by Steve Vera
“Definitely not friends,” Skip agreed. He grunted and made another play at sitting up. This time the pain was merely tremendous rather than incapacitating. With a groan he propped himself on his elbows and got a better look at just where the hell they were.
It was a cave of some sort—a big cave. Dwensolt’s staff light reached out maybe fifteen feet and then was swallowed. Somewhere water dripped.
“I’m surprised you stuck around,” he said to Donovan.
“Wandering aimlessly in the Realm of the Undead is not my definition of wisdom.” Donovan flicked his eyes toward Amanda’s unconscious form. “Gavin will be back.”
If he was still alive.
On cue a, hideous scream sounded off in the distance. Their attention snapped up to the hole they’d fallen through. The scream was far off enough to echo and filled their chamber. Pyrk looked particularly rattled. A moment later there was a spectacular boom of crackling thunder, followed by a staccato of flashing lights and more screams. It lasted a good couple of minutes, which in Skip time felt like hours. Give ’em hell, guys. And win, please. I don’t feel like dying here today.
And then there was silence.
“I wonder if that’s a good silence or a bad silence,” Skip said after a long thirty seconds. Moisture was a thing of the past in his mouth. Even Dwensolt looked concerned, suspicion of Donovan dismissed for the present. He strained to hear more, clutching the remains of his staff.
“That was Gavin’s voice,” Donovan said. Skip didn’t even bother asking him how he knew; if there was one thing they’d learned, it was that Donovan had some keen senses. Animal kingdom good.
Amanda moaned from beside them. Pyrk immediately settled on her wrist and then hopped up and hovered four inches above her face. His wings splashed a dim cloud of color around his body, refracting from Dwensolt’s staff.
“Amanda Kasey?” he asked hopefully in that musical little voice he had. Amanda’s eyes fluttered behind her lids, but after coming tantalizingly close to opening, her breaths deepened.
“Amanda Kasey?” Pyrk asked again, so close to her face and mouth that he touched her cheek with his tiny hands. He repeated her name several more times but to no avail. Reluctantly he settled back on her shoulder, pulling and twisting his spiky gold hair.
Skip took another look around the collapsed chamber. He felt like a sitting duck. This was like every horror movie he’d ever seen—dark, cold and filled with monsters, only he was the one in it. He’d have to see whether or not those years of heckling the characters in the movie of what they should do would pay some dividends. His ax was by his side, which was good, as was his Python tucked securely in his shoulder holster. He glanced at Donovan. I might not like you much, Donnie-boy, but I’m sure glad you’re stuck with us.
“Amanda! Skip!” A voice boomed from above. It was Tarsidion.
Donovan looked at Skip and twitched his left eyebrow up as if to say, “see?”
“Down here!” Skip called back immediately, surprised by the relief that flooded through him. A moment later, a gigantic, caped shadow coasted down into the chamber like a superhero, followed by two others. Gavin was draped around Tarsidion’s shoulder, grimacing as the giant exotic let him down.
“What happened? Is Gavin all right?” Skip asked, struggling to stand, pushing aside his Nightshade hangover to approach. Smoke rose from Gavin’s armor and cloak as if he’d just come out of the oven.
“What happened to her?” Gavin moaned, relinquishing his grip around Tarsidion’s shoulder to drop to a kneel by Amanda’ side. Noah, Quaranai still ablaze, investigated the scene around them and zeroed onto Dwensolt. A line formed in her forehead. She took out a small embroidered cloth from beneath her cloak and with her free hand dabbed some of the leaking blood from his face. The old man accepted gratefully but insisted on watching Donovan, like a boxer between rounds, sitting in his corner, eyes locked on his opponent.
“Look at me,” Cirena said in front of Skip. Her sudden manifestation was startling, almost overwhelming. Skip hadn’t quite made it to a stand yet and was about to push off his left leg. “Don’t stand,” she said.
No arguments here. She lowered herself to one knee so that they were face level, put her index finger and middle finger under his jaw (which sent an electric current right through his skull) and looked deeply in his eyes, almost at his eyes.
Skip didn’t like the expression he saw. She was studying him as if he had a giant spider crawling on his head and she didn’t want him to move.
“What is it, for crying out loud?” he asked. Her grip was neither gentle nor harsh. It was very...scientific. Tarsidion joined Cirena and the two glanced at each other.
“Nightshades,” they said in unison.
“And?”
“What do you feel this second?” Tarsidion asked. There was something in his green eyes, a subtle ring of alarm that kept his giant, coffee-and-milk-colored hand close to the hilt of his sword.
“A ringing. Pressure.” Skip shook his head and was punished by a flash of pain in the back. “And I feel like I just had surgery on my brain. Can you let go of my face now?”
Cirena released him from her grip but not her eyes. To the left, Gavin peered into Amanda’s unconscious eyes, which had a noticeable green sheen around the edges of her irises. Do I look that that?
“Anybody have a mirror?” Skip asked.
No answer.
“Anybody?” And this time, there was a note of suspicion in his tone. “Noah?”
“Perhaps it would be wiser if you just lay down,” Noah said.
“Gimme a mirror,” Skip said in an uncharacteristic monotone.
Noah shook her head.
“Somebody gimme a godda—” Skip yelled but Noah cut him off.
“No need to be profane, Skip, this place is damned enough. Here,” Noah said and tossed him a pocket-sized stainless steel mirror. He looked into it eagerly.
He jerked his fingers to his eyes. “Ho. Lee. Shit.” The eyes that stared back at him were not his. His normally gray eyes were ringed in green, the same color he’d seen in the pits of all the nasties running around here. The green glinted. His skin was paler, too, and had more...texture. He rubbed his fingers over his wrist while staring at his reflection.
“It should fade if we act quickly,” Tarsidion said.
“Lay down,” Noah said to Skip. “You too, Dwensolt. We must be sure that nothing...lingers. You too, Stavengre.”
Both Dwensolt and Skip looked at her suspiciously and then at each other. Gavin set the example and laid down.
“Will you have enough strength?”
“We’ll see, won’t we?” Noah said in response. “Gentlemen?”
It wasn’t until that moment that Dwensolt and Skip finally connected, finally became comrades. Looks like we’re in the same boat, Crazy-eyes. With a shrug and a sigh, Skip lay down beside Gavin.
“Here,” Dwensolt said. He unbuckled the belt around his waist beneath the folds of his green robe. “When you are done, give us these and dispense the rest among yourselves.” He handed said unbuckled belt to Noah. There were eight vials filled with lavender liquid holstered like shotgun rounds. “If we cannot be saved...be quick about it.”
“Of course,” Tarsidion said.
“Be quick about what?” Skip demanded but he was already seeing sparkles at the corners of his vision. Not this again. A big, wet towel flopped over Skip’s brain and his eyeballs were gently squeezed. He had time for one last thought: How about a cup of coffee when I wake up...
Chapter 25
Amanda had no illusions about her status among the group. She felt like a piece of valuable luggage that had to be shifted from arm to arm. Donovan held her in disdain and, rational or not, she felt as if that emotion permeated them all, except for Gavin of course, and may
be Skip. The others hardly looked at her.
At least she had Pyrk. His pretty little face was the first thing she’d seen when she’d awoken, gold-dusted skin screwed into an expression of concern bordering on anguish. There had been nothing contrived about his worry, nothing disingenuous about the pain in his face, which was strange because she hardly knew him. He was the first Sprite she’d ever met—or heard of for that matter—and he’d insisted on sitting on her shoulder through the trek. It was distracting at first; she kept thinking she was going to knock him off, but he sat easily, dangling his legs over her shoulders, murmuring the occasional word of encouragement into her ear.
Gavin held up his fist. Nice to have you back, baby. Noah had been streaming sweat by the time she’d been done healing him. She’d started by making an X-shaped incision on each of their wrists. It was through these cuts that black-green liquid had bubbled out like frothy venom. At one point, both Cirena and Tarsidion had had to put their hands on Noah, imparting their strength to her in the form of steam-like light that seeped into her shoulders from their fingertips. When it was over, all three of them had flopped exhaustedly to the floor until Amanda herself had reached into the belt Dwensolt had given them and started distributing the vials within.
And that was when things got good again.
The lavender liquid within each vial was a magical delicacy known as Primrose Ambrosia. Light, fresh and scrumptiously sweet, the moment it had touched her lips she’d felt an eye-rolling quiver of ecstasy rush through her and like speed photography, Amanda had witnessed the return of color and strength to all of them.
Except for Donovan. He refused to drink no matter how much she tried to convince him. It was the first dumb thing she’d ever seen him do.
“Is something out there?” Dwensolt asked Gavin, who studied the stone walls around them while rubbing his bottom lip with the side of his index finger. It was a motion Amanda knew well—Gavinian for “I don’t like this one bit.”
They’d come to the end of the tunnel. Beyond it was a wall of blackness that swallowed whatever light emanated from their swords and staves. It could be her imagination but she thought she caught a trace of a breeze, a movement of air in this dank, dead place.
Something was out there, indeed.
Gavin inched forward and peered into the darkness beyond and then returned his attention to the perimeter of the exit.
The rusty armor and crumbling skeleton of some doomed knight lay just to the side of his black boots. She’d become so used to the bones that they registered as little more than broken tire treads on a highway.
“This used to be a door,” Gavin said lowly, inspecting the sides, floor and ceiling of the passage. “There was a hinge here and here and here. It opens up beyond.”
“And behind door number two...” Skip said with a heft of his ax.
I do not want to go in there, Amanda thought fiercely. She could feel Pyrk’s agreement by the tensing of his legs on her shoulder, the clenching of his fists around her hair. Which might have been annoying had it not been comforting.
“Donovan?” Gavin asked.
Her emperor moved up, angled his head and looked beyond the archway.
“Anything?”
Donovan studied the darkness several more seconds and then retracted. “Necromancer,” he finally said.
“Are you sure?” Noah asked.
“No, I’m on another fucking planet, remember? But whatever’s in there is stronger than anything we’ve come across.” He stared into the darkness some more. “It’s like a black sun.”
“Well, that’s comforting,” Skip said.
Gavin rubbed the divot between his bottom lip and chin. “All right, Tarsy, up here with me. Noah and Cirena, on the rear. The rest of you stay close to Dwensolt and...kill anything that moves.”
Sure, no problem, Gavin. The grip to Donovan’s .45 pistol was slick with her sweat. He’d given her one full magazine. She’d fired four times, which left her with three shots. Three shots and a Japanese short sword to defend against the Lord of the Dead. Awesome.
Her fiancé held up his burning sword to his face, pressed his lips together, planted his feet and gave a curt nod. “Breach,” he said and then stepped into the dark.
The first thing to hit her was the thickness of the air. And its frigidity. It seemed to coat her lungs like frozen coal dust. After just a couple of breaths she felt like she’d been standing in a smoky nightclub for two months.
“Hear that?” Tarsidion asked. Even though he must have weighed three hundred pounds, he never seemed to make any noise when he walked. “Water.”
She heard it too. Somewhere in the distance was the muted babble of a slow-moving current. The farther they walked in, the more the darkness seemed to recede, as if the walls were programmed to illuminate slowly on a dimmer switch, only the light that emerged was a pallid, macabre hue of electric purple, like a black light, and sickly green, the color of rotting moss.
“Check it out,” Skip whispered. “There’s gold on the ground.”
“Do not touch a thing,” Tarsidion ordered immediately. Amanda looked down and saw gold and silver coins glinting with the sickly light that glowed from the walls, littered among the occasional femur or skull.
Donovan’s hand shot out from behind her and clutched her shoulder, stopping her in mid stride. Before she could blink his mouth was in her ear. “Watch where you’re walking,” he growled. Not two inches under her descending foot was a battered breastplate that probably would have woken up the entire universe. “Remember what happened last time you gave away our position.”
Like the Necromancer didn’t know they were already there.
Amanda suppressed her retort and the urge to headbutt his mouth and settled for clenching her teeth. Along with the dented breastplate she’d nearly kicked, there was a minefield of discarded armor, a split helmet with a skull still inside, a rusty shield with the crest of a faded two-headed wolf on it, a curved dagger that was broken off at the end...this was a graveyard.
All these well armed, trained warriors and knights had been dead here for who knew how long. Her head spun, her stomach rolled and then she was picking her way carefully at the prodding of Donovan’s presence.
There was another statue up ahead, standing alone among the ancient carnage. Unlike the others, however, the expression on this knight’s face was of defiant serenity. He clasped a large two-handed sword in armored fists right by his face and awaited his fate calmly and without fear.
“This is a knight of the Southern March,” Amanda heard Noah whisper as the petite Shardyn briefly stared into its stone eyes. “A captain.”
“Do history’s legends now stand before me?” A voice devoid of any vocal cord came from everywhere at once. Each of the Shardyn shifted their blades and looked around alertly. The wind that blew from their Quaranai sounded all the colder in the vast, lifeless chamber.
There was just enough light to suggest the shadow of a structure of some sort.
“This is about as bad as it ever gets in a horror movie, right?” Skip asked from her right. He hefted Cirena’s ax high and ready. The walls brightened with every step.
“Reveal yourself,” Gavin called back in a booming voice. His cloak blew softly behind him.
“Who are you to command me within my own demesne? Shardyn?”
After several moments of pounding silence, strands of pinkish, greenish and bluish vapor twisted slowly in front of them, rising and falling, thickening and then dissipating to reveal a form. Hooded and wreathed in a robe of darkness, a figure approached, head tilted forward, shoulders unmoving. The Shardyn formed a defensive crescent, the burning of their Quaranai swallowed by the vastness of the chamber. Amanda gripped the tanto in her hands, patted the back of her jeans where she’d stuck the pistol Donovan had given her and watched in terrif
ied curiosity the figure floating toward them like a ghost.
It looked up. To all their surprise, the face that stared out from the living darkness was of a goddess, beautiful beyond words, even more exquisite than Cirena. Her skin was like milk, flawless and creamy, her lips the color of raspberries. It was her eyes, however, that commanded all attention. They seemed to have their own gravity, inviting Amanda to take a deeper look, to forget trivial things such as life and purpose and explore a bit...
Donovan broke the spell by laying his palm over her shoulder. A current of heat poured off his skin into hers, seizing her. She could hear his breath in her ear.
“By what madness do you break your oath to me, old man, that you would dare spurn my gift of life to you?” the creature asked Dwensolt. Her voice was as cold and empty as space, though there was a slight inflection of...dare Amanda say, curiosity?
“There are some causes that transcend all others, Almitra, even the oath of a Druid.” Dwensolt’s voice sounded brittle in the open space.
So that’s how you made it across, Amanda thought. I wonder what kind of deal a Druid would have to make with the Lord of the Dead...
The pinpricks of otherworldly light burning in her eyes flared. “Was I not clear on what would befall you should you ever tread foot within my demesne again?”
Dwensolt swallowed, clutching the upper half of his broken staff. “Aye. You were.”
“And yet you came. I would hear this cause, Dwensolt the Archdruid, that would lead you to such calamity.”
“Asmodeous the Pale has returned,” Gavin announced. His voice was as calm and steady as the hand that held his Quaranai.
Without moving her head she removed her attention from Dwensolt and attached it to Gavin. “What do I care, extinct Shardyn, if the Lord of the Drynn has returned? What transpires beyond my demesne is of no import. What is of import, however—” She snaked a black tongue over blood-colored lips and sniffed through her small, slim nostrils. “Is my thirst and ire. You tread foot upon my realm, strike down my children and dare speak to me without my permission?” The pinpricks of light at the bottom of her eyes had grown, and now Amanda could make out the color, an unholy blend of black-light purple and sickly green. Just like the walls. “After I have sated my thirst on the old man’s blood, Shardyn, I shall peel the skin from your body and feed the scraps of your flesh to my children.” She hadn’t so much as glanced at the rest of them or the four glowing Quaranais pointed at her chest.