”
Jack stared at the other man, who struck him in turns as being quite insane and entirely rational. “I don’t really…I mean, I’m stuck in a videogame. What can I give you?”
“I just want one thing, from both of you, actually: your word that this stays between us. Not a peep to Avery. That son-of-a-bitch cannot know that I’m alive and well.”
Jack disputed the notion that William was well, but only inside his own head. Aloud, he said, “I mean, yeah, absolutely. Not a word.”
William glanced at Jordan, and she nodded. “Of course. But what should we say?”
He shrugged. “Tell them your speed potion plan worked. It almost did, right? So it’s not much of a lie.”
Almost in this context didn’t cut it. It was no different than not at all. But Jack put a firm muzzle on the pedantic side of his nature, and nodded instead. “Exactly.”
Jordan agreed too, and William clapped his hands together. “Good. Excellent. Alright then: let’s get to work.”
Then, he froze very suddenly, and laughed. “You know, it’s been years since I played with someone else. I’ve run through every damned game the Studio has put out since. But not with actual people. Not in years.”
Jack said that that was too bad, and Jordan murmured sympathetically. William laughed and shook his head, saying, “Son-of-a-bitch.” Then, still shaking his head and smiling to himself, he directed them to take up positions in the four turrets. “On my mark.”
Jack went first with the battlecorn to a turret and ordered him to remain ready, then to a turret of his own. William waited patiently on the landing of the northwestern turret, watching everything unfold. Then, when he saw Jack reach the fourth turret, he called, “Alright…ready….set…go.”
Jack signaled for Shimmerfax to flip the lever, and they moved in unison. A deep rumble sounded all throughout the chamber. The floor of Jack’s turret shifted under his feet, and chips of stone fell from the ceiling. For half a moment, he feared the place might collapse on them.
Then, he heard William, cackling and hooting with laughter, and the high, electric hum of wisps. Jordan called, “I’ll get Shimmerfax to the pressure plate. There’s wisps everywhere, Jack. Cover us.”
He ran outside, and saw with dismay that she was right. There were more wisps here than he’d ever seen together at once. The discovery also explained William’s apparent delight: the other man was reveling in doing battle with the enchanted creatures. He’d conjured up some kind of tornado spell. Now, he flung it around the room, catching a slew of wisps up in the mighty winds. He cackled at the sight of his opponents tumbling helplessly this way and that; and all the while, he continued to shoot off spell after spell: sizzling them, freezing them, electrocuting them, and so on.
Jack remained on the stairs and did what he could to help, warding off attackers against himself and sending fireballs after the wisps pursuing Jordan and Shimmerfax. She and the battlecorn glinted as they raced across the cavern floor – she, because of her silver armor, and the horse because of its ridiculous sparkles. Which made them at once eye catching targets to the baddies, but easy to spot even in the midst of the ensuing chaos.
They headed to a patch of cavern wall that, at first glance, seemed completely unremarkable. But, squinting across the distance, Jack could see a tiny rune carved into the stone: a cluster of stars.
Shimmerfax lowered his great head to the plate, and Jordan spun around to fend off his attackers. A new countdown appeared out of thin air, this one starting at thirty seconds. Jack realized that meant he had to ward off attackers for half a minute.
He ran down the rest of the stairs as quickly as he could, firing as he went. By now, they – but mostly, William – had whittled their way through a good three-quarters of the wisps. Jack decided it was time to get closer, where he could hopefully draw the attackers to him, and away from Shimmerfax.
He needn’t have worried, though. William conjured up another tornado, and swept away the last wisps.
The clock continued to count down.
11
10
9
Jack glanced around, half expecting some other foe to spring out of hiding at the last moment.
5
4
3
The rumbling increased, and the cavern trembled this way and that. Jack drew his sword, glancing from end to end of the room.
2
1
The silver crystals overhead disappeared into the stone, leaving nothing but a brilliant golden light hanging from the ceiling. Then the gate swung wide, sending a blast of stale air and dust over them.
Jack coughed and wheezed for a moment. Then, when the dust settled, he stared beyond the gate, transfixed by a brilliant blue light.
“The tears of Saint Acaria,” Jordan said in low, almost reverent tones.
Jack whooped with so much delight and relief that William glanced questioningly at Jordan. She shrugged. “It’s been a long day.”
William shrugged too, and when Jack started to run toward the shimmering gem in the other room, he followed, hollering as he went.
Shimmerfax apparently took this to mean there was some kind of race ongoing, because he ran too, outpacing them all at a quick gallop.
Jordan maintained a more reasonable pace and, Jack told her, came in last. She shook her head at him. “You’re all insane.”
He grinned at her. He’d held off swiping the gem until she got there. Now, he studied it for a long moment. It was a long, tear shaped blue jewel suspended in some kind of magical forcefield over an altar. He reached out a hand toward it.
“Careful,” Jordan hissed.
He froze, remembering the boobytrapped treasure chest in the necromancer’s lair. He must have made some kind of face with the memory, because both of his companions laughed. Jordan admitted, “You’re fine. I just wanted to scare you.”
William laughed a little harder at that, and Jack frowned at them. But he took the gem, and a beautiful thought flashed through his mind:
Objective complete: acquire the Blessed Tears of Saint Acaria
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The chamber with the gem was a great, round room, with doors leading into smaller chambers. Jack looted them one after the other. Though there was nothing remarkable anywhere, he did bring his gold up to twelve hundred and some odd pieces.
More importantly, they found a passage leading upward. “This will bypass the ‘great dark,’” Jordan told him.
Here, William decided it was time to take his leave. “Not that this hasn’t been fun; it has. But if recording doesn’t come back, someone somewhere’s going to notice.” Now, he fixed them both with a careful stare. “Remember what I said: not a word about me.”
They each nodded in turn. “Of course.”
“Good.”
“But…what about you, William? Now that we know you’re here…well, we can’t just leave you,” Jordan said.
He surveyed her for a long moment. “You worry about getting him out, Miss Knight. He’s still got a chance.”
“What about you?” Jack asked.
The
other man grinned at that, saying mysteriously, “Don’t you worry about me. Either of you. I told you, Avery hasn’t heard the last of me. He’ll get his. But for now, you worry about yourselves.”
Then, as suddenly as he’d appeared, he vanished. His voice floated one last time through the room. “Remember your promise: not one word.”
Jack threw a glance all around, looking for the missing man. Then, he turned an expressive gaze to Jordan. “Wow.”
She nodded. “Yeah.”
Somehow, he got the impression that she’d understood him in all his degrees of astonishment, confusion, and concern. Understood, and shared. “Well…I guess we should get back to King Miradorn.”
She nodded again, and they set out in silence. The way back was long, but well lit. They climbed for a space, and then walked over even ground with iridescent mushrooms and glowing vines lighting their way.
Then, the passage seemed to vanish into a patch of pitch-black emptiness. “It lets out at the beginning of the ‘great darkness,’” Jordan explained.
He shivered. He could have done without seeing that place again. Still, he followed her dutifully into the gaping emptiness. He dropped maybe three meters, and felt stone underneath him.
He almost yelped when he felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Jordan, though. He couldn’t see her, but she said, “Turn around.”
Carefully, he did. Then, with a sigh of relief, he saw the end of the blackness. They really had bypassed it, and landed on the far border, right across from the river they’d first crossed. He could still see the little cluster of small mushrooms he’d left behind.
“This is why I said to gather extra mushrooms,” she said. “Otherwise, we’d have to go way downstream to find them, and then come back here, where the water is slow enough to cross.”
He nodded and moved to the riverbank. The mushroom path Jordan constructed when they’d crossed had long ago floated away, downriver. So he pulled fungi from his pack one after another, constructing a new series of stepping stones. He didn’t pay much attention to the particular mushrooms; he just grabbed whatever was near the top of his rucksack, tossed it in, and leaped onto it. “I can’t wait to get out of here,” he was telling Jordan.
He heard her follow, the mushrooms sloshing under her weight. “Me too.”
He dropped another one and leaped onto it. At the same time, Jordan called, “Jack wait, that’s too –”
But he’d already vaulted off the cap on which he’d been standing. His jump had been good, so he wasn’t sure what she’d been warning him against. He glanced down a second before he landed; and saw with dismay that this particular mushroom didn’t have a flat cap. This one was conical, and, thanks to the river, slippery.
Jack teetered for half a second as he landed. Then his boot slipped, and the pressure tipped the mushroom. He went down fast and hard, grasping onto the now capsized fungus. He sputtered and tried to pull himself upward, but the cap was soaked and slippery. He went down again, and the mushroom flipped over, so that the tip of the cone was submerged and the stem jutted up into the air. Jack bobbed in the water, and this time a swift current caught his legs.
Before he knew what was happening, and even as Jordan was skipping across the remainder of the path trying to reach him, the river dragged him off.
His last vision of Jordan was her rowing furiously, trying to pilot the mushroom to the other side of the bank. Then she disappeared along with the shimmering unicorn and the entire section of river. The current tossed him around corners and over tiny falls. He bumped into rocks, and somewhere along the way lost hold on the mushroom he’d still been clinging to.
The water picked up speed, throwing him about like a ragdoll. He fought and kicked and tried to get to one side or the other, all without much luck. As soon as he seemed about to reach one bank, the river would shift again, and the bank would swing well out of grasp.
This continued for some minutes until Jack saw the river vanish before him. A sound like thunder rang out, and a sulfuric smell filled the air – when he could breathe, anyway. He remembered what Jordan had said about the hot springs, and the river that would throw you into one of the hottest pools.
He started to panic. He didn’t know when he’d last saved. The truth was, he’d gotten so used to being in the game that he sometimes forgot it was a game. And so he forgot to save. The terrible thought that he might have to retrieve the artifact again – and that William might not come back for a second time – crossed his mind.
Jack started to panic. He fought against the current like he’d never fought before, and he kicked so fiercely that he managed to reach the eastern bank about a meter before the waterfall.
He pulled himself up onto dry ground, and lay for a moment shaking with nerves.
“Jack?” Jordan’s voice sounded, so near it made him start.
“What the…?” She was standing there – her and Shimmerfax. “How’d you get here so quickly?”
“I quit the game, and joined again, so it would bring me wherever you were.”
“Oh.”
She gestured to the waterfall, and the stone cliff. “You almost ended up in the hot pool. You know, the flesh melting one.”
“I figured. So, is there any way off this plateau?”
She nodded, and, to his relief, it proved less painful than he assumed it would. He didn’t need to scale a cliff face, or risk death. Just left of the end of the plateau was another passage, this one leading downward. It took them to the cavern floor below, and past the steaming pools. Jordan knew the way, and she led their trio.
Eventually, they left the hot pools altogether, and returned to the path back to the city. This time, without the ogre to hunt rats, Jack ignored them.
And finally, the city came into sight.
Miradorn and Arya were waiting for them in a great palace of dark stone, sitting on thrones that looked exactly like the ones they’d found in the ruin. Except, this time, the stone throne hadn’t been smashed, nor the golden one picked over. All of its gems were fixed where they’d originally been set.
“Welcome back, friends. Your smiles tell me the news you bring is good.”
Jack hadn’t been smiling. He was pretty sure his face was set into a weary scowl. But he figured this was some kind of pre-programmed dialogue. Miradorn would say it to anyone, so long as they came back carrying the artifact.
“A blessing travels with you,” Arya said. “I can feel it.”
Three responses entered Jack’s thoughts.
We come with the artifact, Great Queen. [give artifact]
You know, this wasn’t easy. I don’t think I’ll be handing this over. Not unless you make it worth my while. [haggle]
I’ve changed my mind, chumps. I’m keeping this, and I’ll be showing myself the way out. [attack]
Jack considered haggling. But, then, he figured that would impact his standing among the poor and downtrodden. And as it was one of the few in-game demographics that liked him, he decided to hand over the tears of Saint Acaria.
Miradorn stepped down from his throne and took the proffered gem. It collapsed into a thousand glimmering fragments at his touch, and at the same time, something even more extraordinary happened.
Miradorn, and his queen, and all the members of his court, transformed before Jack’s eyes. Gone were the haggard, twisted, pallid forms. In their place stood a fair queen with golden hair, a tall, proud warrior king, and a throne room full of beautiful people.
“The curse is lifted,” Arya said. “You have lifted the curse, Sir Jack. At long last, we are free.”
Chapter Thirty
The king and queen showered Jack in praise. Then she gave him an elven cloak, and he said, “Well, I suppose you’re eager to be on your way.”
An understatement of epic proportions, of course. But Jack nonetheless agreed.
Miradorn and Arya led them out of the castle, through a city full of light and laughter and beautiful faces. Gone was the darkness and the sol
id stone overhead; in its place, sunlight streamed through new apertures in the stone. Everywhere, elves had gathered to cheer the adventurers who freed them.
They returned to the edge of the city, and the elf king paused. “I know a shortcut,” he said, and he spread his hands. A door sprang up out of thin air. He opened it and stepped through, and Arya followed, and then Jack and Jordan, and finally Shimmerfax.
They stepped into a familiar cavern, with shimmering light blue pools all around, and a sulfuric smell in the air. “Here we are, then,” Miradorn said. “Just over here.”
He led them to a natural stone arch between two pools. Then he and Arya joined hands, and chanted something together. Swirling light filled the arch, first faintly, and then more intensely, until the whole cavern blazed.
The two elves stopped chanting and turned to their visitors. “Through this portal, you will find a river, and a raft. The raft will take you where you need to go. The journey will be many days by sea, but you are hearty folk, with stout hearts, and much faith. You will find he who would destroy all life. And, I truly believe, you will stop him.
“You have returned to this place light and laughter, where once hate and anger closed us off from these pleasures. Thanks to you, what malice tried to corrupt has been made pure again.
“This world needs more men like you, Jack. Go now, with the well-wishes of all our people. I know that some day soon, the waters will carry back a report of your victory.
“I hope our paths may cross again, Friend.”
Despite his exhaustion, and his eagerness to be done with the game, Jack felt powerfully affected by the king’s words, and by the gleam of tears in the queen’s eyes. She raised a hand in blessing, and a thrill of magical fortification ran through Jack.
Then, both king and queen stepped aside; and Jack stepped forward, toward the portal. He could hear Jordan and Shimmerfax behind him. He took a deep breath, and stepped into the light.
He emerged in comparative darkness. A second later, Jordan and the battlecorn followed. Jack blinked as his eyes grew accustomed to the light, or lack thereof. They were in another poorly lit cavern. But instead of hot pools, this one opened onto a vast, sandy river bank. Tethered not far from them sat a massive wooden raft.