by Barb Hendee
Hundreds of years past, when the guild took possession of the first castle, they immediately began to excavate with the assistance of dwarven masons and engineers. The work continued over decades. What had once been basic chambers for storage and dungeons were carefully expanded in whatever direction didn't encroach on the city's growing sewer system. There was also a double level of basements below the northeast workshops, where the laboritorium was housed, for the making of cold lamp crystals and other items.
Rooms led into chambers that led through clusters of alcoves… which led into more rooms. Faded wooden cubicles and antechambers along the way provided places to sit and peruse texts, for no material could be removed without the archivists' explicit permission—and a very good reason for it.
All spaces and walls along the way were filled with endless rows of shelves, and Wynn soon lost count as everything began to look the same. She blinked once, and the backs of her eyelids projected images of sheaves; bound books, some spineless with only cord stitching showing; and scroll cases everywhere. No cold lamps were placed this far in, and she stayed close on Tärpodious's heels, their two lamps the only illumination to ward off the blackness.
"Here," he said with a sudden stop, fingering a tall set of shelves along a passageway. "Some from the Suman lands, more from our scattered old cultures. A few have been translated into the Begaine syllabary, but not many."
She nodded, peering at the shelves. "I can read some Sumanese."
"Stick to Spirit by Fire, for the general accumulations," Tärpodious added, "or by Air, should you need to branch out into social customs based on old tales."
For an instant the references left Wynn's mind blank. Tärpodious tapped the bookshelf's end, and she saw the faded etchings filled with remnants of paint in the old wood.
Each guild order was symbolically associated with one of the Elements of existence—Spirit, Fire, Air, Water, and Earth. In turn, geometric symbols for such were used to classify, subclassify, and cross-reference subject matter by emphasis and context.
On the bookshelf's vertical end was a circle above a triangle.
Circle—for Spirit and the Order of Metaology, with its study of metaphysics, philosophy, religion, folklore, etc.
Triangle—for Fire and the Order of Cathology, with its devotion to informational and organizational pursuits.
In this section, Wynn would find works cataloguing and organizing collected information on the subject she sought.
"Thank you," she said. "I'd like to get a good start before supper."
Her breath quickened as she scanned faded titles down a few volumes with cracked leather spines. Her gaze paused briefly on one written in Dwarvish. She suddenly longed to be alone, to pore through these volumes in search of answers. But Tärpodious walked farther down the row, his gray robes dragging through the dust.
"These here are the oldest… too old to date accurately, some in varied ancient Numanese dialects and a couple in the elven Êdän script. Much of the content is poorly organized and difficult to follow. Not much is of interest anymore, so you wouldn't find it in the upper library."
"Yes, thank you," Wynn repeated anxiously. "I don't wish to keep you from your work."
He squinted again, perhaps hearing her implied intent. "Yes, yes, but don't try to reshelve anything, or it may end up out of place. Be selective, and then leave any works in the alcove. I'll check on you later."
"That would be kind," Wynn said.
Tärpodious shuffled away, only the glow of his lamp marking his passage through the dark. The instant the old domin was out of sight, Wynn backtracked to the nearest antechamber and dropped everything but her lamp on the table. She scurried back to the shelves, and began peering at spines and labels. Finally she pulled two wood-bound sheaves, each with no markings or title, and one old book. Clutching the heavy burden, she rushed back to the antechamber.
Wynn paged through the first sheaf of stacked loose sheets and found that it was a collection of various short works divided by hardened parchment separators. Though old and worn, all were in their original languages yet written in ink, which meant these weren't originals but copies, regardless of age.
Texts were often duplicated to keep originals safe in storage. Later, those of greatest importance were transcribed again using the Begaine syllabary, some in their initial language and some translated as well into Numanese—if they were of good general use for the upper library.
Not this sheaf. It remained a hodgepodge, deemed unnecessary for such expense or time. But that didn't mean it held nothing of interest. The first pages were written in Iyindu, a nearly forgotten desert dialect of the Suman Empire.
Wynn grumbled under her breath.
For all her language skills, this was one she barely understood, and her research wouldn't go quickly. She might work her way through dozens of texts before finding a single useful tidbit. She put that first stack aside and paged deeper into the sheaf.
She had no idea what she was looking for, only that she sought an undead, aware and sentient enough to desire the folios—recent ones—and that it could read the Begaine syllabary. And it could drain life without leaving a mark.
Wynn let out a sigh—too many contradictions muddling her thoughts.
The most expedient way to pinpoint a motive would've been through the translation project. Such thoughts—wishes—wouldn't help her now. She didn't even know where the original texts were being kept, let alone where translated portions were being worked on.
Normally translation was done aboveground on the main hall's third floor, close to the offices of the premins. But they and the domins feared anyone outside the project's staff finding out too much. The original texts themselves would be hidden somewhere very secure.
And Premin Sykion and Domin High-Tower would never let her near them.
No, trying to uncover the undead in question was the best she could do for now—better than doing nothing at all.
The next bundle of pages was written in Heiltak, a common enough alphabet used in pre-Numanese languages.
Wynn opened her blank journal, white-tipped quill in hand, and began reading. By the time she neared the bottom of the second stack within the sheaf, piles of sheets were all over the little table.
She barely comprehended a third of what she could actually read, and less than half of one journal page was covered in jotted notes. Not much of it related directly to what she sought. Most were odd terms unconnected to what she would call an undead, let alone a Noble Dead.
Yâksasath—a type of "demon," from Sumanese superstitious references compiled by an earlier scholar. It wasn't even a Sumanese word as far as she could work out. These creatures mimicked the form of a person their victim would recognize and trust.
Had Jeremy and Elias been tricked by someone they thought they recognized?
No, more likely that myth was a variation on the ghül, supposedly «living» demons. Banished from their mythological underworld, they were thought to range the barren mountains. Ghül had to eat their victims while still alive in order to be nourished.
Wynn shuddered at such a notion, but it was nonsense. As if there would be enough people to feed on in such remote places. And unlike vampires or yâksasath, or even the unknown undead hunting the folios, ghüls ate flesh. That would certainly leave a mark on a corpse.
She reached the last stack in the second sheaf, and it was written in Dwarvish. Wynn skimmed the text as she dipped her elven quill into the small ink bottle. She read Dwarvish better than she spoke it, giving her time to work out any older characters. Still, the text was archaic and the syntax difficult to follow, until…
Hassäg'kreigi.
Wynn's gaze locked on that one term. She scanned it twice more to be sure she'd read the characters correctly. When those black-armored dwarven warriors had secretly visited High-Tower, and vanished shortly after, the domin had called them by this title.
Stonewalkers.
She jerked the quill back to h
er journal—and heard something rattle on the tabletop.
Wynn sucked a frantic breath. The little ink bottle teetered and spun amid all the loose sheets. She dropped the quill and grabbed it with both hands, bringing it to sudden stillness. A few black droplets spattered over her thumb.
Wynn broke out in a sweat.
If she blemished even one sheet, Domin Tärpodious might drop dead in his tracks—but not before he took her with him. She slowly released the bottle and carefully lifted her ink-spattered hand away. Ripping a blank page from the journal, she did her best to clean her thumb. Wynn gazed hurriedly across the page of dwarven letters.
There was only one brief mention in a passage about the death of a dwarven female, a thänæ of unknown skills named Tunbûllé—Wave-Striker. That was an odd name, considering dwarves didn't like traveling by sea. Wave-Striker had been «honored» and "taken into stone" by the Hassäg'kreigi, the Stonewalkers.
Wynn had no idea what this meant. Her thoughts rushed back to what she'd overheard in High-Tower's study.
The two vanishing dwarves were dressed like no others she'd ever seen. It seemed very unlikely that they were masons or sculptors, who carved likenesses of their people's «honored» dead. Nothing more in the text helped her, so she took notes for later use and turned to the book selected along with the two wood-sandwiched sheaves.
Wynn was instantly relieved, for it was written in late-era Numanese. The book's spine was worn beyond reading, but an inner page carried its title.
Gydes Färleôvan—Tales of Misbelief—was a collection of folktales traced from the various peoples who predated the nations of the Numan Lands. She turned the pages, trying to catch and decipher strange terms.
…pochel… mischievous nature guardians, prone to pranks upon farmers…
…géasbäna… frail little «demons» who stole people's life essences, turning them into will-less slaves…
…wihte… creatures or beings created rather than naturally birthed…
Wynn sat upright at that last term. The coastal country south of Malourné was called Witeny, and its people the Witenon. The similar sound was probably just a coincidence. Then she noticed that the light in the antechamber had grown dim.
Her cold lamp crystal had waned to half strength. How long had she been down here? She took the crystal out, rubbed it back to brilliance, and replaced it.
Wynn lowered her chin on her hands folded atop the open book. She closed her tired eyes for a moment. Her head ached and she'd made no true discoveries. She took a weary breath, straightened up, and read…
…that blâch-cheargéa gripped the young minstrel by the throat…
Wynn pulled her hands back and read onward.
Try as he might, the minstrel's fists passed through his tormentor as through smoke. He turned pale and dangled dead before the entire village in the grip of thkyensmyotnes…
Wynn's thoughts grew still.
Two words in the short tale were unclear, and not part of the narrative's dialect. Blâch-cheargéa meant something like "black terror-spirit," but how could a spirit be black, let alone hold up a man in its grip? And the other term didn't make sense.
thkyen was a compound word no longer used in Numanese, one that she'd read in accounts of the pre-nation clans that had inhabited this land. It meant ruler by divine or innate right, rather than by bloodline or selection, but the term's latter half wasn't Numanese—not by any dialect that Wynn knew of. She did know a word that sounded similar.
The elven root word smiot'an referred to "spirit," as in that of a person and not the element. The Lhoin'na, the elves of her continent, were the longest-standing culture here—long enough that some of their root words, classified by the guild under the grouping of New Elvish, had been absorbed and transformed in human tongues as pure nouns.
She pulled the book closer, rushing through the text in search of more, but the tale was only half a page long.
A black terror-ghost… sovereign of spirits?
It could touch—physically touch. This had to be another superstition. Even if this tale was an account of a true undead, it wouldn't be the first bit of nonsense concerning such.
Leesil and Magiere had tracked and impaled a vampire named Sapphire, only to have the creature vanish when they turned their backs for an instant. Staking a vampire through the heart turned out to be superstition, one that even some vampires believed in. But the tale in the book still left her wondering about Master Shilwise's scribe shop.
Someone had gotten in, without forcing entry, but then had to break out.
Perhaps the creature in this tale was a mage—like Chane or Welstiel—maybe a thaumaturge, working magic of the physical realm. Yes, a vampire mage would have many years to become highly skilled. At a guess, it might learn how to transmute its solid form into a gaseous state at will, and slip through the cracks of a door.
All right, so it was a silly notion for children's ghost tales, but she'd seen stranger things in the last two years. And there was still the puzzle of why whoever had slipped in had to break out.
Wynn took up her quill and turned a fresh page in her journal. She recorded the entire short tale in the Begaine script. For now, her best path was to search Numanese writings for any further mention of the blâch-cheargéa and thkyensmyotnes. Second, she should search any elven works in the archives, considering the strange hybrid title. She stood up, ready to seek out whatever she could.
"Young Hygeorht!"
Wynn jumped in surprise. Domin Tärpodious stood at the antechamber's entrance, his milky eyes wide in horror. At first she wasn't certain why. He shuffled in, disapproval coloring his pale face.
"Surely you didn't need all of these at once for Tilswith's research?"
Wynn glanced about.
Disheveled piles covered the whole table, and a few sheets had slipped off to scatter about the floor.
"Oh… oops," she said. "I must've… I didn't realize…"
With the old master archivist already displeased, she knew better than to offer help in straightening up. She quickly shut the old book.
"Off with you," he huffed, almost to himself. "I should've come sooner and rousted you for supper."
Wynn stared back. "Supper?"
"Cooked, consumed, and cleaned up," he replied gruffly. "An apprentice just brought down my meal. Best get upstairs and find some leftovers."
Wynn hesitated. Now that she had a lead, there was still so much to do.
"Be off!" Tärpodious snapped, already gathering sheets into sheaves.
"Thank you for the help," she said, and retrieved her belongings. "And again, I apologize. I'll be more discerning next time."
Wynn slipped out, turning right down the corridor, her cold lamp lighting the way between the laden shelves and the catacombs' old stone columns and walls.
"Wynn!"
Tärpodious's sharp call made her whole back cinch tightly. She couldn't help a groan, thinking he'd found some blot of ink she'd missed. She reversed course and peered hesitantly around the edge of the antechamber's opening.
Domin Tärpodious scowled silently at her, and Wynn's stomach sank into her boots.
The old archivist raised a hand, pointing one bony finger toward the passage's other direction.
Wynn flushed, nodded quickly, and hurried off the correct way.
Chane waited in the shadows across the street from the Inkwell scriptorium as two young sages emerged with a folio.
He recognized the pudgy girl in gray. She had occasionally been sent out before. But he had never seen the tall young man in a deep blue robe—too old to be an apprentice but perhaps not old enough for a master or domin. It seemed strange that the guild sent a journeyor of metaology to help retrieve tonight's folio.
Chane pulled farther back out of sight.
As the pair passed by, continuing down the street, the girl clutched the folio to her chest and peered nervously about. When they reached the next intersection, Chane pulled up his cloak's hood and foll
owed from a distance. He had no wish to be seen and remembered.
He kept himself in check rather than close too quickly. But he longed to open the folio and read its contents, and driving desire pressed him forward.
The tall journeyor stopped and turned around.
Other city dwellers moved about in the early evening, and Chane continued walking casually. The blue-robed sage scanned the street, noting a man lighting street lamps, two merchants engaged in conversation, and a flower girl closing her stand… and Chane.
"What is it, Dâgmund?" the pudgy girl asked.
"Nothing," the young man answered. He moved on, tugging his shorter companion along.
Chane kept his gait even.
In his time in Bela with Wynn, he had learned enough of the orders to know each branch's general emphasis. To his best knowledge, those in metaology studied metaphysics and lore and related fields. Few if any became practitioners of magic, and those were mostly thaumaturges, working in pragmatic practices of artificing, such as alchemy. Even if this one had gone further, there was still no way he could detect Chane for what he was by spell or device.
Not while Chane wore Welstiel's old "ring of nothing."
This one possession masked his undead presence from anyone with extraordinary awareness or arcane skills of detection. But still, he had been seen, and he could not allow them to realize they were followed.
Chane turned down a side street.
Once beyond sight, he ran for the next intersection. He turned up a street parallel to the sages' route and slowed a bit. He tried to keep a pace even with the messengers'—or just a little ahead of them. And he knew where they would have to turn.
Three cross streets up, he slowed to hover near the corner.
The pair appeared in the intersection down the way, still following their course. As they passed beyond sight, Chane slipped down the side street to follow them directly.
The main street was slightly more populated with shopkeepers and wanderers heading home for the night, and he might blend in more easily. He glanced aside as a man struggled to calm a slender horse pulling a tarp-covered cart. The horse stomped and snorted. But the sages hurried onward, the girl tightly clutching her folio in both arms.