The dragon flared his wings and landed heavily on the ground before Nellise, who slowly began backing away. Leviachon, his blackened snout still smoking from Sayana’s attack, regarded the cleric curiously.
If you think that weapon is going to stop me, you are sorely mistaken, the dragon purred as he slowly began moving towards her, evidently savouring the moment.
Leviachon struck at Nellise, knocking her from her feet and tearing off some of her armour plates, easily crushing them into scrap with one mighty claw. She struggled to regain her footing while the dragon watched, before he again slammed her to the ground. Unwilling to die on her knees, Nellise crawled back to her feet and when the claw flashed towards her again, she swung Solas Aingeal and struck a telling blow against the dragon who bellowed out a roar at the flash of pain.
He stopped toying with her and ripped the sword from her grasp with one swipe of his claw. Smoke arose from the claw as the blade burned his scaled skin, but he simply sneered down at the Nellise as he tossed the sword into the desert. Robert and Sayana spurred their reluctant mount towards the scene of the fight, until they were close enough for the sorceress to point her staff at Nellise. With a violet flash, the cleric vanished, and Sayana swung the staff over her head and pointed it towards the cave, whereupon Nellise reappeared on the hard, stone floor, bloodied but intact.
Leviachon looked towards Robert with undisguised hatred, but before the dragon could make his next move, a flash of silver shot past, leaving a trail of blood across his chin. Leviachon reeled backwards, his immense head turning to regard Spartan’s reappearance with a derisive snarl.
Spartan, wielding Solas Aingeal in one claw, flew along the length of Leviachon’s body and held the holy blade out, cutting a searing line along his scaled flesh. Roaring in pain and anger, Leviachon snapped at the smaller dragon’s tail, but Spartan was simply too fast.
Robert rode hard for the cave, with Spartan flying just above him and the wounded Leviachon kicking up a storm of sand in furious pursuit. Aiden knew it was going to be close, so he took out one of his scrolls, and after Spartan and Robert’s horse were both within the confines of the cave, read the ancient parchment.
With all the discipline he could muster, Aiden intoned the words correctly and the scroll turned into fiery ash in his hand. He pointed towards the rocky formation above the cave entrance. The earth shook as the magic took hold, and sent a familiar thrill of energy surging through him.
Rocks the size of buildings were torn from the side of the small hill and dropped over the entrance. First one, then an avalanche of dislodged boulders fell from above, forcing Aiden and the others back a few steps as the rock fall blocked the cave entrance and showered down upon Leviachon who rushed towards them, only twenty yards away.
The agonized bellow of the dragon could be heard even over the noise, until the light faded and the rockfall ceased. When all was quiet once more, the entrance was completely closed off, separating them from the monster. Aiden slid off his horse and slumped to the ground, breathing hard as he waited for his heart to slow down.
A small tongue of flame appeared in the gloom, lighting the small group and their current plight. Everyone seemed to be alive and more or less intact, but for Spartan was clearly very injured.
“Now do you see why I hate dragons so much?” Sayana said with tired cynicism. “Present company excepted, of course.”
Leviachon does not represent my kind, Spartan replied, his voice sounding strong within their minds even as Aiden winced at the sight of his damaged armour. The dragon had been sorely beaten in the fight and lay curled upon the cave floor, with Solas Aingeal still held in one claw.
“Thank you for saving us,” Aiden said to him with genuine gratitude. “I can’t imagine what it took for you to stand against your cousin like that.”
“Are you going to be okay?” Criosa asked tentatively.
With time, my wounds will fully heal, Spartan replied. Thank you for your concern.
“Why did you have to be so damn brave?” Pacian said to Nellise in admiration.
“Call it a character flaw,” she replied, unused to such attention. She withdrew her healing crystal and whispered prayers, allowing a healing aura to flow over the small dragon.
“Nice work,” Robert said to Sayana, who nodded a smiled faintly at his genuine praise.
While recovering their strength and their nerve, Pacian explored through the cave a little to see if there was a way out, and before long reported an opening into a tunnel on the far side. The floor slanted down on a gradual slope, descending into the earth. Its construction was definitely similar to the ancient tunnels running under Acadia and Akora, with a strange metal structure built into the rock.
“This place looks like the sort of thing we’re searching for,” Sayana remarked as she examined the walls. “Could we have just stumbled upon the place Sahar was speaking of?”
“According to the map she gave me, we had another half a mile or so before we reached the place she was talking about,” Aiden replied. “That door back there hadn’t been opened in a very long time, whereas the excavation site she spoke of had been visited previously.”
“We need to find out where we’ve ended up, because there’s no chance we can go back the way we came,” Criosa said from somewhere next to Aiden. “Spartan, are you able to move yet?”
I am recovering, though slowly, the dragon’s smooth voice said in his mind.
“I need some more time with him,” Nellise explained to Criosa. “Give me an hour and I’ll have him back on his feet.”
“Alright, we’ll go ahead and see where this passage leads,” Criosa responded. With a gesture, she indicated for Pacian to lead the way, and she placed a grateful hand gently upon Spartan’s flank as she went past.
With Pacian in the lead, they moved further in, unsure what to expect. The metal walls were in relatively good condition, although Aiden had no way of knowing just how old this underground edifice was. It continued on at its unusual angle, descending into the earth for a few more minutes until they came to a metal door.
“Be my guest,” Aiden said to Pacian.
“What am I, a set of lock picks on legs?” his old friend hedged.
“Oh, let me do it,” Criosa hissed. The princess pulled out her own set of lock picks from a pouch and headed for the door.
“Since when have you been able to open locks?” Pacian asked suspiciously.
“The king’s spymaster thought it would come in handy,” she replied archly, selecting the correct tool and leaning in. Just before she touched it however, Pacian’s hand shot out and restrained her, less than an inch from the lock itself.
“Hold perfectly still,” he whispered tersely. Criosa stared back at him, unsure what had just happened. Pacian pointed down at the ground, where in amongst the dust the outline of a pressure plate could be seen — with Criosa’s foot planted firmly upon it. Pacian dropped to the ground and peered closely at the floor, blowing away the dust and attempting to discern what she had just triggered.
“Cunning bastards,” he breathed, tracing a line in the dirt back towards the wall nearby.
“What is it?” Criosa hissed, not daring to move a muscle. Pacian was peering intently at the wall, where he saw something he didn’t quite understand.
“Aiden, you’d better take a look,” he warned, prompting him to lean in and see what he’d found. Hidden behind a tile on the wall was a series of runes, all of which were in the increasing familiar language of the ancient builders.
“Oh,” he groaned, certain it was an advanced security mechanism created by the brilliant minds behind the Lexicon. Fetching the small device from his pouch, Aiden began flipping through the glowing pages of the tome until he found something that matched the inscription upon the wall.
“Yeah, it’s a trap left when the residents deserted this place eons ago,” he explained grimly. “If you lift your foot off the floor, it will unleash powerful energies that will incinerate a
ll of us in an instant.”
“Lovely,” Robert grunted. “Nothing personal mate, but we’re just gonna back up a little…”
“Can you disable it?” Criosa asked in a tiny voice with perspiration evident upon her brow.
“Maybe, but maybe it’s not even working after all these years?” Pacian wondered, trying to peer through the cracks in the wall.
“You might have a point there,” Aiden mused. “When I first found the Lexicon, it didn’t do anything until I exposed it to an old generator of theirs. I think the power dissipates over time, and given the age—”
“Are seriously thinking about taking that risk?” Criosa interrupted, almost hysterically. “Disarm it first, please!” Pacian nodded soberly, and then pulled off his gloves and reached into the gap. Tense moments went past as Aiden watched his friend slowly feel his way around the internal mechanism. It didn’t help his nerves at all to notice Pacian’s hands trembling as he worked.
“There’s a wire connecting it to the floor plate,” he mentioned quietly, “but it feels sort of rusty. I don’t know if cutting it will set it off or disable it.”
“Well I can’t stay like this forever,” Criosa said.
“Cut it,” Aiden suggested.
“What are you basing that on?” Pacian asked suspiciously.
“Nothing lasts forever, not even their magic. Just do it.”
“Yeah right,” Pacian muttered as he fetched a small tool out of his pouch and carefully shoved it into the gap. Aiden offered a hand to Criosa, who gripped it tightly as their fate was decided by chance. They both flinched as the sound of the wire being severed cut through the air, and Aiden breathed heavily with relief when he realized they were all still alive.
“See, nothing to worry about,” he said with a sheepish grin as Criosa stepped away from the door and practically collapsed into his arms.
“I don’t think I’m cut out for this sort of thing anymore,” Pacian mumbled as he mopped sweat from his forehead.
“Compared to that, getting this door opened will be a cinch,” Aiden suggested as he stroked Criosa’s hair. Pacian set to work on the lock, and within a minute he managed to get the stubborn door open.
Hot, stale air washed over them as they looked into another ancient passageway, in relatively pristine condition compared to the passage where they stood. Aiden took the lead, pleased there was no sign of life along the metal hallway. The passage soon came to a junction, and one way seemed as good as another, so he turned left and continued on, the footfalls of his companions barely audible behind him.
On the floor up ahead, Aiden saw the remains of several people, decaying amongst their equipment. He’d seen enough dead bodies recently to guess that they’d been here for only a few years, which he found curious.
“They must have found another way in, because nobody’s been along that corridor in centuries,” he mused.
“Do you have any idea how they perished?” Criosa asked uncomfortably.
“That would be Nel’s area of expertise,” Aiden replied, glancing around the area. Ahead, he saw a stairway leading up from the current floor, upon which he could see sandy footprints.
“Damn this place is hot,” Pacian remarked as he poked his head into one of the nearby doors. “A bit of a mess, too. Whoever left here did so in a hurry. I don’t understand why some of this furniture is broken, though. Maybe there was an earthquake sometime in the past?” The sound of approaching footsteps put them on edge until Nellise came into view, with Spartan lumbering along behind her.
“You scared me half to death,” Criosa admonished her, lowering her bow.
“Terribly sorry about that,” the cleric said as she took in the scene around them. Aiden noted that what remained of her armour was dented and scratched, much like Spartan’s. Sayana went to investigate the footprints, while Nellise took a closer look at the desiccated cadavers that leered lifelessly at the ceiling.
“Those people came in from this stairway,” Sayana said, interrupting Aiden’s train of thought. “They went through that passageway just ahead, and then returned at a later time to die here.”
“As to the cause of their deaths, there are no signs of fatal injuries on any of those present, so I can only conjecture that it was some sort of poison,” Nellise added after her initial assessment.
“This tunnel has collapsed,” Sayana’s echoing voice called from above them in the stairway. “I think it might have led outside.”
“We may have to come back this way and try to dig our way out,” Criosa said, “but by a strange twist of fate, I think we’ve ended up at the place we were looking for anyway.”
“Are you up for this?” Aiden asked Spartan who loomed in the corridor at the rear of the group.
I will do my utmost to keep up with you, the dragon replied stoically. Try to avoid angering anything especially large, if you can.
“We always try,” Aiden said blandly, creating a magical light to glow from the tip of his sword, which he held high as they began to descend the stairs into the gloom below.
Chapter Seventeen
“We’re in the middle of a desert landscape, yet this place is somehow filled with water?” Criosa remarked as they looked at the two feet of water covering the floor of the lower level. Her voice echoed throughout the chamber, along with the subtle sloshing of the otherwise calm waters.
“There must be an underground lake or river nearby,” Robert mused. “I hope what we’re looking for is around here someplace, or someone’s going for a swim.”
“Do you remember the waters under Ferrumgaard?” Nellise asked of Aiden.
“All too well I’m afraid,” Aiden replied quietly as he recalled the vast underground lake in the ruined dwarven city.
“Even underground, those waters had life growing within them. If this place has been flooded for at least as long, I would have expected to see lichen and other simple plants growing here. It’s… barren.”
“What are you suggesting?” Criosa inquired suspiciously.
“The insights I received from on high suggested a water-borne toxin was the demise of those poor men upstairs.”
“So… don’t drink the water?” Aiden suggested.
“It’s more than that,” Nellise answered. “There’s something very strange here, but I can’t put my finger on it. I recommend that we complete our task and be gone from here as quickly as possible.”
“Well, I could have told you that,” Robert scoffed mildly. “Get on with it, Aiden.” Resigned to their fate, Aiden took the first steps into the cool water and began wading through the passage.
Doors appeared at regular intervals to each side of the wide tunnel, each of them opening into a large chamber bereft of anything more than scattered flotsam from long decayed furniture floating on the water. There was a haunted feeling about the place that made Aiden’s neck hair stand on end.
“No matter how many of these ancient places we find,” he murmured, “I can’t shake the feeling we’re walking through memories of something that used to hold great importance, but has been long forgotten.”
Nothing lives forever, not even the people who built this place, Spartan added in his mind-voice, looking up at the cracked ceiling and wondering at the possibilities.
An intersection gave them a choice of directions, each of which looked the same as the other. Aiden chose the path to the left, for it seemed to rise at an angle out of the waters, and he was hopeful of discovering something that hadn’t been destroyed. The bleached bones of a former visitor drifted past, serving as further reminder of the peril they faced.
The waters became shallow as they continued on, and soon they arrived at a very large door, made from solid stone and ringed with many sigils in the ancient language only Aiden had a chance of translating.
“That’s going to take me a while,” he muttered, noting without relish the sheer volume of text inscribed on the door.
“Can’t we just ignore it and see what’s inside?” Paci
an prompted impatiently.
“For all we know it says ‘never enter this door on pain of death’,” Aiden warned.
“This place has been abandoned for a long time,” Pacian retorted. “If there’s anything of value still to be plucked from what remains, it’ll be behind the door that says ‘do not open this door.’”
“He’s got a point,” Robert said with a shrug. Aiden sighed and took out the Lexicon, while Pacian began feeling his way across the door with sensitive fingers, looking for any sort of locking mechanism.
“While you’re doing that, Sayana and I will look around some more,” Criosa said, gesturing for the sorceress to accompany her back down the hallway. Aiden nodded absently, already deep within the arcane pages of the Lexicon seeking clues as to the nature of this ominously inscribed door.
“Wait… it’s already open,” Pacian declared, pushing against its stone bulk. A vertical crack appeared in the middle of the door, but it opened no further. Pacian suddenly stumbled and only avoided falling by grabbing the wall with one hand.
“Are you okay?” Nellise asked, coming to his side.
“Just feeling a bit weak is all,” he muttered with a strained voice. “I’ll be alright in a minute.” Aiden put the Lexicon back into his pouch and investigated the crack Pacian had discovered.
“This isn’t an opening, it’s damaged,” he murmured as he traced a gloved finger along its length. Robert came in for a closer look and came to the same conclusion.
“Something hit it from the inside,” the mercenary confirmed.
“If these words indicate some sort of security measure like the other one, I’d say they’ve been inert for just as long,” Aiden suggested. He traced the glyphs on his gauntlet and took a firm hold of the door, then heaved with all the strength he could muster. The gauntlet whirred in protest, but after a few moments of strain, the stone door suddenly collapsed inwards, slamming onto the floor with such force it broke in half on impact.
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