* * *
GAUNTLETS OF HEALING
Material: Leather
Durability: 150
Armor: 3
Bonus: Increases the effect of all Healing abilities and skills by 20%
Party bonus: Increases Buffs cast on Party Members by 10%
* * *
“WELL, there’s no question about who gets these,” I said as I tossed the gauntlets to Nova and conveyed the stats.
Her eyes went wide. “Wow, really?” she breathed, inspecting the leather arm bracers like they’d vanish if she stopped looking at them. “That’s … amazing. Thank you so much.”
“Hey, you earned them,” I said. “If it wasn’t for your idea, we’d probably still be fighting those ice monsters.”
She cast her gaze down and smiled as she put them on. “It was a lucky guess, but thanks.”
“Man, why don’t these bosses ever drop stuff for pets?” George said a little glumly. “Rabbits are people too, you know.”
Nova made a sympathetic face. “Poor George! Come over and sit with me, and I’ll help you dry your fur.”
George grinned as he headed for Nova’s lap, and for a second, I could’ve sworn he winked at me. I’d let him have his little triumph — though I had to admit, I was a bit surprised he was so taken with Nova. With anyone else he met, it usually wasn’t long before he started coming up with some really creative insults, even if he actually liked them. But he only had praise for her.
“You know, right now I feel like I could sleep for three days straight,” Crash said as he stretched out and repositioned himself in front of the fire. “But I guess falling asleep in this place would be a bad idea. Besides, even though I’m fucking exhausted, I’m also kind of pumped.”
“Yeah, I noticed that,” I said. “I gotta say, I’m impressed that you’re getting less … conservative.”
“You mean he’s not so much of a chickenshit?” George said, almost laughing. “Don’t worry. I’m just kidding, Fish Boy.”
“That’s Squishy to you, Fluff Brain,” Crash shot back, but he smiled as he said it. “And yeah, I guess I am kind of throwing off the chains, at least a little. It’s just … all I could think about before was getting home, you know?” He sighed and stared into the fire. “But now I’m getting it. Nobody’s going anywhere until someone gets all the soulstones, right? So, that’s what we have to do. And we’re not going to get it done without taking a hell of a lot of risks.”
“Exactly,” I said. “And that’s another reason we’re here. I really think there’s a soulstone in this dungeon.”
Nova drew a surprised breath. “Oh my God. You know, I think you’re right,” she said slowly. “Did you know that no one’s ever beaten this place? Hardly anyone even tries, because of the consequences of losing. It’s why Terra wanted to come here so badly.” She shook her head. “She probably wanted to show up Wynn, too. We’ve got to find her.”
“That’s the plan,” I said with an encouraging smile. “We have two areas left, so we’ve got a fifty-fifty shot at getting her on the next run. Which one do you want to try?”
Nova bit her lip and looked hard at the remaining two doors, one by one. “Well … I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t have gone into the fire level first. No, I’m positive she wouldn’t,” she said with determination. “She has to be in the wind level.”
I nodded. “Then that’s where we’re going.”
21
The entrance to the wind area opened onto a hexagonal room with a stone tiled floor and marble walls. There were six doors in total, one on each wall, with murder holes on either side of the doors. There was a glass box on a pedestal in the center of the room, and a key hanging on a fine silver chain inside the box. This puzzle seemed simple enough — get the key, find the right door.
But it was way too simple.
“Hey, whoa!” I said, grabbing Nova and pulling her back as she started to walk right through. “I know you want to get to your sister, but don’t go in there yet. Obvious trap is obvious.”
She went still and backed away slowly. “What trap? I don’t see anything.”
“No, but there’s definitely a trap in that room somewhere. Maybe more than one. It’s too easy,” I said as I moved into the doorway without stepping into the room. “Detect Trap.”
Emerald light flowed from my hand and spread across the room, and several of the floor tiles lit up with a green glow. Most of them were single tiles spaced randomly around the room, but the pedestal with the glass box was completely surrounded with them.
“Oh. Those traps,” Nova said in a small voice. “My God. If Terra really did come in here…”
“Don’t think about that right now. Let’s just get through this,” I said as I moved carefully into the room, making my way toward the center. “Come on, watch your step.”
Nova came inside after me, then Crash and George. I stopped just outside the ring of trap tiles surrounding the key box and looked back at the entrance. “We’ll have to close the door,” I said. “Hopefully that won’t trigger anything, since there are so many traps in here already. But stay alert, just in case.”
“I’ve got it,” Crash said, waiting for George to clear the entrance before he reached out and gently swung the door shut. The latch clicked home, but nothing seemed to happen.
“Well, that’s one bit of luck,” I said as I turned back to inspect the glass box. “Now we have to get that key.”
I reached out as far as I could, but I was a few inches short of the glass. Even if I leaned forward, I wouldn’t be able to touch it without stumbling and tripping one of the tiles.
“Let me try it. I’m taller,” Crash said as he walked up to another side of the box. He extended an arm, and his fingertips just brushed the surface of the box. “Well, I can touch it,” he said. “But I’m not seeing any way to open the box, and even if we could, I wouldn’t be able to reach the key.”
George picked his way closer and stood on his hind legs, peering up at the box. “Well, there’s no way I’m reaching it,” he said. “But you could totally throw me up there, and I could get the key and jump down. If you can open that thing.”
“I don’t see how to open it, either,” I said as I walked around the pedestal, looking at every angle. The box was seamless and solid, with no hinges, gaps, or key holes, so I couldn’t use lock pick — which I wasn’t even going to try on the doors in this room, since it was obvious we needed the key. “I could probably smash it, but I wouldn’t throw you onto a pile of broken glass.”
“I can get it,” Nova said, sounding more in control than she had a few minutes ago. “If you break the glass, I can get the key.”
“Without stepping on the traps?” I said as I raised an eyebrow. “Do you have a flight spell we don’t know about?”
“No. I have this,” she said, reaching up to pull a golden bobby pin out of her long, dark hair. “Trust me. It’ll work.”
“Okay,” I said slowly as I swept a foot back for balance and drew my sword. “Everybody stand back. Remember to watch out for the rest of the traps.”
When the area was clear, I drew back and plunged the sword ahead, driving it into the side of the box. The glass shattered inward, most of it spraying inside the container. A few small fragments tumbled off the pedestal and fell to the floor, and I held my breath as they struck the green tiles. But they were too light to trigger anything.
“Will that work?” I said to Nova.
“Yep, that’ll do it,” she said as she moved forward and came to my side, facing the jagged opening. She held a hand out with the bobby pin resting on her palm, and then pointed at the key with her other hand. “Exchange Object!”
A pencil-thin beam of purple light shot from her finger and struck the key. As it started to glow purple, the bobby pin in her hand did the same. Then both objects vanished in a flash of light, only to reappear a second later in the opposite locations — the bobby pin in the glass case, and the key in her hand.
“Sweet!” Crash said. “I have got to learn that spell.”
“Well, it only works with small objects. But it is handy,” Nova said as she fussed with her hair, tucking it back into place where the bobby pin had been.
“Nice work.” I smiled and stared at the old-fashioned black iron skeleton key. “Hope you don’t want your bobby pin back.”
“I’m good. I’ve got a bunch more of them,” Nova said as she held the key out to me. “So, now what?”
I took it carefully. “Now, we figure out which door is the right one,” I said as I turned the key over, hoping for markings or something that would give us a clue. I didn’t see anything but smooth metal. “Do you want to try Detect Invisible on this?”
“Sure.” Nova cast the spell, but nothing happened.
“Okay. I guess we’ll just try them until we find it,” I said. “Anybody want to make an educated guess?”
Crash started to move, and then stopped. “What about the one we came through?” he said, turning in a circle to look at all the doors. “I mean, that’s probably the last one anybody would try. So maybe it’s the right one.”
I nodded. “Good call. Let’s go for it.”
“Hold on,” Crash said as I started for the door. “It’s my idea. I’ll do it.”
My brow went up. “Are you sure? If it’s the wrong one, something bad is probably going to happen.”
“I’m sure,” he said, holding a hand out. I shrugged and put the key in it.
Crash walked across the chamber to the door we’d come through, pushed the key into the lock, and hesitated before he turned it. There was a click as the lock disengaged. He pulled the key out, tossed it across the room to me, and when I caught it, he grabbed the door knob. “Well … here goes nothing,” he muttered as he turned the knob and pulled the door open.
There was an immense, whistling rush of air, and Crash was blasted across the room to smash into the wall on the opposite side. The door bounced against the wall and slammed itself shut, and as Crash slid abruptly to the floor, he landed on one of the glowing green tiles.
“Crash, look out!” I shouted — not soon enough for him to dodge the dart that blew out of the murder hole beside the entrance door with a pop like a champagne bottle cork and lodged in his neck.
He snarled in pain, ripped the dart free and scrambled to his feet, breathing hard. “Goddamn it, that’s the second time I’ve been poisoned today!” he shouted, half-collapsing against the wall and then thumping down on the floor again. “Those Cure Potion things better work.”
“Hold on, don’t use it yet,” I said as I hurried toward him, avoiding the green tiles. “I can just use Cure. Save the potion in case we run out of mana and need it.”
“Fine, just make it fast,” Crash groaned.
I crouched next to him, held a hand to his neck and cast Cure, focusing on the spell as my mana slowly ticked down. A glow traced my hand and spread to his skin, and he shuddered as the light absorbed into him and vanished. “Better?” I asked.
He nodded. “Yeah, thanks. That worked.”
I stood back, letting him get to his feet. “Well, at least now we know what happens when we open the wrong door,” I said.
“Right. Let’s not open any more wrong doors,” George said as he headed back toward the middle of the room. “That wind blast almost caught me, too. I don’t wanna get smashed into furry goo.”
“You’re definitely not going to get smashed,” I said. “Come on, let’s think about this. All we have to do is make sure nobody’s in front of the doors when we open them, right? So, we all stand against the same wall on the opposite side of the hinges and open them from the side. If it’s not the right door, it’ll blast back and slam shut. Then we try the next one.”
“Yes, I bet that’ll work,” Nova said excitedly. “That’s probably how Terra got through here! She has a thing about never standing in front of doors when she opens them.”
That didn’t explain how she’d gotten the key out of the box, but I wasn’t going to mention that. “All right, let’s just work our way around the room from the door Crash already tried,” I said as I headed for the next door.
I stood beside the door across from the hinges, waiting until everyone was in position. Then I used the key to unlock the door, slipped it into my pocket, and pressed flat against the wall, moving as far away as I could while still being able to reach the knob. “Here we go,” I said as I turned the knob, and then quickly pulled the door open and snatched my arm back.
A massive surge of whistling wind banged the door against the wall, where it rebounded and slammed shut. But no one got caught in the blast.
“Fuck yeah, it worked!” Crash shouted, raising a fist.
George hopped ahead cautiously. “I’ve never been so happy to see somebody fail a challenge,” he said. “Let’s go fail the next door.”
I grinned and led the way. Once we had it figured out, it didn’t take long to find the exit behind the third door I tried. We headed through into the rest of the wind area, hopefully one step closer to finding Terra.
22
The wind level did not look like a fun place.
The door from the puzzle chamber led to a rocky shelf at the top of a cliff that looked out onto endless night. The edge dropped off into black nothing, and a steady wind blew from the cold, black star-filled sky stretched ahead of us. But the space wasn’t empty. A series of ten large, round stone discs floated in the air, the first one around five feet out and level with the cliff, and the rest stepping up to a massive, rocky floating platform that looked like someone had cut off the top of a mountain, turned it upside down, and suspended it in space.
While the first stone disc looked relatively easy to jump to, the others were probably at least ten feet apart. But there was no other way to get to the platform.
“Okay, we can do this,” I said, remembering once again the impossible jump I’d made back in Zombie King land — five feet straight up from a standing start. “This place lets you cheat the laws of physics, if you believe you can.”
“Oh, come on! What are we, Peter Pan now?” Crash said. “There’s no way we’re making those jumps, no matter how hard we believe. That’s ridiculous. There has to be another way.”
“No way, boss. I do not believe,” George said, backing away from the edge of the cliff. “Rabbits can’t fly.”
I sighed. “It’s not flying, it’s jumping really far,” I said. “Look, I’ll show you.”
I took a few steps back, since I could afford a running start this time, then rushed forward and jumped at the edge to land easily on the closest stepping stone. It wobbled slightly, dipping down and back up as I came down, but it wasn’t too unstable. “See? No problem,” I said, taking a short run and jumping back to the cliff.
“I think he’s right. I’m not seeing another way to do this,” Nova said slowly as she looked around the area.
Crash shook his head and scuffed a foot along the ground. “Well, that’s just great,” he said. “Got any pixie dust in all those spells of yours?”
“No, but I do have something that might help,” she said as she stretched a hand out toward him. “Feather Fall.”
Glowing white smoke curled from her fingers and surrounded Crash for a few seconds before settling into him. “Whoa,” he said, shivering slightly. “That feels really weird. What does it do?”
“It’ll slow you down when you’re falling, so you can control where you land,” she said, turning to cast the same buff on me. As the spell took effect, my whole body tingled with pins and needles, like a foot waking up after it had fallen asleep. Yeah, it definitely felt weird.
When Nova pointed at George, he shook his head and held a paw out. “No thanks, sister,” he said. “I may be built for jumping, but not that far. I’m hitching a ride with one of you guys.”
“Okay. You can ride in my hood,” she said with a smile, and then cast Feather Fall on herself. “I don’t have anything else that’s helpful
here,” she said. “So, unless you guys do, I guess we should go for it?”
“Yeah, I think this is as ready as we’re gonna get,” I said, though I was still worried about the bigger jumps after the first one. The other stepping stones were at least twice as far apart, maybe even more. It was going to take some serious concentration to get up there — and I couldn’t think of a damned thing to do if anyone fell off, except watch them plunge to their deaths.
Nova crouched near the ground to let George jump into her hood, and then straightened and said something under her breath as she looked at the stone discs. “I’m going first,” she said, her jaw firming. “Terra has to be here somewhere. Maybe she’s on that platform.”
Before anyone could object, she ran toward the cliff’s edge and jumped.
I held my breath until she landed safely on the stepping stone, and then grinned. “Nice going,” I called. “You okay in there, George?”
“Totally fine,” his slightly muffled voice replied. “Best seat in the house, right here.”
I had to admit, I wouldn’t mind snuggling up with Nova right now either. But we had a lot of jumps to make. “Okay, just stay there,” I said to Nova. “Those platforms are big enough to hold all three of us, so we’ll go up together.”
As she opened her mouth to reply, the stone disc she was standing on started to rise with a whooshing sound. The sudden movement startled a gasp from her, and she wobbled and dropped to one knee. “Shit! What’s happening?” she cried as she struggled back up.
My initial burst of panic subsided as I realized what was happening. “It’s all right!” I called back. “It’s just bringing you up to the next platform. Be ready to jump, in case it doesn’t stop when you’re even.”
“What do you mean, in case it doesn’t stop?” she shouted.
“Well, it might keep going up as long as there’s weight on it,” I said. There were easily half a dozen ways this kind of mechanic could play out, including having the platform tilt and spill you off if you didn’t jump in time. I’d seen a lot of games with levels like this. “You’re doing fine,” I said as the stepping stone drew closer to the next one. “Get ready … okay, go! Now!”
Soulstone: Oblivion (World of Ruul Book 3) Page 14